As a resident of Cincinnati for almost twenty years, I was pleasantly surprised to find that this book offered walking tours in places I had never been to much less heard of. In addition to the unexpected, this book's greatest strength is in the number of walking tours it offers (almost 60). It is also a great companion book to Cincinnati Observed since it offers walking tours of many suburbs and parks that Cincinnati Observed does not cover. However, for those looking for indepth analysis or history of sights you will be seeing on the walking tour, you may be disappointed since the walking tour descriptions are rather short. Also, many areas of the City of Cincinnati are ignored in favor of outlying suburbs. However, since Cincinnati Observed does such a great job with the walking tours inside the city of Cincinnati and Walking Cincinnati picks up areas not covered by Cincinnati Observed, if both books are used, you will be sure not to miss anything interesting in the City of Cincinnati.

I went on Hike# 49 (Boone County Cliffs State Nature Preserve) and if I hadn't been a local resident I would have NEVER found the place. The book's directions were to look for the turn off 6 miles east of Burlington; it should have said WEST of Burlington. Also, the sign at the small road you are supposed to look for that says "Kentucky Nature Conservancy 1.9 miles" actually is an "adopt-a-highway" sign that indicates that the KY Nature Conservancy has adopted the next 1.9 miles of road, meaning they are responsible for picking up trash along the road. I drove past this sign several times before I realized it was the sign I was supposed to be looking for. Ok, other than that, it was a great hike in a beautiful forest. I'm glad the authors wrote this book, they just need to update it with better directions.

I gave up on this one about half-way through it, a rare occurrence for me. I just decided I didn't really care who did it or why. To me, it reads more like a potential made-for-TV script. No background or motivational stuff going on here, just some characters with some thin dialogue. Honestly thought I would really enjoy it for the Amish setting.

I wasn't too crazy about this book.Maybe it's becaouse I've read so many books about the Amish. That this wasn't really all that great.I felt like the writter could have told us more about the characters then he was letting us know.
Not a favorite but good for some one who has just started to read Amish Fiction books.

I hope Paul Gaus continues on with his Amish work. I am a fan of Amish Lit. and mystery. I have read many books before about the Amish and "their ways" by people who claim to be experts. They are not, but Mr. Gaus is. Right from the begining to the last page, his detail and knowledge, entangled with suspense and intrigue will make you too, a Gaus reader for life. His story lines and characters are easy to follow, and you will not put it down until you are finished.

I became a huge fan of Mr. DeMille after by chance reading "Plum Island." I followed that with "The General's Daughter" (mostly because I wanted to read it before the movie comes out),which I also enjoyed, and now "Spencerville." I was very disappointed with the stupidity of our hero, Keith, and the weakness of our heroinne, Annie. For a retired intelligence officer courted by the President, Keith sure acted stupidly on many occassions. I also kept despising Annie for being another weak female character staying in an unhappy and abusive marriage. Our antaganist, Cliff, fluctuated from being a stupid hick and a "cunning" doer of evil. He would have been more threatening if hewouldn't have been so stupid (but maybe that was a subtle technique to connect Keith and Cliff as spiritual brothers...they're both stupid!) I gave the book three stars because I did want to find out how it ended, which is a tip of the hat to Mr. DeMille. I was, however, shocked to find that after fighting through my frustrations with the characters and their stupidity, that I was rewarded with a few chapters of extreme brutality towards Annie that not only made my stomach turn but was completely out of tone for the rest of the book and for Mr. DeMille himself. The first three quarters of the book had a few moments of the charm that I have come to expect from Mr. DeMille but it was not sustained throughout. I had the impression that he wanted to write a great literary romance and it came off as cheesy. It was a very frustrating and inconsistant read and if it was my first DeMille book I would never have read another. But I have not lost faith and will continue to read the entire DeMille library.

Having just finished reading Spencerville, I can now easily understand why most DeMille fans rate this as their least favorite of all his books. While I'm not saying it's a bad book, because it most certainly isn't, it just doesn't meet the exalted standards that followers of this author have come to expect. With a story involving a love triangle, there was just not enough "meat" there to warrant 481 pages.

To net it out, Keith Landry has been an Army intelligence officer working for our government for the past twenty-five years. With the culmination of the Cold War, many employees in his position are forced into early retirement whether they like it or not. In his case, he didn't like it. With angry and hurt feelings, he heads home to his family's farm in Spencerville, Ohio, which also happens to be the home of his high school/college sweetheart, Annie Prentis. Problems start to arise when he and Annie meet up again, especially since she is now married to the Chief of Police, Cliff Baxter, who also happens to be a former classmate of Keith's. In addition to running the police department, Cliff also runs Annie's life and is depicted as a husband who is not only unfaithful and possessive but verbally, emotionally and sexually abusive as well. It's about time for DeMille's "knight in shining armor" to step in.

While this is definitely not a five star book, I don't think I could ever give a DeMille book less than four stars as his writing and storytelling are so superior to other authors when weaving a tale of espionage, cat and mouse escapades, murder and mayhem or a love triangle such as in Spencerville. Don't get me wrong; this is not your usual love triangle. Since it's told by DeMille, the players are experienced both at subterfuge as well as mind games with the common thread being "the love of a good woman." It gets very scary for awhile since Cliff Baxter is the type of irrational man that just might do anything and Spencerville is just the type of small town where a man like Cliff just might get away with it.

This is the sixth book I've read by this author and I'm glad there's still a few more out there for me to conquer.

There are books that take time to read, books you make time for and books you steal time for. "Spencerville" is in the latter category...it never left my side from the minute I started it and kept me up late.

Great characters, very deeply drawn...both the heroes and villains. I felt I got to know them all. The plot is straight forward, but the journey to its conclusion is fast paced, tense, filled with twists and turns and makes you turn the pages rapidly.

There is enough wry humor, sarcasm and cynicism from the protagonist (Keith Landry) and his allies to allow the reader a chance to relax from the nonstop action...refreshing and almost necessary in a book this lengthy.

The major bad guy (Cliff Baxter) is truly despicable, but devious, dangerous, deadly and cunning (and he wears a badge). It is quite easy hoping he gets what's due him.

I have now read all the novels of Nelson DeMille. Only "Cathedral" was a disappointment. Every other one I highly recommend and still think "The Charm School" is my favorite.

It is obvious that Ms. Dew has great writing talent but the characters in this book are so distasteful that it was difficult for me to read.
The main character, Dinah, is completely self-obsessed and lives her life waiting for the other characters to apologize to her for inconsequential things that happened during her youth.
I wanted to shake Dinah and tell her to move on!

Real writers are hard to find, but Robb Forman Dew is most assuredly one of them. One falls at once into the dream of this book and doesn't leave it until the last page is turned. In scene after scene we meet a most believable family facing the strains of separation and the consequences of poor judgment, facing the complicated tangle of forgiveness. It is a seamless book, a perfect book club book, ripe with beauty, power, and wisdom.

I simply can't recommend this book highly enough! My book club read it, and we are all about the age of the book's protaganist. We all began to realize, as we discussed this amazing book, that we, too, had unintentionally neglected out children--and the other people we love best in the world--while always meaning to do the right thing. We, too, had to learn how to forgive ourselves and our families in order to finally grow up. And we laughed in recognition of our own foibles in the character of Dinah, and her "perfect" friend, Pam, and of poor Martin who misses his family. We are a coed book club, and we try to alternate between "women's" and "men's" books. We decided that this book filled the bill for both! I am so surprised to find negative reviews of this lovely book. It has changed my understanding of my own life!

Atrocious grammar aside, this book is nothing more than pointless ramblings by someone with no credentials as a ghost researcher. Or any type of researcher, for that matter. Everett randomly chooses to mix well-known Ohio ghost stories with third-party accounts without ever telling you where he is getting his information.

Plus, in most cases, Everett has never even visited the locations he is discussing. Opting instead to repeatedly stating that he hopes to visit them one day. And some of the narration regarding places he has visited is laughable. For example, Everett's visit to the infamous Athens Mental Asylum consists of him simply waiting in line with 100s of others as part of a Halloween tour; only to be turned away with the tours were cancelled. Yup, that's it. No ghosts. No cold spots. Not even a glimpse of the legendary "stain" on the floor upstairs. He never even set foot inside the building. And yet Everett felt the need to include it in this book. Why? You'll be asking yourself the same question if you decide to spend your hard-earned money on this book.

Perhaps the two most frightening aspects of this book were discovering that a grown man wrote it and that it wasn't self-published!

The most frightening aspect of this book is how poorly it was written. Anyone who has passed their third-grade grammar class will struggle to get through the first three sentences.

The author, quite simply, is in desperate need of an editor who will throw this work in the author's face. It's not worth the paper it's printed on and certainly not worth its cover price.

Incidentally, the one-star rating is an Amazon requirement. If I could, I'd ask to have the star I gave this book returned.

As a former resident of the Belpre, OH, area, I found this book fascinating. It was a little hard to read in some places but the material more than made up for the difficulty. I certainly hope a sequel is in the works!

This is one of those books where some of the photos are captioned, others are not. This is one of those books where the pictures are on a page generally have nothing to do with the text on the page. You may be reading about the Ohio River in Pennsylvania and see a photo of a power plant in Kentucky. In fact, this book on the "Ohio River" seems to spend most of its time picturing and writing about steel mills and power plants, and railroads. It's very much like the authors assembled a few photos, and 3x5 cards of text, threw them up in the air, and where they landed formed a book.

Having moved to Ohio just four years ago, I came across this book in a local library. The author and photographer actually rode the river from Pittsburg to Cairo where the Ohio meets the Mississippi.

The text and photos reflect their ambling journey -and the two are not necessarily related on each page.

"The Ohio River" shows the river and the people as they once were and as they are. Some photos are exhilarating while others are quit pensive and even sad.

If you are a river enthusiast or a lover of the Ohio, you will want this book for your coffee table.

Having moved to Ohio just four years ago, I came across this book in a local library. The author and photographer actually rode the river from Pittsburg to Cairo where the Ohio meets the Mississippi. The text and photos reflect their ambling journey -and the two are not necessarily related on each page.

"The Ohio River" shows the river and the people as they once were and as they are. Some photos are exhilarating while others are quit pensive and even sad.

If you are a river enthusiast or a lover of the Ohio, you will want this book for your coffee table.

The Bells of Christmas had some parts that were interesting. I would have liked to learn more about the father's handicap. However, it seemed like most of the book passed with Jason sitting by the National Road. Learning about the Road seemed to evoke the most interest from my fifth-grade class. One year of that was enough.

I thought the was very interesting and heart-warming.My favorite part was when Jason and his father went and waited for thier cousins to celebrate Christmas along the National Road.It shows how much love the family shows for each other. By Cynthia Santagata

Have you ever been in one of those conversations where you're talking to a group of people, but what they're saying doesn't quite make sense to you? When it seems like they're talking in a code they understand, but you don't know it? Well, this is their book. There is enough of a story here that you can follow along, but you always get the sense that there's a plot running in the background that the characters know, but you aren't seeing. Some of their conversations and actions don't make sense to you, but seem perfectly normal to them. Amory seems to spend her whole life doing things just because they happen and not because she's really drawn to them. Relationships just seem to spring up for no reason. I suppose it's supposed to be telling that Cady tells Amory many times that she loves her and Amory's only response is, "I know you do". This woman is missing something inside. And the ending left me totally confused. I bought this because the Naiad catalog gave it such a great write up. Maybe they wrote it so that they could get rid of their copies of this book. Maybe it's supposed to be gold because Katherine Forrest, who some people seem to treat as the goddess of lesbian literature, edited it. I just wish all of the copies had sold out before I ever had a chance to order it.

For me it was one of those books that you can't put down. The story of a girl discovering herself through life. Amory had lived with her "aunt" all her life, not knowing anything about her past. After her aunt's death, she discovered a picture that seemed all too familiar to her, so familiar that she couldn't imagine why. Her life continues as she goes to college, explores her attraction to women, but the only thing that can free her from the fear of truly allowing herself to be who she is will be knowing about her past. Great writing from the author, the chacacters are real and the story compeling.

FOWL PLAY is the kind of well-written, satisfying average mystery that keeps us one-a-day mystery addicts going. I would give it a "C+" which is not a bad grade for a first novel; Patricia Tichenor Westfall is better at her craft than many much more experienced writers. The four aspects of this small town mystery that particularly interested me were her sleuth Molly West (an intelligent and believable 50+), her elder characters (especially the admirable and independent 70+ Louella), her never-cutesy use of Appalachian folk culture (yes, sometimes Molly's husband Ken gets a little talky, but it's interesting talk and believable coming from a Soc prof), and her portrayal of the lives of the working poor. I look forward to reading future books in this series.

Molly West is an ex-Chicagoan accountant, transplanted to southern Ohio due to her husband's position as a sociology professor at the nearby college. Although they have lived there for fifteen years, they are still considered outsiders by the Appalachian community. Although not an outstanding mystery, I found myself engrossed in learning more about the Appalachian culture. Ms Westfall enlightens the reader about the ways of the hill people. Her next book, Mother of the Bride, also a Molly West mystery, is even more enjoyable.

I agree with a couple of the previous reviews. This book was just packed with perfect people who always have perfect, politically correct, supportive reactions to EVERYTHING that is thrown their way. It is so boring because it is so predictable. Every character will always do the best possible thing. I could not connect with any of them. They seemed inhuman and unrealistic. I read Haien's The All of It and enjoyed that short novel, but Matters of Chance has nothing to recommend.

My book club read Haien's THE ALL OF IT and loved it. I was looking forward to another excellent book, but I was very disappointed. I didn't connect with any of the characters and I especially didn't care for the wartime descriptions; they didn't seem realistic. The twins were not characterized well; I didn't feel I knew them. Too much time passed, too quickly for any real feelings to develop. I have to admit I just skimmed the last half of the book to see what the big mystery re: the twins was. And that was anticlimatic. I liked the first novel so much better. It hardly seems to be the same author.

My only words to describe my experience was to a dear friend who also read this extraordinary novel and my words were "Okay, now what do I do". It left me feeling as if any other book I would read would pale in comparison.