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This digital document is an article from Countries and Their Cultures, brought to you by Gale®, a part of Cengage Learning, a world leader in e-research and educational publishing for libraries, schools and businesses.The length of the article is 6953 words.The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase.You can view it with any web browser.Covers the broad range of popular religious culture of the United States at the close of the twentieth century. Beliefs, practices, symbols, traditions, movements, organizations, and leaders from the many traditions in the pluralistic American community are represented. Also includes cults and phenomena that drew followers, such as Heaven's Gale and UFOs. ... Read more

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Sociology Book Custom Edition for the Columbis Southern University ... Read more

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Bennett is an English expatriate living in France with champagne taste and a beer bankroll.Happy-go-lucky, a bit roguish, and almost out of cash, he places an ad in the International Herald Tribune volunteering his services: anything considered except marriage.

He pursues a response from the very, very wealthy Julian Poe, who has developed a simple but slightly illegal scheme to help keep the French tax man away from his door.He has also (although Bennett doesn't know it yet) developed a means of producing truffles, and intends to corner the immensely lucrative truffle market.

Bennett signs on to help Poe with his taxes and soon finds himself in Monaco, living in a style to which he has always wished to become accustomed.But his bubble soon bursts under the weight of Poe's nefarious truffles, and Bennett finds himself involved with Sicilian and Corsican Mafiosi, crooked gendarmes, an order of monks dedicated to the god Bacchus -- and the beautiful, sexy Anna Hersh, who's supposed to help Bennett, but who has her own agenda for this affaire that may be hazardous to the health of both of them.
Amazon.com Review
Peter Mayle continues to mine the romanticism of Provence forhis literary success. A former advertising executive, his Year in Provence toldof his time there and brought him unexpected acclaim. Then came threemore tales from Provence, Toujours Provence,Hotel Pastis and A Dog's Life. In hislatest work, Mayle finds another good reason to write about Provence:its food and wine. This tale is an adventure that manages to send itsheroes through a series of wine-tastings and excellent restaurants asthey seek to save the black truffle. It's an adventure many of uswould love to take. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (32)

pack this for your trip!
Anything Considered was such a breath of fresh air for me.Perfect summer read, light and airy even though it is a thriller/suspense novel. Mayle mixes great story telling with suspense, yet weaves in humor and romance - great balance. It takes place in France and I could smell the croissants baking as I read.I picked it up from my sister in law's box of books she had out at her garage sale and so glad I swiped it! It was written over 10 years ago so I'm sure it isn't on the top 10 list of books for folks to read in the Summer of 2010, but it should be! I was cheering on Bennett and Anna all the way!I donated it to an organization collecting books for our troops and sure hope one of our service men or women get a chance to relax with this book.Enjoy.

Not as good as earlier work
Peter Mayle appears to be resting on his previous popularity.This book was trite, amateurish and actually too silly.It had none of the characterization and atmosphere of A YEAR IN PROVENCE.He should stick with what he knows.

Anything Considered
This novel of Peter Mayle's is, once again, a very good read.In Anything Considered, we are offered a little a faster paced romp with a real sense of danger.Mayle always delivers a 'happy ending' and the journey to this ending makes one wonder how he is going to pull it off - but he does - once again.

GOOD READ !!!
ANOTHER GOOD STORY BY MAYLE. IT MAKES YOU WANDER INTO THE AREA, THAT HE IS WRITING ABOUT. GOOD READING MATERIAL FOR ARMCHAIR TRAVELERS...

Especially if you daydream about a European lifestyle...
... this title will indulge you richly.It was categorically cinematic - each page plays out like a scene in the mind's eye.Having just read some not-so-light novels, I was surprisingly just as interested in this light read, and rather enjoyed myself. ... Read more

Product Description
Violence finds a burned-out Richard Jury when he becomes the only witness to a murder in a cozy inn called the Old Silent. Though Nell Healey shot her husband in cold blood, Jury will go to any lengths to help her and break through her reticence to untangle a web of twisted motives-and twisted lives. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (20)

Follow the sheep...
Perhaps one of my favorite scenes in ALL the Richard Jury Mysteries takes place in this book, The Old Silent. But it doesn't involve Jury. It involves ex-earl Melrose Plant, who is anything but comfortable around children, saving the life of a girl he has dubbed "The Fury".Abigail is certainly furious, and once again Martha Grimes has spun an excellent mystery around a child who is alone and who is thriving in a world full of unfairness and tragedy.You will love "the sheep scene". Actually, there are two of them.And Melrose this time saves the day. On a side note, as you read this book, pay attention to the aspect of SOUND. Grimes plays off LOUD MUSIC, Rock Music, WHISTLES that cut through the night, Melrose KEEPING SILENT with his awful aunt Agatha, a lost child keeping silent through the years, a murderess keeping silent with a truth she had long known. The theme of sound and silence are woven masterfully through this tale, which takes place in the wintertime upon the frozen moors in England. Can you hear the winter winds blow?

the best Jury yet
I just love this book and all of Ms. Grimes' novels. They are compelling & entertaining. Ms. Grimes is wonderful at creating the plot, and superb at creating characters that continue through the series as true to themselves. If you are an Agatha Christie fan you will love Martha Grimes. She is so witty, I frequently laugh out loud while reading her novels. In this particular novel, there is no grisly description of the murder. I would call her books mild as compared to, for example, Patricia Cornwell, but no less dynamic and, in my humble opinion, much more entertaining because her characters are so well rounded and intricate.
This book is longer than the previous Jury books, but the embellishments are well work it. Mr. Grimes builds a room descriptively before the action takes place. SHe is the door by which you, the reader, walk into the scene. Several of the non recurring characters in this book are also very well written & create a connection with the reader. I expect to hear of some of them in later books.

Probably one of her best yet
This is the tenth murder mystery featuring Superintendent Richard Jury of Scotland Yard and his wealthy, highborn friend, Melrose Plant. But this time, Jury actually witnesses the murder he subsequently investigates when a woman shoots her husband in an inn in the wilds of West Yorkshire. But then there's another murder, out on the moor. As usual, both the victims, the perpetrator (but perhaps not the only one), and the other characters all are connected with a large country house owned by a wealthy family. And, also as usual, one of the characters (and a potential victim) is a precocious adolescent with an affinity for animals. And it all connects with a kidnapping and probable murder nearly a decade before. The writing is smooth and the characters (as usual) are probably the best part of the book. On the other hand, the added theme this time is serious rock `n' roll, of which Grimes seems not to have a broad personal knowledge but is only parroting notions and judgments she has read or been told. (At least, that's how it comes out.)

The Old Silent
Very well written and enjoyable.Inspector Jury and his eccentric friends are always delightful.

The Old Silent
I love this series.Somehow over the years, I had missed this book.It introduces one of the charactors that lives in the flats with Jury and the others. ... Read more

Product Description

Mr. Phillips wakes on a summer's Monday morning in his modest, nearly mortgage-free house, in the bed he has contentedly shared with his wife of almost thirty years,ready to face another ordinary working day.

Except that this day is not ordinary, for on the previous Friday, Mr. Phillips was summarily fired. Through no fault of his own, Mr. Philips has suddenly found his whole life cast into doubt.

Unable to deal with this disaster -- unable to even tell his wife -- Mr. Phillips rises at his usual hour and prepares himself, as he had done his entire working life, for the job he no longer has. Dressed for work with no work to do, he wanders the streets of London, seeing the world as if for the first time, and what he sees triggers memories. Some are improbably funny, some deeply affecting, and all gradually build a portrait of a decent man who only daysbefore knew exactly who he was -- husband, home owner, father, valued employee -- and on on this day wonders what he can become.

With his eye for the telling detail, his ear for the commonplace speech that make each of us who we are, John Lanchester has created both a jewel of a novel and an Everyman for our times.Amazon.com Review
Elegant, demonic, obsessive, John Lanchester's The Debt to Pleasure wonthe Whitbread Award for first novel, was short-listed for many others, and wastranslated into a dizzying number of foreign languages. Its narrator,Tarquin Winot, displays an encyclopedic knowledge of food and hautecuisine, and must surely be one of the firstfictional "foodie-killers." The author's second novel, Mr Phillips,is in a very different key. The eponymous protagonist, a 50-year-old Londonaccountant, has lost his job but hasn't told his family. He leaves for workas usual on Monday morning, and finds himself wandering aimlessly aroundthe city, taking it all in. So the odyssey begins.

A statistician and inveterate quantifier, Mr Phillips likes to give marksout of ten for things (including sexual dreams), a habit that hasespecially humorous consequences when he visits the Tate Gallery. AGaudier-Brzeska head: seven out of ten; The Boyhood of Raleigh:five. His thoughts on Millais's Ophelia are typical: "If she haddrowned surely she wouldn't be floating on her back like that? Certainlythat wasn't how drowned people looked on TV. Six out of ten." Mr Phillips'sjudgments may lack sophistication, but they are often hilariously apt, andabove all true to his personality. He has a penchant for mental arithmetic,and speculates about how many women in England pose nude for magazines andtabloids (16,744, he deduces). He isn't exactly sex-obsessed, but heillustrates dramatically the notion that men think about sex a great deal of the time.

His thoughts also meander in many directions: How many people on a Londonbus have never been on the river Thames? What would the financial accountsof the Battersea Park authorities look like?Standing on Chelsea Bridge,he calculates the speed at which a suicide would hit the water. Is thislitany of seemingly trivial arithmetical puzzles a response to the traumaof unemployment, or is it a heightened version of the mind games we allprivately play? Mr Phillips is extremely observant and insightful--heshould have given up accountancy long ago. He is good on old age andespecially good on death: "But the thought that you would be aware of whatwas going on as you died implied that somewhere in his future was a momentof the purest terror, terror at 200 proof, so that you could have a smalltaste of the fear every time you let your mind touch on the subject, evenfor a second or two."

Reviewers have already been talking about literary influences--Woolf,Joyce, Wells--but John Lanchester's mesmerizing second novel has acumulative power and brilliance all its own. --Jonathan Allison ... Read more

Customer Reviews (30)

Hilarious and brilliant day-in-the-life read
I read this book a few years ago while I was living in London, and thought it was absolutely brilliant.I have since loaned it to some good friends, who also found this book superb.
The main character is lost in a suddenly new but thoroughly familiar landscape which is written so well, you'll feel you are there.
This is an easy read, but a well-written one that you will find yourself laughing out loud at.
I highly recommend this book.

Off the straight and narrow... dear, dear, Mr. Phillips
It may sound sad, a newly unemployed middle aged accountant wondering through London, but Mr. Phillips' somewhat tragic trajectory sends him on a meandering journey of observation and self examination that makes the reader reflect on a great many things about norms, career, marriage, fatherhood, self worth.In the end, the journey paints a complete picture.Lanchester is extremely talented at fully realizing his character -- you feel for him, pity him, share his perspective at times, and hopefully find yourself chuckling throughout, through his eyes, voyeuristically.

Not quite an ordinary day, not quite an ordinary novel
After The Debt To Pleasure, my mouth was watering for Mr Phillips.But Mr Phillips isn't an extraordinary person, like the anti-hero of The Debt To Pleasure was;and Mr Phillips isn't quite an extraordinary novel, like The Debt To Pleasure certainly was.

The problem with writing from a first-person point of view, when the first-person isn't terribly outstanding, is that the narrative - even while touching on eccentricities and drawing out colours which wouldn't normally have been expected - will struggle to be outstanding too;the problem with detailing an ordinary day is that only very ordinary things happen(with one exception - which seemed curiously out of place and hidden under the carpet of the rest of the action's banality), and while Lanchester's story-telling ability should be in no doubt, he often struggles to make you "need to read".

There is a smooth current of comedy in this book, gentle humour which is both poignant and occasionally dark.In that it's quintessentially English, in the mould of Alan Bennet.The writing is of a high standard.The section near the end when Phillips meets and helps an elderly lady is touching and lovely, resonating for a long time in the reader's head.But most of the book is as forgettable as Mr Phillips himself:certainly decent, apparently bland but under the surface richly-layered, achingly, heartbreakingly 'everyman'...but encountered, and then passed by in search of something...else.

I wanted to really like this book, and while I didn't dislike it I found it hard to get excited about it.You won't feel you wasted your time reading it, but you may have the feeling, like I did, that you could have spent it reading something more memorable.

Walter Mitty/Mr. Milquetoast In Hilarious Deadpan Story!
Mr. Phillips very polite notice that his services as an accountant for 20-plus years in contemporary London are at an end. So he prepares himself for work, and daydreams and tours though London on a hot July day. Analyzes practically everything in mathematical terms, first he considers the mating habits of himself, his neighbors, and all England, and comes to some interesting conclusions. He wanders to some tennis courts, and meets an eccentric pornographer learning some interesting things about this tawdry business, while ogling some of the tennis players. In fact, much his past life, 50 years, comes to his head,his marriage, 2 sons, parents and father's death, and professional life. In fact, we are given a fine tour of London as well as the daydreams of Mr. Phillips. But the real story here is the absolutely right on humor of the situation, including Mr. Phillips short stop into an X-rated video store, totally hilarious. Mr. Phillips lunch with his older son is also unforgettable, as is the entire story. Wlaking home he helps on older lady carry her bags home, only to learn that she is the widow of one of Mr. Phillips very eccentric teachers. I musthave laughed out loud at least 2-3 times per page!

Entertains Movingly and Moves Entertainingly
The premise of this novel is that Mr Phillips has just lost his longtime white-collar job, and is wandering aimlessly around London because he hasn't been able to tell his wife. He has a pretty eventful day out, meeting a pornographer and the wife of a mad teacher, and getting involved in a bank robbery, but most of the narrative is internal monologue. It's very readable internal monologue, though, and on the whole wonderfully poised: both sentimental enough to bring out the pathos of the situation, and full of irreverent side-spirals around loneliness or sex. (For instance, the random thought about madmen living on the Circle Line, the bizarre religion teacher, or the long discussion in the first chapter about the general scarcity of sex.) The best thing about the book is the wealth of bright little thoughts heightened by context to wisdom, about life, London, sex etc.

Sentimentality and humour always work together in Mr Phillips's mind. In the non-internal scenes, the ratio of pathos is slightly higher. Apart from the pornographer, most of the characters are stylised and mechanised to good comic effect. But there are intrinsically serious scenes, like the excellent bank robbery scene, where the comic elements are subdued -- though they are distinctly in the background, and keep the narrative voice sharp and poised.

In some ways this novel is Sterne lightened and brought up to date. There's little of the extravagance of Tristram Shandy in either the sentimental or the comic direction. I wouldn't call this an experimental novel; the internal monologue is locally coherent, and the transitions are almost continuous. And though the influence of Sterne (and Joyce, I suppose) is evident, the achievement of this novel is different from theirs: Lanchester manages to work out a style that's elegant, clever, natural and almost unselfconscious. ... Read more

Product Description
**'IT' Can Be Anything. A Fanged Monster That Won't Stay On The Movie Screen. Something Ominous Lurking In The Basement. No Matter What Your Biggest Fear Is, No One Knows 'IT' Better Than Stephen King. Own The Best-Selling 1986, 22-Year-Old Collectible Hardcover, 'IT' And The Terrifying VHS Movie Based On 'IT.' ... Read more

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For the first time on CD! Vintage Stephen King at a great low price!

Stephen King's unparalleled imagination is in full force in this collection of four unabridged short stories originally found in the classic, Nightmares & Dreamscapes. An all-star cast of readers bring to life these timeless stories from the darkest places.

One man's pursuit of world peace turns deadly in The End of the Whole Mess. Stephen King puts his spin on the familiar duo of Holmes and Watson in The Doctor's Case. In The Moving Finger, menace arrives poking out of the drain of a bathroom sink. And a young, pregnant widow takes on a zombie attack inHome Delivery.

Matthew Broderick, Tim Curry, Eve Beglarian and Stephen King lend their voices to this haunting collection of classic stories that no Stephen King fan should be without. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

The End of the Whole Mess is Brilliant!
EDIT: After a day of using it I knocked it down one star, for the packaging and whatnot.Go to the end of the review for that.

These four stories, from the "Nightmares & Dreamscapes" collection marks the first time I've been able to get my hands on the story "The End of the Whole Mess" on disc. While like much of King's short story collections, N&D is a hit and miss affair (often more miss than hit), I have to say that "The End of the Whole Mess" might very well be his finest story in the book.

I first heard the story read years ago at a public library that had the books on tape.Matthew Broderick (Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Election) read it, and his voice is perfect for this story. He perfectly nails every note, every inflection, every stammer and stutter of the character, as the character slowly loses his mind.

Without ruining the story, it's about a man who along with his brother tried to bring world peace to the planet, with devastatingly horrific results.They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions.No more is this evident than in this story here. You have people who mean the very best, and their intentions are noble, except as with most everything, no matter how hard you try, no matter how many outcomes you plan for, there's always going to be that one you didn't calculate, which results in disaster.

And that's "The End of the Whole Mess" in a nutshell.

The other short stories on this four disc package are alright, but fall into the "miss" category, at least for me. Other people have enjoyed those short stories, I just didn't get into them.For audio books you have to appreciate the voice of the reader, and for me while Broderick's voice was excellent for "The End of the Whole Mess", I just didn't get into the other three.

"The Doctor's Case"is a spin on the Sherlock Holmes/Doctor Watson type of story, and is read by Tim Curry (Stephen King's "IT", Rocky Horror Picture Show)."The Moving Finger", no doubt will plague those who've had nightmares about what's in your bathroom sink, and is read by experimental musician Eve Beglarian.

And rounding out the four stories (each on it's own disc) is "Home Delivery", which deals with a young pregnant widow who is being attacked by Zombies, which is read by the author himself.

I bought this specifically for "The End of the Whole Mess" so the other three stories I won't listen to very much, if at all.

I kept going back and forth over the last several months on whether or not to get this, and finally I bit the bullet and did, and I'm glad I did.

A few things about the packaging and discs.

It comes in a box that you open up at the top and it acts like a slipcase of sorts, only you can seal it.Inside that is a folded box that unfolds to reveal four discs in little pockets.So they can be scratched if you're not careful, but they are not tightly fitted in there, so it shouldn't be a big problem.

Also, when I inserted the disc into Itunes to rip it to my harddrive, the tracks were not named, nor were there any information to be had via the net (by searching Itunes/Windows Media Player).

So the tracks are simply "The End of the Whole Mess Disc 1 Track 1" and so on. Not a major deal to me, although it would have been nice if there had been names.Although when it's not split by chapters, I guess it might be hard to label a short story split into 18 tracks.

The tracks are NOT split evenly, so it's not like they cheaply just set it to 5 minutes per track or anything.It looks like a regular album, tracks of different lengths.Just no names. The album title is there though, and the artist is listed as "Stephen King".

Hope you enjoy it if you get it!As I said, The End of the Whole Mess itself is worth the price of admission!

EDIT:Okay so after ripping the whole cd of "The End of the Whole Mess" I put it on my Ipod, and then listened to it later.For some unknown reason, the first 14 tracks of the disc is The End of the Whole Mess, while the last four tracks are the beginning of The Doctor's Case read by Tim Curry.There is no rhyme or reason to this, as each disc is labeled as a separate story.

Then when you insert Disc 2 "The Doctor's Case", it picks up where it left off on Disc 1.

The cassettes did this on the Nightmares & Dreamscapes Tape, as many stories were too long for a single cassette, although End of the Whole Mess was on 1 tape by itself.

I don't know why they did this, and didn't even label it as such. Eitherway, I was forced to knock a star off for this.

Pleased
Product was received in a timely manner in excellent condition.I am very pleased with service and the book. ... Read more

Product Description
Did Jane Galloway commit suicide or was she murdered? Melrose Plant attempts to determine the identity of Jane's mysterious visitor on the night of her death. Was it Alex's sultry grandmother, Genevieve? Jane's sister, Madeline? Francis Fellows? Or the doctor, Maurice Kingsley? ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

A mystery for poets...
This is the 11th book in the Richard Jury Series (although you could also say it's the 11th book in the Melrose Plant series, since Melrose, ex-earl, is Jury's partner in solving the crimes. This one takes place up in Lake District, where all the great British poets once lived. There is a family, the Holdsworth family, that seems to be plagued with too many accidents, too many suicides. Again, like in Jury mysteries of the past, Grimes gives us an extraordinary child. In fact, there are two such children, Alex and Millie, around whom the mystery circles. My favorite characters in this book is not the children but the two old coots--Adam Holdsworth and Lady Cray--living in Castle Howe retirement home. So, if you are in the mood for a good mystery, grab a cup of tea, a volume of Wordsworth, and this Jury mystery and have a great evening!

Better than most in this series
In most regards, this 11th volume in the Supt. Richard Jury mystery series is perhaps the best so far. Jury has gotten involved with Jane Holdsworth, a young woman he met at the Camden street market and after only a few weeks, he's seriously considering proposing marriage. Then she turns up dead on her sofa, an apparent suicide, and Jury is one of the suspects.The body was discovered by her 16-year-old son, Alex, who is something of a genius when it comes to scamming bookies and other gamblers. And Alex is convinced his mother must have been murdered. Because Jury is under suspicion, Melrose goes off to investigate the victim's family in the Lake District, and it's he who actually is the focus of most of the book, not Jury. Several other questionable deaths have been connected to the family is a short period of time. Alex's great-grandfather, Adam, who prefers to spend most of his time at a plush retirement home down the road rather than with his avaricious family, has his own thoughts about the various deaths. So does Lady Cray, Adam's astute and steely-eyed friend. And so, especially, does Milly, the Holdsworth family's twelve-year-old cook, whose mother was yet another suicide (or murder) tied to the Holdsworth family. There's a good deal of Grimes's wry humor here, and much better plotting than usual, but the author still has a penchant for killing off the villain at the end of the book instead of letting the law take its course. But there are still a few holes. For instance, who the devil paid for Jury's expensive attorney, if it wasn't Vivian?

The Old Contemptibles
Great read.Martha Grimes mysteries are well written and the characters in them fascinating.Terrific for English cozy mystery fans.

great book
This was a very interesting and good book with alot of
great mystery to it.

Unusual
I've tried to start this book about ten times before I got over the hump.This book has an interesting plot along with fascinating charachters but there are many parts where you snooze off and then it becomes rather fast paced again.

Also there are a few things in the story that are confusing.Why did the doctor kill Millie's mother?It says she did but I couldn't figure out a reason for why. Also the ending is quite far fetched compared to the rest of the book.

... Read more

Product Description
The sequel to the adventures of Peter Pan, the boy who would not grow up. Fearing for Peter Pan's life, Wendy and the Lost Boys find their way back to Never land--with the help of the fairy, Fireflyer--only to discover adventure waiting in ambush and their worst nightmares coming true in the most unexpected ways. ... Read more

Product Description
A young couple survives World War II and rebuilds their lives by benevolently purchasing family jewels from war survivors and beginning their own gem business. Book available.Amazon.com Review
Birthdays are a time for reflection, especially for Sarah, Duchess ofWhitfield, who is awaiting the arrival of her far-flung family. Yearsearlier, reeling from her pending divorce, Sarah Thompson is force-marchedthrough Europe on the grand tour by her concerned parents. Disinterested inthe sons, grandsons, and nephews paraded before her by well-meaningacquaintances, Sarah chances upon William Whitfield, the Duke of Whitfield,14th in line for succession to the English throne. Disarmed by hiswit and intrigued by his intellect, Sarah allows William to become hercompanion in London, warning him they can only be friends. Undeterred,William dismisses Sarah's protestations that her divorce makes herunsuitable to be his duchess and finally convinces Sarah to marry him.While honeymooning in France, Sarah and William happen upon Chateau de laMeuze. Enchanted, the Whitfields buy and set about restoring the estate.But World War II looms, threatening their idyllic existence. Following thebirth of their first child, Phillip, William joins the RAF when Englanddeclares war on Germany. Reluctantly, he leaves Sarah and Phillip at thechateau. German troops, led by the courtly commandant Joachim von Mannheim,take possession of the chateau to establish a hospital, removing Sarah andPhillip to the caretaker's cottage.

When the war ends, William, after being imprisoned for three years and barely surviving the torture that deprived him of the use of his legs, returns to his family. The Whitfields pick up threads of lives strained, but not broken, by war. Soon, they are approached by others who lost everything during the war except a few secreted heirlooms. But jewelry can't put food on the table, and the Whitfields begin purchasing jewelry to provide neighbors with much-neededcash. When William jokingly suggests opening a Paris store, a legacy isborn: Whitfield's, Jewelers to the Crown. Over the next decades, whichbring three more children, two more branches of Whitfields, and the deathof her husband, Sarah is molded into a force to be reckoned with, capableof handling her willful children and a highly successful internationalbusiness with equal aplomb. Steel paints a portrait of a family, imperfectas they may be, and the powerful matriarch who reminds them of the bondthat transcends titles, money, and borders. --Alison Trinkle ... Read more

Customer Reviews (38)

Enjoyable
This story starts as Sarah Whitfield stands waiting for her children on the eve of her 75th birthday. We are then taken through the memory of her life.

Her first marriage to Freddie is a disaster as he regrets marrying her. finds her boring and is not ready for marriage anyway. Her parents take her on a trip round Europe when she divorces him to try and get over the trauma. When she gets to London she meets William, Duke of Whitfield. She falls in love with him and they buy a French chateau. When they are parted by war Sarah waits for Williams return and her chateau is taken over by the Germans, so she spends the war years living side by side with the Germans and befriends a commander.

We are taken through Sarah's 75 years and I preferred the first half of the book, ie pre war and war years to the second half ie after war. I found Sarah children completely unlikable, but then, I think there supposed to be. Especially Philip, what an ass. I thought Sarah was pretty shallow towards the end also, she didn't like her grand kids cause they were boring and pale skinned. She felt sorry for Philip because he had to have affairs because his wife was boring, much like Sarah with her first husband. Also it was ok for Emmanule to have an affair with minister because his wife was sick and they were doing no harm! For the first 2/3 s of this book, definitely 5 stars, last 1/3 3 stars.

Depressing book.
How could anyone enjoy this book?You take a great woman and a great man, and they get married and have four kids, and the kids are all a mess.How does that work???I found the last third of the book just awful--I kept hoping someone would redeem themselves, but that was a long time coming.She should have ended the book after the War. I also found the shameless spending kind of gross.I like a good escape now and again, but these people just weren't fun.I enjoyed Danielle's older romance novels, but this was just over the top.I wish I could write mindless books like this and have them be bestsellers ...

EPIC...EXCELLENT...HEART WRENCHING AT TIMES
Superbly written over five decades of love and loss and triumph. I especially like the history of WWII era and of course the European setting. Great Read...set aside some time for this one.

Comparing The Good Life Abroad with America in the 1930s.
As all of the Danielle Steel devotees know, she writes always about the rich and famous in a never-ending series of life among the wealthy, the ups and the downs.Sarah grew up in Manhattan in the 1930s and was exceptionally beautiful; like Evelyn Hazen, she was lured into a sordid marriage which she found distasteful.Unlike Evelyn, she had parents who cared enough to take her on the 'Queen Mary' to Europe to get over the embarassment and pain of lost love.Evelyn's parents had money and a big plantation just outside town, but she was left to wallow in mental turmoil and unjust treatment by the man who took advantage of her.All Knoxville men tell lies to get what they want, and go their merry way after they have hurt young girls.Evelyn lived in disgrace but after the trial of breach of promise held in Kentucky, she eventually became the assistant to the Head of the English Department who wrote t he Harbrace Handbook, used by English teachers everywhere.

Sarah met her destiny one afternoon at a luncheon a periperial member of the British monarchy and, like the King, he gave up his office to marry a divorcee from America.There is some accounting of Wallis Simpson and the similarity.Both (or should I say, all three) were scandals, but when a man loves a woman he will give up his throne to be with her in Paris.William Duke of Whitfield was much older than the lovely Sarah but he tookher to France on the honeymoon (like Tom And Katie) and stumbled upon the perfect "dream house," a historic chateau which they renovated.Katie was a princess who married in an Italian castle after having her lover's baby girl.Sarah soon had a son to raise and another child on the way when the war intervened and William is forced to join the allied forces.

The Germans took over her castle and turned it into a medical facility as the Civil War did here in America, confiscating plantations, even the courthouse in downtown Knoxville for their wounded soldiers (the Union did).William has apparently been killed as Sarah is bereft with grief when he is not located; after the war, however, she finds him and brings him home to the chateau in France and nurses him back to health.They go on to have two more children.

This book encompasses fifty years and is a lot like A WOMAN OF SUBSTANCE with the matriarch calling a family gathering on her 75th birthday to decide who gets her business dealing with jewelry.Sarah and William bought the family jewels of the war survivors to sell to the crowned heads of Europe.It is the basis of commerce, to take from the poor and sell to the rich.It goes on all the time.Here where I live, there was a well-planned burglary in which the most expensive antiques, including three large heavy mirrors were stolen from the hallways on three of the eleven floors.Had the thieves been able to get into the apartments, they wouldhave taken money, jewelry, medications to sell on the streets, and anything else they could grab and some of the old people would have been hurt.This place has bad management, and the theft did not reach the newspaper -- probably was not even reported to the police, as this is run by a "Christian" organization (more like a Hell with a monster office manager who mistreats the elderly and steals from the rent money).But Sarah lived to enjoy the fruits of her labors and had to decide who would inherit the jewels along with the family company.It is a hard decision, as Emma in Woman of Substance chose her granddaughter because of the bickering within the group-up part with dissension and finger-pointing.She had an extraordinary marriage, even though the husband was much older, as opposed to Evelyn Hazen who was afraid to marry or love any man ever again.Such is the substance of life versus fiction.

Probably my favorite Steel novel
"Jewels" is a generation spanning, romance driven, nail biting (and all the other cliches) extravaganza that involves all the standard familiar tools of romance writing: the heroine stuck in a loveless marriage... the dashing gentleman (with an accent) who saves her... a war that separates them... and so on.Outward appearances would make one believe it is your old run of the mill romance novel.But Ms. Steel succeeds in creating a very likable and sympathetic heroine, as well as, a truly chivalrous and charming leading man.Though I found the story to slow a bit when the focus was placed on the children, it is not enough to cause the novel to lose momentum (or rating stars).As I said, it is one of her best and truly enjoyable! ... Read more

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7 Unabridged audio cassettes ... Read more

Product Description

In a novel of sweeping narrative power unequaled since her worldwide bestseller The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCullough returns to Australia -- this time with the story of its birth.

Richard Morgan, son of a Bristol tavern-keeper, is a contented man -- happily married, with a child he adores. His idyll crumbles when he finds himself led into an ambiguous relationship with a beautiful young woman, whose dissolute protector seeks vengeance on Morgan to protect his own skin.

Morgan endures the agonies of bereavement and financial loss, incarceration in prison and consignment as a convict to the famous "First Fleet" headed for the continent that Captain Cook had discovered only a few years earlier. Aboard the notorious "hulks," Morgan suffers the horrors of the journey to Botany Bay, where he finds a new love and a new life.

Morgan's Run is great fiction, full of drama, passion, history, love, and hatred, full-blooded and totally engrossing,taking us into a world we know little about, a stunning work that is at once rich entertainment -- and a revelation.Amazon.com Review
Take a long voyage deep into the 18th century with Colleen McCullough, anovelist for readers with a big appetite for historical slices of life. InMorgan's Run, her mild-mannered hero is a Bristol tavern owner's sonwith a God-given gift for crafting the Brown Bess flintlock musket. Thisis handy, because England plans to employ it to put down the mutinousAmerican colonies. McCullough knows this firearm right down to the lastflange and frizzen spring--how its .753-inch ball shatters bones andbutchers bellies and how you have to work up a mouthful of spit, then bitethe paper containing the powder to moisten and rupture it before firing.And like a master gunsmith, McCullough assembles all the elements necessaryto give the novel flash and impact: rogues and heroes, salty dialect,period detail, vicious intrigue, comic relief, betrayal, and unexpectedromance.

She also knows just how her master of the crafts of tavern-keeping andmusket-making would fit into the vast mechanism of history as the Americanvictory wrecks Britain's economy and forces the crown to send convictselsewhere. Richard gets a job with a rum distillery, but his sharp-eyedefficiency undoes him: one day he finds "a number of pipes hidden amongfestoons of spider-web," one of which is diverting 800 gallons a week tododge taxes, a hanging offense. He unwisely reports this, which lands himin a net of corruption. Soon he is sentenced to various convict shipsanchored in England, and then to a slave ship bound for Botany Bay in thenew penal colony, Australia. But save your pity! Richard rises to theterrible occasion. "Prison had given him a star to steer by, and his ownwill had swelled sails he did not even know he possessed."

Though McCullough doesn't quite reach the literary heights of PatrickO'Brian's Master andCommander or Robert Hughes's The Fatal Shore, sheshares some of their virtues. Morgan's Run is a good old-fashionedadventure novel with the unflagging energy and raffish cast of an actionmovie. She considered calling it Morgan's Dirty Dozen, and it wouldhave lived up to that title, too. --Tim Appelo ... Read more

Customer Reviews (59)

Half way through and he isn't even in Australia yet!!!
We chose this for our book club---only one of us finished it. It read as if the author had done all this research and she was bound and determined to include ALL of it.We chose this book because one of our members had visited another member while she spent a year in Australia and because we all fondly remembered enjoying "Thornbirds".I may pick it up where I left off and continue skimming through it but would not recommend this book.

Great Book
I really enjoyed this book. It is a great depiction of the early days in England and Australian settlers.

Waiting for the story to start
This novel is well researched and has great value in bringing to life the historical period of forced British colonialism in the 18th century. However, it took half of a very thick book for the hero even to arrive in the Antipodes, and the book had almost reached its conclusion before anything of note really happened in terms of emotional tension.

How different from The Thorn Birds where the emotional tension was taut throughout the book.

This is an interesting read if you want to learn about the historical era, but I was waiting for the other shoe to drop all the way through. Pity!

Interesting - But Not Overwhelming
I bought this book to learn about the introduction of white society to Australia, when England established a penal colony there in the late 18th century.I had read good reviews of this book, and since the author wrote "The Thorn Birds", I assumed this would be an engrossing and captivating novel. Turns out I was both right and wrong; it was engrossing, but unfortunately, (for me) it was not captivating.

I like a book, especially a long one like this one (800+ pages), to have a "hook" - something to grab my attention and interest within the first 30-50 pages or so."Morgans' Run" did not have the "hook" I wanted.Yes, it was engrossing, and McCullough paints vivid word pictures with her writing, but the pace was just too slow for me. The introduction of the main character, Richard Morgan, goes on for perhaps the first 200 pages, and the trip by ship to Australia not until half-way through the book.I almost quit the book in the early stages, but persisted only because of all the positive reviews.Once the trip to Australia began,the book really held my interest, and it provided an accurate historical glimpse of this era in history.

It is obvious that the author has meticulously researched every aspect of life in England (Bristol), life aboard a prison ship (the Alexander), and how the penal colonies were first established in Australia.I commend her for her historical detail.I have to admit, I went to the dictionary quite a few times to look up nautical names and words that I did not have a clue as to what they meant.I suspect the average reader would have to do the same.

Over all, this is an entertaining book, and well worth the time and effort to read it.I will remember it always due to the intricate details described and the wealth of character traits in the book's central study, Richard Morgan.I do recommend it to all readers who enjoy historical novels, but warn that this book does not take off at rocket speed.

Jim Koenig

Great Book
Sometimes the biggest surprises come not from the latest bestseller list but from digging a little deeper. I found this book at the bottom of a box at a weekend Library Book Sale and now treasure it among the best I've read.I do agree the technical information is a bit overdone and the start was slow but for an interesting mix of fiction and fact, few top Morgan's Run. To read of the horrors of the 1780's British penal system and the brutal conditions of the transport ships was unsettling.For most sailors and convicts, the savage trip drained the will and stripped the spirit -- not Richard Morgan however.While others were falling to the lows of human savagery, he was lifting up not only himself but those around him.That he found love and all the good that comes with it in the wilds of an island 14,000 miles from England is incredible -- but it happened. When's the sequel Colleen wrote of in the afterword? ... Read more

Product Description
This book an EXACT reproduction of the original book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR?d book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words.This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book. ... Read more

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Utilizing the proven Pimsleur Language Method, a beginner's guide to the Spanish language furnishes eight daily audio lessons designed to help listeners learn how to communicate in Spanish. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (15)

somewhat interesting characters but poor plot and dull
Compared to the John Sanford prey series or the Michael Connelley Detective Harry Bosch series
this is pretty dull. There is no gettinginto the mind of the criminal at all. I also felt no intimate
relation with Detective Jury; there is very little about his life problems or what he is thinking as he
tries to solve the murder. It is just a
plodding questioning of suspects with little if any real police procedure or scientific analysis
of evidence. If you like British dialogue with weird names of streets and towns then this may appeal
to you. Some of the characters were interesting but that is it.

Painfully Boring
Honestly, I have no idea why Martha Grimes is so popular. This is the only novel by her that I managed to slog through, and I hope it isn't characteristic of how this author usually writes. This was one of the most boring attempts at a mystery that I have ever encountered. The plot is pretty much non-existent, the characters are completely one-dimensional and often practically indistinguishable. There are endless attempts at very tortured jokes that are supposed to pass for a sense of humor.

The only reason I forced myself to finish this horrible book is because I really wanted to know what is it that makes so many people like this writer. Nevertheless, I still have no answer to this question.

great as usual
I now have all of Martha Grimes' books. This was just as good as all the others.

Second book is finished and I can't wait to the 3rd one..
Second book in a row read by me and third book in the series..Still a very good read, though this one wasn't such a pager turner for me but the atmosphere and the charm is still there, and the story/mystery is very interesting. The second time around a little kid, this time a girl Emilie Perk, is one of the main character and a possible victim.. I'm about to read the first one in a series and wonder if i find a kid there too!

My favorite Richard Jury Mystery
Attention Mystery lovers! If you love reading a mystery series, then the Richard Jury series by Martha Grimes is not to be missed, and this book, The Anodyne Necklace, is my personal favorite. The story starts when a proper old lady/birdwatcher makes a horrible discovery, a human finger. Her spinster sister finds the rest of the body in the wood. A delicious English mystery unfolds, with Scotland Yard's Jury and ex-peer of the realm Melrose Plant following the leads in a delightful British village. The characters are great, including Plant's horrible greedy aunt and a precocious young girl named Emily, who loves to color and ride horses. She will capture your heart and your attention as the murderer closes in!--Denise Tucker, Author of Keeping House, A Madame President Mystery! ... Read more