Gabriella Harrison, a child of the fifties suffers abuse from the hands of her mother, Eloise, who explains her abuse as disciplining Gabriella for being so bad. Frequent beatings mar her life. Her father scared of annoying her mother plays a spectator to all the evil happenings. Before Gabbie turns thirteen her father, tired of his wife''s constant abuse towards their daughter, leaves. Her mother as always accuses Gabbie''s badness for her father''s departure. She says it''s only because of her badness that her parents hate her, and that is exactly why her father has left them. Gabbie is then gotten rid of at a nunnery to finish out her education by her mother so she can abandon the biggest disappointment in her life. While there, Gabriella decides she wants to become a nun. In the course of being a postulant, she falls in love with a priest, Father Joe Connors. They want to move in to the real world to live their life loving each other, but the priest is not confident about making it in the real world for Gabbie and the symbol of their love growing in Gabbie''s womb. Incidentally the priest commits suicide with a turmoil for he cannot break the promise made to the brotherhood of serving the needed, and for he cannot live without Gabriella. Gabriella thus loses her love, and then their child in a miscarriage. Ultimately she is compelled to leave the convent for the sin committed. Cast out into society, Gabbie is determined to move on and finds an apartment where the tenants welcome the young woman lovingly, particularly an old professor. Everything seems to be going well; Gabbie has a job at a pastry shop, but loses it when she defends a child whose mother dislocates her arm in a fit of impatience. Eventually she finds a job at a book store whilst buying a Christmas present to her doting friend, the old professor. Gabbie also meets a new tenant named Steve Porter in the boarding house. She initially does not approve of him, but eventually falls for him. She has a long relationship with him. He does not have a job and is constantly after Gabbie to give him money. She obliges, until the day he steals from her. He turns out to be a con artist, wanted by the police for stealing money from several people. When she comes to know of this, he demands she give him most of the money the old professor leaves her when he dies. She refuses to give him any money after learning his true face and about him being responsible for the professor''s death. He then beats her up, nearly killing her. Gabbie is taken to a hospital, where she becomes friends with a Doctor Peter presiding over her. They like each other. But before moving on with her life with Peter, Gabriella decides to meet her parents and ask them the long avoided question - why they abandoned her and never loved her. Towards the end of the book Gabbie visits her father hoping to get some answers on why he allowed her mother to treat her so horribly. Her father offers no answer except that he was weak. Gabbie then visits her stepfather and his new wife where it is learned that her mother never changed her bitter ways till the end and even went so far as to verbally abuse her new husband until she died of cancer. At last, after realizing that it was not her fault that her parents never loved her, she lets go of the past and moves on with her life with her new love - the doctor by her side. pt:The Long Road Home fi:Kotimatka (Danielle Steelin romaani)

The Long Road Home

It was written at a time when the Kuomintang and Chinese Communists were in a United Front against the Japanese invasion, and before the Japanese attack on the USA at Pearl Harbour. Agnes Smedley had spent many years in China, and spent much of it with the various armies, both regular and guerrilla. Like Edgar Snow, she met the future leaders of Communist China when they were living in rural isolation. She also witnessed the Xian Incident and gives her own account of it in this book, along with her view of He Long, Chu Teh (Zhu De) and Mao. She takes her own very distinct view of Mao: :What I now remember of Mao Tze-tung was the following months of precious friendship; they both confirmed and contradicted his inscrutability. The sinister quality I had first felt so strongly in him proved to be spiritual isolation. As Chu Teh was loved, Mao Tze-tung was respected. The few who came to know him best had affection for him, but his spirit dwelt within itself, isolating him... :In him was none of the humility of Chu. Despite that feminine quality in him, he was as stubborn as a mule, and a steel rod of pride and determination ran through his nature. I had the impression that he would wait and watch for years, but eventually have his way. (Book IV, Chapter 3, p. 122 of the Victor Gollancz edition.) She also spent a lot time with the rank-and-file and with non-Communist Chinese, living at the same level as ordinary Chinese and using basic First Aid skills to help in hospitals where both supplies and trained staff were short. Though the book describes a war, it is mostly about how various individuals react to the war, mostly Chinese but also foreigners. She gives a poignant account of how she wanted to adopt a Chinese boy who had served as her orderly, and to secure a good education for him. But the boy felt it was his duty to stay with the army. She takes an individual and non-ideological view, noting merit where she sees it, including among captured Japanese who had turned against the war. She also notes and praises a community of nuns that was living at the same level as poor Chinese. She takes a polite view of Chiang Kai-Shek and praises the work of Madame Chiang Kai-shek (Soong May-ling). Although the book was published in 1943, it ends with the events of 1941. A Japanese attack on the European powers and the USA is correctly foreseen. She frequently notes how the Japanese were using war materials supplied by the USA. The book was highly influential at the time. It is not currently in print, but was re-issued in 1984 under the title China Correspondent. It is frequently cited as a source in biographies of Mao.

Battle Hymn of China

Twelve-year-old Heidi lives in the town of Reno, Nevada with her mentally-disabled mother and their neighbor, Bernadette. Her mother only knows twenty-three words, including one mysterious one, "soof," that no one can define. Meanwhile, Bernadette has a serious condition called agoraphobia, which causes her to be too afraid to go outside her house. Heidi must take on responsibilities beyond her years to provide for their households. When Heidi finds some photos of her mother at a Christmas party in New York, Heidi decides to go to that state, anxious to uncover more about her family history and to seek what the word "soof" meant, after hearing her mother mutter it all the time. Although Bernadette is anxious about Heidi leaving, she reluctantly allows her to go as long as she calls every night. During her road trip to Liberty, New York, Heidi meets Georgia Sweet, a kind and curious lady on the bus. When she arrived at Hilltop Home, she felt unwelcomed by Thurman Hill. Feeling sorrowful, Ruby takes Heidi into her own home where she and her husband, Roy, investigate. She discovers that Thurman Hill, is her grandfather, Elliot is her father, and that her grandmother was named Diana. She finally finds out what her mothers word, soof, meant, which was her nickname for Sophia Demuth. By the end her mom dies.

So B. It

Chris Brabson is a boy whose family lives in the mountains of Eastern Tennessee during the Civil War. His family encounters hard times when cavalry soldiers of the Union Army come and take most of his family''s food and their one and only plow horse leaving them little supplies to sustain the winter. Chris vowes to get even with the Yanks and is determined to fight for Confederate Army. Chris'' brother, Jethro, has just recently joined the Union Army forcing Chris to examine his beliefs of war, courage, and tolerance. Jethro''s enlistment causes the Brabson family to be the victims of prejudice from their neighbors who are sympathizers of the Confederate Army. The neighbors become intolerant of their beliefs and burn down their shed and threaten to do the same with their house. Though Jethro is a Union soldier, Chris hates the Union troops. When Chris finds out that there is a wagon train in the area he alerts a friend of his, Silas Agee, who claims to be a Confederate spy. It is only after he tells Silas about the wagon train that he finds out that his brother''s job in the Army will be as a wagon driver. Chris then takes it upon himself to go tell his brother of the fact that the Confederates have been alerted about the wagon train in order to try to save Jethro''s life. When he gets to the wagon train in search of Jethro, he is kindly greeted by Union troops who offer him food and conversation. He begins to change his perspective of the Yankees learning that they are very different from him and are not the hateful thieves he once viewed them as.

The Perilous Road

The novel begins in the final days of Nazi Germany with Hitler sheltering in his bunker. Hitler officially commits suicide along with Eva Braun. However, after Eva kills herself, a preselected double takes Hitler''s place and is disposed of along with Braun in the Chancellery yard for the Russians to find. The real Hitler escapes the bunker along with Colonel Günther Brumm, a German commando officer and together with a rag tag team, escape Berlin. Stalin meanwhile has intuitively deduced that the psychological make-up of Hitler is not that of a man who would commit suicide. Hence he sets up a special team of five operatives with wide ranging powers to round up Hitler and bring him back for Stalin''s personal revenge. The novel soon becomes both a thrilling chase and a ruthless game of cat and mouse. Hitler and his protectors make their way across Germany, a charred wasteland where Hitler''s dreams of glory lie in ruins and ashes. Their ultimate goal is Italy (where they have been promised sanctuary) but the Russian team is in hot pursuit. Along the way, Heywood provides an unforgettable historical snapshot of the aftermath of World War II. It is worth noting that many of the German survivors are depicted as admirable, while Red Army and even United States Army personnel are shown to be either timid, short-sighted, or corrupt. In one particularly chilling sequence, US Army Major Rosemary Wilson, a rich older woman, stumbles upon Waller, the beautiful German girl who is carrying the plans for Hitler''s escape. Instead of interrogating the girl or turning her over to the American MP''s, Major Wilson insists on renting a room for Waller and taking her to dinner at a small, dimly lit restaurant nearby. Wholly intent upon a classic lesbian seduction, Rosemary Wilson proves no match for the highly-disciplined German girl. She drinks far too much at dinner and falls into bed in a state of blissful anticipation, only to be found dead the next morning with an SS dagger buried in her breast. The Russians ultimately catch Hitler and bring him back to Stalin. Hitler is secretly imprisoned in a hanging cage in a sub-basement of the Kremlin which is too small for Hitler to either stand or lie fully. He is fed scraps through the bars of the cage and allowed no toilet facilities. Over the years, Hitler changes to a filthy, senile beast who has his right leg amputated above the knee and his left leg amputated above the ankle as gangrene sets in. He is finally executed by Petrov when Stalin is on his death bed and the sub-basement in which Hitler was kept is walled off forever.

The Berkut

Generation X is a framed narrative, like Chaucer''s The Canterbury Tales or The Decameron by Boccaccio. The framing story is that of three friends—Dag, Claire, and the narrator, Andy—living together in the Mojave Desert in California. The tales are told by the various characters in the novel, which is arranged into three parts. Each chapter is separately titled rather than numbered, with titles such as "I Am Not A Target Market" and "Adventure Without Risk Is Disneyland". The locations of the novel was set circa 1990 Southern California in the then rapidly-growing and economic booming-turned-into-depressed communities of Palm Springs and the Inland Empire (California) region. Some characters were born and raised in L.A. and suburban Orange County, California. The first part of the novel takes place over the course of a picnic. Andrew, Dag, and Claire tell each other stories—some personal, others imagined—over the course of the day. Through these tales, the reader glimpses the characters'' motivations and personalities. The initial group of characters is expanded in this section, which introduces stories from additional characters: Claire''s boyfriend Tobias, Claire''s friend and Dag''s love interest Elvissa, Andy''s brother Tyler, and Andy''s boss and neighbour and his wife, Mr. and Mrs. MacArthur. Each character represents a cultural type; Elvissa is constantly stuck in the past, Tobias is a "yuppie", Tyler is a "global teen", and the neighbours represent members of an older generation. The frame is muted here, as the narrative draws back to reveal more of the main characters, while allowing for other characters'' stories to be heard. In this section, the novel continues to pull back its focus, as Andy and Claire travel away from California. Again, the frame is enlarged to include additional characters. Claire travels to New York, while Andy takes a dreaded trip to visit his family. Through the characters'' personal and mental journeys, more tales are told and more of the characters'' personal stories are revealed.

Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture

The protagonist, Mattia Pascal, finds that his promising youth has, through misfortune or misdeed, dissolved into a dreary dead-end job and a miserable marriage. His inheritance and the woman he loved are stolen from him by the same man, his eventual wife and mother-in-law badger him constantly, and his twin daughters, neglected by their mother, can provide him with joy only until an untimely death takes them. Death robs him even of his beloved mother. To escape, he decides one day to sneak off to Monte Carlo, where he encounters an amazing string of luck, acquiring a small fortune. While reading a newspaper on his return home, he discovers, to his immense shock and delight, that his wife and mother-in-law declared an unknown corpse to be his own. Faced with this sudden opportunity to start afresh, he first wanders about Europe, and finally settles down in Rome with an assumed identity. His character develops in unexpected, even admirable, ways. Yet one admirable act brings the protagonist a crisis, followed by additional crises that lead him to conclude that continuing with his plans will entail only misery for those he loves, precisely because his entire life, including the precious liberty he thought he had gained from his past, is now a lie. He ultimately decides to fake his own death and return to his original life. But even that proves difficult; his family and town have long since adjusted to his "death," and his own adjustment of character prompts him to have mercy on his now remarried wife. So the twice-dead Late Mattia Pascal reduces himself to a figure outside the mainstream of society, a walk-on part in his own life.

The Late Mattia Pascal

The novel is split into three sections. The narrator is in Thailand visiting his younger brother, Luk, who works there as an architect. Thailand is the birthplace of the narrator’s mother. He ‘falls in love’ with Thong, a Thai prostitute, during his visit. The book tracks the narrator’s relationship with Thong. This relationship at first seems to be somewhat mutual but soon is clearly shown to be driven by money as Thong accepts every monetary gift doled out by the narrator. Thong eventually events the narrator to live with him and his family instead of spending on expensive hotel rooms every night and it becomes evident that Thong is actually from a relatively wealthy family. The narrator now leaves Thailand to visit family in Malaysia (Penang), the country in which his father was born. In this section, more information concerning the narrator’s childhood and family is revealed. For instance, the narrator’s father had a terrible relationship with his family in Malaysia as well as his own son and wife, whom he later left for an American woman. In this section, stories from the narrator’s past are revealed and we learn that the narrator only began this journey because at home he just recently witnessed his father’s death and the end of his relationship with boyfriend, Jim. His father had been living in Honolulu with wife and was near to death when the narrator decided it was okay to visit him. The narrator dated Jim in New York and the two’s relationship was based on Jim’s economic power and the narrator’s aesthetic value. The relationship ended over Jim’s inability to quit using drugs. Back in Malaysia, the narrator tours the city with his auntie. The narrator also neglects to tell the Luk, his mother, or his father’s family in Malaysia that Ba, the narrator’s father, has died. While in Malaysia, the narrator also devotedly thinks about Thong, whom he very much misses and completely ends his relationship with Jim by first reporting him to the authorities as a drug smuggler and then sending him a postcard that reads, ‘Keep everything’ (89). The narrator also spends some time trying to get a photograph of his grandmother whose death is surrounded by numerous stories. Post a conversation with his grandmother’s spirit, the narrator finally decides his trip is completed and he is ready to return to Thong in Thailand. The narrator makes a point of not contacting Thong right away until he sees him one night past weekend walk into the same bar the narrator is at with three friends. Thong’s commitment to the narrator is suspect. The narrator moves into Thong’s house but he sleeps separately from Thong on an entirely different floor. In general, Thong becomes more and more distant and less and less affectionate. As jealousy takes over the narrator, he spirals into a stronger and stronger drug addiction. At some point, the narrator and Thong bump into each other at a bar and through the translation of another friend, Thong breaks up with the narrator. Eventually, the narrator moves out of Thong’s house. Luk and friends try to help the narrator recover from his breakup. In the end, the narrator realizes that in the end, he is just an American doing things in Thailand he would be unable to do back home. Though he tries to play this off as something that makes him invincible, in the end the narrator seems to realize that his trip is done, and he needs to return home though where home is the book does not specify.

Gold By The Inch

The novel is set in England during World War I at Styles Court, an Essex country manor (also the setting of Curtain, Poirot''s last case). Upon her husband''s death, the wealthy widow, Emily Cavendish, inherited a life estate in Styles as well as the outright inheritance of the larger part of the late Mr. Cavendish''s income. Mrs. Cavendish became Mrs. Inglethorp upon her recent remarriage to a much younger man, Alfred Inglethorp. Emily''s two stepsons, John and Lawrence Cavendish, as well as John''s wife Mary and several other people, also live at Styles. John Cavendish is the vested remainderman of Styles; that is, the property will pass to him automatically upon his stepmother''s decease, as per his late father''s will. The income left to Mrs Inglethorp by her late husband would be distributed as per Mrs. Inglethorp''s own will. Late one night, the residents of Styles wake to find Emily Inglethorp dying of what proves to be strychnine poisoning. Lieutenant Hastings, a houseguest, enlists the help of his friend Hercule Poirot, who is staying in the nearby village, Styles St. Mary. Poirot pieces together events surrounding the murder. On the day she was killed, Emily Inglethorp was overheard arguing with someone, most likely her husband, Alfred, or her stepson, John. Afterwards, she seemed quite distressed and, apparently, made a new will — which no one can find. She ate little at dinner and retired early to her room with her document case. The case was later forced open by someone and a document removed. Alfred Inglethorp left Styles earlier in the evening and stayed overnight in the nearby village, so was not present when the poisoning occurred. Nobody can explain how or when the strychnine was administered to Mrs. Inglethorp. At first, Alfred is the prime suspect. He has the most to gain financially from his wife''s death, and, since he is so much younger than Emily was, the Cavendishes already suspect him as a fortune hunter. Evelyn Howard, Emily''s companion, seems to hate him most of all. His behaviour, too, is suspicious; he openly purchased strychnine in the village before Emily was poisoned, and although he denies it, he refuses to provide an alibi. The police are keen to arrest him, but Poirot intervenes by proving he could not have purchased the poison. Scotland Yard police later arrest Emily Inglethorp’s oldest stepson, John Cavendish. He inherits under the terms of her will, and there is evidence to suggest he also had obtained poison. Poirot clears Cavendish by proving it was, after all, Alfred Inglethorp who committed the crime, assisted by Evelyn Howard, who turns out to be his kissing cousin, not his enemy. The guilty pair poisoned Emily by adding a precipitating agent, bromide (obtained from Mrs Inglethorp''s sleeping powder), to her regular evening medicine, causing its normally innocuous strychnine constituents to sink to the bottom of the bottle where they were finally consumed in a single, lethal dose. Their plan had been for Alfred Inglethorp to incriminate himself with false evidence, which could then be refuted at his trial. Once acquitted, due to double jeopardy, he could not be tried for the crime a second time should any genuine evidence against him be subsequently discovered, hence prompting Poirot to keep him out of prison when he realized that Alfred wanted to be arrested.

The Mysterious Affair at Styles

The narrator and central character is playwright Duncan Patullo. In The Gaudy he returns to his old college, after a long absence, and encounters a number of old friends, including Albert Talbert, his former tutor, Lord Marchpayne, a once-close friend with whom he has lost touch, and fellow Scot Ranald McKechnie, now a lecturer at the college. McKechnie''s wife, Janet, is Duncan''s first love. The second novel, Young Patullo, tells the story of their former relationships and Patullo''s undergraduate career. Fantasy writer and Oxford don J. R. R. Tolkien appears as the elderly "Professor Timberlake" in this novel. In The Madonna of the Astrolabe Patullo copes with his ex-wife, the undergraduates'' production of Tamburlaine, and the problems of raising enough money for the urgently-needed restoration of the crumbling Great Tower. The discovery of a lost masterpiece by Piero della Francesca proves crucial to the college''s future fortunes, and Patullo is able to help when it is stolen. The character of the provost of the college is said to have been based on that of Henry Chadwick, Dean of Christ Church, Oxford during Stewart''s own time there.

A Staircase in Surrey

The novel deals with the significance of two connected events that happened on the same day, long before the opening of the novel. The first was the excavation of an ancient and valuable archaeological idol, a phallic figure unearthed from the tomb of an Anglo-Saxon bishop Eorpwald, known as the "Melpham excavation". Gerald has long been haunted by a drunken revelation by his friend Gilbert, who was involved with this excavation, that the whole thing was a hoax perpetrated to embarrass Gilbert''s father. Gilbert told Gerald that he put the idol there. Gerald while feeling that his friend was telling the truth, pushed the matter to the back of his mind and tried to forget about it. He now feels ashamed that he, a history professor, has never had the courage to try to resolve the matter one way or another. The second is that Gerald Middleton fell in love with Dollie, Gilbert''s fiancée and had an affair with her when his friend went off to fight in WWI. When Gilbert was killed at the front, Dollie refused to marry Gerald. He ended up marrying a Scandinavian woman named Inge but continued his affair with Dollie, who became an alcoholic. Gerald and Inge later separated. Anglo-Saxon Attitudes is full of side-plots and coincidences and contains a host of eccentric characters. Some of these characters are Gerald''s family. Robin his eldest son, is a womaniser who cannot decide whether to leave his wife or his mistress. Kay, has an unhappy marriage and a deeply embittered view of her father, whom she appears to blame for everything that has gone wrong in her life, including her withered hand (which was actually caused by her mother). Gerald''s estranged wife, Inge is a grotesquely deluded woman who cannot bring herself to acknowledge her younger son John''s homosexuality or her daughter''s physical disability. Gerald feels responsible for Dollie''s plight and for those of his children. He feels that the knowledge of his complicity over the Melpham affair has drained his morale and made him withdrawn and indecisive. The novel begins with him resolving to make good the ''bloody shameful waste'' of his life, by investigating the Melpham affair and making peace with Dollie. He also attempts to develop better relationships with his grown-up children and with Inge. By the novel''s end, Gerald achieves a measure of peace with his past. He persuades Dollie to come forward with a letter from Gilbert''s father''s colleague, Canon Portway, proving that the Melpham incident was a hoax; then he and Dollie begin a platonic friendship. He gives up on achieving good relations with his family.

Anglo-Saxon Attitudes

The novel concerns a man named Corky Withers, a shy, odd-tempered and alcoholic magician, whose lackluster performances start to turn around when he adds a ventriloquist''s dummy, Fats, to the show. It chronicles Corky''s childhood and adolescence, and his deep love for a high-school crush named Peggy Ann Snow. After seeing the increasingly disturbing connection to Fats, many people begin to worry about Corky. Although Corky thinks Fats is alive, and can not bear to be apart from Fats for a long period of time, his friends know that Fats is actually an outlet for a hidden homicidal trait in Corky''s personality, and that he has multiple personality disorder. Soon, "Fats" begins to tell Corky to murder anyone that threatens their relationship. All these factors combine and quickly reach a shattering climax during a weekend at Peggy''s home in the Catskills. The novel is written kaleidoscopically, changing time period, location, and point of view swiftly and leaving certain aspects of important events unknown for extended periods of time, especially concerning the identity of Fats the dummy for the early portion of the novel.

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

The Long Road Home

No Author Listed

Battle Hymn of China

No Author Listed

So B. It

By Sarah Weeks

The Perilous Road

By William O. Steele

The Berkut

No Author Listed

Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture

By Douglas Coupland

The Late Mattia Pascal

By Luigi Pirandello

Gold By The Inch

No Author Listed

The Mysterious Affair at Styles

By Agatha Christie

A Staircase in Surrey

By J. I. M. Stewart

Anglo-Saxon Attitudes

By Angus Wilson

Magic

By William Goldman