Market-return

Return to the cave of time is fun because I like how I get to choose whatever I would do in real life instead of going along with the character in the book. I also like how the author writes with excitement and scariness at the same time. I would recommend it for starting readers.

Another great sequel to that mysterious cave of time. This is a great book. Any "choose your own adventure" lover should read it (if its available) It shouldn't be out of print!

This one is better than the original "Cave of Time," which kicked off this fascinating series. Packard is the best of the series authors, and by this time he has it down to a science.

Amy Halladay and her mentor/F.B.I. supervisor are on the trail of a vicous, brutal serial killer. An intercontinental one, no less. You ask yourself, "Wait a second hasn't there been hundreds if not thousands of serial killer's in thiller fiction? Then answer yes, but the title states this novel is original?" There is the nub, so to speak, this serial killer was oringinally a nasty soul, Paul Noakes in eighteenth century England, and an imprisoned convict Myron. In other words this particular killer has been reincarnated several times to kill and kill again.
That is the main premise that distinguishes this good guys vs. bad guy novel from all the others on the market. Hart has interspersed her plot with subplots including domestic tension as the wife of the lead investigator is revealed to be having an affiar with his supervisor.
There is room for even more, Hart valiantly, often succeeding to bring characterization and life to the population of this story. In the main part as stated she succeeds, yet it is almost as if she has spread herself too thin. Trying to say too much in a pared down novel. In other words this tale would have been just as enjoyable if she had made it twice as long. The agents lives are glimpsed as is the killer's various incarnations, yet it is almost as if the reader is seeing them through the window of a bus passing hurriedly through town, without stopping even to make a pit stop. So the lack of depth in some ways hurts her unexpected ending and overall diminishes her otherwise taut and effective writing.

This is the second title (out of five) in the Rocheworld Saga. The humans sent to Barnard's system discovered intelligent (in the most stringent sense of the word) life on Rocheworld, a weird double planet subject to complex dynamics and tidal forces. These aliens -the flouwen- are aquatic amoeba-like creatures living in the oceans of Eau, one of the lobes of the double planet. The flouwen are centuries ahead of us in Mathematics, but have no technology.

In this book, the flouwen are explored more in depth. We learn about their physiology and social structure. Using human technology, the flouwen get into space for the first time, and help the humans in their exploration of Roche, the second lobe of Rocheworld. Then, two longly-separated evolutionary branches meet again...

As with many other Forward's books, neither plot nor characterization are the strongest points in this novel. However, Forward manages once again to put together so much thought-provoking scientific speculation that makes you forget any other deficiencies.

Having read "Rocheworld" (aka "The Flight of the Dragonfly") before starting this novel is obviously recommended, but I guess one could even get into the story without it.

Much better than The Dawning, another Leisure line novel. Cave creates a good plot, believeable characters, and the story flows smoothly until the climax

I am a new reader of Cave's and enjoy his writing style which is simple but powerful. Unlike so many writers, he does not overwrite and uses a clear and concise voice to express his thoughts.

He uses words like darts and creates intense imagery that lets you see the action as it unfolds and is a good dialogue writer as well. Cave is simply a writer with a vision and knows how to detail his research of the occult and witchcraft.

Keep it up, Mr Cave. Two thumbs way way up!

The Evil Returns seems to be a sequel, judging by the brief backstory given in the novel's opening pages, but don't let that discourage you from picking this up, you'll be missing a real treat. Margal (the returning evil) kidnaps a young American girl and sneaks her into Florida, but for what? Finding out is a lot of fun. Judging by the list of awards and high praise blurbs Hugh B. Cave receives on the book jacket, the man is a well known and respected writer in the horror genre. I have been reading horror for well over twenty years and Cave's name is new to me, but discovering this writer late is way better than never, believe me. The Evil Returns features the kind of tight plotting, strong characters, and brisk pace that many contemporary writers seems incapable of providing. Highly recommended.

Hugh B. Cave has an intimate knowledge of Haiti and voodoo and this shows in his novels. The story follows the exploits of an evil bocor (sorcerer) who has a plan to gain influence the US President. The sorcerer uses his powers to control the minds of others, including a little girls who he kidnaps and takes with him to Florida. I enjoyed the creepier aspects of the novel but thought that some of the subplots were a drag, including a perfunctory romance. But all in all if you want a voodoo story that uses authenic details to come alive-this is it!

I have been living abroad for several years, and purchased this book when my tax situation became more complicated (i.e. when my income passed the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion). Although the information in the book is helpful, I found that the large majority of what I needed was available on the IRS' website, which is very user-friendly, contains a wealth of valuable information, and most importantly is free.

In particular, IRS Publication 54 "Tax Guide for U.S. Citizens and Resident Aliens Abroad" seemed to answer all of my questions, and there are hundreds of other publications available from the IRS that are very helpful, are written in plain English and contain many useful examples. Of course, if your tax situation is extremely complex, you may need more help, but in that case, you probably will need to seek recourse to a sophisticated tax advisor as opposed to a book.

This book is an extremely helpful resource for expat tax issues. This subject is very difficult for an individual without a big company taking care of all the details. If I had found this book earlier, it would have saved me dozens of hours scouring the internet for relavent information. Note that this isn't a book to help you figure out the best way to wangle yourself into tax-freedom. You should get this book well before moving, use it to help you plan and then visit a professional - but at least you won't be paying a professional to cover the groundwork.

I am an expat, and I found answers to many of my questions in this work book. I am not knowledgable enough in tax law to pass judgement on the quality of the information presented here. Expat tax law is complicated and intricate, involving many special cases which may not apply to you. The work book overcomes this through careful organization of chapters and topics. It is possible to locate topics of interest without having wade through large amounts of unrelated material. I gave this work book the fifth star for it's spiral binding, which makes it much easier to work with.

This book performs a valuable service to novice investors by explaining some of the realities of the stock market. Unfortunately, the poor editing makes the book awkward to read and unnecessarily hard to understand. If the publisher could do something about that before bringing out the next edition, the book could become a classic.

With better editing this book could have been a classic. The authors perform a valuable service in disposing of some common illusions regarding the stock market, but the reading experience is marred by frequent defects in the English.

This is an excellent book that is still useful years after publication. I would love to see it back in print so I can buy several more copies.

As much as I enjoyed all of Lawheads other Arthurian books, I was left with the feeling that he simply turned this one out too quickly. While the beginning of the book caught my intrest, and kept me reading, as I went along, I began to feel that I was in the middle of a daytime soap opera. The characters were shallow, the situations increasing unbelievable, and the plot ground to a halt about 100 pages before the book did. The ending left me completely flat, and disappointed. There were too many things left unanswered. Why did Waring have such a vituperative hatered of the monarchy, and what happened to him? Such people do not just disappear. Where was the great evil of Morgian-Moira, she was a bit of a joke. And why mention the Lia Fail, and then no more about it again? Merlin was underutilized, no great shakes came from his character at all. James and Jenny were too good to be true, and while you can't help liking them, they were not well developed as real humans, with real human failings. And come on, beaten, stabbed, bitten by pit bulls, twice, save the baby, and a bit of antiseptic and a tetnus shot, and back on the road? Pu-leeze. Not to mention shot, and burned. The only thing left out was a good hanging, maybe that will be in the next book. And where was Excalibur? A central part of the legend forgotten. A king without a sword and all that.
Altogether, I think if Mr. Lawhead had taken more time, added another 100 pages or so, worked the plot to the end, and remembered the background he so magically created for Taliesin - Grail, this could have been a wonderful way to bring the story into modern times. But, it fell flat and failed to deliver the magic of the previous books. I have re-read all the other books at least 4 times, this one will sit on the bottom shelf with the dust bunnies.

I've never read Lawhead before, but will now, and had enjoyed lighter treatments of the theme of Arthur's return, i.e. "The Forever King" and "The Broken Sword" or "Arthur King" or a couple of mid-90's novels that did put modern folks with chivalric dreams in the bodies of authentic,cruder Arthurian court figures. Lawhead has avoided most of the potential whimsy, grappling with thinking through how such an extravagant idea could work in a complex, modern England. The contrast between the wasted opportunities of Britain's royalty since Queen Victoria and what a leader could do was particularly powerful and pounded home so a deaf man could hear it. The characters are well done, the plot moves along modern political thriller lines instead of a few whacks from the Caliburn blade to resolve things, and there is a lot of long reflection obvious in the entire book. If you enjoy the many interpretations of Arthur, you'll enjoy this as well.

I love Arthurian books, I inhale them, I own dozens of them, and each sits in an honored place in my libaray. "Avalon" has joined those books. A fine modern tale of Arthur come alive, "In the hour Britain's greatest need, King Arthur will return." So speaks the legend, and so it is true. Mr. Lawhead's books tries to show the reader how England would be in it's greatest hour of need. Power-hungry Prime Minister, sad defeated King, and a nation in moral decline. One man can change all that and he doesn't even know it. Captain James Arthur Stuart has no idea he is about to become the stuff of legends. It was a good read, all the factors of Arthurian legend were there, well all but one. Excalibur! Why he left out Excalibur I have no idea. Remember? The King without a sword is a land without a King. At times the story wanders around and takes it's time coming back to center. All in all it was a good book, wide open for a follow up story.

I enjoyed the beginning of this book. It started with a bang, and then just sort of fizzled out for me.

The background, the launch and the "accident" I found interesting. It was the tedium of the aftermath that I found dull. The lawsuits, the guilt, the lawyers, that followed...yawn.

I had high hopes for this book and was let down.

Mr. Buzz Aldrin walked on the Moon long before he started writing books. He was one of the handfuls of men ever to go so far from this planet, and among an even smaller group to walk on another world. He was part of the last great space project Apollo, a project that had a goal other than simply circling the Earth in low Earth orbit. He is clearly a man very frustrated with the deterioration of exploration of space, and he makes that clear in this work of fiction.

"The Return", is full of irony as it involves damage to a shuttle named Columbia. This is not cheap opportunism as this book was released a few years ago. This book attempts to include several large events in far too few pages. An event takes place and then is often resolved with little if any detail shared between the event and its resolution.

The work often has an annoying style that has a character involved in a dialogue and then commenting on what they are about to say, are saying, or have said. It leaves the reader feeling as those the same material is covered more than once. Meaningless issues like what type of fast food can cover more than a page or two, and in a book of 264 pages, that is an interminably long time.

I would be much more interested in reading non-fiction from Mr. Aldrin about how he feels America can effectively once again begin the exploration of space. I would like to know what he thinks about the Space Shuttle, The International Space Station, and whether these are worthwhile programs, and if not, what programs should be pursued.

Not many have the experience of Mr. Aldrin and I wish he was using the time that produced this book, to further the exploration, or at least the intelligent discussion of the exploration of space.

Although somewhat light in detail of characters and plot, "The Return" is a fine read of what the U.S. Space Program COULD be leading to. The ideas and dreams of one of America's Finest show, in a well thought out, suspenseful tale of International intrigue that leads from Low Earth Orbit through the morass of the Media and the National legal system, to the intricate spiderweb of Worldwide interagency espionage and skullduggery!
An excellent means of entertaining oneself on a weekend away from it all, at home or on vacation, or sending self off to one's own Dreamland!

The final installment in R.A. Salvatore's Spearweilder series, "The Dragonslayer's Return" is, like its predecessors, a good read that sometimes flirts with greatness, but never really lives up to its potential. In fact, as a conclusion to a trilogy, it is somewhat disappointing, although without completely destroying the series.

Obviously Drizzt Do'Urden creator R.A. Salvatore is deeply connected to these books, and feels very strongly about the subject matter. Again we join Gary (named after Salvatore's own brother, presumably) from Real-earth, and his wife Diane (named after Salvatore's own wife), as they embark upon a journey to the realm of Faerie (a shallow version of Middle-earth, essentially) to destroy once and for all the wicked witch who terrorizes the land. What ensues are a lot of heavy-handed war sequences and some smaller battles that are overflowing with Salvatore's zesty action descriptions. Though action is certainly one of Salvatore's strengths, he often gets carried away, and this is particularly true in "The Dragonslayer's Return." The repetitive nature of these action setpieces leads, sooner or later, to boredom, and skimming ahead to read the inevitable outcome.

Most disappointing, though, is the series conclusion, which doesn't pack as much punch as you might wish (and bears an uncanny similarity to a certain sequence in the film, "Conan the Destroyer"). Salvatore seems almost rushed to deliver an ending as well, and deprives his readers of what could be a more emotional farewell between the residents of Real-earth and their Faerie pals. Like a Hollywood film, it seems that once the action is finished, the story races toward a finale, therefore depriving itself of slower, more character-driven moments. This is a great loss to the series - though not a completely crippling one, by any means.

Though Salvatore uses these books to get a bit preachy at times, his messages are generally worthy ones, and his themes mostly adhere to those embraced by his obvious mentor, J.R.R. Tolkien. The characters are vivid and colorful (though, strangely, Real-earth natives Gary and Diane are perhaps the least interesting), and the humor is generally right on the mark. Again, though, Salvatore tries in vain to balance light-hearted fun with the horrors of war and violence, and though the other two volumes in the series suffered similar difficulties, "The Dragonslayer's Return" is the biggest offender. It's a tough balancing act to be sure, and Salvatore, at least during this stage in his career, just wasn't up to the task.

All quibbles aside, "The Dragonslayer's Return" is, like its forebears, a fast read, and though it has its lulls, it's still a good sword 'n sorcery novel, sure to retain the fans of the previous tomes. It just gets a bit too self-important sometimes, and never really makes the most of its winning premise. Still, I can't help but recommend it to the world's dreamers, who will almost surely find something to like here.

This entire Series is a little juvenile. I read this book and the other tow in the trilogy (The Woods Out Back and The Dragons Dagger) and they were all good. This is an easy read which is part of the reason that I don't think that this is Salvatore's best work. I got the feeling that this might have been one of his earlier attempts before he found his real writing niche. I love all of Salvatore's boooks and am now about 4 books from reading them all. This Particular book and series has great characters. I liked the Leprechan especially. There was a lot of good comedy and there were several fights but these weren't as Dynamic as, say, the Dark Elf books by Salvatore. All in all though this book has a good story, be it predictable at times. I did enjoy this book because the basic premice of the books was good. Somewhat like the Fionavar Tapestry by Guy Gavriel Kay who is also a very good writer. This book and this series (Becuase you might as well read the whole series) are worth the time and this would be a good one to read to your kids at night. I hope this helps.

I was really expecting to be completely scared. Mr. Little has a great reputation for writing great horror stories, but this was not a great horror story. Way too many characters I could care less about, way too many random events taking place that I could care less about, and a "monster" that wouldn't scare my daughter if she saw it. There were so many bizarre, unexplained occurences that I kept expecting to be resolved and never did. And the ending!?!?!?!?!?!? What is up with that? It was as if Mr. Little ran out of ideas and just gave up. The best part of reading this novel is that I learned what not to do when writing my own tale of hororr/supernatural. Thanks!

Bentley Little is one of the few current practitioners of epic horror: horror fiction that takes place over a broad geographic area and weaves together disparate events into one large tapestry. In THE RETURN, he tackles the disappearance of the Anasazi Indians in the Southwest and marries it to a series of contemporary events that are occurring throughout the U.S. Archeologists are uncovering strange and creepy objects at their digs, artifacts are becoming sentient in museums and everything seems to be connected to a series of spooky mummies with orange afros who are suddenly appearing. It's a complex plot with some of the scariest scenes I've read in years. One spooky book.

Let's face it: Bentley Little is a guilty pleasure we all enjoy. He writes horror with no restrictions whatsoever. If you want to learn something while you read, if you want a theme in your story, read King or Laymon--hell, you're probably like me and read them anyway! But if you just want to be scared...

Then pick up a Bentley Little novel.

And why not start with "The Return." Yes, it's complex, and pretty much meaningless. The plot itself is un-realistic as heck, and you characters are shallow, despite attempts to bring their past into the mix. But this novel is scary; it's very scary.

A little recap of the plot, although if you're a Little fan, you know you don't need one: Glen is going through midlife crisis. He drops everything and just leaves. In Arizona, while on a tour of an Anasazi ruin, he gets offered a job at an archeological dig. For reasons unknown to himself, he takes up that offer...and finds himself in Hell on Earth!

Sure, there's Melanie, whom he's quickly falling in love with. And the dig's director, Al, is friendly. So're some of the other diggers. But he doesn't like it. Especially not after he digs up that skull; because that's when the townfolk start taking a disliking to him and the diggers; that's when the Indian artifacts start moving on their own; when people start disappearing right out of thin air; and when a legend--The Mogollon Monster--seems more than just a myth.

If I have to be honest--and I do--I will say that this novel reflects a more mature Bentley Little--not that we want one. The gore is kept, for the large part, until the second half of the book. But when it comes, it comes in full-force. And when you aren't being grossed out, you're checking to make sure nobody's sneaking up behind you.

A brief warning, here at the end: Do not read "The Return" at night, unless you're prepared to lose sleep. This novel, like all of Little's, is packed full of frights. A must for Little fans, and a good introductory course for new recruits.