On being called in to investigate a dead body, NYPSD homicide detectives Eve Dallas and Delia Peabody discover that the woman is a fellow officer, Detective Amaryllis Coltraine, who worked out of another precinct. To add to the emotion of the case, Coltraine was the lover of Li Morris, the Chief Medical Examiner and a good friend of Eve and Peabody. Coltraine was shot with her own police stunner; it also appears that she may have known her killer. Meanwhile, Eve''s contact from Internal Affairs Bureau Donald Webster clues her on the victim''s connection with Alex Ricker Max Ricker''s son back in Atlanta, Georgia, from where the victim requested a transfer to New York following a fallout. Initial evidence suggests that the kill may have been ordered by Alex Ricker. The suspect''s reactions, however, as well as Roarke''s impressions from a private discussion they have, tend to steer the blame away from him. Eve is beginning to sense that the killer may have been one of the detectives Coltraine worked with at her precinct. A humorous minor subplot revolves around Eve''s performing another duty of friendship she has never tackled before: hosting a wedding shower for Louise Dimatto, who is marrying former "licensed companion" Charles Monroe. In the middle of the shower, Eve gets a call from dispatch informing her of the death of Rod Sandy, Alex''s Personal Assistant. After she gets back, Eve requests Charlotte Mira and Cher Reo to sit in for a debrief and ends up explaining the case to all her friends which leads Mavis to point out the killer who was the victim''s partner at her precinct. Further digging reveals the killer to be the illegitimate daughter of Max Ricker,who set her up to extract his revenge on Eve and Roarke for putting him in a cage.

Promises in Death

Prior, despite his new-found peace of mind and engagement to munitions worker Sarah, has been affected by the war and therefore does not have a lot of concern for his safety. Prior has been cured of shell-shock and is preparing to return to France. Once in France, experiences numerous and risky sexual encounters; his only rule is that he never pays for sex - a rule he eventually breaks. Rivers, concerned for Prior''s safety, finally recognises that his relationship with Prior, and his other patients for that matter, is deeply paternal. In contrast with upper-class officers like Sassoon, with whom Rivers has been able to form warm friendships, he has always found Prior to be a thorn in his side. As Prior returns to the front, Rivers continues to take care of his patients and his invalid sister, amid this he reminisces uncomfortably about his childhood and memories of his experience ten years earlier on an anthropological expedition to Melanesia (now Eddystone Island). There, he befriended Nijiru, the local priest-healer who took Rivers on his rounds to see sick villagers and also to the island''s sacred Place of the Skulls. This episode is a symbolic capitulation to the inevitability of his death at the Western Front, a fate he shares with the poet, Wilfred Owen to which in a futile battle that takes place a few days before the Armistice, Billy and his friend Wilfred Owen are killed.

The Ghost Road

The Vom is an intergalactic intelligence described as a large black blob not unlike a gigantic amoeba, impervious to almost all energy and physical attack. Following years of battle with the Tar-Aiym it has sheltered on a planet where it has gone dormant for 500,000 years, waiting for an opportunity to escape the Tar-Aiym Guardian orbiting in space above it. Carmot MMYM a commander in the AAnn Empire discovers the Vom and brings it to the planet Repler for study at a concealed AAnn base. Lieutenants Kitten “Kitty” Kai-sung, a female human, and Porsupah, a male Tolian, of the Intelligence Arm of the United Church have been sent to Repler to investigate the newly re-established trade in the drug bloodhype (aka jaster, silly salt, brain-up, phinto) as the most deadly and addictive drug in and outside the Humanx Commonwealth. Once on Repler they make contact with the drug trader Dominick Rose who are using Captain Malcolm Hammurabi and his ship, the Umbra, as unwitting transporters of bloodhype. This trio tracks Rose to his base where they encounter Flinx, currently in Rose’s employ, who helps them escape when Rose’s men capture the agents. After reporting Rose’s activities to the United Church, Rose escapes to the AAnn base right before the AAnn lose control of the Vom. Meanwhile, the agents have enlisted the help of Rose’s brother who has discovered the Tar-Aiym Guardian and his machine now orbiting above Repler. With the assistance of Flinx’s psychic abilities the Guardian prepares to fight the Vom again, while Kitty, Porsupah, and Mal prepare a raid on the AAnn base to capture Rose. The Vom escapes and the Guardian is forced to fight it in a psychic battle, but is slowly losing until Kitty and Mal manage to recover Rose’s supply of bloodhype and use it to poison the Vom. Now weakened, the Vom succumbs to the Tar-Aiym Guardian. After the battle the Guardian self-destructs, Flinx leaves Repler on his ship Teacher, Porsupah gets drunk, while Mal and Kitty start a romantic relationship.

Bloodhype

This story follows Donata, daughter of a wealthy noble in 1592. VENICE, ITALY 1592. Donata Mocenigo, daughter to one of the city''s noble families, leads a life of wealthy privilege. But constrained by the strict rules of etiquette a young noblewoman must observe, she longs to throw off her veil and wander freely around the vibrant city she can see only from her balcony. So Donata comes up with a daring plan to escape the palazzo and explore - a plan that will change her own and her family''s lives for ever. Donata Mocenigo is the daughter of a wealthy Venetian noble family; but chages at her lack of freedom. Eventually she and her sisters conspire to let her dress up as a poor boy, and wander the city freely - her twin sister, Laura, taking her place around the household. On her first visit outside her palazzo, she injures her foot, wanders into the Jewish Ghetto, and meets a young man called Noé, who helps her and gives her a pair of shoes, in return for her working off the debt for him at a printers'' workshop, copying out handbills. Donata does so for a month, getting closer to Noé. Meanwhile, at home, she and Laura persuade their father to allow them to join their brothers in tutorials - Donata begins learning to read and write, and about architecture, business and history. Laura, however, is less interested, and quits tutorials after a short time. As Donata and Laura are the second and third daughters in their family, and only the first (and sometimes second) daughter normally marries, both of them hope to find husbands instead of being sent to convents like their younger sisters, Maria and Paolina. However, during a dinnertime discussion, Donata''s father announces that he has found not one, but two husbands - one for their older sister Andriana, and one for Donata, who has been selected partly because of being so hardworking. However, since it is Laura who has been working hard in her stead while she wanders around Venice, she feels horribly guilty and decides that she cannot get married - partly from loyalty to Laura, and partly because she is falling in love with Noé. Eventually, she comes up with a plan: she writes a denunciation of herself, claiming that she has converted to Judaism, so that she will be embroiled in a scandal, withdrawn from the betrothal, and Laura can take her place. In the process her family discover that she has been leaving the palazzo, alone, but eventually the plan does succeed. Donata has no idea what her future will hold, but eventually her father reveals that her tutor, Messer Zonico, has gone to the University of Padua to persuade them to allow her to take up the doctorate course in philosophy. Donata is overjoyed, and hope to become a tutor like the one she admires someday, to other noble girls.

Daughter of Venice

The novel is narrated by Grace Strasser-Mendana, an American expatriate who married into one of the three or four families that dominate Boca Grande politics, the Mendanas. Grace was trained as an anthropologist under Claude Lévi-Strauss, and later took up the amateur study of biochemistry, both attempts to find clear-cut, scientific answers to the mysteries of human behavior. Both attempts fail: Grace remains uncomprehending and cut off from the people around her, and in the final line of the novel she admits, "I have not been the witness I wanted to be." But Grace is not the novel''s central character. That is Charlotte Douglas, another American woman sojourning in Boca Grande, although her family ties are elsewhere. Charlotte''s beloved daughter Marin has run off with a group of Marxist radicals and taken part in an absurd act of terrorism, and in the wake of her daughter''s disappearance, Charlotte''s marriage to a crusading Berkeley lawyer (not Marin''s father), has fallen apart. A limited signed edition of this book was issued by Franklin library.

A Book of Common Prayer

Based in part on McDougall''s experience as an officer with Princess Patricia''s Canadian Light Infantry, Execution follows the fictional Canadian 2nd Rifles during the Italian campaign of 1943. Led by the flamboyant Brigadier Ian Kildare (a modern miles gloriosus, or braggart soldier), the Canadians land on Sicily where they meet with little resistance from the Italian Army, composed mostly of hapless conscripts who want no part in the war. Despite Kildare''s strict orders for his men to shoot Italian deserters on sight, the Canadians take kindly to a pair of buffoonish? Italian deserters, more notable for their culinary skills than military prowess. Impetuously, Kildare orders the Canadians to execute the Italians. The Canadians are caught between the obligation to follow orders and the sense that executing the two Italians in cold blood is ethically unjustifiable&mdash;not to mention it being a violation of the Geneva Convention. The brutal execution of the two Italians forces the Canadians to confront the ethics of warfare, now that "the enemy" is no longer a distant and faceless target. Major Bunny Bazin, the most battle-hardened and philosophical of the Canadians, voices the novel''s central theme when he states that "execution is... the ultimate degradation of man." Here the term "execution" works both literally (the killing of the Italians as a brutal act) and as a metaphor (war as a form of mass execution). The novel''s main protagonist, Lieutenant (later Major) John Adam (a semi-autobiographical foil for McDougall), is an efficient soldier and leader, who nevertheless finds "the vulture fear" inhabiting his soul after the execution of the Italians. Bound to protect and lead his men as they march through Italy, from Ortona to the Hitler Line near Monte Cassino, Adam finds himself struggling to maintain the composure fitting a commander, as an inner "horror" gnaws at his conscience (Adam''s reflections occasionally resemble those of Marlow in Joseph Conrad''s Heart of Darkness). Eventually, Adam and his men stumble on a chance to redeem themselves when one of their own comrades, Rifleman Jones, a mildly retarded but efficient infantryman, is sentenced to be executed for treason by his own army, after he falls in with a ring of corrupt soldiers who murder an American. Although everyone, including a newly promoted General Kildare, knows that "Jonesy" is a scapegoat for the real murderers, the execution must go ahead out of political expediency. Led by Adam, the men wage a tenacious campaign to have Jonesy freed, but all efforts eventually fail. When Jonesy is led out to be executed, the officer in charge of the execution faints, and Adam is forced to command the firing squad himself. Execution ends with Adam and the other men regaining a measure of their lost confidence, although Major Bazin dies on the battlefield.

Execution

Alex wrote a letter in a promotional contest for a cat food company that describes the key points in his young life mainly having to do with Little League baseball. Alexwell has played in Little League for six years, his skills in the game are so subpar he refers to himself as "really stinky" when it comes to baseball. He is constantly berated by his nemesis T.J. Stoner, a player widely-known for his incredible skill. After numerous attempts to get T.J. to leave him alone fail, Alex tries beating him in a pitching contest, at which he fails miserably. A few days later, their teams are playing a game against each other and T.J. once again tries to make Alex look foolish. During the game, Alex bunts the ball and runs to first, where T.J. is set to get him out. Desperate to stop him, he jumps up and down, screaming "BOOGA BOOGA!" He makes T.J. miss the ball, allowing him to get a double. Then he is called out by the umpire immediately after for interfering with the play at first base. Though he was thrown out, he accomplished something better than getting a double to him which was making T.J. embarrassed. When he looks like he''s going to beat Alex up, he runs home and locks himself in his room. T.J. gets a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records for beating Alex''s team. Alex, in a twist of good luck, ends up winning the contest from the cat food company that he wrote the letter to at the book''s opening. By winning, he will get to appear on a national television commercial. He leaves school that day, nervous about filming it, but eager to be a big star and hoping things will go well.

Skinnybones

This story is an example of one of the many unjust acts by both the provincial governments and the national Qajar Regime which led to the Constitutional Revolution. In the province of Quchan, the provincial governor, Asaf al-Dawlah, set a flat tax for all of the people, regardless of their income. The poor could not afford to pay this tax, due to a bad harvest, and the only way they could raise the money was to sell their daughters to the elite Turkmen or to nomads. Turkmen also began raiding the village and capturing the women. When the citizens begged for payment postponement, they were shot and killed by provincial government officials. About two hundred and fifty girls had been sold and they became known as “The Daughters of Quchan”. This incident portrays Iranian women as being “objects of traffic” and clearly speaks to the issue of poverty and the social injustice people faced under this government. The people of Quchan went to the central government to protest and ask for help. Finally an investigator was sent to Quchan, who was bribed by the provincial governor, and did not report the inequality to the central government. The citizens went back to the central government again to protest and eventually the issue was resolved. This story was published in newspapers all over Iran and caused a public outcry for social justice and a parliamentary government. Muhammad Husayn Tabataba’i, one of the most prominent philosophers of the time, was particularly irate and argued that the government was not addressing the needs of the people: "Have you not heard the tale of Quchan where they had a bad harvest last year? Each Quchani Muslim had to pay three dozen kilos of wheat in lieu of taxes. They did not have it and nobody helped them out. Instead of wheat, the local ruler took three hundred Muslim daughters, counted each daughter for three dozen kilos of wheat, and sold them to the Turkmens. Some of the daughters were separated from their mothers while they were asleep, because the poor souls would not consent to be separated. Now tell me in all fairness! Can you imagine a worse oppression? Every place is in ruins."(88) It also showed how effective newspapers were at relaying information across the country as many Iranians sympathized for those in Quchan and would join the cause in protesting for a constitutional government. Asaf al-Dawlah and many of his high-ranking officials were put on trial under the new regime in 1906 and there were multiple efforts made to get the girls back from the Turkmens. While some girls were rescued and brought back to their paternal families, the majority of girls were not found. “The Daughters of Quchan” is one of many events which were instrumental to promoting the Constitutional Revolution as the Iranian citizens began to realize that they were tired of living under an oppressive government.

The Story of the Daughters of Quchan

Melanie "Mel" Stryder is one of the surviving rebel humans left after the invasion of the "Souls", parasitic aliens which take over human bodies, erasing the original occupants. Wanderer is a Soul who has lived on eight other planets previously, Mel being her ninth body host. She was inserted under emergency conditions, with the intent of using her to access any information Melanie might have about other free humans like Mel''s brother and boyfriend. This investigation is headed by an individual identified only as "The Seeker", who pressures Wanderer to produce information, and views her with implied contempt for her failure to do so. Melanie remains partially conscious despite her infestation, an aberration for which Wanderer feels some shame, and no small amount of concern. She bombards Wanderer with her memories and emotions, and Wanderer develops emotional connections of her own to both Melanie''s former lover and her brother. When enough information arises for her to find them, rather than report it to the Seeker, Wanderer sets out on her own to find them, nearly dying in the desert before Melanie''s uncle, Jeb, finds her. He brings her into his hideout, a complex of caves containing more than two dozen free humans who survive by scavenging from distant cities. Jeb is unwilling to kill her because her host body is a relative, so she remains in the caves, where she has to deal with the antagonism and distrust of most of the group, including Jared, Mel''s boyfriend. She eventually develops feelings for several of the humans, in particular Ian O''Shea who becomes a constant protector and friend. Her help and support with a dying member of the group makes the others view her more sympathetically. Only a few humans maintain their dislike of her, notably Ian''s brother Kyle, who makes at least one attempt of her life, for which he is threatened with expulsion from the group. Wanderer''s peaceful life with the group is disturbed by the realization that the humans have not given up on reclaiming those the Souls have enslaved; by experimenting with ways of removing Souls from their hosts, both always die in the process. Severely traumatized upon discovering the remains of extracted souls, she enters a period of mourning, withdrawing from the group. She is only roused by news that Jamie is injured and has developed a serious infection. She and Jared sneaking out of the complex together to seek medicine at a Soul-run hospital, using Wanderer''s credibility as a Soul to gain access. After this, she becomes a regular participant in scavenging missions. When the Seeker is captured for getting too close to the caves, Wanderer finally reveals the method of detaching a Soul without killing the host. This allows them to rescue several friends and family members taken by the Souls, including Kyle''s girlfriend. She reveals the technique to the group''s medic, on the condition that he not harm the Souls after they are removed, and that she also be removed from Melanie and be buried. The latter condition proves controversial, especially with Ian, who forcibly takes her to his cave where he confesses his love for her. However Wanderer, undeterred, sneaks away after he falls asleep to complete her plan. She is removed, but awakens in the body of a girl who had not had a chance to develop a personality, since the Soul "Pet" was inserted during her childhood. Kyle''s girlfriend turns out to have been utterly destroyed in the insertion, and he develops a relationship with the Soul in her body instead. Wanderer''s association with the humans continues. In the final scene this is revealed to not be a unique situation, when they meet another group with a human-sympathizing Soul. The ending is a setup for a second book, although one is not yet in the works (2012).

The Host

The Brave Bulls is the story of Luis Bello, "The Swordsman of Guerreras", the greatest matador in Mexico, who is at the top of his profession, with everything that comes with it, money, a mistress, family and friends, bravado, the crowds are infatuated with him. But one day fear changes everything, he suddenly feels a fear that previously he had not felt in the invincibility that comes with healthy-macho-youth. His best friend and manager, Raul Fuentes, is killed in a car crash along with Luis''s mistress, Linda de Calderon, after Linda and Raul had spent a romantic weekend together. This betrayal shakes Luis''s beliefs about what has been real and what is real now. Now Luis must deal with these new found feelings while at the same time facing the most feared bulls in all of Mexico, "the brave bulls". In his first fight after the auto accident he is gored by a bull because of the doubt and guilt that has come into the ring with him. In addition, while under the influence of Tequila, and some pressure from ring promoter Eladio Gomez, he agreed to let his younger brother Pepe fight these top bulls with him. Luis must now examine his life to find out where the courage comes from and if he can get it back.

The Brave Bulls

In the future, Earth has been devastated by war and disease and supports only a primitive agrarian society. Most Earthmen live elsewhere, as émigrés on planets that are populated by alien species. The author suggests that the human species is the only one plagued by "original sin", i.e. by an innate tendency to lie, cheat, kill; aliens have come to accept these traits without understanding them. The story takes place among a group of humans in the "Earth Quarter", a ghetto on the planet Palu that is populated by an insect-like alien race called the Niori. The story opens with a visit by a representative of a political group, the "Minority People''s League", which endorses the return of humans to their ancestral planet and accommodation with the aliens. The envoy is attacked and murdered by a group of thugs who see all aliens as inferior to humans and who seek retribution for humans'' second-class status. Their leader, Rack, commandeers a space ship and convinces a group from the Quarter to follow him as he establishes a new colony on an uninhabited planet. Instead, Rack puts them to work building "total-conversion bombs" and begins a campaign of using the bombs to destroy the suns of alien solar systems (hence the "sun saboteurs" of the title). Eventually Rack is stopped by a fleet of galactic (alien) ships, but he barely escapes and returns to Palu. The humans murder him, but are nevertheless forced by the Niori to leave. At the story''s close, the humans are preparing to board a ship for Earth.

The Sun Saboteurs

Tony Miglione and his working-class family live in Jersey City, New Jersey. When his older brother Ralph and his wife Angie announce they are having a baby but lack money to care for the child, Tony''s parents offer to help. Both of Tony''s parents work extra shifts to try and raise enough money. Tony''s father, an electrician who tries his hand at inventing in his spare time, is inspired to invent wireless electrical cartridges, which he then patents and sells to a large company called J.W. Fullerbach Electronics. Mr. Miglione is then made a plant manager for a Fullerbach factory which will manufacture his invention. This new job brings to the Miglione family a large increase in wealth and a move from Jersey City to Rosemont, New York, a fictitious affluent Long Island town where Tony has to deal with sudden changes coinciding with his growing into adolescence—his mother is becoming a social-climbing phony, his brother quits teaching and ends up going into the family business, and his grandmother (unable to speak since the removal of her larynx due to cancer and a woman who enjoyed housework) is no longer permitted to cook or clean because the family has hired a housekeeper. Add to this the emotional upheaval that comes with puberty while his new friend Joel Hoober acts obnoxiously, makes prank phone calls and has a tendency to shoplift. Tony is also a secret Peeping Tom, watching Joel''s gorgeous sister, Lisa, undress from his bedroom window. He later asks for a set of binoculars too, for Christmas, under the guise of becoming a bird watcher, while they are obviously for him to view Lisa more clearly. Besides dealing with the move and his feelings about Lisa Hoober, Tony experiences anxiety attacks, which mainly strike when Joel commits a misdeed and Tony feels he cannot betray his friend and tell anyone. Joel''s shoplifting is a major catalyst for these attacks, and one is so great it sends Tony into a state of shock and results in his immediate hospitalization. Tony''s parents also arrange for him to meet with a psychologist (although his mother initially is against it, claiming he has no problems) who eventually gains Tony''s trust. The therapy seems to be a great success for Tony. Later it is revealed that Tony has lost a measure of respect for his older brother, Ralph, when he learns that Ralph will be giving up teaching to go into his father''s business. In Jersey City, Ralph had been known among his friends as "The Wizard of Seventh Grade Social Studies," and was a popular junior high school teacher. Tony does not believe Ralph is scientifically oriented, like their deceased brother Vinnie was, and is giving up his true calling to follow the same social-climbing path as his parents. Ralph rationalizes his job change in that he wishes to provide for his daughter and future children. Tony thinks to himself it does not take that much money to raise a child, and it runs the risk of spoiling those children and in turn may end up worse as a result of being raised in such an affluent environment, as he has seen firsthand with Joel''s lack of parental oversight and the idea the Hoobers are doing their jobs solely by providing a fancy home life for him. While leaving a store one day, Joel is stopped by one of the store''s security guards. Joel immediately denies stealing anything and looks to Tony to corroborate the story: Tony refuses and Joel is apprehended. Joel later tells Tony that his punishment for shoplifting isn''t very harsh in terms of the law but he''ll have to go to a military academy when school starts again. Surprisingly, Joel doesn''t seem to blame Tony for this outcome. In the end, Tony finds a certain amount of peace as he accepts his life with help of his counselor. He also resolves to put away his binoculars to stop his voyeurism, but also notes wryly, "Then again, maybe I won''t."

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

Promises in Death

By Nora Roberts

The Ghost Road

By Pat Barker

Bloodhype

By Alan Dean Foster

Daughter of Venice

By Donna Jo Napoli

A Book of Common Prayer

By Joan Didion

Execution

No Author Listed

Skinnybones

By Barbara Park

The Story of the Daughters of Quchan

No Author Listed

The Host

By Stephenie Meyer

The Brave Bulls

By Thomas C. Lea, III

The Sun Saboteurs

By Damon Knight

Then Again, Maybe I Won't

By Judy Blume