I was diagnosed with premature menopause (POF) and couldn't find any information...until this book. I read it cover to cover immediately. This is such a great source of information and comfort. It's about time!

I was in shock last night upon seeing your book written up in Newsday. I have looked at dozens of books on menopause/perimenopause and have only seen 1 page at maximum on this subject. I was just dignosed with early menopause at 42. My husband and I were trying to conceive with our first child. This dignosis was heartbreaking, overwhelming, etc.. I have seen related web sites but nothing specifically on early menopause which I have heard is different than premature ovarian failure. I will try to get the book today. Kathryn I applaud you for offering a book on this subject which needs so much attention. I will visit your web site and would love to get involved with any future support group. Sandy

Kathryn Petras' book The Premature Menopause Book is the only book out on book shelves that deals with this very importtant topic. As the founder and creator of HotFlash! the perimenopause/menopause web site and online support group I have interviewed Kathy and read her book. Her compassion and breath of knowledge is incredible. She has helped literally thousands of women through her book and drive to make this once unknown health challenge get the attention it deserves. In dealing with the media and in consulting with women, I have found that women AND men want to know all they can about perimenopause and menopause. While folks are still catching up on what menopause means to the average woman, Kathy has broken ground in talking about the health challenges, emotional struggles, and the reality of hitting menopause, (which traditionally occurs at age 51) while still being thirty or even twenty. Doctors are finding more and more women, each day, are in early or premature menopause. Thankfully Kathyrn Petras has written a compassionate and informative book to help all women who are faced with a premature menopause.

A high society Boston woman is killed, a "perfect wife in a perfect family". Spenser gets on the case, with Farrel, a gay detective. Spenser finds that the wife was not exactly perfect, her background suspicious, and dead relatives are really quite alive and kicking. The end is full of twists and turns.

The book provides our first look at Farrel, an interesting gay police officer. An addition I like quite a lot, and one that gets better as the series goes on. Spenser's always multicultural and quite open - I like that about him.

Susan's not in this a lot ... calls and such. Probably also a wise decision :)

The characters Spenser runs into are all very well done, as usual. He does miss with the high school year-figuring-out ... she'd have gone to college for 3 years with his math. He does the "If nominated, I will not run" quote of Lyndon B Johnson and the "the rest was silent" from Hamlet.

Big question: How did *poof* Pearl become a Wonder Dog, though?

The writing is excellent, the southern scenes really give you a sense of what that area is like. This is the first Spenser novel that had me truly afraid, too - the jail scene had me afraid to read further. I did of course, and enjoyed it immensely.

I have read several Robert Parker "Spenser for Hire" novels and have enjoyed all of them. This particular book was good, but seemed more formulaic than most. Some of his books are very interesting with unusual plot twists. Unfortunately, some of them, like this one, seem to be cranked out to a formula. Parker has been very successful in slowly defining Spenser's character and nuances. I felt this book drew on already established characteristics and went too far in the extreme with the climactic gunfight scene in the end. Still, the novel plays well into the series and is a fast paced book and a good read for true Spenser fans.

I have read all the Parker books more than once, and this one is my favorite. You shouldn't start with it - it would be better to be familiar with the character first - but if you're going to pick and choose, choose this one. The mystery is top-shelf, the supporting characters are carefully drawn, there isn't too much of the adorably annoying Susan, and Spenser is at his wise-cracking best. He really hit his stride with this book.

Eventhough it is a short novel the author could have done a much better work sticking to the essence of the drama and the court proceedings about the conduct of the captain of the vessel. But he choose to dwell a little bit to much on some philosophical wonderings of Mhirta which loosen the tension and did not add much to the development of the work.

I was actually rather disappointed by the book. The subject matter is obviously very important and emotional, but I felt that the book didn't deliver as much as it could have. At various points in the text, the metaphorical passages seemed somewhat contrived and unoriginal.

Feeding the Ghosts belongs with Johnson's Middle Passage and Morrison's Beloved for offering an accurate portrayal of the immense human tragedy of the transatlantic slave trade coupled with the amazing power of resilience. D'Aguiar's novel reminds us that those we may see only as victims of a brutal system constantly fought that system; their resistance continued even as their hope for a future free from inhumanity disappeared. From the opening line of the novel, "The sea is slavery," the narrative reveals the many ways that the enslaved were at the mercy of their captives, yet it chronicles the repeated efforts of one slave in particular--a young, English-speaking woman--to find a small remnant of humanity in her captors and turn that humanity into freedom.

In addition to the novel's sobering re-creation of the indignities of the slave trade, its imagery and spellbinding writing offer a subtext that explores the power of language. Though the merchants of and investors in the slave trade were allowed to describe and control the language with which the trade was conducted, the final word is yet to be spoken. D'Aguiar's voice joins with that of his character Mintah to help us redefine this peculiar institution.

This book is better than Children Of Dune, and yet still lacks a highly dynamic plot. In fact, the whole thing is set within the space of a few days, detailing the life of Leto II (technically Leto III - but only Siona seems bothered about that) 3,500 years after the events described in the first Dune trilogy.

Leto II has become a human-sandworm creature, ruling over his angry and frustrated empire with his vast legions of Fish Speaker soldiers, enforcing peace for dozens of generations to teach the universe a lesson, while also waiting for the right time to turn Dune back into a desert planet.

While it is obvious allthroughout that Leto has a deep, vision-motivated reason behind his lesson to humanity, the actual reasoning only became even slightly apparent at the end. And some of the talk of politics made whole chapters almost unitelligible to me.

And yet, again, Herbert's strong talent meant that this book never became a punishing read. The tale contains enough action to keep your heart beating, and once more this book has an ending that is heart-stoppingly shocking, but at the same time brilliant.

This is a great transition from the old Dune that we knew into the knew trilogy, but in my opinion the rest of the second trilogy is better. Read on.

This is one of the greatest novels I have ever read. In some respects, I think it is superior to "Dune" - the sheer grandeur of Herbert's conception of humanity and the complexity (and great insight) of his beliefs about the nature of civilization and the meaning of historical change boggle the mind. Leto II is one of the most fascinating characters in modern fiction - his is unquestionably a tyrant, but conventional notions of good and evil simply do not apply to him. Leto II deserves the name God-Emperor because he is something more than human. It is as if all the possibilities of thousands of years of history, genealogy, and knowledge have come together in this one extraordinary being, who, to fully play his role in history, gives up his humanity in order to save the human race from itself. Astonishing. Also, this novel combines religion, politics and technology in a unique way. Not only do the events of the book take place 3000 years after the events chronicled in the first three "Dune" books, but there still remain mingled throughout the text linguistic terms, familial relationships, technologies and even bits of history from our own time which have influenced the world of Arrakis/Dune/Rakis. For the less cerebrally minded, the book also contains some great action sequences (and 1 or 2 sex scenes), 'though not as many as "Dune" does - the Empire has been at peace for millennia, after all. Indeed, the lack of militaristic events (except for the conspiracy to destroy Leto II - a conspiracy of which he is well aware) makes this novel somewhat more difficult to "get into" than its predecessors. Large blocks of the book seem to consist of "just talk" or philosophizing, but it all ties together beautifully if you give it a chance. I reread this book at least once a year and find it more profound each time.

This book delves into the psyche and experiences of Leto II, a tragic and powerful figure that is both very human and very far removed from humanity. We get a detailed picture of Leto's mind, his sacrifices and his goals, but we also get other memorable characters, such as the everpresent aide Moneo and the latest Duncan Idaho ghola. I feel this Dune novel's epic expanse was much more within Leto II's mind than the galaxy-spanning intrigue of other Dune books, but the plotting and scheming of other factions is definitely still here.

The mix of character depth, emotional and political conflict, and the vast scope of Leto II's life and influence make this an unforgettable read and great installment in the Dune series.