PART I
1. UPPER EAST SIDE
Wayward Robert and spoiled rich girl April create Nick, a brilliant child. George Warner, grandfather to be, does everything in his power to prevent their union and fails in the face of fierce opposition from April.
2. PREMONITION
George pulls off a high society wedding before April shows. Louise, Robert’s mother, flies from Germany over the big pond to attend the wedding. Her heart sinks when she sees, how self-involved and sometimes outright mean the adults in the Warner mansion are, and she makes an important decision.
3. AN APPLE, A COW, A SHEEP AND A TREE
Nick is unhappy. He refuses to walk or speak to anyone but Louise. Robert thinks his son is a retard, April stumbles over herself to make him feel better but doesn’t know how, and George thinks he is a genius and takes him to a child psychiatrist in California to have him tested.
4. THE FENCE
After turning four, Nick recognizes that his refusal to speak has become a nuisance and no longer holds the benefits he had been hoping for. When the fussing over him becomes too much, he decides to give up his silent resistance and starts looking for an opportunity to speak.
5. THE FEAR MONSTER
Nick’s stunt is almost successful. Only, the bait he took from George was about circles, and not about squares. Filled with fear, he returns to his room and tries to find the answer for a round fence. He wants to go to school and feels that George will only grant him his request if he finds the accurate solution for the round fence.
6. PI
Nick presents his findings of the night the next morning at breakfast. He’s got it right but his grandfather George starts talking about pies when Nick wants to talk about going to school.
7. TALKING LEGS
Everybody has an opinion about Nick’s education. Nick hides under the sofa in George’s study and listens to a big fight. Nobody is willing to give in and so it is left to George and Louise to find a solution but they have to overcome their differences first. George wants to groom Nick for a business career while Louise thinks Nick should be given room to find out where his talents lie and what he enjoys doing – be it painting, working as a park ranger or making music.
8. CARNEGIE HALL
George and Louise are unable to reach a unanimous decision or even a compromise. In the meantime, George makes good on his promise to take Nick to a concert. When Louise sees the program that George has chosen for them at Carnegie Hall, she smells treachery, but Nick surprises them all again.
9. A SAD WALTZ
Nick finds a piano in their residence on the Upper East Side and plays the encore waltz from the concert because he wants hear it again. He never misses a note or hits a wrong key. George, Louise and April listen to him and start another fight over his education.
10. AN ADVENTURE WITH TINTIN
The mood at the Warner mansion lightens now that everybody knows Nick is not retarded. But the fighting becomes fiercer and no solution is in sight. Nick feels he has to take matters into his own hands again.
11. THIRTEEN BOOKS
Now that Nick can read, he’s eager to find books that quench his thirst for knowledge. He sneaks into George’s study to find a book on pi. He strolls along the shelves and finds a book that he thinks will provide him with the knowledge he’s looking for when he gets caught by Mr. Tuckerman, one of the liveries, but turns the tables on him.
12. THE LADY IN GREY
Louise has to make good on her end of the deal. George, Louise and Nick drive to the University of Yale, where Nick is taken away by a Lady in Grey to take an IQ-test. His test results make George furious and he blames the Lady in Grey. He demands that Nick get proper instructions and repeat the test.
13. THE QUADRATURE OF THE CIRCLE
George, Louise and Nick stop at a Lobster Hut on their way home and Nick thinks he’d better learn The Thirteen Books by heart before someone takes it away from him. He’s disappointed that there’s nothing on pi in The Thirteen Books and George explains the long history of the discovery of pi to him.
14. CANDIDATES
George invites candidates to interview as Nick’s private tutor. Nick wants to stay for the interviews but gets overwhelmed by the crowd in the lobby. George finds a solution and Nick a new hiding place.
15. ALPHA MALE
After almost giving up hope, the last candidate is the one. George isn’t very friendly to him and Nick wants to know why. Louise takes Nick on a walk down the Cliff Walk to explain it and calm him down after the emotional roller coaster of the day. At the end of the walk, they find his favorite candidate musing over his chances. Nick and Julian become friends.
16. Ms. Dillinger’s Rise
To his dismay, George hires another woman in grey, Stacy Dillinger. Nick is not ready to compromise and declares war on her. He refuses to cooperate and does anything in his power to make her leave. There’s only one candidate he wants and accepts as his tutor, and that is Julian.
17. Ms. Dillinger’s Fall
Stacy Dillinger fools the adults in the mansion while the battle between her and Nick is growing fiercer by the day. She doesn’t get Nick or his needs and thinks her strict program is a fit-all. She becomes openly mean to Nick while simultaneously keeping up her charm offensive with George and Robert. Nick doesn’t learn a thing from her but is only strengthened in his resolve to bring her down. When hope seems elusive, Ms. Dillinger herself makes a big mistake.
PART II
18. JULIAN
George gives in and hires Julian. Nick And Julian are overcome with joy and sense they are kindred souls. Nick usually rejects physical contact but seeks Julian’s embrace and sends Robert off the rails again when he does.
19. FUNKY NUMBERS
Julian tells Nick about more funky numbers like pi. Julian discovers that one of the series in Nick’s IQ-test was the Fibonacci series and shows him the true meaning of this unique series that is the golden ratio. He’s also able to shed some light on Nick’s results of the IQ-test for Louise.
20. A FORBIDDEN LANGUAGE
Nick is finally getting the education he has been yearning for. Unfortunately for Nick and Julian, they also have to get spelling rules into Nick’s head and discover the first thing that Nick is not a natural at. In a moment of despair, Julian challenges Nick to learn his native tongue, Gaelic, a forgotten language that is almost dead. Intrigued by stories of battles for independence in the Highlands and merciless Red Coats purging all things Scottish, Nick convinces Julian to teach him Gaelic as their secret language in exchange for a stronger effort on his part to master the English spelling rules.
21. SECRETS IN FRANCE AND SCOTLAND
Everybody is off for the summer. Julian to Scotland and the extended Warner family to the South of France. All holiday aspirations go awry. Louise falls ill, Robert and George resume their endless fight and Nick is left to his own devices. When Robert oversteps the mark once too many, George aborts the whole vacation and calls Julian back to duty in Newport. Relieved at first, Nick has to recognize that something is seriously wrong.
22. PRIMES
Prime numbers come to the rescue. Julian pulls himself together and gives Nick a very enjoyable lesson on prime numbers and some of the secrets they hold to this day.
23. BAD OMEN
Julian is back and Louise has regained her health and best of all, Robert is being sent off to management training in Nebraska (of all states). Things couldn’t be better for Nick. Until the fights over the decision to send him to public school in Newport break out again. The lingering feeling of impending doom takes on physical form when April and Louise are forced to ambush Nick.
24. FIRST DAY
After April and Louise have taken all of Nick’s clothes and replaced them with boring ones and school uniforms, Nick doesn’t talk to anyone except Julian. Then again, it’s his first day at school and his life is about to change forever.
25. CHUBBY
Nick has found a best friend, Martin, and made a lifelong enemy, Chubby, on his first day at school. He cannot believe that George asks him to stay away from the first and become friends with the latter. His new teacher is of no help and makes things worse when she sides with Chubby and his posse.
26. REPRIMAND
Nick and Martin get called to the principal’s office and find both their families present. They are being accused of bullying Chubby who is not there to make his complaint himself. The principal threatens to reprimand them for unfair behavior. George intervenes but suddenly there’s a bigger threat looming over the friends.
27. CONUNDRUM
New fights break out and Nick isn’t so sure anymore that he wants to go school when he doesn’t learn anything there and has Julian to teach him anything he wants at home. Julian opens Nick’s eyes to the nature of school as a social institution and leaves it to Nick to make up his mind.
28. CRAVINGS AND DESIRES
Nick goes back to school and shares his insights with Martin who has learnt similar things from his parents. The friends decide that their friendship is worth the effort of trying to make it there. They develop a way to behave in the classroom and a routine to avoid Chubby and his posse.
29. A PRETTY BIG NUMBER
The friends’ efforts pay off. With George and Robert on a business trip, nothing can keep them from spending Nick’s 5th birthday together and treating Martin to his first math lesson with Julian.
30. THE BOTTOM OF IT
Louise, April and Julian are ready to keep Martin’s visit a secret and they all have a blast at his birthday lunch when April makes a big blunder.
31. LITTLE WOMEN
Martin is eager so see the mansion and the study in particular where he hopes to find many books. He is overwhelmed when he enters the study and sees the endless shelves of books. While browsing the ones that Martin might want to borrow they discover a significant clue.
32. CAESAR’S CIPHER
Being on to the secret that George so desperately tries to keep, the friends become aware that his threat to separate them is not empty. They decide they need a plan for the worst that can happen to them.
33. ONE FABULOUS SATURDAY
After much nagging, Louise finally gives in and takes them to the movies to see Jurassic Park. Chance has it that Chubby is also at the movies and gets himself caught in a rather embarrassing situation.