The following is part one of its summary

In the books beginning, all the major characters are together in the Stone of Tear, where Rand al’Thor has finally managed to kill Ba’alzamon (how much did you bet)? At the end of The Dragon Reborn book, and now stands as the Dragon Reborn by wielding Callandor.

Selene reveals herself as Lanfear the Forsaken who loved Rand before his birth in this era of time and still claims to love him, asks Rand to join her.

The Stone of Tear is then invaded by hordes Trollocs and Fades, which are sent by the Forsaken Sammael.
Another Forsaken, named Semirhage, also sends Shadowforces to oppose Sammaels forces in the Stone of Tear.
Finally, Rand uses Callandor to send a gigantic lightning storm to kill off all the Trollocs and Fades.

Rand declares he intends to go the the desert and prove himself to the Aiel.
Egwene al’Vere and Moiraine Damodred decide to go with him.

Mat Cauthon, confused with what to do next, finds answers inside the Stone of Tear’s Aelfinn ter’angreal, and is advised to follow Rand to the Aiel Waste.

Perrin Aybara, hearing rumors of trouble boiling in Two Rivers, chooses to return home. and Faile Bashere sticks with him.

Elayne Trakand, Nynaeve al’Meara, and Thom Merrilin decide to hunt down the Black Ajah in Tarabon.
Also Min Farshaw manages to arrive in Tar Valon and reports to Siuan Sanche, setting off a domino effect that will lead to the Towers splitting.

so, The Shadow Rising follows four bands of characters in four main story arcs.

Part 2 Coming Soon…

Finally the climax has arrived.

Rand reaches the impregnable fort know as the Stone of Tear, in the city of Tear, in the country named Tear.
Barely able to stand and complete exhausted, Rand enters the fort in an attempt to claim the non claimable sword named Callandor, by any other then the true dragon reborn, a sword made of crystal which when claimed will herald the claimer as the dragon reborn and the worlds final hope for salvation from the shadow.

Rand and the Forsaken Be’lal are about to duel in the Stone of Tear. When in pops Moiraine and interrupts the battle killing Be’lal with the forbidden balefire instead of letting Rand kill him.
Well at least she saved him from the effort as he is very tired right now.
Ba’alzamon thought to be dead form the previous book, appears and disables Moiraine instead of killing her, and sets all his powers to attacking Rand.

Rand manages to claim the Callandor, therefore proving himself as the true Dragon Reborn, and, with it, finally kills Ba’alzamon (want to bet)?.
Rand meanwhile has been thinking all along that Ba’alzamon is the Dark One, Moiraine relieves him of this illusion telling the numbskull that that the Dark One is not human, and therefore cannot be Ba’alzamon, who has left behind a corpse.

Egwene remembers a prophecy parchment that Verin Sedai had showed her, and she deduces that the corpse is possibly Ishamael, Commander-in-chief of the Forsaken.
The desert dwelling powerful race of warriors called Aiel take the Stone of Tear, something never done in 3000 years and reveal themselves to be the People of the Dragon.

The Shadow Rising Coming Soon…

Meanwhile inside the White Tower, through the use of a special sa’angreal made by Aes Sedai, Mat is finally fully and permanently healed of the corruptive and life sucking influence of the evil ruby dagger of Shadar Logoth.
When healed, Mat manages the very awesome task of defeating both Galad Damodred and Gawyn Trakand at the same time. In a practice duel.
Galad and Gawyn use swords while Mat uses a quarter staff.
This wins him two silver coins, enough money to gamble away with and try to escape from Tar Valon which is made difficult by the fact the Aes Sedai have forbidden him from leaving.
Elayne although helps him while entrusting Mat with a letter to her mother Queen Morgase in Camelyn, the letter explains that she will be leaving the White Tower for a time.
Mat ends up meeting Thom Merrilin at an inn.
The pair manage escape Tar Valon together and travel to Andor where Mat, grumbling the whole way, eventually delivers the letter and also learns of a plot by Queen Morgase’s lover, Lord Gaebril, to murder her Daughter-Heir of Andor.
Seeking to prevent this from happening, Mat pursues the trio to Tear.
The trio are already on their way to Tear, Nynaeve, Egwene, and Elayne are unwillingly betrayed by the thief catcher Juilin Sandar, who was unfortunately influenced by Compulsion from Liandrin of the Black Ajah and then they are imprisoned in the Stone of Tear.
Where they are rescued by Mat for which they turn out to be extremely ungrateful and are even abusive towards Mat.
Faile falls for a Black Ajah trap directed at Moiraine, and Perrin risks life and mental limb in the World of Dreams to save her.

Part 3 Coming Soon…

Rand al’Thor, declared by Moiraine Damodred to be Dragon Reborn at the end of the book two, The Great Hunt leaves his camp secretly, which is located in the Mountains of Mist, to go to Tear and prove to himself that he is indeed the Dragon Reborn.
Along the way of course our hero is hunted, hunted, hassled and attacked by Darkhounds and Darkfriends.
He does however manage to get a huge sum of people married off which is always a good thing in the book and sing a lot in his efforts to reach Tear.
Min meanwhile has left camp on orders from Moiraine to report to the Amyrlin on all that happened. Moiraine, Lan, Loial, and Perrin go chasing after Rand. On the way, they encounter a Hunter for the Horn, Zarine Bashere, who later turn out to be Faile Bashere.
They have a close shave with the shadows forces, and discover that Sammael the Forsaken is ruler of Illian.
Mat Cauthon ends being taken to Tar Valon by Verin Mathwin, Nynaeve al’Meara, Egwene al’Vere, Elayne Trakand, and Hurin.
The women have a light skirmish with Whitecloaks before entering Tar Valon. Hurin Immediately after arriving in Tar Valon departs to report to King Easar of Shienar all that has happened.
The Amyrlin, Siuan Sanche, sets Nynaeve, Egwene, with Elayne joining them later, to the daunting task of hunting down the dreaded Black Ajah.
A lead ends up sending the inexperienced trio traveling to Tear.

Part 2 Coming Soon…

Nynaeve al’Meara and Egwene al’Vere go with Moraine to Tar Valon to train as Aes Sedai.
Andoran Princess Elayne Trakand and Rands second soon to be love who can see peoples future through special symbols around them, Min arrive at Tar Valon as well.
In Tar Valon’s Headquarters the White Tower, Nynaeve passes the test to become an Accepted, the rank below Aes Sedai and above Novice due to her strong ability to channel despite being untrained.
Rand, Loial and Hurin become separated from the Shienaran party and get transported to an alternate dimension.
Which mirrors the real world in an unnatural way via a portal stone, Rand strongly suspects he activated the portal stone unconsciously when sleeping by channeling Saidin.
Although Egwene has a dream in which a unknown woman is responsible for the portal stones activation.
Rand’s struggle to come to terms with his ability to channel the One Power, which becomes a constant theme in the series.
In the dream world called Tel’aran’rhiod, Rand meets and fights with Ba’alzamon which ends with Rand getting has a heron branded into his palm.
Eventually, the group find a portal stone with the help of a strange an extremely beautiful woman calling herself Selene.
Rand uses the Stone to return to the natural world, although much farther ahead then Padan Fain’s or Ingtar’s group.
The group decides to hide and wait for the Darkfriends to catch up, a strategy that enables them to sneak into Fain’s camp and take back both the Horn and dagger.
Meanwhile at a complete loss to explain Rand’s and his friends disappearance , Lord Ingtar’s party continues to track Padan Fain with the help of Perrin. Perrin pretends to be a sniffer like Hurin, but is actually using uses his wolf abilities to smell, track and ask the wolves where Padan Fain is.

Part 3 Coming Soon…

Help me to remember the greatness of the work which has been given to me to do; that I work with the most precious material in the world, the mind of youth. Help me to always remember that I am making marks upon that mind which time will never rub out.

Give me patience and understanding with those who are slow to learn, and even with those who refuse and do not want to learn. When I have to exercise discipline, help me to do so in sternness and yet in love. Keep me from the sarcastic and the biting tongue, and help me always to encourage those who are doing their best, even if that best is not very good.

Help me to help my students, not only to store things in their memories, but to be able to use their minds, and to think for themselves. And amidst all the worries and the frustrations of my job, help me to remember that the future of the nation and of the world is in my hands.

Please always guide me every day.

Amen.

Rackham has undertaken a comprehensive study, going into details even upto individual trees. He has drawn information from a broad range of sources and material, and his inclusion of personal experiences has served to enrich the voluminous scientific and statistical data present in the book. He separates myths from facts and backs up broad claims and generalizations with detailed case studies.

The book makes an interesting read for anyone interested to know more about England.

The book gives an overview of the cross-cultural study of art from an anthropological perspective by tackling the diversity of human nature. Exploring the ins and outs of ideas about art and its relationship to other things that people do, the author presents the impact of the vast changes in the world on art in all societies while giving focus on the rise of folk, tourist, and export art. According to Hatcher, art can be best studied by studying the where, how, who, why, what, when of art on the local level, then moving to understand the significance of patterns or systems that have yielded insights in the past. In this book, her cultural studies of native peoples in North America, Oceania, and Africa show how art is a locally specific and extremely significant feature of culture.

I was a little annoyed at the problem, but it wasn’t just that problem that was getting me. It was the fact that everywhere I went, from the grocery store to the bank to the store, the kids just didn’t seem to be cognizant of what went on.

So, I started doing a little research.

For those of you who aren’t familiar, you have to read the academic books on The Dumbing Down of America. The books you want to look into are:

1. ‘The Deliberate Dumbing Down of America – A Chronological Paper Trail” by Charlotte Thompson
2. “Dumbing Down Our Kids: Why American Children Feel Good About Themselves But Can’t Read, Write or Add” by Charles Sykes
3. “Dumbing Down: Culture Politics and the Mass Media” by Ivo Mosley
4. “Death By Supermarket: The Fattening, Dumbing Down, and Poisoning of America” by Nancy Deville

Start with those, and continue looking into the research that has been done. You will be as a amazed as I am. At this point we’ve lost close to two generations of children who are not being taught how to think, how to be logical or how to reason for themselves. If you have as many experiences with the places that you go as I do, than this will help you to understand why.

For anyone living in America who is concerned about the way things are going, nailing this educational problem is the beginning to understanding what is happening in the world of academia as well as in the work force and in our lives in general. This isn’t something to try to nail the parents in a certain place, because it’s based around the cultural and educational systems; however, if we want to start getting some kids that can think… it has to start with understanding what is happening to begin with.