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Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

Paperback
400 pages
Barnes and Noble Classics
ISBN: 9781593081287


Wuthering Heights is the novel of classic English literature authored by Emily Brontë in 1847. It tells the story of a passionate love, yet one flawed, like so many love stories, between Heathcliff and Catherine. Heathcliff was an orphan raised by Catherine's father on the moors of northern England. The father, over time, favors him more than his two children and they resent Heathcliff. Although, Catherine and Heathcliff soon become inseperable as great friends and thier friendship grows into love.

Hindley, the brother, continues to hate and abuse Heathcliff to the point that the once orphaned boy moves away and returns three years later from America a wealthy man. Heathcliff finds that Catherine married a wealthy land owner, so he himself marries Cathy's sister-in-law so that one day he will inherit Thrushcross Grange. He ends up making everyone's life miserable as his had been and at one point also inherits Wuthering Heights where more misery awaits. Wuthering Heights is full of engaging characters with many flaws who find themselves in turbulent relationships.

Oil from Gulf Spill Could Power 43K+ Vehicles

The BP oil spill has reached more than 4 million barrels of crude. This equals roughly 168 million gallons that have spilled into the Gulf and significantly exceeds the Exxon Valdez disaster.

"As of June 9, 2010, if all the oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico had been used for fuel, it could have powered 38,000 cars, and 3,400 trucks, and 1,800 ships for a full year," according to University of Delaware Prof. James J. Corbett. As stated in the article, "That's based on the estimated spill rate of 19,000 barrels of oil per day."

• By May 31 (41 days after the spill), the lost energy could have fueled one freight truck on 17 trips across all 4 million miles of U.S. highway.

• Transportation activities consume about two-thirds of all petroleum in the United States -- more than 20 billion barrels per day, according to Corbett.

Check out other facts about the gulf spill in the article. And on google.

Child-Sized Tablet Computers

The philanthropic organization One Laptop per Child (OLPC) never quite managed to hit its price point for its "$100 laptop," but now the organization is sketching a concept for a $75 tablet computer that it hopes will further decrease power consumption and pioneer the first flexible LCD display. "A tablet computer holds some practical advantages.

Because the keyboard is presented as touch-screen display, like those on the iPhone and iPad, there's no keyboard for a kid to break. Equally important for an organization hoping to reach kids in remote corners of the world, a tablet also allows unlimited customization of keyboards for minor languages and dialects. The existing XO ships with any of 17 different keyboards, but that's hardly enough; India alone has 33 languages."

More on Tablet computers.

Ways to Improve as a Writer

There are many ways to improve as a writer. The strategies are only limited by your desire and the willingness to work hard and set reasonable goals. When you continue to write you'll continue to improve as a writer as long as you give an honest effort and keep to the goals. The best thing to do is to just sit down and write. Even if the writing isn't so great it will always improve as the writer imrpoves.

Practice is most immportant, as is patience. The one thing next to writing that's very important is reading. Read your own writing, then the works of others, doing so first for enjoyment and then the second time to study how that author wrote the scenes and plot, developed the characters and created the settings.

It's also a great thing to write about what you know. And like with any research, you can also write what you don't know about, but have an interest in. When researching, also take notes on the details that you might not include in the story. Building on your knowledge is important, even if it all won't be read on the page. This can bring an in depth experience to the manuscript that it would otherwise lack had the other facts not been known.

When researching, also be sure to observe. It's in your surroundings that observation and awareness can be an important factor in your writing. It adds to the realism of the sights, sounds and smells that a character might encounter. Be sure to read your work aloud, as words sound different when read than just thought. Print a copy of the work and review it with a pen, because this approach also offers a different perspective than from only reading from a screen.

Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

Hardcover
256 pages
Tor Books
ISBN: 9780765317384


In Ender's Game it's the year 2250 and the human race is threatened by a third world war from an alien race. The governments have formed a World Goverment seperated into two parts: the Hegomony (Communist) and the Polemarch (Democrocy/Theocracy). To keep the earth's population controlled, by law, all families are restricted to having only two children. For the Wiggin's family, their first two children were highly skilled, yet Peter was much to selfish and Valentine, the daughter, too compassionate. For the government, these traits weren't suitable for their purposes so they allowed the Wiggins to have a third child. This child the parents named Ender and one who was exactly what was needed.

Ender is sent to military school where his talents surpass all other students'. At his Battle School Ender is trained in war tactics by using game simulations, though he doesn't like violent conflicts. His talent, above everyone else's is his capability to understand combat strategy and therefore wins every time. The Sci-Fi aspect only offers a setting and is likely not to influence the reader. This novel focuses on human emotions, who we are as both individuals and as a society. Among the characters are moral dillemas, rivalries, and thought provoking situations that we can all relate to.

An Invisible Touch for Mobile Devices

It seems easy enough to control mobile devices with just a touch of the screen, but research is finding that requires no use of a touch screen or keyboard to be functional. An "imaginary interface" is implemented during phone conversation by the speaker using hand or finger movements by tracing shapes into the air. "The idea of interacting with computers through hand gestures is nothing new.

Sony already sells EyeToy, a video camera and software that capture gestures for its PlayStation game consoles; Microsoft has developed a more sophisticated gesture-sensing system, called Project Natal, for the Xbox 360 games console." Andy Wilson, a senior researcher at Microsoft, notes that the interface draws on the fact that people naturally use their hands to explain spatial ideas. "That's a quite powerful concept, and it hasn't been explored," he says. "I think they're onto something."

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