On the Lightship

At the Butler Penfields’ garden party, Mabel Dunbar walks off between two rival men—and the conversation soon turns to a story its supposed author claims he can barely remember.

Herman Knickerbocker Vielé’s early-twentieth-century collection begins among garden-party guests trading barbed remarks about society, romance, and the art of writing. Mabel’s two companions, Archer Ferris and Horace Hopworthy, compete for her attention—and for the last word—until a tale about Ignatius, a young monk gathering alms in a shadowy cathedral, becomes their test of wit. With its playful social comedy and fantastical lightship frame, the collection brings an assortment of characters together to share stories. But is Ferris truly the author of Ignatius’s tale, and what will its young monk find in those alms-boxes?

With centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world.

Who are we? We're Cairn Press. Our background is in design, publishing, typography, and technology. These skills fuel our mission to create the highest quality Public Domain eBooks available online, at an affordable price. We give them the treatment they deserve; our proprietary process restores books for a better overall user experience in design, readability, and e-reader compatibility.