Originally released in 1938, Vidas secas portrays the miserable life of a family of backland retreatants forced to move from time to time to areas less punished by drought. The father, Fabiano, walks through the arid landscape of the caatinga in the northeast of Brazil with his wife, Sinha Vitória, and their two children, who have no names, being called only “older son” and “younger son”. They are also accompanied by the family dog, Baleia, whose name is ironic because the lack of food has made her very thin.

Vidas Secas belongs to the second modernist phase of Brazilian literature, known as the “regionalist” or “novel of the 1930s”. It strongly denounces the ills of the Brazilian people, especially the misery of the northeastern hinterland. It is the novel in which Graciliano achieves the maximum expression that he had been seeking in his prose: what drives the characters is the drought, harsh and cruel, and paradoxically the telluric, affective connection that it exposes in those beings in retreat, looking for means of survival and a future.

After breaking up with her boyfriend, Tiffy is looking to move out of her now ex’s apartment and into a place of her own. As an underpaid assistant editor, however, she cannot afford much in the London housing market. When she reads an advert for a very affordable flatshare that involves sharing not only the apartment but also the bed with someone who works a night shift, she decides to take a chance and go for it. After all, the ad says that the roommate, Leon, will only be in the apartment from 9am to 6pm Monday through Friday, and the rest of the time, it will be all hers. Shortly after moving in, Tiffy begins to exchange notes with Leon, initially about mundane things like putting the toilet seat down, but their correspondence gradually becomes more personal. In spite of her friends’ warnings that romance between roommates never ends well, Tiffy finds herself wishing she could meet Leon, but the flatshare agreement clearly states that they are not supposed to meet...And Leon’s girlfriend intends to see that that end of the bargain is held up.

First published in 1875, José de Alencar's novel Senhora belongs to the Romantic period. The book is divided into four parts - the price, discharge, possession and redemption - and its central theme is marriage for interest.

The protagonist Aurélia Camargo is the daughter of a poor seamstress and wants to marry her boyfriend, Fernando Seixas. The boy, however, swaps Aurélia for Adelaide Amaral, a rich girl who would provide a more promising future.

Time passes and Aurélia becomes an orphan and receives a huge inheritance from her grandfather. With the fortune she acquires, the girl rises socially and begins to be seen in a different light, starting to be coveted by interested suitors.

When she learned that her old boyfriend was still single and in dire financial straits, Aurélia decided to take revenge for her abandonment and offered to buy him out. The two finally get married.

Fernando puts up with his wife's taunts until he manages to work and earn enough money to cover what she had spent on the wedding, thus buying his “freedom”. Aurelia notices the change in Fernando's attitude and the couple make up, finally consummating the marriage.

In The Love Hypothesis, Olive is a third-year biology Ph.D. candidate who shares a kiss with a handsome stranger in order make her friend think that she's in a relationship. She's horrified when she realizes the "stranger" is Dr. Adam Carlson, a prominent professor in her department who is known for being a hypercritical and moody tyrant.

She and Adam each have reasons for needing to be in a relationship, and they agree to pretend to date for the sake of appearances. Of course, as she gets to know Adam, it's only a matter of time before she starts feeling something for him, and it becomes clear that her little experiment in fake-dating just might combust...

Capitães da Areia, the raw and moving story of poor boys living in an abandoned wharf in Salvador, is perhaps Jorge Amado's most influential novel. An absolute classic of books about abandoned childhood, it has haunted and enchanted generations of readers and remains as relevant today as it was at the time it was written.

Since its release in 1937, Capitães da Areia has caused scandal: countless copies of the book were burned in public squares by order of the Estado Novo. Over the course of seven decades, the narrative hasn't lost any of its luster or topicality: on the contrary, the urban life of poor boys and offenders has taken on tragic and urgent contours.

Several generations of Brazilians have suffered the impact and seduction of these boys who live in an abandoned wharf on Salvador's docks, living on the fringes of social conventions.

A true formative novel, the book makes us intimate with its little creatures, each with their own needs and ambitions: from the leader Pedro Bala to the religious Pirulito, from the resentful and cruel Sem-Pernas to the pimp's apprentice Gato, from the sensible Professor to the rustic backwoodsman Volta Seca. With the engaging force of his prose, Jorge Amado brings us closer to these boys and infects us with their intense desire for freedom.

Capitães da Areia, the raw and moving story of poor boys living in an abandoned wharf in Salvador, is perhaps Jorge Amado's most influential novel. An absolute classic of books about abandoned childhood, it has haunted and enchanted generations of readers and remains as relevant today as it was at the time it was written.

Since its release in 1937, Capitães da Areia has caused scandal: countless copies of the book were burned in public squares by order of the Estado Novo. Over the course of seven decades, the narrative hasn't lost any of its luster or topicality: on the contrary, the urban life of poor boys and offenders has taken on tragic and urgent contours.

Several generations of Brazilians have suffered the impact and seduction of these boys who live in an abandoned wharf on Salvador's docks, living on the fringes of social conventions.

A true formative novel, the book makes us intimate with its little creatures, each with their own needs and ambitions: from the leader Pedro Bala to the religious Pirulito, from the resentful and cruel Sem-Pernas to the pimp's apprentice Gato, from the sensible Professor to the rustic backwoodsman Volta Seca. With the engaging force of his prose, Jorge Amado brings us closer to these boys and infects us with their intense desire for freedom.

Originally released in 1938, Vidas secas portrays the miserable life of a family of backland retreatants forced to move from time to time to areas less punished by drought. The father, Fabiano, walks through the arid landscape of the caatinga in the northeast of Brazil with his wife, Sinha Vitória, and their two children, who have no names, being called only “older son” and “younger son”. They are also accompanied by the family dog, Baleia, whose name is ironic because the lack of food has made her very thin.

Vidas Secas belongs to the second modernist phase of Brazilian literature, known as the “regionalist” or “novel of the 1930s”. It strongly denounces the ills of the Brazilian people, especially the misery of the northeastern hinterland. It is the novel in which Graciliano achieves the maximum expression that he had been seeking in his prose: what drives the characters is the drought, harsh and cruel, and paradoxically the telluric, affective connection that it exposes in those beings in retreat, looking for means of survival and a future.