15-year-old Jessica Day moves with her family to Bixby, Oklahoma after her mother is employed at a high-tech aerospace company. Soon after the move, Jessica awakens to find time frozen and rain stopped in mid air. Although she thinks it is a dream, she is suspicious when she wakes to find her clothes wet. The next night, it happens again. Leaving her room, she finds that her family is frozen and the only other living thing is a cat, which leads her out of her house. Once outside, the cat transforms into a snake, revealing that it is actually a slither. It, along with other slithers and a darkling in the form of a large cat, attacks her. Jessica is rescued by the "Midnighters": Dess, Rex and Melissa, who chase away the animals using thirteen letter words and steel. The next day, they explain that in Bixby time freezes for an hour every midnight and that only Midnighters - people born at the moment of midnight - can enter it. Creatures known as darklings live in this secret hour where they can hide from advances in human technology. Darklings hate people and fear new inventions, complex concepts and the number 13. It was the darklings who took one hour of each 25-hour-day and hid inside it so that people couldn''t get to them. They also explain that each Midnighter has a special power - Dess is a polymath, Rex is a Seer (someone who can read the lore - the ancient history of the midnighters) and Melissa is a mindcaster (meaning she has a variety of telepathic abilities). They don''t know what Jessica''s power is, except that it isn''t the same as any of theirs. The next midnight, Jonathan, a boy from Jessica''s school, arrives outside her house, and takes her flying with him - he is an Acrobat, and in the Secret Hour gravity does not have a strong hold on him. He and Rex don''t get along, and the other Midnighters avoid talking about him. After flying for most of the hour the pair are chased by a darkling and narrowly escape - only to be arrested by policemen enforcing Bixby''s eleven o''clock curfew. Jessica is grounded for the rest of the month. Meanwhile, the Midnighters are becoming suspicious of why the darklings, who normally avoid Midnighters, are so intent on killing Jessica. Rex decides to take Jessica out to the Snake Pit, a place in the badlands, where she will be able to discover her power. Unfortunately, the badlands are also the home to the darklings. Dess sets up protection beforehand and the Midnighters plan to be inside it before the Secret Hour arrives. However, they are all late, and rely on Jonathan to fly them inside the protection, which causes Rex to get jealous and Melissa to get disgusted and angry. The darklings are so desperate to attack Jessica that they suicidally attack the defenses, weakening them considerably. Just before the defenses collapse, Rex discovers Jessica''s power is Flame-bringer, but none of the group know how they can make a fire. As the defenses are breached, Jessica realizes that her watch is still ticking, implying that her ability allows her to use technology in the secret hour. She uses a flashlight to kill the darklings, and the Midnighters leave safely.

Midnighters 1: The Secret Hour

The book is divided into 13 chapters spanning over 400 pages, and includes an appendix called "The History-Deniers" in the end material. #Only a Theory? (Nature of scientific theory and fallibility) #Dogs, Cows and Cabbages (Artificial Selection) #The Primrose Path to Macro-Evolution #Silence and Slow Time (Discusses the Age of the Earth and the Geological Time Scale) #Before Our Very Eyes (Examples of Evolution Observed) #Missing link? What do you mean, ''Missing''? (the fossil record) #Missing persons? Missing no longer (Human Evolution) #You did it yourself in nine months (a statement attributed to J. B. S. Haldane; discusses developmental biology) #The ark of the continents (biogeography and plate tectonics) #The tree of cousinship (the tree of life, homology and analogy) #History written all over us (vestigiality and unintelligent design) #Arms races and ''evolutionary theodicy'' (coevolution and evolutionary arms races) #There is grandeur in this view of life (based on the final passage of On the Origin of Species)

The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution

A white male is picked up by the New York Police after being found bending over the victim of a mugging at Grand Central Terminal in midtown Manhattan. After having responded to the police questions with somewhat strange answers, he is transferred to Bellevue Hospital for evaluation. Although not physically ill, he is found to harbour a strange delusion: That he is from a planet called K-PAX in the constellation of Lyra. The patient, who calls himself "prot" (intentionally lower-case to reflect the insignificance of an individual life form in the universe), is eventually transferred to the Manhattan Psychiatric Institute (MPI), where he becomes the patient of Dr. Gene Brewer. Dr. Brewer, with the help of a journalist named Giselle, discovers that prot may simply be an alter ego (the result of Multiple Personality Disorder) of Robert Porter, whose life has been devastated by the murder of his wife and child and his subsequent killing of the perpetrator. When prot returns to his own planet, Robert Porter is left in a catatonic state. However, Bess (another patient prot had promised to take with him) disappears along with a box of souvenirs prot has been collecting. Prot promises to return in "about five of your years".

K-PAX

Rebecca and Douglas (known as Becca and Doug in the books) return to their home town of Lucknow, in India, after their adventures in Operation Typhoon Shore. They continue their quest to find their parents and uncover the secrets of the Guild. They become reunited with Miss Liberty Da Vine whom they rescued from Sheng-Fat on Wenzi Island in Operation Red Jericho and travelled with aboard the Expedient in Operation Typhoon Shore. Operation Storm City is the final installment of the trilogy. From India to the desert wastes of China, Becca and Doug must follow every clue and scrap of information discovered so far in their adventures to guide them to the truth about their missing parents. Old friends join them in new alliances, for Becca and Doug know now that they must find Ur-Can the fabled machine at the very heart of the story which is hidden deep in the Taklamakan Desert - the so-called ‘Desert of Death’. They now know Ur-Can holds the answers they seek, as it was the destination of their parents’ lost expedition. But Ur-Can has fallen into the hands of a mad Russian general intent on using the machine’s colossal power for his own evil ends. Becca and Doug are tested beyond anything they have so far endured in the trilogy as they try to conclude their gruelling quest.

Operation Storm City

Hillary Van Wetter has been jailed for the murder of an unscrupulous local sheriff, Thurmond Call. Call had previously stomped Wetter''s handcuffed cousin to death. Wetter is now on death row and awaiting execution. In prison Wetter receives correspondence from Charlotte Bless, a woman he has never met but who has fallen in love with him and is determined that he should be released and that they should marry. Bless provokes immense sexual tension in any situation, given her beauty and presence. Bless attempts to prove Wetter''s innocence by enlisting the support of two investigative reporters from a Miami newspaper hungry for a salacious story: the ambitious Yardley Acheman and the naive, idealistic Ward James, who hails from the small town where Van Wetter is imprisoned and has mixed feelings about returning home. The evidence against Wetter is inconsistent and the writers are confident that if they can expose Wetter as a victim of redneck justice then their story will be a potential Pulitzer Prize winner. However, tricks of the journalist''s trade are played, corners are cut, facts are fudged, small inconsistencies are ignored, and Yardley sleeps with Charlotte. With the newspapermen''s support, Wetter is released from prison and the pair win the Pulitzer Prize. It soon becomes apparent that the writers misjudged Wetter. After marrying Charlotte, Wetter murders her. Consumed by guilt, Ward commits suicide.

The Paperboy

; Characters * Dr. Prentice * Geraldine Barclay * Mrs Prentice * Nicholas Beckett * Dr Rance * Sergeant Match The play consists of two acts, and revolves around a Dr. Prentice, a psychiatrist attempting to seduce his attractive prospective secretary, Geraldine Barclay. The play opens with the doctor examining Geraldine Barclay in a job interview. As part of the interview, he convinces her to undress. The situation becomes more intense during Dr. Prentice''s supposed "interview" with Geraldine Barclay when Mrs Prentice enters. When his wife enters, he attempts to cover up his activity by hiding the girl behind a curtain. His wife, however, is also being seduced and blackmailed by a Nicholas Beckett. She therefore promises Nicholas the post as secretary, which adds further confusion, including Nicholas and Geraldine dressing as the opposite sex. Dr. Prentice''s clinic is then faced by a government inspection. The inspection, led by Dr. Rance, reveals the chaos in the clinic. Dr. Rance talks about how he will use the situation to develop a new book: "The final chapters of my book are knitting together: incest, buggery, outrageous women and strange love-cults catering for depraved appetites. All the fashionable bric-a-brac." A penis ("the missing parts of Sir Winston Churchill") is held aloft in the climactic scene.

What the Butler Saw

Act I Top pop music composer Vernon Gersch, hoping to find a new collaborator, meets offbeat Sonia Walsk, who has already had some success writing lyrics and is in awe of his accomplishments, at his luxury Manhattan apartment. She is surprised that his Oscar is so light, and Vernon quips, "They''re chocolate inside." He is aloof and focused, while she is disorganized and distracted, but Vernon has already written music to one of Sonia''s lyrics, and they decide to forge ahead. Sonia, frazzled by her break up with lover Leon, arrives a day late for their first work session. When they begin, she tells Vernon they should get to know each other on a personal level in order for their work to gel, and they decide to have dinner at "Le Club." Sonia, who has been trying to ease Leon''s anguish, is late yet again, and the evening begins badly. She and Vernon argue, then dance in an effort to calm down. The two settle down to enjoy the evening, and they hear their own songs being played over the sound system. Another work session, in which the two really don''t listen to each other, follows, but Vernon convinces Sonia to join him for a romantic weekend at a Long Island beach house. The trip to the island in Vernon''s small sports car is fraught with engine trouble, calls to Leon, and arguments. They finally arrive at the house, but a phone call from Leon threatens the romantic mood. Determined to concentrate on Vernon, Sonia tells Leon that she can''t help him and hangs up. Act II It''s a week later and Vernon is suffering from insomnia. Sonia manipulates her way into his apartment by telling him she has no place to stay since Leon is back living at her place. Sonia and Vernon''s romance and collaboration seems successful for a while, but the relationship begins to crumble because of her inability to send her ex-boyfriend away. Also, away from his piano, Vernon is a bundle of neuroses and unable to express his deepest feelings. After some psychologizing about the difficulties of living and working together, the pair split up at a recording session. A few months later, while Vernon is in a Los Angeles hospital, Sonia arrives unexpectedly with a tiny red child''s piano as a get-well gift. Months later, both have separately come to the realization that, despite their differences, they are better together. Vernon arrives at Sonia''s apartment in New York to tell her that he wants to try again. She agrees, and they reconcile with a kiss.

They''re Playing Our Song

The novel tells the story of Princess Marguerite "Daisy" Valensky. She is the daughter of Prince Alexander "Stash" Valensky, a wealthy Russian-born polo player and former playboy, and his wife Francesca Vernon, a beautiful and talented American actress. Stash and Francesca, madly in love, are thrilled by her pregnancy and the news that she is carrying twins. However, a problem during delivery denies one of the twin girls, named Danielle, enough oxygen, and she is born brain-damaged, while Daisy is healthy. Francesca suffers from acute post-partum depression and enters a fugue state for several weeks. Stash, who has a fear and disgust of illness and abnormality after a childhood spent watching his mother slowly waste away from tuberculosis, is unable to accept or love Danielle. When Francesca recovers from her depression, he lies to her, telling her that the second-born twin died soon after birth. She discovers the truth and flees with both infants to California, where she is helped by her former agent and his wife. For several years, she lives a secluded life in Carmel and grants Stash short visits with Daisy. Francesca dies in a car accident, and Daisy and Dani are reunited with their father, who immediately places Dani in an expensive but remote home for retarded children, much to Daisy''s distress. When Daisy turns 16, her father dies in a plane accident, after which her older half-brother, Ram, who has become obsessed with her, seduces and then brutally rapes her. To get her away from Ram, her father''s mistress, Anabel (a mother figure to the girl), sends her to the University of California at Santa Cruz, where she forms what will be a lifelong friendship with Kiki Kavanaugh, an auto industry heiress from Grosse Pointe, Michigan. Because of Daisy''s total estrangement from Ram, who is a trustee of her inheritance, she neglects to read his letters regarding her stock portfolio at a crucial moment and thus loses everything her father left her. As a result, she is forced to drop out of college and go to work. She paints portraits of rich, horse-mad peoples'' children on ponies in order to pay Dani''s bills and also works in a demanding job at a production company that makes television commercials. When Anabel becomes ill and needs money for treatment, Daisy must make a decision to abandon her private life. Up to this point, Daisy has lived out of the public eye, refusing to trade on her title for financial gain, but she ultimately accepts an opportunity to do so. In the process, Daisy must learn to trust a man who loves her, to come to terms with her sister''s disability, and to make peace with the life she''s been given.

Princess Daisy

The Penguins of Doom is set in the fictitious city of Conwell, Massachusetts, which is described in the book as a suburb of Boston. Conwell is home to the book''s main character, a seventh-grader named Septina Nash, who is one of a set of triplets. In an attempt to locate her missing triplet sister, Sexta, Septina leads an expedition into the fictitious "Frozen Triangle of Doom" region of Antarctica. The plot is conveyed through letters and notes written by Septina to her teachers, parents, and others. Most of the letters include Septina''s doodle-style illustrations. Septina''s early letters tackle her conflicted feelings toward her missing sister, with whom she did not always get along. Septina also describes a series of improbable events, such as the appearance of wild penguins in her hometown, the arrival of a mad scientist who proclaims himself to be Septina''s arch enemy, and an encounter with a robot duplicate of herself programmed by the CIA. Septina attempts to distract himself from her problems, first by pursuing an ambition to become an Olympic-level skateboarder, then by trying to find a husband for her math teacher, and finally by helping a friend collect empty yogurt containers for a radio station contest. By the end of the novel, Septina learns to somewhat control her talents and locates her sister with the aid of her triplet brother, math teacher, arch enemy, three penguins, and school counselor. The title The Penguins of Doom is derived from the three penguins adopted as pets by Septina. The penguins hail from the Frozen Triangle of Doom section of Antarctica.

The Penguins of Doom

The autobiography Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez is an overall compelling self told story of a scholarship boy. Richard tells readers about his struggle with how separate his home and school life are. Both of which are completely different in many ways. He tells of his feeling of being more distant from his home life each time that he pushed forward in his schooling. Richard goes on to talk about how his school and home had separate views on religion, ethnicity and skin color, and his now current job. Richard mentions frequently the fact that he is a Mexican-American. Telling readers on how being one affected many parts of his life. Later in college and even later in life it affected him because his professors and employers labeled him as a minority student or as part of a minority. He talks about how being labeled a minority gave him many more opportunities but how because of this he felt a sort of guilt. Students who had worked just as hard as him but not being minorities weren''t offered as many jobs as he was. The autobiography not only tells about his own life as a middle-class scholarship student but also his views on what others have written about scholarship students. The book gives provocative arguments and profound thought. It tells of his change from a boy trying to become a man and his reflections on the past.

Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez

The novel is transcribed by ''Michael Moorcock'' (the author''s fictional grandfather) in 1903. Holidaying at the remote Rowe Island, he befriends Oswald Bastable, an ex-soldier stowaway who seems confused and disoriented beyond what could be explained by his opium addiction, and who is tormented by great guilt from an action he performed in his past. Bastable agrees to tell Moorcock the story, and begins his narrative with his experiences in North East India in 1902, sent as part of a British expedition to deal with Sharan Kang, an Indian high priest at the temple of Teku Benga, a mysterious and seemingly supernaturally powerful region. After a confrontation with Kang and his men, Bastable finds himself lost and alone in the caves around the ''Temple of the Future Buddha'', where he is assaulted by a mysterious force and knocked into unconsciousness. When he awakes, and escapes the caves, the Temple is in ruins, as if a great amount of time has passed. He is soon found and picked up by a massive airship, where he learns that it is in fact the year 1973, but not the one that the reader would recognise. In this alternate future, the First World War never happened, and the colonial powers continue to assert dominance over their empires—for example, India remains a British territory, though Winston Churchill had been viceroy in this alternate future as well as in Bastable''s own. At first, Bastable marvels at the wonders that await him in his ''future'' — London is a clean and peaceful city, and the world seems to be a utopia, held in balance by the great empires. Gaining employment amongst the great airship armadas, however, he soon comes into contact with a troop of anarchists — among them a mysterious woman named Una Persson, and an ancient Russian revolutionary named Ulianov. He initially maintains a patriotic resistance to their activities, but gradually discovers the truth: life is peaceful for the dominant empires but the seeming utopia of the empires'' home countries is based on decades of unimpeded and unopposed colonial oppression, brutality and domination of their territories. As the First World War never happened to bankrupt the colonial empires and begin the gradual liberalisation and freedom of the colonies, imperialism remains unchecked and the world is greatly unfair and unjust. Great Britain, France, the Tsarist Russian Empire, the German Empire, Japan, the Italian Empire and the United States ruthlessly dominate this world and suppress anti-imperialist and anti-colonialist dissent. Bastable, a fair and honorable man, is outraged by the cruelty, injustice and horror revealed to him, and begins to fight for the oppressed peoples of the world (opposing, amongst others, his former friend in the airship service, Major Enoch Powell). Tragically, his actions result in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima at the hands of the anarchists. The atomic blast knocks him loose from the alternate 1973, sending him to a new 1903. Wracked with guilt over his part in the destruction of countless millions of innocent lives, and dreading the ''future'' of science and imperialism gone mad, Bastable makes his way to the caves of Teku Benga and returns to 1903, but alas, not his own original time. His experiences have altered him too much to settle into life in this new alternate universe; both his experiences and this sense of dislocation have driven him to opium. The novel ends with Bastable disappearing mysteriously, much to the 1903 Moorcock''s amazement; and a postscript from the modern author Moorcock, establishing his grandfather''s death on the Western Front in 1916.

Warlord of the Air

Sapphire, Conor, and their mum have moved to St Pirans with Roger, leaving behind their cottage by the sea, where their dad disappeared two years ago. Conor has adapted to this new life, but Sapphire cannot. She is withdrawn and restless, and her only relief is Ingo. She goes there more frequently, even without Conor, who has given up going, and prefers his life in the air. A new couple are living in their old house. The woman is on crutches has the look of Ingo on her face but does not know of the world beneath the sea. Sapphire rescues her when she finds the lady down by the sea, not sure why she is there. One evening Sapphire takes her beloved dog Sadie for a walk along the sea, but the call of Ingo is too strong, so she leaves Sadie up on the pavement and dives in. Faro is there. She only stays a minute but when she goes back to Sadie her dog seems shaken and ill. Sapphire''s mum says not to worry: the dog will be fine. Sapphire skips school and takes her dog to see granny Carne, a magical old lady. She phones home from granny Carne''s and tells her mum she''s staying over and won''t be back till morning. That night, Sapphire goes back to the cove, where she sees her father. He tells her that the tide knot is loose, but he can''t stay long and leaves shortly after. The next day her dog is healed but Sapphire is in trouble with her mum. Soon after, Conor and Sapphire go back to Ingo to find out more about her father. They swim in a rogue current. Whilst Faro rescues Conor, Sapphire is carried into the deep. She wakes up in blackness, but a whale helps her back to Ingo. There Sapphire and Conor see in a mirror-like thing a mer woman with a mer baby. The woman smiles at someone in the corner of the mirror – their father smiling lovingly at the woman and the baby. Feeling replaced and sad, they are about to leave when they learn of the tide knot, a stone that controls the tides that is becoming loose. Shortly, after they return, the tide knot loosens and nearly the entire town floods. As the houses are swallowed up by the flood water, Sapphire''s mum is ill. Sapphire, her mum and her friend Rainbow go up to the attic. Sapphire jumps out of the window into the sea where she meets Conor and Faro. Sapphire is slammed against a wall and her leg begins to bleed. Conor calls Elvira, a healer. Elvira heals Sapphire and together the four help Saldowr, the wisest of the mer and the keeper of the tide knot, to put the broken pieces back together to restore the tide knot. Saldowr is weak but they manage to do it with Conor''s power of reading the stone. The flood slowly recedes. Conor and Sapphire return to the rescue centre where they are re-united with their mother. At the end of the book, Sapphire is delighted that they are going back to their old cottage by the sea.

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

Midnighters 1: The Secret Hour

By Scott Westerfeld

The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution

By Richard Dawkins

K-PAX

By Gene Brewer

Operation Storm City

No Author Listed

The Paperboy

By Pete Dexter

What the Butler Saw

By Joe Orton

They're Playing Our Song

By Marvin Hamlisch

Princess Daisy

By Judith Krantz

The Penguins of Doom

By Greg R. Fishbone

Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez

By Richard Rodriguez

Warlord of the Air

By Michael Moorcock

The Tide Knot

By Helen Dunmore