I purchased this book in part on the strength of three 5-star reviews on this site. This is a very handsome hardcover volume at a surprisingly reasonable price.

There are three classifications of stories in the book. First, stories primarily written by Adrian Conan Doyle, with some input from JD Carr. Second, two stories written almost entirely by Mr. Carr, possibly with some slight input from Doyle. Third, six stories written solely by Mr. Adrian Doyle.

Since I have read a number of mysteries by Carr, and expected much, I was most disappointed to find his two stories the weakest in the book. In one instance, after reading the first page I was able to anticipate the entire plot. In the other case, I simply found the story flat, uninteresting, and narrowly derivative of similar stories in the original Holmes canon.

To the contrary, some of the stories by Mr. Doyle cannot be praised enough. One that's typical, "The Adventure of Foulkes Rath," seems up to the work of Arthur Conan Doyle himself. All in all, Adrian Doyle admirably captures the style and brooding Gothic tone that so typifies many of the best stories in the original Holmes canon. Moreover, Adrian Doyle's stories have a kind of life and warmth that brings the Edwardian world alive for the reader.

I would give the book five stars were it not for a few tales that seem off the pace, and decidedly inferior to the others. Alas-- and surprisingly-- these are from JD Carr's pen. Perhaps Carr tried too diligently to write an impeccably logical mystery, where nothing in the denoument was not well provided for in the early story. The effect, unfortunately, was to create a mechanical kind of plot, which made it all to easy for the reader to anticipate too accurately the entire unfolding of the story.

So in this interesting and generally worthwhile book of tales, we might have the amateur outwriting the old master.

All in all, a worthwhile purchase -- and handsome book with great bedtime reading at a very reasonable price.

This collection of stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyles youngest son, Adrian Conan Doyle, in collaboration with American mystery writer John Dickson Carr, are a wonderful treat for anyone who loves the originals! The twelve stories here refer to cases that Doyle made teasing reference to in the original series but never made available to the reading public. The stories are filled with black hearted villians, damsels in distress, atmosphere, and above all, the friendship between Holmes and Watson that have made them the most famous characters in the history of literature. Several stories like "The Adventure of the Deptford Horror" and "The Adventure of the Red Widow" are dark tales of murder; while others such as "The Aventure of the Wax Gamblers" and "The Aventure of the Highgate Miracle" will make you smile. What I enjoyed the most is that the authors have tried to stay true to the characters and didn't try to change them as other writers have done. The stories seem to have been written with one goal in mind, to fill the reader with delight! Originaly written in the early 1950s and out of print for many years, I am happy that Random House has released this once again, and in a Hardbound edition. Come dear reader,"the games afoot!"

Seldom am I impressed by follow-up attempts. In this case though, I almost enjoyed this better than the orginal Sherlock Holmes stories. A collection of dark and dangerous short stories by a descendant of Arthur Conan Doyle, teamed with mystery master John Dickson Carr. Lock the doors and light your pipe, the game's afoot. You will not be disappointed!!!!! John Green Page, A

i admit i didn't read the whole thing, but i believe i am not overly critical, and i couldn't stick it out. first, the writing is very awkward; as i was reading i kept thinking, this writing is intrusively amateurish enough to interfere with the story. In addition, the author uses way too many actual historical figures, which i think highlights the awkward writing, because i found myself thinking, "that person wouldn't talk like that, or think like that. also, the plot was, well, trite. not recommended

A clever mystery onboard the greatest train of all - the Orient Express. Woven in the mystery are unique details of high class train travel in another time. as well as real historical characters intertwined throughout. Sam McCarver's second novel surpasses his first. A delightful read!

THE CASE OF COMPARTMENT 7 is a fun book. John Darnell, the world's first paranormal detective, boards the legendary Orient Express and journeys acorss Europe with a colorful collection of fictionalized historical personalities including Mata Hari, an Eastern European crown prince, and Agatha Christie. Sam McCarver does a great job weaving fact with fiction, and he tells an excellent detective story. There are murders. There's intrigue. There's danger. There's heroics. Here's a book you should read.

As a former sailor and current resident of Virginia Beach, I was stunned to learn that much of this entire story happened in familiar places surrounding me. The author spares no details and does not hesitate to give addresses, places, names, etc. to make the story come to life.

I read this book over a weekend because I simply could not put it down. I enjoy the way the story was told. Our country should thank the FBI, Bob Hunter, and his team for their professionalism in catching America's most damaging spy.

Excellent true spy story from the justics side of the case. Other books ont his case don't cover this much at all. The author (and case agent) is a good, unpretentious storyteller.

Espionage stories like this are usually fiction! The author tells his story in a casual way, like he's talking to you personally over a glass of ale. He's a character himseld!

John Walsh is great at fighting crime and has found a new voice in writing about the criminals he helps take off the streets. Pulblic Enemies grabs you at the begining and holds on tight. Every story is chilling and you are glad that John Walsh is out there watching over us like a big brother. The story of the Yosemite murders was particularly chilling. It thoroughly explains how the women where in a very dark and secluded section of the Motel. It actually gave me the creeps. Mr. Walsh does not exploit the victims or their families, he just tells the story like it is and leaves the reader with a real empathy for the people involved.

I have always been an admirer of John Walsh and this book reinforces that belief. The way he refocused his grief and anger after the murder of his son into a crusade for justice for victims of crime and their family is a testament to the his sincerity. I enjoyed reading about the behind the scene stories involving the cases profiled. Especially the funny stories during his ride along with police officers for an episode of COPS.

The book reinforces the importance of keeping your eyes open and reporting any suspicious activities. The police can't be everywhere. They need the eyes and ears of the general public. Time and time again have proven that it's viewer tips which have helped police catch these scumbags. Imagine what would have happened if someone in that apartment building had reported the suspicious odor coming from Ira Eichorn's apartment right away? Holly Maddux's family would not still be waiting for justice. He would not have had over 15 years of freedom in Europe. I did not know that my senator, Arlen Specter was his lawyer. I wonder what he says now about his famous client - his arguements for bail was ludicrous. The judge was insane to grant such a low bail but he had friends in high places and money & fame talks.I don't regularly watch AMW but I think I will now.

John Walsh is one of my heroes. This book, as his others, is another excellent in-depth look at Walsh's recent cases on America's Most Wanted. This book starts with a bang and keeps up the pace. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to protect themselves and their families from the becoming victims. These cases will open your eyes.

The basic premise of this book is that you should create a stimulating environment in which your child will enjoy learning. Sounds wonderful, doesn't it? Well, I thought so. I was very excited to read this book. As it turns out, I've never been so disappointed in a book. Since the title is "How to Raise a Brighter Child" I had expected that it would be a "how to" book. The author does give a handful of examples of activities and games to engage in with your child. However, in most of the book she simply regurgitates other people's experimentation and data attempting to prove that it is advantageous to teach your child at a young age. Well, I wouldn't have bought this book if I didn't believe that! I don't think the author had a single unique idea of her own. The 38 pages of references and bibliography speaks for itself! I did read the entire book while continually hoping that it would get better, which it did not. Save yourself the cost of this book. As I said, the basic premise is wonderful. Take that and use your own imagination to make it work. You'll be much better served!

Many of the ideas expressed in this book ring true regarding children's learning process. However, be wary of such subtleties as suggesting as fact to your child that this world or things in it have been around for myriads of years. That is not fact, but theory, no matter how widely accepted. The book also advises against corporal discipline, with insignificant substantiation and a single footnoted reference. In place of the wisdom of Solomon, this book suggests mere time outs and moral explications, but relegates the chastening of tough love to archaic obscurity, despite admitting its use by 90% of parents. Perhaps some children of the remaining 10% will become the future intelligent leaders of tomorrow, of companies like Enron and Worldcom.

28 years ago, when I used ideas from the first edition of this book to teach my daughter to read, mainstream educators thought it was harmful to "push" a child to read before age 6. Her own reactions of interest and delight in the suggested activities told me otherwise. She was reading Dr. Suess by age 3 and chapter books without pictures by 4 1/2. Her Montessori teachers were totally amazed. Of course, I kept reading to her myself until she was 8 or so, because we both enjoyed that activity. Today she is an avid reader and the mother of a 10 month old daughter. She recently asked me how I taught her to read, and I remembered this book and came looking for it here. Now I remember that it had many, many other good suggestions for encouraging a child's natural curiousity. It was, by far, the best child development book I've ever read.

This book is for experienced developers who need to make the transition to VB.NET. It will also help programmers with previous knowledge of VB.NET who want to move up to the professional level.

The book begins with an introduction to the .NET Framework and common language RunTime(CLR). The CLR is responsible for managing the execution of code compiled for the .NET platform. The next few chapters focus on object oriented programming and how to derive classes from base classes using inheritance. Chapter 9 gives a detailed discussion on how error handling works in VB.NET by discussing the CLR exception handler in detail and the new Try...Catch...Finally structure. An entire chapter is devoted to multi-threading. You will learn how threads can be created, and the differences between multitasking and multi-threading. Chapter 16 discusses COM and .NET component interoperability, and the tools provided to help link the two technologies together. Chapter 18 gives detailed coverage of the ADO.NET data access technology. You will learn how to build flexible, fast, and scalable data access objects and applications.

The final chapters discuss building web applications with web forms, creating custom controls for Windows Forms and Web Forms, and finally, creating and consuming Web Services.

If you're an experienced VB developer and would like to make the transition to VB.NET, then this book is a must.

As someone who has spent over five years as a professional Visual Basic programmer I don't want to throw away all my knowledge when I move to VB.NET. Fortunately, this (big) book doesn't bother teaching you programming from scratch (you should definitely look elsewhere if you're a complete beginner) but will help you make sense of not only what's changed in the move from VB6 to VB.NET (a lot!) but also what you can take with you from VB6 (a surprisingly large amount actually). This means that you don't have to spend your time working through stuff like "this is a variable", "this is an if statement". Instead the book gets stuck into what makes the .NET Framework and Common Language Runtime tick - and explains how you can relate all of it to VB6.

The first third of the book serves as a reference to the VB.NET language - syntax, error handling, objects, inheritance, interfaces, and the differences between variables and types. While this means that you don't get to create many exciting applications early on it does mean that you have a thorough grounding in the essentials of the language.

Then the rest of the book takes a look at the most important features of .NET in turn: ADO.NET, XML, Windows Forms, Web Services, Data Binding, Remoting, Networking, Threading, Security, Web Forms, etc. You won't be an expert in any of these areas after you've read the book but you will have a much better idea of what VB.NET is capable of and how to get started using the advanced features of the .NET Framework Class Library.

Although there are a lot of authors that wrote on this book, which can spell trouble in my experience, the editors have managed to maintain a consistent voice throughout and there's surprisingly little overlap between chapters. Well worth the money.

The .Net platform has undoubtedly revolutionized the world of software development, whether web based or traditional windows. Professional VB.Net like other WROX books (pardon my bias) does complete justice to the subject matter, explaining every nuance and subtlety with the typical lucidness that WROX books have been come to be known for. I used this book to pass the 70-305 certification exam. Great book for learning the language and the .Net platform.

It seems that this important phase in Wright's illustrious career has not been given the attention it deserves. As Frank Sergeant noted, Wright was most proud of his Usonian Homes and actively promoted his vision of a "Broadacre City." Unfortunately, Sergeant's book was the product of the 70's. He offers a good text, but poor photographs and mediocre illustrations that don't give the reader a compelling vision of these homes.

Wright started with the Jacobs House, built in the late 30's, which got the ball rolling. With a lot of sweat and material contributions by the owners, they were able to keep the cost near the $5000 budget Wright had set. He wanted these homes to be affordable, clean, efficient dwellings that reflected his streamlined view of America. Wright abhorred the wasteful society America had become, and envisioned a "Broadacre City" that would satisfy Americans' insatiable appetite for detached homes, without destroying the landscape in the process. He incorporated many passive solar features into these homes, relied on natural materials, and as always created an open plan that characterized the democratic nature of society.

More enticing books are now available on Usonian homes, but Sergeant's book is a good place to start in getting an impression of the quality of these homes, and how they came to shape America's suburban lifestyle.

Sergeant has made a wonderful and complete effort to balance both the technical information about the famous Usonian houses with the very concept of Usonia and how Wright envisioned the possibilities of what organic architecture could become. At the risk of becoming too reverent to the architect, the book attempts to cover Wright's somewhat anachronistic philosophical views as well as paints an idealised picture of the man. The book is lacking greatly in visual aids. The author takes pains to ensure that the ingenuity and the complexity of the design and construction of the homes is understood, but this is backed up with poor illustration. The homes are displayed in black and white photos that lack the neccessary detail needed to understand what their literary descriptions mean. The floor plans are small, undimensioned, and are not clearly captioned. This coupled with close in photography of specific features of the homes without showing the whole, is frustrating. The literature is complete and well ordered, but a reader just entering the realm of FLLW would be well advised to find a more picturesque book on this topic before diving into Sergeant's text.

The author spent six years researching the book, which is ostensibly about the houses but quickly turns into a book about the man. And how could it not? How many famous architects built mostly houses? Or started a commune during the Depression? Or had elaborate, futuristic, monorail-equipped cities all planned out in complete detail?

Profiles the iconoclastic artist a bit too sympathetically at times, though. For instance crediting him with setting the example for the Postwar ranch house, which would have undoubtedly emerged on its own. He also defends FLLW's writings as well as anyone could, but they're really too old fashioned to mean much today.

The drawings--just small floor plans--are nice but no details are included. Otherwise, plenty of substance.

This was a big disappointment. I know people who have played the course, and thought that it was excellent. I was looking forward to the nitty gritty of course design. Instead we get all of the tedium of getting the permits, the arguements, life stories of some of the participants, and most of them were not particularly interesting. No pictures, only a few lame drawings. Where are the before and after pictures so we can see the transformation of wild land to the course? How about focusing on some design elements, maybe pick a green and show how it was made, and the thoughts on the bunkering, fine-tuning the finished product? Nothing like that was in this book. In fact, the book ends before the first shot is hit. No reactions from players to the new course. No follow up with the designer on how it turned out. No reviews by outside golfers. The book just stops when it is finally getting interesting. It took forever to build this course. It seemed to take longer to get through this book.

The people setting out to realise a dream and their encouters with the outside world and reality are pictured very nice and vivid. The proces is given with warm observations. One comment for those who publish the book: please enclose a 1-page overview of the site and lay-out because then moving 200.000 (square)yards of dirt (soil) from lake 7 to green 12th realy has a meaning. Now, with the details given it was just impossible to understand the weight of this kind of information. Even still: a very fine read for all in golf and courses.

This is one of my very favorite golf reads! Presents realistic insight into the dream, conception, and final reality of a golf course. This is similar to grinding it out that all of us hackers and pros must go through to get to that stage in our round or game where it all comes together. The bird lady story is illustrative of my fascination with this book. It so kept my attention because it seemed so realistic to what real life in golf course architecture must entail. The give and take between developer, architect, and owner was exceptional insight as well.

I've reread and will continue as well as give copies away to those I know are into the game as I.

It's an average mafia book with good details. The good details come from the fact that Anastasia has actual transcripts from the FBI wiretappings of the Philly mob. Don't make much of an effort to read, unless you really like the Philly mob.

George hits the nail on its' head with goodfella tapes. Not only does he successfully and accurately describe the brutal mob war of 93', but tells the story of how the Mafia was the most powerful thing in South Philly. From tough guys like Stanfa to hitmen like John Veasy it's all in there. A must read for people with an interest in organized crime at it's best.

The FBI tapes provided here in the book allow for a great insight into the Philadelphia Mafia at a time of great confusion, botched hits, and mutiny in the ranks.

It's an overall good, quick read but there's better out there if you're not looking specifically to find out about the Philly Mob. A good buy is MURDER MACHINE by Gene Mustain and Jerry Capeci.

It's good to see that the FBI recordings are left untampered with so the "evidence" allows you to draw you're own conclusions. Although this sometimes proves confusing with many unfinished sentances and people cutting in to another's sentance.

I do recommend this book as it does provide a quick and cheap read which is quite fascinating.

The strength of this book is its historical background, but compared to giants like Noah Gordon who provide tons of historical information, McCarver is a lightweight. However, I did really enjoy the way the author wove his "who-done-it" around the enigmatic figures and grand details of the Titanic disaster. Mostly McCarver needs to flesh out his characters as real people though. The villain seemed wooden, even melodramatic, his motivations for murder sketchy and unrealistic, until the book's end when the author finally summed them up in a several, weak paragraphs. Though Darnell is British, nonetheless he seemed two-dimensional and emotionless, despite the fact that he was supposedly so overcome by his love for Penny that he got distracted from the task of unraveling the mysterious Cabin 13 suicides. The first two thirds of the book were the best as far as plot line. After the Titanic went down the plot got tedious while Darnell hunted down the murderous villain. This portion of the book should have been more concise and less predictable. I will read McCarver's next book, though, just to see if he has improved his skill in drawing rich, engaging characters. If he does, I'll probably be entertained by a reasonable plot, a richer Orient Express tapestry, and characters I can sink my teeth into.

I can not recommend this book. I had expected a good period piece with plenty of Titanic atmosphere and a somewhat supernatural mystery. I don't think either was delivered. The hero could have been on the Titanic or the Queen Mary, just because a ship hits an iceberg doesn't bring the Titanic scene to life.

Ther are other, much better mysteries set on the Titanic. Two that come to mind that I enjoyed are Max Allan Collins "The Titanic Murders" and Jack Finneys' "From Time to Time"

The Titanic is an often-discussed subject. Our memories are reverent, painful and even romantic. Sam McCarver was able to blend in just one possible story among thousands, which I am sure were occurring on ship. He puts his protagonist in the middle of the trouble and the reader gets a birds eye view of the crew and the Titanic before and after she goes down.

Professor John Darnell is hired to find out why passengers are dying in cabin 13 on three different ships belonging to the White Star Line. It seems when those who meet the professor hear he is a paranormal detective their first thought is abnormal happenings with ghost and demons. Actually the Professor is a detective who is out to debunk the myth of ghosts or demons being the killer. And he believes the one behind the cabin 13 deaths is very much alive. I considered it an interesting reading. The mystery of whodunit was over a little too quick for me. Mr. McCarver is well versed in the history of the Titanic, as the reader will discover should he/she decide to read it.