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The Algerine Captive | null | null | The Algerine Captive tells the story of the upbringing, early career, and later enslavement of fictional Boston native, narrator Updike Underhill. The first volume chronicles Updike Underhill's youth and early adulthood in America; the Preface suggests that its aim is to "at least display a portrait of New England manners, hitherto unattempted." After detailing his family history, Underhill describes his birth, childhood, and early education. Upon the encouragement of a local minister, Underhill's parents agree to prepare the narrator for college by placing him under the minister's tutelage. Underhill's classical education, through which he learns Greek and Latin, provides him with the ability to recite copious lines of poetry, which his countrymen ridicule. Not only is he mocked for his spouting of Greek poetry, which is unintelligible to all but himself, but he is actually challenged to a duel after writing an unintentionally insulting Greek-inspired ode to a young lady. Luckily for Underhill, the duel is discovered and preempted by the local sheriffs and constables before it can take place. This volume also gives an account of Underhill's failed attempt to serve as a teacher in a village school, follows his travels through the Northern and Southern states as a physician, and discusses his service as a surgeon aboard a slave-ship that heads to Africa by way of London. In the final chapter of this volume, while Updike is on the African coast nursing five sick slaves back to health, he is captured and taken as a slave to Algiers. In the second volume, Updike describes his enslavement and gives an account of the country and people among which he is confined. By setting Algiers in opposition to America, this part of the novel leads Underhill to comment on and formulate his conception of what it means to be American. When he is freed at the novel's conclusion, therefore, the message he imparts to the reader is a nation-building one: "My ardent wish is, that my fellow citizens may profit by my misfortunes. If they peruse these pages with attention they will perceive the necessity of uniting our federal strength to enforce a due respect among other nations...BY UNITING WE STAND, BY DIVIDING WE FALL." |
Kane and Abel | Jeffrey Archer | 1,979 | The book tells the stories of two men born worlds apart. They have nothing in common except the same date of birth (18 April 1906) and a zeal to succeed in life. William Lowell Kane is a wealthy and powerful Boston Brahmin while Abel Rosnovski (originally named Wladek Koskiewicz) is a Pole was born in a situation of great poverty and eventually emigrated to the United States. William follows the steps of his father, Richard Kane, to become a successful banker. When William was still a child, Richard dies in the Titanic disaster, leaving William fatherless and heir to the Kane & Cabot bank. William displays extraordinary discipline and intelligence as a young man at St. Paul's School and later at Harvard. His mother marries Henry Osborne, who turns out to be interested in gambling and women. William hates Henry from the beginning and spends most of the time at Harvard and at his best friend Mathew Lester's home. William dreams of becoming the chairman of Lester's bank one day. Henry spends every last penny of Kane's mother's money on the pretext of speculation, while she dies in a miscarriage. Kane throws Henry out of his home. Wladek Koskiewicz is born in a forest and raised by a trapper family. When he grows up and is found to have exceptional intelligence, Baron Rosnovski asks him to become a companion to his son Leon so Wladek might prove to be a competition to him. Wladek agrees to go to the Baron's castle on the condition that he can bring along his elder sister Florentyna. Soon afterwards, World War I breaks out. Germans attack Poland and capture the Baron, his staff and son in his castle. Leon dies by the hand of a soldier. Before dying, the Baron hands him his silver band of authority. Wladek realises that the Baron was his father when he finds that, like him, the Baron too had a missing nipple. Florentyna is also raped and killed in front of young Wladek by Russian soldiers. Wladek was then moved to Siberia from where he manages to escape to Turkey after facing many hardships. There, he nearly loses his hand (a common punishment in the Middle East and in the Ottoman empire, predecessor of Turkey, before 20th century) for stealing food but is rescued by two British diplomats. They transfer him to the Polish consulate from where with their help, he migrates to America and assumes the name Abel Rosnovski. He starts his life as a waiter in the Hotel Plaza, while taking night classes in business at Columbia University. While Abel is working there, Davis Leroy, owner of the Richmond group of hotels, is impressed by his work and appoints him manager of his flagship hotel. Abel converts the ill-managed hotel to a profit-making one and buys stock in the chain. During the Great Depression, the hotel needs a backer and Davis, unable to find one, commits suicide leaving the remaining shares in the Richmond Group to Abel. Before committing suicide, Davis mentions that Kane & Cabot was the bank that didn't support him. Abel thus plans for revenge and considers Kane his arch rival. The bank gets him an anonymous backer. Abel assumes it to be David Maxton, owner of Stevens' hotel. During this time, Abel befriends George and marries Zaphia, both Polish emigres. Abel changes the name of the hotel from Richmond to Baron and builds up a successful hotel chain. By collaborating with Henry Osborne, who had by now entered politics, Abel plans to ruin Kane and his bank. Abel begets a daughter, named Florentyna in memory of his dead sister while Kane has a son, Richard. Abel during World War II would save Kane's life in France, unaware to each other. He divorces Zaphia when he returns home from the war. Meanwhile Kane's bank and Lester's bank merge and a provision is made that anyone who has a share of 8% can summon board meetings. Abel tries desperately to obtain 8% of the bank's stock but Kane manages to thwart his attempts. They unknowingly meet each other many times throughout the novel. Florentyna Rosnovski and Richard Kane happen to meet and fall in love without knowing about the rivalry between their fathers. They get married amid vehement protests from their fathers and start a chain of boutique stores named Florentyna's. Finally, Abel manages to obtain enough shares of the bank and ousts Kane from power. Kane decides to forgive his son and daughter-in-law and expresses his wish to meet them. He dies before he is able to see them and his grandson William. Abel then comes to know that his backer was not David Maxton, but William Kane. Filled with remorse, he reconciles with his daughter and son-in-law. Abel dies soon after, and bequeathes everything to his daughter Florentyna, except his silver band of authority, which he leaves to his grandson, whom Florentyna and Richard have named "William Abel Kane". ar:كين وأبيل ja:ケインとアベル pl:Kane i Abel vi:Hai số phận zh:凯恩与阿贝尔 |
Contest | Matthew Reilly | null | The story focuses on Dr. Stephen Swain, a radiologist, who manages to fight off two gang members despite having no combat experience. While at home, Swain and his daughter Holly are teleported into the New York City Library. A mysterious alien named Selexin explains that Swain has been chosen to represent humans in a contest called the Presidian. The rules are simple: seven different intelligent beings are teleported into a place such as the Library, and must fight to the death. The last being standing must then find the teleporter that will take them out of the labyrinth. However, an animal called the Karanadon will also be in the labyrinth. The Karanadon was teleported into the Labyrinth a day before the contestants and has already killed Ryan, a security guard at the library. Swain has been chosen to represent Earth because of his natural fighting abilities, as demonstrated in the gang fight. Selexin's species is too small to compete, so they serve as guides and witnesses to a kill. If a contestant says "initialize" a tiny teleporter will appear from a cap on Selexin's head, allowing officials to see what is going on. Clasped to Swain's wrist is a metal band that indicates how many contestants are in the Library, as well as whether the Karanadon is awake or not. As final a precaution in the game, the whole Library is enclosed in a powerful electrical field. If Swain were to somehow get out of the Library the band will give him fifteen minutes to get back inside, and will explode if he fails to do so. Meanwhile, two police officers named Paul Hawkins and Christine Parker are spending the night in the Library after the incident with the security guard's death. Seeing a light down in the stack, Hawkins goes to investigate, leaving Parker alone in the Lobby. Another contestant named Bellos arrives in the lobby and has some unknown creatures who kill Parker. Down in the stack, Hawkins encounters a crocodile-like alien named Reese, who hypnotizes him. Before she can kill him, Swain intervenes and Hawkins escapes. However, Selexin points out that while contestants cannot kill each other at this stage of the contest, they can follow each other. Swain, Holly, Selexin, and Hawkins rush into the parking garage to escape as the final contestant, Balthazar, arrives. In the ensuing fight, Reese injures Balthazar but Swain attacks her and drags Balthazar to an elevator. Having survived, the group tries to regroup in the lobby, but see Bellos and another contestant, called the Konda. Just as the Konda is about to kill Bellos, hunting animals called hoodayas, or hoods, attack and kill the Konda. Selexin and Balthazar's guide say that the Presidian is over: Bellos has cheated by bringing in the hoods, making him an invincible opponent and the definite winner. Before the hoods can kill the group, Reese, who has figured out how to work an elevator, appears and the group flees in the carnage, to a janitor’s closet. Unfortunately, they have stumbled upon the Karanadon's nest. The creature wakes, and kills Balthazar's guide before Swain tricks it into falling down an elevator shaft, knocking it out. Now separated, Swain, Holly, and Selexin find a door Fraser left open to the outside world. Before they can escape, Bellos attacks. Swain manages to kill two of the hoods but the door slams shut, becoming electrified, and trapping him outside, alone and with his wristband counting down. To complicate matters, the NSA has arrived, and is trying to keep people from getting near the library. Finally, Swain manages to uses a magnet in a phone to create a gap in an electrical window and gets back inside. Back in the janitor's closet, Hawkins and Balthazar are attacked by a contestant called the Codex. Balthazar and the Codex kill each other and in the process start a fire. Holly and Selexin manage to escape the stack. Bellos gives chase, and kills Hawkins and the final contestant, called the Rachnid, but one of his hoods is killed by Holly and Selexin. Down in the parking garage, Swain encounters a psychopathic NSA agent named Henry Quaid, who has managed to get into the Library. He is killed suddenly by Reese, who Swain manages to electrocute. While rummaging around, he finds a paper in Quaid's pocket showing power surges every time something is teleported into the Library. By luck, he also finds Holly and Selexin, and uses Selexin's teleporter to kill the final hood, by teleporting half its body away to watching officials. After killing Bellos by crushing him beneath an elevator, Swain's wristband tells him that, because the Presidian has been "contaminated", the final teleporter will not be opened and everything, including Selexin and the Karanadon, will be left behind. Swain realizes that Bellos teleported a teleportation device into the Library, so that at the end of the game he could send the hoods away, and not be discovered cheating. Selexin is teleported away, with the promise to have the escape device teleported back. The electrical field around the Library drops, and the wristband begins its countdown sequence in order to kill all contestants and dispose of the evidence. The Karanadon awakes and chases Swain out into a park near the Library. In the fighting, Swain's band gets knocked off. He clips it to the Karanadon and flees. The NSA watches as the wristbands explode, destroying all trace of the Karanadon and also destroying the Library. The novel ends with Swain and Holly going home on a subway. |
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close | Jonathan Safran Foer | 2,006 | The main protagonist of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close is a nine-year-old boy named Oskar Schell. Oskar Schell's father Thomas Schell dies in the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, before the narrative begins. While looking through his father's closet, Oskar finds a key in a small envelope inside a vase, on the outside of the envelope the word "Black" is written in the top left corner. Curious, Oskar sets off on a mission to contact every person in New York City with the last name Black, in alphabetical order, in order to find the lock to the key his father left behind. The novel also tells a separate narrative that eventually converges with the main story through a series of letters written by Oskar's grandfather to Oskar's father and by Oskar's grandmother to Oskar himself. Based on real life events. One of the first people Oskar meets in his search for the key's origin is a forty-eight-year-old woman named Abby Black. Oskar makes friends instantly, but she has no information on the key. Oskar continues to search the city, meeting an old man he calls "the renter" – as he is the new tenant in Oskar's grandmother's apartment; "the renter" is actually Oskar's grandfather. Eight months after he meets Abby he finds a message on the answering machine. He had not touched that phone since his father died since his father's last words had been on an identical answering machine which Oskar had kept hidden from his mother. It is revealed that Abby had called Oskar directly after his visit, saying "[she] wasn't completely honest with [Oskar], and [she] think[s] that [she] might be able to help". Oskar returns to Abby's apartment, and Abby directs him to her ex-husband, William Black. When Oskar talks to William Black, he learns that the vase used to belong to William's father. In his will, William's father left William a key to a safe-deposit box, but William had already sold the vase at the estate sale to Thomas Schell. Oskar tells William something that he "never told anyone" – the story of the last answering machine message Oskar received from his father, during the attack of 9/11- a repetition of the words "Are you there? Are you there? Are you there?" Oskar then gives William Black the key. Disappointed that the key does not belong to him, Oskar goes home angry and sad, not interested in the contents of the box. After Oskar destroys everything that had to do with the search for the lost key, his mother reveals that she knew Oskar was contacting all the Blacks in New York City. After the first few visits she called every Black that he would meet and informed them that Oskar was going to visit and why. In response, the people Oskar met knew ahead of time why he was coming and usually treated him in a friendly manner. |
Our Lady of the Flowers | Jean Genet | 1,948 | The novel tells the story of Divine, a drag queen who, when the novel opens, has died of tuberculosis and been canonised as a result. The narrator tells us that the stories he is telling are mainly to amuse himself whilst he passes his sentence in prison - and the highly erotic, often explicitly sexual, stories are spun to assist his masturbation. Jean-Paul Sartre called it "the epic of masturbation". Divine lives in an attic room overlooking Montmartre cemetery, which she shares with various lovers, the most important of whom is a pimp called Darling Daintyfoot. One day Darling brings home a young hoodlum and murderer, dubbed Our Lady of the Flowers. Our Lady is eventually arrested and tried, and executed. Death and ecstasy accompany the acts of every character, as Genet performs a transvaluation of all values, making betrayal the highest moral value, murder an act of virtue and sexual appeal. |
The Hot Zone | Richard Preston | 1,994 | The book is in four sections: * "The Shadow of Mount Elgon" delves into the history of filoviruses, as well as speculation about the origins of AIDS. Preston accounts the story of "Charles Monet" (a pseudonym), who might have caught MARV from visiting Kitum Cave on Mount Elgon in Kenya. The author describes in great detail the progression of the disease, from the initial headache and backache, to the final stage in which Monet's internal organs fail and he "bleeds out" (i.e., hemorrhages extensively) in a waiting room in a Nairobi hospital. This part also introduces a young promising physician who becomes infected with MARV while treating Monet. Nancy Jaax's story is told. Viruses, and biosafety levels and procedures are described. The EVD outbreaks caused by EBOV and its cousin, Sudan virus (SUDV) are mentioned. Preston talks to the man who named Ebola virus. * "The Monkey House" chronicles the discovery of Reston virus virus among imported monkeys in Reston, Virginia, and the following actions taken by the U.S. Army and Centers for Disease Control. * "Smashdown" is more on the Reston epizootic, which involved a strain of the virus that does not affect humans but which easily spreads by air, and is very similar to its cousin the Ebola virus. * "Kitum Cave" tells of the author's visiting the cave that is the suspected home of the natural host animal that Ebola lives inside of. The book starts with "Charles Monet" visiting Kitum Cave during a camping trip to Mount Elgon in Central Africa. Not long after, he begins to suffer from a number of symptoms, including vomiting, diarrhea and red eye. He is soon taken to Nairobi Hospital for treatment, but his condition deteriorates further and he goes into a coma while in the waiting room. He dies, but not before a Doctor named Shem Musoke, attempting to insert a laryngoscope, is infected by exposure to Charles' blood and vomit. Musoke is one of the few to become symptomatic from a filovirus and survive. This particular filovirus is called Marburg virus. Dr. Nancy Jaax had been promoted to work in the Level 4 Biosafety containment area at USAMRIID, and is assigned to research Ebola virus. While preparing food for her family at home, she cuts her right hand. Later, while working on a dead, EBOV-infected monkey, one of the gloves on the hand with the open wound tears, and she is almost exposed to contaminated blood, but does not get infected. Meanwhile, Peter Cardinal, a ten-year-old, visits Kitum Cave, gets infected with a MARV relative, Ravn virus (RAVV), and does not survive this infection. Nurse Mayinga is also infected by a nun and elects to visit Nairobi Hospital for treatment, where she succumbs to the disease. A CDC team arrives to collect samples of the virus for study. In Reston, Virginia, less than fifteen miles (24 km) away from Washington, DC, a company called Hazelton Research once operated a quarantine center for monkeys that were destined for laboratories. In October 1989, when an unusually high number of their monkeys began to die, their veterinarian decided to send some samples to Fort Detrick (USAMRIID) for study. At the time, it was believed that the virus was Simian hemorrhagic fever virus, a viral hemorrhagic fever harmless to humans but almost always fatal to other primates (see zoonosis). Early during the testing process in biosafety level 3, when one of the flasks appeared to be contaminated with harmless pseudomonas bacterium, two USAMRIID scientists exposed themselves to the virus by wafting the flask. When they eventually tested the samples with known Level 4 agents, only EBOV reacted with the unknown samples. They decided not to tell anyone about their exposure, but they did secretly test their blood every day. After one of the monkey house staff members becomes ill with nausea and violent vomiting, USAMRIID is given permission to send in a team to euthanize all the monkeys at the facility and collect tissue samples. They later determine that, while the virus is terrifyingly lethal to monkeys, humans can be infected with it without any health effects at all. This virus is now known as Reston virus (RESTV). Finally, the author himself goes into Africa to explore Kitum Cave. On the way, he discusses the role of AIDS in the present, as the highway they were on, sometimes called the "AIDS Highway," or the "Kinshasa Highway" was where it first appeared. Equipped with a Hazmat suit, he enters the cave and finds a large number of animals, one of which might be the virus carrier. At the conclusion of the book, he travels to the quarantine facility in Reston. The building there was abandoned and deteriorating. He concludes the book by saying EBOV will be back. |
Islands in the Net | Bruce Sterling | 1,988 | The action takes place in 2023–2025 on Galveston, Texas; Atlanta, Georgia; Grenada, an island in the north east coast of South America; Singapore and Africa. Protagonist Laura Webster, a mother of three-month-old Loretta, works as a public relations employee for global corporation of economic democrats Rizome. Together with her husband David they run the Lodge, a resort for Rizome workers on the island of Galveston. The action sets off when Rizome organizes a conference between itself and three data havens - EFT Commerzbank of Luxembourg, The Young Soo Chim Islamic Bank and Grenada United Bank - in the Lodge. After the first day of the conference, the representative of Grenada, Winston Stubbs, is assassinated. The organization which admits to killing him calls itself "F.A.C.T." (Free Army of Counter-Terrorism). Rizome decides to send Laura with her husband and baby to Grenada on a diplomatic mission to prove that Rizome had nothing to do with the murder. While in Grenada, Laura and David learn about its tragic history and the advanced technology flourishing on the island thanks to “mad-doctors” like the American Brian Prentis. Grenada is ruled by one party, the New Millennium Movement, with Prime Minister Eric Louison who uses voodoo tradition as means of keeping order in the country. Food is plentiful and cheaply produced on one of the huge tankers adapted for factories and housing. Drugs, in the form of a pure synthetic THC, are also cheap and widely accessible. Laura and David manage to escape Grenada after Singapore attacks it. They return to Atlanta and separate. David takes the baby to one of Rizome’s Retreats and Laura sets off to Singapore to continue her mission to improve the world. In Singapore, Laura witnesses the launching of the first Singaporean space rocket, celebrated by a speech from Singapore’s prime minister and leader of People’s Innovation Party, Kim Sue Lok. The celebration ends in chaos as the prime minister spits fire and explodes, as it turns out he was a victim of Grenada’s pseudo-voodoo tricks. This event triggers national panic and riots. Grenada invades Singapore in reaction to Singapore’s previous attack. In addition, Singapore’s opposition party, the Anti-Labour Party with Razak as a leader, tries to use the situation to get into power. The last group to invade Singapore is the Red Cross. Laura is cut off from the Net and cannot contact her husband or Rizome’s headquarters. Together with other Rizome’s workers in Singapore she decides to get herself arrested and wait in prison for the end of war. Unfortunately, Laura gets separated from her companions and ends up on the roof of The Young Soo Chim Islamic Bank. From there a chopper takes her, together with other survivors from the riots, to a cargo ship somewhere in the middle of a sea. The ship is bombed by F.A.C.T. and Laura is taken to one of F.A.C.T.’s submarines. There she learns more about the organization. Laura is then taken by a plane and transported to one of the prisons in Bamako, the capital of Mali. F.A.C.T. took over this country's government in order to have a base for the organization. After a conversation with the Inspector of Prisons she finds out that she poses a threat to the organization because they think she knows they have an atomic bomb which they keep on board of Thermopylae, the submarine she has been kept on. She spends two years in the prison. When a South African country supported by European authority of the Vienna convention attacks Mali, she is taken in a convoy to the atomic site to be shot on camera as a hostage. She is miraculously freed when the convoy is attacked by a group of Inadin Cultural Revolutionists. Their leader is Jonathan Gresham, an American journalist and radical, who helps Inadin people, also called Tuaregs the nomadic tribes of Sahara, fight against any forms of outside interference in their traditional way of life. Gresham takes Laura to an Azanian relief camp in order to save the life of her convoy companion, Azanian doctor Katje Selous, wounded in the action. Outside of the relief camp Gresham records Laura’s statement on all that happened to her and sends in on the Net. Laura and Gresham get romantically involved but this feeling has no future as she has to go back to the States and Gresham will continue to help Inadins. Next when we meet Laura she arrives at Galveston and takes part in an official Rizome party organized for her. Her husband David lost hope that she was alive and got involved with Laura’s closest friend, Emily Donato. Loretta, Laura and David’s daughter, is raised by Laura’s mother Margaret. Laura continues to work for Rizome and tries to improve the world by doing so. The last scene in the novel describes Hiroshima being bombed by F.A.C.T. Fortunately, this time the bomb did not explode. In the fictional world of Islands there exists a book titled The Lawrence Doctrine and Postindustrial Insurgency by Colonel Jonathan Gresham. It is banned by Vienna and widely read in the political underground. It draws on the example of T. E. Lawrence who during the First World War helped the Arabs fight the Ottoman Turks. Instead of fighting the Ottoman Turks, Lawrence convinced Arabs to block their expansion by destroying their communication lines, which at the time were railway tracks and telegraphs. Although Arabs were successful in fighting Turks they became dependent on the British Empire to provide them with industrial products such as explosives and canned food. Gresham calls the First World War “a proto-Net civil war”. The Arabs defeated their Ottoman overlords by destroying their communication network, namely the railway and telegraph lines. In Sterling's 21st century, for the Tuaregs the enemy is the Net. However, the Arabs were colonized by the British with industrial products and manufactures such as guns, cotton, dynamite and canned food. For Sterling's Tuaregs the necessary products of the Networld are solar power, plastique, and single-cell protein. Gresham’s book shows a pessimistic view of globalization and its mechanisms. It takes the view that it is impossible for small and economically weaker nations to stay completely independent; global influence will always be present with its positive and negative aspects. In the world of the novel the USA and the Soviet Union are still the world powers. The international political order, which is guarded by the Vienna Convention and uses censorship as a means of keeping the world order, is weak and divided, and to avoid world panic protects the terrorists from F.A.C.T. Countries that grow in power are Grenada, Singapore and Luxemburg, the so-called data havens where data piracy is legitimate. Organizations that feel threatened by the growing influence of havens are Rizome Industries Group, an economic democracy global corporation which suffers losses because of the data piracy and wants to negotiate with the pirates, and the Free Army of Counter-Terrorism (F.A.C.T.) which calls itself “the real world police” and plans to deal with any signs of attacks on “doctrines of national sovereignty”. This is the main reason why F.A.C.T. assassinates Winston Stubbs and bombs the ship on which Laura was sailing with Singaporean pirates. The novel shows a new phenomenon emerging in the political world. The global organizations start realizing that they no longer need governments to successfully run their affairs; “Let us cut out the middleman,” says one of Kymera Corporation workers. The F.A.C.T. seems to be fighting signs of such thinking, while at the same time it is a global corporation which chose one of African countries, Mali, and took over its government in order to have its own military base. Africa is still “a mess”. The only problem which has been solved is famine, thanks to "the scop", a single-cell protein. The countries still suffer from poverty and political instability. People die from retroviruses and have no perspectives and developed countries are not interested in what is going on there. |
Forty Signs of Rain | Kim Stanley Robinson | 2,004 | The focus of the novel is the effects of global warming in the early decades of the 21st century. Its characters are mostly scientists, either involved in biotech research, assisting government members, or doing paperwork at the National Science Foundation (NSF). There are also several Buddhist monks working for the embassy of the fictional island nation of Khembalung. |
Heer Ranjha | null | null | Heer is an extremely beautiful woman, born into a wealthy Jat family of the Sayyal clan in Jhang, Punjab. Ranjha (whose first name is Dheedo; Ranjha is the surname), also a Jat of the Ranjha clan, is the youngest of four brothers and lives in the village 'Takht Hazara' by the river Chenab. Being his father's favorite son, unlike his brothers who had to toil in the lands, he led a life of ease playing the flute ('Wanjhli'/'Bansuri'). After a quarrel with his brothers over land, Ranjha leaves home. In Waris Shah's version of the epic, it is said that Ranjha left his home because his brothers' wives refused to give him food. Eventually he arrives in Heer's village and falls in love with her. Heer offers Ranjha a job as caretaker of her father's cattle. She becomes mesmerised by the way Ranjha plays his flute and eventually falls in love with him. They meet each other secretly for many years until they are caught by Heer's jealous uncle, Kaido, and her parents Chuchak and Malki. Heer is forced by her family and the local priest or 'mullah' to marry another man called Saida Khera. Ranjha is heartbroken. He wanders the countryside alone, until eventually he meets a 'jogi' (ascetic). After meeting Baba Gorakhnath, the founder of the "Kanphata"(pierced ear) sect of jogis, at 'Tilla Jogian' (the 'Hill of Ascetics', located 50 miles north of the historic town of Bhera, Sargodha District, Punjab), Ranjha becomes a jogi himself, piercing his ears and renouncing the material world. Reciting the name of the Lord, "Alakh Niranjan", he wanders all over the Punjab, eventually finding the village where Heer now lives. The two return to Heer's village, where Heer's parents agree to their marriage. However, on the wedding day, Heer's jealous uncle Kaido poisons her food so that the wedding will not take place. Hearing this news, Ranjha rushes to aid Heer, but he is too late, as she has already eaten the poison and died. Brokenhearted once again, Ranjha takes the poisoned Laddu (sweet) which Heer has eaten and dies by her side. Heer and Ranjha are buried in Heer's hometown, Jhang. Lovers and others often pay visits to their mausoleum. |
Asterix and the Chieftain's Shield | null | null | The book begins with Vercingetorix conceding his defeat to Julius Caesar. He throws his weapons at Caesar's feet — or rather, on Caesar's feet. In pain, Caesar hops away to the infirmary while Vercingetorix is arrested. The weapons remain where they were thrown, for several hours, until a curious, somewhat greedy Roman legionary sees that no one's looking, and steals Vercingetorix's famous shield. He then loses the shield in a game of dice to another legionary, who is himself out of camp without a pass. He is spotted by a drunken centurion, who confiscates the shield. The centurion himself uses the shield to pay for a jar of wine at a nearby Gaulish inn; later on the shield is given by the innkeeper to a survivor of the Battle of Alesia, who wanders off into the night... Then begins the actual story. Chief Vitalstatistix is horribly ill with a sore liver (to the point that any contact with his liver causes him to scream in agony). The druid Getafix diagnoses that this is the result of too much roast wild boar, greasy, spicy sauces and beer, Liver trouble. Other Gauls repeatedly poke the Chief's chest, causing him intense pain. As Getafix's magic potions cannot cure weight problems (although it soothes the Chief's liver briefly), he sends Vitalstatistix off to a health spa in Arverne to be cured. Asterix and Obelix (with Dogmatix) go as his escort. At first, Vitalstatistix proposes having a banquet before they leave, but Impedimenta goes off in a rage, forcing him and his escort to make a hasty departure. On the way, they stop at various inns to have the banquet the chief wanted, only to bring back his liver trouble, pain is caused merely by a leaf landing on his stomach. When they arrive, Obelix is mistaken for a patient by a Druid, who punches his stomach. At first all the Gauls stay there together, but because Asterix, Obelix and Dogmatix are perfectly healthy and in no need of special diets, they feast on wild boar and beer while everyone else's diets are boiled vegetables daily. This, and other incidents, seriously annoy Vitalstatistix and the other patients, putting pressure on the management, some people break down at this, and the Chef is attacked. One man even tries to steal food from Dogmatix, but is stopped by Obelix. Vitalstatistix advises his men to tour the countryside of Arverne, visiting such beautiful places as Gergovia. Asterix asks about Alesia, but Vitalstatistix angrily shouts that he does not know where Alesia is. (The exact location of Alesia was unknown for centuries, including when this book was published. It also seems to be a sore point for people like Winesandspirix and Vitalstatistix who were there.) Along the way, the Gauls are met by special Roman envoy, Noxius Vapus. A fight ensues, with obvious results: the Romans are left beaten up, with their weapons broken, while the Gauls proceed merrily on their way. In the aftermath Asterix, Obelix and Dogmatix meet an old Gaul called Winesandspirix, who has set up shop as a wine and charcoal salesman in Gergovia. Winesandspirix takes the Gauls to his home as his friends. Asterix asks if Wine and Charcoal shops next to each other causes competition, but Winesandspirix says they buy Wine and Charcoal from each other. His wife then cooks vegetable soup which Obelix loves. Followed by a party, where the neighbouring wine and charcoal owners gather to talk. Someone who brought sausages opens and slammed the door quite loudly. Asterix then asks why Winesanspirix about this and says, "We Arvenians are very fond of bangers". Obelix, grabbing three sausages, tasted them and realised that it was actually Wild Boar sausages when Winesanspirix tells him. Meanwhile, when Noxius Vapus makes his report to Caesar in Rome. Caesar decides that the Gauls must be taught a lesson. He plans a triumph on Vercingetorix's shield, only there's one small problem — he does not have the shield any more. Caesar orders Vapus to send search parties to Arverne, looking for it. Soon the Roman search parties arrive at Winesandspirix's shop. They find nothing, but Asterix's curiosity is piqued. The Romans send a spy, Legionary Pusillanimus, a drunk to find out more but, on drinking too much wine at Winesandspirix's tavern, he accidentally discloses the plan. In order to thwart it, Asterix, Obelix and Dogmatix set off in search of the shield themselves. Pusillanimus actually knows about the legionary who originally took the shield as he was at the Battle of Alesia himself, but he fails to inform his superiors and only tells the Gauls while drunk. They follow the shield's trail, meeting those who possessed it before it disappeared- the first legionary, Lucius Circumbendibus who now owns a wheel manufacturing business, the second legionary, Marcus Carniverus who worked at a health resort before going on to open a restaurant called The Boar in Wine (Much to Obelix's annoyance when they learn that they have spent days at the resort trying to find Carniverus undercover for nothing), and the drunken Centurion Crapulus who is still in the army-, and fighting the Roman search parties who are following the same trail. It eventually leads them back to Winesandspirix, for he was the tavern keeper the Roman centurion originally gave the shield to. Winesandspirix confesses that he does not have the shield any more, as he gave it as a comfort to a Gaulish warrior who was trying to drown his sorrows in wine after having witnessed Vercingetorix's defeat. Right after Winesandspirix explains how he originally ran away from home after Asterix and Obelix left out of shame at giving away something so important and just came back to confess, the Gaulish warrior appears. This Gaulish warrior actually turns out to be chief Vitalstatistix- who returns to the group now significantly thinner than before-, who, as it turns out, has had the shield with him all along! Asterix, Obelix, Dogmatix, Vitalstatistix and Winesandspirix organise a Gaulish (instead of Roman) triumph on Vercingetorix's shield, much to the surprise of Vapus and his troops. As a further twist of fate, Caesar himself arrives to check on Vapus's progress, and seeing the results (They get black because of being covered in charcoal dust as they always the charcoal cellar in Winesanspirix's tavern), he punishes Vapus by sending him and his troops to Numidia. As an added measure, Caesar promotes Centurion Crapulus to Officer commanding the garrison of Gergovia and Legionary Pusillanimus to Centurion- on the grounds that they are the only clean legionaries present, despite them both being drunk- and orders them to keep the whole incident a secret, Crapulus assuring Caesar that they will remain on good terms with the local wine merchants. The Gauls return to their village (Vitalstatistix regaining his original weight from having banquets at the inns they visited earlier in the story) and have their traditional, huge feast — without Vitalstatistix this time, however, for his wife has something to say about his intention to eat well again and put the shield to an offensive rather than defensive use! |
Z for Zachariah | Robert C. O'Brien | 1,975 | Ann Burden's diary begins on Monday, May 20. After living alone for a year and believing herself the last survivor of a nuclear war, Ann fears that a stranger approaching her valley might be a killer or enslave her. She hides in a cave to judge his character first from a distance, not revealing herself even to warn him against bathing in a dead stream. However, when he then sickens, Ann’s fear of being alone forever moves her to help him. The stranger is John R. Loomis, a chemist with Cornell University who helped a Nobel-winning professor design radiation-proof plastic and a prototype “safe-suit.” After three months in an underground lab near Ithaca, New York, he spent seven months searching unsuccessfully for other survivors. Then he headed west, finding Burden Valley after walking through dead lands for ten weeks. During the first stage of Loomis's illness, Ann enjoys his company and feels optimistic about their future. He tells Ann how to pump gas manually and begins plans for a hydroelectric generator. Soon, Ann hopes for a church wedding in the spring; and, while plowing on June 2, she recites Edna St. Vincent Millay’s poem "Epitaph for the Race of Man," happy they can keep humanity from dying. She wishes she had warned Loomis about the poisoned stream. As Loomis’s condition worsens, he has disturbing nightmares about shooting a coworker, Edward, who tried to take the safe-suit to find his family. Though aware Loomis may have acted in self-defense and intended to find other survivors, Ann thinks his journey west suggests selfish motives. After nearly dying, Loomis speaks again on June 8 and says Ann’s companionship saved him. But during his recovery over the next two weeks, Ann worries when he plans for their future in the valley and sometimes scolds her—for neglecting farm work and wanting to use the safe-suit to get books. When he says on June 19 that they must start a colony together, Ann is uneasy despite her similar hopes earlier. By June 23, Ann thinks of Loomis as a murderer and fears that his horrible experiences have damaged his mind. She then becomes very nervous when, after she asks if he ever married, Loomis grabs her hand and demands to know her intentions. She feels sure he is trying to control her possessively, just as he “controlled” her farm work, the suit, and Edward. In the next few days, Ann sees more disturbing signs in Loomis's behavior, such as when she reads aloud Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice but he doesn’t seem to listen. On the night of June 27–28, Ann thinks her fears are validated when Loomis tries to get in bed with her while she lies quiet, assuming he believes she is asleep. Ann flees and, after getting store supplies, returns to her cave hideout. Over the next few days, seeing Loomis sometimes use her family’s dog, Faro, to practice tracking her, Ann feels she is in “a game of move-countermove” that only Loomis wants to play and only he can win. Worrying also about neglected farm work, on July 1 Ann talks to Loomis to suggest a “compromise” of sharing the valley and farm work while living separate lives. Loomis does not understand why Ann won’t return to her house, but he accepts her demands because he has no choice. He only hopes she will change her mind and “act more like an adult.” For about ten days, Ann thinks her system of living separately is working. Though it is inconvenient and she worries about spending winter in the cave, she assumes there is nothing else she can do. She wishes Loomis had never come to the valley. Around July 10, Loomis denies Ann access to the tractor and the store, warning her that she must forgo many conveniences if she continues her “stupidity” of staying away. Ann guesses he is trying to force her to return or he has a “compulsion for taking charge of things” as part of long-term planning. Deciding for the first time to talk with him to learn his intentions, Ann realizes she might be causing his behavior by denying companionship, and she thinks it sensible to offer to talk sometimes. However, when she goes to the house, Loomis tries to wound her by shooting from a window. He then tracks Ann to her cave, where he burns all her belongings and takes one of her guns. Ann is forced to hide in the wilderness nursing a bullet-grazed ankle, which becomes infected. Over the next several days, she develops a fever and begins dreaming of another valley where children are waiting for a teacher. Believing her dreams are true and Loomis is insane, Ann plans to steal the safe-suit and leave the valley. This will also be her revenge for the burning of her favorite book. For a couple of weeks, Loomis focuses on farm work and preparations for winter while Ann lives miserably, scrounging for food. One day, he tries to lure Ann to the store to attempt again to wound and incapacitate her; but Ann tricks him in turn, leading him into a trap she planned for killing Faro. After Ann fires a warning shot, Loomis is surprised she still has a gun and flees, releasing Faro. The dog then swims across Burden Creek to reach Ann and dies the next day of radiation sickness. In planning to kill Faro, Ann feels she is “as much a murderer as Mr. Loomis.” Believing Loomis has forced her into action, on August 7 Ann takes the offensive by leaving a message that she will talk about returning if he meets her unarmed. When he surprisingly leaves his gun to meet her in good faith, Ann steals his safe-suit and cart. While carrying out her plan, she remembers sadly her hopes they would save humanity together. Ann then waits on Burden Hill for a last meeting with Loomis, who arrives on the tractor enraged, ignores a warning shot, and threatens to kill her if she doesn’t return the suit. However, when Ann accuses him of killing Edward the same way, revealing what he said during his sickness, Loomis suddenly becomes dispirited and passive. When Ann declares she has no choice because of refusing to be his prisoner, Loomis replies in fright and bewilderment, “It’s wrong,” and begs her not to leave him there alone. Finally, in admittedly childish manner, Ann blames Loomis because he never thanked her for nursing him. As she walks away expecting to be shot in the back, Loomis calls out that he once saw birds circling to the west. She then keeps walking for most of the night until, exhausted, she lies down without setting up the protective tent. The story ends uncertainly. Awaking late the next morning, Ann continues west beside a dead stream, hoping to see green on the horizon. |
Green Mansions | William Henry Hudson | null | Prologue: An unnamed narrator tells how he befriended an old "Spanish" gentleman who never spoke of his past. Piqued, the narrator finally elicits the story. Venezuela, c. 1840. Abel, a young man of wealth, fails at a revolution and flees Caracas into the uncharted forests of Guyana. Surviving fever and hostile Indian attacks, failing at journal-keeping and gold hunting, he settles in an Indian village to waste away his life: playing guitar for old Cla-Cla, hunting badly with Kua-Ko, telling stories to the children. After some exploring, Abel discovers an enchanting forest where he hears a strange bird-like singing. His Indian friends avoid the forest because of its evil spirit-protector, "the Daughter of the Didi." Persisting in the search, Abel finally finds Rima the Bird Girl. She has dark hair, a smock of spider webs, and can communicate with birds in an unknown tongue. When she shields a coral snake, Abel is bitten and falls unconscious. Abel awakens in the hut of Nuflo, an old man who protects his "granddaughter" Rima, and won't reveal her origin. As Abel recovers, Rima leads him through the forest, and Abel wonders about her identity and place of origin. Abel returns to the Indians, but relations become icy, because they would kill Rima, if they could. Rima often speaks of her dead mother, who was always depressed. Abel falls in love with Rima, but she (17 and a stranger to white men) is confused by "odd feelings". This relationship is further strained because Abel cannot speak her unknown language. Atop Ytaiao Mountain, Rima questions Abel about "the world" known and unknown, asking him if she was unique and alone. Abel sadly reveals that it is true. However, when he mentions the storied mountains of Riolama, Rima perks up. It turns out that "Riolama" is her real name. Nuflo must know where Riolama is, so a wroth Rima demands Nuflo to guide her to Riolama under threats of eternal damnation from her sainted mother. Old, guilty and religious, Nuflo caves in to the pressure. Abel pays a last visit to the Indians, but they capture him as a prisoner, suspecting that he is a spy for an enemy tribe or consorts with demons. Abel manages to escape and return to Rima and Nuflo. The three then trek to distant Riolama. Along the way, Nuflo reveals his past, and Rima's origin. Seventeen years ago, Nuflo led bandits who preyed on Christians and Indians. Eventually, forced to flee to the mountains, they found a cave to live in. Hiding in the cave was a strange woman speaking a bird-like language. She was to be Rima's mother (never named). Nuflo assumed the woman was a saint sent to save his soul. Nuflo left the bandits and carried Rima's mother, now crippled for life, to Voa, a Christian community, to deliver Rima. Rima and her mother talked in their magical language for seven years, until Mother wasted away in the dampness and died. As contrition, Nuflo brought Rima to the drier mountains. The local Indians found her queer, and resented how she chased off game animals, and therefore tried to kill her. A mis-shot dart killed an Indian, and they fled Rima's "magic". In the cave, Rima is eager to enter Riolama valley. Abel reveals sad news: her mother left because nothing remained. She belonged to a gentle, vegetarian people without weapons, who were wiped out by Indians, plague and other causes. Rima is indeed unique and alone. Rima is saddened but suspected it: her mother was always depressed. Now she decides to return to the forest and prepare a life for herself and Abel. She flits away, leaving Abel to fret as he and Nuflo walk home, delayed by rain and hunger. They return to find the forest silent, Nuflo's hut burned down, and Indians hunting game. Abel, exhausted, is again taken prisoner, but isn't killed, as he quickly makes a vow to go to war against the enemy tribe. On the war trail, he drops hints about Rima and her whereabouts. Kua-Ko explains how, thanks to Abel's "bravery", the Indians dared enter the forbidden forest. They caught Rima in the open, chased her up the giant tree. They heaped brush underneath it and burned Rima. Abel kills Kua-Ko and runs to the enemy tribe, sounding the alarm. Days later he returns. All his Indian friends are dead. He finds the giant tree burned, and collects Rima's ashes in a pot. Trekking homeward, despondent and hallucinating, Abel is helped by Indians and Christians until he reaches the sea, sane and healthy again. Now an old man, his only ambition is to be buried with Rima's ashes. Reflecting back, he believes neither God nor man can forgive his sins, but that gentle Rima would, provided he has forgiven himself. |
Blade Runner 4: Eye and Talon | K. W. Jeter | 2,000 | The story follows Iris, another Blade Runner, on an assignment to find Tyrell's owl, which seems to have special importance for the Tyrell Corporation and other dubious organizations. |
Mr Standfast | John Buchan, 1st Baron Tweedsmuir | 1,919 | Dick Hannay, under forty and already a successful Brigadier-General with good prospects of advancement, is called out of uniform by his old comrade, spymaster Sir Walter Bullivant, and sent to Fosse Manor in the Cotswolds to receive further instructions. He must pose as a South African, an objector to the war, and once more takes on the name Cornelius Brand (an Anglicisation of the name he had used on his adventures in Germany in Greenmantle). He is upset by the idea of such a pose, but comforted by thoughts of his friend Peter Pienaar, briefly a successful airman and now a prisoner in Germany, and by the beauty of the Cotswold countryside. At Fosse, he meets two middle-aged spinsters, their cousin Launcelot Wake, a conscientious objector, and their niece Mary Lamington, a girl whose prettiness had struck Hannay earlier, while visiting a shell-shocked friend in the hospital where she works. It emerges that she is his contact, but she can tell him little more than that he must immerse himself in the world of pacifists and objectors, picking up "atmosphere". She gives him a label to paste inside his watch, an address where he will be staying, and advises him to pick up a copy of Pilgrim's Progress. Hannay heads to Biggleswick, a small town full of artists and writers. He buries himself in their pacifist community, attending meetings at a local hall, and meets Moxon Ivery, a local bigwig who seems vaguely familiar; he also sees Mary about the place. He hears of his old comrade John Blenkiron, and one day the American appears at one of the town's meetings; he passes a message to Hannay, arranging to meet in London. Blenkiron reveals that he has been hard at work for some time, around the world and undercover around England, on the track of a huge network of German spies and agents, with their head somewhere in Britain, leaking vital information to the enemy. He believes Ivery to be the spider at the centre of the web, but cannot prove it, and wants to use Ivery to feed misinformation to the Germans. He tells Hannay to try and head for Scotland and an American called Gresson, as he believes the information is being sent that way. Hannay goes to Glasgow, and contacts a trade union man named Amos, through whom he moves into Gresson's circles. He speaks at a meeting which descends into violence, and finds himself in at Gresson's side in a street fight. He saves the day, but makes an enemy of a big Fusilier named Geordie Hamilton. He later learns that Gresson makes regular boat trips up the coast, and plans to tag along. He rides the foul boat, but realises he needs a passport to go all the way north, and must follow it on shore, dodging the law. He has a hint from his contact that a mine at a place called Ranna may be what he seeks, and hears the boat stops at an iron mine, so he resolves to head that way. He leaves the boat and treks inland, but soon finds he is wanted by the law, and is caught by some soldiers. He claims to be a soldier too, and their Colonel takes him home with him, to meet his son to check his story; the son confirms all Hannay's army knowledge, and suspicions are allayed. He moves on, staying overnight with peasants, making his way onto Skye and towards Ranna. Arriving there, he meets Amos, who goes to fetch supplies, and sees the boat and Gresson, who meets a stranger on the hill. Hannay tracks the foreign-looking stranger, who Hannay describes as 'The Portuguese Jew', to a rocky bay, where the man disappears for a time before heading back. Hannay stays there overnight, and next morning fetches his provisions and searches the beach, finding the deep water of the bay ideal for submarines. He finds a hidden cave, and while preparing to lay in wait there sees Launcelot Wake climbing in. They fight and Hannay ties the other man up, but they soon realise they are on the same side. They stake out the cave, and in the night the man Hannay followed returns, meeting with a German from the sea; they exchange pass-phrases, and Hannay sees the hiding place they plan to use to pass messages. Wake identifies some of their talk as extracts from Goethe, and is sent back with messages for Amos and Bullivant, while Hannay ponders the phrases he overheard - Bommaerts, Chelius, Elfenbein ('Ivory', homophone of 'Ivery'), Wild Bird and Caged Bird. He heads for home, but Amos warns him the police are still after him, and gives him a new disguise, as a travelling bookseller. On the way south he takes up with another salesman, a man named Linklater who Amos had seen with Gresson. In a small town, Hannay is recognised by Geordie Hamilton, the big soldier he fought with in Glasgow, and flees once more with half the town, including Linklater, on his tail. He hides out in a troop train heading south; he gets off when it stops, is seen by Linklater, but at the station hooks up with his old pal Archie Roylance, a pilot who flies him on southwards. The plane breaks down, and Hannay, still pursued, flees afoot once more, upsetting a film set, stealing a bicycle and making his way into another town. On the verge of capture, his watch is stolen, and he is dragged of the streets by a man who recognises the badge he carries there; he is given a soldier's outfit and sent on his way. He arrives in London in the midst of an air raid; in a tube station he sees Ivery, the spymaster's guard down in fear, and Hannay finally recognises him as one of the "Black Stone" men he had tangled with in The Thirty-Nine Steps. Hurrying to tell his colleagues, he is arrested as a deserter and delayed. He eventually gets word through to Macgillivray at Scotland Yard, but his enemy has two hours start and evades capture. Hannay is encouraged by a letter from Peter Pienaar, and at a meeting with Bullivant, Blenkiron and Mary, he pushes for them to hound the man down. They discuss the clues Hannay overheard on the beach, and Ivery's fear of the bombing, and Mary reveals that Ivery has proposed to her. Hannay returns to the war in Europe for several months. He finds Geordie Hamilton, and employs him as his batman; he runs into Launcelot Wake, working as a support labourer behind the lines; he sees several adverts in English and German newspapers, which he suspects may be some kind of coded communication. Hamilton reports having seen Gresson in a party of touring visitors, and Hannay learns he had stayed behind in a small village for a time; he later hears a story of mysterious goings-on at a chateau near the same village. Flying with Archie Roylance on a reconnoitre, they get lost in fog and land near the chateau in question, where Hannay sees a mysterious old woman in a gas mask. Finding the castle is in a vital strategic spot, he returns to investigate, and learns the place is leased by a man named Bommaerts, one of the words he had overheard on the beach in Skye. Sneaking into the house at night, he finds Mary there too, and learns she has seen Ivery, now calling himself Bommaerts, who is in love with her. They find anthrax powder and a newspaper with one of the adverts deciphered, and then Ivery arrives. Confronted by Hannay, he flees, and Hannay shoots after him; the chateau burns down. A few days later, in January 1918, Hannay is withdrawn from the front for more special duties. Blenkiron gives dinner for Hannay and Mary, now engaged, where he learns that the newspaper advert scam has been broken up and its operatives, led by Gresson, arrested. Blenkiron has found a second code in the messages, used by Ivery and his masters, and has identified Ivery as the Graf von Schwabing, a former high-flyer unseated by scandal. He hears of the Wild Birds, a ruthless and deadly band of German spies, of whom Ivery is a leading member, and learns that they plan to head to Switzerland to pin Ivery down, using Mary as bait. Hannay makes his way south to Switzerland, where he poses as an injured Swiss, servant to the crippled Peter Pienaar, who has been released there. The two catch up, swap stories, and await instructions, keeping an eye on the nearby Pink Chalet, believed to be the base of the Wild Birds. Finally receiving Blenkiron's instructions, Hannay goes one night to the chalet, where he meets his contact, but is betrayed and taken prisoner by von Schwabing. The German tells Hannay he plans to capture Mary too, and send them both back to Germany to deal with at his pleasure, while the German army attacks and crushes their enemies. Von Schwabing leaves him pinned in an ancient rack, but he breaks free. He runs into the man he followed across Skye, and, using the pass-phrases he overheard there, poses as a conspirator. He is provided with a car and chases after von Schwabing, sending Peter to alert the others. After a long drive through the mountains, he crashes the car and runs the rest of the way, but arrives to find Mary already gone and Launcelot Wake waiting for him. Learning that von Schwabing is returning to the chalet the long way, they resolve to head over the mountains on foot, cutting out much of the road. Wake, an experienced mountaineer, leads a tough climb through snow and ice, exhausting himself in the process. Hannay drags him to the safety of a cottage, then continues by train and again on foot. He arrives at the house, and staggers in, to see von Schwabing gloating over Blenkiron, who appears to have walked into the same trap Hannay had the night before. However, Blenkiron was warned by Hannay's message, and has the house in his command; Geordie Hamilton and Amos emerge and take von Schwabing prisoner. At Hannay's suggestion, von Schwabing is sent to the front to see battle, while the others head to Paris, just as the Germans begin a mighty attack. As they near the front, they hear the defenses are crumbling beneath the onslaught, with Hannay's men at the heart of things. He resumes his command, and holds a thin line against the German advance, with Wake running messages for him, Blenkiron engineering the reserve trenches and Mary nursing in a nearby hospital. Amos and Hamilton guard von Schwabing, whose mind has gone strange. A long and hard battle ensues, in the course of which Wake dies heroically, von Schwabing runs into No Man's Land and is shot by his countrymen, and Blenkiron joins the fray with a party of Americans. At the last, with reinforcements due any moment, a party of German planes overflies Hannay's position, and are sure to bear news of the weak point if allowed to return; British planes fly against them, but one, flown by flying ace Lensch, evades them. Peter Pienaar, flying Archie Roylance's plane despite his bad leg, flies into him, bringing him down and killing himself in the process, but the day is saved. |
Limes inferior | Janusz Zajdel | 1,982 | The hero, Adi Cherryson, also known as Sneer (named after one of Zajdel's fellow science fiction writers Adam Wiśniewski-Snerg), is a lifter who "helps" people cheat during the computer controlled IQ exams by giving them the correct answers through a micro-radio communicator or taking the exam for them. Sneer, who is officially only a level 4, could easily become the top level 0, but he prefers his medium level which doesn't attract much attention. In addition to lifters a whole gallery of black market figures is presented - there are downers (who use their low IQ to provide realistic 'stupid' answers for those who want to keep their class artificially low like Sneer), chameleons (black market point dealers), key-makers (providing all sorts of illegal, special purpose Keys). The story starts when Sneer is questioned by an undercover police agent on the street and unintentionally reveals his intelligence by his answers (or so Sneer thinks). As a result a few hours later his Key is locked and he is told to report to a testing station for an IQ test. Knowing that in such situation "electro-hipnosis" is used to prevent subjects from hiding their true intelligence he solicits help of a "downer". He finds a suitable specialist through another "lifter" - Karl Pron. He goes to the testing station with the "downer", who takes his Key and goes inside leaving Sneer waiting outside. A few minutes later Sneer sees the "downer" arrested. Without his Key he faces the reality of not having a shelter and being able to even find anything to eat without points. Wandering through the city he sees some of the misery of life in Agroland he didn't notice before. Finally, he meets mysterious Alice who gives him shelter and some mysterious clues about a singer and a song about the lake Tibigan. In the morning he meets the "downer" and learns how he secured his release through a ruse - he reported Sneer's Key as found on the street. Sneer goes to the central Police station and retrieves his Key, but the experience makes him uncomfortable and he starts to look at his world in a different way. He visits his parents and an old friend, a doctor, revealing to the reader the history of this world and some further facts about it. He also tries to listen to the song Alice told him about and discovers that theoretical freedom of press is in fact a fiction as some songs etc. can be prohibited. Meanwhile Sneer is hired by a government official (a 'zero') to monitor the scientific lab dealing with Keys - The Key Institute. Working undercover as a doorman Sneer discovers to his amazement that the Key Institute that should know everything about the Keys having designed them is in fact studying them as if they were an alien object. Meanwhile his "lifter" friend Karl Pron tests a new counterfeited Key, which gives the owner an unlimited amount of points. This Key was ordered by the group of '0's - who in fact work in the lab on which Sneer is now spying upon. When Sneer obtains the super Key he is taken to the meeting with top officials of the local government - where he learns that the social system of 'Argoland' is in fact an experiment imposed upon the humanity by the Aliens. The 'over-zeroes' form a ruling class, which suppresses dissent fearful of the Aliens but permits all kinds of irregularities which they see as preserving the human nature of people. The end is largely mystical but it suggests that with the help of Alice Sneer succeeds in saving the humanity, though it is not clear exactly how he achieves that. |
Paradyzja | Janusz Zajdel | null | Paradyzja (from "paradise") is the story about the human colony on a space station orbiting a distant and mineral rich star system. The colony is controlled by a totalitarian regime. All human activity is tracked by electronic devices. It had been primarily devised as a ring, in which the gravity force is simulated by the centrifugal force exerting upon all objects inside a ring tube in the direction opposite to the centre of the ring. This space station was built accidentally. The expedition had to settle on planet Tartar in order to live there and exploit the natural goods. But general Cortazar, the leader of settlers, decided that Tartar was not suitable for settling because of a lack of good conditions for living, so the living place had to be built as a space station on the Tartar's orbit. On Paradise, living rooms are made of transparent material and to get to some of them you have to pass through other living rooms. Personal watches are not allowed, there; the only clocks are those in living rooms. Rinah Devi's first impression is that all people strictly adhere to the regime law, but then he discovered that they had devised various ways to work around the system. One of them is "the only language of truth" - Koalang, an artificial poetic language invented by the inhabitants of Paradise in order to cheat the electronic eavesdropping system. The government and the safety service is trying to suppress every possible knowledge of physics, which could allow a verification of the statements about what Paradise is as presented to Paradisians. That is why every research in physics is blocked, especially every research about Coriolis force. The main hero discovered this, when he was trying to check whether the forces really differ on every floor: all things that would be used to make such an experiment (even such as a spring from his ballpen) have been taken from him by the customs officers and no other things that would make such a simple experiment possible are accessible. Then he discovers that minutes on clocks in living rooms are not equal in length. Finally, he finds out that Paradise is not a ring-tube space station, but a train of buildings lying on the surface of Tartar planet. In addition, Tartar is a planet quite well suitable for settlement and the group in charge built some buildings and gardens for itself, keeping the majority of settlers in the fictional Paradise and making them believe that it was an artificial planet. |
The Commodore | C. S. Forester | 1,945 | Having achieved fame and financial security, Captain Sir Horatio Hornblower has married Lady Barbara Leighton (née Wellesley) and is preparing to settle down to unaccustomed life as the squire of Smallbridge in Kent. He still yearns to serve at sea and accepts with alacrity when the Admiralty puts him in command of a squadron and sends him on a diplomatic and military mission to the Baltic. His primary aim is to bring Russia into the war against Napoleon. Hornblower is shown dealing with the problems of squadron command, and using naval mortars (carried on special ships known as bomb vessels) to destroy a French prize. This leads to the French invasion of Swedish Pomerania. Later his squadron calls at Kronstadt, where he meets with Russian officials, including Tsar Alexander I, who is favourably impressed by Hornblower and his squadron. After Russia enters the war, Hornblower's squadron takes an important role in the defence of Riga, which is besieged by French forces. The bomb vessels again take an important role, and so do amphibious operations under the protection of the squadron. The siege is finally broken, and Hornblower joins the pursuit of the French armies on horseback, only to fall seriously ill with typhus. During the siege and pursuit, Carl von Clausewitz, a German officer in Russian service, who is later to become famous as a military theorist and writer, is a character. The novel occasioned some controversy when it was published. It appeared as a serial in the Saturday Evening Post, and Hornblower, in an implied sexual encounter with a (married) Russian Countess, was the Posts first adulterer. As Forester says in his Hornblower Companion, "...it really caused quite a flutter". Forester wanted to give Hornblower the opportunity to catch typhus, although he does comment that he believes that Hornblower caught typhus during the siege rather than in bed. This book shows Hornblower's contrary character more strongly than many preceding books in the series. In particular, he is shown to be unable to be happy or self-satisfied in spite of accomplishments highly valued by others, including both professional and personal success. It also shows a growth of paternal feeling by Hornblower toward junior officers. The historical accuracy of this book is limited: Forester later wrote that he did not know what British naval forces, if any, were engaged at the siege of Riga. (Historically they were commanded by Thomas Byam Martin.) The date of publication (1945) reveals Forester's preoccupation in The Commodore—he parallels the political situation with that in the second world war. In both cases, Russia was originally allied with a continental dictator (Hitler/Napoleon) but changed sides after being treacherously invaded. In both cases Sweden remained neutral and traded with both sides. Russia similarly occupied other Baltic territories (Finland, Lithuania etc.) raising doubts about the correct response among the British government. In The Commodore (but not in the real Napoleonic period), as in the second world war, the RN offered substantial help to Russia: at the siege of Riga, and by guarding the Arctic convoys. Less obviously, Forester draws parallels between the early 19th century and his own time in one or two of the other Hornblower novels. |
Lord Hornblower | C. S. Forester | 1,946 | Hornblower alters the appearance of his own vessel, the Porta Coeli, so it can masquerade as the mutinous vessel. As dusk falls, he follows a valuable blockade runner into port, pretending to be the Flame. Then, once the two vessels are moored, he captures it and takes it out to sea. He then pursues the Flame, which retreats to the French port. Believing the mutineers responsible, the French send four gunboats to take her. Hornblower manages to exploit the fighting to capture both the Flame and a gunboat. Among the French prisoners is Lebrun, the young and ambitious assistant to the mayor of Le Havre. Lebrun asks to speak with Hornblower privately; he proposes to surrender Le Havre to the English fleet. Hornblower and Lebrun arrange a plan: Lebrun's role is to undermine those parties who would resist a British seizure of the city. Overcoming some tense moments with audacity, Hornblower is able to capture the city with a half battalion of Royal Marines and finds himself its military governor. Hornblower finds his new duties different from that of commanding a naval vessel or squadron. He finds his role demanding, in part because he is such a demanding perfectionist. The Duke of Angoulême, one of the heirs to the Bourbon dynasty, is sent to assume control of the civil leadership. Hornblower hears that Napoleon has been able to amass a strong force, to be transported by barge down the Seine to retake Le Havre. He sends a force, borne by half a dozen large ship's boats, to try to blow up the barges and ammunition. He puts his best friend, Captain William Bush, in command. The raid is a success and the French force is stopped, but an unexpected explosion kills most of the British, including Bush. Hornblower is raised to the peerage, possibly in part to provide him with more dignity, gravitas, when dealing with the French heir's entourage, as well to reward him for his accomplishments. During the following peace, Hornblower's wife Barbara accompanies her brother, the Duke of Wellington, to the Congress of Vienna, leaving Hornblower at loose ends. He decides to visit the Comte de Gracay, where he resumes his relationship with the Comte's widowed daughter-in-law, Marie. When Napoleon escapes from Elba and raises a new army, Hornblower, the Comte and Marie lead a guerrilla fight against the Imperial forces. They are eventually defeated, and Marie dies from a leg wound. Hornblower and the Comte are captured and condemned to death, but news of the Emperor's defeat at the Battle of Waterloo arrives just in time to save their lives. sv:Lord Hornblower |
The Thirteen-Gun Salute | Patrick O'Brian | 1,989 | Immediately following The Letter of Marque, the narrative picks up with Jack Aubrey getting the Surprise underway for a mission to South America. Upon reaching Lisbon, however, Dr Maturin is intercepted by Sir Joseph Blaine and told that he and Aubrey will be required to first go on a mission to the Sultan of Pulo Prabang, a (fictictious) piratical Malay state in the South China Sea. They are to transport Fox, the envoy who will lead the mission to persuade the Sultan to become an English rather than French ally. The French are being openly assisted by the same English traitors - Wray and Ledward - who were responsible for Aubrey's former disgrace. With the Surprise now commanded by Captain Pullings, they return with Blaine to England where Jack Aubrey is reinstated with his former seniority as a Post-Captain in the Royal Navy by Lord Melville, First Lord of the Admiralty. He is also given command of the recently captured French ship Diane for the mission ahead. Fatefully, the Diane is the very ship Jack Aubrey had just captured from the French and which had secured his reinstatement, along with appointment to Parliament as member from Milport. Captain Aubrey's orders to the Diane are mentioned as occurring in the "fifty-third year" of the reign of King George III, thus fixing the year at around 1813 which, due to the mental illness of the king, was the third year of the Regency. A recurring sub-plot is the hostility between the Regent (later George IV) and his brother, the Duke of Clarence (later William IV), a patient and ally of Stephen Maturin. This hostility was, in part, responsible for the delay in re-instating Captain Aubrey to the Navy List and it was appointment to Parliament that tipped the scales. Stephen's work keeps him undercover as a naturalist as he engages in a political duel for influence at the Sultan's court. Although his activities are to go unknown, they prove to be invaluable in both undermining the French efforts and finally exacting his revenge on his enemies, the French agents, Ledward and Wray. Ledward is caught in bed with Abdul, a boy who is the Sultan's cupbearer and catamite, the Sultan having pederast tendencies, though married and fathering a son by his queen. Abdul is gruesomely executed in a bizarre sanctioned execution via "peppering," in which a bag of pepper is placed over the head. The executioners, often the victim's family, then beat the bag, resulting in inhalation of the pepper and painful asphyxiation. Wray and Ledward are banished from the court for their indiscretions, effectively ending the French mission. Wray tries to change sides in exchange for protection but he and Ledward are later assassinated. Maturin dissects their bodies with a fellow natural philosopher and intelligence agent, the Dutchman van Buren. After a long drunken feast, at which Fox and his retinue behave grossly, the Diane makes for Batavia and to rendezvous with the Surprise off the False Natunas. Fox behaves with increasing arrogance during the return voyage, the success of the treaty having gone to his head. Jack has words with him, Stephen turns against him for his incivility, and the rest of crew of the Diane loathe him. One night the frigate strikes a hidden reef and her captain and crew are shipwrecked on a desert island. Fox and his colleagues decide to sail for Batavia in Dianes pinnace, but are caught in a typhoon and presumed killed. During the same typhoon, the marooned Diane is destroyed but Aubrey's crew are able to begin to build a fair-sized schooner from what remains of the frigate - her starboard bow and hull. The title refers to the honour, a thirteen-gun salute, that is due to Fox as an official envoy and representative of the King. |
Asterix and the Black Gold | null | null | The book begins with Asterix and Obelix hunting wild boar. One boar is worried, but the other tells him they will escape the Gauls. The Gauls start chasing the boars, but one boar, however, is crafty and leads them straight into a Roman patrol. As the boar predicted, the Gauls forget both the boars and beat the daylights out of the patrol instead. In the midst of the battle, the boars escape with their lives. Later in the story Asterix ponders on their constantly finding Roman patrols whenever they go boar-hunting. Back in Rome, Julius Caesar hears of this, thinks the Gauls are training wild boars to find Roman patrols, and is humiliated. He orders M. Devius Surreptitius, the head of the Roman Secret Service, to send an agent to infiltrate the Gauls. This agent is a Gaulish-Roman druid known as Dubbelosix, who travels in a folding chariot full of secret devices. Dubbelosix and Surreptitius communicate via a carrier fly. However it is revealed Surreptitius is plotting to overthrow Caesar and sends a self-destructing letter to Dubbelosix telling him they will rule together, though Dubbelosix says he will rule Rome himself. In the Gaulish village, Getafix is extremely frustrated and depressed, because he has run out of rock oil. Without rock oil, he can't make any more magic potion and the village will soon fall against the Romans. The next day, Ekonomikrisis the Phoenician merchant arrives in Gaul. This cheers Getafix up, but he soon finds out that Ekonomikrisis forgot to bring any rock oil. This causes him to have a stroke, and chief Vitalstatistix tells Asterix and Obelix to fetch another druid to treat him. This druid turns out to be Dubbelosix who successfully revives Getafix with an alcoholic tonic. Asterix decides that the best thing to do would be for himself, Obelix and Dogmatix to go to Mesopotamia and bring back the rock oil. Dubbelosix insists on coming with them and they set off on Ekonomikrisis' ship. Along the way, they fight pirates and Roman warships, obviously winning each battle. But there's one thing that they don't know: Dubbelosix is sending covert messages to the Romans so they can prevent the Gauls from completing their quest. The Phoenician ship is finally able to land at Judea, where Asterix, Obelix, Dogmatix and Dubbelosix disembark and head for the city of Jerusalem. The Romans form a heavy presence in the city but some sympathising merchants help the Gauls to get in secretly in spite of an attempt by Dubbelosix to alert the city guards. Leaving the treacherous druid behind, Asterix and Obelix make contact with Ekonomikrisis' friend, Samson Alius who advises them to go to Babylon since all the rock oil in Jerusalem has been seized and destroyed by the Romans. The way to Babylon is across a huge desert, but in the middle of the desert, Asterix, Obelix and Dogmatix find a source of rock oil in the ground so they fill a waterskin with it and head back home. Since Caesar has all ports sealed off to prevent their escape, the two Gauls simply capture Caesar's personal galley — along with Surreptitius and Dubbelosix who have been awaiting the developments on board. However a message is sent to the Romans that makes them decide to attack the village, thinking they cannot make magic potion. Unfortunately, just before landing back in Gaul, Dubbelosix grabs hold of the waterskin of rock oil and, as he tries to force it open, Obelix, despite the objections of Asterix, leaps upon him, causing the waterskin to break open and send the oil into the sea; the first oil spill in recorded history. Asterix has lost all hope, but when they come back to the village, they find the Gauls fighting Romans as merrily as ever. It turns out that Getafix has been able to substitute beetroot juice for rock oil and thus produce more magic potion, it also tastes nicer. Asterix has a stroke when he realises that the journey has been for nothing. All ends well for the Gauls; at their usual celebratory feast the crafty boars comment that the holidays are over. The Gauls send the bound and gagged Dubbelosix and Surreptitius back to Caesar in a gift-wrapped box. Caesar sends them to the Circus Maximus as punishment for failure — with a new show added for a twist: they are covered in honey and chased by bees. |
The Book of Daniel | E. L. Doctorow | 1,971 | Writing his thesis ('The Book of Daniel') Daniel investigates the background to his parents' conviction and execution with his adoptive parents (the Lewins). The final dénouement is the revisiting, in flashback, of the death of his parents, and in due course the death from nervous disorder (and attempted suicide) of Daniel's sister. The novel closes with the library in which Daniel is working being closed by student unrest, and Daniel closing his work with a parody of lines from Chapter 12 of the Biblical Book of Daniel. The book is written in four parts, and in each Daniel is the principal narrator; the narrative moves fluidly and rapidly between 1967 ('the present') and flashback (to the late 40s/early 50s), and between first and third person:- :1. Memorial Day - Opens, in 1967, with Daniel, his young wife, Phyllis and baby Paul, walking to the sanatorium to see Susan; closes with the dropping of atom bomb in Japan :2. Halloween - closes with the lawyer, Ascher, telling Daniel and Susan of the forthcoming start of the Isaacsons' trial :3. Starfish - closes with Daniel's bruising involvement in an anti-draft march, whilst his sister (the starfish of the title) is lying dying from complications following her suicide attempt. : Daniel says with irony to Phyllis through broken teeth '...It looks worse than it is. There was nothing to it. It is a lot easier to be a revolutionary nowadays than it used to be.' :4 Christmas - recalls the closing moments of the trial, including the key evidence from their co-accused, Selig Mindish; Daniel's later search for, and discovery of Mindish, now senile, in Disneyland; and the funerals of Daniel's parents and his sister Susan. |
Nectar in a Sieve | Kamala Purnaiya Taylor | 1,954 | Married to a tenant farmer, Nathan, because her family can't afford the dowry for a better match, Rukmani must leave everything she has ever known and learn how to run a household by herself at the age of twelve. Nathan proves to be a tender, thoughtful husband and Rukmani soon comes to love him. Their first child, a daughter named Irawaddy, is born punctually; then six years pass with no more children. In a society where sons were what mattered most, Rukmani grows desperate. She seeks out the help of an English doctor, Kenny, who successfully treats her infertility. Rukmani eventually gives birth to six more children. Meanwhile, a tannery is built in the village and begins to take over the land. The system of trading, and the quiet way of life for the people who live there is quickly disrupted. Rukmani seems to be the only one who recognizes this as a danger, and stands alone in her protest against modernization. Irawaddy is married off to a well-placed young man; then Rukmani's two eldest sons leave her to go work at a tea plantation in faraway Ceylon. After several years Irawaddy, divorced by her husband because she is barren, returns home. The family endure a time of drought and famine, and Rukmani's third son, weak with hunger, is beaten to death while trying to steal a calfskin from the tannery. Her youngest son Kuti begins to starve. Irawaddy is forced to turn to prostitution so she can provide food for her baby brother. Despite the extra food, Kuti dies. Irawaddy becomes pregnant from the prostitution and gives birth to an albino boy. Eventually, the tannery officials buy the land Nathan has been farming for thirty years and evict him. With nowhere else to go, the couple travel by oxcart and on foot to a city, hoping to move in with one of their sons. The son, however, has gone no-one knows where. Completely destitute, they work as stonebreakers at a quarry in hopes of earning enough money to get home. There Nathan dies. Afterward, Rukmani returns to her home village accompanied by a resourceful street boy named Puli, who has lost his fingers to leprosy. She moves in with her daughter and her youngest son, who is now a doctor at the hospital Kenny has built. |
Last Exit to Brooklyn | Hubert Selby, Jr. | null | Last Exit to Brooklyn is divided into six parts that can, more or less, be read separately. Each part is prefaced with a passage from the Bible. * Another Day, Another Dollar: A gang of young Brooklyn hoodlums hang around an all-night cafe and get into a vicious fight with a group of US Army soldiers on leave. *The Queen Is Dead: Georgette, a transvestite hooker, is thrown out of the family home by her brother and tries to attract the attention of a hoodlum named Vinnie at a benzedrine-driven party. *And Baby Makes Three: An alcoholic father tries to keep good spirits and maintain his family’s marriage traditions after his daughter becomes pregnant and then marries a motorcycle mechanic. *Tralala: The title character of an earlier Selby short story, she is a young Brooklyn prostitute who makes a living propositioning sailors in bars and stealing their money. In perhaps the novel’s most notorious scene, she is gang-raped after a night of heavy drinking. *Strike: Harry, a machinist in a factory, becomes a local official in the union. A closeted homosexual, he abuses his wife and gets in fights to convince himself that he is a man. He gains a temporary status and importance during a long strike, and uses the union's money to entertain the young street punks and buy the company of drag queens. *Landsend: Described as a “coda” for the book, this section presents the intertwined, yet ordinary day of numerous denizens in a housing project. |
I, Jedi | Michael A. Stackpole | null | In I, Jedi, Corran Horn must develop his Jedi powers in order to save the life of his wife, Mirax Terrik. Corran Horn was a member of the elite X-wing force Rogue Squadron. After returning home from a long campaign to find his wife kidnapped, he turns to Luke Skywalker, the only remaining Jedi Master at the time, for help. This coincides nicely with the master's timing, as he is seeking students for his new Jedi Academy on Yavin 4. Corran knows that he is Force-sensitive, and that only with the Force as his ally can he track down his enemy. It turns out that Corran's wife, Mirax, was tracking down a group of elusive pirates known as the Invids. The Invids' primary tactic is to drop out of hyperspace with the flagship, an Imperial Star Destroyer named the Invidious, strike, and disappear with perfect timing. As she grew closer to solving the mystery of how these pirates performed their supernaturally accurate attacks, she was kidnapped and placed into stasis on their fortress planet. On the journey to save Mirax, Corran learns that his grandfather was a Jedi, a member of the Halcyon line. His adopted grandfather shows Corran the records that the Jedi had left behind, and with that, Corran eventually makes up his mind to follow in his ancestor's footsteps and become a Jedi. After extensive training and being caught in a crisis involving the risen spirit of the Dark Sith Lord Exar Kun, Corran goes as far as he can, and infiltrates the pirates using his CorSec training. He quickly rises through the ranks, and finds out where Mirax is being held. With the timely help of Luke Skywalker and his squadron friend and wingman, Ooryl Qrygg, he fights his way past the Jensaarai, a splinter group of Jedi who focus on stealth and premonition, and into the fortress, where he is able to rescue his wife. |
The Tale of Cross-eyed Lefty from Tula and the Steel Flea | Nikolai Leskov | 1,881 | Tsar Alexander I of Russia, while visiting England with his servant the Cossack Platov, is shown a variety of modern inventions. Platov keeps insisting that things in Russia are much better (embarrassing a guide at one point when he finds something that appears well made that turns out to be a Russian gun), until they are shown a small mechanical flea. After his ascension the next tsar, Nicolas I, orders Platov (after he tries to hide the flea) to find someone to outperform the English who had created the clockwork steel flea (as small as a crumb, and the key to wind it up can only be seen through a microscope). Platov travels to Tula to find someone to better the English invention. Three gunsmiths agree to do the work and barricade themselves in a workshop. Villagers try to get them to come out in various ways (for example by yelling "fire"), but no one can get them to come out. When Platov arrives to check on their progress, he has some Cossacks try to open the workshop. They succeed in getting the roof to come off, but the crowd is disgusted when the trapped smell of body odor and metal work comes out of the workshop. The gunsmiths hand Platov the same flea he gave them and he curses them, believing that they have done absolutely nothing. He ends up dragging Lefty with him in order to have someone to answer for the failure. The flea is given to the czar, to whom Lefty explains that he needs to look closer and closer at the flea to see what they have achieved. He winds it up and finds that it doesn't move. He discovers that, without any microscopes ("We are poor people"), Lefty and his accomplices managed to put appropriately-sized horseshoes (with the craftsmen's engraved signatures) on the flea (Lefty made the nails, which cannot be seen since they are so small), which amazes the tsar and the English (even though the flea now cannot dance as it used to). Lefty then gets an invitation and travels to England to study the English way of life and technical accomplishments. The English hosts try to talk him into staying in England, but he feels homesick and returns to Russia at the earliest opportunity. On the way back, he engages in a drinking duel with an English sailor, arriving in Saint Petersburg. The sailor is treated well, but Lefty, authorities finding no identification on him and believing him to be a common drunkard, send him off to a hospital for unknowns to die. The sailor, after sobering up, decides to find his new friend and with the aid of Platov they locate him. While dying (his head is smashed from being thrown onto the pavement), he tells them to tell the emperor to stop having their soldiers clean their muskets with crushed brick (after he sees a dirty gun in England and realizes it fires so well because they keep it oily). The message never arrives, however, because the man who had to inform the emperor never does. Leskov comments that the Crimean War may have turned out differently if he got the message. The story ends with Leskov commenting on the replacement of good, hard-earned labor and creativity with machines. This story is deeply embedded into Russian consciousness as an archetype of relationships between Russia and the West. The language of the story is unique; many of its folk-flavored neologisms and colloquialisms (very funny and natural, though mostly invented by Leskov) have become common sayings and proverbs. Ironically, both Slavophiles and Westernizers used the story in support of their views; indeed the story of Levsha may signify Russian ingenuity and craftsmanship that amaze the world, or it may just as well be used as a symbol of the oppressive Russian society that mistreats its most talented people. |
Runaway Horses | Yukio Mishima | 1,969 | Set between June 1932 and December 1933, it tells the story of young Isao Iinuma, a rightist reactionary trained in the samurai code by his father. Isao becomes the instigator of a plot to topple the zaibatsu that he feels have corrupted the Yamato-damashii and betrayed the will of the Emperor. He is assured of the army's assistance by the young Lieutenant Hori. They plan to assassinate many key government figures simultaneously on December 3, 1932. Shigekuni Honda, a character who figured prominently in Spring Snow, the first novel of the cycle, appears again here as a judge and later lawyer. He comes to believe that Isao is the reincarnation of Kiyoaki Matsugae, the aristocratic schoolfriend whose story was told in Spring Snow. Realising that Isao too seems to be hurtling towards a "picturesque" death, he makes strenuous efforts to save him without revealing this personal connection. It is just after the May 15 Incident of 1932. Shigekuni Honda, the law student from Spring Snow, is now a junior associate judge at the Osaka Court of Appeals. He is asked by Judge Sugawa to give an address at a kendo tournament on June 16 at the Ōmiwa Shrine in Sakurai, Nara Prefecture. At the tournament, the chief priest points out to him a promising athlete called Isao Iinuma. Honda realises that this is the son of Shigeyuki Iinuma, Kiyoaki's old tutor, now a right-wing "personality". After lunch, Honda climbs the sugi-clad Mount Miwa, and afterwards descends to Sanko Falls to bathe. Some of the kendoists are already there. Honda is startled to see that Isao has the same three moles on his side that Kiyoaki had, and remembers Kiyoaki's dying words: "I'll see you again. I know it. Beneath the falls." The next day, at the Saigusa Festival at Izagawa Shrine in Nara, Honda is introduced to Mr. Iinuma. He now runs an "Academy of Patriotism" and is slowly going to seed, morbidly talkative, his face "marked by the years and by the common tribulations." Honda invites him and his son to dinner that evening. Iinuma accepts, and responds by introducing Honda to the poet, retired Lt.-Gen. Kito, and his 30-year-old divorced daughter Makiko. Iinuma and his son leave for Tokyo after the dinner. Just before they go, Isao lends Honda a copy of his favourite book, The League of the Divine Wind by Tsunanori Yamao, and urges him to read it. "At the time of the... Imperial Restoration, the indications had been altogether favourable that the august wish of His Late Majesty Komei to expel the barbarians would be fulfilled. But clouds soon cut off the light of Heaven... swords were forbidden to the common people... it was decreed that samurai could cut off their topknot and that they might go without swords." In 1873, four samurai worship at Shingai Shrine in Kumamoto Prefecture, and then await the results of a divination performed by the priest Otaguro, the heir of the late, revered Oen Hayashi, whose 200 followers will come to be known as "the League of the Divine Wind". The proposals they have put to the gods are: "To bring an end to misgovernment by admonishing authority even to the forfeiture of life" and "to cut down the unworthy ministers by striking in darkness with the sword". Both return the response "Not propitious." In 1874, the proposal Otaguro puts is to take advantage of the vulnerability induced by the Saga Rebellion. Again, the Ukei rite returns "Not propitious." On 18 March 1876, the wearing of swords is prohibited. Harukata Kaya resigns as priest of Kinzan Shrine and presents a petition to the prefectural governor. In May, the rite of Ukei is performed by Otaguro, this time returning "Propitious." The others wish Kaya to join them in rebellion, but he is reluctant. A further rite convinces Kaya that it is his duty. On arriving at Kumamoto Castle on the night of 24 October 1876, the 200 warriors split into three units. The first attacks the residences of the major officials; Governor Yasuoka is killed. The second attacks the artillery battalion, with great success; the third attacks the infantry encampment, breaking down barrack doors and throwing in grenades. The tide turns when ammunition is found for the garrisoned troops, and when the second unit rushes to the aid of the third, it is entrapped, and both Kaya and Otaguro die. The next morning, on the 9th day of the 9th month (lunar calendar), 46 survivors gather on Mount Kinpo, less than four miles (6 km) west of Kumamoto Castle. The six boats intended for escape are stuck in tidal mud and it is debated what they should do. The seven youngest rebels are sent away with Tsuruda, and the rest descend to Chikozu beach. A scouting party returns with the report that a crackdown is underway and no further military action can be taken. Accordingly, the survivors split up. One by one they surrender or commit seppuku, and a detailed accounting is given of each man's end. The pamphlet concludes with a quotation from The Romance of the Divine Fire, a book written by a surviving rebel. Honda sends the book back with a letter that Isao reads when he arrives at school. In it, Honda expresses a new respect for the League, and for the forces of the irrational in general (influenced by his new belief in reincarnation, although that is a secret) and discusses the dead Kiyoaki and his passion for Satoko. However, he warns Isao that the tale of the League is "unsuitable" for him, and dangerous, and lectures him at length on the need for "the comprehensive picture offered by history." Isao concludes that Honda's "age and profession have turned him into a coward", but that the judge is still in some sense "a man of 'purity'." After school, Isao and two schoolfriends (Izutsu and Sagara) go to the boarding-house of a right-wing celebrity, Lieutenant Hori. (It is Kitazaki's—the same inn that appeared in Spring Snow.) Isao boldly announces his intention of organising a "Showa League" and voices extreme sentiments for which Hori expresses sympathy, although become tense when Isao asks direct questions about Hori's connections to men involved in the May 15 Incident. The three boys stay until 9pm, listening to him discuss current affairs. Isao lends him The League of the Divine Wind. On Sunday morning in July, Isao conducts a kendo practice for young boys in the drill hall of the neighbourhood police station. While a detective called Tsuboi talks to him, four Communists are brought to the prison, and Isao feels a stab of envy. Iinuma runs an "Academy of Patriotism" in a wing of his large house in Hongō. We learn about what happened to Iinuma and Miné between 1914 and 1932, and meet the 40-year-old student named Sawa. After Master Kaido's Sunday lecture, Isao shows his two schoolfriends a map of Tokyo, suggesting an air-raid on the areas he has coloured in purple. Later on they have dinner with Makiko at her house, and the four discuss who in Japan most deserves assassination. Isao names Kurahara. Makiko has kept the lilies Isao brought from Izagawa Shrine a month ago, and hands them one each. Isao visits Hori at the garrison. Hori expresses irritation with Isao's hot-headed talk. During kendo practice, he is impressed with Isao's abilities, and proposes taking him to an audience with Prince Harunori Toin, the military royal for whom Satoko had been intended. Baron Shinkawa gives a banquet at his villa in Karuizawa. Five couples sit and chat in his garden before dinner: the Matsugaes, the Shinkawas, the Kuraharas, the Matsudairas, and the Minister of State and his wife. They discuss current affairs in great detail, with prominence given to the personality and monetaristic opinions of Kurahara. We discover the fate of members of the Matsugae household. The Marquis Matsugae himself is humiliated by his insignificance, even by the fact he has no bodyguard. Isao has an audience with Prince Toin, against Iinuma's wishes. Hori and the Prince chat for a while; when the Prince criticises the nobility, Isao uses the opportunity to give him The League and to express his ideas about bushido. By this time, Isao has gathered 20 more boys into his circle, and Izutsu and Sagara have studied explosives. Two weeks before the end of summer vacation, he sends all the boys a telegram ordering them to return to Tokyo for a meeting at the school shrine at 6pm. All turn up and are stunned when Isao tells them it was only a drill; three leave. Isao then has the remaining boys swear vows of fealty. To Isao's surprise, Makiko turns up, and takes them all to dinner at a restaurant in Shibuya. Chapter 19 gives a description of the opening of a Noh play attended by Honda in Osaka, called Matsukaze. While watching the two ghostly women ladle seawater into their brine-cart, Honda suddenly decides that his grief for Kiyoaki has deceived him and that there could be no real connection between Kiyoaki and Isao. While hanging out his washing in October (on a certain Mr Koyama's 77th birthday), Sawa asks Isao if he can go with him and his "study group" to Master Kaido's training camp in the week starting on the 20 October. Isao makes no reply. Sawa, while serving him tea in his own room, starts to describe how three years ago Iinuma helped extort 50,000 yen from a newspaper and used his 10,000 yen share to bolster the Academy. Isao is disappointed, but not shocked until Sawa warns him, without explanation, that he cannot hurt Kurahara without betraying his father. Wondering if Kurahara is a secret patron of the Academy, Isao later returns to Sawa's room and demands an explanation. Sawa responds by begging to be allowed to kill Kurahara himself. But after hearing him out, Isao smilingly denies there is any plot. Honda hears an account of the coup d'état that took place in Siam on 24 June, during which the country became a constitutional monarchy controlled by Col. Phahon Phonphayuhasena. On Friday 21 October, Honda attends a judicial conference in Tokyo, and on Sunday goes with Iinuma to see Isao at the riverside training camp at Yanagawa. Isao is in trouble: he has taken offence at the bland Shintoism espoused by Master Kaido and gone out to kill an animal after having been ritually purified. When he accompanies the whole group as they look for Isao, Honda is startled to realise that one of the dreams in Kiyoaki's journal is now being acted out in detail. Isao holds a secret meeting on Monday evening and shows the other boys his elaborate plan for a "Shōwa Restoration" placing all government functions under the Emperor's control, through (1) destroying Tokyo's six electric transformer substations, (2) assassinating Shinkawa, Nagasaki and Kurahara, and (3) burning the Bank of Japan, events that would lead to the desired declaration of martial law, after which they would all commit seppuku. The plan mentions Hori and Prince Toin. They discuss details of the plot; Isao names December 3 at random as the date, and they receive an unexpected windfall of 1000 yen from Sawa, who claims he acquired the money by selling land. Honda visits Kiyoaki's grave before returning to Osaka. On November 7, Lieutenant Hori summons Isao and tells him he is being sent to Manchuria on November 15. When Hori suggests moving the date of the plot to this week, Isao realises that he has no intention of taking part. Hori suddenly urges Isao to give up the plot, and Isao pretends to be persuaded. At the group's secret headquarters (a rented house in Yotsuya Sumon) Isao tries to salvage the plan. Seyama, Tsujimura and Ui argue with Isao in private, and he dismisses them from the group. Within days, only 10 are left with Isao, and on November 12 they are joined by Sawa, who sets out a plan for the 12 of them to assassinate one capitalist each. Sawa is assigned Kurahara, and Isao is assigned Baron Shinkawa. Isao visits the Kitos one last time on November 29 to deliver a present of oysters, but Makiko follows him, guessing that he has resolved to die, and they kiss on a hill opposite Hakusan Park. Makiko promises to go to Ōmiwa Shrine at Sakurai and bring them each back a talisman the day before they go ahead. Isao does not admit they already each have one of her lily petals. The morning of December 1, the boy conspirators are at their hideout, discussing the daggers they have bought, when they are arrested by detectives. In the afternoon Sawa is arrested at the Academy. On reading about Isao in the newspaper, Honda resolves to save him, and resigns his judgeship to act as defence lawyer for Isao. In Tokyo, Iinuma thanks him, and then claims that it was he himself who informed the police, and that he did it to save his son from death. Prince Toin summons Honda to his house on December 30. The prince expresses sympathy for the twelve, but is horrified when Honda informs him that he was mentioned by name in the propaganda leaflets they prepared, and loses interest in helping them. Honda saves the situation by persuading him to lean on the Imperial Household Minister to have that part of the evidence suppressed. Isao is moved to Ichigaya Prison in late January, and a long prophetic dream is described. He learns that Honda will be defending him, and realises that he has awakened popular sympathy. During an interrogation he hears Communists being tortured, and asks why he is not tortured; the interrogator replies that as a rightist he has his heart in the right place. In June he receives a Saigusa Festival lily from Makiko, which she has gone all the way to Nara to pick. The trial opens on June 25. The evidence of the leaflets has been suppressed, and it becomes clear that Lt. Hori is unlikely to be indicted. At the second session on July 19, Isao boldly admits to planning the assassinations. Honda tries to fudge the issue by bringing up the purchase of the daggers and leading the witness Izutsu to admit that, as imitators of the League of Divine Wind, these weapons would be more appropriate for committing seppuku than for murder. The innkeeper Kitazaki is called as witness, and he says he heard Hori telling a lone visitor to "Give it up!" although he did not know to whom Hori was speaking. Pressed to identify the person, Kitazaki points to Isao, but his strange words seem to suggest he is confusing Isao with Kiyoaki, although they had no physical resemblance. Most assume he is senile. Only Honda realizes the significance of his confusion of Kiyoaki and Isao. Makiko is called as witness, and she reads out a mendacious diary entry for November 29, in which she asserts that Isao was planning to abandon the conspiracy. She hopes that Isao will finally be forced to start lying in order to save her from indictment for perjury. He sidesteps by claiming that he did not mean what he supposedly said to her, but wanted to spare her from any consequences of his actions. The judge, who becomes sympathetic, allows him to enlarge on his motives, and he delivers a long address on the suffering of the common people and the need to destroy the deadly spirit poisoning Japan. The prosecutor expresses doubts about Makiko's testimony, but it is clear he senses defeat. The verdict is handed down on December 26. They are found guilty, but punishment is remitted on account of their youth and pure motives, and they are released. That evening, a celebratory dinner is held at the Academy of Patriotism. Tsumura, the youngest student, is irritated by the jolly atmosphere and shows Isao a newspaper account of desecratory blunders made by Kurahara on December 16 at the Inner Ise Shrine. Iinuma, drunk, tells Isao that he was the informant. Isao is not surprised until Iinuma goes on to say that the Academy is run entirely with money paid by Baron Shinkawa as protection, and that Shinkawa made him promise, just before the May 15 Incident, never to allow Kurahara to be touched. Later, Honda hears the sleeping Isao mutter "Far to the south. Very hot...in the rose sunshine of a southern land," predicting his next reincarnation. In the morning he meets Tsuboi, who asks him to teach kendo to children, and he has a vision of himself doing so till old age. Sawa takes Isao into his room and lets him know that it was Makiko (whom Isao has not seen since the trial) who told Iinuma of their plan by telephone. This is the final straw for Isao. On 29 December, Isao slips away from Sawa during a lantern procession, buys a dagger, and travels to Inamura, a seaside village near Atami, Shizuoka. He breaks into Kurahara's weekend house, stabs him to death, then runs through his tangerine orchards down to a cave on the shore where he commits seppuku. |
The Eleventh Commandment | Lester del Rey | null | The chief of the CIA, Helen Dexter, decides, on her own, to order the murder of political figures of other nations on the basis of their views on the USA. The book starts with the murder of a candidate for the Colombian presidency. During this time, Helen finds out that she would be fired if she is found out to be ordering assassinations on several nations. To cover up her work she plans to have her chief assassin, Connor Fitzgerald, eliminated. The CIA rejects Connor's resignation and asks him to go on a final mission to assassinate a candidate for the Russian presidency. While attending a speech, Connor is arrested and placed in a Russian jail to be executed. A friend of his arrives in time and tries to rescue him by making a bargain with the Russian Mafia. In exchange for Fitzgerald to be replaced with his friend, Fitzgerald will have to assassinate the Russian president. Fitzgerald fails in the attempt and "dies." Later on he returns home with the name of a professor and he has lost his arm. |
Coalescent | Stephen Baxter | 2,003 | The book consists of four distinct parts. The primary purpose of part one is the introduction of the characters, in ancient Britain and the present. Part two introduces a modern first-person view of the Order in Rome while following Regina's budding legacy centuries before. Part three hosts the clash and resolution of Poole and the Order's realities. Part four is a look eons into Humanity's Expansion into the Universe and provides a conclusion in George Poole's present. George Poole copes with the mid-life crisis of losing his father. He meets Peter McLachlan, an eccentric member of an online free-thinking Internet group called the Slan(t)ers, who is researching dark matter and who is fascinated by a new and unknown artificial object discovered beyond the orbit of Pluto. George Poole uncovers an old picture showing a sister he never knew. Poole also discovers that his father regularly donated large sums of money to an organisation called the "Puissant Order of Holy Mary Queen of Virgins". Combined with a sense of futility in determining his future and encouragement from both his former wife Linda and Peter, Poole decides to uncover the mystery of his missing sister. Poole leaves England to visit his sister Gina in Florida for information, despite their strained relationship. After spoiling his clever nephews as well as clashing with his distant sister Gina, Poole extracts the contact of a Jesuit priest in Rome and his own retired uncle in Florida. Poole learns from his uncle, Lou Casella, that his twin sister was given to the ancient Order when Poole's parents were unexpectedly landed with twins. Born into a wealthy mosaic-designing family of 5th-century Roman Britain, seven-year-old Regina is uprooted from her comfortable villa due to her father's death and the Roman Empire's withdrawal. The Roman Empire loses its strength in Britain as invading Saxons pummel the Great Wall north of Roman settlements to where Regina and her grandfather Aetius relocated. Aetius dies after losing control over his unpaid mutinous soldiers. Regina seeks refuge with her servant Cartumandua's relatives in Verulamium but is betrayed by Carta's cousin Amator who rapes and abandons her. Verulamium burns down, forcing Regina and Cartumandua's family to live off the land in poverty for over sixteen years. Regina kills a roaming Saxon who nearly rapes her daughter, Brica. This event convinces Regina, the leader of their hamlet, to accept the invitation of warlord Artorius to help restore order to Britain again. In modern Rome, Lucia, a fifteen-year old scribe for the Order, is devastated when she begins to menstruate — unlike any of her friends and colleagues within the Order. Once this is discovered Lucia is initiated into in her new role within the Order. Meanwhile, Lucia falls in love with seventeen-year-old American Daniel Stannard but is snatched back into the Order to do what is expected of her. After being impregnated by an anonymous distant cousin in a ceremony held deep within the Order's chambers Lucia gives birth following only three months of pregnancy. The baby is removed from her at once and Lucia never sees her baby again. Emotionally unstable, she runs away with Daniel. Back in 5th Century Britain, Regina establishes her life working with Artorius, eventually managing his kingdom's record keeping. Artorius takes Regina as his wife for symbolic and moral reasons. She disdains Artorius' barbaric practices and thirst for conquest. Regina accompanies Artorius to a War Council where she realizes to stay attached with the reckless Artorius would mean certain doom for her progeny. To search out her mother, Julia, Regina secures passage to Rome by allowing herself and her daughter to give sexual favours to a wealthy merchant named Ceawlin. Upon arriving in Rome, Regina contacts Amator, now openly homosexual and a wealthy bakery owner, and demands recompense for abandoning her and her family. Regina re-establishes contact with her mother, Julia, after a cool reunion. Regina joins the Puissant Order of Holy Mary Queen of Virgins, a Christian-adapted faction of the Vestal Virgins located on the Appian Way — an organisation that her family has become intimate with. Regina's leadership revives the ageing Order by converting it into a successful private school. Years later, on the night following her daughter's marriage, the Sack of Rome in 455 by the Vandals occurs. Regina's foresight saves the Order when the women and children are evacuated into the underground Catacombs she had had dug for a sanctuary. In Regina's twilight years, she establishes important rules precedents for the Order. Unnecessary and unsupportable births are prohibited. A handful of mothers must dedicate their lives to replenishing the Order with births. Before her death in 476 AD, Regina establishes three main rules to govern the Order: *Sisters matter more than daughters. *Ignorance is strength. *Listen to your sisters. In the centuries following Regina's death, the Order assists the poor, robbed, and injured, gaining donations to its coffers from the occasional assisted person who became wealthy. Another Crypt that developed similarly to the Order is found and plans made for its eradication and occupation. In 1537 the Order survives the pillage of Rome by Antipope Clement VII by sacrificing five of its members to rape and death in order to divert Clement and his men's attention from an entrance to the Crypt. Meanwhile, in the present, George Poole, followed by a nervous Peter McLachlan, has a cool reunion with his lost sister Rosa. Rosa gives George a tour of the Crypt, the Order's secret human cache. Peter speculates with George about evidence of intelligent dark matter life moving through earth. Daniel serendipitously meets with George Poole, who is searching for additional information about the Order. Daniel, George Poole, and Peter take the very pregnant Lucia to a hospital where Peter becomes suspicious of the mysterious Order. The Order promptly retrieves Lucia from the hospital but not before Peter and George learn that most of the Crypt's inhabitants remain prepubescent indefinitely. George Poole convinces his Jesuit priest contact to grant Peter access to ancient Catholic records. George's patriarchal roots are traced to a British surveyor named George Poole who came to Rome in 1863. George returns to the Crypt looking for information and finds himself smothered with the familiar smell and contact of those in the Crypt, all of whom share his similar facial features (namely, cloudy grey eyes). His sister Rosa almost persuades him to become assimilated into the Order as a stud but an urgent text message by Peter brings him to his senses. Peter has a theory explaining the strange peculiarities of the Order. The Order is a family of eusocial humans that evolved from the intense pressures to survive the various conquests of Rome over the centuries. He cites naked mole rats as an example of eusocial behaviour in mammals. He explains how Regina's three rules result in a "genetic mandate for eusociality." He calls the Order a "human hive" and labels them "Coalescents" — a new kind of human. Peter then suddenly leaves after receiving a text message. Days later, George learns that Peter has invaded the Crypt and is threatening to set off Semtex plastic explosives in order to expose the Order. Peter and the Slan(t)ers are responsible for the recent bombing of a San Jose research facility investigating quantum gravity technology — under the belief that a higher intelligence would notice the manipulation of space-time and eradicate a possible threat to their superiority. Peter's reasoning in exposing the Crypt is that the Order does not exist for any purpose except for itself. It threatens to destroy humanity as individuals and replace it with mindless drones. Peter Mclachlan then detonates his bombs and dies. George begins the evacuation of the Crypt, and the mob of drones emerge hive-like from the crater in the middle of Via Cristoforo Colombo. Toward the end of the novel there are also two short sections telling of a hive planet in the far future. A planet has been knocked out of its solar orbit, and the hives have survived deep underground for aeons. A military mission arrives, aiming to secure workers for the war-effort, and invades a colony. They fight their way into the hive, and ship the survivors off-world. |
Jack Faust | Michael Swanwick | 1,997 | The plot is based around a modernization of the anti-hero, Dr. Johannes Faust, who struggles with his growing discomfort with modern thought and questions how and why things happen without scientific explanation. After burning his library and contemplating suicide, a mysterious being named Mephistopheles comes to Faust and offers him all the information of the universe. With Mephistopheles' help, the madman Dr. Johannes Faust becomes savior Jack Faust by accelerating human progress at a blinding speed, reshaping Germany and then all of Europe in his own image. |
Number the Stars | Lois Lowry | 1,989 | The story opens as two Nazi soldiers stop Annemarie Johansen and her friend Ellen Rosen and ask them both questions on the streets of Copenhagen. That night, Annemarie reminisces about her older sister Lise, who was hit by a car and killed (it is later revealed that the Nazis intentionally hit her). She also recalls her father seeing a boy tell a Nazi soldier about how all of Denmark is King Christian X's bodyguard. Soon after, Peter Nielsen (who was Annemarie's sister Lise's fiance), a man working in the Danish Resistance, visits Annemarie and her family and tells them that the Germans have started closing Jewish stores. The next day, Ellen and her parents go to the synagogue for a Jewish holiday, but come to find out that the Nazis have demanded lists of the Danish Jews. They will use these lists to arrest and relocate the entire Jewish population. Peter takes Mr. and Mrs. Rosen with him into hiding, and Ellen Rosen (disguised as Lise) comes to live with the Johansens. In the middle of the night, Nazi soldiers arrive at the Rosens' apartment and demand that they reveal where the Rosen family is. Annemarie rips off the Star of David necklace which belongs to Ellen to conceal her idenity of being Jewish. The Nazi soldiers become suspicious because Annemarie and Kirsti have blond hair, but Ellen has dark brown hair. Mr. Johansen retrieves baby photos of his three daughters, with their names listed, which clearly show that Lise had hair similar to Ellen's when she was a baby. The soldiers leave. After the Nazis leave, Mr. Johansen calls his brother-in-law, Henrik, and makes encoded arrangements to bring Ellen to him. Later, Annemarie, Ellen, Mrs. Johansen, and Kirsti leave by train for Uncle Henrik's home in Gilleleje. One peaceful day goes by at Henrik's, then Mrs. Johansen tells the girls that their Great-aunt Birte has died and they will be having a funeral. However, Annemarie knows that Great-aunt Birte does not exist, and confronts Uncle Henrik. He explains to her that she is right, and says that it is easier to be brave when you don't know the full truth. Many strangers arrive at Uncle Henrik's house for the funeral, among them a rabbi and several Jewish families. A group of Nazi soldiers arrive and interrupt the funeral, and Ellen's parents and Peter Nielsen arrive shortly after. A soldier asks her mother to open the casket. Her mother told the soldier that she would love to do so, since country doctors were not reliable, and it was only the country doctor who told them that opening the casket would spread germs because Great-aunt Birte had died from typhus. The soldier slaps her face and leaves in frustration. Peter reads the beginning of Psalm 147 to the group from the Bible, recounting the Lord God numbering the stars. Annemarie thinks that it is impossible to number the stars in the sky, and that the world is cold and very cruel like the sky or the ocean, which Mrs. Rosen is scared of. Peter opens the casket and distributes warm clothing and blankets to the Jewish families who then depart, splitting up to attract less attention. Annemarie says goodbye to Ellen. In the morning her mother realizes that a package important to the Resistance was accidentally dropped by Mr. Rosen when he tripped on a flight of stairs. Mrs. Johansen, knowing the importance of the package, gives Annemarie a basket filled with food and hides the package inside. Annemarie runs off, onto a wooded path towards her uncle's boat. When she nears the harbor, she is stopped by German soldiers on patrol, and lies that she is merely delivering lunch to her uncle. The soldiers toss some of the food onto the ground and eventually reach the package, which they tear open, finding only a handkerchief. The German soldiers walk away. Annemarie continues onward to Uncle Henrik and gives him the package. He boards his fishing boat and leaves for Sweden. Uncle Henrik returns to Denmark later that evening and explains that the Rosens and many other Jewish people were hiding in his boat and that the handkerchief contained the scent of rabbit blood and cocaine, to attract the dogs so when they sniffed it, the cocaine would temporarily numb the German dogs' sense of smell. Two years later, the war ends, and all of Denmark celebrates. Several revelations are made: Peter was captured and executed by the Germans. The Jews who were forced to leave Denmark return and find that their friends and neighbors have kept up their apartments in anticipation of their return. Annemarie finds out how Lise died. Before the Rosens come back, Annemarie asks her father to repair Ellen's Star of David necklace (which had been broken off the night the Nazis broke into the apartment in order to conceal her identity), wanting to wear it herself in honor of her best friend. |
Night on the Galactic Railroad | Kenji Miyazawa | null | Giovanni is a boy from a poor family, working hard to feed his sick mother (who has contracted an unnamed disease). Because of this, he never has any free time and is ridiculed by his peers, leaving him as somewhat of a social outcast. His kindly friend, Campanella, is the only one (apart from his mother and his sister, both of whom are never actually seen) who cares for him. At school, in a science class, the teacher asks Giovanni what the Milky Way really is. Giovanni knows that they are stars, but cannot answer. The teacher asks Campanella, but he intentionally does not answer to save Giovanni from even more ridicule from his peers. During class, the local bully, Zanelli, says that Giovanni has been so absent-minded because his father has yet to come back from an expedition to the far north. Zanelli claims that Giovanni's father was arrested (because the trip was supposedly "illegal"), which angers Giovanni. Before he can give Zanelli a good punch, the bell rings, marking the end of the class. The teacher, after encouraging the students to attend the star festival occurring that night, lets everyone leave. Giovanni, however, stays behind to chat with the teacher. After class, the teacher (another of Giovanni's friends) and Giovanni marvel at the fossils that Giovanni's father brought back from his expeditions. The teacher asks Giovanni if his father is back yet (this question is asked repeatedly throughout the story). Giovanni responds no, and heads home to begin another long, lonely night of work at the local paper. On that night (which marks a large festival), Giovanni runs into Zanelli. He makes fun of Giovanni, mocking him about an otter fur coat his father would give him when he comes back, and runs away to the festival. Giovanni can not go to the festival, because he has to take care of his mother, and do the chores that his sister did not. Tired after a hard day's work, Giovanni lies down on top of a hill. He hears a strange sound, and finds himself in the path of a train. Luckily, the train stops. He gets on board, as does Campanella. Giovanni notices that Campanella is all wet. Giovanni asks why, and Campanella says he's not sure, but a flashback that shows him drowning suggests otherwise. The train travels through the Northern Cross and other stars in the Milky Way. Along the way, the two see fantastic sights and meet various people: for example, scholars excavating a fossil from white sands of crystal and a man who catches herons to make candies from them. Children who were on a ship that crashed into an iceberg (possibly Titanic) get on the train at Aquila, suggesting that the train is transporting its passengers to their afterlife. The train arrives at the Southern Cross and all the other passengers get off the train, leaving only Giovanni and Campanella in the train. Giovanni promises Campanella to go on forever, together. But as the train approaches the Coalsack, Campanella disappears, leaving Giovanni behind. Giovanni wakes up on top of the hill. He heads to the town, and finds out that Zanelli fell into the river from a boat. He was saved by Campanella who went into the water, but Campanella had not come up since then and is missing. Worried, Giovanni heads toward the river, in fear of what he already knows. His worries prove true, because Campanella has been under the water for a long duration of time, meaning he is dead. On the verge of tears, Giovanni tries to stay strong. Campanella's father (who didn't notice Giovanni at first) asks Giovanni to have his classmates come over to his home, after school tomorrow (for reasons unknown, though it seems likely that they are being called in for a formal funeral). Giovanni then makes a promise to stay strong throughout life, claiming that, no matter where he is, he and Campanella will always be together. He then heads home, to deliver milk to his mother. |
Cosmopolis | Don DeLillo | null | Cosmopolis is the story of Eric Packer, a 28 year old multi-billionaire asset manager who makes an odyssey across midtown Manhattan in order to get a haircut. He drives around in a stretch limo which is richly described as luxurious, spacious and highly technical, filled with television screens and computer monitors, bulletproofed and floored with Carrara marble. It is also cork lined to eliminate (though unsuccessfully, as Packer notes) the intrusion of street noise. Packer's voyage is obstructed by various traffic jams caused by a presidential visit to the city, a full-fledged anti-capitalist riot, and a funeral procession for a Sufi rap star. Along the way, the hero has several chance meetings with his wife and sexual encounters with other women. Packer is also stalked by two men, a comical "pastry assassin" and an unstable "credible threat". Through the course of the day, the protagonist loses incredible amounts of money for his clients by betting against the rise of the yen, a loss that parallels his own fall. Packer seems to relish being unburdened by the loss of so much money, even stopping to make sure he loses his wife's fortune as well, to ensure his ruin is inevitable. He is finally murdered by the second of the two stalkers, a former employee who sees the assassination of Packer as the only possible meaningful act in his own life. |
The Computer That Said Steal Me | Elizabeth Levy | 1,983 | The protagonist, a sixth grader named Adam, has recently moved with his family to Buffalo, New York from San Francisco, California. Adam attends St. Luke's, an expensive private school which he can only afford by virtue of the scholarship he receives as a consequence of his parents both working for the school. Thus, Adam finds himself the only lower-middle class student at an academy full of children of the wealthy. This disparity is often on his mind as he socializes with his friends, and it serves as the catalyst for the book's central plot and title. Adding insult to injury (at least in Adam's mind) is the fact that he cannot earn any extra money because he must babysit his two year old sister, Allison, a task which his parents feel is a family duty and not an opportunity for income. Adam spends his free time with Jesse and Tracey, with whom he plays chess as well as Dungeons & Dragons. Adam, usually the winner of chess matches with his friends, realizes that he losing more often than he once did. He attributes this new development to the handheld chess computers that his friends now use for practice. Adam knows that his family cannot afford a chess computer, but he begins to covet the device. Without funds, though, all he can do is wish. Lying in bed one night, he begins to toy with the idea of stealing a $400 talking chess computer from an electronics store in the local mall at which he occasionally shops. He approaches the scheme at first in the same fashion as he would create a Dungeons & Dragons game. As the plot becomes more complicated, and in his mind, daring, he dwells upon whether he should actually execute it. He does. Adam takes his sister to the mall on the day he puts his plan into action. Pushing her in her stroller through the aisles of the electronics store, he quickly pilfers a clock radio while no one is watching. He leaves the store without incident. It is no ordinary clock radio, however, at least by 1983 standards. Rather than waking a sleeper with the radio or an alarm pulse, this particular model will play an audio cassette at the designated time of alarm. This is central to his plan, which includes returning the clock radio to the store after setting it to play a prerecorded message the next day. He spends his remaining time at the mall asking passers-by to read one word each into a portable tape recorder he has borrowed from his father. In total, the message reads: "Beware, you will be hurt if you do not do as I say. Go to the bathroom and lock the door." After recording this message, he places the tape into the clock radio and then returns to the electronics store. He explains to Vanessa, the sales clerk, that his sister inadvertently placed the clock radio in the stroller and he did not notice it at the time. Vanessa is overjoyed, as she had feared that the missing clock radio would be deducted from her paycheck. Adam now believes that he is the last person that anyone would suspect of being a thief, as he returned an item when he could have simply kept it. The next day, he returns to the mall moments before the message is set to be played on the clock radio. At the designated time, he enters the store and takes the chess machine. He makes his escape and is not caught. He plays with the talking chess machine but he is quickly overcome with guilt. He confesses to the theft after his friend Tracey finds the chess machine (which Adam had hid in a Monopoly board game box. He later reveals his transgression to Jesse, and ultimately, to his parents (who punish him, but not heavily, as they recognize that their son is racked with guilt). He returns the machine to the electronic store and earns the wrath of Vanessa, who bans him from the store and accuses him of creepy behavior. She does not call the police. |
The Duplicate | William Sleator | null | The main character, David, finds a device at the beach that can duplicate any living organism. After testing the device on his pet fish, David makes a clone of himself so that he could go on a date with his crush, Angela, while his clone attends his grandmother's birthday. His plan backfires because the Duplicate believes himself to be the original, and refuses to take orders. David ends up having to go to his grandmothers birthday after he loses a coin toss to the duplicate. David's real problems begin when the Duplicate uses the device to create a clone of himself. The new duplicate is a less-than-perfect reproduction, being a copy of a copy, and has goals and desires that differ from the original David. Eventually, the second duplicate turns on Angela and the original David, and he has to find a way to stop him. Later, he stumbles upon something that will change his life. |
Free Air | Sinclair Lewis | 1,919 | This cheerful little road novel, published in 1919, is about Claire Boltwood, who, in the early days of the 20th century, travels by automobile from New York City to the Pacific Northwest, where she falls in love with a nice, down-to-earth young man and gives up her snobbish Estate. (From the Book Stub) From a critical perspective, Free Air is consistent with Sinclair Lewis's lean towards egalitarian politics, which he displays in his other works (most notably in It Can't Happen Here). Examples of his politics in Free Air are found in Lewis's emphasis on the heroic role played by the book's protagonist, Milt Dagget, a working class everyman type. Conversely, Lewis presents nearly every upper-class character in Claire Boltwood's world (including her railroad-mogul father) as being snobby elitists. The story also champions the democratic nature of the automobile, versus the more aristocratic railroad travel. Lewis's showing favoritism towards the freedom, which automobiles would eventually accord the working and middle classes, bolster the egalitarian, democratic aesthetic. Free Air is one of the first novels about the road trip, a subject that the Beats (most notably Jack Kerouac), would build a cult following around in the mid-20th century. Composer Ferde Grofe used the novel as the basis for the music to his adventurous composition Free Air. In the HBO series Boardwalk Empire, set initially in 1920, Jimmy and his girlfriend Pearl are reading Free Air. The 18-year old Chicago prostitute Pearl hopes to head West like the heroine, along with Jimmy. |
Solomon Gursky Was Here | Mordecai Richler | 1,989 | The novel tells of several generations of the fictional Gursky family, who are connected to several disparate events in the history of Canada, including the Franklin Expedition and rum-running. Some fans and critics have cited this as Mordecai Richler's best book, and in terms of scope and style it is unmatched by his other works. The parallels between the Gursky family and the Bronfmans are such that the novel "may be seen as a thinly disguised account of the [Bronfman] family". While Richler himself denied any similarities, "one longtime Bronfman associate put it, 'I don't know why Mordecai bothered to change the names.'" |
Sugar Blues | William Dufty | null | The book's central argument is that consumption of refined sugar is unnatural and damaging to human health, causing major differences in physical and mental well-being. Dufty even goes so far as to suggest that eliminating refined sugar from the diet of those institutionalized for mental illness could be an effective treatment for some. The sugar industry is criticized for misrepresenting the health and safety data of its products. |
Scarecrow | Matthew Reilly | 2,003 | Majestic-12, a group of the worlds richest men, make up a bounty list of fifteen targets that have to be eliminated before 12 noon of October, 26th. Among the targets is Shane Schofield, who at that moment is on a mission to Siberia with Book II and a group of Marines. Schofield's team is supposed to meet up with two Delta groups, the leaders of the two Delta units also being on M-12's hit list. Schofield unit comes under fire from a group of bounty hunter led by Cedric Wexley and all but Schofield and Book II are killed. Schofield and Book II escape via a hijacked plane owned by a bounty hunter known as the Hungarian. Meanwhile, in Afghanistan, Schofield's girlfriend Elizabeth Gant leads a group of Marines along with Mother to a cave system where Osama bin Laden's number two man is. Schofield races to Afghanistan so none of the bounty hunters can use Gant to get to him but arrives too late and she is captured by a bounty hunter group known as IG-88, led by Damon "Demon" Larkham. Schofield meets a bounty hunter named Aloysius Knight who has been paid to protect him from harm. Knight and Schofield go to save Gant while Book II and Mother go to London to confront another person on the hit list. Meanwhile, the remaining people on the hit list are being taken out and Schofield's friend David Fairfax goes to help one of them but the man he is going to help is killed. The person that Book II and Mother are attempting to meet is also killed and they, too are almost killed. Schofield, Knight, and Gant disguise themselves as bounty hunters to get into a castle owned by Jonathan Killian to find out more about the bounty hunt. While Knight claims the bounty on two heads, Killian sets a trap for Schofield and Gant, forcing them to escape in one of Killian's cars with Wexley's men in close pursuit, followed by Knight. Schofield goes over a cliff and is presumed dead while Knight and Gant are captured. Mother is picked up by Rufus, Knight's pilot, and goes to help Knight while Schofield is captured by the French and brought to an aircraft carrier to explain to him why he is to be terminated. Gant is murdered and Knight escapes, Gant's final words being for Knight to tell Schofield she would have said yes to his planned proposal. Rufus, Mother, and Knight go to rescue Schofield. It is revealed that Schofield along with the fifteen other targets are the only people who had quick enough reaction to disable a missiles being launched from ships in the Kormoran Project. The plan being for missiles to attack every nation and make it look like its enemies launched the weapon so that a new Cold War will start and M-12 can make more profits from the war. Schofield is rescued before being killed but Knight reveals to him that Gant was murdered. Saddened by Gant's death, Schofield attempts to commit suicide but is stopped by Mother. At the same time, Fairfax and Book II are flown to different ships so that Schofield can disable all of the missiles at the same time. Schofield succeeds and Mother is presumed to have perished, but learns that there was a backup plan and a missile is heading right for Mecca on the first day of Ramadan. Schofield is able to deactivate the missile but in turn, M-12 captures Schofield, Rufus, and Knight. Shofield is about to be killed in the same way and by the same person as Gant was but Mother reveals herself to be alive and Schofield kills Gant's killer while Rufus is injured. Knight and Schofield go to confront Killian and Wexley is killed too. Schofield throws himself and Killian out a window but Knight saves Schofield. Several months later, Knight and Rufus meet the person who hired them, the richest woman on the planet who wanted to be part of M-12 but, as they wouldn't let her, she ruined their plan. It is also revealed that the rest of M-12 died in mysterious ways. Demon and the IG-88 kill Knight's payer as revenge for taking two of their bounties during the hunt. Later, at Mother's house, Schofield receives a letter from Knight telling him to accept Gant's death and move on. Schofield goes to the Marine Corps building and says he's ready for duty again. |
Anvil of Stars | Greg Bear | 1,993 | There are two interwoven themes in the novel. The first is the cost of justice. Destroying the race that attempted to destroy humanity (and, it is later revealed, other races) appears to be a simple matter of retaliation. The Killers, when they are discovered, have formidable philosophical defenses in addition to their vast technological resources. They have created hundreds of sentient races, interlocked in a culture of breathtaking complexity and beauty. The representatives of this cooperative of races claim to not be aware of the Killers' true nature. The combined population of these races number into the trillions, all quite possibly innocents who must be murdered if the Law is to be carried out and the Killers destroyed. The human and non-human characters in the book wrestle with this question of whether enacting the Law at such a cost is just, and the moral qualms nearly tear the crew apart in conflict. Author Charles Stross has an alternate interpretation: "If you take Anvil of Stars at face value, it looks like a childish revenge fantasy. But Bear is a subtle writer, and when you start peeling away the layers you find that a very unpleasant tragedy (in the classical sense of the term) nestling inside a much more ambiguous story." Additionally, Bear explores the complementary theme of the moral compromises required to take and wield power. The children create a libertarian society aboard ship, with few rules and regulations. However, as the pressures of enacting the Law (doing the Job, as they call it) escalate, voluntary cooperation begins to break down. The leaders face the decision between allowing their crew continued freedom, which would result in the disintegration of the ship and abandonment of their purpose, or abandoning their libertarian ideals. Hans, the leader at the time, begins to take increasingly autocratic measures to coerce unity. Bear does not take an explicit moral stance in the novel. Hans initiates the destruction of the system, innocents and all, without consulting with the crew. He is presented as dictatorial, ruthless, and possibly complicit in murder. After completion of the Job, he is overthrown during a violent confrontation between his supporters and Martin Gordon, son of Arthur Gordon in Forge of God, a former leader who was a focal point of dissent. Eventually, a third leader, Ariel, is chosen in place of Hans. It is revealed once the system is destroyed that the Killers were in fact still in the system, and had continued to manufacture fleets of self-replicating machines to destroy alien races. However, while the Killers were destroyed and justice served, trillions of what were likely innocents had to die to accomplish this. Bear leaves the human crew torn between relief that their work is complete and their guilt that they were little better than those they had come to destroy. The book is notable for how well it conveys the alienness and colossal scale of the alien home system, as well as the scope and morality of the final battle. The novel also contains a very original gestalt alien race referred to by the humans as 'Brothers', composed of non-sentient worm-like creatures (Cords) that join to form sentient individuals (Braids). The Brothers form a temporary alliance with the human crew, and the similarities and vast differences between the two races is one of the main elements of the novel's second half. |
The Drowned World | J. G. Ballard | 1,962 | The Drowned World opens within the conventions of a hard science fiction novel, as the catastrophe responsible for the apocalypse is explained scientifically – solar radiation has caused the polar ice-caps to melt and worldwide temperature to soar, leaving the cities of northern Europe and America submerged in beautiful and haunting tropical lagoons. Yet Ballard’s novel is thematically more complex than is immediately apparent. Ballard uses the post-apocalyptic world of the story to mirror the collective unconscious desires of the main characters. A theme throughout Ballard’s writing is the idea that human beings construct their surroundings to reflect their unconscious drives. In The Drowned World, however, a natural catastrophe causes the real world to transform itself into a dream landscape, causing the central characters to regress mentally. Set in the year 2145 in a post-apocalyptic and unrecognisable London, 'The Drowned World' is a setting of tropical temperatures, flooding and accelerated evolution. Ballard's story follows the biologist Dr Robert Kerans and his struggles against the devolutionary impulses of the environment. As part of a scientific survey unit sent to map the flora and fauna in the boiling lagoon, the tranquility and banality of their role is soon upheaved by the onset of strange dreams which increasingly plague the survivors' minds. Amidst talk of the army and scientific team moving north away, Hardman, the only other commissioned member of the unit, a 'burly,intelligent but somewhat phlegmatic man of about of about 30' flees the lagoon and instead heads south, a search team unable to find his whereabouts. When the other inhabitants of the lagoon finally flee the searing sun and head north, Kerans and two associates, the beautiful but reclusive Beatrice Dahl and fellow scientist Dr Bodkin settle down in the swamp into an isolated existence. Kerans is still tormented by his psycho-analytical tendencies, ever analysing and debating the regression of the environment into a neo-Triassic period, but the brief quiet is ended by the arrival of Strangman. A chaotic leader of a team of pirates seeking out and looting treasures within the deep, Strangman defies the remaining civilised reasons of Kerans' mind and upheaves the world that the survivors have grown to know. When Strangman and his team drain the lagoon and expose the city beneath, both Kerans and Bodkin are disgusted, the latter attempts to blow up the flood defences and re-flood the area to no avail. With Kerans and Beatrice resigned to his fate, Strangman pursues Bodkin and kills him in revenge. Strangman and his team grow tired and suspicious of Dr Kerans, and with Beatrice now under his web of control, Kerans is imprisoned and subjected to bizarre and tribalistic rituals intended to kill him. Kerans survives, though severely weakened by the ordeals, and attempts to save Beatrice from her own imprisonment to little avail. With the doctor and Beatrice facing the gun point of Strangman and his men and no apparent excuse, the army return to save them. With no reason and evidence to prosecute Strangman, the authorities co-operate with the captain, and Kerans once more grows frustrated by the inaction, finally taking a stand and succeeding in re-flooding the lagoon where Bodkin had failed. Wounded and weak, the doctor flees the lagoon and heads south without aim, meeting the frail and blind figure of Hardman along the way. Though he aids Hardman back to some amount of strength he soon continues onwards on his travels south, with little idea of an aim or objective, a "second Adam searching for the forgotten paradise of the reborn Sun'. |
Fearful Symmetries | S. Andrew Swann | null | Nohar is living in a cabin in the woods when he is approached by a lawyer to find a missing moreau. Nohar turns the case down and the lawyer leaves. Soon after, the cabin is assaulted by a para-military team. Nohar escapes with his life and on the run, tries to find the moreau and discover why his life was threatened. |
The Last Yankee | Arthur Miller | null | The Last Yankee takes place in a present-day state mental hospital, located somewhere in New England. Patricia Hamilton is recovering from depression, and this may be the day she feels strong enough to go home. But a visit from her husband Leroy, a descendant of one of America's founding fathers (but referred to as a "Swamp Yankee"), coincides with that of a successful businessman, John Frick, who has come to see his newly-admitted wife, Karen. A clash of values and emotions upsets them all. It is a play in two parts which focuses on the relationships of two couples - Leroy and Patricia Hamilton, married many years with seven children, and John and Karen Frick, a childless couple. Both women are patients at a mental institution, and act one sees the two men meet for the first time in the waiting room on visitors day. Karen has not long been institutionalised, and Frick is having a difficult time coping with her mental illness, while Patricia has been in and out of institutions for many years. The two men struggle to communicate under the circumstances, though even this breaks down in the face of their respective situations. Patricia and Karen have become friendly during their time together in the ward, and act two sees the four characters brought together inside, where a picture emerges of a society whose members feel obscurely cheated and where success is equated with failure. `A short piece in length, but a miniature masterpiece. |
Conspiracy of Fools | Kurt Eichenwald | null | Conspiracy of Fools tells the story of the 2001 collapse of Enron. Enron's Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Andrew Fastow is depicted as voraciously greedy, using front corporations and partnerships, paying himself "management" and "consultant" fees as if he were an outsider, all while cooking Enron's books to show fictitious profits. In the 1980s there were questionable activities at the company, but the bulk of the events depicted in the book occur from 1997 onward and led to Enron's collapse. In addition to Fastow, there are stories of the complicity of Enron's accountants (at Arthur Andersen), their lawyers (internal and external), the senior management (Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling), Fastow's partner in many of his deals, Michael Kopper, and Enron's board of directors. The picture that emerges of Enron is that of an out-of-control corporate culture that ignored the basic principles of business, allowing it to be manipulated by greedy incompetents for their own personal gain. The focus on reporting profits — rather than actually making money — created a situation that both encouraged and enabled a small group of insider criminals to "game the system". Enron's business losses were masked by accounting tricks, while the insiders raked off huge "profits" and bonuses for themselves. The game was eventually undone by huge losses, bad investments and the structure of the outside partnerships themselves, the solvency of which depended on ever-rising Enron stock prices. When Enron's stock began to fall, the financial structures imploded, leaving Enron with billions of dollars in losses and few assets. |
Thud! | Terry Pratchett | 2,005 | As the book opens, a dwarven demagogue, Grag Hamcrusher, is apparently murdered. Ethnic tensions between Ankh-Morpork's troll and dwarf communities mount in the buildup to the anniversary of the Battle Of Koom Valley an ancient battle where trolls and dwarves seemingly ambushed each other. Lord Vetinari convinces Commander Vimes to interview a vampire applicant to the Ankh-Morpork City Watch. The new recruit, Lance-Constable Salacia "Sally" von Humpeding, along with Sergeant Angua and Captain Carrot, is attached to the investigation surrounding Hamcrusher's death. Meanwhile, Corporal Nobbs and Sergeant Colon begin an investigation into the theft of the fifty-foot painting, The Battle of Koom Valley by the insane artist Methodia Rascal, from a city art gallery. Most of the populace believe the painting holds clues to a treasure hidden in Koom Valley. Nobbs has a new girlfriend, exotic dancer Tawneee; Nobby first caught her eye when slipping an IOU into her garter. Other subplots involve the tension between vampires and werewolves (new recruit Lance-Constable von Humpeding and Sergeant Angua), and the presence of Vetinari's auditor, A.E. Pessimal, in the Watch House. Vimes finds himself pressured by Lord Vetinari to solve the murder quickly, before inter-species war erupts in Ankh-Morpork. Vimes and Sergeant Angua visit the dwarves' under-city mine, where a nervous dwarf named Helmclever draws a mysterious sign in the spilled coffee on his desk. In a fit of his particular brand of omnidirectional anger, Vimes veers off into the mine where he cuts himself, he supposes, on a locked door. Later, he convinces the deep down dwarves to allow Captain Carrot to be the "smelter" who looks for the truth of the murder. When Carrot tries to find that truth, however, he is shown a body that was mutilated after death, and a confusing patch of clues. Angua discovers that a troll really was in the mine at the time of the murder, much to the consternation and fear of the dwarves who claimed a troll did the killing. This troll turns out to be Brick, who is a gutter troll of the lowest sort, addicted to Troll drugs beginning with "S," (such as Slab, Scrape, Slice, Slide etc.) and who becomes the protege of Sergeant Detritus. Angua and Sally soon discover four more bodies in the mine, dwarves clearly murdered by other dwarves. One of these dwarves used his own blood to scrawl yet another mysterious rune on the back of a door in the mine—the same door that Commander Vimes accidentally 'cut' himself on the other side of. The Deep-Downers flee for the mountains, taking the talking cube they found at the bottom of Methodia Rascal's well, and the painting of Koom Valley. As a parting shot, they send a squad of their guards to invade the Vimes/Ramkin family mansion and attempt to murder Lady Sybil Ramkin and Young Sam. The two survive unharmed, thanks to the fighting talents of Vimes and the family butler, Willikins, as well as a dwarf being foolish enough to provoke Sybil's dragons. Vimes, along with family and several members of the Watch, travels to Koom Valley. He believes he is pursuing justice, but an astute troll king named Mr. Shine and a bright young grag named Bashfulsson know that Vimes is carrying the Summoning Dark, the quasi-demonic entity that wreaks vengeance on dwarves who have done evil in the sight of other dwarves. Vimes acquired the Summoning Dark when he touched the cursed door in the city mine, but his own internal watchman proves stronger than it is. Vimes soon discovers the real secret of Koom Valley: the trolls and dwarves did not intend war, but had originally come to Koom Valley to broker peace. Weather conspired against them and after a thick fog caused a "double ambush", a flash flood carried them into the caverns below. The Deep-Downers intended to destroy the evidence of this attempt at peace to continue the war between troll and dwarf and had sought out the cave where the surviving trolls and dwarfs had been washed. Preserved as a form of stalagmite, troll and dwarf had died as friends in the cavern while the ancient troll king and dwarf king played a game of Thud. As the book ends, the tomb of the dead trolls and dwarves is opened to the public, in the hope that the two races will learn to end their centuries of animosity. Also, back in Ankh-Morpork, the equipment that the Deep-Downers had abruptly left behind in their haste, has been confiscated, under the clause of eminent domain by Lord Vetinari, seeing them as useful for his future "Undertaking" project. |
The Gods of Mars | Edgar Rice Burroughs | 1,918 | After John Carter's arrival, a boat of Green Martians on the River Iss are ambushed by the previously unknown Plant Men. The lone survivor is his friend Tars Tarkas, the Jeddak of Thark, who has taken the pilgrimage to the Valley Dor to find Carter. Having saved their own lives, Carter and Tars Tarkas discover that the Therns, a white-skinned race of self-proclaimed gods, have for eons deceived the Barsoomians elsewhere by disseminating that the pilgrimage to the Valley Dor is a journey to paradise. Most arrivals are killed by the beasts of Valley, and the survivors enslaved by Therns. Carter and Tars Tarkas rescue Thuvia, a slave girl, and attempt to escape, capitalizing on the confusion caused by an attack by the Black Pirates of Barsoom upon the Therns. During the attack, Tars Tarkas and Thuvia hijack a Black Pirate flier, while Carter fights his way aboard another, killing all but one of the Pirates, and rescuing a captive Thern princess. From the captured Pirate Xodar, Carter learns that the Black Pirates, called the "First Born", also think of themselves as gods, and accordingly prey upon the Therns; and additionally identifies the captive Thern as Phaidor, daughter of the "Holy Hekkador" (high priest) of the Therns. When their flier is recaptured by the First Born and taken to their realm of Omean, Carter is taken before Issus, the self-proclaimed goddess of Barsoom, who dictates the Therns through secret communications which they mistake for divine revelation. Issus takes Phaidor as a handmaiden for one Martian year; whereas Carter is imprisoned, with Xodar as his slave as punishment for being defeated by Carter. Thereafter Carter treats him with honor, and thus gains his friendship. In prison, they encounter a young man later identified as Carter's son Carthoris, with whom Carter is taken to a series of games wherein the previous year's handmaidens are eaten by Issus and her nobles. Carter leads a revolt of the prisoners, killing many of the First Born; and upon the suppression of their revolt, he and Carthoris escape via underground tunnels, and give themselves to guards unacquainted with the revolt to be returned to their prison. Upon hearing of the revolt, Xodar rejects Issus’ divinity and joins the others in escape. Upon later abandoning their aircraft, they encounter Thuvia, who describes the capture of Tars Tarkas by the green warriors of Warhoon (a clan rival to his own). Carter goes to rescue Tars Tarkas, but is discovered by his enemies. After a chase, Thuvia is sent on alone mounted while the men attempt a stand against the Warhoons. They are rescued by the Heliumetic navy; but do not find Thuvia. Commanding one of the warships is Carter’s friend Kantos Kan; but the fleet is commanded by Zat Arras, a Jed (chieftain) of the hostile client state of Zodanga, and Carter is suspected of returning from Valley Dor, which is punishable by death. Tardos Mors, the Jeddak of Helium, and Mors Kajak, the Jed of Hastor (the grandfather and father, respectively, of Dejah Thoris, and thus Carter’s in-laws) are absent from Helium, having led fleets in search of Carthoris. Later, Carter discovers that Dejah Thoris may have taken the pilgrimage to the Valley Dor to find him. Upon returning to Helium, Carter is tried for heresy by the Zodangans; but the people of Helium do not tolerate this, and Carter is held prisoner for 365 days until his son frees him. Thereafter he goes to rescue Dejah Thoris; but is kidnapped by the Zodangans. Carter refuses Zat Arras’ offer of freedom in exchange for endorsing Zat Arras as Jeddak of Helium, and is imprisoned. After half a (Barsoomian) year, Carter escapes, and embarks to Omean, with secretly raised troop levies, ships, and soldiers lent by Tars Tarkas. Near Omean Carter is challenged first by the Therns; secondly by Zat Arras; and lastly by the First Born, whereupon Carter causes the Therns and First Born to fight one another, and the Heliumetic crews of the Zodangan fleet mutiny in support of Carter. Thereafter the Heliumites and Tharks defeat the First Born, and Issus herself is killed; but Dejah Thoris, Thuvia, and Phaidor are imprisoned in the Temple of the Sun, of whose rooms each opens only once per year. Immediately before their room closes, Phaidor attempts to kill Dejah Thoris, and her success or failure are left unknown. The story is thence continued in the third book of Burroughs’ Martian series, The Warlord of Mars. |
The Warlord of Mars | Edgar Rice Burroughs | 1,919 | John Carter discovers that a First Born knows the secret of the Temple of the Sun and he and the Holy Hekkador Matai Shang want to rescue the Holy Thern's daughter, who is imprisoned with Dejah Thoris and another Barsoomian princess, Thuvia of Ptarth. John Carter follows them in the hope of liberating his beloved wife. His antagonists flee to the north, taking the three women along. Thereafter John Carter follows them untiring into the north polar regions where he discovers more fantastic creatures and ancient, mysterious Martian races. These he overcomes in battle, and is later proclaimed "Warlord of Barsoom" by his allies. This book is the last to feature Tars Tarkas, John Carter's ally, in any major role; indeed, the green Barsoomians of whom Tars Tarkas is an oligarch disappear altogether from most of the later novels. |
Turnabout | Margaret Haddix | null | In 2001, 100-year-old Amelia Hazelwood was living in a nursing home, sick and tired of life. Content to die, she signs a document given to her by doctors at the nursing home with very little awareness as to what it is. However, she gradually begins to change soon afterward, beginning with the realization that she no longer needs her hearing aid and is able to swing her legs over the side of her bed again. She quickly learns that she and several other nursing home residents had signed an agreement with Dr. Jimson and Dr. Reed to participate in a study for an experimental drug (PT-1) that reverses the effect of aging by making telomeres grow. All the residents at the nursing home had been given the drug and are now growing younger each day. However, because the drug is experimental, it must be kept a secret. While a second chance at life seems wonderful, when Amelia's first birthday while moving back in time arrives, she finds she cannot remember anything from the last year of her life when she was growing older. The residents realize that as they grow younger, their previous memories are disappearing and being rewritten with new memories from growing younger, even though the brain has plenty of chromosomes left for memory. It's then found out that it's like recording while hitting the rewind button. One man, afraid of forgetting his beloved wife's funeral where so many people said such nice things, is the first to request the Cure, a secondary drug that will halt his age at that exact moment. While the Cure works successfully on lab mice, the man immediately shrivels up, dies, and turns into dust when it is administered to him. While the doctors continue to secretly find a way to make the Cure work on humans with little success, Amelia and a friend, Anny Beth, decide to leave the nursing home and live their lives together and experience the world as they growing younger and younger. They find themselves constantly on the move, as with each year, their un-aging bodies prevent them from keeping the drug a secret. By the time Amelia, now called Melly, is sixteen and Anny Beth is eighteen, they become increasingly anxious that they will soon be unable to live on their own and become infants. With the doctors now deceased and their descendants still trying to make the Cure work, Melly and Anny Beth must find someone they can trust with their story and will take care of them when the time comes. Even more distressing is when Melly and Anny Beth realize someone they do not know named A.J. Hazelwood is trying to locate them for information they don't want to disclose. As Melly and Anny Beth try to stay one-step ahead of the mysterious Annabeth J'Amelia "A.J." Hazelwood, they are surprised to learn that she is a descendent of both of them and had been researching her family history. The two decide to take a chance and reveal the truth regarding their identities to A.J., who eventually believes them and agrees to accept responsibility for their well-being as they unage into childhood again. |
Rainbow Valley | Lucy Maud Montgomery | 1,919 | Anne Shirley has now been married to Gilbert Blythe for 15 years, and the couple have six children: Jem, Walter, Nan, Di, Shirley, and Rilla. After a holiday in Europe, Anne returns to the news that a new minister has arrived in Glen St. Mary. John Meredith is a widower with four young children: Jerry, Faith, Una, and Carl. The children have not been properly brought up since the death of their mother, with only their absent-minded father (who is easily absorbed by matters of theology) and their old, bitter, and partially deaf Aunt Martha to take care of them. The children are considered wild and mischievous by many of the families in the village (who tend only to hear about the Meredith children when they have gotten into some kind of scrape), causing them to question Mr. Meredith's parenting skills and his suitability as a minister. For most of the book, only the Blythes know of the Meredith children's loyalty and kindness. They rescue an orphaned girl, Mary Vance, from starvation, and Una finds a home for her with Mrs. Marshall Elliot. When the children get into trouble, Faith sometimes tries to explain their behavior to the townsfolk, which generally causes an even bigger scandal. The Merediths, Blythes, and Mary Vance often play in a hollow called Rainbow Valley, which becomes a gathering place for the children in the book. Jem Blythe tries to help the Merediths behave better by forming the "Good-Conduct Club", in which the Merediths punish themselves for misdeeds. Their self-imposed punishments lead to Carl becoming very ill with pneumonia after spending hours in a graveyard on a wet night, and to Una fainting in church after fasting all day. When this happens, John Meredith is wracked with guilt over his failings as a father. Mr. Meredith realizes that he should marry again and give the children a mother, though he has always thought he will never love anyone again as he did his late wife. He is surprised to find that he has fallen in love with Rosemary West, a woman in her late thirties who lives with her sister Ellen, who is ten years older. John proposes marriage to Rosemary, but Ellen forbids Rosemary to accept, as years earlier they had promised each other never to leave the other following the deaths of their parents. However, Ellen eventually reunites with her childhood beau, Norman Douglas, and asks Rosemary to release her from her promise so she can marry Norman. Rosemary agrees, but now thinks that John Meredith hates her. Una overhears her father expressing feelings for Rosemary and goes to ask Rosemary to marry her father despite her misgivings about stepmothers, who Mary Vance has told her are always mean. Rosemary sets her mind at ease and agrees to speak to John Meredith again. They become engaged, and Rosemary and Ellen plan a double wedding in the fall. |
La Foire aux immortels | Enki Bilal | null | Set in the year 2023, the book follows Alcide Nikopol return to Paris after spending 30 years frozen in space as a punishment for dodging the draft. The Paris he once knew is now ruled by fascist dictator J. F. Choublanc, the city is swarming with aliens, decaying and succumbing to chaos. At the same time, a flying pyramid-shaped space craft is hovering over Paris. It is inhabited by Egyptian gods who ask for fuel from the local authorities, as their pyramid vessel has run out of gas. In return for this service Choublanc wants immortality from the gods. One renegade god, Horus, meets up with the disillusioned Nikopol in the Metro, and Nikopol agrees to allow Horus control of his body. Together they go on a journey to oppose the corrupt and megalomaniacal powers of the 21st century. |
La Femme piège | Enki Bilal | 1,986 | The story centers around Jill Bioskop, a journalist woman with blue hair and white skin whose story becomes involved with that of Alcide Nikopol and the Egyptian god Horus. The story continues two years after Nikopol is admitted to a psychiatric hospital in Paris. Nikopol suddenly stops quoting Baudelaire after the discovery of a block of concrete, which contains the immortal body of Horus. At the same time in London, Jill is working on an article about the Afro-Pakistian and Zuben'Ubisch minority conflicts in the suburbs of Chelsea. While working on her Script-Walker she receives a phone call from John, a Alpheratzish friend and informant. During that phone call John is murdered by four Afro-Pakistiani but before he dies, he tells Jill about an article in De Morgen. After having made her way to the phonebooth and discovered John's body, Jill returns to her hotel room where she takes two red pills of HLV, John's drug. The drug erases John from Jill's memory. Meanwhile the news media are reporting about the block of concrete and the liberation of Horus, which was followed by the brutal murder of the workers who freed him onboard of the space vessel Europe I. Upon hearing this news, Jeff Wynatt, a friend of Jill Bioskop and former journalist, hurries towards the hotel where Jill is staying. He finds her in a deep coma and wakes her with cold water. Afterwards during a dinner in a restaurant Jeff asks Jill to cover the news of the return of Europe I, which is expected to arrive in a few days in Berlin. Jeff also says that he might visit Jill once she is in Berlin, which is something she didn't want to hear. Later that evening in the hotel room Jill uses the antenna of the scripwalker to kill Jeff. After she has cleaned up, she takes another red HLV pill to erase everything from her memory. Alcide Nikopol Jr. receives a report from his father's psychiatrist which says that Nikopol has fully recovered from his alleged mental illness, but that he hasn't accepted the fact yet. However, Nikopol is shown to cover the room observation camera while making a deal with the nurse about taking his pills for a kiss, which can be interpreted in several ways. Jill travels with an air taxi to Berlin and during the flight she discovers in her pocket the news paper article that John had told her about before he was murdered. She also learns that what she is writing on her scriptwalker is printed on an old fax at the editorial office of De Morgen. The other Egyptian gods and the pyramid are somewhere in the neighbourhood of Mars when they discover that the pyramid is missing a block of concrete. Exactly the piece of concrete which was used for Horus's punishment. Jill arrives at Mauer Palast Hotel in Berlin and says goodbye to Nick, the taxi driver. When she walks through the lobby of the hotel she feels Nick's eyes. On her room she orders dinner and reviews the notes from the scriptwalker. During the night Nick tries to sneak into Jill's bed which results in another murder with the antenna of the scriptwalker followed by a red pill. The next day Jill meets another journalist, Ivan Vabek, and they drink a cup of coffee in the bar of the hotel. Ivan tells about a conflict in Berlin called the Egg War, of which he thinks every journalist must cover at least once in his or her career. He offers Jill a front row spot and a dinner invitation. Jill accepts the invitation and is transported by a local boy to the spot where she can watch the Egg War herself. Next evening Jill tries to get access to the space port of Berlin, but everybody is denied access. The government inquires the only survivor of Europe I which is in fact controlled by Horus. Horus leaves the human body of the survivor he had taken and murders everybody who was questioning him. He finds Ivan Vabek and takes control of his body. Nikopol has followed these events with his telepathic cat and is preparing to leave the hospital and travel to Berlin. Also travelling to Berlin is John, Jill's alien friend who was murdered in the beginning of the story. During a dinner with Ivan, Jill notices that something has changed in him, especially his voice. While in Ivan's room, Ivan is fighting the spirit of Horus resulting in Horus leaving his body. Once more Jill is left back with another dead body and the usual red pill to erase it from her memory. Nikopol arrives at the desk of Mauer Palast, and he asks for a room. Once in the room, Nikopol speaks to Horus asking him to appear. Horus appears and during a glass of champagne, they discuss an agreement. John is arriving in the railway station of Berlin, where the police demands him to come with them. John knocks down three police men and flees, but is shot in the back three times... |
Jacob's Hands; A Fable | Aldous Huxley | null | Jacob Ericson is a shy, enigmatic, and somewhat inept ranch hand who works for crotchety Professor Carter and his crippled daughter Sharon, on a ranch in the California Mojave Desert in the 1920s. One day he learns that his hands possess the mysterious gift of healing, a gift he uses to cure animals, which he adores. Sharon, whom he also adores, then persuades him to heal her. When he successfully cures her, his gift is quickly exploited and the boundaries of his charm and naivete begin to stretch. First he offers his healing powers for free at a church in Los Angeles, where he has gone in pursuit of Sharon after she fled her father and the ranch to follow her dreams of stardom. Jacob and Sharon cross paths when they work for the same pair of exploitative showmen. Jacob stays with the seedy stage show only because Sharon is close by. It is when Jacob's gift is recruited to heal Earl Medwin, an eccentric, ailing young millionaire, that the love and security for which he has worked so hard begin to evaporate. |
The Artemis Fowl Files | Eoin Colfer | 2,004 | Artemis Fowl lures Mulch Diggums, a dwarf, to work with him to steal a tiara for a laser he is developing. A band of other dwarfs, using a circus as their cover have already stolen the tiara. The other dwarfs, led by Sergei the Significant, are planning to sell it to a jewellery fence. Captain Holly Short is on a break pending a tribunal after the Fowl Manor Incident, but Foaly tells her that the LEP have been alerted by Mulch Diggum's stolen helmet, about Artemis Fowl. Holly immediately heads to Ireland and confronts the dwarfs. Soon after Holly has tagged all of the dwarfs in Sergei's band, she chases Artemis and Mulch. Mulch and Artemis soon split with Artemis promising to write Mulch a cheque for the tiara. Holly chases after Artemis and demands the tiara and a LEP helmet from him. Artemis gives her the LEP helmet but keeps the tiara. Holly forces Artemis to give her the tiara, and then he hands it over. Later on we learn that Artemis switched the gemstone in the tiara with a fake one. He gives the real one to his mother because it reminds her of Artemis's father, specifically, the color of his eyes. |
The Bluest Eye | Toni Morrison | 1,970 | The novel opens with a prologue relating a paragraph-long Dick and Jane tale in which none of Jane's family will agree to play with her until a friend comes along at last. The tale is then repeated two times, each time with less punctuation or fewer spaces between words, until finally all the words are squashed together. The novel is alternately narrated in first-person by Claudia MacTeer and in third-person omniscient, focusing on various other characters. 9-year-old Claudia and her 10-year-old sister, Frieda, live in Lorain, Ohio with their parents, who take two other people into their home: Mr. Henry, a tenant, and Pecola Breedlove, a temporary foster child whose house has been burned down by her wildly (and widely-gossiped) unstable father. Pecola is a quiet, passive young girl with a hard life, and whose parents are constantly fighting, both physically and verbally. Pecola is continually being told and reminded of what an "ugly" girl she is, thus fueling her desire to be white with blue eyes. Claudia is given a white baby doll to play with and is frequently told how lovely it is, though she despises and spitefully dismantles it. Unlike Pecola, Claudia resists the white racial standard in her society, is aggressive and determined, and has a strict but ultimately stable family. While living in the MacTeer household, Pecola experiences menarche, bringing up the first of the book's many themes of sexuality and adulthood. Likewise, ideas of beauty, particularly those relating to racial and class characteristics, are a major theme in this book. Insults or praises toward physical appearance are often given in racial terms. For example, a light-skinned student named Maureen Peal is shown favoritism at school. Claudia and Frieda initially feel both hatred and attraction toward Maureen. When they finally befriend her after finding Pecola bullied by a group of boys, though, Maureen herself insults Pecola regarding rumors about her father and the MacTeer girls furiously chase Maureen away. Throughout the novel, it is revealed through flashbacks that not only Pecola but also her dysfunctional parents had a life full of hatred and hardships. Her mother, Pauline, feels alive and happy only when she is working for a rich, white family who affectionately call her "Polly." Pecola's father, Cholly, is a drunk who was left with his aunt when he was young but later ran away to find his father, who ended up wanting nothing to do with him. Equally troubling to Cholly as a young man was his loss of virginity, interrupted by a pair of white men who humiliatingly forced Cholly to continue having sex in their presence. By the time of the story's current setting, both Pauline and Cholly have by now lost the tender and affectionate love they once had for each other in their youth. There is a contrast between the world shown in the cinema and the one in which Pauline is a servant, as well as the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant society and the existence the main characters live in. Most chapters' titles are extracts from the Dick and Jane paragraph in the novel's prologue, presenting a white family that may be contrasted with Pecola's; perhaps to incite discomfort, the chapter titles contain much sudden repetition of words or phrases, many cut-off words, and no interword separations. One day while Pecola is doing dishes, her intoxicated father rapes her. His motives are unclear and confusing, seemingly a combination of both love and hate. Cholly flees after the second time he rapes Pecola, leaving her pregnant. Claudia and Frieda are the only two in the community that want for Pecola's child to survive. Consequently, they give up money they had been saving to buy and plant marigold seeds with the superstitious hope that if the flowers bloom, Pecola's baby will live. The marigolds never bloom and Pecola's child, who is born prematurely, dies. Near the novel's end, a dialogue is presented between two sides of Pecola's own imagination, in which she indicates at strangely positive feeling about her rape by her father; in this inner conversation, Pecola converses as though her wish has been granted: she believes that she now has blue eyes. Claudia, as narrator a final time, describes Pecola's insanity and suggests that Cholly (who has since died) may have shown Pecola the only love he could by raping her. Claudia lastly laments on her belief that the whole community, herself included, have used Pecola as a sort of scapegoat to make themselves feel prettier and happier. |
The Valley of Horses | Jean M. Auel | 1,982 | The book starts off from the events at the end of The Clan of the Cave Bear detailing the life of a young Cro-Magnon woman named Ayla who has just been exiled from the Clan, the band of Neanderthals who had raised her from early childhood. Ayla now searches for her own people, whom the Clan refer to as "the Others". In a parallel narrative, Jondalar, a young Cro-Magnon man of the Ninth Cave of the Zelandonii, accompanies his impetuous younger half-brother Thonolan on a traditional rite of passage called the Great Journey. In these episodes, we learn of the Cro-Magnon's neolithic nature religion, centered on the worship of the Great Mother of All, and follow their adventures and sexual exploits. It is also through these episodes that the animosity, verging on hatred, between the Others and the Clan (whom they refer to derogatorily as "flatheads") is introduced. The Others have repeatedly persecuted the Clan, taking land and resources, but justify it by classing them as animals. However, over the course of his adventures, Jondalar starts to question this prejudice, noting that no other animals have fire, tools or communicate intelligently, nor are they actively hated or attacked-as-sport by his people. Ayla, alone and ritually ostracized from the only people she has ever known, travels steadily from the Beran Sea peninsular home of her former tribe north for around half a year until finding the book's titular valley sunk deep into the windy landscape of the periglacial loess steppes in Ukraine. Worried that she might never find the Others, she begins to prepare for winter. Finding a suitable cave and many conveniences in the valley, she establishes a comfortable but lonely life there. Her desire for companionship leads her to tame a filly whose mother she had killed, naming her Whinney. She also takes in and treats an injured cave lion cub, which she names Baby. In the course of their journey, Jondalar and Thonolan have met women and hope to settle with them, but Thonolan's mate dies in childbirth and Jondalar feels he is not really in love with his woman friend. They continue on their journey and meet up with the Mamutoi people, planning to join them later in the year. Jondalar and Ayla meet when Thonolan is killed by a cave lion—Baby, now fully grown and with a mate of his own. Ayla heals Jondalar's injuries and they begin to learn to communicate and get to know each other. Jondalar overcomes his inbred prejudice against the Clan and Ayla learns that all her peculiarities which confused and angered the Clan are actually fully accepted and encouraged by the Others. The two fall in love as the book nears its end, and decide to leave the Valley of Horses and explore regions around the valley Ayla has not yet investigated. |
Tiger Eyes | Judy Blume | 1,981 | Davey Wexler, along with her mother, Gwen, and her little brother, Jason, has just attended the funeral of her father, Adam, who was shot to death in a holdup at their 7-Eleven convenience store in Atlantic City. After lying in bed for days on end and not eating, she starts her sophomore year of high school, but ends up passing out three days in a row. Davey's mother, Gwen, then decides they needed to get away for a couple of weeks, so they take up an offer from Adam's older sister, Bitsy, and her husband Walter, to come stay with them in Los Alamos, New Mexico. However, a few days before they were scheduled to leave, Gwen gets news that their store was further vandalized, and she decides they're going to stay longer. It turns out to be pretty much the entire school year. While there, Bitsy and Walter, who do not have children and were never able to have them, start treating Davey and Jason like their own, which eventually creates tension between Davey and the both of them when they won't let her do a number of things out of fear of her getting hurt or killed, and more so when her mother just sits back and allow it to happen. Meanwhile, as Davey explores the town on her aunt's bicycle, she goes to a canyon and after climbing down she runs into an older boy who calls himself Wolf. Davey calls herself Tiger when they introduce each other. She also becomes a candy striper at the hospital with her new friend, Jane, and meets a cancer patient who turns out to be the father of Wolf. The inspiration from Wolf and his father changes Davey for the better. Another story is Jane's alcoholism and Davey's desire to help her get out of it. Also, in three different parts Davey describes the evening her father was shot and killed, which causes her in at least one part of the book to completely freak out when Jason experiences a nosebleed from the altitude. She carries a paper bag with her, which is revealed to contain the clothing she was wearing when she found her father and cradled him all the way to his death. The clothing was soaked with his blood. She eventually buries it and a bread knife she was carrying for self-defense in a cave in the canyon she met Wolf in. Eventually, against Bitsy's wishes, Gwen decides to return the family to Atlantic City to begin a new life, so Walter helps them buy a car for the trip home. Once they're back home, Davey often wonders if anyone will know how much she had changed, particularly her friend, Laina, and her boyfriend, Hugh, then also has the realization that some changes happen deep down and only you know about them. |
Knowledge of Angels | Jill Paton Walsh | 1,994 | Jill Paton Walsh writes At opposite ends of Grandinsula, a remote pre-reformation Christian island, shepherds find a creature with strange footprints stealing their lambs, and fisherman find a swimmer near exhaustion struggling towards the shore. The child cannot stand, eat or speak like a human being; the swimmer says he is a prince in the unheard of land of Aclar, and declares himself to be an atheist. Severo, Cardinal and Prince of the island, is confronted by a double conundrum. Could an atheist be in good faith? Not if the knowledge of God is inborn; then the atheist must once have known God, and reneged on the knowledge. If he is a renegade from the truth, he must be burned as a heretic; but Severo would dearly like to save him. How could it be found out whether everyone has inborn knowledge of God, since the teaching of the Church as best known to the greatest scholar on the island is unclear? Perhaps by teaching the wolf-child to speak, and then asking her... That will take time. Meanwhile, it is worth while trying to demonstrate the truth of God to the mysterious atheist in argument. What becomes of the argument, of the atheist, and of the wild child, and the effect of their fates on Severo, and the islanders who come in contact with either the Prince of Aclar, or the ferocious child Amara makes up the thread of the story. This is a fable about tolerance, and its conflict with moral certainty. |
The Mammoth Hunters | Jean M. Auel | 1,985 | This book picks up where The Valley of Horses ends; Ayla and Jondalar, meet a group known as the Mamutoi, or Mammoth Hunters, with whom they live for a period of time. As the group's name suggests, their hosts rely on mammoth not only for food but also for building materials and a number of other commodities - and indeed for spiritual sustenance. The protagonists make their home with the Lion Camp of the Mammoth Hunters, which features a number of respected Mamutoi. Wisest of their nation is Old Mamut, their eldest shaman and the leader of the entire Mamutoi priesthood, who becomes Ayla's mentor and colleague in the visionary and esoteric fields of thought. Observing Ayla's affinity with horses and wolves, Mamut begins to introduce her into the ranks of the Mamuti (mystics). Mamut is also one of the first to become aware of Ayla's unique upbringing. Many years ago, while on the Journey that all young men take for a [rite of passage], he broke his arm, and was healed by the medicine woman of Ayla's Neanderthal clan (the grandmother of Ayla's adoptive mother Iza). This story is referenced in Clan of the Cave Bear as the Neanderthals rationalize Ayla's behavior in terms of what they know about "the Others" (Cro-Magnon). Mamut learned some of the Clan sign language during that stay, and became aware of the fact that the Clan are human (as opposed to other animals, as is the common opinion of most of his people). Also within the Lion Camp is a six-year-old boy named Rydag who, like Ayla's lost son Durc, is half Clan and half Other. He was adopted by the headman's mate, Nezzie, when his mother died giving birth to him. He cannot speak, having the same vocal limitations as the Clan, but he also has their ancestral memories. Ayla quickly discovers this and teaches him, and the rest of the Lion Camp, the Clan sign language. Rydag is a sickly child, having a heart defect which limits him from even playing like the other children of the Camp. Many Mamutoi regard him as an animal, but Ayla and the Lion Camp are vehement in their defence of him. Rydag's intelligence, maturity and wit endear him to Jondalar as well, who learns to overcome his cultural prejudice towards Clan and half-Clan people. More so than any other book in the Earth's Children series, The Mammoth Hunters relies on the tension created by the relationships between the characters to create a storyline. Ayla is susceptible to being deceived or confused; she was brought up among essentially honest people who due to their visual language are incapable of deception. She also does not know that when a man asks her to "share Pleasures" with him, she has the option of refusing, since Clan women did not. Thus, there are a number of communication failures in her relationships with members of more complex societies, especially with Jondalar, who is obstinate and passionate. Jondalar, a Zelandoni, is a foreigner among the Mamutoi, and Ayla's acceptance in their society makes him feel separated from her. The primary conflict is a love triangle between Jondalar, Ayla, and Lion Camp member Ranec. Ayla is attracted to Ranec, shares "Pleasures" with him a few times, and comes close to marrying him before several last-minute revelations reunite the former pair. Some fans have criticized author Jean Auel for making the book somewhat of a soap opera compared to her other works. The author also uses the same technique (long minutely precise descriptive passages) for common sexual activity as she uses for stone age technology (e.g. flint-shaping). Nonetheless, many readers report having enjoyed the book. At the end of this novel, Ayla and Jondalar leave for the year-long return journey to Jondalar's people, the Zelandonii, a journey detailed in The Plains of Passage and continued in The Shelters of Stone. As in all her books, Auel's archaeological research is detailed, and the huts of mammoth bones which she describes the Mamutoi building are based on real finds. Similar finds, called Tuns, may be the source of ancient Celtic myths about the "Little People". |
What the Butler Saw | Joe Orton | null | ; Characters * Dr. Prentice * Geraldine Barclay * Mrs Prentice * Nicholas Beckett * Dr Rance * Sergeant Match The play consists of two acts, and revolves around a Dr. Prentice, a psychiatrist attempting to seduce his attractive prospective secretary, Geraldine Barclay. The play opens with the doctor examining Geraldine Barclay in a job interview. As part of the interview, he convinces her to undress. The situation becomes more intense during Dr. Prentice's supposed "interview" with Geraldine Barclay when Mrs Prentice enters. When his wife enters, he attempts to cover up his activity by hiding the girl behind a curtain. His wife, however, is also being seduced and blackmailed by a Nicholas Beckett. She therefore promises Nicholas the post as secretary, which adds further confusion, including Nicholas and Geraldine dressing as the opposite sex. Dr. Prentice's clinic is then faced by a government inspection. The inspection, led by Dr. Rance, reveals the chaos in the clinic. Dr. Rance talks about how he will use the situation to develop a new book: "The final chapters of my book are knitting together: incest, buggery, outrageous women and strange love-cults catering for depraved appetites. All the fashionable bric-a-brac." A penis ("the missing parts of Sir Winston Churchill") is held aloft in the climactic scene. |
Eine Billion Dollar | Andreas Eschbach | 2,001 | John Salvatore Fontanelli, the son of a shoemaker in New York who works as a pizza driver, is one day invited to the Waldorf Astoria by an Italian lawyer, where he is informed that he inherited a huge fortune simply by being the last male descendant of a wealthy Italian merchant living and working in 16th century Florence. This merchant put a rather small amount of money in a bank account some 500 years ago. Through the magic of compound interest, this sum has now grown into the equivalent of roughly 1,000,000,000,000 US dollars. In one fell swoop, John Fontanelli has become by far the richest person in the world, his net worth being bigger than the GDP of most countries. Yet, his ancestor has charged his heir with the task of using the inheritance to give back mankind its lost future. After some hither and tither, he accepts the role assigned to him by his ancestor and tries to better the world socially and ecologically. On the advice of his mysterious new consultant, Malcolm McCaine, he founds a huge corporation called Fontanelli Enterprises and strategically invests the inherited fortune in a diversified group of projects to grow his power and influence. Starting with the hostile takeover of ExxonMobil, John Fontanelli's orders now decide the fate of other companies, currencies, and even complete countries' economies. With the passing of time, John recognizes that all this will not ultimately lead him to success in mastering his assigned task. To get a better picture of the future development of mankind, he sets up a gigantic and secret scientific project, which uses complex computer models to simulate different future scenarios. When the sobering result is finally announced, Fontanelli and McCaine differ about the correct approach to save humanity from its obvious self-destroying development. McCaine leaves Fontanelli, thinking that mankind is doomed to being minimized down to a small but qualified elite. By using his own money, he sets up another company and tries to entice away leading scientists in the research of the AIDS virus to withdraw their manpower from the development of an effective cure. Fontanelli, on the other side, is setting up a foundation to organize and enforce the election of a world speaker. In his belief, the multi-national companies can only be controlled by global laws to prevent a catastrophe. The opposing and contradictory strategies of Fontanelli and McCaine to save humanity from its disastrous fate culminate in an exacerbated struggle for power. Fontanelli achieves a partial victory: The election of a world speaker finally takes place. The book ends with the death of John Fontanelli, who gets shot by an old friend who gradually came under the influence of McCaine. |
Intermere | null | null | Notably in this utopian community women are only permitted to earn half as much as men and cannot vote. Divorce is unknown and Intermere's citizens are said not to have a sense of humor. |
The Plains of Passage | Jean M. Auel | 1,990 | The Plains of Passage describes the journey of Ayla and Jondalar west along the Great Mother River (the Danube), from the home of The Mammoth Hunters (roughly modern Ukraine) to Jondalar's homeland (close to Les Eyzies, Dordogne, France). During this journey, Ayla meets the various peoples who live along their line of march. These meetings, the attitudes and beliefs of these groups, and Ayla's response form an essential part of the story. Characters range in description from innocent to bloodthirsty, from serious to comical, from noble to corrupt, from found to lost, and from peaceful to violent. All of these adjectives apply, interestingly, in some way to either Jondalar or Ayla. Ayla (and to some extent Jondalar) is often viewed by her new friends as mystic or supernatural, partially due to her friendships with the world's first known domesticated horses and wolf, but also due to her generous nature and wisdom. As they encounter people Jondalar and his brother met on their journey eastward they have a hard time leaving them, especially after an offer to become joined with a high-ranking Sharamudoi couple. Jondalar declines the offer, giving as excuse his desire to have the lead mystic of his people search for and help his deceased brother cross over to the other side. It concludes with Ayla and Jondalar's successful return to the Zelandoni, and Ayla's unconfirmed pregnancy, and Whinney's definite pregnancy. The Plains of Passage is one of the longer books in the Earth's Children series. It was followed by The Shelters of Stone. |
The Glory of Living | Rebecca Gilman | null | The play opens with the main characters Lisa and Clint meeting for the first time. Clint has accompanied a friend to Lisa and her mother's mobile home to see Lisa's mother, a prostitute. Clint picks up on Lisa's unease about her mother's situation and begins charming her. The next scene opens a few years later and Clint and Lisa have married and have twins who are being cared for by Clint's mother. The couple has been living in a series of motel rooms and are plying a scam whereby Lisa lures young girls into the room where Clint rapes and abuses them. Afterwards, Lisa murders the girls and disposes of their bodies. Plagued with guilt, Lisa calls the police with anonymous tips on the location of the bodies. Act I concludes with the couple's arrest. Act II deals primarily with the couple's punishments but focuses on Lisa and her motives for her actions. The audience is shown that Lisa has not been able to emotionally mature and that has led her to live the life she has lived. |
The Shelters of Stone | Jean M. Auel | 2,002 | Central to this book is the tension created by Ayla's healing art, her pregnancy, and the acceptance of her by Jondalar's people, the Zelandonii. Ayla was raised by Clan Neanderthals, known as "flatheads" to the Zelandonii and viewed as no better than animals. For the Zelandonii to accept Ayla they must first overcome their prejudice against the Neanderthals. Luckily for Ayla and Jondalar, some of the higher-ranking Zelandonii already have doubts of this misjudgment. Two of their number, Echozar and Brukeval, are of partial Neanderthal ancestry and are ashamed of it. Echozar at least is pacified by Ayla's own story and by his (Echozar's) own marriage to Joplaya, Jondalar's close-cousin (half-sister). Brukeval, on the other hand, rejects his heritage utterly and refuses to listen to reason. Jondalar's first romantic interest, Zelandoni, formerly known as Zolena, has now become the First among the spiritual leaders. She supports adopting Ayla into their society, if not least for the healing arts she brings to the cave, although Ayla also must overcome the feeling that she is uncomfortable with a full connection with the spirit world. After Ayla helps a mortally injured hunter live long enough to see his mate, the First senses that Ayla needs to be brought into the fold of the Zelandonia (mystics, named after their culture so as to identify themselves with it) so that she will be accepted as a healer by all the people of the cave. At one point, Ayla persuades the native mothers to nurse a neglected infant, on the pretext that even a "flathead" would have done so in their place. This both shames them into agreeing (as noted by Jondalar's sister-in-law, Proleva) and educates the Zelandonii in the ways of their ex-neighbors. Ayla is drawn ever closer to an as-yet-undetermined role in the Ninth Cave of the Zelandonii. Her knowledge of the healing arts as well as hunting force her to accept a role in the spiritual leadership of the group. Through it all Jondalar is waiting for the summer meeting and matrimonial that will finally "tie the knot" for the two of them. This has been his ultimate goal since The Valley of Horses. Their daughter, Jonayla, named for her mother's belief a man's "essence" creates babies, which leads to Jondalar and Ayla each being part of the baby, not just their spirits, is born sometime after this event. Not long after the birth, Ayla finally decides to become Zelandonii's acolyte, if only so that the members of the Zelandonii will accept her as a healer. This book is set in what is now the Vézère valley, near to Les Eyzies, in the Dordogne, southwest France. It was relatively densely populated in prehistoric times, with many open cliff-top dwellings that can still be seen, some of which have been turned into tourist attractions. The national museum of prehistory is located in this valley. Ayla also discovers the world-famous cave of Lascaux, which her adopted people subsequently paint. <!-- |
Natalie Natalia | Nicholas Mosley | null | The protagonist of this novel, Anthony Greville, is a Member of Parliament who is married with two children. His son Adam is seventeen and his daughter Sophie is eight. Despite the outward perfection of his life, Greville is having an affair with sculptress Natalia Jones, an enigmatic mother of two who is married to a husband in politics who cheats on her. Greville's wife is away at the family's country retreat for weeks on end and his children at their respective schools, so Greville enjoys his lover's company with minimal risk of being discovered. However, as smitten with Natalia as Greville is, he has a brief fling with a woman named Madeleine, as well. In spite of his easy lifestyle, Greville is not a happy man. The focus of this novel is based on Greville's dissatisfactions and confusions. For instance, although Natalia does not make any demands on him, and his wife prefers not to see what is going on, Greville is torn between the two women. He wants to be with Natalia when he is with his wife and vice versa. What is more, he sees two people in his lover. To Anthony Greville, Natalia is an angelic figure who also symbolizes a diametrical opposite, specifically demonic. This dual perception of his lover leads him call her by two different names (Natalie and Natalia). Greville becomes disillusioned with politics, because he feels that political gaming prefers stalemate to partisanship,and therefore, opposes real change. Subsequently, Greville states that he is going to resign from Parliament as soon as possible. This is a startling announcement because Greville comes from a family of politicians, and his son is already active in grassroots politics. However, before his intended resignation, he must complete a final diplomatic mission as an MP; he journeys to Central Africa to meet Ndoula, a controversial freedom fighter who has been imprisoned by the colonial powers. While he is in Africa, without the emotional chaos of his personal life, Greville begins to introspect, writing and trying to make sense of his life. When Greville returns to England, he finds that both his wife and his idealistic son are leaving for Africa in order to help the current crisis. Greville sees them off at the airport, and then returns to Natalia, even though she has not answered his letters from abroad. Although interesting and similar in content and intent to the works of Graham Greene, the plot line of Natalie Natalia can be construed as "difficult to follow" because the linear narration is interrupted by segments where Greville's thoughts, dreams, and fantasies become the focus of the prose. An example of such an interruptive/introspective segment in Greville's POV (from Chapter 7) follows : […] I had rowed into the harbour from the sea; the oars had made whirlpools. A light appeared in the window: your breast, above the candle, burned. We wrapped our cloaks round us: ran with our shoulders against the drawbridge. Hands came through the door and held us; they were tendrils through the stone. You watched from an upstairs window. We were in the hallway of the castle. You stood with the candle and one hand against your breast. The candle burned: it made blood against the snow. The man with the beak of a bird put his head down to embrace you: with one arm round his neck, you were a tunnel through which he could breathe. On the stairs were figures in suits of armour. Firelight flickered. You were laid on a table with one leg raised. The man with the mask of a bird rummaged inside you. He was looking in you like a suitcase. I had been in the cell all winter alone. Turning you on your front, you had been split up the back by an axe. Men in white coats stood around you. They had instruments in their hands with which to handle coals. They flipped them over. You had your face to the wall and were fastened to iron rings. The man with the beak of a bird tore the lining. Hands had come through the wall and held me. Your arms were round the neck of the man with the mask like a swan. He reached to the entrails and the liver. Men leaned over tables and shovelled coal. Their pink cheeks glowed. You stood with a hand at your breast and the candle burning you. On the stairs were men in armour; their swords flickered. With your back towards them, they heated irons in the coal. They lifted your leg up and put it on the table. Moving with my hands behind me, I felt an iron ring in the stone. If I pulled, there would be a tunnel: I could put an iron bar across the hole. At the end of it would be a cell. There I had been all winter. […] |
Woken Furies | Richard Morgan | 2,005 | Takeshi Kovacs finds himself back on his home planet of Harlan's World. Nine-tenths water, Harlan's World is surrounded by "orbitals" that were created by "Martians". The Harlan's World orbitals are programmed to destroy any object of sufficient technological level flying above ~400 meters altitude and do so with high-energy beam weapons known as "Angelfire". In the Kovacs universe, "Martians" are a long-dead, super-advanced, avian/winged species who disappeared from our galaxy, leaving behind inscrutable artifacts and a few pieces of operating technology. They are referred to as "Martians" by humans because our first discovery of them is on Mars. Their homeworld is unknown, lost in the millennium since they were active in any space humans have discovered. This mystery is compounded by the Martians' peculiar habit of showing all maps with the local settlement at the center of the universe, rather than relative to a fixed homeworld or system. Martian civilization is covered in more detail in the second Kovacs novel, Broken Angels, which centers around a Martian gateway. Kovacs is on the run after making numerous attacks against the Knights of the New Revelation, an extremist religious order. He has declared a personal vendetta against the New Revelation with the express intent of killing every member, revenge for the killing of a long lost love and her daughter for violating the strict tenets of the order. While trying to secure passage after his most recent attack, he saves a woman named Sylvie from a group of religious zealots. In return, she allows him to take refuge with her mercenary "deCom" crew as they head out to decommission sentient military hardware that has run amok on a nearby continent. Sylvie is the "command head" of her crew, coordinating their missions using embedded circuitry and software. During one of these missions, Sylvie collapses, and upon recovery her personality appears to have been replaced by that of long-dead revolutionary leader Quellcrist Falconer. The crew return to base where they discover a younger version of Kovacs has been illegally duplicated and is hunting them on behalf of the Harlans, dictators of Harlan's World. Most of Sylvie's crew is killed and Sylvie/Quellcrist is captured. Kovacs schemes to rescue Sylvie by approaching old criminal associates of his, the Little Blue Bugs. The Little Blue Bugs mount a semi-successful attack on a Harlan fortress and rescue Sylvie/Quellcrist. Hiding from Harlan forces in a floating base, the neo-Quellists are sold out by its owner and recaptured. An assault by Kovacs and a single UN Envoy on the base ends badly when Kovacs is betrayed by the Envoy who was actually embedded with several colleagues. However, Sylvie/Quellcrist has established a connection with the AI/consciousness which operates the orbitals and calls down anglefire, eliminating their captors but sparing Kovacs and his original Envoy instructor and current revolutionary comrade-in-arms, Virginia Vidaura. Kovacs' younger self catches up with him and after a struggle, Kovacs decides not to kill his younger self but instead allow him life and the chance to make the same decisions he himself had to make. Nonetheless the younger self is killed by one of the survivors of the combat. Kovacs, Vidaura and Sylvie/Quellcrist are left to wait and see whether they will be able to incite a planet-wide revolution with Sylvie/Quellcrist's newfound connection to the orbitals and the expansion of a long-dormant genetic virus which will turn the population against the ruling oligarchy. |
The Great Train Robbery | Michael Crichton | 1,975 | In 1854, Edward Pierce, a charismatic and affluent "cracksman" or master thief, makes plans to steal a shipment of gold worth more than twelve thousand pounds being transported monthly from London to the Crimean War front. He faces enormous obstacles as the bank has taken strict precautions, including locking the gold in two heavy safes, each of which has two locks, thus requiring a total of four keys to open. He recruits Robert Agar, a "screwsman" or specialist in copying keys, as an accomplice. To ensure the success of his bold plan, Pierce spends more than a year in preparation; his first steps are fairly easy as he uses his wealth and social contacts to procure information on the security measures and locations of the keys: the bank's executives Mr. Henry Fowler and Mr. Edgar Trent each possess a key; the other two are locked in a cabinet at the offices of the South Eastern Railway at the London Bridge train station. Pierce's first target is the key held by Edgar Trent. The attempt to take Mr. Trent's key is difficult, as Pierce has no clues or prior information on his habits. Through painstaking surveillance, conversations with bank employees and a deliberately bungled pickpocketing attempt, Pierce deduces that Mr. Trent's key is kept at his mansion but is still unable to learn the exact location. After learning that Trent is keen on ratting (a blood sport involving the betting on dogs killing rats), Pierce succeeds in becoming acquainted with the man and while visiting the Trent mansion feigns romantic interest in Elizabeth Trent, Mr. Trent's twenty-nine year old daughter, who has had few suitors. Edward begins to court Elizabeth and manages to learn that the key is most likely located in the basement wine cellar. With the assistance of his mistress Miriam and cab driver Barlow, Pierce and Agar successfully break into Mr. Trent's home at night and make a wax copy of the key after a painstaking search. Henry Fowler develops syphilis and, being unwilling to seek medical attention out of embarrassment, decides to seek a remedy by sleeping with a virgin (similar to superstitions about HIV) and asks Pierce for assistance. After charging Fowler the exorbitant price of one hundred guineas for a night of pleasure with a twelve-year-old (twelve being the legal age of consent), Pierce and Agar take advantage of the opportunity to make a copy of Fowler's key (which he always carries with him around his neck but takes off and leaves on the bedside table during the assignation). The most difficult keys to copy are the two keys at the train station which Pierce plans to procure and copy by night; the presence of "crushers" (policemen) forces him to recruit a "snakesman" (a burglar able to slip inside buildings through small and cramped spaces) nicknamed Clean Willy, who is currently incarcerated in the high-security Newgate Prison. He sends a message through Willy's former mistress and assists him in escaping from Newgate while the public is distracted by a public execution outside the prison. After nursing Willy back to health from injuries received during the escape, the criminals succeed in making wax copies of the two keys at the railway station, completing the task with only seconds to spare before detection. Now possessing all four copies of the necessary keys, Pierce loses no time in bribing Burgess, the poorly-paid guard on the train who rides in the baggage van containing the safes. Agar is then able to perform a dry run of the theft on February 17, 1855, making sure that the copied keys work perfectly. Everything appears to be moving along smoothly; the actual theft is planned for May 22nd when the would-be thieves find themselves seriously compromised: Clean Willy turns informant to the police. Pierce manages to have Willy murdered before he can reveal the most crucial information, although their plans are now in danger of discovery by law enforcement agents who correctly fear that a major robbery is at hand. Through careful manipulation of a "nose" (informant), the criminals manage to divert the police's attention to an alleged robbery in Greenwich, leaving them free and clear to finally strike. On the eve of the Great Train Robbery, another unexpected development occurs as a new railway policy requires the train doors to be locked from the outside. Unwilling to further delay their plans, Pierce manages to smuggle Agar into the baggage van inside a coffin and then risks his life by climbing across the roof of the train during their journey and unlocking the door from the outside, thus allowing them to drop off the gold at a pre-arranged point. By the next day, much of England is in an uproar upon the discovery of the robbery with every organization involved in the gold shipment blaming each other, with few leads as to the true culprits, who have largely vanished from the public eye. Although their daring plan appears to have succeeded, Pierce, Agar and Burgess are ultimately apprehended after Agar's mistress, who has been arrested for robbing a drunk, becomes a police informant to escape imprisonment, and Agar confesses after being threatened by the police with transportation to Australia. Pierce and Burgess are arrested at a prize-fighting event in Manchester, and all three are convicted. Pierce is sentenced to a long prison term but manages to successfully escape while being transported from the court and disappears, though reports indicate he, Miriam and Barlow spend much of the rest of their lives living in luxury in various foreign cities such as New York and Paris. The train guard Burgess dies of cholera during his short prison term, while Agar is indeed transported to Australia but manages to prosper, and passes away a wealthy man. Edgar Trent dies from a chest ailment in 1857, while Henry Fowler dies from "unknown causes" (presumably from the syphilis he had contracted) in 1858. The gold from the Great Train Robbery is never recovered. |
Father Sergius | Leo Tolstoy | 1,912 | The story begins with the childhood and exceptional and accomplished youth of Prince Stepan Kasatsky. The young man is destined for great things. He discovers on the eve of his wedding that his fiancée Countess Mary Korotkova has had an affair with his beloved Tsar Nicholas I. The blow to his pride is massive, and he retreats to the arms of Russian Orthodoxy and becomes a monk. Many years of humility and doubt follow. He is ordered to become a hermit. Despite his being removed from the world, he is still remembered for having so remarkably transformed his life. One winter night, a group of merry-makers decide to visit him, and one of them, a divorced woman named Makovkina, spends the night in his cell, with the intention to seduce him. Father Sergius discovers he is still weak and in order to protect himself, cuts off his own finger. Makovkina is stunned by this act, and leaves the next morning, having vowed to change her life. A year later she has joined a convent. Father Sergius' reputation for holiness grows. He becomes known as a healer, and pilgrims come from far and wide. Yet Father Sergius is profoundly aware of his inability to attain a true faith. He is still tortured by boredom, pride, and lust. He fails a new test, when the young daughter of a merchant successfully beds him. The morning after, he leaves the monastery and seeks out his cousin Pashenka (Praskovya Mikhaylovna), whom he, with a group of other boys, had tormented many years ago. He finds her, now in all the conventional senses a failure in life, yet imbued with a sense of service towards her family. His path is now clearer. He begins to wander, until eight months later he is arrested. He is sent to Siberia, where he now works as the hired man of a well-to-do peasant. |
Utilitarianism | John Stuart Mill | null | The essay is divided into five chapters, namely #General Remarks; #What Utilitarianism Is; #Of the Ultimate Sanction of the Principle of Utility; #Of What Sort of Proof the Principle of Utility is Susceptible; and #On the Connection Between Justice and Utility. In the first two chapters, Mill aims to define precisely what utilitarianism claims in terms of the general moral principles that it uses to judge concrete actions, as well as in terms of the sort of evidence that is supposed to be given for such principles. He hopes thus to do away with some common misunderstandings of utilitarianism, as well as to defend it against philosophical criticisms, most notably those of Kant. In the first chapter, he distinguishes two broad schools of ethical theory — those whose principles are defended by appeals to intuition and those whose principles are defended by appeals to experience. He identifies utilitarianism as one of the empirical theories of ethics. In the second chapter, Mill formulates a single ethical principle, from which he says all utilitarian ethical principles are derived: The creed which accepts as the foundation of morals, Utility, or the Greatest-Happiness Principle, holds that actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. By happiness is intended pleasure, and the absence of pain; by unhappiness, pain, and the privation of pleasure. Most importantly, it is not the agent's own greatest happiness that matters "but the greatest amount of happiness altogether." Utilitarianism, therefore, can only attain its goal of greater happiness by cultivating the nobleness of individuals so that all can benefit from the honour of others. In fact, notes Mill, Utilitarianism is actually a "standard of morality" which uses happiness of the greater number of people as its ultimate goal. The Greatest-Happiness Principle, deals with doing the greatest good for the greatest number of people. With the famous words "it is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied", (260) Mill touts the importance of being well brought up and knowledgeably curious about the world, and understanding higher pleasures such as art and music, than to be uneducated and complacent. One need not be personally satisfied with one's life to be able to contribute to the "total sum happiness" of a society. Mill goes on to discuss what is meant by "pleasure" and "pain" in his formulation of the Greatest-Happiness Principle, to argue that it encompasses intellectual as well as sensual pleasures, and to offer a defence of intellectual pleasures as preferable not only in degree, but also in kind, to sensual pleasures. Throughout the volume, Mill writes mainly as if addressing opponents of utilitarianism, but here he is trying also to criticise and refine the understanding of the Greatest-Happiness Principle offered by earlier utilitarians, Jeremy Bentham in particular. In the third chapter, Mill discusses questions concerning the motivation to follow utilitarian moral principles. He explores ways in which both external and internal sanctions — that is, the incentives provided by others and the inner feelings of sympathy and duty — encourage people to act in such a way as to promote general happiness. The fourth chapter offers Mill's attempt at an inductive proof of the Greatest-Happiness Principle, on the grounds that happiness and happiness alone is desired as an end in itself. The fifth chapter concludes the essay with a discussion of problems concerning utilitarianism, as well as the concept of justice. Critics of utilitarianism often claim that judging actions solely in terms of their consequences is incompatible with a foundational and universally binding concept of justice. Mill sees this as the strongest objection to utilitarianism and sets out to argue #that a binding concept of justice can be explained in strictly utilitarian terms; and #that the problems created by the utilitarian explanation are difficult problems for any concept of justice whatsoever, whether utilitarian or not. Finally, in order to be truly happy, Mill believes that we must turn our attention away from our own happiness towards other objects and ends, such as doing good for others and such high pleasures in life as art and music. We can clarify what Mill means by utilitarianism by comparing and contrasting it with Aristotle's classic position of Eudaimonism or virtue ethics. Both Aristotle and Mill argue humans naturally seek the good life, which is happiness. Mill's principle of utility is natural because it is grounded in the psychological faculty of desiring pleasure and avoiding pain. In Chapter four of his text "Utilitarianism" Mill can claim that the proof for the principle of utility is the fact that it is human nature. Aristotle claims virtue is natural as the excellence of natural human function. But, for Aristotle, virtues are a means to the end of happiness. Virtues are chosen for the sake of happiness. According to Mill, this is an abstract philosophy separated from happiness. Means are, by definition, different from the end for which they are chosen. Mill seeks concrete happiness. The principle of utility establishes what is good because what is good brings about pleasure, while what is bad brings about pain. The principle of pleasure allows us to know what is the best good because it shows what contributes to the greatest good or happiness for the greatest many. As the principle of utility structures human nature it is present in every human action. Every human being desires happiness because every thing a human being desires is desired for its pleasure. Mill shows that the principle of utility is necessary and that those things that are desired are parts of happiness and not a means to happiness. Because humans have parts of happiness, happiness is concrete and not abstract. Happiness remains abstract for Aristotle according to Mill. Mill wants concrete happiness so that people can be happy. For some proponents of Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics, one only becomes happy after they die. Mill wants the living to be happy. According to Mill, the mistake of other moral theories, including Aristotle's, is that all systems are based on the principle of utility, but other moralists were blind to this fact. Mill's principle of utility is the true principle of morality and human nature and makes it possible for the greatest number to have the greatest happiness. |
The Heidi Chronicles | Wendy Wasserstein | null | The plot follows Heidi Holland from high school in the 1960s to her career as a successful art historian more than twenty years later. The play's main themes deal with the changing role of women during this time period, describing both Heidi's ardent feminism during the 1970s and her eventual sense of betrayal during the 1980s. Though most of the characters are women, there are two important male characters; Peter Patrone, a gay pediatrician who is arguably Heidi's best friend, and Scoop Rosenbaum, a magazine editor who marries and has many affairs, and with whom Heidi has a tense friendship. |
Shampoo Planet | Douglas Coupland | 1,992 | Part one begins shortly after Tyler’s return from a European vacation. He is in a relationship with a girl named Anna-Louise, and dreams of working for American Defense Contractor, Bechtel. He is obsessed with his haircare products, having a collection of different brand name products, most featuring names invented by Coupland. The first part of the novel details Tyler’s life in Lancaster, Washington. The town is a near ghost town, after the town’s largest employer, the Plants, was shut down. The effects of the Plants’ shutdown has caused many problems in the town, including the boarding up of many stores in the local mall. Tyler’s family life is composed of himself, his mother, and his two siblings. He calls his mother by her first name, Jasmine. Jasmine is an ex-hippie who is married to an alcoholic man named Dan. At the very introduction of the novel, Dan divorces Jasmine. Tyler, his sister, Daisy, and his brother, Mark, band together to help Jasmine through her troubling time. Tyler’s grandparents are also introduced. They are quite wealthy, but they will not share their wealth with their family members. They have decided to start selling a product satirically labeled KittyWhip, which is a gourmet cat food product line. At the beginning of this part, two of Tyler’s compatriots from his European vacation decide to visit Tyler in Lancaster. They are Monique and Stephanie. Stephanie is Tyler’s secret shame from Europe, as he had a summer relationship with her. Tyler tells us about his European vacation, and the events that lead to him meeting Stephanie, and what it means to have Stephanie visit them in Lancaster. Tyler’s world starts to turn upside down, as his Grandparents lose their fortune, his mother becomes a KittyWhip salesperson, and his relationship with Anna-Louise enters a rough patch. Tyler feels himself become more drawn to Stephanie than Anna-Louise. Tyler, deciding that his life in Lancaster is not interesting enough, leaves with Stephanie to live in Los Angeles. His time in Los Angeles is wrought with strife. Tyler’s worst fear becomes realized as he finds himself working at a chicken fry shop manning the fryer. It is in Los Angeles that Tyler begins to comprehend advice that his mother gave him about loneliness. |
The Family from One End Street | Eve Garnett | 1,937 | Lily Rose comes home early after a pipe has burst at school, and being a Girl Guide, Lily Rose tries to help her mother by ironing some of the laundry her mother does for clients. Unfortunately, she uses a too-hot iron for a petticoat of artificial silk, which shrinks, and her mother is furious as the garment belonged to one of her most trusted customers, Mrs. Beaseley. The next morning, Mrs. Ruggles takes Lily Rose to Mrs Beaseley's house to explain what has happened. Fortunately, Mrs. Beaseley is amused, as she has made similar mistakes when she was a child. Kate has passed her 'eleven plus' examinations with flying colors, but her parents are concerned, as they believe that they cannot afford the extra school expenses this will incur. Mrs. Beaseley’s cook points out that Mr. Ruggles has filled the scholarship paperwork out incorrectly: instead of seven children, he stated that he had only one child. After correcting the paperwork, they get a larger scholarship. The week before school opens, Kate is invited on an outing to the seaside by one of her school friends, and manages to lose her new school hat to the incoming tide. She cannot ask her family for another, as she wasn't supposed to be wearing it on the picnic, nor does she have enough money to buy one. Two local boys, Bill and his brother Ted, tell her where she can pick mushrooms and sell them for a shilling a pound. Unfortunately, they are not wild mushrooms but cultivated ones, and the farmer catches Kate with a basket of his mushrooms. He asks her if she's stolen mushrooms before and she tearfully tells him how she found out about them. The farmer believes her, and is understanding enough to give her a basket of mushrooms to sell. After Kate goes back home, a surprise awaits her in a parcel: the hat she had lost at sea during the Salthaven (i.e. Newhaven, Sussex) outing has been recovered by a friend of the Watkins! Jim, the older and more ambitious of the Ruggles twins, decides he wants an adventure of his own, but is captured by a local gang. A twelve-year-old named Henry Oates heads this gang, whose members call themselves Black Hands. The gang meets every Saturday, in an old lime kiln or at the gasworks, where Henry’s father, a foreman, is employed. Though they consider him too young to join and accuse him of spying, Jim begs for his acceptance. The next Saturday, Jim embarks on a real adventure. As a hailstorm begins, he follows a friendly little dog into a drain pipe around a wharf’s barge-loading area for shelter; the dog escapes but Jim, who has fallen asleep in the pipe, is carried off to the seaport Salthaven, when the pipes are loaded onto a barge. Jim relates his story to Mr. Watkins about being a stowaway. To Jim’s surprise, Watkins says he was also a gang member when he was young, and sends him off home. John, the younger twin, is a car fan and regularly visits Otwell Castle’s car park, in the hope of finding visitors who will pay him to mind their car. A couple called the Lawrences arrive at the castle, and allow him to 'mind' their car. The same rainstorm which sends Jim into the pipe on the wharf for shelter catches John, and he climbs into the car for shelter. When the Lawrences return, they drive away without checking the back seat, and John does not awaken until they've driven some miles. Instead of turning around and taking him home, they invite him to their son's birthday party, and promise to send a telegram to his family in order to let the Ruggles know that John is safe. Aside from a slight mishap with the shower, John enjoys the party. There is a huge coffee-chocolate cake, and games. The Lawrences send John home on the bus with several parcels of leftover goodies from the festivities. William, the youngest Ruggles child, is entered in the Annual Baby Show, but the family is concerned as he is a late teether. He wins his age category (6–12 months), yet a slightly older competitor wins the Grand Challenge Cup as he has teeth. The Ruggles return home only to find that William now has a tooth! Jo Ruggles Jr., a Mickey Mouse fan, spends his fourpence allowance at the local Majestic Theater to see cartoons. One week, he goes to the theater, only to find that the next Symphony is due in a fortnight. He sneaks inside the empty building and hides in the orchestra pit, where he soon falls asleep; several hours later, several cinema musicians find him. Jo explains to them why he sneaked in, and the men give him sixpence for the show, and a warning not to do it again. Mr. Ruggles has always wanted to take his family to London for the great Cart-Horse Parade in Regent's Park, but cannot afford it. One week, he and his co-worker find an envelope with £41 in one of the dustbins on their route. They turn the money in to the police, and a week later, the author Mr.Short gives him a reward of £2, which he uses to take his family to the Cart-Horse Parade. The Ruggles travel to Regent's Park, the venue for the Cart Horse Parade, where they meet the family members who have entered their horse in the competition. The horse, 'Bernard Shaw', takes first place, and the families climb into the cart in order to participate in the parade. The Ruggles spend the afternoon at a "Posh" tea shop while Charlie is stabling his horse. They spend longer than they realize amidst the delights of ice cream, sundaes and orchestra music, and must rush off to the train station. They make it just in time, and as the train pulls out, Mr. Ruggle's brother plays The End of a Perfect Day on his mouth organ. |
Cold Sassy Tree | Olive Ann Burns | 1,984 | On July 5, 1906, Enoch Rucker Blakeslee announces that he intends to marry Miss Love Simpson, a milliner at his store who is years younger than he. This news shocks his family, since his wife Mattie Lou died only three weeks earlier. Rucker’s daughters, Mary Willis and Loma, worry about what the gossips of Cold Sassy will think of their father’s impropriety. Will Tweedy, Rucker’s 14-year-old grandson and the narrator of the novel, supports his grandfather’s marriage. Will thinks Miss Love is nice and pretty, even though she comes from Baltimore and therefore is practically a Yankee. Will thinks that Rucker needs someone to look after him now that Mattie Lou is gone. On the afternoon Rucker announces his engagement, Will sneaks off to go fishing in the country despite the fact that he is supposed to be in mourning for his grandmother. He walks across a high, narrow train trestle and nearly dies when a train speeds toward him. He survives by lying flat between the tracks so the train passes just overhead without touching him. Will becomes a sensation after his near-death experience, and the whole town comes to his house to ask him about the incident. Rucker shocks everyone by arriving with his new bride, Miss Love. The people of Cold Sassy disapprove of Rucker’s hasty marriage, and rumors spread quickly in the small town. Will, however, spends a great deal of time at the Blakeslee house and becomes friends with Miss Love. Will likes her because of her candid opinions and open personality. He also has a little crush on her, often spying on her. Will soon learns that the marriage is one of convenience and that Rucker and Miss Love sleep in separate rooms. Miss Love tells Will that she married Rucker only because he promised to deed her the house and furniture. For his part, Rucker married Miss Love to save on the cost of a housekeeper. One day, Clayton McAllister, Miss Love’s former fiancé from Texas, shows up and tries to persuade Miss Love to leave with him. He kisses her, but Miss Love sends him away contemptuously after kissing him. Will and some of his friends make a trip into the country to pick up a horse for Miss Love, camping in the mountains along the way. When they return, Will and his father, Hoyt, try to convince Will’s mother, Mary Willis, to go on a trip to New York. Rucker has bought the tickets to New York so that Hoyt, who works for Rucker, can go to purchase new goods for the store. At first Mary Willis refuses to go because she is in mourning, but Will and Hoyt convince her that the trip will do her good. Right after Mary Willis changes her mind, Rucker decides to use the tickets himself to go to New York with Miss Love. Mary Willis is crushed, and her hatred of Miss Love increases. To take his and Mary Willis’ mind off the disappointment, Hoyt buys a brand new Cadillac and becomes the first owner of a car in Cold Sassy. Rucker and Miss Love return from New York. They are now flirtatious and affectionate with each other, and Will wonders whether their marriage is becoming more legitimate. Rucker announces that he too has bought a car and intends to begin selling cars in Cold Sassy. Lightfoot McLendon is a classmate of Will’s who lives in the impoverished section of Cold Sassy known as Mill Town. One day Will takes Lightfoot on a car ride to the cemetery, where he kisses her. A nosy neighbor sees the kiss and tells Will’s parents. Outraged at Will’s association with common people, Will’s parents forbid him to drive the Cadillac for two months. Will gets around his punishment by driving Rucker’s car. One Sunday, Will, Rucker, and Miss Love take a day trip into the country, where Will gives them driving lessons. On the way back to Cold Sassy, as he tries to avoid a collision with a Ford wrecked in the middle of the road, Will crashes the car into a creek bed and damages the radiator. While they wait for a repair team to arrive, they stay with a family that lives nearby. That night, Will overhears Rucker tell Miss Love that he loves her and wants their marriage to be real. Miss Love declares that she cannot and that no man would want her if he knew her terrible secret. When she finally tells him what her secret is – that her father raped her when she was a child – he tells her he doesn't care, and affirms his love for her. Eventually, Miss Love and Rucker fall deeply in love. Will’s uncle, Camp Williams, commits suicide, which begins a dark period in Cold Sassy. Rucker hires Will’s worst enemy, Hosie Roach, to work at the store in Camp’s place. Because of his new income, Hosie can marry Will’s beloved Lightfoot. A pair of thieves rob and beat Rucker. Although he recovers from his injuries, Rucker catches pneumonia. As Rucker lies sick in bed, Will overhears him tell Miss Love that God provides strength and comfort to the faithful in times of trouble. Miss Love tells Will that although Rucker does not know it, she is pregnant with Rucker’s child. Rucker dies shortly after he falls ill, but his message of faith in God gives Will strength to cope. Though the town and Will’s family do not accept Miss Love, she knows that they will all accept her child, and plans on staying in Cold Sassy. |
The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum | Heinrich Böll | 1,974 | Four days after a Weiberfastnacht party, where Katharina met a man named Ludwig Götten, she calls on Oberkommissar Moeding and confesses to killing a journalist for the newspaper Die Zeitung. Katharina had met Götten at a friend's party and spent the night with him before helping him to escape from the police. The next morning, the police broke into her house, arrested her and questioned her. The story is sensationally covered by Die Zeitung, and in particular its journalist Tötges. Tötges investigates everything about her life, calling on Katharina's friends and family, including her ex-husband and hospitalized mother, who dies the day after Tötges visits her. He paints a picture of Katharina as a fervent accomplice of Götten, and as a communist run amok in Germany. Katharina arranges an interview with Tötges. According to Katharina, upon his arrival he suggests that they have sex, whereupon she shoots him dead. She then wanders the city for a few hours before driving to police headquarters and confessing to Moeding. The book also details the effects of the case on Katharina's employers and friends the Blornas; Mr Blorna is her lawyer, and Mrs Blorna one of the designers of the apartment block where Katharina resides. Their association with Katharina leads to their exclusion from society. |
Voyage in the Dark | Jean Rhys | 1,934 | # Anna compares England to her Caribbean, where everything was colourful. By contrast, England was greyish. She dislikes England throughout the novel, always feeling like an outsider; she is always cold and describes all of the towns that she tours as part of a chorus line as identical. The book begins with them Anna living in Southsea with a friend, Maudie, where they have trouble persuading a landlady to take them in; the implication is that chorus girls are 'professionals' or prostitutes. The landlady complains about the way that they walk around in their dressing gowns. Anna goes for a walk with Maudie, and they meet two men whom they take back to their flat for some tea, much to their landlady's disgust. When Anna goes to London, she agrees to meet one of the men, Walter. # Walter takes her to dinner in a restaurant with a private dining room and a bedroom attached, a place clearly meant to be used for illicit rendezvous. He is obviously wealthy. After a meal, he makes a pass at Anna, and she goes into the bedroom, shuts the door and lies down on the bed for a long time. He comes in and apologises, and walks her to a taxi. The next day she receives some money in a letter from Walter, in which he apologises. She goes out the next day to buy some clothes. Back home she becomes ill and sends him a letter asking him to visit. Walter visits, buys her food and a warm coverlet for her bed, and pays a doctor to see her. # Anna visits Walter again, and when he puts his hand on her knee, says that she must go, and begins to cry. But he tells her to be brave and they end up going to bed together, and she loses her virginity. # Anna is now supported as a "kept woman"; she moves to better quarters, and waits all day for letters from Walter arranging meeting times. She has fallen in love with him. One day a letter arrives from Maudie, saying that she will visit soon, and they go for a walk in Hyde Park. # Anna goes to visit Walter and meets Vincent, his cousin. She says she doesn't like him and begins to tell Walter about her early life in the Caribbean. They make love, and she lies awake. # Anna goes to visit her stepmother, Hester, who tells her that there is no more money for her from her father's Caribbean estate, which Hester sold. Hester is upset. She sent a letter to Anna's Uncle Bo saying Anna would be better in the Caribbean, but that he will need to pay the other half of the return fare. The reply accuses Hester of cheating Anna out of her inheritance, which Hester denies vehemently. Hester argues she cannot afford to help Anna financially any longer and that it is her uncle's responsibility. Anna's stepmother is depicted as overtly racist; she states that she does not approve of Anna's uncle because he is open in his acceptance of both the black and white children in his family, and gives all the children the family's last name. Her abhorrence of miscegenation is depicted negatively in the text, as a sign of her intolerant bigotry, for her major concern is the appearance of impropriety, and not the impropriety itself. Hester doesn't approve of black-white friendship at all; we learn that she got very annoyed when Anna got too close to the black servant Francine, and eventually had her sent away. Anna's uncle, in turn, doesn't approve of Hester, accusing her of mismanaging her husband's property and failing to support Anna as she should. # Anna is desperately afraid that Walter will get bored and leave her. One day he takes her to the country for what for a while is a wonderful time, but the trip is cut short. Vincent and his French lover, who are with them, fall out and they decide to leave early. Walter tells Anna that the reason for the argument was because Walter is taking Vincent when he goes to the US for a while … the first time that Anna has heard of the trip. # Sure enough, Anna receives a letter from Vincent saying that Walter is sorry, but he is no longer in love with her. They both still want to assist her as much as possible. # Anna asks Walter to meet her, despite the fact that Vincent has said it is better that they don't see each other. She tries to get him to take her home, but he won't, so they part. Anna decides to break from him altogether, and she leaves the lodging he has paid for without leaving a forwarding address. # Anna sells some clothing to raise money to pay her rent. In her new accommodations, she meets a woman called Ethel, only there, she says, whilst her new place is being refurnished. They go to the pictures together, and Ethel, who runs a manicure and massage business, offers Anna accommodation and a job. # One day Anna goes out and meets Laurie by chance, along with two American boyfriends of hers, Carl and Joe. They go out for drinks and get a little tipsy. # They go out again to a hotel. It is implied that Laurie is a prostitute, and Anna goes into hysterics, and throws a scene. # Anna goes and visits Ethel, and is taken up as the manicurist, even though she has no experience. # Anna isn't very good at her job. Ethel is obviously running a bit of a racket. Her adverts are suggestive, but not explicitly so, so that the men arrive expecting more than a massage, but when they don't get it there is nothing that they can do. One day Ethel's massage table breaks and the man on it jumps off into some hot water and injures himself. Anna doesn't show much sympathy, and Ethel is suddenly angry. She tells Anna that she is too moody, no good at the job, and never invites Ethel along when she goes out. It appears that Ethel expected that Anna might prostitute herself and that Ethel expected to act as a madam, but she does not say this explicitly. She orders Anna to leave, then suddenly says the opposite. Anna says that she must go for a walk, and Ethel tells her that if she is not back within an hour she will gas herself. She goes half way to Walter's place and then returns to a very relieved Ethel. # Anna is ill. When she meets up with Laurie, one of her boyfriends, Carl Redman, asks her if she is on ether. She ends up going to sleep with him. # Ethel is inquisitive about Redman and doesn't seem to disapprove. Redman tells Anna that he is leaving the country soon; both he and Joe have wives in the States. One day Anna meets Maudie, who borrows some money. She needs to buy new clothes or else she thinks the man she is going out with won't marry her. # Anna almost ends up going to bed with a man with a broken hand, and while they are dancing she throws her shoe at a picture of a dog she imagines is smirking at her, shattering the glass. Soon after, she has a fit of morning sickness, hits the guy on his injured hand, and throws up. He goes. # Anna is staying at Laurie, who receives a 'peach of a letter' from Ethel, saying that Anna owes her money for utterly destroying her room. She also mentions that Anna was bringing any old man back to the apartment, which she could not stand. Anna and Laurie discuss the possibilities of an abortion. Anna has waited too long to seek this abortion, ambivalently wishing to keep the baby she cannot support. # Laurie and Anna meet up with Vincent to arrange the money for the abortion. He assures her that everything will be all right, but commands Anna to return the letters between her and Walter, which she does. # Anna goes to Mrs. Robinson's and has the abortion. # The abortion is botched, and Anna becomes extremely ill. Anna hears Laurie talking to her new landlady, Mrs Polo about her condition. She is still unwell. She hallucinates, her mind filled with scenes of the masquerade in the Caribbean of her childhood, recent seductions, and the dark room that she is in. A doctor comes to attend her and says, "She'll be alright […] Ready to start all over again in no time, I've no doubt." The last paragraph returns to Anna's stream of consciousness narrative voice pondering repeatedly the idea of "all over again." |
The Story of Doctor Dolittle | Hugh Lofting | null | John Dolittle, MD, is a respected physician and quiet bachelor living with his spinster sister in the small English village of Puddleby-on-the-Marsh. His love of animals grows over the years and his household menagerie eventually scares off his human clientele, leading to loss of wealth. But after learning the secret of speaking to all animals from his parrot Polynesia, he takes up veterinary practice. His fortunes rise and fall again after a crocodile takes up residence, but his fame in the animal kingdom spreads throughout the world. He is conscripted into voyaging to Africa to cure a monkey epidemic just as he faces bankruptcy. He has to borrow supplies and a ship, and sails with a crew of his favourite animals, but is shipwrecked upon arriving to Africa. On the way to the monkey kingdom, his band is arrested by the king of Jolliginki, a victim of European exploitation who wants no white men traveling his country. The band barely escapes by ruse, but makes it to the monkey kingdom where things are dire indeed as a result of the raging epidemic. He vaccinates the well monkeys and nurses the sick back to health. In appreciation, the monkeys find a pushmi-pullyu, a shy two-headed gazelle-unicorn cross, whose rarity may bring Dr. Dolittle money back home. On the return trip, they again are captured in Jolliginki. This time they escape with the help of Prince Bumpo, who gives them a ship in exchange for Dolittle's bleaching Bumpo's face white, his greatest desire being to act as a European fairy-tale prince. Dolittle's crew then have a couple of run-ins with pirates, leading to Dolittle's winning a pirate ship loaded with treasures and rescuing a boy whose uncle was abandoned on a rock island. After reuniting the two, Dolittle finally makes it home and tours with the pushmi-pullyu in a circus until he makes enough money to retire to his beloved home in Puddleby. |
Absolute Friends | John le Carré | 2,003 | The book tells the story of Ted Mundy, a Pakistani-born Briton who as a student becomes proficient in the German language. He joins a 1960s-era student protest group in West Berlin and becomes a lifelong friend of a West German student anarchist named Sasha. Having been brutally beaten by West Berlin police and ejected from Germany, Mundy fails at several careers, as a teacher at an English prep school, as a newspaper reporter, a radio interviewer and a novelist. Eventually Mundy obtains a position with the British Council. Meanwhile, Sasha has defected to East Germany to become a member of the notorious Stasi secret police. On a trip to East Germany with a youth theatre group, Mundy and Sasha meet again. By this time Sasha has become totally disillusioned with the Communist Bloc and enlists the naive Mundy to become a double agent. Sasha has access to state secrets and he recruits Mundy to help him smuggle them out of East Germany and deliver them to MI6, the British Secret Service. Their efforts contribute to the collapse of the GDR and eventual destruction of the Berlin Wall. Later, Sasha and Mundy once again conspire in grandiose schemes to combat American military and industrial globalization. The two ideologues become pawns of the group they thought they were combating. After they are killed, they are portrayed as terrorists "with connections to Al-Qaeda", in efforts to convince European governments to support the United States in its "war on terror". After Mundy's death, Amory, his controller from the British intelligence service during his espionage years, tries to publicize the truth, but slander by the British government results in his story being totally discredited. The novel is a chilling reminder of the ability of governments and groups to manipulate public thinking to achieve their private ends, and underlines the need for people to not simply believe what they are told/sold without question. |
Shiloh | Phyllis Reynolds Naylor | 1,991 | The novel is set in the small town of Friendly, West Virginia,Nicknamed the "Mountain State", West Virginia abounds in mountains and rivers. For hundreds of years, the state has been home to hunters of deer, bears, beavers, and other animals. Before 1600, Native American tribes of the Iroquois, the Cherokee, and the Shawnee hunted for food. In the contemporary day, people hunt despite most of the large animals' having disappeared. Numerous laws in West Virginia determine "when, where, how, and what animals may be hunted". In the rural hill setting, neighbors because of local customs rarely meddle with each other's business. Respect of elders and a commitment to honesty are expected of children. where an eleven-year-old boy named Marty Preston finds a stray beagle wandering in the hills near his house. The dog follows him home, and Marty names him Shiloh, a tribute to a neighborhood schoolhouse. Shiloh's real owner is Judd Travers, who owns several hunting dogs. Fearing for the dog's safety because Judd drinks and treats his hunting dogs poorly, Marty does not want to return Shiloh. His father insists Shiloh be returned to his owner and they take the dog to Judd Travers. Shiloh returns to Marty who hides him from his family. Concealing Shiloh in the woods in a wire pen he builds, Marty smuggles some of his dinner to the dog each evening. After his mother discovers Marty feeding the dog, he persuades her not to reveal the secret. That night, Shiloh is attacked by a German Shepherd Dog while in his makeshift cage and his family discovers Marty has been lying and hiding the dog. After taking the dog to the town doctor, the family must return Shiloh to his rightful owner. Before doing so, Marty travels up to Travers' house to try to convince Travers to allow him to keep Shiloh. Judd does not see Marty approaching, and shoots a doe out of season, which would mean a stiff fine Judd cannot afford. Marty lets Judd know he knows, and attempts to blackmail him out of Shiloh. Judd and Marty eventually negotiate a deal in which Marty will earn Shiloh for 40 dollars, paid with 20 hours of working for Judd. At the end of the first week, Judd says that he will not keep his end of the deal because the evidence of the dead doe has with the passage of time disappeared. Second, the contract that Marty had him sign is worthless in the state of West Virginia without the signature of a witness. Despite Judd's pointed disapproval of his work, Marty continues to work for him. They begin discussing dogs and Judd's father who began physically abusing Judd when he was four years old. In the end, Judd warms to Marty, relents, and lets him keep Shiloh. |
We All Fall Down | Robert Cormier | 1,991 | In the small town of Burnside, the Jerome family house is destroyed by teenage vandals, who defecate on the floors and push their daughter down the stairs, placing her in a coma. However, a childlike stalker calling himself 'The Avenger' witnesses the whole incident and, enraged, begins to track down each culprit. |
The Glass Lake | Maeve Binchy | 1,994 | When the beautiful and glamorous Helen is deserted by her lover, she marries the kindly Martin McMahon and moves to the small village of Lough Glass. Although Martin and Helen have two children, Helen still pines for Louis, the man who broke her heart. Helen seems restless and unhappy living in Lough Glass. Then one day, Helen disappears, leaving behind only a note for Martin. Kit, Helen and Martin's 13-year old daughter, finds this letter, and burns it without opening it. Kit knows that her mother was unhappy and assumes that her mother has committed suicide. A suicide note would mean that her mother could not be buried in 'consecrated' ground according to Catholic tradition. However, Helen hasn't committed suicide. Rather, she decided to run away to England with her former lover. Kit McMahon struggles to grow up without her mother and with the stigma of her mother's death. While Kit has many friends and mentors to help her grow, she forges a close relationship via letters with Lena Gray. Lena Gray claims to be a close friend of Helen. However, Lena Gray is really Helen herself. The story then traces the fallout of Kit finding out that her mother isn't dead and is Lena Gray. |
Sharpe's Regiment | Bernard Cornwell | 1,986 | In this book set during the Napoleonic Wars, Sharpe repeatedly runs into problems caused by his lower social class and his officer standing. This is the only book in the series to be set in England (though in the Television series a second was produced - Sharpe's Justice) and involves Sharpe looking for the missing Second Battalion of the South Essex Regiment which he needs to reinforce the dwindling First Battalion in Spain. The story also involves Sharpe and Harper having to rejoin the South Essex as recruits to find the missing men. |
The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle | Hugh Lofting | 1,922 | Doctor Dolittle meets Tommy Stubbins, the young son of the local cobbler, who becomes his new assistant. Tommy learns how to speak animal languages and becomes involved in the Doctor's quest to find Long Arrow, the greatest naturalist in the world. This novel takes us to the Mediterranean, South America, and even under the sea. |
Among the Hidden | Margaret Haddix | null | Luke Garner, a twelve year old child, lives on a farm with his mother, father, and two brothers, Matthew and Mark. (The Mothers objective was to have a Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.) As a third child or a Shadow child, Luke's parent's have to break the law. Like all third and fourth children, must spend his days without being seen by the public. Luke meets a person named Jen and she leads a rally against the population law then dies, luke feels guilt |
Moon Tiger | Penelope Lively | 1,987 | Claudia Hampton, a 76-year-old English woman and a professional historian, is terminally ill and is spending her last remaining moments in and out of consciousness thinking of writing a history of the world with her life as a blueprint. Her first, primordial recollections are of a father that died in World War I, and of the summer of 1920, when she was 10 and competing with her 11-year-old brother Gordon for fossils. Claudia and Gordon are, at times throughout their lives, rivals, lovers, and best friends to each other. When the two are in their late teens they begin an incestuous relationship and find it hard to relate to almost any other person their own age. Soon, however, their college careers and other events allow both to open up to the outside world, and look outward for companionship. At the outset of World War II, Gordon, a would-be economist, is sent to India, whereas Claudia sets aside her studies in history to become a war correspondent. Independent and enterprising, Claudia talks her way into a correspondent's post in Cairo, where she meets Tom Southern, a captain of an English armoured tank division, who sweeps her off her feet. Tom and Claudia spend a long weekend together while he is on leave from the front, which culminates in both of them falling in love with each other and making plans for a seemingly far future. But their future together is never to materialize: shortly after their time together, the English are called to defend Egypt from Erwin Rommel's offensive at the First Battle of El Alamein, and Tom is declared missing. Later on, Claudia receives news that he has died. Shortly after Tom's death, Claudia finds out she is pregnant, and decides that she will have the child, even though she would have to raise it alone. It isn't to be: Claudia miscarries, and is never told whether the child she had carried was a boy or a girl. That uncertainty, along with her fear that Tom died a horrible and painful death, will haunt her for the rest of her life. After the War, Claudia and Gordon reunite, but the encounter is more friendly than passionate. Each of them has obviously been changed by the War, but they are both sparse on actual details during their conversations. Gordon marries a girl named Sylvia, who Claudia finds insipid and boring. Claudia meanwhile met Jasper, a well connected young man who she goes on to have an on and off, rather stormy relationship with, and one that Gordon is openly disapproving of. In 1948 Claudia finds herself pregnant again, this time by Jasper, and while she has no intention of marrying him, she decides to have the child, Lisa. While Claudia loves Lisa, she finds she has little patience and time to care for a child, and so Lisa ultimately ends up being raised by her maternal and paternal grandmothers, who share her custody and dictate her upbringing. Not surprisingly, Lisa grows up sullen and indifferent to Claudia, and marries off at a young age to a respectable (boring) man. Throughout her travels abroad, Claudia comes in contact with an Hungarian functionary who becomes implicated in the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. Knowing that persecution is forthcoming, the functionary decides to ask Claudia to make sure that his son Lazlo, who is in England at college, does not attempt to return to Hungary. So Claudia becomes a sort of surrogate mother to Lazlo, who she grows to love and admire over the years, recognizing that he is drastically different from anyone else she knows: an open, painfully honest, sensitive, self-destructive artist. Claudia writes several books that attempt to popularize history for the masses, earning her accolades from the public, and scorn from other professional historians. She also briefly becomes a consultant for a movie based on her history of Cortez, which leads to a personal scandal, when she ends up in a car accident with the star of the movie, and the press suspects there is more to the relationship than just friendship. The event earns scorn from Jasper, who refuses to see her when she is in the hospital. Gordon, on the other hand, visits her to let her know that she is not alone. At some point in time, Claudia decides to travel to Egypt alone, to try and see Cairo again, but she finds things much changed. The only thing that has not changed is that the desert has become forever etched in her memory as synonymous with her pain at everything she experienced during the war, a pain that she is still unable to share with any other living soul even after all the years that have passed. When Claudia turns 70, she receives a package containing Tom's diary, one of the few personal effects of Tom's recovered from the war. It had been sent to Claudia by Jennifer Southern, Tom's sister, who decides that Claudia should have it upon realizing that Claudia is "C.", Tom's often referred to girlfriend. Claudia cannot muster the courage to read beyond the note accompanying the diary, and so sets the book aside. Shortly thereafter, Gordon dies, and leaves a gaping void in Claudia's life. A few years later, when she is diagnosed with cancer, and knowing death is imminent, she tries to tentatively reach out to Lisa, to apologize for having been a cold and distant mother. Lisa accepts the apology, but is not sure how to feel about it: it is the most unlikely thing Claudia (who to Lisa seemed to revel being an almost omnipotent figure), has ever done for Lisa. Right before dying, Claudia finally musters the courage to ask Lazlo to fetch her Tom's diary. Poring over the short entries in the diary, Claudia allows herself to reflect on her bitterness about having been left behind and having become wholly different from the woman he knew and loved, and to make peace with the fact that she too will soon become nothing more than a set of imperfect memories as recalled by those who knew her. The next day, Claudia passes away. |
Snow Falling on Cedars | David Guterson | 1,994 | Set on the fictional San Piedro Island in the northern Puget Sound region of the state of Washington coast in 1954, the plot revolves around a murder case in which Kabuo Miyamoto, a Japanese American, is accused of killing Carl Heine, a respected fisherman in the close-knit community. Carl's body had been pulled from the sea, trapped in his own net, on September 16, 1954. His water-damaged watch had stopped at 1:47. The trial, held in December 1954 during a snowstorm that grips the entire island, occurs in the midst of deep anti-Japanese sentiments following World War II. Covering the case is the editor of the town's one-man newspaper, the San Piedro Review, Ishmael Chambers, a World War II US Marine Corps veteran who lost an arm fighting the Japanese at the Battle of Tarawa. Torn by a sense of hatred for the Japanese, Chambers struggles with his love for Kabuo's wife, Hatsue, and his conscience, wondering if Kabuo is truly innocent. Spearheading the prosecution are the town's sheriff, Art Moran, and prosecutor, Alvin Hooks. Leading the defense is the old, experienced Nels Gudmondsson. Several witnesses, including Etta Heine, Carl's mother, accuse Kabuo of murdering Carl for racial and personal reasons. Kabuo Miyamoto (a decorated war veteran of the 442nd Regimental Combat Team), experienced prejudice because of his ancestry, following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Also involved in the trial are Horace Whaley, the town coroner, and Ole Jurgensen, an elderly man who sells his strawberry field to Carl. The strawberry field is contested in the trial. The land was originally owned by Carl Heine Sr. The Miyamotos lived in a house on the Heines' land and picked strawberries for Mr. Heine. Kabuo and Carl Heine Jr. were close friends as children. Kabuo's father eventually approached Heine Sr. about purchasing of the farm. Though Etta opposed the sale, Carl Sr. agreed. The payments were to be made over a ten-year period. However, before the last payment was made, war erupted between the US and Japan following Pearl Harbor, and all islanders of Japanese ancestry were forced to relocate to internment camps. Hatsue and her family, the Imadas, are interned in Manzanar camp in California. In 1944, Carl Sr. died due to a heart attack and Etta Heine sold the land to Jurgensen. When Kabuo returned after the war, he was extremely bitter towards Etta for reneging on the land sale. When Jurgensen suffered a stroke and decided to sell the farm, he was approached by Carl Heine Jr., hours before Kabuo arrived to try to buy the land back. During the trial, the disputed land is presented as a family feud and the motivation behind Carl's murder. Ishmael's search of the maritime records at Point White lighthouse station reveals that on the night that Carl Heine died, a freighter, the SS "West Corona" had passed through the channel where Carl had been fishing at 1:42am, just five minutes before his watch had stopped. Ishmael realizes that Carl was likely to have been thrown overboard by the force of the freighter's wake. Despite the bitterness he feels as Hatsue's rejected lover, Ishmael comes forward with the new information. Further evidence is collected in support of the conclusion that Carl had climbed the boat's mast to cut down a lantern, been knocked from the mast by the freighter's wake, hit his head, then fallen into the sea. The charges against Kabuo Miyamoto are dismissed. |
Rocket Boys | Homer Hickam | 1,998 | Homer "Sonny" Hickam, Jr. lived in a small coal mining town in West Virginia named Coalwood. Sonny, after seeing the Russian satellite Sputnik, decides to join the American team of rocket engineers called the Army Ballistic Missile Agency when he graduates from school. (Note: In the book Rocket Boys, the main character is always called Sonny. In the movie October Sky, he is called Homer.) Sonny's older brother, Jim Hickam, excelled at football and expected to get a college football scholarship. Sonny, however, was terrible at sports and had no special skill that would get him "out of Coalwood". Sonny's mother was afraid that he would have to work in the mines after high school. Sonny's first attempt at rocketry consisted of a flashlight tube and model airplane body as a casing that was fueled by flash powder from old cherry bombs. It exploded violently, thus destroying his mother's fence. After that, Sonny enlisted the help of Quentin Wilson, Roy Lee Cooke, Sherman Siers, Jimmy "O'Dell" Carroll, and Billy Rose to help build rockets while forming the BCMA (Big Creek Missile Agency). Their first real rocket, powered by black powder, was named Auk 1. This an allusion to the Great Auk, which is a flightless sea bird that became extinct in the mid-19th century. Auk 1 flew six feet before the solder melted and the nozzle, a washer, separated from the casement which subsequently gave the name of the group and book. They called themselves "Rocket Boys" and called the place they were launching their rockets from "Cape Coalwood", in honor of Cape Canaveral. The Rocket Boys enjoyed mixed success during their three year rocket launching campaign (1957 to 1960). They employed several fuel mixtures including rocket candy and a mixture called "zincoshine", which was composed of zinc dust and sulfur, along with alcohol made by a local bootlegger as a binder for the mixture. They launched a total of 34 rockets all sequentially numbered Auk I–XXXI. (There were four different Auk XXIIs.) They also won a National Science Fair gold medal for their rockets, for their project titled "A Study of Amateur Rocketry Techniques". |
A Pale View of Hills | Kazuo Ishiguro | 1,982 | During a visit from her daughter, Niki, Etsuko reflects back on her own life as a young woman in Japan, and how she left that country to live in Britain. As she describes it, she and her Japanese husband, Jiro, had a daughter together, and a few years later Etsuko met a British man and moved with him to Britain. She took her elder daughter, Keiko, to Britain to live with her and the new husband. When Etsuko and her new husband have a daughter, Etsuko wants to call her something "modern" and her husband wants an Eastern-sounding name, so they compromise with the name "Niki," which seems to Etsuko to be perfectly British, but sounds to her husband at least slightly Japanese. In Britain, Keiko becomes increasingly solitary and antisocial. Etsuko recalls how, as Keiko grew older, she would lock herself in her room and emerge only to pick up the dinner-plate that her mother would leave for her in the kitchen. This disturbing behavior ends, as the reader already has learned, in Keiko's suicide. "Your father," Etsuko tells Niki, "was rather idealistic at times...[H]e really believed we could give her a happy life over here... But you see, Niki, I knew all along. I knew all along she wouldn't be happy over here." Etsuko tells her daughter, Niki, that she had a friend in Japan named Sachiko. Sachiko had a daughter named Mariko, a girl whom Etsuko's memory paints as exceptionally solitary and antisocial. Sachiko, Etsuko recalls, had planned to take Mariko to America with an American soldier identified only as "Frank." Clearly, Sachiko's story bears striking similarities to Etsuko's. |
Doctor Dolittle's Garden | Hugh Lofting | 1,927 | Doctor Dolittle's assistant, Tommy Stubbins, reports on Professor Quetch, curator of the Dog Museum in the Home for Crossbred Dogs. Meanwhile, the doctor has learnt insect languages and hears ancient tales of a giant race of insects. Fascinated, the doctor plans a voyage to find them — but before he does so, one arrives in his garden. ja:ドリトル先生と月からの使い |
Doctor Dolittle in the Moon | Hugh Lofting | 1,928 | Doctor Dolittle has landed on the Moon and each day brings a new discovery. He meets Otho Bludge the Moon Man, a Stone Age artist who was the only human on the Moon when it broke away from the Earth. The animals of the Moon flock to Doctor Dolittle, and he discovers how to communicate with the intelligent plants there. But will the lunar flora and fauna ever let him leave? There is no pretence that the Lunar environment, described in meticulous detail, in any way conforms to what was known to science at the time of writing; thus, the book can be considered as fantasy more than science fiction. ja:ドリトル先生月へゆく |
The Beautiful and Damned | F. Scott Fitzgerald | null | It tells the story of Anthony Patch (a 1920s socialite and presumptive heir to a tycoon's fortune), his relationship with his wife Gloria, his service in the army, and alcoholism. Toward the end of the novel, Fitzgerald references himself via a character who is a novelist by quoting this statement given after the novel: "You know these new novels make me tired. My God! Everywhere I go some silly girl asks me if I've read 'This Side of Paradise.' Are our girls really like that? If it's true to life, which I don't believe, the next generation is going to the dogs. I'm sick of all this shoddy realism." |
Better Than Life | Rob Grant | 1,990 | Following on from Infinity Welcomes Careful Drivers, Lister, Rimmer and The Cat have discovered a cache of 'Better Than Life' headbands in one of the sleeping quarters. They fantasise that they board the Nova 5 and use its Duality Jump drive to return to Earth. Lister settles down with a woman who looks exactly like Kristine Kochanski in Bedford Falls, which looks exactly like the Bedford Falls in Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life, Lister's favourite movie. He has two sons, Jim and Bexley, who are so intelligent they were able to change their own nappies. Lister also opens a successful curry shop and every day is Christmas Eve. Rimmer becomes the head of a multi-national corporation, Rimmer Corp., and has a 50 billion dollarpound fortune. He's married to Juanita Chicata, the most beautiful model and actress in the world, with a massively fiery temper. He's also developed a solidgram to give himself a real body and a time machine, which he uses to beat George Patton, Julius Caesar and Napoleon Bonaparte at Risk. The Danish government gives Cat an island, on which is built a giant golden castle, right out of a gothic fairy tale. The castle is surrounded by a moat of milk, and is staffed by , scantily clad Valkyrie warriors. He likes to travel on firebreathing yaks and shoot dogs. Back in reality, Kryten is cajoled by Holly to laser messages into Lister's arms. Lister feels the pain of this in Bedford Falls, and when he applies cold cream to the areas of pain, they spell two messages - 'U=BTL' on his left arm and 'DYING' on his right. Eventually Kryten is forced to enter the game to try to retrieve the crew, and his mechanoid brain allows him to remember entering. While searching for his shipmates, Kryten accidentally wanders into a diner which is advertising for a dishwasher to work through an endless pile of dirty dishes. The next thing he knows, months have passed. Meanwhile, the messages on his arm cause Lister to realise that he is in the game and confronts Rimmer. They travel to Denmark and meet with the Cat. While discussing how to get out. Kryten arrives and explains how they started playing, and to leave they need only want to leave, but their subsequent attempts to escape fail because the game lures them in. Their collective fantasies fall apart because of Rimmer's massive self-loathing; even if he wants to stay, he hates himself so much that his mind has only built up his life so that it can bring him down later. He loses his fortune, has his body repossessed, and ends up in the body of a woman while trapped with a couple of violent convicts, forcing him to recognise that his own attitude towards women is disturbing; most of his groupies in the fantasy are women who rejected him in life, his first wife was actually his brother's wife in reality, and his second wife was his mother. Upon attempting to leave, he can't, and realises that all four must leave together. He travels to Bedford Falls in a giant truck, accidentally wiping out the town square in the process, ruining Lister's fantasy. They travel to Denmark, to discover that Cat's Valkyries have gone on strike, the milk moat has curdled, and a volcano has started to erupt. The crew leave the game together. The next morning, Lister wakes up and starts making breakfast, only to realize something is amiss. He didn't have to wait for the lifts on his way back, his alarm clock doesn't violently blare, his towel extends all the way around his waist. Eventually Lister drops his toast and it lands butter-side up, confirming his fears that he's still in the game. The rest of the crew enter and announce they've found statis units containing Rimmer, Kochanski and Petersen, only for Lister to tell them the bad news. At this point, the creator of the game appears and offers them a replay. They decline, and finally return to reality. Due to their having not moved for such a long time, Lister and Cat's muscles have atrophied considerably, and they have to be placed in special suits for some time to re-hydrate and restore their muscles. While Lister and the Cat recover, Kryten and Rimmer realise Holly has shut himself off and the ship's engines are dead. His companion, a novelty appliance named Talkie Toaster, convinced the computer to perform a dangerous repair operation which lead to Holly having a five digit IQ, but has less than two minutes of run time left, forcing him to shut himself down. To make things worse, a rogue planet is on a crash course with the disabled Dwarf. In order to restart the engine, hundreds of mile-high pistons must be test fired. Things are going well, until Rimmer accidentally crushes most of the skutters when he test fires the wrong pistons. Rimmer turns Holly on to warn him that Red Dwarf is doomed. Holly prints out a solution and shuts himself down again. Starbug is to fire a nuclear missile into a nearby sun, causing a solar flare that will knock its planet out of orbit and in turn, knock the rogue planet away from the Dwarf. Rimmer and Lister carry out the plan and although successful, Starbug crashes into the icy rogue planet. Rimmer and Lister are marooned on the planet, Lister begins to starve and Rimmer begins to slow down. He shuts down and is brought online back on Red Dwarf, where he intends to launch a rescue operation. However, the Dwarf is being sucked into a black hole. Holly, via the toaster- having shared the information with the toaster earlier-, informs them that if they accelerate into the hole, they can zip through safely. Lister, meanwhile, is having problems of his own. The ice on the planet has melted, revealing a landscape of green glass bottles. Acid rain begins destroying Starbug. When he sees the remains of Mount Rushmore, he finds that he is on Earth, converted into a garbage dump for the solar system and accidentally blasted from orbit. Lister discovers a tiny olive tree and befriends some cow-sized cockroaches and vows to begin life again. After the black hole experience, the Dwarfers finally go to rescue Lister; Rimmer and the Cat in one ship, Kryten and the Toaster in the other. Rimmer and the Cat are shocked to find a beautiful farm amidst the garbage, tended by an old Lister. Because of the time dilation of the black hole, thirty years have passed on the planet. Kryten contacts the rest of the crew having found a polymorph disguised as Lister, which the Toaster disables. Lister insists the polymorph's remains be shot out into space, but its offspring manages to return to Red Dwarf. It steals emotions from the crew until they are saved by a freak accident which slays the beast, causing them to regain their emotions. The stress of the battle is too much for the elderly Lister, and he dies from a heart attack. After Lister's funeral, Rimmer informs Holly of the loss. Holly prints out some instructions to rescue a canister from certain coordinates in space. They are then to fly back into the black hole and enter a parallel dimension, where they are to bury Lister and the canister (which contains Kochanski's ashes). Lister wakes up in a strange hospital in a weird world where time runs backwards. He recovers from his heart attack, regurgitates lunch, and is forced to take a wallet and watch from a mugger. A message from the Dwarf crew instructs Lister to meet them in thirty years (they can't stay with him or they would have gotten younger). Lister takes a taxi to his new home, and finds an elderly Kochanski waiting for him. Lister is happy, knowing that he and Kochanski have many years behind them to look forward to. When the two Red Dwarf novels were printed together as an omnibus, Rob Grant and Doug Naylor took the opportunity to alter the ending of Better than Life in order to clear up confusion about the book's ending. |
Earthsearch II | James Follett | null | The story of Earthsearch 2 continues the adventures of the crew of the starship Challenger (Telson, Sharna, Darv and Astra) begun in the previous serial, Earthsearch, which told the story of theirquest for their lost ancestral homeplanet of Earth (which had moved to orbit a new and unknown star when its citizens realised their original sun was going to go nova). At the end of the serial, the four crewmembers had chosen to settle on the sufficiently Earth-like planet Paradise and escape the ruthless, manipulative control of the Challengers megalomaniacal control computers, Angel One and Angel Two. While the Angels departed Paradise orbit to continue the Earthsearch mission (and to achieve their aim of dominating an entire civilisation), the humans began their new life on their new homeworld. Earthsearch 2 begins four years later, when Telson, Sharna, Darv and Astra have settled into their life on Paradise (assisted by two androids, the agricultural machine George and the argumentative general-purpose service unit Tidy). Both couples now have young children - Darv and Astra have the twins Elka and Savin, and Telson and Sharna have their son Bran. Despite the colonists' embrace of Paradise as home, the lifestyle is proving to be difficult and full of hardships. Sharna's loss of what would have been her second child raises questions about the sustainability of the small colony as well as bringing up differences of opinion on how (and whether) to use the remaining technology and resources (including their surviving planetary shuttle). When Savin is unexpectedly killed by a 'monster' that appears from the sea, the colonists are placed under further strain. Noticing the appearance of an unidentified artefact in planetary orbit, Telson and Darv fly up towards it in the shuttle, to discover that it is an eight-mile long spaceship called Voyager 30 and apparently part of an Earth-originated survey mission. Appearances are deceptive. The spaceship is in fact the returning Challenger: repaired, shortened, refitted and still operated by the Angels (as well by a team of control room androids overseen by Android Surgeon-General Kraken). The Angels are now being attacked by mysterious transmissions apparently aimed at damaging or destroying organic computers such as themselves and the Challengers higher intelligence androids. As humans are totally unaffected by the attacks, the Angels require human assistance in order to seek out and destroy the transmissions at source, and have therefore returned to Paradise to recruit the only humans they can obtain. However, the Angels do not reveal this information, and instead feign an interest in the welfare of the colony in an attempt to gain the trust of the humans. At the same time they have secretly sent an android to kidnap the children (the same "sea monster" which accidentally killed Savin in a bungled abduction attempt). When rejected by the suspicious humans, the Angels resort to sabotage on a planetary scale, using terraforming equipment from the Challenger to melt Paradise's polar ice caps and thus raise the sea level in an attempt to get their former crew to rejoin them on the ship. The resulting flooding begins to submerge all of the land, forcing the settlers to abandon their colony and use their shuttle as a floating ark, even down to loading breeding pairs of animals into the shuttle cargo bay. The crew survive and hold out against the Angels' plans until a series of accidents loses them their drinking water, forcing a surrender. They make the best of things by demanding a concession in the shape of a reversal of the flood (so that the animals can be released and survive), following which they fly their shuttle up to the Challenger. On board the Challenger, the colonists make attempts to regain control over both the Angels and the ships control room, but are thwarted when the Angels kidnap the children from the shuttle. The adults are gassed by a surgical android and fall unconscious. When they come round, they discover that the ship has long left the Paradise system and that they have been in suspended animation for sixteen years. However, the children have been awake the whole time, and have aged normally, now being between eighteen and nineteen years old and firmly under the influence of the Angels. Elka appears friendly and enthusiastic, but Bran is now both hostile and the commander of the Challenger. He demonstrates harsh suspicion and aggression towards his parents and the other two adults, even threatening to kill them should they challenge his authority. En route to the source system of the attacks, the Challenger encounters a free-floating fifty-mile wide parabolic dish which the Angels decide to use as raw material for shielding. Telson, Sharna, Darv and Astra are sent to investigate the dish. They discover that it is an abandoned artificial sun called Solaria D, used by the Earth during its transit to its new sun, and presided over by an Angel-like control computer called Solaria. Despite her apparent benevolence, Solaria is revealed to have been abandoned by Earth once she developed murderous megalomaniacal tendencies. Darv succeeds in destroying her. During their stay on Solaria D, the crew discover the name (though not the location) of Earth's new home star, Novita Six. Returning to the Challenger, the crew notice that Solaria D is now moving in an anomalous way. They discover that the artificial sun is now in the grip of the gravity well of a black hole, and that the Challenger is following it. Attempts to escape from the black hole are hampered by the fact that the human crew have no access to the Challengers control room, where Android Surgeon-General Kraken has had his reasoning capacity damaged by the continuing attacks and is no longer responding to or obeying instructions. With the Angels drastically weakened by the attacks and unable to assist, the humans attempt to storm the control room, which is defended by android warriors. The assault fails when the crew run out of time and the Challenger is pulled into the black hole. The crew regain consciousness to find themselves on a gigantic plain surrounded by many different kinds of abandoned starships, including the Challenger. They discover that they have in fact landed unharmed on an enormous artificial construct - a "gravity platform" which merely resembles a black hole and forms part of Earth's long-range defences, acting as a trap for potentially hostile vessels. The chief engineer of Spaceguard Six, Theros, refuses to release either the Challenger or its crew as he deems the Angels too much of a threat. Not only have they integrated themselves into the entire structure of the ship (making their removal from it effectively impossible), Theros suspects that they may have interposed themselves into the brains of the Challengers crew. When Darv locates the Spaceguard's gravitational control room and reverses the field, he frees the Challenger but at the cost of destroying Spaceguard Six. The ship continues its journey, but immediately runs into further problems when debris from the Spaceguard seriously damages the ship's life support systems and farm galleries, threatening the lives of all humans and organic computers on the ship. With the inexperienced and insecure Bran unable to cope (and undermined by Elka, who secretly dominates him and dictates his actions at the prompting of the Angels), Telson regains command of the Challenger and succeeds in organising the crew to deal with the problems. A second assault on the control room is more successful, but attracts the wrath of the near-invincible Android Surgeon-General Kraken, who kidnaps Darv and Astra to replace his destroyed control room androids. Now suffering catastrophic delusions about seizing the power of stars, Kraken is placing the ship at drastic risk. With the assistance of their android Tidy, the crew manage to destroy Kraken and regain control of the ship. Telson discovers that Kraken has coincidentally selected Novita Six as the ship's next target star. Arriving in the Novita Six system, the Challenger finally reaches its original home, Earth. However, the planet does not look like the Earth that the crew have seen in recordings. It is almost totally dead, with very little water and no rain. The only sign of life is a huge ten-mile-high tower on the equator, with a tiny village nearby. The crew fly down to the village, and meet Peeron, the leader. They discover that the Earth's civilisation has collapsed a long time ago, and the human race is reduced to eking out a meagre living from a tiny spring that grows weaker every year. It appears that the humans will be extinct in a short period of time. The Challenger crew use the terraforming systems on the Challenger to bring rain to Earth and create a stable weather pattern which will allow the people to flourish. The crew examine the tower, finding that there is a door set into one side which cannot be opened. Peeron says that many of his predecessors have made attempts over the centuries - for example, by hitting the door with battering rams - but it will not budge. It is said that it is held shut by a "lock of knowledge". Darv eventually works out how to open the ingeniously simple lock, which requires a low grade of technology which would only be available to people who have already worked out basic principles of science and engineering. The door is a very close/accurate fit in the aperture, and contains mild heating elements that cause it to expand and lock in place. These heaters do not heat it to the point that it is warm to the touch. Simply attaching a refrigeration system to the door and cooling it a few degrees causes the door to shrink and move freely. When the crew open the door, they enter the tower, leaving Peeron and his people outside. They discover that the tower contains a colossal library, presided over by the artificial intelligence "Earthvoice" which serves as both the voice of the library and as a "guardian". Earthvoice explains to the crew that the tower was constructed by the people of Earth as a repository of all human knowledge when their last great civilisation was collapsing. The lock was designed so that the people could not enter until they had already worked out how to make some technology for themselves. Unfortunately, Earthvoice's abilities do not included weather control, so although he has successfully defended Earth's legacy of knowledge he has been helpless to deal with the deterioration of the planet's environmental conditions. Earthvoice has already communicated with the Angels, presenting himself as friendly and subservient. Prompted by Elka to work with the Angels, Earthvoice re-establishes contact with them and is welcomed eagerly. He admits to having been the source of the attacks which have damaged the angels but states that they were a programming directive which he has now overridden. To the humans' horror, Earthvoice and the Angels agree to share both the library's knowledge and power over the Earth, with the Angels also urging that Earthvoice exterminates the crew for safety. Earthvoice begins to transfer the knowledge - however, the Angels have fallen into a final trap. Earthvoice has always intended to destroy them, and he now launches one last brutal and specialised attack on the Angels from close range, erasing their consciousness and memory facilities. Rather than interfere further with the primitive human culture on Earth, the crew seal the door to the tower and return to the Challenger. With the Angels now reduced to subservient and "quite brainless" computer systems, they head back to their chosen home, Paradise, to rebuild their colony. |
The Jew of Malta | Christopher Marlowe | null | The play contains a prologue in which the character Machiavel, a Senecan ghost based on Niccolò Machiavelli, introduces "the tragedy of a Jew." Machiavel expresses the cynical view that power is amoral, saying "I count religion but a childish toy,/And hold there is no sin but ignorance." The Jewish merchant in question, Barabas, is introduced as a man owning more wealth than all of Malta. When Turkish ships arrive to demand tribute, however, Barabas's wealth is seized and he is left penniless. Incensed, he begins a campaign to engineer the downfall of the Maltese governor who robbed him. With the aid of his daughter, Abigail, he recovers some of his former assets and buys a Turkish slave, Ithamore, who appears to hate Christians as much as Barabas. Barabas then, in revenge for the robbery, uses his daughter's beauty to embitter the governor's son and his friend against each other, leading to a duel in which they both die. When Abigail learns of Barabas's role in the plot, she consigns herself to a nunnery, only to be poisoned (along with all of the nuns) by Barabas and Ithamore for becoming a Christian. The two go on to kill a couple of friars who threaten to divulge their previous crimes. Ithamore himself, however, is lured into disclosing his secrets and blackmailing Barabas by a beautiful prostitute and her criminal friend. Barabas poisons all of them in revenge, but not before the governor is apprised of his deeds. Barabas escapes execution by feigning death, and then helps an advancing Turkish army to sack Malta, for which he is awarded governorship of the city. He then turns on the Turks, allowing the Knights of Malta to kill the Turkish army. The Maltese, however, turn on Barabas and kill him as they regain control of Malta. |
Dragon's Eye: A Chinese Noir | Andy Oakes | null | The protagonist of the story is Sun Piao, a Chief Investigator of the Shanghai Public Security Bureau Homicide Department. He has a sidekick of sorts, an overweight and spirited rural Chinese, Yaobang. Sun Piao is a jaded, righteous man determined to do his job and with a reputation for being good at it; alternatively he is the archetypical hardboiled detective of film noir: cynical, pessimistic and somewhat self-destructive. The storyline of the book revolves around an investigation of several horrifically - but surgically - mutilated corpses, all chained around their necks and ankles, and one night resting on the muddy banks of the Huangpu, near the Bund. Other characters in the book worth noting are Barbara Hayes - an American politician who goes to Shanghai in search of her missing son, Chief Liping (a Party member several grades higher than Sun) and an Englishman named Charles Haven. |
Exiles | James Joyce | 1,918 | The action of the play is very simple. Bertha is jealous of Rowan's relationship with Beatrice, and Hand is jealous of Rowan's relationship with Bertha. Joyce himself described the structure of the play as "three cat and mouse acts", and the action mostly involves Robert Hand's attempts to pounce on Bertha. In the first act, at Rowan's house, Hand kisses Bertha "with passion" several times "and passes his hand many times over her hair". He asks her to come to his own house for a second meeting later that evening. Bertha tells Rowan about this invitation, and asks if she should accept it. Rowan tells her to decide for herself. In the second act, Hand is expecting Bertha at the appointed hour, but instead it is Rowan who appears. Rowan calmly explains that he knows all about Hand's wooing of Bertha. After some minutes of what for Hand is clearly a very awkward conversation, Bertha herself knocks at the door. Hand goes tactfully into the garden, while Rowan explains to Bertha the conversation he has just had with Hand. Rowan then goes home, leaving his wife alone with Hand. Hand again begins to seduce Bertha. The act ends inconclusively, with Hand asking if Bertha loves him, and Bertha explaining: "I like you, Robert. I think you are good... Are you satisfied?" The third act begins in Rowan's house at seven o'clock, the following morning. Bertha tells the maid that she hasn't slept all night. The maid tells her that Rowan has left the house an hour earlier, to go walking on the strand. In the morning newspapers, Hand has published a favourable article about Rowan, written the previous evening. Exactly what has happened the previous night is not entirely clear. Hand and Bertha have shared "a sacred night of love", although the specifics of this are not explicitly stated, and both characters agree that it was "a dream". Hand supplies more detail in his account of the night to Rowan, although of his time with Bertha, he admits only that "she went away". He then claims to have gone to the Vice-Chancellor's lodge where he drank claret, returned home to write the newspaper article, and then gone to a nightclub where he picked up a divorcée and had sex with her ("what the subtle Duns Scotus calls a death of the spirit took place") in the cab on the way home. Hand himself leaves "for foreign parts" (his cousin's house in Surrey), while Rowan and Bertha are reconciled. Bertha admits that she longs to meet her lover, but asserts that the lover is Rowan himself. The resolution of the play lies precisely in the sense of doubt about what occurred between Hand and Bertha between Acts Two and Three. Rowan is wounded by the sense of doubt that he admits he longed for. Indeed, he sees this sense of doubt as what enables him "to be united with [Bertha] in body and soul in utter nakedness". |
Nobody's Buddy | John A. Moroso | 1,936 | Sweet story of a boy and his dog, and their adventures with the circus and the local sheriff. |
The Last Days of Pompeii | null | 1,834 | Pompeii, A.D. 79. Athenian nobleman Glaucus arrives in the bustling and gaudy Roman town and quickly falls in love with the beautiful Greek Ione. Ione's former guardian, the malevolent Egyptian sorcerer Arabaces, has designs on Ione and sets out to destroy their budding happiness. Arabaces has already ruined Ione's sensitive brother Apaecides by luring him to join the vice-ridden priesthood of Isis. The blind slave Nydia is rescued from her abusive owners by Glaucus, for whom she secretly pines. Arabaces horrifies Ione by declaring his love for her, and flying into a rage when she refuses him. Glaucus and Apaecides rescue her from his grip, but Arabaces is struck down by an earthquake, a sign of Vesuvius's coming eruption. Glaucus and Ione exult in their love, much to Nydia's torment, while Apaecides finds a new religion in Christianity. Nydia unwittingly helps Julia, a rich young woman who has eyes for Glaucus, obtain a love potion from Arabaces to win Glaucus's love. But the love potion is really a poison that will turn Glaucus mad. Nydia steals the potion and administers it; Glaucus drinks only a small amount and begins raving wildly. Apaecides and Olinthus, an early Christian, determine to publicly reveal the deception of the cult of Isis. Arabaces, recovered from his wounds, overhears and stabs Apaecides to death; he then pins the crime on Glaucus, who has stumbled onto the scene. Arabaces has himself declared the legal guardian of Ione, who is convinced that Arabaces is her brother's murderer, and imprisons her at his mansion. He also imprisons Nydia, who discovers that there is an eyewitness to the murder who can prove Glaucus's innocence --- the priest Calenus, who is yet a third prisoner of Arabaces. She smuggles a letter to Glaucus's friend Sallust, begging him to rescue them. Glaucus is convicted of murder, Olinthus of heresy, and their sentence is to be fed to wild cats in the amphitheater. All Pompeii gathers in the amphitheater for the bloody gladiatorial games. Just as Glaucus is led into the arena with the lion --- who, by a miracle, spares his life and returns to his cage --- Sallust bursts into the arena and reveals Arabaces' plot. The crowd demands that Arabaces be thrown to the lion, but it is too late: Vesuvius begins to erupt. Ash and stone rain down, causing mass panic. Arabaces grabs Ione in the chaos but is killed by a strike of lightning. Nydia leads Glaucus, Sallust, and Ione to safety on a ship in the Bay of Naples. The next morning she commits suicide by quietly slipping into the sea; death is preferable to the agony of her unrequited love for Glaucus. Ten years pass, and Glaucus writes to Sallust, now living in Rome, of his and Ione's happiness in Athens. They have built Nydia a tomb and adopted Christianity. |
The Well of Loneliness | Radclyffe Hall | 1,928 | The book's protagonist, Stephen Gordon, is born in the late Victorian era to upper-class parents in Worcestershire who are expecting a boy and who christen her with the boy's name they had already chosen. Even at birth she is physically unusual, a "narrow-hipped, wide-shouldered little tadpole of a baby". As a girl she hates dresses, wants to cut her hair short, and longs to be a boy. At seven, she develops a crush on a housemaid named Collins, and is devastated when she sees Collins kissing a footman. Stephen's father, Sir Phillip, dotes on her; he seeks to understand her through the writings of Karl Heinrich Ulrichs, the first modern writer to propose a theory of homosexuality, but does not share his findings with Stephen. Her mother, Lady Anna, is distant, seeing Stephen as a "blemished, unworthy, maimed reproduction" of Sir Phillip. At eighteen, Stephen forms a close friendship with a Canadian man, Martin Hallam, but is horrified when he declares his love for her. The following winter, Sir Phillip is crushed by a falling tree; at the last moment he tries to explain to Lady Anna that Stephen is an invert, but dies without managing to do so. Stephen begins to dress in masculine clothes made by a tailor rather than a dressmaker. At twenty-one she falls in love with Angela Crossby, the American wife of a new neighbor. Angela uses Stephen as an "anodyne against boredom", allowing her "a few rather schoolgirlish kisses". Then Stephen discovers that Angela is having an affair with a man. Fearing exposure, Angela shows a letter from Stephen to her husband, who sends a copy to Stephen's mother. Lady Anna denounces Stephen for "presum[ing] to use the word love in connection with ... these unnatural cravings of your unbalanced mind and undisciplined body." Stephen replies, "As my father loved you, I loved ... It was good, good, good – I'd have laid down my life a thousand times over for Angela Crossby." After the argument, Stephen goes to her father's study and for the first time opens his locked bookcase. She finds a book by Krafft-Ebing – assumed by critics to be Psychopathia Sexualis, a text about homosexuality and paraphilias – and, reading it, learns that she is an invert. Stephen moves to London and writes a well-received first novel. Her second novel is less successful, and her friend the playwright Jonathan Brockett, himself an invert, urges her to travel to Paris to improve her writing through a fuller experience of life. There she makes her first, brief contact with urban invert culture, meeting the lesbian salon hostess Valérie Seymour. During World War I she joins an ambulance unit, eventually serving at the front and earning the Croix de Guerre. She falls in love with a younger fellow driver, Mary Llewellyn, who comes to live with her after the war ends. They are happy at first, but Mary becomes lonely when Stephen returns to writing. Rejected by polite society, Mary throws herself into Parisian gay nightlife. Stephen believes Mary is becoming hardened and embittered and feels powerless to provide her with "a more complete and normal existence". Martin Hallam, now living in Paris, rekindles his old friendship with Stephen. In time, he falls in love with Mary. Persuaded that she cannot give Mary happiness, Stephen pretends to have an affair with Valérie Seymour to drive her into Martin's arms. The novel ends with Stephen's plea to God: "Give us also the right to our existence!" |
The Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre | Louis Cha | 1,961 | Set in the late Yuan Dynasty, the story revolves around a pair of priceless and extremely powerful weapons, known as the Heaven Reliant Sword (倚天劍) and Dragon Slaying Saber (屠龍刀), which many jianghu pugilists covet. Either or both of them are thought to allow their wielder to rule the wulin (martial artists' community), according to a widely circulating rumour in a repeated mantra, "Honoured by the wulin, the precious saber slays the dragon, it commands the world, who dares to disobey? If the Heaven Reliant does not appear, who can challenge it?" (武林至尊，寶刀屠龍，號令天下，莫敢不從！倚天不出，誰與爭鋒？). The reason for that is lost at the beginning of the story. The protagonist Zhang Wuji is of mixed heritage: his father Zhang Cuishan hails from the reputable Wudang Sect under the master Zhang Sanfeng, while his mother Yin Susu is from the unorthodox Heavenly Eagle Cult. As a boy, he lives with them and his godfather Xie Xun on the isolated northern island where he was born. He returns to the Chinese mainland and loses his parents after they are cornered on Mount Wudang by several martial artists coveting the Dragon Slaying Saber. At the same time, he is wounded by the Xuanming Elders and survives after seeking medical treatment from Hu Qingniu, a master physician. His adventures further lead him to discover the long lost Nine Yang Manual and he masters the inner energy skills described inside, becoming a formidable pugilist. He later resolves the conflict between the Ming Cult and the six major orthodox sects, who are intent on destroying the cult. He earns the respect of the cult's members and becomes its leader after mastering the skill Heaven and Earth Great Shift. He reforms the cult and helps to improve its relations with other sects. He becomes a key figure in leading rebel forces to overthrow the Yuan Dynasty. Throughout his adventures, Zhang Wuji finds himself entangled in a complex web of love relationships with four maidens. The first, Yin Li, is a horribly disfigured girl who is actually his maternal cousin. The second, Xiaozhao, is a Chinese Persian servant girl who understands him very well. The third, Zhou Zhiruo, is a childhood friend whom he develops a strong bond with. The fourth, Zhao Min, is a Mongol princess and his former arch-rival. Yin Li is apparently killed in the middle of the story while Xiaozhao returns to Persia after it is revealed that she is destined to lead the Persian Ming Cult. Zhou Zhiruo soon falls in love with Zhang Wuji, but has to turn against him as she is bound by an oath she made in front of her teacher Abbess Miejue, who hates and distrusts Zhang Wuji and anyone related to the Ming Cult. Miejue devises a vicious scheme for Zhou Zhiruo to seize the two weapons by exploiting Zhang Wuji's love for Zhou. Zhou Zhiruo also turns vicious after Zhang Wuji reneges his promise to marry her and she swears vengeance on him. Zhao Min was initially Zhang Wuji's rival as they were on opposing sides. However, Zhao Min gradually falls in love with Zhang Wuji after their various encounters, and she even turns against her clan to help him. At the end of the novel, Zhang Wuji decides to retire from the jianghu after he mistakenly believes that the Ming Cult's members are plotting to betray him. He decides that Zhao Min is his true love and they leave for a reclusive life far away from society (the ending to the second edition, however, is ambiguous about his relationship with Zhou Zhiruo). Zhang Wuji gave up an opportunity to become the emperor, as the Ming Cult eventually overthrew the Yuan Dynasty, and ideally Zhang would become the new sovereign, but instead Zhu Yuanzhang takes the throne and founds the Ming Dynasty. In 2005 Jin Yong published the third edition of the novel, which has a slightly different ending from the earlier versions. In this edition, Zhang Wuji becomes disillusioned when he could not save the life of a general and address the death of Han Lin'er, and with that he left the leadership of the Ming Cult in the hands of Yang Xiao and Fan Yao, and then left the Central Plains with Zhao Min. |
Dead Man's Folly | Agatha Christie | null | En route to Nasse House, Poirot gives a lift to two female hitch-hikers – one Dutch and one Italian – who are staying at the youth hostel adjoining the Nasse House grounds. When he arrives, Mrs Oliver explains that she feels that her plans for the Murder Hunt have been, almost imperceptibly, influenced by the advice that she has been given by people in the house, until it is almost as though she is being pushed into staging a real murder. The owner of Nasse House is George Stubbs, a wealthy man who has seemingly adopted an unearned title of "Sir" in order to confirm his position in the local community. His much younger wife is the seemingly simple and impressionable Hattie, a young woman who has apparently been introduced to him by Amy Folliat, the surviving member of the family that once owned the house. Now that her sons have been supposedly killed during the War, she is living out her days in the Lodge House. Other visitors at Nasse House include an architect, Michael Weyman, who criticises the siting some years earlier of a folly in an inappropriate area of the grounds. On the day of the fête, Hattie learns that a cousin, Etienne de Sousa, is about to visit, and she seems upset by this, referring to him as a killer. At the fete, a local Girl Guide, Marlene Tucker, is to play the part of the victim, and she waits in the boathouse to play her role when someone approaches her. Poirot observes the movements of some of the visitors to the house. Later, in the company of Mrs Oliver, he discovers the corpse of Marlene in the boathouse. Moreover, Hattie is discovered to have gone missing. Both the police and Poirot himself are initially baffled. The investigation focuses on Etienne de Sousa, a wealthy young man who shows no apparent concern at Hattie’s disappearance and has arrived in perfect time to have committed the murder. Another suspect is Amanda Brewis, George's secretary, who appears to be in love with Sir George and claims to have been sent down to the boathouse by Hattie with refreshments for Marlene at around the time that the girl was killed. This sounds very out of character for Hattie. Further confusion is added by the behaviour of the Legges, who appear to have some sort of shady connection with a young man in a turtle shirt who has been seen in the grounds. (It later comes to light that this red herring is connected with Legge's career as a nuclear physicist.) Poirot’s attention is directed to Amy Folliat, who seems to know more than she is saying. After the boatman Merdell dies, Poirot discovers that he was Marlene’s grandfather. Now he puts together several stray clues: Marlene had said that her grandfather had seen someone burying a woman in the woods; Marlene was the type to blackmail, and had in fact received small sums of money prior to her murder; Merdell had commented significantly to Poirot that there would "always be Folliats at Nasse House". In the denouement Poirot reveals that "Sir" George Stubbs is none other than Amy Folliat's younger son, James, who had deserted during WWI. Instead, Amy had paired him with the impressionable, but very wealthy, Hattie, hoping they would make a good couple. However, he fleeced her of her money and established his new identity, buying the family house and ensuring the continuity of Folliat possession. Unbeknownst to his mother, however, George/James was already married, and as soon as he had possession of Nasse he killed Hattie, and substituted his legal, first wife, a young Italian woman, in her place. The real Hattie was buried on the grounds where the Folly was built. Marlene Tucker had guessed the secret from hints dropped by her grandfather, and George and his real wife decided it would be safer to kill her than continue giving her hush money. The day before the day of the murder, "Hattie" began to establish another identity as an Italian hitch-hiker. On the day of the murder, she switched between the two roles, killing Marlene and leaving the grounds as the hitch-hiker, with Hattie's clothes in her rucksack. The day of the murder had been selected to cast suspicion upon Etienne, who had actually notified them some weeks earlier of his visit, of whom the fake Hattie pretends to be afraid. As Hattie's cousin, Etienne would not have been deceived and would have realized that the fake Hattie was not his cousin. The arrests of the culprits is not referenced in the novel, the end of which focuses on the despair of Amy Folliat, who does not appear to be facing legal charges, although that is never quite spelled out, in her allocution to Poirot. |
Doctor Dolittle's Return | Hugh Lofting | null | Tommy Stubbins is waiting for Doctor Dolittle's return from the Moon and when the Doctor does so, he is anxious to write of what he has experienced. This proves more difficult than expected. The poignancy of the doctor's lunar experiences is juxtaposed with his hilarious attempts to be put into jail so he will be free of all responsibilities and will be able to write his book. ja:ドリトル先生月から帰る |
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