Gordon Reeve, a former SAS soldier, receives a phone call in his home in Scotland, informing him that his brother Jim has been found dead in a car in San Diego - the car being locked from the inside, and the gun still in Jim''s hand. While in the USA to identify the body, Gordon realises that his brother was murdered, and that the police is more than reluctant to follow any lead. Retracing Jim''s final hours, he connects Jim''s death with his work as a journalist, investigating a multinational chemical corporation. Soon, Gordon finds himself under surveillance, and decides to find out more among Jim''s acquaintances back in Europe. In London, he finds more hints, but no evidence for his brother''s sources. After returning to his wife and son, he finds that his home has been bugged by professionals. Sending his wife and son to a relative, he determines to take on his enemy on his own. Interestingly, there are two parties after him: The multinational corporation, represented by "Jay", a renegade SAS member, and an international investigation corporation, somehow connected with the case. Traveling to France, in order to find out more from a journalist colleague of Jim''s, they are attacked by a group of professional killers under orders from Jay, resulting in multiple deaths, and leading to Gordon becoming a police target. Gordon decides to return to the USA, where he infiltrates the investigation corporation, and learns more about the history of the case. Then he travels to San Diego, to collect more evidence, and eventually returns to England, deliberately leaving a trail for Jay. Their long enmity leads Jay to follow Gordon to Scotland, where Gordon kills him and his team in a final showdown. Gordon manages to locate Jim''s hidden journalistic material, hopefully clearing Jim''s and his own name.

Blood Hunt

The protagonist is a fictional character named Nicholas Garrigan, a young Scottish doctor who goes to work in Uganda out of a sense of idealism and adventure. He relates how he came to be the personal physician and confidant of Amin, the president of Uganda from his coup d''état in 1971 until his deposition in 1979. The novel focuses on Garrigan''s relationship and fascination with the president, who soon grows into a brutal and ruthless dictator. Garrigan acts repeatedly against his better judgment, remaining in Amin''s employment until he is far past the point of easy escape physically or morally. He is gradually drawn into the corruption and paranoia of Amin''s rule, including the expulsion of the Asians, with disastrous results for those around him. Drawing on his twenty years of living in Africa and his background as a journalist, Foden researched the events surrounding Amin''s rise to power and downfall. He interviewed many of those who watched and participated in the Ugandan ruler''s eight-year reign. The author evokes the form of a memoir by inserting fictional newspaper articles and journal entries, along with actual events. In a 1998 interview with the online magazine Boldtype, Foden said he based parts of Garrigan''s character on an associate of Amin named Bob Astles. As a British soldier who worked his way into Amin''s favour, Astles was much more "proactive" than Garrigan, according to Foden. He paid the price by spending six and a half years in a Ugandan jail after the fall of his protector. Astles compromised himself by his direct association with Amin''s security forces. While Amin was in power, Astles was alternately either favoured or punished; he was imprisoned and tortured on at least one occasion. Amin''s personal physician was, in fact, a Ugandan doctor called Paul D''Arbela. The title of the book refers to Amin declaring himself as the King of Scotland.

The Last King of Scotland

Donald Duk is a twelve-year-old Chinese-American. He is the son of a Chinese chef father named King Duk, and a Chinese mother named Daisy Duk. Donald has two older twin sisters named Penelope and Venus Duk. From the start of the book we are told how embarrassed Donald is of his name and of being introduced with his family. The story begins with Donald comparing himself to Fred Astaire. Donald believes he dances as well as Fred and throughout the novel considers himself the real "Chinese Fred Astaire" (91). Donald immerses himself in old black-and-white movies, and especially admires Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers films. He envies the way "everyone" adores Fred when he dances. Donald wishes he could "live the late-night life in old black-and-white movies and talk with his feet like Fred Astaire, and smile Fred Astaire''s sweet lemonade smile" (1). Donald Duk''s father, King, feels Donald dreams too much in black-and-white, wanting to become as American as possible. Donald is ashamed of the way his family rejects American culture and that even when they watch television "they make everybody on the TV look Chinese!" (91). Donald does not want to be like them, he considers himself American because he was born in America. Donald''s father tells him, "I think Donald Duk may be the very last American-born Chinese-American boy to believe you have to give up being Chinese to be an American" (42). As Donald and his family welcome the Chinese New Year, Donald''s best friend, Arnold Azalea, stays over at Donald''s home in Chinatown in order to observe Chinese culture and celebrate the new year. On the first day of the New Year, Donald''s family begins to talk about Chinese immigrants working on the Central Pacific Railroad end of the Transcontinental Railroad. Donald begins to have dreams of being a part of the Chinese men that built that railroad. Every night he dreams of the days getting closer to the Chinese men finishing and ending up at Promontory Summit. As these dreams progress, he is inspired to research the work the Chinese immigrants put into this track laying and found no credit had been given to the Chinese immigrants in American history books. Suddenly Donald finds himself claiming that white people are racists. Upon reaching this conclusion, King tells his son that not all white people are racist and that up to that point, Donald was the one that was ashamed of who he was. Donald realizes he can be American born and be influenced by his Chinese heritage.

Donald Duk

Rayford Steele, Chloe Steele, Buck Williams and Bruce Barnes find themselves left behind. This group of believers, as well as others left behind but becoming believers, are otherwise known as "Tribulation Saints", to differentiate from the pre-Rapture designation of Christian. The question of what to do in response to this radical change in situation arises. They propose to fight the perceived threat that Antichrist Nicolae Carpathia poses in the form of eradicating all religion and establishing a single world religion. The dogma consists that "there is no heaven nor hell, just [the left-behind]." In addition, Nicolae twisted the message of world-famous rabbi Tsion Ben-Judah about Messiah, in order to point to himself as thus. Buck flies to Jerusalem to meet Ben-Judah and present him to the two witnesses (described in Revelation) stationed at the United Nations-blockaded Wailing Wall. He converts to Christianity, believing that Jesus is the one and only Messiah; thus disproving Carpathia. During the prophesied eighteen months of peace following the covenant with Israel, Chloe and Buck are married, along with Rayford and new believer Amanda White. However, both Buck, who becomes publisher of Global Community Weekly, formerly Global Weekly, and Rayford, who is handpicked to pilot Carpathia’s jet, are in the distressing position of watching Carpathia, now Supreme Potentate of the U.N. - now reorganized into the Global Community- strengthen his grip on the world, witnessing how he orchestrates World War III to bring the former world powers under his heel and how he bamboozles Israeli botanist Chaim Rosenzweig into giving the GC his illustrious Eden formula for a GC-guaranteed peace treaty with Israel, thus initiating the Tribulation. As World War III breaks out, the Tribulation Force suffers its first casualty in the death of their pastor, Bruce Barnes, who was killed in a bombing in the now-decimated city of Chicago.

Tribulation Force

Jerome Branch Corbell has incurable cancer and is cryogenically frozen in the year 1970 in the faint hope of a future cure. His body is revived in 2190 by an oppressive, totalitarian global government called "The State". His personality and memories are extracted (destroying his body in the process) and transferred into the body of a mindwiped criminal. After he is awakened, he is continually evaluated by Peerssa, a "checker", who has to decide whether he is worth keeping. With the threat of mindwiping looming over his head, Corbell works hard to pass the various tests. Peerssa decides that Corbell is a loner and born tourist. This makes him an ideal candidate to be the pilot and sole passenger of a Bussard ramjet, whose mission is to find and seed suitable planets as the first step to terraforming them. Disgusted with the State''s treatment of him as an expendable commodity, Corbell hijacks the ship and takes it to the centre of the galaxy. It was at this point that the original short story ended. Peerssa tries to talk him out of it, but fails. Peerssa and The State resort to subterfuge; an artificial intelligence program based on Peerssa''s personality is secretly transferred into the ship''s computer by way of the conversations. Though the Peerssa AI opposes the detour, it cannot disobey Corbell''s direct orders. After a lengthy journey (including a close approach to the super-massive black hole at the galactic axis), possible only due to the suspended animation devices on board, Corbell returns to the solar system. Although only hundreds of years have passed on the ship, three million years have elapsed on Earth, due to relativistic time dilation. At first, he is confused and initially believes they might have come to the wrong system because it has changed considerably; the Sun has apparently evolved into a red giant and Earth is now in orbit around a super-hot Jupiter. Corbell and Peerssa eventually find that the solar system has been engineered into this new configuration in order to move the Earth to a habitable distance from the enlarged Sun, but this revelation only comes later in the book. Corbell puts the ship into orbit around the Earth. The Earth''s climate has changed, despite its new location in orbit around Jupiter. Among the most important changes is the increased surface temperature; the poles are temperate, while the former temperate zones reach temperatures of over 50 degrees Celsius (120+ degrees Fahrenheit). The Earth''s axial tilt is still 23.5 degrees so the poles experience 6 years of night and 6 years of day. Almost all remaining life on Earth has adapted to live in Antarctica. Elsewhere life is extinct except for some evidence of biological activity in the Himalayan mountains. When Corbell lands (in a modified biological probe), he is captured by Mirelly-Lyra, who is also a returned star ship pilot and refugee from the past—though from Corbell''s (and Peerssa''s) future. She explains that the human species has fragmented; it is dominated by a race of immortal, permanently pre-adolescent males (the Boys), who are created by advanced medical techniques. Some time in the past, they had defeated the equally immortal (though now extinct) Girls, in the ultimate war of the sexes. The Boys have enslaved the dikta, who are unmodified humans (though they have evolved somewhat), from whom they take boys to replenish their ranks. A starship pilot, Mirelly-Lyra had initially been a captive toy of the Girls. After their downfall, she had spent her time obsessively searching in vain for the lost adult-immortality treatment, while extending her life as much as possible using her own drugs and a form of zero-time stasis with which she waited for another returning star ship and potential help. Because she could not stop the aging process entirely, she is an old crone by the time she finds Corbell. He manages to escape from her, only to be caught by the Boys, who take him to a dikta settlement. With Gording, the dikta leader, he escapes once more. Eventually, Corbell discovers the adult-immortality treatment, albeit by accident and only realizing it after he himself has been exposed to it. He uses it to enlist Mirelly-Lyra''s help, which in turn finally gives him full control of his ship''s technology (the hostile Peerssa has decided that the woman is the last survivor of the State and will only obey her). The planet Uranus has been discovered to have been maneuvered to pass by the Earth and adjust its orbit by Peerssa the AI. Corbell arranges for the Earth''s distance from the super-heated Jupiter to be adjusted by Peersa to lower the Earth''s temperature without destroying the plants and animals that have adapted to the extreme conditions. As the novel closes, he is plotting to liberate the dikta and enable them to regain control of their own destiny.

A World Out of Time

Firestar''s Quest takes place between The Darkest Hour and Midnight. The novel follows Firestar, leader of ThunderClan on a journey to find a fifth lost Clan of the forest called SkyClan. Firestar and his mate Sandstorm journey upriver in order to rebuild the long-lost Clan. When they arrive at the Clan''s former home, they meet Skywatcher, (the remaining survivor of SkyClan), who tells them about SkyClan''s story, and shows them the Whispering Cave, they also find SkyClan''s old home deserted, the caves strangely marked with tiny claw marks resembling those of rats. Firestar gathers together Leafdapple, Sparrowpelt, Sharpclaw, Echosong, Rainfur, Petalnose, Clovertail, Patchfoot, Shortwhisker, Cherrytail, Sagekit, Mintkit, Tinypaw, Rockpaw, and Bouncepaw. Eventually, Firestar re-establishes the Clan and helps the Clan fight the force that destroyed the ancient SkyClan: rats. Though SkyClan emerges victorious, the warrior Rainfur is murdered and Firestar loses his second life. As Firestar and Sandstorm prepare to return home, Leafdapple is made the leader and renamed Leafstar in the Whispering Cave, which is used to connect to the SkyClan ancestors. Sharpclaw is made deputy of the Clan, and Echosong becomes the medicine cat. In the epilogue, Sandstorm and Firestar''s new kits are born. They decide to name one Squirrelkit (after her bushy tail), and the other Leafkit (in honor of SkyClan''s new leader, Leafstar, and after Spottedleaf). SkyClan blood runs through ThunderClan in cats such as Spottedleaf from Spottedpelt and Tigerclaw from Gorseclaw. Before Firestar left the forest, a whole series of events happened that weren''t shown in the The New Prophecy. Such events included the warrior Longtail losing his sight because a rabbit clawed his eyes, Willowpelt being killed by a badger, and Bramblepaw receiving his warrior name Brambleclaw. warrior ceremony. Also, Sootpaw got a new mentor, Thornclaw. This book is also the origin of the prophecy "There will be three, kin of your kin who holds the power of the stars in their paws." The prophecy was passed on to Firestar by Skywatcher.

Firestar''s Quest

The book includes contributions from twenty-two academics in the field of philosophy. Topics include issues of sexuality involved in depicting Saddam Hussein and Satan as gay lovers, existentialism as applied to the death of Kenny, and a debate about whether feminists can enjoy the show due to some of its misogynistic characters. The contributors to the work utilize philosophical concepts derived from Plato, Aristotle, Freud and Sartre and place them in a South Park context. The book''s contributors all attempted to analyze the philosophical and cultural aspects of South Park in the work. One of the authors, David Koepsell, wrote about the controversial episode dealing with Scientology, entitled: "Trapped in the Closet". Koepsell cited the fact that the series won a Peabody Award due to its willingness to criticize intolerance in April 2006 as a "special concern for criticizing and countering intolerance", and the notion that "the Church of Scientology suffers from the widely held perceptions that it seeks to silence former members and others who criticize its beliefs and practices" as the motivation behind the episode. Koepsell analyzed Comedy Central''s reaction to the episode itself, in a section of his book entitled "2005-2006: Comedy Central Caves". He mentions South Park''s usage of the onscreen caption "this is what Scientologists actually believe." in the episode, noting that the same device was used in the episode "All About the Mormons?." In referencing this similar use of the onscreen caption device, Koepsell seemed to point to an inconsistency in the behavior of Comedy Central relative to the episode. He explained "By a long shot, this show was more kind to Scientology than was "All About the Mormons" to Mormonism." He noted Comedy Central had suggested it would not rebroadcast the episode for the second time, though it later announced on July 12, 2006 that it would. The book can thus be summed up in the following sentence: "Perhaps the truth is in the middle."

South Park and Philosophy: You Know, I Learned Something Today

The book is about a story that a kindly and elderly grandfather tells to his grandchildren about the town of Chewandswallow, where the weather comes three times a day, at breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and is always food and beverages. The rain is juice and soup, the snow is ice cream, and the wind brings hamburgers. Because of this phenomenon, there are no grocery stores. However, the weather soon takes a turn for the worse, at first simply just giving the people disgusting things, like pea soup fog, soggy green beans and Brussels sprout cakes. However, it quickly becomes catastrophic, and the portion sizes of the food grow to massive sizes, and the entire island is bombarded with a severe amount of food that completely buries buildings, crushes homes and blocks traffic. The people decide to use stale bread and pizza to build boats to escape from Chewandswallow, while they still have a chance before the weather completely destroys the island. Soon, the population of Chewandswallow arrive in a new town, where they struggle to adapt to their new lives in the world where the sky doesn''t bring food.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

Tintin, a reporter for Le Petit Vingtième, and his dog Snowy are sent on an assignment to the Soviet Union. Departing from Brussels, his train is blown up en route to Moscow by an agent of the Soviet secret police, the OGPU, who believes him to be a "dirty little bourgeois". Tintin is blamed for the bombing by the Berlin police but escapes to the border of the Soviet Union. Here he is brought before the local Commissar''s office, where the same OGPU agent that tried to kill Tintin on the train secretly instructs the Commissar that they must make the reporter "disappear... accidentally". After escaping again, Tintin finds "how the Soviets fool the poor idiots who still believe in a Red Paradise", by burning bundles of straw and clanging metal in order to trick visiting English Marxists into believing that Soviet factories are productive, when in fact they are not even operational. Tintin goes on to witness a local election, where the Bolsheviks aim their guns at the voters to ensure their own electoral success. Several Bolsheviks then come to arrest him during the night, but he manages to scare them off by dressing up as a ghost. Attempting to make his way out of the Soviet Union, he is pursued and arrested, before being threatened with torture. Escaping his captors, he reaches Moscow, which Tintin remarks has been turned into "a stinking slum" by the Bolsheviks; he then witnesses a government official handing out bread to those homeless children who adhere to the Marxist ideology and denying it to those who do not. Snowy steals a loaf and gives it to a boy who was refused it. Then sneaking into a secret Bolshevik meeting, Tintin learns that all the Soviet grain is being exported abroad for propaganda purposes, leaving the people starving, and that the government plan to "organise an expedition against the kulaks, the rich peasants, and force them at gunpoint to give us their corn." Tintin infiltrates the Soviet army and warns some of the kulaks to hide their grain from the army officials, but is caught and sentenced to death by firing squad. By planting blanks in the soldiers'' rifles, Tintin fakes his death and is able to make his way into the snowy wilderness, where he discovers an underground Bolshevik hideaway in a haunted house. Here he is captured by a Bolshevik who informs him that "You''re in the hideout where Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin have collected together wealth stolen from the people!" With the help of Snowy, Tintin escapes, commandeers a plane, and flies into the night. The plane crashes, but Tintin fashions himself a new propeller from a tree using a pen knife, and continues to Berlin, where he gets drunk and passes out. Captured by OGPU agents yet again, he is locked in a dungeon, but escapes with the aid of Snowy, who has dressed himself in a tiger costume. Another attempt to kidnap him is foiled when he manages to capture his assailant, an OGPU agent who "intends to blow up all the capitals of Europe with dynamite". Finally, Tintin arrives back in Brussels to a huge popular reception.

Tintin in the Land of the Soviets

Thanks to a computer error, Tom Carmody, an unlucky civil servant, wins the main prize of the Galactic Lottery. Being a human from the Earth, he doesn''t even reach the level of the 32nd class creature, therefore he doesn''t possess galactic status and shouldn''t even be eligible. However, he obtains the Prize before the mistake is found out and is allowed to keep it. That''s when his adventure begins, since, not being a space-traveling creature, he has no homing instinct that can guide him back to Earth, and so the galactic lottery organizers cannot transport him home. At the same time, his removal from his home environment has caused, by the ''universal law of predation'', a predatory entity to spring in to existence that perpetually pursues and aims to destroy him. So Carmody is forced to be on the run, and with the help of his Prize meets several well-meaning (but usually not very competent) aliens that attempt to find where, when and which Earth he belongs on. He ends up transporting from Earth to Earth: different phases and realities of his planet, which of course, is not in the time or condition he expects it to be.

Dimension of Miracles

An anonymous inventor sends copies of the "Gismo" through the mail to hundreds of people. Civil society immediately collapses; as one news commentator says: "The big question today is: Have you got a Gismo? And believe me, nothing else matters." The story jumps to the year 2149: the society we know has been replaced by a society of wealthy minority supported by slavery. Access to Gismos is jealously guarded by a handful of strong men. The story is told through the eyes of Dick Jones, the son of the leader of Buckhill, a compound in the Poconos. Jones is coming of age and is about to be sent to Eagles, another, larger compound in the Rocky Mountains, for military training. Jones is initially presented as an unsympathetic character: spoiled, impulsive, hot-headed. In his final day at Buckhill, he picks a fight with a cousin, who challenges Dick to a duel; Dick kills him, and has to be ushered away in secret the following morning to avoid retribution. Jones arrives at Eagles, a fabulous city built into a mountain. Like Buckhill, Eagles is run as a slave society; but Jones is startled to realize that the Gismo is used to duplicate slaves, and that the most trusted slaves have been copied hundreds of times. Status among citizens is determined by social connections, and, for males, by skill at hand-to-hand combat. The author takes care to show us the seamy side of Eagles; for instance, the Boss relaxes by dropping slaves from the top of a tall tower and watching them plunge to their death via closed-circuit television. There are hints from Jones''s father in Buckhill that the slaves are contemplating revolt. In Eagles, Jones is introduced to a secret society that debates the merits of the slave culture and that plans a revolution, with the collaboration of a disaffected member of the ruling family. Jones is enthralled by the arguments he hears. But before the revolution can be put into action, the slaves revolt, killing most of the free citizens in Eagles and Buckhill, including Jones''s family. Jones is forced to choose between his allegiance to kin and his yearning for a better society.

A for Anything

The book starts with Bryson explaining his curiosity at the Appalachian Trail near his house. He and his old friend Stephen Katz start hiking the trail from the state of Georgia in the south, and stumble in the beginning with the difficulties of getting used to their equipment; Bryson also soon realizes how difficult it is to travel with his friend, who is a crude, overweight recovering alcoholic, and even less prepared for the ordeal than he is. Overburdened, they soon discard much extra food and equipment to lighten their loads. After hiking for what seemed to him a large distance, they realize they have still barely begun while in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, and that the whole endeavor is simply too much for them. They skip a huge section of the trail, beginning again in Roanoke, Virginia. The book recounts Bryson''s desire to seek easier terrain as well as "a powerful urge not to be this far south any longer." This section of the hike finally ends (after nearly of hiking) with Bryson going on a book tour and Katz returning to Des Moines to work. In the following months Bryson continues to hike several smaller parts of the trail, including a visit to Centralia, an environmentally poisoned mining town in Pennsylvania, and eventually reunites with Katz to hike the Hundred Mile Wilderness in Maine, which again proves too daunting. The fact that Bryson did not complete the trail is not surprising since fewer than 25% of thru-hike attempts are successful; he quotes the older figure of 10%.

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

Blood Hunt

By Ian Rankin

The Last King of Scotland

By Giles Foden

Donald Duk

By Frank Chin

Tribulation Force

By Tim LaHaye

A World Out of Time

By Larry Niven

Firestar's Quest

By Cherith Baldry

South Park and Philosophy: You Know, I Learned Something Today

No Author Listed

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

By Judi Barrett

Tintin in the Land of the Soviets

By Hergé

Dimension of Miracles

By Robert Sheckley

A for Anything

By Damon Knight

A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail

By Bill Bryson