Up until Unnatural Exposure, there has been a trend towards the unblelievable in PC's Kay Scarpetta books. Early on, her books were straight whodunnit -- in the tradition of Sherlock Holmes. Kay is at her best when she's picking apart fibers, doing autopsies, and doing straight forensic work. And when she's in a good mood. In Unnatural Exposure, Kay was in a bad mood the whole time. She did, however, manage to get back to a bit of what she does best -- being the Medical Examiner. All in all, I was pleased that Unnatural Exposure was better than Cause of Death -- which reeked. But it's still not her best. Before writing her next book, I hope PC goes back and reads Postmortem, Cruel & Unusual, All That Remains, and From Potter's Field. They're vintage Kay Scarpetta and Patricia Cornwell. One last note: I agree. Chuck the Lucy storyline. She's obnoxious.

this was the first Kay Scarpetta book i ever read. It is what got me hooked. Since then, i have read better ones, and worse ones. But none of them have been bad.

This is another great one. The plot is nicely original, fast paced, and punchy. The writing is the same. (I love her writing)

Kay is back, and her usual superwoman self. Lucy too is back, but here seems far more human and likeable than in some of the other books. (but hey, i still like ger a great deal. i dont know what most people's problem is with her.)

Theres some more good forensic detail (although often she needs to explain things just a tad more) which adds dimension to the book, and even more interest.

really, theres not a lot i can say about this book, apart from repeating things that i have said about all her others, which i cant really be bothered to do. Rest assured, though, that here again Patricia Cornwell has produced another excellent forensic thriller that is easy to read, with a superb writing style. Highly reccomended. (As are all her books.)

I have read numerous reviews of this book and in doing so, have come to this conclusion: some of the people who have reviewed it just are not smart enough to read it. Or, they aren't taking their time and enjoying the plotline. (One such person, referring to the killer, used the wrong sex in which to discribe them!) Relax, and not rush to the end. Reading is simular to eating; while some dine, others swine. Slow down and enjoy the time away from the real world. Patricia Cornwell has created a stimulating, and real character in Kay Scarpetta. It's nice to read about an intelligent woman who doesn't conform to others standards. As for Scarpetta's neice, Lucy, she needs a little polishing. Cornwell seems a little skiddish on thoroughly developing this character, and at this point, she is merely a two demensional character. Ease up Patricia, go with your gut feelings on this one and let everyone else be damned. Back to the book itself... I've read almost all of the Scarpetta novels and find this to be one of the best, thus far. A twisting rollercoaster of murder and intrigue. That's why Cornwell gets the big bucks.

This is the first book I've read by Shreve and I liked it well enough. Jack is a Trans-Atlantic pilot who dies when his plane goes down. Kathryn who has been a stay-at-home wife, raising their daughter. She learns that Jack was living another life that she had no clue about. The plot was good, but Shreve's forte is to show the mind and the emotions, where they go and how they make the character behave. She tries to paint the emotions and thoughts of the character in a way that you can feel them also. I particularly liked the way Kathryn's mind would wander, as if trying to prevent her from thinking too hard about the whole mess and save her from the grief.

Shreve touched upon a theme in this book that has always intrigued me and given me food for a great deal of thought. Just how well can you ever know a person? Regardless of how long you've lived with them or loved them, can you ever truly know what's inside them. Most people do carry secrets and hold at least some part of themselves back from everyone. Her exploration of this theme is pretty well done.

Reading a Shreve novel is an exersize in patience. There are no action sequences, the pacing is slow, but ultimately if you can hang in there, she offers a rewarding read. I also notice that adultery is a common theme in her novels, makes you wonder doesn't it?

This 1998 novel by Anita Shreve opens when Kathryn, the lead character, discovers that her pilot husband has been killed in plane crash. What follows is a detailed exploration of grief as she has to cope with some startling revelations about him and discovers that she never really knew him at all. The reader follows her inner anguish as she copes with betrayal and loss. It's hard to put my finger on exactly why the book rises above the soap opera genre. The writing is clear and fast paced but yet sometimes repetitive. The characters are well drawn but Kathryn is too good to be true. And as the mystery surrounding the pilot's death unfolds, it is not quite believable.

But why did I go right past my bus stop while I was reading the book? Why did I think about the book all day, barely looking at my e-mail and forgoing television in order to continue reading it last night? Why did it keep me up well past my usual bedtime in order to finish it? Essentially, in spite of the faults of the book, Ms. Shreve is a great story teller. I just kept reading. This book is not for everyone as it deals with the what could be called sentimental inner feelings and the thought patterns in Kathryrn's mind. Considering that it's about a plane crash, there is not much action. And it makes no earth-shattering revelations other than reinforce the concept of how hard it is to really know a person. But a book that can keep me so intrigued must be given a high recommendation. After all, Isn't that what the pleasure of a good read is all about?

A haunting book who's scenes I still see at times. Not too heavy in details so as to bog things down, but just right. Coffee cups, bathrobes and unmade beds become talismen of the tale.

In real life, I doubt the fait accompli of the pilot would fly for long. "The Policeman's Wife", "The Salesmen's Wife"; not quite the same ring to it. And, in print, there's some measure of sympathy for all 3 adults and what is assumed to be their visions of circumstance.

This book must be properly framed for a child, otherwise they will take away the lesson that fitting in is much more important than finding out what it is that makes us all different and unique. The book reads just fine up until the rainbow fish is told (mandated, nearly) to share with everyone the very thing that makes it unique - hence, to dillute itself and bend to the whims of others.

I would have preferred to see the authors take a harder line against this, but I suppose that it's fitting in this day and age to teach our children that fitting in is #1, and realizing what makes you different, or special, or unique, is secondary and expendible.

A real shame.

This book will soon become one of your child's favorites. No one is immune to the stunning beauty of the vivid watercolors that are highlighted with reflective, colored foil to make the Rainbow Fish shimmer across the page. The sheer gorgeousness of the image makes the moral of the story hit home like a smack into the middle of your forehead. All children have trouble learning to share, and this book makes an eloquent case for why that's in your child's best interest. It is easy to see why this book won the American Bookseller's 1995 Book of the Year Award!

The Rainbow Fish was simply "the most beautiful fish in the entire ocean." He had scales that "were every shade of blue and green and purple, with sparkling silver scales among them." Not only was he the most beautiful, the "other fish were amazed at his beauty." When the other fish invited him, "Come play with us!", he would just glide by. But he did enjoy being admired.

When one of the fish asked for a scale, the Rainbow Fish haughtily said, "Get away from me!" Pretty soon everyone avoided the Rainbow Fish, and he was lonely.

The rest of the story describes how Rainbow Fish achieved happiness through sharing. In the process, he makes the whole ocean more beautiful and his own life a study in connectedness. Psychologists tell us that people have both a need to be distinctive and a need to be connected. Those desires can cause behavior that improves one satisfaction at the expense of the other. The Rainbow Fish effectively shows how the two dimensions can be combined through locating and sharing with others who have the same interests.

This book will be improved by some discussions because a child may not have the experience to know how to extend the moral of this story into her or his own life. For example, your child doesn't need to permanently give away 90 percent of his or her toys in order to have any friends. However, your child should be prepared to share 100 percent of toys when friends or relatives visit. You can explain to your child how the same sharing will occur in reverse when visiting the other children. In that way, everyone has more and more fun.

You can also use the story to help explain the joys of giving to those in need. For example, you could read this book before your child trick or treats for UNICEF (or helps raise money for some other charity) for the first time.

Unfortunately, your child can mistakenly see this book as suggesting that it is a bad idea to stand out. That can be harmful in areas like academic achievement, where there is a lot of peer pressure not to excel in some schools. You want your child to understand that excellence is praiseworthy, but pridefulness and rudeness towards others are not.

You can turn this around by encouraging your child to come up with games and activities that can be shared with others. When we share the richness of our minds, the lives of all are improved. The bounty we receive in return is boundless.

I like books that raise fundamental questions about how to live an upright and emotionally rich life, and The Rainbow Fish will provide many wonderful opportunities for discussions of this sort. As a result, you will have more wonderful experiences with your child. That's a great benefit to get from sharing this book!

After you have finished reading the book many times, ask your child how a person can obtain more happiness. You will be impressed with the good ideas you will hear, and you can enjoy the happiness of seeing the beauty of your child's character in the answers.

Create beauty through giving!

Although some would argue that this book teaches people to buy friends, I do not see it in this light. The book simply encourages children to give of themselves to others. As the rainbow fish shares his scales, he feels good about giving a part of himself to make others happy. I don't see how giving oneself to others qualifies as buying friends. My three-year-old son absolutely LOVES this book. He memorized the whole storyline in about a week. He loves to tell me the story as we flip the pages. The illustrations are colorful and exciting for a three-year-old. I would recommend this book as the basis for a discussion on sharing, not on buying friends, but sharing of yourself. This oldfashioned concept is threatened in our ME world.

This book is not based on Visual Studio.Net Final Release!

I have read the book front to back including introduction page. I just realized that the book was based on beta 2 of Visual Studio.Net, too late for a refund. Anyway, I went on to read it and found out that the book was not very much organised as tons of '...we'll discuss this on chapter xx ... ' appear no less than 5 times in a single chapter (on some chapters). Mispelled words also are catching enough to say that this book was in a hurry to be printed.

If you're looking for a book that covers thorough details on window forms and web form control howtos, this wouldn't give you enough detail on those topics. Web Services is equally a mere introduction, with about two pages of discussion on UDDI as well as WSDL. Not much on ADO.Net and XML.

I should have borrowed this book instead and skim through it or should have bought it for 20 bucks less. Besides, it's already outdated. I hope the same authors would come up with a second edition that has richer detail...and send me a free copy.

I was planning on buying this book and noticed the out of print note on the Wrox site. Not exactly sure what out of print means.
Looks like other books based on the betas say out of print on the Wrox site.
If this book was released in August 2001 then it should have been based on the beta. They might plan on releasing an updated version.

I'd say this is the best Professional VB.NET book so far. I like the the ADO.NET part and VB control part of this book. Better than O'really ASP and VB book.

and clearly a cut-and-paste rush conversion job from the NW 5.1 book.

There are dangerous omissions and advice here. Do not purchase this book unless you already know NW 6 and just need a quick reminder occasionally (and thus can recognize likely errors)

I am a current Master CNE and have been a CNE for many versions of Netware (also an MCSE, CCNA, CCDA, CCSA). The book is filled with wrong information and problems. I'm not being overly critical, I'm talking basic information that's just plain wrong. It was right for NetWare 5, but not NetWare 6. In fact in several places, the book accidently says NetWare 5 when it means NetWare 6 - I think they were cutting and pasting from the NetWare 5 book. I virtually always buy the Novell Press books and this is the first time I have ever been this disappointed. The information that is correct is frequently woefully light on content. It's amazing how little of value a 1500 page book can actually say.

I purchased this book hoping to find a definitive reference on NetWare 6. I mean, who else would publish such a book but Novell Press themselves.

Unfortunately, within the first 50 pages of this book there are at least 10 errors on items such as what is included with the OS, minimum requirements for RAM and DOS partitions, what is included with the Express Install and what some of the features like NSS support. There were also numerous references in the text to NetWare 5 or 5.1, which makes me think that much of the text was cut and pasted from previous versions of the book. There are also some glaring omissions like no mention whatsoever of the new auditing tools.

Considering that the book was published about 5 months after the release of the OS, I was extremely disappointed in its accuracy. I'll be looking to return my copy and find something else that does a better job. I recognize that someone put a tremendous amount of work into this book, but someone should have done a better job at checking it for technical accuracy.

Probably not edited by anyone speaking English (at least, nobody that knows ANYTHING about networks). Extremely wordy, repetitive, regularly travels half-way around the world to get across the street. Exhaustive in its treatment of trivial details (like how to expand an NDS container) while lightly skipping over complex subject matter (like partitioning). The only good thing I could say about this book is the design and outline of its contents and the effort exerted in filling in the details seem to be well matched, both of them quite low. Would not recommend this book for anyone unless they are an incurable insomniac -- this is the cure. I wrote to IDG to express my dissatisfaction with this book and my disappointment with them for pandering it to the public.

I was looking for a complete guide to NetWare 5 for a new network operating system user. This is not it. The was written by experts for experts.

I had the chance to meet the authors at Brainshare 99, they were kind enough to autograph the book. In various installations this book has helped alot!! Especially with the new backup system Novell has implemented with Netware 5. Easy reading, not overly technical..

Cause of Death involves a plot that is better left to a different genre of fiction. By the time Scarpetta and her cronies begin to figure what is ultimately going on, it has already happened. The book starts off okay but steadily declines to a less than admirable conclusion. Could not empathize with the personal troubles of either Scarpetta or her niece Lucy, as Cornwell tries to get the reader to do.

I have read all of Cornwell's books and can now honestly say I am deeply depressed by the author's galloping ego. Lucy irritates me endlessly. Her relationship with Kay bounces back and forth with remarkable clarity however. It's perhaps the most convincing relationship in the series. I hate Kay's affair with Benton Wesley with a passion. Not only is it contrived and embarrassing - how can he be so ethical and yet so base? It would have been far more interesting to team up Scarpetta and Marino. I love Marino. He's so real, I can practically see the egg stains on his tie. Benton, clearly modelled on John Douglas, the former charismatic head of the FBI's Investigative Support Unit, has lost something in the translation. He has become quite improbable since he took up with Kay. Why oh why did Cornwell bump off the boyfriend Mark? And this I think is the crux of the problem. Firstly, we are told of Mark's death in an earlier book - in the past tense! We are not allowed to really share her agony, even though we by now, care deeply about Kay Scarpetta. In Cause Of Death, Cornwell pulls the same stunt. We have to wait for nearly 100 pages to see Benton and Kay together - and we learn, they've been split up for months! Quite conveniently, Benton is getting a divorce - at his long suffering wife's request. I guess Cornwell got stung by so much criticism of the extra-marital affair. In the context of the books, it seems highly unlikely Connie Wesley would really run off with another man, but okay, I'll rent the idea for now. Still, the medical aspects of the books continue to inspire, in spite of the laughable, clunky final set pieces.. A nuclear power plant? Please! I miss the earlier Kay back in Richmond with her squirrel and no-life. This one is too Cosmo, too Rambo-lina. However, the earlier diving sequences are fun and the locations as usual, make me jealous as a writer. Cornwell has been there, done that. I can't wait for the next book

I have read all of Cornwell's books and can now honestly say I am deeply depressed by the author's galloping ego. Lucy irritates me endlessly. Her relationship with Kay bounces back and forth with remarkable clarity however. It's perhaps the most convincing relationship in the series. I hate Kay's affair with Benton Wesley with a passion. Not only is it contrived and embarrassing - how can he be so ethical and yet so base? It would have been far more interesting to team up Scarpetta and Marino. I love Marino. He's so real, I can practically see the egg stains on his tie. Benton, clearly modelled on John Douglas, the former charismatic head of the FBI's Investigative Support Unit, has lost something in the translation. He has become quite improbable since he took up with Kay. Why oh why did Cornwell bump off the boyfriend Mark? And this I think is the crux of the problem. Firstly, we are told of Mark's death in an earlier book - in the past tense! We are not allowed to really share her agony, even though we by now, care deeply about Kay Scarpetta. In Cause Of Death, Cornwell pulls the same stunt. We have to wait for nearly 100 pages to see Benton and Kay together - and we learn, they've been split up for months! Quite conveniently, Benton is getting a divorce - at his long suffering wife's request. I guess Cornwell got stung by so much criticism of the extra-marital affair. In the context of the books, it seems highly unlikely Connie Wesley would really run off with another man, but okay, I'll rent the idea for now. Still, the medical aspects of the books continue to inspire, in spite of the laughable, clunky final set pieces.. A nuclear power plant? Please! I miss the earlier Kay back in Richmond with her squirrel and no-life. This one is too Cosmo, too Rambo-lina. However, the earlier diving sequences are fun and the locations as usual, make me jealous as a writer. Cornwell has been there, done that. I can't wait for the next book

For most current authors this book would be a four star effort, however Patterson has proven he should be held to a higher standard with some of his other books including coauthoring two nonfiction books that give startling and original insight into today's society. However let us forgive him this flight into fantasy, after all it really is an exciting book with most of the elements James Patterson normally provides. Kit Harrison, enstranged FBI agent and Frannie O'Neill, recently widowed veterinarian, are unkowingly on a collision course with each other and a clandestine scientific group hell bent on keeping their morally questionable, genetic experiments under wraps. Watch the feathers fly when the above mentioned experiments, children created with birdlike qualities, reluctantly accept help from Frannie and Kit to achieve the freedom they so desperately desire. It wouldn't be inaccurate to compare this novel to Dean Koontz's masterpiece Watchers in some respects; but for the most part, When the Wind Blows is lighter and more compact than the other. James Patterson's novel Virgin is another book that strays from the mystery/suspense genre and a updated version is said to be in the works. As usual for Patterson, When the Wind Blows includes action, romance, and well rounded characters while bringing up insightful moral questions

I have read most of Patterson's books. This one I enjoyed the most, so far. I think because it was the only one to really creap me out. Others were creepy in a I'm reading about a creepy guy kind of thing. This one actually creeped me out while reading in the dark.

This book was absolutely riveting. I've learned from reading Mr. Patterson's books that you only start reading them in the morning, on a Saturday or Sunday, and if you're smart, you don't have any pressing engagements. If you do, you'll do one of two things.............you'll call and cancel or you just won't show up. I've read the Alex Cross books and they are some of my favorites, but this book was SPECIAL. The concept of these winged children was so unique that it truly captured my heart. You actually become so involved with Max that as you move through the book you actually form an emotional attachment to her and then to the other children. It would make a wonderful movie, but the casting would be very difficult. The children really would have to be unknowns or they wouldn't be believable. Someone would always say well "she" was so different in "...........". I read about 4 to 5 books a week, most of the mystery genre, but James Patterson is my absolute favorite. Please, if the publisher reads this, we need a sequel to "Max"........and soon. Believe me...this is one novel that everyone should read. Keep it up Mr. Patterson, just write faster!

I made myself finish this because I had bought it. I bought it because I had previously bought and enjoyed "While I was Gone" but this book just didn't gel. It could have done with a lot of editing out of excess words and adding in of character development. Neither the characters nor action ever seemed to be wholly developed. I also felt that the jumps back in forth in time and the use of the present tense were done awkwardly - they came acoss as a creative writing experiment which really didn't help the story to move.

While I have liked some of Sue Miller's books ("The Good Mother" and "Inventing the Abbotts"), this one was very unsatisfying to me (as was "While I Was Gone"). I never felt that I knew the characters and because of this, could not understand their motivation. It was as though I was viewing them through a cloudy lens...the characterizatons just never were clear.

I tried to feel sympathy or even empathy for Lottie and Cameron, but could never muster any. They just never really engaged me as a reader.

Also, parts of their history and background seemed to be missing, as if lost in all of the changes of time that Miller used.

I will try "Family Pictures" next.....hope I can get more involved.

"For Love" takes place over the course of a summer in Boston. Lottie is struggling with her second marriage and she's using the summer to figure out what she wants. She and her grown son Ryan spend the summer preparing her childhood home for sale, while her husband Jack stays home in Chicago. Meanwhile, her brother Cameron rekindles his high school romance (obsession) with Elizabeth, who has since married but has returned to her parents house down the block from Lottie, also deciding whether to leave her husband. Elizabeth, who was never nice to Lottie as a teenager, tries to befriend Lottie, putting her in the middle of a difficult relationship between her and Cameron.

Sue Miller's books tend to start the reader out in the middle of a story, and as the action progresses, we learn about the main character's past through flashbacks. She uses this technique here as well, and I think it generally works. In the first chapter, Cameron accidently runs over Elizabeth's au pair in a wild attempt to keep her from returning to her husband. That sets the stage to show us how this affects Lottie and what led to this event. Over the course of the book, we learn that Lottie met her second husband Jack while his wife was deeply ill and that their relationship is in many ways defined by the slow death of his wife. We learn that Lottie's father was arrested for embezzlement when she was a child, and she grew up with her alcoholic mother, both angry at her and guilty for being favored over Cameron. Yet Cameron has become the devoted one, looking after their mother as she deteriorates in the nursing home. We learn that Lottie takes pride in growing up without wealth, for having tacky taste, for not going the conventional route, and yet she chooses Jack, who is a doctor, with money and refined tastes. All of this (and more) figures in how Lottie eventually makes her decision and, perhaps, comes to accept herself.

This is my third book by Sue Miller, and like her others, it has interesting and complex characters and it has many insights about human behavior. But while I found Lottie's journey is interesting, this book didn't affect me as much as "While I Was Gone" or "The Good Mother." The story felt a little disjoint at times -- it seemed like if you put the story back in chronological order, there would be some important periods missing. I sometimes felt that I didn't understood Lottie's emotional development and the reasons she made the choices she did. At the end, although I expected Lottie to make the decision she did, I didn't really understand why from her point of view. Still, I liked Lottie's unconventional ways and I appreciated the emotional complexity of her character. It's not my favorite of Miller's book, but I wasn't sorry I read it.

Mary Stewart, one of the finest romantic suspense novelists of all time, has written a novel without any romance or suspense. This whisper of a book contains the lovely scenic descriptions of her earlier novels but the "mystery" amounts to a break-in at an empty house and the "romance" amounts to a semester together at Cambridge in the fall. The heroine is an emotionless school-marm who is so stern and prim that she is bascially an 80-year-old masquerading as a "dish." After enjoying such great mysteries as The Moon-Spinners and This Rough Magic, I thought for sure that something was going to happen. But the only excitement was the occasional sighting of a petrel (a very shy bird). Whoa! It is clear that Miss Stewart, in her dotage, lost all interest in love and danger, and was captivated only by nature and wildlife. This is not a bad thing but she should have stopped writing ficton and become an author of travel books.

This is definatly not Mary Stewart at her best. I found this book very lacksidasical and totaly unintresting. Tell me what is romantic about this book? I won't get a awnser because there isn't. I was very disapointed in this book. After having read Moonspiners and the Ivy tree. Currently I am reading the Merlin Trilogy which is absolutly fantastic.The Stormy Petrel is nonromance all the way. The only romance in the whole book is when she had s smile on her face thinking of her next fall semester term.If you think that thats romance you must not know excitment. If you must read this book though read it for the nature stuff she talks about.

If you are expecting the usual holiday-impulsive heroine of one of Ms Stewart's earlier tales to star in this short novel, you will not find her here. Rose Fenmore, professor of English Literature at Cambridge is like Ms. Stewart herself, a poet and a spinner of fantasy--for Rose in the form of Science Fiction novels under a nom de plume. Stewart does a more than adequate job of portraying Rose's inner calmness in her choice of vacation, her penchant for wordplay and in the merging of the two: her gift for describing the tableau she sees before her with such detail, the reader can actually feel the breeze move strands of hair, hear the slightest stirrings of the night birds and sense the awe in which all characters become eventually humbled by nature's majesty.

Rather than create a story of treachery as she has in the past,in the "Stormy Petrel", Stewart weaves a simple story which acts as a vehicle for her true love and the story's ultimate theme of preservation of nature's natural beauty. With every quiet word, her love of Scotland and its lovely vistas are pronounced loudly and clearly. Her description of her own writing process as outlined poetically while Rose attempts to inch her scifi plot foward is a magnificent insight into Ms Stewart's own love of her craft. I believe, the impact of the story's "mystery" and "romance" disregarded by the other reviewers, is all there---only it is as subtle and perfect as a bird's song and quite as easy to overlook when compared to the gun-in-the-back terror readers of Ms. Stewart (and her current crop of wannabees)have come to expect.

I listened to the audio version of this book, read by Isla Blair. She does a wonderful job of conveying Rose's inner quietude and does justice to Stewart's lyrical descriptions of Rose's most monumental moments on the isolated island in the Scottish Hebrides: the evenings of seals' song and the nocturnal flight of the stormy petrel.

This is recommended to anyone who has a love of nature, of beautiful language and who promises to regard the story and its soft cadences as a wise and truly loving tribute to nature.