As the story begins, Honor returns to her Steading on Grayson, having just been promoted to Commodore for her actions in Honor Among Enemies. During a party celebrating her promotion, she engages in a heated debate with Earl White Haven, her superior, and the two realize they have mutual unspoken romantic feelings for each other. In an attempt to escape her own feelings, Honor goes with Alistair McKeon on a convoy escort mission to the Adler system, which has been captured by Citizen Rear Admiral Lester Tourville of the DuQuesne base, under the orders of Thomas Theisman, in order to capture or destroy a large chunk of Manticoran shipping. Spotting the ambush and after salvaging what she can of her convoy from Havenite attack, Honor orders McKeon to surrender. After learning of Honor''s capture Cordelia Ransom, the People''s Republic''s Secretary for Public Information, demands that the Manticorans be surrendered to her for propaganda uses. Unable to deny Ransom and her StateSec enforcers, Admiral Theisman capitulates. The crew are transferred to the Havenite battlecruiser PNS Tepes, Ransom''s personal flagship, bound for the Havenite prison planet of Hades, where Ransom intends to execute Honor for a death sentence handed down by the prior government. Ransom gives any crew member serving under Harrington a chance to defect and Senior Chief Petty Officer Harkness takes up the offer claiming that Manticore have never really done anything for him. Unbeknownst to StateSec, Harkness has no intention of truly defecting, and after fooling his assigned watchdogs, hacks into the security and communication systems, eventually disabling them and causing massive explosions in the boat bays. Freeing the rest of the crew, they manage to destroy the Tepes and land on Cerberus B 2, facing a well-provided for prison camp and unknown amounts of space forces.

In Enemy Hands

Legacy is the immediate sequel to Beguilement in the Sharing Knife series. It follows the pairing of farmer Fawn and lakewalker maverick Dag, after their marriage at Fawn''s home in the previous volume. Where they, unencumbered by minor opposition, were married in accord with the customs of both groups. They travel to Dag''s clan''s home camp at Hickory Lake, where they find the expected prejudices against miscegenation between Farmers and Lakewalkers. Dag is called on to lead a group of Lakewalker patrollers against an advanced malice. Dag decides that confronting the malice is more important than trying to free several Lakewalkers who have been entranced in the mud-man-making process by which the malice produces its slaves. After Dag''s group has killed the malice, Dag, himself, also becomes entranced. Fawn carries her heroine role through by thinking out a way to revive him, and the rest of the Lakewalkers. Neither achievement carries enough weight with Dag''s brother and mother to make them relent in their efforts to break this pairing. These two carry the role of villains, but they are drawn so that the reasons for their awkward quirks are clear. Although their marriage, and Fawn''s potential value to the camp are accepted by some of the Lakewalkers, The Dag-and-Fawn combination raises enough awkward precedents that they are about to be voted into exile when Dag subverts the process, stating that he intends to leave his home community in any case. Dag and Fawn then take as many portable assets as they can, and set out in chosen exile towards the southeast. There, Dag guesses he may be able to confirm his ideas about the near kinship of Farmers to Lakewalkers, and to find ways to combine their efforts toward the eradication of malices. These themes unfold in the next pair of books.

Legacy

In The Moon by Night (ISBN 0-374-35049-3), Vicky and her family are on a cross-country camping trip, meant to be a transition between their life in rural Thornhill, Connecticut and a very different one in New York City, where Vicky''s father, Dr. Wallace Austin, will be doing research. In another big change in Vicky''s life, Maggy Hamilton, an orphan who has been living with the Austins since her father''s death, goes to live with her legal guardian Elena, who is marrying Vicky''s uncle, Douglas Austin. Uncle Douglas and his new family move to Laguna Beach, California, where Vicky''s family is to visit them during their travels. The first chapter begins with the wedding of Elena and Douglas. The family''s adventures show its differences from contemporary society. Along the way, they meet a teenage gang in Tennessee, help rescue children from a flood in Texas, and find an abandoned baby at a campsite in Utah. Vicky''s younger sister Suzy grows emotionally during the trip, from wanting to adopt a fawn near the beginning to her later swift and competent rendering of first aid when another child is injured, despite wrong-headed demands by nearby adults. They see bears several times, and though they always act properly, their peers sometimes do not, with dangerous results. They also encounter anti-U.S. sentiment in a campground in Canada and intimations of the Cold War throughout their journey. Early in the trip, at a Tennessee campground, Vicky meets Zachary Gray, who arrives with his parents in a luxuriously equipped tent trailer pulled by a brand new black station wagon. She finds him charming, handsome and intelligent, but also frightening in his cynicism and recklessness. He pursues her (in person and with notes left behind) at other campgrounds across the country and in Laguna Beach. Vicky enjoys this attention, but the rest of her family dislikes Zach. She resents this, torn between obedience to her family and her growing need for independence. Observing Zachary''s paleness and shortness of breath during an interpretive hike in Mesa Verde, Vicky''s father, a doctor, deduces that he has a history of rheumatic fever that has damaged his heart. Dr. Austin several times orders the boy to avoid strenuous exercise as he accompanies Vicky and her family in their sightseeing. Late in the trip, at Yellowstone National Park, Vicky meets Andy Ford, another boy who becomes interested in her. Andy is more emotionally stable than Zachary and far more cheerful, but also less exciting. Zachary turns up with his parents at the Austins'' next destination, in the Black Ram section of Wyoming, and exhibits jealousy toward Andy. A few hours later, a game of hide and seek ends with Zachary missing. As the Austins search for him, Zachary lures Vicky to a remote mountainside to speak with her privately about Andy. Vicky turns to return to her family, but is unable to do so after an earthquake brings down her side of the mountain in an avalanche. Zachary is trapped between two large rocks with a broken wrist. Vicky comes to terms with her concerns about the precariousness of life and the existence of a loving God, and Zachary promises to take better care of himself. Vicky waits with Zachary until help arrives.

The Moon by Night

James is joined on a new mission by Dave Moss and his sister Lauren Adams. The mission focuses on Jane Oxford, an international arms dealer who has been untraceable for as long as she has been on the CIA''s most wanted list. But then they come across a breakthrough: Jane''s 14-year-old son Curtis Oxford has been jailed for murdering three innocent people. He is being held at Arizona Maximum Security Prison. The Americans ask a favour from CHERUB, an organisation with one essential advantage: even experienced criminals do not expect kids to be spying on them. The plan is for James and Dave to be sent into the prison undercover, then to bust Curtis out, hoping that Curtis will lead them to his mother. However, after a prison fight Dave is injured and taken to hospital, leaving James alone behind bars. Soon James and Curtis escape with the help of Lauren. Later, they meet up with Jane Oxford. Jane wants James dead, so she sends her men to execute him but he beats them. Soon, the FBI arrive to arrest Jane. Lauren gets her navy shirt for her performance.

CHERUB: Maximum Security

Set in the projects of Brooklyn, New York, The Coldest Winter Ever is the story of Winter Santiaga (aptly named because she was born during one of New York''s worst snowstorms), the rebellious, pampered teenage daughter of a notorious drug dealer. Ricky Santiaga, Winter''s father, has attained substantial wealth through his illegal drug empire and lavishes his wife, Winter, and Winter''s three younger sisters, Porsche, Lexus, and Mercedes, with the best things money can (and cannot) buy. Unknown to her father, Winter uses her hustling tricks to get whatever she wants. Winter''s world is turned upside down on her 16th birthday, when her father suddenly decides to relocate his family and his growing business to Long Island, but she is determined not to sever ties with the old neighborhood. Her life spirals downward when her mother is shot in the face by foes of her father. Shortly afterward, the FBI arrives at the Santiaga mansion while Winter is at a party, seizes the family''s possessions, and sends the drug lord to prison. At this juncture, Winter''s sisters are placed in child custody, rather than in their unemployed mother''s custody. Winter escapes by pretending to not be her parents’ daughter. Winter stays with a man just for his money for a while, but when his girlfriend comes back, Winter goes to live with an aunt. While with the Aunt, Winter''s location is revealed, and she is turned over to the Bureau of Child Welfare. Winter''s location was probably divulged by Natalie, a former friend of Winter''s, who suspected that Winter was trying to date her boyfriend. While visiting her father in jail, she finds out that he had an infant son and was cheating on her mother, which tears her apart. Also, her father murdered someone while in jail. After being taken out of her aunt’s home, Winter starts living at the House of Success, a group home for teenage girls. Her new surroundings do not stop her from hustling: she makes money by selling clothes and cigarettes to her housemates, and she does their hair. Winter obtains the goods she sells from her friend Simone, who is a booster who steals designer clothes for her. Winter continues making money this way until Simone is arrested. Winter does not bail out now-pregnant Simone, but Simone gets out another way. Upon her release, Simone gathers some friends to wait so that they can beat up Winter. Winter escapes the beating by running and never returns. Then Simone falls and has a miscarriage. Rashida, one of Winter''s House of Success housemates, thinks that Winter needs help and persuades her to go to a friend''s house. Winter doesn''t know that the friend is Sister Souljah, whom Winter boldly stated she never liked in the book''s introduction. Under Souljah''s tutelage, Winter volunteers at a benefit for people with HIV/AIDS, but Winter still does whatever she can to get money. Winter steals money from the AIDS benefit and rushes home to pack. Suspicious of Winter leaving, Lauren, Souljah''s sister, switches the bag into which Winter has put her prized belongings. Winter takes a cab to a New Jersey hotel, and realizes that she has no money, no jewels, and no protection. Winter hooks up with an old boyfriend named Bullet, who has money. She finds out that she is pregnant with the baby of a man who tricked her into believing he was hip-hop MC GS. Months later, Winter''s world crashes again when she is attacked in a car by Simone. A crowd gathers to watch the fight, and Winter loses focus when she sees Bullet cause the crowd to disperse by waving a gun in the air. Once Winter looks away, Simone slashes her across the face with a broken bottle. Winter is led back to the car by Bullet and, shortly afterward, the police arrive. Bullet leaves Winter, who gets a mandatory 15-year prison sentence for transporting drugs in his rental car. Soon, her old friends Natalie and Simone join her in prison, and her younger sister eventually becomes just like her. The ending surprises: after her father was jailed, Winter talked about being let out of prison to attend her mother’s funeral.

The Coldest Winter Ever

Dr. Barbara is a disgraced doctor who forms a small band of environmentalists to attempt to save the albatross from nuclear testing by the French government on the remote Pacific island of St.Esprit. Neil, a naïve 16 year old, joins the group and the story is told from his perspective. During an illegal landing on the island, Neil is caught on film being shot in the foot by a French soldier. The subsequent news coverage makes Neil, and their environmental campaign, media celebrities. This allows a return visit to the island with a larger and more eccentric group of campaigners. Whilst attempting to land, a French navy frigate collides with their boat. This event is broadcast live to the world by the cameraman who dies in the collision. The subsequent adverse news coverage causes the French to leave the campaigners unmolested on the island. The coverage also leads to a deluge of gifts from well wishers all over the world, a steady stream of visitors and a growing collection of endangered animals which are meant to use the island as sanctuary. Visitors include a representative from Club Med who investigates whether the island can be turned into a resort. These excesses cause Dr. Barbara to manipulate Neil and other residents to commit ever greater acts of sabotage to cut themselves off from the outside world. Gradually, the male residents of the island (except Neil) become ill and slowly die under the ''care'' of Dr. Barbara. As fewer able bodied residents are left, the endangered animals they are supposed to be saving are killed and eaten. Slowly, Neil realises that his role is to father as many children as possible from the female residents. As more visitors arrive on the island, the female members stay and the male members disappear. When another young man arrives on the island, Neils role as stud is in jeopardy and he too becomes ill whilst the new arrival is kept healthy. Slowly, over the course of the story, the environmentalists change from being the sane ones in an insane world into total insanity as Dr. Barbara''s all female ''paradise'' is constructed. Neil and the remaining residents are rescued in the nick of time by the French navy after a couple who only just manages to escape alerts the authorities to what is really happening on the island.

Rushing to Paradise

In order to save the future, undercover SpecOps investigator Thursday Next attempts to convince her son Friday to join the ChronoGuard. To complicate matters, she''ll have to deal with renegade apprentices, ruthless corporations, and a sting operation from the Cheese Enforcement Agency. The title First Among Sequels was met with stiff resistance from Fforde''s publishers because it had ''sequel'' in the title, and it was felt that telegraphing the ''sequelness'' of the book might be a bad move. It was decided, however, to capitalise on the fact that this was a series - a sort of ''Have you discovered Thursday Next yet?'' approach to marketing. First Among Sequels is the first part of a new four-part Thursday Next series, which is reported to be continued with One of our Thursdays is Missing in 2011. The title is a parody of First Among Equals, which is the title of a best-selling Jeffrey Archer novel, but also comes from the English translation of the Latin phrase primus inter pares. It is traditionally used to describe the position of the British Prime Minister, since in the British Constitution the position of prime minister has no official existence, and the office holder is simply the ''most powerful'' of the Queen''s advisors in Cabinet.

First Amoung Sequels

The story follows the unnamed protagonist and his irrational hatred of John Claverhouse, a man with a "moon-face". The protagonist clearly states that his hatred of him is irrational, saying: "Why do we not like him? Ah, we do not know why; we know only that we do not. We have taken a dislike, that is all. And so I with John Claverhouse." The protagonist becomes obsessed with Claverhouse, hating his face, his laugh, his entire life. The protagonist observes that Claverhouse engages in illegal fishing with dynamite and hatches a scheme to kill Claverhouse. The protagonist teaches a dog, Bellona, to do one thing and one thing only, retrieval, with emphasis on water retrieving and taking the stick back to the thrower no matter where they were. Claverhouse is presented with Bellona before his upcoming trout fishing trip. The protagonist observes from a distance with glee as Claverhouse lights a stick of dynamite and throws it into the water. Bellona, trained to retrieve, fetches the explosive. Claverhouse runs from the dog in futility until "just as she caught up, he in full stride, and she leaping with nose at his knee, there was a sudden flash, a burst of smoke, a terrific detonation, and where man and dog had been the instant before there was naught to be seen but a big hole in the ground." The death is ruled an accident while engaged in illegal fishing. The protagonist takes pride in killing Claverhouse with no mess or brutality and lives in peace.

Moon face

The Rising begins in media res during a conflict between two groups, the Commonwealth and an extremist religious group the Mission Of Life Lived In Ecclesia (commonly referred to as "Mollies") and the Mollies'' allies, an alien species known as the Fibians. The basis of the conflict is that the Mollies settled an otherwise worthless sector of the galaxy, later discovered to naturally have extremely rich sources of easily obtainable antihydrogen, an energy particle that is required for the high technology space travel and civilization, and difficult to manufacture artificially. Commander Peter Raeder, formerly a pilot, has been assigned as Chief Engineer on the new fast carrier ship CSF Invincible, a smaller carrier type the Commonwealth hopes to use to preserve their dwindling stockpile of antihydrogen for as long as possible. Shortly after launch, Raeder becomes aware that there is a Mollie sleeper agent aboard performing acts of sabotage to prevent the success of the fast carrier design. After several missions and assorted acts of sabotage, Raeder successfully IDs the sleeper, and manages to prevent the final sabotage, which would have destroyed the entire ship. A sub-plot involving piloting of a Speed, the in-universe space superiority fighter, is that a pilot requires two flesh-and-blood hands to properly interface with the fighter for battle (Raeder had lost a hand prior to the events of The Rising, and though outfitted with a high-tech prosthetic otherwise indistinguishable from a real hand, cannot make the link, the prosthetic''s sensory devices being unable to match the delicacy and precision required for interface). Toward the end of the book, Raeder''s engineering staff successfully create an interface device that will work even for Raeder, on the basis that injuries such as Raeder''s are becoming more common in the conflict, and losing an experienced pilot for such an injury drastically reduces the Commonwealth''s pilot pool.

The Rising

Hawkeye Pierce returns to live in Crabapple Cove, Maine near the town of Spruce Harbor. Having left the Army, Hawkeye is established to be working for the Veterans Administration. In May 1954 he is laid off. At this point, Hawkeye doesn’t have much money in the bank, is 31 years old, and has three children: Billy, Stephen and Karen. The day he’s released, Trapper John McIntyre comes to visit and sets Hawkeye’s future in motion. Trapper John, a Lieutenant in the medical organization of Maxie Neville in New York City, arranges for further thoracic training for Hawkeye, first in the East Orange VA Hospital in New Jersey, then at St Lombard’s in Manhattan from July 1954. After two years Hawkeye breezes through the Thoracic Boards. At the end of his training in June 1956, two Spruce Harbor locals, Jocko Allcock (the man who was responsible for Hawkeye being fired by the VA) and “Wooden Leg” Willcox (the local fish magnate) come to visit Hawkeye to set him up in practice—by betting favorably on the outcome of his operations. The first operation with Trapper John’s assistance (upon Pasquale Merlino) is a success, and thanks to his superior training Hawkeye becomes the local surgeon. As time goes by, Hawkeye is given more patients by the local general practitioner of note, “Doggy” Moore; goes into private practice with ex-Spitfire pilot Tony Holcombe and plots the eventual reuniting of the Swamp Gang. By 1959 Hawkeye has lured Trapper John, Duke Forrest, and Spearchucker Jones into his net, and thanks to the proceeds of the “Allcock-Willcox” syndicate, a new “Finestkind Fishmarket and Clinic” is set up along with the new Spruce Harbor General Hospital. Duke returns to Georgia from Korea, and takes a course in urology. Hawkeye Pierce then invites him up to Spruce Harbor, Maine to join him and a new friend, Tony Holcombe in private practice. Duke immediately turns up in Maine with his bloodhound, Little Eva, and joins Hawkeye in persuading Spearchucker to become the local neurosurgeon. Duke and his family move into Crabapple Cove next to Hawkeye and Mary Pierce. Pierce''s home, "Port Waldo", is (real-life) Waldoboro, and the FinestKind Clinic is just up Route 1 in Rockland. "Crabapple Cove" is Broad Cove, in Bremen, just down the Medomak River from Waldoboro Village. Richard Hooker (Hornberger) owned an old farmhouse on Heath Point. The reader will note Wreck Island, Thief Island, and other Muscongus Bay landmarks in the book. It is possible that the Pierce family is modeled after the (real-life) Spear family, who had a number of different branches in the area, in the 1950s.

M*A*S*H Goes to Maine

The story is set in an alternate universe, taking place after the “Voodoo Wars”, a conflict between humans and the “Others”. The Others mainly consist of vampires, werewolves, and demons, though the main conflict occurs between humans and vampires. As a result of this war, “bad spots”, or places where black magic thrives, have appeared more frequently. Rae "Sunshine" Seddon, the pastry-making heroine of the novel, has the misfortune of being caught off-guard at her family''s old lake side cabin and is abducted by a gang of vampires. She is confined to the ballroom of an abandoned mansion with Constantine, a vampire shackled there by vampires of a rival gang, led by Constantine’s enemy Bo. Bo’s intention is to allow Constantine to slowly die of hunger and exposure to sunlight. Rae is brought as bait for him, and the vampires cut her upper chest as temptation. However, Rae not only manages to defy the supposed power that any vampire has over a human, but also uses her all-but-forgotten magical powers of transmutation, taught to her by her grandmother, to effect an escape. Rae realizes that the magical lineage she has ignored allows her to draw power from the sunlight, ergo transferring her ability through touch to Constantine and allowing him to be under the light of day, so long as contact is maintained. Through this symbiotic relationship, the two of them make an escape. Despite her best efforts, all does not return to normalcy once Rae is back home. Her friends and family are shocked by her survival of an encounter with vampires, and over time she both starts to become more affected by the trauma and refuses to tell anyone the circumstances leading to her alliance with a vampire. As it becomes clear that the conflict with Bo and his gang is only beginning, Sunshine begins to embrace her magical ability, is coerced into working with the "Special Other Forces", wonders what kind of tentative partnership can exist between two individuals whose races are bitter enemies, and, finally, works with Constantine to overthrow Bo for good.

Sunshine

Dorothy is near her home in Kansas when the story begins. She and her dog Toto first meet the Shaggy Man, a wandering hobo who carries the Love Magnet with him, en route to avoid the town of Butterfield. Further on, the road splits into seven paths. They take the seventh and soon meet Button Bright, a little boy in a sailor''s outfit who is always getting lost. Later, the companions meet Polychrome the Rainbow''s Daughter, a fairy who danced off the edge of the rainbow just as it disappeared. Dorothy, Toto, the Shaggy Man, Button-Bright, and Polychrome soon come to the town of Foxville, where anthropomorphic foxes live. With prompting from King Dox of Foxville, Dorothy deduces that she''s on another "fairy adventure" that will ultimately lead her to Oz, just in time for Ozma''s birthday party, which is now acknowledged as August 21 by Oz fans, even though the book only refers to the 21st of the month, Dorothy having mentioned that the current month is August in another passage. The king takes a particular liking to Button Bright, whom he considers astute and clever due to his tabula rasa-like mind. Believing that the human face does not suit one so clever, Dox gives him a fox''s head. A similar event subsequently happens to the Shaggy Man, when King Kik-a-Bray of Dunkiton confers a donkey''s head upon him—also in reward for cleverness, even though it''s implied that Foxville and Dunkiton exist at odds with one another. After meeting the Musicker, who produces music from his breath, and fighting off the head-throwing Scoodlers, Dorothy and her companions reach the edge of the Deadly Desert surrounding Oz. There, the Shaggy Man''s friend Johnny Dooit builds a "sand-boat" by which they may cross. This is necessary, because physical contact with the desert''s sands, as of this book and Ozma of Oz, will turn the travelers to dust. Upon reaching Oz, Dorothy and her companions are welcomed by Tik-Tok and Billina the Yellow Hen. They proceed in company, to come in their travels to the Truth Pond, where Button Bright and the Shaggy Man regain their true heads by bathing in its waters. They meet the Tin Woodman, the Scarecrow, and Jack Pumpkinhead who journey with them to the Emerald City for Ozma''s birthday. As preparations are made for arrivals from all over Fairyland (principally characters from Baum''s non-Oz books, such as Santa Claus, Queen Zixi of Ix, John Dough – a man made out of gingerbread – and Chick the Cherub), the Shaggy Man receives permission to stay in Oz permanently. He is given, in addition to this, a new suit of clothes having bobtails in place of his former costume''s ragged edges, so that he may retain his name and identity. After everyone has presented their gifts and feasted at a banquet in Ozma''s honor, the Wizard demonstrates a method of using bubbles as transportation by which to send everyone home. Polychrome goes home upon a rainbow, Button-Bright goes home with Santa Claus on a soap bubble, and Dorothy is wished home by Ozma''s use of the Magic Belt.

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

In Enemy Hands

By David Weber

Legacy

By Lois McMaster Bujold

The Moon by Night

By Madeleine L''Engle

CHERUB: Maximum Security

By Robert Muchamore

The Coldest Winter Ever

By Sister Souljah

Rushing to Paradise

By J. G. Ballard

First Amoung Sequels

By Jasper Fforde

Moon face

By Jack London

The Rising

By James Doohan

MAS*H Goes to Maine

By H. Richard Hornberger

Sunshine

By Robin McKinley

The Road to Oz

By L. Frank Baum