This book is a ghosted autobiography of Bratton. The writing isn't as bad as some of the reviewers have suggested. It is a book that can be read in an evening. The strategies suggested by Bratton are now well known and have become the flavor of the month in the United States. To keep a neighborhood presence and to prevent the development of crime, rather than to react to the commission of more serious crime. To use technology to focus on problem areas and to maximize the police resources.

Bratton is very much the sort of person who once in job does not seem to accept things but rather wants to change things around so as to achieve different results. The interesting things are in a way left unsaid. Bratton joined the Boston Police Force after a three month stint in Vietnam as a Military Policeman. He relates how Boston at that time had significant corruption. Further a large number of police officers were lazy and avoided work. In the book there is not the slightest suggestion that Bratton as a junior police officer did anything about these things. In fact the first real outrage in the book is a passage about how outrageous it is that people urinate in the street, use language and so forth. One of Bratton's claims to fame is his focus on what has come to be known as zero tolerance policing. That is the belief that by preventing low level crime neighborhoods are protected from the development of a criminal culture. Such an approach has angered some groups in the States as it is argued that such policing styles are targeted against disadvantaged people.

The failure to act against other police in his early career is something, which is easy to understand. He as a junior police officer would not have had the power to alter entrenched patterns of behavior and he would have ended up in another profession. If some one such as Bratton was not able to act against corruption in his early years one can understand the immensity of the problem. Bratton is clearly and intelligent man with considerable drive and one who is committed to honest policing. His powerlessness as a younger man shows the importance of developing ways to ensure that police culture is monitored so the community can be protected.

If you're interested in the topic of police management, and effective police work in the community, this is a terrific book. Bratton is a very straightforward type, which makes him a terrific police administrator, and (with the help of an excellent co-author) not bad at explaining situations. Especially the complicated and tense problems of politics at high levels where a bad quote or misplaced humor can end one's career. Most fascinating to me were the chapters on how he turned around crime in the New York Subways when he was head of their special police force. Paying attention to small crimes, like fare evasion, made a huge difference. He also figured out how to back his men and help them work effectively. His accomplishment in reducing crime in New York City, helping police be effective and more honest, is extremely important. We hope to publish a Polish translation next year.

What an ego!!! But to be honest, perhaps Bratton deserves to toot his horn. Although I never worked for him, my cousin served under him when he was Chief of Transit Police in NYC. She loved him. He got her the Glock semiautomatic sidearm, he changed the look of the Transit Police and he reduced subway crime during the peak of New York's crime wave. I guess it took me a while to get to Bratton's book, but I'm glad I finally did. The question is: Is William Bratton a great cop, or a great politician? Perhaps he's both.

I concur with the other reviewers in general (I don't want to repeat the basic statements), but wanted to point out my defining moment of shock, not to say incomprehension, over Felix's crack-up. Why on earth did this occur? He is shown as being on top of things, when Enid has to have an abortion --- all described so well ---- and then, with no real explanation, JCO tells us "In early March it began..." Why?

Suddenly,he becomes (glibly?) like the old boxing bum he despised, and so disintegrates. The old bum is even able to spot him in a restroom and do him over(!). Sorry, but I just lost touch with the book at this point. I finished it, because so much of what had gone before was excellent. Lyle Stevick, especially. JCO certainly got inside male characters in a way most women who write do not. This was particularly so over the effect sports have on men who practise them (as opposed to sitting on their rear ends watching...). Perhaps JCO should have taken up boxing...

As you can see, I really liked the book up to the point where JCO (not Felix) loses it. I almost felt as if I was watching some other writer take over her character and proceed to write him out, sans perception. This is a vintage book, now, so I don't suppose many people will post this page, but I write FWIW and IMHO, as they say.

That said, dear potential reader, do buy it in paperback. It's worth it.

FGH

Joyce Carol Oates is a gifted writer, and although I enjoyed this book because of its attention to detail, that detail was also one of the aspects I didn't like. I was impressed with Ms. Oates study and expertise of boxing, but I also found it detracting to the story, at times. Still, this is a good book and worth the read.

I read this book a number of years ago and I can still remember, vividly, what the story is about--the characters--the setting. I took to watching boxing for a while after I read it, not the big title matches but the small town boys going at it dreaming of fame. Thanks to Ms. Oates' love for boxing I found a new way to see this "sport". But that is not what I remember most. I remember a character who is nothing short of a despicable, who does evil, unspeakable things and who I was made to care about. I don't think he will ever leave me...I couldn't forget him if I tried. Reading Oates can make you a more compassionate person--if you want her to our not. What a gift. Read the book, you won't be sorry you did--and, it is my guess that you too will remember this one.

I'm a journalist, publisher and Christian, quite concerned about the role of the mass media in the world today. I bought this book hoping for insight into how to respond to the media. Instead, I was dismayed to find a paranoid attack on the Times, which assumes that its leadership, if not entire staff, is consciously promoting an anti-Christian moral code. Proctor endlessly argues his own conclusions, which is ultimately hypocritical, since his words make it clear that he is pushing a conservative agenda and he assumes that anything that disagrees with it is biased.

There are seeds of truth about the media throughout the book, which might inspire critical thinking by mature Christians who have substantial media knowledge. But Proctor is not that sort of deep thinker. He is a cheerleader for those who would swallow simple-minded conclusions, starting with the notion that responsibility for changes in public attitudes over the last few decades "must in large part be laid squarely at the feet of the mass media."

Proctor fundamentally goes astray in his assumption of *intent* on the part of the Times. In fact, no one had to plan to create a moral code; the implicit moral code in the mass media is the result of a society that puts faith in free markets to be an infalliable source of truth. By demonizing the Times, Proctor neglects the reality that human institutions *always* fall short of the truth. In an eagerness to place blame, he fails to see how the mass media could become a force of evil, in which we all share responsibility, unless people consciously chose to make it one. Proctor shows that he worships free speech and free markets -- the mass media's justifications -- more than God.

The subtitle -- "How the world's most powerful news organization shapes your mind and values" -- barely begins to pay tribute to the book's arrogant and often illogical over-simplifications.

Bottom line: Ignore it unless you plan to treat it as Proctor (correctly, I fear) says we should regard the Times: with great skepticism.

This book should be studied by every high-school civics class. It's among the most useful and incisive studies of the print media's "idea" (or intellectual) content.

This book is not so much about familiar "liberal bias" claims; rather, it shows what the New York Times does goes beyond simple bias, to a conscious, deliberate, planned attack on opposing world-views with the goal of substituting its own set of absolute values.

A decision to engage in propaganda often arises from a strong set of beliefs or vested interests. Since the average person today has shallow or non-existent personal philosophies (generally developed by cobbling together beliefs based on what gratifies preconceptions one isn't even aware of), true-believers with convictions can often convince non-believers easily.

But if you understand the propagandists presuppositions -- those things he assumes are true, often without even realizing it -- and can identify and understand links to other organizations and philosophies, you will be in a better position to recognize the pattern, evaluate which assumptions are in play, and thus the correctness of the message.

This book can therefore serve as an excellent guide to fostering critical thinking when it comes to modern media, through its examination of the most powerful news organization in the world, the New York Times. Nearly all journalists determine what is important and 'the angle' from the NYT, thus extending it's influence to the smallest town or largest cable network.

The author shows how the beliefs of a handful of people are able to shape perceptions of reality in hundreds of millions by implanting assumptions in the public via decisions of what types of stories are important, headlines, picture selection, subtly slanted writing and the placement of opinion-shaping stories cloaked as news reports. Sheer persistent repetition is able to completely change the thinking and values of a public lacking intellectual foundations.

30 years ago, who could have even imagined the Boy Scouts would be banned from public schools that now dispense condoms? Or the country would be managing its own dissolution by allowing the importation of 3rd world populations exceeding the size of France in just 10 years? And that criticism of such things is called "controversial" (if not a "hate-crime"!) and can ruin people? Curious about how the complete inversion of right and wrong could be engineered within a single generation? Read this book.

The author also looks at conflicts of interest, giving examples where organizations the New York TImes had a direct undisclosed financial interest in were at the center of its reporting and editorializing to its benefit; the link between the NYT and the Pulitzer Prize committee which returns so many awards to it; the many examples in which Culture Creep techniques were used to alter public morality by using "the opinion piece in disguise", "the editorial blast", "the op-ed hit piece", and "the bombardment".

The author identifies the set of fundamentalist beliefs the New York Times promotes; "The Sin of Religious Certainty", "The Sin of Conservatism", "The Sin of Capital Punishment", "The Sin of Broken Public Trust", "The Second of the Second Amendment", the "Sin of Censorship", "The Sin of Limiting Abortion".

The NYT also defines certain cultural spirits as being positive: globalism, multiculturalism, total sexual freedom, environmentalism, entitlement, scientism and humanism.

The book analyzes coverage of stories ranging from the Columbine shooting to election coverage; both the coverage content, slanting, comparison of stories with the actual events, and statistical studies of the word usage and counts.

The book is well-written. Afterward, one can hardly read the New York Times without laughing, assuming you took it seriously before.

For example, two days ago I read in the NYT that public belief in the existence of absolute right and wrong, jumping to 38% after the Sep 11 attack, had now declined to "normal"; 22%. The message was "religion back to normal". Apparently, this was thought by the NYT a matter needing polling. Those religious leaders who had earlier remarked about the rebirth of religion in America could now be shown as wrong while simultaneously emphasizing how "religious certainty" was once again a declining minority. The effect of the attack, which reawakened patriotic sentiments and threatened the Times belief system, was now waning. Back to business as usual.

Of course, if you read the polling question, results would actually have to be 100% of the public believe in absolutes. If you think there is no absolute right or wrong, that belief itself is a claim to an absolute truth; a claim to be right.

But, two days later, USA Today picked up on the NYT priority, incoherent as it is, and ran it's own piece on the same subject, echoing the marching orders, as did countless other papers around the country and world. In this way, opinions are remolded in a specific direction without regard to reality.

Excellent book. It is amazing how so many people are lead down a predetermined path by the media. Just like the book says, everyone is afraid of being called uneducated or intolerant therefore they mindlessly mouth the same message delivered by the mainstream press. Just like sheep. They blindly follow the leader. Ignore the Media. Think For Yourself. (...)

It is rare to find a book such as Joe Gould's Secret and even rarer still that through reading it, one would fall in love with such a irritating, grubby, vile little man as Gould. But love it was - certainly not at first sight but as I began to learn his history and then finally his secret, my heart just gave way.

Joe Gould was a well known "vagrant" in New York's Greenwhich Village during the early and mid 1900's. During his years as a bohemian in New York he met many people, some famous (such as ee cummings and Ezra Pound) and many more equally interesting yet unknown people. Through his many friends and detractors he drew the attention of a young reporter, Joseph Mitchell, who interviewed him for a piece in the New Yorker.

The book contains the two pieces that Joseph Mitchell wrote for the New Yorker about Joe Gould and his unpublished work, rumored to be ten times larger than the bible (over 10 million words), The Oral History. The more I read the more I craved to know more about Joe Gould and his life.

I highly recommend this book as it is a true snapshot into the life of someone who deserves to be known. Joseph Mitchell truly captured the feel of New York and inner workings of Joe Gould and his crazy life.

Apparently, 11 dime-store composition books that make up a nearly 150,000-word diary (part of his Oral History)are quietly tucked away within NYU's archives in NYC - I can't wait to get a look at them as well!

Live on Joe Gould!

Joseph Mitchell was a legendary, and legendarily eccentric, writer for The New Yorker. Disparate things fascinated him: the Fulton Fish Market, gypsies, bums in the Bowery, New York's architecture, the men who worked the Hudson River. Mitchell would immerse himself in the lives of the people who held his attention, and during the 1940s and 1950s he turned out a series of New Yorker stories that are unique in American literary nonfiction.

"Joe Gould's Secret," the book, is an anthology of two New Yorker pieces. The first, "Professor Seagull," ran in the magazine in 1942. The second, "Joe Gould's Secret" (the article) ran in two parts in 1964. The first was an affectionate profile of a Harvard-educated down-and-outer named, of course, Joe Gould, who was a well-known and much-tolerated bum in Greenwich Village. The second piece expanded on the first, again portraying Mr. Gould, but also detailing the strange story of Mr. Gould's "Oral History of Our Times."

Joe Mitchell turns his acute eye for detail (and his remarkable patience) on Joe Gould, and writes with grace and humor. Mr. Mitchell had an acute ear, as well, and let's Mr. Gould speak for himself for page after page. The pieces in this book are exquisitely crafted, and all the more poignant for Joe Mitchell's secret: Not long after publishing the last word on Joe Gould, Mr. Mitchell ceased publishing. He came to The New Yorker every day, and claimed to be working on a long piece year after year, but never ushered a word of it into print. To my knowledge, no one knows (or at least no one has said) what the piece was to be, and why Mr. Mitchell could not seem to finish it.

An extraordinary book by an extraordinary writer.

Reading anything by Joseph Mitchell is a goldmine of pleasure and "Joe Gould's Secret" is no different: a fascinating profile of a well-known Greenwich Village eccentric. Joe Gould was, for upwards of thirty-five years, a homeless dropout living from day to day on his wits and handouts from any sympathetic ear, whether friends or strangers. The two parts of the book, headed Professor Seagull, and Joe Gould's Secret, first appeared in the New Yorker in 1942 and 1964.The son of a medical practitioner, Harvard-educated Gould arrived in New York in 1916 and soon dismissed all thought of holding down a steady job when he had a flash of inspiration to write what he called "An Oral History of Our Times". He decided any form of regular employment would be detrimental to his thinking. Over many years, Gould would add daily to this work "in progress" ("about a dozen times as long as the bible") even when badly hung over; loading his fountain pen in the Village post office, scribbling in grubby, dog-eared school exercise books in parks, doorways, cafeterias, Bowery flophouses, subway trains and in public libraries, some of these hangouts also serving as places to doss - alternatives to the floor of an artist friend's studio or a subway station. 270 filled notebooks had been stored in numerous drops for safekeeping until the work was completed. When a publisher friend of Mitchell asked to see the material, with a view to publishing a book of selections, an indignant Gould declared that the material would either be published in its entirety or "not at all".

Mitchell, intrigued by the "Oral History" idea, wrote a compassionate profile of Gould showing much patience and sensitivity in his dealings with his subject with whom he spent an inordinate amount of time. Scruffy in appearance, wearing cast-offs, often unwashed for days at a time, all the time dogged by "homelessness, hunger and hangovers", ("I'm the foremost authority in the U.S.A. on the subject of doing without") Gould's norm was to hang around bars and diners in the Village cadging food, money and drinks from friends, visiting tourists and other regular contributors to the "Joe Gould Fund". He survived on a diet of fresh-air, dog-ends, strong black coffee, fried egg sandwiches and bottles of diner-bar ketchup supped off a plate. ("the only grub I know that's free of charge") Once asked what made him as he is today, Gould answered it was all down to a strong distaste for material possessions, Harvard, and years on end of bad living on cheap booze and grub "beating the living hell out of my insides".

Things took a turn for the better for Gould when a secret benefactor, informed of Gould's plight and worsening health, paid for his room and board at a cheap hotel for upwards of three years. When the subsidy was suddenly cut-off without explanation, however, Gould reverted to the flophouses in the Bowery that were handy for the Village. Thereafter, Gould spiralled rapidly downwards. He died in 1957 whereupon Mitchell, who knew as much as anyone about the "Oral History", was persuaded to join a Committee set up to organise the collection of the mass of scattered material that made up "An Oral History of Our Times".

If you enjoy "Joe Gould's Secret", read also "McSorley's Wonderful Saloon", a marvellous collection of profiles of old-time New York characters in a New York that is no longer.

This excellent manual shows some of the care and thought that went into Fowler's, Modern English Usage first published in an Oxford University edition of the 1920's. Newer writers have filled the need to update old Fowler and "Americanize" the examples without markedly changing the rules of our language. In this respect, the present authors Siegal and Connelly have done a great job of updating everything that crossed their desks. It was revealing to see, for example, the use of MIRV in two conflicting applications. Also, the small caps font for related entries is very useful.
Yet, I am frustrated; the glossy cover conceals an unfortunate economy in its production. The paper reminds me of pulp novel stock and the binding of these 369 pages which will be well-thumbed, is likely to fall apart if the pages are opened for the book to rest flat on a table. The print size is fairly small, but most important, the print is weak, the paper greyish -- a hard combination to live with. If you have any vision problem, you will need to read this with a strong light.
The thoughtfully presented Foreword (yes, this book has a Foreword well worth reading) with its well-chosen examples of style is excellent -- on any kind of paper!

It's difficult, if not impossible, to produce an error-free text, even after more than one edition, but when it's more than a spelling or language error, it's worthy of mention: Entries for both Fahrenheit and Celsius should give conversions to each other, but the Fahrenheit does not convert to Celsius; you'll have to reverse the math yourself.

If you are going to use this as a frequent reference, opt for the hard-cover edition.

As a copywriter, I have relied on the earlier edition of the NY Time Manual, not only as an easily used guide to style and usage, but as an acceptable authority my clients and I can share. Inevitably, questions come up in commercial writing, and the Times Manual is a readily available arbiter we can turn to for the answers. It saves a lot of time and aggravation.

I wish I had known about this book ten years ago. It's got almost everything I need, as a newsletter editor and technical writer. I love it and use it every day.

Strengths: In-depth explanation of hyphenation with prefixes (pre-, in-, under-), very useful for a technical writer.
Flaws: It's got a strong NY regional focus (to be expected) and omits some useful words such as "hitchhike".

I back it up with the AP stylebook and Fowler's Modern English Usage.

I did not like the book because it skip around too much between characters. I could not understand the characters. It wasn't really abour roller skating. I just wanted to read about roller skating.

I don't remember the first time I read this book or, rather, had it read to me. But I'm 24 now and I probably re-read it every 18 months or so. It's just that good.

Lucinda is one of the best characters in children's literature. She's not a beautiful girl (though you can tell she'll grow into a striking and riveting woman), but she's got an entirely generous spirit and energy saved up from a lifetime of restraint. She manages to have both entirely unique and exciting experiences that few people would (or should) ever share and to make everyday things into adventures. What's more, through the book she truly grows and changes, not any more than a girl of 10 years old should, but just enough.

Her adventures bring to life 1890s New York, both familiar as the city we know now and completely different in scale. One amazing thing, if you think about it, is that this book is set just about 15 or 20 years after the first of Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books, so perhaps Laura was a young married woman during Lucinda's orphan year. And yet think of the difference in the lives they lived! You wouldn't think it was the same country, even.

It's true that there are some difficult parts in this book. Lucinda does lose friends, one of them violently. But, speaking as someone with a clear memory of being read this book as a child, it's handled so as not to be traumatizing. Lucinda doesn't fully understand or absorb her friend's murder; neither did I, because it's so sensitively written that as a child you realize only that something awful has happened that you _shouldn't_ quite understand. If you tend to underestimate your children, if you want to "protect" them from being thinking people able to live fully in the world, you may want to protect them from this book. My parents thought more of me, and I'm glad of it. Lucinda has been a great friend to me.

This book is a charming book about a charming child and her adventures over a year. There is a serious and sad side to the book as well, as there is to any life, but overall the story is wonderful.

First let me say that I am a huge Jeffrey Deaver fan. He is definitely one of the top three in my eyes but this book left a lot to be desired. It was a struggle to get through it and it was way too predictable compared to his other novels that have trademark twists and turns. I did appreciate the historical nature of the novel and learning more about Hell's Kitchen. However, I was overall disappointed with the novel's content.

The story begins when Ettie Washington, an old black lady is arrested and stands accused of hiring an arsonist to burn down the building where she lives, the neighborhood of Hell's Kitchen in New York City. John Pellam, who was interviewing her during the making of a film about this particular place, finds difficult to believe that she is the culprit and starts to investigate who is behind the fire.

From then on Deaver sets a very complicated and intertwined plot, which I have found at some points difficult to follow in terms of the relationships between the different characters and situations, because he was continuously adding too many confusing elements, he went wavering without a precise course in sight.

Nevertheless, though the plot somewhat faltered, this book has a terrific ending, masterly crafted, where Deaver speeds up and goes at full steam employing all his ingenious trademark resources and his greatest writing skills, which I have found in some of his other books; many ingenious twists and turns, the sudden comeback of a villain and a great ability to explain everything so as not leave loose ends.

This book has his ups and downs and changes speeds like a roller coaster, my four stars ?, one for the plot and three for the ending !!!!

John Pellam is a former stuntman and location scout filming an oral history of New York's Hell's Kitchen. While working on the documentary he meets Ettie Washington, a septuagenarian who lived in that New York City area for most of her life. They get together for several days a week where Pellam records Ettie's memories of life in Hell's Kitchen. One day on his way to see Ettie, John witnesses her building being engulfed by flames. Ettie manages to escape but gets arrested shortly thereafter on suspicion of arson and insurance fraud. The police have strong circumstantial evidence against Ms. Washington and they plan to indict her for the death of one of the building's tenants. Pellam is not convinced of her guilt and he will do everything in his power to prove her innocence.

During the course of his investigation he meets several characters that show life in Hell's Kitchen. Carol Wyandotte is a pessimistic social worker that does not have any hope for the youth living in that area. Roger McKennah is a real estate developer who wants to replace the tenements with new buildings. Sonny is a pyromaniac who is burning buildings all over Ettie's neighborhood for some mysterious motive that will be made clear later in the novel. There are other secondary characters that help bring the book to life, everything from Irish gangs to male prostitutes. Everyone has a story to tell and they make sure John hears all about it.

Jeffery Deaver (or William Jefferies) gives a bleak portrait of this infamous New York area. There is a sense of hopelessness and despair shown throughout the book. It has an interesting plot and it was just recently nominated for an Edgar Award for Best Paperback Mystery Novel. The author's work had certain twists and turns that surprised me as a reader. I strongly recommend this book but be warned, it is a downer. Hopefully the next book I read will lift my spirits.

Alejandro Monahan is the son of a NY cop and Mexican Indian mother. The old man "retired" to raise his family in the Baja and was killed by drug lords tied to the title drug. Alejandro is now a sexy club singer and also Chilebean, a deep cover agent with the NYPD looking to avenge his father's death.

Ther characters are great: Che-Che, Roberto Barrios and Pizzaro on the drug side; Too Tall Paulie, Sal Elia and Joey the G-man for the cops. You're never sure who's the real boss is or where the line between undercover agents and the drug business is drawn. Amidst a lot of action Alejandro convinces Che-Che he can guarantee safe importation of heroine using a military guided parachute technology.

With 100 pages to go, the shipment has landed and the multiple Cleopatra lines develop: the drug, the queen and a woman whose father called her that. I had it at five stars until the end, which was just too Hollywood and dropped it down to four. A lousy ending, but an otherwise great cop / druggie story.

I'm used to reading page turners. There were too many characters in this book and I found it a bit hard to catch up to them, and who was the good guy or the bad guy. However, there were plenty of action going on enough to make this book into a movie--people getting shot and killed, cars blowing up, etc., drug abuse, sex, blood everywhere, and ridiculous spy devices put inside genital orifice unheard of in real life. I wasn't too happy about the ending and I thought the Alejandro character wasn't appropriate. A latin singer and a cop? Come one! I found that tacky!

Author and former lieutenant of the NYPD Caunitz is the best of the police procedureal novelists, the most innovative, and one writer who gives you uncensored dialogue. You recognize it as fact; he's been there. His other books tell stories from the police side of things. This one tells about the narcotic trade from the inside as the reader follows the dangerous life of a detective who goes undercover. There is a crushing anaconda, a mysterious feminine killer, and much more. Novelists are able to deduct travel from their income tax which is why we see so many exotic locations in these books and this one is no exception. Some authors end up sounding like travel writers but Caunitz makes it work. Other thriller writers have achieved more fame but no one makes police/detective stories LIVE the way this author does. Try it, you'll like it.

After all the rave reviews, I couldn't wait to start this book. What a disappointment it was. I found the characters shallow and totally unlikeable, the plot impossible to follow, and in general....just a boring book. I read to the end but now I don't know why I bothered.

Superstar author William Bernhardt here assembles a cast of fellow mystery stars to provide an entertaining legal tale that shows the positives and negatives of collaborative novels.

First, the positives--Collaborative novels are hot! Few things are as intriguing as multiple popular authors under one cover. The reader is able to sample the works of authors s/he may not have read before along with old favorites.

All of the authors included in this book are top-flight stars. Bernhardt starts this novel with a bang, laying out the murder mystery and primary characters in light fashion. Each subsequent author then adds to the plot and adds a new twist of his/her own. In the final chapter, Bernhardt then wraps up all the loose ends of this convulted tale, solves the whodunit, and ensures a happy ending. The plot moves along well and the book can be easily read in a day or two.

The negatives?--Many of the same things that will make some people love this book. Because each author has unique style and views of where the plot should go, the tale can flow very unevenly. Characters likable in previous chapters become villainous in later chapters. Details presented in earlier chapters become inconsequential later in the story. This will disappoint readers more accustomed to a favorite author. Perhaps a previously agreed-upon plot outline may have minimized some of this confusion.

Overall, however, collaborative novels are written as novelty -- fundraising for the Nature Conservancy in this case. While this novel isn't superior in its quality, it is a whole lot of fun and it has definitely introduced me to some mystery writers that I may not have sought out otherwise. This book is well worth the time.

While ostensibly a "legal thriller" about the death of a tycoon, in reality this book reads more like a zany combo of chase movie/murder mystery, with a lethal cross-dressing assassin targeting one character after another. The authors then throw in adulterous rich people, a secret organization avenging corporate misdeeds, a giant pet rabbit with a hi-tech secret, and a defense-attorney heroine with a secret benefactor. A group of famous mystery writers each wrote a chapter of this book, whose profits benefit the Nature Conservancy (hence the title), with each chapter throwing in a new plot twist and ending in a cliff-hanger, until the hilarious end. Might make a lively TV movie, and definitely makes for a fast, fun read.

vice cop which is based on a true story,tells the life of bill mcarthy,a tough irish-american cop who wont give in to corruption.the book takes place in the 70's in a pimp infested new york city.the author mike mallowe takes us from bill mcarthy's first experience as a cop in public morals division,to the climax where an event changes the way the nypd operates now.an inside look into the life of corrupt cops and the cops that try to bring them down,filled with pimps,gambling,murders and the mafia.a good read.

I'm a ninth grader at West Orange- Stark High School. My english teacher assigned my class a research project over anyone who we were interested in. After taking many people into consideration, I chose this one because it is what I am most interested in. I found it to be interesting. From what I have read about Bill McCarthy, he seems to me to be a very heroic person who delt with some of the worst situations a policeman would go through. I could sometimes just picture myself there as he used great imagry to take the reader through good and bad situations. Before reading this book I personaly didn't know much about a cops life. I thought a cop was just someone with a special suit who pulled people over for speeding and shot at the "bad guys". Now I understand more of what a cop has to go through everyday. I highly recomend this book to anyone who is interested.

As a former student of Professor McCarthy's I found this book to be everything he had ever said and taught me in class. The book details the struggles and problems with dealing with the criminal element and a corrupt hierarchy of beuracracy. Very well done.