The Monkey's Paw Summary

"The Monkey's Paw" is set in the White family home in England. It begins on a dark and stormy night, so we know we're in
for a scary story. The Whites – Mr. and Mrs. White and their adult son Herbert – are inside enjoying a cozy evening
around the fire. Soon Sergeant-Major Morris arrives. He's been in the army in India for the past 21 years. He tells the
Whites stories of his adventures in that faraway land and shows them a monkey's paw that has the power to grant three
wishes. Mr. White wants the paw, but Morris tells him it's cursed – people get hurt when their wishes are granted. He tries
to burn the paw in the fire, but Mr. White snatches it up and buys it. After Morris leaves, Mr. White, following Herbert's
suggestion, wishes for two hundred pounds, the amount of money he would need to pay off the bank and own the house
outright. The next morning, Herbert goes off to work as usual and Mrs. White watches for the two hundred pounds to
show up. In the afternoon, a fancily dressed man pays the Whites a visit. He is from Maw and Meggins, the company
Herbert works for. The man tells the Whites that Herbert has been killed in a machinery accident. (We aren't given details
of Herbert's work, but the clues suggest that he works in some kind of factory.)

The man says that the company takes no blame for Herbert's death but wants to give the Whites some money to help with
their loss. You can probably guess how much money the man gives the Whites. That's right, two hundred pounds. Mrs.
White screams and Mr. White faints. Full of sadness over Herbert's death, Mr. and Mrs. White bury him in the cemetery
two miles from their home. One night Mrs. White gets a bright idea: use those other two wishes to bring Herbert back! She
shares her plan with Mr. White. He thinks it's a bad idea – he could barely look at Herbert's mangled body when he went
to identify it. His wife really turns up the heat, though, and he caves in. Mr. White pulls out the cursed monkey's paw and
wishes Herbert back to life. Nothing happens, so the Whites go back to bed. Soon after, someone – or something – starts
pounding on the door. (Have you seen Pet Sematary? This cannot be good.) Mrs. White is sure it's Herbert – it just took
him a minute to get there from the cemetery. Mr. White is sure it's Herbert too, and he doesn't want his son to get in the
house, so he makes his third wish on the monkey's paw. (We aren't told what it is.) The knocking stops. Mr. White hears
Mrs. White open the door. He hears her scream out in agony because Herbert is not there. He goes outside with her and
sees that the road is completely empty.
 Animal Farm Summary

Animal Farm begins with a very drunk Mr. Jones (owner of Manor Farm) doing a really crummy job of, you know, his job.
Luckily, there's a wise pig on the farm: Old Major. Old Major encourages the neglected animals to rebel and run the farm
themselves with one important qualification: everyone should be equal. Then he dies. This seems like a grand idea to
everyone except Benjamin, a cynical donkey whose main job in life is to be, well, cynical. So, they rebel. The pigs, being
the smartest animals, naturally take the leadership role. So much for that equality business. So much for Old Major's
vision of a peaceful coup, too, because there's immediate conflict between two pigs, Napoleon and Snowball. Napoleon
wants to sit around and be in charge of everything, while Snowball wants to teach the other animals and build a windmill.
Obviously, Snowball's plan is way better, so he wins.

Not. Instead, Napoleon uses his private army of nine ferocious and enormous dogs to become the All Powerful Dominant
Boss Leader Chief Pig. Okay, he doesn't call it that, but you know it's in the back of his mind somewhere. With Snowball
out of the picture, the other pigs blame everything on him. They exploit the other animals shamelessly, breaking all the
rules about equality that they had established after the Rebellion. Life on the farm gets worse and worse, the animals
forget old Major's original dream, and the pigs make some poor management decisions when dealing with the neighboring
farms. The culminating miserable moment comes when the pigs send Boxer, a hardworking and loyal horse who is ready
for retirement, to his death. Ouch. In short, the pigs are starting to look a lot like the horrible human owners that we started
with at the beginning of this whole mess, walking on two legs and everything. In fact, they may even be worse. Hm. It
looks like grumpy old Eeyore—we mean, Benjamin—was right after all.
The

Necklace Summary
At the beginning of the story, we meet Mathilde Loisel, a middle-class girl who desperately wishes she were wealthy.
She's got looks and charm, but had the bad luck to be born into a family of clerks, who marry her to another clerk (M.
Loisel) in the Department of Education. Mathilde is so convinced she's meant to be rich that she detests her real life and
spends all day dreaming and despairing about the fabulous life she's not having. She envisions footmen, feasts, fancy
furniture, and strings of rich young men to seduce. One day M. Loisel comes home with an invitation to a fancy ball thrown
by his boss, the Minister of Education. M. Loisel has gone to a lot of trouble to get the invitation, but Mathilde's first
reaction is to throw a fit. She doesn't have anything nice to wear, and can't possibly go! How dare her husband be so
insensitive? M. Loisel doesn't know what to do, and offers to buy his wife a dress, so long as it's not too expensive.
Mathilde asks for 400 francs, and he agrees. It's not too long before Mathilde throws another fit, though, this time because
she has no jewels. So M. Loisel suggests she go see her friend Mme. Forestier, a rich woman who can probably lend her
something. Mathilde goes to see Mme. Forestier, and she is in luck. Mathilde is able to borrow a gorgeous diamond
necklace.With the necklace, she's sure to be a stunner.

The night of the ball arrives, and Mathilde has the time of her life. Everyone loves her (i.e., thinks she's hot) and she is
absolutely thrilled. She and her husband (who falls asleep off in a corner) don't leave until four a.m. Mathilde suddenly
dashes outside to avoid being seen in her shabby coat. She and her husband catch a cab and head home. But once back
at home, Mathilde makes a horrifying discovery: the diamond necklace is gone. M. Loisel spends all of the next day, and
even the next week, searching the city for the necklace, but finds nothing. It's gone. So he and Mathilde decide they have
no choice but to buy Mme. Forestier a new necklace. They visit one jewelry store after another until at last they find a
necklace that looks just the same as the one they lost. Unfortunately, it's thirty-six thousand francs, which is exactly twice
the amount of all the money M. Loisel has to his name. So M. Loisel goes massively into debt and buys the necklace, and
Mathilde returns it to Mme. Forestier, who doesn't notice the substitution. Buying the necklace catapults the Loisels into
poverty for the next ten years. That's right, ten years. They lose their house, their maid, their comfortable lifestyle, and on
top of it all Mathilde loses her good looks. After ten years, all the debts are finally paid, and Mathilde is out for a jaunt on
the Champs Elysées. There she comes across Mme. Forestier, rich and beautiful as ever. Now that all the debts are paid
off, Mathilde decides she wants to finally tell Mme. Forestier the sad story of the necklace and her ten years of poverty,
and she does. At that point, Mme. Forestier, aghast, reveals to Mathilde that the necklace she lost was just a fake. It was
worth only five hundred francs.