The novel is written in the third-person with flashbacks to specific events in the life of Simón Bolívar, "the General". It begins on May 8, 1830 in Santa Fe de Bogotá. The General is preparing for his journey towards the port of Cartagena de Indias, intending to leave Colombia for Europe. Following his resignation as President of Gran Colombia, the people of the lands he liberated have now turned against him, scrawling anti-Bolívar graffiti and throwing waste at him. The General is anxious to move on, but has to remind the Vice-President-elect, General Domingo Caycedo, that he has yet to receive a valid passport to leave the country. The General leaves Bogotá with the few officials still faithful to him, including his confidante and aide-de-camp, José Palacios. At the end of the first chapter, the General is referred to by his full title, General Simón José Antonio de la Santísima Trinidad Bolívar y Palacios, for the only time in the novel. On the first night of the voyage, the General stays at Facatativá with his entourage, which consists of José Palacios, five aides-de-camp, his clerks, and his dogs. Here, as throughout the journey that follows, the General''s loss of prestige is evident; the downturn in his fortunes surprises even the General himself. His unidentified illness has led to his physical deterioration, which makes him unrecognizable, and his aide-de-camp is constantly mistaken for the Liberator. After many delays, the General and his party arrive in Honda, where the Governor, Posada Gutiérrez, has arranged for three days of fiestas. On his last night in Honda, the General returns late to camp and finds one of his old friends, Miranda Lyndsay, waiting for him. The General recalls that fifteen years ago, she had learned of a plot against his life and had saved him. The following morning, the General begins the voyage down the Magdalena River. Both his physical debilitation and pride are evident as he negotiates the slope to the dock: he is in need of a sedan chair but refuses to use it. The group stays a night in Puerto Real, where the General claims he sees a woman singing during the night. His aides-de-camp and the watchman conduct a search, but they fail to uncover any sign of a woman having been in the vicinity. The General and his entourage arrive at the port of Mompox. Here they are stopped by police, who fail to recognize the General. They ask for his passport, but he is unable to produce one. Eventually, the police discover his identity and escort him into the port. The people still believe him to be the President of Gran Colombia and prepare banquets in his honor; but these festivities are wasted on him due to his lack of strength and appetite. After several days, the General and his entourage set off for Turbaco. The group spend a sleepless night in Barranca Nueva before they arrive in Turbaco. Their original plan was to continue to Cartagena the following day, but the General is informed that there is no available ship bound for Europe from the port and that his passport still has not arrived. While staying in the town, he receives a visit from General Mariano Montilla and a few other friends. The deterioration of his health becomes increasingly evident—one of his visitors describes his face as that of a dead man. In Turbaco, the General is joined by General Daniel Florencio O''Leary and receives news of ongoing political machinations: Joaquín Mosquera, appointed successor as President of Gran Colombia, has assumed power but his legitimacy is still contested by General Rafael Urdaneta. The General recalls that his "dream began to fall apart on the very day it was realized". The General finally receives his passport, and two days later he sets off with his entourage for Cartagena and the coast, where more receptions are held in his honor. Throughout this time, he is surrounded by women but is too weak to engage in sexual relations. The General is deeply affected when he hears that his good friend and preferred successor for the presidency, Field Marshal Sucre, has been ambushed and assassinated. The General is now told by one of his aides-de-camp that General Rafael Urdaneta has taken over the government in Bogotá, and there are reports of demonstrations and riots in support of a return to power by Bolívar. The General''s group travel to the town of Soledad, where he stays for more than a month, his health declining further. In Soledad, the General agrees to see a physician for the first time. The General never leaves South America. He finishes his journey in Santa Marta, too weak to continue and with only his doctor and his closest aides by his side. He dies in poverty, a shadow of the man who liberated much of the continent.

The General in His Labyrinth

It is the year 1020. Rob Cole is the eldest of many children. His father is a Joiner in the Guild of Carpenters in London. His mother,Agnes Cole, is his father''s wife. Robert has a particular Gift: he can sense when someone is going to die.When his mother and father both die, the Cole household is parceled out to various neighbors and friends. The Cole children are parceled out likewise. Rob is taken by the only one who wants him: a traveling barber-surgeon who goes only by the name of Barber. He is a fleshy man with fleshy appetites and a very great zest for life. Over the next years, he takes Rob as his apprentice. He teaches the boy how to juggle, to draw caricatures, to tell stories, to entertain a crowd, to sell the patent nostrum on which they make their living. He also teaches the boy all he knows of medicine - which is little. When Barber dies, Rob takes over his traveling medicine show. But he is restless, desiring to know more about the ways of medicine. He meets a Jewish physician in Malmesbury who tells him of schools in Córdoba, Toledo, even in far-away Persia, where the medical and scientific learning of the Muslim is taught. Unfortunately, besides being worlds away, the schools do not admit Christians - and even if they did, no country in Christendom would allow a person with such heathen learning to return. In a moment of epiphany, Rob decides that he shall take on the guise of a Jewish student, so that he can travel to Persia and study at the feet of Avicenna. Rob travels, as a Christian, from London throughout Europe to Constantinople. Here he becomes Jewish in appearance, and travels eastwards with a group of Jewish merchants, learning their ways as best he can. Rob arrives in Persia and tries to enter into the school of physicians there. He is not allowed access. He struggles to find a place in the city while searching for a way to enter the school. A chance encounter with the Shah of Persia opens for Rob the door to the school of physicians. Here he begins the study of medicine - the first formal study he has ever had in his life. At the same time he immerses himself in the life of a Persian Jew. Comparable to a surgical residency or similar term of practicum, Rob goes to a war-torn (and plague-torn) land to practice his medical knowledge. His journeys with the Shah''s armies take him as far as India, where he encounters elephants, spices, and Wootz steel. He makes friends among the Muslim students of the school. Upon his return he encounters a woman he had met on his travels across Europe, a Scottish woman journeying with her father in search of superior Turkish sheep. Though she is Christian, they form a liaison, and are secretly wed. He is passed as a physician and helps to instruct new physicians in the school. Soon afterwards, Avicenna dies, and Isfahan is conquered by a rival king. Rob and his wife flee the rape and pillage and make their laborious way back to England, delivering her of children as they go. Rob struggles to locate his lost brothers and sisters, likewise to make his place amongst the terribly ignorant physicians of London. Despairing, he returns with his wife and family to Scotland, where he acts as physician to his wife''s people high in the hills.

The Physician

In 1960, 58-year-old Jim Fergesson decides to sell his Oakland-based auto repair business and retire. This threatens to greatly inconvenience his business tenant, used car salesman Al Miller, who rents a lot from Fergesson to sell his battered but superficially reconditioned old jalopies. Chris Harmon, an entrepreneur, advises Fergesson to invest in a new super-garage located in Marin Country Gardens. Jim takes a fall in the mud and has a minor heart attack during a visit to the property to personally verify its existence. Miller is convinced that Harmon is corrupt and makes an amateurish attempt at blackmailing him over his alleged (then-illegal) sale of salacious audio recordings. At the same time Al enters employment with Harmon as a curiously unqualified salesman of Classical Music. This, as it turns out, was an innocent administrative error. Al''s actual assignment now involves the mass marketing of, wait for it now, Barbershop Music. He sees conspiracies, machinations and double-dealings where there are none and strives mightily, but ultimately fails, to disrupt the final contract-signing between Fergesson and Harmon by playing on old Jim''s paranoia. The strain of it all takes its toll on a recently injured, weakened, ailing Fergesson and he dies later that night at home. Al then discovers that his used car lot has been ferociously vandalised, although the exact time and date remain uncertain. This plays an unexpectedly important role in the unfoldment of subsequent events. Things are not quite what they seem, and coincidence plays a starring role here. His wife Julie quits her job and they run off together across Nevada, whilst Lydia, Jim''s widow, discovers that her late husband''s deal with Harmon was, contrary to what Al had sincerely believed, completely legitimate. Al is temporarily detained after Lydia threatens to sue him for fraud. Julie leaves him forever. In a moment of true serendipity Al starts a new relationship with his married real estate vendor, a vivacious, attractive "colored" woman by the name of Mrs. Lane.

Humpty Dumpty in Oakland

As Count Wallmoden, an Austrian World War I veteran and lieutenant of the reserve, readies himself for a four-week military exercise which is scheduled to start on August 15, 1939 he experiences the first of several derealization episodes. Later, during an idle evening spent in talk with his fellow officers, as the discussion touches on the topic of spiritism, his regimental commander half-jokingly promises Wallmoden that whenever they meet he would indicate whether he is still alive or already dead because that might not be immediately apparent to a living person. During a training attack near the village of Würmla Wallmoden has an apparition of naked ghosts swirling around him. He keeps this vision to himself until much later when he reports it to a military physician, who tells him that there is nothing necessarily wrong with him, as hallucinations in the sane are not uncommon as most people believe. While spending an off-duty evening in Vienna Wallmoden socially meets people who, as it eventually turns out, are not quite what they seem and might in fact be members of the Austrian resistance. Among them is a strange aristocratic lady, Baroness Pistohlkors who states that she is German by birth but lived in Sioux Falls as a child before coming to Austria. The two start an affair. Wallmoden promises to meet her again on September 16, the day his tour of military duty is over. Later, returning from another visit to Vienna, Wallmoden finds that his unit has been mobilized for war. Motorized night marches take them through Jedenspeigen (where Walmoden has a lucid dream of two young women bathing in the room he is sleeping in) and across Slovakia (at this time, a Nazi puppet state) to Trstená at the Slovak-Polish border. As the regiment prepares to attack Jabłonka at first morning light he witnesses an eastward migration of thousands of crabs, a phenomenon apparently not perceived or ignored by his comrades – and clearly a symbol for the German war machine. As Wallmoden''s regiment approaches Hrubieszów by way of Tarnów on September 16, the invaders face the first serious Polish resistance. A fellow officer who had supposedly visited Baroness Pistohlkors in Vienna admits that he had deceived Wallmoden when he had conveyed her greetings to him earlier; actually his beloved died resisting apprehension by the Gestapo. On a country road he meets his regimental commander who—in keeping with his promise—had stated on all earlier occasions that he was "still in the flesh" but now almost proudly announces that "his status has changed." When the junior officer remarks that such a joke is in bad taste given the considerable number of recent casualties, the colonel angrily orders Wallmoden to stand aside near a group of trees. As Wallmoden complies he sees the corpse of his regimental commander being carried away. Before he can come to terms with the fact that he has talked to a ghost a minute ago, Polish aircraft appear and drop bombs on the grove Wallmoden had been ordered to by his dead commander. As he is hurled through the air by one of the explosions he briefly enters a dreamlike state from which he (apparently at least) awakes to find himself being transported in an ambulance car, although he does not seem to have suffered injuries. In Janówka their car breaks down and Wallmoden strays into a villa where he meets a woman whom he recognizes as his beloved although there is no outward resemblance. After they have made love she identifies herself as the true baroness Pistohlkors who had become a victim of identity theft after her passport had been stolen. As the two make their way back towards Germany the story terminates, without explicit ending, as they pass Niwiska. It is not clear whether the two continue on the factual plane of the story as living beings, or rather have rejoined in the Otherworld.

Mars in Aries

The main plot of the novel is generally concerned with the rise of Marius, his marriage to Julia, his success in replacing Metellus as general in charge of the Numidian theatre of war, his defeat of King Jugurtha of Numidia, his re-organization of the Roman Army system, his unprecedented consecutive consulships, his defeat of a massive invasion of German tribes (the Teutones, the Cimbri and the Marcomanni/Cherusci/Tigurini), and the details of his relationship with his subordinate and close friend Sulla. However, although Marius can be considered the protagonist, Sulla occasionally becomes the central figure of the narrative; there are several lengthy sections dealing with his plot to murder the two wealthy women with whom he lives, his use of the newfound wealth in establishing himself politically, his homosexual relationship with the Greek child-actor Metrobius, and his marriage to the (possibly fictitious) younger daughter of ''Julius Caesar Grandfather'', Julilla. McCullough explains that, while it is certainly known Sulla''s first wife was a Julia, it is not known to which branch of the Julii she belonged, but she was certainly a relation of Marius''s better-known Julian wife, hence the decision to assign her the role in the novel of a younger sister. A third storyline is focused on the figures of Marcus Livius Drusus and his sister Livia Drusa who both feature more prominently in The Grass Crown: and their own growing friendship with the Servilius Caepio family resulting in a double marriage, which proves disastrous when Quintus Servilius Caepio Senior is not only accused of embezzling more gold than there was in the Roman Treasury, but also is responsible for Rome''s most disastrous military defeat for generations - a defeat which so ruins the credibility of the conservative leaders of the Senate that it lets Marius into power far earlier than he expected, and for a longer time. Much of the narrative is also told in the form of letters between the protagonists - Marius, Sulla, Old Caesar and frequently their friend, Publius Rutilius Rufus - himself a man somewhat torn in allegiance: conservative by instinct, but partisan of Marius by friendship. The novel closes with Marius''s sixth consulship, in which he proves not to be as adept politically as he is militarily: and the tribune whose help he needs, Lucius Appuleius Saturninus, has an agenda of his own, leading to an armed insurrection which Marius himself has to put down. To cap it all, he also suffers a minor stroke during the summer, although he makes a full recovery. Tarred by association, his political career seems over: but after fighting many battles together, there is some reason for Marius and Sulla to hope that Rome will have peace for a few years. de:Die Macht und die Liebe es:El Primer Hombre de Roma

The First Man in Rome

McCullough continues her Masters of Rome series with the seventh and final installment, Antony and Cleopatra. The novel spans the years 41 BC to 27 BC, from the aftermath of the Battle of Philippi and the suicide of Marcus Junius Brutus and Gaius Cassius Longinus until the downfall of the second triumvirate, the final war of the Roman Republic and the renaming of Octavian to Augustus in 27 BC. The novel, which is supposed to be McCullough''s last in the series, focuses mainly on the famous love story between Mark Antony, victor at Philippi, and queen Cleopatra, earlier the lover of Julius Caesar. This book differs greatly from Shakespeare''s treatment of these events; Cleopatra is portrayed as no great beauty, but rather an inept politician who helps ruin Antony''s cause by publicly meddling in affairs of state, and Antony is, for much of the book, far more in love with Cleopatra''s wealth than her person. Caesarion is portrayed as a gifted, idealistic youth who would be far happier had he never been a king, and who is not happy with his mother''s ambitious plans to make him ruler of all the East. Octavian and his wife Livia are depicted as pragmatic to the point of total ruthlessness but not needlessly cruel.

Antony and Cleopatra

The story is about a little girl named Sophie, after the author''s granddaughter Sophie Dahl. One night, when Sophie cannot fall asleep during the "witching hour", she sees a giant blowing something into the bedroom windows down the street. The giant notices her, reaches through the window, and carries her to his home in Giant Country. Once there, he reveals that he is the world''s only benevolent giant, the Big Friendly Giant or BFG, who operating in the strictest secrecy, collects good dreams that he later distributes to children. By means of immense ears he can hear dreams and their contents (which manifest themselves in a misty Dream Country as floating, blob-like objects) and blow them via a trumpet-like blowpipe into the bedrooms of children. When he catches a nightmare, he destroys it, or uses it to start fights among the other giants, who periodically enter the human world to steal and eat "human beans", especially children. The BFG, because he refuses to do likewise, subsists on a foul-tasting vegetable known as a snozzcumber (inspired by English cucumbers), and on a drink called frobscottle, which is unusual in that the bubbles in the drink travel downwards and therefore cause the drinker to break wind instead of burp; this causes noisy flatulence known as Whizzpoppers. Sophie and the BFG become friends early on; later, she persuades him to approach the Queen of England with the aim of capturing the other giants to prevent them from eating any more people. To this end, the BFG creates a nightmare introducing knowledge of the man-eating giants to the Queen and leaves Sophie in the Queen''s bedroom to confirm it true. Because the dream included the knowledge of Sophie''s presence, the Queen believes her and speaks with the BFG. After considerable effort by the palace staff to create a table, chair, and cutlery of appropriate size for him to use, the BFG is given a lavish breakfast, and the Queen forms a plan to capture the other giants. She calls the King of Sweden and the Sultan of Baghdad to confirm the BFG''s story - the giants having visited those locations on the previous two nights &ndash; then summons the Head of the Army and the Marshal of the Air Force. The said officers, though initially belligerent and skeptical, eventually agree to co-operate. Eventually, a huge fleet of helicopters follows the BFG to the giants'' homeland. While the child-eating giants are asleep, the Army ties them up, hangs them under the helicopters, and (after a brief struggle with the largest and fiercest of the giants, known as the Fleshlumpeater), flies them to London, where a special pit has been constructed from which they will not be able to escape. With thousands watching closely, the BFG unties the giants, then feeds them snozzcumbers which they will eat for the rest of their lives as a punishment for eating human beings. Afterwards, a huge castle is built to serve as the BFG''s new house, with a little cottage next door for Sophie. While they are living happily in England, the BFG writes a book of their adventures, which is stated to be the same book in which the afore-mentioned story is narrated (a literary device also apparent in James and the Giant Peach and The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar).

The BFG

The story takes place at Lincoln International, a fictional Chicago airport based very loosely on O''Hare International Airport. The action mainly centers on Mel Bakersfeld, the Airport General Manager. His devotion to his job is tearing apart his family and his marriage to his wife Cindy, who resents his use of his job at the airport as a device to avoid going to various after-hours events she wants him to participate in, as she attempts to climb into the social circles of Chicago''s elite. His problems in his marriage are further exacerbated by his romantically-charged friendship with a lovely divorcee, Trans America Airlines passenger relations manager Tanya Livingston. The story takes place mainly over the course of one evening and night, as a massive snowstorm plays havoc with airport operations. The storyline centers on Bakersfeld''s struggles to keep the airport open during the storm. His chief problem is the unexpected closure of primary Runway 30 (runway 29 in the subsequent film), caused when a landing airliner turns off past the wrong side of a runway marker light, burying the plane''s landing gear in the snow, and blocking the runway. This becomes a major problem as another airplane, Trans America Flight Two, experiences a midair emergency and returns to Lincoln. This requires that runway 30 be made operational---at any cost. The closing of runway 30 requires the use of shorter runway 25 (runway 22 in the subsequent film), which has the unfortunate consequence of causing planes to take off over a noise-sensitive suburb, whose residents picket the airport in protest. The shorter runway 25 is also later inadequate to land the returning airplane, which has suffered major structural and mechanical damage due to explosive decompression caused by the detonation of the bomb brought on board. The book presents an overview of the vast and complex operations involved in operating a major commercial airport, much of which is still applicable over 40 years later. Several major and minor characters appear, illustrating the vast complexity of the airport and its operations. They include Customs officers, lawyers, snow clearers, airport police, doctors, clerks etc.

Airport

Hugo Darracott, an enormous figure of a young man, arrives at Darracott Place in Sussex to find his family waiting: his grandfather, Lord Darracott; his uncle, Matthew, a politician, his wife, Lady Aurelia and their sons Vincent and Claud; and his uncle Rupert''s widow Elvira and her children Anthea and Richmond. They are, it is immediately apparently, expecting "a fellow who eats off his knife": that is, a working- or at best lower middle-class man. Hugo obligingly applies a Yorkshire accent and looks gormless. Lord Darracott puts pressure on his older grandchildren, Vincent, Anthea and Claud, to educate Hugo. He discourages Hugo from much contact at all with Richmond, who is young and army-mad - Richmond is Lord Darracott''s favourite, and his grandfather has no desire to see him leave Darracott Place. All three of the older grandchildren oblige: Vincent because his grandfather bribes him financially, Claud because he is a dandy and wishes to be influential, and Anthea to ease her grandfather''s bullying of her mother. It rapidly becomes apparent to Hugo that things are not all quite straightforward at Darracott Place; among other things he is disconcerted at the positive attitude towards smuggling that his family display. He is also unimpressed at the financial status of the family: while the lands are clearly rich, the tenants'' farms are ill-maintained and so indeed are the family buildings (both Darracott Place itself and the Dower house which is reputed to be haunted and is maintained by a single servant). It emerges that Richmond, bored by being kept at home with nothing to do, has started joining in the smuggling . This ultimately results in a farcical scene in the family''s pains to keep this discovery from the customs officers, choreographed by Hugo, with Claud and Richmond pretending to be drunk and playing cards in order to deceive the main customs officer into not realising that Richmond, not Claud, is actually suffering from blood-loss. Anthea, who is already half-falling for Hugo, is hugely impressed by his inventiveness and strength - and is as a result appalled when Vincent reveals that, far from being the impoverished man they had assumed, son of a weaver''s daughter and having earned his Commission rather than bought it, is in fact a Harrow-educated grandson and heir of a wealthy mill-owner, since she fears being considered a gold-digger. Hugo feels this suggestion is ridiculous, and begs her to marry him to protect him from matchmaking mamas - an offer which Anthea ultimately accepts.

The Unknown Ajax

The Code of the Woosters is the first installment in the Totleigh Towers saga. It introduces the characters of Sir Watkyn Bassett, the owner of Totleigh Towers, and Roderick Spode, later known as Lord Sidcup after his ascension to Earldom. The story opens with Bertie recovering from a bachelor party he has thrown the night before for Gussie Fink-Nottle, his fish-faced, newt-fancying friend. While still convalescing, he is summoned before his somewhat beloved Aunt Dahlia and ordered by her to go to a particular antique shop and "sneer at a cow creamer". This is an effort to sap the confidence of the shop''s owner and thus drive down the piece''s price before it is purchased by Dahlia''s collector husband Tom Travers. While in the shop, Bertie has his first run-in with Sir Watkyn (another collector of silver pieces) and Spode (whose aunt Sir Watkyn is planning to marry). Bertie escapes this ordeal relatively unscathed, but later learns that, via underhanded skulduggery involving lobsters and cold cucumbers, Sir Watkyn has obtained possession of the creamer ahead of Uncle Tom and spirited it away to Totleigh Towers. Bertie was already headed there in a frantic attempt to patch over the sudden rupture in the engagement of Gussie and Madeline Bassett, Sir Watkyn''s droopy and oversentimental daughter, but now he has been assigned an additional impossible task by Aunt Dahlia: recovery of the cow creamer, which is being guarded both by Spode and the local police. His situation is complicated further by the presence at Totleigh Towers of Stiffy Byng, Sir Watkyn''s anarchic young ward, who draws Bertie into her plan to marry the local curate, another old pal of Bertie''s named "Stinker" Pinker, and a certain leather-covered notebook of Gussie''s, in which he has lovingly and extensively detailed Sir Watkyn and Spode''s many character failings, and which has escaped Gussie''s possession to roam freely about the local community. Jeeves''s intellect is strained to the utmost, but in the end, the two couples are still engaged to be married, the cow creamer is headed back towards the hands of its rightful owner, and Bertie has not been beaten to a pulp by Spode, thrown in jail for stealing a policeman''s helmet, roped into marriage with either Madeline or Stiffy, or cut off from partaking in the cooking of the famed Anatole. In gratitude, he agrees to take the Round-The-World cruise Jeeves has been promoting, thinking that at absolute worst, he won''t be seeing Stiffy Byng. The actual code of the Woosters is "Never let a pal down."

The Code of the Woosters

Rockets was ten years old when he first met Darby Crash, lead singer of LA punk band The Germs. He and Darby had a sexual relationship and Rockets, like many in the scene, looked up to Darby. Rockets was aware, however, that he was often manipulated by Darby''s mind games and talent for controlling people. After Darby''s death Rockets continues to hang out in the local punk scene, but things are changing and he considers leaving LA. Rockets'' circle of close friends is composed of Siouxie, Squid, and Blitzer. Peripheral characters include Rory Dolores, Animal Cracker, Slade, and Hellin Killer. Despite his age, Rockets is accepted as one of the gang, but he is secretly scared of being returned to a group home. Blitzer, a young man, is very affectionate towards Rockets and the two gradually become more intimate, sexually and otherwise. Blitzer holds out the hope of a new life for the two of them together in Idaho. Blitzer gradually gets more intimate with Rockets, buying a double sleeping bag when they go camping and offering to hold his penis in the bathroom. Eventually, after a concert, they make love and Rockets welcomes Blitzer''s advances. They then shower together and Blitzer comments on the bruises that Rockets got when he was arrested by the police]. Rockets admits to Blitzer, "My worst fear is like ending up in a boy''s home." Blitzer then gives the boy his first shave and later on shaves his head as Rockets turns from punk to skinhead for his birthday. All four of the core group of friends make money by turning tricks of one sort or another and spend it on drugs, typically poppers, tabs, and the amphetamine derivative Desoxyn. Two gay tourists hire the group to show them around LA and are therefore also involved in much of the action of the book.

What We Do Is Secret

The novel describes the student life of Shekhar Verma, a middle class boy who grows up in the post liberalization era in India. Shekhar is described as a typical boy growing up in urban India - focused on Bollywood and Cricket. As he becomes older and faces Board Exams, he is pressured by his parents, relatives and neighbors to take life seriously and to consider pursuing a career in information technology. In order to achieve this goal, he decides to pursue his graduation in Information Technology but is disheartened when the IT bubble bursts and salaries plummet. Shekhar then trains his eyes on the IIMs, in the hope that an MBA from an IIM would help him get his dream job. The book describes in detail Shekhar''s life at IIM Bangalore and introduces various personalities that make up life there. Shekhar is shown to mature as the book progresses, ultimately questioning the choices he has made, which though make him successful as per society''s expectations, leave him confused about what he really wants in life.

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The General in His Labyrinth

By Gabriel García Márquez

The Physician

By Noah Gordon

Humpty Dumpty in Oakland

By Philip K. Dick

Mars in Aries

No Author Listed

The First Man in Rome

By Colleen McCullough

Antony and Cleopatra

By Colleen McCullough

The BFG

By Roald Dahl

Airport

By Arthur Hailey

The Unknown Ajax

By Georgette Heyer

The Code of the Woosters

By P. G. Wodehouse

What We Do Is Secret

By Thorn Kief Hillsbery

Joker in the pack

No Author Listed