Captivating readers since 1908, this book tells a story of love, shipwrecks, and the Pacific Islands.
The Classic - The Blue Lagoon by Henry De Vere Stacpoole
Henry De Vere Stacpoole wrote The Blue Lagoon in 1908, making a name for himself as an author and starting a new craze in fiction. The Blue Lagoon is a romance novel featuring a blooming relationship and the beginning of a family. However, this romantic story includes the added suspense of surviving on a deserted island.
Young cousins Dick and Emmeline are traveling through the South Pacific when their ship is wrecked. Surviving the shipwreck was only the first challenge, as they found themselves stranded on an island with only the galley cook, Paddy. Luckily, Paddy teaches the children how to survive before he dies two years later. Left on their own, Dick and Emmeline continue to live their new life on the island, eventually falling in love and starting a family of their own. But everything changes when the Blue Lagoon sweeps them away from their home and out into the ocean.
The Blue Lagoon
by Henry De Vere Stacpoole
The Blue Lagoon (1908) is a novel by Henry De Vere Stacpoole. The first in a trilogy of novels including The Garden of God (1923) and The Gates of Morning (1925), The Blue Lagoon is a story of romance and adventure inspired by the author's travels in the South Pacific. A total of five films have been adapted from the novel, including the hit 1980 drama of the same name starring Brooke Shields.
"The Pacific slept; a vast, vague swell flowing from far away down south under the night, lifted the Northumberland on its undulations to the rattling sound of the reef points and the occasional creak of the rudder; whilst overhead, near the fiery arch of the Milky Way, hung the Southern Cross like a broken kite."
When a terrible shipwreck leaves them stranded on a deserted island in the South Pacific, Dick and Emmeline Lestrange are merely children. Paddy Button, the ship's cook and the only other survivor, takes it upon himself to train them in the ways of survival, teaching the arts of fishing and pearl diving to ensure the youths know how to take full advantage of a hostile environment. When Paddy dies from alcoholism, Dick and Emmeline are more than prepared to fend for themselves, but as they grow into young adulthood, a strange sense of desire starts to take hold. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Henry De Vere Stacpoole's The Blue Lagoon is a classic of British literature reimagined for modern readers.
Our Modern Companion - Reckless Girls by Rachel Hawkins
Stacpoole’s novel sparked a trend in shipwreck-themed novels, including Tarzan of the Apes. Many of those novels were romance novels. Today, however, novels featuring shipwrecks and survival lean away from the romance genre and dive head-first into suspense and thrillers. A great example of this is Reckless Girls, by Rachel Hawkins.
The island of Meroe in the Pacific Ocean is a breathtaking island, perfect for adventurous tourists looking for something off the beaten path. This sense of adventure is what brings a group of six seafarers to the island. However, Meroe Island also has a mysterious past riddled with shipwrecks, cannibalism, and murder. In the isolation of this faraway island, the islanders start to feel like the island is closing in on them. Tensions start running high as the island’s mysteries begin to unravel.
Reckless Girls
by Rachel Hawkins
Instant New York Times and USA Today bestseller
From Rachel Hawkins, the New York Times bestselling author of The Wife Upstairs, comes a deliciously wicked gothic suspense, set on an isolated Pacific island with a dark history.
"A literary pina colada."--Entertainment Weekly
"A high-octane thriller."--New York Times Book Review (Staff Pick)
ONE ISLAND
Beautiful, wild, and strange--Meroe Island is a desolate spot in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with a mysterious history of shipwrecks, cannibalism, and even rumors of murder. It's the perfect destination for the most adventurous traveler to escape everything... except the truth.
SIX VISITORS
Six stunning twentysomethings are about to embark on a blissful, free-spirited journey--one filled with sun-drenched days and intoxicating nights. But as it becomes clear that the group is even more cut off from civilization than they initially thought, it starts to feel like the island itself is closing in, sending them on a dangerous spiral of discovery.
COUNTLESS SECRETS
When one person goes missing and another turns up dead, the remaining friends wonder what dark currents lie beneath this impenetrable paradise--and who else will be swept under its secluded chaos. With its island gothic sensibility, sexy suspense, and spine-tingling reimagining of an Agatha Christie classic, Reckless Girls will wreck you.