When I saw the title I knew it applied to my life and my relationship with my elderly mother. As I turned each page I had the vague sense that someone had been eavedropping during the time she was living in our household. "Toxic" described her interaction with everyone who cared about her. This book preserved my mental health! It contains clear descriptions of the toxic personality and gives guidelines for dealing with people who have this world view. If you are struggling with a difficult sibling, spouse, or parent, read this book. Protect yourself from this condition.

This book is wonderful!!!!!!! It was as if Davenport knew my mother when she wrote this book. I am very happy that I got to read this book. It has made me very aware of my own toxicity. I now know there is some hope for me to change. Oh my God I am very luck to have been able to read this book ...

Real solutions and insightful advice for dealing with difficult elders. Dysfunctional families struggle with these individuals for a lifetime, now they can learn how to manage them. Another excellent book on this subject, written with a humorous slant is "Elder Rage."

I looked for a long time to find a book strictly on rigid hettle weaving, looking even at the weaving shop where I learned to weave. I was starting to believe that no one had written a book on this piece of equipment I had bought. I found her book very good for beginning weavers such as myself. It goes through putting the warp on the hettle to having small projects to take you through creating woven pieces.When you don't have a teacher available, or need a refresher, this is a very good book.

Being mostly a self taught weaver, when I put out the money for a really nice rigid heddle loom, I bought this book. It took me through all the basics with ease. I've made several of the projects with wonderful results (the shawl is especially nice). This book will continue to be a valuable resource for me.

This book contains a collection of essays about the makings of a great leader. Some essays, particularly the one about emotional intelligence, I found invaluable. Others, were interesting, but not new news.

This is one in a series of volumes of articles which previously appeared in the Harvard Business Review. They offer direct and relatively inexpensive access to cutting-edge thinking on a major business subject. This volume provides eight essays, each preceded by an "Executive Summary." The first selection "What Makes a Leader?") was written by Daniel Goleman, author of Emotional Intelligence, Working with Emotional Intelligence, and the most recently published Primal Leadership. After years of wide and deep experience with all manner of executives, Goleman has found that "the most effective leaders are alike in one crucial way: they all have a high degree of what has come to be known as emotional intelligence [which Goleman asserts] is the sine qua non of leadership." He then identifies and briefly discusses what he calls "The Five Components of Emotional Intelligence at Work": Self-Awareness. Self-Regulation, motivation, empathy, and Social Skill." These are the titles and authors of the other seven essays:

"Narcissistic Leaders: The Incredible Pros, the Inevitable Cons" (Michael Maccoby)

"Leadership That Gets Results" (Goleman)

NOTE: Those especially interested in this subject are urged to check out Bossidy and Charan's Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done (June 2002).

"Getting the Attention You Need" (Thomas H. Davenport and John C. Beck)

NOTE: Davenport and Beck later developed their ideas in much greater depth in The Attention Economy.

"The Successor's Dilemma" Dan Ciampa and Michael Watkins)

"The Rise and Fall of the J. Peterman Company" (John Peterman)

NOTE: To "Seinfeld" fans, yes, he is that Peterman.

"Why Should Anyone Be Led by You?" (Robert Goffee and Gareth Jones)

"Leading Through Rough Times: An Interview with Novell's Eric Schmidt" (Bronwyn Fryer)

No brief commentary such as this can do full justice to the rigor and substance of the articles provided. It remains for each reader to examine the list to identify those subjects which are of greatest interest to her or him. My own opinion is that all of the articles are first-rate. A majority were later developed into books. For me, one of this volume's greatest benefits is derived from sharing a variety of perspectives provided by several different authorities on the same general subject. In terms of value, if all eight articles were purchased as an individual reprint, the total cost would be $56.00.

Desmond bagley excels once again in this book that involves avalanches and law!! Snow tiger is a book that will appeal to those who like the John Grisham type of legal thrillers. This book deals with the story of a mining company director who has to clear his name. Desmond Bagley has woven all his characters with so much skill and bringing in believable legal issues that i would classify this book as unputdownable..

This story is fascinating, as are most of Bagley's books, and is told in a somewhat more artistic style than most. The art is not simply gratuitous, however; Bagley did not simply decide to try something new for no reason. The story is actually two stories, one of the events leading up to an avalanche (the "Snow Tiger" of the title) and the other of the inquest that takes place afterward. It was necessary to tell the story of the events leading up to the avalanche as flashbacks, otherwise the inquest could not have been told in an interesting fashion. As always, Bagley's characters live and breathe, each speaking with his own unique voice, and his plot as always is never lacking for action. If you can find a copy of this book, or almost any of Bagley's works, I highly recommend it/them.

This book is a masterpiece in giving the reader an intimate view of a Dominant/submissive relationship. I found it completely erotic and can't recommend it enough for anyone curious about D/s.

Reprint of Beating the Wild Tattoo.

This book has something for everyone. Tenderness, harshness, spankings, bondage, love, trust, virgin, master, multiple partners.

Perfect tale of the training of a young girl by a master who owns her from the first time she sees him. Takes Miss Julia from a wide eyed innocent virgin to the (almost) perfectly trained & content slave.

This is one book that does the S/D scene right + the bondage and sex scenes are hot and erotic.

A hard core romance story that deals with sex openly and hotly!

Even with their relationship being based on master/slave the main characters make you care about them and believe in the relationship they forge - from beginning to end.

A Must Read for anyone interested in erotica and Submissive women/dominating men.

I have read all of the "Prey" books. This book does not, exactly, meet up to the standards of previous books. Lucas Davenport is not the "loose cannon" that he was in the past. The search for the villain is not as compelling. I felt that another character in the book should have, either been the murderer, or, at least, an accomplice. This mystery woman could have been the missing element. John Sandford is one of my favorite authors. He seems determined to rehabilitate Lucas Davenport. (He tried in Winter Prey, and now, again in Secret Prey.) Maybe, he needs to read Mickey Spillane and make Lucas more like Mike Hammer, like he was in Eyes of Prey and Silent Prey, the best books of this series, by far.

I've enjoyed all of John Sandford's Lucas Davenport novels. While Silent Prey is true to form, it falls well short of Sandford's best effort. Much of this novel seems forced. Davenport's battle with depression is simply distracting. His not unexpected relationship with a female detective, while entertaining at times, seems to be thrown in for the laugh track. Davenport's fellow detectives, fully fleshed out in the previous "Prey" novels, are not given much to do here ... and that's too bad. Part of the fun in the Davenport stories comes from the other detectives in the squad.

The villain in this story is the highlight of the book. Evil comes in many forms and none so subtle as this one. Sandford's killers are never simple and this one is as complex as any he has created. Frankly, the villain makes the story.

I recommend this book to any Sandford fan. If you have never read one of the "Prey" novels, you may still want to read this one. However, I would suggest picking up "Winter Prey" first.

Sandford is the pseudonym for John Camp, a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist. I happened to run across this book while staying with a friend at Little St. Simon's Island over Thanksgiving. It was one of those bibliophile moments when you are bored and perusing a bookcase of paperbacks. Suddenly I was enthralled. I like his characters so much that I have read four of his novels and am in the middle of two more in less than a month. I find I cannot put them down!

I actually cannot tell you precisely why I like these books so much, which may be the greatest testimonial I can give them as simply good reads. Most of them are set in the Minneapolis area and the central characters are a homicide team that gets the toughest cases. The central figure in the series is Lucas Davenport, a detective, then ultimately a vice-chief who made a good bit of money designing software games but is addicted to the dangers and complexities of solving difficult crimes and taking on violent criminals.

This particular novel involves the killing of a bank president in the middle of a merger. It has enough twists and turns to keep you turning the pages all night. The characters are believable and the plot is both engrossing and becomes very convincing as you get deeper into the characters' personalities, histories and motivation.

Sandford/Camp is to Minneapolis what Parker is to Boston and Archer was to Southern California. I highly recommend his works.

Lucas Davenport, ace investigator, is on the trail of the latest woman-hunter who savagely kills without leaving a clue. Louis Vullion is a mediocre attorney turned serial killer who loves games as much as Davenport. The two begin a cat-and-mouse chase once Louis fails in his attempts to murder Carla Ruiz.
This is the first Sandford novel I've attempted. After reading so many positive, enthusiastic reviews of the PREY series, I simply had to start at the beginning. Was I disappointed? Not entirely. There are some interesting characters. Carla Ruiz is a rather strong, determined, intelligent woman. Sister Mary Joseph (or Elle Kruger when she grew up with Davenport) was my favorite character overall; she's witty, intelligent, confident and she serves as an anchor and confidante for Davenport. Louis himself is an interesting killer; however, there is no clear motive for his killing. There are some brief mentions of a weak mother, but nothing substantial about Louis is ever fleshed out. Annie McGowan and Jennifer Carey are rival tv reporters sniffing out the hottest story in Minnesota. Then there's Davenport. Intelligent? Yes. Brilliant detective? Perhaps. But he also possesses the scruples of a street hood, beds half the female characters before the story truly begins, and is quite willing to plant evidence or to physically threaten/harm witnesses or suspects. He designs elaborate games which supposedly supplies him with an income allowing him to drive a Porsche, own a wilderness hideaway, a boat, and several collectible firearms. One of his many girlfriends becomes pregnant, and the two share many a glass of wine and bottles of beer throughout the novel. Hmmmm.....
The last 100 pages of this novel redeemed it in my opinion. I was honestly rather bored through the earlier segments, but I appreciated the quicker pace offered more toward the end. Perhaps I've read one too many serial-killer novels, but this one was a bit too predictable for my taste. I know I'll try out at least one more in the series to see if Sandford develops some of these characters (and if Davenport's libido cools off). I'd also like to see if Sandford is able to strengthen the writing and to provide a less predictable story with a more thrilling conclusion. Overall, I give this 3 stars because it was interesting enough to keep me reading. I'll reserve more glowing reviews if the next in the series does better at grabbing my attention from beginning to end.

This book was an intriguing start to the "Prey" series. This was my first encounter with the "Prey" series and with John Sandford and I was very satisfied. Lucas Davenport is an interesting and mutil-dimensional character. I found myself caring about him and the supporting cast just as much as the plot. The relationship between him and Jennifer Carey was very complex and I hope to see it develop in further novels. The only thing that's holding me back from 5 stars is that the Maddogs' motives were never fully expained. I am almost done with Shadow Prey and plan to read the rest of the books in this series.

Rules of Prey, which is written by John Sandford, is a great tale between a heroic detective and a serial killer. This story is a part of a series that is written by John Sandford. A theme common among many books, but this novel keeps getting more interesting throughout the entire plot. It is an exciting book to read and easy to follow along. Any person would enjoy reading this book.

The characters Lucas Davenport, the detective, and Louis Vullion, also known as the maddog killer, are unique on the opposite ends of the spectrum. Davenport is the typical masculine male figure with his good looks and charm; he sleeps with basically every woman in town ... you can't help but enjoy his lifestyle. The maddog, on the other hand, is more of the quiet character; he is the most grotesque personality imaginable, which, once again, keeps any reader interested. For example the maddog once leaves the message on Davenport's answering machine, "It was lovely," after one of the murders. Both are quite intelligent and know how to play the game.

The thoughts of both characters are written clearly, which creates two stories that tie together at the end. The characters are compelling in the highest forms. Depending on your personality, you'll be rooting for one or the other. Throughout the entire story, you begin to understand the reasoning for each character. The story also includes action that keeps the pages turning the whole time. It is a very enjoyable book to read especially reading in solitude.

Certain Prey is the first Lucas Davenport mystery I've read. It won't be the last. As a former Minneapolitan I felt a closeness to the story both because of the location and the cultural reflection as seen in Davenport's reading material. I'm glad the author did not resort to stereotypical "ya sure, you betcha" characterization some people associate with Minnesota. The author created creditable characters with definite human attributes.

As a fan of the assassination genre, I especially liked the character development and presentation of Clara & Carmel. Certainly, Clara, even though the professional, is a sympathetic villain. Carmel probably represents many people's extreme view of lawyers in general. In Carmel, the author created an unsympathetic but understandable character.

The author has written a tight, no nonsense mystery without a lot of blathering that some authors believe is necessary in their literary endeavors. However, all is not golden. The book reflects a certain degree of sloppiness in the author's and editor's work. At one point, Clara & Carmel are torturing Rolo, an unsavory character, in order to get information they need. They chain him to a bed by looping a chain around his neck and lock this chain on the headboard. Then, to secure his arms, "she (Carmel) took a tight wrap of chain around one of his wrists, snapped on a padlock, leaned over the SIDE (uppercase mine) of the bed, threw the chain beneath it, fished it out from the opposite side, took a wrap around Rolo's other wrist, and snapped on the last padlock," His legs were chained and locked to the footboard. (Page 66)

The man is now spread-eagled on the bed.

Yet, once his body reaches the morgue, the police notice that he has clawed initials of his to-be-apparent killer onto the back of his hands. This is a remarkable deed for someone whose hands were chained separately, and far away from each other. Ultra flexible fingers? The reader doubts this. These initials play a role in Davenport's determination of Carmel's involvement.

To compound this lapse in proofreading and editing is the statement on page 105, made by Davenport, when asked how the man's hands were chained. " 'Like this,' Lucas said, demonstrating. 'Over his head.' "

In books poorly written, I would have put the book down at this point and relegated it to the circular file. Fortunately, Sandford/Camp still pulled through a winner.

The Prey series has just built a life of it's own. Unlike some of the tired and tried crime series out there, author John Sandford (Camp) has made each entry in his series quite unique. Some of the books have given us a serial killer (Rules of Prey, Eyes of Prey), others handle action (Sudden Prey, Shadow Prey), others allow a cat-and-mouse storyline (Mind Prey, Silent Prey), and still others move right into a straight mystery (Winter Prey, Secret Prey). Sandford keeps things fresh while constantly making each novel stand on it's own strengths.

The constant of the series is of course central character Lucas Davenport. Millionaire cop? Sure. But once you get past this, show me one man out there who wouldn't want to be Lucas. Smart. Sexy. Rich. Adventurous. I know I'd like to be him.

All this of course leads to this entry in the Prey series - CERTAIN PREY. Much like Eyes of Prey, this story gives Lucas two antagonists to deal with. One is a smart, rich, borderline psychopath. The other is a strong, skilled, borderline sociopath. Killings happen. Clues are left. And the characters match wits...and keep the reader turning the pages.

I recommend this book. It is definately one of the stronger entries in the series.

I always anxiously await for another Lucas Davenport book to arrive - only disappointment I have is when I read it so quickly! Sanford still shows suspense in his stories! I enjoy following the "life" of Davenport and hope Lucas continues in the next books and that he doesn't approach retirement too soon! I did find the character, Carmel Loan, a little awkward - a smart prosecutor getting so deeply sucked into the life of crime didn't seem right. Suddenly having no regard for human life didn't seem to follow. Enjoyed Clara Rinker, but wouldn't expect her to return to Minneapolis any time too soon. Great book! Wish Sandford could write & publish as quick as I can read them! Great summer reading!

I first read Moby Dick; or The Whale over thirty years ago and I didn't understand it. I thought I was reading a sea adventure, like Westward Ho! or Poe's Arthur Gordon Pym. In fact, it did start out like an adventure story but after twenty chapters or so, things began to get strange. I knew I was in deep water. It was rough, it seemed disjointed, there were lengthy passages that seemed like interruptions to the story, the language was odd and difficult, and often it was just downright bizarre. I plodded through it, some of it I liked, but I believe I was glad when it ended. I knew I was missing something and I understood that it was in me! It wasn't the book; it was manifestly a great book, but I hadn't the knowledge of literature or experience to understand it.

I read it again a few years later. I don't remember what I thought of it. The third time I read it, it was hilarious; parts of it made me laugh out loud! I was amazed at all the puns Melville used, and the crazy characters, and quirky dialog. The fourth or fifth reading, it was finally that adventure story I wanted in the first place. I've read Moby Dick more times than I've counted, more often than any other book. At some point I began to get the symbolism. Somewhere along the line I could see the structure. It's been funny, awesome, exciting, weird, religious, overwhelming and inspiring. It's made my hair stand on end...

Now, when I get near the end I slow down. I go back and reread the chapters about killing the whale, and cutting him up, and boiling him down. Or about the right whale's head versus the sperm whale's. I want to get to The Chase but I want to put it off. I draw Queequeg with his tattoos in the oval of a dollar bill. I take a flask with Starbuck and a Decanter with Flask. Listen to The Symphony and smell The Try-Works. Stubb's Supper on The Cabin Table is a noble dish, but what is a Gam? Heads or Tails, it's a Leg and Arm. I get my Bible and read about Rachel and Jonah. Ahab would Delight in that; he's a wonderful old man. For a Doubloon he'd play King Lear! What if Shakespeare wrote The Tragedy of The Whale? Would Fedallah blind Ishmael with a harpoon, or would The Pequod weave flowers in The Virgin's hair?

Now I know. To say you understand Moby Dick is a lie. It is not a plain thing, but one of the knottiest of all. No one understands it. The best you can hope to do is come to terms with it. Grapple with it. Read it and read it and study the literature around it. Melville didn't understand it. He set out to write another didactic adventure/travelogue with some satire thrown in. He needed another success like Typee or Omoo. He needed some money. He wrote for five or six months and had it nearly finished. And then things began to get strange. A fire deep inside fret his mind like some cosmic boil and came to a head bursting words on the page like splashes of burning metal. He worked with the point of red-hot harpoon and spent a year forging his curious adventure into a bloody ride to hell and back. "...what in the world is equal to it?"

Moby Dick is a masterpiece of literature, the great American novel. Nothing else Melville wrote is even in the water with it, but Steinbeck can't touch it, and no giant's shoulders would let Faulkner wade near it. Melville, The pale Usher, warned the timid: "...don't you read it, ...it is by no means the sort of book for you. ...It is... of the horrible texture of a fabric that should be woven of ships' cables and hausers. A Polar wind blows through it, & birds of prey hover over it. Warn all gentle fastidious people from so much as peeping into the book..." But I say if you've never read it, read it now. If you've read it before, read it again. Think Dostoevsky, Shakespeare, Goethe, and The Bible. If you understand it, think again.

It's always dangerous to label a book as a "masterpiece": that word seems to scare away most readers and distances everyone from the substance of the book itself. Still, I'm going to say that this is the Greatest American Novel because I really think that it is--after having read it myself.

Honestly, Moby Dick IS long and looping, shooting off in random digressions as Ishmael waxes philosophical or explains a whale's anatomy or gives the ingredients for Nantucket clam chowder--and that's exactly what I love about it. This is not a neat novel: Melville refused to conform to anyone else's conventions. There is so much in Moby Dick that you can enjoy it on so many completely different levels: you can read it as a Biblical-Shakespearean-level epic tragedy, as a canonical part of 19th Century philosophy, as a gothic whaling adventure story, or almost anything else. Look at all the lowbrow humor. And I'm sorry, but Ishmael is simply one of the most likable and engaging narrators of all time.

A lot of academics love Moby Dick because academics tend to have good taste in literature. But the book itself takes you about as far from academia as any book written--as Ishmael himself says, "A whale-ship was my Yale College and my Harvard." Take that advice and forget what others say about it, and just experience Moby Dick for yourself.

Most readers of Moby Dick seem to praise it for the wrong reasons and some miss the boat completely.

Criticize all you want of Melville's scientific inaccuracy, wandering themes, or even his improper punctuation. The guy wrote this thing in a year - not enough time to refine it, and it was a book he knew would not sell.

Underneath a mess of useless whaling information and Ishmael's rambling are ideas and questions that most people don't dare think about. Unlike Charles Darwin, Galileo or the fearless Ahab, Melville hid safely behind his metaphors and guided the careful readers to draw their own conclusions without completely leading the way.

Let me explain.

While to Ishmael, Moby Dick is nature's wonder and to Starbuck is just a whale, to Ahab Moby Dick is God, with his infinite power.

There are some disturbing things in the universe begging for an explaination, such as why one person is rewarded with happyness while another punished in suffering. There are feel-good answers, like the idea that the score will be evened in the afterlife and there are humble answers, like the book of Job, which suggests that man has no right to complain or question God. Melville's Ahab takes this to another level when he asks why man needs to be God's puppets. Ahab is insulted by God's creation of man, letting man live in suffering, "with half a heart and half a lung".

The bewildered God-fearing masses will not comprehend the depth Melville trys to take them. This most important theme was written for the pursuit of truth, not happyness. This book is not for everyone, and a lot of chapters are better off skipped, but those with enough empathy for Melville will find an emotional and intellectual adventure.

By now, John Sandford (the pen name of John Camp) has these things down pat. His main character, Lucas Davenport, is a three-dimensional policeman, hunting serial killers and dangerous murderers, seducing women, and cracking wise now and again. The secondary characters---other cops, the killer, his girlfriend, victims---are marvelously rendered, and you're actually sad when one meets his/her end.

This time around, the bad guy is an art professor named James Qatar, who kills beautiful women, and has been doing it successfully for years. He's an interesting and very well-drawn character, what with his obsession with clothing, and his meticulousness about the killings that he does. Davenport is looking at a particular murder, and it's discovered that a woman, missing for several years, resembles the killing in a few details. Then clues begin to build up, and the suspense builds as the plot thickens, so to speak.

I would recommend this book, though of course it's not the best (I still think Rules of Prey was in a class by itself; it should be read first) and if you haven't read other books in the series you're going to be a bit at sea about the relationships between the various characters. Still, a good book.

This was a hard book for me to rate. I have read the previous books in Sandford's Prey series, eleven in all. As a reader who is familiar with all long running characters and plot threads, reading this book was like running into an old friend you have not seen in years, and talking like you live next door to each other. It was a pleasure to read simply for the continued evolution of the characters I have grown to know and love.

On the other hand, as a passable, stand alone novel, Sandford falls so far short of his past triumphs that I wonder if this does not signal the end for Lucas Davenport and company. Gone is all the tension, suspense, and thrill-of-the-chase that was so prevalent in many of the early Prey books. It has been replaced with a tired reworking of past Prey villains and a soap opera pace. In fact, the hunt for the bad guy plays a secondary role to Lucas' relationship with his ex-fiancée. It is writing like this that leads me to believe that Sandford is trying to stage a stopping point in this series.

If you have not read the previous Prey books, perhaps your money or time would be better spent reading a different book. If you are a Prey veteran, then carry on.

Colleagues respect St. Patrick University associate professor art historian James Qatar for his collective works. This includes one book and several scholarly articles published in highly regarded journals and magazines. Unbeknownst to his peers is that Professor Qater has a second life in which he hunts blondes, has sex with them, and kills them.

When an early victim is found, the police link her to photographs that are part of Qater's hobby of creating pornographic works with women he knows but who don't really know him. Being a political appointee, Minneapolis Deputy Chief of Police Lucas Davenport expects to lose his job within six months when the mayor retires. Lucas intends to use his time wisely to catch the killer.

John Sandford is one of the top authors of police procedurals due to his three dimensional characters that consistently turn the "Prey" books into great reads. The hero is a flawed individual with a complex and realistic personal life that places demands on him even as he risks everything because he believes in the value of justice for all. CHOSEN PREY is the best of a great series. The audience knows the identity of the killer early on, but watch in fascination as Lucas tries to do likewise while balancing his complex personal life.

Harriet Klausner