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First published in 1812, The Swiss Family Robinson may sometimes seem old-fashioned to modern readers, especially the family’s attitude toward wildlife (if it moves, shoot it). However, it’s a truly exciting adventure and a timeless story of warm and loving family life.As the narrator says: “It was written... for the instruction and amusement of my children... Children are, on the whole, very much alike everywhere, and you four lads fairly represent multitudes... It will make me happy to think that my simple narrative may lead some of these to observe how blessed are the results of patient continuance in well-doing, what benefits arise from the thoughtful application of knowledge and science, and how good and pleasant a thing it is when brethren dwell together in unity, under the eye of parental love.”Written by Swiss pastor Johann David Wyss and edited by his son Johann Rudolf Wyss (this edition lists J.R. as the author), the novel was intended to teach his four sons about family values, good husbandry, the uses of the natural world, and self-reliance. It’s fun to think of the long-ago author reading his own books of natural histor...

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Adventure, Children, Fiction, Nature, Teen/Young adult

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For the Term of his Natural Life, written by Marcus Clarke, was published in the Australian Journal between 1870 and 1872 (as His Natural Life), appearing as a novel in 1874. It is the best known novelisation of life as a convict in early Australian history. Described as a ripping yarn, and at times relying on seemingly implausible coincidences, the story follows the fortunes of Rufus Dawes, a young man transported for a murder which he did not commit. The harsh and inhumane treatment meted out to the convicts, some of whom were transported for relatively minor crimes, is clearly conveyed. The conditions experienced by the convicts are graphically described. The novel was based on research by the author as well as a visit to the penal settlement of Port Arthur, Tasmania. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/For_the_Term_of_his_Natural_Life )...

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Historical Fiction

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As the New York Times said in 1903, this lesser-known work by Jerome K. Jerome does not display the wit of Congreve or even the glittering sort Mr. Jerome employs in some of his other books. It takes the form of imaginary conversations between the writer and a number of un-named characters at the afternoon tea table. The Woman of the World, the Old Maid, the Girton Girl, the Philosopher and the Minor Poet wax lyrical on subjects like marriage, art, society and politics. Frequently they appear to prefer the sound of their own voice to that of others. Although I couldn't agree with the NY Times that it is the Baedeker guide to conversation, it is certainly an eye-opening glimpse into this now almost extinct art. The participants are already bemoaning the lack of invigorating conversation in society: Conversation has become a chorus; or, as a writer wittily expressed it, the pursuit of the obvious to no conclusion. (Summary by Ruth Golding)...

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Excerpt: A chapter of which the last page only is of any importance comedy is a game played to throw reflections upon social life, and it deals with human nature in the drawing-room of civilized men and women, where we have no dust of the struggling outer world, no mire, no violent crashes, to make the correctness of the representation convincing. Credulity is not wooed through the impressionable senses; nor have we recourse to the small circular glow of the watchmaker?s eye to raise in bright relief minutest grains of evidence for the routing of incredulity....

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Epictetus (Greek: Επίκτητος; c.55–c.135) was a Greek Stoic philosopher. The name given by his parents, if one was given, is not known - the word epiktetos in Greek simply means acquired. Epictetus spent his youth as a slave in Rome to Epaphroditos, a very wealthy freedman of Nero. Even as a slave, Epictetus used his time productively, studying Stoic Philosophy under Musonius Rufus. He was eventually freed and lived a relatively hard life in ill health in Rome. So far as is known, Epictetus himself wrote nothing. All that we have of his work was transcribed by his pupil Arrian. The main work is The Discourses, four books of which have been preserved (out of an original eight). Arrian also compiled a popular digest, entitled the Enchiridion, or Handbook. In a preface to the Discourses, addressed to Lucius Gellius, Arrian states that whatever I heard him say I used to write down, word for word, as best I could, endeavouring to preserve it as a memorial, for my own future use, of his way of thinking and the frankness of his speech.(Summary by Wikipedia)...

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Philosophy

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Excerpt: This treatise, which is grown up under your lordship?s eye, and has ventured into the world by your order, does now, by a natural kind of right, come to your lordship for that protection which you several years since promised it. It is not that I think any name, how great soever, set at the beginning of a book, will be able to cover the faults that are to be found in it. Things in print must stand and fall by their own worth, or the reader?s fancy....

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Contents AN ESSAY CONCERNING HUMAN UNDERSTANDING (1690) ......................................................................... 6 EPISTLE TO THE READER .......................................................................................................................................... 9 INTRODUCTION:....................................................................................................................................................... 22 BOOK I Neither Principles nor Ideas Are Innate ..................................................................................................... 27 Chapter I No Innate Speculative Principles ...................................................................................................................... 27 Chapter II No Innate Practical Principles ......................................................................................................................... 46 Chapter III Other considerations concerning Innate Principles, both Speculative and Practical .......................................... 67 BOOK II Of Ideas .................................................

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Master storyteller Padraic Colum's rich, musical voice captures all the magic and majesty of the Norse sagas in his retellings of the adventures of the gods and goddesses who lived in the Northern paradise of Asgard before the dawn of history. Here are the matchless tales of All-Father Odin, who crosses the Rainbow Bridge to walk among men in Midgard and sacrifices his right eye to drink from the Well of Wisdom; of Thor, whose mighty hammer defends Asgard; of Loki, whose mischievous cunning leads him to treachery against the gods; of giants, dragons, dwarfs and Valkyries; and of the terrible last battle that destroyed their world. (Summary from Project Gutenberg)...

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Myths/Legends, Children

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Faces and Places is a collection of articles on nineteenth century travel, events and personalities by the British journalist Henry Lucy, who wrote for the Daily News, a London newspaper. His open letter To Those About to Become Journalists rings as true today as when it was written.

The first article, Fred Burnaby, includes a lively account of a balloon trip, while Night and Day on the Cars in Canada and Easter on Les Avants relate Lucy's experiences of rail travel at that time. Other travel tales (A Night on a Mountain, Mosquitoes and Monaco, and Oysters and Arcachon) provide an insight into the Victorian Englishman's attitude to Europe.

Three of the pieces, Peggotty and Ham, A Cinque Port and Christmas Eve at Watts's, concern the county of Kent, where Lucy had a country house. Christmas Eve at Watts's contains an interesting exposé of Dickens' short story The Seven Poor Travellers.

Other articles are of historical interest: A Wreck in the North Sea is an account of the wreck of the ship Deutschland in 1875; A Historic Crowd describes the massive popular interest in the 1871 trial of the Tichborne Claimant; The Battle of ...

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Humor, Essay/Short nonfiction

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Rufus Estes was born a slave in 1857 in Tennessee, and experienced first hand the turmoil of the Civil War. He began working in a Nashville restaurant at the age of 16, and in 1883 took up employment as a Pullman cook. In 1897, he was hired as principal chef for the private railway car of U.S. Steel magnates (the fin-de-siecle equivalent of today's Lear Jets for corporate travel). There he served succulent fare for the rich and famous at the turn of the 20th century. (Summary by Denny Sayers)...

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Cookery, Advice, Instruction

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One Man. Ten days. No talking. One Centre. 102 meditators. No eye-contact. One Course. 105 hours of meditation. No gestures. One Law. One Truth. One Universe. This story isn't about me, it's about you. It may read as if it's about me, but if you've ever sought the Truth, then it's about you too. Surrender; it's the only way to win the war, the one being fought within, deep down in the trenches of your mind. Wherever that may be . . . Can I do it? And if so, what then?...

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Although heavily influenced by traditional Hindu scriptures, The Soma Tantra is a completely original retelling of an ancient story about a war against the moon. As a piece of literature it has few parallels since it sprawls across many genre boundaries including Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Mythology, Epic Poem and Spiritual Text. Yet despite an overtly serious tone, The Soma Tantra is also filled with a light-hearted campiness running throughout its pages....

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A humongous metallic cylinder floated far above the site of the battle. It would have appeared as a bright star to those below except that their attention was drawn elsewhere. This state of distraction afforded Upaya Panther-Mask a bird’s-eye view of the ongoing havoc. He stood at the brink of a hatch on the vessel’s side, scanning that distant panorama through sensory augmentations ingrained in his helm. The fulmination that had dissipated a little earlier would have blinded him too were it not for said helm shading his eyes from any glare. “What do you see?” Priestess Kaitabh inquired next to him. “Berunni’s Danavas have found their way from the shadows and engaged the Devata’s infantry, which means that my Daityas shouldn’t be far behind.” “Excellent,” crooned the Raksha, “allocating our ground forces on the dark side of the moon was a superb idea wily prince.” “Not quite as superb as these vimanas. Your mages are exceptionally gifted to extract such artifice from the collective unconscious of Bhuloka. I always assumed that there was nothing left worth retrieving in the spatial-temporal sphere.” Kaitabh only gri...

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I – Three Planes of Existence II – Mythic Overview: The Denizens of Antarloka III – Prologue: The Nectar of Immortality Act One – Soma Chandra’s Hubris [ 1 ] A Gathering of Gods [ 2 ] Mutual Grievances [ 3 ] Heaven’s Orphans [ 4 ] Besieged ­- Interstice - Act Two – To Hell and Back [ 5 ] Avenues of Deceit [ 6 ] Curious Occurrences [ 7 ] Rescued by Old Enemies [ 8 ] Predestined Warpaths ­- Interstice - Act Three – Tremendous Upheavals [ 9 ] Surya Sets [ 10 ] A Duel Between Renegades [ 11 ] Fall of the Devatas [ 12 ] Deus Ex Machina Appendix: Glossary of Sanskrit Terms ...

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In this volume, a wide array of scholars turn a critical eye toward NASA’s first 50 years.

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Collections of original poetry in the mainstream European tradition.

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Vision Ambiguity Of The Idea The Sunflower And The Heliotrope Dawn Island Of Perception The Feeling Of A Feeling Gulf The Winds Fandango Of Time Pomegranate Without You, In You Gift Of The Already Given Communication Is A Purpose Of Meaning The Arbitrary Is Not Art The Bronze-Feathered Bird No Emperor No Platonic Spaces Very Old Are The Stars The Force A Basin Filled With Water Pike Is Pike And Not More Everywhere, Nowhere Identity Retrieved From The Sea The Face Leavings Amethyst, Argent, Sable Nature’s Order, Not Our Order Mind Is A Passion Of Its Own Creation Beyond Imagination No Wilful Obscurity Reality Is Imagination’s Mirror. More Serious Or Less? No Way For All Septet Immortality Is Deceptive Another Meaning Of The Sun Body Cooling, Your Mind Goes Cold? No One Watching Seal States Of Awakening In Louisiana Music And Meaning Products Of Motley Selection Courts Of The Night Keep It Real Its Movement Is The Drama In The Mind At The Full Far Enough, High Enough, To Turn Back Woman The Pillar And The Flame Netsuke Unaccompanied Sonata The Blue-Flowered Weed The Age Of Empathy Th...

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Collections of original poetry in the mainstream European tradition.

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White Birch Life’s Irony Chauvet Far East Getting to Grips with Myth Words For A Western Scroll Be Not Afraid Simply Complex At The Edge Scanning Deeper The Path By The Field The Reality Inside Which We Imagine Quartering We’re Getting There, Back When Not Laughing, Gloating Fire Outside, Fire Within Higher, Deeper Such Stuff The Finding Understanding Mind Old-World Path Anthropocene For the Rest… Threnody Veils and Crowns Every Constellation Only a Pattern of Mind The Folded Thing Pollen In The Air Not There Until You Made It There The Purple Flower Can A Polar Bear Stare Upward? The Word A Hurricane Deeper Sound Not Bamboo Time Slipping For A Moment Bearing In Our Hands: Bearing In Their Hands Indiscretion Abstracted At the Back of the Eye, the Whole Universe, All TimeSomething Under The Stars Motes In The Eye of Noon The River Bird, Flight, Moon Moving Pictures A Diamond in Every Pebble Saying Goodbye at the Edge of the Road Singing On The Shore The Lark Ascending Immersed In Time How We See Form Time To Come Tiny Manifesto The Place He Built The Pure And The Impure Meadow Medi...

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Collections of original poetry in the mainstream European tradition.

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Voiceless Banners Blowing Purify Your Mind Beautiful Attachment Baths All The Creatures Golden Grass Intricate Structure, Strange Lives Not Easy, Not Careless Kyoto Three Ways For the Spirit Moonlit Walk It’s A Long Time Now Every CreatureCultivars How Do You Climb? The Opposite of Deadly Going Quietly, Harming Nothing The Colour Blue Whose Idea Were Cities? Big Snow Mountain Ten Billion Splinters Fragile By Starlight Dancing in the Eye of Night Seeing It Near Benares (Or Elsewhere) What Are You Saying? Before the Felling It Freely Works Without Us Matter Is Spirit: Both Are Process Our Power Is Silence Not Platonist Rehearse Infinity No Fuss, No Claims The Reverse Side In Flight Low Slopes There’s a Way Near Conjunction Inanimate: Not Dead This Afternoon Tryst. The City Mad Clouds Infinitely Free The Island Ice-Burning Perverse Thoughts About Communication Every New Freedom. Where We Are Going The Warm Eye of Deer All Gone, Weak Each of Us Fails in Our Own Way Not All Articulate, or All-Flowing Sound-Waves in the Night Delight is Best Letting the Objects Breathe Is It Poetry? ...

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In the late 21st century on Earth, new technology allowed man to create machines merged with the body of their fallen comrades of war. These ?manchines? fought and won the war for the West. Discarded, the manchines learned of their worth and fought back for their own freedom, destroying half of the population of mankind. Now, Saron Bravewind rules the main Earth city of Orland built from ruin after the ban of technology that once was man?s downfall. With his heart set on discovering life beyond the stars, he finally gets his chance when tragedy strikes as his daughter falls into an incurable illness. Saron mans a flight into space with a faith in finding a higher life to help his daughter. What he finds will change the fate of the future mankind. (http://www.raelori.com)...

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Noi pledăm pentru un proces cogniscibil care să nu aibă îngrădiri de nici o formă. Din această cauză, hermeneutica se presupune a fi cât mai diversificată. Interviurile următoare împletesc cultura, ştiinţa, tehnica şi viaţa într-un multi-eu. De aceea volumul se numeşte multirelavititate: adică idei şi metodologii privite din unghiuri cât. We advocate for a process that does not have restrictions of any form. Therefore, hermeneutics is assumed to be more diversified. Next interviews intertwined culture, science, technology and life in a multi-I. Therefore the volume is called multirelavititate: that ideas and methodologies as viewed from angles....

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Scriitorul şi omul de ştiinţă Florentin Smarandache, cunoştiinţă deosebită, specială, de aproape 20 de ani, este permanent pe drumuri, cu carneţelul de însemnări în buzunar. Este un ambasador autentic al inteligenţei şi talentului românilor, în aceeaşi măsură, acest Geo Bogza al zileleor noastre gata permanent să noteze tot ce trebuie să fie marcat în vreun fel în istoria locurilor pe care le parcurge cu: piciorul, maşina, vaporul, avionul şi nu rareori cu gândul şi ochii minţii. Creaţia sa literară va face istorie, amintesc aici despre „Cântece de mahala” care este numai o mică însemnare a zbaterilor interioare ale scriitorului. Writer and scientist Smarandache special familiar special, almost 20 years, is constantly on the road, the notebook of notes in his pocket. It is a genuine ambassador of intelligence and talent Romanians equally Bogza this Geo's days of our permanent ready to write down everything must be marked in some way in the history of the places they go through with: foot, car, boat, plane and rarely does the thought and mind's eye. Will make his literary history, remember this about "Songs slum" is just a little ...

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- Prefaţă, Florentin Smarandache ................................ 5 - Paradoxismul - o reacţie contra totalitarismului *Interviu cu Florentin Smarandache, conducătorul „Mişcării literare paradoxiste”*Valeria Tănase - Informaţia zilei”(miercuri, 1 iunie 1994) ........7 - Interviul domnului FLORENTIN SMARANDACHE difuzat la Radio România Actualităţi, în cadrul emisiunii ROMÂNII ÎN LUME, 16.04.2011, ora 21:05, moderator dna Puşa Roth, http://www.romania-actualitati.ro/ [Cu mici editări ale textului]........................... 11 - Interviu Eugen Evu - Florentin Smarandache, mai 2011, Deva, Romania, Pseudo editorial - Întrebare şi răspuns....................................... 44 - În cadrul emisiunii CEASUL DE TAINĂ, 02.06.2011, ora 2030, moderator dna Liliana Hinoveanu .................. 47 - Interviu Mihaela Năftănăilă–FlorentinSmarandache pentru “Romȃnia liberă”, 22.11.2011 ......75 - „Ipoteza Smarandache”: Dialog Puiu Popescu-Florentin Smarandache (decembrie, 2011) .....79 - Interviul domnului FLORENTIN SMARANDACHE difuzat la Radio România Cultural, Bucureşti, în cadrul emisiunii NĂSCUT ÎN ROMÂNIA, 31.01.2011, moderator doa...

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This book is one of a series written for Kamehameha Schools Intermediate Reading Program (KSIRP) students. They are designed to increase students' reading skills and their knowledge of Hawaiian history and culture by focusing on topics such as the Hawaiian monarchy. The books are written by KSIRP staff in an effort to provide young readers with culturally relevant materials in language arts and Hawaiian studies. The authors are pleased that the books have been well received by both educational and general audiences. KSIRP is a Community Education Division program of Kamehameha Schools/Bernice Pauahi Bishop Estate. It is operated in collaboration with the State of Hawai?i Department of Education at several intermediate schools throughout the state....

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Lili?uokalani was born on September 2, 1838, to the High Chief Caesar Kapa?akea and High Chiefess Keohokalole. She was named Lili?u (Smarting) Kamaka?eha (The Sore Eye). It may seem as if the baby had an eye problem when she was born, but this was not so. The High Chiefess Kina?u, who gave Lili?u her name, was the one with the sore eye. Besides Lili?u Kamaka?eha, her Christian name was Lydia, a name given her at her baptism. It was not until years later that she was called Lili?uokalani....

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Preface. vii -- Acknowledgments. ix -- Introduction. 1 -- Early Years. 3 -- School Years. 5 -- Marriage. 13 -- Waikiki Estate. 15 -- From Lili?u to Lili?uokalani. 19 -- A Working Princess. 21 -- The Golden Jubilee. 25 -- The English Clock. 29 -- A Sad Start. 31 -- The Queen's Story. 37 -- The Other Side of the Story. 41 -- The Queen Surrenders. 53 -- Annexation or No. 55 -- A Major Obstacle. 6l -- The Fight Goes On. 65 -- A Hawaiian in America. 75 -- The End of the Hawaiian Kingdom. 79 -- The Queen's Legacy. 89 -- Aloha ?Oe. 95 -- Conclusion. 97 -- Bibliography. 99 --...

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The love of personal decoration appears very early in the history of the human race. When the fierce struggle for existence and the pursuit of food and shelter allowed time for the consideration of family, the keen hunters must have learned many a lesson from the beasts of the field and forest,—not less from the birds of the air, of the processes of Nature which Mr. Darwin has called sexual selection. That any savage ever reasons out these processes cannot be believed, but the sharp eye trained in daily hunts could not be blind to the patent fact that so many birds have plumage evidently intended for attractive decoration, and that it answers this purpose. Savage man at first put on the adornments in which he saw the male of so many birds and beasts was resplendent, and not until many ages after was the woman allowed to appropriate to her own use what in early tribal life was the exclusive property of the male....

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The lion's mane, the tiger's skin, the eagle's feather were man's earliest adornment, and it is not improbable that woman in humble emulation of her lord made for herself clusters and bands of flowers or fruits, while the dwellers on the ocean shores soon took the sea-shells cast on the sandy beach. The warrior of the far North has the eagle and hawk from which to borrow, and the ancient war dress of a Mandan chief was decorated with spoil of these and other birds; but in the warmer regions of the earth, where Nature puts forth all her powers, and birds and insects vie in coloring with the most brilliant flowers, uncivilized man has wantoned in the prodigality and fashioned for himself a gorgeous decoration taken from the captives of his bow, net, or blow-gun....

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"This collection of stories is like a blanket woven from 100% wanderlust under which you can hide as Frances M. Thompson tucks you in with her words and keeps you warm with her descriptions of characters you'll love and places you can tell she knows by heart." Gesa Neitzel, www.bedouinwriter.com Shy Feet: Short Stories Inspired by Travel is a collection of twelve quirky, charismatic and touching tales of travel. The inquisitive Ruth tells the story of The Lost Children of Gatwick Airport and in Max's Holiday we learn what a seven-year-old boy considers a "proper holiday" to be. In The Flowers Sleep Tonight, we meet Thomas and Carly, two solo travellers whose paths keep crossing... because that's exactly what Thomas wants. A spontaneous plan to elope is revealed in The Runaways and Homes from Homes is about the lessons Patricia learns from the hotel bellboy she has a fling with. Oh, Henry is the story of how a dream holiday can mean two different things to two lovers and Katie's Maps is an offbeat love letter to a vast collection of maps. Extracts from a travel journal tell one woman's life story in All the Beaches are Made of ...

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SHY FEET Part One Thirty-seven years ago, I was born into debt. I arrived two weeks early, surprising both my mother and the woman whose hair she was cutting. Before I’d even entered the world, I owed my mother the price of her customer’s leather loafers. Thirty years ago, a teacher told my mother to keep an eye on me. I was “frighteningly astute" and “abnormally self-aware” for my age. In other words, I was going places. Twenty-eight years ago, I paid my mother back for those leather loafers with money I made from selling jars of jam to our neighbours. Every Sunday evening I would stand on a stool in front of our gas stove and stir a viscose pink liquid around a giant saucepan. Behind me, my mother would hold her breath as I poured the hot mixture into jars, never spilling a drop. Twenty-six years ago, I began secondary school. Within weeks I learnt that with very little effort I could get top marks in most subjects. I rarely studied more than I had to and I blitzed through my homework on the school bus home. While Mum finished work in the front room, I cooked dinner for us both, listening to her scissors snip through ...

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Shy Feet - Part One The Flowers Sleep Tonight The Lost Children Homes from Homes The Runaways Oh, Henry Katie's Maps Scorpion The Road is Long Max's Holiday See the Amalfi Coast All the Beaches are made of Pebbles Shy Feet - Part Two...