Amazon.com
In Organizing from the Inside Out, author Julie Morgenstern used three main strategies to whip a living space or office into shape: "analyze, strategize, attack." Using the same system, Morgenstern now shows readers how to get rid of chaotic schedules in order to live more comfortable and productive lives. Morgenstern likens a cluttered schedule to a cluttered closet. For example, a closet is typically "crammed with more stuff than storage," and a schedule is typically "crammed with more tasks than time."
Those who fear "time management" because they worry about living uncreative or overly scheduled lives will find themselves reassured by Morgenstern's ability to customize her system. The most important thing readers must do, she emphasizes, is to create a time management system that fits one's personal style--whether it be spontaneous and easily distracted or highly regimented and efficient. "Just as everyone's living room looks different, reflecting the individual's or family's values and priorities, everyone's time management system will look different, reflecting what's important to him or her," she explains. Fortunately, readers can easily customize her excellent advice while learning how to create a personal time map, streamline routine tasks, conquer procrastination and chronic lateness, and manage all the inevitable crises and distractions of daily life. Speaking of procrastination, what better time than now to try this book out--ridding yourself of all that draining clutter so you can get on with living the life you want? --Gail Hudson
Book Description
A thoroughly updated and expanded edition of the definitive guide to managing and freeing up time Applying the groundbreaking from-the-inside-out approach that made Organizing from the Inside Out a New York Times bestseller, Julie Morgenstern set a new standard for the time- management category. Her system has helped countless readers uncover their psychological stumbling blocks and strengths, and develop a time-management system that suits their individual needs. By applying her proven three-step program-Analyze, Strategize, Attack-and following her effective guidelines, readers will find more time for work, family, self-improvement, or whatever is most important to them. Time management is a learnable skill, and in this completely revised edition, Morgenstern provides the ultimate tools to combine, delegate, and eliminate unnecessary tasks; put technology to work; and stop procrastinating once and for all.This revised edition delivers- a new chapter about the WADE formula for getting started- new time maps for people with irregular schedules- new four-, eight-, and twelve-week program guides for improving time-management skills - a fully updated resource guide
Customer Reviews:
Excellent; just a little repetative.......2007-10-19
I LOOOOVE this book. It so explains the psychology behind tardiness, mismanagement of time, etc. It definitely gives a great step-by-step guide on how to manage time. It also takes into consideration people's personalities and individual lifestyles. For instance, people who are afraid that a rigid "time map" might hinder their creativity and spontaneity...it gives us various methods to deal with the realities of our lives and accept our weaknesses (rather than continually pretending that they don't exist and continually failing!) and find ways around those weakness, and use our strengths to our advantage. The book shows how to reach our goals by using our time to our advantage. It can transform the person whose time is chaotic and imprisoned and turn them into the person whose life is orderly and free!
The only disadvantage to this book (very minor) is that the author starts repeating herself 2/3 of the way into the book. As I was typing notes throughout my reading, I started realizing that I was typing the same things over and over.
Good time strategies for aquired brain injuries.......2007-10-18
I have an acquired brain injury from falling down some stairs. I find the strategies in this book to be very helpful indeed. I would recommend this book to anyone who needs to get a handle on their time.
Worth Reading.......2007-07-04
I really loved this book. I got so much out of it, that I have started to read all her other books too. She is really different in her approach to time management and it really works for me. The book is very well written, easy to follow and is a book you can keep to use as a resource for many years to come.
My Clients Love this Book.......2007-03-24
I just got this book because my business coaching clients often have issues with running a business, often by themselves, and finding enought time to have a life. Julie offers great, easy to implement strategies that help the really busy person get control. I love that she looks at the hidden reasons behind our time management difficulties and styles. I keep recommending it and will continue!
Joseph.......2007-01-10
Perfect. I use this text in my teaching of a college level course.
For everyone who has been trying to be organized...this is the book to start with !
Book Description
Pencil your way to financial security!
What would it be like to know that you were making the very best decision for every dollar you spent or saved? Can you imagine balancing your budget by the beginning of next month? Wouldn't it be great to know whether a pro's advice is right for your situation? How valuable would it be to have a customized financial plan that would serve you for life?
What you hold in your hands is the first step to achieving all of the above. Whatever your income, lifestyle, or financial concerns may be, The Motley Fool Personal Finance Workbook will help you put more power into every dollar. Like a financial global positioning system, The Motley Fool Personal Finance Workbook will show you exactly where you stand right now and the most direct path to where you want to be.
With easy-to-follow, quick-witted exercises, you'll discover all the ways that money touches your life -- from saving and spending to insurance to retirement. The Motley Fool's legendary smarts and math-made-easy will show you:
-
How to create a workable budget that gives you money and a life
- The smartest (and fastest) way out of debt
- How to set priorities to guide your financial decisions
- The savviest ways to finance big purchases like a home or an education
- Tactics for eliminating stress when saving for retirement
And much more...
Hip, funny, and immediately useful, The Motley Fool Personal Finance Workbook is an indispensable hands-on guide for anyone looking to make the most of his or her money.
Download Description
"Pencil your way to financial security! What would it be like to know that you were making the very best decision for every dollar you spent or saved? Can you imagine balancing your budget by the beginning of next month? Wouldn't it be great to know whether a pro's advice is right for your situation? How valuable would it be to have a customized financial plan that would serve you for life? What you hold in your hands is the first step to achieving all of the above. Whatever your income, lifestyle, or financial concerns may be, The Motley Fool Personal Finance Workbook will help you put more power into every dollar. Like a financial global positioning system, The Motley Fool Personal Finance Workbook will show you exactly where you stand right now and the most direct path to where you want to be. With easy-to-follow, quick-witted exercises, you'll discover all the ways that money touches your life -- from saving and spending to insurance to retirement. The Motley Fool's legendary smarts and math-made-easy will show you: How to create a workable budget that gives you money and a life The smartest (and fastest) way out of debt How to set priorities to guide your financial decisions The savviest ways to finance big purchases like a home or an education Tactics for eliminating stress when saving for retirement And much more... Hip, funny, and immediately useful, The Motley Fool Personal Finance Workbook is an indispensable hands-on guide for anyone looking to make the most of his or her money. "
Customer Reviews:
Easy to understand and useful.......2007-07-20
I got this book a few weeks ago to get a feel for personal finance (I just turned 23 and i figured it was time) and it was oen of the best book purchases I ever made! It was laid out very simply with helpful charts and graphs so the math doesn't seem so abstract. Highly recommended!
Put this Workbook to Work.......2006-09-21
David and Tom Gardner have once again succeeded at making something difficult seem easy. As an estate planner, I know that many people avoid financial matters out of fear . . . fear that they're not smart enough to understand them. The Personal Finance Workbook puts valuable financial planning information at your fingertips and the forms to keep track of your finances are right in the book. If you are just starting out after college, or a Baby Boomer beginning to think about retirement, or someone retired, this workbook will be immediately useful. On a more personal level, as a dad, I am glad that a personal finance book like The Workbook exists. Young people who take early action on managing their finances and developing good savings habits will be infinitely better off in the long run.
James Lange, CPA/Attorney and author of Retire Secure! Pay Taxes Later: The Key to Making Your Money Last as Long as You Do
Great book..........2005-11-30
I bought this book about a year after college, when I wanted to come up with a plan to get rid of some credit card debt and begin saving money. This guide is fun and interesting, yet informative. It guides you step-by-step through good personal finance habits, and allows you to prioritize what goals you have for the future. The most insightful to me was when it asks you to name the things you spend that LEAST contribute to your happiness and MOST contribute to your happiness. I.E. - it's not wasteful if the spending improves your quality of life - versus you're just spending to spend! The workbook section asks you to guess how much you spend on things each month and then actually track your spending for 6 months to help you develop a realistic budget & see how you did. It's definitely a wake-up call to people like me, who seemed to piddle their money away without realizing exactly where it's going. This exercise helps you find the answer to that question!
Fun!.......2003-06-27
This book has been a great step-by-step guide to getting financially organized. It's geared to average working-class folks, not aspiring accountants and brokers. The author's humorous approach makes the material accessible and interesting!
The book begins with steps to determine where your money goes, then works through ways to eliminate debt, plan for emergencies, and invest money for various purposes: retirement, college, and other large expenses. The book also includes advice for buying insurance and completing your taxes.
The book is a beginner's guide, not an exaustive reference -- so don't expect to find all the information you need if you want to invest in individual stocks or understand each line of your tax return. Rather, it gives clear advice to new investors through commonsense arguments that require almost no background information.
Only two minor complaints: First, health insurance is not discussed. Some advice on such an important kind of insurance would have been very helpful to me. Second, the authors repeatedly advertise their website.
(To their credit, the website Fool.com is a pretty good resource. You might want to try it before you get the book or even instead of the book. It has free trial membership as of this writing.)
Fun!.......2003-06-27
This book has been a great step-by-step guide to getting financially organized. It's geared to average working-class folks, not aspiring accountants and brokers. The author's humorous approach makes the material accessible and interesting!
The book begins with steps to determine where your money goes, then works through ways to eliminate debt, plan for emergencies, and invest money for various purposes: retirement, college, and other large expenses. The book also includes advice for buying insurance and completing your taxes.
The book is a beginner's guide, not an exaustive reference -- so don't expect to find all the information you need if you want to invest in individual stocks or understand each line of your tax return. Rather, it gives clear advice to new investors through commonsense arguments that require almost no background information.
Only two complaints: First, health insurance is not discussed. Some advice on such an important kind of insurance would have been very helpful to me. Second, the authors repeatedly advertise their website. (To their credit, the website ...is a pretty good resource. You might want to try it before you get the book or even instead of the book. It has free trial membership as of this writing.)
Book Description
Every Rental Property Manager's Complete Handbook
How would you like to own multiple rental properties, make money from them, and have lots of spare time in this typically high-maintenance business? You can! Although many property managers lose more money each year on maintenance or long vacancies than they make in profit, with the right management system and some business savvy, you can rent out a house or condominium and still have enough time to enjoy your growing profits—or purchase more properties!
Greg Perry shows you how! With more than 40 of his own properties, he has created a foolproof system for rental management that has turned his rental business into a virtual turnkey operation. And now, in this revised edition of his book, he shows you step by step how you can profit from and enjoy managing your rental properties.
Inside, you'll learn valuable money-saving tips, such as how to:
·Market your property to attract droves of prospective tenants
·Keep good tenants happy and get rid of bad tenants
·Save a fortune on renovations, advertising, and other expenses
·Buy new properties and turn them into the most attractive houses on the block
·Use the Internet to market your rentals
·Choose the right insurance and prepare your taxes
·Plus much, much more!
Also included are up-to-date samples of leases, rental applications, eviction notices, and other important documents you can copy and customize.
“Real estate investors as well as professional property managers can profit from following Perry's practical advice."—
San Francisco Sunday Examiner & Chronicle
“On a scale of 1 to 10, this excellent book rates a 10!"—
Chicago Tribune
Customer Reviews:
Managing Rental Properties for Maximum Profit, Revised 3rd Edition: Save Time and Money with Greg Perry's Foolproof System for: .......2006-10-07
Very informative book on how to manage and increase your property's cash flow with realalistic approaches. Well worth the money and time reading
For beginners without rentals only!.......2005-07-10
Rating for beginners: 4
Rating for others: 3
This author goes through the motions on what you can expect from running a rental property. As the title indicates, his focus is on maximizing profits. Of course, the tradeoff is greater time outlay on the landlord's part.
If you're just starting to consider landlording and don't own any properties, this book isn't a bad starting point but much of it is common sense.
A better addition to your library would be "Property Management for Dummies". It is more complete and a great source for all levels of landlords (newbies on up). The Dummies' author, Robert S. Griswold, covers all the subject matter in Perry's book plus insurance, evictions, and other lawsuits in greater detail with more graphs and charts to illustrate the author's points.
A Beginners Guide to Rental Management.......2004-10-07
This book is good for those who have very limited experience in managing rental properties. It's main focus seemed to be on managing time and for those of you who don't know the secret I will let you in on it. Excellent Tenants = Minimal Time. It's finding and keeping the excellent tenants that require some time. This book goes into detail about how to do just that. If you are a struggling landlord or a complete newbie than this book is for you.
However, if you have some experience in this area, or are an effective manager outside of rental properties you will probably be an effective rental manager. Other things to consider is that Mr. Perry seems to specialize in very low cost rentals so much of his ideas are drawn towards those crowds. For Example
Getting Tenants the book says advertising the local newspaper is the best, it does work but for higher cost rentals I average about 70% of new tenants from the internet.
Dishwashers and Garbage Dispoals - you might be able to get away without them in cheap units, but try renting a unit at 1500 a month without them - it just wouldn't work.
Wainscot - Again nice idea for those low income units, but most people look at wainscot as that cheap stuff you had on your vacation home when you grew up.
Electric Water Heaters - Keep gas if you have it already, electric heaters are always more problems and will cost more in the long run - gas is always easier and better. BTW, if you go to a plumbing wholesale warehouse (usually open only to licensed plumbers) the gas units are cheaper than electric.
When buying a home Mr. Perry seems to think that plumbing problems are easily fixed. Caveat Emptor - A person who bought a house that I passed on due to plumbing problems just spent $22,000 in getting it re-plumbed. From my experience I walk away from any house that 1) has foundation problems 2) has flooded recently 3) has major plumbing problems. I am highly suspicious of any house that has 1) Roof Problems 2) Electrical problems.
Things not mentioned that might help you out.
Automatic Rent Payments - I have about 50% of my tenants on automatic rent payments. It's easy to set up (talk to your bank) and you get your money every month on the same day.
If you have more than 5 units I strongly urge you to look into incorporating. It limits you liability and there are positive tax reasons to do so. This book barley mentions corporations and in a slightly negative way too.
If you buy in the right area and market your unit accordingly it is very easy to get some long term leases written up. I have approximately 70% of my tenants on 3 year or longer lease agreements.
While mentioned I have had a great deal of success with Townhomes and Condos - just be aware that this is very AREA sensitive. The plus side to these is that you can be a truly hands off landlord. Write your rental agreements that the tenants agree to take care of all repairs inside including AC/Heat. The associations take care of everything outside and all you do is collect the rent. True your returns are not as high, but it is the simplest form of rental management that I know of. Also, if the townhome/condo is slightly upper scale you will find that your vacancy rates drop considerably. The shortest tenant I have ever had in a townhome/condo was 1 year with my average being around 6 years.
Anyhow, This book is good for the beginners, that is why I gave it 4 stars.
One Tip is Worth the Cost.......2004-03-05
You'll get MANY tips in this but the open house concept that Perry teaches is brilliant and one I'd never thought of.
The book just gets better for the struggling landlord (or landlady as Perry says). But for me, the first 2nd chapter changed my life as a landlord.
I needed only one answer.. and got much more!.......2004-03-03
We had a problem. We wanted to get rid of our rent house and get out of the business.
We looked through lots of books and settled on this and another one. The other turned out to be for more professional rent house owners.
This one spoke DIRECTLY TO US.
We were surprised at how this author seemed to be talking directly to us, in a manner that a friend would do. He told US advice, not just on how to sell our rent house but how to make it work if we kept it. We decided to give it another round of tenants but ony if we followed the advice in these pages. Much of it, such as the open house concept that we'd only thought applied to houses for sale, dramatically worked to change EVERYTHING about rent houses for the better! We now love being rent house investors and we are looking for more properties. If this book had cost twice as mich, it would be worth only a fraction of its value even then. I strongly encourage you to read this if you really dislike being a landlord.
Book Description
Good real estate investors make money in every type of market, whether it is a normal, boom, or bust market – their techniques and strategies are just different for each market.
Successful Real Estate Investing in a Boom or Bust Market begins by explaining the economics of real estate. Real estate demand, sales prices, and sales volume are all affected by (and to some extent controlled by) interest rates, inflation, real estate cycles, and state and local economies (and tax laws, if changed). For example, recall that when President Jimmy Carter left office interest rates had skyrocketed to 21.5%. Conventional borrowing for real estate was virtually eliminated. Recall the failure of oil companies and the S & L collapse (triggered in part by the 1986 changes in tax laws affecting real estate) that destroyed the real estate markets in Texas and Oklahoma. On the other side of the ledger, consider the recent boom markets in places like San Diego, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Orlando, and Naples.
Successful Real Estate Investing in a Boom or Bust Market will also help the reader identify which market he or she is faced with and describe what the author calls the ""Equalization Effect."" This means that each type of market will equalize in a very short period of time. Every type of market brings advantages and disadvantages, and techniques to adjust to them. For example, in 1980, when interest rates climbed to over 21 percent, the real estate market had to adjust, or ""equalize."" If you were a seller, you had to either offer seller financing at reasonable rates (say 10-12 percent) or you couldn't sell your property. At conventional rates, buyers couldn't cash flow properties. So all serious sellers offered financing and the market equalized. Deals were still closed. When interest rates are very low, as we've seen in the last few years (mortgage rates at 40 year lows), this huge buying advantage is adjusted, or equalized, by higher prices. Mortgage payments come out fairly close in either scenario because the bust market gives low prices but high interest rates, while the boom market gives high prices but low interest rates. The remainder of the book will describe techniques to succeed in each specific market, and techniques that will help the reader succeed in
ANY market.
Book Description
A quick and easy formula for selling your product, your service, yourself, that gets results..guaranteed
Whatever you have to sell, be it product or service, this book will show how to create the perfect presentation and nail the sale. Written by the experts at Speechworks, this book arms the huge and guidance-hungry market of salespeople, business presenters, and entrepreneurs with a fool-proof formula for making the perfect pitch every time, whether they're talking to one person or an audience of thousands. With this book you'll find:
* A proven formula for organizing your thoughts for clarity and impact
* Visualization techniques that help you find the most compelling language and anecdotes to captivate even the toughest audiences
* Surefire techniques for increasing your physical presence and personal persuasiveness
SPRING ASHER and WICKE CHAMBERS (Atlanta, Georgia) are partners of Chambers & Asher Speechworks. They are also columnists for The Atlanta Journal/Constitution. For their work as TV producers they have received six Emmy Awards and the Best of Gannet Award for New Programming.
The A to Z guide to making a flawless business presentation.
Thirty-three million business presentations are made each day, most of them by people whose number one fear is public speaking. This is the complete guide to creating winning business presentations and making the perfect pitch. It includes a step-by-step guide that makes it easy to persuade the listener, develop evidence that sells, and create visuals that reinforce the message.
The authors train several thousand executives each year from organizations including MCI, Georgia-Pacific and UPS.
* Offers a foolproof formula: finding the hook, the incentive, and the style to sell anything to anyone.
Spring Asher and Wicke Chambers (both of Atlanta, GA) are partners of Chambers & Asher Speechworks, an organization providing communications consulting services to business professionals and executives.
Customer Reviews:
A secret weapon for building business........1998-06-02
This book helped me to quickly pull together my presentation(s) and helped me win a piece of profitable business. It also helped me feel less nervous making presentations and gave me practical information about what to do with my hands, how to use my voice, etc. An especially informative section focused on how to handle Q&A sesssions.
Book Description
Every parent wants to raise financially responsible children, but often, any efforts to teach kids about money are doomed from the start. As David Owen learned with his own daughter and son, parents who take a traditional approach to talking about money will find that their children learn all the fiscal restraint of an Enron executive.
So Owen devised a novel approach: he established the Bank of Dad, offering simple terms and generous incentives for saving, and then stepped aside and gave his young children the freedom to use their money as they wanted. Instead of blowing it all on candy and toys, they developed a strong sense of financial discipline and responsibility. As they grew older, he added a stock exchange to the Bank of Dad to broaden their understanding of investing.
It sounds complicated, but it's not. His kids will have to work for a living someday, but they are well armed to meet their financial needs and responsibilities. They are avid savers; they know how to balance their checkbooks; they understand the principles of investing in stocks and bonds.
The First National Bank of Dad is a highly accessible guide that offers excellent financial tips for any family and shows readers just how to implement this unusual and innovative plan in their own households.
Average customer rating:
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Foolproof Finances
David Mallonee
Manufacturer: Kingdom Publishing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
 Budgeting & Money Management
| Personal Finance
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Personal Finance
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
Money & Values
| Personal Finance
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
Business
| Christian Living
| Christianity
| Religion & Spirituality
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 1883906113 |
Book Description
This is arguably the best financial book of the last decade! Mallonee goes to the root of finances. He explains from the Bible why money flows to some people and away from others. This book is guaranteed to help you improve your finances in 60 days or your money back!
Average customer rating:
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Stephen Pollan's Foolproof Guide to Selling Your Home
Stephen M. Pollan , and
Mark Levine
Manufacturer: Fireside
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
Buying & Selling Homes
| Real Estate
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Real Estate
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Sales & Selling
| Marketing & Sales
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
Home Repair
| How-to & Home Improvements
| Home & Garden
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0684802295 |
Book Description
Selling your home isn't an overwhelming project; it just feels that way. You need a strategy. You need Stephen Pollan's Foolproof Guide to Selling Your Home.
How do you know you can trust your broker? How do you choose a price range? How do you negotiate a contract? And what about repainting, exterminating, sanitizing, and organizing? What do you do when? Stephen Pollan has the answers.
With this simple, streamlined plan, Pollan takes you by the hand and walks you through the whole process, from start to finish. Organized like a workbook, with tips, checklists, warnings, and encouragement to help you along, the Foolproof Guide tells you exactly what to do and what to say at every step, from placing an ad to dosing the deal.
All you have to do is follow Stephen Pollan through these pages. He knows what he's doing. By the time you reach the end of Stephen Pollan's Foolproof Guide to Selling Your Home, you will have sold your house for the best price and the least pain.
Average customer rating:
- These checklists are essential to buying a home!
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Home Buyer's Checklist: A Foolproof Guide to Finding the Perfect House
Richard M. Scutella , and
Dave Heberle
Manufacturer: Tab Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
Buying & Selling Homes
| Real Estate
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Real Estate
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
Household Hints
| How-to & Home Improvements
| Home & Garden
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Reference
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0830644652 |
Book Description
"... excellent... a detailed, yet simple, guidebook... numerous illustrations and extensive checklists add to the practicality of the book... provides a quick education on the essentials of the physical aspects of a home... On my scale of one to ten, this outstanding book rates a nine."-Robert Bruss, syndicated real estate columnist, Tribune Media Services. This home inspection book stands out-it's the only one that helps home buyers determine what they need and want in a home, and the only one that follows a unique system of checklists to help them find that "dream house."
Customer Reviews:
These checklists are essential to buying a home!.......1999-07-13
As a first time homebuyer, I was intimidated by all of the things that can be "wrong" with a prospective home. This book explains the essentials of everything on the extensive checklists. Definitions are given in words and pictures for everything you should inspect.
This is not the only book you should read, but I strongly recommend it as part of your arsenal.
Average customer rating:
- Enjoyable reading experience
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FOOLPROOF (Iris Thorne Mysteries)
Dianne G. Pugh
Manufacturer: Atria
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
United States
| World Literature
| Literature & Fiction
| Subjects
| Books
| 18th Century
| 19th Century
| 20th Century
| African American
| Asian American
| Classics
| Collections & Readers
| Drama
| General
| Hispanic
| History & Criticism
| Humor
| Jewish American
| Letters & Correspondence
| Native American
| Poetry
| Short Stories
| Women Writers
General
| Mystery
| Mystery & Thrillers
| Subjects
| Books
Women Sleuths
| Mystery
| Mystery & Thrillers
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Mystery & Thrillers
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Contemporary
| Romance
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0671014242 |
Book Description
"Pugh's uncanny knack for using the perfect word gives the novel a special quality....There's action to spare...[and] an almost erotic lushness to her writing...." raved The Plain Dealer (Cleveland) of Dianne Pugh's third smashing Iris Thorne mystery, Fast Friends. Now she plunges her savvy heroine into a maelstrom of marriage and murder in the Los Angeles high-tech world, proving that in a city where ruthless ambition, community property laws, and earthquakes are facts of life, nothing is really Foolproof.
From where she stands in her newly purchased beachfront bungalow -- complete with cozy garage for her beloved red Triumph convertible -- life looks good for Los Angeles investment counselor Iris Thorne. The only clouds an her horizon are caused by her boss from hell and the never-ending office battles at McKinney Alitzer. But one hot night, everything changes. At the Gothic hilltop mansion owned by her dear friends, entrepreneurs Bridget and Kip Cross, Bridget is brutally murdered. The sole witness is Brianna, the couple's five-year-old daughter. The sole suspect is Kip, the volatile creative genius behind Pandora, the Crosses' trailblazing computer games company.
Hotheaded Kip had motive to spare: he was violently opposed to his cool, business-minded wife's plan to take Pandora public. Iris must now sort through her conflicting emotions as she faces the mounting evidence against Kip: the gunpowder burns on his hands, infidelity against Bridget, and no alibi. Then there's the unsettling matter of Slade Slayer, the brutal antihero of Kip's revolutionary games -- rumored to be Kip's alter ego. Is there enough of Slade in Kip to have ended Bridget's life? Worse still, is he a threat to Brianna, who has wiped the murder from her young memory? Bridget surprised everyone -- especially Kip -- when she left her majority stake in Pandora not to her husband, but to her daughter. And she named Iris as administrator of Brianna's trust. Suddenly, Iris finds herself responsible for a collapsing computer games company, the financial future of a little girl, and, as Brianna could hold the key to convicting her mother's killer, maybe even the five-year-old's life.
Exposing the deadly tensions behind the glamorous facades of Brentwood mansions and laying bare the riddles along a dark stretch of the Pacific Coast Highway, Dianne Pugh has marked the L.A. mystery with a style all her own. And with "her bold moral compass, her appealing in-your-face attitude and unsettled romantic life, Iris is a compelling heroine" (Publishers Weekly) who "deserves our undivided attention" (Los Angeles Times Book Review).
Customer Reviews:
Enjoyable reading experience.......1998-02-12
In the Los Angeles area, Bridget and Kip Cross have turned their family computer business, Pandora Software, into a huge success. However, as their company grows and goes public, their marriage begins to crumble. Not long after the stock went public, Bridget is murdered and Kip is the prime suspect.
Investment counselor Iris Thorne was a close friend of Bridget and Kip. In spite of the seemingly insurmountable evidence, Iris finds it difficult to believe Kip murdered his spouse. Still, her deceased friend's will names her as the fiscal guardian of the couple's little girl, who inherited her mother's stock. Though she cannot remember, the little girl witnessed the murder of her mother. Iris knows that it is up to her to protect the little girl from a cold blooded killer, who may target a five year old child as his next victim.
The fourth Thorne mystery, FOOLPROOF, is filled with interesting characters, especially Iris (whom readers will love) and five years old Brianna (whom the audience will adopt). Although the story line is riddled with too many plot gimmicks and devices that ultimately cause reader attention to diminish a bit,this still remains a fun and enjoyable reading experience.
Harriet Klausner
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- Total E-mail Marketing, Second Edition: Maximizing your results from integrated e-marketing (Emarketing Essentials)
- Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords (Ultimate Guide to Google Adwords)
- Understanding PKI: Concepts, Standards, and Deployment Considerations, Second Edition
- Warehouse Distribution and Operations Handbook (McGraw-Hill Handbooks)
- Women & Money: Owning the Power to Control Your Destiny
- WORDS THAT WORK: IT'S NOT WHAT YOU SAY, IT'S WHAT PEOPLE HEAR
- Your Money or Your Life: Transforming Your Relationship with Money and Achieving Financial Independence
- 10 Secrets to Successful Home Buying and Selling: Using Your Housing Psychology to Make Smarter Decisions
- 10 Secrets to Successful Home Buying and Selling: Using Your Housing Psychology to Make Smarter Decisions
- 301 Simple Things You Can Do to Sell Your Home Now and for More Money Than You Thought: How to Inexpensively Reorganize, Stage, and Prepare Your Home for Sale
Books Index
Books Home
Recommended Books
- Nice Girls Don't Get the Corner Office: 101 Unconscious Mistakes Women Make That Sabotage Their Care
- Behind the Wheel Chinese
- Steve Marriott: All Too Beautiful
- The Medicaid Planning Handbook: A Guide to Protecting Your Family's Assets from Catastrophic Nursing
- The Art of Project Management
- Athena Unbound: The Advancement of Women in Science and Technology
- 2005 Children's Writers & Illustrator's Market
- Make It Through Accounting: A Fun, Easy Study Guide to Help You Pass Accounting
- The Intersection of Cultures: Multicultural Education in the United States and the Global Economy
- The Mammalian Molecular Clock
Organizing from the Inside Out
Never Check E-Mail In the Morning: And Other Unexpected Strategies for Making Your Work Life Work
Organizing from the Inside Out for Teenagers: The Foolproof System for Organizing Your Room, Your Time, and Your Life
Making Work Work: New Strategies for Surviving and Thriving at the Office
Making Work Work CD: New Strategies for Surviving and Thriving at the Office
