If I recall correctly, this was the second of Clayton Rawson's four detective novels featuring The Great Merlini, a famous magician, as a crime-solver, and it has many of the same persons as the first one, Death from a Top Hat. Rawson's great idea was that the locked-room mysteries were a sort of magic tricks, so what would be more natural than having a magician as a detective?

I found this novel very funny, fast-moving and enjoyable to read, as long as you didn't take it very seriously (as the name implies, murderer seems to have left footprints in the ceiling!). What was disappointing, was the actual solutions to several mysteries the book had to offer. They all seemed either too far-fetched or too simple.

However, I would recommend this and other Rawson's books (especially to already-mentioned Death from a Top Hat) to all the fans of humoristic locked-room mysteries in the style of John Dickson Carr/Carter Dickson (whose great admirer and friend Rawson was).

WR Grace is infamous for polluting the environment in which it does business as seen in the book "A Civil Action" by Jonathan Harr and also by its ongoing asbestos litigation involving asbestos products made from its Cambridge,Mass facility. Grace is a politically astute company and Republican party supporter. In addition, it has had prominent members of the high Finance and Intelligence communities on its Board of Directors.

This is a very nice coffee table book by Peter Clayton. It features many beautiful photos of classical art, and descriptions of the major figures from various world mythologies. This book is NOT by Joseph Campbell, however it does include an excerpt from 'Hero With A Thousand Faces' as an introduction.

this text is too basic for most orthopaedic surgeons. even as a student i found it paltry.

I think it gives you very good ideas. But the way they are presented is too conventional, a little boring I would say. I would'n buy it again.

Aleytys' quest for her mother's homeworld and her stolen son must wait, while she saves yet another world from its exploitative imperialists. "The Company" has recently changed its trade policies toward the cludair people of the rainforest and the cerdd of the plains. Aleytys must rely on her diplomacy, psi ability, and the cast of characters in the diadem interwoven into her head and mind. In a city where a woman's place is in the bed she must contend with company spies, pimps, and a man who hunts the ancient parasite that could level the world of Maeve.

This isn't a bad book. It isn't a good book. It just seems pretty standard issue. There aren't any surprises in the story line and I found the artwork to be somewhat stilted. However, if you're a fan of magic and mayhem, check it out.

Severance pay allows some insight on the evils of the coporate world. Sexism, racism, protection of self and the overall struggle for power are all addressed in this novel. Severance pay is easy to read and interesting even though some of the technical jargon of the computer world may loose some. Get the book and enjoy!!!

This book has many of the author's strengths: vivid visual description, intensely detailed societies, interesting interpersonal relationships. It also has some of her weaknesses: overly exotic words and names, characters with too much power, characters speaking in nonsense syllables far too much of the time. The sequel to Wild Magic, Wildfire concerns Faan's ongoing search for her mother and her struggle to control her increasingly powerful firestarting magic. Some of the characters, particularly Sabuse and Varney, are not as well drawn as they probably deserve, and I got tired of Faan's adolescent temper. There's also a huge plot inconsistency concerning a black horse which does, or doesn't, get eaten by woodfolk. Despite all that, I found the book to be original, lively and generally a fun read.

As a student, I thought the C++ Master Reference would be a great find, but after looking through it, I took it back for a refund. You get just as much help (and often better) from the Visual C++ help CD as you do from this text.

Plus, I must agree with the reviews of the others that say that this book is NOT ANSI compliant. The book states on the cover "Fully ANSI Compliant", which is extremely misleading!

For example, the book lists the functions stricmp, strupr, and strlwr as being part of string.h These functions are not ANSI standard at all, and are in fact Microsoft Visual C++ specific.

True, most of the ANSI stuff is there, but to call the book "fully ANSI compliant" is VERY misleading to say the least. It would not be so bad if the non-standard functions were clearly labeled, but they are not.

Thus, you can use about 70-80% of the functions on UNIX, but with many, it's hit and miss.

If you want to be a real C++ programmer who relies on industry standard instead of proprietary functions, eschew this book.

Pick up a copy of the ANSI C++ standard instead.

I have to say, after reading all the other reviews, and perusing the book myself. I feel inclined to side with the folks who think this book is misleading.

I especially do not like the line on the title that states "Fully ANSI C++ Compliant". I find this severly misleading. It has the ANSI items covered, but does not bother to label what is and is not ANSI standard.

This is very important to me as a student.

For example, the book lists the functions stricmp, strupr, strlwr. These functions are not part of the ANSI standard library. They only exist in the Microsoft C++ compiler, or on other proprietary compilers who choose to implement them.

True, 60-70% of the book is probably ANSI standard and will port to UNIX or some other platform, but much of it WON'T, and is not labeled except in patches here or there, which is a disservice to the reader.

Sorry, I was drawn to the book when I first saw it, but you get much better information by typing the keyword in Visual C++ and pressing F1. Or go download a copy of the C++ ANSI Standard.

As a knowledgable C++ programmer, I bought this book in the hopes of having an end-all reference manual. What I got was an excellently indexed book of mistakes. I've never seen so many errors in descriptions, examples, and usages as this book has. I've even found instances where a description for a call was an exact duplicate of an earlier call's description (cut and paste) but had nothing what-so-ever to do with the call it now described. I managed to give it 2 stars only because it is accurate MOST of the time.