Judgement Book Reviews

The Housing Boom and Bust

2012-02-12T14:28:00.000-08:00

By Thomas Sowell Copyright 2009

According to this book's author, Thomas Sowell, the housing bubble and bust was caused by the federal government trying to make housing more affordable and increase home ownership rates. Starting during the Great Depression of the 1930's, the federal government created Fannie Mae to make home financing more available. This program, and similar ones, made the federal government the primary owner or guarantor of residential mortgages in the United States. And then in the 1990's, the federal government began forcing banks to give home mortgage loans to non-white people with little regard to their credit risk.

The federal interventions in the housing and mortgage market were the primary factors responsible for the housing bubble and bust, at least according to the author of this book. However, he does address many other issues related to the housing market which affected affordability and ownership rates and that contributed to the boom and bust. The other issues he discusses include government land management, or smart growth, policies, section 8 housing vouchers, banking regulation, and political activists campaigns.

The author is famous for his criticism of race based government policies, so this book includes an emphasis on race based mortgage lending.

While all the issues discussed by the author in this book certainly contributed to the housing bubble, there were other factors that were much greater contributors. In particular, the manipulation of interest rates by the Federal Reserve Bank.

The artificially low interest rate environment created by the Fed forced down yields on fixed income investments. Insurance companies, pension funds, and other investors all require fixed income investments to meet their fiduciary responsibilities. So when the Fed lowered interest rates on traditional fixed income assets, investors began looking for new debt that paid higher yields. So investment banks created a new variety of mortgaged backed securities to sell to these investors.

Mortgage debt was always a low-risk investment, so by expanding the sub-prime mortgage market investment bankers believed they were creating a new high-yield but low-risk investment. This lead to strong demand for lower quality mortgage debt, and mortgage brokers filled that demand by handing out mortgages with little regard for borrowers ability to repay.

The main point is that the low interest rate environment created by the Fed, specifically the Fed chairman Alan Greenspan, was one of the primary causes of the housing bubble.

Unfortunately, this book has only flattering things to say about Alan Greenspan. The author claims that Mr. Greenspan warned about the housing bubble, and he even provides several tepid quotes from the Fed chairman. However, this is misleading. Alan Greenspan is widely recognized as one of the people most responsible for the bubble and bust.

Readers will wonder how Mr. Sowell can be so kind to Mr. Greenspan. The answer is probably that the two men are personal friends. However, this lack of objectivity really undermines this entire book.

While this book contains much great analysis of the failure of government planning of the economy and a recognition of the superiority of free markets and private property, it fails by not being objective about all the causes of the housing boom and bust.

Bell, Book, and Scandal

2012-01-29T13:18:00.000-08:00

By Jill Churchill Copyright 2003

The main character in this mystery novel is amateur detective Jane Jeffry, a housewife who lives in America's Midwest. Her character is an aspiring writer who is trying to find a publisher for a historical mystery novel she is writing. So to further her goal, she attends a mystery writers conference along with her friend Shelley.

While at the conference, a bossy woman who is a publisher's agent becomes ill after eating a box of poisoned chocolates. Also, an obnoxious writer of book reviews is found knocked unconscious and in his hands is found a page torn from a book. Jane investigates these incidents and discovers they are related to a case of plagiarism. At the end of the book she discovers the culprit, but she doesn't report the culprit to the police, because the woman who was poisoned, and the man who was knocked out, were both unpleasant people whom she didn't like.

The mystery part of this story doesn't really begin until about half way through the book, and when it does begin, it is presented in a very dull and uninteresting manner. One of the problems is that the suspects are not very well developed characters, so their motivations for doing what they do isn't very apparent, so it leaves readers not really caring about the characters or what happens to them.

The first half of the book is taken up by Jane shopping for a new car and attending various seminars at the conference. In fact, after Jane buys a new car, the remainder of the book is mostly just an itinerary for a writers conference. And then added to the itinerary are notes from a participant of the various seminars and workshops attended.

So if you enjoy reading business conference itineraries and the personal notes of someone who attended various meetings and their discussion of who they met and what happened, you may enjoy this book. Perhaps readers who are intensely interested in the subject of publishing and the writing profession may find this book informative, but otherwise everyone else will probably find it a tremendous bore.

Another problem with the book is the main character of Jane Jeffry. She is a silly, petty-minded housewife who seems alternatively astonished and challenged by all of life's little daily trivialities. Every little household task she does, meal that is eaten, shopping trip taken, and drive down the street is profiled in detail and discussed by Jane and her equally silly friend Shelley.

A good writer can often weave the common daily activities of an interesting character into an interesting story, but Jill Churchill apparently isn't one of those writers, at least not in this book. She seems to just verbalize and transcribe many of her own activities. Readers will suspect she actually attended a writers conference while she wrote this book and she simply made bland notes about some of the things she did and saw. That may explain partly why the story lacks imagination, wit, and cleverness.

So needless to say, this book is a waste of time.

The Case of the Man Who Died Laughing

2012-01-22T12:26:00.000-08:00

By Tarquin Hall Copyright 2010

It is rare nowadays to find a murder mystery story as clever, witty, and well-written as an old Agatha Christie mystery novel. So often books in the murder mystery genre are long, tedious, far-fetched tales written by narrow-minded, provincial authors who resort to vulgarity in a mistaken attempt to appear sophisticated and cosmopolitan. Fortunately, this book and it's author doesn't fall into any of those categories. It is a rare find.

This book is the second in a series about a private detective, named Vish Puri, who lives in New Delhi, India. He owns a detective agency with several employees and operatives who help him with his investigations. Mr. Puri is wise and intelligent, as well as confident and proud, but at the same time very likable. He is also fat. He is married and has grown children. His family members are included in scenes and subplots in the book, and they are a significant part of the book.

The main plot of this story involves an atheist scientist who campaigns against religion and gurus. The scientist believes progress in India is being held back by religion and superstition. One day, a guru who uses magic tricks to attract devotees, threatens to kill the scientist. The scientist is then murdered, but in a mysterious and rather ironic way. He is killed while attending an outdoor meeting of a "laughing club." The image of a goddess suddenly appeared and stabbed the scientist to death in front of other members of the laughing club.

Mr. Puri, the most private detective, was acquainted with the scientist and also the founder of the laughing club. And although Mr. Puri is a religious Hindu, he respected both men. So when he is informally asked by a friend on the police force to help investigate the murder, he is happy to do it. Mr. Puri begins by interviewing the members of the laughing club who witnessed the crime. He also sends a woman operative to pose as a devotee of a guru suspected of being involved with the murder.

In addition to the main plot, there are several subplots. One of the subplots involve Mr. Puri's wife and mother. While they are attending a woman's club meeting, they are robbed by armed gunman. After police dismiss the crime as unimportant, they involve themselves in a rather comic investigation of the event.

One of the unique elements of this story that makes it enjoyable is its setting in India and the contrast between old India and the new modern developing India. For example, there is a scene where Mr. Puri and his operatives travel by car on a large modern highway that ends abruptly. The highway is incomplete because of politics and corruption. Also, the aspects of Indian culture that are a blend of Asian and English influences, including language and customs, are very interesting. The author does a good job conveying an understanding of life in India, without being pedantic.

If there was any criticism against this book, it may be that the series will eventually have too many recurring characters. Mr. Puri's family and his detective agency include many characters with backgrounds and relationships to other characters that will have to continually be re-explained in subsequent books in the series. It will make the subsequent books repetitive and boring. It's best when a story has just a few main characters and then each book in the series introduces unique characters that only appear in one book.

But other than that one criticism, this book represents high quality writing and storytelling and is very enjoyable reading.

The Duchess

2011-12-29T14:57:00.000-08:00

By Amanda Foreman Copyright 1998

Georgiana Spencer was the Duchess of Devonshire in the late 1700's and early 1800's. She is famous mostly because of a famous painting of her by Thomas Gainsborough, and also because she was an ancestor of Princess Diana. The author of this biography attempts to make the case that the Duchess of Devonshire was also an influential political adviser to members of Parliament and royalty. The Duchess and her husband, the Duke, were members of a faction of the Whig party. They supported more democracy and limits on the power of the aristocracy and King.

This biography quotes from many of the Duchess's own letters and diaries, as well as the letters and diaries of her friends and contemporaries. The quotes and excerpts introduce the language and manner of speech from that era into this modern biography . This in turn gives the biography an atmosphere similar to a Jane Austen novel, albeit a rather debauched Jane Austen.

The reason it's debauched is because the Duchess was an adulterer, gambler, and spendthrift, and the Devonshire household was very irregular. What made the household irregular was that the Duke of Devonshire was basically a polygamist. Their household included the Duchess's best friend, Lady Elizabeth, and the Duke fathered the children of both the Duchess and Lady Elizabeth.

So there are three key elements to the Duchesses life. Her political activities, her finances, and her love life. The author clearly admires and sympathizes with the subject of her book, however, most readers will probably find the Duchess a rather silly and foolish woman.

The author attempts to make the Duchess a serious person by attributing political opinions and activities to her. However, most of the evidence reviewed in this book doesn't really support the view that she had much political influence or impact on events. She just socialized with some of the prominent personalities of her time.

The author claims the Duchess was always deeply in debt and struggled to make payments on it. However, there isn't much evidence to support the view that she was ever in any serious threat of being sent to debtors prison. Her family and friends always seemed to have money to bail her out. And the people she borrowed money from wouldn't have kept lending money to her if they seriously thought there was real risk of it not being repaid.

The Duchess had a very strange love life. She not only didn't seem to mind her husband fathering the children of her best friend, but she supposedly gave birth to a child fathered by another man. It was all very sorted and disgusting. It reminds one that the so-called upper classes and the lower classes often have a lot in common. They tend to conduct their lives more like animals than people.

But despite the vulgar and debauched lives of the characters in this biography, it is still a rather enjoyable book. If readers enjoy Jane Austen's novels, they will likely enjoy this book. It is similar in style and is about characters who were contemporaries of Austen's characters. The only difference is that the characters in this biography would have been the villains in an Austen novel and not the heroes.

How to Raise the Perfect Dog

2011-12-18T10:21:00.000-08:00

By Cesar Millan and Melissa Jo Peltier Copyright 2009

The full title of this book is How to Raise the Perfect Dog Through Puppyhood and Beyond. It is co-authored by Cesar Millan who is the host of a TV show called the Dog Whisperer. His philosophy is that dog owners must be their dog's pack leader. If the owner is not the leader, than the dog is likely to exhibit all sorts of behavior problems such as jumping on people, not obeying instructions, chewing on inappropriate objects, barking, etc. Mr. Millan says his mission in life is to teach owners how to handle dogs and prevent dog misbehaviour that results in owners rejecting and abandoning their pet.

To help provide material and examples for the book, Mr. Millan adopted five puppies and used his experiences with them to discuss in this book. The five puppies are all different breeds, but the most attention is given to the experiences of a bull dog. However, the dog stories in the book are not exclusively about the five puppies. In fact, the development and progress of the five dogs is rather difficult to follow because so many other dogs and issues are discussed.

Mr. Millan says raising the perfect dog begins with procuring a puppy from a reputable source. Specifically, a reputable source for a dog is a professional breeder or rescue shelter. The author warns against buying from pet stores. Dogs from pet stores may not have been treated well and could have behavioral and health problems as a result.

Mr. Milan goes on to describe his experiences procuring the five dogs for this book. He discusses the behavior of some of the puppies he observed during his selection process. However, he makes rather elaborate claims about the puppy behavior he witnessed. Based on brief interactions with the pups, he draws conclusions about their personalities and future character. His snap judgements seem very speculative and sometimes far fetched. For example, after a few minutes of observing a mother and her puppies, he observes one puppy wandering away from the mother so he decides that particular puppy has certain characteristics its siblings lack. Readers will suspect that an hour before or after he observed this wandering puppy, he probably could have seen one of its siblings doing exactly the same thing.

Mr. Millian and his co-author go on to discusses what to expect from your new puppy and address a comprehensive list of subjects and give practical advice related to raising a puppy.

The whole philosophy of Mr. Milian is based on dog owners projecting calm assertive energy around their dog and being the pack leader. He also emphasizes that dogs should be fed and walked on a routine schedule which contributes to the dogs perception that the owner is the pack leader. An alternative approach to Mr. Millians philosophy would be to think of the dog as a friend and equal and for the owner to follow and react to the dog's behavior. This would let the dog be in charge and the owner would lose control. In that situation the dog can become a nuisance to the owner and to other people.

Almost all the information and advice presented is told in the form of stories about real dogs and experiences, so the information is rarely dry or boring. Even for readers who don't particularly like dogs, the stories are well enough written to make for generally good reading.

One thing this book makes clear is how much work and responsibility is involved in raising and caring properly for a dog. It may make many readers appreciate the superiority of cats as pets. But if people still insist on owning a dog, this book is full of good advice about raising a well behaved one so that at least it won't be an annoyance to people who don't particularly like for dogs.

The Ultimate Depression Survival Guide

2011-12-02T05:01:00.000-08:00

By Martin D. Weiss Copyright 2009

This book is subtitled: Protect Your Savings, Boost Your Income, and Grow Wealthy Even in the Worst of Times. The author is an investment advisor. His father was an economist and also an investment advisor during the Great Depression of the 1930's. The author frequently quotes his father to support his belief that the economic crisis of 2008 is the beginning of a new economic depression that parallels the 1930's depression.

This book focuses on investment strategies which should be implemented at a later date. The author tells readers to sign-up at his website to receive updates of when to make specific investment moves.

His basic investment strategy is to sell stocks and real estate, and to buy US government bonds and speculate in gold and currency ETF's. The author's main reason for following this strategy is because it would have worked well in the 1930's. This doesn't seem like a very sensible rationale for making an investment. The best investment strategy is usually diversification into all asset classes.

The book does contain some limited discussion about economic theory and philosophy, which seems sensible. Specifically, the discussion about the government and the Federal Reserve encouraging the accumulation of excessive debt at all levels of society which has led to the current economic problems. And these economic problems won't end until some of the excessive debt has been eliminated.

The author is optimistic that the United States will one way or another reduce it's debt and a new age of prosperity will begin. He also seems to believe that this new age of prosperity will exist within the same political configuration as today. That may happen, but it seems just as likely that the economy won't improve until there are dramatic changes in the political boundaries and configuration. The author seems to base his opinion on the fact that the United States continued along the same path after the Great Depression as before and continued to prosper.

But the author's views seem to be based on the theory that history always repeats itself. History does seem to follow similar pattens, but it never exactly repeats itself. Since most of the author's advice is based on history exactly repeating itself, the advice probably isn't very good. And the authors advice to speculate in currency ETF's, which is just gambling, is further evidence that the advice in this book is not very good.

So you can skip this book as a waste of time.

13 Bankers

2011-09-25T12:46:00.000-07:00

By Simon Johnson and James Kwak Copyright 2010
According to the authors of this book, the financial crisis of 2008 was caused by inadequate government regulation of large banks. Unfortunately, the author's thesis is wrong, and they waste their time needlessly rehashing United States banking and economic history only to arrive at this wrong conclusion.

They argue that banking regulations put into place after the Great Depression of the 1930's resulted in 50 years of financial market stability. Then in the 1970's and 1980's the government began deregulating the banking and finance industry. This allowed some of the banks to grow very large and become interconnected and form into an oligarchy.

This banking oligarchy engages in high risk investments on a massive scale. When the risky investments succeed, the bankers keep the profits. But when the investments fail, the taxpayers take the losses and bail out the bankers. The authors point to events such as the 1990's savings and loan crisis, and the 2000's housing and mortgage bubble, among others, as examples of how the system works.

The authors say the government's response to the 2008 financial crisis didn't solve anything. The same banking oligarchy that created the crisis is still in place. Specifically, there are, by the authors count, 13 banks that are too large to fail. None of these banks could be allowed to go bankrupt because they are so large and intertwined with other financial institutions that one failure could cause a chain reaction of other failures.

For readers who are already familiar with the banking and economic history of the United States, there is nothing new in this book. And although the authors get most of their history correct, their conclusions are wrong.

One of the glaring mistakes the authors make is to claim that the former Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan was an ardent supporter of free markets and financial deregulation. The authors repeatedly make this claim which seriously undermines their credibility. Alan Greenspan is an ardent Monetarist, which means he believes in paper money and central banks and government controlled interest rates. Anyone who believes in those things isn't a believer in free markets, no matter what they say. The regulator of the money supply is the banking and economic dictator. Alan Greenspan only claimed to believe in free markets and financial deregulation, but in fact he controlled and manipulated the money supply to the point that other financial regulations were of little importance.

The authors are essentially correct in their assessment of the American financial system being controlled by an oligarchy of financial institutions with the support and assistance of the government. However, their claim that it is government support of free market policies and limited regulation that created the oligarchy is not true. The truth is that a free market financial system would require ending the Federal Reserve System, the fiat money monopoly, fractional reserve banking, and government sponsored financial guarantees expressed or implied. The end of these government policies would result in a true free market banking system which would result in competition and the end of the oligarchy.

The authors are so wrong in their conclusions, and their history of banking is so commonplace, that this book is a waste of time.

Shooting at Loons

2011-09-14T17:25:00.000-07:00

By Margaret Maron Copyright 1994

This is a revolting book. The author is obviously a feminist, and she has written a book intended to degrade men. She also appears to have some sort of social agenda. She wants to inspire woman to change their behavior and to adopt masculine personalities and for men to be regarded as feminine. So her story consist of woman characters who are strong, aggressive, and decisive leaders. And her male characters are relatively weak, sensitive, vulnerable, and indecisive. In addition, her male characters are the villains, and the women characters are the heroes.

The story is about a woman judge, in her thirties, who is staying at her cousins vacation cottage in a North Carolina coastal fishing community. In the community, there is conflict between the local people, who traditionally support themselves with fishing, and newcomers who are wealthier and support tourism and environmental regulation.

The judge discovers the murdered body of one of the local residents who got along with both the locals and the newcomers. As the judge goes about her business she learns more about the community residents and motives they may have had to commit the murder.

The suspects include an ambitious woman real estate agent, a feisty woman fish processing plant owner, a strong woman fish farmer, and a sharp woman lawyer.

There are also male suspects. One is a divorce lawyer the judge use to live with in New York. He use to be an idealist, but he has now sold out and is just interested in making money. Another is a fellow male judge, who turns out to be crooked. And then there is her ignorant, abusive boat building neighbor who turns out to be the murderer.

The woman characters are all successful and turn out to be good. The male characters are all pathetic.

This book is rubbish and suitable for burning.

House of Cards

2011-08-21T14:48:00.000-07:00

By William D. Cohan Copyright 2009

This book can be divided into three sections. The first section focuses on the events leading up to the collapse of the Wall Street investment firm Bear Stearns. It explores the last days of the firm's existence in a minute-by-minute narrative of events and conversations. The narrative consists primarily of transcripted interviews with some of the key figures at Bear Stearns and other people familiar with the firm's collapse.

The second section of the book consists of stories about the 80 year history of Bear Stearns from its founding to the period shortly before its demise. There are also profiles of the people who built and ran the company.

The final section of the book is a review of the housing bubble and the residential mortgage business that fueled the bubble. The author places significant blame for the housing bubble on the government. The government put in place policies to enable low-income people to buy houses. The government also set artificially low interest rates.

Low interest rates caused fixed-income investors, who traditionally seek low-risk investments, to seek higher interest rates in non-traditional investments that appeared to be low-risk. Investors found these apparently low-risk investments at Wall Street firms who had engineered new complex real estate investments based on residential mortgages and sub-prime mortgages. These new real estate investments were supposedly low-risk because traditional mortgage investments had historically been low-risk. The result was money flowed into the real estate market and created a huge financial and real estate price bubble that collapsed in 2008 and brought down Bear Stearns and other investment firms.

This book is rather tedious and repetitious. But it is comprehensive and covers all angles of the collapse of Bear Stearns. So if a reader is looking for a definitive history of the collapse of this company and what caused it, they will find this book enjoyable. However, most readers, even ones interested in the real estate bubble and collapse, will find this book contains more information than they require.

Also, as mentioned earlier, most of the book consists of transcript-like text from interviews with Wall Street bankers. And most of these people seem rather unpleasant and obnoxious. Many of them also seem quite stupid. They all just wanted to make a lot of money and travel around the world and attend social events and parties. They didn't have any interest in doing anything productive by creating something of use to other people. They are very unappealing people, so spending time reading what they have to say is not very enjoyable.

So for most people, this book will be a waste of time to read.

The Rise and Fall of Bear Stearns

2011-08-07T12:58:00.000-07:00

By Alan C. Greenberg Copyright 2010

Bear Stearns was an investment bank and stock trading firm that collapsed during the financial crisis of 2008. The firm collapsed when investors and banks wouldn't loan them money and withdrew their funds. The banks and investors were concerned that Bear Stearns' investments in residential mortgages would bankrupt the company. In an attempt to salvage some value for shareholders and save employee's jobs, Bear Stearns agreed to sell itself to JP Morgan for a fraction of the price it's stock had been trading just weeks prior to its collapse.

The author of this book, Alan Greenberg, is the former head of Bear Stearns. He worked at the firm his entire career, starting in 1949. He rose through the ranks to eventually lead the company. He stepped down from the top job in the 1990's but continued to work at the company and serve on the board of directors. He is now in his eighties. In this book he provides some biographical information about his life and also the rise and fall of Bear Stearns.

Alan Greenberg is a charming man with a sense of humor. And in this book he uses his charm and humor to sugarcoat attacks on some of his former colleagues at Bear Stearn. He seems to have been offended by some of their comments about him, which they made to the author of another book about Bear Stears. Apparently, his former colleagues considered him to be out of touch and petty minded during his later years at the company.

After reading this book, most readers will probably agree that Alan Greenberg stayed at Bear Stearns long past his usefulness. Reading between the lines, most readers will probably decide the company was run by a bunch of cronies who didn't like each other very much. These cronies, including Alan Greenberg, were out of touch and didn't really understand economics or free market investing. They were just "along for the ride" in a place and time that provided them the opportunity to acquire huge amounts of money while doing nothing productive. The policies of the Federal Reserve and the federal government created Wall Street firms like Bear Stearns. These firms do nothing but create huge amounts of paper wealth they use to skim real wealth from the real economy.

The most revealing part of the book, and the part which best demonstrates how Alan Greenberg was out of touch, is his discussion of the housing bubble and mortgage market. It is clear he had no understanding of the disparity between middle class incomes and house prices in the mid-2000's and how the mortgage market was out of control. He repeatedly tells how surprised he and everyone else was when residential mortgage investments began losing money when home owners stopped paying their mortgages.

The most ironic part of the book is when the author discusses how when he ran the company he always sought to hire smart, poor people who had a desire to become rich. Yet in his later years at the firm, all the key employees, including him, were extremely rich and seemed very content with their financial status. That should have been a clue to him that it was time for him to retire along with the rest of his cronies.

In spite of the negative comments above, this is actually an enjoyable book to read. The author is likable and has many good stories to tell. And even though he makes very insulting comments about some of his former friends, he actually seems fair minded and likable. The people he insults are all rich tough guys who can easily defend themselves anyway.

Miss Julia Paints the Town

2011-07-30T16:36:00.000-07:00

By Ann B. Ross Copyright 2008

This is a comic novel about a wealthy southern lady, Miss Julia, and the unusual situations she frequently finds herself. This is the seventh book in the Miss Julia series. The earlier books in the series tend to be a little sentimental, but this book is almost pure comedy.

In many ways, the author Ann Ross has a style of writing and storytelling that is similar to P.G. Wodehouse, the English comedy writer. However, Mr. Wodehouse's stories were set mostly in Edwardian England, but the Miss Julia stories are set in the American south of the 21st century.

The stories are told as a first person narrative by Miss Julia herself. Although she is referred to as Miss Julia, she is actually a widow who has remarried, and she is rather elderly, as is her new husband, who is a retired lawyer.

They live in a small town in North Carolina, and their household includes a housekeeper and the housekeeper's young granddaughter. But in addition to these commonplace characters, there is the unexpected addition to the household of a woman, named Hazel Marie, who was the girlfriend of her deceased first husband. Hazel Marie has a young son, whose father was Miss Julia's first husband.

Part of the comedy of this series derives from Miss Julia rising above the disgraceful circumstances in which she finds herself. Such as her first husband's former mistress and illegitimate son living in her home.

Miss Julia is a religious woman and belongs to a conservative Presbyterian church. However, her pastor is more conservative than she, and they frequently feud with each other. Miss Julia is very concerned with good moral conduct and proper appearances, yet her status and reputation are always at risk by events surrounding her, which many times were instigated by her.

The plot of this book involves a real estate developer from New Jersey who comes to town with plans to tear down the old court house and build a high-rise condominium on the site. Meanwhile, two of Miss Julia's friend's husbands disappear. One husband was an investment adviser accused of running off with his client's money. Miss Julia was one of his clients. The other husband appears to have faked his own death for unknown reasons. Eventually, the story lines of the real estate developer and the missing husbands intersect.

Miss Julia tries to comfort her friends and at the same time is attempting to stop the real estate developer from tearing down the court house. Her plans and interactions with her friends and the real estate developer involve many comedy inducing misunderstandings and hidden motives.

If readers are unfamiliar with the earlier books in the Miss Julia series, they may find it difficult to understand the relationships of some of the characters. The recurring characters have complex histories with Miss Julia, but this history is not explained very well in this book. So some of the relationships may be confusing. This can be a distraction while trying to follow the story.

However, the flaws in the book are minor. Overall, it is a very entertaining story. Fans of traditional English comedy will likely enjoy this book. As mentioned earlier, the writing style is reminiscent of an English comedy, even though the story is set in the American south. English comedy is often based on conflicts arising from differences in manners and social status and class. And that is the type of comedy found in much of this book. But even readers who don't enjoy comedies of manners will likely find enough general comedy to be amused. Anyone with a sense of humor should be able to enjoy this book.

The Town that Food Saved

2011-06-28T19:14:00.000-07:00

By Ben Hewitt Copyright 2010

If you ever thought the state of Vermont is increasingly becoming populated by weird people, this book may confirm your suspicion. However, it's not the ideas presented in this book that are weird, rather it's the author and some of the rural Vermont hippies he writes about that seem a bit weird.

Although, the problem may be the author's writing style, which can be overly personal and rather rude. But if you can see past the author's writing and ignore some of the odd characterizations of people, there are some interesting ideas presented and discussed.

This book is about the economics of food production and the impact it can have on a community. The author, Ben Hewitt, is a writer and subsistence farmer in northern Vermont. He lives near a small town called Hardwick, population 3,000. The town is a working class community that has fallen on hard times. It's main industry was once granite mining, but the granite quarry shut down many years ago. Farming has also been part of the local economy.

However, starting in the 1990's a new breed of entrepreneurial farmers began producing organic and speciality foods in the community intended for local and regional customers. These entrepreneurs include a seed producer, compost fertilizer producer, cheese maker, vegetable grower, soy product maker, and a restaurant that serves mostly locally produced food. The author profiles all of these businesses and the people who run them.

The town is also home to a non-profit organization named the Center for an Agricultural Economy. This organization advocates decentralized food production. Which means they believe people should eat food that is primarily produced locally. They claim it results in a healthier diet, less environmental impact, a better and more stable economy, and is more sustainable.

In the United States today, food production has been centralized and is controlled by large corporate organizations. Most of the food that people eat has travelled thousands of miles and has been produced using manufactured fertilizers, pesticides, and genetic modification. And the food is processed and preserved so it can be stored and transported long distances.

According to the author, today's food system of centralized, large-scale production is unsustainable, and it will collapse in the future. He warns readers that they should prepare themselves, as he has, if they wish to survive the coming collapse of the food production system in the United States. However, he doesn't make a very convincing argument. He never really explains how he thinks this collapse of the food system will transpire.

Within the Hardwick community, there is conflict between some of the newer entrepreneurial farmers and the traditional farmers and the local hippie subsistence farmers. The entrepreneurial farmers cater to higher income consumers and are willing to export their products to markets outside the local community. But the hippie farmers object to the entrepreneurs business model. They prefer small scale farms and co-ops and farmers markets that only do business with local people.

The author takes the side of the hippie farmers. In fact he is one of the hippie subsistence farmers himself. He raises his own animals and grows most of his own food. When he talks about the issues of food production and social structure he sounds like Mao Zedong or Pol Pot. This is where the book gets weird. He seems to believe we need to return to an agrarian civilization with more people working on small farms. He repeatedly insists that large scale food production is unsustainable and is on the edge of collapsing. But his arguments are unconvincing.

One of the main reasons the author is unconvincing is that his knowledge of economics seems to be lacking. For example, he doesn't seem to understand the economic concept of "competitive advantage" which means specialization of production based on natural competitive advantages leads to more wealth and prosperity and a higher standard of living for everyone. Specifically, some climates and regions are better suited for food production, so it makes sense to produce food in those areas and ship it to where its needed.

Another concern about the author's wisdom is aroused when three-quarters of the way through the book he states that if the reader has read this far they must agree with him that the current centralized food production system is on the verge of collapse. This statement seems to suggest he would only read an entire book if he agrees with the author. But it is this sort of practice that dulls the mind. Intelligence is developed by exposing oneself to ideas different than ones own. The author probably doesn't do this, which explains why he's doesn't have a very good grasp of the issues.

However, the author does seem to stumble into the truth at some points. He is correct to argue that decentralized food production can make a more stable food supply. It also can create economic diversification and provide a greater variety of occupations for workers within local communities.

The worst part of this book is when the author appears to be suggesting that the government should create programs to develop a more decentralized food production system and coerce people into it. This is a horrible idea and it didn't work in China or Cambodia, and it won't work in the US. The author also missed an opportunity to more directly challenge the role the government currently takes in involving itself in setting agricultural policy. There is no role for the government in planning food production or distribution. But that subject is clearly beyond the grasp of the author.

But all in all, this book includes interesting ideas and is worthwhile reading.

The Murder of King Tut

2011-06-19T11:22:00.000-07:00

By James Patterson Copyright 2009

It was apparently the intention of the author of this book to write a historical novel. However, he failed and his book seems to be mostly a work of fiction, or even worse, a fraud or hoax. The author claims King Tut was murdered by a conspiracy of his wife and his top advisor and general. His evidence is supposedly the pictures on the wall of King Tut's tomb. But the information presented in this book is unlikely to convince anyone of that fact.

This short book contains over 100 short chapters. The chapters alternate between scenes from ancient Egypt, the early 20th century, and the present day. The ancient Egypt scenes include biographical dramas involving King Tut's ancestors and King Tut's own life and death. Even for a historical novel the author takes incredible liberties with supposed historical facts. Most of his assumptions about the life of King Tut appear to be pure speculation, and other assumptions seem based on minor scraps of historical evidence or theory.

The book's scenes set in the early 20th century involve the archaeologist Howard Carter who discovered King Tut's tomb in the 1920's. The biographical dramas focusing on Howard Carter seem to be based on more reliable sources, but they still seem over dramatized.

The scenes set in the present day feature the author discussing the book with his publisher and his wife.

The chapters featuring King Tut are the worst. The author makes the characters seem like they are from a cheap romance novel. There can't possibly be any historical evidence to support most of the author's portrayal of King Tut. Historical evidence doesn't exist about King Tut's thoughts and feeling about the people in his life. So when the author presents scenes rich with details about the feelings and thoughts of King Tut and his associates, he is clearly just making it up. In addition, he attempts to write in the style of Shakespeare and make the characters seem out of Macbeth. The author is clearly attempting to make the scenes intriguing and sophisticated, but instead they just seem fake.

The chapters featuring Howard Carter the archaeologist are marginally better, but not by much. Again the author is clearly over dramatizing events and making stuff up.

Ultimately, this book is rubbish and suitable for burning. It is historical make-believe. The author should be ashamed of himself. But if he had any conscience or sense of shame, he would never have attempted to get this piece of rubbish published.

Unfinished Portrait

2011-05-29T15:08:00.000-07:00

By Anthea Fraser Copyright 2010

The publisher of this book promotes it as a mystery story, but in reality the story is more similar to a romance, of the soap opera variety. There are mystery elements to the story, and they are moderately engaging, but the dominant soap opera storyline is tedious and boring.

The main character is Rona Parish, who is a newspaper and biography writer. She is apparently in her thirties, although this fact isn't apparent until mid-way through the book. Her character seems more like a woman in her fifties. Rona's husband is an artist, and they have no children.

The story is presented as a third person narrative, so the other characters each have their own story lines. The other main characters include Rona's mother, father, and twin sister.

The mother and father are divorcing, but meanwhile they are each involved in love affairs with other people. The twin sister is also having a love affair. It is a rather revolting element of this book that so much of the story involves these complicated and slightly disreputable relationships while the author attempts to present the characters as saintly individuals. Unfortunately, the narrative for much of the book consists of discussions about these characters and their disreputable relationships. As mentioned earlier, this book is promoted as a mystery story, but three-fourths of it is actually a soap opera about this family and their love affairs.

In addition to all the romances, the characters also spend a tremendous amount of time scheduling get-togethers and meals. There is also an interior decorating and remodeling subplot that keeps surfacing.

The mystery subplot is introduced in the first chapter, but then it is only discussed occasionally until the final chapters. The mystery involves an artist (a painter) who disappeared a year and a half ago, and in the first chapter Rona's publisher contacts Rona with a proposal to write a book about the artist.

The artist was a disagreeable woman and her best friend had apparently committed suicide recently. The artist's family and friends and the suicide victim are moderately interesting characters. Each of these characters have semi-hidden motives against the artist, as well as against each other. Unfortunately, it is difficult to follow the motives of these characters or the facts and clues regarding the artist's life and relationships because the mystery plot scenes are rather few and far between. The plot keeps getting interrupted by Rona's family and their rather seedy love affairs.

The mystery story scenes that are presented in the first part and middle parts of the book make it seem like a rather tame and mundane mystery of the cozy variety. So readers will be surprised at the end of the story to discover that a great art forgery is involved as well as violent murder and kidnapping and attempted poisoning.

The solution to the mystery in the final chapters actually make the book seem a bit schizophrenic. Because until the end of the book, it seemed like a cozy murder mystery, but at the end it attempts to be a great adventure and thriller.

The author may have been trying to offer variety by presenting three genres of stories (mystery, romance, adventure). She may have hoped it would distract readers from the fact the characters are dull, the story tedious, and the conclusion exaggerated. But if that was the case, the author failed because the variety of genres just make this book confusing. So this book is just a waste of time.

Globish

2011-05-22T11:02:00.000-07:00

By Robert McCrum Copyright 2010

The word Globish is a combination of the words Global and English, and the author of this book is attempting to popularize the word. He argues that the English language is becoming the basis of a new worldwide language.

The subtitle of this book is "How the English Language Became the World's Language." However, if readers are looking for a linguistic history of how the English language has developed over the centuries, and how it is changing in our current times, they will be disappointed. This book doesn't deliver what it promises. It barely touches on word and grammar history. Instead, it is a breezy history of political and social events involving English speaking people. The format is similar to Winston Churchill's book, "A History of the English Speaking Peoples."

The author of Globish begins with a discussion of the origins of England. The history of England began with the fall of the Roman empire. Then there were invasions by Anglos and Saxons from Germany and Normans from France. And then there was a migration of England's people to the United States, Australia, and India.

Then after the second world war, when the United States became a world superpower, the English language was spread by American businesses and military to secure it's place as the dominate global language.

The author also discusses the technology of the Internet as another force propelling the spread of the English language. English is the language of the Internet, because the Internet and personal computer's were invented in the United States. The author then ends the book by discussing how English is spreading in China because of trade relationships and economic development.

If readers are interested in linguistic history, this book won't interest them because it is almost entirely about political and social history. But if readers are interested in political and social history, this book still won't interest them because it simply skims over centuries of history from a high level, and also with a highly biased viewpoint.

Readers will know from the start the author is not a serious thinker or academic, because he discusses Barack Obama as though the current American President represents a serious influence on the spread of English. Several times in the book he discusses Barack Obama and always in glowing terms. No serious book on the history of the English language has any need to mention Barack Obama. Also, further proving the hack status of the author is the fact he even manages to work in an insult of Sarah Palin.

This book is too silly to waste any time on. The English language is without doubt an international language, and it will certainly form the basis of future languages. It is similar to Latin in the days of the Roman empire. But this book doesn't contribute anything to understanding the history of the English language or predicting its future.

Amarcord: Marcella Remembers

2011-04-27T04:50:00.000-07:00

By Marcella Hazan Copyright 2008

According to the jacket of this book, the word "Amarcord" means "I remember" in the Italian dialect of the author. Since this book is an autobiography, Amarcord is an appropriate word for the title. The author, Marcella Hazan, is also a cookbook author. She is apparently famous in some circles of society, although most people probably won't recognize her name. She authored several cookbooks about classic Italian cooking and also ran a cooking school in Italy which was attended by wealthy people, including a few celebrities. But Marcella is more than just a cook. She is also a woman who has led a very interesting and busy life.

Marcella Hazan's nationality is Italian, but she was born in Egypt in 1924 and lived there until the age of 12. Her family returned to Italy after Marcella broke her arm and needed better medical attention than was available in Egypt. Her parents weren't wealthy, but they were apparently prosperous. Her father was a tailor and owned property in Italy. The broken arm Marcella suffered never fully healed and to this day she doesn't have full use of her arm and hand.

When World War II started, her family moved to the country to avoid the dangers of the war. But unfortunately they moved to an area with military activity, so they were frequently bombed. During this period, Marcella attended school and studied biology and zoology. After the war, when she and her parents returned to their hometown, she continued to attend school and eventually obtained a Doctorate in biology. She then worked as a school teacher and lived with her family until she was 30.

She then met her husband, Victor, who was an American visiting Italy and studying art. Victor had been born in Italy, but moved to the US as a boy. His parents were wealthy and owned a fur store. Victor was Jewish, and Marcella was Catholic, and they married in a civil ceremony so as not to antagonize his parents. But his parents never did approve of Marcella, and they even temporarily disowned Victor.

Soon after their marriage they moved to New York, and Victor worked in his parent's business. This was in the late 1950's. Marcella eventually got a job and leaned English. She then got pregnant, and quit her job. At about the same time, Victor was in a car accident. These events seemed to inspire the couple to return to Italy.

So for most of the 1960's they lived in Italy, with their young son (and only child), and Victor got a job in advertising. But he wasn't successful, and he decided to return to New York and work in the family business again.

It was during this time, in the early 1970's that Marcella took a cooking class. She then began giving her own cooking classes on Italian cooking. This led to a New York Times reporter interviewing her. Which then led to a book publisher asking her to write a cook book. The book was successful, and it also created more demand for her cooking classes.

In the late 1970's, her husband apparently wound-up the family business and Marcella and him opened a cooking school in Italy. So they spent most of the 1980's living in Italy and even bought a house in Venice and remodeled it. They also published several more cook books. And they got married again, in a Catholic church this time, since Victor's parents were dead.

By the 1990's they retired and decided to return to the US and live in a house they owned in Longboat Key, Florida. One of the reasons they wanted to live in the US, is because they were concerned about the lack of quality of Italy's nationalized health care system. But another reason was the weather was better in Florida.

This is a good book. It is also a very honest autobiography. Marcella is very matter-of-fact about the failures and disappointments in her life, and also about the conflicts and disagreements she had with various people. But she never "over shares" by giving too much personal information, which many autobiographies tend to do. She has a good sense of personal boundaries and fairness and gives just the right amount of information. She seems very self-aware and has a pleasant sense of humor. She has travelled many places and done lots of interesting things. Her long and interesting life has given her wisdom, and the expression "a life well lived" would seem to apply in this case.

This book is very enjoyable reading.

The Midnight Show Murders

2011-04-20T10:08:00.000-07:00

By Al Roker and Dick Lochte

This book is a murder mystery story featuring a reformed conman/convict, named Billy Blessing, who is now a chef and restaurant owner. Billy also makes appearances on a network TV morning show, as a guest chef and presenter. He has been sent by the network to serve as the sidekick on a new late night TV talk show. When the host of the show is killed by a bomb during a live broadcast, Billy gets caught up in the murder investigation.

When the killer's motive is finally revealed at the end of the book, it makes the whole story rather convoluted and bizarre. Because the motive didn't really have much to do with the rest of the story or characters. It turned out the host, who was Irish, was supposedly a former member of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), and he had been involved years ago in a bombing that killed the daughter of one of the other characters. So the Irish host was killed by the girl's father as revenge. All the other convoluted scenes and action leading to the revelation of the IRA connection turns out to have been meaningless attempts at intrigue. And in spite of what may seem a rather serious plot element, this book is ultimately intended to be a comedy. Unfortunately for readers, it isn't funny or enjoyable.

There are so many problems with this story it's hard to know where to begin. First, the story is written as a first person narrative by the main character, Billy Blessing. This is a problem because first person accounts are not well suited for fictional stories, although this fact seems lost to the publishing world.

Second, there are too many characters. When the story begins, Billy tells about events that occurred twenty years earlier and introduces four primary characters, one of whom had been murdered. Then Billy starts narrating about the present, and an additional four or five main characters are introduced. And then in addition to all these main characters, there are about 10 other secondary characters who keep popping up.

The characters represent every Hollywood stereotype possible. There is a pushy real estate agent, the aggressive TV executive, the timid secretary, the phony agent, the beautiful TV reporter, the temperamental chef, the Jewish guy, the catholic guy, and the list goes on and on. And the background stories of the main characters are so complicated they are difficult to follow. In addition, they are mostly outlandish and silly. And there is a multi-ethnic agenda in the casting of the characters. Every race, ethnicity, gender, and religion is politically correctly represented. One may think it would make the story rather cosmopolitan, but in fact the characters are all extremely provincial. The only readers who relate to them will be liberals with an interest in celebrities and the television industry.

The story is saturated with references to pop culture and celebrities. This book will not age well. Readers in ten or twenty years will have no idea about many of the celebrities and events the author mentions. There are pop singers and TV shows mentioned that won't even be remembered in two or three years.

It is a fast moving story, but unfortunately it moves fast from one unengaging scene to another. And there is a constant stream of misplaced profanity. And the profane words are not the only problem. There are just too many words. Period.

The authorship of this book is partially attributed to the NBC Today shows weatherman Al Roker. The co-author is Dick Lochte. To judge by their writing, they are rather shallow and vulgar people and only wrote the book in an attempt to sell it as an idea for a TV series. There is action, romance, mystery, and comedy. But most of all, there is just dumbness.

It is certainly a waste of time to read this book, but worse than that, readers are likely to feel worse about the world and their fellow men after reading the story. It would be better if books like this never got produced, because it would avoid the danger of anyone getting dumbed down and feeling bad after being exposed to it. So this book is suitable for burning.

Lies the Government Told You

2011-03-27T19:15:00.000-07:00

By Judge Andrew Napolitano Copyright 2010

In this book, the author claims that the government lies and betrays the libertarian values promised to the American people in the US Constitution. But readers who hope to find an intelligent indictment of the federal government's infringement on the values of freedom and liberty, are likely to be disappointed. The problem is the author is very selective about which government lies he objects to. And then he tells his own lies to defend his viewpoint. He also tends to dwell on marginal issues, while failing to effectively communicate a broad, positive vision of how a libertarian America should function.

He professes to revere the US Constitution, but then he lies about, or perhaps doesn't understand, one of the most fundamental issues surrounding it. That issue is the "Incorporation Doctrine." Advocates of this "Doctrine" claim the US Constitution guarantees individual citizens specific freedoms and rights. But the fact is, there is no Incorporation Doctrine in the Constitution, other than the 5th amendment's right to procedural due process. The Constitution, as written, only applies to the Federal Government. The Supreme Court invented the Incorporation Doctrine to expand its power. So the Incorporation Doctrine is the government's biggest lie, but you won't find an honest discussion of it in this book. That's because Judge Napolitano needs that lie to support his views.

A true Constitutional-Libertarian-American believes in freedom of association and democratic self-government. That was the beauty of the Constitution as written. It guaranteed the free migration of individual citizens to live in any state they wanted. Each state was suppose to have unique laws, and within each state there were individual counties and cities, that ideally were also to have their own unique laws. This type of arrangement allowed everyone to live in a community with a government which reflected the beliefs they valued the most.

If someone valued freedom most highly, they could choose to live in a state with libertarian laws. But if someone valued certain social controls, or welfare, or communal ownership of property above freedom, they could choose to live in a state with socialist laws. The only role for the Federal government was to regulate trade between the states and protect people's right to citizenship in any state they choose to live.

However, Judge Napolitano believes the Federal government is suppose to impose libertarian values within every state. He believes in a powerful centralized government ruling over all Americans, rather than a federation of nation states with individual citizens freely submitting themselves to the laws of their own chosen nation states.

He also has a rather odd definition of a "lie." And many of his allegations of government lies, seem to be lies themselves. For example, he claims the government told people that Social Security was suppose to be temporary. Perhaps some politicians made that claim, but generally speaking, government imposed old-age pension systems were always understood to be permanent. He also claims the government lies about the Federal Reserve being controlled by Congress. In fact, the government claims the opposite. The Fed, we are told, is independent to keep the Fed's decisions free from political influence.

In this book, Judge Napolitano supports the usual libertarian ideas of free speech, right to own guns, right to use any drugs you want, strong limits on the powers of government to investigate alleged crimes, protection of private property, the original interpretation of the inter-state commerce clause, and a military for defense of national territory only. However, if someone wants to live in a local jurisdiction that bans guns or drugs or imposes an income tax, Judge Napolitano wants the Federal government to interfere and deny them the right to live in a democracy. (Although, in all fairness, he would support their right to collectively buy private property and live a communal life with those types of rules governing their own private community, but that's not the same thing as a democracy.)

But ultimately, this book is a waste of time. It is a hodge podge of Judge Napolitano's political views presented in a scatterbrained manner. It is over-written and is a poor presentation of libertarian ideas.

And the audio version, which is narrated by Judge Napolitano himself, makes the book even more awful. Listeners get a sense of the author's personality and character from his voice presentation. And in this case, the author is a loud-mouthed blowhard. His obnoxious and self-righteous attitude and his New Jersey accent are all very grating, and listeners will quickly tire of listening to him.

The Roots of Obama's Rage

2011-03-23T06:20:00.000-07:00

By Dinesh D'Souza Copyright 2010

According to author Dinesh D'Souza, Barack Obama is angry at America and wants to "right the wrongs" the country has done around the world. D'Souza's thesis is that the roots of Obama's rage is anti-colonialism. According to the anti-colonialists, the European and American colonizers of Africa and Asia caused misery and suffering.

D'Souza supports his thesis by tracing Obama's history using stories from Obama's own autobiographies. Obama's father was African and his step-father was Asian (Indonesian). The both lived troubled lives. Obama's mother was a white American from Kansas who was obsessed with race. She apparently blamed her African and Indonesian husband's problems on colonialism.

One of the stories D'Souza discusses is Obama's claim that as a child he once felt rage when reading a story in Life magazine about a black person in America who lightened their skin color. In reality, no such story ever appeared in Life magazine, or any other similar magazine, but it highlights Obama's obsession with alleged race victimization.

Another story is about Obama's white grandfather once accusing his white grandmother of being racist because she had felt threatened on a bus when a black man was accosting passengers. And it was Obama's white grandfather who introduced him to a black socialist poet who taught Obama that all white people were racist.

There is a story about Obama travelling to Kenya in the 1980's, after his father died, to visit members of the Kenyan side of his family. It is during this trip that D'Souza says Obama decided American and European colonialism was a great evil and that it would be his life mission to seek revenge against the colonizers. But Obama knew a path to power in the US Federal government wouldn't be possible if he ever publicly said his goal was to put America on an equal footing with all countries and cultures of the world. So Obama chose to avoid commenting on the subject or on race issues. He adapted a low key, moderate manner.

This book contains many blunt and politically incorrect statements by D'Souza that are rather amusing. For example, he explains how Obama seems to revere and admire his African father, when in fact the senior Obama was clearly a complete jerk.

Also, D'Souza says he is personally thankful for colonialism. D'Souza is originally from India and he was able to be successful in America because of the culture and language the British colonizers brought to India. He was able to relate to American culture because of it. In fact, D'Souza argues that some former colonized countries are failures because there wasn't enough colonization. He uses the examples of Ethiopia and Liberia in Africa as examples. These two countries were the only ones never colonized on the continent, and the people in them suffer the most among the African people.

There is much truth in D'Souza's thesis. Obama certainly doesn't seem to admire America or its history. The irony is that Obama had a good upbringing and many opportunities, courtesy of traditional American and European culture. Yet he is intent on destroying that same traditional American culture. D'Souza makes a plausible and compelling case that Obama is motivated by a belief that American and European colonialism damaged his father and step-father's countries and lives, and it is his goal to right that wrong by humbling America.

This is an interesting book for anyone who enjoys politics and wants to better understand Barack Obama.

No One Would Listen

2011-02-27T10:56:00.000-08:00

By Harry Markopolos Copyright 2010

The author of this book, Harry Markopolos, is the investigator who discovered Bernie Madoff's ponzi scheme many years before it became public knowledge. In this book he tells the story of how he informed the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of his suspicions, long before the ponzi investment fund collapsed. However, the SEC never took Mr. Markopolos or his complaints seriously.

The SEC's handling of Mr. Markopolos' complaint highlights some very severe deficiencies in the SEC's structure and staff competence. Although after reading this book, readers may have some sympathy toward the SEC, because Mr. Markopolos seems a bit eccentric. He seems to enjoy drama and cloak and dagger theatrics. At some points in the story it is rather difficult to take him entirely seriously. There is also the fact that Mr. Markopolos is a "bounty hunter" and was attempting to make a living under the "False Claims Act," which rewards people who report frauds to the government. So Mr. Markopolos had a financial motive, which may have indicated to the SEC an attempt to get them to go on a "fishing expedition" in hopes of uncovering some fraud.

Prior to becoming a fraud investigator, Mr. Markopolos worked for an investment firm that designed complex investments. His superiors had requested he design an investment fund that could duplicate Bernie Madoff's returns. Madoff had delivered consistently good returns to his investors month-after-month and year-after-year and he virtually never lost money.

Mr. Markopolos studied and learned about Madoff's fund, and while doing this research discovered it was impossible to achieve the returns Madoff claimed he was earning. So Mr. Markopolos decided Madoff must be operating a ponzi scheme. He also thought it was possible Madoff might have been using inside information to earn his extraordinary returns. The interesting fact is that some of Mr. Madoff's other investors also apparently suspected that Bernie Madoff was achieving great returns with insider trading, however they were not concerned about it. But only Markopolos seems to have recognized that Madoff was operating a ponzi scheme.

Mr. Markopolos had a friend within the SEC's Boston office who helped him submit his report and meet with SEC investigators. Mr. Markopolos presented his information to the investigators but they obviously didn't understand it. They apparently didn't have the technical skills or curiosity to pursue it very aggressively. In fact some of the SEC investigators visited Madoff's office, but they didn't visit the correct division of the organization. Which is another clue that they didn't understand the complaint.

One of the most interesting aspects of this book is what it reveals about the personality of Harry Markopolos, and how his personality may have affected the SEC's reaction and treatment of his complaint. It is fair to categorize his personality as eccentric and theatrical, which may have caused the SEC to more easily dismiss his complaint as the imaginings of an unreliable person. Even though the technical evidence, if it had been studied and tested, would have proved the credibility of his complaint.

Based on the stories in this book, Mr. Markopolos seems to love adventure, danger, spies, intrigue, David and Goliath situations, and morality tales. He tells how he feared that gangsters had invested with Madoff and they might try to kill anyone who tried to expose the fraud. So Markopolos would check his car for bombs before he would start it, and he carried a gun. Most people would be extremely frightened if they thought someone was trying to kill them, but Markopolos seems to have relished the idea. In addition, he was in the Army Reserves for 17 years as an intelligence officer, which presumably means he enjoys playing war games and wearing a uniform. He also exhibits a strangely exaggerated loyalty to his friends. For example, he defends his friend who works in the SEC's Boston office, but readers will likely suspect the Boston employee could have done more to raise the awareness of the issues being reported.

SEC investigators probably perceived Mr. Markopolos' personality quirks and decided he shouldn't be taken too seriously. Unfortunately they should have taken his complaint seriously because it would have helped avoid a lot of financial turmoil.

Mr. Markopolos is basically a likable character and has an interesting story to tell, which makes this an interesting book. On the negative side, the story is rather long and over dramatic, but on balance this book is worthwhile reading.

Honeymoon in Tehran

2011-02-14T18:22:00.000-08:00

By Azadeh Moaveni Copyright 2009

The author of this book is an American of Iranian descent, and she is a writer for Time magazine. Her parents left Iran after the Islamic revolution of 1979. She decided to visit Iran in the early 2000's and wrote a book called Lipstick Jihad. That book was (apparently) about young Iranians and their efforts to reform the country. After writing Lipstick Jihad, she returned to the United States.

This book, Honeymoon in Tehran, is about her return to Iran. This time she falls in love and gets married and has a baby. Her husband is from a wealthy family and they lived in North Tehran, which is the wealthier part of the city where the more educated people live. So her reporting about life in Iran generally doesn't seem to relate to the typical Iranian. Instead, her reports are about the life of westernized Iranians in Tehran who are educated and own property.

During her second stay in Iran, the politician Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was elected president of the country. He represented a return to a more militant and harsh form of fundamentalist Islam. His followers eventually began to crack down on secularist who wouldn't follow fundamentalist Muslim rules. Ms. Moaveni is a secularist and was intimidated by the crack down. At the end of the book she leaves the country with her husband and baby to live in London.

Her story covers many aspects of life in Iran. Among them are stories about how young people socialize and date and the structure of families, Iranian social class distinctions, dress requirements of women, including the requirement to always wear a headscarf in public, housing and living arrangements, food and entertainment, medical care, Internet access and satellite television, education, marriages and weddings, religion, Islam, pre-Islam religion in Persia, and Persian history and literature.

All these topics are covered in the context of her meeting, dating, and marrying her husband and having a baby. Along the way she discusses her status as a foreign journalist and her relationship with the government official who monitored her activities. She also discusses her American relatives, their stories, and their reaction to her decision to live in Iran.

This book is very interesting, but the story and the writing are too "wordy". About half the text could be eliminated without any loss to the story or details. The author tends to verbalize every feeling and thought in her head. She doesn't appreciate that once an idea is communicated there is really no need to keep repeating the same idea using alternative wording.

Another problem with the book is that Ms. Moaveni seems a slightly foolish woman. She reports how her family and friends warned her that living and marrying in Iran was a bad idea, but she ignored their advice. She wanted to believe that the country was on the cusp of being reborn as a free and modern society. It took her two years and 350 pages to realize that it's not happening yet and that she prefers living in a democratic country with more political freedoms. No duh!

However, this book is worthwhile reading, but an abridged version of it would be better.

No Apology: The Case for American Greatness

2010-12-29T04:28:00.000-08:00

By Mitt Romney Copyright 2010

No Apology is a collection of political essays written by Mitt Romney, a presumed Presidential candidate in 2012. Mitt Romney is the former Governor of Massachusetts and a businessman. In this book he attempts to position himself as right-of-center on most issues. However, he is essentially a Statist who believes the US Federal government has a role in everything. He is enamored of central planning "experts" who make decisions based on studies and data, regardless of the objections of individual citizens.

He tells about one of his early jobs as a business consultant. He worked for a consulting firm that was employed by organizations to do research and advise the organization's managements about how to make their operations run better. He has also worked as a venture capitalist and investment banker. Anyone familiar with business consultants and investment bankers knows they are mostly non-productive skimmers, similar to welfare recipients, politicians, and government bureaucrats. So it is no surprise that Mitt Romney wants to be President of the United States, the leader of all skimmers.

The book begins with a discussion about foreign policy. Mitt Romney says he believes in American "exceptionalism" which by his definition means the United States federal government should take an active role around the world to promote democracy and free markets. He says if the US doesn't do this, then some other country will seek to impose their ideas on the rest of the world. Specifically, he identifies China, Russia, and Iran. These countries are all unacceptable because they are controlled by small groups of individuals who mistreat their citizens. He makes many plausible sounding arguments.

However, the problem is the US, as a super power, has no control or influence over these bad countries, so even if these bad countries become super powers, what makes Mitt Romney or anyone else think they would have any control or influence over the US? The likely answer is that Mitt Romney says what he says because he is just seeking a reason to support the huge military industrial complex. Specifically, he wants political support from the people who are employed by it.

He believes the US should spend 4% of annual GDP on the military. How he arrives at this percentage is not explained, but he says President Obama is spending only 3.8% of GDP on the military and this lesser amount is putting American exceptionalism at risk.

Next, Mitt Romney discusses the economy and declares "productivity" and "innovation" are essential to maintain American supremacy. Oddly enough, he seems to believe government programs and regulations help create private sector productivity and innovation.

And what's even more odd, he doesn't include any reference to productivity and innovation when he discusses his desire to spend 4% of GDP on the military. Wouldn't someone who is supposedly so enthusiastic about "productivity" and "innovation" be interested in making the military perform better with less resources? The answer is he probably doesn't care much about any of the issues he discusses, he's just ambitious and wants to be seen as a "big shot" and have a title. So he will say anything if he thinks it will win him political support.

Throughout the book he repeatedly expresses his love of freedom and free markets. But then he immediately begins telling about the government rules and programs he supports and the big government initiatives he was involved in as governor of Massachusetts. In particular, he boasts about his involvement with mandating Massachusetts residents to buy health insurance. Or as another example, he complains about government entitlements, like abuse of disability income programs, and the next moment he is expressing support and expansion of them. He seems to think government entitlement programs just need to be run better. It is obvious he is trying to reassure recipients of government checks that they have nothing to worry about having Mitt Romney as President. The check will still be in the mail every month.

He also tries to appeal to social conservatives. Although he is more awkward when discussing social issues than when he is discussing economic issues or foreign policy. His main social concern seems to center on single parent families. Children in single parent families statistically perform worse then children raised in two parent families. But Mitt Romney is obviously unwilling to make any real critical value judgements concerning other people's values or lifestyle. While that might be polite behavior when interacting with individuals, it is simply liberal permissiveness and irresponsible conduct when analyzing larger social problems. There are superior and inferior values, and people with inferior values need to know about it or they will never improve. So government officials who can't criticize groups of people and their inferior values, just contribute to social problems.

Depending on a persons political point of view, they may perceive and interpret this book differently, but one thing is clear. Mitt Romney doesn't really believe in traditional American ideals. In particular, he doesn't believe in freedom and individual responsibility and decentralized political control. Instead, he believes in the Statist idea of "freedom" from responsibility. He makes the same Utopian promises as other Statists about a central government tending to every need of the people. Statists make their empty promises to gain power and hold power over people. But all they accomplish is a lower standard of living and lower quality of life for everyone, while providing a better life for themselves.

This book is a waste of time. It is nothing but a collection of often repeated empty promises of just another Statist.

End the Fed

2010-12-21T04:28:00.000-08:00

By Ron Paul Copyright 2009

This is an excellent book. The author is US Congressman Ron Paul, who is a libertarian, and he argues that eliminating the US Federal Reserve Bank would benefit the economy and advance freedom. He explains the libertarian theory of money and free markets, and he makes a convincing case that an economy based on these principles provides the highest standard of living for poor people and rich people alike. However, the enemies of freedom and free markets, specifically Statists, don't want to give up the Fed because it would take away some of their power and privileges.

Ron Paul explains how people who don't understand the Fed are hurt the most by it, but that people "in the know" benefit the most and are greatly rewarded by it. He argues that ending the Fed would restore prosperity and freedom to the United States. However, he also explains it wouldn't create Utopia, but it would force economic debate and policy to occur in an environment of reality.

He begins by discussing the origin and nature of the Fed. It was formed by bankers who wanted to privatize banking profits and socialize losses. He discusses how the Fed allows Fractional Reserve Banking. Banks have two functions. One function is to be a "warehouse" for money, and the other is to be a loaner of money. Fractional Reserve Banking combines the two functions. However, this book's discussion of the issue doesn't seem fully accurate. While Fractional Reserve Banking does create a higher multiplier effect for money, there would still be a multiplier effect without it. It is just a more practical and efficient method of banking compared to Full Reserve Banking.

The Fed was created in 1913 after a banking panic a few years earlier. A small group of powerful bank executives and government officials created the system at a secret meeting. It was a turning point in US history. It created a banking cartel that protected bad businessmen from their decisions. The Fed was suppose to create economic stability by providing an "elastic currency". The author says it has failed and cites the following failures. Inflation that has reduced the value of the US dollar by 95% since 1913, economic panics and recessions, and very few bank failures, which is a bad thing according to the author. He uses the example of Soviet Russia to explain how people become impoverished when bad businesses are not allowed to fail.

The author discusses his personal experiences and intellectual influences that helped him form his ideas and understanding of economics. His father had owned a small dairy business where the author had worked as a boy, so he learned first hand about working and running a business. He uses a dairy metaphor to explain how an "elastic currency" is similar to diluting milk.

He respects and admires the underground economy and black markets. They are a response to government mischief and they help keep economies afloat. In some countries, like Zimbabwe, the underground economy is the real economy.

He recognizes that deflation is a natural and good economic function, which is contrary to what government and bank officials claim. One of his examples of good deflation is computer technology. Declining prices made computer technology more affordable for consumers, and the higher sales of computer products made computer companies more profitable. The same result should have occurred in the field of medicine as knowledge and technology advanced, but government programs have instead made medical care more expensive.

In 1971 the United States abandoned the gold standard, which was one of the reasons Ron Paul entered politics. He says the Fed has been able to manipulate the fiat currency since 1971 to avoid worldwide depression, but eventually it will fail.

He also cites the book "Road to Serfdom" by Friedrich Von Hayek as having a great influence on his economic and political philosophy. Another economic influence was Ludwig Von Mises, a libertarian economist.

The government and big corporations and universities are filled with Keynsians and Statists who are opposed to sound money (commodity based money) because it would take away their power which comes from printing money. Central bankers fear sound money, in particular gold, and they manipulate the price of gold to protect their fiat currencies.

The author also addresses the Great Depression and how the Fed created the boom of the 1920's which led to the bust in the 1930's, and how Presidents' Hoover and Roosevelt's policies prolonged the depression.

Ron Paul is very anti-war and says that central banks and elastic currencies are the cause of many wars. Elastic currencies temporarily allows politicians to spend beyond their means. The author's anti-war views are the weakest part of the book. He seems to be willing to assume that there aren't any predatory dictators in other countries that need to be deterred and challenged to maintain peace.

While in Congress, Ron Paul co-authored a law in the late 1970's to establish a Gold Commission. The commission's purpose was to re-establish the gold standard for the US dollar. Instead, the only thing the commission seemed to accomplish was to authorized the US dollar gold coin. The gold coin is minted as $1.00 legal tender. Ron Paul opposes legal tender laws. He wanted the US dollar gold coin to have no denomination.

Two chapters of this book review the congressional testimony of Fed chairmen Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke. Ron Paul's analysis of their views is very informative. He uses their own words to support his positions and expose them for the arrogant Statist they are. Greenspan and Bernanke oppose a gold standard for money because it would take away their power and their banking friend's power. They would lose power because they couldn't "print" more gold.

Ron Paul says most members of Congress are not interested in monetary policy, and most don't even understand it. He says Congress will never initiate the end of the Fed because the Fed is very political and helps to keep Congressional incumbents in office. The initiative to end the Fed will have to come from people demanding sound money. But that probably won't happen until the US dollar collapses.

Ron Paul says some supporters of the Fed believe they are humanitarians and are helping people, but eventually these Fed supporters become tyrants and use force to impose their "goodwill" on other people.

The book includes discussion of the financial crisis of 2007 and 2008. Cheap credit from the Fed caused the crisis and the Community Reinvestment Act also contributed to it.

The Fed should be ended, Ron Paul says, because it is immoral, unconstitutional, impractical, promotes bad economics, and undermines liberty. He then makes the case by analyzing each of these reasons.

He says the Fed is immoral because it is cheating, it is a tax, it is counterfeiting, it benefits the few at the expense of the many, it breaks the rule of contracts, it causes suffering and punishes the innocent, it enables world wars and vast payoffs to the powerful. The Statist who support the Fed claim the moral high ground by pretending they alone care about the poor, but they ignore how freedom takes better care of the poor than government programs.

The Fed is unconstitutional because the US Constitution prohibits paper money, and no Article or Amendment of the Constitution authorizes a central bank, so the Fed is prohibited by the 10th Amendment. However, as with most other issues, the US courts won't enforce the Constitution as written. Judges use their own reasoning to shape laws to reflect their own views.

The economic case against the Fed is presented by discussing banking prior to the Fed. There were many banking panics and failures, but they were caused by government interference in banking. Ron Paul claims ending the Fed and implementing a sound money system would end the business cycle of economic booms followed by recessions. This seems unlikely, but the Fed hasn't done any better. Ron Paul believes there was an artificial economic boom from 1971 to 2000 and that there will be no more economic booms. The next big economic event will be the collapse of the US dollar.

Ron Paul's plan for ending the Fed would be to use the government's gold supply to make the dollar redeemable in gold. The next step would be to take away the Feds charter and end Fractional Reserve Banking. The Fed's other legitimate banking regulatory functions would be transferred to the US Treasury department. Ron Paul would also repeal legal tender laws and let the states and private banks issue money based on gold and silver, or other precious metals.

This is a fantastic book. It disputes and refutes virtually every commonly accepted idea and policy that government officials and university economists and big financial corporate executives advocate and support. The people who support the Fed do so because it gives them power over other people. And they lie and say they support it because it is best for the "little people." Reading this book will make freedom loving readers look forward to the inevitable collapse of the US dollar. The collapse will be an opportunity to implement a sound money system which will provide productive people with more freedom and a better life.

A Full Cup

2010-11-29T04:10:00.000-08:00

By Michael D'Antonio Copyright 2010

The first half of this book is a biography of Thomas Lipton, a Scottish grocer who founded the Lipton tea brand. The second half of the book is about yacht racing, and Thomas Lipton's involvement in the America's Cup yacht races.

The first part of the book is very enjoyable, but the second half is a bore, unless perhaps the reader is intensely interested in yacht racing history and stories.

Thomas Lipton was born in the year 1848 in Glasgow, Scotland. His family was originally from Ireland and they were working-class poor. The author tries to portray Glasgow's working-class neighborhoods of Lipton's youth, during the early industrial revolution, as being horrible places with people living in misery. But then the author tells stories about Lipton's youth, which appear to be from Lipton's own autobiography, and the stories portray a nice childhood with some exciting adventures told from a humorous perspective. The juxtaposition of the author's negative portrayal of 19th century Glasgow with Lipton's own positive portrayal of his experiences in 19th century Glasgow is a rather amusing contradiction.

From an early age Lipton was interested in ships and the Glasgow port. He rented boats as a boy to go sailing. When he was still young his parents opened a small grocery store and imported food from relatives in Ireland to sell in the store. Lipton left school at an early age to begin working, although he apparently continued to attend night school. One of his first jobs was in a shirt factory. Another job was working as a cabin boy on a passenger ship, but he was fired from that job in 1866, when he was 18 years old. He had saved some money, so he bought a one-way ticket to the United States.

His entrepreneurial character is demonstrated by a story from his journey to America and his first days there. He had made friends on the ship by writing letters home for fellow illiterate passengers. When he arrived in New York, a boarding house owner, looking to meet paying guest, was there to meet the arriving immigrants. Lipton offered to find guests for the boarding house owner in exchange for some free rent. The owner agreed, and Lipton recruited his new friends from the ship to become guests at the boarding house.

After a short stay in New York, Lipton went to Virginia to work as a farm laborer. This was during the period after the Civil War and plantation owners were hiring European immigrants to take the place of freed slaves. Lipton injured his foot a few months later while working in the fields, but was nursed back to health by the plantation owner and his wife in their house. But when he was well again, he returned to New York to find a better job.

From New York he was recruited for a job working on a rice farm in South Carolina. He eventually obtained a job as a farm clerk in South Carolina and worked at it for a year.

In 1868, he left South Carolina and went back to New York again. He then set out for New Orleans, Louisiana where he found a job as a street car company clerk. But in 1869, he returned once again to New York.

This time he found a job in New York as a food clerk in a major department store. From this job he learned about advertising and marketing in the grocery business. He was able to save some money, the author says it was about $3,000 in 2010 money, and he returned home to Glasgow in 1870.

His parents still owned their small grocery store and he began working there. He then opened his own grocery store on the other side of town in 1871, when he was 23 years old. His store was successful, and he hired his first employees. He then began buying his food stock directly from farmers in Ireland and dealing in larger quantities. He also advertised and promoted his store based on what he had learned working at the New York grocery store. He then began opening additional stores. His first foray into processing his own brand of food was with pork. The author writes extensively about the marketing and promotional gimmicks Lipton used to attract attention for his stores and products. The author claims Lipton was a marketing genius.

By 1880 Lipton owned many stores and was a wealthy man. He returned to America. He travelled to Chicago and learned about the stock yards and meat processing businesses in the area. But he also travelled beyond America looking for products to sell in his stores in Great Britain. One of the products he found was big cheese wheels manufactured in America. He had some giant cheese wheels shipped to his stores in Britain and used them for publicity purposes. By the 1880's Lipton had over 150 stores in Britain.

In 1889 Lipton's mother died, and in 1890 his father died. Lipton then moved to London. It was at this time that he began processing his own brand of tea. He also purchased a tea plantation in Sri Lanka (Ceylon at that time). The product was successful because of its high quality and affordable price. The Lipton tea brand was sold in all of Lipton's stores in the UK, but it was also sold in American stores.

The author calls Lipton a "publicity hound." One way Lipton gained publicity was during Queen Victoria's 60th jubilee celebrations in London in 1897. Princess Alexandra was organizing banquets for the poorer residents of London to mark the occasion, and Lipton made a huge donation for the event. His friendship with the Princess and his donations to her charity activities led to Lipton receiving a knighthood in 1898. He was 50 years old at this time and his high profile made him famous throughout the UK and also in the United States.

At this point in the book, the story changes from a biography of Lipton to a story about yachting and the America's cup race. Lipton became interested in yachting and built boats to compete in the America's cup races. Even if a reader is interested in yachting, this part of the book is rather dull and tedious, but perhaps the historical details will be informative for some people. But for readers not interested in yachting history, this part of the book isn't worth reading.

Unfortunately, this review is based on an audio book and the final disc of the book was defective, so the end of the story couldn't be reviewed. However, an Internet search about Thomas Lipton reveals that his chain of stores were sold to a company called Home and Colonial, which itself was eventually sold to Safeway stores. So the Lipton store chain is part of the Safeway stores ancestry. Thomas Lipton died in 1931 at the age of 83.

Hunting Evil

2010-11-13T15:14:00.000-08:00

By Guy Walters Copyright 2009

This book is about the hunt for Nazi war criminals after the Second World War. It explores a variety of issues related to the hunt for Nazis, so it is rather like several books in one.

The following issues are covered. The career of the famous Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal is reviewed. The author claims Wiesenthal was mostly a liar and a fraud and took credit for finding and helping prosecute Nazis, when in fact he had little actual involvement in the cases. The book also provides short biographies of the most famous Nazi war criminals, and it looks at the various organizations and individuals involved in the hunt for them, as well as the people who helped them escape and hide. The book discusses the various official efforts by governments to prosecute war crimes in the decades after the war. It also discusses how Nazis and Nazi hunting is portrayed in books and movies.

This book is arranged in chronological format starting with Germany's defeat and ending with the present efforts to prosecute the few remaining Nazi war criminals.

At the beginning of the book, the author promises to break new ground and challenge readers ideas about what they think they know about the efforts to find and prosecute former Nazis. However, for people who have a general knowledge of the issue, they won't be surprised by any of the information in this book. In other words, the author doesn't really break new ground or make any startling revelations.

In particular, the author says the results of his research into Simon Wiesenthal's life and career will surprise readers. He claims Wiesenthal was actually a dishonest person and did very little to find or help capture former Nazis. Instead, Wiesenthal mostly took credit for the work of other Nazi hunters. However, at the end of the book the author justifies much of Wiesenthal's behavior by saying "he was on the side of the angels."

The problem with the author's claim that readers will be surprised by his information, is that the author assumes everyone believes in the "politically correct" version of the Holocaust. However, that assumption isn't accurate. Instead, it is probably fair to say that most people believe the horrific war crimes perpetrated by the Nazi's have been portrayed by politicians as having occurred on a much greater scale than they actually did for political purposes. So for the author of this book to have documented that someone like Simon Wiesenthal was a liar and exaggerator, isn't really surprising. But as the author concludes, Wiesenthal's activities generated publicity which did help in the efforts to find and prosecute Nazi war criminals, so perhaps he can be partially forgiven.

The author is critical of the official efforts by the Allied counties after the war to punish Nazi criminals. He shows that the English and Americans were more concerned about the rising threat of communism, than prosecuting former Nazi's. Many of the Nazis were anti-communist, so they were treated more leniently in hopes of using them to combat the communists.

The author also discusses how the Catholic Church helped former Nazis hide and escape from war crime investigators. Although many of the efforts the author profiles appear to have been small scale operations by a few members of the church, who it seems also helped the victims of Nazis.

The author discusses an alleged organization called Odessa, which was supposedly a group of former Nazis and their sympathizers who helped Nazis escape prosecution. The organization was also suppose to be the start of a Fourth Reich. However, the author claims Odessa never really existed and is mostly just a catch all name for various organizations and individuals that helped hide and protect former Nazis.

Some of the famous Nazi's profiled in this book include Adolf Eichmann, who after the war fled to Argentina and was kidnapped by the Israelis in 1960 and taken to Israel and put on trial and executed. It is interesting how Eichmann was a factory worker in Argentina and lived a quiet life in poverty with his family, yet he was suppose to have been a brilliant and powerful leader when he was a Nazi.

Another Nazi profiled is Josef Mengele, who was a mentally deranged doctor who tortured people in concentration camps. His family helped him escape to South America were he apparently sold farm equipment that his family's business manufactured. He also worked as a farm laborer. He died in Brazil in 1977 after having a stroke while swimming.

Another Nazi was Klaus Barbie who was a Gestapo officer in France during the war. After the war he escaped to Bolivia and worked for a Bolivian dictator. He was returned to France in the 1980's and prosecuted for war crimes and sent to jail, but he died from cancer a few years later.

The profiles of the Nazis and their life after the war are the best part of this book. However, their stories are told in disconnected sections as the book progresses chronological, which rather detracts from the continuity of the individuals personal stories. It would have been better if the author had profiled each criminal in their own complete chapter.

This book has much interesting information. However, it probably would have benefited from more and better editing. The hodge podge presentation of much of the information rather detracts from the story. If the book was divided into individual sections, it would have been better. For example, one section to tell the complete story of Simon Wiesenthal, and then a separate section to profile the Nazi's and their eventual fates, and another section to discuss the government and private organizations that worked to prosecute and protect Nazi war criminals. Instead, the author jumbled all these topics together in small sections while trying to maintain a chronological time line.

However, the author is generally a good writer. He is a former newspaper writer, and as is often the case, they are good writers. The story moves at a good pace and the story telling is clear and to the point.