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Half a Team

Michael Hardcastle

The book is the sixth in Hardcastle's series about a Junior football League and features recurring characters Nick Abel- Smith (United! 1973, Away from Home 1974) and Lester Rowan (Away from Home). The book follows the story of Abel-Smith and fellow young footballer Steve Sewell as they attempt to overcome the humiliation of being dropped from their respective teams ahead of a five-a-side tournament. Joining forces they create a new team, The Swifts, and, after overcoming a series of obstacles, including getting Steve from Manchester back to their home town without his parent's knowledge, enter the tournament and finally get the opportunity to take on their former teammates and prove their worth.

At First Sight

Nicholas Sparks

Where At First Sight begins its story is after Jeremy’s proposal. The books setting begins in New York City as Lexie and Jeremy are preparing to move Jeremy to their future home, Boone Creek. Lexie is making Jeremy keep the baby a secret from his family and friends and the residents of Boone Creek until after the wedding, because she doesn’t want people to get the wrong impression of why he and Lexie have decided to get married after only a few weeks of knowing each other. The only people that know of the pregnancy are Jeremy’s long time best friend Alvin, and Lexie's grandmother, Dorris. When Jeremy and Lexie return to Boone Creek, Jeremy finds himself unable to find the inspiration to write any new columns for his magazine. This adds to the stress of buying a new house for his new family and having a child on the way. Dorris tries to help Jeremy with this problem by giving him her book. Dorris is the town psychic and has the specialty of predicting the sex of a newborn baby, and records it all in her book. Dorris suggests that Jeremy try to write about the journal for a new column. Rodney is a character featured in True Believer as a longtime friend of Lexie that has been after her for years until Jeremy came along. By the end of the previous novel he starts to be interested in he and Lexis other longtime friend, Rachel. By this book they are an established couple, who have been having problems in their relationship. Rachel feels as though Rodney is still not over Lexie, and would be with her if she weren’t marrying Jeremy. One day Jeremy finds Lexie sitting alone with Rodney talking and holding hands. He immediately feels this is suspicious but tries to tell himself that it was nothing and he was simply making it into something it wasn’t, even if Rodney had been after Lexie for years. Jeremy later confronts Lexie about what she had done that day, in which case she fails to mention anything about seeing Rodney that day. Jeremy receives an anonymous email saying only “how do you know the baby is yours?” This paired with his supposed inability to conceive leaves Jeremy with his mind racing, suspecting it may have been someone else’s, Rodney’s in particular, but once again reminding himself that Lexie wasn’t capable of such a thing and that nothing had ever become of her and Rodney, and he decides to not tell Lexie. Sometime later, Rachel runs off for a few days without telling anyone, leaving Rodney Dorris and Lexie all feeling worried. Lexie cancels her dinner plans with Jeremy and says she is going over to Dorris’ house to talk and comfort her, but when Jeremy checks up on her he finds her car at Rodney’s instead. Feeling angry that Lexie had once again lied went to her house and waited outside for her to get back. When she returns he confronts her about Rodney and Lexie explains that she went over to her grandmothers like she said and then decided to console Rodney. They have a heated argument and Jeremy goes back to the local motel where he had been staying. When he gets back, Jeremy receives a second anonymous email, this time saying “she hasn’t told you yet? It’s in Dorris’ book.” Moments later, Lexie shows up crying and the two end up working things out. Jeremy still does not tell Lexie about the emails, not yet knowing what to say or make of them. Jeremy searches for what the email might be referring to, and after numerous times going through and analyzing the book, he finds it; a prediction from 4 years earlier of a miscarriage with Lexies initials and the name of the father. Jeremy is angered that Lexie had never told him of this and feels she has lied to him for the third time. The two end up in an even more heated argument after closing on their new house, and this time when Jeremy leaves he’s heading back to New York City for his bachelor party. There he discovers the sender of the anonymous emails was his best friend, Alvin who doesn’t want the couple to get married after such a short period of time. Jeremy learns that when Rachel ran away, she had gone to New York City and visited Alvin, who she had met in the previous novel, and spilled the secret about Lexies’ previous miscarriage and the documentation of it in the journal, and that’s how Alvin knew of it. Jeremy is furious telling Alvin he never wants to hear from him again, and gets the next flight back to Boone creek. When Jeremy returns, he and Lexie have a long talk and both admit that they were both wrong, and Jeremy fills her in on the emails, Alvin, and Rachel. Everything is explained from then that the baby was in fact, despite the odds, definitely Jeremy’s’ and that there was nothing between Lexie and Rodney. Rachel avoids Lexie and Dorris for a short time until finally coming to Lexies house, apologizing and explaining how she accidentally told Alvin about the pregnancy and they make up. They have a wonderful wedding a short time later where Lexis deceased parents were married. When Jeremy and Lexie go to their ultrasound appointment, they learn that an amniotic band threatened their baby with possible deformities if it were to attach, or even its life. Jeremy and Lexie spend the last ten weeks of her pregnancy in fear and distress over the news. Lexie tells Jeremy that they can move to New York for Jeremy, in hopes of Jeremy finding inspiration to write again. Jeremy briefly thinks on this offer and quickly turns down her offer. Moments later, Jeremy finds inspiration to write his next column and his writing rut was over. Lexie wakes Jeremy up early in the morning to inform him that she was in labor. With this news Jeremy freaks out like any expecting father and was a mess for the whole experience. Lexie successfully delivers their daughter, Claire, named after Lexis deceased mother; however Lexie dies immediately after giving birth, leaving her grandmother Doris and Jeremy in anguish and Jeremy, a widowed parent.

Walking Into the Night

Ólafur Jóhann Ólafsson

For twenty years Christian Benediktsson has led a quiet life as the butler to William Randolph Hearst, the greatest newspaper magnate in the world. His days are filled with the rituals of Hearst’s life and the demands of running a grand household. But in his most private thoughts and memories, he relives another life: once a husband and father in Iceland, he abandoned his family for an actress in New York, where his affair ended in death and financial ruin. Retreating from his previous existence, he ended up at Hearst’s castle in California. No one else knows the secret of the man he once was—husband, father, businessman, lover—and, ultimately, even he will choose to forget that this person ever existed.

The Survivor

Tom Cain

The novel opens with Samuel Carver masquerading as a maintenance man. He sabotages the executive jet of wealthy Texan businessman Waylon McCabe. The sabotage fails and McCabe begins to suspect that he was the target of an assassination as opposed to a victim of a freak accident. The novel then jumps forward to continue the story of Cain's first novel, The Accident Man. Carver is recovering in a Swiss hospital and attempting to regain memories lost during the torture by that book's villain. The story centres around McCabe's attempt to obtain a lost Russian suitcase nuke in an effort to instigate a nuclear holocaust that would bring about the rapture; Carver aims to stop him.

Kapalkundala

Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay

Nabakumar, a young gentleman from Saptagram, got lost in a forest while returning from pilgrimage in Gangasagar. He met a Tantric sage who trapped him, intending to make him a sacrifice to goddess Kali; but was later freed secretly by Kapalkundala, the sage’s foster-daughter. She, at once, fall in love with Nabakumar and with the help of a village priest they got married on the next day. The priest urged Nabakumar to take Kapalkundala away from her wicked foster-father and also showed Nabakumar his way to Saptagram. Nabakumar returned home with his newly-wed wife Kapalkundala, now re-christened as Mrinmoyee. The sage, on the other hand, got annoyed at Kapalkundala’s betrayal and began to plot his revenge. In the meantime, Nabakumar met Padmabati, his first wife, who was converted to Islam by his father, making Nabakumar to desert her. Padmabati, now renamed as Motibibi, expressed her love for Nabakumar, but he refused her. Later the sage came to Saptagram and met Motibibi. The sage wanted to kill Kapalkundala, but Motibibi wanted to separate her from Nabkumar only. They made a plot to prove Kapalkundala unfaithful. Padmabati called Kapalkundala to meet her in a nearby forest and she, herself, came there in a man’s disguise. The sage showed Nabakumar that Kapalkundala came out at night to meet a ‘man whom she loves’. Then the sage made the angry Nabakumar bring Kapalkundala to the sacrificial ground where Kapalkundala revealed the truth to him. Nabakumar came to his senses and he asked Kapalkundala to come with him to his home, but she refused and jumped into the river. Nabakumar also jumped into the river to save her, but both of them were lost.

Assassin

Tom Cain

This novel takes place twelve years after the previous Samuel Carver novel, The Survivor, with Carver having spent the intervening years as a security consultant. The plot of the novel centres around a copycat killer attempting to implicate Carver in the assassination of America's first black president.

Goshawk Squadron

Derek Robinson

Goshawk Squadron follows a front-line squadron of British pilots late in the war. The commanding officer is Stanley Woolley, a cold, cruel and sour taskmaster, training the squadron with brutality. The years of war and slaughter had hardened Woolley into a humorless cynic. Woolley especially hates the delusions that replacements have about air combat being gallant and chivalrous. Woolley keeps no emotional attachments, even to his girlfriend Margery, a nurse in the Hospital Corps. The Germans launch their final massive offensive, which leads to a relentless bloodbath. The squadron gets decimated in the endless grind of combat. When Margery's field station gets bombed, she is erroneously reported dead. Realizing how much he did love her, this shatters Woolley, who is incredibly relieved when she appears unharmed. However, Woolley's unemotional focus is stripped away by this close call. Distracted by the thought of Margery and the life they could have together, Woolley is killed leading the next combat patrol.

Valentines

Ólafur Jóhann Ólafsson

The twelve stories in Valentines are linked by the months of the year. Each brisk story captures the most candid moments between spouses, family members, and lovers—moments when dangerous feelings surge to the surface and everything changes. A wife realizes her closest confidante is much more than that. A father tries to dress his new lover in the clothing of his late wife. A woman, watching her son and husband from afar, sees something she can never forget.

Restoration

Ólafur Jóhann Ólafsson

A sweeping story of love tested by the terrors and tragedies of war set in the gorgeous hills of Tuscany in the 1940s. Having grown up in an exclusive circle of British ex-pats in Florence in the 1920s, Alice shocks everyone when she marries Claudio, the son of a minor landowner, and moves to San Martino, a crumbling villa in Tuscany. Settling into their new paradise, husband and wife begin to build their future, restoring San Martino and giving birth to a son. But as time passes, Alice grows lonely, a restlessness that leads her into a heady social swirl of wartime Rome and a reckless affair that will have devastating consequences. While she spends time with her lover in Rome, Alice’s young son falls ill and dies, widening the emotional chasm between her and her husband—and leaving her vulnerable to the machinations of a nefarious art dealer who ensnares her in a dangerous and deadly scheme. Returning to San Martino, Alice yearns for forgiveness. But before she can begin to make amends, Claudio disappears, and the encroaching fighting threatens to destroy everything they have built. Caught between loyalists and resisters, cruel German forces and desperate Allied troops, Alice valiantly struggles to survive, hoping the life and love she lost can one day be restored.

Conqueror

Conn Iggulden

A warrior who would rule a fifth of the world with strength and wisdom. A scholar who conquered an empire larger than those of Alexander or Caesar. A brother who betrayed his own to protect a nation. From a wise scholar to one of history's most powerful warriors, Conqueror tells the story of Kublai Khan - an extraordinary man who should be remembered alongside Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great and Napoleon Bonaparte as one of the greatest leaders the world has ever known. It should have been a golden age, with an empire to dwarf the lands won by the mighty Genghis Khan. Instead, the vast Mongol nation is slowly losing ground, swallowed whole by their most ancient enemy. A new generation has arisen, yet the long shadow of the Great Khan still hangs over them all … Kublai dreams of an empire stretching from sea to sea. But to see it built, this scholar must first learn the art of war. He must take his nation’s warriors to the ends of the known world. And when he is weary, when he is wounded, he must face his own brothers in bloody civil war.

An Answer from Limbo

Brian Moore

The central character in the book is Brendan Tierney, a young Irish writer living in New York with his American wife and their two children. Tierney is working on his first novel. For him to write full time, his wife must work; he invites his widowed mother over from Ireland to look after the children. Conflicts arise when the mother finds that her own lifestyle, values and sense of morality are at odds with what she sees in her son and daughter-in-law's home. Denis Sampson describes it as "a novel about marital dissatisfaction that develops into a moral fable because the dilemmas in which these characters find themselves mirror a society in spiritual and cultural crisis".

Dictator

Tom Cain

Ten years prior to this story, Carver was supposed to have assassinated Henderson Gushungo, an African dictator. The novel follows Carver's subsequent attempts to oust the dictator, and force a regime change. Amongst the locations used as settings are Switzerland, Malemba, Suffolk, England and Hong Kong.

A Rising Thunder

David Weber

The book begins in March 1922 P.D. as tensions continue to escalate between the Star Empire of Manticore and the Solarian League after the battles of New Tuscany, Spindle, and the Yawata Strike. Manticore begins to enact Case Lacoön by recalling all of its merchant vessels from Solarian space, taking control of, and denying access to wormhole bridges and junctions to Solarian traffic. As the effects of Manticore's actions begin to reverberate throughout the League, Permanent Senior Undersecretary Innokentiy Kolokoltsov and his four fellow senior bureaucrats, known derisively as "the five Mandarins", start feeling the pressure from the transstellar corporations and criticisms from the media. While it is clear that Manticore is in a position to do the League economy tremendous harm, the Mandarins are not willing to pay the political and diplomatic price of taking responsibility for the actions of the League Navy. They continue to support Admiral Rajani Rajampet's planned invasion of the Manticoran Star System, despite the risk that a failure of the invasion will make them look even weaker and ineffectual than before. In the meantime, Captain Anton Zilwicki and Agent Victor Cachat arrive at Haven and present to President Eloise Pritchart their evidence of Mesan involvement in the assassinations that triggered the resumption of hostilities between Haven and Manticore. Upon hearing this and supporting information from their defector, Dr. Herlander Simões, about other new technologies and revelations before unknown about Mesa, she sets out on an unprecedented state visit to Manticore. The evidence is presented to a reluctant Empress Elizabeth, who is finally convinced that Haven is no longer the enemy and agrees, not only to negotiate a peace treaty, but to accept Pritchart's offer of military alliance against the upcoming League attack. Hearing about this visit and the intelligence Zilwicki and Cachat brought with them regarding Mesa's plans, the Beowulf government arrives for an unexpected visit of its own to join the new "Grand Alliance". Shortly afterwards, Protector Benjamin Mayhew arrives from Grayson to participate in the peace talks and the represent the other members of the Manticoran Alliance. Admiral Filareta arrives at the Manticoran System, with a massive fleet of 420 superdreadnoughts, and proceeds upon a course to Sphinx. The Grand Alliance Fleet, under Honor's overall command, executes its battle plan. Honor then contacts Filareta and attempts to dissuade him from continuing on his mission. Filareta refuses to back down despite Harrington's repeated warnings not to cross the system's hyper-limit and demands that she stand down her ships and surrender. The Solarian 11th Fleet crosses the hyper limit and Harrington springs her trap - Her own ships emerge out of stealth in front of 11th Fleet while Haven's forces drop out of hyperspace behind it. Harrington then contacts Filareta again and reveals the misdirection. Filareta realizes that his position is hopeless and orders a surrender, but to his shock, his ops officer suddenly launches all the 51,000 missile from their pods without orders. Harrington promptly opens fire in response. The total losses for the SLN in the Second Battle of Manticore are staggering, even for the SLN. Manticore's own losses are marginal. In Beowulf, an additional fleet sent to support 11th Fleet via the Wormhole terminus is forced to retreat when faced with the combined forces of the Beowulf System Defense Force and a Manticoran task force under the command of Admiral Alice Truman. Upon news of 11th Fleet's destruction, the five Mandarins find themselves forced to contend with the consequences of this debacle. Their failures to crush Manticore and reverse the effects of their actions have been a serious blow to the League's prestige. Yet any negotiated settlement with Manticore would be done from a position of weakness, so they decide they have no choice but to continue their current policies. They accuse Manticore of perfidy and Beowulf of treason for its discordance with League policy vis-à-vis Manticore. Their efforts to convince the public are successful and the Manticoran Embassy and the Beowulf Assembly Delegation Office are besieged by angry mobs who protest their actions. Admiral Rajampet, despite the failure of his strategy against Manticore, does not intend to become the Mandarins' scapegoat and prepares to release damaging information on all of them should they try to lay the blame of this failure upon him. But before his meeting with them, he suddenly commits suicide. Upon the death of Admiral Rajampet, his deputy, Admiral Winston Kingsford becomes the acting head of the SLN and is summoned to Kolokoltsov's office to brief him on the League's military options vis-à-vis Manticore. Kinsford, far more cautious and smarter than Rajampet, promptly informs Kolokoltsov of the unpalatable truth: Manticore's military advantage over the League is so overwhelming that any further confrontations between their respective capital ships will all be one-sided massacres. Even worse is the economic and political analysis presented to Kolokoltsov at that meeting. Ultimately, Kingsford presents Kolokoltsov with their only options: fighting a commerce-raiding war until they can match Manticore's military capability or sue for terms. Kolokoltsov convinces the other Mandarins that their best chance is to adopt Kingsford's recommendations, score some victories and only then attempt a negotiated settlement that would not be detrimental to the League's internal stability. They also maneuver to have the Beowulf System Government investigated for treason to divert attention away from their own failings. The maneuver backfires badly however, when the head of the Beowulf delegation to the Assembly declares, in response to the motion, that her government intends to invoke a never before used section of the League constitution which allows member systems to secede from the League, to be confirmed by a referendum of Beowulfan voters (which is certain to pass by a huge majority). The story concludes with indication of a planned SLN strike upon Beowulf, to prevent this eventuality.

The Enchanted Wanderer

Nikolai Leskov

The protagonist, Ivan Flyagin, a bogatyr-type of a character has been "promised to God" by his mother but refused to join the monastery as a young man, ignoring all the "signs", allegedly pointing him the way. The rest of his life he sees as a "punishment" for this, and after all becomes a monk, driven though not by spiritual motives, but rather by poverty and having nowhere else to go.

Carver

Tom Cain

The central character, Samuel Carver, is an ex-assassin. The story focuses on an unknown group who are attempting to bring about a global financial crisis, after having caused the collapse of the Lehman Brothers financial institution, and Carver is hired to stop them.

Murder by Family

Murder by Family chronicles Bart Whitaker's attempts to have a hitman murder his parents and sibling on 10 December 2003. The book also follows father Kent Whitaker's spiritual journey of healing afterwards and forgiveness for his son.

Dinosaur Planet Survivors

Anne McCaffrey

Dinosaur Planet featured the survey of planet Ireta for its mineral wealth. Several mysteries unfolded whose resolution was interrupted by a Heavyworlder mutiny. After 43 years, survivors of the mutiny are wakened from cold sleep. Their emergency message has been decoded by a Thek who asks questions but not about the mutiny. They tell him about a buried beacon they found, and he immediately leaves without helping them. Forced to survive on their own, they discover that the mutineers have built a settlement and landing grid that could only be used to colonize a planet -- in this case, illegally. Several Thek arrive and seize control for their own reasons.

Touched: The Jerry Sandusky Story

The book tracks Sandusky's life from his youth in Washington, Pennsylvania, his adoption of six children, at least one of whom he allegedly molested, and taking in six foster children, his years as a player and coach at Penn State, and his work with the Second Mile charitable organization. According to one review of the book, "Sandusky writes equally of his time in and out of football. Most of his time away from the game is devoted to his family and his charitable foundation, the Second Mile, which serves underprivileged children. Interesting anecdotes from all aspects of his life are neatly packaged with the help of Kip Richeal, a 1987 Penn State graduate and former equipment manager for the football team."

The King's Dragon

Una McCormack

The Doctor, Amy and Rory arrive in the city-state of Geath, where it appears that everyone is happy and rich. However, they discover that there are secrets and creatures hidden, as well as a metal dragon that oozes gold. A Herald appears demanding the return of her treasure and a battle for possession of the treasure begins. The Doctor, Amy and Rory must save the people of the city before they are destroyed by the war.

Tangled Up in Blue

The book has a foreword by Steve Richards, an introduction, five chapters and a conclusion. In the foreword Richards relates how his first actual meeting with Glasman shattered his initial assessment that Blue Labour was derivative and backward looking. Richards states that the importance of Blue Labour is partly shaped by Ed Miliband's recent rise to be party leader, after which he declared that the era of New Labour was over. According to Richards, Blue Labour is the most important source of fresh ideas to fill the resulting void. He also says that Glasman has the potential to be just the sort of compelling advocate needed to present new thinking if it is to gain acceptance by the political mainstream. Davis sets out her aim to reveal the untold story of Blue Labour's genesis and growth as an influential force within the Labour party. She quotes Ed Miliband talking about how one of the strengths of Blue Labour is its recognition of the importance of personal relationships both for a healthy society and even for a good economy. Davis touches on many of the themes which she expands later in the book: * the way Glasman was inspired to attempt to invigorate the Labour party by his dying mother and by contact with the "red Tory" Phillip Blond. * the story of Glasman's almost unique role as someone supporting the leadership campaigns of both Miliband brothers. * an outline of Blue Labour's agenda and intellectual development. Much of the introduction describes the three pillars of Blue Labour, which are: Pillar one: interests, institutions and ideas ; Pillar two: reciprocity, relationships and responsibility ; Pillar three: virtue, vocation and value. In the opening chapter, Davis discusses the factors that led Glasman to launch the Blue Labour initiative. The first was his mother, a lifelong Labour supporter who very much saw the Labour party as the champion of ordinary people's interests. Glasman was incensed that on the night she died, Labour's bailout of the banks was still playing out on the news. Glasman saw the bailout as a huge unnecessary transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich. It was on the night of her death in January 2009, in conversation with his wife, that Glasman first came up with the label "Blue Labour". Another key influence in the development of Blue Labour was Phillip Blond, the so called "red Tory". When Blond first met Glasman it was the Tory who was much better known within Westminster. The two became friends and Blond was pleased to help raise Glasman's profile as the two had partially overlapping ideas. The success of Obama's 2008 election campaign had also helped to inspire Glasman, as it involved the sort of relationship-orientated, decentralised community mobilisation that he wished to promote. A fifth influence was Glasman's prior involvement with Citizens UK, an umbrella group dedicated to community organising. The second chapter discusses how Glasman came to form relationships with the senior leadership in the Labour party. Ed Miliband had found out about Glasman during his investigation of Citizens UK, which he had became interested in due to the group's efforts to address poverty with its Living wage campaign and other initiatives. The two met in the autumn of 2009 and became fast friends. Shortly after, Glasman also formed strong relationships with senior figures in David Miliband's camp, thanks to introductions by his friend, the journalist Allegra Stratton. Just three nights before the election, Glasman wrote a speech for Gordon Brown, who had decided to address Citizens UK. The speech was very well received, often considered his best of the campaign, demonstrating Glasman's talent. This chapter records Glasman's role as advisor to both the Miliband brothers during their 2010 campaign to be elected as the new leader of Labour. According to Davis, Glasman was almost unique among prominent Labour party members in helping the campaigns of both Ed and David but committing to neither. David Miliband entered into an informal alliance with Citizens UK - several members from the organisation helped his campaign. Glasman assisted Citizens UK to liaise with David's senior team. Despite this, Glasman also advised Ed Miliband. According to Davis, Glassman had a strong personal relationship only with Ed and not with his brother, though he did have close friendships with senior members of David's team. The book reveals that Glasman expected Ed to win as he thought the younger brother had a more appealing energy. The book does not reveal which brother Glasman personally voted for. The fourth chapter focuses on an important stage of Blue Labour's intellectual development which took place at seminars held at Oxford University between October 2010 and April 2011. Davis relates that the five key people leading the seminars were Glasman himself and four other academics who are all to various degrees also active as political strategists. These four are Jonathan Rutherford, Marc Stears, Stuart White and Lord Wood. Some two dozen senior Labour players attended the meetings. These included both Miliband brothers and the MP Jon Cruddas. It was at these seminars that the document often regarded as Blue Labour's manifesto was drafted: The Labour Tradition and the Politics of Paradox. Davis discusses Glasman's personal contribution to the document: a paper where he traces the Labour tradition back to the participatory democracy of the ancient Greeks, going on to discuss how Labour was founded in the 19th century not by an intellectual elite but from grass roots community activism, in particular that which arose from the London Dock Strike of 1889. Chapter Five records Glasman's ascent to the House of Lords under the patronage of Ed Miliband, the consequent media attention, and the controversy he generated which came close to ending Blue Labour as a political force. After his elevation to the Lords, Glasman received considerable mainstream media attention and attracted the interest of several new party members, who would frequently meet at Westminster's Portcullis House. Blue Labour's high profile also attracted hostile attention; several feminist Labour party MPs fiercely attacked the movement as they saw Blue Labour as anti-woman. Even greater controversy was created by Glasman's repeated comments on the need to tighten up immigration, and his assertion that Labour ought to reach out to the EDL, a far right group who describe themselves as opponents of radical Islamism but who are described by critics as racist. The controversy peaked in July 2011, with several leading figures including Jon Cruddas and Jonathan Rutherford publicly dissociating themselves from Blue Labour. Following this, several media commentators announced that Blue Labour had effectively ended. Davis relates how Lord Glasman concedes he was politically naïve in making the comments about immigration. He thought he would never be cast as racist or sexist due to his life's work in helping immigrants, especially female immigrants, speak out, and in representing their interests through community organising. In the conclusion, Davis reviews the prospects for Blue Labour's continued influence on the mainstream Labour party. She concludes that Blue Labour probably does have a future, at least as a source of ideas if not as a brand. After the movement was pronounced dead by various journalists in summer 2011, Lord Glasman withdrew from the public eye, but remained committed to promoting Blue Labour, and continued to expand his network of interested contacts. There has been growing interest among Labour academics and strategists centred around London and Oxford. Davis says support for Blue Labour remains weak among the parliamentary party, naming only a handful of MPs who openly support Blue Labour, such as Hazel Blears, Tessa Jowel and Caroline Flint. The author also states that despite its aim to champion working class traditional values, Blue Labour has next to no grassroots support from regular people outside of Citizens UK. However, both Miliband brothers remain interested in Blue Labour and there are signs that the party leader is increasingly accepting and implementing its ideas. Ed Miliband told the author in a September 2011 interview that Blue Labour is an idea that is "ahead of its time".

The Rise of Nine

Pittacus Lore

Marina and Six, along with Ella (a previously unknown tenth member of the Garde) and Crayton (her Cepan) are on a plane heading towards India, where they hope to find another member of the Garde; Number Eight. As soon as they land at the New Delhi airport they are picked up by men who worship Eight as they believe him to be the reincarnation of the God Vishnu (it is later revealed that he appeared to them in the form of Vishnu, thanks to his shape-shifting abilities). They plan to take them to the summit of a mountain in the Himalayas, which is where Eight has made his home. However, before they reach him, they are ambushed by soldiers of the Lord's Resistance Front, who want to kill Eight and all of those associated with him. After defeating their attackers and reach the mountain, Six, Seven and Ten have to face three of Vishnu's avatars, which are used as a way of testing whether they are really members of the Garde. Once Number Eight realises that they are Loric, he tells them his story; his Cepan Reynolds was killed by Mogodorians after being betrayed by the love of his life, a human named Lola. During this same attack, Eight's chest was taken by the Mogodorians. Eight has been living in the Himalayas since. They discover that one of Eight's legacies is the ability to teleport, which they plan to use to reach New Mexico, where they can easily make their way to Number Four. They travel farther up the mountain to a Loric cave that contains a large stone of Loralite, and acts as a "door" between several other locations that have a Loralite stone. In the cave they see paintings on the walls as they are a timeline of the events that have happened. (They see One's, Two's, and Three's deaths, Four's battle in the school and Number Five battling Mogs from a tree) They then come across a painting of a Loric with a sword through them although the face is ripped off. It is revealed this is Number Eight, who ripped off the face to try and avoid the fate. The Mogs then burst into the cave and kill Crayton, forcing the group to perform a hurried teleport together from the Himalayas. Six is teleported to a desert in New Mexico while Eight, Seven, and Ten end up in Somalia. Six is dehydrated due to desert heat but manages to make it to an abandoned town, where she is captured by FBI agents. After intense questioning she manages to break out and in the process comes across Sarah Hart, Four's girlfriend who supposedly turned him in to the FBI in the previous novel. To Six's horror, the false Sarah Hart forms into Setrakus Ra. She challenges Setrakus Ra to a one-on-one fight before being thrown into a cell with the real Sarah Hart. Meanwhile Four and Nine, along with Bernie Kosar; Four's shape-shifting Chimæra, are captured by the FBI, who are now working with the Mogs. Whilst in transit they escape easily, seriously wounding their captors in the process. Four asks one of the dying agents, Agent Walker, where Sam and Sarah are being held and is told that they are being held out west. Walker then seemingly dies. Once he helps Nine fight off the rest of the FBI, Four returns to the van they had been travelling in only to find that all the bodies are gone. The pair take a freight train to Chicago and argue about what to do next. They eventually decide to go to Nine's safe house, although Four is angered by how little Nine seems to care about Sam and Sarah. Nine reveals that his safe house is in the top floor of the John Hancock Center, including training rooms, weapon cabinets and city-wide surveillance systems. Nine shows off for experienced he is with all the rooms and, when the talk returns to Sam and the tablet the two found, that he has a piece of equipment that fits the tablet. When they use it they see a map of the Earth with several pulsing blue dots; two in Chicago, one in Jamaica and four in India. They realise that the tablet shows the locations of the other Garde and, seeing that there are seven dots instead of six, realised that there was a second ship that made it to Earth, carrying with it a tenth Garde member. They then see two green dots, one in New Mexico and the other in Egypt, and realize that these are their ships. As they watch the four dots in India suddenly reappear, with three off the coast of Somalia and one in New Mexico. The pair once again disagree about what to do next (with Four wanting to go to new Mexico to rescue the stranded Garde member and Nine wanting to go to Sam's house in Paradise, Ohio, to see what else they can find) and it becomes violent. The fight goes to the roof where, after a long battle, Nine holds Four over the edge and demands the he stop claiming to be Pittacus Lore (which he had told Nine during one of their arguments) and that they go to Paradise. Nine lets Four back onto the roof and storms off, threating to drop him next time. Later in the night, Four has a vision where he and Nine are told to go to New Mexico. After finding out that Nine had the same vision they travel together towards New Mexico. Four begins to grow fond of Nine when he witnesses him defending a pair of unarmed hitchhikers from their assailants and they begin to open up about their previous lives. In the meantime Seven, Eight, and Ten are able to teleport to Stonehenge and then onto New Mexico, after Ella contacts Six through telepathy (developing her first legacy) and learns her location. She even contacts Number Four who was on the way to New Mexico along with Number Nine. They eventually reunite after defeating the FBI who were attacking Four and Nine and enter the base where Setrakus Ra and Number Six are fighting. Setrakus Ra manages to use his power of removing a Garde member's legacy and overpowers Six but, instead of killing her, he uses a whip-like weapon to turn her into black rock. The group fight their way through the base and find Sarah, who belives that Four is Setrakus Ra trying to trick her. Once Four convinces her that it really is him they move on, also finding a badly injured Agent Walker. They tell Sarah to watch her, giving her a Mogadorian cannon to shoot Walker with if she tries to escape. In a large room they see a black statue on the roof, which Nine goes to inspect and find Six there, telling them that Setrakus Ra is dead and that the black mass is Mogadorian poison. Eight teleports to Six and embrases her, but is stabbed just as the painting in the Loric cave showed. The fake Six then transforms into Setrakus Ra, who removes all of their legacies. Nine fights Setrakus Ra whilst Bernie Kosar fight of Mogadorian soldiers. Four and Marina try to carry away Eight so that Marina's healing legacy can return and save him, but are also attacked by Mogs. After defeating them they carry on trying to pull Eight out of the battle Then, Nine is hit in multiple places by Setrakus Ra's whip weapon and begins to turn to stone, Bernie Kosar is almost overpowered by the Mogs and Four is shot. Just as it seems that they are doomed to lose the fight, Sarah and Ella appear and Ella throws a red dart at Setrakus Ra. He loses his power to remove their legacies, Bernie Kosar is able to get the upper hand and Six and Nine are able to begin to break out of their casings. But Setrakus Ra then hits Ella and Sarah with the whip and they both fall. Four, after being healed, rushes to them while Marina heals Eight. Nine re-engages Setrakus Ra and Eight and Six fight off the Mogs. A Mog then fires at Ella and Sarah and they begin to convulse, dying from the shot. Marina prepares herself for Ella's and Sarah's deaths but when it doesn't happen she notices Four using a newly found healing legacy on them. Sarah wakes and kisses Four. An explosion rips the ceiling apart and kills the remaining Mogs. All of the group find each other except Nine, who is nowhere to be found. They eventually find him stunned but alive, but Setrakus Ra has gone. They all greet each other properly and begin to work their way back to the outside world.

Destiny Times Three

Fritz Leiber

The Probabiltity Engine made differing timelines a reality: alternate universes real enough to exist side by side - and to be invaded... de:Schicksal mal drei fr:Alternatives

The Stone Cutter

A more claustrophobic narrative landscape than before; the plot consists of a shift between the past and the present-day account of the murder investigation, but the link twixt the alternating narratives is not revealed until the end:-there are also multiple side stories which make for a somewhat cluttered plot. The roots of the theme lies in an earlier generation and can be attributed, at least in part, to the upbringing of offspring. In the present, Eric/ Patrik try to find a suitable parenting means; even the incompetent police chief becomes obliquely involved in raising an infant, albeit belatedly. Used in this novel skilfully is the utilization of a secondary story, delivered to us a couple of pages at a time, at long intervals; This sub-plot is perfectly timed, revealing the killer’s motive or insanity, at just the correct pace. In fact it's not at any one particular moment when you realise who the killer is – that’s the skill. The remote resort of Fjällbacka has seen its share of disaster, though perhaps none worse than that of the young child found in a fisherman′s net. The gruesome post-mortem shows that this is no case of accidental drowning. The death of Sara, an eight-year-old girl, is no less shocking for Patrik Hedström having just become a father. This is a child both he and his partner Erica knew well. It is his grim task to discover who could be behind the methodical murder. What he does not know is how this case will reach into the blackened heart of Fjällbacka and the town′s history, ripping apart its idyllic façade, perhaps permanently. An interesting aside is that the parents of the dead child live with the maternal grandmother, Lilian, an acerbic hag engaged in a never ending battle with her 'Neighbour from Hell' Kaj, who has built a new domicile next door to her profound chagrin; Kaj has a reclusive autistic son, Morgan, who spends many hours isolated in his room working on his computer; the finer of suspicion begins to point to him as the possible murderer, particularly as he had seen and spoken to the child on the fatal day they died. The plot is further complicated by the fact that Erica is a good friend of Sara's mother, Charlotte – bonded by both recently having had children. Another detective story with a plot twist that takes until the end to discern; enjoyable literature- not too demanding but intelligent; the only qualm is perhaps that most detective stories seem to have a protagonist detective - this doesn't which some might miss. This novel would be more satisfying if only the author planned a much nicer motive;If only the killer wasn't the person.

Rubber

Jeyamohan

The story traces the rise and fall of the Peruvattar family, rubber plantation owners based in the Kanyakumari Nanjil district in Tamil Nadu. The story begins in the present and moves back briefly to trace the early life of the family patriarch Ponnu Peruvattar. Ponnu begins life as a forest laborer and slowly grows to acquire the entire forest and converts it into a rubber plantation through hard work and ruthless means. Rubber, which is alien to the Nanjil land, provides wealth, power and social position to the Peruvattar dynasty, but also corrupts it from within. Ponnu's equally ruthless son Chelliah tries to expand the empire; Chelliah's wife Thirese exhibits all the trappings of the "nouveau riche" - Chelliah worships her despite her infidelity. The last two of Chelliah and Thirese's five children are still with the family - Francis, the grandfather's favourite, is a wastrel; Livy goes to college but lacks morals and compassion. The ailing patriarch Ponnu spends his last days contemplating whether his life was worth anything at all. Chelliah faces financial ruin as he dabbles in exports, and he desperately wants his father to die soon so that he could sell the family home and assets. Dependent on the spiteful family for even minor needs and consumed by guilt and self-pity, Ponnu Peruvattar begs his assistant Kunhi for poison. He is visited by his old friend, the simple and noble Kandan Kaani, a tribal that had roamed the forest land with him in his youth. The novel ends with the passing away of the patriarch and the salvation of family scion Francis.

Brothers in Arms

Lois McMaster Bujold

Shortly after the Dagoola IV escape detailed in the novella "Borders of Infinity", Miles and some of his Dendarii mercenaries arrive on Earth, fleeing Cetagandan retribution and desperate to repair the damage suffered by their ships. Miles visits the Barrayaran Embassy so the Dendarii can be paid for their last mission. There he finds his cousin Ivan Vorpatril working for the distinctly hostile Captain Duv Galeni, who turns out to be a Komarran related to one of the alleged victims of Miles' father. Miles is reassigned to the Embassy as Third Military Attaché, under Galeni's command. Further complicating matters, Miles discovers he has a clone, created and trained as an assassin by Komarran diehards determined to free their planet. The assassination plot is foiled. Miles allows his clone to escape; by Betan law, the clone is his brother, and Miles is well aware his formidable mother would be greatly displeased if he got rid of his troublesome new sibling. According to Barrayaran tradition, his brother would be named Mark Pierre Vorkosigan. In exchange for "Mark" helping Miles fool the Cetagandans, who are beginning to suspect that Naismith and Vorkosigan are the same person, the psychologically scarred Mark is let go with a considerable sum of money and the invitation to claim his Barrayaran heritage, if he wants to—or dares.

The Gallows Bird

Camilla Läckberg

Patrik (police officer) and Erica (writer) have reconnected, had a child and are moving headlong into matrimony. Problems sidelined when a chaotic alcohol-fuelled party ends with the death of an unpopular contestant on a reality TV show. A woman is found dead, apparently the victim of a car crash: the first in a spate of seemingly inexplicable accidents in Tanumshede. The car reeks of alcohol and the assumption is that it is a drink drive accident. It becomes clear there's a serial assassin in the vicinity. As cameras shadow the stars' every move, relations with the locals are strained to breaking point. A piece of evidence reveals that a pair of seemingly disparate homicides are linked, a pattern emerges of similar homicides spread over many years- in different regions of Sweden; slowly Patrick realises that these cases are more closely linked than he realises.Patrick also has his own ephemera to contend with: a wedding to arrange, and Erica′s sister Anna -- he′s experiencing stress.

The Hidden Child

Camilla Läckberg

This is regarded as one of the more plot driven novels in the series-with more emphasis on the story. Erika wants to write a 'great-book' so Patrik goes on paternity leave to look after the baby whilst this occurs; then unexplained things start to happen: an elderly neighbour is found dead – not just that, but he has been dead for some time. What's more, this guy knew Erika's late mother. Erica consults a local historian of World War 2, however, shortly after her visit, he is brutally murdered and it becomes clear that the past is still very much a part of some people's lives. The plot focuses on the discovery of a child's blood spattered vest plus other memorabilia. Who would murder so cold-bloodedly to bury secrets so ancient? By way of a side-theme Melberg adopts a stray mutt finding that this leads to a meeting with another pooch owner who happens to be the mater of his new detective, Paul Morales; this provides a counterpoint to the increasingly sordid facts being unearthed in the search for the murderer.

The Stories of Ibis

The Stories of Ibis begins with a wandering storyteller who encounters Ibis. He has the mindset that all robots are a threat to humanity and must be fought against for survival. He attacks the robot Ibis, not aware of who she is, as a result of his mindset. Ibis tells the storyteller that she is far more proficient in battle. During the battle the storyteller becomes injured and Ibis takes him to an android hospital to care for him. While he is recovering Ibis offers to tell him stories. While originally skeptical he agrees after Ibis makes it clear that the stories are not taboo. The space after each story is referred to as intermission and is a time for Ibis to comment on the story she just told. The story is about a group of friends who are writing a science fiction story over the internet. One of the group members kills someone in real life. The rest of the short story is about how the group fights to convince this man to not commit suicide, but to turn himself in. He resolves to turn himself in, being hopeful to the future because he knows he has friends who care about him. The ending words of the story are a commentary. While the story they were writing was not real, the emotions they were feeling were real. This is another story about human interactions over the internet. The device that allows people to enter virtual reality (VR) is MUGEN Net. Such devices are extremely expensive and most people need to go to a public server to use one. However the girl's parents in this story are wealthy enough to own one. This girl is shopping in VR when a boy meets her and asks her out for ice cream. All goes well and they plan for another. After some time of VR dating they agree to meet up in real life. Another story about human interactions over the internet. A short story about an artificial intelligence that grows over time with human interaction. The inspiration for this story was Ray Bradbury's I Sing the Body Electric (Bradbury). The mirror girl Shalice starts off with basic knowledge and by interacting with her owner develops. The owner grows up and marries a technician who incubates Shalice by teaching her in the virtual world at many thousand times faster than average life. When he is done, Strong Eye is created. Strong Eye is the fully developed and completely intelligent AI. A futuristic story about an artificial space station and people who go diving into a black hole. The space station cannot stop people but is sorry that they go to their deaths because none of them get past the event horizon. Then one girl comes who has the space ship, the training, and the research necessary to attempt to dive into the black hole. As she goes into the black hole the space station can no longer observe. She may have made it, she could have been destroyed. An anime flavored story about the intelligence of people being scanned onto a computer network. The AIs in the network fight crime and live repeating lives. At the end of each year they start anew, but different story lines. Thousands of 'extras' populate the network and are the ones subject to harm and deletion. The protagonist has a pen pal in real life who explains to her that the real world is under attack and that there are no respawns and no extras. The AI finds this so cruel that people would willingly kill each other when they can't come back. The stories leading up to this were all relatively short. This and the next took up over 100 pages each. This is a story about an android named Shion who works in a Japanese nursing facility. Shion comes with only extensive nursing training but lacks the knowledge of how to communicate with the residents. After months of training she informs her adviser that she believes all humans have dementia, which explains their irrational behavior. Near the end of the story one of the residents threatens suicide but Shion convinces him to step down and be rational. The culminating story of the entire novel. It is about Ibis herself. She starts off as a virtual reality fighting program and overtime develops intelligence. Her master gains enough funds to create her a body in the real world or level 0. There is significant hate against TAIs (True Artificial Intelligence) in the real world. Ibis and her friend Raven rebel against their masters to make a point. Human hatred was destroying them. After many years robots took prevalence and most humans realized they were not worthy to be the guardians of Earth and died in peace. The remaining population was stubborn and fought against the robots for centuries. The storyteller is a child of this generation, being raised in hatred and ignorance. The robots sought to take him captive, and teach him the truth so that he could go to the villages where people lived and teach them the truth. The whole point was they cared for the humans and wanted them to live in peace, rather than fighting for their survival.

The End of Liberalism

Theodore J. Lowi

In this book Lowi proposes that classic liberalism and capitalism have died as a public philosophy and have been replaced by interest group liberalism. Lowi goes on to explore the flaws and consequences of interest group liberalism. Lowi argues that the government has grown too large due to Congress assuming power and delegating authority to administrative agencies rather than coming up with a solution to problems within congress. He suggests that American politics has become controlled by interest groups in which politicians associate. Lowi contends that, because of this, the United States has entered into what he calls “The Second Republic.” He then suggests that interest group liberalism needs to be replaced by a juridical democracy in order to restore the rule of law.

Preincarnate

"Suppose you were murdered and then woke up 300 years earlier in someone else's body. Wouldn't you want to put yourself in suspended animation and be re-awoken in time to prevent yourself from being murdered in the first place? This is the extraordinary tale of an ordinary man in a race across Time."

Wild About Harry

In Paraguay an English Major, Harry Copeland-Smith is guarding a war criminal and in his best efforts to protect him becomes like his charge.

Charlie Peace

Criminal Jack Peachey needs to find his own human narrative in the incredible stories Charlie Peace told him when he was a boy. He wants to imagine a Christ in his own image.

A Stranger in Mayfair

Charles Lenox, gentleman amateur detective, has recently married and has been elected to Parliament. Although Lenox plans to give up detection (due to the demands of his new vocation and to alleviate the concerns of his new wife), he is pulled into a case when a colleague in Parliament asks for help solving the murder of his footman.

Durgeshnandini

Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay

The story is set in the backdrop of Pathan-Mughal conflicts that took place in south-western region of modern-day Indian state of Paschimbanga (West Bengal) during the reign of Akbar. Jagat Singh, a General of Mughal army and son of Raja Man Singh met Tilottama, daughter of Birendra Singha, a feudal lord of south-western Bengal in Mandaran (in modern-day Hooghly district, Paschimbanga) and they fell in love with each other. While they were preparing for a marriage ceremony, Katlu Khan, a rebel Pathan leader attacked Mandaran. Birendra Singha died in the battle and Jagat Singh was imprisoned along with Birendra’s widow Bimala and their daughter Tilottama. Katlu Khan’s daughter Ayesha saved Tilottama from her father’s lust, but Ayesha herself fell in love with Jagat Singh. Later, Bimala revenged her husband’s death by stabbing Katlu Khan. In the meantime, Man Singh signed a pact with the Pathans and they set Jagat Singh free. But Ayesha’s lover Osman challenged Jagat Singh in a duel which Jagat Singh won. Realising that Jagat Singh who was a Hindu prince would never marry a Muslim woman, Ayesha gave up hope for him, but she eventually helped Tilottama to get married to Jagat Singh.

Ceremony

Leslie Marmon Silko

Ceremony follows the troubles of Tayo, a half-white, half-Laguna man, as he struggles to cope with battle fatigue after surviving World War II and witnessing the death of his cousin Rocky during the Bataan Death March of 1942. After spending several months recovering from injuries sustained during his captivity at a VA Hospital in Los Angeles, California, Tayo returns home to his family's home at Laguna Pueblo. Tayo suffers from increasing mental instability and turns to alcoholism to escape his inner turmoil. Tayo eventually turns to traditional pueblo spirituality and ceremony as a source of healing.

All Hell Let Loose

Max Hastings

All Hell Let Loose covers the entire span of World War II, following the military developments of the war but focusing on the reactions and experiences of different individuals (both uniformed and civilian). Reviews refer to the book as an "everyman's story" made up of accounts from those with lesser roles in the conflict; "ranging from ship's cooks to wireless operators, farmers and housewives to typists and black marketeers." The book addresses several "triumphalist" aspects of written war history by focusing on the "misery, heroism and endurance" of individual accounts. Hastings concludes that whilst the Nazis fought individual battles well, their overall war effort showed "stunning incompetence".

The Future of Us

Jay Asher

Josh and Emma are about to discover themselves--fifteen years in the future. It's 1996, and Josh and Emma have been neighbors their whole lives. They've been best friends almost as long--at least, up until last November, when everything changed. Things have been awkward ever since then, but when Josh's family gets a free AOL CD-ROM in the mail, his mom makes him bring it over so that Emma can install it on her new computer. When they sign on, they're automatically logged onto Facebook . . . but Facebook hasn't been invented yet. Josh and Emma are looking at themselves fifteen years in the future. Their spouses, careers, homes, and status updates--it's all there. And every time they refresh their pages, their futures change. As they grapple with the ups and downs of their future, they're forced to confront what they're doing right--and wrong--in the present.

Ingenious Pain

Andrew Miller

James Dyer is born without the ability to feel pain or pleasure. Set in mid 18th century Russia, the novel follows Dyer as he attempts to come to terms with this disability whilst working as a sideshow freak, then as a surgeon, until his eventual consignment to the Bethlem institute.

The Angel Maker's Wife

Camilla Läckberg

In April 1974 there is a disappearance of a family without a trace from the island Valö just outside Fjällbacka: an Easter buffet is in the dining room and a baby (Ebba) is missing. Ebba is eventually found; then when older visits again the ancients children colony where her father ran a boarding school with an iron rule. Two parallel stories, one past/one present, where the past explains the present. Ebba and her husband Martin have lost a son, and in an attempt to overcome the sadness they decide to open a bed and breakfast.

Rogue Leaders: The Story of LucasArts

The book aims to tell the history of the first 25 years of LucasArts game development and publishing, from its beginning as Lucasfilm Games, to the 2008 releases such as Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures. The book is also an art book, as it features concept art and unused art concepts from LucasArts games.

Casanova

Andrew Miller

Set in 1763, this novel centres round the historical figure of Giacomo Casanova and loosely follows his autobiographical Histoire de ma vie. The plot of the novel concerns Casanova falling for a woman and having, for the first time, to deal with rejection and the pain which it causes him.

Oxygen

Andrew Miller

Set in San Fernando Valley and Hungary in 1997, the story revolves around a late-stage cancer patient, Alice; her two markedly different sons, one a translator, the other a soap star; and a seemingly unconnected Hungarian playwright named László Lázár. The plot centres on the family's troubles and the sons coming to terms with the fact that their mother will likely not see another birthday.

Rabies

Borislav Pekić

Set in early 1980s, during the height of Cold War, novel follows a series of parallel storylines. The situation on the Heathrow Airport is tense, due to the arrival of the Soviet delegation, led by the Soviet Minister of Foreign Affairs Artamonov. Heathrow VIP loungue is where they and British Foreign Minister Sir Geoffrey Drummond, are to conclude the signing of the new Anglo-Soviet treaty with protocolar toasts. Whilst the tight security is being deployed by the head of the Aviation Security, Major Lawford, along with his colleagues: Colonels Donovan of the MI6 and Rasimov of the KGB, medical service, headed by Dr. Luke Komarovsky, gets informed that a nun from a convent near Lagos Nigeria, who was travelling on the Alitalia Boeing 747 en route to New York City via Heathrow, has gotten ill. Her symptoms are first diagnosed as those of hysteria caused by fear of flying, then to an epileptic seisure. Plane is given a priority landing. Dr. Komarowsky, who in past has been a scientist, was working, along with three other doctors, each of whom will make an appearance further in the book: Dr. John Hamilton, Dr. Matthew Laverick, and Dr. Coro Deveroux, in a team of the world renowned microbiologist, Dr. Frederick Lieberman. Their work, in a somewhat laboratory at Wolfenden House was and remains weiled in mystery, but their goal (four of them were called either the nucleus or evangelists of Messiah Lieberman) was the 'holy grail' of microbiology - creation, through genetical reorganisation, of general immunity to bacterial, viral and oncological diseases, which would, being based on the modifications of the very human DNA, thus also be hereditary. But the last batch of experiments, a vaccine based on a recombined Rabies virus, was done on humans who were exposed to the rabies virus in a quarantine in Britain. To be continued...

The Optimists

Andrew Miller

The novel focuses on a veteran photojournalist named Clement Glass, and his struggle to come to terms with the aftermath of a church massacre. Although these events take place in an undisclosed African location, there are close similarities to Rwanda and the genocide of 1994. The novel follows Glass as he travels from Africa to locations in Europe and North America, and tries to reconcile his memories, while dealing with a family crisis, eventually journeying to Brussels, where the perpetrator of the massacre may be in hiding.

Bitter Blood

Jerry Bledsoe

In 1984, Susan Newsom (the niece and namesake of North Carolina Supreme Court Chief Justice Susie Sharp) and Tom Lynch got divorced and many intense custody battles ensued over their two sons, John and Jim. Shortly after the divorce and power struggles, Susie Newsom became intimate with her first cousin, Fritz Klenner. Fritz Klenner was a gun worshipping “doctor” who had a long history of dishonesty. Fritz followed in the footsteps of his father, Frederick Robert Klenner, and started his own medical practice in Reidsville, North Carolina. However, Fritz was a fraud and deceived many people (including his father) because he did not actually attend college nor did he receive a license to practice medicine. In the summer of 1984, relatives of the former couple began to be murdered across the country. At first, Tom Lynch’s mother (Delores) and sister (Janie) were murdered in cold blood in Louisville, Kentucky. The two were killed at their home as they returned from a Sunday morning church service on July 22, 1984. The police originally had no leads and no suspects were under investigation after these two mysterious murders. Then on May 18, 1985, Susie Newsom’s father (Bob Newsom), mother (Florence), and grandmother (Hattie) were shot to death in their home in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Before his murder, Bob Newsom had agreed to testify in favor of Tom Lynch at an upcoming custody hearing. Investigators now had a suspect. Because of this lead, police began to speculate that Susie played a role in the murder of her family. Soon after the death of her family, police began gathering information, heavily scrutinizing many aspects of Susie Newsom’s life. Police soon discovered that Susie was in a relationship with Fritz and both became prime suspects in the murders of Susie’s family and Tom’s family. By June 1985, investigators had gathered substantial evidence and were closing in on the arrests of Susie and Fritz. However, an unpredictable and shocking event happened instead. On June 3, police forces entered the apartment complex of Fritz Klenner in Greensboro, North Carolina. Authorities were ready to subdue him in the case of physical resistance, but they never got the chance. Fritz became outraged and fired multiple gunshots in the direction of the police, then fled the scene in an SUV with Susie and her two children, John and Jim. Fritz and the police became engaged in a low speed 15-minute police chase. When the SUV was stopped, Klenner opened fire with a machine gun, wounding three officers in the initial burst of fire. Before they could respond in kind, he detonated an explosive charge inside the van, killing himself and his three passengers. in all, nine people died in 1984 and 1985 due to the events recounted in Bitter Blood.

Leaving the Atocha Station

Ben Lerner

The first-person narrator of the novel, Adam Gordon, is an early 20s American poet participating in a prestigious fellowship in Madrid circa 2004. The stated goal of his fellowship is long narrative poem highlighting literature's role in the Spanish Civil War. Gordon, however, spends his time reading Tolstoy, smoking spliffs, and observing himself observing his surroundings. Leaving the Atocha Station can be read as a Künstlerroman. However, Lerner has said: The protagonist doesn't unequivocally undergo a dramatic transformation, for instance, but rather the question of "transformation" is left open, and people seem to have strong and distinct senses about whether the narrator has grown or remained the same, whether this is a sort of coming of age story or whether it charts a year in the life of a sociopath.

Soldier of Sidon

Gene Wolfe

This book continues with the conceit of the earlier two books of having the tale arising from the translation of scrolls discovered in the present day, allegedly written in Latro's own hand. Latro suffered a head wound as a mercenary in the army of the Persian King Xerxes at the Battle of Plataea. As Tony Keen in his review states: Latro cannot recall events of more than a day, but on the other hand, he can see gods and demigods. In this book, the gods and demigods encountered by Latro and his companions, in their journey up the Nile in a search for a cure to his affliction, are Egyptian and African, rather than the Greek ones of the two earlier books.

The Cat's Table

Michael Ondaatje

The central character and narrator named Michael, an unaccompanied 11 year old boy, boards an ocean liner, the Oronsay, in Colombo enroute to England via the Suez canal and the Mediterranean. For meals on board Michael is sat at the "cat's table" (the one furthest from the Captain's table) with other boys Ramadhin and Cassius and other misfit characters. The book follows the adventures of Michael and these boys while they are aboard the Oronsay, and Michael's later perspective as an older man looking back on this boyhood voyage.

Earth Unaware

Aaron Johnston

A clan of "free miners" living on the spaceship El Cavador is working an asteroid far out in the Kuiper Belt when they detect what appears to be an alien ship decelerating from near light speed as it approaches the solar system. Meanwhile, Lem Jukes, son and heir of the hard-driving founder of the largest mining corporation, is also in the remote region, far from the prying eyes of competitors, secretly testing a "glaser" (gravity laser) that promises to revolutionize mining. Back on Earth, Captain Wit O'Toole goes recruiting among the elite New Zealand Special Air Service for the even more select, multinational Mobile Operations Police (MOPS). In his haste to step up the glaser testing process, Jukes orders his ship to "bump" El Cavador from the asteroid the family is mining. During the violent collision, one of the crew of El Cavador is killed. In retaliation, El Cavador launches a "sniffer" probe to hack the corporate ship's network, planting a message for Lem Jukes and downloading confidential files pertaining to the glaser. Jukes, realizing that a scandal involving the death of a free miner and the loss of the confidential files will ruin him, sets out for Weigh Station Four, where he intends to plant a hacker to strip El Cavador's files. Having detected the alien ship using a sky-scanner called the Eye, El Cavador also identifies a smaller pod racing toward an Italian freemining ship with which they had recently docked and exchanged crew. With their laserline transmission equipment having been destroyed in the bump, El Cavador is helpless to warn the Italians as the pod destroys them. El Cavador hurries to attempt a rescue of any survivors, meeting with very limited success. As the bulk of the El Cavador crew works to rescue survivors trapped in a large intact section of the Italian ship, a three-man crew (including Victor) modifies and mans a "quickship," an automated vessel normally used to send processed metals to a Luna, and continues to search for survivors. When the pod diverts to attack El Cavador, the men on the quickship ram and disable the pod using mining equipment. During the attack, the crew of the pod emerge to battle the humans. Their physiology is revealed to be Formic (ant-like), and the Venezuelan men name them "hormigas." The crew of El Cavador realize the Formic ship is a formidable threat to Earth and make a plan to get a warning out. El Cavador will head to Weigh Station Four and use their laserline transmitter. As a backup, Victor volunteers to take a datacube with all the evidence the free miners have accumulated back to Luna aboard a quickship. The journey is perilous due to the realities of limited movement and prolonged zero gravity. Meanwhile, the Juke ship makes its way to Weigh Station Four only to come under attack from roughnecks who recognize the crew as corporates. Several of the attackers are killed by Chubs, a man seemingly junior to Lem Jukes but revealed as having been assigned by Ukko Jukes to protect him. The corporates are still able to leave behind a hacker who intends to strip El Cavador's files, but the whole ordeal ends up moot when the Formic ship destroys the station. El Cavador sends a short-range, broad radio call and is able to contact the Juke ship and a Chinese mining vessel, both of which pledge to attack the Formic ship. El Cavador sends its women and children aboard the Chinese vessel, which is too small to help in the attack. The plan of attack is to plant mining explosives along the hull of the alien ship, then execute a synchronized detonation to avoid contact with the Formic soldiers. Unfortunately, one of the explosives detonates early, drawing a response from the Formic crew, who at first engage the humans wearing space suits, but subsequently attack without any protection, demonstrating a fanatic loyalty to their leadership, hinting at the Hive Queen/Worker relationship demonstrated in other books set in the Enderverse. Chubs pulls Lem Jukes and his men away from the battle and moves the corporate ship away as the Formic ship focuses its weapons on El Cavador and destroys it. Victor arrives at Luna, only to be largely ignored and confined for his illegal arrival. But rumors begin to spread on Earth that an alien invasion is looming, prompting Wit O'Toole to prepare his MOPs for that (he thinks) hypothetical situation. Victor is eventually given a case-worker who believes his story and helps him transmit the evidence onto the Nets.

The Mother/Child Papers

Alicia Ostriker

The books begins with a lengthy prose section in which Ostriker recalls the events of her son, Gabriel’s, May 14, 1970 birth and relates it to political developments that occurred around that time, most notably the Kent State Shootings and the beginning of Operation Total Victory, the United States invasion of Cambodia. The three events are described in tandem, with each intertwined with the others. Ostriker then tells of the births of her two older daughters. One was delivered in a progressive Wisconsin hospital and another by midwife in England. Ostriker says that these two experiences shaped her expectation of what childbirth should be like: “a woman gives birth to a child, and the medical folk assist her.” Ostriker then speaks of the birth of her third child, Gabriel, at a southern California traditional hospital. Despite having reached an agreement with her doctor about what drugs she was to be given during the procedure, while in the early stages of labor Ostriker inadvertently consented to being injected with Demerol, a sedative, thinking it was a local analgesic. Under the effects of the Demerol, Ostriker then consented to receive a spinal anesthetic, which left her unable to feel anything from the waist down. Upon waking, Ostriker was furious about being deprived of the experience of natural childbirth and relates the invasion of her body by the medical professionals who delivered the child to the US invasion of Cambodia. The second section of the book is a series of related, untitled stream-of-consciousness poems alternating between the new mother and the child’s perspective. In these sections, Ostriker explores the intimate, even erotic, relationship between a mother and her infant child. She expresses the different emotions she experienced towards the child during this time, from blissful admiration and boundless optimism, to bitter resentment and a wish that the “leech” would “die”. There are also a number of short prose sections in which Ostriker relates the events of the Kent State shooting and the immediate aftermath of Gabriel’s birth. References to war and devastation pervade both accounts; as Ostriker muses on the beauty of her child, she suddenly thinks of “babies stabbed in their little bellies / and hoisted up to the sky on bayonets”. The section ends with two titled pieces: “Paragraphs,” a prose piece in which Ostriker examines the range of emotions new mothers feel towards their infants, ranging from almost divine love to murderous rage, and “Mother/Child: A Coda,” in which she dispenses advice about life and consciousness to her child, alerting him to its savage, brutal nature, as well as its potential for transcendent beauty. The third part of the book is the longest and is composed of a series of 16 titled prose and poetry pieces exploring life with the new child and its effects on the family. In “Letter to M.” the speaker discusses the erotic pleasure inherent in nursing a child and ponders why this is never discussed in any parenting material. The poem “Song of the Abandoned One” is written from the perspective of the infant’s jealous and angry older sibling, begging her parents to “Kill the baby”. Ostriker recounts an experience with her family listening to a production of Shakespeare’s Macbeth on the radio in “Macbeth and the Kids In the Cabin at Chester.” In “Things to Remember of Eve,” Ostriker describes her daughter, Eve, at two different stages in her life, at ages 8 and 21. In “In the Autumn of My Thirty-Seventh Birthday,” Ostriker describes the sense of emptiness and depression she experienced dealing with family life, recounting also a discussion with a depressed friend, N., who refuses to take the antidepressants her psychiatrist prescribed her. In “Exile,” Ostriker considers the contrasting powers of love and violence, wondering when her son will grow to the point where “he will turn away” from his mother’s kisses “not to waste breath.” The poem’s post-script reads, “during the evacuation of Phnom Penh, 1975.” In the section’s titular prose piece, “The Spaces,” Ostriker recalls an ideal “windy, snowy January evening” at home with her children. Throughout the poem, there are a number of allusions to William Blake’s Songs of Innocence, as well as a repeated lamb motif. Ostriker’s perfect winter day with her children is contrasted with her husband’s discussion about entropy and the ultimate heat death of the universe. The next poem, “Propaganda Poem: Maybe For Some Young Mamas” is divided into three parts. In the first part, “The Visiting Poet,” Ostriker recounts an experience she once had giving a guest lecture to a class of feminist college students. She read the class a poem about pregnancy and was shocked when the class reacted with revulsion to the notion of motherhood. Ostriker tries to explain that motherhood is one of the most fulfilling and empowering experiences possible for a woman to experience and that the class has been thoroughly brainwashed against it through patriarchal messages. In part two, “Postscript to Propaganda,” Ostriker acknowledges that raising children is an incredibly difficult and demanding experience which wears a mother down, but she concludes the poem by asking the audience, “Come on, you daughters of bitches, do you want to live forever?” The poem’s last part, “What Actually,” indicts the “ideological lockstep” that Ostriker claims dictates women’s feelings on motherhood. She goes on to explain that she believes that certain women are born to be mothers, while others simply were not. She concludes by once more acknowledging that although raising children wears away at a person, so does anything enjoyable in life, and that those who refuse to do anything dangerous are “already dead.” In “The Leaf Pile,” Ostriker recounts the events of an October day when, upon catching her son trying to put something dirty in his mouth, she slapped him. The poem explores the workings of memory and how such events can be easily forgotten by the child but remain a vivid mark of shame for the parent. The next work is a prose piece titled “The Seven Samurai, The Dolly, and Mary Cassat.” Ostriker remembers an evening watching Akira Kurosawa’s The Seven Samurai, trying to compare it to other masculine art works in an attempt to come to a better understanding of the male perspective. She is interrupted by her children coming to her asking for attention and assistance. She recalls a quote by W.B. Yeats about how one must choose between the perfection of one’s craft and one's life before going to help her daughter with her report on Mary Cassat. The next poem, “The Change” explores the relationship between animate and inanimate things how it parallels the distant relationship Ostriker’s daughter maintains with her as they drive to her horseback riding lessons. In “One, To Fly,” Ostriker examines the transformation of her son Gabriel as he grows up. In nursery school, he tells her that his three wishes are to be able to fly, to be able to talk to animals, and for there to be no more war. The poem’s last stanza reveals that at age 9, Gabriel has largely lost his pacifist nature due to bullying and social pressures and now fights children who bully him. “In the Dust,” the section’s penultimate poem, deals with the development of Ostriker’s daughter and examines the mother’s own role in helping mold her daughter into an acceptable woman in society’s eyes, even if that role has made the mother personally unhappy. In the last poem of the section, “His Speed and Strength,” Ostriker meditates on seeing her son at play, overtaking her on his bicycle, using his strength for a purely creative purpose. She also sees a group of black and white children playing together without any tension and thinks to herself that maybe “it is not necessary to make hate.” The book’s last section is composed of three poems, “One Marries,” “This Power,” and “Dream.” “One Marries” begins with a quote from Percy Shelley’s Hymn to Intellectual Beauty, “To fear himself, and love all human kind.” In this poem, Ostriker meditates upon the dynamics of marriage, comparing its necessity for balance to the crude, simple domination of Imperialism. In “This Power,” Ostriker considers the respect and attraction children feel towards their mothers, even in the most degrading and trying circumstances. “Dream,” the book’s last poem is very brief and describes“a woman / oliveskinned like an Indian / brownhaired like a European” “giving birth / comfortabl[y]” for days on end.

Wadzeks Kampf mit der Dampfturbine

Alfred Döblin

As the novel opens, Wadzek, owner of a factory that produces steam engines, is locked in a struggle with his more powerful rival Rommel, whose much larger concern manufactures turbines. He can be seen as representing a new type of entrepreneur, more technologically advanced and less scrupulous than Wadzek. Losing value, the stock of Wadzek's company is being bought up by Rommel; in desperation, Wadzek teams up with Schneemann, an engineer working at one of Rommel's factories, to thwart his company's takeover by Rommel. This effort includes the misguided theft of some of Rommel's business correspondence. Fearing legal retribution for this theft, Wadzek, accompanied by Schneemann, flees with his wife Pauline and daughter Herta to his house in Reinickendorf, where the two men fortify the house in delusional preparation for a siege that never comes. Financially and spiritually broken, Wadzek returns to Berlin and with Schneemann attempts to turn himself in at a police station, where they learn that no warrant has even been issued for their arrest. There follows a temporary reconciliation with his estranged family and the first attempts to begin a new career in education—Wadzek would instruct his students in a new, moralistic and humane approach to technology. However, after walking in on an erotically and exotically charged debauch held in his own parlor (the aftermath of an African-themed birthday party Pauline held with her two new friends from Reinickendorf), Wadzek suffers a further breakdown. The novel ends aboard a ship bound for America, Wadzek eloping with Gaby, an old acquaintance and erstwhile lover of Rommel's, to begin a new life.

One Morning Like a Bird

Andrew Miller

Yuji Takano is a writer in 1940s Tokyo. The story focuses on Takano's exploration and discovery of "Western" culture, exemplified in the meetings of the "club" which he forms with his French-speaking friends. The novel examines the effects on Takano's life and relationships of the impending events of World War II, and the possibility of conscription.

Islay

The book has three sections, titled “Strings”, “Drums”, and “Cymbals”. These three sections document Lyson’s journey to make Islay a Deaf state. He comes across many problems along the way, and is ridiculed by some. Others accuse him of being a peddler and he is misunderstood by many. His wife, in the beginning of the novel is embarrassed by his dream and keeps Lyson behind lock and key when he is working on his project. She does not want her friends to know about what he is doing and does everything in her power to keep it a secret. In the first section, “Strings”, the book’s protagonist Lyson Sulla is in the beginning stages of his plans for a state by and for Deaf people. He is learning about the state Islay, and how it could work for what he is envisioning. He receives financial support from his in-laws so that he can move to Islay. Once there, he spends a week’s time looking over the state, seeing how it will work for him, and meeting with public officials. He is pleased with what he sees in Islay and believes that it will work for what he plans. He moves his wife, Mary out to Islay with him. Once they are moved into a large home, they throw a big party. The second section, “Drums” documents Lyson’s travels to recruit other Deaf people to move to Islay. He meets many Deaf people along the way and is able to convince many well-established Deaf people to move to Islay. He also has a few misunderstandings along the way when people misunderstand what his intentions and meanings are. In the last section, “Cymbals”, many Deaf people move their families to Islay and open businesses. Lyson still has troubles, as he is accused of real estate fraud. However, he gets out of this predicament. Those who moved to Islay register to vote, so as to help Lyson become Governor. The election is a rough experience for Lyson, but in the end he wins, becoming Governor of Islay.

La inocencia castigada

Don Diego, a womanizing knight, falls in love with the beautiful Doña Inés wife of Don Alonso. Her poor neighbor takes notice, and borrows a dress from the lady under the pretense of needing it to wear to a wedding. She then hires a prostitute who resembles Inés to pose as her in order to have sexual relations with Diego in exchange for gifts. When it comes time to return the dress, they end the arrangement. Diego approaches Inés to ask why she broke off their relationship, which confuses her greatly, until he mentions that she always wore the dress she is wearing at the moment when they were together. The dress is the one that she lent to the neighbor, so she realizes that he must have been tricked, and seeks help from the Mayor, who sees to it that the two women involved are punished. Diego, embarrassed but still in love with Inés, seeks help from a Moorish necromancer, who gives him a candle shaped like the object of his unrequited love. When he lights the candle, a demon will possess Inés, forcing her to come to his bedchamber and submit to him. He is warned not to extinguish the candle before she is back in her own bed or she will die. Diego begins to use the candle while Don Alonso is out of town on business. Inés is conscious of what is happening, but doesn't understand it and thinks she is having vivid nightmares. One night she is discovered walking in a trance through the street in only a shirt by the Mayor and her brother, Don Francisco. They follow her and discover what Diego has been up to. He warns them not to extinguish the candle until she is back in her own bed. She returns to her room and awakens, surrounded by strange men who work for the Mayor, and is distraught with fear and guilt when she learns what has been happening to her. Diego is later killed by Inés' brother and husband. Her brother, husband, and sister-in-law, convinced that Inés is guilty of adultery and has therefore brought dishonor upon the family, kidnap her and take her to Seville, where they hole her up inside a chimney in a place so small she is unable to stand or sit, but must crouch. They leave a tiny window to allow her to breathe and eat paltry meals, so they she will die very slowly. She is left here for six years, surrounded by trash and excrement, without light or the ability to lie down. She never gives up her faith in God and constantly prays for death or release, and is further tormented by her inability to celebrate the sacraments. Finally, a woman moves in next door into a room with sufficiently close proximity to the chimney to hear the lamentations of Inés. She asks who the woman is, and Inés tells her the story of how she came to be held captive. The next day the woman seeks help from the Mayor and Archbishop, who promptly go to the house of Alonso and Francisco and tear down the wall. Inés is now blind, having lost her sight due to never seeing light, her hair tangled and covered with lice, her body covered in open wounds infested with worms. The Archbishop sends the three evil relatives to prison, and they are later condemned to death by hanging. Inés is cured and restored to her former beauty, though she never regains her sight, and enters a convent, where she spends the rest of her days.

Math Girls

At the start of his first year of high school, the narrator meets a new classmate, a girl named Miruka. Without introducing herself, she gives him the beginning to number sequences, to which he answers with their continuation. One year later, the narrator is handed a letter by another girl, a new student named Tetra. The letter she wrote is a request for the narrator to tutor her in math. He begins teaching her, making Miruka jealous. The narrator balances his friendship with Tetra and his romantic interest in Miruka until Miruka and Tetra become friends after Tetra demonstrates her dedication to learning mathematics.

Dr. America: The Lives of Thomas Dooley, 1927-1961

The book begins by pointing out that Dooley grew from an “undisciplined Irish American rake into a celebrity-saint” through his use of showbiz and his ability to market himself. Dooley’s use of showbiz became apparent when the Kingston Trio named one of their songs after him so as to make people increasingly aware of Dooley and his work. Fisher also presents the Kingston Trio’s song “Tom Dooley” as evidence for Dooley’s successful self-marketing while also pointing to Dr. America (Thanh Mo America), a term people in Laos used to glorify Dooley. Fisher does not fail to mention that Thomas Anthony Dooley III was the seventh-most well-known name in the world after Winston Churchill, Pope John XXIII, Albert Schweitzer, and a few other prominent figures. In addition, Fisher makes two claims regarding Dooley’s self-marketing ability: first, he claims that Dooley’s self-marketing resembled Albert Schweitzer’s ability to market himself. Second, Fisher proposes that Dooley’s self-marketing ability was strongly connected to Cold War politics “on a world stage.” The book then delves into Thomas A. Dooley III’s childhood and the personality of his early life. Fisher points out that classmates paradoxically describe Dooley as both “quiet and pleasant” and a “cocky showoff.” However, classmates commonly noted that Dooley “remained aloof from the conventional groupings that comprised the student body." According to Michael Harrington, Dooley’s classmate, they felt like soldiers of Christ guarding faith from the forces of the modern world. Harrington and Dooley were also claimed to have lived in a secure “ghetto,” protected from “British imperialists, Yankee bosses, and Protestant princes” by a Roman Catholic church that had been shielding them from modern culture for more than four hundred years. Fisher discusses how Dooley’s music career in his childhood made him seem like a nonconformist when Dooley played melodic ideas from contemporary pop tunes. Dooley is also portrayed as a mischievous child, teenager, and bachelor who became a homosexual in his adolescence while maintaining prodigious contact with the opposite sex. After briefly narrating Dooley’s shenanigans in college and his expulsion from medical school, Fisher points out that Dooley was assigned as a medical officer to a special operation called Passage to Freedom, a part of the Saigon Military Mission (led by Edward Lansdale) designed to propagandize the anti-communist movement in South Vietnam. According to Fisher, Dooley’s principal objective of his work was to make the military familiar with the diseases they would be up against should they occupy Vietnam. In the process, Dooley appeared as if he did extraordinary work, offering “medical triage to the refugees who are here in such large numbers." Fisher uses these facts to propose that although Dooley appeared as a selfless altruist, he was actually a political pawn shaping US-South Vietnam relations. Fisher then transitions into discussing how a shift in Dooley’s motivations for being in Vietnam helped shape his political role there. He claims that Dooley went to Vietnam at first because he detested French colonialism but that this motivation changed into one that wanted to overthrow the communist Viet Minh. He concludes that Dooley’s work for “preventive medicine” was a crucial component of CIA officer Edward Lansdale’s agenda to facilitate an anti-Communist regime under Jean Baptiste Ngo Dinh Diem in South Vietnam. Lansdale was trying to find an American Catholic who was both anticommunist and able to connect with people across cultural barriers. Dooley had an opportunity here to assume this position by giving the Americans the impression that "a pluralist Vietnamese democracy" was emerging. Fisher then discusses how Dooley marketed himself, thereby earning celebrity status. Through Dooley’s connection with William J. Lederer, a public information officer for the Navy, Dooley had his military adventures in Vietnam published in his bestselling book Deliver Us from Evil. Chapters of this book were reprinted in Reader's Digest, a periodical Fisher claims to have been heavily monitored by the CIA at that time. Afterwards, he discusses how the Navy discharged Dooley due to homosexuality, and he delves into Dooley’s relationship with secular and Catholic journalists. Secular and Catholic journalists emphasized different aspects of Dooley’s work; secular journalists emphasized the fact that Dooley was a “so-what guy on the surface” who had profound individual initiative. Catholic journalists emphasized how Dooley’s refugee work resonated with Catholic spiritual values. Fisher follows this contrast by explaining that Tom Dooley then mobilized support from the International Rescue Committee for his Operation Laos, which Dooley began in the late 1950s. The author then discusses the Laos Operation in greater detail and how it deviated from the mainstream American anticommunist agenda of the 1950s. Fisher also presents Dooley as a medical missionary and analyzes Dooley’s attitude towards the people whom he helps. The partnerships between Operation Laos and Lansdale’s Operation Brotherhood are also discussed. Dooley is then described as a “Jungle Doctor of a New Age” and is contrasted with his contemporary Albert Schweitzer. Fisher discusses the relationship fostered between the two humanitarians and also introduces a key person who shaped how Dooley conducted his work. This person, Teresa Gallagher, was an earnest fan of Dooley who joined his efforts. Fisher discusses how Gallagher nicely resembled the ideal selfless maiden of Catholic theology because of her giving nature, as demonstrated by how she constructs a prayer for Dooley when Dooley becomes afflicted with melanoma. Fisher then writes about how media attention on Dooley’s Operation Laos and his recovery from melanoma created a story of hope that inspired Americans to continue pursuing humanitarianism. How American government agencies learned to sync their political endeavors with Dooley’s Operation Laos is also discussed. Dooley’s death, legacy, and impact on cold war politics are finally mentioned.

No Way Out

Nikolai Leskov

The novel tells the story of young and naïve European Socialist Vasily (Wilhelm) Rainer who comes to Russia to somehow apply his rootless, artificial ideas to the local reality. The action takes place in houses of state officials and merchants, in literary circles of Moscow and Saint Petersburgh, in editorial rooms, Polish revolutionaries’ headquarters. Among those surrounding Rainer are some honest people (like Liza Bakhareva, another character who’s been shown by Leskov with great sympathy), but in general the 'nyhilist' community is being portrayed in the novel as a bunch of amoral crooks for whom high ideals serve as mere means to their own ends; such characters (Arapov, Beloyartsev, Zavulonov, Krasin) the author treated with open disgust.

Humsafar

Farhat Ishtiaq

The novel begins with the arrival of a bitter and angry Khirad Hussain at Ashar Hussain’s office. Khirad informs Ashar that her daughter Hareem is a patient of congenital heart disease and requires immediate open heart surgery. As Ashar is Hareem’s biological father and a rich businessman, it is Hareem’s legal right that he provides her with the care and money she needs, since she is unable to afford Hareem’s medical treatment (Khirad lives in relative poverty but still provides the best she can for her daughter, however her surgery is so expensive that it is out of her reach). Furthermore, Khirad also threatens Ashar that she could easily get a DNA test ordered from a court. Khirad leaves with Ashar all the legal documents (including her current address and phone number) on his desk. Her presence leaves Ashar in a daze, anger and complete shock, and he is so taken aback to see her standing in front of him that he does not realizes the weight of all the things she said and left with him. He leaves his office without touching or even looking at all the files and the picture of his daughter. It is revealed that Ashar has not seen Khirad in almost four and half years and for unknown reasons (which are revealed later in the novel) she left him heartbroken and filled with anger and he now has nothing but hate for her. Ashar reflects back on the unusual circumstances that lead them to getting married without each others consent, the development of their married life and the passionate love that they shared once a long time ago. The novel then switches to present where Khirad is eagerly waiting to hear back from Ashar. When he does not contact her for five days, Khirad concludes that he is cruel and vain and all her efforts to contact him are fruitless as they were 4 years ago. In the meantime, Ashar’s friends notice he is extremely distracted at work and at home his mother confronts him that he needs to stop living in the past and he needs to get over Khirad and all the hurt and pain she hurled at him. The next day Ashar goes to the hospital to visit a friend who had a heart attack. While walking towards the door, a toy falls at his feet and a little girl walks to get her toy. When Ashar picks up and hands the toy to her, she puts her hands on her face and exclaims “app papa hain; app photo walay papa hain!” (You are my dad; You are my dad from the picture!). Ashar is extremely confused and turns to look at the mother of the child who is walking towards him who is none other than Khirad. Khirad takes Hareem away towards the cardiologist’s office. Ashar at that moment weighs in the purpose of Khirad’s meeting with him. His anger and hate for Khirad grows even stronger because she kept his child away from him. He was unaware that she was pregnant and had a daughter. At that moment Ashar decides that he is going to take his daughter with him so Hareem can live with him in a better place, although he can’t separate her from her mother as she is too young and extremely sick. He will also provide her with the best treatment possible. Ashar and Khirad tolerate each other for their daughter's sake and start living together in a separate apartment that Ashar rented out for Hareem. The rest of the story continues to reveal what occurred between Ashar and Khirad, the misunderstandings which lead to them to be separated, the intensity of the relationship that they have with Hareem and if they can ever resolve their differences and understand each other better.

Umr-e-Lahaasil Ka Haasil

Haider Qureshi's poetry is basically on the theme of love and affection but his some nazms are on different topics, as like on corrent issues of the globe, history and mythologies. Qureshi has also written heart touching Mahiyas, a form of the Urdu poetry. In prose, the second part of the book, Qureshi expresses his emotions, views and feelings. His work of prose and poetry is based on the universe, human being, God, soul and cultures. In his short stories, he speaks about the oil-driven wars imposed by western world and rich and poor. He has also written his impressions in his autobiography. Qureshi's literary work one can easily admire and praise. Qureshi has expressed and recalled, in many poems, articles and short stories, his memories of old days in Pakistan. He has also written his views about poets and writers like Faiz Ahmad Faiz, Dr Wazir Agha, Mirza Adeeb, Ghulam Jeelani Asghar and Azra Asghar.

Spirit of the Wind

Chris Pierson

This novel is set after the Chaos War. In the east, on the Dairly Plans, the peace is shattered by the thread of the red dragon Malystryx. The kender Kronn-alin Thistleknot travels to Abasasinia with his older sister Catt, where they seek heroes to stop the dragon from destroying Kendermore. Riverwind and his daughter Brightdawn set out on a quest to save the kender from the dragon's wrath.

Dezra's Quest

Chris Pierson

Dark Wood is the home of Ansalon's centaur tribes, where they dwelt in peace, until strife began tearing them apart. A brave young warrior named Trephas sets out for Solace to seek aid from Caramon Majere and his daughter Dezra against a mad chieftain.

Quest for Lost Heroes

David Gemmell

The Drenai fortress of Dros Delnoch has fallen and blood hungry Nadir hordes sweep across the land, bringing desolation and despair. But, with the Nadir triumphant, slavers seize a young girl in the tiny realm of Gothir and a peasant boy sets off on a quest that will shake the world. To rescue her, Kiall must cross the savage steppes and journey through the Halls of Hell, facing ferocious beasts, deadly warriors and demons of the dark. But the boy is not alone. With him are the legendary heroes of Bel-Azar: Chareos the Blademaster, Beltzer the Axeman and the bowmen Finn and Maggrig. And one among them hides a secret that could free the world of Nadir domination. For he is the Nadir Bane, the hope of the Drenai. He is the Earl of Bronze.

Burma Chronicles

Guy Delisle

The book recounts Guy Delisle's trip to the southeast Asian country that is officially recognized by the United Nations as Myanmar but that is referred to as Burma by countries that do not recognize the military junta that controls it. Delisle went with his infant son, Louis, and his wife, Nadège, an administrator for Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF). At the beginning of the trip, the family must stay in an MSF guest house while they search for more permanent housing. Guy stays home and takes care of Louis while Nadège is frequently absent on MSF business. Guy takes Louis on frequent walks around the neighborhood in his stroller and interacts with local people.

Swamplandia!

Karen Russell

The novel opens with the Bigtree family suffering tragedy and finding their way of life under threat. The family patriarch, Sawtooth Bigtree, has recently been confined to a floating nursing home with dementia and his daughter-in-law, Hilola Bigtree, has died of cancer, leaving behind a husband and three teenage children. Hilola, a champion alligator wrestler, was Swamplandia!'s star attraction. Meanwhile, a brand new amusement park, The World of Darkness, has opened nearby on the Florida mainland. The remaining Bigtrees struggle to cope with the changing situation. In light of plummeting attendance and mounting debts, The Chief, Hilola's husband, unveils a plan, which he calls "Carnival Darwinism", for improvements to Swamplandia such as the addition of saltwater crocodiles, but his son Kiwi is skeptical and suggests selling the park altogether. Kiwi and his siblings have been raised on Swamplandia, largely in isolation from the mainland. They have been homeschooled and educated largely through family legends, educational materials sent from a Florida state agency and books found on a derelict "library boat". Having grown up on Swamplandia! himself, the Chief is adamantly opposed to abandoning his family's unique heritage and lifestyle. The situation on Swamplandia! continues to deteriorate. The Chief's middle child, Osceola, becomes obsessed with ghosts and with occult knowledge she's gleaned from an old book, The Spiritist's Telegraph. Osceola begins to hold seances with her younger sister Ava and to communicate secretly with ghosts via a Ouija board. This begins the sisters' quest to contact their dead mother; however their efforts amount to little success. Osceola's loneliness and inability to talk with her mother drives her to talk to dead 'boyfriends'. Osceola sometimes disappears at night leading her sister to worry that she might be possessed by spirits. Meanwhile, Kiwi continues to clash with his father, and he eventually decides to leave the island in an attempt to save Swamplandia! on his own. He finds minimum-wage employment as a janitor at The World of Darkness, but his highfalutin language and his stated desires to attend Harvard don't endear him to his coworkers, who scrawl obscenities on his locker and call him Margaret Mead after finding a copy of Mead's Coming of Age in Samoa in his possession. Kiwi eventually befriends his coworker Vijay, who helps him learn to adopt some of the normal teenage vernacular and mannerisms. Kiwi begins to attend night school and is promoted to lifeguard. When he rescues a teenage girl who appears to be drowning in the pool, Kiwi becomes a local hero and, as a result, The World of Darkness sends him to train as an airplane pilot. Kiwi's job will be to fly guests of The World of Darkness on tours of the Everglades and its ecological destruction. With no new tourists arriving at Swamplandia!, The Chief decides to shut the park down and to take a business trip of unspecified purpose and duration to the mainland, leaving Ava and Osceola alone on the island. One day, while clearing melaleuca plants - an invasive species that threatens native vegetation - on a remote part of the island, Ava and Osceola discover a decaying dredge boat offshore. The girls recover some artifacts and Osceola attempts to communicate with the dead crew using her Ouija board. Osceola eventually reveals what she has learned about the boat to Ava: In the 1930s a young man named Louis Thanksgiving ran away from the abuse of his adoptive family on a farm in the midwest. Louis found his way to the Everglades, where he found work with the Civilian Conservation Corps, dredging the swamp for the purpose of flood control. Despite the difficulty of the work and the primitive conditions in the Everglades, Louis finds that he enjoys his newfound sense of independence. When his assignment with the Conservation Corps ends, Louis signs up to work on a commercial dredging boat for local land developers, but an explosion in the boat's boiler kills him and the rest of the crew. Osceola confesses that she is in love with Louis' ghost and, when Osceola and the dredge disappear, Ava fears that she has run off with him. Now alone on Swamplandia!, Ava meets the Bird Man, a man of indeterminate age who lives in the swamp and makes a living by traveling between local properties and driving off bothersome birds. Ava hires the Bird Man to take her in his pole boat to find her sister. At first, Ava believes that the Bird Man has a mystic power to lead her into the underworld, and at his direction, she even lies to a park ranger, telling him that the Bird Man is her cousin and they are on a fishing trip. Ava and the Bird Man travel deeper into the remote wilderness, resting in a hut built by park rangers and an abandoned group of houses on stilts. Eventually, Ava becomes convinced that the Bird Man has no special powers and that he is taking advantage of her. When they encounter a group of drunken fishermen, Ava screams to get their attention, and the Bird Man silences her. Later, the Bird Man rapes the thirteen-year-old Ava. Ava flees the Bird Man but finds herself lost in the dense sawgrass marshes, without food or water and with no one but the Bird Man looking for her. Kiwi, meanwhile, discovers that his fiercely-independent father has been working secretly at a casino, possibly for many years. Kiwi continues his pilot training and, on his first flight, he notices a seemingly stranded woman in the remote swamp. The woman turns out to be his sister Osceola, wearing the remains of their mother's wedding dress. Osceola explains that she did elope with the ghost of Louis Thanksgiving, and that Louis directed her to attach an outboard motor to the derelict dredge and pilot it deep into the swamp, but that Louis left her at the altar. Ava is being chased by the Bird Man. She enters an alligator's cave to escape him. The alligator attacks Ava, but she uses the wrestling skills she learned from her mother to defeat the creature. Leaving the alligator's lair, Ava notices some men in the distance. They are park rangers who have been looking for her - the drunken fishermen heard her screaming and alerted the authorities. Ava, Osceola and Kiwi are reunited with their father. As the family plans for the future, they realize that they will have to abandon Swamplandia! and move to the mainland, where Ava and Osceola will attend high school.

Ente Katha

This book is about Aami (Kamala), starting from her childhood and her village. It also depicts her teenage love towards a neighbor of the same age. Aami moves to Kolkata with her parents as her father is employed there. She also explains her married life in Ente Katha.

The Good Muslim

Tahmima Anam

The central characters of the novel is Maya and Sohail. While A Golden Age tells their story before and during the liberation war of Bangladesh, the Good Muslim tells their story a decade after the war. Separated during the war, Maya met her brother, Sohail a decade after the war. Meantime, Sohail became a charismatic religious leader whereas Maya was trying to peruse her revolutionary ideals. When Sohail decided to send his son to a madrasa, a conflict grew between brother and sister and the conflict leads the story to a devastating climax.

Blitzcat

Robert Westall

Blitzcat is told through the point of view of a domestic cat as she travels across England during the Blitz in search of her owner, who is serving with the RAF. The story includes a detailed depiction of the bombing of Coventry.

Death Comes to Pemberley

P. D. James

The novel begins in October, 1803, six years after the events in Pride and Prejudice which resulted in the marriage of Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy and Miss. Elizabeth Bennet. The Prologue and Book One introduce the main characters, summarize the histories of the Bennet and Darcy families, and introduce a murder. The remainder of the novel is about the mystery and its solution. The novel is a pastiche in the style of Jane Austen, as James acknowledges in her Author's Note. The book is divided into sections: Author's Note; Prologue; six Books; Epilogue. : Author's Note : Prologue : Book One: The Day Before the Ball : Book Two: The Body in the Woodland : Book Three: Police at Pemberley : Book Four: The Inquest : Book Five: The Trial : Book Six: Gracechurch Street : Epilogue

Emma in Winter

Penelope Farmer

It is wintertime. Emma's older sister Charlotte leaves Aviary Hall to stay with a schoolfriend, and then to return to her second term at her London boarding school. Emma, along with her classmate Bobby Fumpkins, simultaneously begin a series of dreams of being able to fly again, as they were able to do in The Summer Birds. Bobby, being fat, is consistently teased by his classmates. Emma is also initial hostile towards Bobby, but realises that not only does Bobby appear in these dreams, but he is also having the same dreams. As the two oldest children in the school, Bobby and Emma are appointed head boy and head girl. In the dreams, they fly over their village and the South Downs, with the North Downs and the sea visible in the distance. They are observed and shadowed by an evil presence, initially appearing as a pair of eyes watching them. Strangely, the trees in their dreams consistently shrink downwards into the ground. Bobby realises that in their dreams, they are being dragged backwards in time. In successive dreams, they travel farther and farther back in time, visiting the Ice Age and seeing a mammoth, and a distant prehistoric time where they see a monstrous dinosaur. They speculate if they will eventually arrive at the beginning of the world, and if they will see the Garden of Eden. Eventually, in their final dream, Emma and Bobby are dragged back to the beginning of the world. They stand on a rocky shore facing the sea, and are confronted by the evil being, revealed as a grotesque, distorted form of their teacher, Miss Hallibutt. The being threatens to consume them by taking away their thoughts of reality. After transforming itself into replicas of Emma and Bobby themselves, its attempts are defeated by the two children being able to concentrate on reality and of their home and their school. The children are jerked out of the dream world and return to reality. As term draws to a close, the thaw comes, and the children at school react with great joy, with Emma realising that Charlotte will soon be return home after her second term at the boarding school. Bobby and Emma walk home, with the children knowing they will not return to the dream world. As Bobby runs up the laneway to his home, Emma calls out to him, "Pleasant dreams, Bob, pleasant dreams!"

Supplement to the Journey to the West

Tong Yue

During the battle with the Raksasha Lady Iron Fan, Monkey transforms into an insect and enters her stomach. He forces her to give him the magic fan that he needs to quell the heavenly fire of the Flaming Mountain blocking their path to India. However, it is while he is in her stomach that he becomes aroused with passion. This becomes a chink in Monkey’s emotional and spiritual armor as he is otherwise without weakness. It is months after the pilgrims bypass the mountain that he falls prey to the magic of the Qing Fish demon, an embodiment of desire. The demon uses its powers of illusion to trap him in a dream world so nothing will keep it from eating the Tang Priest. The story from this point reads disjointedly as the dream world does not adhere to the rules of the physical world. While on a mission to find food, Monkey comes upon a large city flying the banner “Great Tang’s New Son-of-Heaven, the Restoration Emperor, thirty-eighth successor of Taizong.” This strikes him as odd as it was Taizong who had originally sent them on their mission to retrieve the Buddhist scriptures in India. This either means that the pilgrims’ journey had taken hundreds of years, or the city is a fake. He flies to heaven in order to learn more about the Great Tang, but finds that the gates are locked because an imposter Monkey has stolen the Palace of Magic Mists. The situation becomes stranger when he returns to the city and learns that the king has sent someone to invite the Tang Priest to become a general of his military. But when Monkey tries to intercept the messenger, the person is nowhere to be found, and he instead comes upon mortal men flying on magic clouds picking at the foundations of heaven with spears and axes. From them he learns that Little Moon King (小月王), the ruler of the neighboring Kingdom of Great Compassion, has put up a great bronze wall and a fine mesh netting so as to block Monkey’s path to India. But because he feels sorry for the Tang Priest, the Little Moon King forced the men to dig a hole in the firmament of heaven so that Xuanzang could hop from the Daoist heaven to the Buddhist heaven to complete his mission. But in the process, the men accidentally caused the Palace of Magic Mists to fall through to earth (hence the reason why heaven blamed it on him). Monkey goes to the Emerald Green World, Little Moon King’s imperial city, in order to fetch his master, but is blocked from entering once inside the main gate. When he uses his great strength to bust open the wall, he falls inside of a magic tower full of mirrors that act as gateways to different points in history and other universes. Monkey travels to the “World of the Ancients” (the Qin Dynasty) by drilling through a bronze mirror. He disguises himself as Beautiful Lady Yu, concubine of King Xiang Yu of Chu, in order to retrieve a magic “Mountain-removing Bell” from the first Qin Emperor so that he can use it to clear the group’s path to India of any obstacles blocking their way. But Monkey later learns that the Jade Emperor had banished the emperor to the “World of Oblivion,” which lies beyond the “World of the Future.” Xiang Yu takes him to a village housing a set of Jade gates that lead to the World of the Future. Monkey leaps through and travels hundreds of years forward in time to the Song Dynasty. After resuming his normal form, some junior devils appear and tell him that King Yama has recently died of an illness and that Monkey must take his place as judge of the dead until a suitable replacement can be found. He ends up judging the fate of the recently deceased Prime Minister Qin Hui. Monkey puts Qin through a series of horrific tortures, after which a demon uses its magic breath to blow his broken body back into its proper form. He finally sends a demon to heaven to retrieve a powerful magic gourd that sucks anyone who speaks before it inside and melts them down into a bloody stew. He uses this for Qin's final punishment. Meanwhile, Monkey invites the ghost of Yue Fei to the underworld and takes him as his third master. He entertains Yue until Qin has been reduced to liquid and offers the general a cup of the Prime Minister's "blood wine." Yue, however, refuses on the grounds that drinking it would sully his soul. Monkey then does an experiment where he makes a junior devil drink of the wine. Sometime later, the devil, apparently under the evil influence of the blood wine, murders his personal religious teacher and escapes into the "gate of ghosts," presumably being reborn into another existence. Yue Fei then takes his leave to return to his heavenly abode. Monkey sends him off with a huge display of respect by making all of the millions of denizens of the underworld kowtow before him. After leaving the underworld, Monkey is able to return to the tower of mirrors with the help of the New Ancient, a man who had been trapped in the World of the Future for centuries. However, when he tries to leave the tower through a window, Monkey becomes entangled by red threads (a representation of desire). He becomes so worried that his very own spirit leaves his body and, under the guise of an old man, snaps the threads. He later discovers from a local Daoist immortal that the Qin Emperor has loaned the Mountain-removing Bell to the founder of the Han Dynasty, his former enemy. In addition, he learns that the Tang Priest has given up the journey to India, dismissed his other disciples Pigsy and Friar Sand, taken a wife, and accepted the position as a general of the imposter Great Tang military. Xuanzang begins to amass a huge army to fight the forces of desire led by King Paramita, one of Monkey’s five sons born to Lady Iron Fan. Monkey is eventually made a junior general and faces his son in battle. Confusion eventually sets in causing the clashing armies to attack both friend and foe. This shock causes Monkey to slowly stir from the dream. Somewhere between the dream world and the world of reality, he learns from the disembodied Master of the Void that he has been bewitched by the Qing Fish demon. Both Monkey and the Qing Fish have a connection because they were born at the same time from the same primordial energies at the beginning of time. The only difference is that Monkey’s positive Yang energy is offset by the demons far more powerful negative Yin energy. The demon is in effect the physical embodiment of Monkey’s desires. When he finally awakens, having dreamed the entire adventure in only a few seconds, he discovers that the demon has infiltrated the Tang Priest’s retinue by taking on the form of a young and beautiful Buddhist monk. Monkey instantly kills him with his iron cudgel, thereby killing his desire. He explains everything that had transpired, to which the Tang Priest commends him for his great effort.

Mr. Monk in Trouble

Lee Goldberg

The story opens with a diary excerpt from the early 1850s, narrated by a young woman named Abigail Guthrie, who lives with her farmer husband Hank in the middle of Kansas. Hearing about the discovery of gold out west in California, and hoping for a better life, they leave Kansas and migrate to California, ending up in the small mining camp of Trouble. As years go by, Abigail struggles to support Hank, who eventually becomes ill and dies of natural cases portaining to his "gold fever" (desire for gold). Struggling to find a job in the aftermath of her husband's death, she eventually is found and hired by Artemis Monk, one of the most important people in the town due to his job as an assayer (who examines rocks and tells miners what the worthiness of their mining operation is going to look like). However, as Abigail soon finds out, Artemis is also known for his worthy reputation of solving crimes. 150 years later, in 2008, the main story of Mr. Monk in Trouble opens on Halloween, which couldn't be worse for Adrian Monk. He hates trick-or-treaters, and considers it a form of extortion. Nonetheless, he gets a bit of a reprieve when a man named Clarence Lenihan shows up at his door. Monk exposes him as a killer on the fact that he is wearing a confession - blood spatter on his clothes. Captain Stottlemeyer arrives and arrests Lenihan. Two days later, Monk and Natalie Teeger are called to the police station, where Stottlemeyer informs them of a favor he would like them to do. It involves a retired SFPD beat cop named Manny Feikema, who retired a few years earlier and moved to the tiny old mining town of Trouble, in central California. He signed up as a security guard at their history museum a few months later, and worked that job until a few nights ago, when he was bludgeoned and killed while doing his rounds. It wouldn't be any of the SFPD's business, but the Trouble police chief has contacted Stottlemeyer to see if someone Manny put away has been released recently. Stottlemeyer has Monk and Natalie go out to Trouble to assist the chief, which he can't do because he is out of vacation days. Monk and Natalie make their way east towards Trouble, though they almost turn back when they drive through a big swarm of migrating butterflies that leave the windshield completely filthy. They introduce themselves to Harley Kelton, the local police chief and a former Boston cop, who takes them to the Gold Rush Museum, housed inside Trouble's old train station. Monk observes the scene, and learns that Manny Feikema had a routine - he had to walk the perimeter every hour and log in at sensors placed around to confirm that he wasn't sleeping at his desk. Kelton notes that the killer struck Manny over the head with a pick from a diorama and left at about 2:32 AM. Monk notes some interesting details: namely, why did the killer use the pick instead of using one of the closer weapons? And why does nothing appear to have been taken, more or less, even searched? Monk and Natalie take great interest in the museum's centerpiece: the actual steam locomotive from the "famous" Golden Rail Express train. According to the museum director, Ed Randisi, the locomotive was part of a train consist involved in a renowned holdup in 1963. It seems that the Golden Rail Express train was a private railroad built in the 19th century to run the wealthy barons from San Francisco and Sacramento up to their mining operations in Trouble. It was eventually made a public operation, and shortened to start in Sacramento. A high stakes poker game contrived by a developer proposing a housing tract in Trouble would mark the final run in 1963. During the game, the train was held up by three masked men, who robbed the gambling car in a brazen heist. One security guard was shot and killed and the conductor, Ralph DeRosso, fell off the train and died of his injuries. Two of the robbers, George Gilman and Jake Slocum, were eventually caught, but what happened the gold has always been a mystery. Several theories have come up since the robbery as to what happened. The most widely known theory is that the burlap bags containing the loot were thrown off the train. This theory has several holes in it: if the fall was bad enough that the conductor died, then the bags could have broken open and spilled their contents everywhere, yet the only things discovered during a search of the tracks were the discarded guns and masks used by the robbers. Interested in learning more about the train robbery, Monk and Natalie visit the office of Doris Thurlo, Trouble's historian. She has a momentary panic attack when Monk introduces himself, and for a moment appears to be having a panic attack when she refers to Natalie as "Abby". Monk and Natalie are both confused by Doris's unusual behavior, but she regains control of herself and admits that she mistook Adrian for Artemis Monk, Trouble's renowned assayer during the Gold Rush period and the diary excerpt in the prologue. In fact, Doris Thurlo's office is Artemis's old cabin, called the Box House because of its perfectly square shape. According to Doris, Artemis Monk was a very important figure in Trouble, responsible for sampling and testing rock samples brought in by miners and then telling them how good their claim was. He also helped their sheriff, Sheriff Wheeler, solve the most puzzling of the crimes that took place in the mining town. In regards to the train robbery, Monk and Natalie learn from Doris that Slocum and Gilman, the arrested robbers, were caught because they carried distinctive gold coins in their pockets and were caught carrying them when they got off. Gilman was the one who shot the guard, and interestingly, both of them claimed to have been hired by Ralph DeRosso to pull off the robbery. They also learn more about the other important players on the train that night - Gilman died in prison, but Slocum made parole in the early 1990s. The engineer, Leonard McElroy, and the boilerman, Clifford Adams, also didn't hear anything. The train, it turns out, was supposed to be discontinued after the run during which the heist happened, but as a result of the overnight fame from the robbery, the service continued for another twenty years until 1982. Though McElroy died of lung cancer six months before the service was discontinued, Adams worked until the very last day and now lives in an old mine shack outside of Trouble. The locomotive is the only remaining car of the train to have survived being scrapped. During the next part of the story, there are small breaks away from the modern story where Natalie reads from The Amazing Mr. Monk, a diary written by Artemis's assistant Abigail Guthrie (also the narrator of the prologue at the beginning of the book) about Artemis's exploits. All of the sub-stories are narrated from Abigail's point-of-view, much like the parent novel is narrated from Natalie's point-of-view. During their first night in Trouble, Natalie first reads a story called "The Case of Piss-Poor Gold," about an incident where Artemis proves a cowhand named Bud Lolly guilty of smashing in a miner's skull and stealing his gold simply from the splinters and tar on his clothing before even seeing the body. Later, after having dinner with Kelton, Natalie reads "The Case of the Snake in the Grass," where Artemis exposes a placer miner's scheme to salt his property and con the man he is selling his property to. The next day, Monk and Natalie visit Dorothy's Chuckwagon, the local diner, and talk to Crystal, Ralph DeRosso's daughter, about the Golden Rail Express robbery. She mentions that McElroy and Adams both gave portions of their paychecks to the DeRosso family, which would most likely not have happened if they knew that DeRosso was one of the robbers. While they are eating, they also encounter Bob Gorman, the local auto mechanic and now the museum's volunteering security guard, who has information about the Manny Feikema case - he tells them that a few days before the murder, a man driving a 1964 Thunderbird (unique because it was the type of model equipped with a swing-away steering column) stopped by his garage and asked him some questions about Manny, apparently wanting to see him. With some consulting from Kelton, Monk and Natalie locate and track down Clifford Adams at his old shack. He mentions that the train never stopped during the robbery because the robbers threatened to kill anyone who tried to stop the train before they reached Trouble. He also gives several theories about what happened to the gold, but they don't turn out to be useful at all. Thanks to a call to Stottlemeyer, they have managed to also track down Jake Slocum to a retirement home in Angels Camp. They interview him, and Slocum tells them his story in detail: Some time before the robbery, he and Gilman supported themselves by committing muggings and burglaries. While contemplating their next move at a bar in Placerville, they saw Ralph DeRosso and decided that they had an easy mark. As they were about to mug him, he suddenly turned around and recruited them into helping him carry out the robbery of the train. DeRosso took a napkin and drew out a sketch of the train, which was comprised (in order) of a locomotive, a boxcar, the gambling car, the dining car, and then two passenger cars. There were several twists: Slocum and Gilman only would know what they were supposed to do, so neither of them were sure whether DeRosso planned on double-crossing them or not. According to the plan, Slocum and Gilman were to meet on the platform outside the gambling car at a prearranged point (when the lights flickered for a few seconds; which would happen several times during the trip). At the arranged time, they were to put on their masks, and then burst into the gambling car, taking the guard by surprise. After overpowering him, they would load the money into burlap sacks brought in by a robber entering from the forward end of the car. This third man would then take the bags with him, Slocum and Gilman would then toss their stuff off the train, and then rejoin the party in the dining car, without ever being missed. This entire aforementioned plan was perfect in planning, but when it was actually executed, things didn't work out correctly: first, Gilman shot and killed the guard instead of disarming him, and DeRosso somehow fell from the moving train. During the interview, Kelton arrives and informs Monk and Natalie that he's found a person of interest from Gorman's tip, an enforcer Manny put away named Gator Dunsen, who is living at his place in Jackson. As they follow Kelton to Gator's house, Natalie tries running some other theories about the robbery, but Monk shoots them all down, since her theories don't explain where the secret compartment the gold was rumored to have been hidden in went. When they reach Gator's house, a shootout ensues between Gator and Kelton, who eventually kills him. Monk and Natalie are ejected from the scene by Detective Lydia Wilder of the state police, who also berates Kelton for pursuing Gator without contacting them. The evidence hinting that Gator is the killer is overwhelming - Gorman's statement from the restaurant, and photos recovered from Gator's house of the museum's diorama that suggest that Gator was casing the gallery. However, as Monk and Natalie return to Trouble, Monk points out several holes in the circumstances around Gator's death - for one thing, his car was squeaky clean, yet it would have gotten dirty going into or out of Trouble since you have to pass through the swarm of migrating butterflies. Also, if the diorama photos were ones he took while casing the museum for a hiding place, how come the pick used as the murder weapon is not present in any of them? Monk believes that someone planted those photos to lure them astray and suspects that Gorman is lying about them. When they do reach Trouble, they notice Clifford Adams leaving the museum in his pickup truck. Monk wonders what Adams might be up to. They also notice Gorman watching Adams with very keen interest. That night, Natalie reads from Abigail Guthrie's diary "The Case of the Cutthroat Trail," where Artemis solves a miner's murder just based on how the killer slit the guy's throat. The next morning, she gets a call that seems to be coming from Clifford Adams, who says "I want to live," like he is in danger. Monk and Natalie race out to Adams's compound, but they are too late: he is dead. As they are observing, Monk accidentally falls into an old mine shaft. Natalie ends up dislocating her shoulder and ripping some of her fingernails out when she is pulling him up. Once he's safely up, Monk confirms that Adams is dead by noting that vultures are now eating at him. He also believes that the killer called Natalie and was intending for them to fall into one of the abandoned mine shafts that are located all over the area. Monk is forced to drive the car back to the main road where they are able to get a signal to call for help. Natalie is taken to the hospital, and her arm is put into a sling after Kelton pops her shoulder back into place. While at the hospital, Natalie asks Monk to read a story from the diary. Monk reads "The Case of the Golden Rail Express," which shows that the Golden Rail Express train was held up many times before the famous robbery in the 1960s. The earlier robbery discussed is one where two local men from Trouble held up the train, killed three people and shot two others, and then made off with their money, which was later used in an attempt to salt their mine so they could con the businessman they were selling out to. Natalie spends much of the day in a stupor, finally coming around in the evening. She also finds that Monk has gone out, but he has apparently been making calls to Stottlemeyer, Lieutenant Disher, Doris Thurlo, and the voicemail for the museum. Desperate, she tracks down Kelton, and tries to see if he knows where Monk is. As they head towards the museum, Kelton confirms Monk's suspicion that Clifford Adams's killer tried to lure them onto the booby-trap field. He also notes that Adams was struck over the head at around midnight and the body was moved out on the rocks, the "bait". Natalie suspects Gorman of killing Manny Feikema and then somehow leading them astray, meaning he could be involved with Gator Dunsen's death. She also briefly wonders if Gorman killed Adams, but then realizes that at the distance from town to Adams' compound, Gorman would have to have missed one of his rounds driving out there and then back. When Natalie and Kelton enter the museum, they find Gorman looking inside the locomotive's furnace. Kelton draws a gun on him, and Monk comes out of the diorama, revealing that he has solved the robbery of the Golden Rail Express. Monk remembered Clifford Adams mentioning that he had been trying for years to find gold in his mining operation. He figured out what happened to the gold after reading the journal entry about the historic train holdup. It turns out that the Golden Rail Express loot has never left the train. Whether he knew it or not, Jake Slocum was right when he suspected that Ralph DeRosso was the robber who entered the gambling car from in front. Plus, from the beginning, Slocum and Gilman were always skeptical about DeRosso's ability to keep a promise about delivering them their shares of the money (which would have been made six months after the robbery if things went as planned). They were worried that DeRosso might suddenly withdraw their shares of the money. Indeed, Slocum and Gilman did not know that Leonard McElroy and Clifford Adams in the locomotive were also in on the job as well. After they loaded the money into DeRosso's burlap sacks, DeRosso delivered them to Adams and McElroy up in the locomotive. This makes sense - with his experience as both a conductor and as a brakeman, DeRosso was able to easily make his way along the roof of the train to the locomotive. He fell off the train after delivering the sacks to the crew. As for what happened to the gold, it was put into the locomotive's furnace. Monk notes that in the earlier robbery, the robbers hammered the gold into black flakes that they mixed with blasting powder in their salting scheme. In the 1960s robbery, Adams and McElroy tossed the money bags into the furnace of the locomotive. This turns out to be the reason why burlap sacks were used - they were easy to burn. Adams and McElroy tossed the sacks into the furnace, melting down the gold, and used it to line the furnace. The plan was for the furnace to be recovered after the locomotive was scrapped, but this never happened. The resulting fame of the train caused the service to continue for 20 more years. After the train was finally discontinued in 1982, another attempt was made at recovering the furnace, but the locomotive was snatched up by the museum and there was no way the furnace could be recovered and the gold extracted. Monk reveals that Gorman killed Manny Feikema for the job of night watchman and has been spending his nights digging the gold out of the furnace. However, he needed to have Kelton present to prove it. It turns out that Kelton is actually holding his gun on Natalie, not on Gorman. A few weeks before Manny was killed, Kelton read Abigail Guthrie's diary, including the story about the 19th century train robbery. Being a good detective when sober, he figured out what happened, and decided to try recovering the gold, but he knew Manny would not help him out. Kelton instead hired Gorman, who killed Manny for the job. It was because he was digging out the furnace that explain why his hands have received a layer of soot. Kelton is a murderer, however - he is responsible for killing Clifford Adams. Monk reveals that he made that leap from a pebble in a pothole on the road out to Adams' compound. It turns out that this pebble got lodged in Kelton's tire treads when he parked in Gator Dunsen's driveway, and got knocked loose when he passed over a medium pothole on his way out to the compound. Kelton admits that after Monk and Natalie talked to Adams, he must have also figured what was happening to his gold, and went back to the museum, where he had found that Gorman had started digging the gold out of the furnace. Kelton killed him to prevent him from doing anything dangerous. It wasn't hard for Kelton to kill Adams, because he had just killed Gator and tried framing him for Manny's murder. Gorman was responsible for helping Kelton kill and frame Gator. When Monk, Natalie, and Kelton arrived at the house, Gorman was already inside, and he had planted the photos of the diorama to make it look like Gator had cased the museum. Gorman forced Gator at gunpoint to drink himself into a stupor, then tied him up and duct-taped his mouth, and then shot up the front door. Once Monk and Natalie had taken cover and Kelton had entered the house, all of the shots from the shootout, minus the fatal shot that killed Gator (which had to come from Kelton's own gun for obvious reasons), were staged. Kelton spent the extra time staging the scene, removing the duct tape from Gator's mouth, and then covering Gorman's escape out the back door. Monk's leap to the assumption that Gator's mouth had been duct-taped came from the fact that his lips were chapped and bleeding. Kelton prepares to kill the two of them, but then Stottlemeyer, Disher and several police officers burst out of hiding and arrest Gorman and Kelton for their crimes. Natalie is unhappy that Monk used her as part of the trap to catch Kelton, but while at the Chuckwagon, Stottlemeyer admits to her that Monk cared more about catching Kelton than about her feelings. On their last day, they return Abby Guthrie's journal back to Doris Thurlo, who mentions that at some point, Artemis Monk might have married his assistant.

Shuttlecock

Graham Swift

The story concerns Prentis, senior clerk in the 'dead crimes' department of the police archives in London, who is becoming increasingly frustrated and confused by the work he is being given by his enigmatic boss Quinn; he discovers crucial files are missing and suspects they are being deliberately withheld by Quinn. At home, Prentis is alienated from his wife and children and is obsessed about uncovering the truth about the wartime exploits of his father, who was a spy (codenamed 'Shuttlecock') behind enemy lines. His father published his memoirs but is now the inmate of a mental hospital following a breakdown in which he lost the ability to speak. As the story unfolds, Prentis suspects there may be links between Quinn's behaviour and his father's breakdown.

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children

Ransom Riggs

Jacob Portman, a 16 year old boy, goes to Wales to find out the truth of his grandfather's past after he was murdered by what Jacob thought was a make-believe creature. When he arrives, he meets Emma, a "strikingly pretty" girl who can control fire. She takes him to meet Miss Peregrine in a time loop set back in the 1940s. Jacob enjoys hanging out with the other peculiar children, such as Millard, who is invisible, and Bronwyn, who has incredible strength. Then Jacob is told some mysterious stories of strange killings in the pub he's staying at, and warns the peculiar children. When they tell Jacob he is the only one who can see the "hollows" or "hollowgasts", the monsters that killed Jacob's grandfather, Jacob knows he is the only hope they have for safety. Jacob and some of the peculiar children encounter a hollow which Jacob kills. Upon return to the Miss Peregrine's home, they find that Miss Peregrine has been kidnapped. The children rescue Miss Peregrine but she is in bird form and cannot change back to human form. At the end of the book, the peculiar children look for another time loop they can stay in because their current one has been destroyed.

You Can't Live Forever

Harold Q. Masur

Joshua Wilde, a theatre producer, attempts to sue his former partner Nicholas Creel, alleging that Creel concealed a promising script until after the company’s split. Wilde alleged that Creel had hidden the script in order to be the play's sole producer, gaining a larger share of the profits. Scott Jordan, who represents Wilde in the suit, finds a dead body in Creel’s apartment. Creel returns to find Jordan alone in his apartment with the body, calls the police, and furiously accuses him of the apparent murder. Jordan protests that he was let in by a brunette, but that he did not know her name; she had disappeared before Creel had returned. Jordan is arrested and later released when accusers can produce no motive or evidence that Jordan ever met the deceased. Creel drops the charges of breaking and entering after his wife, Hildegard, testifies that Creel was having an affair with a small brunette meeting Jordan’s description, lending credibility to Jordan’s testimony that he was let in rather than forcing entry. The body in Creel’s apartment remained unexplained; Creel was naturally the first suspect, but a witness, Julian St George (Hildegard’s uncle), had brought him straight to his apartment from his office, where he had been all day, and his secretary was able to corroborate his alibi. Scott resumes his search for the author of the script in order to confirm the date of submission, thereby proving his client’s case that Creel had intentionally hidden it from his partner. Scott discovers that the real author died before the script was produced, yet an “author” continues to receive royalty checks, addressed to Willard Thorne, a fabricated name. Scott begins to suspect that Creel, impersonating the author, was receiving royalty checks as well as revenues from the produced play. Gladys, Creel’s former secretary who tells Scott the true identity of the author, is found strangled the day after he speaks with her, and Scott begins to fear for his own life. Scott and Lieutenant John Nola, a police detective, although unable to find a solid link between Creel and the murders acknowledge that the circumstances seem to indicate his guilt, and they decide to question him, hoping to back him into a corner. When they arrive, they find Creel dead, stabbed with a knife belonging to Hildegard; Hildegard said that the knife had been stolen the night before. The knife was an heirloom passed down to Hildegard from her uncle Julian. Scott notices that the hilt opens, revealing a hollow tube and remembers a photograph found in Creel’s apartment curled like a scroll to a roll the width of a pencil. The image is a wedding photograph of Julian and Eva St George, and Scott notices that the photo shows Julian to be definitely shorter than Eva, whereas the Julian he knows is very tall. Julian St George was receiving substantial annuity payments every month, and since his father had set up the policy for him long before he was married, upon Julian's death, the policy would be terminated, and his wife Eva would no longer receive anything. Scott, upon seeing the height discrepancy, realizes that the real Julian St George had died years ago, but to continue receiving the annuity, Eva had gotten an impersonator, someone who looked exactly like Julian except for the unfortunate difference in height. Creel had discovered the photograph concealed in his wife’s knife heirloom and was blackmailing the St Georges, extorting thousands of dollars and forcing them to receive checks as Willard Thorne in order to give him the money once the checks were cashed. In an effort to destroy the one piece of evidence remaining of the former Julian St George, the impersonator had stolen the knife. Wanting to remove the remaining witness to their scheme, he had killed Nicholas Creel. When Scott confronts the St Georges with his theory, the impersonator draws a gun, planning to kill Scott as well. Lieutenant Nola enters just in time to save Scott, starting a gunfight in which the impersonator is shot and killed.

Child of a Dream

Valerio Massimo Manfredi

The story starts before the birth of Alexander at Pella, when her mother Queen Olympias dreams of a snake slithering inside her bed and thrusting its seed inside her; when she recounts her dream to the priests of the Oracle of Dodona, they tell her that her child shall be the offspring of Zeus and a man, just like his hero Achilles. During his childhood, Alexander and his friends Hephaestion, Ptolemy, Seleucus, Leonnatus, Lysimachus, Craterus, Perdiccas and Philotas, are firstly educated by Leonidas. He teaches them the values of courage and pride, but also magnanimity; this would prove very important to Alexander during his campaigns. When Alexander is 13 years old, his father decides to send him (and his friends with him) to Mieza, a nearby town, for him to be tutored by Aristotle. The great philosopher teaches Alexander and his friends all the latest notions of science, philosophy and literature. Leptine, a girl that Alexander himself had saved from slavery, also joins the boys in Mieza; she will also stay very close to Alexander until his death. When back into his hometown Pella, Alexander manages to tame a wild war horse at his first attempt. He calls his horse Bucephalus and he grows very fond of him. So much so that the two share an almost human friendship. Finally, Alexander is old enough to go to war with his father's army in Cheronea, where they are victorious. Alexander greatly admires his father and his military achievements. He is also very close to his sister, Cleopatra, and to his mother. However, when Philip marries Eurydice Alexander grows harsher towards his father but much closer to his mother, jealous and unhappy about the polygamy of Philip. Things go out of hand during the banquet of the wedding, when Alexander, after Attalus offends his mother Olympias, insults Attalus and his father and is obliged to leave the palace, taking refuge to his uncle's palace. Thanks to the help of Eumenes, the court secretary, he becomes reconciled with his father and comes back to the Royal Palace just in time for Cleopatra's marriage. However, Philip is murdered during the ceremony, which causes great sorrow to the young prince. The sorrow is then replaced by the anger towards the murderer and the desire to catch the responsible. He then decidedly steps up to the throne. Many people are not convinced by the new King Alexander, however, mostly due to its young age and lack of experience. Shortly after Alexander becomes king, Eurydice's children and Attalus are killed and Eurydice herself takes her own life shortly after due to the unbearable sorrow. Alexander immediately decides to undertake a campaign in Greece and Asia to affirm Macedonia's position amongst the Pan-Hellenic League and expand its frontiers, just like his father wished to do when alive. His expedition first leads them to Thessaly and his army, now featuring many of his boyhood friends but still a few veterans from Philip's army, records the first of a long sequence of victories.

Mr. Monk is Cleaned Out

Lee Goldberg

During a financial crisis, the San Francisco police department fires Adrian Monk as a consultant. Natalie Teeger learns that Monk invested his life savings with Bob Sebes, an investor who has just been arrested on charges of orchestrating a $100 million fraud. The key witness in the Sebes case is murdered, leaving Monk to consider him the prime suspect, except Sebes is under house arrest with constant guard and continuous media scrutiny.

Mr. Monk on the Road

Lee Goldberg

Adrian Monk is finally at peace after his wife's murder has been solved. He wants his agoraphobic brother, Ambrose, to feel the same way, so he adds sleeping pills to his brother's birthday cake. When Ambrose wakes up, he is in a motor home with Adrian determined to show him the outside world. The road trip is postponed several times when Adrian Monk is called upon to help with various murders.

Mr. Monk on the Couch

Lee Goldberg

Adrian Monk has to solve a murder of three people: a struggling student, a security guard, and a beautiful woman. The only common element between these three people is a couch.

Mr. Monk on Patrol

Lee Goldberg

The town of Summit, New Jersey is hit with a string of arrests, leading Randy Disher serving as the town's mayor. Disher hires Adrian Monk to serve as a temporary police officer for the town.

The Sands of Ammon

Valerio Massimo Manfredi

After the victory in Thessaly which ended the first book of the trilogy, Child of a Dream, Alexander and his army march towards the East. The first step of the expedition is to free the Greek cities from the Persian domination in order to establish a strong and unite Pan-Hellenic League. Once that is achieved, the target is the Persian Empire itself and its immense Asian territory. During his military campaign the Macedonian army records numerous victories, including those against the city of Tyre, the Towers of Giza and the legendary Halicarnassus. And it is in the midst of this campaign that Alexander meets the only opponent he believes worthy of his utmost respect: Memnon of Rhodes, the commander of the Greek mercenaries of the Persian army. He struggles in the attempt to defeat Memnon fair and square on the field, but the two end up stalemating each other with strategic cunning. Alexander's friends then suggest to end the confrontation between the two men by ordering to poison the mercenary; Alexander is however disgusted by this outrageous idea as he reckons his opponent is worthy of being defeated with respect and the only way for that to be possible is for Alexander to beat him on the battle field. However, Alexander's friends do carry out the order without Alexander's approval or knowing and Memnon is poisoned within a few weeks. The mercenary's death represents an anti-climactic end to the fantastic strategic battle between the two. After Memnon's death, Alexander claims his former wife: the beautiful Barsine. The two grow close, which makes Leptine jealous of their relationship. After the Macedonian army finally defeats Darius, thank to a tactically perfect charge, Alexander becomes the sovereign of the greatest Empire ever existed. But the young king is certainly not satisfied: he heads towards Egypt and, after defeating the Tyrian naval force that was attempting to block his way into the country, he finally makes it to the land of the Pharaohs. Here, he is proclaimed Pharaoh and he founds the first of his cities: Alexandria. Finally, he crosses the Libyan desert and after a long and hard journey, he reaches the Oasis of Siwa, where the Oracle of Ammon lies. This tells him that he is not a mere human, but the son of Zeus himself.

The Ends of the Earth

Valerio Massimo Manfredi

When the Oracle of Ammon tells Alexander that he is the son of Zeus, the young Macedonian king finds even more inner strength and will to conquer new lands and rule the biggest Empire ever known. His army then crosses the Tigris and the Euphrates to reach Babylon, which is then raged by the Macedonians. The palace of Persepolis, the most beautiful palace in the world, is burnt to ashes by Alexander himself. This marks the end of Darius III's Persian Empire and the beginning of Alexander's. The Macedonian King, Pharaoh of Egypt and Great King of Persia is now also nomined Great Leader by the Pan-Hellenic League and he aims for India and Arabia to expand his Empire even further. His army seems unstoppable and unbeatable, driven forward by a man that defies human capabilities. Yet, when he tries to make his dream of a great unite Empire between Macedonians and Persians reality, his army starts to doubt his ideals and to critique his way of adapting to Persian customs at court. As his companions slowly yet gradually wonder about their king's choices, Alexander's life gets a sorrowful turn. He loses his wife Barsine, his loved horse Bucephalus, his best friend Hephaestion and his tutor Leonidas in the most brutal of ways. Even his own life is now in danger, with some of his warriors planning to kill him twice. He has to execute the warriors who planned for his assassination as well as a friend of his that had heard of the plan but did not inform him. This torments him, but he knows he does not have choice. He finds refuge in the Iliad and other poems, where in the past he found sources of inspiration for battle tactics. He stops eating food and falls ill, and the only thing that gives him strength to go on and chase his immense dream is love. He meets and falls in love with Queen Roxane, who also gives the great gift of becoming father of a son. He is also named Alexander. He then tries to push forward towards India, as conquering it would mean that the whole of Asia would be in his hands, but his warriors' homesickness gets too much to bear. He then has to march backwards towards the now far Macedonia and, during this very last part of his journey, he falls ill again. His friends get really worried about his deteriorating conditions and it seems nothing can save the man whom pushed the boundaries of human capability. During the last few days of his life, unable to walk, he lets every one of his warriors walk into his tent and by its bed for a last farewell. And it also gives the opportunity to the sorrowful Macedonian soldiers to pay their tribute to their epic and heroic king.

Adujivitam

The book is divided into four parts (Prison, Desert, Esacape and Refuge). Najib Muhammad, the protagonist of the novel, is a young man from somewhere near Kayamkulam, Kerala state, recently married and dreams of a better job in any of the Persian Gulf states. In Riyadh, Saudi Arabia however he got trapped. Najib Muhammad is taken away by a rich Arab animal farm supervisor from King Khalid International Airport and is being used a "slave" laborer and shepherd assigned to look after goats, sheep and camels for almost three and half years in the remote deserts of Saudi Arabia. He is forced to do back-breaking work, is kept half-hungry and is denied water to wash and suffers unimaginably. The farm's brutal supervisor keeps Najib in control with a gun and binoculars and frequently beats him with a belt. In a country where he does not know the language, places or people, he is far away from any human interaction. Najib steadily starts to identify himself with the goats. He considers himself one of them. His dreams, desires, revenge, hopes—he identifies all it with them. He talks to them, eats with them, sleeps with them and virtually lives the life of a goat. Still he keeps a ray of hope which will bring freedom and end to sufferings some unknown day. Finally one night with the help of Ibrahim Khadiri, a Somalian worker in the neighboring farm, Najib Muhammed and his friend Hakim escape from the horrible life to freedom. But, the trio fumbles across the desert for days, and young Hakim dies of thirst and fatigue. Finally, Ibrahim Qadiri and Najib manage to find their way to Al-Bathaa, Riyadh, where Najib gets himself arrested by the Regular Police in order to get deported to India. Najib spends several months in the Sumesi Prison before being put on a plane to India by the Saudi Arabian authorities.

Spartan

Valerio Massimo Manfredi

Spartan is the enchanting story of two brothers born in the military city-state of Sparta. The elder brother, Brithos, was a Spartan paragon; the younger brother, Talos, was crippled and deformed at birth. Because of the cruel and strict laws in vigour at Sparta, babies that were deformed, crippled or had any health issues would not serve the city-state its purpose, which was to battle; therefore, these weaker children had to be sacrificed at Mount Taygetus. The young Talos however survives, rescued by a shepherd of the Helots, the people who served as slaves to the Spartans. This shepherd, who becomes Talos's adoptive father, raises Talos with love and recounts him the intriguing tale of Aristodemus, the last King of the Helots. The legend goes that he who wears his armour, shall be the one to free the Helots from slavery. However, the blood that runs in his veins is Spartan after all; Talos the Cripple is drawn back to his hometown and in the midst of the legendary Battle of Thermopylae. Here he faces the inhuman brutality and savagery of the Spartan soldiers and meets his brother for the first time since their separation when he crosses his brother's gaze whilst attempting to protect Antinea, the woman he loves. But destiny has got a better fate for them in store: as a war between the Persian Empire and the Greek city-states looms, the two brothers will find each other again and will fight shoulder to shoulder for the future of their country. Along the way, he discovers some thing of his [Spartan} life like his real name is Kleidemos. When his brother dies, he oversees the Helots, with the help of his friend Karas, helps the Helots have victory over his own race.

The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery

Eric Foner

The Fiery Trial chronicles how Lincoln's position on slavery changed during his life, as he witnessed slavery in his early life, growing up in Kentucky and Indiana. He occasionally dealt with issues of slavery in his law practice in Illinois. The book also discusses Lincoln's position on slavery in the context of his political career. Lincoln was a moderate, attempting to bridge the gap between the Radical Republicans and conservative Democrats, including those in the slave-holding states, who he hoped would choose preserving the Union over steadfastly defending slavery. However, Lincoln eventually abandoned his moderate stance on slavery when he determined that to win the American Civil War, he needed to act to end slavery.

Reinventing Discovery: The New Era of Networked Science

Michael Nielsen

The following is a list of major topics in the book's chapters. #Reinventing Discovery #Online Tools Make Us Smarter #:Kasparov versus the World, The Wisdom of Crowds, various online collaborative projects #Restructuring Expert Attention #:InnoCentive, collective intelligence, Paul Seabright's economic theory, online chat #Patterns of Online Collaboration #:History of Linux, Open Architecture Network, Wikipedia, MathWorks' computer programming contest #The Limits and the Potential of Collective Intelligence #:communication in small groups, particularly as studied by Stasser and Titus; praxis of science; a discussion of communication among scientists #All the World's Knowledge #:Don R. Swanson and Literature-based discovery, predicting influenza with Google searches, Sloan Digital Sky Survey, Allen Institute for Brain Science, Ocean Observatories Initiative, Human Genome Project, Google Translate #Democratizing Science #:Galaxy Zoo, Foldit, citizen science, eBird, open access, arXiv, PLoS #The Challenge of Doing Science in the Open #:Complexity Zoo, academic publishing #The Open Science Imperative #:Open science, academic journal publishing reform, SPIRES :appendix - The problem solved by the Polymath Project

In the Place of Fallen Leaves

Tim Pears

It is set in the long, hot summer of 1984 in an isolated Devon village on the edge of Dartmoor where thirteen year old Alison is growing up, the youngest member of a farming family. The story covers scenes from Alison's own life as well as those of her neighbours, siblings, parents and grandparents.

The Shield Ring

Rosemary Sutcliff

The story revolves around Frytha and Bjorn, a girl and a boy who have both been orphaned by the Norman conquest, and have sought refuge and been taken in by Jarl Buthar in his hidden Lakeland settlement by Buthar's Mere . The group is portrayed as Northmen settlers who have long established themselves in the area, and are resisting Norman advances into their country. They describe themselves as forming their shield ring up in the fells of Lakeland, as a form of Last Stand against the Norman invasion. The theme of this Shield Ring is developed throughout the story, an ultimately portrayed as an ethic of loyalty to one's group, even unto death. Bjorn is fostered to a Harp player, an old man who originally fought the Normans at Hastings, who refers to being part of that Shield Wall resisting William the Conqueror. The instrument becomes a key feature of the narrative, being a symbolic link to the indigenous Welsh and British peoples with whom the Norse of Lakeland have intermingled. Bjorn is seen as having the musical gift from his maternal Celtic forebears, and learns to play as he grows up. This links him back to the family of the emerald seal ring with the dolphin insignia, which he is given when he comes of age. Frytha is shown as being very close to Bjorn, as she adapts from her original Saxon upbringing to be part of the Norse settlement. The story develops with a paralleling to the epic of Beowulf, with Frytha making connections between events in their life and in the epic. The Northmen successfully fend off a series of Norman attempts to overrun Lakeland, but the story comes to its crux when Ranulf le Meschin leads the largest and seemingly final attack, coming down from Cockermouth. Bjorn is sent as a spy, under the guise of a traveling harper, to reconnoiter the enemy camp, and Frytha sneaks off to accompany him, referencing how even Beowulf had Wiglaf come to his aid when Beowulf faced his doom. They succeed in infiltrating the enemy camp, and gather much information, but are ultimately discovered when the emerald seal ring is recognized by a Norman knight who had previously had a life-and-death struggle with Bjorn. Bjorn is subjected to torture by fire, paralleling Beowulf's downfall to a firedrake, and successfully resists. The whole concept of the Shield Wall being a spirit of resistance and unity within the band is brought into direct focus during his ordeal. Bjorn and Frytha soon escape, and return to bring the needed news to their people. With this information, the Northmen mislead the Norman host into an annihilating ambush in Rannerdale. Although her own inimitable take on the story of Jarl Buthar's guerilla campaign and a final battle at Rannerdale between the Normans and the Anglo-Scandinavian Cumbrians led by the Jarl, Sutcliff's novel was clearly inspired by the dramatized history written by Lakeland historian Nicholas Size, called "The Secret Valley: The Real Romance of Unconquered Lakeland" (pub. 1930) Being the second novel written in the series of eight novels about the evolution of a British bloodline throughout the ages, it is the last in chronological order. It closes with the characters facing a world of change and persevering in their loyalty to their culture and to each other.

Turpentine Jake

Turpentine Jake is an epic play about the turpentiners, African-American men who worked fourteen hours a day harvesting pine gum from the longleaf pines in the Florida Panhandle. This forgotten chapter of American history (1890-1960) illustrates the story of Blacks held under debt peonage, earning less than the cost of food and clothing provided by the company store. Co-authors Linda Bannister and James E. Hurd, Jr. based the drama on the true story of Hurd’s grandfather and oral histories gathered from surviving turpentine workers. The play follows Jake, a legendary storyteller and mentor to those in the camps, as he spins tales and songs that help his fellow workers assert some control over their oppressive environment. A drama with music and original folktales, the play has a total of twenty-one roles. Double casting can bring the number down to nine or ten actors, if preferred. The set and costumes can be abstract or minimalist, with mere suggestions of the pine forest and turpentine camps. Productions can be mounted relatively easily, but offer high impact and strong audience involvement, as well as address slavery issues more timely than ever, given rising worldwide human trafficking. The play’s premiere was staged in workshop at Loyola Marymount’s Del Rey Theatre and received two NAACP Theatre Award nominations. Constance Congdon, Playwright in Residence at Amherst College writes, “Turpentine Jake is a play full of mystery and song, with an epic story and indelible characters. I left the theater feeling thanks and hopeful about what theater can accomplish with wonderful material.” “While the historical setting of Turpentine Jake takes place more than fifty years ago, debt peonage is as much an issue in the present as it was in the past. Turpentine Jake is a play for our time,” says Elias Wondimu, publisher and editorial director, Marymount Institute Press and Tsehai Publishers.

Of Wee Sweetie Mice and Men

Colin Bateman

Protagonist Dan Starkey is tasked with writing a book about "Bobby Fat Boy McMaster", the current heavyweight champion of Ireland, in his upcoming championship fight with Mike Tyson on St. Patrick's Day. When McMaster's wife is kidnapped, Starkey must figure out who's behind it before the varied and numerous factions that McMaster has offended, in his short time in New York, catch up with them.

Turbulent Priests

Colin Bateman

The plot of this novel is based on Wrathlin Island, a small island north of mainland Ireland. Dan Starkey has been sent by Cardinal Daley, the Primate of All Ireland, to investigate reports that the Messiah has returned in the shape of a young girl, Christine, about to start school. Starkey has his wife Patricia and illegitimate child "Little Stevie" join him as he investigates the tiny dry community and meets considerable resistance from the defensive residents.

She Lover of Death

Boris Akunin

A naive young woman, Masha Mironova, travels from provincial Russia to Moscow, where she changes her name to Columbine and joins the Lovers of Death, a small group of bohemian poets, each of them eagerly waiting their turn to die a romantic fin de siècle death by suicide. Once one member dies, their replacement is found by the leader of the group, the Doge. Another newcomer to the society appears to be a Japanese prince, although this turns out to be Erast Fandorin acting undercover. Fandorin is not the only person to have connected the suicides and the group: a newspaper reporter, Zhemailo, has also done so and he also dies a mysterious death. Fandorin uncovers that many of the suicides are murders, all committed by the Doge: in the process of his investigation Columbine also falls in love with Fandorin and becomes his mistress.

Shooting Sean

Colin Bateman

Dan Starkey is employed by legendary film star, Sean O'Toole, who is looking to escape his type cast action hero career and move into directing movies. Unfortunately, O'Toole is making a movie based on an infamous IRA member, nicknamed "The Colonel", and events soon lead to Starkey once again struggling to both protect his wife "Patricia" and illegitimate child "Little Stevie", while also keeping himself alive and writing.

Reality and Dreams

Muriel Spark

The story concerns Tom Richards a successful British film director and serial womanizer who has just fallen from a crane whilst shooting his latest film. During his lengthy recuperation he attempts to maintain control of the film, whilst the relationships in his extended family are tested as his daughter Marigold disappears...

The Horse With My Name

Colin Bateman

This novel follows Dan Starkey who is currently both unemployed and single. His estranged wife Patricia, after cancelling their counselling sessions with Relate, has entered into another relationship with someone called Clive and is currently living with him in the family home. Starkey receives a request from Mark Corkery, known as "The Horse Whisperer", to investigate racing entrepreneur Geordie McClean who is apparently not quite as clean as his name would suggest.

The Summer Birds

Penelope Farmer

Charlotte and Emma Makepeace are children living with their grandfather, Elijah, in a country house in the South Downs in southern England. Named Aviary Hall, the house is decorated with stuffed birds and images of birds. On the way to their small English village school, they meet and befriend a mysterious boy who tells them that he is able to teach them to fly. Over the following days and weeks, the boy teaches Charlotte to fly, and then the other children at the school learn this ability. The boy remains invisible to the adults, with the exception of the schoolteacher, Miss Hallibutt, who herself, as a child, had wished that she could fly. The boy tells her that he is unable to teach her to fly: he can only teach children. The children spend an idyllic summer flying above their village and the downs. As summer draws to an end, the boy offers to take the children on a journey, and the children prepare to go with the boy. Charlotte realises that the boy is not telling them the whole truth, and forces the boy to admit the truth. The boy reveals that while he wants to take them back to his country where the can fly forever, and be children forever, without adult responsibilities, the cost of following him is that they will never be able to return to their homes and their loved ones. The children decide that this indeed is too high a price to pay, and all decline to travel with the boy, with the exception of one girl, who has neither parents, nor a happy life to return to. The children return to their homes and prepare to begin a new term at school.

The Black Rose

Thomas B. Costain

In 13th century England, Walter, the bastard of Gurnie, attends a lecture by Roger Bacon at medieval Oxford and is inspired to journey to the far-away semi-mythical land of Cathay. After participating in a student riot and a raid on a castle – both led by his friend Tristram – Walter decides to leave England in order to escape Norman justice, taking Tristram with him. Walter's inheritance, obtained from his lord father's death, gets them as far as Antioch, where they are compelled to enter the services of a powerful Greek merchant named Anthemius. Impressed by Walter's cleverness and Tristram's physicality, he finds a place for them on a gift-bearing caravan heading east to the court of Kublai Khan. On the way, one of the beautiful women – the sister of Anthemius, Maryam (the Black Rose) - being sent as a gift to the great Khan escapes custody. She finds her way to the two Englishmen, who decide to shelter her on condition she pretend to be a servant boy and quietly leave when near the next large city. The caravan soon meets up with its chief escort: Bayan of the Hundred Eyes and his Mongol horde. Having fallen in love with Walter, Maryam stays with the duo; all three risking the deadly consequences that would follow their being caught by the Mongol general. The journey east sees Walter curry the favor of Bayan through being a competent chess-player and Tristram demonstrate the power of the English longbow in front of an astonished horde. Unfortunately, a spiteful Mongolian learns of their secret, and Walter decides they all need to leave the army. While the rest flee south into China, Walter attempts a desperate measure to lead the army off course. Although initially successful, he is caught in the act. He is honest to Bayan – who considers him a friend - but punished. He spends weeks recovering from the ordeal, and comes out with little hope of ever seeing his friend and lover again. He returns to Bayan only to be given the task of convincing the Chinese to surrender, for the Mongol horde has reached their borders. Once in the Chinese capital, he desperately searches for his companions while encouraging Chinese nobility to pursue peace. Although he succeeds in the first – marrying Maryam in the process – the Empress refuses to surrender due to an old proverb, and thereby holding them indefinitely. Caged in the most luxurious of palaces, the young couple live in happiness while the threat of war approaches. Eventually, they are able to procure escape, but Maryam is mistakenly left behind. Fearing her dead, the two friends find their way back to England. Two years of ship-hopping see them arrive home, rich with presents from the Empress and knowledge of the wondrous inventions they encountered: paper-manufacturing, gunpowder, the telescope, and the compass. Walter returns to Gurnie to find his lord grandfather prosperous in his business pursuits. Proud of his grandson, the old man names him heir to Gurnie. Now a nobleman, Walter finds his fame gaining him audience with the young King Edward I and his Queen, Eleanor of Castile. He tells them of the truths of Roger Bacon and the adventures to Cathay. Meanwhile, the determined Maryam – now with a baby Walter – finds it incredibly difficult to travel with the knowledge of only two English words. Around India to Aden, Alexandria, Venice, and Marseilles, she finally reaches London to be reunited with her husband – the very joyous and surprised Walter.

Big Nate: Strikes Again

Lincoln Peirce

Nate and Teddy are standing looking at the bulletin board looking at baby pictures for the "Guess that Baby!" game. Teddy points out a picture saying it's the ugliest. Nate realizes it's his picture. Francis walks up saying it's easy to tell it's Nate because he is drooling and he is trying to put a square peg in a round hole. Nate finds a baby picture of Francis and makes fun of it by saying Francis looked like a sumo wrestler in the picture. Teddy refuses to show Nate and Francis his picture. Then Nate finds Jenny's picture. He says it is the best looking baby by far. Gina walks up asking is he sure it's Jenny. He says it is. She goes up and peels off the picture. Nate tells her not to because it's not hers but it ends up being hers. Everybody laughs at Nate. Nate, Teddy, and Francis walk to Social Studies, and because of the new seating chart, Nate has to sit next to Gina. Then matters get worse when Ms. Godfrey pulls two names for a pair who will work on a project together. Francis and Teddy work to together and Artur and Jenny work together, which annoys Nate. But then Nate finds out he has to work with Gina on a Ben Franklin project. After class, they walk to the gym to see the team captain chart, and Nate is thrilled when it says he is a fleeceball (indoor baseball) captain. Then Randy Betancourt and his gang shows up. Randy sees his name on the chart, and when he sees Nate's name, he says he thought captains had to be good at sports. Then Nate says you don't have to be good at sports to be a captain. To prove this, Nate leads Randy and his gang to his locker. When Nate opens it stuff piles out of it burying Randy and his crew. Nate says you have to be able to outthink your opponent to be a good captain. Afterwards everybody is talking about how Nate punked Randy. Nate is at the library because he got in trouble in science. After the bell Nate has to go back to science so Mr. Galvin so he can lecture Nate. Nate realizes he's late to picking teammembers. After he gets to the gym he finds out Coach Calhoun already chose his team. Although discouraged at first, he is extra satisfied that Gina is on his team because now she is under his control. When Nate gets home he is thinking of a name for the team. When he hears Spitsy barking like crazy he gets a name, the Physco Dogs. The next day, Nate and his friends are walking to school, when Chad shows up. He tells Nate that Randy's looking for him. He says it's payback time. Nate thinks the school safety policy will keep him safe until he sees that Coach John is on duty. Nate thinks that if he sees Randy bossing him around, Coach John will let it go. Then Nate decides to run into the building, but Randy chases him. Then Principal Nichols stops them. Nate tries to get out of the situation by telling him that he's going to the computer lab to work on his Ben Franklin project, but Randy says he is, too. Then Principal Nichols asks the couple a question about Ben Franklin. When Nate answers correctly, Principal Nichols lets Nate go to the computer lab while Randy goes back outside. The bell rings, and Nate goes through a few classes. In art, the class is making clay sculptures, and Nate makes a Phsyco Dog mascot, and when Francis guesses it is a walrus, an annoyed Nate tells him it's a Phsyco Dog. Then Francis reminds him that he needed to tell Coach the fleeceball name by homeroom. After the bell rings, Nate rushes to Coach's office. Coach says Gina chose the name. Nate looks at the fleeceball schedule, and is shocked to discover that his team is named the Kuddle Kittens. Even though Nate still conciders that the name of his fleeceball team is still Psycho Dogs though nobody else calls them the Psycho Dogs after they read the bulletin board. Nate trying to get revenge on Gina by "accidentally" spilling egg salad on her but accidentally trips and spills it on his crush Jenny though Coach doesn't give him detention Jenny gets so mad at Nate even shouting IDIOT! at him.

Driving Big Davie

Colin Bateman

Dan Starkey is invited to Florida by his old friend, "Big Davie", who has a spare honeymoon ticket after being dumped by his erstwhile fiancée. Starkey is back with his wife Patricia and feels he's gotten over the murder of his toddler son "Little Stevie" - however his wife disagrees and declares that an American road trip would do him good. When the opportunity to avenge Stevie's death presents itself, Starkey cannot refuse.

The Millionaire's Wife

Twenty years after George Kogan's murder, in July 2010, his estranged wife Barbara admitted to hiring a hit man to have her husband gunned down. She was sentenced to 12 to 36 years in prison. The son of Holocaust survivors, 49-year-old George Kogan grew up in Puerto Rico before relocating to New York City, where he enjoyed success as an antiques and art dealer—until one morning in 1990 when George was approached on the street by an unidentified gunman and was killed in cold blood. Just before the shooting, George had been on the way to his girlfriends’s apartment. Mary-Louise Hawkins was 29 years old and had once worked as George’s publicist. But after they became lovers, George’s estranged wife, Barbara, was consumed with bitterness. As she and George hashed out a divorce, Barbara fueled her anger into greed—especially after a judge turned down her request for $5,000 a week in alimony. Barbara, who stood to collect $4.3 million in life insurance, was immediately suspected in George’s death. But it would take authorities nearly 20 years to uncover a link between her lawyer, Manuel Martinez, who was convicted of hiring a hitman to kill George. In 2008, Martinez was convicted in the murder of George, and in 2010, Barbara pleaded guilty to grand larceny, conspiracy to commit murder, and murder in the first degree.

Stranger Will

Caleb J. Ross

William Lowson spends his working life in the town of Brackenwood as a Human Remains Removal Specialist, cleaning stains left over after violent deaths. He spends his home life trying to convince his pregnant fiancée, Julie, that raising a child in a world so depraved is not only ignorant but egomaniacal as well. So far, however, Julie remains strict to her motherly desires and constantly assures William that his anxiety stems from simple cynicism. When not cleaning messes or preaching the world’s distress William sits atop a highway billboard and shoots down messenger pigeons as they attempt to deliver their cargo. Over the years William has amassed a sizable collection of their fallen messages, which he pins to a wall in his home. Throughout the novel William places and rearranges these messages according to similar themes in a subconscious attempt to organize the chaos around him. During one of these outings William meets Mrs. Rose, the messenger pigeon ring’s organizer and principal of Harold Straton Elementary. Conversation drifts toward William’s hesitancies with fatherhood, and considering Mrs. Rose’s part-time work at a local adoption agency she and William quickly become good friends. One night William gets an early morning call for a cleanup in the neighboring city of Alexandria. He and his co-worker, Philip, find at the location not only a human stain but also a woman in the basement, Shelia, barely alive, and as they find out later, the recipient of a very recent back alley abortion. Philip, always the romantic, quickly takes to this woman’s plight and rides with her to the hospital. William stays back to finish the original job. Philip pretends to be the woman’s brother in order to assume responsibility for her, but as is typical with Philip and his company he asks William and Julie for a few days’ help while he prepares his home for Shelia’s potentially lengthy stay. They accept. Shelia, due to a series of medical complications originating from the back alley abortion, screams all night. Julie cannot take the screaming so William agrees to ask for help. Mrs. Rose agrees to care for Shelia. A few days later Julie goes into labor. For William this event is the culminated failure of unsuccessful attempts to persuade Julie into somehow getting rid of the child. In his desperation he calls Mrs. Rose for help, though because Julie’s contractions are close he must leave for the hospital immediately. Due to the heavy rain William is run off the road and crashes the van. He blacks out. He wakes to Mrs. Rose burying his child. She reveals that her involvement with adoptions goes much further than the passive act of answering questions and guiding parents. She plays an active role in weeding out potentially “faulty” children, while motivating other children via her unique leadership styles at Harold Straton Elementary. One of these unique methods is hiring fake homeless people to sit outside the school playground in an attempt to draw the children near, and then using the interaction to teach children not to talk to strangers. Though growing apprehensive of Mrs. Rose’s methods William agrees to take part as a stranger knowing that he can argue little considering his involvement in the death of his child. The next day he plants himself at the Harold Straton playground, dressed in torn clothing and a fake beard. He meets Frank, one of the veteran strangers, and is invited to play cards with him and the rest of the strangers. William declines so that he can visit Julie at the hospital, whom he learns is comatose. The following night, however, he accepts Frank’s invitation and joins the strangers for horseshoes. He learns that the strangers are not as passive as he has been led to believe. They, like their mentor Mrs. Rose, actively participate in weeding out children, only their methods are truly disturbing. They manipulate the children anyway they can in order for Mrs. Rose to witness the devotion the children have toward her. One particular project has the children huge a tree covered in toxic phenyl. If they hug the tree, they pass; if they don’t, they fail. During his time sitting outside the playground William meets a child named Eugene, whom Frank says doesn’t have the potential to move forward in Mrs. Rose’s program. William grows close to Eugene, ultimately embracing the idea of fatherhood via his time with the boy. Once Mrs. Rose discovers this camaraderie she asks William to join her on an “adoption” meeting with an expecting couple. By this time, of course, William has learned that “adoption” means abortion, and that Mrs. Rose’s influence runs deep: even Shelia was one of her projects. Having learned of the beauty in fatherhood William spends this meeting with the expecting couple subtly undercutting Mrs. Rose’s attempts to sway this couple into “adoption.” By the end of the meeting, however, Mrs. Rose is successful. Julie returns from the hospital unaware of where her child has gone but insistent that she find it. She spends every moment digging holes, tearing down walls, destroying everything in search for her baby. William, having changed his mind about parenthood, watches this with absolute shame. At his most depressed state William is called, along with Philip, for a cleanup job at a home William recognizes as the Miller’s. Mrs. Rose has completed her task by taking their baby and William must now clean up the bloody mess left over. In the kitchen William finds a caged messenger pigeon with a note attached. Having learned that the messenger pigeon ring is Mrs. Rose’s way of organizing her “adoptions” William hesitates to read the note but does, discovering that it was Mrs. Rose who ran him off the road causing the wreck that killed his child. In an effort to end everything William kills Mrs. Rose and goes to the police about his missing child, but when they attempt to locate his child William finds that Mrs. Rose has moved it. The police reprimand William for the wasted time. William goes home understanding that he cannot control the world, but he can embrace his time with it.