A mentally disturbed man takes residence in a halfway house. His mind gradually slips back into the realm created by his illness, where he replays a key part of his childhood.

A Kentucky woman whose mine-worker husband is nearly killed in a cave-in, and whose father is slowly dying of black lung disease, joins the picket lines for a long, violent strike.

A loser finds success in the revenge-for-hire business.

Two death-row murderesses develop a fierce rivalry while competing for publicity, celebrity, and a sleazy lawyer's attention.

In 709 AD, in the Iron Age, a spacecraft crashes in the Viking kingdom of Herot, Norway, and the pilot Kainan survives. He turns the beacon on; learns the language and culture of the planet using a machine; and finds that the predator, Moorwen, that he was transporting, had escaped. While chasing the alien monster, he finds a village completely destroyed and is arrested by the warrior Wulfric, believing that he killed the locals - Kainan is brought to Herot as a prisoner.