David Lindsey is a prosemeister. His descriptions are lush; his characterizations have clarity and depth. His Houston Police Department detective Stuart Haydon is a many faceted, sensitive man, perhaps too sensitive to be a homicide cop. Haydon's helpless, nightmare flashbacks were vividly, realistically done.

The plot is unusual. The crime is not a crime: the obsessive collection of violent scenes and film footage. Mr. Lindsey is skillful enough that we feel as repelled by the violence as we would child pornography.

This was my first outing with Mr. Lindsey, and perhaps "Heat from Another Sun" is part of a series, but I never caught any reason for the fabulously wealthy Stuart Haydon to have a motivation for being a member of the Police Department. I became weary of the continual street directions "right on Main, left on Elder, cross Jessamine---" This may be fascinating to Houston residents, but is numbing to outsiders. If you never know another thing about Houston, you will be thoroughly convinced after reading this book; it must be the hottest, most humid place in the USA.

I thought the book should have been slimmed down. It occasionally dragged and felt padded. The pace was uneven; at times I was so lulled by the scene setting and the minute descriptions of apparel that I had to wake up and sit up straight when a graphic, hard-hitting passage popped up. Mr. Lindsey has a unique style; and I will try another book, as the author was recommended to me by a highly respected friend from the Amazon Discussion Boards.

As one who has read everything David Lindsey has published, I eagerly await each new addition to his list. Although he has several stand-alone books, this novel is one of his Stuart Haydon series. It exhibits Lindsey's great ability as a writer to capture the look, feel, smell and tone of a city or location, something that was taught to us in the Creative Writing Program at the University of Pittsburgh. Unfortunately many writers skim over these details and fail to use them to there full potential for setting a mood, characterizing a location and the people in that setting, making a story come alive with vivid scenes and textures. Why a wealthy man whould continue to be a police detective may not be apparent in this one book, but has been explored and slowly revealed in several of Lindsey's other books. Read them all. You won't be disappointed.

The title itself is a work of art. A rich recluse loves his violent movies and he's willing to pay for those that will provide bloody flicks for him. And the "fix" of third world war scenes just is not enough, and pruveyors of the sick mind get their video cams primed for more ways to make money. Houston police detective Stewart Hayden is a man of wealth and taste himself and here we go. David Lindsey writes beautifully, and even if the characters and plot were not first rate, the prose would be enough to keep the pages turning.

With its long chapters, long paragraphs and densely packed small point text, this book is neither a quick nor an easy read. You cannot simply pick up this book in a spare five minutes and expect to polish off a section of a chapter - you'd be lucky to read two pages.

The reader will have to set aside significant time, sit down (with a drink), and take time to read and understand what is going on. To this reviewer, this spoils the whole essence of reading novels.

The book starts off with chapters alternating between the two main characters, Saturnino Barcena and Stuart Haydon. Haydon is a Houston detective, albeit with an affluent background and family connections with Mexico City. His life is interrupted by the daily receipt of a photograph that seems to hint at his families' past in Mexico. When he receives a photograph of himself taken the previous week with a trajectory line of a bullet entering his head added to it, he takes some time off and goes down to Mexico to try and work out what is going on.

Unfortunately, when he reaches Mexico City, things start to become increasingly confusing, both for Haydon and for this reader. There are a lot of characters who suddenly become involved in this part of the story, all of whom have connections with all of the others. Haydon seems to spend most of his time driving between the residences of these people, which quickly became very disorientating for me, trying to keep track of who's who and where they are in relation to each other.

I read another review of this book somewhere where the reader suggested that a map of Mexico City marked with the various locations referred to in the story would have been a great help in their understanding and I fully second that particular motion. I'm not sure how much a map would contribute to my understanding of this book, but it would certainly have helped.

Don't make this the first David Lindsey book that you read, as the two other books by this author that I have read ("Mercy" and "Requiem for a Glass Heart") are much better. I hope the other half dozen are too.

This is an exceptional novel. The writing is amazing, the story grips you from start to finish. Lindsey does an excellent job of capturing the feel of Mexico City. Its uniqueness transcends the novel. Mexico City is the star here, her allure remains long after her beauty has faded. Stuart Haydon is Lindsey's best protagonist and he is at the top of his game here. Be forewarned this book is not for the squeemish, but none of Lindsey's books are. If you are someone who enjoys great writing and riveting suspense you will not be disappointed.

Previous reviewer lucas (uk) needs to read more often. This is an involving and satisfying read and as with all of Lindsey's works the reader gains a real feel for the characters and for the complexities of human situations...if you're willing to take the time to get involved with the lives you're being introduced to. Am really looking forward to his newest...The Color of Night.

In general I don't read a lot of detective or mystery fiction. An exception has been David Lindsey. I own most of his books, even some of the more obscure works, published early in his career. I have been drawn to Lindsey's books by his writing style and the moral ambiguity of his plots. Sometimes decent people do ugly things in Lindsey's stories. As in life, in Lindsey's plots there have been no simple answers.

The Rules of Silence is the last David Lindsey book I'm planning to buy. The only reason that I was able to finish this howler is that I could not believe that the plot was really as simplistic as it turned out to be. I kept thinking that Lindsay would twist the plot around in the end and show the reader that everything that they thought was true was not. Instead The Rules of Silence was a waste of time and money. This is the sort of book that I would expect from Clive Cussler, not the author of Mercy.

In contrast to some of Lindsay's previous work, the characters in The Rules of Silence are cliches, without any depth. The story is so predictable and trite that until I reached the last page I could not believe that Lindsay would actually write something like this. If Lindsay had a long history of writing empty "boy fiction", then I would not expect anything else. Sadly Lindsay has been capable of better work. Given the poor quality of this book and the fact that there are so many good books, I'll think twice before spending time on another David Lindsay work.

It's a good thing that Mr. Lindsey is writing books, instead of coming up with ideas such as portrayed in this adventure/mystery novel...I'd hate to have him on the wrong side of the law. The book sounded interesting, and it was. The realization that so much of our nation's police forces, espionage, search and rescue groups, and politicians have their minds elsewhere, makes the premise of this book, someone coming in and threatening someone in the U.S. who has a corporation under him, very plausible. Because of 9/11 and the various wars or problems in other nations our own nation is involved in, makes the possibility of someone using this as an opportunity frighteningly possible. I sure hope someone is paying attention to this possibility out there.

This story is very much more along the lines of a Tom Clancy book, but it is better written then the latest Tom Clancy books which are often relegated to other writers in 'his' group. This was a new author for me and I was very impressed with his writing, and his plotting. I had a bit of a difficult time keeping up with all the various people who were called in to do a single job, and then left.

I also knew right away, that the woman assistant was going to be targeted by the mastermind of this entire operation. In a situation such as thought up by this evil man, lives are not worth anything...and he will target those closest to the man he is manipulating.

The ending is not unexpected, but the idea of having to keep absolute silence about the reality behind two deaths because of possible national and international consequences is mind-boggling. To not even be able to talk out such horror with a psychologist/psychiatrist for fear of what might happen, and then live with the knowledge that someone killed two people you loved just to get to you...I think most people with a conscience would find it very difficult to do that...be totally silent.

A terrifying read...

Karen Sadler

Titus Cain has what some would call the "perfect life." He has a loving relationship with his wife Rita, several good friends, and has built his own multi-million dollar company. He is unaware that life as he knows it is about to change forever.

Cayetano "Tano" Luquin, a professional kidnapper, has chosen Titus as his next victim. Tano's methods are as deadly as they are unconventional and obscure. Unlike most kidnappings, Titus is not sequestered. He will go on with his life, business as usual; however, he will be forced to make several "risky" business investments to the tune of 64 million dollars. These millions will be transferred to Tano as his "ransom". If Titus resists or contacts the authorities, those close to him will die.

Titus contacts CIA agent Garcia Burden, who has a considerable amount of information about the inner workings of Tano's organization. What ensues is a suspenseful, psychological thriller that leaves you breathless.

This is my first time reading a work of David Lindsey, and I became an instant fan. THE RULES OF SILENCE is a gripping page-turner that left me wanting more. This is a must read for those looking for an intelligent, fast-paced, action-packed novel.

Reviewed by Latoya Carter-Qawiyy
The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers

Now that I am finished with this novel and have moved on to my next read, I am having a hard time remembering much about David Lindsey's "An Absence of Light". Being a big fan of concise writing styles, such as Michael Crichton and Greg Iles, I found Lindsey's overly descriptive style distracting, particularly since the prose was often irrelevant to the action. If you are a fan of very wordy authors, I would direct you to someone like a Pat Conroy (of Prince of Tides fame), who despite being extremely descriptive and downright wordy, does it extremely well.

I wouldn't describe it as a bad book or a horrible read, just an extremely ambivalent one.

I enbjoyed this book and felt it stimulating! I was very moved by the authors work! It rates up there as agood one....almost as good as "Going Too Far", by that great up and coming author Steven Gardner

Reading this book reminds me of my childhood dreams in Ireland.

Hey, the new Stiglitz text book! I was looking forward to this (I look forward to almost anything from Krugman and Stiglitz), but my impression of this new Stiglitz text is rather negative.

As an introductory text book, it's not bad. Covers all the important points of micro and macro. However, I was rather dissapointed that the text book emphasises "the new economy" caused by IT. It has all these "e-Insights" and "e-Cases" in all of the chapters, to show how IT is affecting the economy in fundamental ways.... only, is it? After the fall of dot.coms in 2000, I would have expected a more reserved approach, to say the least, not just all these IT glorifications. Especially from Stiglitz, the champion of the economics of information, I didn't imagine such "oh the Internet is great" attitude. Such as; "lowering search costs, the Internet holds out the promise of vastly increasing the efficiency of labor markets." (p.313) Really? I thought the lessons of the dot.com crash was that when people say "enormous" or "vastly" about IT benefits, you should ask "how enourmous/vast?" This text book doesn't do that. "Today, with virtually instantaneous information on sales, production and inventories, managers gan fine tune their production levels, avoiding the types of fluctuations seen in the past." (P.777) Theoretically, yes. But that didn't materialize too well, did it. But no comment on that. It devotes significant pages (well, 4, but with so much ground to cover, this is quite a lot to the history of personal computers and the Internet (pp.6-10). Nice story, but how does that tie in to the theme of economics? The book offers no connection! It's supposed to give an overview of the issues in Economics, but it's not a particulary good one (this industry is a bit peculiar, you know.)

I just hope the undergrads using this text book doesn't start another IT bubble.

On the good side, Stiglitz's experience at the World Bank has a lot of positive effect. The parts about development aid and globalization is strong (although short, but hey, this is only introductory). It's readable and understandable (but I'm in Japan; compared to the cranky jargon-laden econ textbooks here, most American textbooks are sweeter than candy). It's treatment of inflation is rather deep, which is nice. Emphasis of the environmental issues are, well, a bit bent toward the "Litany" (see Lomborg "Skeptical Environmentalist" on this), but it's good to see that they are given some explanation.

All in all, it's not as good as I expected, but still very good and strong. I might say that grabbing the 2nd edition (which is getting real [inexpensive] now...) might offer more U (utility) for your buck.

First of all, cover design and abundant pictures attraced my mind and then I just bought and read through it without special burden. but now I came to know that's really big help for me to understand Economics together with quick real world application.....that's why I'm recimmending this book. buy introduction of modern economic theory is reletavely neglected.........I dare to say.

I struggled through the interminable descriptions of stench, of fountains bubbling in the background, of statues, wrought iron gates, you name it, Lindsey can write two paragraphs on it.

After 80 pages, I started skipping the paragraphs that were desciptive filler. I gave up by chapter 17.

If ever there were a book that would make me believe the author was being paid by the word, it would be this one. Had some of those words actually created a spark of interest in the characters, I might have pressed on.

Perhaps Lindsey has written better books. Too bad this was my first encounter with his writing. It will be my last.

How could a book like this be published? Yes, He has been to Guatemala. Yes, He knows the structure of the city precisely. Yes, He invested his time and money preparing for the novel. DOES THAT MEAN I HAVE TO THREAD THROUGH ALL THE DESCRIPTION ABOUT THE CITY FOR MORE THAN 300 PAGES? He wrote pretty well at the beginning. But as the story went on he lost balance and wasted too much effort on city and landscape description. DON'T TRY TO READ THIS ONE. NEVER!

I can't quite understand the negative reviews this book seems to be getting here. I think it may well be the best thriller I've read. I've spent a fair amount of time in Guatemala, and I'd say Lindsey may overstate the menacing atmosphere a bit, it is hard to look at Guatemala's recent history and fault him for this. A great book.

David L. Lindsey apparently doesn't need Houston detective Stuart Haydon, but I do. In Haydon Lindsey created one of the most complex, contradictory characters in the genre. Then he abandoned him.

ANIMOSITY is a well-written novel (David Lindsey writes beautiful prose), but it left me wondering what exactly was the point. The characters were not very likeable and nothing was what it seemed. The plot was painfully convoluted and tended to twist and turn upon itself like a snake hit by a car. The conclusion was very unsatisfactory.

I gave the book three stars because any David Lindsey book is worth at least that, but I don't think that I will recommend it.

David Lindsey has established himself as a pretty good mystery writer over the years, telling dark tales that usually are good if not exceptional. His gift for description gives his stories a quality that with other writers may be thought of as slow; with Lindsey, however, this novels do not move slowly, but serenely.

In this story, sculptor Ross Marteau has just returned to his Texas home from Paris, where his most recent relationship has ended rather badly. Soon, he gets involved with a pair of sisters, one beautiful and mysterious, the other suffering from a deformity that takes away from her own beauty. It is obvious that the two women are out to manipulate Marteau, but he blindly allows himself to be drawn into their web.

Although Lindsey's descriptive abilities are as good as ever, his plot is weak and not very original. There are story elements here from a number of works, including Body Heat and the Grifters. The truly clever plot twist that I kept longing for, the one that would say that these plot cliches are about to be turned into something new and delightful, never comes. Add to that a main character who rather densely allows himself to be manipulated and rarely takes action (until the end of the story), and there is a little to be desired here.

I have always looked forward to Lindsey's books, which makes this book all that more of a disappointment. While his talent offers some redemption, this is barely a two-and-a-half star work, rounded up only because of his past successes. This one is for Lindsey fans only...all others can find better material elsewhere.

David Lindsey has a very good reputation, as far as I'm concerned, as a mystery writer. His books are moody, slowly paced, wonderfully written, and very quirky and atmospheric. When he started he concentrated on a detective in Houston (I think) named Stuart Haydon, but recently many of his books have been about other characters, and some (notably Mercy) have been true masterpieces of the mystery genre, and very good as literate novels, to boot.

Which brings us to the present book, Animosity. This isn't really a mystery novel at all, at least in so far as there's a mystery involved. For the first half of the book, the plot follows Ross Marteau, a commercial sculptor who has had a particularly nasty breakup with his girlfriend in Paris, and moves back to San Rafael, Texas, where he is from. There he is approached by two sisters in a roundabout way. The younger of the two, hauntingly beautiful but deformed by a hunchback, wants him to make a nude sculpture of her. The other of the sisters he begins an affair with. Suddenly things derail, and with the change in the story, the whole thing turns into a rollercoaster ride.

I won't tell you anything further except to tell you that the plot is very Hitchcockian, or perhaps Cohen Brothers, in flavor. Lindsey is so good at forming pictures in your head that it almost plays as a movie.

I had two complaints about the book. One, I didn't like the ending. I can't tell you what the ending is, or why I didn't like it, but I didn't. The other is that the story takes a bit long to get going. I was beginning to wonder if anything ever would happen when it did.

Given that, this is a good book, and worth the money.

I discovered David Lindsey first in 'An Absence of Light' (hummm ... 'The Color of Night' ... 'An Absence of Light ... I should have guessed something was on the fritz here just from that). Backtracking from that first book, I read all his prior work and became a awed admirer of his unique ability to construct real lyricism from both the horrific and the mundane. Alas, however, everything since has been a stunning disappointment. 'The Color of Night' is a bit of a mess -- unfocused, overwritten, rambling, clumsy, and almost pointless in its core narrative line. Of course it's not nearly as awful a book as 'Requiem for a Glass Heart' was, but then nothing possibily could be. I really don't get it. Has the David Lindsay of 'Body of Truth', 'In the Lake of the Moon', 'Spiral' and 'Mercy' died, and a vastly less-talented imposter taken over writing under his name? You know, now that I think about it, I'd bet on it.

A skilled Amazon reviewer gently chastised this book for lacking any of the cutting wit that this genre tends to carry forth. This lack is exactly what caused the novel and the characters to stand out for me. The Color Of Night was painted--not written and does not lack in action. The "retired spy is drawn back into the fray" formula is fresh again in this authors skilled hands. A truly enjoyable yarn.

As both a writer and artist, I was taken with this exquisitely-drawn - and I do mean "drawn" - novel. It is like a perfectly beautiful colored drawing, sometimes black and white, in brush and inks, just like the works of art Lindsey writes about with obvious knowledge of his subject.

You just saw everything so vividly. I particularly appreciated the mouthwatering European travelog, the descriptions of scenes, restaurants, food, hotels - visited by the rich and famous.

There is a flaw in this book that keeps it from being a great, however. (Sorry if it bothers some amazon review readers, but I often give five stars to a book for having entertained me thoroughly, and this one did). It is this: every truly great book is laced with wit. Read the grimmest novels, say, by Dostoevsky, Dickens or Tolstoy, and even and even some of the best contemporary detective and mystery writers and you will be chuckling, laughing, amused. "The Color Of Night" would have benefited had Lindsey given us a few wry touches here and there. He was too dead serious, which sometimes lent it a slightly precious tone. Of course, "precious" can be hilarious, and he might have capitalized on some of his foppish characters, but I found this novel too stolid.

Another flaw: like some of the beautiful drawings one sees, the perfect, deft creations of the greatest artists, there is a coldness about the book itself. If I didn't know otherwise, I would have guessed that the author wrote the whole book with a quill pen and ink. I can see him thinking, dipping, scribing, again and again, with a dispassionate hand - and heart. Not exactly an insult, but sometimes I like a feeling (and the word 'feeling' is exactly the word I meant to use) that the work is coming from the artist's gut. Like Van Gogh, for example, who wasn't afraid to make a mess.

Nevertheless, despite these flaws, "The Color Of Night" is a fun book to read and Hollywood would be crazy not to make it into a movie. Clint Eastwood as Harry? This time, clean, of course. Harry Strand is a morally upright man, despite his years of spying and his (acceptable) thievery. I'm glad he lived to "watch" Mara cross the street.