Recently retired from college life, John and Elspeth McKenzie move to a planned community in Maine where they can be near their son Alex and daughter in law Sarah. Neither counts on Sarah's uncanny ability to turn up bodies and, in fact, Sarah doesn't actually find the first body. Soon, however, she is involved, especially when Elspeth's expensive new bicycle is stolen and vanishes from the gated and guarded community.

More murders lead to police mystification and Sarah's increasingly desperate attempts to do something--anything--to come up with a solution. But not only are there no suspects--there aren't even any good motives. Both of the victims are habitual losers but, oddly enough, both are related to two of the families who have recently moved into the development.

Author J. S. Borthwick writes convincingly of Maine life and weather, and presents murder with a light touch. John and Elspeth, in particular, are engaging characters, each with their own foibles, uncertain about their decision to leave their old life and take up this new and organized one. MURDER IN THE ROUGH is light fluff, but it is enjoyable reading.

I have enjoyed all of Borthwick's books since I ran across the first one shortly after its publication. And this latest one is an enjoyable read as we follow Sarah's good and evil twin journey. HOWEVER, this has to be one of the most slovenly-edited books I've ever read. Not only are there typos which a spellchecker couldn't possibly get (vice for voice)so some human intervention is needed, but Uncle Fergus occasionally becomes Uncle Felix. Not what one expects from a respectable publishing house! I do hope enough people complain that they haul up their socks and get down to business!

Dr. Sarah Deane is between assignments. She just completed a substitute teaching job at a Massachusetts girls' boarding school and has not yet started her English classes at Maine's Bowmouth College. Her mother-in-law Elspeth has invited Sarah to come to their Maine home for several family celebrations.

However, instead of an idyllic respite, Sarah arrives in time for father-son homicides on the community golf course forcing the police to close the course as a crime scene. Sarah finds a third corpse that of her father-in-law's uncle and not long afterward observes a lad vanish. Sarah searches for the missing person only to be caught by the criminals. Unless she escapes, Sarah could become part of the greens.

Though MURDER IN THE ROUGH is quite simplistic especially the way everything falls into place for Sarah, readers will enjoy this sports amateur sleuth tale. The story line engages the audience as the eccentric cast makes for a fine coastal Maine tale similar to the Murder She Wrote crowd. Sarah is a likable individual and her inquiries are fun to follow. J.S. Borthwick avoids sand traps and the rough while shooting par.

Harriet Klausner

Grad student/teaching fellow Sarah Deane and her boyfriend, Alex McKenzie, M.D., go for a cruise on a luxury yacht owned by fatherly millionaire evangelist David Mallory, who distributes Bibles to churches along the Maine coast and, as a sideline, keeps a lookout for suspicious-looking boats that might harbor drug dealers. Before long, the oddest and most unpleasant crew member is found dead in the water. This book might be just your cup of tea if you enjoy a leisurely-paced cozy with idiosyncratic characters and plenty of literary references: John Buchan's Richard Hannay, hero of the classic thriller "The 39 Steps," holds the key to solving the mystery. (And, if only Sarah had read it, the Sherlock Holmes story "The Adventure of the Lion's Mane" might have shed further light on the case.)

This was a cute mystery. At times, the answers to some of the mysteries seem obvious and one doubts the intelligence of the protagonist (herself a college professor.) The imagery of sailing on the Maine coast is often vivid. All in all, this is a very cozy mystery that makes you want to continue solving crimes with the hero.

Once again, Sarah and Alex travel and find murder on the itinerary. This time, they are joined by Sarah's formidable Aunt Julia Clancy. Julia invites them to join her for Christmas at an upscale dude ranch where all kinds of strange things are happening. Between making the acquaintance of a movie star and her boy toy, saving horses doomed to be dogfood, and observing the odd workings of the resort, a would be presidential candidate and his secretary are murdered, and of all people, Aunt Julia is a suspect.

J.S. Borthwick writes a fine mystery, very descriptive and entertaining. The characters are very human and the mystery and practical jokes were very entertaining.

Sarah Deane's Aunt Julia is staying at an Arizona dude ranch for her arthritis. She invites Sarah and her boyfriend to come spend Christmas with her. Some dirty tricks have been played on the guests. Julia has been squirted with water, another guest finds a rubber snake in her bath, etc. Everyone takes these things in stride until the first murder occurs. A guest, Senator Hopgood is found at the bottom of Santa's wagon load of gifts. Sarah and Aunt Julia work to find out whodunit, but before they do, there are a couple more deaths. Lots of interesting characters, and an involved plot. A good read.

This is a great first thriller! In "Las Vegas Comp: Murder at the Emerald Towers", we meet detective Fargo Blue, retired Las Vegas cop turned private eye. Fargo's assignment in this story is to recover a large amount of cash owed to his beautiful poker-playing client, nicknamed "Pleasure." The story quickly turns into a murder mystery, though, when a woman is found murdered by the pool in the Emerald Towers casino. Fargo finds himself as the prime suspect in the murder. The story twists and turns through glittery Las Vegas, and features a jewel heist, another murder and several secret identities.

I thoroughly enjoyed the Las Vegas setting. In addition to Fargo Blue, the McKenzie Borthers introduce several other interesting characters, including Fargo's partner, Sherri, who is a former coast guard sailor, and Uncle Leo, horse addict and attorney who shares an office with Fargo and Sherri.

The book contains an excerpt of the next Fargo Blue mystery, which looks like another great page turner. If you're looking for a fresh gumshoe, I highly recommend checking out this story!

This would be an excellent book to read while relaxing at any one of the pools in Las Vegas. I didn't read this while in Vegas, However if you have been to Vegas you can identify with a lot of the locations mentioned. (even though some are fictional in the book)Iam looking forward to their next book.

Back Cover description: Eligible, elusive...and engaged! Logan McKenzie liked his life exactly how it was-with no surprises, and without a wife. Then Logan learned his mother was about to marry for the third time, and that Darcy, his very pretty stepsister-to-be, was in danger of being hurt by that marriage. So he found himself getting involved-not only in trying to prevent the forthcoming nuptials, but with Darcy herself...and his carefully controlled existence was turned upside down.

The other review on this Amazon.com page is for a different author. This book is part of the BACHELOR COUSINS series. I am looking for the next one. There was a lot I liked about all the characters in this book, which is why I'm looking for another; but Darcy could have been less volatile. Interesting families on both sides, and issues that need to be addressed helped move the plot. Hopefully the next in the series has a less emotional heroine, and why are the ALWAYS gorgeous?

Sandra Marton does it again! This is another one of the books in her Barrons series and its great! Samantha Brewster is introduced to Demetrios Karas as a skilled translator. Little does he know its the woman he tried to seduce at his friend Rafe's party! I love the sexual tension and intense scenes. It's a fast paced and involved read like all her books. I love that all throughout the book Samantha (the heroine)emphasizes to Demetrios (the hero)she has a life of her own and is very independant. Her work is superb! This book is definitely another keeper!

This book is not so much a handbook as it is a basic introduction to near eastern languages and literature. It is geared toward beginning/intermediate students of biblical hebrew who want to supplement their studies with comparative methods. This book will give you a small taste of the field without excess detail or jargon. Each chapter focuses on a particular language, providing a brief grammatical survey, an overview of the literature and suggestions for further study. Additional background material would have made the book much more useful-- things like historical timelines, comparison of grammatical paradigm's, more samples of literature, glossary of terms etc. In sum, beginners will find a user-friendly starting point, advanced students are advised to look elsewhere for more practical help.

Drs. McKenzie and Wright boldly strike out in an interesting and novel direction in their attempt to explain a possible etiology for schizophrenia, post-traumatic stress disorders and other forms of mental illness. The writing is well-documented (although heavily psychoanalytically oriented) and offers enough theoretical insight to pique the reader's clinical curiousity. Based upon my clinical experience, I suspect that some of what Drs. McKenzie and Wright propose is verifiable and will be confirmed. At this point, further empirical studies must be done to validate the hypotheses and move it from a clinical research level to experimental. All in all, it is worth reading as research in progress, particularly for those of us who must deal with schizophrenia or emotional trauma.

Aveni's book is a fascinating portrait of the rhythms and roles of time keeping in a variety of cultures including the Aztec, Inca, Maya, and ancient Chinese. A fascinating exploration of a topic we all too often don't bother to consdier.

If you are one of those who want to be the first ones to experience/own a technology or product and love books, then this book has something unique to offer.

It is a book/CD which has versions. Once you own it, you can get updates from the Internet Site and continue to build the brain/database.

The choice of sites/products used in the book/CD is excellent, fun and unique. You are bound to learn something new and that too "off-line" cause the contents are both in print and on the CDRom.

This book is an experience in itself. But it is non-traditional -- it is different!

This revised edition of "Oxford Dictionary of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology" is comprehensive, clinically relevant, and fairly up-to-date. It has a good coverage (for degree students), although that advanced researchers may need something more extensive. Its ability to correlate biochemical terms and data is appreciated. But with just over 17,000 definitions, its listed price is a bit on the high side. Buyers could get a better illustrated, more voluminous Biochem dictionary at that price.

As someone involved in biochemical research, I spend loads of time reading a variety of life science journals. Just keeping up with the latest research is hard enough, but as my areas of interest become ever larger and intermeshed with other disciplines such as medicine and physics, I've found myself delving into this book more and more. But the pace of research is also a problem for a book like this, because to remain useful, new editions cannot appear fast enough to keep up with the latest batch of techniques, genes and proteins. Ultimately an Internet version of this book that gets updated on a regular basis would be the most useful. Never the less, once you get in the habit of using this dictionary, you'll want to keep it nearby when you're browsing the life science literature. Is this book good value? I think it's expensive compared to all other books, but well priced for an academic textbook. I find that using this book is still more rapid and direct than browsing the web for the definition of a word I don't know, and the brief definition given in this book is a good starting point for hunting down more detailed information.

Great for Science majors, all the definitions or words you used to know but can't remember from class to class. Very thorough. much better than a textbook glossary.