Title Recommendations based on Shirley Bennett
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." So begins Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen's classic novel of manners and mores in early-nineteenth-century England. As the Bennets prepare their five grown daughters to enter into society, each shows personality traits that illuminate their future prospects as wives. Jane, the oldest, is the most demure and traditional, and Lydia, the youngest, the most headstrong and impulsive. Attention centers on haughty second-born Elizabeth, and her blossoming relationship with the dashing but aloof Fitzwilliam Darcy. Adversaries at first in the endless rounds of balls, parties, and social gatherings, they soon develop a grudging respect for one another that blossoms into romance when each comes to appreciate the tender feelings that course beneath the veneer of their propriety and reserve.
When the Valley of Peace is threatened, lazy Po the panda discovers his destiny as the "chosen one" and trains to become a kung fu hero, but transforming the unsleek slacker into a brave warrior won't be easy. It's up to Master Shifu and the Furious Five—Tigress, Crane, Mantis, Viper and Monkey—to give it a try.
In Stranger Things, friends Mike, Dustin, and Lucas look for their friend Will Byers, who had disappeared. But they discover something strange instead: a bald girl named Eleven who is walking around the woods in her hospital gown. Eleven speaks only a few words, but she may provide their best hope of finding Will.
Bob, his wife, and his three young kids live in a tiny apartment above their restaurant, Bob's Burgers. Bob loves his family but his wife is out of touch with reality and often drunk, his older daughter obsesses over butts, his son wears a burger suit, and his youngest daughter is a ruthless schemer. As Bob tells them, "Listen, you're my children and I love you, but you're all terrible."
The story centers around two fiercely fighting schoolgirls, Ryuuko Matoi and Satsuki Kiryuuin. On a campus ruled by force, a transfer student wielding a Basami sword brings about upheaval.
Hell's Kitchen is a British reality show that features prospective chefs competing with each other for a final prize—and getting yelled at by Judge Gordon Ramsey for all the mistakes they make along the way.
A family loaded with quirky, colorful characters piles into an old van and road trips to California for little Olive to compete in a beauty pageant.
Everyone deserves a chance to follow their dreams, but some people only get one shot. Tyler Gage is a rebel from the wrong side of Baltimore's tracks and the only thing that stands between him and an unfulfilled life are his dreams of one day making it out of there. Nora is a privileged ballet dancer attending Baltimore's ultra-elite Maryland School of the Arts.
Victor Hugo's tale of injustice, heroism, and love follows the fortunes of Jean Valjean, an escaped convict determined to put his criminal past behind him, and has been a perennial favorite since it first appeared over 150 years ago. This exciting new translation with Jillian Tamaki's brilliant cover art will be a gift both to readers who have already fallen for its timeless story and to new readers discovering it for the first time.
Miles "Pudge" Halter is abandoning his safe-okay, boring-life. Fascinated by the last words of famous people, Pudge leaves for boarding school to seek what a dying Rabelais called the "Great Perhaps." Pudge becomes encircled by friends whose lives are everything but safe and boring. Their nucleus is razor-sharp, sexy, and self-destructive Alaska, who has perfected the arts of pranking and evading school rules. Pudge falls impossibly in love. When tragedy strikes the close-knit group, it is only in coming face-to-face with death that Pudge discovers the value of living and loving unconditionally.
Torchwood features characters who have fallen deep into the rabbit hole that is the darker side of the Whovian universe. Jack Harkness, Ianto Jones, and Gwen Cooper are part of Torchwood Three—a secret organization whose mission is to protect earth from evil extraterrestrial beings. The three of them are complex and at times flawed characters—but, do not get too attached, because central characters are not protected from their own potential demise.
Bleach is the story of Ichigo Kurasaki, a scrappy high-schooler who is thrown into battling ghosts, death gods, and more. He is studying to be a Shinigami, responsible for taking care of the souls of the dead as well as dispatching ghosts and malevolent spirits. Because Ichigo can see these spirits, he got tangled up in a fight between a Shinigami and an evil ghost. The Shinigami, Rukia, was forced to save him, but in order for them both to survive, she gave him her powers. Now, under her guidance, he's working to become a full Shinigami, mastering combat and magical powers.
The 100 picks up the pieces after Earth was ravaged by nuclear war and 2,658 survivors moved to the Ark. Clarke Griffin knows that the Ark is running out of oxygen, which is the reason (though not the public one) that she and 99 other "Delinquents" have been shipped to the wasteland that is Earth. It's a toss-up as to what is more dangerous: her surroundings or her companions.
After a little white lie about losing her virginity gets out, a clean cut high school girl sees her life paralleling Hester Prynne's in The Scarlet Letter, which she is currently studying in school. She decides to use the rumor mill to advance her social and financial standing.
Love Actually follows seemingly unrelated people as their lives begin to intertwine while they fall in, and out, of love. Affections languish and develop as Christmas draws near.
