The general plot revolves around an allegedly overpopulated world and the Government’s Procrustean attempts to arrest the symptoms of population growth and scarcity amongst the Earth''s resources. In this turmoil, the democratic government has been overthrown and a totalitarian Government has been put in its place. Laws established by the regime prohibit a family from having more than two children (any more will be killed). Luke Garner, an illegal third child living with a fake ID, is going by the alias Lee Grant at the Hendricks School for Boys. Lee Grant was killed while skiing down a mountain so no one knows that he was gone except for his family. He is at first confused and paranoid, as well as treated brutally by his roommates, mainly the boy he comes to call "Jackal Boy". Eventually, Luke begins sneaking out of the school to do things, and tries to plant his own garden in the woods. This brings him great happiness and a sense that he belongs. When his garden is trampled, he realizes that other people are going outside, including Jackal Boy. He reveals himself to them, finding out that they are other illegals as well. The leader, Scott Renault (whose real name is Jason Barstow) otherwise known as Jackal Boy, is outwardly a huge admirer of Jen Talbot, Luke''s only friend who died at a rally for third children''s rights. However, the later part of the book reveals that he is a Population Police operative and is trying to get the group''s real names only to betray them. Luke is accepted into Jason''s group, but is still too frightened to give his real name. He learns more and more about Hendricks School, but never learns what his schedule is until he is asked about "finals" by Jason. He then is told that he has to take his semester final tests, and that his results will be sent to his fake parents, the Grants, who happen to be Barons, and one of the richest and most powerful people in the country. When awoken one night, he realizes Jason is gone, and Luke while looking for him happens to overhear a phone conversation of Jason''s, where he is talking to a Population Police officer. Luke finally realizes who Jason really is and attacks him with a history book, causing the phone to get disconnected, and knocks Jason out when Jason''s head hits the stairs. He comes up with a cover story for the Population Police officer at the other end and gets Jason down to the nurse''s office. He calls Mr. Talbot, a double agent working with Population Police, and convinces him to come to Hendricks. When another officer comes, Mr. Talbot convinces them that Jason is lying about the third children and has Jason arrested along with Nina, his "accomplice" at the nearby Harlow''s School for Girls, even though she has done nothing. Luke is later given the choice to leave the school, but he decides to stay at Hendricks and help the other third children.

Among the Impostors

One of the most quoted parts of the book deals with the distinction which Bonhoeffer makes between "cheap" and "costly" grace. But what is "cheap" grace? In Bonhoeffer''s words: :"cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline. Communion without confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ." Or, even more clearly, it is to hear the gospel preached as follows: "Of course you have sinned, but now everything is forgiven, so you can stay as you are and enjoy the consolations of forgiveness." The main defect of such a proclamation is that it contains no demand for discipleship. In contrast to this is costly grace: :"costly grace confronts us as a gracious call to follow Jesus, it comes as a word of forgiveness to the broken spirit and the contrite heart. It is costly because it compels a man to submit to the yoke of Christ and follow him; it is grace because Jesus says: "My yoke is easy and my burden is light." " Bonhoeffer argues that as Christianity spread, the Church became more "secularised", accommodating the demands of obedience to Jesus to the requirements of society. In this way, "the world was Christianised, and grace became its common property." But the hazard of this was that the gospel was cheapened, and obedience to the living Christ was gradually lost beneath formula and ritual, so that in the end, grace could literally be sold for monetary gain. But all the time, within the church, there had been a living protest against this process: the monastic movement. This served as a "place where the older vision was kept alive." Unfortunately, "monasticism was represented as an individual achievement which the mass of the laity could not be expected to emulate"; the commandments of Jesus were limited to "a restricted group of specialists" and a double standard arose: "a maximum and a minimum standard of church obedience." Why was this dangerous? Bonhoeffer points out that whenever the church was accused of being too worldly, it could always point to monasticism as "the opportunity of a higher standard within the fold - and thus justify the other possibility of a lower standard for others." So the monastic movement, instead of serving as a pointer for all Christians, became a justification for the status quo. Bonhoeffer remarks how this was rectified by Luther at the Reformation, when he brought Christianity "out of the cloister". However, he thinks that subsequent generations have again cheapened the preaching of the forgiveness of sins, and this has seriously weakened the church: "The price we are having to pay today in the shape of the collapse of the organised church is only the inevitable consequence of our policy of making grace available to all at too low a cost. We gave away the word and sacraments wholesale, we baptised, confirmed, and absolved a whole nation without condition. Our humanitarian sentiment made us give that which was holy to the scornful and unbelieving... But the call to follow Jesus in the narrow way was hardly ever heard."

The Cost of Discipleship

The groundswell is characterized by several tactics that guide companies into using social technologies strategically and effectively. Businesses should listen to their customers to understand what the market is looking for in their products. In order to do this, a company needs to find out if their customers are using social technologies and how they are using them. Instead of advertising to customers, marketing departments should find creative ways to connect with users about their experience with a product and their feelings about the brand. One common method is participation in social networks. Enthusiastic customers are part of the groundswell, and companies can recognize and appreciate these customers by creating online communities and social platforms where they can connect with the brand and provide reviews. Businesses can harness the support of their own employees by creating internal social applications for them to connect with the brand, also known as enterprise social software.

Groundswell

Virginia "Ginny" Blackstone, a seventeen-year-old girl who is on summer break before her final year of high school, has received 13 blue envelopes from her self-proclaimed "Runaway Aunt" Peg, who is now dead. Ginny is told that she is about to leave for several weeks and will travel to foreign lands. Her aunt leaves her four rules to follow: you can only bring what fits into your backpack, you cannot bring any kind of journal or foreign language aid, you cannot bring extra money of any kind, and you cannot use or bring anything electronic with you. She is only allowed to open the next envelope once she has reached the destination or has completed the task set in the previous letter. The envelopes lead her to London, where she meets a "starving" artist named Keith, and Aunt Peg''s best friend and roommate, Richard. She realizes she has a crush on Keith, and they go to Scotland to meet her aunt''s guru, artist Mari Adams. Ginny then has an argument with Keith and they part ways. She meets him again in Paris. Later, she encounters a horrible hotel in Amsterdam, along with a very hyperactive family. Following, she goes to Denmark and meets four Australian students, Emmett, Bennett, Nigel, and Carrie. Together they form the "Blue Envelope Gang" and follow the second-to-last envelope to Greece. On the way, the 12th envelope tells her she can open the last one whenever she feels ready. While there, her backpack is stolen, along with the 13th envelope. She enlists Richard''s help to return to England; upon arriving there Richard tells her that he and Peg were married during her final illness, which makes Richard Ginny''s uncle. This last bit of information completely unsettles the already-distressed girl, who runs to Keith''s house for the night. Returning to Richard''s apartment the next day, she manages to discover a trove of her aunt''s final paintings, in the attic of Harrods, a large department store in London, which her aunt used as a private art studio. The painting collection is sold at auction, and the proceeds become her inheritance. She writes a letter to her aunt, letting her know that even though she never read the 13th envelope, she knows what it said. Ginny finally makes her way back home to New Jersey, after leaving half the inheritance to Richard.

13 Little Blue Envelopes

Act 1 - Emperor Augustus has executed Toranius, the father of young Emilie whom he considers nonetheless like a daughter. Emilie, in love with Cinna, asks him to save her honor by killing Augustus. In exchange, she will marry Cinna. With the help of his friend, Maxime, Cinna plots to kill the emperor. Act 2 - Augustus, tired of ruling the Roman Empire, seeks the advice of his friends Maxime and Cinna. Should he renounce his rule? Because he desires the love of Emilie, Cinna advises Augustus to keep his throne so he can go forward with his assassination plot. Augustus thanks the two men by offering them important government posts and land, and he even offers Emilie to Cinna as wife. Act 3 - Meanwhile, Maxime is also in love with Emilie, and when Cinna reveals his true reason for advising Augustus to stay on the throne, Maxime is overcome with jealousy. Maxime''s servant, Euphorbe, suggests that Maxime betray Cinna and go to Caesar with the assassination plot so that he may receive Emilie in marriage; however, Maxime does not listen. Cinna is faced with a dilemma: the goodness and generosity of Augustus has caused him to question his devotion to Emilie. He nonetheless decides to go through with the assassination attempt to please his lover. Act 4 - Euphorbe, claiming to be sent by Maxime, goes to August to reveal everything. Caesar''s wife, Livie, tells him to pardon Cinna in order to gain glory and respect, but Augustus is apparently deaf to these arguments and calls Cinna before him. Maxime goes to find Emilie to declare his love, but Emilie pushes him away and accuses him of betraying Cinna. Act 5 - Emilie finds Cinna before Augustus. She declares her guilt and tries to clear Cinna''s name by saying that she seduced him to do her will. Cinna tries to protect Emilie by declaring her story to be false. Finally, Maxime enters and declares that he and Euphorbe had made the entire story up. Faced with those he holds dear, Augustus decides to pardon them all. He proposes that his enemies take the government positions and lands that he offered them prior to the scandal, and they all accept and thank him graciously.

Cinna

The story takes place in Providence, Rhode Island and revolves around the Church of Starry Wisdom. The cult uses an ancient artifact known as the "Shining Trapezohedron" to summon a terrible being from the depths of time and space. The Shining Trapezohedron was discovered in Egyptian ruins, in a box of alien construction, by Professor Enoch Bowen before he returned to Providence, Rhode Island in 1844. Members of the Church of Starry Wisdom in Providence would awaken the Haunter of the Dark, an avatar of Nyarlathotep, by gazing into the glowing crystal. Summoned from the black gulfs of chaos, this being could show other worlds, other galaxies, and the secrets of arcane and paradoxical knowledge; but he demanded monstrous sacrifices, hinted at by disfigured skeletons that were later found in the church. The Haunter of the Dark was banished by light and could not cross a lighted area. The Shining Trapezohedron is a window on all space and time. Described as a "crazily angled stone", it is unlikely to be a true trapezohedron because of the Old Ones'' penchant for bizarre non-Euclidean angles. It was created on dark Yuggoth and brought to Earth by the Old Ones, where it was placed in its box aeons before the first human beings appeared. After the passing of the Old Ones, during the final stages of the lower Triassic period, the trapezohedron was salvaged from the ruins of their cyclopean cities by the serpent people of Valusia. Eventually, after the bloody extermination of the serpent people at the hands of the advancing pre-human hordes of Lomar, the device found its way into the possession of the primitive men of Lemuria, Atlantis and in later cycles the Pharaoh Nephren Ka of Egypt until at last it was unearthed and brought to New England. After the death of Robert Blake, who came to grief after discovering the Shining Trapezohedron and deciphering texts about it from ancient evil cults, the artifact was removed from the black windowless steeple where it was found by a Dr. Dexter and thrown into the deepest channel of Narragansett Bay. It was expected to remain there, under the eternal light of the stars, forever; yet, Robert Bloch''s sequel, "The Shadow from the Steeple", proved that Nyarlathotep had cheated Dexter, forcing him to peer into the stone and throw the stone into the bay, where the eternal darkness of the depths gave the Haunter the power to remain perpetually free; it used this power to merge with Dr. Dexter and make him one of the world''s leading nuclear scientists-in charge of atomic investigation for warfare. Nyarlathotep appears in this story as the "three-lobed burning eye", a huge bat-winged creature, with a burning tri-lobed eye appearing unseen from the Trapezohedron. Blake realizes the horror can only travel in the dark. When a storm and power blackout envelop the city, he scribbles down his findings, concluding the story with his terrified record of what he can only glimpse of the approaching beast. "I see it-- coming here-- hell-wind-- titan-blur-- black wings-- Yog-Sothoth save me-- the three-lobed burning eye..." Lovecraft indicated in his letters with then-young writer Robert Bloch, that the character Robert Blake was an intentionally thinly veiled gesture at killing off one of his friendly correspondents. In 1936, Bloch published story that continued the professional fun, in which Blake did not actually die, but was possessed by Nyarlathotep, and kills off a character based on Lovecraft.

The Haunter of the Dark

Mitochondria are the "energy factories" of biological cells. It is thought that they were originally separate organisms, and a symbiotic relationship between them and early cellular life has evolved into their present position as cell organelles with no independent existence (see endosymbiotic theory). The novel''s plot supposes that mitochondria, which are inherited through the female line of descent, form the dispersed body of an intelligent conscious life-form, dubbed Eve, which has been waiting throughout history and evolution for the right conditions when mitochondrial life can achieve its true potential and take over from eukaryotic life-forms (i.e. humans and similar life) by causing a child to be born that can control its own genetic code. Eve is able to control people''s minds and bodies by signaling to the mitochondria in their bodies. She can cause certain thoughts to occur to them and also make them undergo spontaneous combustion. The conditions Eve has waited for have arrived; she has found the perfect host in the body of Kiyomi Nagishima. At the start of the book, Eve is the mitochondria in Kiyomi''s body. She causes Kiyomi to crash her car; Kiyomi survives but is brain dead. Kiyomi''s husband is Toshiaki, a research assistant teaching and researching biological science. Eve influences Toshiaki and a doctor to ensure that one of Kiyomi''s kidneys is transplanted into the teenage girl Mariko Anzai as an organ donation. As part of Kiyomi''s body, the kidney is also a part of Eve; this prepares Mariko to be a suitable host for giving birth to mitochondrial life, as her immune system would otherwise rebel. Eve influences Toshiaki to grow some of Kiyomi''s liver cells in his lab in sufficient quantities to provide Eve with an independent body, he thinks that he is doing this as an experiment using different cultures of the liver cells. Forming some of the cells into a body, Eve possesses Toshiaki''s assistant Sachiko Asakura and intermittently takes control of Asakura to work upon the cultures. Eventually, she takes control of Asakura during a conference presentation speech and announces her presence. Leaving Asakura''s body, she returns to the lab. Toshiaki pursues her, and she rapes him in the form of Kiyomi to capture some of his sperm, which she uses to fertilize an egg of her own production. Moving to the hospital, she implants this egg in Mariko''s womb. The egg develops into a child that is born almost immediately. Eve anticipates that her child will be able to consciously change its genetic code, thus being an infinitely adaptable "perfect life form" capable of replacing humanity and similar life-forms. Mariko''s body will be host to a new race of these life-forms. The experiment fails, since Toshiaki''s sperm carry a separate line of "male" mitochondria (inherited through sperm) that will be wiped out in the new order; these resist the change by fighting for control of the child''s body, causing it to switch between male and female forms. The child dies; Toshiaki also dies, merging his body with the child''s to control the bursts of psychokinetic-like power it gives out in its death throes that threaten to kill many people. In the novel''s epilogue, it is revealed that some samples of the Eve cells in Toshiaki''s lab survived. Fortunately, they are destroyed shortly after being found.

Parasite Eve

The story starts with a girl Kathereine Collins going to a private GYN clinic, located in Manhattan, New York, where she is undergoing treatment for some Gynac ailments. Simultaneously she has started having seizures where in she smells a repulsive and oddly familiar odor and then loses consciousness. She wants to withdraw her records from this clinic and move onto her hometown to her family doctor. While on her way back, she faints at the elevators. The next scene shows her parents visiting her apartment and the cops searching the room as she has been missing for some days now. The story revolves around the protagonist Dr. Martin Philips from then on, who is a doctor in neuroradiology at the NYC medical center. Dr. Martin Philips, a 41 year old neuroradiologist is involved in creating a self-diagonstic x-ray machine, along with Michaels, who is a researcher graduating from MIT and also head of the department of artificial intelligence. Dr. Philips''s girlfriend and colleague Dr. Denise Sanger (28 years old) is also involved in the same hospital. The story proceeds with the hospital working being shown where Dr. Mannerheim, a stubborn neurosurgeon, is to operate on a girl named Lisa Marino who is a seizure patient. She is set to undergo a brain operation to remove damaged brain cells which her doctors say are causing her seizures. The symptoms are described in another female patient, Kathereine Collins, only stronger. However, when Dr. Phillips starts to discover a conspiracy involving usage of human test subjects, he is drawn into a world that is deceiving and dangerous. After the reveal, Dr. Phillips asks to be put in an asylum.

Brain

The story begins with Prince Dolph lying in his sister, Ivy''s, bed watching her magical tapestry which shows images from the past and present of Xanth. Dolph is the son of King Dor and Queen Irene, and he has the powerful talent of being able to shapeshift, giving him the power to change into any animal he chooses. While watching the images of the magical tapestry Dolph begins to think about the disappearance of the Good Magician Humphrey. Dolph gets so enraptured with the thought of finding the Magician that he eventually asks his father and mother permission to set out on a quest to find the answers. Queen Irene decides that Dolph is at a fine age to set out for a quest, but as long as he takes with him an adult companion. After some debate and arguing over who should accompany Dolph, Dolph suggests that Marrow Bones accompany him. Marrow is a walking, talking skeleton who has the ability to transform his skeletal body into many shapes as long as Dolph gives him a good kick in the tail bone first. Once Dolph and Marrow set out on their journey they realize their first stop must be at the Good Magician Humphrey''s castle to investigate for any clues to his disappearance. Once in the castle Dolph and Marrow find a hidden room that can only be viewed through a clear rock from above. In the hidden room is a message that reads "Skeleton Key to Heaven Cent". Marrow distinguishes that there is a pun in the message, and a Skeleton Key is really an island made of coral. So Dolph and Marrow set out to find the isle and find the Heaven Cent to bring back the Good Magician Humphrey. Throughout Dolph and Marrow''s adventures through the land of Xanth they encounter many different creatures. There are the always rhyming ogres, bone hungry and smelly harpies, the cruel merwomen, and many others. One of the major creatures that come into play in the book are the nagas. The nagas are a snake-human people who have the power to transform into either a full snake, full human, or mixed form. Dolph and Marrow encounter the nagas when trying to get through a goblin kingdom where the goblins are holding Nada, the naga princess, prisoner. After rescuing Nada, Dolph and Marrow return to the naga kingdom, where Dolph, even though too young, becomes unintentionally betrothed to Nada through a naga tradition. Nada joins Dolph and Marrow on their quest to find the Heaven Cent, and their romantic relationship blossoms until Nada reveals to Dolph that she is actually many years older than he is. Although Dolph is taken aback by this information, his love for Nada does not waver and he keeps the betrothal intact. When Dolph, Marrow, and Nada finally find the right island where the Heaven Cent is supposed to be they encounter a magical castle where a maiden has been under a magical sleep for 900 years of a 1000 year sentence. The sleeping maiden is named Electra, and she was put under the sleeping spell because 900 years ago she accidentally activated the Heaven Cent. Dolph kisses the sleeping Electra and awakens her, but to Dolph''s surprise Electra cannot survive unless she marries the person who broke the spell on her. Once the entire party returns to Castle Roogna Dolph is left with the decision about what to do with his two betrothed women. After much debate with both women and the King and Queen, Dolph asks for the test of the roses. Dolph chooses the yellow rose for Electra showing friendship and the red rose for Nada representing love. Electra is the first of the betrothed to attempt the test and she quickly chooses the red rose for Dolph representing love. Nada goes second and tries to pick the red rose, but she cannot because she does not truly love him and she is pricked by a rose. Nada then tries to pick a black rose and commit suicide, but Dolph jumps over to her and stops her. Dolph explains that he loves Nada even though the love is not returned. In the end Dolph remains betrothed to each girl even though the King and Queen do not believe in it, but Dolph and the girls believe that, in the next seven years before Dolph can marry, they will work out all the problems.

Heaven Cent

Miss Caroline Ross, in order to inherit a fortune, must be married but, in the London of 1815, such a marriage would turn control of the funds over to her husband. She therefore marries Dick Darwent, a convicted murderer who is to be hanged in Newgate Prison the next day, who agrees to the marriage so that Caroline will settle money upon his mistress, the actress Dolly Spencer. However, when it is learned that Dick has succeeded to the title of the Marquis of Darwent, his trial is invalidated; a peer must be tried by the House of Lords. The commutation of his sentence means that he has made a deadly enemy in the form of Sir John Buckstone, a brutal dandy who is one of Caroline''s suitors. Darwent has been framed for murder by a mysterious figure known only as "the coachman". He must sort out his domestic arrangements, which include his wife and mistress under one roof, prove himself innocent of the murder of which he was convicted, and reveal the identity of the evil figure behind his problems.

The Bride of Newgate

In this story, an artist, named Niggle, lives in a society that does not much value art. Working only to please himself, he paints a canvas of a great Tree with a forest in the distance. He invests each and every leaf of his tree with obsessive attention to detail, making every leaf uniquely beautiful. Niggle ends up discarding all his other artworks, or tacks them onto the main canvas, which becomes a single vast embodiment of his vision. However, there are many mundane chores and duties that prevent Niggle from giving his work the attention it deserves, so it remains incomplete and is not fully realized. At the back of his head, Niggle knows that he has a great trip looming, and he must pack and prepare his bags. Also, Niggle''s next door neighbour, a gardener named Parish, is the sort of neighbour who always drops by whining about the help he needs with this and that. Moreover, Parish is lame and has a sick wife, and honestly needs help — Niggle, having a good heart, takes time out to help. And Niggle has other pressing work duties that require his attention. Then Niggle himself catches a chill doing errands for Parish in the rain. Eventually, Niggle is forced to take his trip, and cannot get out of it. He has not prepared, and as a result ends up in a kind of institution, in which he must perform menial labour each day. In time he is paroled from the institution, and he is sent to a place ''for a little gentle treatment''. But he discovers that the new country he is sent to is in fact the country of the Tree and Forest of his great painting, now long abandoned and all but destroyed (except for the one perfect leaf of the title which is placed in the local museum) in the home to which he cannot return — but the Tree here and now in this place is the true realization of his vision, not the flawed and incomplete form of his painting. Niggle is reunited with his old neighbour, Parish, who now proves his worth as a gardener, and together they make the Tree and Forest even more beautiful. Finally, Niggle journeys farther and deeper into the Forest, and beyond into the great mountains that he only faintly glimpsed in his painting. Long after both Niggle and Parish have taken their journeys, the lovely field that they built together becomes a place for many travelers to visit before their final voyage into the Mountains, and it earns the name "Niggle''s Parish."

Leaf by Niggle

The novel is a continuation of the story in The Ship From Atlantis, telling of Prince Gwalchmai''s star-crossed love for Princess Corenice of Atlantis in her various reincarnations, along with his centuries-delayed quest to secure aid and settlers to shore up the faltering empire established by his father and refugees from the fallen kingdom of Arthur in the New World. The story opens with Gwalchmai''s reawakening after centuries in suspended animation. The Britain he finally reaches is a prostrated land transformed into England by its Saxon conquerors, with his father''s exile long forgotten and his countrymen incapable of undertaking any sort of colonization project. Guided by his reincarnated lover, he seeks aid unsuccessfully, his travels taking him from Viking-age Europe to the far-eastern empires of the Chinese and Japanese, and ultimately back to Europe again as it approaches the Renaissance. He is abetted down through the centuries by the magical ring of his godfather Merlin, responsible for his longevity, and by Corenice. Highlights include the hero''s visit to Faerie, his service as a companion to Joan of Arc, and his final revelation in Iceland of the secret of the New World to a Genoan, merchant, Christopher Columbus.

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

Among the Impostors

By Margaret Haddix

The Cost of Discipleship

By Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Groundswell

No Author Listed

13 Little Blue Envelopes

By Maureen Johnson

Cinna

By Pierre Corneille

The Haunter of the Dark

By H. P. Lovecraft

Parasite Eve

By Hideaki Sena

Brain

By Robin Cook

Heaven Cent

By Piers Anthony

The Bride of Newgate

By John Dickson Carr

Leaf by Niggle

By J. R. R. Tolkien

Merlin's Ring

By H. Warner Munn