Francis Petrel, recently released from an asylum faces his own inner demons as he recounts his memories of a murderer in the asylum during his time there. The story tells itself in two parallel parts: one of the stories is during his time in the asylum, all a memory slowly bringing itself back to life; the other story takes place after he is released, and he feels compelled to author a book on the events surrounding that murder. He has no paper, so he writes his story on the wall and is constantly challenged with tedious interruptions. At the same time, he forgoes his medication, and the tension of continuing with his work becomes threatened by his struggle with his own madness. It is currently being turned into a movie and it was supposed to be filmed from November 26th, 2007 until approximately January 20th, 2008 at Fairfield State Hospital in Newtown, Connecticut. Filming has not yet taken place due to personal issues of Jonathan Rhys Meyers, the films star, according to an article in the Newtown Beehttp://www.newtownbee.com/. Trivia: Descriptions in the text suggest that the central hospital, "Western State Hospital", is actually modeled on the Northampton State Hospital, which operated in Northampton, MA from 1856 - 1996.

The Madman''s Tale

Following the return of the occupied states of Kentucky and Houston to the Confederacy in early 1941, President Jake Featherston breaks his solemn vow and re-militarizes them, essentially declaring war against the United States in act if not in word. US President Al Smith hurries to prepare for war, but his country is sent reeling by the Confederate attack into Ohio on June 22, 1941. The Yankees under General Abner Dowling and Colonel Irving Morrell fight desperately, but by 1942 the Confederate Army has reached the shores of Lake Erie and cut the country in two. Meanwhile, the Mormons in Utah have once again revolted, prompting a swift response from the U.S. Army. A US counterattack in Virginia bogs down, and the Confederates are preparing a second offensive for the summer of 1942 when Al Smith is killed in a bombing raid on the capital city of Philadelphia. A shaken Charlie La Follette is sworn in as President of a nation fighting for its survival. Meanwhile, in the Confederacy, the murderous persecution of Blacks is escalating towards a full-scale genocide, similar to our timeline''s Holocaust. Another hint of things to come is provided when Featherston makes a strategic blunder in rejecting the offer of a physics professor to start research towards producing nuclear weapons, believing that the professor just wants government money to finance an abstruse scientific project - while it is hinted that the US does start a version of the Manhattan Project, located in this case in the state of Washington and overseen by Franklin Roosevelt - in this world an Assistant Secretary of War harboring no presidential ambitions.

Settling Accounts: Return Engagement

The plot opens on a rainy and cold Marlinspike Hall; the occupants, Tintin and Captain Haddock are miserable and poor because there are no new Tintin adventures sending them to adventures in the sun any more since the death of their creator Hergé. (This is the first of many self-references the plot makes.) As they consider their plight, Jolyon Wagg''s wife arrives and ask them to go to Thailand to look for her husband who went there on a trip he won from his employer, the Rock Bottom Insurance Company, but never came back. The wife has already sent Thomson and Thompson there to look for Jolyon but without any results. As it is an all expense paid trip, the group eagerly accept and are soon off to Thailand. Nestor, Snowy and the cat are left behind, but Professor Calculus comes along too. As the group checks in to their Bangkok hotel they are spotted by Derek Dimwit, a representative of the Marlinsprick Company that holds the rights to the Tintin franchise. He calls head office and is told that he must stop the group from going on any more adventures that would be the basis of a pirated book not controlled by the Marlinsprick Company. The group head out to the red light district where they run into General Alcazar, now the owner of a Thailand bar after being deposed by General Tapioca. Alcazar has seen Jolyon Wagg pass through the bar, but he has gone north to Chiang Mai with a kathoey (transexual). Calculus and Haddock both hook up with prostitutes in the bar but Tintin prefers the company of a young boy instead (This is a reference to questions by fans regarding Tintin''s sexuality in the original books). The next day the group takes a flight north and soon run into Thomson and Thompson. The Thompson twins do not want the group to find Wagg as they enjoy being in Thailand at Wagg''s wife''s expense. However, the group picks up the trail to Jolyon Wagg who is living in a house outside Chiang Mai and finds that he does not enjoy the company of his kathoey partner. Jolyon longs for his wife''s cooking, in particular her rabbit marinated in beer. After a series of misadventures the group finds itself back in Chiang Mai in time for the celebration of the new year of 2000. The story ends with Tintin being presented with the first copy of Tintin in Thailand, and he exclaims that this work will guarantee him many peaceful days in the sun.

Tintin in Thailand

The novel is set at the time of the English Civil War. A middle-aged Honor Harris narrates the story of her youth, from the age of ten, when living with her brother Robin. The narrative begins when Kit, Honor''s oldest brother, brings home his new bride, Gartred. After only three years, Kit dies of smallpox and Gartred moves away. At age eighteen, Honor meets Richard Grenvile, Gartred''s brother. They fall in love and, despite a former arrangement for Honor to marry another, they decide to be married. Honor is injured and loses the use of her legs in a riding accident, when out with Richard and Gartred. Subsequently, Honor refuses to marry - or even see - Richard. By the time the Civil War breaks out, fifteen years have passed; Honor has grown in independence, and Richard has had three children, Joe, born illegitimately from an affair with a dairymaid, and Dick, from a failed marriage. Dick''s sister lives in Holland and is not really part of the story. Following some nearby violence, Honor moves to Menabilly, the home of her sister and brother-in-law, where she again meets Richard, posted in Plymouth as a leader of the King''s army in the west of England. During the war, Richard is wounded, and Honor tends to him in weakness. The Parliamentarians take Cornwall, and Richard flees the country. He is part of a Royalist rebellion, though, some years later. He is, however, betrayed: it is suggested that the betrayer is his son Dick. An escape plan is made to remove Richard and Dick safely from the Parliamentarians to Holland to be with Richard''s daughter and Dick''s sister, after the revolt fails. Rumours of their escape which are told to Honor suggest that only Richard is able to escape, which brings the reader back to the prompt for Du Maurier''s tale - the skeleton discovered in the excavations of Menabilly.

The King''s General

The Weapon Shops of Isher and its sequel The Weapon Makers detail the workings of Isher civilization and the adventures of Robert Hedrock, The One Immortal Man, as he keeps it in balance in the face of attempts by the Weapon Makers, who have forgotten their purpose as a permanent opposition, and the strong government of the Empress, Innelda Isher, with its intimate connections to a network of financial institutions, to undermine each other. The Weapon Shops provide the populace with defensive weapons and an alternative legal system. The Isher/Weapon Shops novels are one of the very few examples of Golden Age science fiction that explicitly discusses the right to keep and bear arms, specifically guns. Indeed, the motto of the Weapon Shops, repeated several times, is "The right to buy weapons is the right to be free". Van Vogt''s guns have virtually magical properties, and can only be used in self-defense. The political philosophy of the Weapon Shops is minimalist. They will not interfere with the corrupt imperial monarchy of the Isher government, on the grounds that men always have a government of the type they deserve: no government, however bad, exists without at least the tacit consent of the governed. The mission of the Weapon Shops therefore is merely to offer single individuals the right to protect themselves with a firearm, or, in cases of fraud, access to a "Robin Hood" alternative court system that judges and awards compensation from large, imperial merchant combines to cheated individuals. Because the population has access to this alternative system of justice, the Isher government cannot take the final step toward totalitarianism. The novel was published by Greenberg in New York in 1951. It was also published as a paperback by Ace Books and in 1969 by New English Library in the U.K.

The Weapon Shops of Isher

Meg Finn is in trouble. Her mother is dead and her only family is an abusive stepfather who does nothing but watch TV all day. Her stepfather is forced to resign from his job when Meg embarrassed him by showing his work colleagues a video of herself smashing his brand new television that he bought with Meg''s mother''s engagement ring and all of Meg''s life saving . When she is forced to help Belch Brennan, a dim-witted criminal, rob the elderly Lowrie McCall, the attempted burglary ends in disaster. In an attempt to scare Meg, Belch shoots by a gas tank which explodes, killing them both. While Belch is sent straight to hell (his soul merged with that of his vicious dog Raptor by the explosion, making him a half-boy half-dog creature,) Meg''s perfect balance between good and evil earns her a chance to redeem herself and get blue in her Aura. She is sent back to earth in order to help Lowrie complete the items on his "wish list": a list of things that he feels will correct the many mistakes he made in his life. Meanwhile, Satan has decided that he wants Meg''s soul in Hell and Beelzebub is forced to send Belch to recapture Meg and "make her bad", making Belch and Elph, the hologram with which he has been equipped, the chief antagonists in the story. The Wish List: 1) Kissy Sissy - Kiss Cicely Ward, (aka Sissy) a popular talk-show granny and one-date girlfriend of Lowrie. 2) Kick a ball over the bar in Croke Park. 3) Burst Ball - Punch a man who bullied Lowrie at school, Punch Brendan Ball. 4) Spit over the Cliffs of Moher. Ultimately, following a confrontation on the edge of the Cliffs of Moher, Belch is destroyed and Meg''s final act of holiness - giving her stepfather a new life - gains her entry to Heaven, where she meets her mother again.

The Wish List

Valérian and Laureline''s astroship has crashed in the middle of a graveyard of spaceships on an unknown asteroid. Swept over a waterfall, they are rescued by a motley group of various aliens gathering seaweed. Suddenly, overhead, a flock of birds gathers over the ship. The crew fly into a panic upon sight of these “Birds-Of-Madness” and Valérian and Laureline are ordered to work with the others in gathering the seaweed. One of the crew is a human but he refuses to talk to Valérian. The hold fully loaded, the boat begins the journey back to its port. On the way, they get into a conversation with a young alien called Sül who tells them that all the others are mad – they think only of gathering as much food as possible for their Master. Arriving at the village, they join a flotilla of boats that travels across the viscous marshes and along a series of fjords until they reach a cove – from here they must continue on foot. Laden with the produce, they reach the Village of the Fruits where they join a caravan carrying exotic fruits. When Valérian asks Sül who the Master is, Sül laughs – nobody has ever seen him but he calls all those he wants into his service. Some are brought here, others are born here. Many have been here so long they have no memory of their past lives. The caravan continues across a vast distance, joined by more and more caravans all bringing their produce to the Master and watched by the birds-of-madness, until they reach his city at the head of an immense valley. The bottom of the valley, the domain of the Master, lies shrouded in mist. They are brought to the great kitchens where they are put to work preparing klaar to feed the master. When the klaar is ready, they are brought to a huge, beautifully decorated basin. The klaar is poured into the basin where it will flow to the Master. The others will be allowed to dine on the leftovers. Suddenly, a man, starving, detaches himself from the crowd and tries to take some of the klaar for himself. The birds-of-madness attack biting him. Sül tries to intervene but is bitten himself. The man now thinks he is a bird while Sül''s hatred for the Master now manifests itself as fully fledged rage. Having sated themselves on the remnants of the klaar, the rest of the crowd turn on Sül and the man and, despite Valérian and Laureline''s attempts to stop them, carry the two of them away. Valérian and Laureline follow but are too late and Sül and the man are thrown into a pit where all those driven insane by the birds are cast. Valérian tries to talk to the crowd, to make them see what they are doing is wrong but to no avail – the crowd hurl stones at them and Laureline is knocked unconscious. Valérian drags her away to safety. That night, Valérian and Laureline return to the pit once the crowds have moved on. They rescue Sül and the rest of the madmen. As they try to make their escape on a chariot, the alarm is raised and they are pursued. The follow the Pathway of the Klaar towards the Master''s lair. Eventually they pass into the forbidden lands and their pursuers give up the chase. Continuing to follow the Pathway of the Klaar, they are attacked by the birds-of-madness. Valérian and Laureline take shelter in a cave while the others form a shield around the entrance. This is not enough and Valérian and Laureline are bitten also. The attack passes and they find that they are almost at the bottom of the valley. A strange glow emanates from the mists. Reaching the source of the glow, they find the Master – a large amorphous grey blob. Laureline hits upon a plan – if they destroy the Pathways of Klaar, the Master will starve. Valérian begins firing but suddenly he breaks down on the ground – his mind has been attacked by the Master, presenting him with terrible images of war and destruction. Laureline takes up the gun but is also struck down, terrified by images of her body being torn to pieces by machinery. Similarly, Sül and the rest of the madmen are taken down one by one by the Master''s superior mental powers. Laureline realises that problem is that they attacked one at a time. Gathering the others together, they hold hands and use their combined strength to overcome the Master''s influence. Suddenly, the Master rips himself free and flees into the sky followed by the birds-of-madness and the mist. Realising they are free, the others consider settling in the Master''s domain and living off the klaar. Valérian points out to them that it is not right to replace one dictator with another and they agree to return to the villages to free the others. Later, a large group of people work to free Valérian''s astroship from the marsh in the graveyard of spaceships. The astroship blasts off with just one passenger, Sül, the rest having decided to stay on the asteroid. They wonder where the Master has gone to, blissfully unaware that he has attached himself to hull of their ship...

Birds of the Master

A normal girl in Michigan, Zoe Elias has dreams of becoming a pianist just like Vladimir Horowitz. Zoe''s mom is obsessed with her work and her dad doesn''t have a job, and doesn''t like to interact with others. When her father brings home a Perfectone D60 Organ, Zoe is upset because she was hoping for a baby grand piano. The organ comes with free lessons and her teacher is Miss Person. After a lesson, Zoe disobeys Miss Person and instead of practicing with her tempo, she uses Ramba version. Miss Person realizes that Zoe has talent and decides that Zoe should enter the Perform-O-Rama. Zoe''s mom misses her birthday and Zoe is very upset. After things go wrong, and her mother can no longer drive her to the Perform-O-Rama on the following day, she thinks that she won''t make it to Perform-O-Rama. She takes out her anger on her dad, and Mr. Elias decides to take Zoe to the Perform-O-Rama, knowing she really wants to do it. Her first performance, at the Perform-O-Rama, doesn''t go as well as she''d wanted. But during her second, she looks up in the audience and sees her mom, by her dad. Zoe gets motivated and later comes home with a 4th place trophy.

A Crooked Kind of Perfect

A prototypical Yatesian dreamer, John C. Wilder is a bored but successful salesman of advertising space, living in New York who seeks refuge from the disappointments of his life in alcohol and adultery. He breaks down during a distillers'' convention. Lacking sleep and the worse for alcohol upon his return to New York, he threatens his family. His friend, Paul Borg, has him committed to the psychiatric ward of Bellevue Hospital in New York. Upon his release he seeks help from his family, psychiatrists, and AA meetings, all of whom he subsequently rejects. With the encouragement of a mistress, Pamela Hendricks, Wilder renews himself through their common love of movies and the prospect of making a film about his institutionalization. After a group of enthusiastic college students embrace his story and partially film his screenplay, Wilder leaves his family and job to move to Hollywood in the hopes of securing a deal that will complete and distribute the film. The loss of his mistress and the rejection he suffers from producers leads him even deeper into an abyss of paranoid alcoholic delusion. The novel ends with Wilder wandering the streets of Los Angeles, declaring himself to be Jesus Christ (mirroring a delusional incident in Yates'' own life), and being recommitted to an institution.

Disturbing the Peace

The story is set in May 1964. Nick Carter is on the trail of Judas – the master spy first encountered in Run, Spy, Run. Posing as an investigative journalist for a West German tabloid newspaper, Carter tracks Judas to Buenos Aires, Argentina, where he is living among the expatriate German community under the alias Hugo Bronson. Carter meets an informant at his home who reveals that Bronson is actually Martin Bormann, one of Adolf Hitler''s closest aides and who was thought to have escaped from Germany at the end of World War II. Before he can reveal Bormann''s current whereabouts the informant is shot dead by a sniper. Carter takes documents from the informant''s safe that identify two missing German scientists as former Nazis. Carter traces Bronson to a house in West Berlin where he discovers a plot to kidnap five renowned German scientists living overseas. AXE suspects that the terrorist organization known as CLAW, supported by communist China, is behind an operation to kidnap the scientists and transport them to China. Four of the scientists are missing; the fifth, Dr Mark Gerber – a naturalized American – has been persuaded by his attractive secretary (Elena Darby) to join her on a round-the-world trip. AXE sends two agents to trail Gerber on his trip while Carter meets up with them in Cairo, Egypt. AXE discovers that Gerber''s secretary is a communist spy luring Gerber to a location where he can be kidnapped more easily. On the Bombay to New Delhi leg of the world tour Julia Baron (Carter''s assistant in Run, Spy, Run and The China Doll) joins the group. One of the missing scientists is also on the flight against his will accompanied by a minder. The elderly scientist tries to leave the group during a sightseeing trip aided by Carter but dies of heart failure in the attempt. He manages to inform Carter that Bormann was behind the plan to assemble the team of scientists on behalf of China. En route to the Taj Mahal the plane is hijacked by terrorists posing as passengers and diverted to a military base in China. Gerber is separated from the rest of the passengers and taken to a secret underground laboratory. There he meets Bronson and the team of missing German scientists who are expected to help build an atomic bomb for the Chinese. Carter organizes a revolt by the passengers. They overcome the guards and steal their weapons. Carter and Elena enter the secret laboratory searching for Gerber. They find him and the other missing scientists restrained in a chamber while the military base commandant (Yi) is torturing Julie Baron to force the scientists to cooperate. Carter kills the commandant in unarmed combat and frees the scientists. Elena is caught and tied up. Carter places a time bomb in the missile silo and breaks out with the passengers – several of whom are killed or injured in the attempt. Carter recognizes Bronson as Judas. Judas escapes unharmed as the passengers board their hijacked plane and escape as Carter''s bomb explodes destroying the secret base.

Fraulein Spy

Michael and Corinne Mulvaney are the parents of four children: Michael, Patrick, Marianne, and Judd. Living in a picture perfect farm in upstate New York, the Mulvaneys own a successful roofing company; Michael Mulvaney is considered a serious businessman. Corinne is a bubbly, earthy mother whose life revolves around the family unit. For nearly twenty years the Mulvaney clan thrives, admired throughout Mt. Ephraim for being the model family. On St. Valentine''s night, 1976, Marianne Mulvaney, after prom, goes to a party where she becomes intoxicated and is raped by an upperclassman whose father is a well-respected businessman and friend of Mr. Mulvaney. Marianne''s rape is the beginning of a tumultuous fifteen-year period. Her father, lost and angry, does not understand why his daughter will not press charges against her attacker. He can no longer look at his daughter the same way, and sends her to live with a distant relative of Corinne''s in Salamanca. Marianne, moving haphazardly from place to place, continues to wait for her father to call on her, but he never does. Michael Mulvaney''s casual drinking turns into full-fledged alcoholism. Gradually, his reputation as a respected businessman disintegrates. The Mulvaneys are forced into bankruptcy and forced to sell the farm. Eventually, Corinne and Michael split up. For the other family members, things continue to get worse. All three of the Mulvaney boys leave home angrily, never to return. One of them "executes justice" on his sister''s rapist. After many years, the Mulvaneys meet once again in a family reunion at Corinne''s new home which she shares with a friend. The family has extended to include spouses and children. Finally, the Mulvaneys come full circle and receive closure.

We Were the Mulvaneys

The novel''s protagonist is Sarah Woodruff, the Woman of the title, also known unkindly as “Tragedy” and by the unfortunate nickname “The French Lieutenant’s Whore”. She lives in the coastal town of Lyme Regis, as a disgraced woman, supposedly abandoned by a French naval officer named Varguennes — married, unknown to her, to another woman — with whom she had supposedly had an affair and who had returned to France. She spends her limited time off at the Cobb, a pier jutting out to sea, staring at the sea itself. One day, she is seen there by the gentleman Charles Smithson and his fiancée, Ernestina Freeman, the shallow-minded daughter of a wealthy tradesman whose origins are Scottish. Ernestina tells Charles something of Sarah’s story, and he develops a strong curiosity about her. Eventually, he and she begin to meet clandestinely, during which times Sarah tells Charles her history, and asks for his support, mostly emotional. Despite trying to remain objective, Charles eventually sends Sarah to Exeter, where he, during a journey, cannot resist stopping in to visit and see her. At the time she has suffered an ankle injury; he visits her alone and after they have made love he realises that she had been, contrary to the rumours, a virgin. Simultaneously, he learns that his prospective inheritance from an elder uncle is in jeopardy; the uncle has become engaged to a woman young enough to bear him an heir. From there, the novelist offers three different endings for The French Lieutenant’s Woman. * First ending: Charles marries Ernestina, and their marriage is unhappy; Sarah’s fate is unknown. Charles tells Ernestina about an encounter which he implies is with the “French Lieutenant’s Whore”, but elides the sordid details, and the matter is ended. This ending, however, might be dismissed as a daydream, before the alternative events of the subsequent meeting with Ernestina are described. Before the second and third endings, the narrator — who the novelist wants the reader to believe is John Fowles himself — appears as a minor character sharing a railway compartment with Charles. He tosses a coin to determine the order in which he will portray the two, other possible endings, emphasising their equal plausibility. * Second ending: Charles and Sarah become intimate; he ends his engagement to Ernestina, with unpleasant consequences. He is disgraced, and his uncle marries, then produces an heir. Sarah flees to London without telling the enamoured Charles, who searches for her for years, before finding her living with several artists (seemingly the Rossettis), enjoying an artistic, creative life. He then learns he has fathered a child with her; as a family, their future is open, with possible reunion implied. * Third ending: the narrator re-appears, standing outside the house where the second ending occurred; at the aftermath. He turns back his pocket watch by fifteen minutes, before leaving in his carriage. Events are the same as in the second-ending version but, when Charles finds Sarah again, in London, their reunion is sour. It is possible that their union was childless; Sarah does not tell Charles about a child, and expresses no interest in continuing the relationship. He leaves the house, deciding to return to America, and sees the carriage, in which the narrator was thought gone. Raising the question: is Sarah a manipulating, lying woman of few morals, exploiting Charles’s obvious love to get what she wants? En route, Fowles the novelist discourses upon the difficulties of controlling the characters, and offers analyses of differences in 19th-century customs and class, the theories of Charles Darwin, the poetry of Matthew Arnold, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and the literature of Thomas Hardy. He questions the role of the author — when speaking of how the Charles character “disobeys” his orders; the characters have discrete lives of their own in the novel. Philosophically, Existentialism is mentioned several times during the story, and in particular detail at the end, after the portrayals of the two, apparent, equally possible endings.

Over 8000 Takeaways For Your Brain!

Read - Listen - Learn

The Madman's Tale

By John Katzenbach

Settling Accounts: Return Engagement

By Harry Turtledove

Tintin in Thailand

No Author Listed

The King's General

No Author Listed

The Weapon Shops of Isher

By A. E. van Vogt

The Wish List

By Eoin Colfer

Birds of the Master

By Pierre Christin

A Crooked Kind of Perfect

No Author Listed

Disturbing the Peace

By Richard Yates

Fraulein Spy

No Author Listed

We Were the Mulvaneys

By Joyce Carol Oates

The French Lieutenant's Woman

By John Fowles