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684924 | /m/032t6v | The Te of Piglet | Benjamin Hoff | 1992 | null | The Te of Piglet is based around two topics, the concept of Te, the Chinese word meaning 'power' or 'virtue', and Piglet of the Winnie the Pooh books. Hoff elucidates the Taoist concept of 'Virtue — of the small'; though, he also uses it as an opportunity to elaborate on his introduction to Taoism. It is written with many embedded stories from the A. A. Milne Winnie the Pooh books, both for entertainment and because they serve as tools for explaining Taoism. In the book Piglet is shown to possess great power — a common interpretation of the word Te, which more commonly means Virtue — not only because he is small, but also because he has a great heart or, to use a Taoist term, Tz'u. The book goes through the other characters — Tigger, Owl, Rabbit, Eeyore and Pooh — to show the various aspects of humanity that Taoism says get in the way of living in harmony with the Tao. |
689802 | /m/032_fh | The Jesus Incident | Frank Herbert | 1979 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction"} | The book takes place at an indeterminate time following the events in Destination: Void. At the end of Destination: Void the crew of the ship had succeeded in creating an artificial consciousness. The new conscious being, now known as 'Ship', gains a level of awareness that allows it to manipulate space and time. Ship instantly transports itself to a planet which it has decided the crew will colonize. The first book ends with a demand from Ship for the crew to learn how to WorShip or how to establish a relationship with Ship, a godlike being. The action of the book is divided between two settings, the internal spaces of Ship which is orbiting Pandora and the settlements on the planet. While the original crew of Ship, as described in Destination: Void, were cloned human beings from the planet Earth, by the time of The Jesus Incident, the crew has become a mixed bag of peoples from various cultures that have been accepted as crew members by Ship when it visited their planet as well as people who have been conceived and born on the ship. Evidently Ship has shown up at a number of planets as the suns of those planets were going nova. Implied is that the various planets were other, failed experiments by Ship to establish a relationship with human beings. Ship refers to these as replays of human history, suggesting Ship itself has manipulated human history time and time again. The Jesus Incident begins at a long, but indeterminate, time after the ending of Destination: Void. Ship's charge for humans to decide how to WorShip still remains unsatisfied. In The Jesus Incident, Ship has delivered the humans to a new planet, Pandora, upon which they are attempting to establish a colony. In the opening chapters, Ship reveals that Pandora will be a final test for the human race. Ship awakens the Chaplain/Psychiatrist Raja Flattery (part of the original Destination: Void crew that created the artificial consciousness of Ship) from hybernation, and reveals to him the true nature of this test. He tasks Flattery with intervening in the society which has developed on Pandora to solve this riddle of WorShip. Flattery is to help the humans to pass Ship's test or else risk the destruction of the race. Flattery assumes the name of Raja Thomas to mask his identity from the other shipmen. The surface of the planet Pandora is 80% seas, and the sea is dominated by a type of kelp which appears to be sentient. The land is overrun by a number of deadly predators who are efficient killers, requiring people on the planet surface to adapt to a highly stressful lifestyle living within a fortress. The main fortress is known as Colony, a small city that is predominately underground. When The Jesus Incident begins there have been three failed attempts at colonization of the surface. The current colony is starting a second colonization site, known as The Redoubt. In addition to Raja Flattery, several main characters drive the narrative. Morgan Oakes is the head administrator of both the crew and the colonists and the central provocateur whose actions drive the conflict. Jesus Lewis is his main assistant as well as a biological engineer. Kerro Panille is a poet who has a special relationship with Ship. Legata Hamill is an administrative assistant and data analyst for Morgan Oakes. The planet Pandora itself with its non-human inhabitants is another main character of the book, echoing a strong version of the Gaia Hypothesis. As the book progresses, the reader discovers that the kelp, the hylighters, and other creatures of the planet appear to be linked into a large entity with a shared consciousness, Avata. Jesus Lewis is the manager and chief scientist of Lab One which is a genetic engineering facility that is working on genetically modified clones of human beings in order to develop a class of engineered human beings who can survive the predators of Pandora. The clones are viewed as organic tools much like they were presented in Destination: Void where clones are sent out in specially prepared space ships to create an artificial consciousness. There is a clear social distinction between clones and naturally born human beings, a distinction that in the end leads to the outbreak of a series of battles and confrontations (slave rebellions) between natural humans and clones as conflict over food supplies and assignment of risk escalates. The other major project of Lab One is to create a tool that will eliminate the kelp living in the seas of Pandora. The kelp is viewed by the leadership of the Oakes administration as the major impediment to the exploitation of the seas as a source of food. |
690703 | /m/0332n1 | Soldier X | Don L. Wulffson | 2003-07 | {"/m/098tmk": "War novel"} | Soldier X takes place during the World War II. The main character of the book is a 16-year-old German boy named Erik Brandt. Although Erik lives in Germany, he is also half-Russian and speaks Russian very fluently, and he is often used as an interpreter for the German army, questioning Russian prisoners of war. Erik shows discontent at being a part of Hitler's Nazi army during World War 2, but he is forced to fight alongside young boys and older veterans alike in terrible conditions. Erik learns to accept several of his German allies as friends, and soon heads into his first battle after living in muddy trenches. After receiving a quick weapons training one day, Erik's platoon is attacked by Russian forces. During the battle, Erik is knocked out. When he awakens, Erik finds that most, if not all, of his friends are now dead, and that the Russians have taken the position from the Germans. Finding a dead Russian soldier nearby, he changes from his German uniform into a Russian army uniform. Since he is wounded, he is then taken to a Russian hospital, mistaken for a Russian due to his understanding of that language. There he meets a nurse, Tamara, who takes care of some of the injured soldiers - including Erik - and would later develop strong feelings for her. After becoming accustomed to hospital life and even volunteering to work around the hospital, Erik quickly makes new friends of his own: injured Russian men like Nikolai and, of course, Tamara and most of the nurses. Erik bonds with Tamara more so when he learns that her brother had died in a battle in the war. Tamara learns of Erik's German origins when Erik accidentally uses profanity in German after burning himself with hot water. Surprisingly, Tamara keeps this a secret, but keeps to herself more often than usual, seeming more quiet and reserved. As this daily routine carries on and Erik meets more and more injured soldiers, Erik especially bonds with one Russian soldier who, due to injuries sustained, would lose both of his legs and be sent back to his family without being able to walk. One day, the hospital is evacuated because of an impending wave of destruction in the of advancing German troops and artillery shellings. Erik escapes with Tamara and flees from any sightings of conflicts. Walking from city to city and looking for food wherever possible, Erik and Tamara travel together and once again reinforce their bond with each other. Their love reaches an epiphany when they kiss each other and proclaim their love for one another after being housed by a kind lady who had lost her son to the war. Eventually, Erik and Tamara are both injured by Allied soldiers. Ordered to cease fire by their commanding officer, the group of Allied, apparently American, soldiers notices that Erik and Tamara are but teenagers and send them to a hospital. Erik awakens to find that he is scarred in a gruesome manner from surgeries, and that he has lost an arm due to a gunshot wound. Tamara walks away with fewer and far less urgent injuries. Despite the grouchy and melancholy mood Erik first shows due to his injuries, he and Tamara make up as the story comes to an end. As time passed,the couple then traveled to the United States and still happily live there today with their children. |
691293 | /m/0334g5 | The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism | Max Weber | 1905 | {"/m/06ms6": "Sociology"} | Although not a detailed study of Protestantism but rather an introduction to Weber's later studies of interaction between various religious ideas and economics (The Religion of China: Confucianism and Taoism, The Religion of India: The Sociology of Hinduism and Buddhism, and Ancient Judaism), The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism argues that Puritan ethics and ideas influenced the development of capitalism. Religious devotion, Weber argues, is usually accompanied by a rejection of worldly affairs, including the pursuit of wealth and possessions. To illustrate his theory, Weber quotes the ethical writings of Benjamin Franklin: Weber notes that this is not a philosophy of mere greed, but a statement laden with moral language. Indeed, Franklin claims that God revealed the usefulness of virtue to him. The Reformation profoundly affected the view of work, dignifying even the most mundane professions as adding to the common good and thus blessed by God, as much as any "sacred" calling. A common illustration is that of a cobbler, hunched over his work, who devotes his entire effort to the praise of God. To emphasize the work ethic in Protestantism relative to Catholics, he notes a common problem that industrialists face when employing precapitalist laborers: Agricultural entrepreneurs will try to encourage time spent harvesting by offering a higher wage, with the expectation that laborers will see time spent working as more valuable and so engage it longer. However, in precapitalist societies this often results in laborers spending less time harvesting. Laborers judge that they can earn the same, while spending less time working and having more leisure. He also notes that societies having more Protestants are those that have a more developed capitalist economy. It is particularly advantageous in technical occupations for workers to be extremely devoted to their craft. To view the craft as an end in itself, or as a "calling" would serve this need well. This attitude is well-noted in certain classes which have endured religious education, especially of a Pietist background. He defines spirit of capitalism as the ideas and esprit that favour the rational pursuit of economic gain: "We shall nevertheless provisionally use the expression 'spirit of capitalism' for that attitude which, in the pursuit of a calling [berufsmäßig], strives systematically for profit for its own sake in the manner exemplified by Benjamin Franklin." Weber points out that such a spirit is not limited to Western culture if one considers it as the attitude of individuals, but that such individuals – heroic entrepreneurs, as he calls them – could not by themselves establish a new economic order (capitalism). He further noted that the spirit of capitalism could be divorced from religion, and that those passionate capitalists of his era were either passionate against the Church or at least indifferent to it. Desire for profit with minimum effort and seeing work as a burden to be avoided, and doing no more than what was enough for modest life, were common attitudes. As he wrote in his essays: : After defining the "spirit of capitalism," Weber argues that there are many reasons to find its origins in the religious ideas of the Reformation. Many others like William Petty, Montesquieu, Henry Thomas Buckle, John Keats have noted the affinity between Protestantism and the development of commercialism. Weber shows that certain branches of Protestantism had supported worldly activities dedicated to economic gain, seeing them as endowed with moral and spiritual significance. This recognition was not a goal in itself; rather they were a byproduct of other doctrines of faith that encouraged planning, hard work and self-denial in the pursuit of worldly riches. Weber traced the origins of the Protestant ethic to the Reformation, though he acknowledged some respect for secular everyday labor as early as the Middle Ages. The Roman Catholic Church assured salvation to individuals who accepted the church's sacraments and submitted to the clerical authority. However, the Reformation had effectively removed such assurances. From a psychological viewpoint, the average person had difficulty adjusting to this new worldview, and only the most devout believers or "religious geniuses" within Protestantism, such as Martin Luther, were able to make this adjustment, according to Weber. In the absence of such assurances from religious authority, Weber argued that Protestants began to look for other "signs" that they were saved. Calvin and his followers taught a doctrine of double predestination, in which from the beginning God chose some people for salvation and others for damnation. The inability to influence one's own salvation presented a very difficult problem for Calvin's followers. It became an absolute duty to believe that one was chosen for salvation, and to dispel any doubt about that: lack of self-confidence was evidence of insufficient faith and a sign of damnation. So, self-confidence took the place of priestly assurance of God's grace. Worldly success became one measure of that self-confidence. Luther made an early endorsement of Europe's emerging labor divisions. Weber identifies the applicability of Luther's conclusions, noting that a "vocation" from God was no longer limited to the clergy or church, but applied to any occupation or trade. However, Weber saw the fulfillment of the Protestant ethic not in Lutheranism, which was too concerned with the reception of divine spirit in the soul, but in Calvinistic forms of Christianity. The trend was carried further still in Pietism. The Baptists diluted the concept of the calling relative to Calvinists, but other aspects made its congregants fertile soil for the development of capitalism—namely, a lack of paralyzing ascetism, the refusal to accept state office and thereby develop unpolitically, and the doctrine of control by conscience which caused rigorous honesty. What Weber found, in simple terms: * According to the new Protestant religions, an individual was religiously compelled to follow a secular vocation with as much zeal as possible. A person living according to this world view was more likely to accumulate money. * The new religions (in particular, Calvinism and other more austere Protestant sects) effectively forbade wastefully using hard earned money and identified the purchase of luxuries as a sin. Donations to an individual's church or congregation were limited due to the rejection by certain Protestant sects of icons. Finally, donation of money to the poor or to charity was generally frowned on as it was seen as furthering beggary. This social condition was perceived as laziness, burdening their fellow man, and an affront to God; by not working, one failed to glorify God. The manner in which this paradox was resolved, Weber argued, was the investment of this money, which gave an extreme boost to nascent capitalism. By the time Weber wrote his essay, he believed that the religious underpinnings of the Protestant ethic had largely gone from society. He cited the writings of Benjamin Franklin, which emphasized frugality, hard work and thrift, but were mostly free of spiritual content. Weber also attributed the success of mass production partly to the Protestant ethic. Only after expensive luxuries were disdained, could individuals accept the uniform products, such as clothes and furniture, that industrialization offered. In his remarkably prescient conclusion to the book, Weber lamented that the loss of religious underpinning to capitalism's spirit has led to a kind of involuntary servitude to mechanized industry. Weber maintained that while Puritan religious ideas had significantly impacted the development of economic system in Europe and United States, there were other factors in play, as well. They included the rationalism in scientific pursuit, growing connections between observation and mathematics, development of scholarship and jurisprudence, rational systematisation of government administration (development of bureaucracy) and advances in entrepreneurship. In the end, the study of Protestant ethic, according to Weber, investigated a part of the detachment from magic, that disenchantment of the world that could be seen as a unique characteristic of Western culture. In the final endnotes Weber states that he abandoned research into Protestantism because his colleague Ernst Troeltsch, a professional theologian, had begun work on The Social Teachings of the Christian Churches and Sects. Another reason for Weber's decision was that Troeltsch's work already achieved what he desired in that area, which is laying groundwork for comparative analysis of religion and society. Weber moved beyond Protestantism with his research but would continue research into sociology of religion within his later works (the study of Judaism and the religions of China and India). This book is also Weber's first brush with the concept of rationalization. His idea of modern capitalism as growing out of the religious pursuit of wealth meant a change to a rational means of existence, wealth. That is to say, at some point the Calvinist rationale informing the "spirit" of capitalism became unreliant on the underlying religious movement behind it, leaving only rational capitalism. In essence then, Weber's "Spirit of Capitalism" is effectively and more broadly a Spirit of Rationalization. The essay can also be interpreted as one of Weber's criticisms of Karl Marx and his theories. While Marx's historical materialism held that all human institutions – including religion – were based on economic foundations, The Protestant Ethic turns this theory on its head by implying that a religious movement fostered capitalism, not the other way around. Other scholars have taken a more nuanced view of Weber's argument. Weber states in the closing of this essay, "it is, of course, not my aim to substitute for a one-sided materialistic an equally one-sided spiritualistic causal interpretation of culture and history. Each is equally possible, but each if it does not serve as the preparation, but as the conclusion of an investigation, accomplishes equally little in the interest of historical truth." Weber's argument can be understood as an attempt to deepen the understanding of the cultural origins of capitalism, which does not exclude the historical materialist origins described by Marx. |
692200 | /m/0336z1 | Iacocca: An Autobiography | William Novak | 1985-01 | {"/m/0xdf": "Autobiography", "/m/05h83": "Non-fiction"} | In part 1 of the book, Iacocca speaks of his Italian immigrant family and his experiences at school. Because he couldn't join the army for World War II due to rheumatic fever as a child, he attended Lehigh University, where he completed his studies in 8 straight semesters. He was offered a job at Ford straight out of college, but at the same time, he was offered a fellowship for a graduate degree at Princeton University. He took the fellowship with the promise of a job after leaving Princeton. Unfortunately, in his year at Princeton, his recruiter was drafted into the war and by the time he was finished with school, no one at Ford had heard of him. After explaining what had happened, he was given the 51st spot on the training group. In part 2 of the book, "The Ford Story", Iacocca tells of his triumph of the Mustang and his climb to power in the company. He and Henry Ford II developed a father-son relationship, and he also had developed a lasting relationship with Robert McNamara. After becoming President of Ford, Henry Ford II began fearing that Iacocca would be after the CEO job next. He established a plot to fire Iacocca, and Iacocca was to resign from the company on October 15, 1978, his 54th birthday. In Part 3, "The Chrysler Story", Iacocca tells of his difficult task of saving Chrysler from bankruptcy. He began a total reorganization of the company (including many layoffs) and received a US$1.2 billion loan guarantee http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d096:HR05860:@@@D&summ2=m& from the government with many stipulations, including increased fuel efficiency of its vehicles and restructuring the company to be profitable. On July 13, 1983, the loan was paid back in full and Chrysler began to flourish under the management of Iacocca. The final portion of the book, titled "Straight Talk", consists of rhetoric arguing for legislation compelling Americans to wear seatbelts, the high cost of labor, the Japanese challenge, and making America great again. |
695414 | /m/033gjn | Red Alert | Peter George | 1958 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | In paranoid delusion, a moribund U.S. Air Force (USAF) general, thinking to make the world a better place, unilaterally launches an airborne, preemptive, nuclear attack upon the USSR, from his command at the Sonora, Texas, Strategic Air Command (SAC) bomber base, by ordering the 843rd bomber wing to attack, per war plan "Wing Attack Plan R"—which would authorize a lower-echelon SAC commander to retaliate after an enemy first strike has decapitated the U.S. Government. He attacks with the entire B-52 bomber wing of new airplanes each armed with two nuclear weapons and protected with electronic countermeasures to prevent the Soviets from shooting them down. When the U.S. President and Cabinet become aware the attack is underway, they assist the Soviet defense interception of the USAF bombers; to little effect, because the Soviets destroy only two bombers and damage one, the Alabama Angel, that remains airborne and en route to target. The U.S. Government re-establishes the SAC airbase chain-of-command, but the suicidal general who launched the attack—the only man knowing the recall code—kills himself before capture and interrogation; however, his executive officer correctly deduces the recall code from among the general's desk pad doodles. The code is transmitted to and received by the surviving bomber airplanes and are successfully recalled, minutes before bombing their targets in the Soviet Union—save for the Alabama Angel—whose earlier-damaged radio prevents its recalling, and it progresses to its target. In a last effort to avert a Soviet–American nuclear war, the U.S. President offers the Soviet Premier the compensatory right to destroy a U.S. city, offering Atlantic City, New Jersey, however, at the final moment, the Alabama Angel fails to destroy its target and nuclear catastrophe is averted. |
697395 | /m/033n0d | Wizard's First Rule | Terry Goodkind | 8/15/1994 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/03qfd": "High fantasy"} | The primary protagonist in Wizard's First Rule is Richard Cypher, a young woods guide. Richard lives in an area of the world known as Westland, which is the only part of the world that at the time contains no magic. The Westland is separated from the other lands by a dangerous magical boundary that prevents anyone without the aid of powerful magic from passing through it. On the other side of the boundary are many sovereign nations, jointly known as the Midlands, and farther still past another magical boundary lies the empire of D'Hara. Richard works as a woods guide leading important political figures through dangerous forests, while his brother's interests lie entirely in politics. Richard is naturally compelled to investigate the mysterious brutal murder of his father who worked as a trader of ancient artifacts. Investigating the only clue he has, a small piece of vine, he happens upon a woman named Kahlan Amnell, whom he helps keep alive as she is being hunted by a group of four men sent to assassinate her. After helping to save Kahlan's life, it is revealed that Kahlan has come through the boundary with the aid of five wizards searching for the First Wizard, who is rumored to have crossed into the Westland after the creation of the boundaries. Richard feels that this woman is in need of protection and takes her to the only man he can trust, his best friend and mentor, Zedd. Richard discovers that this close friend of his has kept many secrets from him for his entire life. Zedd is not the simple man that Richard had presumed him to be, but rather the wizard for whom Kahlan is looking. Kahlan tells him of the events taking place on the other side of the boundary. An evil wizard named Darken Rahl is leading his army against the Midlands. At the same time, Zedd reveals that he discovered Richard to be worthy to be the Seeker at birth. He also explains that a "Seeker" must be tested for years before he can be appointed. When Richard wakes up the morning after being healed from the bite by the snakevine, he names Zedd as the first wizard, and this is when Zedd names Richard the Seeker of Truth because this was his final test. The "Seeker", is a title which comes with many responsibilities, primarily the Sword of Truth: an ancient magical weapon forged by the powerful wizards of old to enhance the righteous anger of the Seeker of Truth. Zedd explains that while the Sword is an awesome tool, Richard himself is the true weapon. They begin their journey together to stop Darken Rahl and prevent him from opening the boxes of Orden: magical devices which can give absolute power over life and death. Kahlan tells them that Rahl has two of the boxes but requires the third before he is able to make the magic work. Richard and Kahlan are tasked with finding the third box and keeping it out of Rahl's hands until the winter solstice, at which time, unless Rahl has successfully joined the three boxes, his life will be forfeit to the magic of Orden. However, due to an attack from some of the creatures of the boundary, Richard and Kahlan are forced to leave their companions in the care of Adie: a mysterious bone woman and cross the boundary alone. They journey to the village of the Mud People. This tribe had the ability to contact spirit ancestors for guidance. In order to seek out where the third box of Orden is hidden, they ask for the ancestors to be contacted. After finally convincing the Mud people to comply by becoming mud people themselves, they learn through a gathering of the mud people's ancestors that only the witch woman Shota, who is more feared than any other person in all the Midlands, has the power to reveal the location of the last box of Orden. While in the gathering Darken Rahl slaughters several mud people and kidnaps Siddin, the son of an elder. Richard and Kahlan travel to Agaden Reach where Shota tells them that the last box is in the hands of Queen Milena. Shota also warns Richard that both Kahlan and Zedd will use their powers against him. From Agaden Reach they travel to Tamarang, seat of Queen Milena, meeting back up with Zedd along the way. Upon reaching Tamarang, they discover that the last box is gone and eventually realize it was given to a small girl named Rachel for safekeeping. Soon Richard is separated from the group and he falls into the hands of a Mord-Sith named Denna and tortured for a month. He eventually breaks her hold upon him by using the magic of the Sword of Truth and turning the blade white. After helping a dragon named Scarlet find her lost egg, he discovers how to both beat Rahl, and be with Kahlan. Kahlan, falsely thinking Richard dead, enters the Con-Dar, or Blood Rage. Thinking Richard is in fact Rahl, she uses her powers on him, however he is immune to her touch. In the end, Rahl opens the wrong Box of Orden, under Richard's false guidance, thus killing Rahl. Finally it is learned upon Rahl's death, that Rahl raped Zedd's daughter, the result of which was Richard. Thus, Zedd is Richard's grandfather, and Richard is the new Lord Rahl. Kahlan and Richard set off for the Mud People's village to return Siddin to his parents. |
697872 | /m/033pd9 | Billy Bathgate | E. L. Doctorow | 1989 | {"/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | The title character is a poor and fatherless teenager growing up in The Bronx. Billy and his friends are in awe of the flashy mobsters in the neighborhood. Dutch Schultz and Otto Berman, based on the real-life mobsters, hire Billy as a gofer and become mentors to him. The gangsters take Billy up to their upstate hideaway, where they are awaiting a trial. Schultz becomes a community leader and converts to Catholicism. Billy works his way up but begins to question his actions when he falls in love with Dutch's moll Drew, whom Dutch plans to have killed. Billy is sent to Saratoga Springs with Drew to keep an eye on her. They act as a couple in Saratoga. He realizes that she is to be killed and calls her husband in New York City to come and rescue her. After Schultz is acquitted, Attorney General Thomas Dewey brings up more charges and the gang goes into hiding. This time they are in Union City, New Jersey. While Billy is visiting the gang to give them updates on Dewey's routine, unnamed gangsters come in and kill everyone except Billy and the bartender. Billy goes back to Schultz's hotel room and takes all the money from his safe. |
699430 | /m/033tnx | The Joy Luck Club | Amy Tan | 1989 | {"/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | The Joy Luck Club consists of sixteen interlocking stories about the lives of four Chinese immigrant women and their four American-born daughters. In 1949, the four immigrants meet at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco and agree to continue to meet to play mah jong. They call their mah jong group the Joy Luck Club. The stories told in this novel revolve around the Joy Luck Club women and their daughters. Structurally, the novel is divided into four major sections, with two sections focusing on the stories of the mothers and two sections on the stories of the daughters. The first section, Feathers from a Thousand Li Away, introduces the Joy Luck Club through Jing-Mei Woo, whose late mother Suyuan Woo founded the Joy Luck Club, and focuses on the four mothers. Jing-Mei relates the story of how her mother Suyuan was the wife of an officer in the Kuomingtong during World War II and how she was forced to flee from her home in Kweilin and abandon her twin daughters. Suyuan later found out her first husband died, remarried to Jing-Mei's father and immigrated to the United States. Her mother and Jing-Mei's father attempted to find Suyuan's daughters, and Jing-Mei's father assumed that Suyuan had given up hope. Jing-Mei, who has been asked to take her mother's place in the Joy Luck Club, learns from the other mothers that her half-sisters are alive and ask that Jing-Mei tell them about Suyuan's death. The other three mothers relate the stories of their childhood. An-Mei Hsu's story relates how her mother left her family to become the fourth concubine of Wu Tsing, a rich merchant, while An-Mei was raised by her maternal grandmother. Her mother returns only to cut off a piece of her flesh to cook a soup in hopes of healing An-Mei's grandmother, though An-Mei's grandmother still dies. Lindo Jong explains how in childhood she was forced into a loveless marriage and was pressured by her mother-in-law's desire for Lindo to produce grandchildren. Through her own ingenuity, Lindo fabricates a convincing story to annul her marriage and emigrate to the United States. The final story of the first section follows Ying-Ying St. Clair, who tells the story of how she fell into a lake during the Moon Festival when she was a four-years-old. After being rescued by strangers, she wanders into an outdoor opera featuring the Moon Lady, said to grant wishes; when Ying-Ying approaches the Moon Lady after the play to wish to be returned to her family, she discovers the Moon Lady is played by a man. The second section relates important childhood stories of the Joy Luck Club's American-born daughters. Lindo's daughter Waverly recalls being a national chess champion but her relationship with her mother is strained by how Lindo pressures her and brags about Waverly's accomplishments. Lena St. Clair, Ying-Ying's daughter, relates her mother's nervous breakdown and her mother is extremely withdrawn to the point where first her father and then Lena winds up being Ying-Ying's voice. In contrast, Lena notices and initially pities her neighbour's family, believing their noisiness is an expression of unhappiness but realizes later it is how they express their love. An-Mei's daughter, Rose Hsu Jordan, reveals how her mother lost faith in God when Rose's youngest brother, Bing, drowned in a beach outing. However, An-Mei still insists that Rose puts faith in her failing marriage. The section concludes with Jing-Mei's story, where she reveals how Suyuan had high expectations that Jing-Mei would be talented like Waverly and tried to shape a disinterested Jing-Mei into a concert pianist, which ended after an embarrassing piano recital. The third section follows the Joy Luck children as adult women, all facing various conflicts. In Lena's story, she narrates her troubling marital problems and how she fears being inferior to her husband, but does not realize he has taken advantage of her both at home and at work, where he is also her boss and earns much more than her. Waverly Jong worries about her mother's opinion of her white fiance, Rich, and recalls quitting chess after becoming angry at her mother in the marketplace. Believing that her mother still has absolute power over her and will object to her forthcoming marriage to Rich, Waverly confronts her mother after a dinner party and realizes that her mother has known all along about her relationship with Rich and has accepted him. Rose Hsu Jordan learns that her husband intends to marry someone else after divorcing her, she realizes that she needs to fight for her rights and refuses to sign the conditions set forth by her husband's divorce papers. In Jing-Mei's story, Jing-Mei has argument with Waverly at a Chinese New Year's dinner the year before the story begins. Realizing that Jing-Mei has been humiliated, Suyuan gives Jing-Mei a special jade pendant called "life's importance," which Jing-Mei rues that she never learned the meaning of the pendant's name. The final section of the novel returns to the viewpoints of the mothers as adults dealing with difficult choices. An-Mei reveals what happened after her grandmother died; she accompanied her mother back to where she lived as the abused fourth concubine of Wu Tsing, whose second concubine manipulates and controls the household and has taken An-Mei's half-brother as her son. After learning how her mother was forced into accepting her position after Wu Tsing's second wife arranged for An-Mei's mother to be raped and shamed, An-Mei finds her mother has poisoned herself two days before Chinese New Year, knowing that Wu Tsing's superstitious beliefs will ensure An-Mei will grow in favourable conditions. Ying-Ying St. Clair reveals how her first husband, a womanizer, abandoned her and how she married an American man she did not love after relinquishing her sense of control in her life. Lindo Jong relates how she arrived in San Francisco and met An-Mei Hsu when they both worked at a fortune-cookie factory, which eventually gave her the means to plant the idea of marriage in her boyfriend's head. The novel's final episode returns to Jing-Mei and her mother's desire to find her lost twin daughters. Jing-Mei and her father fly to China, where Jing-Mei meets her half-sisters and embraces her Chinese heritage. |
699520 | /m/033tz2 | Fried Green Tomatoes | Fannie Flagg | 8/12/1987 | {"/m/01qxvh": "Romance novel"} | Throughout the novel the narrator and time period changes. The reader relies on the chapter-opening visuals in order to establish the date and the source of the chapter. Some of the narration comes in the form of the fictional newspaper in Whistle Stop, Alabama called The Weems Weekly. Other narrations come from the Couches' house in Birmingham, and finally, some of the other narrations fill in some of the more intimate details of the characters mentioned in the various stories. The story jumps between two time periods. The first is set in the mid-1980s. Evelyn Couch goes with her husband several times a year to visit his aunt in a nursing home. Even though the aunt dislikes Evelyn, she still makes the trip. On one visit, she meets Ninny Threadgoode, another resident of the same home. Ninny begins to tell Evelyn stories from her life growing up in Whistle Stop in the 1920s, which is the second time period. As the novel advances, Ninny and Evelyn develop a lasting friendship. Evelyn also learns from the characters she meets in Ninny's stories. Ninny Threadgoode grew up in the bustling house of the Threadgoode family and eventually married one of the Threadgoode brothers, Cleo Threadgoode. However, her first love was young Buddy Threadgoode, whose closest sibling was the youngest girl, Idgie (Imogene) Threadgoode. An unrepentant tomboy, Idgie learned her charm from Buddy and the two of them were inseparable. Young Idgie becomes devastated when Buddy gets hit by a train and dies. After Buddy’s death Idgie kept away from her house and the only one who knew where she was, was Big George one of her family’s African American workers. Nothing could get Idgie to come home or act like more of a lady until a few summers later when the virtuous Ruth Jamison came to live with the family while she taught at the Vacation Bible School. The family and servants watched with amusement as Idgie fell head over heels in love with Ruth, but when Ruth went home to Georgia to marry a man she was promised to, once more, Idgie left home. Shortly after Ruth's mother dies of an illness, Idgie receives a page torn from the bible. The page was from the Book of Ruth (appropriately Ruth 1:16, "But Ruth said, 'Do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you; for where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God.'"), and was sent to the Threadgoode house. This page was believed to be a sign that Ruth was being abused by her husband Frank Bennett. Idgie then decides that she is going to get Ruth and bring her back to her house, so Idgie, Big George, her two brothers, and two friends go to Georgia to get Ruth. Intimidated by Big George, Frank does little more than protest before the group leaves with Ruth. Papa Threadgoode gives Idgie money to start a business so that she can care for Ruth and their son. Idgie uses the money from Papa Threadgoode to buy the cafe in which Sipsey, her daughter-in-law Onzell, and Big George (who was married to Onzell) worked. Idgie and Ruth used the money they made at the café to raise their son. The café quickly became known all over the US during The Great Depression due to the communication between various hobos who visited the café while passing through town. One of these hobos was half-time Whistle Stop resident Smokey Lonesome who became a part of the café family when he was in Whistle Stop. The café had a reputation for feeding men who were down on their luck. Idgie and Ruth even created a little controversy when they decided to serve black customers from the back door of the cafe. Around the same time as the controversy Georgia detectives stopped by to investigate the disappearance of Ruth’s husband Frank Bennett. Through Mrs. Threadgoode’s stories Evelyn begins to question the purpose of her life. She also begins to come to the realization that her reasons behind caring about what people's opinions were while growing up were pointless. When Evelyn’s efforts to reconnect with her husband are ignored she looks to Idgie’s story and becomes inspired by Idgie's boldness and audacity. Evelyn then creates an alter-ego named Towanda, a hyper-violent, Amazon-like character who lashes out at people. Evelyn begins to feel uneasy by how much satisfaction she feels at lashing out, and confesses this to Mrs. Threadgoode. Evelyn gets a job with Mary Kay Cosmetics and, at Mrs. Threadgoode's suggestion, starts to take hormones for menopause and becomes happier than she ever had been. For years the cafe ran, through World War II and into the 1950s. Idgie and Ruth's son grew up, and the lives of the town members moved on. However, when Ruth died of cancer, the life went out of the cafe. Several years later, Idgie herself was arrested along with Big George for the murder of Frank Bennett after his car was found at the bottom of a lake outside of Whistle Stop. The case is dismissed at the trial when the local minister lies on the stand and testifies that she and Big George were at a three-day revival the weekend Frank Bennett went missing. It is believed that the minister lies on the stand as a way to pay Idgie back for anonymously bailing his son out of jail. Bennett's body was never found, but it is revealed toward the end of the novel that when he came into the cafe to kidnap Ruth's infant son, Sipsey killed him with a cast iron skillet. While Big George barbecued the body, Sipsey buried Frank’s head in the Threadgoode’s garden. The barbecued body of Frank Bennett is then served to the Georgia detectives who are investigating Frank’s disappearance. The detectives rave that it is the best barbecue they have ever had. Evelyn, having gained a new outlook on life, goes to The Lodge (which she paid for with money she made selling cosmetics) in order to lose weight. Her husband Ed forwards her mail to her while she is away and she receives a letter from Mrs. Hartman, who is Mrs. Threadgoode's neighbor. In the letter, Mrs. Hartman tells Evelyn that Mrs. Threadgoode has died and that she has something for Evelyn from Mrs. Threadgoode. The ending of the novel reveals that some of the characters from Mrs. Threadgoode’s stories are still alive. |
700955 | /m/033ygj | Cradle | Arthur C. Clarke | 1988 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction"} | In 1994, the Marines are testing a new missile, but after the launch it mysteriously disappears and it's clear that if the rocket reaches civilian areas they will be in big trouble. Carol Dawson, a journalist, is alerted by an unusual sight of whales in the Miami area, and decides to go and write about it. Armed with special equipment provided by her friend, Dr. Dale Michaels from MOI (Miami Oceanographic Institute), goes to investigate the rumors of a missing missile belonging to the Marines and that could be behind the mysterious whale behavior lately. She hires the services of Nick Williams and Jefferson Troy, owners of a little boat so she can get to the Gulf of Mexico and investigate closer if a missile has something to do with all of the above. They end up finding an unknown artifact, bringing a lot of doubts about its nature, and even if it's part of a lost treasure that could be worth millions. Old friends of Williams and Troy noticed the finding and just like the old times, they want to steal it from them. In the background of the story, the author talks about a submarine snake civilization on a planet called Canthor, and how they were struggling to stay alive due to new threats into their ecosystem. It's revealed later in the story that the artifact found in the sea is actually a cradle that contains seeds with altered superhumans, which were extracted from earth millions of years ago and were altered so they could live with other species (including the submarine snakes) on earth. The spaceship that carries the cradle is manned by robots/cyborgs and has hidden itself on Earth's ocean floor to make repairs. Dawson, Williams and Troy found the damaged ship in the bottom of the sea while looking for the missile, and were asked to gather materials so the ship can be repaired and it could go back to its mission. Before leaving earth, the ship asked the humans to keep the cradle because it would enormously help the human race to have such superhuman seeds to develop faster and better through time, but in the end the humans refuse in order to avoid future wars between the human and superhumans. |
701947 | /m/03400m | Kings of the High Frontier | Victor Koman | null | {"/m/03lrw": "Hard science fiction", "/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction"} | The story is a polemic about NASA. The thesis is that NASA, far from helping space exploration, actually prevents it from going forth. The narrative follows disparate engineering efforts, ranging from New York University engineering students working out of a warehouse in the Bronx to full-fledged commercial rocket operations, to create a single-stage to orbit reusable launch vehicle. All of the science and equipment used in the story was based on technology that existed at the time of writing, like the space activity suit. |
702179 | /m/0340mk | Redemption Ark | Alastair Reynolds | 12/31/2002 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel", "/m/03lrw": "Hard science fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02n4kr": "Mystery", "/m/0c3351": "Suspense"} | The novel takes place around the planets Yellowstone and Resurgam, in two story lines which converge near the climax of the novel. The novel begins in the year 2605, where Skade has been tasked with investigating a Conjoiner ship that has returned to the Conjoiner headquarters, the Mother Nest. It is revealed early on that Skade is a Conjoiner woman who appears to be in touch with secret circles of control within the theoretically egalitarian Conjoiners society. In the ship, she discovers Galiana, the original founder of the Conjoiners, who left Conjoiner space decades previously on an exploration mission. In space, she encountered the Inhibitors, who have unleashed an agent into her ships which has taken control of it and killed her crew. It now controls her mind as well. Galiana requests that Skade kill her, but Skade only places her in suspended animation in the hope that she can be helped in the future. Ten years later, Nevil Clavain is facing problems in the Conjoiner mother nest; he is struggling to find answers as to what happened to Galiana (he is unaware that she is still alive) and about Felka, who he believes may be his daughter. He ponders this as he leaves on a mission, during which he rescues Antoinette Bax as she buries her father in the gas giant Tangerine Dream. Her ship severely damaged, Antoinette limps back to the Rust Belt, a ring of orbital habitats around Yellowstone. When Clavain and Skade return to the Mother Nest, Skade, Remontoire, and Felka finally convince Clavain to join the Conjoiner's leadership, which Clavain had been resisting. Skade now informs him about the Inhibitors, convincing him to undertake a mission to reclaim lost Conjoiner doomsday weapons and taking him to see the fleet of advanced starships that the Conjoiners have been building in secret. Although, Skade claims that the weapons and ships will be used to defend humanity against the Inhibitors, Clavain is convinced that they will actually be used simply to evacuate the Conjoiners and abandoning the rest of humanity. Clavain defects to the Demarchists at Yellowstone and spread the news of the Inhibitors, enlisting Antoinette Bax's help to escape the pursuing Conjoiners under Skade. Clavain is followed by Scorpio and Remontoire, but they along with Antoinette and Clavain are captured by the mysterious underground figure known as "H". H reveals what happened to Skade during a Conjoiner raid into Chasm City. This was when Skade discovered the secrets that would lead her to develop inertia suppression technology, and when H believes she was subverted by an alien intellect. Clavain reveals Skade's plans for the Conjoiner fleet and the cache weapons, and H agrees to help him beat Skade to them. H supplies ships and his own version of the inertial suppression technology, while Scorpio supplies an army of hyper-pigs for the pursuit. Skade and Clavain race to the Resurgam system employing various creative long-distance strategies against each other and pushing their vessels to higher and higher speeds. Eventually, Skade's vessel is damaged in an attempt to exceed the speed of light. Clavain and crew arrive in the Zodiacal Light ready to recover the cache weapons. Several years on (roughly 50 from the start of the book), Triumvir Ilia Volyova and Ana Khouri are on the planet Resurgam and have discovered a new threat; the Inhibitors, alerted to the presence of humanity during events described in Revelation Space, have begun dismantling several rocky moons across the system and are moving their components towards the gas giant, Roc. They resolve to evacuate Resurgam by enlisting the aide of the rebel Thorn who has been attempting to evacuate Resurgam all along, by open communications with Captain John Brannigan who is in direct control of their ship due to the nanotechnological Melding Plague, and by enabling the Cache Weapons as a last resort against the Inhibitors. (These are the same weapons that Clavain will be sent to recover, and it was their activation during the events in the novel Revelation Space by Volyova which allowed the Conjoiners in Yellowstone to determine the weapons' location.) Successful in all three endeavors Volyova, Khouri, and Thorn begin the lengthy evacuation, while the Inhibitors continue their mysterious construction project. Only a few thousand people have been evacuated from the surface when the Inhibitors come so close to Resurgam's star that Volyova begins deploying the cache weapons in the hope that they will be able to buy more time. It is at this point that a beta-level simulation of Clavain arrives in a laser transmission, and attempts to negotiate the peaceful turn over of the cache weapons to the soon to be arriving Zodiacal Light. Volyova rejects his requests, explaining that she has greater need to the weapons and continues deploying them. When Zodiacal Light arrives in the system, and because of the failure of the beta-level to negotiate a handover, Clavain attacks Nostalgia for Infinity using Scorpio and his army of pigs as a boarding party. Clavain's superior force capture Nostalgia for Infinity, although Volyova is able to damage Zodiacal Light with one of the cache weapons. Negotiations resume and the two sides come to terms. The evacuation is completed with the help of the Storm Bird and Nostalgia for Infinity departs; Volyova, who is dying from injuries suffered during a suicide attempt by the Captain takes half of the cache weapons and attacks the Inhibitors in the Storm Bird, to no effect. Remontoire and Khouri remain in the system in the Zodiacal Light to try and contact Dan Sylveste in the Hades Matrix in hope that he will be able to supply information that can be used to fight the Inhibitors. The novel ends with Nostalgia for Infinity establishing a colony on an unnamed Pattern Juggler planet (in the following novel Absolution Gap it is called Ararat), waiting for the Zodiacal Light to catch up with them so that they can continue the fight against the Inhibitors. In addition to the two plot lines there are occasional asides explaining the history and motivation of the Inhibitors. These asides explain the galaxy was once filled with star faring civilizations. Those civilizations were largely destroyed in the "Dawn War", a galaxy wide conflict over the galaxy's scarce resources. One of these civilizations determines that a collision between our galaxy and another will occur in 3 billion years and create/become the Inhibitors in order to shepherd intelligent life through this cataclysm. They had determined that collision could be most easily dealt with if intelligent life was kept isolated to individual star systems, leaving the Inhibitors to perform any necessary manipulations of stars and planets to reduce the damage caused by the collision. The asides also reveal that the Inhibitors were not as brutal in their past, but their performance has degraded over the millennia. They have been detecting civilizations at later stages, and required to commit wholesale extinction more often. Clavain and Felka learn of this history during communication with the Inhibitors in Galiana's head. Clavain, however, is not convinced that the Inhibitors are right about the coming catastrophe and believes that their degrading performance may give humanity a chance for survival that other species have not had. As such, he rejects the Inhibitor requests to stand down. The future collision of our galaxy with the Andromeda Galaxy is a scientifically predicted event. However, astronomers believe that it would not cause major damage to the capability of the galaxy to support life because galaxies are so diffuse that very few, if any, planets and stars would collide. |
703402 | /m/0343l1 | The Scary Sleepover | Ulrich Karger | 2002 | {"/m/0dwly": "Children's literature"} | The book tells about a group of children having a Halloween sleepover party at school (Kindergarten). The children prepare for it by making decorations and costumes. As night draws near, so do the children's fears. One student, Mary, shares a trick her father taught her with the other students. He gave her a special bright star - whenever she feels afraid to go to bed, she has only to think about her star. This sends the darkness and the evil ghosts from her heart. Jonas does not believe in that, but he also thinks he is not afraid of ghosts. In the end, all the children need another, older trick: keeping the hallway light on all night. |
703539 | /m/034443 | White Fang | Jack London | 1906-05 | {"/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/08sdrw": "Adventure novel"} | The story begins before the three-quarters wolf-dog hybrid is born, with two men and their sled dog team on a journey to deliver a coffin to a remote town named Fort McGurry in the higher area of the Yukon Territory, Canada. The men, Bill and Henry, are stalked by a large pack of starving wolves over the course of several days. Finally, after all of their dogs and Bill have been eaten, four more teams find Henry trying to escape from the wolves; the wolf pack scatters when they hear the large group of people coming. The story then follows the pack, which has been robbed of its last prey. When the pack finally manages to bring down a moose, the famine is ended; they eventually split up, and the story now follows a she-wolf and her mate, One Eye. The she-wolf gives birth to a litter of five cubs by the Mackenzie River, and all but one die from hunger. One Eye is killed by a lynx while trying to rob its den for food for the she-wolf and her cub; his mate later discovers his remains near the lynx's den. The surviving cub and the she-wolf are left to fend for themselves. Shortly after the she-wolf manages to successfully kill all the lynx kittens, prompting the lynx to track her down and a vicious fight breaks out. The she-wolf eventually kills the lynx but suffers severe injury, the lynx carcass is devoured over a period of seven days. The cub comes across five Native Americans one day, and the she-wolf comes to his rescue. One man, Grey Beaver, recognizes the she-wolf as Kiche, his brother's wolfdog, who left during a famine. Grey Beaver's brother is dead, so he takes Kiche and her cub, christening the cub White Fang. White Fang has a harsh life in the Indian camp; the current puppy pack, seeing him as a wolf, immediately attack him. He is saved by the Indians, but the pups never accept him, and the leader Lip-lip singles him out for persecution. White Fang grows to become a savage, morose, solitary, and deadly fighter, "the enemy of his kind." When White Fang is five years old, he is taken to Fort Yukon so that Grey Beaver can trade with the gold-hunters. There, he is bought—with several bottles of whiskey—by a dog-fighter, Beauty Smith, who gets Grey Beaver addicted to the alcohol. White Fang defeats all opponents, including several wolves and a lynx, until a bulldog is brought in to fight him. The bulldog manages to get a grip on the skin and fur of White Fang's neck, and slowly and surely begins to throttle him. White Fang nearly suffocates, but is rescued when a rich, young gold hunter, Weedon Scott, happens by and stops the fight. Scott attempts to tame White Fang and after a long patient effort he succeeds. When Scott attempts to return to California alone, White Fang pursues him, and Scott decides to take the dog with him back home. In Sierra Vista, White Fang must adjust to the laws of the estate. At the end of the book, a murderous criminal, Jim Hall, tries to kill Weedon Scott's father, Judge Scott, for sentencing him to prison, not knowing that Hall was "railroaded". White Fang kills Hall and is nearly killed himself, but survives. As a result, the women of Scott's estate name him "The Blessed Wolf", and the story ends with White Fang relaxing in the sun with the puppies he had fathered with the sheep-dog Collie. |
705675 | /m/0349xs | The Conformist | Alberto Moravia | 1951 | {"/m/0d6gr": "Reference", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | In the prologue, the reader witnesses numerous formative events from a short period in Marcello’s childhood. In the first, Marcello coldly kills several lizards in the yard between his home and the home of his neighbor and friend, Roberto. He tries to coax Roberto into offering approval of this behavior, and when Roberto doesn’t comply, they fight and Roberto leaves. Marcello later obtains a slingshot and fires a few stones through the ivy that covers the fence around Roberto’s family’s house, only to find that he has killed their family cat instead of Roberto. Marcello is mortified not so much by his actions but by what he perceives as the abnormality of his sentiments. Marcello also witnesses a fight between his parents that is later revealed to mark the beginning of his father’s decline into mental illness. Marcello’s mother and housemaid discover that his father has vandalized a photograph of Marcello and his mother by poking holes through their eyes and drawing streaks of blood on their faces. His father ultimately chases his mother around the house and attacks her in the bedroom, leaving Marcello torn between whether to rescue his mother or aid his father. It is revealed that Marcello’s father often physically abuses the boy. The final section of the prologue covers Marcello’s torment at the hands of his classmates, who use his somewhat effeminate appearance to question his gender. One day, five classmates follow Marcello home from school and try to force him to wear a dress, but their attack is interrupted by a chauffeur who happens on the scene and offers to drive Marcello home. En route, the chauffeur appears to proposition Marcello, offering him a pistol in exchange for unspecified actions. The chauffeur, who reveals himself to be a former priest de-frocked for indecent behavior, ultimately stops himself before initiating any actions with Marcello and begs the boy to ignore him if he tries to speak to him again. Marcello doesn’t fully understand what is happening, and his desire for the pistol leads him to go with the chauffeur again a few days later. This time, the chauffeur, named Lino, locks himself in the room with Marcello and tells the boy that he won’t be able to escape the (still unspoken) abuse to come. During the struggle, Lino’s gun comes loose and Marcello grabs it. When Lino tells Marcello to shoot him, he complies and flees out the window. Part I opens with Marcello, now a state employee of the Fascist government, looking though old newspaper clippings for information on the incident with Lino. He ultimately finds an obituary that blames the death on an accident during the cleaning of the gun. While Marcello does not feel true remorse, he does seek some absolution for this incident throughout the novel. A colleague of Marcello’s named Orlando asks Marcello to participate in a mission to Paris. A former professor of Marcello’s, named Quadri, is now an anti-fascist agitator, and the Italian government would like to infiltrate his organization. Marcello is also due to be married shortly to a woman named Giulia, and offers to take his honeymoon in Paris so that his presence there would not be suspicious to Quadri. Marcello also takes confession, despite his apparent atheism, as a prelude to the Catholic wedding his wife expects. He confesses to murdering Lino, and the priest indicates that he can seek absolution if he feels true remorse for his actions – an emotion that Marcello does not appear capable of feeling. The section closes in the days leading up to Marcello’s wedding, and we see his mother-in-law lavishing praise upon him, in stark contrast to his mother, who now lives alone in squalor. His father has been in an asylum for six years and suffers from the delusion that he is one of Mussolini’s top aides. On the way to see his father, Marcello’s mother gives him a wedding present but indicates that she won’t be attending the ceremony. Marcello and his mother make their monthly visit to his father, who neither recognizes them nor even acknowledges their presence. Part II covers the honeymoon and the odd interpersonal relationships that unfold between Marcello, Giulia, Quadri, and Quadri’s voluptuous young wife, Lina. En route to Paris, Marcello makes a scheduled stop at a brothel in a small, unnamed town in France, where he is to meet Agent Orlando for further instructions. At the brothel, Marcello is mistaken for a client, causing him some embarrassment before Orlando arrives to tell him that the new plan is to kill Quadri. Marcello needs simply to confirm Quadri’s identity to Orlando to fulfill his duties. As he is leaving, Marcello realizes he has forgotten his hat, but when he goes to retrieve it, he finds Orlando with his arm around a prostitute to whom Marcello feels a strange attraction. Marcello experiences the same feeling when he and Giulia head to Quadri’s apartment, as Lina reminds him in some ways of that prostitute, and Marcello tells himself that he is in love with Lina despite her apparent dislike for him. Lina allows Marcello to begin to seduce her, but always keeps him at arm’s length, even telling him that she and Quadri are aware that he is a spy there in service of the Italian government. While Lina and Giulia head out shopping, Marcello is accosted by an old man who first mistakes him for a beggar, and then mistakes him for a homosexual or perhaps a prostitute, revisiting the humiliation of the incident with Lino on Marcello. When the old man refuses to take Marcello back to his hotel, Marcello pulls his gun and demands to be let out of the vehicle. Marcello’s feelings for Lina intensify alongside a growing contempt for her when he sees her attempting to seduce Giulia and realizes that her interest in him is merely for show. Lina’s pursuit of Giulia leads to an argument in a nightclub where Giulia tells Lina that she is not a lesbian and has no interest in an affair. At a dinner, Quadri asks Marcello to post a letter for him on his way back to Italy, as Quadri’s activities are monitored and the letter might be intercepted otherwise. Marcello refuses, and Quadri takes this as a sign of solidarity, as Marcello could have taken the letter and turned it over to the authorities instead. However, Marcello does confirm Quadri’s identity to Orlando, and on a trip to Savoy, Quadri – as well as Lina, who left with him in response to Giulia’s rejection – is killed by Orlando and his men. The epilogue briefly explores Marcello’s conflicted responses to his role in the murders of Quadri and Lina, including his attempts to rationalize away his culpability. The epilogue takes place years later, on the night that Mussolini falls from power. Giulia reveals that she has long suspected that Marcello was involved in the murders, but her sorrow is more for their own safety than for Marcello’s victims or his duplicity. The two go out for a drive and walk that evening, and while Giulia tries to convince Marcello to make love to her in a wooded area, a stranger arrives and calls to Marcello by name. Marcello is floored to see that it is Lino. Marcello shows real emotion for the first time in the book when he screams at Lino and blames him for ruining his life by taking his innocence. Lino defends himself by arguing that the loss of innocence is inevitable and is merely a part of the human experience. This speech leads Marcello to the beginning of acceptance of his own non-conformity. The novel’s closing passage has Marcello, Giulia, and their daughter driving to the mountains to evade possible reprisals for Marcello’s role with the government. En route, they drive into an air raid, and their car is strafed with bullets. Giulia and the daughter are killed in the first wave, and Marcello falls out of the car, wounded. Realizing his wife and daughter are dead, he waits for the second wave to return. The novel ends with Marcello hearing the plane’s approach. |
706319 | /m/04w53xz | Buying a fishing rod for my grandfather | Gao Xingjian | null | null | In "The Temple", the narrator is on his honeymoon and mysteriously anxious despite being "deliriously happy" during his and his wife's outing. The story "In the Park" has two friends from childhood meet after many years and then part once more. "Cramp" has a man about a kilometer from shore on the verge of drowning barely survive, only to have no one notice he's been gone. "The Accident" portrays a cyclist being hit by a bus and the pedestrians' momentary reaction to the event. In the title story, a man sees a fiberglass fishing rod in a store window and is reminded of the times he went fishing and hunting with his grandfather. "In an Instant" traces the lives of three people on a typical day. et:Gei wo laoye mai yugan |
708688 | /m/034n52 | Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang | Kate Wilhelm | 1976 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | Massive environmental changes and global disease, attributed to large-scale pollution, cause the collapse of civilization around the world. One large, well-to-do extended family sets up an isolated community in an attempt to survive the coming catastrophe. However, as the death toll mounts, due to a disease and other causes, they discover that they are universally infertile. After discovering that the infertility might be reversed after multiple generations of cloning, the family begins cloning themselves to survive. It is assumed that after enough generations of clones have been created and fertility restored, that sexual reproduction will be become the norm again. However, when the clones come of-age, they reject the idea of sexual reproduction in favor of further cloning. The original members of the community, too old and outnumbered by the clones to resist, are forced to accept the new social order. As time passes, the new generations of clones eliminate the ideas of individuality from their social structure. Since they are cloned in groups of 4-10 individuals, they grow to depend on each other enormously and lose their sense of individuality, gaining in return an empathic sense of their clones. One woman, after being separated from her clones while on an expedition to find materials in the ruins of nearby cities, regains her sense of individuality; she goes on to have a child, Mark, with a man who was also on the expedition. The two are expelled from the community when Mark is discovered, though Mark himself is not. As Mark grows up, he discovers that his uniqueness gives him individuality and the ability to live away from the community, something which the clones are now unable to do. The leaders of the community realize that the latest generations of clones are losing all sense of creativity and are unable to come up with new solutions to problems; simultaneously they see that the growing lack of high-technology equipment will result in the community losing the ability to continue with the cloning process. Mark, now a teenager, also sees this problem, and rather than lead an expedition to find more high-technology equipment instead at the climax of the book leads a group of people that he has persuaded to his cause to leave the community and start over with a lower, more sustainable level of technology. In the ending to the book, he returns to the community 20 years later to discover that in the wake of a disaster the non-creative clones were unable to adapt, and the village has been destroyed. He then returns to his community, where all of the children and younger generations have been produced naturally and continue to thrive. The novel makes a passing reference to global warming caused by human pollution, an idea still in its infancy at the time of publication: The winters were getting colder, starting earlier, lasting longer, with more snows than he could remember from childhood. As soon as man stopped adding his megatons of filth to the atmosphere each day, he thought, the atmosphere had reverted to what it must have been long ago, moister weather summer and winter, more stars than he had ever seen before, and more, it seemed, each night than the night before: the sky a clear, endless blue by day, velvet blue-black at night with blazing stars that modern man had never seen. fr:Hier, les oiseaux pl:Gdzie dawniej śpiewał ptak ro:Unde, cândva, suave păsări cântătoare... |
710301 | /m/034svs | Eugénie Grandet | Honoré de Balzac | 1833 | null | Eugénie Grandet is set in the town of Saumur. Eugénie's father Felix is a former cooper who has become wealthy through both business ventures and inheritance (inheriting the estates of his mother-in-law, grandfather-in-law and grandmother all in one year). However, he is very miserly, and he, his wife, daughter and their servant Nanon live in a run-down old house which he is too miserly to repair. His banker des Grassins wishes Eugénie to marry his son Adolphe, and his lawyer Cruchot wishes Eugénie to marry his nephew President Cruchot des Bonfons, both parties eyeing the inheritance from Felix. The two families constantly visit the Grandets to get Felix's favour, and Felix in turn plays them off against each other for his own advantage. On Eugénie's birthday, in 1819, Felix's nephew Charles Grandet arrives from Paris unexpectedly at their home having been sent there by his father Guillaume. Charles does not realise that his father has gone bankrupt and is planning to take his own life. Guillaume reveals this to his brother Felix in a confidential letter which Charles has carried. Charles is a spoilt and indolent young man, who is having an affair with an older woman. His father's ruin and suicide are soon published in the newspaper, and his uncle Felix reveals his problems to him. Felix considers Charles to be a burden, and plans to send him off overseas to make his own fortune. However, Eugénie and Charles fall in love with each other, and hope to eventually marry. She gives him some of her own money to help with his trading ventures. Meanwhile, Felix hatches a plan to profit from his brother's ruin. He announces to Cruchot des Bonfons that he plans to liquidate his brother's business, and so avoid a declaration of bankruptcy, and therefore save the family honour. Cruchot des Bonfons volunteers to go to Paris to make the arrangements provided that Felix pays his expenses. The des Grassins then visit just as they are in the middle of discussions, and the banker des Grassins volunteers to do Felix's bidding for free. So Felix accepts des Grassins' offer instead of Cruchot des Bonfons'. The business is liquidated, and the creditors get 46% of their debts, in exchange for their bank bills. Felix then ignores all demands to pay the rest, whilst selling the bank bills at a profit. By now Charles has left to travel overseas. He entrusts Eugénie with a small gold plated cabinet which contains pictures of his parents. Later Felix is angered when he discovers that Eugénie has given her money (all in gold coins) to Charles. This leads to his wife falling ill, and his daughter being confined to her room. Eventually they are reconciled, and Felix reluctantly agrees that Eugénie can marry Charles. In 1827 Charles returns to France. By now both of Eugénie's parents have died. However Charles is no longer in love with Eugénie. He has become very wealthy through his trading, but he has also become extremely corrupt. He becomes engaged to the daughter of an impoverished aristocratic family, in order to make himself respectable. He writes to Eugénie to announce his marriage plans, and to break off their engagement. He also sends a cheque to pay off the money that she gave him. Eugénie is heartbroken, especially when she discovers that Charles had been back in France for a month when he wrote to her. She sends back the cabinet. Eugénie then decides to become engaged to Cruchot des Bonfons on two conditions. One is that she remains a virgin after marriage, and the other is that he agrees to go to Paris to act for her to pay off all the debts due Guillaume Grandet's creditors. Bonfons de Cruchot carries out the debt payment in full. This comes just in time for Charles who finds that his future father-in-law objects to letting his daughter marry the son of a bankrupt. When Charles meets Bonfons de Cruchot, he discovers that Eugénie is in fact far wealthier than he is. During his brief stay at Saumur, he had assumed from the state of their home that his relatives were poor. Bonfons de Cruchot marries Eugénie hopeful of becoming fabulously wealthy. However, he dies young, and at the end of the book Eugénie is a very wealthy widow of thirty-three having now inherited her husband's fortune. At the end of the novel, although by the standards of the time she should be unhappy - childless and unmarried - she is instead quite content with her lot. She has learned to live life on her own terms, and has also learned of the hypocrisy and shallowness of the bourgeois and that her best friends will come from the lower classes. |
711904 | /m/034xrk | Anglo-Saxon Attitudes | Angus Wilson | 1956 | {"/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | The novel deals with the significance of two connected events that happened on the same day, long before the opening of the novel. The first was the excavation of an ancient and valuable archaeological idol, a phallic figure unearthed from the tomb of an Anglo-Saxon bishop Eorpwald, known as the "Melpham excavation". Gerald has long been haunted by a drunken revelation by his friend Gilbert, who was involved with this excavation, that the whole thing was a hoax perpetrated to embarrass Gilbert's father. Gilbert told Gerald that he put the idol there. Gerald while feeling that his friend was telling the truth, pushed the matter to the back of his mind and tried to forget about it. He now feels ashamed that he, a history professor, has never had the courage to try to resolve the matter one way or another. The second is that Gerald Middleton fell in love with Dollie, Gilbert's fiancée and had an affair with her when his friend went off to fight in WWI. When Gilbert was killed at the front, Dollie refused to marry Gerald. He ended up marrying a Scandinavian woman named Inge but continued his affair with Dollie, who became an alcoholic. Gerald and Inge later separated. Anglo-Saxon Attitudes is full of side-plots and coincidences and contains a host of eccentric characters. Some of these characters are Gerald's family. Robin his eldest son, is a womaniser who cannot decide whether to leave his wife or his mistress. Kay, has an unhappy marriage and a deeply embittered view of her father, whom she appears to blame for everything that has gone wrong in her life, including her withered hand (which was actually caused by her mother). Gerald's estranged wife, Inge is a grotesquely deluded woman who cannot bring herself to acknowledge her younger son John's homosexuality or her daughter's physical disability. Gerald feels responsible for Dollie's plight and for those of his children. He feels that the knowledge of his complicity over the Melpham affair has drained his morale and made him withdrawn and indecisive. The novel begins with him resolving to make good the 'bloody shameful waste' of his life, by investigating the Melpham affair and making peace with Dollie. He also attempts to develop better relationships with his grown-up children and with Inge. By the novel's end, Gerald achieves a measure of peace with his past. He persuades Dollie to come forward with a letter from Gilbert's father's colleague, Canon Portway, proving that the Melpham incident was a hoax; then he and Dollie begin a platonic friendship. He gives up on achieving good relations with his family. |
711958 | /m/034xw8 | Eldest | Christopher Paolini | 8/23/2005 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/03qfd": "High fantasy"} | Eldest begins as Ajihad, the leader of the rebel Varden force, is ambushed and killed, with Murtagh gone while The Twins and Murtagh are assumed dead. At his funeral, Ajihad's daughter Nasuada is elected to command the Varden. The protagonists Eragon and Saphira then decide to travel to the forest Du Weldenvarden to become trained as a Dragon Rider by the elves. The dwarf king, Hrothgar, decides to adopt Eragon to his clan, Durgmist Ingeitum, and have his now foster brother, Orik, accompany him to the forest. Once there, Eragon meets Oromis, The Cripple Who Is Whole, and his Dragon Glaedr, the only Dragon and Rider secretly alive besides Eragon, Saphira and Galbatorix and his forcibly bonded dragon Shruikan. Oromis and Glaedr, however, are both crippled, and so cannot fight Galbatorix and must hide to avoid Galbatorix hunting them down. Eragon and Saphira are taught the use of logic, magic theory, scholarship, and combat, among other things. Meanwhile, Eragon's cousin Roran, is planning to marry Katrina, daughter of Sloan the butcher. While the village is at peace, they are all of a sudden attacked by Galabatorix's soldiers and the Ra'zac, the strangers who had killed Roran's father, Garrow. The village smithy, Horst, equips his sons along with Roran with equipment. Roran takes a hammer and the soldiers. The Ra'zac and most of the soldiers escape, saying that they want information for Roran. The entire village then sets up defenses, and during a second invasion, the Ra'zac escape again. One night, Roran wakes up to find Katrina being attacked by the Ra'zac, who snuck into the house. Roran then takes off the cloth around the Ra'zac's face and sees that they are monsters, not humans. A Ra'zac bites Roran and they leave with Katrina captured. While Roran is chasing them, Sloan, Katrina's father, betrays the village and joins the Ra'zac. The Ra'zac escape with their steeds, the Lethrdblaka, who are originally their parents. Meanwhile, Nasuada chooses to move the Varden from Tronjheim to Surda to mount an attack on the Empire. The Varden suffer financial troubles, however, until Nasuada learns that she can create an expensive lace with magic, and sell it at extremely low rates. One night when Nasuada is in her room, a character named Elva saves her from an assassination attempt. Elva is enchanted, and locates the assailant, who is killed after unwillingly surrendering information to Varden magicians about a subversive group based in Surda called the Black Hand, who is plotting to kill Nasuada. Nasuada later attends a meeting with key figures in Surda's government to discuss a potential upcoming battle against the Empire. They learn that the conflict is coming sooner than they initially suspected, and mobilize forces to attack, as well as sending for help from the dwarves. In the meantime, Eragon continues his training, but is discouraged when the scar on his back causes him to have seizures multiple times per day. He has been swooning over Arya for most of the book. Saphira also has a similar problem with Glaedr, as she believes him to be a good choice for a mate and tries to win his affections. The effort fails miserably, but brings Eragon and Saphira closer together. Later, at the ancient elven ceremony, the Agaetí Blödhren (Blood-Oath Celebration), Eragon is altered by a spectral dragon. The changes alter his senses, and enhance his abilities, effectively turning him into an elf-human hybrid, as well as healing all of his wounds. Reinvigorated, Eragon continues training until he learns that the Empire will soon attack the Varden in Surda. Afterward he confesses his feelings for Arya who rejects him brutally. Dismayed, he leaves without completing his training, to aid the Varden in battle. Upon leaving he is given a bow with magical arrows, a belt with 12 priceless gems, an enchanted flask of elvish concoction, a copy of his poem, and the blessing of Oromis and Glaedr. Meanwhile, Roran is planning to rescue Katrina. He decides that the only solution is to join the Varden in Surda, and so convinces almost the entire village to travel there. The village reaches Narda, where they pay for barges to sail to Tierm. In Tierm, Roran meets Jeod, Brom's friend, who tells him about Eragon and that he is a Dragon Rider now. Roran is stunned that his cousin is a Dragon Rider, and he asks Jeod for help to reach the Varden. Jeod decided to go with them and he gathers a group of his friends to steal a ship called the Dragon Wing. The village is chased by a group of Galbatorix's boats, but they force themselves into the gigantic whirpool, the Boar's eye, so that they can trap the enemey boats. Meanwhile, Eragon arrived at the Varden's camp, who is under attack of an army of 100,000 of Galbatorix's men. A group of Urgals join the Varden, and Eragon is able to repel the opposing army with help from the dwarves' reinforcements. Eventually, a Dragon Rider appears in favor of the Empire. The hostile Dragon Rider kills the dwarf king Hrothgar, and soon begins to fight with Eragon. The Dragon Rider is soon unmasked by Eragon and is revealed to be Murtagh. Murtagh tells Eragon that he was kidnapped and forced into loyalty by Galbatorix after a Dragon hatched for him, whom he named Thorn. Murtagh outmatches Eragon, but shows mercy due to their old friendship. Before leaving, Murtagh reveals that Eragon is his brother, and takes Eragon's sword as well. Ultimately, Galbatorix's army is forced to retreat due to heavy losses, after the arrival of the dwarves and the village of Carvahall and the departure of Murtagh and Thorn. Roran manages to defeat the Twins by bashing them in the heads with his hammer, thus earning him the title of Roran Stronghammer. In the end, Eragon reunites with Roran and Eragon decides to help Roran rescue Katrina from the Ra'zac in Dras-Leona. |
712030 | /m/034y22 | Forever Free | Joe Haldeman | 1999 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | William Mandella, protagonist of The Forever War, lives with his wife Marygay on the icy world Middle Finger. Still dissatisfied with the state of society, they eventually decide to jump forward in time again, using the time dilation of interstellar travel. Their intention is to travel for 10 subjective years at relativistic speeds, during which 40,000 Earth years will pass on Middle Finger. They, along with other Forever War veterans and other disenchanted humans on Middle Finger, hope that whatever they will find upon their return will be more to their liking. This "experiment" requires the consent of the posthuman group mind now known as Man, and of the alien Tauran race. While it appears that they refuse permission, forcing the humans to take the ship by force, neither Man nor Tauran put up much of a fight indicating that those resident on Middle Finger did not share the views of the larger group mind. Taking their daughter and leaving their son who has decided to join Man, they head away from their planet. However before they have gotten very far many unexplained occurrences happen and the ship starts to lose antimatter mysteriously. They abandon the ship and return home on fighters that have been converted into escape pods (although some people who believe it all to be a test by some deity remain aboard the drifting ship and are not mentioned in the text again). Instead of the intended 40,000 years, they have only been away 24 Earth years. Upon arrival, they find the planet still intact, but seemingly vacant with everyone having literally disappeared at the same time as the incident on their ship. They then return to Earth and in the course of the investigation they discover a shape-shifting being (similar to the "Chameleon" in his later novel Camouflage) posing as an android cowboy at a western-themed amusement park. This being has been on Earth and the other inhabited planets for millennia and is not certain of its own origin. It also has no idea what happened to the denizens of Earth. The resolution involves an archetypal deus ex machina, a childish god who evidently created the universe on a whim but doesn't really understand it. This god recognizes Mandella as a scientist and explains that his action of leaving the galaxy on a 40,000 year round-trip is similar to a laboratory mouse escaping its cage. The galaxy would appear to be one large experiment controlled by these gods, an experiment damaged by Mandella's actions. Eventually "God" restores the inhabitants, who have been stored in stasis. The story also focuses on William's and Marygay's relationship to their children, who do not agree with their parents' views, but still have to deal with their parents 'fleeing' into the future. Forever Free is much shorter than the preceding book and also contained many printing errors in its first edition. The comic A New Beginning, the sequel to the comic version of The Forever War, was connected to Forever Free. |
712214 | /m/034ym1 | The Cuckoo's Egg | Clifford Stoll | 1990 | null | Clifford Stoll (the author) managed some computers at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California. One day, in August 1986, his supervisor (Dave Cleveland) asked him to resolve a USD$ 0.75 accounting error in the computer usage accounts. He traced the error to an unauthorized user who had apparently used up 9 seconds of computer time and not paid for it, and eventually realized that the unauthorized user was a cracker who had acquired root access to the LBL system by exploiting a vulnerability in the movemail function of the original GNU Emacs. Over the next ten months, Stoll spent a great deal of time and effort tracing the hacker's origin. He saw that the hacker was using a 1200 baud connection and realized that the intrusion was coming through a telephone modem connection. Stoll's colleagues, Paul Murray and Lloyd Bellknap, helped with the phone lines. Over the course of a long weekend he rounded up fifty terminals, mostly by "borrowing" them from the desks of co-workers away for the weekend, and teleprinters and physically attached them to the fifty incoming phone lines. When the hacker dialed in that weekend, Stoll located the phone line, which was coming from the Tymnet routing service. With the help of Tymnet, he eventually tracked the intrusion to a call center at MITRE, a defense contractor in McLean, Virginia. Stoll, after returning his "borrowed" terminals, left a teleprinter attached to the intrusion line in order to see and record everything the cracker did. Stoll recorded the hacker's actions as he sought, and sometimes gained, unauthorized access to military bases around the United States, looking for files that contained words such as "nuclear" or "SDI". The hacker also copied password files (in order to make dictionary attacks) and set up Trojan horses to find passwords. Stoll was amazed that on many of these high-security sites the hacker could easily guess passwords, since many system administrators never bothered to change the passwords from their factory defaults. Even on army bases, the hacker was sometimes able to log in as "guest" with no password. Over the course of this investigation, Stoll contacted various agents at the FBI, CIA, NSA, and Air Force OSI. Since this was almost the first documented case of hacking (Stoll seems to have been the first to keep a daily log book of the hacker's activity), there was some confusion as to jurisdiction and a general reluctance to share information. Studying his log book, Stoll saw that the hacker was familiar with VMS, as well as AT&T Unix. He also noted that the hacker tended to be active around the middle of the day, Pacific time. Stoll hypothesized that since modem bills are cheaper at night, and most people have school or a day job and would only have a lot of free time for hacking at night, the hacker was in a time zone some distance to the east. With the help of Tymnet and various agents from various agencies, Stoll eventually found that the intrusion was coming from West Germany via satellite. The Deutsche Bundespost, the German post office, also had authority over the phone system, and they traced the calls to a university in Bremen. In order to entice the hacker to reveal himself, Stoll set up an elaborate hoax (known today as a honeypot), inventing a new department at LBL that had supposedly been newly formed because of an imaginary SDI contract. He knew the hacker was mainly interested in SDI, so he filled the "SDInet" account (operated by the imaginary secretary Barbara Sherwin) with large files full of impressive-sounding bureaucratese. The ploy worked, and the Deutsche Bundespost finally located the hacker at his home in Hanover. The hacker's name was Markus Hess, and he had been engaged for some years in selling the results of his hacking to the Soviet KGB. There was ancillary proof of this when a Hungarian spy contacted the fictitious SDInet at LBL by mail, based on information he could only have obtained through Hess (apparently this was the KGB's method of double-checking to see if Hess was just making up the information he was selling them). Stoll later had to fly to Germany to testify at the trial of Hess and a confederate. |
712274 | /m/034yth | Going Postal | Terry Pratchett | 2004 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | As with many of the Discworld novels, the story takes place in Ankh-Morpork, a powerful city-state based on the historical and modern settings of various metropolises like London or New York City. The protagonist of the story is Moist von Lipwig, a skilled con artist who was to be hanged for his crimes, but saved at the very last moment by the cunning and manipulative Patrician Havelock Vetinari, who has Moist's death on the scaffold faked. In his office, Vetinari then presents Moist with two choices: he may accept a job offer to become Postmaster of the city's rundown Postal Service or he may choose to walk out of the door and never hear from Vetinari again. As the door in question led into a fatal drop Moist accepts the job. After a thwarted attempt at escape, Moist is brought to the Post Office by his parole officer Mr. Pump, a golem. It turns out that the Post Office has not functioned for decades, and the building is full of undelivered mail, concealed under a layer of pigeon dung. Only two employees remain: the aged Junior Postman Tolliver Groat and his assistant Stanley Howler. Meanwhile, Vetinari is holding a meeting with the board executives of the Grand Trunk Company, a company that owns and operates a system of visual telegraph towers known as "clacks". He notes that since they have taken full control, the quality of service had gone down considerably. Despite unnerving most of the board, Vetinari fails to make headway, especially with its chairman, Reacher Gilt. As Moist attempts to revitalize the service, he discovers that a few months before taking the job, a number of his predecessors have predeceased in the building within weeks of each other in unusual circumstances. He also discovers that the mail inside the building has taken on a life of its own, and is nearly suffocated as a result. Moist introduces postage stamps to Ankh-Morpork, hires golems to deliver the mail, and finds himself competing against the Grand Trunk Clacks line. He meets and falls in love with the tough, chain-smoking golem-rights activist, Adora Belle Dearheart, and the two begin a relationship by the end of the book. Dearheart is the daughter of the Clacks founder Robert Dearheart, though the company was taken away from her father and the other founders by tricky financial maneuvering. Because of this, she still has useful contacts amongst the clacks operators. The unscrupulous Clacks chairman, Reacher Gilt, sets a banshee assassin (Mr Gryle) on the Postmaster, but only manages to burn down much of the Post Office building. The banshee dies when he gets flipped onto the space-warping sorting machine. Lipwig makes an outrageous wager that he can deliver a message to Genua faster than the Grand Trunk can. "The Smoking Gnu", a group of clacks-crackers, sets up a plan to send a Discworld equivalent to a killer poke into the clacks system that will destroy the machinery, halting the message that Lipwig will race against. Lipwig talks the Gnu out of it, and opts for a more psychological attack on the Grand Trunk, leaving the semaphore towers standing. This plan succeeds. Gilt is soon arrested and finds himself confronting the Patrician. Offered the choice of a job or exiting the room, he ends up walking through the door and to his death. |
712513 | /m/034zqp | Another Roadside Attraction | Tom Robbins | null | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | The novel follows the adventures of John Paul Ziller and his wife Amanda—lovable prophetess and promiscuous earth mother, inarguably the central protagonist—who open "Captain Kendrick's Memorial Hot Dog Wildlife Preserve," a combination hot dog stand and zoo along a highway in Skagit County, Washington. Other characters in this rather oddball novel include Mon Cul the baboon; Marx Marvelous, an educated man from the east coast; and L. Westminster "Plucky" Purcell, a former college football star and sometime dope dealer who accidentally infiltrates a group of Catholic monks working as assassins for the Vatican. In so doing Plucky discovers a secret of monumental proportions dating to the very beginning of Christianity. |
712522 | /m/025v3my | Of the City of the Saved... | Philip Purser-Hallard | 2004 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction"} | Beyond the end of the universe exists The City of the Saved, an urban sprawl the size of a galaxy. Within it every human being that ever lived, from the first australopithecine to the last posthuman, has been inexplicably resurrected. For three hundred years, the uncountable inhabitants have enjoyed their unaging and invulnerable second lives. But now, the unthinkable has happened. Someone has been murdered. |
713577 | /m/0351lv | A Game of Thrones | George R. R. Martin | 8/6/1996 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | A Game of Thrones follows three principal storylines simultaneously. Early in the story, Eddard Stark (Ned), as Lord of Winterfell, on behalf of the Seven Kingdoms, must condemn and execute a deserter of the Night's Watch, with his sons among the witnesses. On the return journey to Winterfell, Eddard's sons discover six direwolf pups, which are entrusted to Eddard's five legitimate children and his bastard. (The direwolf, the sigil of House Stark, is integral to the Stark family.) Following the death of Lord Jon Arryn, previous "Hand of the King" (the highest advisor to the king), King Robert Baratheon visits Eddard at Winterfell. Because he trusts him as an old friend and as an ally in the previous struggle for the throne, King Robert asks Eddard to become the new Hand of the King. Eddard agrees, against his instincts, and at the same time promises his wife, Lady Catelyn Stark that he will investigate the death of the previous Hand, Jon Arryn. Lysa Tully, Catelyn's sister and Lord Arryn's widow, had suggested in a secret message that Arryn may have been the victim of poison and political intrigue at the hands of King Robert's wife, Queen Cersei and her powerful family of House Lannister. Before the Starks leave for King's Landing in the South, Eddard's young son Bran Stark witnesses Cersei committing incest with her twin brother Jaime Lannister, who promptly flings Bran from a tower hoping to conceal the secret. Bran survives against the odds but enters a coma. During his recuperation, an assassin attempts to murder him, only to encounter Catelyn, who has refused to leave his side. Bran's direwolf then saves his life, as well as Catelyn's, by killing the assassin. Catelyn realizes her husband faces danger in King's Landing; she travels there incognito by ship to warn him, leaving the eldest son Robb Stark to rule as the Lord of Winterfell. Not long after Catelyn's departure Bran awakens from his coma as a paraplegic and with no memory of how he fell. He names his direwolf Summer. He remains at Winterfell along with his older brother Robb and younger brother Rickon. Meanwhile, Lord Eddard travels toward King's Landing, the capital, taking with him his daughters Sansa and Arya. Eleven year-old Sansa is betrothed to King Robert's twelve year-old son Joffrey, the heir apparent. At King's Landing, Eddard assumes the duties of the Hand and the ruling of Westeros, as Robert is a renowned knight with little interest in governance. Upon Catelyn's arrival in King's Landing she is brought to a secret meeting with Petyr Baelish, known as Littlefinger, a childhood friend and admirer turned "Master of Coin" or Treasurer of King's Landing. He identifies Tyrion Lannister, the dwarf brother of Cersei and Jaime, as the owner of the dagger used in the attempt on Bran's life. While traveling back to Winterfell Catelyn encounters Tyrion, returning from the Wall, and takes him captive. She changes her destination and takes him to the remote Eyrie, where her sister, Lady Lysa Arryn rules as Lady of the Vale. Lysa blames the Lannisters for Jon's death and is eager to execute Tyrion, but he demands trial by combat and regains his freedom when his unlikely champion, hired-sword Bronn, wins the duel. In retaliation for Tyrion's abduction, Tyrion's father, Lord Tywin Lannister wages war. He is soon joined by Jaime, who angrily confronts Eddard in King's Landing, killing a number of his men and crippling Eddard before he flees the city. Eddard learns, as the murdered Jon Arryn had learned before him, that Robert's legal heirs are in fact Jaime Lannister's children by his sister. He confronts Cersei and offers her a chance to escape before he tells Robert the truth, but Robert is mortally injured in a hunt and Eddard cannot bear to tell Robert the reality about his supposed children as he lies on his deathbed. As Robert lies dying, his youngest brother Renly suggests to Eddard that they should use their combined household guardsmen to detain Cersei and her children and take control of the throne during the night, before the Lannisters can act. Eddard refuses, deeming such a deed dishonorable. Renly flees Kings Landing with the loyal House Baratheon guards instead. Eddard recruits Littlefinger to have the city guards arrest and charge Cersei, but is betrayed by him, resulting in Eddard's arrest, the death of all of his men, and Sansa's capture. The Lannisters attempt to capture Arya as well, but she flees the castle after her fencing instructor, Syrio Forel, interferes. With Eddard imprisoned, Cersei and Jaime's eldest son, Joffrey, is crowned as Robert's heir and King of the Seven Kingdoms. Eddard is persuaded by Varys to confess to treason, and to swear fealty to Joffrey as the trueborn King, in exchange for Sansa's life and his own, as Varys has arranged with Cersei to have Eddard sent to join the Night's Watch rather than be executed. Eddard then makes a public confession, but Joffrey orders his execution despite his council and mother's advice to spare him. Lord Eddard is then beheaded in full view of his daughters, Sansa and Arya. Arya is then taken by Yoren of the Night's Watch, her fate unknown. A civil war erupts as news of Eddard's death spreads across the Seven Kingdoms. Robb, now Lord of Winterfell, masses an army of northmen and marches south, joining with Catelyn to rescue his father and sisters in King's Landing, but upon learning of Eddard's death, goes instead to the Riverlands to raise support from his maternal grandfather, Lord Hoster Tully. To reach Riverrun, he agrees to a marriage pact with House Frey. At Riverrun, Jaime Lannister is currently laying siege, while holding Lord Hoster's heir and Catelyn's brother, Edmure Tully as hostage. Upon hearing of Robb's march, Lord Tywin also advances his army to meet Robb's. In a bold move, Robb covertly detaches his cavalry towards Riverrun, while his infantry under Lord Roose Bolton engages Tywin's army. Tywin, joined by the now-liberated Tyrion who has massed his own army of mountain clansmen, defeats Bolton's host, only to discover too late that they were a decoy. Robb's forces then take Jaime's army by surprise during the night, capturing Jaime himself after setting a trap for the reckless knight. Jaime's host is scattered and Edmure Tully is liberated, joining the houses of the Riverlands to Robb's army. Renly Baratheon is the younger brother to Stannis Baratheon, who is the next rightful heir to the Iron Throne. But Renly campaigns for the Throne and wins the support of Houses Baratheon and Tyrell by wedding Lord Mace Tyrell's daughter, Margaery Tyrell. Declaring himself king, Renly masses all the strength of the south and begins his march on King's Landing. After extended discussion, Robb's bannermen to House Stark and the House Tully bannermen, lords of the Riverlands, proclaim Robb King in the North. The Prologue of the novel introduces the out-kingdom Northern wilderness beyond the Wall, an ancient 700-foot-high (200 m), 300-mile-long (480 km) barrier of ice, stone and ancient magic, shielding the Seven Kingdoms from the North, manned by the order of the Night's Watch. Men of the Night's Watch (nicknamed "crows") swear an oath to serve on the Wall for life, foregoing marriage, and they wear clothing dyed only in black. In the lawless lands North of the Wall, a small patrol of Rangers from the Night's Watch encounter the Others, an ancient and evil race of beings thought to be long extinct and mythological. All the Rangers are killed except a single survivor (who flees south, becoming the deserter whom Ned executes in the beginning of the story). Jon Snow, the bastard son of Lord Eddard and despised by Catelyn, is inspired by his uncle, Benjen Stark, the First Ranger of the Night's Watch, to "take the black" and go to the Wall to join the Night's Watch. Jon travels north to the Wall with the Queen's brother, Tyrion Lannister, and other members of the Night's Watch. He becomes disillusioned when he discovers that it is little more than a penal colony meant to keep "wildlings" (human tribesmen who live in relative anarchy, north of the Wall) in check. At the Wall, Jon unites the recruits against their harsh instructor, and protects cowardly but good-natured and intelligent Samwell Tarly. Jon hopes that his combat skills will earn him assignment to the Rangers, the military arm of the Night's Watch. Instead he is assigned as steward to the Lord Commander of the Watch, Jeor Mormont, nicknamed "the Old Bear". He arranges for his friend Samwell Tarly to be made steward to elderly Maester Aemon. Meanwhile, Benjen Stark leads a small party of Rangers on patrol beyond the Wall but fails to return. Nearly six months later, the dead bodies of two of the Rangers from Benjen's party are recovered from beyond the Wall, and their corpses re-animate as wights in the night. Undeterred by sword wounds, the wights kill six men while Jon and his direwolf, Ghost, save Lord Commander Mormont by destroying one of the wights with fire. For saving his life, Mormont presents Jon with the Valyrian-steel bastard sword "Longclaw", an heirloom of the Lord Commander's House Mormont. Lord Mormont has replaced the existing bear pommel with a pommel in the shape of a white direwolf's head, representing both House Stark and Jon's direwolf. When word of his father's execution reaches Jon, he attempts to desert the Night's Watch and join his half-brother Robb in war against the Lannisters. His friends among the Night's Watch catch up to Jon before he gets too far from the Wall and persuade him to return. Mormont convinces Jon that his place is with his new brothers, and that the war for the throne does not compare to the evil that winter is set to bring down upon them from the North. With Jon's loyalty secured, Mormont declares his intention to lead a massive ranging north of the Wall, to find Benjen Stark - dead or alive - as well as to investigate the disappearance of many wildings and the dark rumors circling the King-Beyond-the-Wall, a deserter from the Night's Watch known as Mance Rayder. Across the sea in the Free City of Pentos, Viserys Targaryen lives in exile with his thirteen-year-old sister Daenerys. He is the son and only surviving male heir of Aerys II of house Targaryen, "the Mad King", who was overthrown by Robert Baratheon during the War of the Usurper. The Targaryens had ruled Westeros as dragon-lords for about 300 years, but their dragons and power are now gone. Viserys negotiates a marriage contract that exchanges his sister to Khal Drogo, a warlord of the nomadic Dothraki horse warriors, in exchange for use of Drogo's army to reclaim the Westeros Iron Throne for House Targaryen. The wealthy merchant, Magister Illyrio, who has been hosting Viserys and Daenerys, gives a wedding gift to Daenerys of three petrified dragon eggs. A knight exiled from Westeros, Ser Jorah Mormont (son of Jeor Mormont, Lord Commander of the Night's Watch), joins Viserys as an advisor. Unexpectedly Daenerys finds trust and love with her barbaric husband; she conceives a child who is prophesied to unite and rule the Dothraki. When Drogo shows little interest in conquering Westeros, the temperamental Viserys initially tries to browbeat his sister into coercing Drogo, but Daenerys, emboldened by her position as the Khal's wife, begins to stand up for herself and refuses to be bullied by her brother any longer. Initially, Drogo endures Viserys and punishes his outbursts with public humiliation. When Viserys publicly threatens Daenerys Drogo executes him by pouring a pot of molten gold on his head, giving him the golden crown he had been promised in return for Daenerys. As the last Targaryen, Daenerys takes up her brother's quest to reclaim the Iron Throne of Westeros. An assassin seeking King Robert's favour unsuccessfully attempts to poison Daenerys and her unborn child. Enraged, Drogo agrees to invade Westeros to seek revenge. While sacking villages to fund the invasion, Drogo is wounded. The wound festers and Daenerys commands a captive maegi to use blood magic to save him; the treacherous maegi sacrifices Daenerys' unborn child to power the spell, which keeps Drogo alive in a vegetative state. As the leaderless Dothraki horde disbands, Daenerys takes pity on her once-proud husband and smothers him. Eager for revenge, she orders the maegi tied to Drogo's funeral pyre and places her three dragon eggs on the pyre with Drogo. While she watches it burn, Daenerys is seduced by the beauty of the flames and walks into the inferno. Instead of perishing in the flames, she emerges unscathed and with three newly-hatched dragons draped around her and nursing at her breasts. As a true Targaryen, she is suspected to be immune to flame. The few remaining Dothraki and Ser Jorah swear their allegiance to her as The Mother of Dragons. |
713590 | /m/0351my | A Clash of Kings | George R. R. Martin | 1998 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | A Clash of Kings picks up where A Game of Thrones ended. The Seven Kingdoms of Westeros are plagued by civil war, while the Night's Watch mounts a reconnaissance force north of the Wall to investigate the mysterious people, known as wildlings, who live there. Meanwhile, in the distant east, Daenerys Targaryen continues her quest to return to and conquer the Seven Kingdoms. All signs are foreshadowing the terrible disaster that is to come. The civil war to claim the Iron Throne becomes more complex. Three kings had declared their claims in A Game of Thrones: Joffrey Baratheon, Renly Baratheon, and Stannis Baratheon. Robb Stark declares himself King in the North while Balon Greyjoy declares himself king of the Iron Islands, launching a massive assault along the west coast of the North, and becoming the fifth of the war's kings. At the Stark stronghold of Winterfell, Robb's younger brother Bran Stark is in command. He finds two new friends when Jojen and Meera Reed arrive from Greywater Watch and take an interest in his strange dreams. Stannis Baratheon declares himself King of Westeros, encouraged by Melisandre of Asshai, a red priestess of R'hllor, a god popular in the East, but relatively unheard of in Westeros, who believes Stannis to be the reincarnation of a messianic figure of her faith. The war is dubbed the War of the Five Kings. Stannis's younger brother, Renly, has also laid claim to the throne. As the elder brother, Stannis has the better claim; but Renly will not back down, since he has the larger army and believes he would make a better king than his brother. Catelyn Stark joins a meeting between Renly and Stannis to discuss a possible Stark-Baratheon alliance against their mutual foe, the Lannisters. The meeting fails, and a mysterious shadow kills Renly in his tent whilst Catelyn and the warrior-maid Brienne of Tarth are present. The two women are implicated in Renly's murder, and they flee. As a result of the murder, most of Renly's supporters shift their loyalty to Stannis, although the Tyrells do not. Renly's stronghold at Storm's End also falls when Melisandre uses her sorcery to give birth to another shadow to kill the castle's defiant castellan. Tyrion Lannister arrives at King's Landing to serve as Hand of the King, the closest adviser to the monarch, his young nephew Joffrey. Whilst intriguing against his sister Cersei, widow of the late King Robert Baratheon and mother of Joffrey, Tyrion works to improve the defenses of the city against possible attack and enters negotiations with the lords of the other noble houses to strengthen his nephew's hold on the throne. He sends the devious Littlefinger to negotiate with the Tyrells, gaining that house's support when Lord Mace Tyrell agrees to wed his daughter Margaery to Joffrey, despite Margaery's earlier unconsummated marriage to the deceased Renly and despite Joffrey's earlier pledge to wed Sansa Stark. Tyrion also forges an alliance with House Martell when he arranges for Joffrey's sister Princess Myrcella to wed Trystane Martell. In an attempt to use Winterfell as a base from which to conquer the North and to impress his father Balon, Theon Greyjoy, a former ward of the Starks and close friend of Robb's, captures Winterfell with just thirty men, taking the young Stark children Bran and Rickon captive. Bran and Rickon disappear in the night and Theon is unable to trace them. Rather than look foolish, Theon murders two anonymous peasant boys and mutilates their faces to pass them off as Bran and Rickon. Believing that their princes have been murdered, Stark supporters besiege the castle joined by a force from House Bolton. Yet Theon had previously conspired with Bolton's bastard, Ramsay Snow, and the Bolton soldiers turn on the besiegers as planned. Theon opens the gates to the victorious Boltons, but they betray him as well and raze Winterfell. Theon's whereabouts are currently unknown. Bran and Rickon emerge from hiding after the sack of the castle. To protect the heirs to Winterfell, a dying Maester Luwin convinces the boys to take separate courses: Osha, a captured wildling turned castle servant, agrees to take Rickon to safety, while Bran, accompanied by Meera, Jojen, and his simple manservant Hodor, travels north to the Wall. Robb Stark leads his army into the Westerlands and wins several victories against the Lannisters in their home territory. Tywin Lannister advances against him, but receiving news that King's Landing is threatened, rapidly withdraws south. Arya Stark, posing as a boy named Arry to protect her identity as a daughter of Eddard Stark who was previously executed on charges of treason, travels north along with new recruits for the Night's Watch. The group is captured and taken to Lannister-held Harrenhal, where Arya poses as a peasant serving girl. A mysterious man, Jaqen H'ghar, offers to repay Arya for saving the lives of him and his two companions by killing three men of her choice. Arya selects two minor, but evil Lannister bannermen as her first two choices before realizing she had wasted her opportunity. Instead of choosing a third man, Arya cunningly enlists Jaqen's help to release a band of Stark supporters who quickly take over Harrenhal. His debt repaid, Jaqen gives Arya a coin and a strange phrase, "Valar Morghulis", to be used if she ever encounters a man of Braavos and requires aid. Lord Roose Bolton soon arrives to occupy Harrenhal. Arya becomes his cup bearer, but soon escapes. Stannis Baratheon's army reaches King's Landing and launches assaults by both land and sea. Under Tyrion's command, Joffrey's forces throw back Stannis's forces through cunning use of "wildfire" (a Greek Fire-like substance) to set fire to the river while raising a chain across it to prevent Stannis' fleet from retreating, essentially trapping them in the fiery bay. Stannis' attack ultimately fails when Tywin Lannister leads his army and the remaining forces of Highgarden under Loras Tyrell to the aid of King's Landing. Stannis' fate is left uncertain, with some saying he retreated while others claim he was killed. Tyrion is seriously injured during the battle as a result of a treacherous attack by one of Joffrey's guards working as an agent of Cersei; however, he is saved by his squire, Podrick Payne. A scouting party from the Night's Watch advances northwards from the Wall. At Craster's Keep they learn that the normally anarchic wildlings are uniting under a single figure, King-beyond-the-Wall Mance Rayder. The Watch continues north to a ruined fortress formerly known as the Fist of the First Men. Lord Commander Jeor Mormont sends Jon Snow and Qhorin Halfhand on an advanced reconnaissance of the Skirling Pass. In the pass, Snow and Halfhand find themselves being hunted by wildling warriors. Facing certain defeat, Halfhand commands Snow to act as an oathbreaker to infiltrate the wildlings and learn their plans. To create proof he has truly turned, Halfhand forces Jon to fight him, and Jon kills him with the aid of his direwolf Ghost. Jon learns that Rayder is already advancing on the Wall with tens of thousands of fighters. Daenerys Targaryen strikes east across the forbidding red waste, accompanied by the knight Jorah Mormont, her remaining few loyal followers, and three newborn dragons. Scouts find a safe route to the great trading city of Qarth. Daenerys is the wonder of the city for her dragons. One merchant in particular seems especially interested in her, Xaro Xhoan Daxos, who is the leader of the Thirteen, a prominent group of traders in Qarth. He initially acts as a great host, but ultimately Daenerys cannot secure commitment from the merchants for aid in claiming the throne of Westeros because she refuses to give away one of her dragons. As a last resort, Daenerys seeks council from the warlocks of Qarth, but in the House of the Undying, the warlocks show Daenerys many confusing images and her life is threatened. Daenerys' dragon, Drogon, burns down the House of the Undying, sparking the enmity of the Qartheen. An attempt to assassinate Daenerys at the city's harbor is thwarted by the arrival of two strangers, a fat warrior named Strong Belwas and his squire, an aged warrior named Arstan Whitebeard. They are agents of Daenerys's ally Illyrio Mopatis, come to escort her back to Pentos. |
713625 | /m/0351r6 | A Storm of Swords | George R. R. Martin | 2000 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | A Storm of Swords picks up the story slightly before the end of its predecessor, A Clash of Kings. The Seven Kingdoms of Westeros are still in the grip of the War of the Five Kings, with the remaining kings Robb Stark, Balon Greyjoy, Joffrey Baratheon, and Stannis Baratheon fighting to secure their crowns. Civil war is destroying the common people, the ruling House of Baratheon and the major houses of Westeros: House Arryn of The Vale, House Baratheon of Storm's End, House Greyjoy of the Iron Islands, House Lannister of Casterly Rock, House Martell of Dorne, House Stark of Winterfell, House Tully of Riverrun, and House Tyrell of Highgarden. Stannis Baratheon's attempt to take King's Landing has been defeated by the new alliance between House Lannister (backing Joffrey) and House Tyrell. House Martell has also pledged its support to the Lannisters through the forces of Dorne, while House Arryn of The Vale have yet to take the field or declare their allegiance. Meanwhile, a large host of wildlings are marching toward the Wall under Mance Rayder, with only the tiny force of the Night's Watch in its path; and in the distant east, Daenerys Targaryen is on her way back to Pentos, hoping to raise forces to retake the Iron Throne. The novel begins in the final months of 299 After the Landing and carries on into the year 300 AL. Note the UK paperback edition of Storm of Swords was split into two books, and the French paperback edition in four. The plot summary below contains information on the single-volume editions. At Riverrun, Catelyn Stark strikes an unauthorized deal with her captive Jaime Lannister: his freedom in return for that of Catelyn's daughters. Jaime agrees, and is sent south, escorted by Brienne of Tarth. Jaime and Brienne are waylaid by mercenaries known as The Brave Companions (now in the service of Roose Bolton) and taken to Harrenhal. Their vicious leader, Vargo Hoat, chops off Jaime's sword hand, and Jaime is sent back to King's Landing. Brienne, having little value as a hostage, is left to Hoat's mercies, but Jaime returns to rescue her. Robb's army returns to Riverrun, having smashed Lannister forces in the Westerlands. Robb reveals that he has married Jeyne Westerling of the Crag, invalidating his betrothal to a House Frey daughter, thus risking losing their support. Robb's forces are dwindling as his soldiers are caught between Lord Randyll Tarly and Gregor Clegane. The Greyjoys now hold Robb's home territory of Winterfell. Nevertheless, Robb has a plan to take Moat Cailin from the Greyjoys, but it hinges on winning the support of the Freys, which they are now unlikely to give. When Lord Hoster Tully dies, Catelyn's brother Edmure becomes Lord of Riverrun. Robb gains renewed hope when he hears news that Balon Greyjoy has mysteriously died in a fall from a bridge. Further, the Iron Islands are now in a succession crisis, because both of Balon's brothers as well as his daughter Asha are each vying to succeed him, leaving the ironborn divided and vulnerable to a counter-attack. Arya Stark and her friends encounter a group of men known as the Brotherhood Without Banners, led by Lord Beric Dondarrion and the red priest Thoros of Myr. Beric's group, originally sent by Eddard Stark to put down the Lannister raids, has devolved into defending the smallfolk of the war-torn Riverlands. The group encounters Sandor Clegane, former bodyguard of King Joffrey, known as the Hound, and offers him trial by battle, which he wins by killing Lord Beric. Thoros is able to resurrect Beric using what he calls a gift from his god R'hllor. Soon after, Arya is kidnapped by the Hound. The Hound decides to take her back to her family to collect a ransom, and they head north. Robb Stark's army reaches The Twins. Frey agrees to forgive Robb on the condition that Lord Edmure Tully weds a Frey daughter in Robb's place. At the wedding celebration, warriors disguised as musicians produce crossbows and fire at the Stark supporters, breaking the sacred bond protecting guests from their hosts. The Boltons and Freys kill Robb's entire army in the betrayal. Catelyn is seized, her throat cut, and her body dumped into the river. Robb is personally stabbed through the heart by Roose Bolton, and as a final insult by the Freys, Robb's corpse is desecrated by beheading it and sewing the head of his direwolf into its place. Many of the northern lords are killed, and the few survivors captured. Tywin Lannister rewards Roose by naming House Bolton as the new Wardens of the North in place of House Stark. Arya and the Hound arrive at the outskirts of the castle as the "Red Wedding" is taking place. Realizing that something is dreadfully wrong, Arya attempts to enter the castle, but the Hound knocks her unconscious and takes her downriver. Arya dreams, seeing through the eyes of her long-missing direwolf, Nymeria. In the dream, Nymeria finds the corpse of a woman floating in a river. Arya tells the Hound that her mother Catelyn is dead. Arya and the Hound encounter his brother Gregor Clegane's men. They fight free, but the Hound is wounded. His wound becomes infected, but Arya refuses him the mercy of a clean death and leaves him. She finds a ship from the Free City of Braavos, but the captain refuses her passage until she offers him the coin that Jaqen H'ghar gave her and says "Valar Morghulis", as instructed. The captain replies "Valar Dohaeris", and they set sail for Braavos. In the Epilogue of the book, it is discovered that a re-animated Catelyn Stark is alive with the Brotherhood Without Banners, eager for revenge against those who betrayed and murdered her and her son. Davos Seaworth washes ashore on a rocky island after the Battle of the Blackwater. He is found by King Stannis's men and taken to Dragonstone. Davos blames the red priestess Melisandre for Stannis's defeat, and he is imprisoned for treason (Melisandre having foreseen his intention to assassinate her). Melisandre asks for Davos simply to be true to his king, and Stannis releases Davos and asks him to serve as his Hand, since he is one of the few men Stannis can trust to serve him truthfully (most of the others being ambitious sycophants or fanatics). With Stannis' cooperation, Melisandre has performed blood rituals to awaken "stone dragons", which she thinks are the great statues that guard the castle. (Chronologically, this happens shortly before the Red Wedding.) King's Landing welcomes the Tyrells as liberators. King Joffrey agrees to set aside his betrothal to Sansa Stark and marry Lady Margaery Tyrell instead. Sansa is soon compelled to marry Tyrion Lannister. Tyrion treats Sansa gently and refuses to consummate the marriage against her will. Balon Greyjoy of the Iron Islands offers an alliance, but Tywin Lannister, Joffrey's grandfather and Hand, spurns it. Thus Balon's hope that the Lannisters would let him rule as king in the Iron Islands if he betrayed the North comes to nothing, as Theon said it would. Word reaches King's Landing of the sudden death of Balon Greyjoy, followed by news from The Twins regarding the Red Wedding and the murder of Robb Stark. Joffrey gloats that he has "won" the war upon hearing of Robb's death, angering Tywin, as the boy Joffrey played no part in the war at all. Margaery and Joffrey's wedding is held as planned; but, in the following festivities, King Joffrey is poisoned to death. Cersei Lannister has her brother Tyrion arrested as the poisoner and put on trial. Meanwhile, Sansa is smuggled out of the castle and taken to Littlefinger, who admits responsibility for Joffrey's death. Littlefinger, with Sansa, departs King's Landing for the Eyrie with a new scheme: to woo Lady Lysa Arryn, Catelyn's sister, into marriage. Davos Seaworth discovers a message from the Night's Watch, begging for aid against Mance Rayder and The Others. Melisandre convinces Stannis to sacrifice Edric Storm, a bastard son of Stannis's late brother, King Robert, to the flames to wake the dragons; but Davos smuggles Edric to safety. Stannis prepares to execute Davos for treason; before he can, Davos shows Stannis the Night's Watch's plea. Jaime Lannister and Brienne of Tarth reach King's Landing to find that Joffrey's younger brother Tommen has inherited the throne but is not yet crowned, Tyrion is on trial for Joffrey's murder, and the Tyrell bannermen blame Brienne for King Renly's death. Jaime becomes Lord Commander of the Kingsguard but refuses his father's offer to make him heir to Casterly Rock. He also refuses to believe Cersei's claims that Tyrion killed Joffrey. After a quarrel, Jaime rejects her advances. Tyrion is seemingly doomed, as Cersei has recruited many people to give evidence against him, including the spymaster Varys and Tyrion's concubine Shae. Tyrion is approached by Lord Oberyn Martell of Dorne, who offers to fight for him in a trial by combat against Cersei's champion, Ser Gregor Clegane, "the Mountain that Rides". Oberyn nearly emerges victorious, but a mortally-wounded Gregor kills him. Tyrion is again condemned to death but escapes from his dungeon with the help of Jaime and Varys. Jaime reveals that Tyrion's beloved first wife had been a crofter's daughter, not a prostitute as their father Tywin had told him. Tyrion sees this as an unforgivable betrayal and swears vengeance on his father and siblings. Entering Tywin's chamber, he discovers Shae in his father's bed and kills her. He confronts Tywin as he sits on the privy. When taunted, Tyrion shoots Tywin through the bowels with a crossbow and leaves. Jaime frees Brienne and gives her a sword reforged from Ned Stark's sword of Valyrian steel. He tells her to keep her oath to Lady Catelyn, to find Arya and Sansa and return them home. He also tells her that the real reason he betrayed his oath and murdered King Aerys was that Aerys planned to destroy the city and everyone in it, rather than let Robert Baratheon take it. He carried out his most infamous act to save the innocent. At the Eyrie, Littlefinger and Lysa are now married, and Sansa remains hidden by pretending to be an illegitimate daughter of Littlefinger's named Alayne Stone. Only Littlefinger and Lysa are aware of her true identity. Sansa lives in fear of her increasingly psychotic Aunt Lysa, who threatens to cast her from the Eyrie after seeing Littlefinger kiss her. Littlefinger intervenes, unceremoniously pushing Lysa out of the "Moon Door" to her death. Sansa learns that Littlefinger convinced Lysa to poison her husband Jon Arryn and blame the Lannisters, which was the catalyst to the events of A Game of Thrones. A detachment of the Night's Watch awaits word from Qhorin Halfhand and Jon Snow. The Watch comes under attack by wights and the fabled monsters of legend known as the Others, suffering heavy casualties, but they manage to withdraw. Samwell Tarly kills one of the Others with a strange blade of obsidian, or "dragonglass". Some of the men of the Watch mutiny and kill Lord Commander Jeor Mormont at Craster's Keep. Sam escapes with the help of one of Craster's daughter-wives, Gilly, and they make their way south towards the Wall. They are helped on the way by a strange figure riding an elk, whom Sam calls Coldhands. Bran Stark, along with Jojen and Meera Reed, fleeing the ruins of Winterfell, are guided north by Bran's strange dreams of a three-eyed crow. They reach the Wall and meet Samwell Tarly and Gilly. Sam guides them to Coldhands, who will take them north, and returns to Castle Black, agreeing to keep the truth of Bran's survival a secret. Jon Snow is taken to Mance Rayder and is able to convince him that he is a deserter from the Night's Watch. He learns that the Others are driving the wildlings south towards the Wall. Jon and Ygritte also begin a sexual relationship due to their "marriage by capture". Ygritte takes Jon into a cave where they have sex, and Ygritte tells Jon she is in love with him. Mance seeks the legendary Horn of Winter which will shatter the Wall when sounded, but has been unable to find it. Jon escapes from the wildlings and reaches Castle Black ahead of Mance Rayder's army. The wildling army, over forty thousand strong, reaches Castle Black and assaults the Wall; Jon takes command of the defences and repels several assaults. Ygritte is among those slain in the fighting, dying in a heart-broken Jon's arms. As Jon Snow is leading the defense of the Wall, Janos Slynt and Ser Alliser Thorne return to Castle Black and hold an impromptu trial, accusing Jon of oathbreaking and treachery. He is imprisoned in an ice-cell at the base of the Wall. Janos Slynt's imagined self-importance and Ser Alliser's grudgingly-held anger at Jon Snow cause them to send Jon to kill Mance Rayder. Rayder now has the Horn of Winter, but would rather cross the Wall than destroy it, as the Wall is the only thing that will keep the Others at bay. As Jon is talking with Mance Rayder in the Wildling camp, the surviving army of King Stannis arrives. Rayder is captured and imprisoned. Stannis reveals that Davos Seaworth convinced him that a true king would protect the Seven Kingdoms' northern boundary from invasion. Melisandre believes the wildling invasion to be the forerunner of the return of The Great Other, the sworn foe of her red god R'hllor. Stannis offers Jon Snow Winterfell in exchange for his support, but Jon is chosen by the Night's Watch as its new Lord Commander through the cleverness of Samwell Tarly, and politely refuses Stannis' offer in favor of keeping his oath. Heading for Pentos by sea, Daenerys Targaryen learns that large slave armies can be bought in the cities of Slaver's Bay. Daenerys agrees to give up one of her beloved infant dragons to entice the Slavers to sell her the entire host of the Unsullied, the feared warrior-eunuchs of Astapor. After Daenerys is declared their new mistress, she immediately orders her new army of Unsullied to turn on their former masters and sacks the city. They are aided by Daenerys' maturing dragons, which while not yet big enough to ride, wreak havoc by breathing fire. She then frees all the slaves of Astapor. Daenerys' combined Dothraki/Dragon/Unsullied horde then advances on the slaver city of Yunkai. Many Yunkai mercenaries are killed; the remainder switch sides to Daenerys' growing horde, and Yunkai easily falls. However, the lords of Meereen antagonize Daenerys by killing child slaves and burning the land to deny her resources. Daenerys besieges the city to no avail. Daenerys discovers two false persons in her camp, but the natures of their deceptions are very different. Ser Jorah Mormont was spying for Varys the Spider, informant to the late King Robert Baratheon; Arstan Whitebeard is actually an alias of Ser Barristan Selmy, the humiliated former Lord Commander of Robert Baratheon's Kingsguard, who has come seeking the true Targaryen ruler. Daenerys offers both men the chance to make amends: by sneaking into Meereen to free the slaves and start an uprising. Meereen soon falls. Barristan Selmy submits to Daenery's judgement; she forgives him and makes him Lord Commander of her Queensguard; however, Mormont still insists that he did nothing wrong, and thus she banishes him for his betrayal. Daenerys decides to remain in Meereen and learn to be the queen that Westeros needs. |
714151 | /m/0352zf | A Deepness in the Sky | Vernor Vinge | 1999-03 | {"/m/03lrw": "Hard science fiction", "/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | The Qeng Ho arrive at the On/Off star shortly before the Emergent fleet, a few years before the sun turns on, at which point the Spider civilization will "wake up" and continue its climb into a technological civilization. A reception held by the Emergents doubles as a vector to infect the Qeng Ho with a timed "mindrot" virus. The Emergents time an ambush to take advantage of the onset of symptoms. During these events, a concurrent history of the Spider civilization unfolds – mainly through the picaresque, and then increasingly political and technocratic, experiences of a small group of liberal-minded and progressive Spiders. Their struggles against ignorance and obsolescent traditions are coloured with oddly human-like descriptions and nomenclature, prefiguring some major plot revelations towards the end of the story. Far above, after a close fight, the Emergents subjugate the Qeng Ho; but losses to both sides force them to combine and adopt the so-called "Lurker strategy", monitoring and aiding the Spiders' technological development, waiting until they build up the massive infrastructure and technological base that the visitors need in order to repair their vessels. The mindrot virus originally manifested itself on the Emergents' home world as a devastating plague, but they subsequently mastered it and learned to use it both as a weapon and as a tool for mental domination. Emergent culture uses mindrot primarily in the form of a variant which technicians can manipulate in order to release neurotoxins to specific parts of the brain. An active MRI-type device triggers changes through dia- and paramagnetic biological molecules. By manipulating the brain in this way, Emergent managers induce obsession with a single idea or specialty, which they call Focus, essentially turning people into brilliant appliances. Many Qeng Ho become Focused against their will, and the Emergents retain the rest of the population under mass surveillance, with only a portion of the crew not in suspended animation. The Qeng Ho trading culture gradually starts to dilute this totalitarian regime, by demonstrating to the Emergents certain benefits of tolerated and restricted free trade; the two human cultures merge to some extent over the decades of forced co-operation. Pham Nuwen, the founder of the Qeng Ho trading culture, is living aboard the fleet under the pseudonym Pham Trinli, posing as an inept and bumbling fleet elder. He subverts the Emergents' own oppressive security systems through a series of high-risk ruses. During his plotting he begins to admire the Emergents' Focus technology, and begins to evaluate its usage in his own plans for the future of the fleet. The plan to wrest fleet control from the Emergents, however, requires the co-operation of a much younger Qeng Ho who, through attrition, has become the Qeng Ho "Fleet Manager". His position as the unique liaison officer between Qeng Ho and Emergents leads him to despair, and he accepts Pham Nuwen's offer to join a plot against the Emergents as a way to personal redemption as well as to take revenge against the Emergents. However, his understanding of Pham's ambitions for Focus technology leads to a confrontation between them over the future use of Focus by the Qeng Ho. Coming to an understanding, the two seize the critical moment when the Emergents attempt to provoke a nuclear war on the Spider home-world in order to seize power. By subverting the Emergents' management systems and by luck and human resilience, they defeat the ruling class of the Emergents. The combined Emergent/Qeng Ho fleet now negotiates with the Spider civilization as a trading partner. Pham announces his plans to free all of the Focused in the entire Emergent civilization, and, if he survives that, to go to the center of the galaxy to find the source of the On/Off star and the strange technology remnants that have clearly traveled with it. |
714218 | /m/03538v | The Notebook | Nicholas Sparks | 10/1/1996 | {"/m/01qxvh": "Romance novel"} | The story begins with Noah, an 80-year-old man, reading to a woman in a nursing home. He tells her the following story: : Noah, 31, returns from World War II to his town of New Bern, North Carolina. He finishes restoring an antebellum-style house, after his father's death. Meanwhile Allie, 29, sees the house in the newspaper and decides to pay him a visit. : They are meeting, again, after a 14-year separation, which followed their brief but passionate summer romance when her family was visiting the town. They were separated by class, as she was the daughter of a wealthy family, and he worked as a laborer in a lumberyard then. Seeing each other brings on a flood of memories and strong emotions in both of them. They have dinner together and talk about their lives and the past. Allie learns that Noah had written letters to her, every day of one year, 365 letters after their breakup. She realizes that her mother must have intercepted his letters. They talk about what could have happened between them without her mother's interference. At the end of the night, Noah invites Allie to come back the next day and promises her a surprise. She decides to see him again. During this time, her fiancé, Lon, tries to reach her at the hotel. When Allie does not respond to his calls, he begins to worry. : The next day, Noah takes Allie on a canoe ride in a small lake where swans and geese swim. She is enchanted. On their way back, they are caught in a storm and end up soaked. When they return to his house, they talk again about how important they were to each other, and how their feelings have not changed. Noah and Allie share a kiss and make love. : Allie's mother shows up the next morning and gives Allie the letters from Noah. When her mother leaves, Allie is torn and has a decision to make. She knows she loves Noah, but she does not want to hurt Lon. Noah begs her to stay with him, but she decides to leave. She cries all the way back to the hotel and starts reading the letters her mother returned to her. At the hotel, her fiancé, Lon, is waiting in the lobby. The man stops reading the story at this point, and tells the reader that he is reading to his wife, who suffers from Alzheimer's disease and does not recognize him. He explains that he is also ill, battling a third cancer, and suffering heart disease, kidney failure, and severe arthritis in his hands. He resumes reading the story and describing their life together: her career as a famous painter, their children, growing old together, and finally the diagnosis of Alzheimer's. He had changed the names in the story to protect her, but he is Noah and she is Allie. They walk together and Allie, although she does not recognize him, says she might feel something for him. That night they have dinner together. Referring to the story, she says that she thinks Allie chose Noah. Recognizing her husband, she tells him that she loves him. They embrace and talk, but after almost four hours, Allie fades and begins to panic and hallucinate. She forgets who he is again. |
717167 | /m/035cm4 | A History of the World in 10½ Chapters | Julian Barnes | null | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | "The Visitors" describes the hijacking of a cruise liner, similar to the 1985 incident of the Achille Lauro. "The Wars of Religion" reports a trial against the woodworms in a church, as they have caused the building to become unstable. "The Survivor" is set in a world in which the Chernobyl disaster was "the first big accident". Journalists report that the world is on the brink of nuclear war. The protagonist escapes by boat to avoid a nuclear holocaust. The chapter "Shipwreck" is an analysis of Géricault's painting, The Raft of the Medusa. The first half narrates the historical events of the shipwreck and the survival of the crew members. The second half of the chapter analyses the painting itself. It describes Géricault's "softening" the impact of reality in order to preserve the aestheticism of the work, or to make the story of what happened more palatable. The chapter "The Mountain" describes the journey of a religious woman to a monastery where she wants to intercede for her dead father. The "Three Simple Stories" portray a survivor from the RMS Titanic, the Biblical story of Jonah and the whale, and the Jewish refugees on board the MS St. Louis in 1939, who were prevented from landing in the United States and other countries. "Upsteam!" consists of letters from an actor who travels to a remote jungle for a film project, described as similar to The Mission (1986). His colleague is drowned in an accident with a raft. Entitled "Parenthesis," the half chapter is inserted between chapters 8 and 9. It is different in style to the other chapters, which are short stories; here a narrator addresses his readers and offers a philosophical discussion on love. The narrator is called "Julian Barnes", but, as he states, the reader cannot be sure that the narrator's opinions are those of the author. A parallel is drawn with El Greco's painting Burial of the Count of Orgaz, in which the artist confronts the viewer. The piece includes a discussion of lines from Philip Larkin's poem An Arundel Tomb ("What will survive of us is love") and from W. H. Auden's September 1, 1939 ("We must love one another or die"). The chapter "Project Ararat" tells the story of a fictional astronaut Spike Tiggler, based on the astronaut James Irwin. The final chapter "The Dream" portrays New Heaven. |
717649 | /m/035dq2 | Enemy Lines: Rebel Stand | Aaron Allston | null | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction"} | Continuing the adventures started in Rebel Dream, Wedge Antilles continues to defend the planet Borleias from the Yuuzhan Vong. After rooting out a spy in the Vong-controlled Tam Elgrin, he begins creating a superlaser, identical to the Death Star's except in one regard: it doesn't work. Using both the laser and Commander Czulkang Lah's obsession with the capture of Jaina Solo, Antilles draws the Yuuzhan Vong fleet away from Lah's flagship. While the fleet is elsewhere, the Super Star Destroyer Lusankya is fitted with a spear and flown directly into the worldship. The worldship is destroyed, and Czulkang Lah perishes. Meanwhile, on Coruscant, Luke Skywalker, Mara Jade Skywalker, Tahiri Veila and Wraith Squadron continue their scouting mission. There, they encounter a Dark Jedi similar to the mythical Lord Nyax, but who is really the genetically modified Dark Jedi Irek Ismaren. Nyax is more powerful than Luke, but, with the combined efforts of the Jedi and the Yuuzhan Vong, Nyax is defeated. Meanwhile, Viqi Shesh's plans to escape Coruscant are foiled by Wraith Squadron, and she commits suicide as a result. Han and Leia Organa Solo, along with their droids C-3PO and R2-D2, set off on adventures to root out and overthrow any planetary government that plans to acquiesce to the Yuuzhan Vong. One of their most dangerous missions is set on Aphran IV, though they are able to escape death with their mission a success. |
717675 | /m/035drw | Traitor | Matthew Stover | null | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | At the beginning of the novel, Jacen Solo is being tortured via the Embrace of Pain as he is overlooked by his captors, the Yuuzhan Vong and the mysterious figure known as Vergere. Vergere increases this pain by somehow robbing Jacen of the Force, but at the same time, she helps him through his agony by telling him to embrace, just like the Yuuzhan Vong do. Jacen does just as Vergere suggested, which pleases the Vong, represented by Nom Anor throughout the novel, who believe that in no time, Jacen will become just like them. Soon, nearly a year following the Fall of Coruscant, Jacen is transported to a Yuuzhan Vong seedship, where he is enslaved to a creature called a dhuryam. As this happens, he gains Vongsense, similar to how his late brother, Anakin, had sensed them with his lambent-imbedded lightsaber back in Edge of Victory I: Conquest. The dhuryam is competing against other dhuryams to become the World Brain of the captured Coruscant, which has been renamed Yuuzhan'tar in honor of the Yuuzhan Vong's dead homeworld. As World Brain, the dhuryam that Jacen is enslaved to will have the responsibility and authority of everything technical on Yuuzhan'tar. Through more help from Vergere, who turns out to be a Force-user herself, Jacen forces the dhuryam to stop enslaving him and think of him as a partner; this way, the dhuryam would be more successful to be in consideration of being the World Brain of Yuuzhan'tar. As a result of this, Jacen's dhuryam indeed becomes more successful throughout various operations aboard the seedship. Eventually, the day comes when a dhuryam aboard the seedship will become selected to govern Yuuzhan'tar. Jacen uses this day to start a riot where Yuuzhan Vong and slave alike are killed, and he takes advantage of the chaos to kill off his dhuryam's opponents. When he decides to kill his own dhuryam, he sees the spirit of Anakin telling him to stop. Unknowing of whether or not this was the real Anakin or a fabrication created by Vergere, Jacen's hesitation in killing the surviving dhuryam results in him getting knocked out. Jacen's dhuryam becomes the World Brain of Yuuzhan'tar by default, and Jacen wakes up on the captured Coruscant, realizing in horror what this newly transformed planet once was. Vergere leads him on a journey throughout the transformed world, and gradually, she shows him evidence that the Jedi's ideals of the Force are flawed; there is no light or dark side, but an overall power of the Force whose raw power is only considered to be of the dark side. Jacen refuses to believe this until Vergere leads him into a Yuuzhan Vong trap where he nearly kills all of them, including Vergere herself. Jacen is shocked at just how right Vergere is, even after she revealed previously that she was once a member of the previous Jedi Order. But eventually, Jacen comes to accept the Yuuzhan Vong's ways as they give him the late Anakin Solo's lightsaber, which is considered a holy relic to the Vong due to its imbedded lambent crystal. Jedi Knight Ganner Rhysode has spent much time searching the galaxy trying to find Jacen, being one of the few who believe that he is still alive. He comes into contact with Jacen and an entourage of Yuuzhan Vong infiltrators aboard a New Republic refugee ship, and Ganner is captured due to his Jedi nature. He is taken to Yuuzhan'tar in order to be converted to their ways like Jacen. But as it turns out, Jacen had feigned loyalty to the Vong so that he could get close to the World Brain. The plan works as both he and Ganner are allowed admittance into the Well of the World Brain, although Nom Anor knows that they were faking their obedience to the Yuuzhan Vong. Knowing that Jacen won't have time to do whatever he wants to the World Brain, Ganner takes Jacen's lightsaber and decides to take on every Yuuzhan Vong warrior at the Well of the World Brain, vowing that not one of them will ever pass. Ganner fights every Vong warrior to the death, but in the end, he is so mortally wounded that he brings down the hall of the Well of the World Brain on top of himself and every surviving Vong with him. Meanwhile, as the battle commenced, Nom Anor looked to Vergere to escape the disaster, and Vergere tricks him into revealing his escape craft. Vergere then coerces the Vong plant life around them to tie up Nom Anor so that she and Jacen could escape Yuuzhan'tar. Meanwhile, Jacen concludes his business with the World Brain, and he and Vergere leave. As they travel back to the New Republic, Jacen reveals to Vergere that he convinced the World Brain to teach the Yuuzhan Vong the concept of compromise; the brain will cause problems throughout the Vong's occupation of the world so that for once, the invaders will know that not everything will ever be perfect for them. Vergere applauds Jacen for applying what she taught him throughout the novel to the World Brain. |
717690 | /m/035dtq | Force Heretic: Remnant | Shane Dix | null | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction"} | Luke Skywalker leads a Jedi mission to find the lost, living world of Zonama Sekot, and on his way helps repel a Yuuzhan Vong invasion of the Imperial Remnant, formerly the Empire. Peace is declared between the Remnant and the reorganizing Galactic Alliance, but this is marred by the ruin of Barab I and the destruction of N'zoth by the Yuuzhan Vong. Meanwhile, the Solos (minus Jacen, since he is with Luke trying to find Zonama Sekot) and their allies discover an alliance between the Vong and the Fians, the inhabitants of Galantos, which is thwarted after the Vong try to invade the planet. Elsewhere, on Yuuzhan'tar, Nom Anor takes on the identity of Yu'shaa, prophet of the heretical Jeedai cult. |
717697 | /m/035dvd | Force Heretic: Refugee | Sean Williams | null | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction"} | Luke Skywalker's mission to find the living world of Zonama Sekot takes him and his team to the Chiss capital world of Csilla. There, they look into the planet's library for any information on the living planet, and amidst this, they foil a Chiss conspiracy against the Fel family. As a result of this, Luke and his team are given more time, and Jacen Solo manages to figure out that Zonama Sekot is probably hiding in the Unknown Regions disguised as a moon. The team finds evidence of this as they look into information on a solar system that inhabits the gas giant of Mobus. Meanwhile, the Solos and their allies foil two conspiracies on the world of Bakura just in time to repel the second Ssi-ruu Imperium's invasion of the planet. However, as a consequence, Tahiri Veila falls victim to her Yuuzhan Vong personality, which had previously been implanted in her by the late Vong shaper Mezhan Kwaad, and which has taken on potency to Tahiri's psyche following her boyfriend Anakin's death. Tahiri falls into a coma as a result, and her normal half and her Yuuzhan Vong half fight over control of her body within Tahiri's mind. Beneath Yuuzhan'tar, Nom Anor, posing as Yu'shaa, the Prophet of the Shamed Ones, manages to find a turncoat Yuuzhan Vong priestess by the name of Ngaaluh. Ngaaluh agrees to help Nom Anor and the Shamed Ones topple Supreme Overlord Shimrra from the polyp throne, as there are those within the Vong elite who doubt Shimrra's ability to lead the species to salvation. |
717714 | /m/035dw2 | Force Heretic: Reunion | Sean Williams | null | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction"} | Han Solo and his wife Leia fight to keep a critical communications center out of Yuuzhan Vong hands as Tahiri masters her half-Jedi, half-Vong nature. Luke Skywalker and his team of Jedi Knights rediscover the living world of Zonama Sekot (first seen in Greg Bear's novel Rogue Planet) and plead for that world's interference in the ongoing war. It goes well; the world agrees to follow them. Meanwhile, Nom Anor's heresy among the Shamed Ones is hindered when his elite spy, Ngaaluh, is discovered by Supreme Overlord Shimrra, and she is forced to kill herself. However, before she did so, Ngaaluh revealed to Nom Anor rumors from Shimrra's court of a living world that, according to Yuuzhan Vong legends, will be the downfall of the species. |
717726 | /m/035dxq | The Final Prophecy | Gregory Keyes | null | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction"} | The novel's subplot focuses on the Galactic Alliance's battle with the Yuuzhan Vong in the Bilbringi system. When the HoloNet is suddenly scrambled, General Wedge Antilles's forces are forced to fight tooth-and-nail against the Vong while Jaina Solo is forced to deal with a group of cowardly criminals aboard a space station that would have meant quite a deal against the galactic invaders. As a result of the Battle of Bilbringi, several Galactic Alliance officers are captured or killed, and the remnants of Antilles's forces retreat back to their home defenses. The main plot of the novel deals with the decisions made by Nom Anor and Nen Yim. With his heresy among the Shamed Ones starting to wane, Nom Anor reveals that a living world will come to save them and defeat Supreme Overlord Shimrra. Meanwhile, Master Shaper Nen Yim studies a spacecraft taken by an executed Yuuzhan Vong commander from the living world of Zonama Sekot. Nen Yim soon finds evidence that the biology between the Sekotan ship is similar to the DNA of the Yuuzhan Vong and their creations. This is part of the evidence among Nom Anor and the Shamed Ones that the living world that Ngaaluh mentioned in the previous novel is a destined harbinger of doom to Shimrra's order, or, to Shimrra and the elite, could spell the extermination of the Yuuzhan Vong as a whole. As this happens, the presence of the Quorealists becomes more well known in Shimrra's order. As it is revealed, the Quorealists are the lingering supporters of Shimrra's predecessor on the polyp throne, Quoreal, who espoused against invading the galaxy, which was what prompted Shimrra and his own supporters to overthrow and kill Quoreal and his followers. Priest Harrar, a secret Quorealist, becomes intrigued with the new evidence that Nen Yim uncovered from the Sekotan ship. Nom Anor decides to act upon what Nen Yim discovered by calling to the Galactic Alliance to send Jedi over to help him and Nen Yim escape Yuuzhan'tar and find Zonama Sekot. Tahiri Veila and Corran Horn respond to the call, and along with successfully collecting the disguised Nom Anor and Nen Yim, they also pick up the turncoat Harrar via the Sekotan ship. They use its navigation to travel to Zonama Sekot, where the ship lands and dies. The five travelers begin to study the planet alongside each other in order to get to know the others' ways. As Nen Yim eventually discovers a shocking truth between Zonama Sekot and the Yuuzhan Vong, Nom Anor makes a decision to kill the living world by sabotaging its hyperdrive cores just as he calls for help from the Vong; he believes that by killing the world that Shimrra fears so much, he would be inducted back into the elite. Nom Anor then reveals his true identity to Nen Yim and mortally wounds her before going after the hyperdrive cores. As she fades away into death, Nen Yim is able to tell Tahiri what Nom Anor plans to do, and she, Corran, and Harrar go after him. However, Nom Anor is successful in sabotaging the hyperdrive cores and escapes as the planet appears to begin dying. After Harrar is knocked off a cliff from his brief encounter with Nom Anor, Tahiri and Corran are rescued by Luke Skywalker, his wife Mara, Jacen Solo, and Saba Sebatyne, and they are all taken to shelter before Zonama Sekot jumps into hyperspace. Soon, Sekot, taking on the form of Nen Yim, reveals to the Jedi that Nom Anor's attempt to kill the living world has failed, and now, it is returning to known space to fight the Yuuzhan Vong. |
718998 | /m/035jkn | Millennium | John Varley | 1983 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | Millennium features a civilization that has dubbed itself "The Last Age". Due to millennia of warfare of every type (nineteen nuclear wars alone), the Earth has been heavily polluted and humanity's gene pool irreparably damaged. They have thus embarked on a desperate plan; time travel into the past, collect healthy humans, and send them to an uncontaminated planet to rebuild civilization. The time travelers can only take people that will have no further effect on the timeline: those who have vanished without a trace, or died without being observed; otherwise they would be changing the past, which risks a temporal paradox and perhaps even a catastrophic breakdown of the fabric of time. Though they collect everyone they can, they exert a great deal of effort on those destined to die in various disasters such as sinking ships and crashing airplanes (and once a century of Roman soldiers lost and dying in the North African desert). As such incidents leave no survivors to report interference and change the timeline, they can freely remove the living but soon-to-die victims, and replace them with convincing corpses they have manufactured in the future. The novel deals with several of the raids, their inevitable discovery in the present day, and the fallout that results from changes to the present day reverberating into the future. The story follows Louise Baltimore, who is in charge of the "snatch team" that goes back into the past to kidnap people who would otherwise die. Because of the massive pollution and the genetic damage she has sustained, she is missing one leg and must get advanced medical treatment daily. Her appearance is quite ugly due to skin damage (from "paraleprosy") and other problems; however, she wears a special "skin suit" which makes her look whole and beautiful (which may or may not be real—she is an unreliable narrator), and gives her a functional artificial leg. The team she leads uses a "time gate" to appear in the bathroom aboard an airplane in flight. Dressed to look like flight attendants, they begin to bluff the passengers into entering the bathroom where they are pushed into the gate, to arrive in the future. After large numbers of people disappear, the remaining passengers become suspicious. The future team then uses special weapons to stun them before throwing them through the gate. During the removal of the passengers, they run into an unexpected hijacker. The ensuing gunplay is one-sided and one of the snatch team members is killed, her stunner lost. The rest of the team finishes removing the passengers and the real flight attendants. The team then scatters pre-burnt body parts around the plane so they will be found after the crash. As the plane approaches the moment when it is destined to crash, the lost weapon still has not been found. Upon returning to her present (our future), Louise is informed that the weapon that was left behind has caused a paradox and that it must be recovered to prevent a breakdown in the fabric of time. The novel then continues with her efforts to go back in time to fix the paradox created. |
719323 | /m/035kbs | Making History | Stephen Fry | null | {"/m/0mz2": "Alternate history", "/m/07s2s": "Time travel", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | The story is told in first person by Michael "Puppy" Young, a young history student at Cambridge University on the verge of completing his doctoral thesis on the early life of Adolf Hitler and his mother. He meets Professor Leo Zuckerman, a physicist who has a strong personal interest in Hitler, the rise of Nazism and the Holocaust. Michael assumes this is due to his Jewish heritage. However, it is later revealed that Leo was born Axel Bauer, the son of Dietrich Bauer, a Nazi doctor at Auschwitz. Leo has developed a machine that enables the past to be viewed—but it is of no practical use as the image is not resolvable into details. Together, they hatch a plan to modify the machine such that it can be used to send something back into time. They decide to use a permanent male contraceptive pill, stolen from Michael's girlfriend (a biochemistry researcher), who, due to his continual distraction, has left him to take a position at Princeton University. They decide to send this pill back in time to the well in Braunau am Inn so that Hitler's father will drink from it, become infertile, and Hitler will never be born. When Michael awakens he is completely disoriented. He soon discovers that he is in the USA, at Princeton University. Everyone he encounters is surprised that he is speaking with an English accent. It takes some time for Michael's memory to return. He realizes that his plan was successful, history has changed, and for some reason his parents must have moved to America. Initially he is elated and tells his new friend Steve how happy he is because Steve has never heard of Hitler, Braunau-am-Inn, or the Nazi party. Steve corrects Michael and reveals that he is well aware of the Nazi party. Michael begins to discover the history of this new world. It turns out that without Hitler, a new leader emerged, Rudolph Gloder, who was equally ruthless. In fact, Michael and Zuckerman have replaced Hitler with a Nazi leader who was even more charming, patient, and effective, and as committed to the Final Solution as Hitler had been. In this alternate timeline, the Nazis won a mandate in the Reichstag in 1932 and built up an electronics industry of their own. Unlike Hitler, Gloder proceeded with stealth, ensuring peaceful unification with Austria in 1937. More alarmingly, Gloder's Nazis also had a head start on the research and development of nuclear weapons, which led to the destruction of Moscow and Leningrad, eliminating Joseph Stalin and his Politburo in this alternate 1938. The Greater German Reich annexes Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Poland, Turkey and invades the remnants of the former Soviet Union. In 1939, France, Britain, Scandinavia, and the Benelux nations capitulate, although Britain rebels in 1941, leading to the execution of several dissidents, among them the Duke of York (the historical King George VI). Jews are exiled to a "Jewish Free State" within the former Yugoslavia, where most of this world's Holocaust occurs. The United States develops nuclear weapons in 1941, leading to a Cold War between Nazi Germany, its satellites, and the United States. The latter has never gone to war against the Japanese Empire in the Pacific, and it is left unsaid whether Japan has its own nuclear weapons as well. Due to these changes, the Nazis are now the dominant power in the whole of Europe. The plan for genocide of the Jewish race came to fruition, although this is only implied, never explicitly stated. (Every time Michael attempts to ask someone what happened to Europe's Jews, he receives no answer.) The USA is engaged in a fierce struggle short of combat against the Nazis, supporting former Soviet guerrillas fighting in Siberia. As a result, this United States has become far more socially conservative. Because there was no sixties upsurge of social liberalism and decriminalisation of homosexuality in (Nazi-occupied) Western Europe in this world, the latter is still a felony, while racial segregation is still active. Steve turns out to be homosexual, and when he discovers Michael's background, he marvels at his talk of gay pride marches, urban gay communities, and a mass social movement in Michael's world of origin, regarding it as "utopian". Much to his surprise, Michael reciprocates Steve's feelings, and realises that he too is gay. Michael is apprehended by the authorities, who believe that he is a possible spy. Michael learns that the water from the well in Hitler's home town was used to create "Braunau Water", which was the instrument to sterilise the European Jews, wiping them out in one generation. In a cruel twist of fate, the person who perfected the synthesis was Dietrich Bauer. Once more his physicist son, Axel, is wracked with guilt and has developed a Temporal Imager. With Michael and Steve's help, they plan to send a dead rat to poison the well so that it will be pumped clean of the sterilising water. As they begin to do this, they are interrupted by the federal agents that apprehended Michael earlier and they end up shooting Steve, who dies in Michael's arms just as the time alteration occurs. Time changes again. Expecting the disorientation, Michael comes to his senses faster now and discovers that almost everything is back to how it was, except that his favorite band never existed. He gives up his career in academia, figuring he can at least make some money "writing" the songs that he remembers from the previous reality. Finally, Michael is reunited with Steve, who also remembers the previous reality. Their gay relationship is no longer criminal. |
722248 | /m/035ph8 | Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community | Robert Putnam | 2000 | {"/m/06n6p": "Social sciences", "/m/05h83": "Non-fiction"} | In Bowling Alone: America's Declining Social Capital (1995) Putnam surveys the decline of "social capital" in the United States of America since 1950. He has described the reduction in all the forms of in-person social intercourse upon which Americans used to found, educate, and enrich the fabric of their social lives. He believes this undermines the active civil engagement which a strong democracy requires from its citizens. Putnam discusses ways in which Americans have disengaged from political involvement including decreased voter turnout, public meeting attendance, serving on committees and working with political parties. Putnam also cites Americans' growing distrust in their government. Putnam accepts the possibility that this lack of trust could be attributed to "the long litany of political tragedies and scandals since the 1960s" (see paragraph 13 of the 1995 article), but believes that this explanation is limited when viewing it alongside other "trends in civic engagement of a wider sort" (par. 13). Putnam notes the aggregate loss in membership of many existing civic organizations and points out that the act of individual membership has not migrated to other, succeeding organizations. To illustrate why the decline in Americans' membership in social organizations is problematic to democracy, Putnam uses bowling as an example. Although the number of people who bowl has increased in the last 20 years, the number of people who bowl in leagues has decreased. If people bowl alone, they do not participate in social interaction and civic discussions that might occur in a league environment. Putnam then contrasts the countertrends of ever increasing mass-membership organizations, nonprofit organizations and support groups to the data of the General Social Survey. This data shows an aggregate decline in membership of traditional civic organizations, proving his thesis that U.S. social capital has declined. He then asks the obvious question "Why is US social capital eroding?" (par. 35). He believes the "movement of women into the workforce" (par. 36), the "re-potting hypothesis" (par. 37) and other demographic changes have made little impact on the number of individuals engaging in civic associations. Instead, he looks to the technological "individualizing" (par. 39) of our leisure time via television, Internet and eventually "virtual reality helmets" (par.39). Putnam suggests closer studies of which forms of associations can create the greatest social capital, how various aspects of technology, changes in social equality, and public policy affect social capital. He closes by emphasizing the importance of discovering how the United States could reverse the trend of social capital decay. |
722312 | /m/035pjq | Women in Love | D. H. Lawrence | null | {"/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/01qxvh": "Romance novel"} | Ursula and Gudrun Brangwen are two sisters living in the Midlands of England in the 1910s. Ursula is a teacher, Gudrun an artist. They meet two men who live nearby, school inspector Rupert Birkin and coal-mine heir Gerald Crich. The four become friends. Ursula and Birkin become involved, and Gudrun eventually begins a love affair with Gerald. All four are deeply concerned with questions of society, politics, and the relationship between men and women. At a party at Gerald's estate, Gerald's sister Diana drowns. Gudrun becomes the teacher and mentor of his youngest sister. Soon Gerald's coal-mine-owning father dies as well, after a long illness. After the funeral, Gerald goes to Gudrun's house and spends the night with her, while her parents are asleep in another room. Birkin asks Ursula to marry him, and she agrees. Gerald and Gudrun's relationship, however, becomes stormy. The four vacation in the Alps. Gudrun begins an intense friendship with Loerke, a physically puny but emotionally commanding artist from Dresden. Gerald, enraged by Loerke and most of all by Gudrun's verbal abuse and rejection of his manhood, and driven by the internal violence of his own self, tries to strangle Gudrun. Before he has killed her, however, he realizes that this is not what he wants--he leaves Gudrun and Loerke and on his skis climbs ever upward on the mountains, eventually slipping into a snow valley where he falls asleep, a frozen sleep from which he never awakens. The impact on Birkin of Gerald's death is profound; the novel ends a few weeks after Gerald's death, with Birkin trying to explain to Ursula that he needs Gerald as he needs her--her for the perfect relationship with a woman, and Gerald for the perfect relationship with a man. |
722321 | /m/035pks | The Ragwitch | Garth Nix | 1990 | {"/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/03npn": "Horror", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/03mfnf": "Young adult literature", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | Julia and her brother, Paul, are spending a day by the beach when they discover a midden heap. They climb to the top, where Julia discovers a rag doll in a ball of feathers hidden in a nest. It turns out to be a powerful and evil witch, and it possesses Julia and spirits her away through a pyramid of fire. Paul manages to follow them and he finds himself in a strange country desperately unprepared for the return of the Ragwitch. At first, he meets the May Dancers, who after questioning him, lead him to the edge of the forest and set him free. The people of the land aid him as he searches for a way to free his sister, action following at every turn, as both Paul and Julia battle the Ragwitch; Julia from within Her, and Paul from outside. Paul collects several mystical objects from the powerful Elementals, before meeting with the Patchwork King, who forges for him a needle spear in order to kill the Ragwitch. There are no strong fighters to help Paul, no saviors for him and he must find his own way. Because Paul is no hero, his war is one of bravery and brains, not brawn. Julia tells her own story from the mind of the Ragwitch. Although she is much more courageous than Paul, her war is one of the mind, resisting the power of the Ragwitch from within the witch's body. |
722636 | /m/035qdt | Sundiver | David Brin | 1980 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | The novel begins with the main character, Jacob Demwa, working at the center for uplift on Earth, while he recovers from a tragedy at the Vanilla Space Needle where he saved the space elevator from destruction but lost his love in the process. An alien friend of Demwa's, Fagin (a Kanten), contacts Demwa and offers him a job. Initially reluctant to return to his previous life as a scientific investigator, Demwa agrees to attend a secret meeting. He learns that there are “ghosts” appearing in the Sun's chromosphere. The ghosts are without precedent in the galactic library. Demwa agrees to come and investigate the origin and purpose of the sun-ghosts, and travels to Mercury where the sundiver project is based. With him on Mercury are: Helene deSilva, the attractive station commander with whom Jacob develops a relationship over the course of the book; Fagin; Pila Bubbacub, the library representative; his assistant Culla (a Pring); Dr. Dwayne Kepler (the head of the Sundiver expedition); Dr. Mildred Martine (a psychiatrist); and the exuberant journalist Peter LaRoque. Demwa goes to the sun, and observes the sun-ghosts. There are apparently three forms: the “toroids” which appear to be similar to cattle and live off of the magnetic fields in the chromosphere, a relatively fluid, apparently intelligent variety, and a threatening, anthropomorphic figure that avoids the side of the sunship where the instruments are located. When a neo-chimpanzee scientist, Dr. Jeffrey, is killed on a solo mission to the sun, it seems to confirm the sun-ghosts' hostile intent. An investigation seems to implicate the reporter, LaRoque. LaRoque is then tested to determine if he is capable of murder. The test results indicate LaRoque has violent tendencies and he is incarcerated. A third trip to the sun is undertaken, in hopes that Pil Bubbacub will be able to contact the sun-ghosts. He fails to do so, but claims to have succeeded, saying that the sun-ghosts are offended and have used psi to control LaRoque’s actions. He uses a powder that blocks the ships sensors to pretend he has dispelled the sun-ghosts because he is embarrassed by the Library's lack of data on the ghosts. Back on Mercury, Jacob discovers his trick, and reveals it, resulting in disgrace to Bubbacub and embarrassment for the Pila. The characters go on yet another mission into the sun, this time with a laser to communicate with the sun-ghosts. They make brief contact with one of the ghosts, but an anthropomorphic ghost appears and warns them against further exploration of the sun. While they are leaving, they discover that one of Culla’s dietary supplements is a dye used in tunable lasers. Combining this with an earlier conversation about Culla's eyesight, Demwa concludes that Culla can project laser light from his eyes: he has been faking the anthropomorphic ghosts. When Culla realizes he has been discovered he retreats to the instrument side of the ship and begins disabling the equipment that propels the sunship so that it will fall into the photosphere, taking all evidence of his deception with it. The sun-ghosts use toroids to arrest the ship’s fall, but eventually they give out, and the ship plummets. While Demwa and one of the crew attempt to disable Culla, Helene discovers that only the galactic technology has been sabotaged, and uses the refrigerator laser as a thruster to move the ship out of the sun. Culla is killed, and the ship eventually escapes the sun, though all but Fagin temporarily “die” of hypothermia and frostbite from the refrigerator laser. The ship’s records are recovered, showing that Culla used his laser sight to discredit Bubbacub, as part of a campaign to free his species from its client status, and then to sabotage the ship when he was discovered to prevent the Pila from finding out. Although set in the same universe as the rest of the other Uplift books, it is set a considerable amount of time before the other books, and shares none of the same characters, apart from Jacob Demwa, who is mentioned as the mentor of Tom Orley and Gillian Baskin, and Helene Alvarez (née deSilva), who is mentioned in Startide Rising as Credeiki's former captain aboard the James Cook and who appears in The Uplift War to sign a treaty with the Thennanin. |
723638 | /m/035tfg | Journey to the Center of the Earth | Jules Verne | 1864 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/08sdrw": "Adventure novel", "/m/01gw42": "Scientific romance"} | The story begins on May 1863, in the Lidenbrock house in Hamburg, with Professor Lidenbrock rushing home to peruse his latest purchase, an original runic manuscript of an Icelandic saga written by Snorri Sturluson ("Heimskringla"; the chronicle of the Norwegian kings who ruled over Iceland). While looking through the book, Lidenbrock and his nephew Axel find a coded note written in runic script. (This is a first indication of Verne's love for cryptology. Coded, cryptic or incomplete messages as a plot device will continue to appear in many of his works and in each case Verne goes a long way to explain not only the code used but also the mechanisms used to retrieve the original text.) Lidenbrock and Axel translate the runic characters into Latin letters, revealing a message written in a seemingly bizarre code. Lidenbrock attempts a decipherment, deducing the message to be a kind of transposition cipher; but his results are as meaningless as the original. Professor Lidenbrock decides to lock everyone in the house and force himself and the others (Axel, and the maid, Martha) to go without food until he cracks the code. Axel discovers the answer when fanning himself with the deciphered text: Lidenbrock's decipherment was correct, and only needs to be read backwards to reveal sentences written in rough Latin. Axel decides to keep the secret hidden from Professor Lidenbrock, afraid of what the Professor might do with the knowledge, but after two days without food he cannot stand the hunger and reveals the secret to his uncle. Lidenbrock translates the note, which is revealed to be a medieval note written by the (fictional) Icelandic alchemist Arne Saknussemm, who claims to have discovered a passage to the centre of the Earth via Snæfell in Iceland. In what Axel calls bad Latin, the deciphered message reads: In slightly better Latin, with errors amended: which, when translated into English, reads: Professor Lidenbrock is a man of astonishing impatience, and departs for Iceland immediately, taking his reluctant nephew with him. Axel, who, in comparison, is cowardly and anti-adventurous, repeatedly tries to reason with him, explaining his fears of descending into a volcano and putting forward various scientific theories as to why the journey is impossible, but Professor Lidenbrock repeatedly keeps himself blinded against Axel's point of view. After a rapid journey via Lübeck and Copenhagen, they arrive in Reykjavík, where the two procure the services of Hans Bjelke (a Danish-speaking Icelander eiderdown hunter) as their guide, and travel overland to the base of the volcano. In late June they reach the volcano, which has three craters. According to Saknussemm's message, the passage to the centre of the Earth is through the one crater that is touched by the shadow of a nearby mountain peak at noon. However, the text also states that this is only true during the last days of June. During the next few days, with July rapidly approaching, the weather is too cloudy for any shadows. Axel silently rejoices, hoping this will force his uncle – who has repeatedly tried to impart courage to him only to succeed in making him even more cowardly still – to give up the project and return home. Alas for Axel, however, on the last day, the sun comes out and the mountain peak shows the correct crater to take. After descending into this crater, the three travelers set off into the bowels of the Earth, encountering many strange phenomena and great dangers, including a chamber filled with combustible gas, and steep-sided wells around the "path." After taking a wrong turn, they run out of water and Axel almost dies, but Hans taps into a neighboring subterranean river. Lidenbrock and Axel name the resulting stream the "Hansbach" in his honor and the three are saved. At another point, Axel becomes separated from the others and is lost several miles from them. Luckily, a strange acoustic phenomenon allows him to communicate with them from some miles away, and they are soon reunited. After descending many miles, following the course of the Hansbach, they reach an unimaginably vast cavern. This underground world is lit by electrically charged gas at the ceiling, and is filled with a very deep subterranean ocean, surrounded by a rocky coastline covered in petrified trees and giant mushrooms. The travelers build a raft out of trees and set sail. The Professor names this sea as the Lidenbrock Sea. Whilst on the water, they see several prehistoric creatures such as a giant Ichthyosaurus, which fights with a Plesiosaurus and wins. After the battle between the monsters, the party comes across an island with a huge geyser, which Lidenbrock names "Axel's Island." A lightning storm again threatens to destroy the raft and its passengers, but instead throws them onto the coastline. This part of the coast, Axel discovers, is alive with prehistoric plant and animal life forms, including giant insects and a herd of mastodons. On a beach covered with bones, Axel discovers an oversized human skull. Axel and Lidenbrock venture some way into the prehistoric forest, where Professor Lidenbrock points out, in a shaky voice, a prehistoric human, more than twelve feet in height, leaning against a tree and watching a herd of mastodons. Axel cannot be sure if he has really seen the man or not, and he and Professor Lidenbrock debate whether or not a proto-human civilization actually exists so far underground. The three wonder if the creature is a man-like ape, or an ape-like man. The sighting of the creature is considered the most alarming part of the story, and the explorers decide that it is better not to alert it to their presence as they fear it may be hostile. The travelers continue to explore the coastline, and find a passageway marked by Saknussemm as the way ahead. However, it is blocked by what appears to be a recent cave-in and two of the three, Hans and the Professor, despair at being unable to hack their way through the granite wall. The adventurers plan to blast the rock with gun cotton and paddle out to sea to escape the blast. Upon executing the plan, however, they discover that behind the rockfall was a seemingly bottomless pit, not a passage to the centre of the earth. The travelers are swept away as the sea rushes into the large open gap in the ground. After spending hours being swept along at lightning speeds by the water, the raft ends up inside a large, geyser-acting volcanic chimney filling with water and magma. Terrified, the three are rushed upwards, through stifling heat, and are ejected onto the surface from a side-vent of a stratovolcano acting like a cone geyser until the geyser stops erupting. When they regain consciousness, they discover that they have been ejected from Mount Stromboli, a 926 metre-high stratovolcano located in southern Italy. They return to Hamburg to great acclaim – Professor Lidenbrock is hailed as one of the great scientists of history, Axel marries his sweetheart Gräuben, and Hans eventually returns to his peaceful life in Iceland. The Professor has some regret that their journey was cut short. At the very end of the book, Axel and Lidenbrock realize why their compass was behaving strangely after their journey on the raft. They realize that the needle was pointing the wrong way after being struck by an electric fireball which nearly destroyed the wooden raft. |
724284 | /m/035w31 | The Betrothed | Alessandro Manzoni | 1827 | {"/m/0hwxm": "Historical novel"} | Renzo and Lucia, a couple in an unnamed Lombard village near Lake Como, are planning to wed on 8 November 1628. The parish priest, Don Abbondio, is walking home on the eve of the wedding when he is accosted by two "bravoes" (thugs) who warn him not to perform the marriage, because the local baron (Don Rodrigo) has forbidden it. When he presents himself for the wedding ceremony, Renzo is amazed to hear that the marriage is to be postponed (the priest didn't have the courage to tell the truth). An argument ensues and Renzo succeeds in extracting from the priest the name of Don Rodrigo. It turns out that Don Rodrigo has his eye on Lucia. Lucia's mother, Agnese, advises Renzo to ask the advice of "Dr. Azzeccagarbugli" (Dr Quibbleweaver, in Colquhoun's translation), a lawyer in the town of Lecco. Dr Azzeccagarbugli is at first sympathetic, showing Renzo a recent edict on the subject of priests who refuse to marry, but when he hears the name of Don Rodrigo he panics and drives Renzo away. Lucia sends a message to "Fra Cristoforo" (Friar Christopher), a respected Capuchin friar at the monastery of Pescarenico, asking him to come as soon as he can. When Fra Cristoforo comes to Lucia's cottage and hears the story, he immediately goes to Don Rodrigo's mansion, where he finds the baron at a meal with his cousin Count Attilio, along with four guests, including the mayor and Dr Azzeccagarbugli. When Don Rodrigo is taken aside by the friar, he explodes with anger at his presumption and sends him away, but not before an old servant has a chance to offer him help. Meanwhile, Agnese comes up with a plan. In those days, it was possible for two people to marry by declaring themselves married before a priest and in the presence of two amenable witnesses. Renzo runs to his friend Tonio and offers him 25 lire if he agrees to help. When Fra Cristoforo returns with the bad news, they decide to put their plan into action. The next morning, Lucia and Agnese are visited by beggars, Don Rodrigo's men in disguise. They examine the house in order to plan an assault. Late at night, Agnese distracts Don Abbondio's servant Perpetua while Tonio and his brother Gervaso enter Don Abbondio's study, ostensibly to pay a debt. They are followed indoors secretly by Lucia and Renzo. When they try to carry out their plan, the priest throws the tablecloth in Lucia's face and drops the lamp. They struggle in the darkness. In the meantime, Don Rodrigo's men invade Lucia's house, but nobody is there. A boy named Menico arrives with a message of warning from Fra Cristoforo and they seize him. When they hear the alarm being raised by the sacristan, who is calling for help on the part of Don Abbondio who raised the alarm of invaders in his home, they assume they have been betrayed and flee in confusion. Menico sees Agnese, Lucia and Renzo in the street and warns them not to return home. They go to the monastery, where Fra Cristoforo gives Renzo a letter of introduction to a certain friar at Milan, and another letter to the two women, to organise a refuge at a convent in the nearby city of Monza. Lucia is entrusted to the nun Gertrude, a strange and unpredictable noblewoman whose story is told in these chapters. A child of the most important family of the area, her father decided to send her to the cloisters for no other reason than to simplify his affairs: he wished to keep his properties united for his first-born, heir to the family's title and riches. As she grew up, she sensed that she was being forced by her parents into a life which would comport but little with her personality. However, fear of scandal, as well as manoeuvres and menaces from her father, induced Gertrude to lie to her interviewers in order to enter the convent of Monza, where she was received as la Signora ("the lady"). Later, she fell under the spell of a young man of no scruples, associated with the worst baron of that time, the Innominato (the Unnamed). Renzo arrives in famine-stricken Milan and goes to the monastery, but the friar he is seeking is absent and so he wanders further into the city. A bakery in the Corsia de' Servi, El prestin di scansc ("Bakery of the Crutches"), is destroyed by a mob, who then go to the house of the Commissioner of Supply in order to lynch him. He is saved in the nick of time by Ferrer, the Grand Chancellor, who arrives in a coach and announces he is taking the Commissioner to prison. Renzo becomes prominent as he helps Ferrer make his way through the crowd. After witnessing these scenes, Renzo joins in a lively discussion and reveals views which attract the notice of a police agent in search of a scapegoat. The agent tries to lead Renzo directly to "the best inn" (i.e. prison) but Renzo is tired and stops at one nearby where, after being plied with drink, he reveals his full name and address. The next morning, he is awakened by a notary and two bailiffs, who handcuff him and start to take him away. In the street Renzo announces loudly that he is being punished for his heroism the day before and, with the aid of sympathetic onlookers, he effects his escape. Leaving the city by the same gate through which he entered, he sets off for Bergamo, knowing that his cousin Bortolo lives in a village nearby. Once there, he will be beyond the reach of the authorities of Milan (under Spanish domination), as Bergamo is territory of the Most Serene Republic of Venice. At an inn in Gorgonzola, he overhears a conversation which makes it clear to him how much trouble he is in and so he walks all night until he reaches the River Adda. After a short sleep in a hut, he crosses the river at dawn in the boat of a fisherman and makes his way to his cousin's house, where he is welcomed as a silk-weaver under the pseudonym of Antonio Rivolta. The same day, orders for Renzo's arrest reach the town of Lecco, to the delight of Don Rodrigo. News of Renzo's disgrace comes to the convent, but later Lucia is informed that Renzo is safe with his cousin. Their reassurance is short-lived: when they receive no word from Fra Cristoforo for a long time, Agnese travels to Pescarenico, where she learns that he has been ordered by a superior to the town of Rimini. In fact, this has been engineered by Don Rodrigo and Count Attilio, who have leaned on a mutual uncle of the Secret Council, who has leaned on the Father Provincial. Meanwhile, Don Rodrigo has organised a plot to kidnap Lucia from the convent. This involves a great robber baron whose name has not been recorded, and who hence is called l'Innominato, the Unnamed. Gertrude, blackmailed by Egidio, a male neighbour (and acquaintance of l'Innominato) whose attentions she has returned, persuades Lucia to run an errand which will take her outside the convent for a short while. In the street Lucia is seized and bundled into a coach. After a nightmarish journey, Lucia arrives at the castle of the Unnamed, where she is locked in a chamber. The Unnamed is troubled by the sight of her, and spends a horrible night in which memories of his past and the uncertainty of his future almost drive him to suicide. Meanwhile, Lucia spends a similarly restless night, during which she vows to take the veil if she is delivered from her predicament. Towards the morning, on looking out of his window, the Unnamed sees throngs of people walking past. They are going to listen to the famous Archbishop of Milan, Cardinal Federigo Borromeo. On impulse, the Unnamed leaves his castle in order to meet this man. This meeting prompts a "miraculous" conversion which marks the turning-point of the novel. The Unnamed announces to his men that his reign of terror is over. He decides to take Lucia back to her native land under his own protection, and with the help of the archbishop the deed is done. The astonishing course of events leads to an atmosphere in which Don Rodrigo can be defied openly and his fortunes take a turn for the worse. Don Abbondio is reprimanded by the archbishop. Lucia, miserable about her vow to renounce Renzo, still frets about him. He is now the subject of diplomatic conflict between Milan and Bergamo. Her life is not improved when a wealthy busybody, Donna Prassede, insists on taking her into her household and admonishing her for getting mixed up with a good-for-nothing like Renzo. The government of Milan is unable to keep bread prices down by decree and the city is swamped by beggars. The lazzaretto is filled with the hungry and sick. Meanwhile the Thirty Years War brings more calamities. In September 1629, German armies under Count Rambaldo di Collalto descend on Italy, looting and destroying. Agnese, Don Abbondio and Perpetua take refuge in the well-defended territory of the Unnamed. In their absence, their village is wrecked by the mercenaries. These chapters are occupied with an account of the plague of 1630, largely based on Giuseppe Ripamonti's De peste quae fuit anno 1630 (published in 1640). Manzoni's full version of this, Storia della Colonna Infame, was finished in 1829, but was not published until it was included as an appendix to the revised edition of 1842. The end of August 1630 sees the death in Milan of the original villains of the story. Renzo, troubled by Agnese's letters and recovering from plague, returns to his native village to find that many of the inhabitants are dead and that his house and vineyard have been destroyed. The warrant, and Don Rodrigo, are forgotten. Tonio tells him that Lucia is in Milan. On his arrival in Milan, Renzo is astonished at the state of the city. His highland clothes invite suspicion that he is an "anointer"; that is, a foreign agent deliberately spreading plague in some way. He learns that Lucia is now languishing at the lazzaretto, along with 16,000 other victims of the plague. But in fact, Lucia is already recuperating. Renzo and Lucia are reunited by Fra Cristoforo, but only after Renzo first visits and forgives the dying Don Rodrigo. The friar absolves her of her vow of celibacy. Renzo walks through a rainstorm to see Agnese at the village of Pasturo. When they all return to their native village, Lucia and Renzo are finally married by Don Abbondio and the couple make a fresh start at a silk-mill at the gates of Bergamo. |
724729 | /m/035wx7 | The Redemption of Althalus | David Eddings | 7/3/2000 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy"} | The story revolves around Althalus, a professional thief with a gift for storytelling and a reputation for uncanny luck. After numerous disasters, the thief decides to return to the savage lands of the north, where he grew up, and decides to rob a fort. After arriving there, and amusing everyone with his stories, Althalus breaks into the storeroom during the night only to find out that all the talk about gold in the fort were lies, and that there are only bags of worthless copper coins and a handful of brass coins. Furious, Althalus steals all the brass coins and leaves - only to become chased by every man in the fort, its owner taking advantage of the situation to claim the theft of a non-existent fortune. He escapes to Hule, where he finds refuge in a camp. A man named Ghend arrives there a short time later and presents Althalus with a proposition. Ghend hires Althalus to travel to the "House at the end of the world" to steal a book. Although he suspects something is amiss, Althalus accepts the job and heads there. After several days of travel he finds the house and manages to stumble upon the book, only to realize that the House is occupied by a talking cat who has trapped him. After several days of being trapped he finally decides to listen to the cat and thus finds out several astonishing things. The book is called the "Book of Deiwos", Deiwos being the God who created the world, and the cat (named Emerald or Emmy by Althalus) teaches him to read it. After two and a half thousand years, Emerald reveals to Althalus that the book can be used to accomplish feats of magic. The intervening two millennia have seen many changes in the world, including the initial stages of an ice age triggered by the evil God Daeva. Emerald tells Althalus that Ghend is Daeva's agent, and is working to establish Daeva as the ruler of the world. The cat and Althalus set out to gather a party of people who are destined to save the world from Daeva's dominion. They try to find the knife which will guide them to each person.Having arrived at the knife's depository, they are told that the knife has been taken by Eliar, a member of the army. With this new information they travel to Osthos, where Eliar seems to have become a slave. Deciding that they will have to buy off all the slaves, the two travel to Emerald's private gold mine and collect twenty blocks of gold, which Althalus converts into coins. With their purses full, they return and meet Andine, the queen of Osthos, in her palace, posing as slavers. However, Andine won't sell Eliar to them. Emerald worms her way into Andine's affection in an attempt to persuade her to give up Eliar.Finally, the queen (or "Arya") agrees to sell the other slaves along with Eliar. With the deal struck, Althalus leads his troupe out, but overhears Eliar planning on attacking him with the other soldier slaves. To break the soldier's loyalty, he randomly picks a soldier and sends him several thousand feet into the air before bringing him back down and releasing the slaves, except Eliar, whom he keeps chained up. In the morning, Eliar decides that he will follow Althalus. After buying some horses they head to Awes, where Emerald tells Eliar that he must show the writing on the knife to every priest in Awes and ask if they can read it. While doing this they discover an agent of Daeva, who screams in anguish after seeing the knife. Eliar quickly slays him and they hide the body under a pile of rocks. Unfortunately, a young priest finds them, but it turns out that the priest is none other than the fourth member of their party, Bheid. With their new member ready, Emerald "reads" the knife, which leads them back to Osthos, where their fifth member is destined to be none other that the queen of Osthos: Andine. Returning to Osthos, they camp out behind the walls of the city for the night. Formulating a plan, Althalus and Emerald sneak into Andine's palace unnoticed. In her chambers, Emerald captures Andine in a spell, causing her to be little more than a puppet. Leading their newest member out of the city, they rejoin their group and decide to hastily leave before morning comes and Andine is discovered missing. Unfortunately, Andine wants no part in this and focuses on killing Eliar, but the enchantment on the knife forces her to listen to Althalus, and so, with their newest member in tow, the party travels to Hule, to find their sixth member. While traveling towards Hule, Bheid tries to quell Andine's hatred towards Eliar - with limited success, it but appears to be taking effect when Andine refrains from making any scathing remarks towards Eliar. During the night, Althalus and Eliar hear someone sneaking towards their camp and capture the boy named Gher, who, it turns out, is their sixth member.Emerald finally sorts out the problems with Andine by using Gher as a voice, Andine (having a change of heart) helps clean up the beaten up Gher and they head to Kweron to find their final member; a "witch". In Kweron, Althalus and Emerald hatch up a scheme that involves Bheid; Bheid will pretend that he has come to collect the "witch" for interrogation, as well as predicting avalanches and lightning strikes (which Althalus will provide). Bheid is, at first, reluctant to so lie that blatantly about something, but in the end, he agrees. After a conversation with the priests of the village, he finds out that the "witch" is about to be burned alive. Through the respect he has gathered by his "forecasts", he can convince the priests to give the enigmatic Leitha into his care. Before leaving, Leitha reveals that she can "hear" the thoughts of other people. The group decides to travel back to the House at the end of the world. Dweia reveals the origins of why they must do what they do: Deiwos, the Sky God - and Dweia's brother - created the world, and filled the planet with living things, whom Dweia cares for. However, Daeva's only role is to destroy parts of the universe, but only those which Deiwos and Dweia allow him to. Daeva tries to change this, and has Ghend find each member of his "chosen ones" to prepare to take over the world, and to do this he needs Deiwos's book, to copy it and make a book of his own for this purpose. After learning this, Althalus introduces Emerald, who in reality was Dweia all along, to the "family" and quickly explains the situation to them as well as telling them about Eliar's ability to use the doors of the House to travel through Spacetime. After getting acquainted with living in the house, they use the doors to return to Arum where they try to win Albron's (the knife keeper's) clan as allies, and show him the House as an act of trust. They know that they will need an army to combat Gelta's archaic forces from the past. Calling a clan meeting they hire all the Arum clans and prepare themselves to fight against Gelta's army. Thanks to the more modern warfare of their time, Gelta's forces are easily crushed and, although Eliar is injured, with the help of to Althalus's powers, the remaining part of the enemy forces is defeated. Ultimately, Ghend and Althalus face off in the House at the end of the world, ending with the destruction of the Book of Daeva, the defeat of Daeva, and the saving of the universe. fr:La Rédemption d'Althalus nl:De kronieken van de eerste ijstijd ja:アルサラスの贖罪 fi:Althalus: Matka maailman ääriin sv:Tjuven Althalus |
725513 | /m/035ytb | Brazzaville Beach | William Boyd | null | null | Brazzaville Beach consists of three separative narratives. The first is Hope Clearwater's reflections on her current life whilst living in a beach house on Brazzaville Beach. The second narrative is a description of her former marriage to John Clearwater, a mathematician, who gradually goes mad resulting from failure to make progress in his academic research. The third narrative, and by far the most graphic, is the narrator's account of her work in a national park called Grosso Arvore (Big Tree), where she tracks the movements of a small band of chimpanzees that have split off from a larger group in the north. John Clearwater, Hope's former husband, is a mathematician thirsty for discovery and fame. This part of the narrative is set in London, where the couple share her flat in South Kensington, and southern England, where Hope works as an ecologist on an intriguing hedgerow mapping project in Dorset. At the beginning of their marriage the two are very much in love with Hope believing that John is the ideal man for her owing to his rather eccentric but empathetic character and strong intelligence. She is uninterested in working after getting her PhD until her former Professor forces her to take on the hedgerow mapping project. After being interviewed by Munro, its leader, Hope discovers she is pleased to be working once more, losing weight because she is outside all day, and enjoying the disciplined approach she has to adopt: However, whilst Hope's work is going well, her husband's is going badly with John failing to make progress with his mathematical research into chaos theory, and Hope finds herself unable to deal with its consequences. The first signs are when he is caught digging an illegal long trench on the Knap estate in Dorset, work that he feels will help him visualise the mathematical forumulae he is trying to come to grips with (having worked before during their stay at a rented cottage in Scotland). He then breaks into hysterics in an Italian restaurant back in London and matters are made worse when Hope discovers he is having an affair with the wife of a Polish university colleague. Their marriage breaks down and irretrievably and tragically, John commits suicide. Hope flees to Africa to recover from the ordeal. The Grosso Arvore Research Centre, where Hope seeks asylum, is the creation of Eugene Mallabar. After studying wild chimps for the last twenty-five years, Mallabar knows more about them than anyone else on earth. He is the author of "The Peaceful Primate" and "Primate's Progress" and the recipient of million-dollar grants. Mallabar has just finished writing a magnum opus that will be the last word on the subject of the seemingly gentle beast with which man shares 98 percent of his DNA. Hope Clearwater, however, slowly comes to the realization that the chimps are up to no good as the two groups of chimpanzees she is studying come into lethal conflict. Males from the northern group, led by the alpha male Darius, start patrolling into the southerners' territory and then start to kill, with extreme cruelty, the rival males - one an old chimpanzee called Mr Jeb, and the other Muffin, an adolescent. What she sees brings Hope herself into conflict with Mallabar, and threatens the very existence of Grosso Arvore research project and his lifelong study of primates. In tandem with the other two narratives are Hope's recollections of her affair with Usman Shoukry, an Egyptian mercenary airforce pilot flying sorties in a MiG 15 against rebel army groups. Hope is able to meet him when she carries out supply runs in the reserve's landrover to Brazzaville, the provincial capital. He surprises her one time when he designs the world's smallest aeroplanes by strapping on wings and landing gears to house flies made from match-sticks and paper. They are both genuinely fond of each other during their time together, with Usman making plans to buy one of the run-down houses on the beach where they go to relax and swim, until he meets an untimely end on one of his missions. Hope herself gets caught up in the civil war when she and Ian Vail are captured by Dr Amilcar and his atomique boum volleyball team, who commandeer their landrover to return more quickly to the UNAMO stronghold in the Musave River Territories following a failed offensive against the Federal Army. The power of the story comes from the clever intertwining of the different narrative strands as the reader is sucked into the vortex of Hope's complex world. Accompanying this are the author's fascinating and highly detailed descriptions of chaos theory, the social and professional wrangling between the different project members working at the Grosso Avore Research Centre (Ian and Roberta Vail, the thoroughly dislikeable Anton Hauser and the Mallabars themselves), along with the thoroughly human-like behaviour of the chimpanzees as one group sets out to destroy the other. The aggressors' motive is to ensure the return of the alpha female, Rita Lu, to her original group which has become dysfunctional during her absence, and these chimpanzee wars only come to an end as a result of human intervention. |
725810 | /m/035zk3 | The Indian in the Cupboard | Lynne Reid Banks | 1980 | {"/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | A young boy, Omri, receives a cupboard from his brother, Gillon, for his birthday. He uses a "magical" key, which belonged to his great-grandmother, to bring a plastic Native American figurine to life with the cupboard. The now-living Indian reveals his name as Little Bear (in some editions he is called Little Bull), and he is an Iroquois who lived in the 18th century. Omri's best friend, Patrick, finds out about the magic cupboard and brings a cowboy, Boone, into the present. Despite the fights and rivalries between the two tiny men, Patrick refuses to send them back until it is too late — Little Bear wounds Boone with an arrow while they are watching an old western movie on the television. Although Omri has a World War I medic figure, who could treat the injured Boone, he cannot be brought to life as the key is missing. After a brief adventure with Gillon's pet rat, who had escaped, the key is found and Boone is treated. However Little Bear is a demanding character, and ultimately Omri must provide him with a bride, Bright Stars (in some editions she is called Twin Stars). Omri thinks it best to send Little Bear, Bright Stars and (with Patrick's agreement) Boone back to their time, and Omri gives his mother the key so he is not tempted to bring them back. |
725991 | /m/035_37 | The Wealth of Nations | Adam Smith | 1776 | {"/m/05h83": "Non-fiction"} | Of the Division of Labour: Division of labour has caused a greater increase in production than any other factor. This diversification is greatest for nations with more industry and improvement, and is responsible for "universal opulence" in those countries. Agriculture is less amenable than industry to division of labour; hence, rich nations are not so far ahead of poor nations in agriculture as in industry. Of the Principle which gives Occasion to the Division of Labour: Division of labour arises not from innate wisdom, but from humans' propensity to barter. The apparent difference in natural talents between people is a result of specialisation, rather than any innate cause. That the Division of Labour is Limited by the Extent of the Market: Limited opportunity for exchange discourages division of labour. Because "water-carriage" extends the market, division of labour, with its improvements, comes earliest to cities near waterways. Civilization began around the highly navigable Mediterranean Sea... Of the Origin and Use of Money: With division of labour, the produce of one's own labour can fill only a small part of one's needs. Different commodities have served as a common medium of exchange, but all nations have finally settled on metals, which are durable and divisible, for this purpose. Before coinage, people had to weigh and assay with each exchange, or risk "the grossest frauds and impositions." Thus nations began stamping metal, on one side only, to ascertain purity, or on all sides, to stipulate purity and amount. The quantity of real metal in coins has diminished, due to the "avarice and injustice of princes and sovereign states," enabling them to pay their debts in appearance only, and to the defraudment of creditors. Of the Real and Nominal Price of Commodities, or of their Price in Labour, and their Price in Money: In the first two passages Smith gives two conflicting definitions of the relative value of a commodity. Ricardo responded to one of Smith's inconsistencies in the Preface of his "Principles": :The writer, in combating received opinions, has found it necessary to advert more particularly to those passages in the writings of Adam Smith from which he sees reason to differ; but he hopes it will not, on that account, be suspected that he does not, in common with all those who acknowledge the importance of the science of Political Economy, participate in the admiration which the profound work of this celebrated author so justly excites. Adam Smith defines the value of commodities by the labour embedded and also by the labour a good commands. Ricardo agrees with the first definition: "The real price of every thing," says Adam Smith, "What every thing really costs to the man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble of acquiring it. What every thing is really worth to the man who has acquired it, and who wants to dispose of it, or exchange it for something else, is the toil and trouble which it can save to himself, and which it can impose upon other people. That this is really the foundation of the exchangeable value of all things, excepting those which cannot be increased by human industry, is a doctrine of the utmost importance in political economy." For Ricardo, the value of reproducible commodities and services reflects the relative difficulties of production counted in labour units: direct labour plus the dated labour of the past embedded in inputs (capital) and corrected by interests. This differs from Smith's second definition of value: :"The value of any commodity … is equal to the quantity of labour which it enables him to purchase or command. Labour, therefore, is the real measure of the exchangeable value of all commodities." Ricardo disagrees: :"Adam Smith, who so accurately defined the original source of exchangeable value … speaks of things being more or less valuable, in proportion as they will exchange for more or less of this standard measure. … [N]ot the quantity of labour bestowed on the production of any object, but the quantity which it can command in the market: as if these were two equivalent expressions…" Smith's second definition pleases neoclassical economists, who determine value by the utility that a commodity provides a person rather than cost of production as do classical economists. Of the Component Parts of the Price of Commodities: Smith argues that the price of any product reflects wages, rent of land and "...profit of stock," which compensates the capitalist for risking his resources. Of the Natural and Market Price of Commodities: To paraphrase Smith, and the first part of this Chapter, when demand exceeds supply, the price goes up. When the supply exceeds demand, the price goes down. He then goes on to comment on the different avenues that people can take to generate a larger profit than normal. Some of those include: finding a commodity that few others have that allows for a high profit, and being able to keep that secret; Finding a way to produce a unique commodity (The dyer who discovers a unique dye). He also states that the former usually has a short lifespan of high profitability, and the latter has a longer. He also notes that a monopoly is essentially the same as the dyers trade secret, and can thus lead to high profitability for a long time by keeping the supply below the effectual demand. Of the Wages of Labour: In this section, Smith describes how the wages of labour are dictated primarily by the competition among labourers and masters. When labourers bid against one another for limited opportunities for employment, the wages of labour collectively fall, whereas when employers compete against one another for limited supplies of labour, the wages of labour collectively rise. However, this process of competition is often circumvented by combinations among labourers and among masters. When labourers combine and no longer bid against one another, their wages rise, whereas when masters combine, wages fall. In Smith's day, organised labour was dealt with very harshly by the law. Smith himself wrote about the "severity" of such laws against worker actions, and made a point to contrast the "clamour" of the "masters" against workers associations, while associations and collusions of the masters "are never heard by the people" though such actions are "always" and "everywhere" taking place: "We rarely hear, it has been said, of the combinations of masters, though frequently of those of workmen. But whoever imagines, upon this account, that masters rarely combine, is as ignorant of the world as of the subject. Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform, combination, not to raise the wages of labour above their actual rate [...] Masters, too, sometimes enter into particular combinations to sink the wages of labour even below this rate. These are always conducted with the utmost silence and secrecy till the moment of execution; and when the workmen yield, as they sometimes do without resistance, though severely felt by them, they are never heard of by other people". In contrast, when workers combine, "the masters [...] never cease to call aloud for the assistance of the civil magistrate, and the rigorous execution of those laws which have been enacted with so much severity against the combination of servants, labourers, and journeymen." In societies where the amount of labour exceeds the amount of revenue available for waged labour, competition among workers is greater than the competition among employers, and wages fall. Inversely, where revenue is abundant, labour wages rise. Smith argues that, therefore, labour wages only rise as a result of greater revenue disposed to pay for labour. Smith thought labour the same as any other commodity in this respect: However, the amount of revenue must increase constantly in proportion to the amount of labour for wages to remain high. Smith illustrates this by juxtaposing England with the North American colonies. In England, there is more revenue than in the colonies, but wages are lower, because more workers flock to new employment opportunities caused by the large amount of revenue— so workers eventually compete against each other as much as they did before. By contrast, as capital continues to flow to the colonial economies at least at the same rate that population increases to "fill out" this excess capital, wages there stay higher than in England. Smith was highly concerned about the problems of poverty. He writes: The only way to determine whether a man is rich or poor is to examine the amount of labour he can afford to purchase. "Labour is the real exchange for commodities". Smith also describes the relation of cheap years and the production of manufactures versus the production in dear years. He argues that while some examples, such as the linen production in France, show a correlation, another example in Scotland shows the opposite. He concludes that there are too many variables to make any statement about this. Of the Profits of Stock: In this chapter, Smith uses interest rates as an indicator of the profits of stock. This is because interest can only be paid with the profits of stock, and so creditors will be able to raise rates in proportion to the increase or decrease of the profits of their debtors. Smith argues that the profits of stock are inversely proportional to the wages of labour, because as more money is spent compensating labour, there is less remaining for personal profit. It follows that, in societies where competition among labourers is greatest relative to competition among employers, profits will be much higher. Smith illustrates this by comparing interest rates in England and Scotland. In England, government laws against usury had kept maximum interest rates very low, but even the maximum rate was believed to be higher than the rate at which money was usually loaned. In Scotland, however, interest rates are much higher. This is the result of a greater proportion of capitalists in England, which offsets some competition among labourers and raises wages. However, Smith notes that, curiously, interest rates in the colonies are also remarkably high (recall that, in the previous chapter, Smith described how wages in the colonies are higher than in England). Smith attributes this to the fact that, when an empire takes control of a colony, prices for a huge abundance of land and resources are extremely cheap. This allows capitalists to increase his profit, but simultaneously draws many capitalists to the colonies, increasing the wages of labour. As this is done, however, the profits of stock in the mother country rise (or at least cease to fall), as much of it has already flocked offshore. Of Wages and Profit in the Different Employments of Labour and Stock: Smith repeatedly attacks groups of politically aligned individuals who attempt to use their collective influence to manipulate the government into doing their bidding. At the time, these were referred to as "factions," but are now more commonly called "special interests," a term that can comprise international bankers, corporate conglomerations, outright oligopolies, trade unions and other groups. Indeed, Smith had a particular distrust of the tradesman class. He felt that the members of this class, especially acting together within the guilds they want to form, could constitute a power block and manipulate the state into regulating for special interests against the general interest: Smith also argues against government subsidies of certain trades, because this will draw many more people to the trade than what would otherwise be normal, collectively lowering their wages. Chapter 10, part ii, motivates an understanding of the idea of feudalism. Of the Rent of the Land: Rent, considered as the price paid for the use of land, is naturally the highest the tenant can afford in the actual circumstances of the land. In adjusting lease terms, the landlord endeavours to leave him no greater share of the produce than what is sufficient to keep up the stock from which he furnishes the seed, pays the labour, and purchases and maintains the cattle and other instruments of husbandry, together with the ordinary profits of farming stock in the neighbourhood. This is evidently the smallest share with which the tenant can content himself without being a loser, and the landlord seldom means to leave him any more. Whatever part of the produce, or, what is the same thing, whatever part of its price, is over and above this share, he naturally endeavours to reserve to himself as the rent of his land, which is evidently the highest the tenant can afford to pay in the actual circumstances of the land. Sometimes, indeed, the liberality, more frequently the ignorance, of the landlord, makes him accept of somewhat less than this portion; and sometimes too, though more rarely, the ignorance of the tenant makes him undertake to pay somewhat more, or to content himself with somewhat less, than the ordinary profits of farming stock in the neighbourhood. This portion, however, may still be considered as the natural rent of land, or the rent for which it is naturally meant that land should for the most part be let. Of the Division of Stock: :"When the stock which a man possesses is no more than sufficient to maintain him for a few days or a few weeks, he seldom thinks of deriving any revenue from it. He consumes it as sparingly as he can, and endeavours by his labour to acquire something which may supply its place before it be consumed altogether. His revenue is, in this case, derived from his labour only. This is the state of the greater part of the labouring poor in all countries." II.1.1 :"But when he possesses stock sufficient to maintain him for months or years, he naturally endeavours to derive a revenue from the greater part of it; reserving only so much for his immediate consumption as may maintain him till this revenue begins to come in. His whole stock, therefore, is distinguished into two parts. That part which, he expects, is to afford him this revenue, is called his capital." Of Money Considered as a particular Branch of the General Stock of the Society: :"From references of the first book, that the price of the greater part of commodities resolves itself into three parts, of which one pays the wages of the labour, another the profits of the stock, and a third the rent of the land which had been employed in producing and bringing them to market: that there are, indeed, some commodities of which the price is made up of two of those parts only, the wages of labour, and the profits of stock: and a very few in which it consists altogether in one, the wages of labour: but that the price of every commodity necessarily resolves itself into some one, or other, or all of these three parts; every part of it which goes neither to rent nor to wages, being necessarily profit to somebody." Of the Accumulation of Capital, or of Productive and Unproductive Labour: :"One sort of labour adds to the value of the subject upon which it is bestowed: there is another which has no such effect. The former, as it produces a value, may be called productive; the latter, unproductive labour. Thus the labour of a manufacturer adds, generally, to the value of the materials which he works upon, that of his own maintenance, and of his master's profit. The labour of a menial servant, on the contrary, adds to the value of nothing." Of Stock Lent at Interest: :"The stock which is lent at interest is always considered as a capital by the lender. He expects that in due time it is to be restored to him, and that in the meantime the borrower is to pay him a certain annual rent for the use of it. The borrower may use it either as a capital, or as a stock reserved for immediate consumption. If he uses it as a capital, he employs it in the maintenance of productive labourers, who reproduce the value with a profit. He can, in this case, both restore the capital and pay the interest without alienating or encroaching upon any other source of revenue. If he uses it as a stock reserved for immediate consumption, he acts the part of a prodigal, and dissipates in the maintenance of the idle what was destined for the support of the industrious. He can, in this case, neither restore the capital nor pay the interest without either alienating or encroaching upon some other source of revenue, such as the property or the rent of land." :The stock which is lent at interest is, no doubt, occasionally employed in both these ways, but in the former much more frequently than in the latter." Of the Natural Progress of Opulence: :"The great commerce of every civilised society is that carried on between the inhabitants of the town and those of the country. It consists in the exchange of crude for manufactured produce, either immediately, or by the intervention of money, or of some sort of paper which represents money. The country supplies the town with the means of subsistence and the materials of manufacture. The town repays this supply by sending back a part of the manufactured produce to the inhabitants of the country. The town, in which there neither is nor can be any reproduction of substances, may very properly be said to gain its whole wealth and subsistence from the country. We must not, however, upon this account, imagine that the gain of the town is the loss of the country. The gains of both are mutual and reciprocal, and the division of labour is in this, as in all other cases, advantageous to all the different persons employed in the various occupations into which it is subdivided." Of the Discouragement of Agriculture: Chapter 2's long title is "Of the Discouragement of Agriculture in the Ancient State of Europe after the Fall of the Roman Empire". :"When the German and Scythian nations overran the western provinces of the Roman empire, the confusions which followed so great a revolution lasted for several centuries. The rapine and violence which the barbarians exercised against the ancient inhabitants interrupted the commerce between the towns and the country. The towns were deserted, and the country was left uncultivated, and the western provinces of Europe, which had enjoyed a considerable degree of opulence under the Roman empire, sunk into the lowest state of poverty and barbarism. During the continuance of those confusions, the chiefs and principal leaders of those nations acquired or usurped to themselves the greater part of the lands of those countries. A great part of them was uncultivated; but no part of them, whether cultivated or uncultivated, was left without a proprietor. All of them were engrossed, and the greater part by a few great proprietors. :This original engrossing of uncultivated lands, though a great, might have been but a transitory evil. They might soon have been divided again, and broke into small parcels either by succession or by alienation. The law of primogeniture hindered them from being divided by succession: the introduction of entails prevented their being broke into small parcels by alienation." Of the Rise and Progress of Cities and Towns, after the Fall of the Roman Empire: :"The inhabitants of cities and towns were, after the fall of the Roman empire, not more favoured than those of the country. They consisted, indeed, of a very different order of people from the first inhabitants of the ancient republics of Greece and Italy. These last were composed chiefly of the proprietors of lands, among whom the public territory was originally divided, and who found it convenient to build their houses in the neighbourhood of one another, and to surround them with a wall, for the sake of common defence. After the fall of the Roman empire, on the contrary, the proprietors of land seem generally to have lived in fortified castles on their own estates, and in the midst of their own tenants and dependants. The towns were chiefly inhabited by tradesmen and mechanics, who seem in those days to have been of servile, or very nearly of servile condition. The privileges which we find granted by ancient charters to the inhabitants of some of the principal towns in Europe sufficiently show what they were before those grants. The people to whom it is granted as a privilege that they might give away their own daughters in marriage without the consent of their lord, that upon their death their own children, and not their lord, should succeed to their goods, and that they might dispose of their own effects by will, must, before those grants, have been either altogether or very nearly in the same state of villanage with the occupiers of land in the country." How the Commerce of the Towns Contributed to the Improvement of the Country: Smith often harshly criticised those who act purely out of self-interest and greed, and warns that, :"...[a]ll for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind." (Book 3, Chapter 4) Smith vigorously attacked the antiquated government restrictions he thought hindered industrial expansion. In fact, he attacked most forms of government interference in the economic process, including tariffs, arguing that this creates inefficiency and high prices in the long run. It is believed that this theory influenced government legislation in later years, especially during the 19th century. Smith advocated a government that was active in sectors other than the economy. He advocated public education for poor adults, a judiciary, and a standing army—institutional systems not directly profitable for private industries. Of the Principle of the Commercial or Mercantile System: The book has sometimes been described as a critique of mercantilism and a synthesis of the emerging economic thinking of Smith's time. Specifically, The Wealth of Nations attacks, inter alia, two major tenets of mercantilism: # The idea that protectionist tariffs serve the economic interests of a nation (or indeed any purpose whatsoever) and # The idea that large reserves of gold bullion or other precious metals are necessary for a country's economic success. This critique of mercantilism was later used by David Ricardo when he laid out his Theory of Comparative Advantage. Of Restraints upon the Importation: Chapter 2's full title is "Of Restraints upon the Importation from Foreign Countries of such Goods as can be Produced at Home". The "Invisible Hand" is a frequently referenced theme from the book, although it is specifically mentioned only once. The metaphor of the "invisible hand" has been widely used out of context. In the passage above Smith is referring to "the support of domestic industry" and contrasting that support with the importation of goods. Neoclassical economic theory has expanded the metaphor beyond the domestic/foreign manufacture argument to encompass nearly all aspects of economics. Of the extraordinary Restraints: Chapter 3's long title is "Of the extraordinary Restraints upon the Importation of Goods of almost all Kinds, from those Countries with which the Balance is supposed to be Disadvantageous". Of Drawbacks: Merchants and manufacturers are not contented with the monopoly of the home market, but desire likewise the most extensive foreign sale for their goods. Their country has no jurisdiction in foreign nations, and therefore can seldom procure them any monopoly there. They are generally obliged, therefore, to content themselves with petitioning for certain encouragements to exportation. Of these encouragements what are called Drawbacks seem to be the most reasonable. To allow the merchant to draw back upon exportation, either the whole or a part of whatever excise or inland duty is imposed upon domestic industry, can never occasion the exportation of a greater quantity of goods than what would have been exported had no duty been imposed. Such encouragements do not tend to turn towards any particular employment a greater share of the capital of the country than what would go to that employment of its own accord, but only to hinder the duty from driving away any part of that shares to other employments. Of Bounties: Bounties upon exportation are, in Great Britain, frequently petitioned for, and sometimes granted to the produce of particular branches of domestic industry. By means of them our merchants and manufacturers, it is pretended, will be enabled to sell their goods as cheap, or cheaper than their rivals in the foreign market. A greater quantity, it is said, will thus be exported, and the balance of trade consequently turned more in favour of our own country. We cannot give our workmen a monopoly in the foreign as we have done in the home market. We cannot force foreigners to buy their goods as we have done our own countrymen. The next best expedient, it has been thought, therefore, is to pay them for buying. It is in this manner that the mercantile system proposes to enrich the whole country, and to put money into all our pockets by means of the balance of trade Of Treaties of Commerce: :"When a nation binds itself by treaty either to permit the entry of certain goods from one foreign country which it prohibits from all others, or to exempt the goods of one country from duties to which it subjects those of all others, the country, or at least the merchants and manufacturers of the country, whose commerce is so favoured, must necessarily derive great advantage from the treaty. Those merchants and manufacturers enjoy a sort of monopoly in the country which is so indulgent to them. That country becomes a market both more extensive and more advantageous for their goods: more extensive, because the goods of other nations being either excluded or subjected to heavier duties, it takes off a greater quantity of theirs: more advantageous, because the merchants of the favoured country, enjoying a sort of monopoly there, will often sell their goods for a better price than if exposed to the free competition of all other nations." :Such treaties, however, though they may be advantageous to the merchants and manufacturers of the favoured, are necessarily disadvantageous to those of the favouring country. A monopoly is thus granted against them to a foreign nation; and they must frequently buy the foreign goods they have occasion for dearer than if the free competition of other nations was admitted. Of Colonies: Of the Motives for establishing new Colonies: :"The interest which occasioned the first settlement of the different European colonies in America and the West Indies was not altogether so plain and distinct as that which directed the establishment of those of ancient Greece and Rome. :All the different states of ancient Greece possessed, each of them, but a very small territory, and when the people in any one of them multiplied beyond what that territory could easily maintain, a part of them were sent in quest of a new habitation in some remote and distant part of the world; warlike neighbours surrounded them on all sides, rendering it difficult for any of them to enlarge their territory at home. The colonies of the Dorians resorted chiefly to Italy and Sicily, which, in the times preceding the foundation of Rome, were inhabited by barbarous and uncivilised nations: those of the Ionians and Eolians, the two other great tribes of the Greeks, to Asia Minor and the islands of the Egean Sea, of which the inhabitants seem at that time to have been pretty much in the same state as those of Sicily and Italy. The mother city, though she considered the colony as a child, at all times entitled to great favour and assistance, and owing in return much gratitude and respect, yet considered it as an emancipated child over whom she pretended to claim no direct authority or jurisdiction. The colony settled its own form of government, enacted its own laws, elected its own magistrates, and made peace or war with its neighbours as an independent state, which had no occasion to wait for the approbation or consent of the mother city. Nothing can be more plain and distinct than the interest which directed every such establishment." Causes of Prosperity of new Colonies: :"The colony of a civilised nation which takes possession either of a waste country, or of one so thinly inhabited that the natives easily give place to the new settlers, advances more rapidly to wealth and greatness than any other human society. :The colonists carry out with them a knowledge of agriculture and of other useful arts superior to what can grow up of its own accord in the course of many centuries among savage and barbarous nations. They carry out with them, too, the habit of subordination, some notion of the regular government which takes place in their own country, of the system of laws which supports it, and of a regular administration of justice; and they naturally establish something of the same kind in the new settlement." Of the Advantages which Europe has derived from the Discovery of America, and from that of a Passage to the East Indies by the Cape of Good Hope: :"Such are the advantages which the colonies of America have derived from the policy of Europe. What are those which Europe has derived from the discovery and colonisation of America? Those advantages may be divided, first, into the general advantages which Europe, considered as one great country, has derived from those great events; and, secondly, into the particular advantages which each colonising country has derived from the colonies which particularly belong to it, in consequence of the authority or dominion which it exercises over them.: :The general advantages which Europe, considered as one great country, has derived from the discovery and colonisation of America, consist, first, in the increase of its enjoyments; and, secondly, in the augmentation of its industry. :The surplus produce of America, imported into Europe, furnishes the inhabitants of this great continent with a variety of commodities which they could not otherwise have possessed; some for conveniency and use, some for pleasure, and some for ornament, and thereby contributes to increase their enjoyments." Conclusion of the Mercantile System: Smith's argument about the international political economy opposed the idea of Mercantilism. While the Mercantile System encouraged each country to hoard gold, while trying to grasp hegemony, Smith argued that free trade eventually makes all actors better off. This argument is the modern 'Free Trade' argument. Of the Agricultural Systems: Chapter 9's long title is "Of the Agricultural Systems, or of those Systems of Political Economy, which Represent the Produce of Land, as either the Sole or the Principal, Source of the Revenue and Wealth of Every Country". :"That system which represents the produce of land as the sole source of the revenue and wealth of every country has, so far as by that time, never been adopted by any nation, and it at present exists only in the speculations of a few men of great learning and ingenuity in France. It would not, surely, be worthwhile to examine at great length the errors of a system which never has done, and probably never will do, any harm in any part of the world." Smith postulated four "maxims" of taxation: proportionality, transparency, convenience, and efficiency. Some economists interpret Smith's opposition to taxes on transfers of money, such as the Stamp Act, as opposition to capital gains taxes, which did not exist in the 18th century. Other economists credit Smith as one of the first to advocate a progressive tax. Smith wrote, "The necessaries of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food, and the greater part of their little revenue is spent in getting it. The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principal expense of the rich, and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off to the best advantage all the other luxuries and vanities which they possess. A tax upon house-rents, therefore, would in general fall heaviest upon the rich; and in this sort of inequality there would not, perhaps, be anything very unreasonable. It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion" Of the Expenses of the Sovereign or Commonwealth: Smith uses this chapter to comment on the concept of taxation and e |
penditure by the " | null | null | null | null | null | null |
726178 | /m/035_ms | Naked Came the Stranger | Penelope Ashe | null | null | Gillian and William Blake are the hosts of a popular New York City breakfast radio chat show, The Billy & Gilly Show, where they play the perfect couple. When Gillian finds out that her husband is having an affair, she decides to cheat on him with a variety of men from their Long Island neighborhood. Most of the book is taken up by vignettes describing Gilly's adventures with a variety of men, from a progressive rabbi to a mobster crooner. |
726183 | /m/035_n3 | Area 7 | Matthew Reilly | 10/31/2001 | {"/m/017rf8": "Techno-thriller", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | The President of the United States is visiting America's most secret military installation, Area 7. Assigned to his protective detail is Shane Schofield and his team of Marines including Gunnery Sergeant Gena 'Mother' Newman, Staff Sergeant Elizabeth 'Fox' Gant and Buck 'Book II' Riley Jr. They are plunged into a race for survival when an Air Force general, Charles “Caesar” Russell, unleashes a plan he has been working on for over 15 years. Despite being 'executed' on the day of the president's inauguration, Caesar is revived, and with a squadron of 50 elite Air Force soldiers (the 7th Squadron), have taken control of Area 7 and initiated a lockdown. A transmitter, attached to the president's heart before he was elected, has been activated; a satellite sends and receives messages to and from this transmitter, which is powered by the kinetic energy of the president's heart beating. If the satellite doesn't receive the messages from the transmitter 14 Type-240 Blast Plasma based nuclear warheads in the airports of the Northern, “pro-black” capital cities of the United States will explode, destroying these cities, and making way for a new, racist, Confederate America. As long as the President's heart beats, the messages will be sent to the satellite, and the nuclear warheads will not detonate. To prevent the president from trying to escape Area 7, Caesar also overrode the launch codes on the Nuclear Football so that to prevent the detonation of the warheads, the president must place his hand on the fingerprint sensor on the Football (that is being kept in Caesar's possession) every 90 minutes. While moving through the underground complex Gant and her group, including the president, come to a cell block and find a scientist locked inside one of the cells. After being released and questioned, it is discovered that the prisoners being held at Area 7 are "volunteers" that the scientists use to carry out experiments. It soon comes to light that there are ways of opening exits out of Area 7, and that two have already been opened by another scientist, Dr Gunther Botha. In addition to opening two exits, Botha has also shut down main power to the complex, so that it is now running on auxiliary power. Meanwhile, Schofield and his group, after fleeing from the ground level hangar, make their way into the sublevels where they find a bedroom of a 6 year old boy named Kevin who lives in a cube. Schofield's group then meets up with Riley's group, and the president reveals that the reason for his visit to Area 7 is to check on the progress of a vaccine being developed for the Sinovirus, a genetically engineered virus that differentiates between the amount of pigmentation in a person's skin, allowing it to target only people of a specific race (however people of Asian descent are immune). The president explains that to develop a vaccine for the Sinovirus (and protect America from biological weapons containing the Sinovirus) the scientists had to create a genetically engineered human, a boy named Kevin, who's blood could be used to produce antibodies, and the prisoners being held at Area 7 are used as guinea pigs to test the vaccine. Botha is killed during a chase and the President and Scarecrow escape to Area 8. When they reach it they realize Echo unit from the 7th squadron are being paid 120 million American dollars by the Chinese government to bring Kevin to them. Schofield and the President follow onto the 747 which has a mounted X-38 in an attempt to rescue Kevin. Schofield hijacks the X-38, escaping with the president and Kevin. Later, Schofield and Gant finally face off with Caesar back in Area 7. ===== Captain Shane "Scarecrow" Schofield ===== The commander of the US Marines in the President's security, Schofield is the main protagonist of the novel. ===== Gunnery Sergeant Gena "Mother" Newman ===== A Marine and close friend of Schofield. Was presumed to have been killed by the 7th Squadron, but was later revealed to have cheated death. ===== Staff Sergeant Elizabeth "Fox" Gant ===== Another Marine who is a close friend of Schofield and Mother. Together with Schofield, the two managed at the last moment to foil Caesar's revolutionary plan. Fox survived the events of the novel. ===== Sergeant Buck "Book II" Riley Jr. ===== A young Marine who is the son of Schofield's deceased and loyal colleague, Book II urges Schofield to find the answers relating to his father's death. Although severely wounded, Book II survived the novel's events. ===== Colonel Rodney "Hot Rod/ Ramrod" Hagerty ===== The pompous White House Liaison Officer, Hagerty is known as an officer who never experienced the full elements of direct combat. After being imprisoned by a serial killer in he base, he attempted to escape Area 7. However, the Marines never found him and presumed he was killed by the thermonuclear blast. ===== Sergeant Wendall "Elvis" Haynes ===== A Marine who is a close friend of Love Machine, Elvis attempted a kamikaze strike on the 7th Squadron Unit, Bravo Unit, to avenge the death of Love Machine. Although Elvis himself was killed, he managed to foil Bravo Unit's attempt in killing the US President and his security detail by inflicting severe casualties among the Unit's members. ===== Sergeant Ashley "Love Machine" Lewicky ===== A Marine and close friend of Elvis, Love Machine was killed during Bravo Unit's attempted assassination on the US President. ===== Corporal Gus "Braniac" Gorman ===== A Marine who is regarded as a genius, Braniac was killed by a decoy vehicle triggered by the Reccondos. ===== Captain Tom "Calvin" Reeves ===== A young and highly skilled Marine officer, Calvin was killed by a raid triggered by Alpha Unit, one of the 7th Squadron units in the base. ===== Colonel Michael Grier ===== The pilot of Marine One, he was killed by 7th Squadron commandos. ===== Lieutenant Colonel Michelle Dallas ===== The copilot of Marine One, she was never mentioned to have escaped Area 7 and was most likely killed around the same time as Grier. ===== Lieutenant Corbin "Colt" Hendricks ===== A Marine who was killed by 7th Squadron Commandos after discovering the deceased members of a US Secret Service Advance Team. ===== President of the United States ===== The U.S. President has been labeled as one of two keys in triggering Caesar's long-planned revolution. Although the 7th Squadron commandos in Area 7 attempted to assassinate him, the US President survived the day's events. ===== Nicholas Tate III ===== The President's Domestic Policy Adviser, Tate managed to survive the day's events, although he was horrified by several elements of the novel. ===== Warrant Officer Carl Webster ===== A US Army Officer, Webster was responsible for the security of the Football, a briefcase important to the President himself. However, he betrayed the President and leagued with Caesar, triggering his plan by giving him the Football. He was later killed by Mother. ===== Special Agent Juliet Janson ===== A member of the President's Secret Service Detail, she survived the day's events, but was severely wounded in the process. ===== Special Agent Francis X. Cutler ===== The leader of the President's Secret Service Detail, he was killed by the 7th Squadron Unit Delta while trying to evacuate the US President. ===== Agent Julio Ramondo ===== A member of the President's Secret Service Detail, he was killed by a raid triggered by Alpha Unit, one of the 7th Squadron units in the base. ===== Agent Curtis ===== A member of the President's Secret Service Detail, he was killed by a raid triggered by Alpha Unit, one of the 7th Squadron units in the base. ===== Agent Tom Baker ===== The leader of a US Secret Service Advance Team, he was killed by 7th Squadron commandos before the day's events. ===== David Fairfax ===== A cryptanalyst working for the DIA, Fairfax was responsible for foiling two plans in the novel's events, involving a vaccine against a highly-lethal biological weapon known as the Sinovirus. ===== Doctor Herbert Franklin ===== An immunologist involved in highly classified projects within Area 7, he was killed by the Reccondos who attempted to steal a vaccine against the Sinovirus and retreat from American soil. ===== Kevin ===== The source of the vaccine against the Sinovirus, both Reccondo commandos and a rogue 7th Squadron Unit attempted to retrieve Kevin from American soil. He managed to escape from the two threats with the help of the Marines and survived the day's events. ===== Lieutenant General Charles "Caesar" Russell ===== A former Air Force General, Caesar is the main antagonist of the novel. The leader of the Brotherhood, a secret and racial military organization, Caesar was the mastermind behind the revolutionary plan involving two elements: the assassination of the US President, and control over the Sinovirus and its vaccine (Kevin). He was killed in the thermonuclear blast of the base while mortally injured, and as a result his long-planned operation ended in failure after it was foiled by Schofield's efforts. ===== Colonel Jerome T. Harper ===== The Commanding Officer of Area 7, Harper was revealed as leagued with Caesar in achieving his revolutionary plan. He was killed in a brutal fashion by Lucifer Leary, a serial killer within the base. ===== Major Kurt Logan ===== The overall commanding officer of the 7th Squadron Units in Area 7 (who were ordered to assassinate the US President) and the commander of Alpha Unit, one of the 7th Squadron Units in Area 7. He was killed by Schofield. ===== Captain Bruno "Boa" McConnell ===== The commander of Bravo Unit, one of the 7th Squadron Units in Area 7. He was killed by Book II. ===== Captain Luther "Python" Willis ===== The commander of Charlie Unit, one of the 7th Squadron Units in Area 7. He was killed by the rogue Echo Unit, in league with the Chinese Government. ===== Captain J.K. Stone ===== The commander of Delta Unit, one of the 7th Squadron Units in Area 7. He was killed by Reccondo commandos as they retrieved Kevin from the base. ===== Captain Lee "Cobra" Carney ===== The commander of Echo Unit, one of the 7th Squadron Units in Area 7. Carney was the leader who betrayed Caesar in retrieving Kevin from American soil and sending him to the Chinese Government with the aid of Chinese agents. He was killed by 7th Squadron commandos after his plan was foiled by Schofield and ended in failure. ===== Captain Robert Wu ===== A former 7th Squadron officer, he was one of four Chinese agents ordered by the Chinese Government to remove Kevin from American soil and place him under the control of the Chinese. He was killed by 7th Squadron commandos after the plan was foiled by Schofield and ended in failure. ===== Lieutenant Chet Li ===== A former 7th Squadron officer, he was one of four Chinese agents ordered by the Chinese Government to remove Kevin from American soil and place him under the control of the Chinese. He was killed by 7th Squadron commandos after the plan was foiled by Schofield and ended in failure. ===== Doctor Gunther Botha ===== A former member of the South African Defence Force, he attempted to retrieve Kevin from American soil in order to commence a lily-white African revolution. He was later killed by Charlie Unit while trying to escape Area 7 via Lake Powell, resulting in his plan ending in failure. ===== Seth Grimshaw ===== The presumed leader of Area 7's prisoners, Grimshaw attempted to escape Area 7 after the majority of prisoners were killed by Harper's Sinovirus agent. He was later killed by Janson. ===== Goliath ===== Seth Grimshaw's right-hand man, he also attempted to escape Area 7 with Grimshaw after the Sinovirus killed most of the prisoners. He was later killed by Book II. ===== Lucifer James Leary ===== A serial killer based in Area 7 as a test subject, he is known to have committed several acts of cannibalism during his criminal career. Leary was later killed by Schofield. it:Area 7 (romanzo) |
726510 | /m/0360c_ | Callahan's Crosstime Saloon | Spider Robinson | null | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction"} | The bar is run by Mike Callahan. The regulars are welcoming and willing to listen to any visitor's problems, no matter how strange, but do not snoop if a visitor is unwilling to share. Strange and unusual events and visitors turn up with frequency in the stories. Regulars at Callahan's include a talking dog, several extraterrestrials and time travelers, an ethical vampire, a couple of Irish mythological beings, and an obscenity-spewing parrot. The stories make heavy use of puns. Irish whiskeys are the preferred beverage, with Tullamore Dew and Bushmills mentioned in nearly every collection of shorts or novel that references the saloon. The stories make an obvious homage to Fletcher Pratt and L. Sprague de Camp's Tales from Gavagan's Bar and Arthur C. Clarke's Tales from the White Hart. Lady Sally McGee, the madam of a house of excellent repute (and Mike Callahan's wife), stars in Robinson's Callahan's Lady and Lady Slings the Booze. The regulars at Lady Sally's brothel (where the employees are "artists" and the patrons are "clients") insist on the same empathy and humor as those at Callahan's, and they are just as likely to have fantastic backgrounds. Relatedly, nobody in Lady Sally's is forced into anything they are unwilling to do. This is the source of Callahan's Law (also known as the Law of Conservation of Pain and Joy): "Shared pain is lessened; shared joy, increased—thus do we refute entropy." Stated another way: "Just as there are Laws of Conservation of Matter and Energy, so there are in fact Laws of Conservation of Pain and Joy. Neither can ever be created or destroyed. But one can be converted into the other." |
726557 | /m/0360gz | The Witches of Eastwick | John Updike | 4/12/1984 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction"} | The story, set in the fictional Rhode Island town of Eastwick in the late 1960s, follows the witches Alexandra Spofford, Jane Smart, and Sukie Rougemont, who acquired their powers after leaving or being left by their husbands. Their coven is upset by the arrival of a devil-like character, Darryl Van Horne. The mysterious Darryl seduces each of the women, encouraging them to play with their powers and creating a scandal in the town. The three women share Darryl in relative peace until he unexpectedly marries their young, innocent friend, Jenny, on whom they resolve to have revenge by giving her cancer through their magic. The witches doubt their judgement after Jenny's death when Darryl flees town with her younger brother, Chris, apparently his lover. In his wake he leaves their relationships strained and their sense of self in doubt. Eventually they each summon their ideal men and leave town. The Widows of Eastwick, John Updike's sequel to The Witches of Eastwick, was published by Alfred A. Knopf in October 2008. |
726973 | /m/0361gh | Syrup | Max Barry | 1999-07 | {"/m/06nbt": "Satire"} | Set in present day, a young marketing graduate named Scat comes up with an idea for a new product for Coca-Cola called 'Fukk'. This causes him to go to Coca-Cola to sell his idea for $3 million, but he finds that Sneaky Pete has already claimed the copyright in a backstabbing move. This then leads him to leave his apartment with Sneaky Pete and move in with Cindy. Cindy eventually throws him out and he goes to live with 6 and Tina while managing the summer marketing campaign for Coca-Cola. He eventually succeeds with the campaign. After that Scat tries to undermine Sneaky Pete's effort to run a new secret project for Coca-Cola, the first feature length advertising movie. |
727199 | /m/03621h | The Midwich Cuckoos | John Wyndham | null | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | Ambulances arrive at two traffic accidents which block the only roads into the fictional British village of Midwich, Winshire. Attempting to approach the village, one paramedic falls unconscious. Suspecting gas poisoning, the army is called in. However, they find that a caged canary becomes unconscious upon entering the affected region, but regains consciousness when removed. Further experiments show the region to be a hemisphere with a diameter of around the village. Aerial photography reveals an unidentifiable ground-based silver object in the centre of the created exclusion zone. After one day the effect vanishes along with the unidentified object, and the villagers wake with no apparent ill effects. Some months later, the villagers realise that every woman of child-bearing age is pregnant, with all indications that the pregnancies were caused by xenogenesis during the period of unconsciousness referred to as the "Dayout". When the 31 boys and 30 girls are born they appear normal except for their unusual, golden eyes and pale, silvery skin. These children have none of the genetic characteristics of their parents. As they grow up, it becomes increasingly apparent that they are, at least in some respects, not human. They possess telepathic abilities, and can control others' actions. The Children (they are referred to with a capital 'C') have two distinct group minds: one for the boys and another for the girls. Their physical development is accelerated compared to that of humans; upon reaching the age of nine, they appear to be sixteen-year-olds. The Children protect themselves as much as possible using a form of mind control. One young man who accidentally hits a Child in the hip while driving a car is made to drive into a wall and kill himself. A bull who chased the Children is forced into a pond to drown. The villagers form a mob and try to burn down the Midwich Grange, where the Children are taught and live, but the Children make the villagers attack each other. The Military Intelligence department learn that the same thing has taken place in four other parts of the world, including an Inuit settlement in the Canadian Arctic, a small township in Australia's Northern Territory, and a rural Siberian village. The Inuit instinctively killed the newborn Children, sensing they were not their own. The Australian babies had all died within a few weeks, suggesting that something may have gone wrong with their xenogenesis process. The Siberian village was destroyed by the Soviet government, using nuclear weapons, claiming that it was an accident. The Children are aware of the threat against them, and use their power to prevent any aeroplanes from flying over the village. During an interview with a Military Intelligence officer the Children explain that to solve the problem they must be destroyed. They explain it is not possible to kill them unless the entire village is bombed, which results in civilian deaths. It is revealed that the Children have put up an ultimatum: The Children want to migrate to a secure location, where they can live unharmed. They demand aeroplanes from the government. An elderly, educated Midwich resident (Gordon Zellaby) realises the Children must be killed as soon as possible. As he has a only a few weeks left to live due to a heart condition, he feels an obligation to do something. He has acted as a teacher and mentor to the Children and they regard him with as much affection as they can have for any human, letting him approach them more closely than they do with others. One evening, he - in effect abusing their trust - hides a bomb in his projection equipment, while showing the Children a film about the Aegean Islands of Ancient Greece. At an unspecified moment, Zellaby sets off the bomb, killing himself and all of the children. The title is a reference to the cuckoo bird, which lays its eggs in the nest of other birds in the hopes that they will raise the cuckoo's offspring as their own. |
728016 | /m/0364tc | Akhenaten, Dweller in Truth | Naguib Mahfouz | null | {"/m/03g3w": "History", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | On the way from Thebes with his father, the scribe Amunhoben points out the ruins of Akhetaten, the city that the "heretic pharaoh" Akhenaten built for his One and Only God. Seeking a balanced perspective on the events of that time, which split Egypt politically and religiously, Meriamun gets a letter of introduction from his father to many members of Akhenaten's court, among them the High Priest of Amun, his chief of security Haremhab, and his queen Nefertiti. Each tale adds a new dimension to the enigma that is Akhenaten and the thoughts of those that were close to him allow Meriamun – and the reader – to judge for themselves whether Akhenaten was a power politician or a true believer. |
728114 | /m/03656d | Faerie Tale | Raymond E. Feist | 2/1/1988 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy"} | Phil Hastings and his family have just moved back to his hometown for some much needed peace and quiet from the Hollywood scene. As Phil's twins, Sean and Patrick, soon discover, there is more to their new home than was expected. Gloria, their mother, senses something, but simply dismisses her concern as stress from their recent move. Gabbie, their older half-sister, meets the man of her dreams, but also is tempted by other men. Deep in the woods, The Bad Thing and his Master are ready to break free of the centuries old compact made to keep the Faerie world and the Human world at peace. Only through believing the insane and impossible can they save both worlds from colliding again. |
728752 | /m/0367cs | Lirael | Garth Nix | 2001 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | Lirael sees herself as an outcast within the world of the Clayr. With raven-black hair, a pale complexion, pointy face, muddy-brown eyes and unknown paternal parentage, she differs physically from the generally deep-tanned, fair-haired, round-faced and blue- or green-eyed seers around her. Most hurtful, though, is her lack of the Clayr's birthright, the Sight (the ability to see into the future or possible futures). The fact that this bloodline trait has not shown itself at the usual age of around eleven, as well as the absence of any truly understanding or sympathetic other in her life, leaves Lirael emotionally distressed and very unhappy until her appointment to the Clayr's Library on her fourteenth birthday. Through her solitary work in forgotten corners of the mystical library in the Clayr's Glacier, Lirael begins to unlock the keys to embarking upon an apparently predestined adventure of utmost importance. She also summons the Disreputable Dog, whom she befriends and who helps her in her explorations. Five years later, across the Wall in Ancelestierre, Prince Sameth has an encounter with the necromancer Hedge and his summoned Dead Hands, which leaves him injured both spiritually and physically. His father Touchstone arrives to take him back to the Old Kingdom and the safety of the palace in Belisaere. Here he is expected to continue his studies to follow his mother as the Abhorsen, a future he is mortally afraid of, especially since his encounter with Hedge. Their paths cross as Nicholas Sayre, an Ancelestierran friend of Sameth, crosses the border into the Old Kingdom and then to the Red Lake in search of the Lightning Trap, a region in the south west of the Kingdom where the royal rule does not extend and the Clayr cannot See. Sameth flees the palace and his sister to go and look for Nick. He gets into trouble on the way and Mogget turns up, to his surprise and suspicion. Meanwhile, Lirael finds, on her nineteenth birthday, a non-Clayr magical inheritance of the artifacts of a Remembrancer (one who looks into the past) and is quite swiftly dispatched to fulfill a very recent vision the Clayr had of her in a boat on the Red Lake with Nick. She sails down the River Ratterlin and, by coincidence, meets up with Sam, who had to use a bathtub to escape the Dead who had been following him. They continue on to the Red Lake, but are nearly intercepted by Chlorr of the Mask and the Dead Hands assigned to her. They decide to proceed to Abhorsen's House to rest and generally regroup. Once there, a strange set of revelations take place: Sameth is given a surcoat with the Royal Blood's tower and the Wallmaker's trowel, and Lirael is given a surcoat with the Clayr star and the Abhorsen key. Lirael realizes, with the help of memories she has Remembered, that she must be half-Abhorsen — a fact confirmed by Mogget, as only a child of both Clayr and Abhorsen may become a Remembrancer. The novel ends with Lirael and Sameth deciding to go on to find Nick and Hedge at the Red Lake. |
728758 | /m/0367dx | Abhorsen | Garth Nix | 2003 | {"/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | The main novel begins at Abhorsen's House, which is besieged by Dead Hands led by Chlorr of the Mask, once a powerful necromancer who has died and come back as one of the Greater Dead. She is in turn under the control of Hedge the Necromancer, who serves Orannis the Destroyer. The Destroyer is the Ninth Bright Shiner, and the most evil magical force or being. It had destroyed many worlds before It was defeated by the Seven Bright Shiners, the free magic entities that formed the Charter after defeating Orannis. The Seven also bound Yrael, the Eighth Bright Shiner, who was a free magic entity who would not join the charter. The Seven were known as Ranna, Mosrael, Kibeth, Dyrim, Belgaer, Saraneth, and Astarael. These Seven binders are also the names of the seven necromantic bells and some of the original natures of The Seven linger in these bells. Lirael and Sameth must escape the Abhorsen's House to stop the Destroyer and to save Sameth's friend Nicholas Sayre, who is being used by Orannis as an avatar. Lirael and Sameth now have to travel to the Red Lake, where The Destroyer is being unearthed. As Lirael and Sameth journey through the Old Kingdom they learn more about Orannis and its plans to destroy all life. Meanwhile, Prince Sameth's parents, the Abhorsen Sabriel and King Touchstone are in Ancelstierre trying to stop the probable death of thousands of Southerling refugees if they are allowed to enter the Old Kingdom without the protection of the Charter (see also the Five Great Charters). While they are in Ancelstierre attempting to reason with a corrupt government they become victims of an assassination attempt and barely escape with their lives. They flee to the Old Kingdom to attempt to save the lives of the Southerling Refugees from the other side of the Wall. While Sabriel and Touchstone are trying to get back to the Old Kingdom, Lirael, Sameth and the Disreputable Dog are trying to save Nicholas Sayre, Sameth's best friend and also the host of the Destroyer. The question becomes one of whether Lirael and Sameth are able to stop The Destroyer from completing its plans for eternal freedom and the destruction of the world and other worlds after this. Orannis is successful in joining the hemispheres that imprisoned him. Nick dies in the process of the rejoining, but the Disreputable Dog gives him a Charter Mark, thus binding him to the edge of death. Lirael uses her Rembrancing powers to figure out how the original Seven bound Orannis. During her journey through Death to use the Dark Mirror, she is confronted by and defeats Hedge. In the end, Lirael and her friends defeat Orannis, who must once again bind Orannis by re-enacting the original binding of the Seven with each member holding a bell and adding a bell’s voice. Lirael takes Astarael, and prepares to strike at the hemisphere with a new sword, forged from her panpipes and Nehima, that Sameth made for her. The others include King Touchstone (Ranna) and Abhorsen Sabriel (Saraneth), Sanar and Ryelle (Mosrael), Ellimere (Dyrim), the Disreputable Dog (who is truly a remnant of Kibeth), and Sameth (Belgaer). The first attempt at rebinding shows that the Destroyer is strong enough to resist. Eventually, Sameth frees Mogget, who reveals himself to be the Eighth Bright Shiner, Yrael. Yrael fights against the impulse to kill the Abhorsen, and sets itself against Orannis. This shocks Orannis, and gives the added power to bind him. As Lirael prepares to make the final blow, she readies herself to die. Unexpectedly, the Disreputable Dog takes the blow for Lirael and disappears into Death. In the end, though, the Disreputable Dog gives Nick back his life and tells him that Lirael will have a hand of gold made for her by Sameth to replace the hand she lost while being saved by the Dog. |
728793 | /m/0367kj | The Girl Who Owned a City | O. T Nelson | 3/28/1975 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/0hc1z": "Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction", "/m/0dwly": "Children's literature"} | A deadly virus has swept the world, killing off everyone over the age of twelve in the span of a month or so. In suburban Chicago, ten-year-old Lisa Nelson and her younger brother Todd are surviving, like all the children in the story, by looting abandoned houses and shops. Although there are abandoned cars in every driveway and lining every street, Lisa is the first child to think of driving one. She is also the first to think of raiding a farm, and the first to look at the dwindling supplies in stores and deduce that groceries come from warehouses. She finds a supermarket warehouse and raids it, enlisting the help of a neighbor boy her own age, but makes clear to him that the entire warehouse and all its contents are her exclusive property, not to be shared unless she chooses. She considers relocating to the farm, but decides against it because it is difficult to defend (other children are starting to form gangs) and because "planning and getting the world back to the way it was, with schools, and hospitals, and electricity" are much more "exciting" than "hiding away on a farm ... digging in the dirt all day". Lisa and her friends are approached by the "Chidester Avenue Gang", led by Tom Logan. Suspecting that Lisa has a source of supplies, Logan offers a food-for-protection deal, which Lisa declines. Unhesitatingly taking charge, she forms her block-long stretch of Grand Avenue into a militia, armed with guns, Molotov cocktails, and primitive weapons. When the militia proves unsuccessful at defending the "Land of Grandville" against "the fearful and cruel army of Chidester and Elm" Lisa comes up with the idea of moving the "child-families" -- and the entire contents of the warehouse—into the local high school, and transforming it into a fortress-city. Within the city Lisa is the only authority, by virtue of the fact that she saw the abandoned high school and thought of moving there: this has earned her sole title to the "City of Glenbard" and everything in it. Things proceed according to plan until Tom Logan and his gang manage to stage a successful attack on Glenbard, during which Lisa is shot in the arm. Todd and Lisa's friend Jill rescue her, and Jill performs basic surgery to remove the bullet from her arm, dosing her with whiskey for pain relief. When Lisa recovers they retake the city of Glenbard from Tom, who has meanwhile learned that conqueror and leader are two very different things. Glenbard's "citizens" have shown no sign of rebellion, or of preferring Lisa's leadership to Tom's (or vice versa), but Lisa lectures Tom into relinquishing control of the city to her. The book ends with a foreshadowing that the citizens of Glenbard will at some time be forced to face far larger armies, led by now extremely powerful dictators and gang leaders. If any semblance of a free society is to exist in the new world, the citizens of Glenbard must make themselves capable of protecting and growing it by gaining in knowledge, power, and organization, and at the same time continuing to incorporate leadership and respect for the individual person into their society. |
729737 | /m/036b77 | Right Ho, Jeeves | P. G. Wodehouse | 10/5/1934 | {"/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | Bertie returns to London from several weeks in Cannes spent in the company of his Aunt Dahlia Travers and her daughter Angela. In Bertie's absence, Jeeves has been advising Bertie's old school friend, Gussie Fink-Nottle, who is in love with Madeline Bassett. Gussie is too timid to speak to her. Madeline, a friend of Bertie's cousin Angela, is staying at Brinkley Court (country seat of Aunt Dahlia and Uncle Tom). Bertie himself is expected at Brinkley Court to deliver the school prizes at the local grammar school, which he considers a fearful task. Bertie sends Gussie to Brinkley Court so that he will have the chance to woo Madeline, but also so that Gussie will be forced to take on the job of distributing the prizes. When Angela breaks her engagement to Tuppy Glossop, Bertie feels obliged to go down to Brinkley Court to comfort Aunt Dahlia. In addition to her worry about Angela's broken engagement, Aunt Dahlia is anxious about the 500 pounds she lost gambling at Cannes, as she has to ask her miserly husband Tom for the money. Bertie advises Aunt Dahlia to pretend to have lost her appetite through worry, advice he also offers to Tuppy to win back Angela and—largely redundantly—to Gussie, to win Madeline. All take his advice. The resulting plates of untasted food upset Aunt Dahlia's prized chef Anatole, who gives notice. Bertie's attempt to plead Gussie's case is misinterpreted by Madeline as a marriage proposal, but she tells Bertie she cannot marry him, as she has fallen in love with someone else, and her description of the man makes Bertie realize that she is talking about Gussie. When Gussie is too timid to speak to Madeline even with this substantial encouragement, Bertie decides to embolden Gussie by making the teetotal Gussie drink alcohol without his knowledge. Gussie ends up imbibing more gin than Bertie had intended. Gussie successfully proposes to Madeline, then—in a scene that is the highlight of the novel—delivers an inebriated speech to the grammar school, to the delight of a few but to the horror of many. Madeline breaks the engagement. Gussie, still drunk, proposes to Angela, who accepts him solely to anger Tuppy. In the face of this chaos, Bertie admits his inability to act as a counselor, and removes a restriction he had placed on Jeeves to offer advice. Jeeves ensures Bertie's absence for a few hours, and during that time swiftly ensures that Angela and Tuppy are reconciled, that Gussie and Madeline are engaged, that Anatole withdraws his resignation, and that Uncle Tom writes Aunt Dahlia a check for 500 pounds. Sections of the story were adapted into episodes of the ITV series Jeeves and Wooster. |
730784 | /m/036g58 | Green Darkness | Anya Seton | 11/1/1972 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02p0szs": "Historical fiction", "/m/01qxvh": "Romance novel", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/0hwxm": "Historical novel"} | In the 1960s, young Celia Marsdon is a rich American heiress who, upon her marriage to English aristocrat Richard Marsdon, goes to live at an ancestral manor in Sussex, England. Shortly afterward, strange things begin to occur — Richard begins acting out of character, and Celia starts to have strange fits and visions. Celia's mother, Lily Taylor, has befriended a Hindu guru, Dr. Akananda, and it is he who discovers what's wrong with the young couple. The troubles of the present time can only be solved by revisiting a tragedy from the past. The book then moves back in time to the reign of Edward VI, as lovely young Celia de Bohun and her guardian aunt take up residence with the noble, Catholic family of Anthony Browne as "poor relations." Celia is a fascinating and believable character, full of contradictions and human failings. She is headstrong and impulsive; innocent but coquettish; and can easily attract male attention. She creates a scandal when she becomes infatuated with the family chaplain, Stephen Marsdon, who in turn desires Celia but does not want to break his vow of chastity. They are forced to part, but never forget each other. Time passes; King Edward dies and his persecution of Catholics ends, only to follow by his successor, Queen Mary I's persecution of Protestants; the Browne family fortunes prosper under the Marian reign; and sympathetic characters harden into detestable ones. When Celia and Stephen finally meet again, nothing can stop the passion between them. It ends tragically. The Tudor story and the narrative returns to the 1960s to find resolution in the present and lay to rest the tormented souls of Stephen and Celia so that Richard and his wife can live together happily without visions of their past lives coming between them. |
732229 | /m/036lcw | Stig of the Dump | Clive King | 6/1/1963 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | Stig is a caveman. He lives at the bottom of the old chalk pit close to Barney's grandparents' house. Since the chalk pit is no longer used, people throw all their old junk away down there. So it is rather an interesting place to build a den. Barney falls over the edge of the quarry and tumbles down through the roof of Stig's den. When he looks round, there's Stig, with his shaggy black hair and bright black eyes. Barney and Stig get on rather well together. They have to manage without language, of course, but that doesn't seem to stop them. Stig's den is a brilliant place built out of discarded rubbish. Stig is Barney's secret friend, not because Barney doesn't tell anyone, but because no-one really believes that Stig is real. They have a great time, improving Stig's den, collecting firewood, going hunting, and even catching some burglars who break into Barney's grandparents' house. It's really a collection of short-story adventures. We know that Stig is a caveman, and really Barney hardly seems to give any thought to where Stig has come from until the end of the book. Then, during a very hot, sultry mid-summer's night, when Barney and his sister Lou can't sleep, they find themselves transported back in time and out onto the downs. To their surprise, they meet Stig, back with his own people, engaged in the construction of four gigantic standing stones. They spend a magical night camping out with the people of Stig's tribe, and helping to shift the final stone into position before sunrise. Has Stig found a way to travel backwards and forwards in time, or is it as much a mystery to Stig as it is to Barney and Lou? |
735197 | /m/036vv4 | Demian | Hermann Hesse | 1919 | {"/m/05hgj": "Novel", "/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/04fqp": "K\u00fcnstlerroman", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | Emil Sinclair is a young boy raised in a bourgeois home, amidst what is described as a Scheinwelt, a play on words that means "world of light" as well as "world of illusion". Emil's entire existence can be summarized as a struggle between two worlds: the show world of illusion (related to the Hindu concept of maya) and the real world, the world of spiritual truth. In the course of the novel, accompanied and prompted by his mysterious classmate 'Max Demian', he detaches from and revolts against the superficial ideals of the world of appearances and eventually awakens into a realization of self. |
735622 | /m/036xd_ | The High Crusade | Poul Anderson | 1960 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | It is 1345 AD, and in the English town of Ansby (in northeastern Lincolnshire), Sir Roger, Baron de Tourneville, is recruiting a military force to assist King Edward III in the Hundred Years' War against France. Suddenly, an enormous silver spacecraft lands outside the town. It is a scouting craft for the Wersgorix Empire, a brutal dominion light years from our solar system. The Wersgorix attempt to take over Earth by testing the feasibility of its colonization. However, the aliens, having forgotten hand-to-hand combat since it was made obsolete by their advanced technology, are caught off-guard by the angered Englishmen, who mistake the craft for a French trick. The villagers and soldiers in Ansby storm the craft and kill all but one Wersgor, Branithar. Sir Roger formulates a plan that with the captured ship, he can take the entire village to France to win the war, and then liberate the Holy Land. The townspeople, with all of their belongings, board the ship at the baron's instruction, and prepare to take off. The people of Ansby are mystified at the advanced technology aboard the ship, which they come to call the Crusader. Being unable to pilot the Crusader Sir Roger directs the surly Branithar to pilot them to France. Instead, the alien wrecks the baron's plan by throwing the Crusader into autopilot on course to Tharixan, another Wersgor colony. The Crusader arrives at Tharixan in days, and Sir Roger learns of this new world: it is sparsely-populated, with only three fortresses, Ganturath, Stularax, and Darova (the chief base). The humans capture Ganturath but destroy the Crusader in the process. Word spreads of the invaders and a meeting is arranged between Sir Roger and his soldiers and the chief of Tharixan, Huruga. The humans and Wersgor hold talks which do very little to give either side any advantage, but a truce is agreed to. Sir Roger, in order to intimidate the aliens, makes up tall tales about his estate, "which only took up three planets" and his other accomplishments, including a very successful conquest of Constantinople. Sir Roger demands that the entire Wersgorix state submit to the King of England. During the talks, Baron de Tourneville ignores the truce, and orders the capture of the fortress of Stalurax. Unfortunately, the entire base is obliterated by an atomic bomb. In retaliation, Huruga attacks Ganturath again, but loses. He is forced to give up. Now comes Sir Roger's most outrageous plan; having captured Tharixan, he sets out to overthrow the Wersgorix Empire itself. He enlists the help of three other races enslaved by the Wersgor: the Jairs, the Ashenkoghli, and the Pr?*tans. Meanwhile, one of his main soldiers and friend, Sir Owain Montbelle, hatches a plan to return to Earth, something that Sir Roger has lost interest in. With Lady Catherine, Sir Roger's wife, Montbelle corners the baron and demands that he help the people of Ansby get back to Earth. De Tourneville gives in, but attacks Sir Owain in person. At the climax, Lady Catherine betrays Montbelle and kills him herself. Unfortunately, she also destroys the notes that could have helped get the villagers of Ansby back home. Sir Roger goes on to topple the Wersgor Empire and build one for himself. He manages with the help of not only the species under the Wersgor, but from members of the Wersgor race who rebelled against their government. The religious figures in the story go on to establish a new branch of the Roman Catholic Church. A millennium after the main events of The High Crusade, the holy galactic empire founded by Sir Roger and his people finally reunites with long lost Earth. A spacecraft from Earth comes across the empire, and is welcomed by the descendants of Red John Hameward. There is, in the epilogue, a reference to events on Earth since 1345. The captain of the Earth ship is described as being a loyal subject of an Israeli empire. It also appears that Huruga wound up as an Archbishop. |
736671 | /m/036_g8 | Tempest-Tost | Robertson Davies | null | {"/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | In Tempest-Tost an amateur theatrical group sets about mounting a production of Shakespeare's The Tempest. |
736673 | /m/036_gm | Leaven of Malice | Robertson Davies | null | {"/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | The book starts out with a false, anonymous engagement notice between Pearl Vambrace and Solly Bridgetower published in the local newspaper, the Bellman. The wedding is to be held on November 31 at the local cathedral. The notice creates a stir in the community. Professor Vambrace, the father of Pearl, is outraged, considering it an insult directed at himself and his family, due to his longtime feud with the Bridgetower family. As such, he threatens the Bellman's editor, Gloster Ridley, to sue the Bellman for libel. Mrs. Bridgetower is also outraged, although she confines this to her personal circle. Vambrace consults a lawyer, a relative of his wife, who suggests that he not go through with the case, and that the newspaper is as much a victim of the hoax as he is. His partner, Snelgrove, however, says otherwise, and offers to take the case himself. The case is looked into by both Snelgrove and Ridley's lawyer. Along with several major and minor characters in the novel, they pursue a quest for the person responsible for entering the false wedding notice, who is dubbed 'X'. The climactic scene takes place at the Bellman, where the principal characters gather and the identity of X is revealed. The novel explores themes of innocence, guilt, and judgement. |
737935 | /m/03730q | Noble House: The Epic Novel of Modern Hong Kong | James Clavell | 1981-04 | {"/m/02p0szs": "Historical fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/0hwxm": "Historical novel"} | Noble House is set in 1963. The tai-pan, Ian Dunross, struggles to rescue Struan's from the precarious financial position left over from his predecessor. To do this, he seeks partnership with an American millionaire, while trying to ward off his arch-rival Quillan Gornt, who seeks to destroy Struan's once and for all. Meanwhile, Chinese communists, Taiwanese nationalists, and Soviet spies illegally vie for influence in Hong Kong while the British government seeks to prevent this. And nobody, it seems, can get anything done without enlisting the aid of Hong Kong's criminal underworld. Other obstacles include water shortages, landslides, bank runs and stock market crashes. In Noble House, Dunross finds his company the target of a hostile takeover at a time when Struan's is desperately overextended. He is also embroiled in international espionage when he finds himself in possession of secret documents desperately desired by both the KGB and MI6. The novel follows Dunross' attempts to extricate himself from all this and to save Struan's, the Noble House. |
738608 | /m/026030v | Red Star | null | null | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction"} | The novel begins with an explanation of Leonid's few relationships within the revolutionary movement and the beginning of his relationship with Menni, a Martian in disguise. Soon after they become friends, Menni invites Leonid to go back home with him to Mars. The purpose of this visit would be to teach his own society to Martians and to understand and experience theirs. The trip is accomplished by the "etheroneph", a nuclear photonic rocket. On their way there, Leonid is exposed gradually to Martians and their society. With the help of Menni and Netti, his doctor, Leonid is able to speak the Martian language by the time they arrive. At this point in the novel, Bogdanov details some of the aspects of the socialist Martian society as seen through Leonid’s eyes. Children’s colonies, factories, and housing are a few among the many aspects of this society that Bogdanov describes. Eventually, the unfamiliarity of Mars and the stress of his mission there exhaust Leonid to the point of being delusional. Just in time, Netti is alerted to his condition and treats him for his severe illness. While Leonid is recovering, he finds out, contrary to his original assumption, that Netti is female. His previous feelings for her are then expressed and they fall in love with one another. It is soon after this period that both Netti and Menni are called away for a mining expedition to Venus. While they are away, Leonid develops a relationship with Enno, another fellow shipmate from his arrival to the planet. While discovering many things about the nature of personal relationships on Mars, Leonid uncovers frightening information. He discovers that the council in charge of the Venus expedition was vying Earth’s colonization as a possibility. The argument presented, by Sterni (yet another shipmate), was that this was the only feasible solution and that it would only be made possible if Earth’s population was destroyed. As Leonid’s emotional state was not fully recovered from his exhaustion, this news sent him into a state of psychosis. His resolution is to murder Sterni, which he proceeds to do. After this occurrence, Leonid is sent back to Earth to recover from his extreme apathy. He does so with the aid of Dr. Werner, an old comrade. Once he is able, Leonid rejoins the revolutionary fight, but this time with a mature perspective. The novel ends with a letter from Dr. Werner to Mirsky (a character assumed to be Plekhanov). In this letter, Leonid’s reunion with Netti is described and they are supposed to have returned to Mars together. |
738767 | /m/0375rx | Hawaii | James A. Michener | 1959 | {"/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | The novel tells the history of Hawaiian Islands from the creation of the isles to the time they became a state of the U.S.A. through viewpoints of selected people who represent their ethnic and cultural groups in the story (e.g. the Kee family represents the viewpoint of Chinese-Hawaiians). Most of the chapters cover the arrivals of different peoples to the islands. Describes the creation of the Hawaiian land from volcanic activity. The second chapter follows the creation of the isles which is mentioned in the preceding chapter. The chapter begins on the island of Bora Bora where many people including the King Tamatoa and his brother Terero are upset with the neighboring isles of Havaiki, Tahiti, etc. because they are trying to force the Bora Borans to give up their old gods, Tane and Ta'aroa, and start worshiping Oro the fire god, who constantly demands human sacrifices. Tamatoa suggests to his brother and friends that they should migrate to some other place where the might find religious freedom. After finally agreeing to this plan, his brother secretly puts fire to Havaiki to take revenge for the human sacrifices they have been demanding from Bora Borans. Later they take the canoe Wait for the West Wind and sail to Hawaii. Later some voyage back to Bora Bora to bring back with them some women and children and an idol of the volcano goddess, Pele. Follows the journey of the first Christian missionaries to Hawaii in the 1800s and their influence over Hawaiian culture and customs. Many of the missionaries become founding families in the islands, including the Hales and Whipples. Covers the immigration of Chinese to work on the pineapple and sugar plantations. The patriarch of the Kee family contracts leprosy (aka the "Chinese sickness") and is sent to the leper colony in Molokai. Japanese workers are brought to the islands to replace Chinese laborers who begin to start their own businesses. Also covers the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The final chapter summarizes the changes in Hawaiian culture and economics based on the intermarriages of various groups in the islands. |
739474 | /m/03789f | 1632 | Eric Flint | 2/1/2000 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel", "/m/0mz2": "Alternate history", "/m/02p0szs": "Historical fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | The fictional town of Grantville, West Virginia (modeled on the real West Virginia town of Mannington) and its power plant are displaced in space-time, through a side effect of a mysterious alien civilization. A hemispherical section of land about three miles in radius measured from the town center is transported back in time and space from April 2000 to May 1631, from North America to central Germany. The town is thrust into the middle of the Thirty Years' War, in the German province of Thuringia in the Thuringer Wald, near the fictional German free city of Badenburg. This Assiti Shards effect occurs during a wedding reception, accounting for the presence of several people not native to the town, including a doctor and his daughter, a paramedic. Real Thuringian municipalities located close to Grantville are posited as Weimar, Jena, Saalfeld and the more remote Erfurt, Arnstadt, and Eisenach well to the south of Halle and Leipzig. Grantville, led by Mike Stearns, president of the local chapter of the United Mine Workers of America (UMWA), must cope with the town's space-time dislocation, the surrounding raging war, language barriers, and numerous social and political issues, including class conflict, witchcraft, feminism, the reformation and the counter-reformation, among many other factors. One complication is a compounding of the food shortage when the town is flooded by refugees from the war. The 1631 locals experience a culture shock when exposed to the mores of contemporary American society, including modern dress, sexual liberation, and boisterous American-style politics. Grantville struggles to survive while trying to maintain technology sundered from twenty-first century resources. Throughout 1631, Grantville manages to establish itself locally by forming the nascent New United States of Europe (NUS) with several local cities even as war rages around them. But once Count Tilly falls during the Battle of Breitenfeld outside of Leipzig, King Gustavus Adolphus rapidly moves the war theater to Franconia and Bavaria, just south of Grantville. This leads to the creation of the Confederated Principalities of Europe (CPoE) and some measure of security for Grantville's up-timer and down-timer populations. |
741230 | /m/037fb_ | The Rivals | Richard Brinsley Sheridan | null | null | The play is set in Bath in the 18th century, a town legendary for conspicuous consumption and fashion at the time. Wealthy, fashionable people went there to "take the waters", which were believed to have healing properties. Bath was much less exclusive than London, and provides an ideal setting for the characters. The plot centres on the two young lovers, Lydia and Jack. Lydia, who reads a lot of popular novels of the time, wants a purely romantic love affair. To court her, Jack pretends to be "Ensign Beverley", a poor officer. Lydia is enthralled with the idea of eloping with a poor soldier in spite of her guardian, Mrs. Malaprop, a moralistic widow. Mrs. Malaprop is the chief comic figure of the play, thanks to her continual misuse of words that sound like the words she intends but mean something completely different. (The term malapropism was coined in reference to the character.) Lydia has two other suitors: Bob Acres (a somewhat buffoonish country gentleman), and Sir Lucius O'Trigger, an impoverished and combative Irish gentleman. Sir Lucius pays Lucy to carry love notes between him and Lydia (who uses the name "Delia"), but Lucy is swindling him: "Delia" is actually Mrs. Malaprop. As the play opens, Sir Anthony arrives suddenly in Bath. He has arranged a marriage for Jack, but Jack demurs, saying he is in love already. They quarrel violently. But Jack soon learns through the gossip of Lucy and Fag that the marriage arranged by Sir Anthony is, in fact, with Lydia. He makes a great show of submission to his father, and is presented to Lydia with Mrs. Malaprop's blessing. Jack confides to Lydia that he is only posing as Sir Anthony's son. She annoys Mrs. Malaprop by loudly professing her eternal devotion to "Beverley" while rejecting "Jack Absolute". Jack's friend Faulkland is in love with Julia, but he suffers from jealous suspicion. He is constantly fretting himself about her fidelity. Faulkland and Julia quarrel foolishly, making elaborate and high-flown speeches about true love—satirizing the romantic dramas of the period. Bob Acres tells Sir Lucius that another man ("Beverley") is courting the lady of Acres' choice (Lydia, though Sir Lucius does not know this). Sir Lucius immediately declares that Acres must challenge "Beverley" to a duel and kill him. Acres goes along, and writes out a challenge note - despite his own rather more pacifist feelings, and the profound misgivings of his servant David. Sir Lucius leaves, Jack arrives, and Acres tells him of his intent. Jack agrees to deliver the note to "Beverley", but declines to be Acres' second. Mrs. Malaprop again presents Jack to Lydia, but this time with Sir Anthony present, exposing Jack's pose as "Beverley". Lydia is enraged by the puncturing of her romantic dreams, and spurns Jack contemptuously. Sir Lucius has also learned of the proposed marriage of Jack and Lydia, and determines to challenge Jack. He meets Jack, who, smarting from Lydia's rejection, agrees to fight him without even knowing the reason. They will meet at the same time as Acres is scheduled to fight "Beverley". At the dueling ground, Acres is very reluctant to fight, but Sir Lucius will have no shirking. Jack and Faulkland arrive. Acres learns that "Beverley" is his friend Jack, and begs off from their duel. However, Jack is quite willing to fight Sir Lucius, and they cross swords. David informs Mrs. Malaprop, Lydia, Julia, and Sir Anthony of the dueling, and they all rush off to stop it. Sir Lucius explains the cause of his challenge, but Lydia denies any connection to him, and admits her love for Jack. Mrs. Malaprop announces that she is Delia, but Sir Lucius recoils in horror, realizing that he has been hoaxed. Sir Anthony consoles Mrs. Malaprop, Julia is reconciled to Faulkland, and Acres invites everyone to a party. |
741901 | /m/037hcd | Q | null | 1999 | null | The book follows the journey of an Anabaptist radical across Europe in the first half of the 16th century as he joins in various movements and uprisings that come as a result of the Protestant reformation. The book spans 30 years as he is pursued by 'Q' (short for "Qoèlet"), a spy for the Roman Catholic Church cardinal Giovanni Pietro Carafa. The main character, who changes his name many times during the story, first fights in the German Peasants' War beside Thomas Müntzer, then is in Münster's siege, during the Münster Rebellion, and some years later, in Venice. |
742927 | /m/037kzk | New Spring | Robert Jordan | 2004-01 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy"} | New Spring describes events which take place twenty years before the events of The Eye of the World (Book 1). The story begins in the last days of the Aiel War, and the Battle of the Shining Walls around Tar Valon. It is set primarily in Tar Valon and the Borderlands, specifically Kandor. New Spring focuses mainly on Moiraine Damodred and Siuan Sanche, two Aes Sedai new to the sisterhood, and how a young Moiraine became Aes Sedai, met Lan Mandragoran and made him her Warder. The novel also explains how Moiraine and Siuan witnessed a prophecy of the Dragon's rebirth and came to begin investigating the Karaethon Cycle, the Prophecies of the Dragon, decades before discovering Rand al'Thor. |
743958 | /m/037nzz | Asterix the Gaul | René Goscinny | 1961 | null | All of Gaul is under Roman control, except for one small village of indomitable Gauls that still holds out against the Romans. Centurion Crismus Bonus, head of the Roman garrison at the fortified camp of Compendium is very keen on discovering the secret of the Gauls' superhuman strength after four soldiers are knocked out by one man, and sends a spy disguised as a Gaul into the village. The Roman's identity is revealed when he loses his false moustache, but not before he discovers the existence of the magic potion brewed by the Druid Getafix. He also manages to drink the potion after pretending he needs it to get back home as he claims the Romans think he's a spy, and reports his discovery back to the Centurion. Crismus Bonus believes that with this potion, he could overthrow Julius Caesar, and become Emperor himself. So, he and his second-in-command Marcus Ginandtonicus have Getafix captured using a pit in order to get the recipe. He is tortured by having a feather tickle his feet for hours, but does not give in. Asterix learns of Getafix's capture from a local man, and manages to sneak into the Roman camp where Getafix is being held captive in the man's cart after telling him Compendium has a second-hand cart stall on. He hears Crismus and Ginandtonicus planning to overthrow Caesar using the magic potion. Asterix finds Getafix and they concoct a scheme to trouble the Romans. Getafix pretends to agree to the Centurion's ultimatum of making the potion when Asterix pretends to give in to torture, despite the torture not actually having started yet, and demands an unseasonal ingredient like strawberry. While Crismus Bonus' soldiers try to find strawberries, Asterix and Getafix lounge around in comparative luxury, enjoying themselves at the Romans' expense. When the strawberries are bought at a vast sum from a Greek Merchant, the two Gauls eat them, causing anger to Crismus, before Getafix says the potion can be made without strawberries, they just leave a taste in the mouth. After all the ingredients are found, a potion is prepared that causes the hair and beard of the drinker to grow at a very accelerated pace. The Romans test it on the local man from earlier as Crismus worries about it being poisoned, and when he tests his strength on Asterix, Asterix pretends to be knocked out. The Romans are tricked into drinking this potion and before long, all of them have long hair and beards. They plead with Getafix to make an antidote, who makes a cauldron of vegetable soup (as the effects of the hair potion are about to wear off anyway) and also prepares a small quantity of the real magic potion for Asterix to drink so that they can fight their way out. As Getafix and Asterix are attempting to escape, they are stopped by a huge army of Roman reinforcements just outside the camp and are captured again. It turns out that Julius Caesar is leading the army and checking on the condition of the area. Upon meeting Asterix and Getafix, Caesar learns of Crismus Bonus' intentions. As punishment, he sends Crismus Bonus and his garrison to Outer Mongolia where there is a barbarian rebellion and frees Asterix and Getafix for giving him the information, while reminding them that they are still enemies. The story ends with a traditional banquet in the village. Throughout the entire Asterix series, the Roman legionaries use the wrong weaponry and armor for their period. For instance, their armor is the lorica segmentata, which was the standard during the Roman Empire era; in Caesar's time, chainmail armor (the lorica hamata) was in use. Also, the real-life Roman legionaries used pila (javelins) instead of spears, and they usually carried two of them. |
746865 | /m/037xp4 | The Heroic Legend of Arslan | null | null | {"/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy"} | Neither the novels nor the manga of The Heroic Legend of Arslan have been translated into English; therefore, this summary deals with the anime OVAs. As it directly focuses on the events of the first OVA, the characters names as they are translated there will be used (see "Names" below). Arslan has two qualities that make it unique among anime fantasy tales. While the world in which it takes place is one where magic obviously exists, said magic is of an extremely limited nature. Until the end of the anime, the only magical happenings involve a few rare occasional spells and a giant, humanoid monster. There are none of the races typically associated with a fantasy realm, such as elves or dwarves. It is, at the core, a war story taking place between human nations. In addition to this, there is an underlying theme of exploring the repercussions of slavery on a society, having an absolute monarch who treats the poor as cattle, and religious obsession. The story opens with a battle between the armies of Palse and Lusitania. The king of Palse, Andragoras, is quickly proved to have poor judgement and a quick temper, as he demotes one of his most loyal servants, Daryoon, on the word of a man who proves to be a traitor, Kharlan. In this first battle, the Lusitanian army deliberately leads the Palsian forces into a seemingly simple assault. The assault turns into a bloodbath, as the Lusitanians booby-trap the battlefield by soaking the ground in oil. Not only do the Palsian war-horses slip and break their legs, but the enemy forces set the oil on fire, burning many of the soldiers alive. Daryoon's uncle, Eran Vaphreze, takes it upon himself to lead the king away from the battlefield before Andragoras can be discovered and killed by enemy troops. Before he rides off, he commands Daryoon to dedicate himself to protecting the crown prince, Arislan. While Daryoon rides off to seek out the prince, Vaphreze and Andragoras attempt to escape. They are unsuccessful — Vaphreze is murdered by the leader of the Lusitanian army, an incredibly strong and enigmatic warrior who, because of his unique headgear, is known only as Silvermask. Silvermask declines to kill Andragoras, preferring instead to kidnap him and drag him back to his stronghold in Zahburu Fortress. Having survived the Lusitanian assault, Arislan and Daryoon seek help for their cause, in the form of the philosopher/swordsman/tactician, Narsus. After a bit of trickery on Daryoon's part, they convince Narsus to help them in their cause. Narsus' young boy servant, Elam, goes with them. As this goes on, Lusitanian troops march to the capital city of Ekubatana; in order to convince Queen Tahamine to surrender her city. An interrogator of the Lusitanians — a high-ranking cleric named Jon Bodan — tortures captured Palsian soldiers outside its gates, declaring to all who would hear that he will only stop when Ekubatana surrenders. While she refuses, the city is eventually invaded successfully. The Queen is captured, and the city's buildings, sculptures, and sacred writings are all destroyed. As Arislan travels around, trying his best to avoid being located by the armies and agents of Silvermask, he meets two others who are convinced to join his cause of re-taking and rebuilding Palse. Pharangese, an aloof, cold priestess of Misra, is sent by her holy order to protect and serve the prince — a fact which she considers to be natural, as she is the wisest, most beautiful, and most deadly. There is also the travelling musician and con-man Gieve who is no mean swordsman himself. Gieve actually makes his first appearance when he, defying both a strong wind and a long distance, successfully shoots one of Jon Bodan's victims, sparing the poor soldier anymore misery and humiliation. For his skills with a bow, Gieve is paid well, and is also offered the chance to serve as the Queen's bodyguard as she attempts to escape the besieged Ekubatana. While making their way out of the castle, Gieve learns that the "Queen" he is escorting is actually a double for Her Majesty, in order to permit the real Queen to escape in a more secretive fashion. When she is captured by be city's attackers he escapes on his own, encounters Pharangese, and declares that he will dedicate himself to following her. She simply tells him to help protect the prince. The most obvious stumbling block to Arislan's ability to re-take his kingdom is his utter lack of an army. As it is ironically observed at the conclusion of the first episode, with six fighters at his command, they have doubled their forces, and will only need to take on 50,000 enemy soldiers each. The subsequent episodes chronicle Arislan's plans on finding an army to back him up. They also cover wide and sundry sub-plots, Silvermask's identity and motives, how Andragoras came to the Palsian throne, and the introduction of various new characters. |
747561 | /m/037zx8 | Ruins of Adventure | Michael Breault | null | null | Ruins of Adventure contains four linked Forgotten Realms miniscenarios set in the ruined town of Phlan. The scenarios form the core of the Pool of Radiance computer game, and include clues to that game's solution. The adventurers are hired to remove evil forces from Phlan, presumably by killing them. They hear rumor of a Boss controlling them and seek him out. This Boss proves to be a worthy adversary, but in the end the adventurers defeat him. There are various locations in the fictional city of Phlan. Each of these locations comes with a map and detailed area description. These locations include: * Kovel Mansion * The Slum District * The Temple of Bane * Kuto's Well * Mantor's Library * Stojanow Gate * Podol Plaza * The Cadorna Textile House * Valhingen Graveyard * Valjevo Castle * Sorcerer's Island * Zhentil Keep Outpost There are numerous pre-generated characters in this book. Monsters each have their own stats prepared and there are quite a few non-player characters. |
747584 | /m/037zzf | Giles Goat-Boy | John Barth | 1966 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel", "/m/026ny": "Dystopia"} | George Giles is a boy raised as a goat who rises in life to be Grand Tutor (spiritual leader) of New Tammany College (the United States.) He strives for (and achieves) herohood, in accordance with the hero myth as theorized by Lord Raglan and Joseph Campbell. The novel abounds in mythological and Christian allegories, as well as in allusions to the Cold War, 1960s academia, and religion. The principle behind the allegorical renaming of key roles in the novel as roman à clef is that the Earth (or the Universe) is a University. Thus, for example, the founder of a religion or great religious leader becomes a Grand Tutor (in German Grosslehrer), and Barth renames specific leaders as well: Jesus Christ becomes Enos Enoch, Moses becomes Moishe, Buddha becomes the original Sakhyan. As the founder of the maieutic method, Socrates becomes Maios; Plato (whose Greek name Platon means "broad-shouldered") becomes Scapulas (from scapula, shoulder-blade); as the coiner of the term entelekheia (lit. "having an end within," usually translated "entelechy," or glossed as the actualization of a potentiality), Aristotle becomes Entelechus. Enos Enoch in Hebrew means "The man who walked with God" or "humanity when it walked with God." The heroes of epic poems tend to be named after the Greek for "son of": Odysseus becomes Laertides (son of Laertes), Aeneas becomes Anchisides (son of Anchises), and so on. The subtitle The Revised New Syllabus means, in the novel's Universe=University allegory, a parodic rewriting of the New Testament. Satan is the Dean o' Flunks, and lives in the Nether Campus (hell); John the Baptist is John the Bursar; the Sermon on the Mount becomes the Seminar-on-the-Hill; the Last Judgment becomes the Final Examination. Among the parodic variations, a computer replaces the Holy Spirit, and an artificial insemination the Immaculate Conception. Very presciently, a hypertext encyclopedia also figures in the novel, years before the invention of hypertext and three decades before the Web became part of society at large. The character Max Spielman is a parody of Ernst Haeckel, whose insight "ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny" is rephrased as "ontogeny recapitulates cosmogeny" and "proctoscopy repeats hagiography". The "riddle of the universe" is rephrased as "the riddle of the sphincters". |
747676 | /m/0678s4n | Land Beyond the Magic Mirror | Gary Gygax | null | null | In this module, the player characters plummet into a strange partial plane. They meet the Jabberwock, the Bandersnatch, and the Walrus and the Carpenter, and become involved in a giant game of chess. |
747822 | /m/037_mv | The Intuitionist | Colson Whitehead | 1999-01 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | The story begins with the catastrophic failure of an elevator which Watson had inspected just days before, leading to suspicion cast upon both herself and the Intuitionist school as a whole. To cope with the inspectorate, the corporate elevator establishment, and other looming elements, she must return to her intellectual roots, the texts (both known and lost) of the founder of the school, to try to reconstruct what is happening around her. In the course of her search, she discovers the central idea of the founder of Intuitionism – that of the "black box", the perfect elevator, which will deliver the people to the city of the future. |
747903 | /m/037_xg | Ravenloft | Laura Hickman | null | {"/m/06c9r": "Role-playing game"} | The story involves a party of player characters (PCs) who travel to the land of Barovia, a small nation surrounded by a deadly magical fog. The master of nearby Castle Ravenloft, Count Strahd von Zarovich, tyrannically rules the country, and a prologue explains that the residents must barricade their doors each night to avoid attacks by Strahd and his minions. The Burgomaster's mansion is the focus of these attacks, and, for reasons that are not initially explained, Strahd is after the Burgomaster's adopted daughter, Ireena Kolyana. Before play begins, the Dungeon Master (or DM, the player who organizes and directs the game play) randomly draws five cards from a deck of six. Two of these cards determine the locations of two magical weapons useful in defeating Strahd: the Holy Symbol and the Sunsword. The next two cards determine the locations of Strahd and the Tome of Strahd, a book that details Strahd's long-ago unrequited love. In this work, it is revealed that Strahd had fallen in love with a young girl, who in turn loved his younger brother. Strahd blamed his age for the rejection, and made a pact with evil powers to live forever. He then slew his brother, but the young girl killed herself in response, and Strahd found that he had become a vampire. All six possible locations are inside Castle Ravenloft. The fifth and final card selected determines Strahd's motivation. There are four possible motivations for Strahd. He may want to replace one of the PCs and attempt to turn the character into a vampire and take on that character's form. He may desire the love of Ireena, whose appearance matches that of his lost love, Tatyana. Using mind control, Strahd will try to force a PC to attack Ireena and gain her love by "saving" her from the situation he created. Strahd may also want to create an evil magic item, or destroy the Sunsword. If, during play, the party's fortune is told at the gypsy camp in Barovia, the random elements are altered to match the cards drawn by the gypsy. As the party journeys through Barovia and the castle, the game play is guided using 12 maps with corresponding sections in the book's body guide. Example maps and sections include the Lands of Barovia, the Court of the Count, five entries for each level of the Spires of Ravenloft, and the Dungeons and Catacombs. Each location contains treasure and adversaries, including zombies, wolves, ghouls, ghosts, and other creatures. The main objective of the game is to destroy Count Strahd. The DM is instructed to play the vampire intelligently, and to keep him alive as long as possible, making him flee when necessary. In an optional epilogue, Ireena is reunited with her lover. They leave the "mortal world" as Ireena says, "Through these many centuries we have played out the tragedy of our lives." |
749028 | /m/03826k | The English Teacher | R. K. Narayan | 10/15/1980 | {"/m/012jgz": "Autobiographical novel", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | As an English teacher at Albert Mission College, Krishna has led a mundane and monotonous lifestyle comparable to that of a cow, but this took a turn when his wife, Susila, and their child, Leela, come to live with him. With their welfare on his hands, Krishna learns to be a proper husband and learns how to accept the responsibility of taking care of his family. He felt that his life had comparatively improved, as he understood that there's more meaning to life than to just teaching in the college. However, on the day when they went in search of a new house, Susila contracts typhoid after visiting a dirty lavatory, keeping her in bed for weeks. Throughout the entire course of her illness, Krishna constantly tries to keep an optimistic view about Susila's illness, keeping his hopes up by thinking that her illness would soon be cured. However, Susila eventually succumbs and passes away. Krishna, destroyed by her loss, has suicidal thoughts but gives them up for the sake of his daughter, Leela. He leads his life as a lost and miserable person after her death, but after he receives a letter from a stranger who indicates that Susila has been in contact with him and that she wants to communicate with Krishna, he becomes more collected and cheerful. This leads to Krishna’s journey in search of enlightenment, with the stranger acting as a medium to Susila in the spiritual world. Leela, on the other hand, goes to a preschool where Krishna gets to meet the Headmaster, a profound man who cared for the students in his school and teaches them moral values through his own methods. The Headmaster puts his students as his top priority but he doesn’t care for his own family and children, eventually leaving them on the day predicted by an astrologer as to be when he was going to die, which did not come true. Krishna gets to learn through the Headmaster on the journey to enlightenment; eventually learning to communicate to Susila on his own, thus concluding the entire story itself, with the quote that he felt 'a moment of rare immutable joy'. |
750272 | /m/0384z_ | The Giving Tree | Shel Silverstein | 10/7/1964 | {"/m/016475": "Picture book", "/m/0dwly": "Children's literature", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | The Giving Tree is a tale about a relationship between a young boy and a tree. The tree always provides the boy with what he wants: branches on which to swing, shade in which to sit and apples to eat. As the boy grows older, he requires more and more of the tree. The tree loves the boy very much and gives him anything he asks for. In an ultimate act of self-sacrifice, the tree lets the boy cut it down so the boy can build a boat in which he can sail. The boy leaves the tree, now a stump. Many years later, the boy, now an old man, returns, and the tree sadly says: "I'm sorry, boy... but I have nothing left to give you." But the boy replies: "I do not need much now, just a quiet place to sit and rest." The tree then says, "Well, an old tree stump is a good place for sitting and resting. Come, boy, sit down and rest." The boy obliges and the tree is very happy. |
750322 | /m/038552 | Fanshawe | Nathaniel Hawthorne | 1828 | {"/m/017fp": "Biography", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/01qxvh": "Romance novel"} | Dr. Melmoth, the President of Harley College, takes into his care Ellen Langton, the daughter of his friend, Mr. Langton, who is at sea. Ellen is a young, beautiful girl and attracts the attentions of the college boys, especially Edward Walcott, a strapping though immature student, and Fanshawe, a reclusive, meek intellectual. While out walking, the three young people meet a nameless character called “the angler,” a name he gets for appearing an expert fisherman. The angler asks for a word with Ellen, tells her something in secret, and apparently flusters her. Walcott and Fanshawe become suspicious of his intentions. We learn that the angler is an old friend of the reformed Inn owner, Hugh Crombie. The two had been at sea together, where Mr. Langton had been the angler’s mentor and caretaker. Langton and the angler had a falling out, however, and, thinking that Langton has been killed at sea, the angler undertakes to marry Ellen in order to inherit her father’s considerable wealth. Thus in his secret meeting with Ellen, the angler instructs her to sneak out of Melmoth’s home and follow him, telling her he has information about her father’s whereabouts. His real aim, though, is to kidnap her, to tell her of her father’s death, and to manipulate her into marrying him. When the various men (Melmoth, Edward, Fanshawe) learn that she is not in her chamber, they go searching for her. The search reveals the nature of each: Melmoth, an aged scholar unused to physical labor, enlists the help of Walcott, who is the most skilled rider and the most likely to be able to contend with the angler in a fight. Fanshawe, who lags behind the search because of his weak constitution and his slow horse, is given information by an old woman in a cabin (where another old woman, Widow Butler, who turns out to be the angler’s mother, has just died) that allows him to reach the angler and Ellen first. The angler has taken Ellen to a craggy cliff and cave, where he intends to hold her captive. Ellen has finally realized the angler’s intentions. When Fanshawe arrives, he stands above them, looking over the edge of the cliff. The angler begins to climb up the cliff to fight Fanshawe but grabs a twig too weak to support him and tumbles to his death. Fanshawe awakens Ellen from a faint, and they travel back to town together. Fanshawe loves Ellen but knows that he will die young because of his shut-in lifestyle. When Langton offers Ellen’s hand in marriage to Fanshawe in exchange for rescuing her, he refuses, sacrificing his happiness so as not to subject her to a life of widowhood. He also knows that Ellen has affections for Walcott. Fanshawe dies at 20. Ellen and Walcott marry four years later. The narrator states that Walcott grows out of his childish ways (drunkenness, impulsiveness, the suggestion of teenage affairs) and becomes content with Ellen. They are, according to the narrator, happy, but the book ends on an ambivalent note, stating that the couple did not produce children. |
750558 | /m/0385y5 | Rob Roy | Walter Scott | 1817 | {"/m/0hwxm": "Historical novel"} | The story takes place just before the 1715 Jacobite Rising, with much of Scotland in turmoil. Frank Osbaldistone, the narrator, quarrels with his father and is sent to stay with an uncle, Sir Hildebrand Osbaldistone, in Northumberland. Frank falls in love with Diana Vernon, Sir Hildebrand's niece, whose father has been forced to go into hiding because of his Jacobite sympathies. Frank's cousin, Rashleigh, steals important documents vital to the honour and economic solvency of Frank's father, William, and Frank pursues Rashleigh to Scotland. Several times his path crosses the mysterious and powerful figure Robert Roy MacGregor, known as Rob Roy, an associate of Sir Hildebrand. There is much confusion as the action shifts to the beautiful mountains and valleys around Loch Lomond. A British army detachment is ambushed and there is bloodshed. All of Sir Hildebrand's sons but Rashleigh are killed in the Jacobite Rising, and Rashleigh, too meets a bloody end. Following this, Frank inherits Sir Hildebrand's property and marries Diana. Robert Louis Stevenson loved the novel from childhood, regarding it as the best novel of the greatest of all novelists. The novel is a brutally realistic depiction of the social conditions in Highland and Lowland Scotland in the early 18th century. Some of the dialogue is in broad Scottish, and the novel includes a glossary of Scottish words. |
750630 | /m/03865w | The House at Pooh Corner | A. A. Milne | 1928 | {"/m/0dwly": "Children's literature"} | The title comes from a story in which Winnie-the-Pooh and Piglet build a house for Eeyore. In another story the game of Poohsticks is invented. Hints that Christopher Robin is growing up, scattered throughout the book, come to a head in the final chapter, in which the inhabitants of the Hundred Acre Wood throw him a farewell party after learning that he must leave them for good soon. It is made obvious – though not stated explicitly – that he is starting school. In the end, as they say good-bye to Christopher Robin, they realise they will never see him again. Pooh and Christopher Robin say a long, private farewell, in which Pooh promises never to forget him. |
751104 | /m/0387hl | Queen of Angels | Greg Bear | 1990 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/05hgj": "Novel"} | Queen of Angels describes our world just prior to the binary millennium (2048 AD) through several parallel (and to some degree interlocking) tales. Nanotechnology has transformed almost every aspect of American society, and its application to psychology, psychiatry, and neuroscience has resulted in new techniques for mental "therapy" that have created new forms of social stratification. Increasingly, individuals are "therapied" - that is, well-integrated personalities capable of productive work and constructive social interaction which does not threaten the social order. Therapied individuals have access to the best jobs. There are two other classes: the "high naturals", who possess such a positive mental makeup without the need for therapy, and the "untherapied", who find themselves increasingly marginalized. The central unifying element involves a famous writer, Emmanuel Goldsmith, who has committed a gruesome series of murders, a crime almost unheard of in the age of therapy. One storyline involves Mary Choy, a high natural police detective assigned to the case to track down and arrest the murderer. Mary is a transform - she has chosen to have her body extensively altered by nanotechnology, both to enhance her abilities as a policewoman and for aesthetic reasons. A second storyline involves Richard Fettle, a good friend of the murderer, also an untherapied writer, who must come to terms with what happened to his friend and how his life—and that of artists, and all of the untherapied—must change. The third plot line concerns Martin Burke, a pioneer in psychotherapy who uses a technique which allows him to directly enter and interact with a patient's psychology - the "Country of the Mind" - through a sort of virtual reality. Although in a position of disgrace at the story's opening, Dr. Burke is given the opportunity to use his technique to explore Goldsmith's mind, which turns out to be one of the most fascinating and dangerous minds imaginable. Finally, the fourth plotline considers the nature of artificial intelligence, as an AI robot space probe discovers life on a planet in the Alpha Centauri system, and simultaneously achieves its own independent self-awareness, as does its twin back on Earth. The novel deals with issues of technology, identity, the nature of justice, and the existence of consciousness and the soul. Queen of Angels, set in 2047, was written just before the creation of the first website in 1991 and describes a global network based on the exchange of text (a sort of super USENET), whereas the sequel, Slant, set in 2055 and written in 1997 after the coming of the World Wide Web, describes a global network which has inexplicably changed to resemble a vast shared virtual reality. |
751241 | /m/0387s9 | The House Without a Key | Earl Derr Biggers | null | {"/m/02n4kr": "Mystery", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/0c3351": "Suspense"} | The novel deals with the murder of a former member of Boston society who has lived in Hawaii for a number of years. The main character is the victim's nephew, a straitlaced young Bostonian bond trader, who came to the islands to try to convince his aunt Minerva, whose vacation has extended many months, to return to Boston. The nephew, John Quincy Winterslip, soon falls under the spell of the islands himself, meets an attractive young woman, breaks his engagement to his straitlaced Bostonian fiancee Agatha, and decides as the murder is being solved to move to San Francisco. In the interval, he is introduced to many levels of Hawaiian society and is of some assistance to Detective Charlie Chan in solving the mystery. The novel's denouement is nearly identical to that in the final Perry Mason novel by Erle Stanley Gardner, The Case of the Postponed Murder (1970). |
751496 | /m/0388v1 | Behind That Curtain | Earl Derr Biggers | null | {"/m/02n4kr": "Mystery", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/0c3351": "Suspense"} | It is set almost exclusively in California (as opposed to Chan's native Hawaii), and tells the story of the former head of Scotland Yard, a detective who is pursuing the long-cold trail of a murderer. Fifteen years ago, a London solicitor was killed in circumstances in which the only clue was a pair of Chinese slippers, which he apparently donned just before his death. Sir Frederic Bruce has been following the trail of the killer ever since. He has also been interested in what appears to be a series of disappearing women around the world, which has some connection to the disappearance of a woman named Eve Durand in rural India also fifteen years ago. Just when it seems he might finally solve the murder case, at a dinner party to which a number of important and mysterious guests have been invited, Inspector Bruce is killed—and was last seen wearing a pair of Chinese slippers, which have vanished. It is left to Chan to solve the case and tie up all loose ends. |
751514 | /m/0388w2 | The Black Camel | Earl Derr Biggers | 1929 | {"/m/02n4kr": "Mystery", "/m/05hgj": "Novel", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/0c3351": "Suspense"} | It tells the story of a Hollywood star (Shelah Fane), who is stopping in Hawaii after she finished shooting a film on location in Tahiti. She is murdered in the pavilion of her renter house in Waikiki during her stay. The story behind her murder is linked with the three-year-old murder of another Hollywood actor and also connected with an enigmatic psychic named Tarneverro. Chan, in his position as a detective with the Honolulu Police Department, "investigates amid public clamor demanding that the murderer be found and punished immediately. "Death is a black camel that kneels unbidden at every gate. Tonight black camel has knelt here", Chan tells the suspects." |
751532 | /m/0388yk | Charlie Chan Carries On | Earl Derr Biggers | 1930 | {"/m/02n4kr": "Mystery", "/m/05hgj": "Novel", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/0c3351": "Suspense"} | Inspector Duff, a Scotland Yard detective and friend of Chan's, first introduced in Behind That Curtain, is pursuing a murderer on an around-the-world voyage; so far, there have been murders in London, France, Italy and Japan. While his ship is docked in Honolulu, the detective is shot and wounded by his quarry; though he survives, he is unable to continue with the cruise, and Chan takes his place instead. Eventually, after more murders, Chan finds the killer before the next port of call. |
751548 | /m/038903 | Keeper of the Keys | Janny Wurts | 1932 | {"/m/02n4kr": "Mystery", "/m/05hgj": "Novel", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/0c3351": "Suspense"} | Once again, the setting of the novel is rural California, where Chan has been invited as a houseguest. He meets a world-famous soprano, Ellen Landini, who is murdered not too long after the meeting. Chan does not have far to look for suspects—the host is her ex-husband, as are three of the other house guests. Her servants, entourage and husbands all come under suspicion. Once again, Chan is expected to solve the murder, which he does by understanding the key clues—the actions of a little dog named Trouble, two scarves, and two little boxes. When he understands how the murder is committed, he learns the role of elderly house servant Ah Sing—the keeper of the keys. |
751672 | /m/03899g | The Street Lawyer | John Grisham | 1998 | {"/m/01jfsb": "Thriller", "/m/02n4kr": "Mystery", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/0c3351": "Suspense"} | A homeless man calling himself "Mister" enters the offices of the Washington DC law firm Drake & Sweeney and takes many of the lawyers hostage. Although he is eventually shot by a police sniper and the hostages freed, one of the hostages, an antitrust lawyer named Michael Brock, is concerned by what he has learned and feels compelled to investigate further. He finds his way to the 14th Street Legal Clinic, where he meets Mordecai Green, an advocate for the homeless, who asks him to help one night at a homeless shelter. As Brock's investigation deepens, he finds that his own employer was complicit in an illegal eviction, which eventually resulted in the death of a young homeless family. He takes a confidential file, intending to copy it, but is quickly suspected of its theft. Shocked by what he has found, Brock leaves his firm to take a poorly-paid position with the 14th Street Legal Clinic, which works to protect the rights of the homeless. This leads to his wife divorcing him. He admits one of his clients, Ruby, to a therapy class for drug-addicted women, and in the process meets Megan, the Brock's love interest. As Drake & Sweeney comes after Brock with theft and malpractice allegations, the Clinic launches a lawsuit against the law firm and its business partners. Terrified of the certain bad publicity, the matter is settled by mediation and the clinic receives a large payout to be shared with the victims of the eviction. Drake & Sweeney's head partner, deeply troubled by the events, offers to make pro bono staff available to assist the work of the Clinic in fighting for the rights of homeless people. The book ends with Brock taking a short vacation with Megan and Ruby, and them reflecting on their lives. |
752068 | /m/038b8j | The Runaway Jury | John Grisham | 1996 | {"/m/02n4kr": "Mystery", "/m/05hgj": "Novel", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction", "/m/0c3351": "Suspense"} | Wendall Rohr and a legal team of successful tort lawyers have filed suit on behalf of plaintiff Celeste Wood, whose husband died of lung cancer. The trial is to be held in Biloxi, Mississippi, a state thought to have favorable tort laws and sympathetic juries. The defendant is Pynex, a tobacco company. Even before the jury has been sworn in, a stealth juror, Nicholas Easter, has begun to quietly connive behind the scenes, in concert with a mysterious woman known only as Marlee. Rankin Fitch, a shady 'consultant' who has directed 8 successful trials for the Big Four, has placed a camera in the courtroom, feeding to his office nearby so that the trial can be observed. He has begun to plot many schemes to reach to the jury. He planned to get to Millie Dupree through blackmailing her husband through a tape that has him trying to bribe an official. He reaches to Lonnie Shaver through convincing a company to buy his employer and convince him through orientation. He also tries to reach Rikki Coleman through a blackmail of revealing her abortion to her husband. As the case continues, Fitch is approached by Marlee with a proposal to 'buy' the verdict. However, as Fitch investigates Marlee's past, he discovers that her parents have been killed by smoking and that Marlee was actually planning against the defense. However, he has already sent the $10 million, so he lost $10 million in addition to having lost the trial. Easter becomes jury foreman after the previous one became ill (an illness resulting from Nicolas and Marlee spiking his coffee) and convinces them to find for the plaintiff and make a large monetary award - $2 million for compensatory damages, and $400 million for punitive measures. The defense lawyers and their employers are devastated. Whilst Easter and Marlee are now rich through short-selling the tobacco companies' stocks and satisfied that they served justice, Fitch realizes that his reputation has been destroyed and that the tobacco companies, once undefeatable, are now vulnerable to lawsuits. The book closes with Marlee returning the initial $10 million bribe to Fitch, having used it to make several times that much, and warning Fitch that she and Nicholas will always be watching. She explains that she had no intention to steal or lie, and that she cheated only because "That was all your client understood." |
752406 | /m/038c96 | Jesus on Mars | Philip José Farmer | null | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction"} | An unmanned scientific probe sent to Mars discovers an alien artifact. A follow up robotic explorer lands and verifies that an enormous alien ship is partially buried on Mars. So a manned expedition is sent to explore this apparently abandoned alien ship. The expedition members are captured and taken underground to the habitat occupied by a combined society of humans living harmoniously with the alien Krsh. The expedition learns that, in previous millennia, the technologically advanced Krsh were won over to the religion of the humans. This society practices Judaism but accepts Jesus as their Messiah. Included in their Bible is the Book of Matthias which is the testament written by Judas Iscariot. However, unlike mainstream Christianity, this society views Jesus as a man and not as God (see Nicene Creed). Originally, the Krsh had arrived at Earth on an exploratory mission. To study humans, the Krsh had offered to bring injured humans to their spaceship for medical treatment. Then, the ship was attacked by another alien species which is especially hostile and xenophobic. Even though the attack was repelled and the ship of the xenophobic aliens was destroyed, the Krsh's own ship was damaged. So they landed on Mars to hide from more potential hostility which never arrived. During the years of camouflage, the Krsh and humans crew joined together into a unified society. Halfway through the novel, we learn that Jesus himself miraculously arrived among these people almost two thousand years earlier and had been living with them ever since. The proximity of Jesus is overwhelming and convincing both in terms of concrete, scientifically verifiable miracles as well as a strong visceral presence. This proximity convinces even the scientifically advanced Krsh. Also, three of the four crew members accept this Jesus and convert to this hybrid form of Judaism and Christianity. The fourth crew member, an atheist and the only female crew member, commits suicide. She is subsequently resurrected using advanced technology but not before she suffers brain damage that erases much of her personality. Towards the end of the novel, Jesus leads a flotilla of spaceships back to Earth in a reenactment of the Second Coming. Although desiring peaceful interaction and offering immortality and boundless manna, they are prepared for hostile action. As can be expected, Jesus is accused of being the Antichrist. Such doubts afflict Richard Orme who is the astronaut leading the manned expedition from Earth. In the penultimate chapter, Orme wavers on his conversion and submission to this Martian Jesus. He then prepares to assassinate the Jesus but, ironically throws himself upon a grenade from another assassin so as to save Jesus. In the final chapter, he awakens naked and disoriented to discover that he has been resurrected by Jesus while the world media looked on. Then, Orme reaffirms his commitment and the novel ends abruptly with a sense of the years of impending struggle against the forces of evil. |
752711 | /m/038dbg | Polgara the Sorceress | David Eddings | 1997 | {"/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/01hmnh": "Fantasy", "/m/02xlf": "Fiction"} | Polgara the Sorceress begins with Ce'Nedra entreating Polgara to write a book about her life, filling in the gaps left by her father's story, Belgarath the Sorcerer. The main part of the story then opens just before the birth of Polgara and her sister. Polgara and her twin sister Beldaran were raised by their "uncles", the deformed dwarf Beldin and the twin sorcerers Beltira and Belkira (all disciples of Aldur, like Belgarath), after the apparent death of their mother, Poledra. Their mother had been a shape-shifting wolf (that is, she could assume the form of a human woman; but was born and still thought as a female wolf) and was distressed that her human babies would be born lacking in wolvish instinctive knowledge, so she began speaking to and training them telepathically while they were still in her womb. After the birth of the twins, Poledra was presumed to have died, but her daughters knew that she had simply had to go away. She continued to speak to Polgara, who throughout her life maintained a close relationship with her mother. Polgara and Beldaran were identical twins, but Aldur and their mother made physical changes directed at Polgara while they were still in the womb. Beldaran was fair-haired and Polgara was dark. According to various historical dates listed in Belgarath the Sorcerer and Polgara the Sorceress we are able to determine that Polgara and Beldaran were born in the year 2000 A.C. (Alorn Calendar). Polgara was born first, but Beldaran was the dominant twin. Soon after her birth, her father, Belgarath, touched her forehead in a gesture of welcome to his first-born which was also a symbol to which his original race performed on their first born. One lock of her hair turned silver, at his touch, marking her forever as a sorceress. For many years, Polgara hated her father. This was in part because her mother's wolf instincts could not understand his apparent abandonment during her pregnancy, and sensitive Polgara had picked up on this. This was also because, as Belgarath believed his wife dead, Belgarath had left for years, wandering from vice to vice in poor mental condition. Polgara took great offense to his continued abandonment. When Belgarath returned to take care of his daughters, Beldaran was quick to forgive him but Polgara often fled to the Tree at the center of the Vale of Aldur, where she befriended and learned to speak to birds. Beldaran's forgiveness of Belgarath further enforced Polgara's hatred. It was there, in the tree, that she first learned how to access her powers as a sorceress. She learned to shift into the form of an owl, a shape she learned from her mother. Belgarath (with Beldaran's help) eventually negotiated an uneasy peace, and Polgara began her academic training. Eventually, it was revealed that one of the twins was to wed Riva, the king of a newly formed subdivision of the Alorn kingdom of Aloria. Beldaran was chosen, as indeed this was her role in the ongoining War of Destinies. Polgara bitterly resented the "loss" of her sister, who had been the center of her life, but the shared loss eventually brought father and daughter closer together, and Polgara was presented for the first time as beautiful Polgara the Sorceress. Beldaran soon died, but Polgara, as a sorceress and disciple of Aldur, did not age. (Although the male disciples tended to be gray-haired, Polgara remained young.) Over the years, she maintained a relationship with the descendants of Beldaran and Riva that would eventually become her life's work. A relatively young Polgara spent many years in the Arendish duchy of Vo Wacune. The focus of her work was to end (sometimes by force) the Arendish civil wars. Ultimately she earned the gratitude of the dukes and her own duchy, and she became the Duchess of Erat. She imposed her own particular notions on the people of her duchy, modernizing its government and freeing her serfs. When war broke out again and Vo Wacune was destroyed, Polgara trained her people to become self-sufficient, and eventually what was once Erat became part of the new kingdom of Sendaria, noted for the practicality of its people, and the Duchess of Erat was all but forgotten. When the Rivan King was killed by assassins, Polgara became the guardian of a secret line of surviving heirs. She became an expert in not being noticed, often living in the towns of Sendaria. At the Battle of Vo Mimbre, Polgara learned that in the prophecies of the other side, her role was to be the bride of the dark god Torak. Her continued defiance both confused and infuriated him, but she was nonetheless afraid of Torak . Her refusal to accept Torak's dominance (At Vo Mimbre and in the volume 5 of the Belgariad, Enchanters' End Game), due to her previously unrealized love for Durnik, was a key point (an Event) in the fight between the two competing Prophecies. Following Torak's defeat at Vo Mimbre, Polgara returned to caring for the descendants of Riva, eventually raising Garion. The story ends there, overlapping with Garion's earliest memories as recounted at the beginning of the Belgariad. |
755109 | /m/038l52 | Ilium | Dan Simmons | 2003 | {"/m/06n90": "Science Fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction"} | The novel centers on three character groups: that of Hockenberry (a resurrected twentieth-century Homeric scholar whose duty is to compare the events of the Iliad to the reenacted events of the Trojan War), Greek and Trojan warriors, and Greek gods from the Iliad; Daeman, Harman, Ada, and other humans of an Earth thousands of years after the twentieth century; and the "moravec" robots (named for scientist and futurist Hans Moravec) Mahnmut the Europan and Orphu of Io, also thousands of years in the future, but originating in the Jovian system. The novel is written in first-person, present-tense when centered on Hockenberry's character, but features third-person, past-tense narrative in all other instances. Much like Simmons's Hyperion, where the actual events serve as a frame, the three groups of characters' stories are told over the course of the novel and begin to converge as the climax nears. |
758569 | /m/038xbv | Iron Council | China Miéville | 2004 | {"/m/025txgl": "Western fiction", "/m/014dfn": "Speculative fiction", "/m/06www": "Steampunk"} | Iron Council follows three major narrative threads that join to form the novel’s climax. Although Miéville weaves back and forth between narrative, time, and space, this summary will follow each narrative individually, discussing their relation to each other toward the end. The novel is set in and around New Crobuzon, a sprawling London-esque city. New Crobuzon has for some unknown amount of time been at war with Tesh, and is attempting to build a railroad across the outlying desert, partially as a new means of conducting this war. Against this backdrop, the novel follows the deeds of three main characters–-Ori, Cutter, and Judah Low. Judah’s story begins some twenty years before the novel’s opening. Judah was hired as a railroad scout for New Crobuzon, charged with mapping terrain, and informing the land’s inhabitants of the railroad’s coming. While doing so, Judah spends time with the Stiltspear, a race of indescribable creatures who can disguise themselves as trees and conjure golems, living creatures made from unliving matter. Judah attempts to warn the Stiltspear away, but they won’t listen and he must settle for making a few recordings and beginning to learn their golemetric arts. Eventually, he returns to the railroad, which does indeed wipe out the Stiltspear. Shortly afterward, Judah, a prostitute named Ann-Hari, and a Remade named Uzman lead a revolution in which the rail workers drive the overseers away, free the Remade, and hijack the train, transforming it into a moving socialist dwelling. Iron Council, the perpetual train, moves through the desert, gathering track from behind and laying it in whichever direction its citizens decide. The Council keeps moving to avoid the New Crobuzon militia, who are anxious to reclaim the train and destroy the rebellion-inspiring Council. Judah returns to New Crobuzon, where he immerses himself in esoteric golemetry literature, emerging as a master of the art. Eventually, Judah returns to the Iron Council, having spread its word throughout New Crobuzon, and intent on using his golemetry to protect it. Cutter, whom the reader joins at the novel’s opening, was a friend, disciple, and lover to Judah during Judah’s return to New Crobuzon. Cutter leads a group consisting of other disciples of Judah in search of the Iron Council, to warn of the impending attack of the New Crobuzon militia. Although the militia was initially defeated by Iron Council, it has amassed a force now capable of destroying the “perpetual train.” After living and working with the Council for a while, Cutter returns with Judah and others to New Crobuzon to inspire revolt with the news of Iron Council, which has decided to return to the city and confront the militia on its own turf. After learning of the failed uprising by the Collective, Judah sends Cutter back to dissuade the citizens of the Council from returning. He is unsuccessful, and at the novel’s climax, Judah conjures a time-golem to freeze the train in time, thus saving it at the point of attack from destruction by the militia. As the novel ends, Iron Council has become a public monument of sorts, poised on the verge of attacking New Crobuzon’s exterior until the undisclosed time in which Judah’s time golem will dissipate. Judah is murdered by Ann Hari for halting the Council’s attack, and Cutter re-immerses himself in New Crobuzon’s underground resistance movements, revitalizing the protest publication Runagate Rampant. Happening somewhat simultaneously with most of the preceding summary are the deeds of Ori, a dissatisfied revolutionary who cannot abide the endless talk of his fellow Runagaters (so named for the above-mentioned publication). Seeking action, Ori is led by Spiral Jacobs, a half-crazed homeless old man, to join the militant gang of Toro. Committing robberies, raids, and even murder, Toro’s group proceeds mercilessly on its quest to assassinate the mayor of New Crobuzon, a plan which is later revealed to be personal rather than political. During Ori’s struggles with and against his new gang, an uprising by The Collective, a union of revolutionary groups, threatens to finally wrest New Crobuzon from the hands of its corrupt parliament and militia. After several days of fighting, however, the Collective is destroyed. Shortly after the fall of the Collective, Ori learns that Spiral Jacobs is in actuality a powerful sorcerer (A Tramp-Ambassador alluded to very briefly early in the novel) sent from Tesh to introduce a dark, destructive force into the midst of New Crobuzon (doing so with the help of the spiral signs he keeps drawing in New Crobuzon, which are considered by the Collective's supporters to be freedom signs). Here Judah, Ori, and Cutter finally cross paths as they unite to stop Spiral Jacobs, who is trying to raise Phasma Urbomach (also called the murderspirit and citykiller), a powerful entity which would destroy the entire city. They finally manage to stop him with the help of Qurabin, a disciple of a Teshi religious tradition whom Cutter and Judah met on the journey to Iron Council; Qurabin, a monk of the Moment of the Hidden and Lost, trades something of his for the knowledge on how to banish the spirit back (during the course of the novel, Qurabin loses his native language, memories of moments, and finally his eyes in order to help the main protagonists) and finally takes the Tesh ambassador with him 'into the domain of Tekke Vogu'. Ori is killed in the confrontation. Cutter and Judah then leave to rejoin the thread of the Iron Council, depicted above. |
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