The book starts out with 15-year old Tack just trying to survive a ruthless high school where any infraction means expulsion. And expulsion means death. After a run in with some bullies, Tack escapes into abandoned District 19, where he meets Umasi. Umasi pays Tack to do menial chores like sorting through salt and pepper, and trains him in several fighting ways. On a routine inspection of Tack''s school, his little sister Suzie takes the blame for her friend Melissa for throwing a stink bomb at the Disciplinary Officer. Suzie is expelled on the spot and is taken away from the school. Tack immediately follows and leaves the school just in time to see a firebomb fly into the car killing Suzie and the Disciplinary Officer. As he holds his sisters dead body, he sees the person who killed Suzie, calling her "Collateral Damage". Tack runs away and passes out on a dock. When he wakes up he is found by two members of the Truancy, which is a group of children trying to overthrow the City. He joins the Truancy under the name Takan, thinking that he can find the one who killed Suzie if he does. He eventually finds her killer, whose name is Zyid, but he is the leader of the Truancy. Tack sympathizes with the Truancy and feels he can not kill their leader. He eventually replaces a girl named Noni as Zyids favorite because of his fighting skills taught by Umasi. Tack eventually falls in love with Noni. The Mayor hires one of Umasis former pupils named Edward, and appoints him as the Chief Enforcer and leader of the "student Militia", which are students that were promised instant graduation if they fought the Truancy. Zyid confronts Umasi and tells him that he must correct his mistake and kill Edward. Umasi doesn''t want to, as he has become a pacifist and has never enjoyed killing people. Umasi eventually agrees to do it, and finds and kills Edward that night. The next day, Zyid tells Tack that the war will end that night, and asks Tack to join him to "plead their case to the city" by breaking into a radio tower and setting a tape to loop constantly. After they do this, Zyid reveals that he knows who Tack is and says "killing me won''t bring her back". They agree to a duel to the death. Right before the duel, Zyid reveals that his real name is Zen, his brother is Umasi, and both of them are the adoptive twin sons of the Mayor. What follows is a lengthy duel between the two that gets interrupted several times. Tack eventually wins by kicking Zyid off of the top of his old school. Umasi comes and stays with Zyid as he dies. Zyid asks Umasi to promise to help Tack. The Story ends with Tack becoming the leader of the Truancy under the name Takan.

Truancy

Baldwin, the Archbishop of Canterbury, had exhorted the Britons, and the Anglo-Normans who were settled on the borders of the Welsh principalities, to lay aside their feuds and join in the third Crusade. Accordingly, Gwenwyn, the Prince of Powys-land, and Sir Raymond Berenger, the Knight of Garde Doloureuse, had accepted each other''s hospitality, and Gwenwyn, at the suggestion of his chaplain, had arranged to divorce his wife Brengwan, in order that he might marry Sir Raymond''s daughter Eveline. In reply to his proposal, however, a messenger brought a letter stating that she was promised to Sir Hugo de Lacy, the Constable of Chester. This being taken by the Welsh as an affront, the call to war was sung by the bards, the Norman castle was attacked, and its owner slain in a combat with his would-be son-in-law. Nerved by the presence of Eveline on the battlements, and supplied with food by a ruse of her father''s vassal the Flemish weaver, the garrison, assisted by the military predilections of their chaplain, held out until Damian Lacy arrived with a large force, when the brave but unarmoured Britons were repulsed, and their prince Gwenwyn was killed. Having granted an interview to her deliverer, Eveline was escorted by her suitor the Constable, and a numerous retinue, to her aunt''s nunnery at Gloucester. On her way thither she passed a night at the house of a Saxon kinswoman, the Lady of Baldringham, where she occupied a haunted chamber, and saw the ghost of an ancestor''s wife, who foretold that she would be Widowed wife, and married maid, Betrothed, betrayer, and betrayed. During her visit to the abbess she was formally espoused to Sir Hugo; but the archbishop having the next day commanded him to proceed to Palestine for three years, he offered to annul their engagement. Eveline, contrary to her aunt&#39;s advice, promised to await his return; and it was arranged that she should reside in her castle, with Rose and Dame Gillian as her attendants, and Damian as her guardian. Wearied with her monotonous life during this seclusion, she was induced one day to join in a hawking expedition unaccompanied by her usual escort, and was seized by rebels secretly instigated by Ranald Lacy. In attempting to rescue her Damian was severely wounded, and she insisted on nursing him in the castle, while Amelot led his men-at-arms in pursuit of the outlaws, whose disaffection had reached the king&#39;s ears, with a rumour that Damian was their captain. Sir Guy Monthermer was, accordingly, sent to demand admittance to Garde Doloureuse, where he was reported to be concealed; and when Eveline ordered the portcullis to be dropped against him, a herald proclaimed her, and all who aided and abetted her, as traitors. The constable and his squire, who were supposed to be dead, returned from Syria, disguised as palmers, just as the royal troops, headed by Prince Richard, had occupied the castle, Eveline at the same time being sent to a convent, and Damian consigned to a dungeon. Having learnt the ill news from old Raoul and his wife, Sir Hugo made his way towards King Henry&#39;s camp, near which, surrounded by an assembly of spectators, Ranald Lacy, who by false representations had obtained a grant of Eveline&#39;s forfeited lands, and assumed his kinsman&#39;s dress and title, was about to present a royal charter of immunities to a procession of the Flemish settlers. Cadwallon, the Welsh bard, had, however, attached himself to Sir Hugo as a Breton minstrel, in order that he might avenge the death of Gwenwyn; and mistaking Ranald for the returned constable, suddenly sprang behind him as he leant forward in his saddle, and stabbed him in the back. Sir Hugo now made himself known, and was welcomed by the king, the assassin was executed, and, convinced that his betrothed&#39;s love had been given to Damian, the old Crusader resigned her to him, and consoled himself by taking part in the subjugation of Ireland.

The Betrothed

The second book of the Little Black Girl Lost series reveals all the damaging secrets of the first book. Johnnie Wise, the main character, has a lot on her mind and trouble in her path. Every day Johnnie deals with the fact that she''s rich by prostitution, is a high school dropout, has no parents, and is only 16. In the last year, before the second book began, Johnnie went from a church-going good girl, to a prostituting liar. Johnnie''s troubles all started off on Christmas Eve, when her mother sold her virginity to a white man named Earl Shamus. Earl was a regular customer of her mother, Marguerite Wise, also a prostitute. Marguerite is later killed by the KKK leader, Richard Goode, who was also a regular customer. Johnnie wants justice for the death of her mother, and seeks the help of Napoleon Bentley. Bentley is a white Spaniard, who owns one of the hottest clubs on the black side of New Orleans. In exchange for sleeping with him, the married Napoleon grants Johnnie justice, while betraying his own morals. Lucas Matthews, Johnnie''s boyfriend and Napoleon''s employee, has an affair with Marla Bentley, Napoleon''s wife. Lucas'' inability to keep away from Marla''s lust puts his life on the line. Bubbles, Napoleon''s bodyguard and right hand man, constantly warns Johnnie and Lucas that the things they are doing are wrong and dangerous, but these warnings are meaningless to the naive teenagers. After Johnnie quits prostituting, she gets a job as a maid for the Beauregards. Though Johnnie doesn''t have to work, she wants to get to know the white side of her family. Ethel Beauregard, Johnnie''s boss, is unaware that Johnnie is her blood relative. On her first day she meets Katherine, the cook, who believes that she is queen of the house, and that the Beauregards praise her. Her thoughts of her high status are soon crushed when Johnnie sits at the table for breakfast with the Beauregards, and then feeds her sickly grandfather, Nathaniel. As Johnnie''s life progresses and she tries to find the answers to all her questions, Lucas'' trouble starts to unravel. One day Lucas is ordered by Napoleon to take Marla to Shreveport, Louisiana to pick out a new car. He doesn''t want to go for the fact that he know he will fall into Marla''s trap once again. As they make a pit stop, Lucas meets Preston, who pitches the idea that he should start selling marijuana for some fast money. When Lucas returned home, he went to Johnnie''s house so they could fix their relationship. He also told Johnnie of his idea to start selling marijuana. Johnnie opposed at first, because Bubbles had warned him of these fast money ideas, but soon changed her mind and helped him carve a safe, secret plan. As Lucas and Johnnie progress, Napoleon''s and Bubble''s old enemies return. Vinnie Milano and John Stefano, some ten years ago, wanted to have Napoleon killed in prison, but his attempts failed. The black side of New Orleans was supposed to be Vinnie''s, but Sam gave it to Napoleon instead, and Vinnie hated that. So once John heard that there was a race riot over the killing of Richard Goode he asked Sam for permission to terminate Napoleon. When Sam said no Stefano told Salvatore Porcella, his bodyguard, to take a trip to Chicago to pay Vinnie a visit, and get him to do their dirty work. When he returned to New Orleans his life was shortly ended before he could tell Stefano what happened, and that Connie Giovanni knew of their plans. Napoleon still yearned for Johnnie and would stop at nothing to get her, but first he knew that Lucas had to die. So he sent Bubbles to find Lucas'' enemy, Billy Logan. It was now Thanksgiving and, Lucas was on the run for selling marijuana. Johnnie''s life was going good until she got that call. Now that Lucas was in jail looking at 15&nbsp;years, Johnnie was desperate for help so she went to Napoleon. Everything was going down hill for Johnnie, her stock broker stole all her money, Lucas is in jail, and now she could possibly be pregnant. She believes that Napoleon is trustworthy, but he planned all this. Sadie tries to help, but doesn''t know how, so she just listens and helps educate Johnnie''s young mind on the harsh ways of people. Johnnie can''t even begin to think of how to handle all this. "Will God help?" She asks herself, Johnnie Wise''s young life was going so great, but she now realizes she can''t trust everyone and how cold the world really is.

Little Black Girl Lost 2

Growing up among the Ilyassai, a fierce tribe of warrior-herdsmen who despise his origin, the young Imaro struggles for acceptance after the breaking of a taboo forces his mother to leave him behind. The boy becomes a man, unlike any other the Ilyassai has ever seen. His quest acceptance and identity continues. Yet he learns he has powerful enemies, human and inhuman. Prevailing over foes who desire nothing more than to see him dead, Imaro finds that in victory, there can be loss. Departing from the Ilyassai, Imaro roams afar, wandering across the vast continent of Nyumbani, pitting his prodigious strength and courage against men, beasts and demons. Hunted by relentless foes, Imaro becomes the hunter. Eventually, he finds friendship and love among people who are like him, exiles and outlaws. Yet forces beyond Imaro’s comprehension are aligned against him. As he rises to prominence, events preordained before Imaro’s birth begin to unfold. Powers are stirring in Nyumbani, the Africa of a world that is beyond the one we know. And Imaro learns that some of the powers are aligned against him. As he struggles to hold on to his hard won acceptance, the warrior seeks the answer to the question that has haunted him all his life:

Imaro

Ms. Frizzle''s class is learning about the solar system and Arnold''s unpleasant cousin Janet, who constantly raves about herself, has joined them. The Friz decides to take the kids on a field trip to the planetarium, but, once they get there, they find the planetarium is closed. However, on the way back to school, Arnold reminds Mrs. Frizzle of the planetarium known as "the big one". Ms. Frizzle pushes a button that makes the bus transform into a rocket and blast off into outer space. Once in outer space, the bus flies to the Moon, where the kids make the most of the lesser gravity. Ms. Frizzle then takes them to the Sun and then Mercury, Venus and Mars before flying into the asteroid belt. However, while in the belt, the bus is damaged by an asteroid and the Friz flies out to fix the damage with a tether line connecting her to the bus. However, the bus''s autopilot malfunctions, causing the bus to fly off, breaking Ms. Frizzle''s tether line and leaving her stranded in the asteroid belt. Janet looks through the Friz''s things and finds Ms. Frizzle''s lesson book, which documents the information she is supposed to tell the kids during the field trip (complete with "Arnold, are you listening?" written into it.) Janet reads through the book as they pass the outer planets and until they pass Pluto, leaving the solar system. Janet then flips through the book and finds the instructions for the autopilot, so they can fly back to the asteroid belt and rescue Ms. Frizzle. After they rescue the Friz, they return to Earth. The kids try to tell everyone about their strange trip, but no one believes them.

The Magic School Bus Lost in the Solar System

Rather than a history of atheism, as the title may suggest, the book is a guide to why (according to the author) atheism is superior to theism and why the (a)theist discussion is important. According to Harbour, atheism is "the plausible and probably correct belief that God does not exist", while theism is "the implausible and probably incorrect belief that God does exist", and anyone who cares about the truth should be an atheist. Harbour makes his case on the basis of two fundamental worldviews which he labels the Spartan Meritocracy and the Baroque Monarchy. Worldviews are the ways in which we look at and try to explain the world around us; as a result, the validity of our worldviews is extremely important because it determines the validity and reasonableness of our beliefs. The Spartan Meritocracy makes minimal assumptions, that are subject to criticism and possible revision, when trying to explain the world - focusing more upon a proper method of inquiry than on reaching any particular or prejudicial conclusions. The Baroque Monarchy, however, relies upon elaborate dogmatic assumptions in the absence of any evidence — assumptions which are placed beyond question, critique or revision. Harbour spends little time directly comparing atheism and theism; rather, he compares these two opposing worldviews and argues that the Spartan Meritocracy is more plausible, more reasonable, and helps make the world a better place to live. Thus, anyone who cares about the truth should be inclined to adopt it rather than blind obedience to dogmatism as in the Baroque Monarchy. He does not, however, argue that there is a direct and necessary connection between these worldviews and either atheism or theism — he acknowledges that it is possible in theory for an atheist to adopt the Baroque Monarchy and for some types of theist to adopt the Spartan Meritocracy. Strictly speaking, then, the main thrust of his argument is that the Spartan Meritocracy is superior and anyone who cares about the truth should adopt this worldview. Nevertheless, he also argues that it is highly unlikely for theism ever to occur within the Spartan Meritocracy due to the evidence the world presents, and that, consequently, anyone who adopts the Spartan Meritocracy will almost inevitably be an atheist. Harbour constructs an argument throughout the book to demonstrate that the Spartan Meritocracy leads logically and naturally to atheism rather than theism. Much of Daniel Harbour''s book is focused on demonstrating the ways in which the Spartan Meritocracy does a better job of helping us to explain the world and make the world a better place to live in. The former involves analyzing the impact of science and technology, pursuits fundamentally based upon a spartan and meritocratic perspective of nature. "It would be one thing to abandon the paradigm of rational enquiry if it were merely a proposal on paper. However, centuries of effort have made it much more: it is the most successful attempt to understand the world that the world has ever seen. By dint of breadth, the paradigm stands out. Through the sum total of its theories, it covers more facts, explains more phenomena, and unmasks the mechanisms of more one-time mysteries than any alternative."

An Intelligent Person’s Guide to Atheism

Ibn Fattouma, also known by his birth name Qindil Muhammad al-Innabi, is a Muslim man disillusioned by the corruption in his home city. When he asks his teacher, a Sufi, why a land whose people obeys the tenets of Islam suffers so, Ibn Fattouma is told the answer he seeks lies far away from the city. Since travel broadens one''s horizons, the teacher encourages Ibn Fattouma to seek the land of Gebel, where such problems have been solved. The teacher tried to travel there himself, but civil war in neighboring lands and the demands of family ultimately prevented him from completing the journey. Also, no documents exist about Gebel and no one is known to have traveled there and come back. Ibn Fattouma says farewell to his mother and proceeds with a camel train out of his home city to the land of Mashriq. In this sexually libertine society (by Ibn Fattouma''s standards), the women and men do not marry, they share sexual partners and they share power over their children. Nevertheless, Ibn Fattouma settles in Mashriq with a woman named Arousa and they have five children as husband and wife. Because of Ibn Fattouma''s insistence upon teaching his eldest son Islam, he is exiled from Mashriq and prohibited from seeing Arousa or their children again. Ibn Fattouma then travels to the land of Haïra. The invasion of Mashriq by militaristic Haïra further separates Ibn Fattouma from his family, and when the annexation of Mashriq is finished, Arousa is brought to Haïra as a slave. The chamberlain of the god-king of Haïra wants Arousa as his wife and arranges for Ibn Fattouma to be jailed. Twenty years pass in Haïra before the god-king is overthrown, and the chamberlain (who was also jailed) tells Ibn Fattouma to look in the neighboring land of Halba for his wife and son. In Halba, the freedom of the individual is the greatest good. All religions peacefully coexist and openly encourage freedom of inquiry. The Halbans are also aggressive promoters of their philosophy of life in other nations; preparations are underway as Ibn Fattouma arrives for a war with neighboring Aman. Ibn Fattouma is reunited with Arousa, who thought him lost and had since married a Buddhist. There Ibn Fattouma meets and marries Samia, a pediatrician in Halba''s hospital. With his wife''s reluctant approval, Ibn Fattouma decides to continue his journey before war makes such travel impossible. In the land of Aman, justice is held as the greatest good, and every citizen is encouraged to spy on every other to maintain order. He leaves just as Aman and Halba prepare to fight. His next stop, the land of Ghuroub, finds Ibn Fattouma questioned to the depths of his being. Does he earnestly desire to go to Gebel, and why? Ibn Fattouma states as he has many times before that he seeks to learn Gebel''s secret of perfection in life and share it with the people of his homeland. He and the other seekers of Gebel are driven from Ghuroub by an invading army from Aman, and after months of travel, they sight Gebel itself from a mountain peak. As Ibn Fattouma descends to continue his journey, the story ends without the reader learning whether he finds the perfection he seeks.

The Journey of Ibn Fattouma

The events of Surface Detail take place around 2970 AD, according to Banks himself. The events occur six to eight hundred years after the "Chel Debacle", depicted in the earlier novel Look to Windward which is set a hundred years after the events in Use of Weapons. Each chapter of the book covers one or more of the six main protagonists—Lededje Y''breq, a chattel slave; Joiler Veppers, an industrialist and playboy; Gyorni Vatueil, a soldier; Prin and Chay, Pavulean academics; and Yime Nsokyi, a Quietus agent. Some of the plot occurs in various simulated environments. As the book begins, a simulated war game—the "War in Heaven"—has been running for several decades. The simulated war is to determine whether to allow or to disallow cultures in the galaxy from running Hells, simulated afterlives in which the mind-states of the dead are tortured. The Culture, fiercely anti-Hell, has opted to stay out of the war while accepting the outcome as binding. Vatueil is a soldier who has fought up the ranks of the war game to a position where he can determine policy, and he is instrumental in the decisions first to cheat—attempting to hack the Hells directly as well as attacking various pro-Hell side simulations—and then to take the simulated war into the real world. He is also revealed to be the character Zakalwe from another of Banks'' Culture novels, Use of Weapons (or at least someone with the same last name). Prin and Chay belong to a species, the Pavuleans, which runs a Hell. While still alive, they enter the Pavulean Hell on a mission to reveal the existence and details of this Hell to the general population. Prin succeeds in getting out, but has to leave Chay behind, where she is subsequently tortured, restored to some semblance of sanity, and finally given an involuntary role in the pantheon of the afterlife. Prin, meanwhile, testifies to the Pavulean public of his experiences in Hell and attempts to convince them that it should be abolished. Veppers is a businessman and industrialist: the richest individual in his society, the multi-planet Sichultian Enablement. On the planet Sichult, Y''breq—an indentured slave owned by Veppers and a frequent victim of rape—is murdered by him as she attempts to escape. She is unexpectedly reincarnated aboard a Culture ship, having been secretly implanted with a neural lace some ten years previously by a visiting Culture ship super-AI known as a Mind. She immediately wants to return to her homeworld, to find and kill Veppers. The book hinges on Veppers'' involvement in the War in Heaven. He initially appears to be a bit-player, but his involvement is gradually revealed to be more and more critical. The final revelation is that he has made some of his fortune by providing the hardware to run the Hells of various species; over a century he has accumulated about 70% of all the Hells. The hardware is located on his country estate on the planet Sichult. He sets up a secret deal to have the Hells destroyed in an attack which is to be blamed upon the Culture. His motivation is that such an attack will release him from his contracts to run the Hells, which would have become worthless if the anti-Hell side won, but which he cannot wriggle out of in any other way. Y''breq travels back to Sichult on the Falling Outside The Normal Moral Constraints, an advanced Culture warship. In hot pursuit is Yime Nsokyi, a Culture agent tasked with preventing Y''breq from killing Veppers. As they and their ships arrive, things come to a head. The Culture agents conspire to arrange that the attack on Veppers'' estate successfully destroys the Hells, while simultaneously appearing to attempt to stop the attack. They also conspire to ensure that Veppers'' secret deal is revealed. Veppers himself is at the estate''s mansion during the attack, where Y''breq finds him for the final, personal, showdown.

Surface Detail

The story begins with the main character introducing himself as "the painter who killed María Iribarne" before delving into the circumstances that led to their first encounter. Castel''s obsession begins in the autumn of 1946 when at an exhibition of his work he notices a woman focusing on one particularly subtle detail of his painting "Maternidad" ("Maternity"). He considers this observation deeply significant since it is a detail that he values as the most important aspect of the painting but to which nobody besides him and the woman pay any attention. Missing out on an opportunity to approach her before she leaves the exhibition, he then spends the next few months obsessing over her, thinking of ways to find her in the immensity of Buenos Aires, and fantasizing about what to say to her. Ultimately, after seeing her entering a building which he presumes to be her place of employment, he considers how to go about asking her about the detail in the painting. He approaches her and learns that her name is María Iribarne. Following their discussion about the painting, Castel and María agree to see each other again. It later becomes clear that she is married to a blind man named Allende and lives on Posadas Street in the northern part of the city. As Castel continues to see María, however, their relationship comes to be dominated by his obsessive interrogations of her life with her husband, why she does not take her husband''s last name, and of her inner thoughts, questions she is unable to answer to his satisfaction. Out of this disconnect, Castel''s obsessive thoughts lead him to all sorts of irrational doubts about the love he has come to believe that they have for one another. This anxiety intensifies after he and Maria make a trip to an estancia, a country ranch in Mar del Plata owned by Allende''s cousin Hunter. The atmosphere, the presence and the attitudes of the other visiting relatives, and an overheard but not understood argument between María and Hunter feed into Castel''s paranoia, forcing him to flee the ranch with little more than a word to one of the service staff. While waiting at a station to leave the region, Castel expects María to figure out he has left and to come stop him. She never arrives, confirming his negative feelings. Upon returning home to Buenos Aires, Castel passionately composes a hurtful letter, accusing her of sleeping with Hunter, which he immediately regrets upon mailing to her. He angrily but unsuccessfully attempts to convince a postal worker to retract the certified letter and later concludes that fate has decided it should reach its destination. Later, Castel reaches María by phone: she reluctantly agrees to meet with him again, although she tells him that it will likely do them little good and, in fact, probably cause him more harm. When she does not arrive to Buenos Aires, he decides that María is, in fact, a prostitute who cheats on her husband not only with him, but also with Hunter and other men. In a fit of rage, he drives out to the estancia. There he waits hidden outside for guests to leave the large house. Meanwhile his anxiety grows to the point where he envisions he and María passing each other through life in parallel passageways or tunnels, whereas his is "a single tunnel, dark and solitary: mine, the tunnel wherein passed all my infancy, my youth, my entire life." Eventually, Castel enters the house, approaches María in her room, where he accuses her of leaving him alone in the world, and stabs her to death. Following the attack, Castel shows up to Allende''s office to tell him that he has murdered María for sleeping with Hunter, only to discover that Allende is well-aware of his cuckold status. Crying out again and again that Castel is a fool, Allende sadly, and ineffectually, tries to fight Castel, who leaves and later turns himself in to the police.

El Túnel

Set in a rundown neighborhood of Manhattan in 1936, the novel explores a five-day alcoholic binge. Don Birnam, a binge drinker mostly of rye, fancies himself a would-be writer. He lapses into foreign phrases and quotes Shakespeare even while attempting to steal a woman''s purse, trying to pawn a typewriter for drinking money, and smashing his face on a banister. That accident gets him checked into an "alcoholic ward." There, a counselor advises Birnam on the nature of alcoholism: There isn''t any cure, besides just stopping. And how many of them can do that? They don''t want to, you see. When they feel bad like this fellow here, they think they want to stop, but they don''t, really. They can''t bring themselves to admit they''re alcoholics, or that liquor''s got them licked. They believe they can take it or leave it alone &mdash; so they take it. If they do stop, out of fear or whatever, they go at once into such a state of euphoria and well-being that they become over-confident. They''re rid of drink, and feel sure enough of themselves to be able to start again, promising they''ll take one, or at the most two, and &mdash; well, then it becomes the same old story over again. Perhaps the only thing keeping Birnam from drinking himself to death is his girlfriend Helen, a selfless and incorruptible woman who tolerates his behavior out of love. Helen does, however, upbraid him with the words: &#34;I haven&#39;t got time to be neurotic.&#34; No sooner has he begun to recover from his &#34;Lost Weekend&#34; than he contemplates killing Helen&#39;s maid to get the key to the liquor cabinet. He has a few drinks and crawls into bed wondering, &#34;Why did they make such a fuss?&#34;

The Lost Weekend

The novel is a meditation on the effects of modernity upon the individual''s perception of the world. It is told through a number of plot lines that slowly weave together until they are all united at the end of the book. * Kundera, as narrator, visits a chateau on vacation and tells a story that seems to be a combination of fiction and fact. * A Chevalier from eighteenth-century France visits the chateau and experiences a night of carefully orchestrated sensual pleasure with its owner, Madame de T. * Vincent, Kundera''s friend, visits the hotel and pursues a romance with a girl met in a bar. * Berck, a "dancer", meets a woman who once scorned him at the same conference and shows his emptiness to her. * Immaculata, the woman who scorned Berck, must deal with her disappointment at learning Berck''s apparent perfection is actually a facade. Each plot shows a different point-of-view into Kundera''s concept of the dancer and provides a perspective on modernity, memory and sensuality. By the end of the book, all of these plots have been brought together in a single location and the characters interact, showing how the ideals they represent interact in the world. Kundera even manages to tie the modern to the past by having Vincent meet the Chevalier as they both depart. By having these characters meet, Kundera again illustrates how the idea of sensuality and pleasure have changed as technology provides humanity with tools that speed us to our destination and demand our attention.

Slowness

West recovers memories of early childhood sexual abuse and is diagnosed with DID as an adult. The book chronicles the first few years of his struggle to accept and heal from his disorder. West describes a system of 24 different personalities that emerge one by one. The presence of personalities is tied to flashbacks West experiences in which he is molested by his mother and grandmother as well as one or more unidentified male perpetrators. Alters emerge who either hold memories of West''s abuse, carry the pain of the experience, or protect West''s psyche in one way or another. One personality, named Switch, physically injures West''s body in an effort to release pain. Unlike the classic "Sybil" (Shirley Ardell Mason), West experiences co-consciousness and doesn''t have fugue states. Throughout his long journey to acceptance, West undergoes intensive therapy, and through hospitalizations in DID-centered programs, meets many people who share his condition. His wife Rikki''s constant support as well as his love for her and his son motivate West to accept his abuse and begin to heal from the damage it did to his psyche. One chapter, written entirely from Rikki''s point of view, depicts her attempts to understand. In the final pages, West allows himself to be videotaped as his alters emerge and speak. After viewing this tape, West begins to fully realize and accept the exact nature of his condition and his denial begins to abate. West pursues the study of psychology and is awarded a Ph.D..

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

Truancy

No Author Listed

The Betrothed

By Walter Scott

Little Black Girl Lost 2

No Author Listed

Imaro

By Charles R. Saunders

The Magic School Bus Lost in the Solar System

By Joanna Cole

An Intelligent Person’s Guide to Atheism

By Daniel Harbour

The Journey of Ibn Fattouma

By Naguib Mahfouz

Surface Detail

By Iain Banks

El Túnel

By Ernesto Sabato

The Lost Weekend

By Charles R. Jackson

Slowness

By Milan Kundera

First Person Plural: My Life As a Multiple

No Author Listed