Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) is the local mean time at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, London, counted from midnight. At different times in the past, it has been calculated in different ways, including being calculated from noon; as a consequence, it cannot be used to specify a particular time unless a context is given. The term "GMT" is also used as one of the names for the time zone UTC+00:00 and, in UK law, is the basis for civil time in the United Kingdom.
An hour is a unit of time historically reckoned as 1⁄24 of a day and defined contemporarily as exactly 3,600 seconds (SI). There are 60 minutes in an hour, and 24 hours in a day.
Noon is 12 o'clock in the daytime. It is written as 12 noon, 12:00 m., 12 p.m., 12 pm, or 12:00 or 1200 . Solar noon is the time when the Sun appears to contact the local celestial meridian. This is when the Sun reaches its apparent highest point in the sky, at 12 noon apparent solar time and can be observed using a sundial. The local or clock time of solar noon depends on the date, longitude, and time zone, with Daylight Saving Time tending to place solar noon closer to 1:00pm.
The 12-hour clock is a time convention in which the 24 hours of the day are divided into two periods: a.m. and p.m.. Each period consists of 12 hours numbered: 12, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11. The 12-hour clock has been developed since the second millennium BC and reached its modern form in the 16th century.
Lyra Belacqua, later known as Lyra Silvertongue, is the heroine of Philip Pullman's trilogy His Dark Materials. In His Dark Materials Lyra is a young girl who inhabits a universe parallel to our own. Brought up in the cloistered world of Jordan College, Oxford, she finds herself embroiled in a cosmic war between Lord Asriel on one side, and a deity figure known as The Authority and his Regent, Metatron, on the other. Lyra also features prominently in the subsequent trilogy The Book of Dust.
In geography and geodesy, a meridian is the locus connecting points of equal longitude, which is the angle east or west of a given prime meridian. In other words, it is a line of longitude. The position of a point along the meridian is given by that longitude and its latitude, measured in angular degrees north or south of the Equator. On a Mercator projection or on a Gall-Peters projection, each meridian is perpendicular to all circles of latitude. A meridian is half of a great circle on Earth's surface. The length of a meridian on a modern ellipsoid model of Earth has been estimated as 20,003.93 km (12,429.87 mi).
Love of Life is an American soap opera televised on CBS from September 24, 1951, to February 1, 1980. It was created by Roy Winsor, whose previous creation Search for Tomorrow premiered three weeks before Love of Life; he created The Secret Storm two and a half years later.
Scott David Westerfeld is an American writer of young adult fiction, best known as the author of the Uglies and the Leviathan series.
The Secret Hour is a science-fiction fantasy novel written by Scott Westerfeld. It was published by EOS Books, a now defunct branch of HarperCollins, in 2004. It is the first book of The Midnighters Trilogy.
Charlaine Harris Schulz is an American author who specializes in mysteries. She is best known for her book series The Southern Vampire Mysteries, which was adapted as the TV series True Blood. The television show was a critical and financial success for HBO, running seven seasons, from 2008 through 2014.
True Colors was an annual music event created by American recording artist Cyndi Lauper. The concerts were headlined by Lauper and featured various music and comedy acts. Beginning in 2007, the trek supported the Human Rights Campaign, PFLAG and the Matthew Shepard Foundation. Other local and private LGBT charities and foundations were supported as the event grew. The tour began with 16 shows in 2007 expanding to 25 shows in 2008. Lauper's set during the 2008 tour was basically the North American leg of her worldwide Bring Ya to the Brink Tour that year. An outing in 2009 was planned and later cancelled. In lieu of the tour, Lauper partnered with Broadway Impact to create the True Colors Cabaret. The show began September 28, 2009 and ran once a month at Feinstein's at Loews Regency. It featured performances from Lauper, Rufus Wainwright, Lea Michele, Jonathan Groff, Jason Mraz, Sara Bareilles, Karen Olivo, Melinda Doolittle and Broadway Inspirational Voices. The shows ran until February 2010.
Touching Darkness is a young adult novel by Scott Westerfeld. The second book in his Midnighters series, it was released in 2005 through EOS Books, a now-defunct branch of HarperCollins.
The Midnighters Trilogy is a science-fiction fantasy series written by Scott Westerfeld. It was published by Eos in 2004. It comprises three books; The Secret Hour, Touching Darkness and Blue Noon. Over the course of the trilogy Jessica encounters other Midnighters with whom she allies herself. The protagonists in the trilogy are the eponymous Midnighters Desdemona, Rex, Jonathan, and Melissa. The antagonists of the series are Darklings and Slithers, dangerous and powerful beings that created and live in the Blue Hour.
Judith Lewis, better known by her pen name Cassandra Clare, is an American author of young adult fiction, best known for her bestselling series The Mortal Instruments.
Donna Noble is a fictional character in the long-running British science fiction television series Doctor Who. Portrayed by British actress and comedian Catherine Tate, she is a companion of the Tenth and Fourteenth Doctors. Originally appearing in the closing scene of the show's 2006 series and as a special guest star in its following Christmas special, "The Runaway Bride", Tate was not expected to reprise her role as Donna; for series 3 (2007), the Doctor travelled alongside medical student Martha Jones. However, Tate expressed interest in returning to the role, and returned as a series regular in series 4 (2008), the subsequent 2009–2010 Christmas and New Year's special, and in the 60th anniversary specials in 2023.
Skulduggery Pleasant is a series of dark fantasy novels written by Irish author Derek Landy. Tom Percival is the series' illustrator. The books revolve around the adventures of fledgling detective Valkyrie Cain and her mentor Skulduggery Pleasant, along with other friends and allies. The central story concerns Valkyrie's struggle to stop evil forces threatening the world and her internal struggle to resist the darkness within.
The Maze Runner is a 2009 dystopian novel by American author James Dashner. It takes place in a world suffering from a coronal mass ejection and whose surviving civilians fight to avoid an apocalyptic illness called the Flare. It is written from the perspective of Thomas, a 16-year-old boy who wakes up with no memories inside an artificially produced maze but who is also the key to his friends’ salvation. An organization called WICKED controls the world politically, seeks a cure to the Flare, and uses the youngest generation of civilians who are immune as test subjects.
The Books of Abarat are a series of young adult fantasy novels written and illustrated by English writer and visual artist Clive Barker. The series is intended to contain five books, three of which have been published from 2002 to 2011. The series takes place on the Abarat, a fictional archipelago consisting of twenty-five islands, one for each hour of the day.
Creepy Creatures is the first book in R. L. Stine's Goosebumps Graphix series. It is a comic book that contains three stories; TheWerewolf of Fever Swamp adapted by Gabriel Hernandez, The Scarecrow Walks At Midnight adapted by Greg Ruth and The Abominable Snowman of Pasadena adapted by Scott Morse, all based on the Goosebumps books by R. L. Stine. The book was first published on September 1, 2006 by Scholastic in the United States.
The Smurfs 2 is a 2013 American fantasy comedy film loosely based on The Smurfs comic book series created by the Belgian comics artist Peyo. It is the second and final installment in the Smurfs live action film series and a sequel to the 2011 film The Smurfs, produced by Columbia Pictures, Sony Pictures Animation, The Kerner Entertainment Company, and Hemisphere Media Capital, and distributed by Sony Pictures Releasing. The film was again directed by Raja Gosnell from a screenplay written by Karey Kirkpatrick and the writing teams of J. David Stem and David N. Weiss, and Jay Scherick and David Ronn, and a story conceived by the latter four. The entire main cast reprised their roles from the first film. New cast members include Christina Ricci and J. B. Smoove as members of the Naughties, and Brendan Gleeson as Patrick Winslow's stepfather.
