Downloads and Free Reading Options

1Edison, His Life and Inventions

By Frank Lewis Dyer and Thomas Commerford Martin

A detailed biography of Thomas Alva Edison, inventor of such things as the telephone, the microphone, the electric motor, the storage battery, and the electric light. In the words of the authors, "It is designed in these pages to bring the reader face to face with Edison; to glance at an interesting childhood and a youthful period marked by a capacity for doing things, and by an insatiable thirst for knowledge; then to accompany him into the great creative stretch of forty years, during which he has done so much. This book shows him plunged deeply into work for which he has always had an incredible capacity, reveals the exercise of his unsurpassed inventive ability, his keen reasoning powers, his tenacious memory, his fertility of resource; follows him through a series of innumerable experiments, conducted methodically, reaching out like rays of search-light into all the regions of science and nature, and finally exhibits him emerging triumphantly from countless difficulties bearing with him in new arts the fruits of victorious struggle." (written by Justin Barrett, with authors' quote taken from the work itself)

Joining the Continental Army as a teenager, Joseph Plumb Martin spent the next eight years fighting in the Revolutionary War as an enlisted man. His memoirs tell in detail his experiences during that time...the bitter cold, hunger, loss of life, long marches, and fear of battle. He also includes tales of fishing, hunting, and other activities...including encounters with a "saucy miss". His narrative reveals much about American life at the time and is one of the fullest and best accounts of the Revolutionary War, presented from a private's point of view.<br /><br /> The book has been later republished under the names Private Yankee Doodle and Memoir of a Revolutionary Soldier. (Summary by Barry Eads)<br /><br /> This recording was read from a hard copy of the book, no online version being available at the time of the recording.

3Kastle Krags: A Story of Mystery

By Absalom Martin

A series of murders occur at the remote seaside mansion of a millionaire in Florida. The mystery is heightened via local lore of pirates and hidden treasure, not to mention a fabled ancient octopus said to have a taste for the local black population. It's up to grad student Ned Killdare, a budding naturalist and detective, to solve the case, aided by the rich man's pretty niece, Edith. - Summary by Matt Pierard

4Warwickshire Lad: The Story of the Boyhood of William Shakespeare

By George Madden Martin

Ever wonder what happened to ol' Billy Shakespeare as a child? How did Little William get to be the great writer that we remember him for? This cute little coming of age story charts Willy's life from the age of 5 into his early adulthood. Summary by catrose.

5Captain's Story

By William Martin

This seafaring adventure story was adapted from the German. It is also known as The Disobedient Son and tells the story of a boy who runs away to sea. - Summary by Lynne Thompson

Of all the legends of bygone ages which we in the foremost ranks of time may call our own perhaps none have come to us so fraught with the spirit of lofty idealism as those which cluster about the figure of King Arthur of Britain and the mystic Quest of the Holy Grail. <br></br>In their devious wanderings down the centuries they have gradually been purified of all original coarseness while still retaining that wonderful charm and simplicity which belongs to the tales of the childhood of the race. Furthermore, upon the lips of many a bard, both ancient and modern, they have become literature, so that they are now the rightful heritage of the child of to-day and should, in one form or another, find a place in every class room as supplementary reading at least. <br></br>Because, for obvious reasons, in dealing with young children, the versions of the masters have not always proved practicable, the author has ventured to offer this little volume which grew out of a library story-hour trusting that it may be useful to mothers, teachers, children’s librarians and others who are endeavouring to hold before the children of a materialistic age that vision without which the people perish. - Summary by Winona Caroline Martin

So far as they deal with "the last great crisis of the Sacred Life "— (and I have entitled the volume THE SHADOW OF CALVARY, because it does not dare to attempt to carry the reader into the thick darkness!)-—these pages are an attempt to view the history of Christ's sufferings in the light of the doctrine and the fruits thereof. May the Lord graciously give a blessing with what I have thus written! - Summary by Preface