iPod

In Beatrice Prior’s dystopian Chicago world, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue—Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives.

The latest adventure in the Dragonriders of Pern series follows the efforts of Pern's human colonists to re-establish contact with the legendary, super-intelligent "shipfish" they brought with them centuries ago.

On Pern, men breed and train great fire-breathing dragons to help them fight the deadly silver Threads that fall from the sky, destroying all life-forms, whenever the Red Star passes near.

Chronicling the first settlers of Pern, this is the story of the colonists' efforts to breed dragons to fight the deadly Thread before the lush planet is destroyed.

It's been two-hundred years since the deadly Thread fell like rain upon Pern, devouring everything in its path. No one alive remembers that first horrific onslaught and no one believes in its return--except for the dragonriders. For two centuries they have been practicing and training, passing down from generation to generation the formidable Threadfighting techniques.

Tris's initiation day should have been marked by celebration and victory with her chosen faction; instead, the day ended with unspeakable horrors. War now looms as conflict between the factions and their ideologies grows. And in times of war, sides must be chosen, secrets will emerge, and choices will become even more irrevocable — and even more powerful.

Before Wicked was formed, before the Glade was built, before Thomas entered the Maze, sun flares hit the earth and mankind fell to disease. Mark and Trina were there when it happened, and they survived. But surviving the sun flares was easy compared to what came next.

The deadly Threads have not rained on Pern for centuries, and people are beginning to say they no longer need dragonriders or harpers. In particular, the despot Fax would like to be rid of talented masterharper, Robinton.

"When Gregor Samsa woke up one morning from unsettling dreams, he found himself changed in his bed into a monstrous vermin." With this startling, bizarre, yet surprisingly funny first sentence, Kafka begins his masterpiece, The Metamorphosis.

The inhabitants of Pern are threatened by a band of renegades that attempts to expose them to deadly airborne spores in the atmosphere.

Slaughterhouse-Five is one of the world's great anti-war books. Centering on the infamous fire-bombing of Dresden, Billy Pilgrim's odyssey through time reflects the mythic journey of our own fractured lives as we search for meaning in what we are afraid to know.

When Jaxom, a rebellious youth, and Ruth, his white dragon, fly into another time to retrieve the queen's stolen egg and avert a dragonrider war, they find their planet threatened once again by a Threadfall.

Harper Lee's classic novel of a lawyer in the deep south defending a black man charged with the rape of a white girl.

Sometimes I feel like I have walked into the middle of a movie. Maybe I can make my own movie. The film will be the story of my life. No, not my life, but of this experience. I'll call it what the lady who is the prosecutor called me: Monster.

Sarajevo in the 1990's, is a hellish place. The ongoing war devours human life, tears families apart and transforms even banal routines, such as acquiring water, into life-threatening expeditions. Day after day, a cellist stations himself in the midst of the devastation, defying the ever-present snipers to play tributes to victims of a massacre.