A honeymooning couple, John and Rae Ingram, rescue a young man, Hughie, from a sinking boat who claims to have lost his companions to food poisoning. When John goes to inspect the sinking boat, he discovers the captain, Russ, and another woman, Mrs. Warriner, alive and begging for help. Discovering that John has left, Hughie panics, takes Rae hostage, and begins driving her boat away from the sinking ship. On board the sinking ship, John learns that Hughie and Mrs. Warriner and Russ and his wife, Mrs. Bellows, were vacationing when Hughie suffered an agoraphobic reaction while diving with Mrs. Bellows and accidentally killed her trying to climb onto her shoulders. The realization of what he''d done resulted in Hughie suffering a psychotic break. Mrs. Warriner further tells John that Hughie, though a gifted artist, has the mind of a child, his emotional growth having been stunted by his overbearing father and a codependent relationship with an inappropriately affectionate mother. On board the Ingram''s boat, Rae is able to surmise this herself from Hughie''s behavior and assumes the role of a caring mother figure in order to lull him into a false sense of security, while preparing to kill him with a shotgun John has stashed in their room. Ultimately, John and Russ are able to sufficiently repair their boat and rendezvous with Hughie and Rae. When everyone is reunited, Hughie suffers a flashback and sees Russ as his father and knocks him overboard. Hughie suffers a panic attack in the water and seizes up, and drags Russ below water where they both drown. John gives a sympathetic psychological analysis of Hughie as he, Rae, and Mrs. Warriner see that a new wind has come in that will take them all home.

Dead Calm

In the middle of a New England winter, the boys accidentally disturb an experiment in their parents'' lab. A sonic boom - a blast of heat - and the boys find they have been transported to a vast, trackless desert which is shaken by periodic earthquakes. Providentially, they encounter a water prospector named Japheth who offers to help them find refuge at the nearest oasis. Sandy and Dennys are intrigued by the creatures which accompany them on their trip through this (as they initially assume) alien world, which include a two-foot-tall mammoth; a pair of unicorns which appear simultaneously to be, and not to be; and humans much shorter than the brothers are. After a long ride through the desert during which they develop a severe case of heat stroke, the boys are separated when the unicorn Dennys is riding disappears. Sandy remains with Japheth and his elderly grandfather Lamech and is tended to by a variety of improbable beings, including a pelican. Dennys reappears in another tent, only to be bodily thrown into a refuse heap. Now seriously ill, he comes under the care of a friendly family with a large tent in the center of the oasis, headed by a gruff but kindly patriarch. As he recovers from his "sun-sickness", Dennys learns that his benefactor is in fact Japheth''s father and Lamech''s son - and his name is Noah. It soon becomes apparent that the boys have been transported back to Biblical times, just before the Great Flood. The pelican, scarab beetle and lion turn out to be the animal hosts of seraphim, who are surprisingly knowledgeable about quantum physics and twentieth century Earth. The nephilim, who also transform into animals, distrust the twins. They use their human wives to try to discover why Sandy and Dennys have come to the oasis, and whether they represent a threat. Separated for much of the book, the twins become more independent of each other, and learn that neither they nor reality itself is as ordinary as they previously supposed. Both gain maturity over the course of about a year in the desert with Noah and his family. They each fall in love with Noah''s daughter Yalith, but do not act on their desires. Dennys convinces Noah to reconcile with Lamech, and both twins eventually care for the old man''s gardens as they wait to discover a way home. After Lamech''s death, Sandy is kidnapped. He refuses to use violence to escape, and is eventually found by Japheth. Both twins worry that Yalith is not to be on the Ark, and neither are they. Nevertheless, they help build the Ark before returning home via flying unicorn.

Many Waters

Into a Dark Realm continues the Darkwar saga and mostly concentrates on two groups of characters. The first group consists of Pug, Magnus, Nakor and Ralan Bek who are attempting to reach the Dasati home world. The main problem facing them is that the Dasati exist on the Second Plane, the next lower plane of existence, a separate reality considered to be the first of the seven planes of hell (where the seven upper planes are considered heaven). The second group consists of Tad, Zane and Jommy who are sent into training by the Conclave of Shadows for their future as generals in the Conclave. Tad, Zane and Jommy are sent to a monastic university in Roldem, where they will undergo training and education to prepare them for their future roles with the Conclave. Upon arrival, they instantly clash with a group of boys led by a bully named Servan, who they later discover is related to the king of Roldem. Eventually, the two groups of boys are forced to work out their differences, for they are soon released from the university, and commissioned as junior officers in the Roldemish army, where they immediately begin serving together in campaigns against raiders from Roldem''s border colonies. There Tad, Zane and Jommy are reunited with Kaspar, another agent of the Conclave, who is a senior officer with the army. Meanwhile, on their journey to the Dasati realm, Pug and his companions spend time with the Ipiliac, a race related to the Dasati, on their world of Delecordia, halfway between the first and second planes. There they become acclimated to the conditions they will face in the second plane, and undergo crucial training and education to help them survive in the harsh Dasati society. As he spends more and more time closer to the second plane, Bek realizes he belongs there, easily acclimating to the nature of the plane as well as the culture, and expresses a desire to stay behind when the others return. An additional plot thread is added halfway through the novel, introducing Dasati culture as seen through the eyes of a young Dasati warrior, Valko, as he rises to become Lord of his clan, the Camareen. Unbeknownst to him at first, Valko''s family are agents of The White, a secret organization of servants of Good who oppose the Dasati''s Dark God and seek to restore balance to the Dasati. After completing their training, Pug and his companions succeed in reaching the Dasati realm, on the outer world of Kosridi, finding themselves guided by allies of Valko and The White. When they finally reach the Dasati homeworld, the leader of the Dasati resistance, known as The Gardener, is revealed to be none other than Macros the Black, reincarnated as a Dasati. They also discover that the Talnoy hidden on Midkemia contain the souls of 10,000 lost Dasati Gods, banished after the Dasati Chaos Wars. Into a Dark Realm is very much an intermediary book, setting up the final book in the trilogy, Wrath of a Mad God.

Into a Dark Realm

After the death of an elderly Greek man who is an internationally famous art dealer and collector, his attorney discovers that his will is missing and notifies the district attorney. When Inspector Richard Queen of the New York Police Force''s Homicide Squad and his amateur detective son Ellery are called in, Ellery narrows down the possible location of the will to a single location: the dead man''s coffin. When it is exhumed, however, it contains no will but the surprising addition of a strangled ex-convict. Ellery performs an extended piece of deduction in public early on in the novel that concerns a number of used teacups, and is proved wrong. Stung by this embarrassing error, he keeps his deductions to himself for the remainder of the case. Subsequent clues involve color-blindness, a shred of the burned will, two copies of a Leonardo da Vinci painting differing only in skin tone, a thousand-dollar bill, a dead art dealer whose office door was either open or closed and, most importantly, an infinitesimal typing error. Ellery and his father lay a trap, unmasking the murderer— whose guilt will probably have been entirely unsuspected by most readers.

The Greek Coffin Mystery

The Night Circus is a phantasmagorical fairy tale set near an ahistorical Victorian London in a wandering magical circus that is open only from sunset to sunrise. Le Cirque des Rêves, the Circus of Dreams, features such wonders and "ethereal enigmas" as a blooming garden made all of ice, acrobats soaring without a net, and a vertical cloud maze where patrons who get lost simply step off and float gently to the floor. The circus has no set schedule, appearing without warning and leaving without notice; they travel in a train disguised as an ordinary coal transport. A network of devoted fans styling themselves "rêveurs" ("dreamers") develops around the circus; they identify to each other by adding a splash of red to garb that otherwise matches the characteristic black and white of the circus tents. The magical nature of the circus is occluded under the guise of legerdemain; the illusionist truly transforms her jacket into a raven and the fortune teller truly reads the uncertain future, and both are applauded for their ingenuity. The circus serves a darker purpose beyond entertainment and profit. The magicians Prospero the Enchanter and the enigmatic Mr. A.H— groom their young proteges, Celia and Marco, to proxy their rivalry with the exhibits as a stage. Prospero teaches his daughter to hone her innate talents by holding ever larger and more complex magical workings in her mind. Celia takes her position on the game board as the illusionist who makes true transformations, adding tents and maintaining wondrous aspects from the inside. Mr. A.H— trains his orphan ward with books in the ways of glyphs and sympathetic magic and illusory worlds that exist only in the mind of the beholder. Marco takes a position as majordomo to the producer of the circus; he works from the outside in, connected to the circus but not a part of it. The two beguile the circus goers and each other with nightly wonders, soon falling in love despite being magically bound to a deadly competition with rules neither understands; the magical courtship strains the fate laid out for them and endangers the circus that has touched the lives of so many and cannot survive without the talents of both players.

The Night Circus

The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun is set in the World of Greyhawk. The player characters (PCs) follow a band of marauding norkers from the caverns, discovering the temple along the way. They must search through the dangerous mountain passes to find the norker lair inside the temple. The adventurers are drawn into the story by a gnomish community and travel to the temple. After battling their way in, the PCs explore the temple chambers, which contain mundane creatures and new monsters from the Fiend Folio supplement. During their exploration, the characters may reach chambers of the temple in which religious rituals were performed, and risk insanity and death as they encounter remnants of worshipers of the imprisoned god Tharizdun. To progress further, the characters must enact portions of the rituals of worship of Tharizdun, traveling into an underground sub-temple, and magically opening an inner sanctum called the Black Cyst. Having advanced this far, the characters are likely to be driven insane, killed outright, or permanently trapped within the underground temple.

Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun

The book suggests that, whereas the majority of the 5-billion people in the "developing world" are getting richer at an unprecedented rate, a group of countries (mostly in Africa and Central Asia but with a smattering elsewhere) are stuck and that development assistance should be focused heavily on them. These countries typically suffer from one or more development traps. The Conflict Trap: Civil wars (with an estimated average cost of $64bn each) and coups incur large economic costs to a country. Additionally, in the time period immediately following a major conflict, relapse is highly likely. Collier also argues that the longer a country stays in a state of conflict, the more players become established that profit from the state of tumult, making the situation increasingly intractable. The Natural Resource Trap: Countries that are rich in natural resources are paradoxically usually worse off than countries that are not. Collier attributes this to a variety of causes: * Resources make conflict for the resources more likely. * Natural resources mean that a government does not have to tax its citizens. Consequently, the citizenry are less likely to demand financial accountability from the government. * The exploitation of valuable natural resources can result in Dutch disease, where a country''s other industries become less competitive as a result of currency valuation due to the revenue raised from the resource. Landlocked with Bad Neighbours: Poor landlocked countries with poor neighbours find it almost impossible to tap into world economic growth. Collier explains that countries with coastline trade with the world, while landlocked countries only trade with their neighbors. Landlocked countries with poor infrastructure connections to their neighbors therefore necessarily have a limited market for their goods. Bad Governance in a Small Country: Terrible governance and policies can destroy an economy with alarming speed. The reason small countries are at a disadvantage is that though they may have a low cost-of-living, and therefore be ideal for labor-intensive work, their smallness discourages potential investors, who are unfamiliar with the local conditions and risks, who instead opt for better known countries like China and India. He suggests a number of relatively inexpensive but institutionally difficult changes: # Aid agencies should increasingly be concentrated in the most difficult environments, accept more risk. Ordinary citizens should not support poorly informed vociferous lobbies whose efforts are counterproductive and severely constrain what the Aid agencies can do. # Appropriate Military Interventions (such as the British in Sierra Leone) should be encouraged, especially to guarantee democratic governments against coups. # International Charters are needed to encourage good governance and provide prototypes. # Trade Policy needs to encourage free trade and give preferential access to Bottom Billion exports. The book does not include a list of bottom billion countries because Collier believes this might lead to a "self-fulfilling prophecy." However, he states that there are 58 such countries mentioned throughout the book. In his book Wars, Guns, and Votes, Collier lists the Bottom Billion, to "focus international effort": Afghanistan, Angola, Azerbaijan, Benin, Bhutan, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cambodia, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Republic of the Congo, Cote d’Ivoire, Djibouti, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Haiti, Kazakhstan, Kenya, North Korea, Kyrgyz Republic, Lao PDR, Lesotho, Liberia, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Moldova, Mongolia, Mozambique, Myanmar, Nepal, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Togo, Turkmenistan, Uganda, Uzbekistan, Yemen, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

The Bottom Billion

Ivypaw and Dovepaw get their warrior names of Ivypool and Dovewing. Icecloud falls through the shallow roof of a tunnel near where Hollyleaf was buried, and so Lionblaze and Jayfeather venture down the tunnel, only to find a tuft of fur in the spot Hollyleaf supposedly died in. This indicates that Hollyleaf may not be dead. Midway through the book, Jayfeather, Dovewing, Foxleap, and Squirrelflight visit the Tribe of Rushing Water when Jayfeather receives a dream from Rock, who insists he go to the mountains for a mysterious purpose. While there, Jayfeather is again sent into centuries before his own time, to convince the ancient Tribe ancestors to stay in the mountains, as they''re weary and very close to returning to the lake (their previous home). Jayfeather (known as "Jay''s Wing" in the ancient time he''s visiting) succeeds in the mission Rock assigned him, and even completes the most important task of all: assigning the new Stoneteller of the Tribe in the ancient times, and in his own time. He appoints Half Moon as the Stoneteller of ancient times (who he has a brief relationship with, but as expected, it does not work out) and Crag Where Eagles Nest as the Stoneteller of modern times. While in his slight relationship with Half Moon, Jayfeather is tempted to never return to his own time and stay with her to become mates. This, obviously, does not succeed as their paths are very different, with destinies too great to put aside, as Rock puts it. Meanwhile, Ivypool struggles with the Dark Forest, haunted by its darkness and trying to find out answers: mainly, when the battle of the Dark Forest and StarClan will be. Lionblaze still pursues a relationship with Cinderheart, even though Cinderheart believes that Lionblaze is to good for her so Lionblaze has no success.

Sign of the Moon

Up to this time Cornwell had been going back through the period of the Napoleonic Wars to find new incidents into which to place his hero. Rather than do this, he adopts a "prequel" approach and uses an earlier campaign period in the history of the British Army, that of colonial India. The novel opens with Richard Sharpe serving as a private with the British army, then invading Mysore and advancing on the Tippoo Sultan''s capital city of Seringapatam. Sharpe is contemplating desertion with his paramour, widow Mary Bickerstaff. His sadistic company sergeant, Obadiah Hakeswill, deliberately provokes Sharpe into attacking him, and engineers the virtual death sentence of 2,000 lashes for the private. But Sharpe is rescued by Lieutenant William Lawford after 200 lashes are inflicted, in order to effect a rescue mission behind the Tippoo''s lines. Lawford and Sharpe are ordered to pose as deserters to rescue Colonel Hector McCandless, chief of the British East India Company''s intelligence service. Although Lawford is nominally in command, Sharpe quickly dominates the lieutenant by force of personality and, without authorization, brings Mary on the mission. Joining the Tippoo''s army, they discover that the Tippoo has set a trap for the invading British by mining the weakest (and thus most inviting) portion of Seringapatam''s walls. Before Sharpe and Lawford can discover a way to transmit a warning to the British, they are betrayed by Sergeant Hakeswill. Hakeswill has been captured in battle and the Tippoo orders him made a human sacrifice for victory, but Hakeswill secures the Sultan''s mercy in exchange for revealing Sharpe''s and Lawford''s identity as spies. Sharpe and Lawford are imprisoned as the British army prepares to assault the booby-trapped wall of the city. Mary helps Sharpe to escape, and Sharpe blows up the mine before the main British army can enter the trap. As the Tippoo tries to flee the city, Sharpe finds him in a dark tunnel, kills him, and steals his rich jewels. Sharpe throws Hakeswill to the Tippoo''s tigers, but the recently fed animals ignore Hakeswill, and Sharpe''s enemy survives to plague him in later adventures.

Sharpe''s Tiger

The novel tells the story of a journey. The unnamed narrator is in his late twenties and is the son of a wealthy family, and travels south from the northern-most tip of Germany down to the Bodensee and onwards to Zürich. He is more an involuntary observer than participant in the events that unfold. He begins in Sylt and heads through Hamburg, Frankfurt, Heidelberg, Munich, Meersburg, and finally Zürich. In each of these places he has experiences with decadent excesses in the form of alcohol, drugs, and sexual encounters. These excesses are not enjoyed by the participants, but are more an expression of their hopelessness. The protagonist sees the downfall of his generation – a close friend commits suicide – and experiences his own downfall. He also reflects on unhappy memories of youth. His odyssey, which can be interpreted as either a search for meaning or a long goodbye, ends on Lake Zürich: the references to Greek mythology (Charon, Obolus, and Hades) suggest the narrator''s suicide in the middle of the lake. Another interpretation sees the crossing to the other shore as a sign of the homosexuality of the narrator. Neither has been confirmed by Kracht. The ending is left open.

Faserland

Painter Claude Lantier advocates painting real subjects in real places, most notably outdoors. This is in stark contrast to the artistic establishment, where artists painted in the studio and concentrated on mythological, historical and religious subjects. His art making is revolutionary and he has a small circle of like-minded friends equally intent on shaking up the art world and challenging the establishment. His best friends are his childhood comrades Pierre Sandoz, novelist and Louis Dubuche, an architect. Like Zola, Sandoz contemplates a series of novels about a family based in science and incorporating modern people and everyday lives. Dubuche is not half as bold as Claude and, although a painter, finds music to be his passion. He chooses a more conventional course, opting for the security of a middle-class life and a bourgeois marriage. Sandoz also pursues marriage - not for love but stability and to better understand what he is writing about. The outcry in the artistic community over the sidelining of new artists in favor of popular, established, traditional artists at the annual Salon of the Académie des Beaux-Arts leads to the creation of a Salon des Refusés for the rejected artists to display their work. No painting gathers more interest or generates more criticism than Claude''s. Entitled Plein Air (Open Air), it depicts a nude female figure in the front center and two female nudes in the background, with a fully dressed man, back to the viewer in the foreground. (Zola deliberately invokes Le déjeuner sur l''herbe by Edouard Manet, which provoked outcries at the actual Salon des Refusés in 1863.) Claude moves to the country to soak up more of the ''Open Air'' atmosphere he revelled in as a child and to create more masterpieces. Accompanying him is Christine Hallegrain, who served as the model for Claude''s nude and they have a son. Claude is unable to paint much and grows more and more depressed. For the sake of his health, Christine convinces him to return to Paris. Claude has three paintings in three years rejected by the Salon before a spectacular view of the Ile de la Cité captures his imagination. He becomes obsessed with this vision and constructs a massive canvas on which to paint his masterpiece. He is unable to project his ideas successfully or combine them into a meaningful whole. He begins adding incongruous elements (like a female nude bather), reworks and repaints until the whole enterprise collapses into disaster, then starts over. His inability to create his masterpiece deepens his depression. The slow breakup of his circle of friends contributes to his decaying mental state, as does the success of one of his confreres, a lesser talent who has co-opted the ''Open Air'' school and made it a critical and financial triumph. Christine, whom he has at last married, watches as the painting — and especially the nude — begins to destroy his soul. When their son dies, Claude is inspired to paint a picture of the dead body that is accepted by the Salon (after considerable politicking). The painting is ridiculed for its subject and its execution and Claude again turns to his huge landscape. Christine watches as he spirals further into obsession and madness. A last-ditch effort to free him from Art in general and from his wished-for masterpiece in particular has an effect but in the end Claude hangs himself from his scaffolding. The only ones of his old friends who attend his funeral are Sandoz and Bongrand, an elder statesman of the artistic community who recognized and helped nurture Claude''s genius.

L''Œuvre

The book starts off from the events at the end of The Clan of the Cave Bear detailing the life of a young Cro-Magnon woman named Ayla who has just been exiled from the Clan, the band of Neanderthals who had raised her from early childhood. Ayla now searches for her own people, whom the Clan refer to as "the Others". In a parallel narrative, Jondalar, a young Cro-Magnon man of the Ninth Cave of the Zelandonii, accompanies his impetuous younger half-brother Thonolan on a traditional rite of passage called the Great Journey. In these episodes, we learn of the Cro-Magnon''s neolithic nature religion, centered on the worship of the Great Mother of All, and follow their adventures and sexual exploits. It is also through these episodes that the animosity, verging on hatred, between the Others and the Clan (whom they refer to derogatorily as "flatheads") is introduced. The Others have repeatedly persecuted the Clan, taking land and resources, but justify it by classing them as animals. However, over the course of his adventures, Jondalar starts to question this prejudice, noting that no other animals have fire, tools or communicate intelligently, nor are they actively hated or attacked-as-sport by his people. Ayla, alone and ritually ostracized from the only people she has ever known, travels steadily from the Beran Sea peninsular home of her former tribe north for around half a year until finding the book''s titular valley sunk deep into the windy landscape of the periglacial loess steppes in Ukraine. Worried that she might never find the Others, she begins to prepare for winter. Finding a suitable cave and many conveniences in the valley, she establishes a comfortable but lonely life there. Her desire for companionship leads her to tame a filly whose mother she had killed, naming her Whinney. She also takes in and treats an injured cave lion cub, which she names Baby. In the course of their journey, Jondalar and Thonolan have met women and hope to settle with them, but Thonolan''s mate dies in childbirth and Jondalar feels he is not really in love with his woman friend. They continue on their journey and meet up with the Mamutoi people, planning to join them later in the year. Jondalar and Ayla meet when Thonolan is killed by a cave lion—Baby, now fully grown and with a mate of his own. Ayla heals Jondalar''s injuries and they begin to learn to communicate and get to know each other. Jondalar overcomes his inbred prejudice against the Clan and Ayla learns that all her peculiarities which confused and angered the Clan are actually fully accepted and encouraged by the Others. The two fall in love as the book nears its end, and decide to leave the Valley of Horses and explore regions around the valley Ayla has not yet investigated.

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

Dead Calm

By Charles Williams

Many Waters

By Madeleine L''Engle

Into a Dark Realm

By Raymond E. Feist

The Greek Coffin Mystery

By Frederic Dannay

The Night Circus

By Erin Morgenstern

Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun

By Gary Gygax

The Bottom Billion

No Author Listed

Sign of the Moon

By Erin Hunter

Sharpe's Tiger

By Bernard Cornwell

Faserland

No Author Listed

L'Œuvre

By Pierre-Louis Rey

The Valley of Horses

By Jean M. Auel