The novel ends with a surprise twist, when Nikolai''s worst fears are realized. The Mongol hordes that the Tsar kept at bay for hundreds of years are finally unleashed on the weakened empire of Russia via a complex labyrinth of tunnels. The inhabitants of Petersburg, unable to defend themselves from the ravaging horde of Tartars, quickly capitulate to the rule of the Khan. Appolon Appolonovich is beheaded by the tyrannical Khan and his son Nikolai assumes his rightful place as guardian of the Russian people. This was intended to be the first in an epic trilogy detailing the resistance movement of the intelligentsia against the alien invaders. However, with the onset of post-revolutionary censorship, the series was deemed to be too monarchist and was therefore abandoned. Bely presents the idea of the entire world being connected by a series of tunnels. As a symbolist he saw tunnels as a gateway to the soul. By having the Mongols use these tunnels to breach Russia''s defenses, he expresses the widely held fear of Orientalism defiling the Russian soul.

Petersburg

The schools in Ramona Quimby''s neighborhood have been reorganized, and now she gets to ride the bus to Cedarhurst Primary, where she and her fellow third graders will be the biggest kids in the school. Ramona is happy about the changes until a boy on the bus steals her new eraser, but she rises to the challenge and ends up deciding the "Yard Ape" may not be so bad, after all. The best part of being in third grade is Sustained Silent Reading. Ramona loves getting time to read in school every day. The worst part is that she isn''t sure if her teacher, Mrs. Whaley, likes her. When Ramona cracks a hard boiled egg on her head at lunch- and finds out her mother forgot to boil it- she ends up in the secretary''s office with a head full of raw egg, where she overhears Mrs. Whaley describe her as a show-off and a nuisance. Even Yard Ape can''t make her feel better about that. Things get worse when she throws up in class and her mother has to leave work to take her home. Then there''s the problem of spoiled Willa Jean. Every day after school Howie goes outside to ride bikes with his friends, and Ramona is forced to play baby games with her. Beezus can always say she''s busy doing homework, but that doesn''t work for Ramona. Clearly, though, she is growing up, as she uses her creativity to find ways to help her family by getting along.

Ramona Quimby, Age 8

Teilhard views evolution as a process that leads to increasing complexity. From the cell to the thinking animal, a process of psychical concentration leads to greater consciousness. The emergence of Homo sapiens marks the beginning of a new age, as the power acquired by consciousness to turn in upon itself raises humankind to a new sphere. Borrowing Julian Huxley’s expression, Teilhard describes humankind as evolution becoming conscious of itself. In Teilhard''s conception of the evolution of the species, a collective identity begins to develop as trade and the transmission of ideas increases. Knowledge accumulates and is transmitted in increasing levels of depth and complexity. This leads to a further augmentation of consciousness and the emergence of a thinking layer that envelops the earth. Teilhard calls the new membrane the “noosphere” (from the Greek “nous,” meaning mind), a term first coined by Vladimir Vernadsky. The noosphere is the Collective consciousness of humanity, the networks of thought and emotion in which all are immersed. The development of science and technology causes an expansion of the human sphere of influence, allowing a person to be simultaneously present in every corner of the world. Teilhard argues that humanity has thus become cosmopolitan, stretching a single organized membrane over the Earth. Teilhard describes the process by which this happens as a “gigantic psychobiological operation, a sort of mega-synthesis, the “super-arrangement” to which all the thinking elements of the earth find themselves today individually and collectively subject.” The rapid expansion of the noosphere requires a new domain of psychical expansion, which “is staring us in the face if we would only raise our heads to look at it.” In Teilhard’s view, evolution will culminate in the Omega Point, a sort of supreme consciousness. Layers of consciousness will converge in Omega, fusing and consuming them in itself. The concentration of a conscious universe will reassemble in itself all consciousnesses as well as all that we are conscious of. Teilhard emphasizes that each individual facet of consciousness will remain conscious of itself at the end of the process.

The Phenomenon of Man

The novel begins with Nicky DeSota, a timid mortgage broker in a fascist America who draws the unwelcome attention of Nyla Christophe, an FBI agent investigating a break-in at a government lab by what proves to be a Dominic DeSota from an alternate universe. Used as a pawn by Christophe''s con-man boyfriend Larry Douglas to entrap an activist former actor (who turns out to be Ronald Reagan), he is later detained and brought to New Mexico to unravel a mystery. The focus then shifts to another Dominic DeSota, a United States Senator having an affair with Nyla Christophe Bowquist, who in this world is a famous violinist. Contacted by the military, he travels to Sandia National Laboratories, where he meets an identical version of himself—a "Cat" from an alternate universe. As Senator DeSota interviews his alternate-universe counterpart, the man vanishes after offering a cryptic warning. As the senator leaves the building, he and the base commander are captured by a detachment of troops led by Major Dominic P. DeSota, the commander of a military force from yet another universe. Major DeSota''s mission is revealed to be to secure the parallel-world research facilities of Senator DeSota''s universe, which is the first step in a larger military operation. In Major DeSota''s universe (which is subsequently designated Paratime Gamma) a militaristic United States is engaged in a tense standoff with the Soviet Union, and wants to use Senator DeSota''s universe (Paratime Epsilon) to launch sneak attacks against them. After being transported to Paratime Gamma, Senator DeSota manages to escape by distracting his guard (Gamma''s version of Nyla Christophe) and escaping through a portal with a scientist to Paratime Tau—the home universe of Nicky DeSota. After being discovered in the desert, Senator DeSota and the scientist—who is Larry Douglas from another universe—are captured and interrogated by Agent Christophe. In an interrogation session involving the senator, the scientist, and their counterparts from Paratime Tau, Douglas reveals that he is from Paratime Alpha, and that he was forced by the military in Paratime Gamma to give them the ability to travel between universes. As Agent Christophe begins to pressure Douglas to give her government similar assistance, she and the other FBI agent with her are rendered unconscious by knockout darts fired by Dominic DeSota—the same Dominic DeSota who had escaped interrogation in Sandia. DeSota brings the entire group back to his universe—Paratime Alpha—where he explains that since the senator''s escape that Paratime Gamma has invaded the Epsilon''s Washington D.C. in a failed bid to capture the president. He also reveals that travel between universes is creating a growing problem of "ballistic recoil," where the boundaries between the universes is growing weaker, causing matter and energy to cross unintentionally from one universe to the next (something depicted in interludes between the chapters). He brings the travelers to Washington D.C., where they cross over to Paratime Epsilon in an effort to help stop the invasion. Before they can help, however, every "Cat" located in a different universe disappears, along with any scientists involved in paratime research. There they are informed that they have been transported by a group of more advanced alternate Earths in order to stop ballistic recoil before it escalates and the barriers between universes become irreparably permeable. The "Cats" are relocated to New York City on a new Earth, one being resettled after its inhabitants wiped themselves out. There the paratime transplants gradually settle into new lives. Six months after his arrival, Nicky DeSota returns to New York to propose to Agent Christophe. Now working on a collective farm in Palm Springs, he has embraced the opportunity for a new life and developed into a much more confident man. After considering his proposal, the Nyla of his world accepts. On their trip back to California, however, Nicky reveals to her his expectation that their transplantation has not solved the problem of paratime travel—that with an infinite number of Earths, the number of them that will develop the ability to cross into alternate worlds will only increase, so many that the problem of ballistic recoil may prove to be unavoidable.

The Coming of the Quantum Cats

Anaxandra is the daughter of Chrysaor, a chieftain who rules of an uncharted island. When Nicander, king of the island Siphnos, comes to demand a tribute, he takes Anaxandra to be his daughter Callisto’s playmate. Unable to return home, she comes to love the small island of Siphnos and lives there for six years with Nicander''s family. When pirates attack the island, Nicander and his family are killed while Anaxandra survives by scaring off the pirates by pretending to be Medusa. Found by Menelaus, king of Sparta, Anaxandra assumes the identity of Princess Callisto, believing that Menelaus will otherwise abandon her to her doom. Brought into Menelaus''s household in Sparta, all the members of his family welcome her, except Menelaus’s beautiful wife, Helen. Suspicious of "Callisto," Helen''s animosity towards Anaxandra places her in greater danger than ever. When Menelaus leaves for Crete to repay its king for slaves, Paris, a prince of Troy arrives to plunder Sparta''s treasury and takes an eager Helen away with him. To save Helen''s daughter Hermione from leaving, Anaxandra takes her place and soon becomes the sole protector of Helen''s infant son, Pleisthenes. Upon arriving in Troy, Anaxandra is exposed again by Helen, who will stop at nothing to make Anaxandra suffer and neglects her own son in favour of her new life as the bride of Paris. Helen is quickly beloved by all of Troy, save Paris''s sister Cassandra who has foreseen that Helen will destroy the city but is cursed so her prophecies will never be believed. In spite of her suffering, Anaxandra befriends Andromache, the bride of Prince Hector, and Cassandra. When Menelaus learns that Paris has stolen Helen and the treasures of Sparta, he calls upon his brother Agamemnon and all of Helen''s former suitors who have sworn to defend his honour and to declare war upon Troy. As Helen revels in the war that will occur for her sake, Anaxandra finds herself falling in love with Euneus, the neutral king of Lemnos who is a friend of Hector. Torn between her love of Troy and her loyalty to Menelaus, Anaxandra must find a way to rescue Pleisthenes and return the young prince to his father before Troy is destroyed.

Goddess of Yesterday

The Animorphs morph cockroaches in order to infiltrate a meeting of The Sharing. They discover that the Yeerks have infested an entire hospital staff and are using them to turn patients into Controllers. Not only that, but next week their state''s governor - who is a Presidential candidate - will be checking in for surgery. The Animorphs morph houseflies to infiltrate the hospital, and discover a Jacuzzi that has been converted into a miniature Yeerk Pool. Jake demorphs to human and turns the Jacuzzi on to kill the Yeerks, but the Animorphs are discovered by the Controllers. In the subsequent fight Jake is hit by a sledgehammer blow and his head falls in the pool. He is infested by a Yeerk named Temrash 114 who seeks to escape death. The Animorphs escape from the hospital into the woods, and Jake panics as he realizes that none of his friends have noticed anything different about him. Fortunately, Ax notices something amiss in Temrash''s initial reaction to him and accuses Jake of being a Controller. Temrash loses his cool and insults Ax, calling him "Andalite filth" and the others realize he is indeed a Controller. The others decide to hold him for three days until Temrash dies of Kandrona starvation. In the meantime, Ax morphs Jake and takes his place at home and school. The others tie Jake to a chair in an abandoned shack out in the forest, but Temrash still has access to all of Jake''s morphs. He morphs to tiger in the night and escapes. He becomes lost in the forest and morphs to falcon and tries to and fly away, but Cassie stops him as a great horned owl. Temrash morphs to wolf and again tries to escape, but is stopped by a rival wolf pack, in fact, the same wolf pack from The Encounter. Rachel escorts him back to the shack in elephant morph. Temrash begins to taunt Jake, revealing that he was once the Yeerk controlling Jake''s brother Tom. Jake tells him that he will never give up. The next morning Temrash again tries to escape, this time as an ant, but is forced back by an enemy ant colony. Temrash begins to die of Kandrona starvation. As he does, Jake witnesses his pain, and in the final hours catches his first terrifying glimpse of Crayak. Jake returns to his family to find that he has apparently been acting strangely lately, because Ax is not used to being in human morph. A few days later he morphs partway to wolf (to disguise his voice) and telephones Tom to give him a message of hope. *Crayak is briefly introduced.

The Capture

Paladin of Souls is a sequel to The Curse of Chalion and is set some three years after the events of that novel. It follows Ista, mother of the girl who became Royina (Queen) in that book and a minor character in it. Recovering from the extreme guilt and grief that had marked her as mad while the Golden General''s curse on her family persisted, she finds herself bored to distraction and restless. To get away from her home town, Valenda, and its ugly memories she sets out on a religious pilgrimage with the dy Gura brothers (also minor characters from the earlier story) for protection; Liss, a feisty and clever courier girl; and dy Cabon, a plump priest of the Bastard (one of the five gods) as her ''spiritual guide''. The Bastard, god of disasters and of things out of season, becomes a larger presence in this novel than was The Lady of Spring in The Curse of Chalion; by its end, Ista herself has become a saint in his service. (The Father of Winter, another of the five gods, also makes a brief appearance.) The pilgrimage party is overrun and captured by a troop of Roknari raiders from the adjacent principality of Jokona, then set free by a patrol from nearby Castle Porifors. Leading the rescuers is Arhys, lord of the castle and a very effective warrior indeed—considering that he scarcely eats or drinks, or sleeps except for brief afternoon naps. Though she comes to be immensely attracted to him, she realizes in horror that he is the son of a man she had helped murder. Another obstacle is Arhys''s very young and very beautiful wife, Cattilara. Once in the castle Ista discovers another odd man: Lord Illvin, Arhys''s half-brother. He is unconscious except for afternoon wakings that match Arhys'' naps. She has seen him before, though, in a baffling dream that at last makes some sense. As this mystery begins to come clear, Castle Porifors is besieged by a new force of Roknari from Jokona that includes its Prince, Sordso, and his mother, Princess Joen. The latter is an elderly, minor daughter of the Golden General and has accumulated a whole troop of demon-ridden magicians, including her son, all of them controlled by one major magician: herself. As Castle Porifors and its defenders crumble under magical siege, Lord Arhys and a picked troop make a night raid that jolts the Jokonans but does not dislodge them. Only when Ista allows herself to walk as a hostage into the Princess'' lair is the siege ended. The remaining magicians'' demons are sent back to the Bastard''s care, and the remaining loose ends of the story are resolved, with Ista''s acceptance of the Bastard''s offer of skills and a job that give use and meaning to the rest of her life. Lord Illvin comes with the job as a bonus.

Paladin of Souls

Alex (the main character) is an 11-year-old Jewish boy living in a Ghetto in German-occupied Poland during World War II with his father and their friend, Boruch. German soldiers come into the Ghetto and send people onto trains to be taken away (most likely to concentration camps). Alex and his father get separated, and soon Alex has to learn how to survive in the empty ghetto by himself. As it turns out the ghetto is not entirely empty, and that is where he comes across various people, from neighbors to robbers, some of whom even try to help him. He finds himself in an abandoned, bombed out building on Bird Street (Ptasia street) where he seeks refuge. The only thing he has to pass the time away with is his pet mouse Snow, the novel Robinson Crusoe and other books, and a small window overlooking the town. He has to hunt for food on his own and still stay hidden from soldiers. It is a great test for Alex to see if he can make it through tough conditions, and also wait for the arrival of his father.

The Island on Bird Street

The Butter Battle Book tells the story of a land where two hostile cultures, the Yooks and the Zooks, live on opposite sides of a long curving wall, fairly similar to the Berlin Wall. The Yooks wear blue clothes; the Zooks wear orange. The main dispute between the two cultures is that the Yooks eat their bread with the butter-side up, while the Zooks eat their bread with the butter-side down. The conflict between the two sides leads to an escalating arms race, each competing to make bigger and better weapons to outdo the other, which results in the threat of mutual assured destruction. The race begins when a Zook named Van Itch slingshots the Yooks'' "Tough-Tufted Prickly Snick-Berry Switch", which could be used to give Zooks a twitch if they dared to come close to the wall, which was guarded by "the Zook-Watching Border Patrol". The Yooks then develop a machine with three slingshots interlinked, called a "Triple-Sling Jigger". This works once (Van Itch got scared and ran off), but the Zooks counterattack with their own creation: The "Jigger-Rock Snatchem", a machine with three nets to fling the rocks fired from the Triple-Sling Jigger back at the Yooks'' side "just as fast as we catch ''em". The Yooks then discover that slingshots are old-fashioned, and create a gun called the "Kick-A-Poo Kid", loaded with "powerful Poo-A-Doo powder and ants'' eggs and bees'' legs and dried-fried clam chowder", and toted by a dog named Daniel, the country''s "first gun-toting spaniel". The Zooks counterattack with an "Eight-Nozzled Elephant-Toted Boom Blitz", a machine that shoots "high-explosive sour cherry stone pits, and will put your dumb Kick-A-Poo Kid on the fritz!" The Yooks then devise a machine called the "Utterly Sputter", a large blue mecha with two very tall mechanical legs, a cabin which resembles that of a helicopter''s, but with no rotors, and four faucets on the back, whose main purpose was to "sprinkle blue goo all over the Zooks!". But the Zooks counterattack with a Sputter identical to the Yooks''. Eventually, each side possesses a small but extremely destructive red bomb called the "Bitsy Big-Boy Boomeroo", the smallest weapon of all, and neither has any defense against it. The TV special (see below) demonstrates the development of the weapon in a mysterious, and somewhat frightening, mad scientist-style song (complete with living goo, floating rings, ghosts, snakes, and chemical flasks which imitate volcanoes). No resolution is reached by the book''s end, with the generals of both sides on the wall poised to drop their bombs and waiting to see who will do it first. The question is left hanging for the reader to answer by his or her actions, much like the question "UNLESS" at the end of Dr. Seuss'' book, The Lorax. The book thus departs from the commonly-accepted approach to children''s writing, of positive themes and resolution of the plot''s conflict by the end of the story.

The Butter Battle Book

Timon is not initially a misanthrope. He is a wealthy and generous Athenian gentleman. He gives a large banquet, attended by nearly all the main characters. Timon gives away money wastefully, and everyone wants to please him to get more, except for Apemantus, a churlish philosopher whose cynicism Timon cannot yet appreciate. He accepts art from Poet and Painter, and a jewel from the Jeweller, but by the end of Act 1, he has given that away to another friend. Timon''s servant, Lucilius, has been wooing the daughter of an old Athenian. The man is angry, but Timon pays him three talents in exchange for the couple being allowed to marry, because the happiness of his servant is worth the price. Timon is told that his friend, Ventidius, is in debtors'' prison. He sends money to pay Ventidius''s debt, and Ventidius is released and joins the banquet. Timon gives a speech on the value of friendship. The guests are entertained by a masque, followed by dancing. As the party winds down, Timon continues to give things away to his friends; his horses, and other possessions. The act is divided rather arbitrarily into two scenes but the experimental and/or unfinished nature of the play is reflected in that it does not naturally break into a five-act structure. Timon has given away all his wealth. Flavius, Timon''s steward, is upset by the way Timon has spent his wealth–overextending his munificence by showering patronage on the parasitic writers and artists, and delivering his dubious friends from their financial straits. He tells Timon so when he returns from a hunt. Timon is upset that he has not been told this before, and begins to vent his anger on Flavius, who tells him that he has tried repeatedly in the past without success, and now he is at the end; all Timon''s land has been sold. Shadowing Timon is another guest at the banquet; the cynical philosopher Apemantus, who terrorises Timon''s shallow companions with his caustic raillery. He was the only guest not angling for money or possessions from Timon. Along with a Fool, he attacks Timon''s creditors when they show up to make their demands for immediate payment. Timon cannot pay, and sends out his servants to make requests for help from those friends he considers closest. Timon''s servants are turned down, one by one, by Timon''s false friends, two giving lengthy monologues as to their anger with them. Elsewhere, one of Alcibiades''s junior officers has reached an even further point of rage, killing a man in "hot blood." Alcibiades pleads with the Senate for mercy, arguing that a crime of passion should not carry as severe a sentence as premeditated murder. The senators disagree, and when Alcibiades persists, banish him forever. He vows revenge, with the support of his troops. The act finishes with Timon discussing with his servants the revenge he will carry out at his next banquet. Timon has a much smaller party, intended only for those he feels have betrayed him. The serving trays are brought in, but under them the friends find not a feast, but rocks and lukewarm water. Timon sprays them with the water, throws the dishes at them, and flees his home. The loyal Flavius vows to find him. Cursing the city walls, Timon goes into the wilderness and makes his crude home in a cave, sustaining himself on roots. Here he discovers an underground trove of gold. The knowledge of this spreads. Alcibiades, Apemantus, and three bandits are able to find Timon before Flavius does. Accompanying Alcibiades are two prostitutes, Phrynia and Timandra, who trade barbs with the bitter Timon on the subject of venereal disease. Timon offers most of the gold to the rebel Alcibiades to subsidise his assault on the city, which he now wants to see destroyed, as his experiences have reduced him to misanthropy. He gives the rest to his whores to spread disease, and much of the remainder to Poet and Painter, who arrive soon after, leaving little left for the senators who visit him. When Apemantus appears and accuses Timon of copying his pessimistic style, the audience is treated to the spectacle of a mutually misanthropic exchange of invective. Flavius arrives. He wants the money as well, but he also wants Timon to come back into society. Timon acknowledges that he has had one true friend in Flavius, a shining example of an otherwise diseased and impure race, but laments that this man is a mere servant. He invites the last envoys from Athens, who hoped Timon might placate Alcibiades, to go hang themselves, and then dies in the wilderness. Alcibiades, marching on Athens, then throws down his glove, and ends the play reading the bitter epitaph Timon wrote for himself, part of which was composed by Callimachus: <poem> "Here lies a wretched corpse of wretched soul bereft: Seek not my name: a plague consume you wicked caitiffs left!" Here lie I, Timon, who alive, all living men did hate, Pass by, and curse thy fill, but pass and stay not here thy gait." </poem>

Timon of Athens

Continuing the adventures started in Rebel Dream, Wedge Antilles continues to defend the planet Borleias from the Yuuzhan Vong. After rooting out a spy in the Vong-controlled Tam Elgrin, he begins creating a superlaser, identical to the Death Star''s except in one regard: it doesn''t work. Using both the laser and Commander Czulkang Lah''s obsession with the capture of Jaina Solo, Antilles draws the Yuuzhan Vong fleet away from Lah''s flagship. While the fleet is elsewhere, the Super Star Destroyer Lusankya is fitted with a spear and flown directly into the worldship. The worldship is destroyed, and Czulkang Lah perishes. Meanwhile, on Coruscant, Luke Skywalker, Mara Jade Skywalker, Tahiri Veila and Wraith Squadron continue their scouting mission. There, they encounter a Dark Jedi similar to the mythical Lord Nyax, but who is really the genetically modified Dark Jedi Irek Ismaren. Nyax is more powerful than Luke, but, with the combined efforts of the Jedi and the Yuuzhan Vong, Nyax is defeated. Meanwhile, Viqi Shesh''s plans to escape Coruscant are foiled by Wraith Squadron, and she commits suicide as a result. Han and Leia Organa Solo, along with their droids C-3PO and R2-D2, set off on adventures to root out and overthrow any planetary government that plans to acquiesce to the Yuuzhan Vong. One of their most dangerous missions is set on Aphran IV, though they are able to escape death with their mission a success.

Enemy Lines: Rebel Stand

The novel features scenes and events including the discovery of a near-dead alien in the desert, who clearly says in English, "I''m sorry, but there is bad news," and this alien''s subsequent interrogation and autopsy; the discovery of an artificial geological formation and its subsequent nuclear destruction by a desperate military; and the Earth''s eventual destruction by the mutual annihilation of a piece of neutronium and a piece of antineutronium dropped into Earth''s core. There is another alien faction at work, however, represented on Earth by small spider-like robots that recruit human agents through some form of mind control. They frantically collect all the human data, biological records, tissue samples, seeds, and DNA from the biosphere that they can, and evacuate a handful of people from Earth. In space, this faction''s machines combat and eventually destroy the attackers, though not before Earth''s fate is sealed. The evacuees eventually settle a newly terraformed Mars while some form the crew of a Ship of the Law to hunt down the home world of the killers, a quest described in the sequel, Anvil of Stars. One of the point of view characters is Arthur Gordon, a scientist who, with his wife Francine and son Martin is among those rescued from the destruction of Earth. Some other characters are close to an American president who fails to take action against the threat. The two books show at least one solution to the Fermi paradox, with electromagnetically noisy civilisations being snuffed out by the arrival of self-replicating machines designed to destroy any potential threat to their (possibly long-dead) creators. (A similar theme is explored in Fred Saberhagen''s Berserker novels.)

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

Petersburg

By Andrei Bely

Ramona Quimby, Age 8

By Beverly Cleary

The Phenomenon of Man

No Author Listed

The Coming of the Quantum Cats

By Frederik Pohl

Goddess of Yesterday

By Caroline B. Cooney

The Capture

By K. A. Applegate

Paladin of Souls

By Lois McMaster Bujold

The Island on Bird Street

By Uri Orlev

The Butter Battle Book

By Dr. Seuss

Timon of Athens

By William Shakespeare

Enemy Lines: Rebel Stand

By Aaron Allston

The Forge of God

By Greg Bear