Wrightslaw: From Emotions to Advocacy, The Special Education Survival Guide is a must have for ALL parents with a child in the special education system.
FETA helps to organize your thoughts, concerns and plan for your childs education. It gives you the ability to understand where the schools are coming from and how to build an effective relationship with the Special Education team. By doing this, you can effeectively advocate for your child. As the parent,you should be the "Project Manager" for your child as he/she makes her way through school. Through FETA you gain an understanding of HOW to do this. Special education systems and laws can at best be confusing and overwhelming, we parents need help in sorting it all out and FETA does that! We the parents of children in special education need to be equal players in the planning for our kids, NO ONE knows them like we do, and NO ONE will advocate for them like we will! FETA is an important tool in that process.
FETA also does a wonderful thing. It shows you how to organize all the mounds of paper that special education produces. I walk into meetings and seminars with everything I need at my fingertips.
FETA does someting else amazing, it helps you to understand the TESTING SCORES! Yikes, we all need help with that!
I can go on forever about this book, but I am running out of room. From special education laws, IEP's, resources, how to write effective letters, it its ALL in there! GET THIS BOOK!!

Because of the book, Wrightslaw: From Emotions to Advocacy, and the wrightslaw and fetaweb websites, we were able to get our school district to fund a residential special education placement for our daughter.

We took treats to all meetings, took a pic of our child with us, kept our calm, documented everything in letters, worked the files, and learned the wright buzzwords. It worked. We are very very grateful.

We can't thank Pete and Pam enough for the book Wrightslaw: From Emotions to Advocacy and their websites. We highly recommend this book.

This book is the perfect companion to "Wrightslaw: Special Education Law". If you have a child with special needs the most frustrating thing as a parent is trying to get educational services for your child. This book teaches you how to advocate for your child to get the services he needs. The Wrights give you the confidence and skills that you need to successfully advocate for your child. This book (and it's predecessor) help level the playing field between the parents and the school. As a parent and child advocate, I own several 100 books. This book (and Wrightslaw) rank in the top 5. I HIGHLY recommend this book to anyone who has a special needs child who is attending public school.

I just bought this book a week ago and read it in two days. Now that Game Show Network has brought the show back, it's nice to also read about it. Peter Marshall has written a book not about his life, but his time on "The Hollywood Squares". He talks about what life was like with Paul Lynde, Rose-Marie, George Gobel and many others that I loved as a kid watching the show.

I gave this five stars because of the book. It also includes a wonderful CD with the zingers that we all loved to hear after a question was asked. The only drawback on this CD is hearing Buddy Hackett's laugh for much of the CD, and it's always the same laugh! It's irritating to listen to, but I can get past that.

The book answers many questions and gives many secrets of what went on in the heyday of this show. I won't spoil it for others, but it has information on the recently discovered thought to be destroyed episodes that GSN now airs. Plus, you can read about stars of today who were contestants on the show. One secret I'll give away is the fact that Naomi Judd was once a contestant!

Buy this book today. You'll find it's worth the money!

Peter Marshall: Why do Motorcyclists wear leather jackets?

Paul Lynde: Because Chiffon Wrinkles.

For quite some time now, I have been listening to Peter Marshall on the radio every weekday morning as he hosts "the Music of Your Life" on KLOA a.m. His knowledge of music from that era is extensive and he always adds interesting comments and stories about the songs that he plays. Every once in a while he mentions the Hollywood Squares and you can hear in his voice how he cherishes that part of his life. With his new book, "Backstage With the Original Hollywood Square", he has a chance to reminisce fondly of the much beloved game show that brought joy to lives of so many.

The tone of the book is mostly fun, and even when he briefly mentions those few things that are perhaps less than pleasant, he does so with an honest, human candor that puts things in perspective. We get a quick glimpse of Peter's life before, during and after Squares, however, the majority of the book is about all of the celebrities that took part in the show, both those that were regulars like Paul Lynde and the many brief appearances by stars throughout the years as diverse as George C. Scott to Alice Cooper. The inner workings of the show are also presented for our enlightenment, as well as the pleasant announcement that the videos of the show that were once believed lost have recently been uncovered and are now playing on the Game Show Network.

My favorite story in the book concerns an amazing letter that Pete received from none other than the Duke himself: John Wayne!

As if this fabulous photo packed book were not enough, it comes with a CD of the long out of print album, "Zingers from the Hollywood Squares"! If you liked Hollywood Squares, then you will not be let down by this bargain package.

"Backstage with the Original Hollywood Squares" is written by Peter Marshall himself, and he couldn't have made it any better. Firstly, it is very touching, because we get it first-hand from him as he looks back on his years with those great friends of his, all those celebrity panelists, and at times it's quite sad. Second, it's hilarious, because he complies so many of the best quotes, jokes, and one-liners that made the original Hollywood Squares as good as it was. Third, there is so much information here that any fan of the show needs this book! Peter gives you the inside scoop on his own life and the lives of the panelists. There is a HUGE list of every panelist who EVER appeared on the show. Peter tells you things you would never guess just by watching the show. He tells you who his favorites and least favorites were. He gives accounts of the various trips taken by the HS family, including a particularly disastrous Christmas vacation to Jamaica. He decribes the romances that blossomed on the show, the funny letters they received, and how it all finally ended. This book answers pretty much any question about the original Hollywood Squares that we're capable of asking it as fans. It's not one of those short, cheap, all-black-and-white books that hardly tell you anything. It's a 200-page total recount of the show's life. Good reading!

There are so many fabulous insights in this book, and such honesty that it should be required reading for high school religion classes. Cardinal Ratzinger has really hit the nail on the head, giving all of us an inside view of the issues that are important to the Church. "In today's whirl of instant bliss, religion, too, is socially respectable only as a dream of happiness without tears, as a mystical enchantment of the soul. Perhaps the Church comes under heavier fire because she talks about sin and suffering and rectitude of life....Just one curious example - when it comes to the state, as soon as crimes begin to multiply and society feels its safety threatened, there is an immediate demand for tougher laws. In relation to the Church, whose laws are moral in nature, the exact opposite happens - there is a demand for further relaxation."

A very readable, interresting book! Cardinal Ratzinger gives his views on a wide range of topics in the course of an extended interview with Peter Seewald, including his life and the state of the *world-wide* Church. This book offers valuable insights from a man who is uniquely positioned to "see" the workings of the Church as a whole.

In the more "liberal" circles, there's apparently a tendency to villify Cardinal Ratzinger as some kind of "right-wing", closed-minded fringe type. Having read this book, I find that claim hard to believe: whether one agrees with his views or not, it is hard to see the Cardinal as anything other than a thoughtful, intellegent and learned man.

[The following three paragraphs were striken from the end of my earlier review of this book due to length restrictions. The beginning of the review, of which these three paragraphs form the concluding portion, appears immediately below this review.]

Cardinal Ratzinger is forthright in his pessimistic assessment of the time ahead. "The danger of a dictatorship of opinion is growing, and anyone who doesn't share the prevailing opinion is excluded, so that even good people no longer dare to stand by such nonconformists [i.e. Christians]. Any future anti-Christian dictatorship would probably be much more subtle than anything we have known until now. It will appear to be friendly to religion, but on the condition that its own models of behavior and thinking not be called into question." (153) The Church must attorn to the zeitgeist in this scheme. These themes are explored in Michael D. O'Brien's "Children of the Last Day" novels.

It is time for the faithful, Cardinal Ratzinger says, to form "vital circles." [T]here are great, vibrant new beginnings and joyful forms of Christian life that don't figure much statistically but are humanly great and have the power to shape the future." (143). "Particularly when one has to resist evil it's important to not to fall into gloomy moralism that doesn't allow itself any joy but really to see how much beauty there is, too, and to draw from it the strength needed to resist what destroys joy." (69)

In his autobiography, the novelist and historian Russell Kirk wrote, "Not by force of arms are civilizations held together, but by the threads of moral and intellectual belief. In the hands of the Fates are no thunderbolts: only threads and scissors." Throughout this book, Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger shows that in most parts of the world that the Roman Catholic Church is the last defense against the decay of human civilization. By defending revelation and sacred tradition against the moral anarchy of the age, the Church withholds disorder of the soul and the commonwealth, the idolatry of man as god, and preserves man, as a creature of God, against transitory and often violent popular passion. The ambitions of those men who would bring about and celebrate her demise are dangerous. Implicit in Cardinal Ratzinger's words and lifetime service is the message that it is time for serious men of serious purpose to come to her defense.

This book is should be required for all students of theater. Not only does it offer inspiration, practical insight, and thought provoking questions, it is an exciting read. It is an indispensable companion to "The Empty Space." Brook's ideas are vital and timeless, and Dr. Moffitt serves as both guide and translator through them. No theater Library would be complete without this tome of wisdom from two living legends: Peter Brook and Dr. Dale Moffitt.

"Between Two Silences: Talking With Peter Brook" is the account of a conversation between Peter Brook and an academic audience over a period of several days. Intelligently edited by Dale Moffitt, it displays Brook's first rate mind. I assume the book would be helpful to students of drama and of Brook's work; my purpose is to recommend it to more general readers. Brook has keen insights into human nature and motivation, with zesty comments about ego, hierarchies, awareness of one's surroundings, and focusing on the material at hand. I profited from his comments about working with what is available, in terms of budget, personnel, setting, and so on. Anyone who needs to work with a team with limited resources, whether in business, academia, government, or even the church, will find here a comrade and a masterful intellect. Brook was clearly "present" to his audience during these conversations. One can understand that the same presence is the key to his remarkable accomplishments in directing.

Dr. Dale Moffitt's stellar editing of Brook's spoken words is a feat of great importance and magnitude. Cheers!

What separates this book from others I have read is that the information is based on extensive research not subjective opinions. This allows the author to be very specific and direct with the "how-to's" of positioning, branding, and new product ideation. The examples provided illustrate and were very confincing that the marketing principles being communicated work. I have never seen this type of evidence in other marketing books. I was very impressed with the significant increase in results these businesses experienced by utilizing the methods from the book. I learned a lot despite having 20+ years of marketing experience at top marketing companies.

As a graphic designer/marketing consultant and business owner sometimes marketing recommendations are made more on instinct that on facts. Doug Hall offers a book dedicated to the "hard numbers" of marketing. He offers a lesson into his "marketing physics" - the rules of the marketplace that can increase your chances of success. A must read for anyone who wants to be successful in marketing. This book is the blueprint for overhauling the marketing for my company. A free trial of Hall's marketing success predictor called "Merwyn" make this a book you have to own!

Jump Start Your Business Brain Can Change Your Business. If you are a person who takes action and believes in their idea then this is the book to read.

Hall doesn't preach - he inspires and coaches. The examples in the book are examples of REAL small businesses and the success they've had using the methods outlined.

The most inspiring part about this book is not the data or the laws but the energy which Hall gives to entrepreneurs. A great idea that is articulated well has the power to CHANGE the World. If you own a business or have an idea that your passionate about this book is a definite read.

For all stargazers who have university level math, and those equipped with lighter high school stuff, this book is a gem. In a few pages, and with nothing more than a pocket calculator, it allows you to explore the universe in a way which only a few hundred years ago was only possible with extensive state-support and massive buildings such as Stonehenge, state-sponsored observatories, and teams of pedantic astrologers and stargazers.

Starting from the simple building blocks (converting your local time to Universal time), it progresses to more and more complex calculations, until finally at the end, you can calculate eclipses and planetary orbits. All the formulas needed for doing this are given in the book, and explained in great detail with many diagrams. All relevant astronomical data is also given. And for every calculation, a sample example is carried out with real numbers, which you can trace along with, so by the end of it you understanding is complete, practically as well as theoretically.

A must read for any astronomy buff. I highly recommend it. It produces the information age equivalent of that feeling of satisfaction you get when you build a telescope and look out onto the heavens yourself--without any intermediaries. Astronomy and stargazing are the activities which were the genesis of the scientific revolution, more than 6000 years ago. This book shows you just how its done.

I am a Chinese from Hong Kong, China. I first read this book was on 1985 on Public Library, it the the only computational astronomy related book. At that time, I was being a secondary school student. This book I found is a very good on basic concept in positional astronomy and other fundamental knowledges concerning in basic ephemeris work. The English of this book is plain and be within the level of Hong Kong secondary school students. Starting from this book, I was being attracted on computational astronomy till now, recently I am in the way of writing of homepage of computational astronomy in Chinese, with the "practical astronomy with your calculator" as paradigm. I am so highly recommended this book.

Don't be misled by the title. The recipes supplied by Peter Duffett-Smith are aimed at making calculations easier with a hand held calculator. However they are easily adapted for creating utilities on personal computers. The material should be easily handled by anyone whose completed highschool algebra and some trigonometry.

The organization and format is well thought out. The earliest chapters deal with time and coordinates which are used in the more complex problems such as computing planet positions later in the book.

Each concept is explained in straight forward language and conventional algebraic formulas are supplied. I found this especially useful for programmers using higher languages such as C,Pascal or Java. Then a step by step practical example is provided that is suitable for a scientific hand calculator. Duffett-Smith is careful about displaying units; a mindfield for most scientific calculations.

My only minor criticism is that some of the typos errors could leave a user quite frustrated. On pp108 I found the value of Tp=0.240850 gave the correct answer while the tabulated value is 0.240852. Similarly, I on page 129, after repeated checks, I got a value of 7.08...AU for Rho compared with the value of 8.13AU in the book. The text cites a 7.2AU value from the Astronomical Almanac.

Otherwise this is one neat addition to the bookshelf of any amateur astronomer of individual interested in astromical calculations.

"Oh, rapture! Oh, bountiful Jehovah! Oh, joy for all our former woes a thousand times repaid!" ... "You blasphemed the aspidistra, and something awful HAS come down that chimney!" How can we resist an intelligent, deft, good-humored protagonist like Lord Peter Wimsey, here assisted by his new bride Harriet Vane? They honeymoon in the countryside at a newly-purchased house, whose previous owner turns up -- not early in the novel -- quite starkly & mysteriously dead in the cellar. With that unfortunate find begins a merry, mirthful, sharp, scintillating murder mystery which anyone will enjoy.

The 30 pages of letters & diaries which open the book are slowish going, but do keep going ... This reader's first experience with a Dorothy Sayers mystery was marvellous & rewarding. "Busman's Honeymoon" is literature, if we can rob that august noun of any suggestion of the ponderous, the boring, the dull -- it is literature that effervesces!

Dorothy L. Sayers' "Busman's Honeymoon" can be considered her finest "all inclusive" Lord Peter Wimsey novel. She skillfully combines the culmination of the Wimsey/Vane romance and a "domestic mystery". Whereas other of her novels (The Nine Tailors, for example) could be considered her best mysteries, this book is beautifully written. The reader is expected to have a passing knowledge of England at the time and the life to date of the characters, as well as a classically literate education. Don't let this put you off, however; the book stands perfectly well alone. It's old - it's not outdated.

Based on a stage play co-written by Sayers, Busman's Holiday is Sayers last significant statement in the mystery genre--and a completely satisfying one at that. Like several other novels that involve both Sayers' sleuth Lord Peter Wimsey and mystery novelist Harriet Vane, the novel is as much a portrait of their relationship as it is a murder mystery, and while these two elements occasionally seem at odds in other works (most notably the unworthy Have His Carcass), Busman's Holiday strikes a perfect balance between the two as we follow the couple through the first few days of their honeymoon as they deal with the shock of marriage, domestic disasters, and an unexpected body in their honeymoon home's basement. As in other novels, Sayers draws a great deal from her setting--in this case rural England on the eve of World War II--and presents us with a memorable cast of supporting characters, and the result is as fine a novel as she ever produced, particularly notable for its wittiness and sly humor. A greatly satisfying finish to a highly enjoyable series.

There is, incidently, an extremely well-made 1930s film version of this particular work starring Robert Montgomery and Constance Cummings. Although Montgomery is not quite the image of Lord Peter Wimsey, he plays quite well, and Cummings is Harriet Vane brought to life on the screen. Sayers fans should enjoy the film almost as much as they enjoy the book!

Of Peter Matthiessen's non-fiction I have previously read only The Snow Leopard, but I have also enjoyed a collection of short stories called On the River Styx. Mr. Matthiessen's authorial voice is very prickly in Birds of Heaven, much more cranky than I remember it in The Snow Leopard, which was written in the wake of the death of his wife from cancer. The Snow Leopard was permeated with sadness and longing. Birds of Heaven is permeated with anger and impatience.

The book is arranged geographically. Beginning in Siberia, Mr. Matthiessen takes through Asia to Australia and then on to Africa and Europe and finally to North America. There are no cranes in South America (or Antarctica).

The author is at his best when he is combining his wry observations of the people and places around him with an enthusiastic and well-informed account of the natural history of a region. I felt that he was less successful when he lets his righteous indignation get the better of him and begins to make snide comments about the absence of a love of the natural world in Chinese society, the wrong-headedness of various bureaucrats and the corruption of local officials.

It is not as if I disagreed with his point of view, but I knew that I already shared it before I even picked up the book. I can't imagine anyone who had any doubts about the importance of cranes as sensitive indicators of the general health of the environment being won over to the crane's side by this hectoring, doctrinaire authorial voice. But then, perhaps this books is really just an extended love letter to the cranes and to the environment in general. As such, it succeeds wonderfully.

Peter Matthiessen includes stories of native people on all the continents that harbor cranes in _The Birds of Heaven: Travels With Cranes_ (North Point Press). He recounts some encounters with humans ("craniacs") who are trying to save the cranes, which are in trouble everywhere, but most of the extensive travels described in this book can only report trouble. If we do not, however, learn what the crane has to tell us, it will be despite Matthiessen's efforts, for in him, cranes have a lucid and compelling advocate.He has gone to exotic locales wherever cranes go. There are plenty of common denominators wherever he travels. Cranes, like so many other forms of wildlife, are hunted, trapped to sell as exotic specimens, and poisoned as agricultural pests. Cranes need wetlands in which to feed, and humans need wetlands to serve as repositories for waste and to be built over to make more space for more humans. It is clear everywhere that Matthiessen goes that humans are winning, and therefore losing.

He has produced an unforgettably bleak picture of ecological matters in China, and an optimistic account of our own country's efforts in getting whooping cranes started again. That we don't know what we are doing in dealing with the cranes is shown in a paradoxically happy outcome for them in Korea. Wars are, as the posters used to declare, harmful to children and other living things, and the Korean War was disastrous for humans and for cranes. There is now a Demilitarized Zone between the two Koreas, just a couple of miles wide but running from the Sea of Japan to the Yellow Sea. Human habitation is forbidden in the area, and farming is very limited. Matthiessen is thus able to visit the DMZ's boundary, accompanied by armed soldiers. ("One may visit a North Korean museum that reveals American atrocities, but we decline this educational opportunity, electing to go birdwatching instead.") He thus gets to watch cranes in the "most fiercely protected wildlife sanctuary on earth... an accidental paradise for cranes." Woe to the cranes if peace breaks out.

This volume includes paintings and drawings of cranes by Robert Bateman, lovely renderings that are more compelling than the usual field guide renditions. They complement Matthiessen's fine text. Cranes are long lived, and they often mate for life. Their windpipes are modified like French horns to produce eloquent and distinctive calls. Their size and their pugnacity, for they are protective birds and dangerous to handle, should make us respect them as fellow-citizens of the planet. There is no need to invoke anthropomorphism; there is a spiritual bond between humans and these animals which Matthiessen has movingly demonstrated. He knows, however, that "the time is past when large rare creatures can recover their numbers without man's strenuous intervention," and despite his romantic optimism, his stories show we are strenuously bent on something else entirely.

If you've read any of Matthiessen's non fiction you'll know that when he's passionate about a subject he has the ability to bring feelings alive with his poetic and vivid command of language. Tie that in with his inclination to be a naturally introspective writer - literally seeking inner truths through nature - and you've got the threads that are woven together here to make THE BIRDS OF HEAVEN a beautifully written book. In describing a glimpse of three Japanese cranes on a misty early evening on the snow covered banks of a river, Matthiessen is at his evocative best. "Sun silvered creatures, moving gracefully without haste and yet swiftly in the black diamond shimmer of the Muri River - a hallucinatory vision, a revelation, although what is revealed beyond this silver moment of my life I do not know."

While Matthiessen is poetic and romantic as a nature writer he is a blunt and critical social commentator. Our species comes in for some stick. We neither stack up well in creation - look at the beauty of an African Crowned crane, the "red-black-and-white head crowned by a spray of elongated feathers on the nape, like spun gold in the bright sun...how wonderful it seems that even the boldest colors of creation are never garish or mismatched, as they are so often in the work of man." Nor do we do so well with what we create - China's Three Gorges Dam will destroy some pristine crane wintering lands and is, according to Matthiessen, "a grand folly of enormous cost." Worse still is that we are such a self destructive species. The dam, he goes on to say, will also cause "social and environmental ruin" in this part of China.

Poignancy, yes, even sorrow at the passing of so many of the last wild and unspoilt areas of the planet, but sentimentality, wistfullness, hopelessness, and inaction are not words that are in this author's vocabulary. Indeed the fact that cranes are the central focus here is cause for cautious optimism. Cranes have always been a vibrant part of our cultural history and remain evocative symbols of our spiritual and creative imagination and are seen as omens of good luck and longevity in many countries.

The fifteen species of cranes (eleven of which are endangered or threatened) have lessons to teach mankind. Matthiessen's recounting of the sectarian squabbling that took place at an international gathering of crane conservationists is illustrative. While economics, politics, and nationality remain common dividing factors among the human participants, more than half of the species of cranes are content to make the Amur River basin in central Asia their common gathering ground.

A powerful book for Matthiessen's writing, the beautiful paintings and illustrations offered in support, and the stories of the cranes themselves - Saurus, Crowned Crane, Brolga, Siberian and the rare Whooping and Japanese Cranes - two of the most endangered species that Matthiessen says are "heraldic emblems of the purity of water, earth, and air that is being lost." We need to conserve, appreciate, and learn from these birds of heaven, and heed the "horn notes of their voices, [that] like clarion calls out of the farthest skies, summon our attention to our own swift passage on this precious earth."

Peter Pan is a good adventure/fantasy that kids and adults can enjoy alike. With much exaggeration, it is something kids can enjoy and read into. It's a page-turning book that once you started you can't stop.

This isn't like the Disney movie! I loved this book but at the same time I was shocked by the violence of the fighting between Hook and the Lost Boys and the Indians. I don't think I'll be reading this one to my nephews and neices, not until I have edited out the violent bits. It wasn't that In-Your-Face violence of the Hollywood movies, it was more insinuated and there was definetly a menacing atmosphere surrounding Wendy's, Peter's and Michael's adventures in Never Never Land. I do recommend it though, just not for easily frightened youngsters. This is definetly in need of a PG rating on the cover. PARENTS: This is no Disney Peter Pan!

My 10 year old daughter found this book in the school library. She read it one weekend and has checked it out several times. The classic story along with the beautiful illustrations by Eric Kincaid have made this one of her favorite books. When I surprised her with her own copy that I had found on Amazon she was thrilled and commented on it's excellent condition.

Dorothy L. Sayers wrote some of the best mystery novels that ever appeared in print. In fact she wrote most of them.

Gaudy Night is mainly a novel of Oxford, despite its being ostensibly a mystery. Harriet Vane is the main character of this novel, though of course Sayers' best creation, Lord Peter Wimsey, plays an important part in this book. The dialogue is as clever and wonderfully piffling as ever, the story thought-provoking, and best of all it is here that Peter is finally successful in wooing his Harriet. (The punt scene! And the finale...)

There never was a better mystery writer. I would suggest, before reading this, that you read Strong Poison and Have His Carcase for the full effect. Oh, and follow Gaudy Night up with Busman's Honeymoon.

This book is amazing: not only does it comment intelligently on just about every human life issue, but it does so while being a very competent murder mystery, and consistently enjoyable to boot. Gaudy Night is the novel that shows the world why Dorothy L. Sayers is the master. Her style is as beautiful as always, and this third book in the 4-book Harriet Vane/Peter Wimsey series is a fascinating piece of whodunit mystery fiction, a commentary on the single-sex environment as well as the place of women in education and education in women, a treatise on love, and a breathtakingly realistic and satisfying romance that anyone who's been following Harriet and Peter through Strong Poison and Have His Carcase will appreciate. The fourth and final book, Busman's Honeymoon, is the only thing that could possibly crown Gaudy Night, and I recommend them both.

I think anyone who's pondered the very real problems in reconciling Harriet and Peter and how Sayers could approach them while remaining true to both will feel as I did--bought the book, liked it, will keep it.

Dorothy Sayers has frequently used autobiographical experiences as a starting point for her writing - as an example, "Murder Must Advertise" was set in an advertising agency and based on Sayers' own experiences in the field. Here again, Sayers goes back to her past days as an Oxford student at Somerville College and this makes "Gaudy Night" a unique entry in the Lord Peter Wimsey series. Harriet Vane, an Oxford alum, attends the Gaudy, which is a reunion of past students and is asked by her old professors to turn her talents as a detective writer to practical use. Someone is terrorizing the faculty and students of the college by sending vicious anonymous letters. The college is terrified of this leaking out to the press and giving education for women a bad name, therefore discretion is vital. Rather relectantly, Harriet accepts and comes down to Oxford to stay for a term. She discovers that the perpetrator is not now satisfied by just sending letters and is moving on to more serious offences like trying to burn the books in the college library, destroy the works of the faculty and eventually attacking certain faculty members. Harriet struggles with the realization that the perpetrator may be a professor as well as with the realization of her growing feelings for Lord Peter Wimsey. The actual unraveling of the mystery is fascinating by itself, but I was particularly intriuged by Sayers taking the opportunity to discuss issues such as society's view towards University education for women, and the need to maintain one's own identity, even in a serious relationship. "Gaudy Night" is therefore a truly feminist work and Harriet's internal struggle between her love for Wimsey and her desire to maintain her independence is something all women can identify with, even today. Although she is hard to like at times, being prickly and sensitive to a fault, we can all sympathize with her predicament. In a nutshell - absolutely fabulous and required reading for all Sayers fans!