Tombo the tadpole declares himself King of the Pond. He brags that he’s the biggest, the fastest, and the strongest tadpole, and he teases and chases all the other tadpoles. But one day while showing off doing a triple flip, Tombo’s life takes a major turn. He’s captured by a boy and taken from his lush pond to a fish tank. There Tombo is fed dry fish flakes, a food he despises.

Christopher has great dreams of becoming an inventor, but he dislikes anything requiring work. When Christopher’s friend and mentor, Dr. Finkle, invents a time remote, his dreams come true! He gets the time remote and avoids all unpleasant activities like math tests and eating vegetables. Who needs to do homework and eat right? Let’s just eat dessert and play!

Spike the rebel is a mean-spirited bully in his neighborhood and school. All the kids are afraid of him, except Mary. She warns him that one day his meanness will come back to haunt him. On a family camping trip, Spike steals a canoe, rows past a caution sign, and ends up being thrown over the waterfalls. ( Read more)

Androcles lives a miserable life as the slave of a cruel and unjust master. Even though runaway slaves face the death penalty, he flees to the nearby woods. There Androcles delights in his new-found freedom. He also makes an unusual friend: a lion with an injured paw. The two live together happily, but the lion gets captured, and shortly afterwards Androcles, too. Androcles is punished by being fed to a lion.