Lambert Strether, a middle-aged, yet not broadly experienced, man from Woollett, Massachusetts, agrees to assume a mission for his wealthy fiancée: go to Paris and rescue her son, Chad Newsome, from the clutches of a presumably wicked woman. On his journey, Strether stops in England, and there meets Maria Gostrey, an American woman who has lived in Paris for years. Her cynical wit and worldly opinions start to rattle Strether''s preconceived view of the situation. In Paris, Strether meets Chad, and is impressed by the much greater sophistication Chad seems to have gained during his years in Europe. Chad takes him to a garden party, where Strether meets Marie de Vionnet, a lovely woman of impeccable manners, separated from her reportedly unpleasant husband, and Jeanne, her exquisite daughter. Strether is confused as to whether Chad is more attracted to the mother or the daughter. At the same time, Strether, himself, feels an overwhelming attraction to Marie de Vionnet, which he suspects she might requite, and so begins questioning his commitment to return to Woollett and marry Chad''s mother, despite his admiration for her. All of these impressions of Parisian culture lead Strether to confide in Little Bilham, a friend of Chad''s, that he might have missed the best life has to offer; he starts to delight in the loveliness of Paris, and stops Chad from returning to America. Strether''s American traveling companion, Waymarsh, provides thematic counterpoint, by refusing to be seduced by the charms of Europe. Meanwhile, Mrs. Newsome, Strether''s fiancée and Chad''s mother, impatiently waiting in America, enlists new "ambassadors" to return forthwith with Chad. The most important of the new ambassadors, Sarah Pocock, Chad''s sister, harshly dismisses Strether''s impression that Chad has improved, condemns Marie as an indecent woman, and demands that Chad immediately return to the family business in America. To escape his troubles, Strether takes a brief tour of the French countryside, and accidentally encounters Chad and Marie at a rural inn; he then comprehends the full extent of their romance. After returning to Paris, he counsels Chad not to leave Marie; but Strether finds he is now uncomfortable in Europe. In the event, he declines Maria Gostrey''s virtual marriage proposal and returns to America.

The Ambassadors

The evil Duke of Coffin Castle lives with his good and beautiful niece, the princess Saralinda. A few days before Saralinda''s twenty-first birthday, Prince Zorn of Zorna arrives in the town disguised as a minstrel named Xingu. After meeting an enigmatic character known as the Golux, who declares his intention to help Zorn rescue the Princess, Zorn gets himself arrested and imprisoned. The Duke gives Zorn the task of finding a thousand jewels. However, the Duke was aware of Zorn''s identity all along; therefore, to prevent Zorn from simply traveling to his father''s kingdom and back again, the Duke only allows him 99 hours to complete the task. To complicate things further, the Duke commands that when Zorn returns, the thirteen irrevocably frozen clocks in the castle must all be striking five. Zorn and the Golux travel to the home of Hagga, a woman with the ability to weep jewels, only to discover that she was made to weep so much that she is no longer able to cry. As the realization that they have failed sets in, Hagga begins to laugh inexplicably until she cries, producing an abundance of jewels. The Golux counts out a thousand, and they return to the castle after thanking her. At the castle, the Duke reveals to his servant Hark that he kidnapped Saralinda as a child and that she is not actually his niece. Under the conditions of a spell cast on the Duke as he fled with the Princess, the Duke may not marry Saralinda until she is twenty-one; furthermore, the spell prophecies that the Duke will be destroyed and Saralinda saved by a man whose name begins with x and doesn''t. Hark reminds the confident Duke that Zorn was called Xingu while he was posing as a minstrel, and therefore he is the man mentioned in the spell. While the furious Duke and his men are fighting Zorn, the Golux and the Princess sneak throughout the castle to each of the thirteen clocks, using Saralinda''s beauty and warmth to start them once more. Presented with the thousand jewels and the sound of the thirteen clocks striking, the Duke is forced to admit defeat. Zorn and the Princess happily depart to the distant shores of ever after. A fortnight later, while the Duke is gloating over his jewels, they melt back into Hagga''s tears. The angry Duke is then confronted by a nightmarish creature called the Todal, sent by the devil to punish him. Faced with his failure and the loss of his jewels, the wrathful Duke attacks the Todal. The story ends with Hark entering an empty room to find the Duke''s sword on the floor and a puddle of tears dripping from the table; he can just make out the sound of someone laughing.

The 13 Clocks

Five of the 19 surviving Little Sisters of Hoboken, a one-time missionary order that ran a leper colony on an island south of France, discover that their cook, Sister Julia, Child of God, accidentally killed the other fifty-two residents of the convent with her tainted vichyssoise while they were off playing bingo with a group of Maryknolls. Upon discovering the disaster, Mother Superior had a vision in which she was told to start a greeting card company to raise funds for the burials. The greeting cards were an enormous success and, thinking there was plenty of money, the Reverend Mother bought a VCR and camcorder for the convent, leaving her with no money in the kitty to pay for the last four burials. With the deceased nuns on ice in the deep freeze, they decide to stage a variety show in the Mount Saint Helen''s School auditorium to raise the necessary amount. Participating in the project are Mother Superior Mary Regina, a former circus performer who can not resist the spotlight; her competitive but dignified rival, second-in-command Sister Mary Hubert; Sister Robert Anne, a streetwise nun from Brooklyn; Sister Mary Leo, a novice who is determined to be the world''s first ballerina nun; and wacky, childlike Sister Mary Amnesia, who lost her memory when a crucifix fell on her head. The entertainment that they present includes solo star turns, madcap dance routines, and an audience quiz. Naturally, VCRs and camcorders are now no longer such current or expensive devices, so modern presentations of the show tend to substitute newer or more generic terms such as "home entertainment system" or a "plasma TV".

Nunsense

In The Lyre of Orpheus, the executors of the will of Francis Cornish (the subject of What''s Bred in the Bone) find themselves at the head of the "Cornish Foundation". The executors, Simon Darcourt, Arthur Cornish, and Maria Cornish, are called upon to decide what projects deserve funding. They decide that a hitherto-unfinished opera by E.T.A. Hoffmann will be staged at Stratford, Ontario; to this end, they hire a brilliant young composition student, Hulda Schnakenburg, to complete the opera as the work necessary to qualify her for a PhD., while Darcourt is charged with the completion of the libretto, which James Planché had attempted to write. The opera to be completed is King Arthur or the Magnanimous Cuckold. The story follows the writing and then production of the opera, and the plot of the story arcs in a way that parallels the legend of King Arthur, and in particular the triangle of King Arthur, his queen, Guenevere, and Lancelot. Geraint Powell, an actor who serves on the Board of the Cornish Foundation, fathers a child by Maria Cornish, forcing Arthur Cornish to choose between a generous or vindictive response. The Lyre of Orpheus explores not only the world of early eighteenth century opera, but also follows Darcourt''s research into the life of the benefactor and artist, Francis Cornish, leading to a discovery that forces Darcourt to conclude that a painting previously attributed to an unknown fifteenth century painter was in fact the work of Francis Cornish himself. This painting, entitled The Wedding at Cana featuring the portraits of many of the people who appeared as characters from Blairlogie, the fictional town in Ontario that was the setting of the second book of the trilogy, What''s Bred in the Bone. A further plotline involves the sexual and artistic flowering of PhD candidate Hulda Schnakenburg ("Schnak") under the hand of Gunilla Dahl-Soot, a distinguished Swedish musicologist who serves as Schnak''s academic advisor and becomes her lover. The book explores a number of themes, including the pursuit of life beyond the ordinary or comfortable routine and which is exemplified in the artistic quest to produce the opera or in Darcourt''s quest to uncover the truth behind the painting of The Wedding at Cana The theme of marriage is examined through the relationship between Arthur and Maria Cornish, a relationship that must withstand the test of infidelity And the modern approach to relationships is mocked in the dysfunctional common-law marriage of two minor characters who present themselves in Toronto to monitor and record the production of the opera from start to finish. As often happens in Davies'' novels, all is not simple; for example, the ghost of Hoffman, trapped in limbo as a result of the unsatisfactory state of his artistic work, attends and comments on the proceedings. Nor is all peaceful among the characters, as they react to Powell''s seduction of Maria Cornish, Dahl-Soot''s seduction of Schnak, and the inevitable tensions created by the effort to mount an operatic production.

The Lyre of Orpheus

Raptor is an historical novel set in the late fifth and early sixth centuries. It purports to be the memoirs of an Ostrogoth, Thorn, who has a secret: he is a hermaphrodite and takes on the name, "Thorn the Mannamavi", "a being uninhibited by conscience, compassion, remorse- a being as implacably amoral as the juika-bloth and every other raptor on this earth." Thorn discovers his sexuality rather unorthodoxly during his early teens. After he is banished from both a monastery and, later, a convent, he travels throughout the dying Roman Empire on a quest to meet his fellow Ostrogoths (even though it was never confirmed that Thorn was an Ostrogoth; he simply assumed it by reaching several logical conclusions), meeting several characters; among the most crucial to the storyline: Theodoric and the retired Roman legionary-turned-woodsman Wyrd, with whom he forms close friendships. Thorn lives his life chiefly as a man but can easily pass for a woman (he is beardless, has shoulder-length hair, and is relatively small-statured), and he uses this ambiguity for his own benefit. Throughout his life, Thorn conducts affairs with both men and women. The novel treats actual historical events, the fall of the Western Roman Empire and Theodoric''s assassination of Odoacer among them. Taking place in most of western Europe (the British Isles and Spain notably excepted), the story has an international feel, heightened by the appearance of several characters from different cultures (not only Romans and Goths but also Greeks, Celts, Huns, Jews and Syrians appear). As is typical in Gary Jennings''s novels, the plot is developed with historical detail (including extensive use of Gothic words, which the narrator calls "The Old Language") supplemented by graphic violence and bizarre sexual situations. Again typically, the story not only spans virtually the central character''s entire life but also has a recurring theme: those whom Thorn loves, die.

Raptor

The book takes place in the second part of the 1850s and is a story of a young orphan girl; Marjorie, who on the way to the next orphanage meets a nice and concerned Judge Gray. He keeps the girl for a while at his place, where she befriends with his teenage son; Reggie. Unfortunately, Marjorie finally gets to the orphanage, but eventually does not stay there long, since a wealthy family adopts her. The family has just lost their own little girl and has a teenage son, who becomes highly jealous of his new sister. His unpleasant behaviour results in Marjorie''s accident and consequently, missing. The girl loses her memory and an old begger finds her and looks after her. She turns out to have her own business in it, though. When the girl recovers, she is taken for beg by the begger because people more willingly give money to children. One day, the couple meets a young woman who takes Marjorie from the begger and adopts her. Six years later, Marjorie goes to a Southern farm, where she is a teacher for two little children. There, she meets a young soldier ...

Marjorie''s Quest

In this book, told in first-person narrative, the lead character—an unnamed Catholic priest—volunteers to playtest a new type of computer game for a relative. Called Duke and Duchess (though the title is changed to God Game at the end of the book), it puts the player in the role of God for a small swords and sorcery world. However, after a violent lightning storm, the narrator discovers that the game''s crude CGA graphics have become live video, and that he is now responsible for the inhabitants of a small, but very real, world somewhere else in space and time—a world that threatens to run away from his control and into total chaos. Cast, reluctantly, into the role of God, the narrator, not to be confused with the narrator''s author who also provides commentary, the priest strives to create peace between the two warring sides. He finds that both sides pray to him or to the Other Person, aka, God. His closest ally in trying to create this peace is Ranora, an ilel - something of a cross between a fairy and an angel- who has been assigned to the Duke, but dances wherever she wishes to go. The priest finds that it is "hell being God," as most of his characters, even when obeying, create further problems for him. Minor characters want to be major ones, then change their mind, and since he is not God, and lacks omniscience, he cannot always predict that outcome of his directives. There is comic relief provided by groups of dissidents who try to sabotage god''s plans, which are always smote by "divine" wrath. At times, characters cross Planck''s Wall to speak to him directly in his home, and he finds evidence that they were actually there, not mere figments. Finally, he is able to broker peace and thinks he can walk away from the game, but when he turns his back, those opposed to peace strive to undo all his good work. Ranora crosses the Wall to implore him to return, and it takes a miracle to save the Duke''s life, for the bad guys have convinced the Duchess he needs to be sacrificed in a pagan ritual. The minor characters will get their prayers answered as they become major ones and learn how much the Lord Their God loves them.

God Game

The story involves a new ice age hitting Europe, British refugees fleeing to Nigeria, and what a later group find when they return. As the story opens, Andrew Leedon, a London-based television documentary producer, is given a new story to research: an Italian scientist, Fratellini, has proposed an imminent fall in solar radiation for the forthcoming few years which may lead to harsher winters. Leedon meets with David Cartwell, a Home Office civil servant and useful source, to see if he can find out more. Cartwell quickly becomes a close friend of Leedon, but also begins an affair with Leedon''s wife, Carol. The winter of that year is, as predicted, long and harsh, but by January is it becoming clear to insiders that the solar downturn is worse than Fratellini had calculated and no upturn is in sight. By March, food stocks are becoming dangerously low, rationing has been imposed and the Government imposes martial law. Those in the know, including Andrew''s estranged wife, sell up and move south to the tropics and countries such as Nigeria. Leedon stays behind, as inner London is finally cordoned off from the rest of the UK to protect the seat of power – an area called the London Pale – as the rest of the country is abandoned to starvation and barbarism. Finally Leedon is persuaded both by Carol and by David Cartwell to exit the country while safe passage is still possible. Taking with him Cartwell''s wife Madeleine, he moves to Lagos in Nigeria, finding that the tables have now turned – white refugees fleeing from the ice-bound northern countries are living in slums, unemployed or with only menial jobs, and penniless, as African governments have withdrawn recognition of currencies such as Sterling and no longer recognize the British Government, with reason, as it no longer exercises sovereignty over its own land. A ray of hope arrives for Leedon as Abonitu, a young Nigerian whom Leedon had treated with kindness and generosity one evening in London, finds him and in turn helps him and Madeleine out of the slum. Abonitu plans a reconnaissance expedition back to Britain.

The World in Winter

Koestler starts off the book by looking back into his childhood about his philosophy of the world. He states that when he looks at the world, he looks at it as how the Babylonians did. He goes on to talk about where the Babylonians and Egyptians left off and the Greeks took over philosophy. "Homer''s world is another, more colourful oyster, a floating disc surrounded by Okeanus." A central theme of The Sleepwalkers is the changing relationship between faith and reason. Koestler explores how these seemingly contradictory threads existed harmoniously in many of the greatest intellectuals of the West. He illustrates that while the two are estranged today, in the past the most ground-breaking thinkers were often very spiritual. Another recurrent theme of this book is the breaking of paradigms in order to create new ones. People - scientists included - hold onto cherished old beliefs with such love and attachment that they refuse to see the wrong in their ideas and the truth in the ideas that are to replace them. "The conclusion he puts forward at the end of the book is that modern science is trying too hard to be rational. Scientists have been at their best when they allowed themselves to behave as "sleepwalkers," instead of trying too earnestly to ratiocinate."

The Sleepwalkers

The book begins when Phule and his "Omega Mob" receive orders to report to the space station Lorelei, a resort space station home of many casinos. The "Omega Mob" is contracted to defend the Fat Chance Casino from take over by organized Crime. Phule splits 50 of the troops from the company, giving them permission to operate under cover in order to gain intelligence on the crime syndicate. He supplements the lost legionnaires with actors and trains the whole unit, actors and legionnaires, in Casino security. Upon their arrival they learn that the Crime boss, Maxine, has partial ownership in the Casino and plans to bankrupt the Casino in order to gain a controlling interest. With this intelligence, Phule is able to thwart all of the schemes developed by Maxine thanks to his prior knowledge. In retaliation, Maxine''s thugs attack two of the actors. However, upon noticing the thug''s leader''s possession of the company''s distinctive wrist communicators, Chocolate Harry, the company''s supply sergeant, retrieves the communicators and beats up the leader. Frustrated with all the failed actions, Maxine results to her backup plan: kidnap Phule and ransom him. The resourceful Omega mob foils the kidnapping, rescuing Phule and forcing Maxine to hand over her share of the Casino to the company.

Phule''s Paradise

At the prologue of the book, D''Ablo is murdered by a mysterious man. He is described as familiar, but lacked further information because D''Ablo dies immediately afterward. Cutting back to the present, Vlad sees his father and doubts whether he really is there. He thinks he is going crazy from drinking Dorian''s blood in the previous book. His dad then disappears, leaving Vlad with Dorian''s corpse and a severely injured Joss lying on the ground. Henry later comes and is the one who calls the hospital for Joss. Vlad insists that he stays despite Henry''s protests. Vlad and Henry then walk home to Nelly''s while Vlad explains what happened during the night. When they reach Nelly''s house, they are greeted by Em and Enrico. Em informs Vlad and his Uncle Otis that D''Ablo is dead. Vlad then negotiates with Em to let him go free if he gives her his father, who of which Vlad is still uncertain is alive. Em agrees and gives Vlad until the end of the year to hand over his father. She then tells Vlad that she is actually his great-grandmother. Vlad is immensely surprised, especially when Otis reassures him by saying it''s true. After Em''s visit, Vlad and Henry go to the hospital to visit Joss. Two cops confront Vlad about Joss and Vlad answers some of their questions. Joss''s mother will not let Vlad anywhere near Joss. After the visit, two more cops confront Vlad outside the hospital. The four cops attack Vlad, revealing that they are Slayers. Vlad knocks them unconscious with his vampire abilities. Later that day, Vlad begins his search for his father all over town. Soon enough Henry, Otis and Vikas help him in the search. Finally, days later,Vlad decides to go to his hiding spot (the belfry) in the school. When he is there, he discovers his father, who greets him warmly and explains his motives for hiding. Vlad and his father finally make up go to their house as father and son. At the house Tomas says he was hiding from a secret vampire society that wants the Pravus to enslave vampire kind and that they were responsible for the fire and Mellina''s death. Otis shows up soon after and gets angry at his half brother for making Vlad suffer for many years. At the end, Snow is turned into a vampire by Vlad to keep her from dying, and Tomas is revealed to be evil and a man who had Vlad just so Vlad could become the Pravus and then Tomas could take his powers. Tomas also killed Vlad''s mom, and the man in the charred bed was Aidan, the son of Dorian. Nelly dies at the hand of Tomas, then later Vlad kills Tomas with Joss'' stake. Vikas turned out to be Tomas'' partner in crime and had helped Tomas kill Mellina, Vlad''s mom. Vikas had opened the drapes to burn Aidan. Vikas is killed by the Lucis which slips from Vlad''s hand- while on- and falls over the edge of a building, slicing an unsuspecting Vikas in half. Also, it is supposedly revealed that Snow''s eyes turn iridescent green near the end, hinting something, that maybe life would finally go his way.

Twelfth Grade Kills

Tobias has been having bad luck on his hunts. Every time he''d dive on the rabbit litter to pick off a hapless youngster, he''d suddenly envision himself as the prey with the shadow of death swooping at him. To make his situation worse, another red-tailed hawk is aggressively moving in on his territory. He doesn''t have the will to deal with the threat once and for all. So he resorts to picking dead carcasses off the road once, while eating a half-squashed raccoon he was seen by Rachel. He stops by at Rachel''s house. She tells him that a lawyer and a long-lost cousin, Aria, has been searching for him. Chapman, too, is interested in his whereabouts. Tobias suspects a trap. Tobias meets his father''s lawyer, DeGroot. The lawyer tells him the father he knew may not have been his real father, and his real father''s will is meant to be read on his next birthday. Tobias is puzzled. He also tells him that Aria wants to meet him at the Hyatt hotel. Tobias left the practice, and found himself being followed by a Yeerk agent. Rather than meeting with the Animorphs at the barn, he flies to the Hork-Bajir colony. There, Toby Hamee, Jara Hamee and Ket Halpak''s seer daughter, tells Tobias that a child Hork-Bajir, Bek, is missing. It is then that a disbelieving Tobias discovers that the Hork-Bajir regularly leave the valley (led by Toby) to free more of their kind. Back at the barn, Tobias must deal with his friends'' thinly-veiled pity for him, and the group splits up to both try to find Bek and investigate Aria. While Rachel and Tobias are watching her hotel, Aria leaves in a cab, and stops over at Frank''s Safari Land and Putt-Putt Golf, a dodgy roadside zoo-slash-amusement park. It''s there that they find Bek, locked in a miserable cage alongside a bunch of very depressed animals. They find Aria talking to the owner, Frank, who wants to make money off his "alien freak". Tobias and the others storm the place and try to take Bek, tearing down the place in the process. But the Controllers were ready for them, and Tobias encounters Visser Three in a hideous Kaftid morph, who thinks Tobias is Ket Halpak. The Visser assails Tobias with an acid attack, forcing him to release Bek in pain. The rescue fails, and the Animorphs and the Yeerks withdraw, with Bek in Yeerk custody now. Tobias constantly wonders if he could ever live life as a human - with Aria. He wonders if she''s a Controller. He and Ax return to the Hyatt, and witness her saving a little girl. Tobias assumes this means she''s not a Controller, but Ax is doubtful. Tobias swings by Rachel''s house that night, and they engage in a hot debate about Tobias''s humanity, with Rachel expressing sadness about the fact that she and Tobias can never be close due to his hawk body. The next day, the Animorphs and the Hork-Bajir plan their attack on the new Yeerk Dracon cannon facility out of town. The Animorphs and the free Hork-Bajir allow themselves to be captured. Tobias, in flea morph, jumps out of the cage, demorphs, morphs a Hork-Bajir, and opens the cage. A quick fight between the Hork-Bajir-Controllers and the freedom fighters results in the latter''s victory. As they climb up to the Yeerk Dracon cannon, Tobias spots Aria in a helicopter. Only then does he make the connection that Aria is actually Visser Three in a morph. Enraged, horrified, and hating himself, he falls to the ground, unable to will himself to join the fight. He is later rescued by Toby after a terrible fight ensues. The facility is destroyed, and Bek is saved. Aware now that he is walking into a trap, Tobias must engage Aria on his own. He goes to the testament-reading, and discovers that his father was in fact Elfangor, the Andalite prince. Tobias gives nothing away, instead jeering that he was left no money and accusing Aria of merely seeking his inheritance. Only after he returns to his hiding spot does he break down, and decides that he can''t give up his morphing powers because he must continue to fight for his people, just like his father did. Later that night, he flies to Rachel''s where she lights him a candle on a birthday cake. The next day, Tobias kills and eats the mother rabbit, morphs her, and brings the baby rabbits under his protection from the rival hawk. * Tobias discovers that Elfangor was his biological father. * Chapman is no longer suspicious of the lost boy who lives on the street. * Toby Hamee makes her first speaking appearance (excepting the last page of The Hork-Bajir Chronicles). Goof: In the 13th book, Visser Three believes that Ket Halpak, a Hork-Bajir, is dead. In the 23rd book, he recognizes her and is not at all surprised to see someone who he watched get killed.

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

The Ambassadors

By Henry James

The 13 Clocks

By James Thurber

Nunsense

By Dan Goggin

The Lyre of Orpheus

By Robertson Davies

Raptor

No Author Listed

Marjorie's Quest

By Jeanie Gould

God Game

By Andrew Greeley

The World in Winter

By Samuel Youd

The Sleepwalkers

By Arthur Koestler

Phule's Paradise

By Robert Asprin

Twelfth Grade Kills

By Heather Brewer

The Pretender

By K. A. Applegate