The Justus Girls is a novel noting the lives of four girls growing up in the 60s in Philadelphia. The story starts out with the murder of Peaches, and it is this event that brings the remaining three girls back together again after many years of absence. At first the book was hard to follow, it seemed to skip around a lot, but as I began to know the characters things that I had read, fell into place and the story progressed nicely. Some of the things that happened to Peaches, Jan, Sally Mae and Rachel while they were growing up are really hard to imagine and might not be for the faint at heart. Unfortunately, child abuse is all too real. I'm always looking for a point or purpose for a story being told and I think Ms. Lambright was able to capture a fundamental truth, that adversity doesn't determine ability.

I had a hard time with the title of the book when I was deciding what order to read the book from my "To Be Read" pile. I wanted over and over again to say "Justice" and could understand why it was spelled incorrectly. As the story progressed and the four formed a drill team, the title became clear. Just Us... nothing pretentious about them, they were just themselves. They were able to discipline themselves and provide structure and direction. Everything they achieved was self-taught. They became known as the JG's-the Justus Girls. As with all friendships, there were problems, but never a setback big enough to separate them permanently. Certainly they didn't all agree with the others choices about how to live their individual lives, but there was no judgment or condemnation among them, mutual understanding, love and respect.

The Justus Girls is action packed and I'm sure it contains something for everyone. There are a couple mysteries to solve, romances to follow, a reunion of long lost family members, a little of the Vietnam conflict, an in depth study into the world of a pimp who is all powerful. Some parts of the story kept me on the edge of my seat and I just couldn't put the book down. I couldn't decide which of the 4 girls lives I wanted to read more about which is a good thing. I think Ms. Lambright did a wonderful job of exposing just enough of the girls to make the reader satisfied that we were included. It was all told at just the right point in the story to keep you reading. This was a well-crafted novel that improved the more you continue to read.

Upon opening this book you get the feeling that one of the four friends is murdered and no one knows who did it; no one can believe it. As you continue to read you realize that each friend has a story to be told.

The Justus Girls is the story of four friends coming of age in the 60s. Four friends involved in a drill team as children; four friends with their own distinct childhood. I liked that each alternating chapter told pieces of each girl's/woman's story from childhood through adulthood. Four friends with secrets and shame. Four friends with their own personalities and when one dies the remaining realize that they have not been there for each other. As they set out to discover who killed their friend they rediscover each other.

There are characters that you absolutely love and characters that you hate. There are mini stories told here but they are all necessary to understand who the Justus Girls really are.

This story is wonderful and when the killer is revealed the reader will be surprised. Slim, my hats off to you. The descriptions of Philly and the neighborhoods were on point. This is a well-written story of true friendship and ties that bind.

The Justus Girls by Slim Lambright is an impressive debut. The story includes all the ingredients of a wonderful read: suspense, drama, memorable characters, vivid imagery, sharp and witty dialogue, and strong writing. The Justus Girls were four African American girls from blue-collar families who resided in inner city Philly during the '50s/'60s. The Girls-Peaches, Jan, Sally and Rachel/Roach later known as Rasheda-- were so close and did everything together that they decided to form a drill team during their childhood and they made a vow that they would always be their for one another. Unfortunately, as they grew up they would also drift apart. As the story opens, three decades later, the remaining friends are gathered at the funeral of Peaches who has been murdered. They're surprised at how time and distance caused them to loose contact with one another but they promise to rekindle their friendship and find out the truth about who killed Peaches. But in the process they will also rediscover each other and learn that the bond they established years ago might have been slightly cracked but it was never really broken.

The Justus Girls was a poignant and heartwarming read. I enjoyed how Lambright navigated us back into time and how we lived each girl's life via a series of flashbacks. We witnessed how their futures were shaped by alcohol, promiscuity, the husbands they choose, the dreams they pursued, and long-held secrets that each of them were afraid of being exposed. These characters truly jump off the pages and into your life. Lambright weaved a tale so revealing about friendship and supporting each other that for a moment I thought this was my life story she was talking about. The Justus Girls is probably one of the best written, best developed, best plot twists and turns storylines that I have had the pleasure to read by a new author in quite sometime. This novel just touched me on so many levels...and I liked that it wasn't overwritten. Lambright set up scenes and situations and gave you enough information to wet your taste and satisfy your need for details without going overboard. I think folks who remember growing up during the late 50s/60s will really enjoy this book cause it takes you back to when it was a different world from what you know today...when folks truly cared about one another and everyone in the community felt like your family. I look forward to more novels from this writer as this book was da bomb and off the hook good! I can't say enough good things about this book so I will just close by saying...pick up a copy today and curl up with it. I think you will enjoy the story immensely and if you like it as much as I did you will want to read it in one sitting. And Slim...I look forward to future books from you...you're an exciting and welcomed addition to the literary community. Ps...This review is not a paid endorsement...I just really enjoyed this book and wanted to let others know!

In this charming memoir, Terry Ryan details the life of a busy household, growing up as one of 10 children in Defiance, Ohio. Raised by a mother who has a knack with words and jingles, and a father who is an alcoholic, Terry Ryan lets us in to her family life and how her mother struggled to make ends meet by entering contests and winning prizes for her family.

Not only is the book jam packed with old contests and jingles, it is laced with heartfelt humor and triumph. Terry's mother is a woman, who after reading this story, you can't help but love, admire and respect. The Ryan family will stay with you, and there are a lot of laugh out loud moments. A great, wholesome read~

The only truly appropriate review of this book would be in rhyming verse and 25 words or less. But I don't have Evelyn Ryan's gift.

I enjoyed this book on many levels. The amazing "Prize Winner" herself, surviving and even triumphing (sometimes) over a truly dreadful situation. The hysterically silly rhymes she came up with! The way she never let poverty, alcoholism, even violence slow her down or ruin her enjoyment of life. The ferocious love she had for all ten of her children. Wotta woman.

But this book is more than an inspiration. It is also a damming portrait of the "good old days" our politicians and other hand-wringers want to revive. Evelyn Ryan was trapped in a marriage to an alcoholic, forced by her inflexible church to have child after child that they could not afford, and of course prevented by tradition and all those kids from pursuing a career of her own. I suspect that her contest wins, the devotion of her children, and her own hopeful nature made life bearable for her, but she deserved better.

I recommend this book highly. Although it's certainly "inspirational" it's never sentimental or cloying.

The Prize Winner Of Defiance Ohio" is a beautiful love letter from a daughter to her mother. It is a special kind of biography that chronicles the life of Evelyn Ryan an extraordinarily resourceful woman who was born ahead of her time.

Evelyn Ryan, raised her ten children with grace and style, using her wit and ability to see the humor in a life that would have most people begging for relief to win prizes large and small. It is an unflinching look at a large family that depended on an alcoholic and abusive breadwinner who was more likely to drink his wages rather than pay his mortgage.

"The Prize Winner of Defiance Ohio" is a fantastic chronicle of an America that no longer exists and in some ways never existed. It shatters the myth of the middle class 50's housewife who stayed at home and took care of the children without 'worrying her little head' about the finances. In this America contests were won by skill rather than luck and Evelyn managed to keep her family going with prizes such as that ranged from bicycles to two-week trips to Switzerland (converted to cash) to TVs and juke boxes. Ryan had the touch.

This book has made me laugh and cry and think about my family. My grandmother was in an abusive marriage, with an alcoholic husband and seven children, at around the same time that Evelyn was at a time when the law and the community blamed a woman for an abusive husband. What a life.

What a great story. Buy this book and celebrate the life of Evelyn Ryan, or E.L. Ryan, or Mrs. Ryan, or whatever entry was the winner of the day, with her daughter, Terry Ryan

I had the pleasure of meeting the author at a Borders bookstore near my home. I purchased the book because the author seemed to be a very pleasant woman. Unfortunately, I was very disappointed with the book. I found the characterizations to be shallow, almost to the point of caricature. The book was riddled with cliches. It seems that the author tried very hard to paint a positive portrayal of African Americans living in Los Angeles. In the process, she sacrificed characters with any dimension or complexity.

GET THE SHOW ON THE ROADis indeed a delightful story. I was browsing in a local community bookstore last month and saw the book.At first, I was not sure as to wheter I should purchase it.But it kept calling me. Thank God I purchased it and completed it in two days.It has a wonderful simple story line but yet one that is so reaffirming.Quite refeeshing to read books that depict African Americans as we really are.Its a love story, its a family story and hope the author will continue to write stories that tell our truths.Such an uplifting story line.I have shared to date this book with three co-workers.Keep up the good work! We need your voice in print.

This was a great book that makes you believe dreams do come true. Africa was a hard worker that everyone loved. She took what was given and made it happen. This book makes you think about how you treat other because you will never know who is watching. She met the man that swepted her off her feet. It was a modren day fairly tale. People that emjoy romantic books should read it.

The recipes in this book are healthy but they are not neccessarily easy or quick to prepare. If you are cooking for others they may be fooled by the "sneak" ingredients but after all the shopping, chopping, & measuring entailed in preparing these dishes, the cook sure won't be fooled. Many recipes are very difficult to prepare without a food processor and some ingredients are not to be found in the average grocery store. I was hoping for recipes that required less preparation & simpler ingredients. The book was not a total dissappointment; the recipes were tasty but if you are looking for shortcuts to good nutrition, look elsewhere.

I have been wanting to purchase this book for a long time. However, I have been disappointed with other books that promised great tasting recipes for health and didn't want to waste more money. Finally,I decided to purchase Stealth Health through the used section of Amazon.com, which was a very good experience in itself. The good experience did not end there. Every recipe we have tried from this book has been delicious!!! My husband does not eat bran cereal, but did in The Date Nut Bran Muffins and didn't even know it(still doesn't know it). I used dates and nuts in half of the batch for my taste and raisins in the other half for his. I really dislike cauliflower, but couldn't even tell it was in the Twice-Baked Potatoes-and I was the one that prepared the potatoes.Both of us enjoy rice pudding. The Golden Rice Pudding and all of the recipes can be enjoyed without feeling quilty. As for the other Healthy Cook Books purchased in the past-they will be donated to make room for other books written by Evelyn Tribole.

This book is by far the best book on eating healthfully. Why? Because Evelyn teaches you how to sneak "good food" (veggies, fiber, even soy) into "normal food". Yeah, we all know we should eat cruciforous veggies, more fiber, some soy, fruits, etc. But we don't. Evelyn shows you ways to pump up the nutritional value of foods you like--in a way that you won't even notice. Adding black beans to brownies is one solution--and it works (adds fiber, phytochemicals) and the brownies taste good, not healthy. She teaches you to puree cauliflower into your potatoes, so that you get the boost of nutrition. (I HATE cauliflower, but I don't mind eating it this way). All in all, I can't wait for more Stealth Health recipes. If you have kids, doubting husbands, or just plain don't like the taste of healthy food, buy this book. :) If you do like healthy food, this book will amaze you with how good healthy eating can taste.

This sentimental favorite children's book has the moral values of E. Nesbitt, who was a famous liberal activist in England. She creates a household utopian vision of a world where people are naturally good and where parents raise their children to be helpful and honest and brave.

This provides the background charm for a really lovely tale about a family in distress who sticks together bravely and provides a shining example to all around them, while being aided by equally high-minded and kind folks around them.

A knock on the door at the idyllic middle class town home of the children ends with a tragedy that they can scarcely understand. But Mother is brave and despite rumors of terrible things, they make their way to a more modest home in the country, next to a railway line. The children become friends with the trains and the regular commuters who wave at them. Their fascination with the train results in a heroic rescue. Meanwhile, their situation is sometimes difficult, and they develop some remarkable strategies for getting aid. There is a happy ending.

The morals taught to the children are particularly British (helpful, kind, brave) but certainly apply to us as well. The goodness that the children spread is really a lovely message and contributes to the charm and longevity of this great favorite. Good for reading aloud.

I like the Railway Children a lot,especially how the author told the story. I liked Bobbie because there is something different about her,she was helpful and sweet at the same time. I am wondering where the dog James went? Other than that, the story was great!

It is a story about three children who change a little town in England. The book is very adventurous in every chapter.It is a very well writen book.

L. Frank Baum's enduring story is wonderfully presented in this elegant edition and the Washington Post called Lisbeth's The Wizard of Oz "the loveliest edition imaginable."

However, the assessment of the local kids is the drawings are "weird." Perhaps intended for a more adult audience, the illustrations are beautiful--I enjoyed them--but their idiosyncratic style may not appeal to the younger set.

The characters pictured in the illustrations are dramatcially reinterpreted by the artist, however this may disappoint some viewers. The Scarecrow will look nothing like any scarecrow you've imagined. The Witch of the North is difficult to identify. This fresh point of view will be enjoyed by some but is sure to disappoint others.

I also felt the illustrations don't tell the story as well as the edition by Michael Hague or the original edition with W. W. Dinslow. (This is more important to the younger, read-to crowd, than the older, I can read it myself crowd.)

My daughter asked that we return the book and get a different edition for her. I would urge you to carefully consider the sample pages, except the sample pages don't cover a broad range of the illustrations included with this edition. The sample pages do include an image of the dramatic and striking cover. Unfortunately, in the judgement of several reviewers from 4 to 40, the other illustrations were noticably more "weird" than the cover and I don't think the sample pages represent the overall reading/viewing experience scrupulously.

The Wizard of Oz is about a girl named Dorothy who is a farm girl from Kansas. One day Dorothy is carried away by a cyclone to a magical land called Oz. While she is there she meets a tlaking scarecrow, a man made of tin, and a cowardly lion afraid of his own shadow. Dorothy and her friends follow a yellow brick road to the Emerald City where they hope to find the famous wizard that can grant each of their wishes. But the wicked witch keeps trying to ruin their trip to the Emerald City.
The setting of the book is in a magicla land full of little people called Munchkins, flying monkeys, and a wicked witch that will melt if touched with water. The characters have their separate reasons for wanting to see the wizard. As the story goes on, the reader can not help but fall in love with them.
The text gives great detail as to what everything looks like and with those details the whole world of Oz can come to life in the readers imagination.

The Wizard of Oz written by L. Frank Baum is a wonderful book about a young girl who goes on an adventure full of excitement and fun. Dorothy the main character lives on a small country farm in Kansas with her Aunt, Uncle, and small dog, Toto. One day a twister comes over their country farm and whisks Dorothy along with her little dog away to a make believe land called Oz. There she is greeted by the people who live there. She asks them how she can get home to Kansas. They tell her that the Great Oz will help get her home. But before she heads on her way to Oz the Good Witch of the North kisses her on the forehead and says that with that kiss no one can harm her. So she and Toto head on their way to Oz. On her way she meets The Scarecrow who wants a brain, a Woodman made of tin who wants a heart and a Cowardly Lion who wants courage. These four new friends eimbark on an adventure to the great city of Oz. Will they all get their wishes? Find out when you read the Wizard of Oz. I loved this book because not only did it have fantasy but it is a great book for all ages. I recomend it to anyone who loved being a child.

John Courteney Boot is a rising young British novelist, but after an affair gone sour he wants to get out of England for awhile. He approaches the well-connected Mrs. Algernon Stitch for assistance & she in turn recommends to Lord Copper, publisher of the Beast newspaper, that he send Boot to cover the war in Ishmaelia, Africa. Copper in turn orders Mr. Salter, his Foreign Editor, to get Boot and in short order a series of mix-ups leads to the Beast sending William Boot, their nature columnist and a man who loathes leaving his ancestral home, Boot Magna Hall, to Africa. In Ishmaelia, Boot stumbles into a couple of scoops and returns home a hero, "Boot of the Beast".

Evelyn Waugh is one of the great satirists of the century and he has never been funnier than he is here, skewering the Press.

GRADE: B+

In October 1935, Italy invaded the independent African nation of Ethiopia. The Italo-Ethiopian War lasted less than eight months, Emperor Haile Selassie's kingdom falling quickly before Italy's modern weaponry. It was a little war that, nonetheless, implicated the great powers of Europe and foreshadowed the much bigger war to follow.

Evelyn Waugh was in his early 30s, already the author of four remarkable comic novels, when he accepted an assignment to cover the Italo-Ethiopian War for a London newspaper. The enduring result of that assignment was Waugh's fifth novel, "Scoop," a scathing satirical assault on the ethos of Fleet Street and its war correspondents, as well as on Waugh's usual suspects, the British upper classes.

The time is the 1930s. There is a civil war in the obscure country of Ishmaelia and Lord Copper, the publisher of the Beast newspaper, a newspaper that "stands for strong, mutually antagonistic governments everywhere," believes coverage of the war is imperative:

"I am in consultation with my editors on the subject. We think it a very promising little war. A microcosm you might say of world drama. We propose to give it fullest publicity. We shall have our naval, military and air experts, our squad of photographers, our colour reporters, covering the war from every angle and on every front."

Through the influence of Mrs. Algernon Stitch, Lord Copper soon identifies John Courteney Booth, a best selling popular author, as the right man to cover the war in Ishmaelia. Neither Lord Copper nor his inscrutable editorial staff, however, is especially well read or familiar with the current socially respectable literati. Amidst the confusion, Mr. Salter, the foreign editor, mistakenly identifies William Booth, country bumpkin and staff writer for the Beast, as the "Booth" to whom Lord Copper was referring:

"At the back of the paper, ignominiously sandwiched between Pip and Pop, the Bedtime Pets, and the recipe for a dish named 'Waffle Scramble,' lay the bi-weekly column devoted to nature: --

Lush Places. Edited by William Boot, Countryman.

" 'Do you suppose that's the right one?' "

" 'Sure of it. The Prime Minister is nuts on rural England.' "

" 'He's supposed to have a particularly high-class style: 'Feather-footed through the plashy fen passes the questing vole' . . . would that be it?' "

" 'Yes,' said the Managing Editor. That must be good style. At least it doesn't sound like anything else to me.' "

Thus, William Boot, Countryman, soon finds himself on his way to Ishmaelia to cover the civil war for the Beast. Boot hooks up with an experienced wire reporter named Corker along the way. Corker teachers Boot the ins and outs of covering the war, a war in which reportage comes from little more than the imagination of the journalists sent to cover it and the editorial policies of their papers. The real nature of the war correspondent's profession is suggested when Boot and Corker go to the Ishmaelia Press Bureau to obtain their credentials: "Dr. Benito, the director, was away but his clerk entered their names in his ledger and gave them cards of identity. They were small orange documents, originally printed for the registration of prostitutes. The space for thumb-print was now filled with a passport photograph and at the head the word 'journalist' substituted in neat Ishmaelite characters."

Boot, despite his naivety and ignorance of the war correspondent's trade, inadvertently succeeds in trumping his more experienced journalistic competitors in reporting the war. Along the way, his adventures in Ishmaelia provide the perfect Waugh vehicle for a satiric dissection of the journalistic trade and of what passes as governance in the less developed parts of the world, where tribalism and nepotism more often than not underlie the veneer of ostensibly functioning political systems.

Boot, of course, returns to England, where he is now a household name. But one Boot is just as good as another, or so it seems. In the confusion of Boots, William, the real war correspondent, thankfully returns to his country home while his doddering, half-senile Uncle Theodore fulfills his role as the center of attention at the Beast and the prominent author John Courteney Booth (the man who started all this) mistakenly ends up with a knighthood intended for William.

"Scoop" is another brilliant Waugh comic send-up based on real-life experience, in this case his experience as a war correspondent in Ethiopia. It also is one of his best works, a little comic novel that will keep you in stitches from beginning to end.

A lot of books complain about the world, but here's a book that knows that there's a difference between what actually goes on in the world and what gets reported as news, and that the news is only as good as the people that report it. Inspired by his own experience as a foreign correspondent, Evelyn Waugh's "Scoop" is partly a satire of journalism, partly a spy story with a well-crafted plot, and totally a masterpiece of comic writing.

Civil war is brewing in a fictitious African country called Ishmaelia. In England, a successful novelist named John Courteney Boot would like to be sent there as a foreign correspondent/spy, so he gets a friend to pull some strings with the owner of a London newspaper called the Beast, a paper which "stands for strong mutually antagonistic governments everywhere." The paper's owner, Lord Copper, has never heard of Boot, but accedes to the request and has his Foreign Editor, Mr. Salter, set up the engagement. Salter mistakenly taps John's less famous, less talented cousin William Boot, who writes a dippy nature column for the Beast, to be the foreign correspondent in Ishmaelia. So off William goes, a large assortment of emergency equipment for the tropics in tow, including a collapsible canoe.

When William gets to Ishmaelia, he encounters several journalists from newspapers all over the world who also are looking for the big scoop on the war. The problem is that nobody knows what's going on, as there is no palpable unrest, and the country's government is an institution of buffoonery. The events in Ishmaelia are reminiscent of the circus-like atmosphere of Joseph Heller's "Catch-22." While the rest of the journalists take off to the country's interior on a red herring, William stays behind in the capital and meets a man who is at the center of the country's political intrigue and lets William in on exclusive information. William manages to turn in the big story and becomes a journalistic hero back in England.

Lovers of good prose will find much to savor in "Scoop"; practically every sentence is a gem of dry British wit. Waugh is comparable with P.G. Wodehouse in his flair for comic invention, and indeed William Boot is a protagonist worthy of Wodehouse -- a hapless but likeable dim bulb who triumphs through dumb luck.

While this was Waugh's least favourite of his own books, the one that he blamed for exposing him to the trials of fan mail and public recognition, it is in fact, a great and glorious book. Spanning the short adult life of Sebastian Flyte, it is told retrospectively through the eyes of his friend and former lover Charles, who goes on, once youthful experimentation is over, to carry on an equally passionate and hopeless love affair with Sebastian's sister. But in some ways, these themes are not the great story. The larger pictures are of the slackening grip of British aristocracy, the power of love and the power of Faith. Waugh paints a masterpiece of the sweet, desperate years between the wars, at Oxford, in London and Paris, with one generation lost and the next helplessly watching history lurching towards a repetition of the same madness.

Brideshead is a gloomy book but a must-read nonetheless. I am sometimes embarassed to say I liked it enough to read it twice and I'm sure that I'll read it again. I read mostly for the story- (not particularly postmodern of me) and for the pleasure of perceiving with some hard intimacy the lives and surroundings of a period and time that is no more and wouldn't have been mine anyway. The Catholic intensity would be meaningless to a younger lapsed soul, but even in my American youth, the religion as destiny- for better or worse- was certainly a part of my parents' top ten issues of life. As such, they were also for the younger me.
Waugh's own yearnings for lineage and the rest of inheritance and 'class' are transformed into a good story with details of snobbery and those horridly cold (British upperclass) childhoods. Those children became adults only having born consequences of World War, modernism and legacies of excess- religious and alcoholic. All of those were certainly bedeviling Waugh as much as any of his creations. No doubt the novel was chosen by a smart BBC producer for the very same details that made the book work for me. If you are a reader of Waugh or Nancy Mitford or any of the first half of the 20th century 'greats,' I cannot imagine that you would forego Brideshead- if only because it is certainly more serious, and in that, more silly. Even his lesser literary efforts- and God knows he had plenty of those-reflected his superstardom, his trajectory as one of the most multifaceted authors.

I had a friend who made it a point to read "Brideshead Revisited" once a year without fail. She considered it the finest book ever written. While I might quarrel with that hyperbole, I do in fact list it in my own personal top ten. I, too, re-read it, in my case, every few years. And of course I was riveted to the brilliant BBC production starring Jeremy Irons as Charles Ryder.

Imagine my delight, then, when I found this unabridged reading by Irons himself! My delight was rewarded. Irons' perfect reading of this book opened up a whole new world for me. This time, I heard and felt the absolute poetry of Waugh's words--his ability to take his reader from sultry ... summertime to the slums of the Casbah to a storm at sea that is the perfect metaphor for the turmoil to come. Waugh never wasted a word. Never said more than he had to say. Never helped the reader by sugarcoating the story. And the result was breathtaking.

Maybe because I was listening this time rather than reading, I paid much more attention this time to the book's main theme, religion versus humanity. Can one exist without the other? Does one destroy the other? How far can one stray when bound by the "invisible thread"? Waugh's very personal and moving tale of upper-class Catholics in a Protestant country is a brilliant affirmation of faith, and at the same time, a bitter acknowledgement of the price that faith can exact.

I cannot say enough about this recording, which brings all the best of Waugh to the fore even more so than the written word.

Poor Paul Pennyfeather! As the "hero" of Evelyn Waugh's first novel he is barely worth a cent and light as pillow stuffing. This flimsiness of character may cause concern unto lack of concern in the reader who wishes to strongly identify with the protagonist, but halfway through the book, Waugh's narrator assures us that Pennyfeather's hollowness is intentional:

"In fact, the whole of this book is really an account of the mysterious disappearance of Paul Pennyfeather, so that readers must not complain if the shadow which took his name does not amply fill the important part of hero for which he was originally cast."

Pennyfeather is someone who is acted upon more than he acts--perhaps it is better to say he is more sinned against than sinning--his story begins when he is attacked in an Oxford quad by a group of his snobbish bully classmates. They strip him naked from the waist down and before he knows it the university has expelled him for indecent behavior. He then loses his allowance and ends up teaching in a disreputable prep school in Wales where adventures continue to be inflicted upon him.

Waugh never allows Pennyfeather to defend himself, his satirical point being that an English gentleman wouldn't stoop to blame those who had wronged him, even if it means he goes to jail. After all, his irrepressible fellow teacher Grimes tells Paul, no matter how bad things get, there is "a blessed equity in the English social system that insures the public school man [public schools in England are actually private] against starvation." It's that social system that the young Waugh, twenty-five when this book was published, enjoys puffing up just to tear it down. Waugh maintains a light narrative touch though his subject matter is often serious and occasionally outrageous. He structures the book well and has a sharp appreciation for the absurdities of the English upper classes in the 1920s that is not inapplicable to many other time periods and cultures.

DECLINE AND FALL did not make me laugh as much as I thought it might. There are funnier English campus comedies out there, notably Kingsley Amis's LUCKY JIM and the first part of Waugh's own BRIDESHEAD REVISITED. Waugh was one of the twentieth century's great stylists, however, and I look forward to reading his second book, VILE BODIES.

More deadpan than hilarious, "Decline and Fall" is the story of Paul Pennyfeather, who seems not only to attract misfortune but to embrace it as his due. While depicting Pennyfeather's downward trajectory, Waugh skewers the pretensions and mocks the hypocrisy of every class of British society. Although I trust Waugh did not mean for the reader to sympathize with Pennyfeather, who is truly an apathetic oaf, I (ironically) found him surprisingly likable.

Blameless throughout, Pennyweather resignedly and almost eagerly accepts punishment for crimes committed by others. (In prison, he positively enjoys solitary confinement for its regimen and its lack of stress.) Some of Waugh's commentary is a bit pedestrian, especially to modern readers, but he occasionally and fearlessly tackles weighty and "scandalous" themes: the apostasy of the clergy ("modern churchmen who drew their pay without the necessity of the commitment to any religious belief"), the excesses of the prison reform movement ("So far as possible, I like the prisoners to carry on with their avocations in civilized life. What's this man's profession, officer?" "White Slave traffic, sir."), and societal attitudes towards an aristocratic lady who takes a black American lover (and her own patronizing posture). This last subplot, it must be said, makes uncomfortable reading, because the black character barely rises above stereotype, because Waugh unflinchingly uses racial epithet, and because ultimately the reader is not quite sure where Waugh is coming from.

Much of Waugh's satire is dated, but (like Candide) Paul Pennyweather is a virtuous nobody whose misadventures transcend time. The edition from Everyman Library also includes an astute introduction from the critic Frank Kermode, who provides useful background for the book instead of assuming you've already read it.

Waugh's first novel is an outrageous satire that pokes fun at the British class system, religion, and education. If one does not take it at all seriously, then it is a howlingly funny book. His "hero," Paul Pennyfeather, and the other characters float in and out of various kinds of trouble without seeming to learn a single thing. Best moment - the casual, but horrifying fate of poor little Lord Tangent. The amusing illustrations drawn by Waugh himself are a delightful bonus. I highly recommend this book and look forward to reading more of Waugh.

In Austin, Texas, school principal Bobbie Strickland is a single mother who raised her twin children and for almost a decade her granddaughter, Monika "Monee" Strickland. Her daughter Darlene gave birth to the child when she was sixteen but never revealed the father's identity. Over the next few years, Darlene went deeper into the abyss, becoming a junkie. Now Darlene wants her daughter back, but Bobbie does not trust her to properly care and nurture Monee.

Retired military officer Ray Caldwell returns to his hometown of Austin. At church, he meets Bobbie and is immediately attracted to her. As Ray tries to court Bobbie, she feels that she has too much on her plate though she genuinely loves the ex soldier. Bobby knows she will face her own child in court, but is unaware that Darlene is trying to regain her life and respect.

EVERYTHING IN ITS PLACE is an entertaining African-American contemporary relationship drama that will touch the soul of every reader. The story line grips the audience as it focuses on the aftermath of everyone in the sphere of a baby having a baby. Evelyn Palfrey avoids turning the plot into a simplistic tear jerker by making her key cast seem real by filling each one with compassion yet struggling with distrust and a need to overcome flaws. Fans of modern day issue not tissue tale will relish this strong story.

Harriet Klausner

Ray, fresh out of the military attends church at the insistence of his mother. Meaning to make a quick exit, he hears the voice of Barbara, aka, Bobbie stops in his tracks and is immediately smitten by this woman. He makes it his business to get to know her.

Bobbie is a busy grandmother, school principal and is raising her granddaughter. The many distractions in her life makes it difficult for her to even think about establishing a relationship. Romance is the last thing on her mind, but Ray's persistence grows on her.

This book has a little of everything: romance, mystery, child custody, grandparents raising grandchildren, the aftermath of sexual exploitation, and substance abuse. It is another signature novel by Evelyn Palfrey featuring a trip taken in a RV, characters whose appearances are left to your imagination, and always the marvelously mature woman. It has all the components that makes one return to reading her work again and again.

Jeanette
APOOO BookClub

I read this book in a matter of hours.

Once you begin it you won't want to put it down.

You are introduced to Bobbie Strickland a devoted mother and grandmother. Bobbie has a daughter named Darlene that is causing havoc in her mother's life. After raising Darlene's daughter Monee, Darlene decides she wants her daughter back with her.

Bobbie then meets a handsome stranger by the name of Raymond Caldwell and they begin to date.

Ms. Caldwell has some of everything in this book. This was an enjoyable book and I would recommend it to others.