When you find yourself trying to remember a show (or any works) that's on the tip of your tongue but just out of reach, come here - the collective brain of the TVTropes community can probably help. Post all the details you can remember (examples help). If you're looking for a trope, head over to Trope Finder. Have general questions about tropes? Visit Ask The Tropers!
Find a Show:
openNo Title Literature
A children's chapter book or YA book about a ghost of a girl who haunted her old house. I'm pretty sure her name was Beryl and that she'd died by falling off her bike and hitting her head. I think the protagonist was the girl who now lived in the house, and maybe she had a brother who was in on it too? The ghost makes a lot of trouble for them and I think they kind of take it upon themselves to put her soul at rest or whatever. I think I remember a scene where they'd arranged for Beryl's now-grown-up family to come around for dinner and it ends up being a disaster because Beryl loses her temper over something and trashes the place.
openNo Title Literature
This is a fantasy book. The protagonist is a little girl who can take objects out of books. Like, if the book has the word 'apple' in it, she can take an apple out of the book. The plot is about two old men trying to get something. The girl teams up with one of them. I remember there's a room full of books. I think the little girl's dad is in it? It ends with the two old men admitting they used to be friends, and they make up. In the next book (or maybe later in the book?) the old men join forces to fight something evil.
openNo Title Literature
I have two:
- A YA book I read for a report in middle school. I barely remember anything about it except that there was a group of kids who were in the woods for whatever reason (lost?), and I think there was a motorcycle gang they had to avoid? I literally only remember one scene that was probably at the end of a chapter, where they're all talking or arguing and then they hear the sounds of the motorcycles through the trees and it shuts them up. Or something. Sorry. I just have the leftover mental image in my head and it drives me crazy sometimes.
- A short story we read, also in middle school, as part of a "man vs. nature" unit. It was a Western (I remember having "mesa" as a vocab word for the nine hundredth time) about a guy who's supposed to be bringing a flock of sheep somewhere with an older partner, but at the beginning he shoots the partner so he can do the job on his own and get paid both their shares. The rest of the story is about this plan blowing up in his face. It ends with him falling off a ledge onto a rock and breaking his back (I think he was trying to get to a tree growing near it because he was out of water). I remember it as being pretty graphic about his dying agony.
openNo Title Literature
I half-remember a science-fiction book. The title was "Bad Moon Rising" or "Dark Moon Rising" or something similar. (Searching on Google and Wikipedia has resulted in a large number of things that match those titles but are not what I'm looking for).
The plot is that a group of aliens come to Earth and wish to speak to the President of the USA. The problem is that the USA was invaded by China years ago, so the USA (and therefor the president) no longer exists... So a simple farmboy is "elected" president overnight and sent to meet the aliens. He travels to their planet and finds out that they intend to "help" the USA by destroying China, and also learns that every other alien race they've ever "helped" has been completely obliterated. (So he has to stop them, which he does... but you have enough to recognize the book by now if you're familiar with it.)
openNo Title Literature
I'm remembering a book that I read in 8th grade that I really enjoyed, but I can't remember the title. The premise was a woman hiding on a pirate ship, and eventually getting sent to a lady's school (where she accidentally sets it on fire.) She falls in love with a boy on the ship (and they sleep in the same cot and almost go further), but the captain can't stand her adn wants her off. I think the two are siblings perhaps. The main character's name (or her lover) was Jaime.
The title had "blue" in it somewhere, that I do remember. It definitely wasn't Charlotte Doyle.
Thank you!
openNo Title Literature
I was passing through an airport recently, and saw this book in one of the stores, in the fantasy section. I thought the title was "Tide Storm", or something like it, but apparently I was wrong, as my searches aren't finding anything close to it.
The cover was reddish and depicted some kind of scenery. What I remember from the back of the book is some mentions of war and - I think - some kind of fantasy world. I realize this isn't much to go off of, but any help would be hugely appreciated.
Additional cover description: There were some buildings on the front. They don't really stand out; the scenery just kind of blends together in a sunset-red haze. The scenery, or at least the redness, extends to the back cover as well. The whole cover is primarily red.
Edited by TwiddleropenNo Title Literature
This was a book I read the back-cover blurb on and wanted to research more when I got home, but I forgot the title/author. It was about some kids (two boys and a girl) playing a D&D-style game. One of the boys wants to quit and start a new game but the girl doesn’t. The thing is, the characters they created become real and begin to fight to make sure their world isn’t destroyed.
Is this ringing any bells with anyone? I seem to remember it was called something like Gameworld or Gameland.
openNo Title Literature
Ok, so this is incredibly vague and odd. Around 2004 I remember reading a young adult fantasy novel, it was in the new book section of the library and it seems it just came out. It was about these teens or preteens, a brother and a sister who wandered in a forest and met some kind of magical creature, I think they were elf-like. I vaguely remember there were these things that were valuable to the creatures and I think they looked like golden leaves or candy wrappers. It turns out their dad worked for the creatures in the past and they called him a 'thrall'. I also remember a gang fight in a mall involving a thuggish friend of theirs.
openNo Title Literature
It's an older fantasy book that focuses on a girl who attends a school for the magically gifted (I'm about 99% sure that it was written before the Harry Potter books). The school appears differently based on your skill level - beginners see it as a rundown building and more experienced students see a fancier structure. I think the same goes for the food.
The story ends with each witch in her graduating class receiving some sort of gift. It turns out that the main character doesn't get one, she cries, and one of her teachers tells her that one of her tears is actually universe/galaxy and that she's so powerful that she has actually reached god status.
I really enjoyed reading this as a teenager and I've been trying to figure out the title of this book for a very long time with no success. I'd very much like to be able to find it and read it again, so if the description sounds familiar to anyone I'd really appreciate a response!
openNo Title Literature
A scene in a young adult novel, probably a ghost story, where a girl (or boy) goes up into the attic and finds an old record player with a recording of the song "The Old Gray Mare" in it. The record keeps getting stuck on the "many long years ago" part of the song.
Edited by amazinglyenoughopenNo Title Literature
Does anyone remember reading a 'young adult' novel (I think there were two of them in series) concerning a book where the characters inside it are real. Every time a person reads the book the characters read their lines, and I think this was whenever anybody read any copy of the book rather than the characters being localised to a single copy. I don't remember the plot of the first book at all, but the second involves the granddaughter of one of the original characters (real life not the book within) and/or the original author of the book and I think she somehow gets into the book? She meets a teenage girl called Laurel who emerges from a laurel bush, has blue eyes and possibly supernatural powers? Like she created herself instead of being written or something like that? And I vaguely recall her being a young version of the protagonist's grandmother. I think the second book ends with the protagonist selling the story to a publisher so that it will go back into print and be read again.
Also, the version I read possibly had the image of a girl on the back of a giant owl / some other giant, brown, feathered beast.
Appreciate any replies :)
openNo Title Literature
It was a series of three books, aimed at about the 12-15 crowd (maybe younger.) It's sci-fi. The last book had a daughter and her irresponsible dad flying in a spaceship at the beginning, and she was trying to get him to help fix something. They land on a planet, with mountains and fields of grain (and possibly an uninhabitable side, not sure.) The daughter gets some UST with a native boy, and the dad uses a drug from another planet (ambroesia) and a pimped out box to trick the mayor into giving him power. The native boy accidentally leaves a bloody hand print, and there's a big dinner hall, some scandal, and at the end, the dad nearly gets stoned to death (with stones, not drugs.)
openNo Title Literature
I'm trying to remember the name of a short story where a doctor is performing surgery on herself using a tiny remote - controlled robot. She goes into a coma and an adventure guide who uses remote - control robots to let tourists hunt giant spiders safely is recruited to find the missing robot before she dies.
Futurama (I think) had an episode where something similar to this happened.
openNo Title Literature
I am trying to remember the name of a book. It was about a vampire girl, Megan I think her name was. She was running from another vampire who was borderline evil. She had two gay "protectors"/friends... She ends up with the borderline evil vampire, and gives birth to twins a boy and girl light and dark. The dad ended up taking the boy and disappearing cause someone was looking for him if I remember correctly... Ugh I hate that I cant remember... -.- it was also several years ago.
openNo Title Literature
I remember reading a Star Trek Voyager novel some time ago that provided a great non-video game example of Save Scumming, but I can't remember the title of the book, and all my searches so far have come up empty.
Plot goes somewhere along the lines of an away team (Torres and a couple others, possibly Kim and Paris) being sent to a seemingly deserted planet with signs of an ancient civilization on it. The away team accidentally triggers a time travel device that sends them to an inhabited era of the planet's history, but in the process they end up breaking one of the civilization's fundamental timeline protection laws. The aliens contact Janeway in the present to discuss the situation, while the away team (Torres in particular) tries to come up with an escape plan, only to be thwarted at every turn by the time traveling abilities of the aliens, complete with descriptions of the various iterations the aliens had to go through to come up with the eventual solution. (Hence, the Save Scumming example)
openNo Title Literature
(Putting this under "literature" because there's no "comics" option, I hope that's OK.)
I can't remember the title of a Captain America TPB, it's the one where a Skrull takes over HYDRA and pretends to be Captain America so he can turn people against each other by making everyone paranoid about Skrulls invading Earth. At the end the real Cap gives a speech about how America isn't as awesome as it should be, or something like that.
openNo Title Literature
I remember reading this series of books a few years back. If I remember correctly, it was about these kids who had some sort of powers. I think there was a character named Tim who was kidnapped by aliens and later found. I also remember that one of the books dealt with a rat infestation or something like that. I remember that the books had shiny covers. Thanks for the help in advance.
openNo Title Literature
A whole bunch of literature queries, while I think of them:
- 1) A short story where the main character is planning on selling his soul to The Devil - he goes on and on about admiring how clever The Devil is and how successful he is going to become for it... Then he finally meets with The Devil, and as he signs his soul away he looks in The Devil's eyes, and instantly regrets it because he realizes that The Devil is "an idiot".
- 2) I think this was in an English textbook I had in grade school: There's a class field trip to the zoo, and on the way one kid is made fun of for constantly making up outrageous stories about how cool his father is, such as that he has magical powers and keeps ostriches in their yard. Later on, the kids meet his father, and everything he said about him turns out to be true... sort of: He's a magician and there are life-sized ostrich sculptures in the yard, for instance.
- 3) A YA book: There was a school with a magical, vaguely Mary Poppins-ish school teacher. The main bad guy is one of the students, and at one point in some sort of magic-related mishap his hair turns green. The bad kid comes home with green hair and has to assure his malaproper father that he hasn't become "one of those runk-pockers". Also, even though it seemingly had nothing else to do with Doctor Doolittle, a Pushmi-Pullyu was involved somehow.
- 4) Another YA book - I only remember one small scene where the main character is hiding, and needs to enter a building guarded by two mook-type characters who are British (and I believe it's mentioned they're rugby players), and are described as both being so laconic as to seem like they have their own language. I mainly remember that the main character was listening in to their conversation and at one point one responded to the other with "Grade A, mate", and in his narration the main character wonders whether the mook did really say "Grade A, mate" or if he just changed the subject completely by commenting on the weather ("gray day, mate"). There may have also been something about a character being kidnapped and trapped in a room with a man who yells at them in an unrecognizable language and is described as looking like Mr. Clean, and the book may have actually alternated narrators with each chapter (If so, the chapters were headlined by the name of the character whose POV it was to make this less confusing). But then again maybe the "Gray day" / "Grade A" thing, the guy who looked like Mr. Clean and even the alternating narrators were entirely different books.
- 5) A very... odd book I ended up browsing through in the library as a kid. It had something to do with alien invasion, but the main thing I remember is that the end of the world was supposed to be preceded by an endless traffic jam, which one of the main characters ends up starting. There's a certain song that drives the aliens away, and the song was even printed in the book with lyrics and sheet music.
openNo Title Literature
I read a book when I was younger and now I can't remember the name of it. I know the copy I had was a tall, skinny book. It was about a boy, I want to say he was in the 4th grade. I just remember that instead of regular-length chapters, it had a ton of shorter chapters (by shorter, I mean 1.5-4 pages). The only thing I remember from the plot is that the kid is ridiculously good at untangling knots. In one of the chapters, there's a business (maybe a pizza place?) that has a flag and the excess string from tying the flag to the pole had become hopelessly tangled over many many years. There may have even been a long-standing challenge with a prize to whoever can untangle it. It takes the kid several hours, but he does it. I want to say that the name of the book had the kid's name in it, but I could have made that up just now.

Alright, I put this in the old YKTS and no one answered...
There's a boy who finds out he's a werewolf. The book has the transformation as being all person to all wolf. There's some dude who comes for the boy and tells him about his transformation. The dude is a werewolf with black fur. They head to a restaurant and even though the boy is a vegetarian, he's so hungry that he eats a burger. He's in the werewolf camp, or whatever and they give him a new set of clothes so when he morphs out of wolf form he's not naked. He lopes around with the pack in wolf form and they fall asleep in a dog pile, but when he wakes up they're all human and he notes how normal it felt being piled on top of each other as a wolf, and how awkward it feels as a human. He was shocked at how cruel the pack was to the omega. The omega was a female.