Part one: 'A strangely clever youth ... ' --
Admiration and dislike: how others saw him, a personal rediscovery --
The first years: the house of desolation, flagrant injustice, young man in India --
The first books: Plain tales, Doors to new worlds, Soldiers three, Odd man out --
Part two: The search for a home --
An end to boyhood: romantic friendship, writing for a living, many inventions, the first fable --
The flight from Vermont: in a strange land, captains courageous, ignominious flight --
A check to growth: complete surrender, engines and screws, the South African War, growth and experiment --
Hallo my fancy: Mowgli, folk in Housen, Kim --
The other side: excommunicatory hatreds, the imperialist, the farces, flawed opals --
Part three: retribution and compassion --
Restoring the balance: the late stories, revenge and retribution, dayspring mishandled, loneliness and pain, healing --
Belief: what do you expect for the money? forgiveness, untimely, a vision of heaven, dismissed to the mercy --
Pain and love: the last period, the brutality of art, if the dead rise not ... the wish house, the gardener.

A personal rediscovery of Kipling's works, including plot summaries of the stories.