After the wizard Rincewind has fallen from the edge of the Discworld, the Octavo magic book saves his life and he lands back onto the world. Meanwhile, the wizards of Ankh-Morpork discover from Death via a rite that the Discworld will soon be destroyed by a huge red star unless the eight spells of the Octavo are read: the most powerful spells in existence, one of which hides in Rincewind''s head. Consequently, several orders of wizards try to capture Rincewind, led by Trymon, a former classmate of Rincewind''s, who wishes to obtain the power of the spells for himself. After Rincewind, who has met again with Twoflower, escapes them, it becomes apparent that Great A''Tuin, the giant turtle that carries the Discworld, has set a new course that leads it directly into a red star with eight moons. Rincewind and Twoflower are accompanied by Cohen the Barbarian, a toothless, ageing hero, and Bethan, a sacrificial virgin saved by Cohen, with assistance from Rincewind and Twoflower. Rincewind becomes one of the very few people ever to enter Death''s Domain whilst still alive, where he finds Twoflower playing a card game with the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. He is nearly killed when he meets Death''s adopted daughter Ysabell, but is saved by the quick-acting Luggage. The group also encounter people who, anticipating the apocalypse, are heading for the mountains (not for protection, but because they will have a better view). As well as this, they happen upon the kind of shop where strange and sinister goods are on sale and inexplicably vanish the next time a customer tries to find them. The existence of these shops is explained as being a curse by a sorcerer upon the shopkeeper for not having something in stock. As the star comes nearer and the magic on the Discworld becomes weaker, Trymon tries to put the seven spells still in the Octavo into his mind, in an attempt to save the world and gain ultimate power. However, the spells prove too strong for him and his mind becomes a door into the "Dungeon Dimensions", whence strange, horrible creatures try to escape into reality. The seven leading wizards are meanwhile turned to stone. After winning a fight against them, Rincewind is able to read all eight spells aloud; whereupon the eight moons of the red star crack open and reveal eight tiny world-turtles that follow their parent A''Tuin on a course away from the star. The Octavo then falls and is eaten by Twoflower''s Luggage. The book ends with Twoflower and Rincewind parting company, as Twoflower decides to return home, leaving The Luggage with Rincewind as a parting gift.

The Light Fantastic

The book is primarily an extended essay, entitled "Genocide by Any Other Name," tracing the history of the mandatory attendance of Native American children at residential schools, which generally meant they left their families to receive education in distant places, where they studied with children from other tribes. Churchill analyzes this as a process of genocide (forced assimilationist policies, as school policies often prohibited the use of the students'' own languages and their exercise of their own religions or cultural practices, such as style of hair and clothes. Particularly in the early years, the schools were generally run by religious organizations, many of which had already established missions among the Native Americans. During the nearly 100-year history of the schools, conditions varied from place to place. Former students have also reported positive experiences. Families often hid their children, or their cultural identities, in an attempt to keep their children from being kidnapped. Trickery and outright paternalistic force were used to remove young children from their homes. Families were devastated, and once enrolled at school, the children were not allowed to associate with siblings or loved ones. Stress and trauma for both native communities and individual children still haunt the people today. Children were forced to develop an identity which did not prepare them for life back home in the native communities from which they came, or in the society at large which did not accept native people as equals. These people did not belong anywhere. He describes the sometimes terrible conditions in the schools, with poor nutrition, a high rate of tuberculosis (untreatable until the use of antibiotics was developed) and other infectious diseases (which were common in the times); forced labor, and incidents of physical, sexual and emotional abuse. He says the students suffered a higher rate of mortality than children of their age in the general population. He notes that many graduates have reported being damaged by their experiences and have suffered high rates of alcoholism (note: this has been a problem for Native Americans outside of the school experience) and suicide. Churchill says the former students have transmitted the "trauma to successive generations," contributing to social disintegration among Native American communities. The author intended the book to compensate for his not having covered the boarding schools and their issues in his 1979 book A Little Matter of Genocide. It includes numerous photos and lists of such historic schools in the US and Canada.

Kill the Indian, Save the Man

In the sewers of Deptford there lurks a dark presence that fills the tunnels with fear: Jupiter, a dark god known only by his evil, no one really knows who he is except for his lieutenant Morgan his glowing eyes seen behind a dark "portal" in the tunnel wall. The rats worship him and do his dark bidding. The Deptford mice, who worship the Green Mouse who brings Spring, are aware of Jupiter''s evil presence in the tunnels. One of the mice, Albert Brown, is pulled through a grate into the sewers by the dark enchantments that Jupiter has woven there. He meets a cheeky mouse from the city, Piccadilly, also lost inside the lair of the rats. When Albert is captured by Morgan, a Cornish, piebald rat with a stump for a tail and rings through his ears (none other than Jupiter''s lieutenant) and brought to Jupiter, Piccadilly escapes into Albert''s home, known as the Skirtings, where he meets a large number of friends. Firstly, there is Audrey Brown, Albert''s day-dreaming daughter who hates Piccadilly for surviving where her father did not. Then there is Arthur Brown, Audrey''s plump and funny brother. There is also simple fieldmouse William Scuttle or ''Twit'' and his cousin, the sickly albino runt, Oswald Chitter. Along with the old Midship-mouse, Thomas Triton and Gwen Brown, the mother of Audrey and Arthur, they venture into the sewers to banish Jupiter from the world. The Rat God, however, has an evil plan to unleash the Black Death on the world once more, ridding it of humans and enabling him to conquer it. After a tense-confrontation with Jupiter in this throne-room during which the malevolent deity is revealed to be a monstrous cat, Audrey defeats the Dark Lord by flinging her mousebrass at him. The talisman explodes and Jupiter falls into the water that is rapidly flooding his chamber. The spirits of the many mice and rats he has tortured and devoured then rise up and drag the dark god down to a watery grave. Audrey glimpses her father among the legion of spirits as they depart and despairs, realising that he is truly dead. The sewer floods and the Black Death is destroyed. Thankful that they are alive and resolving to celebrate Jupiter''s downfall once they return home, the mice begin the journey back to the surface but as they leave, Orfeo the bat foretells doom.

The Dark Portal

Like most of the Henry Huggins books, the incidents in this book follow an ongoing plot line. In this book, the Huggins have a new car, and go out shopping; Ribsy, denied a ride, chases the car at up to 25 miles per hour, and is finally allowed in. At the shopping mall, Ribsy is left in the car, and lowers the electric window with the button. Ribsy eventually wants to return to the car to await Henry, and gets into the first new-smelling car he finds, but a different family, with several daughters and one toddler son, gets in and takes Ribsy home with them. Ribsy endures a bubble bath and escapes, wandering in search of Henry. Ribsy finds an old lady named Mrs. Frawley who is telling him to go away when Ribsy raises his paw in greeting and Mrs. Frawley invites him in. With dinner in his stomach, Ribsy sleeps while Mrs. Frawley goes out to shop for her new pet. Ribsy chafes at a coat and colorful leash, then escapes. He, soon after, finds himself becoming the unofficial mascot for a class of elementary school students until he is kicked out over an incident with a squirrel. Later, Ribsy sneaks into a high school football game and inadvertently makes the game-winning tackle. He is caught by a boy who, pleased at the attention he gets for people thinking it was his dog who won the game, takes Ribsy in. The story of the game gains the attention of the Huggins family who attempt to retrieve Ribsy. Ribsy, however, escapes again after hearing Henry''s voice on the phone and running off in search of his beloved owner. Later, Ribsy is found by a boy with a tennis ball who lives in an apartment building. The boy decides to adopt Ribsy, but panics when confronted by his landlady and hides Ribsy on a fire escape where, fortunately, he is spotted by the Huggins family as they drive through the neighborhood in search of him. Mr. Huggins manages to retrieve Ribsy from the fire escape with the help of some nearby workmen and the mutt is happily reunited with Henry. The family offer the boy, Larry, a portion of the reward and help him deal with his landlady before getting back in the station wagon where Ribsy sits beside Henry on the seat as they drive home, finally reunited.

Ribsy

Dragonfly in Amber opens when Claire returns to Scotland with her twenty-year old daughter, Brianna, hoping to find what happened to the men of Lallybroch after the battle of Culloden. After discovering Jamie Fraser''s gravestone in an abandoned churchyard, Claire ends up breaking the news of Brianna''s true paternity to her and Roger Wakefield. The story then flashes back in time (literally and figuratively) to when Claire and Jamie lived in Paris after leaving the abbey at the end of Outlander. As the story develops, we learn about Claire and Jamie Fraser''s fight to stop the 1745 Jacobite rebellion and the bloody battle of Culloden - and also why Claire returned to the future. At the end of Outlander, Claire convinced Jamie that they should do everything possible to stop the Jacobite Rising and the slaughter that would follow. After learning that Charles Stuart is trying to get money from the French King, Louis XV, they travel to Paris. In Paris, Jamie agrees to work with his cousin Jared, running his wine business and, since many of his French relatives are Jacobites and are well placed in society, secures meetings with Charles Edward Stuart (also known as Bonnie Prince Charlie) and many well-to-do members of the French aristocracy and bourgeoisie. So, while running Jared Fraser''s wine business, Jamie and Claire begin to plot against the Bonnie Prince. However, their lives are soon interrupted by the arrival of Jack Randall, who Jamie and Claire thought had died at Wentworth Prison. Jamie, despite promising Claire that he would spare Randall''s life in order to spare Claire''s previous husband, Frank, challenges Randall to a duel in the Bois de Boulogne. Though he doesn''t kill the man, he does wound him and renders him impotent. And, after she witnesses the duel, Claire loses the child she was carrying and is taken away to l''Hôpital des Anges, where they believe she won''t recover. Jamie is sent to the Bastille for the crime of dueling. After recovering from her illness, Claire manages to free Jamie from prison. A condition of his release is that they must leave France, so they sail to Scotland. (Fortunately, Jamie is pardoned for his crimes). Once in Scotland, Claire and Jamie settle in to farm life at Jamie''s home at Lallybroch, with his sister, Jenny, and her family. However, Jamie receives a letter from Charles Stuart, announcing his attempt to retake the throne of Scotland. There is no escape, as Charles has had Jamie''s name on the letter as one of his supporters. The Rising has begun. Seeing no option but to fight for the Stuarts, Jamie gathers the men of Lallybroch to join the Stuart army. They fight and win at the battle of Prestonpans, but the tide soon turns against the Jacobites. The Rising culminates in the disastrous battle of Culloden. Jamie, knowing that the Scots won''t win at Culloden, takes Claire and heads for Craig na Dun, where he forces her to travel back to her own time, to spare her the battle''s aftermath. Before she goes, however, Jamie tells Claire that he knows she is pregnant again. After sending her through the stones, Jamie returns to Culloden, intending to die. The lengthy flashback ends and the reader learns that Brianna is the child Claire was carrying through the stones. Frank asked Claire where she had been during her absence but refused to believe her, thinking she was mentally unstable. Claire told him to leave her but suspecting he was sterile and desperate for a child, he asked Claire to allow him to be father to her baby and only tell Brianna the truth after his death. Brianna refuses to believe Claire and Claire enlists Roger''s help by revealing his true parentage to him as the great great grandson of Geilie Duncan and Dougal. They witness Geilie Duncan/Gillian Edgars'' disappearance through the stone circle and the novel ends with Roger informing Claire that Jamie didn''t die at Culloden. nl:Terugkeer naar Inverness sv:Slända i bärnsten

Dragonfly in Amber

Princess Ivy, who is now a 5 year old in this book, asks one of Castle Roogna''s ghosts to tell her how he became a ghost. Ivy uses her talent of enhancement - and some caustic Crewel Lye to strip off centuries of accrued grime - to improve the range and clarity of Castle Roogna''s magical Tapestry. The Tapestry is a woven hanging which allows anyone to view recent or historical events (although it cannot violate the Adult Conspiracy, nor does it include sound). The ghost, known as Jordan the Barbarian when he was alive 400 years ago, begins his story by recounting how he set off on an adventure with his horse Pook. Jordan had the magical talent of self-healing — which came in handy as he was cut, stabbed, and dismembered during his travels. In one case, a woman finds him gravely injured and hauls him to her cottage, not knowing of his talent. Jordan ends up falling in love with this woman, Threnody. Unfortunately, the evil magician Yin-Yang had already claimed Threnody to be his wife, and was willing to do anything to have her. Intending to keep Jordan safe from Yin-Yang, Threnody makes it appear that she has betrayed Jordan. She cuts him into pieces and buries each piece in a different remote location — knowing that if the pieces were reattached, he would be able to heal himself. However, she is never able to break free of Yin-Yang long enough to collect Jordan''s dismembered body and eventually kills herself. After hearing Jordan''s story, Ivy decides to gather his body parts herself. Once placed near each other, the pieces mend together and cover back up with muscle and skin (greatly sped up due to Ivy''s enhancement). Jordan is alive again — but he wants his new love, the ghost Renee, to be brought to life again too. When Ivy and Jordan use a regenerating potion on Renee''s remains (after accidentally teleporting Stanley Steamer the baby Gap Dragon away), Threnody emerges from her grave. Threnody explains that her "cruel lie" had been done to protect Jordan. After some time, he forgives her and they get married. pl:Okrutne kłamstwo

Crewel Lye: A Caustic Yarn

The novel takes place in a provincial Russian setting, primarily on the estates of Stepan Trofimovich Verkhovensky and Varvara Stavrogina. Stepan Trofimovich''s son, Pyotr Verkhovensky, is an aspiring revolutionary conspirator who attempts to organize a knot of revolutionaries in the area. He considers Varvara Stavrogina''s son, Nikolai, central to his plot because he thinks Nikolai Stavrogin has no sympathy for mankind whatsoever. Verkhovensky gathers conspirators like the philosophizing Shigalyov, suicidal Kirillov, and the former military man Virginsky, and he schemes to solidify their loyalty to him and each other by murdering Ivan Shatov, a fellow conspirator. Verkhovensky plans to have Kirillov, who was committed to killing himself, take credit for the murder in his suicide note. Kirillov complies and Verkhovensky murders Shatov, but his scheme falls apart. He escapes, but the remainder of his aspiring revolutionary crew is arrested. In the denouement of the novel, Nikolai Stavrogin kills himself, tortured by his own misdeeds.

The Devils

Detective Inspector John Rebus finds the body of an overdosed drug addict in an Edinburgh squat, laid out cross-like on the floor, between two burned-down candles, with a five-pointed star painted on the wall above. Some of his colleagues are inclined to categorise it as the routine death of a "junkie", but Rebus is perturbed by some unusual facts of the case: a full package of heroin in the dead man''s room, and some mysterious bruises on his face and body. Rebus takes seriously a death which looks more like a murder every day, and he begins to investigate the true circumstances of the death. As part of his investigation, Rebus finds the young woman named Tracy who knew the dead man and heard his terrifying last words: "Hide! Hide!" It emerges that the dead man was a photographer who took and hid some sensitive photos in a specialist private members'' club - Hyde''s - where highly-connected people in society watch illegal boxing. Rebus is able to arrest Hyde''s owner and several high profile members, but to his outrage and disgust all the prisoners die suspicious deaths: the powers-that-be are covering it up to prevent scandal. Shortly after Rankin moved to London, there was a real-life case of male prostitutes bribing lawyers and judges, similar to some parts of the book: "questions were asked in parliament" and two lawyers began to investigate the police investigation. "To everyone''s surprise, this inquiry found that the allegations were false. Police officers involved in the case found themselves demoted..."

Hide and Seek

The story starts when the 17 year old Anna''s parents die. She moves in with Aunt Stella and Uncle Leo and her cousins Walter and Zofia, a very manipulative and promiscuous girl. Anna later meets Jan Stelnicki and falls in love almost instantly and remains obsessed with him for most of her life. Zofia, however, wanted Jan and out of her jealously she tricks Anna into coming into the forest with her where she abandons her. While there Anna is raped by a stranger and Leo goes to where Anna was raped, but he gets stuck and Zofia and Walter watch him die. Anna is married off shortly after her attack to Antoni and the rest of the family move to Warsaw. Now living in Warsaw, Anna''s life changes drastically. The Constitution of May 3, 1791 is signed by King Stanisław August Poniatowski, giving the peasants human rights. Many Polish nobles are enraged by the new laws, and call for Catherine the Great of Russia to deliver them. Anna discovers she is pregnant from being raped and gives birth to a son. It is revealed that it was Walter, who supports the Russians, was the one who raped Anna. Anna becomes a supporter of Polish independence, but is forced to watch as her country is overrun by hostile powers. As the victorious Russians march on Warsaw, Zofia sacrifices herself to buy time for Anna and her family to flee the war torn city.

Push not the River

It is 1794 and Paris, "despite the horrors that had stained her walls - has remained a city of pleasure, and the knife of the guillotine did scarce descend more often than did the drop-scenes on the stage." The plot begins when Sir Percy, the Scarlet Pimpernel, reluctantly agrees to take Armand St. Just, brother of his wife, Marguerite, with him to France as part of a plan to rescue the young Dauphin. Percy warns Armand not to renew any friendships while in Paris, but it doesn''t take long before Armand has ignored his warnings and renewed a friendship with the scheming Baron de Batz (in the pay of the Austrian government), who wants to free the Dauphin himself and despises the Scarlet Pimpernel and all he represents. Whilst attending the opera with De Batz, Armand foolishly tells him that he is in the league of the Scarlet Pimpernel. While there, he falls in love with a young actress named Citizeness Jeanne L''Ange. De Batz introduces the couple backstage at the theatre and once they have fallen for each other, De Batz tells Citizen Heron of the general committee of Public Safety where and when they have arranged to meet. After covering for Armand at her house, L''Ange is arrested and thrown into jail. Learning of her peril and in the throes of passion, Armand fails to trust Sir Percy who has told him that he will rescue Jeanne, and forgets his promise to his leader. Armand, desperate to share Jeanne''s fate, runs to the gate of the Temple prison and screams, "Long Live the King." There he''s intercepted by none other than Percy''s arch enemy, Chauvelin. Faced with the death of his love, Armand betrays Percy, unaware that The Pimpernel has already secured Jeanne''s freedom. Sir Percy is then captured and imprisoned by Chauvelin and Heron in the cell that was home to Marie Antoinette in her last days. Chauvelin insists that Percy is to be deprived of sleep in the hope that he will be weakened and disclose where young Capet, the uncrowned King of France, is being held following his rescue. After 17 days in prison, Percy is sure that the dauphin has been transported safely into Holland. He then contrives, by pretending to crack and confess the dauphin''s whereabouts, to make his escape. He tells Chauvelin and Heron that the dauphin is being held in an area in the north, near the coast of France, but that he has to show them, rather than tell them, because the paths are nameless and too small for them to find without him. Chauvelin and Heron, skeptical, bring along Armand and Marguerite as hostages. Once in the north, Percy takes advantage of a chance when Chauvelin and Heron are separated, and darkness, to subdue Heron, bind and truss him, put on his clothes, and direct the guileless French soldiers (who think that the bound Heron is Percy) to put him in the gated yard of a church. Percy, still thought to be Heron, drives a carriage with Marguerite and Armand inside to the coast, where his ship is waiting for them. de:The Scarlet Pimpernel fr:Le Mouron rouge

Eldorado

Thomas describes his life chronologically in My Grandfather''s Son. The early parts of the book are dominated by the impact his grandfather had on him, while sections describing his adulthood up to his Supreme Court appointment focus on overcoming personal demons without describing too much about his career. Following his confirmation to the Court, Thomas centers his writing on professional, ideological and judicial issues. The themes of race and self reliance run throughout, and many issues are framed through one or both of those lenses. My Grandfather''s Son begins with Thomas''s birth, in rural Georgia in 1948, to Leola Anderson, a maid who earned $10 a week. Thomas''s father abandoned the family when Thomas was a toddler. In first grade his mother sent him and his brother to live with his maternal grandfather, Myers Anderson, and his wife in Savannah. He attended all black schools until the 10th grade, when Anderson paid for Thomas to attend a Catholic boarding school. Thomas, who had been an altar boy throughout his childhood, wanted to be a priest and was one of only two black students at the school. Upon graduating, he began studying to be a priest, but gave up at the age of 19 because he was disappointed with the church''s stance on racism. As a result of Thomas dropping out of school, his grandfather kicked him from the house. Thomas moved to Massachusetts to attend The College of the Holy Cross. One of his reasons for moving was the racism he had encountered as a child, and his belief that in the North he would be freed from that. Once there, he found Massachusetts to be plagued with latent racism and far from the utopia he had anticipated. Thomas excelled academically and socially at Holy Cross, graduating with honors and marrying his long term girlfriend Kathy Ambush shortly after. He also began drinking steadily, a problem that would haunt him in later years. Thomas attended Yale Law School, graduating in 1974. After Yale, Thomas took a job as an assistant district attorney under John Danforth, then Missouri''s Attorney General. My Grandfather''s Son continues to follow Thomas''s career, including a stint at the legal department of Monsanto Company and his 1979 move to Washington, D.C. to work for then-Senator Danforth. Throughout this period Thomas made an intellectual journey from libertarian to conservative, culminating in changing his party registration to Republican in 1980. In 1981 he joined the Reagan Administration''s Department of Education as its Assistant Secretary of Education for the Office of Civil Rights, and in 1982 he was promoted to head of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The main focus, however, is on Thomas''s financial and emotional struggles. Although he says he was never an alcoholic, Thomas says that in the late 1970s and early 1980s his drinking became worse, and that he often drank while home alone. These confessions were the first time there had been any public suggestion that Thomas was a heavy drinker. Burdened by student loans and subsisting on low government salaries, Thomas had a difficult time financially, almost getting evicted from his apartment several times. In one incident, a car rental agent cut up Thomas''s credit card in front of him. After falling out of love with his first wife, Thomas worried about the morality of leaving her and his child. Throughout most of this period Thomas was still estranged from his grandfather, and describes being haunted by the memory of Anderson kicking him out of the house. The two reunited briefly in 1983 when his step-grandmother was in the hospital, having a meaningful conversation and embracing at the end. The new found closeness was short-lived, and Anderson died the next month of a stroke before Thomas had another chance to see him. Around this point, Thomas describes himself regaining control of his life. In 1983 he quit drinking cold-turkey. Approximately a third of My Grandfather''s Son is spent discussing Thomas''s nomination and confirmation to the Supreme Court. My Grandfather''s Son goes through the hearings day by day, with Thomas defending himself against his accusers and criticizing their motives. Thomas says he learned of the accusations of sexual harassment by Hill over the weekend after the first five days of the hearings when a pair of FBI agents visited his home.

My Grandfather''s Son: A Memoir

Natasha leaves her parents'' home and runs away with Alyosha (prince Alexey) – the son of Prince Valkovsky who abuses her father. As a result of his pain, her father, Nikolai, curses her. The only friend that remains by Natasha''s side is Ivan – her childhood friend who is deeply in love with her. Prince Valkovsky tries to destroy Alyosha''s plans to marry Natasha, and wants to make him marry the rich princess Katerina. Alyosha is a childish young man who is easily manipulated by his father. Following his father''s plan, Alyosha falls in love with Katerina. Eventually, Alyosha chooses Katerina over Natasha. In the meanwhile, Ivan picks up an orphan girl, Elena, and learns that her mother ran away from her father''s (Smith) home with her sweetheart – Alyosha''s father. Shortly after Elena was born, Prince Valkovsky abandoned her, took her money and the poor woman and her daughter came back to Smith asking for forgiveness. Elena''s mother dies shortly before her father eventually agrees to forgive her. In attempt to make Nikolai (Natasha''s father) forgive his daughter, Ivan persuades Nilokai and his wife to adopt Elena. By telling them her life story, Elena makes Nikolai''s heart soften and he accepts Natasha. Shortly afterwards, Elena dies from epilepsy. Finally Natasha accepts Ivan''s love.

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

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The Light Fantastic

By Terry Pratchett

Kill the Indian, Save the Man

No Author Listed

The Dark Portal

By Robin Jarvis

Ribsy

By Beverly Cleary

Dragonfly in Amber

By Diana Gabaldon

Crewel Lye: A Caustic Yarn

By Piers Anthony

The Devils

By Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Hide and Seek

By Ian Rankin

Push not the River

No Author Listed

Eldorado

By Baroness Emma Orczy

My Grandfather's Son: A Memoir

By Clarence Thomas

The Insulted and Humiliated

By Fyodor Dostoyevsky