PRESENTATIONS OF THE BOOKS

LITTLE WOMEN

Josephine March -  The protagonist of the novel, and the second-oldest March sister. Jo, who wants to be a writer, is based on Louisa May Alcott herself, which makes the story semi-autobiographical. Jo has a temper and a quick tongue, although she works hard to control both. She is a tomboy, and reacts with impatience to the many limitations placed on women and girls. She hates romance in her real life, and wants nothing more than to hold her family together.

Meg March -  The oldest March sister. Responsible and kind, Meg mothers her younger sisters. She has a small weakness for luxury and leisure, but the greater part of her is gentle, loving, and morally vigorous.

Beth March -  The third March daughter. Beth is very quiet and very virtuous, and she does nothing but try to please others. She adores music and plays the piano very well.

Amy March -  The youngest March girl. Amy is an artist who adores visual beauty and has a weakness for pretty possessions. She is given to pouting, fits of temper, and vanity; but she does attempt to improve herself.

Laurie Laurence -  The rich boy who lives next door to the Marches. Laurie, whose real name is Theodore Laurence, becomes like a son and brother to the Marches. He is charming, clever, and has a good heart.

Marmee -  The March girls’ mother. Marmee is the moral role model for her girls. She counsels them through all of their problems and works hard but happily while her husband is at war.

Mr. March -  The March girls’ father and Marmee’s husband. He serves in the Union army as a chaplain. When he returns home, he continues acting as a minister to a nearby parish.

Mr. Brooke -  Laurie’s tutor. Mr. Brooke is poor but virtuous.

Frederick Bhaer -  A respected professor in Germany who becomes an impoverished language instructor in America. Mr. Bhaer lives in New York, where he meets Jo. He is kind and fatherly.

Mr. Laurence -  Laurie’s grandfather and the Marches’ next-door neighbor. Mr. Laurence seems gruff, but he is loving and kind.

Hannah -  The Marches’ loyal servant.

Aunt March -  A rich widow and one of the March girls’ aunts. Although crotchety and difficult, Aunt March loves her nieces and wants the best for them.

Daisy -  Meg and Mr. Brooke’s daughter. Daisy is the twin of Demi. Her real name is Margaret.

Demi -  Meg and Mr. Brooke’s son and Daisy’s twin. Demi’s real name is John Laurence.

Mrs. Kirke -  The woman who runs the New York boarding house where Jo lives.

Kate Vaughn -  One of Laurie’s British friends. At first, Kate turns up her nose at the bluntness and poverty of the Marches. She later decides that she likes them, however, showing that she is able to overcome her initial prejudice.

Sallie Gardiner -  Meg’s rich friend. Sallie represents the good life to Meg, and Meg often covets Sallie’s possessions.

Aunt Carrol -  One of the March girls’ aunts. Aunt Carrol is ladylike, and she takes Amy with her to Europe.

Florence -  Aunt Carrol’s daughter. Florence accompanies her aunt and Amy to Europe.

Fred Vaughn -  One of the Vaughn siblings. Fred is Laurie’s friend, but he soon develops a romantic interest in Amy.

Esther -  Aunt March’s servant. Esther is a French Catholic.

Annie Moffat  -  Another wealthy friend of Meg’s. Annie is fashionable and social, and she wears stylish clothing that Meg envies.

Ned Moffat -  The older brother of Meg’s friend Annie Moffat.

Frank Vaughn  -  One of the Vaughn siblings. Frank is sickly.

Grace Vaughn -  The youngest sister of the Vaughn family. Grace and Amy become friends on a picnic.

Dr. Bangs -  A doctor who tends to Beth when she is ailing.

The Hummels -  A family that lives near the Marches. The Hummels are poor and in bad health.

HARRY POTTER

The story of Harry Potter begins as he is about to celebrate is eleventh birthday. Up until this time, Harry’s birthdays have come and gone like any other day; they have been nothing worth celebrating. You see, Harry has lived in a cupboard under the stairs in his Uncle Vernon’s and Aunt Petunia’s house. He has never received a birthday present worth remembering. His very few possessions have been the hand-me-downs of his cousin Dudley. Harry has never known why the Dursley’s have never treated him well. All he knows is that his mother and father died in a car crash and he came to live with the Dursley’s when he just one year old.
But all things will forever change on Harry’s eleventh birthday. He learns from a letter, given to him by an unknown, very large person name Hagrid, that he is not just a regular person. He learns that like his mother and father, he too is a wizard. Harry’s life changes in an instant. The letter he receives is an acceptance and invitation to study at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Upon arriving at Hogwarts, Harry is sorted into the Gryffindor House by the Sorting Hat. At Hogwarts, Harry will learn what it means to be Wizard. He will learn many things about wizardry from his teachers and Head Master, Dumbledore. He will learn that not all people come from wizard families. Some, called Muggles, will also study at Hogwarts. For the first time, he will meet and make friends. Hermione Granger (Muggle born) and Ron Weasley (Wizard ), will help Harry through a most challenging first year at Hogwarts.
Harry’s first year at Hogwarts will be challenging as he comes to learn more about his past and the death of his parents. Not only did Harry learn on his eleventh birthday that he was a wizard, but he also learned that his parents died at the hands of a wizard practicing dark magic:Voledmort. And although, Voldemort attempted to kill Harry, something saved him. Instead of Harry dying, Voldemort lost his powers. Harry is reminded of that fateful night each time he looks in the mirror and sees a lightening bolt scar on his forehead and as others greet him famously wherever he goes.

Harry will experience many life threatening situations during his first year. These situations will arise as he comes to learn more about Voldemort and those that follow him. Every experience Harry, Hermione, and Ron will find themselves in, will bring Harry closer to the one that must not be named, Voldemort.

WUTHERING HEIGHTS 

Many people, generally those who have never read the book, consider Wuthering Heights to be a straightforward, if intense, love story — Romeo and Juliet on the Yorkshire Moors. But this is a mistake. Really the story is one of revenge. It follows the life of Heathcliff, a mysterious gypsy-like person, from childhood (about seven years old) to his death in his late thirties. Heathcliff rises in his adopted family and then is reduced to the status of a servant, running away when the young woman he loves decides to marry another. He returns later, rich and educated, and sets about gaining his revenge on the two families that he believed ruined his life.

I AM MALALA

Malala Yousafzai was born in 1997 to a Pashtun family in Swat Valley, Pakistan. She grew up in and around school, as her father's lifelong dream had been to found a school; thus, Malala valued education from an extremely young age. Two brothers followed her: one, Kushal, is two years younger than she is, and the other, Atal, is seven years younger than she is.

Life in Mingora, Swat's largest city, was easy for the first part of Malala's childhood. The family had little money at first, but as her father’s school began to do well, they were better off. In school, Malala was always at the top of the class, contested only by her best friend, Moniba, and her rival, Malka-e-Noor. Pakistan began to change after the 9/11 attacks happened. Power continuously shifted, as did the nation's international reputation. One autumn, an earthquake devastated Swat Valley, leaving its people suffering and vulnerable and eager for some sort of leadership.

When Malala was ten years old, the Taliban, an Islamic fundamentalist group seeking to implement its brutal version of sharia law in the region, came to Swat Valley. It was led by a man named Fazlullah, who at first appealed to many people because of his charisma and rationality. The Taliban began to implement many strict rules: CDs, DVDs, and TVs were not allowed in the home, women must remain in purdah, and girls could not be educated. For Malala, this last rule was unacceptable. She and her father began to speak out strongly and publicly against Talibanization. Malala even began to write a diary about life as a girl under the Taliban, using a pseudonym so it could not be traced to her.

At last the Pakistani army said that they had struck a deal with the Taliban to institute sharia law in Swat in return for peace, but unfortunately this peace did not last. The situation got so bad that scores of people left Swat Valley, fleeing the Taliban—Malala's family tried to stay for as long as they could, but eventually they left as well. They became IDPs (Internally Displaced Persons), living outside of Swat for three months before they were able to return when the army announced that the Taliban had allegedly been driven out of the valley.

Once she returned to Swat, Malala began to gain more national and international fame for being an advocate for girls' education. Similarly, her father continued to speak out loudly. Pakistan was shaken up when the United States Navy SEALS conducted a raid on a compound in Abottabad, where Osama bin Laden, the world's most wanted terrorist, had apparently been hiding out for years. Meanwhile, signs showed that the Taliban had never really left Swat Valley, and Malala's father continued to fear that he would be targeted. Then one day when Malala was on the bus home from school, a strange man pulled the bus over, asked for Malala by name, and shot her in the face.

Malala was taken to an army hospital in Peshawar and given an operation that gave her brain space to swell where the bullet hit it. Everyone prayed that she would survive, but they were unsure. A pair of British doctors came from Rawalpindi to assess her and the hospital, and determined that she had to be moved if she was to survive. First they moved her to a high-security army hospital in Rawalpindi, but then she was moved abroad to Birmingham, UK, where she was treated more extensively. Her family followed her ten days later; they did not return to Pakistan, instead settling in an apartment and then a house in Birmingham. In the aftermath of her shooting, Malala became an international sensation, using her newfound fame to speak out on a larger stage for girls' education.

TO THE LIGHTHOUSE

To the Lighthouse is divided into three sections: “The Window,” “Time Passes,” and “The Lighthouse.” Each section is fragmented into stream-of-consciousness contributions from various narrators.

“The Window” opens just before the start of World War I. Mr. Ramsayand Mrs. Ramsay bring their eight children to their summer home in the Hebrides (a group of islands west of Scotland). Across the bay from their house stands a large lighthouse. Six-year-old James Ramsay wants desperately to go to the lighthouse, and Mrs. Ramsay tells him that they will go the next day if the weather permits. James reacts gleefully, but Mr. Ramsay tells him coldly that the weather looks to be foul. James resents his father and believes that he enjoys being cruel to James and his siblings.

ROSE IN BLOOM 

·         Rose Campbell - the heroine of the story. She is sweet, kind, pretty, and ambitious. She is an heiress just come of age, and struggles with the many suitors she attracts by learning to judge love versus those who regard her only as 'a good match'.

·         Archibald "Archie" Campbell: Eldest son of Jem and Jessie. Eldest of all the cousins, of steady and thoughtful character, he is the Chief, much respected by all the boys and an “older brother” figure to Rose. He works for Uncle Mac and has begun to "settle down", some think too young.

·         Charles C. Campbell (Charlie): Also known as Prince Charlie, the “flower of the family,” considered the most handsome, talented, and promising of the lot. He is the spoiled only child of Stephen and Clara – spoiled by his too-indulgent mother, with no father present to give him guidance. Charlie is looked up to by all the boys because he is particularly charming and well loved in society, nicknamed "Prince Charming" by the girls. He falls in love with, and tries to woo, Rose.