Greene Books

An interesting review of the southern black population, and how their self esteem was, and possibly still is, somewhat depressed because of the discrimination toward them, by people who were victims of their upbringing, not intentionally putting them down.

My first thought on this book was 'did you really think that a few laws and a few court cases was going to make really serious differences in the way people thought. Yes, you can force some things, like the attendance of a token few blacks at an all white high school, but back in the remote hinterlands life is going to go on much as before.

This is a story of race in a backwater southern community where an old-time sheriff continued to rule his domain much as before. The result was, eventually, for white legal aid attorneys to overthrow the system.

This is a story of race, but it's also a story of the lack of political power for a selected community. Much the same tale could have been told of Chicago in the Daley days, of jews during the holocaust and unfortunately of many other peoples over many other times. It is a fascinating story that ultimately offers some hope for the future.

Having been born and raised in a small community in south Georgia, I have seen first-hand much of what was described in this book. I found this work to be incredibly interesting and moving. Have attitudes evolved and changed for the better in this area? Yes, fortunately. Are there still traces of this? Yes, unfortunately. But with excellent works such as this, we can only hope that the sad attitudes and discrimination that is so accurately described in Ms. Greene's work will become a part of our distant past.

You will enjoy this book, it took a long time for things to get right in southern Georgia, You will find that there is power in numbers,especially if your on the side with the most numbers.
There is also some very funny stories in this book.

There are a number of astonishing things about this provocative and evocative history of a remote coastal region of Georgia. Greene's chronicle is not simply an account of the institutional and covert racism that plagued one Southern county. Nor is it merely a biography of an unlikely black leader who led a momentous, peaceful rebellion against the white hierarchy before succumbing (at best) to his own credulity or (at worst) to the very corruption he criticized. Instead, "Praying for Sheetrock" is a composite oral history of a complex, deceptively quiet community during the 1970s and 1980s, where the social norms seemed old-fashioned, even quaint, and where even justifiably disgruntled citizens, both white and black, are restrained equally by an ill-defined sense of fear and by a desire to get along with their neighbors.

At the time of the writing, McIntosh County had been dominated by a corrupt yet efficient, nepotistic yet clever "Old Boy" network, but it was also populated by an impoverished black community that, on the surface, seemed to have been on good terms with the local white authorities all through the chaos of the civil rights struggle. For many years, state and federal authorities suspected that county officials, led by Sheriff Tom Poppell, had been deeply implicated in jury tampering, tax evasion, bribery, illegal gambling, drug-running, prostitution, and even murder. Folks joked that Poppell "was the only sheriff in America who owned four houses, one with an airfield, and all on twelve thousand dollars a year." Yet every attempt by higher authorities (who regularly indicated on their reports that Poppell was to be considered "armed and dangerous") failed to nab the suspects. The victims of their never-indicted yet well-documented activities included tourists on the way through the county to family vacations in Florida as well as the local poor.

The story of how this county eventually entered the late 20th century makes fascinating reading, and Greene's prose is an odd yet refreshing blend of journalism and lyricism. (It was included among the top 100 works of 20th-century American journalism by the New York University School of Journalism.) The reader is repeatedly stunned by her ability to persuade such a wide spectrum of local citizens--rich and poor, white and black, conservative and liberal--to talk at such length and with such honesty. Only at the very end of the book, in the acknowledgments, does it become clear that the author was far from a Janie-come-lately to the scene: she worked at Georgia Legal Services (which provided advice on civil liberties matters for the black community), was a witness to most of the events, and married one of the lawyers featured in the book. Rather than prejudicing her account, her experiences give the events an insider's perspective and make her relative objectivity all the more admirable. In fact, it's safe to say that only Greene could have written this book. And, much like "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" (itself set only a few miles to the north), her book manages to look underneath the scandal and the poverty and to reveal much to admire in the gentle camaraderie of these easygoing neighbors.

Above all, "Praying for Sheetrock" reminds us of the courageous heroes who look "upon law, upon the Constitution, as a series of fundamental truths about basic human rights." Those heroes include black community members, young and old, willing to risk everything for those rights; the lawyers who represented and advised them for next to nothing; and the small yet powerful number of local whites who believed that enough was enough. It's an inspiring tale that reminds us that the civil rights struggle is far from over.

A splendid audio rendition of a good book by Mr Jarvis, who would be able to make the reading the yellow pages entertaining... Mr Jarvis is an excellent actor, his voice is loud and clear, and he assigns different voices (and different accents!) to each different character (without falling in the annoying habit of many male readers of using falsetto when playing women). I think his voice is especially well-suited to express cynicism, of which you will find a lot in this story.

If you like audio book, Mr Jarvis is one of the best voices around (you may want to check out his marvelous Dickens audio renditions). This audiobook is fairly short, 4 tapes only, but it is also very inexpensive. I like Greene's writing style a lot, and even if the book is probably not as much of a masterpiece as the movie (whose tune though remains here as well in the audio rendition), the audiobook is certainly worth its price, and I am actually writing this review while I approach the end of my second listening.

So, highly recommended.

i have read 5 graham greene books and this is by far the lamest of them. this was conceived of first as a hollywood movie, and it shows. the book is not much more that a silly, corny thriller (just what hollywood orders over and over and over). there is very little character development involved, & the the sense of place (vienna after world war ii) could have been given much greater depth, as well. this is simply a plot being rushed onto the big screen ( a half-baked, lame plot, at that) to make some cash. pass this one by.

This book spent two decades on my shelf without my so much as touching it. Now I've read it, and I wish I had read it a long time and several Harry Limes ago in my life.

You don't need enemies with friends like Harry Lime. For starters, he effectively strands his old school friend Rollo Martins in postwar Vienna. Lime is occupied with other matters at that moment, like his own funeral, but it still leaves a sour taste, especially after a number of questions are raised in Rollo's mind. Did Harry really kill children by selling tainted penicillin? What secrets about Harry does his former lover Anna hold so close? And who was that third man seen helping move Harry's body after he was hit by that car?

Though it was written before the more celebrated movie of the same name Graham Greene worked on with director Carol Reed, "The Third Man" came out a year after the film in 1950, well in advance of le Carre and Fleming and the spy thriller. Short and to the point, Greene seems to employ an almost Hemingwayesque terseness to his narrative, describing a shattered Austrian city so: "A thaw set in that night, and all over Vienna the snow melted, and the ugly ruins came to life again: steel rods hanging like stalacitites, and rusty girders thrusting like bones through the grey slush."

There's not much of Greene's layered depth to be found here; Rollo drinks a little and is bad with women, but otherwise he's pretty much exists for the sake of drawing out Harry Lime. Because Martins "believed in friendship," as explained on the first page, he is set to suffer at the hands of Lime, dead or alive, as Rollo discovers a cold heart he never knew. For Rollo, it makes a difference what kind of man Harry was; to his surprise others are more indifferent about it.

The movie presents a few key differences, such as the oft-quoted line about the Swiss contribution to mankind and the resolution of Martins' relationship with Anna, one of cinema's most arresting images which feels empty here. Rollo goes by the name "Holly" in the movie and is played as an American, not a Brit, by actor Joseph Cotton. He still writes cheap westerns but doesn't suffer exactly the same indignities for it Rollo does in the book. Greene notes in a preface that he himself thinks the movie works better, and he's right, but like other reviewers here say, you get an interesting line here on the thought processes of the central players, not to mention another examination of sin and salvation from the author of "Brighton Rock" and "The Power And The Glory."

People can be like ants when seen from high above, but when someone looks down on them and asks: "Would you really feel any pity if one of those dots stopped moving - forever?" it's not the humanity of those down below that's being obscured. Rollo finds himself with a difficult choice between concrete loyalty and abstract morality, and though "The Third Man" doesn't press this point so much as simply raise it, it makes for an examination of man's duality you would do well not to leave on the shelf as long as I did.

When I bought this book I did not realize that it was written after the movie. It is not good Graham Greene. The book follows the movie closely but, it adds very little. As I read the story I miss the music. Save your money and buy the DVD.

As Graham Greene admits in the preface of the novella "The Third Man", this story 'was never written to be read but only to be seen'. When invite by director Carol Reed to write a screenplay, the British novelist decided to write a short story first and then develop the script. As he confess, it is too hard to write a movie without having worked on the story previously, because the movie depends also on characterization, mood and atmosphere, and these are hard to be captured in the first time in a screenplay.

That is a mark of a genius. He wrote "The Third Man" only as a blueprint for the script and, nevertheless, both story and movie are great. It is a novella with a little more than 100 pages, and yet largely entertaining, as the writer wanted it to be. Not many writers are capable of doing such a amazing story without pretension -- because it is not easy to acquire simplicity.

The plot is not complicated as well. A British writer arrives in the pos-War divided Vienna to meet an old friend, who turns out to be dead. But there are some suspicious events surrounding his death -- and he also has a gorgeous girlfriend, who is very sad. Rollo, the main character, ends up investigating the death and there comes many twists in the plot of the story.

"The Third Man" is a very short narrative, nevertheless, Greene succeeded in all he wanted. More than anything, the story has atmosphere. Vienna is destroyed, picking up the pieces -- so are the characters who are caught in a plot bigger than themselves. However much Rollo doesn't want to be involved with his friend's death -- he can't avoid due to the train of events that catch him.

The writing is Greene at his best. The plot is convincing and well built with tension and fun coming from every page. Although the novel is slightly different from the movie, fans of Carol Reed's genial "The Third Man" can't be disappointed with the short story that was the genesis of this that is considered the best British movie ever.

Do you like books that relate with sports or action, well this a book for you! The book The Boy Who Drinks Too Much by Shep Greene is a very good book. It was about a teenager named Buff Suanders. He is a very good hockey player who has problems. He deals with them by drinking. Until drinking becomes his biggest problem. His friends do their best to help him with his problem. They finally found Buff drunk at the school. The point of view in this story is that 3rd person, the setting is mostly at each of the characters houses and at the ice rink, never in the book where there was a slow part or a boring part. The relationship between the characters are very strong, they become very good friends.
This is suitable book for anyone who likes sports also who like books when each other have to help with each other. Some of the feelings I had was if Buff was going to be okay, also will everything turn out be good. I highly recommend this book for anyone! Two thumbs up!!

"The Boy Who Drank to Much" was a really good book for younger teens to read. It shows you what can happen to people when they dink too much especially if their in sports. It also shows that if you drink the people around you might start drinking and back things might happen. At the beginning of the book it was really boring but by the time you read the first 4 chapters, you'll get into it.
The author shows good points why you shouldn't drink or even be around people that drink.

The Boy who Drank to Much, by Shep Greene, was a good book. It was about a teenager named Buff Suanders. He is a very good hockey player who has problems. He deals whith them by drinking. Until drinking becomes his biggest problem. His friends do their best to help him with his problem. In the end Buff gets the help he needs.

This story really had my concentration from the beginning to the end. It had well placed settings which it made it easy to understand and follow along through every detail that was going on. I read this book in my English class. This is a really great book choice; something interesting was happening every chapter. I was so engaged by the book things kept telling me "Don't stop now! The best part is about to start!" This is such an unbelievably well written book, that if any person had the chance to read this book, they would be able to understand the problem that Buff is going through. I would recommend this book to any one that faces a problem with alcohol because they might remember why they started drinking in the first place. They might realize that drinking is not the thing to do to deal with there problems and that it's not worth all the damage they are doing to there bodies, and, with some luck, they will understand that they are destroying there life.

I thought this book was engaging. After a couple of sittings, I had this book done. The basic theme to this book goes along with what you'd expect, alcoholism is a disease which needs to be dealt with. I don't recall all the people's names in the book, however the only people you really need to focus on is Buff and his father.

The whole idea of the book is how alcoholism destroys families and breaks down relationships. It made for a very fast paced book indeed.

If this book had flaws, I didn't pick up on them. The book had me drawn in.

Graham Greene is one of my favorite writers. In such novels as THE HEART OF THE MATTER, OUR MAN IN HAVANA, THE HUMAN FACTOR, THE HONORARY COUNSUL and THE POWER AND THE GLORY, he presents ordinary men whose lives unexpectedly acquire a profound moral dimension or political significance. While questionable motivation--that is, naïveté, loneliness, or self-hatred--often impels his characters to act, Greene's plots also force the unforgettable Henry Scobie, Jim Wormold, Maurice Castle, Dr. Plarr, and the whiskey priest to make a choice. Then, they are on paths without return and with, at best, ironic reward.

In THE TENTH MAN, Greene gives us Jean-Louis Chavel, a lawyer in a Gestapo prison who, according to my dust jacket, "offers his fortune and house to anyone who will take his place before a firing squad." Then Greene follows "this survivor on his postwar return to the home he has surrendered."

As is usual with Greene's novels, there are several memorable and fully achieved characters--in this case, Chavel, Carosse, and Therese Mangeot--who bump against the limits of their principles or the shallowness of their illusions. As usual, the story is told in a spare style and has layers of conflict and believable emotion, which Greene explores to reveal amazing connections and parallels between dissimilar characters.

As the book jacket says: Watch Chavel..."discover the humanity and courage that [earlier] failed him." Highly recommended!

This is a short novella that was written originally as a film script for MGM. It is not a novel. It is an excellent short story or novella. As a novella it is a masterpiece.

This is the first book that I read from Greene, and I was very impressed with his style, the structure, the prose, and the overall thrust of the book and his writing in general.

In this present novella, he presents a two part story of a man who makes a bargain in jail to save his life. It is set during World War II. The story takes place near Paris and then in rural France. The man trades his home and his money for his life. The first part takes place in jail, and the second part is after he is released from jail. From the jail and the bargain to trade money for his life, the story advances in time to the post-war period and we see how the now penniless man copes with his new situation and how he deals with the people that he knew before the war, and the people that now live in his old house.

There is a certain level of depression and desperation transmitted by Greene through his writings so that we have empathy and sympathy with the man who has lost all of his material wealth. Through the loss, he manages to maintain his moral integrity. There is a high level of drama and a surprise ending.

This is an excellent novella and a good introduction to Green.

The beginning of the story is quite dull, but after a while you can't stop reading. The story is also written in an easy language, so you can easily read it as a non-native speaker.
The end is not very satisfying and the characters are flat, but that doesn't really matter because of the action in the book, I was never bored.

Although short in length, Greene delivers a profound novel in "The Tenth Man." The premise is a lawyer who cowardly buys his life as a German POW during World War II. The man who is executed in his place, Janvier, is bequeathed all the possessions of the lawyer (Chavel). Then, the trials and tribulations of Chavel takes center stage as he returns to a postwar world as a penniless beggar who cannot reveal his real identity.

Perhaps the most profound concept is that of the disgraced Chavel and his attempts to win back his place in the world. He goes back to the country manor he gave up and now disguises himself as a beggar, but one who was with Chavel and Janvier in the German prisoner. Janvier's sister, as the new owner of his house and soon a fantasy object of his love, accepts his new identity. Yet, all the time Chavel is living life on borrowed time, as he is fearful he will be found out. Indeed, his new life is one of a tortured existence. It is more than once that he regrets that he did not die as he should have in the dank German prison.

Throughout the novel, Chavel's attempts at retribution are shown. Although one can sympathize with Chavel's predicament, Greene nevertheless presents him in a less than desirable light. It's difficult to know what one might do in a similar situation. Yet, somehow saving your own life at all costs seems cowardly. Overall, this is a quick read but one which will leave many questions to ponder.

This is a minor work, an idea for a film expanded to novella length, and it lacks the depth of Greene's major books. But it is the work of a master all the same, and raises fascinating questions about the role of those elements other than narrative that make the difference between a story and a novel.

Greene pitched the underlying idea for THE TENTH MAN to a film producer in 1937. His fuller treatment of it was not written until after the War, but the manuscript dropped out of sight and was not published until it was rediscovered in the mid-1980s. The author explains these circumstances in a preface, and also includes two very short film treatments written in the same postwar years. The first of these, "Jim Braddon and the War Criminal," concerns an American businessman who happens to bear a close resemblance to a former Nazi official; losing his memory after a plane crash, he comes to believe that he IS the wanted German. The story is quite melodramatic and not filled out in any detail, but it contains the essence of the central moral question of Greene's greatest works: is a man to be judged by what he has done, however horrible, or by his spiritual state at the time of his death? The second story, "Nobody to Blame," is essentially a sketch for OUR MAN IN HAVANA, though trasferred to an imaginary Baltic state in the late 1930s. Although much longer than the first treatment, it details only the farcial mechanisms of the story, without any reality of setting or depth of character, and absolutely omitting the moral dimension; reading it makes one look again at OUR MAN IN HAVANA with enhanced appreciation.

Greene describes his first idea for THE TENTH MAN thus: "A political situation like that in Spain. A decimation order. Ten men in prison draw lots with matches. A rich man draws the longest match. Offers all his money to anyone who will take his place. One, for the sake of his family, agrees. Later, when he is released, the former rich man visits anonymously the family who possess his money, he himself now with nothing but his life...". Even here, the moral core is clear: redemption for a previous act of cowardice through later generosity or suffering. What it needs to become a true novel is the creation of fully-rounded characters, the establishment of a social and political setting, and above all a sense of time, so that the rich man's transformation will be credible and the moral issues resonate. And indeed in the middle of the novella, when the man returns anonymously to his former house, Greene does provide most of these things, especially in capturing the peculiar political situation in France just after liberation, when strangers of any sort were suspected as collaborators. He also adds one magnificent plot twist, which I cannot reveal here. But the opening of the book seems almost schematic, somehow failing to give depth or immediacy to the hostages in the German prison. And although Greene tackles the moral issues quite explicitly at the end of the book, they seem laid out rather than lived through. The problem, I think, is his compression of time, to bring the action to a climax in a matter of weeks, days, or hours; this might work well in a movie, but in a novel it seems a weakness.

I just finished reading this book. I have never wriiten a review , but I do feel compelled to after reading some of the other reviews posted here. For me, this is a memoir, not a travel guide. I admire anyone who is willing to share his life experiences with me--I find it a most generous act. I feel like writing to the author to thank him for his book. He brought the area and the people to life for me. I am studying French; so the sentences in French (don't be alarmed, he supplies a translation just following) were fun for me to figure out. I liked learning about Henri IV's locks, and learning about the author's childhood. I love a good memoir--and particularly, one by someone who is not famous except in his own circle. I would encourage anyone who feels the same to buy, or borrow this book--and order "Eyewitness France" if you want a travel guide. This book is a lovely eyewitness to a man's life.

Beware the spate of books on the topic of Americans/Brits living in France! Talk about publishers milking a trend! Unfortunately, not every author is a Peter Mayle or an Ann Barry. Greene's book, for example, is hopeless--- a shambles as far as organization goes, peopled by clueless, insensitive, and incompletely delineated characters (maybe that last is the good news, because the bad news is that this is a work of non-fiction.) It is about as illuminating of the French culture and countryside as a Greyhound bus tour of the Top Ten tourist sites of the Ile-de-France.
Don't be taken in by the book's title, as I was. Even we bibliophilic Francophiles have some standards!

I am beginning my third reading of this memoir of creating a life and finding a world in Burgundy...and that should say how highly I think of Jeffrey Greene's writing. I feel as if I too moved to the old presbyterie with its hundreds of empty wine bottles left by the last, somewhat alcoholic priest/resident. The people and the place are so personally described. Love, life, leaky roofs and fascinating neighbors all wound together by a poet! We are fortunate readers!

This is the 5th book of it's type I've read in a row. You know the genre, Americans buy a home in ruins and fix it up. I'm a sucker for this kind of book. But the things I've learned from these books are: 1. You have to have bottomless pockets. 2. French government regulations are enough to drive me insane. 3. If I ever do buy a house in France, I will find one that someone else has already roofed, tiled, windowed, painted, landscaped etc etc etc! What a nightmare.
If you like this sort of book, this one is great because it's located in a different, less written about area of France. And it's every bit as good as Ann Barry's. I always thought Ann was a ninny sort of wimp that depended on the kindness of her neighbors way too much. At least Jeff Greene and his wife were more self reliant.

I just finished French Spirits and then read other reviews. It never occurred to me that the author was being a braggard. The story is full of real characters and the author's acceptance and appreciation of their quirks is obvious. My only complaint is that this swift read ends abruptly. There are implications that his mother does not continue to live with them in France, but we never learn what happens to her. Surely there is a sequel, but perhaps more life has to be lived before he will be ready to write it. I will certainly be waiting.

I read the book but it didn't help me with the grieving of my pet. It is a good book to read if you aren't in the midst of recovery. There are good points as far as the ceremony but other than that it was nothing that I didn't already know.

Finally, a well written and very helpful book on grieving the loss of your pet. Dr. Greene shares a nice mix of pet owner stories and wonderful, proven exercises to help you move through your own emotions.

Best of all, for us, was her suggestions on how to respond to others who may not share as strong a bond with pets. Her simple paper-pencil assessment helped us understand where we fell on the continuum from pets are animals to pets are family members. Our 14 year dog was definitely a family member to us!

Her book provided us comfort, humor, and a sense of peace about not having to defend our grief over the loss of our dog. We highly recommend this book to anyone whose pet recently passed away, and to those with dogs and cats faced with the tough decision about putting their pet down at the vet due to a serious medical condition. Get it, read it, and allow yourself to celebrate your pet's life and its positive impact on you.

I found this book in a program that offers courses for R.N. continuing education. What a wonderful book! We have had many pets over the years. With three kids in the family, we've loved frogs, lizards, fish, cats, dogs and a horse. My horse is 25 yrs. old now and that's why this particular book caught my eye. I think it is very well thought out and written. I give thanks to Lorri Greene and Jacquelyn Landis for addressing the love that we have for our companions and how to help them-and us- to go on when their time comes. My daughter is in Vet school. I'm giving this to her. Good Book!

I got this book soon after I lost my 10-year-old Persian male soul mate, and it really helped me through a time of great sorrow. There are exercises to do that help you work through your grief and help you to understand your feelings. I highly recommend it for anyone dealing with the loss of a pet.

I ordered this book and waited for it eagerly, based on "Search Inside" reading I did on Amazon. I hoped the chapter devoted to guilt experienced by "animal guardians," as the author considerately calls pet owners, when euthanasia or an accident precipitates a pet's death would speak to me. Therefore I was surprised to find the book more clinical than inspirational. I also found it emotionally distant from its subject...which perhaps is to be expected, considering that it was written by a psychologist. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone suffering from deep grief over a lost pet.

Shirley Hazzard's memoir is touching and literally transports you to a time when writers gathered casually on islands and sipped wine wine and talked about the world. However, her friendship with Greene provides remarkable insight into Greene's character and actually left me wanting to read more about Greene, but much more about Hazzard herself.

Shirley Hazzard brilliantly evokes Capri in this easy-to-read portrait of one of the 20th Century's most influential British authors. This book melds literary biography at its best with personal memoir, and Hazzard's friendship with Greene offers important insights into not only his work habits and travels, but also his interpersonal relationships. As to her prose style, Hazzard may be a part of the "old-school" authors--long, serpentine sentences and frequent digressions--but there is only enjoyment to be found in the quiet island life she chronicles. Anyone interested in Greene, Hazzard and the beautiful isle of Capri itself will delight in this book.

I can only conclude from other reviews that Shirley Hazzard is an acquired taste, but would add that it's worth giving a go. She is a supremely old-fashioned writer, which I think some find mannered or awkward. It's odd, because I find her prose illuminating and exciting to read - each word is measured and beautiful. Her novels are luminous things of beauty, particularly The Bay of Noon and The Great Fire. She's just won Australia's top literary prize - very well-deserved. If you have time and patience, for her books need careful reading, they are richly rewarding. It's only an inexpensive paperback, go on, try some, you never know, you might like it!

Really no more than a very, very long New Yorker sort of profile blown up to book size, GREENE ON CAPRI A MEMOIR is an irresistible sort of book and pure opium for those of us who like to read about people with so much money they can afford to live on several continents at once. Shirley Hazzard writes so creamily that it was only after several chapters that I started asking myself, where is all this money coming from? For none of the characters, save the distantly observed fishermen, have anything to do with their time but sit around all day at one of Capri's many colorful cafes, sip aperitifs, and cap each other's quotations from the Brownings.

It's a form of literary sleight of hand that at its best is positively alluring, but when the illusion falters for even a minute a certain distast sets in. All travel writing is sort of alike, and there are two sorts of readers, one who loves nothing better than a book about Capri, and the other, who would rather undergo a Brazilian body wax without anesthesia than have to read a book like this one. Beyond this certainty, there are a few other problems with Hazzard's book. One is the problem noticed by most reviewers: that she really doesn't care much for Greene, so you ask yourself, then why write a book about someone who you just can't stand? The feeling creeps in that she was fascinated by his bad manners and his egotism, but that she was too drawn to his fame (the way her husband, Francis Steegmuller, became known as a permanent barnacle of the fame of Cocteau) to resist.

Another debit is the photo selections which render Shirley Hazzard, not a bad looking woman, as the victim of a truly evil costume designer. No matter what decade it is, you see her wearing blouses with long Peter Pan style collars in which the tabs droop down practically to her breasts, a bizarre style which makes her look like a bejeweled and preening horse. It must have been Graham Greene's revenge. Probably long ago, in 1962, in Capri, he might have sent her a little CARE package from some demented designer in Antibes, and advised her it would make her look less like Lillian Hellman. His unpleasantness was legendary, the "irrational and cruel paroxysm of the playground," as Hazzard hazards. The odd thing is that Greene went to Capri at all! He was of the generation of Englishmen, she avers, that was actually blind to the beauty of physical surroundings. Perhaps they thought it unmanly. He was just there because it was "away." Her explanation isn't very convincing, but she does provide some interesting sidelights, such as the fact that Greene thought Olivier a terrible actor, much preferring the mundanities of Ralph Richardson or Paul Scofield. Hazzard also provokes a chuckle when she talks about how bad Graham Greene's own performance is, in Truffaut's DAY FOR NIGHT. "In a companion scene of the same film, a cat does far better."

I read Shirley Hazzard's book prior to visiting Capri for the first time in 20 years, and took it with me to read on the flight to Italy. In fact, the book made the journey with me to the island. This is an excellent portrait of Graham Greene and the information Ms. Hazzard adds concerning Capri certainly whetted my appetite and increased my anticipation to get to the island to see the places she mentioned.

The book is written in a beautiful style. One hears Ms. Hazzard's voice in her writing and shares her experiences. I must confess that I really did not like Graham Greene very much as a person but I understand a great deal about him and what drove him. I was most touched by what Ms. Hazzard had to say about Harold Acton, so much so that I re-read that part of the book. Mr. Action was such a wonderful scholar and writer with such a wonderful presence that I would very much have liked to have known him. I will never forget the last visit of Ms. Hazzard to Harold Acton when he said he regretted not being able to see Naples one more time. Since I was reading this in Naples I was able to understand what he meant all the more.

Someone else I enjoyed learning about was Ms. Hazzard's husband Francis Steegmuller, and some of the books he wrote. In particular the discussion about Mr. Steegmuller's book about Flaubert in Egypt sparked my interest to read it. Another book mentioned by Ms. Hazzard that has my interest in The Viper of Milan, historical fiction on the war between the dukes of Verona and Milan, which sounds like quite an exciting read.

So this is a wonderful book that gives us a unique perspective on a great writer - Graham Greene - but also gives us a glimpse into the island of Capri and the people who came to live on this paradise of a place over the years, some who came and left and others who never did. I gained insight into places of the island, such as the Villa Jovis and the town of Capri, and met some interesting people, chief of whom is Ms Hazzard herself. I highly recommend this book for the superb memoir that it is and also for the excellence of the writing.

This is a self-help IT security book aimed at those who work from a Small Office/Home Office (SOHO). Written by The Register's Associate Editor, it should be no surprise that the book challenges accepted norms such as Microsoft Windows, Office and Internet Explorer, recommending Linux and Open Source alternatives on security grounds. Regardless of the merits of the argument, the book is a worthwhile security awareness text for a general if IT-literate audience.

From the preface: "This is a handbook for ordinary people concerned about computer security and online privacy. It addresses everyday computer users and Netizens with little or no background in information technology, concerned parents, business users, and corporate telecommuters. It speaks as well to corporate security managers struggling to articulate the necessary principles and procedures to nontechnical staff in understandable language ... It's a book written specifically for users that, I hope, can also make the professional's job a bit easier by promoting security awareness ...". I do not agree that the book is suitable for a nontechnical audience. It's not a detailed technical security manual but most of the issues covered are technical in nature, and the descriptions while clearly worded assume a level of technical competence beyond most ordinary computer users I know.

The book is quite thorough, offering more depth and security content than the superficial coverage typical of many books aimed at ordinary PC users. It tackles head-on the installation and use of encrypted email packages such as PGP and GPG, for example.

Advice in chapter 4 on using task manager to check for malware processes ignores the fact that malware authors usually hide their processes from the list. This perhaps hints at a limit on the author's technical knowledge but he is strong in other areas so perhaps this was just an oversight. He does however admit to being a "computer security specialist" not a "computer security expert".

According to the author, the book is meant to be read from cover to cover like a story with activities for the reader to undertake at most stages. Nowhere does the book deal with the change management issues such an approach would cause in an office with more than a small handful of systems.

Chapter 6 is a bare faced rant against Microsoft Windows and related products, mostly on the basis of it being an insecure monoculture, backed up with selected quotations that support the author's position. There is some merit in this point of view but the chapter is heavily biased and unfortunately detracts from the remainder of the book. It would have made a reasonable piece on the Register but not here.

The author indulges in other extended asides and stories of historical interest only that also detract from the book's stated goals. Several paragraphs on BSE (Bovine Spongiform Encephalitis, commonly known as Mad Cow Disease) in at least two places, for instance, can hardly be more unrelated to computer security for home or small office users.

The author's journalistic training shines through in many places. He has presumably researched some areas in depth for The Register, whereas others are less well supported by quotations and commentary. Ironically, the latter are easier to read. I get the impression several of these `illustrations' were included purely because Greene took a journalistic interest in the original stories and has source material available, rather than because of their relevance to the subject of this book.

If you are an IT manager responsible for IT support for a small business, or a student of information security working towards CISSP or a college degree, this book is good value and will give you plenty of things to think about and do. If you are a nontechnical PC user, the book will probably stretch your abilities to the limit, although if you have the patience and dedication to persist, you will be able to improve security of your PCs.

The author thinks this would be a good place to espouse his high-handed philosophy, instead of actually telling you how to secure your computers. Boring! It's essentially a Time-Life-Do-It-Yourself security book, with the author's personal rants included. Apparently he hasn't figured out how to create a blog.

If you want to secure your home network, there are lots of free resources online that can provide the same information, and better books available without the long-winded speechifying.

I agree with what everyone else has written about this book so far, although I did find the book a little difficult at times to follow (maybe I'm just a little dense). But what no one has really pointed out is that the book is highly entertaining to read as well, at least if you appreciate dry humor. I chuckled my way through the whole book.

Thomas Greene is most well known for his articles on cybercrime, network and computer security and other information technology subjects for the British tech newspaper The Register. As Associate Editor and journalist for The Register he has a developed a distinctive style and a great reputation.

I have long said that more focus needs to be given to providing security tools and education to the home and small office computer user. Corporations have teams of people and expansive budgets to implement layered security solutions with administrators to monitor and enforce them, but home and small office users have neither the knowledge they need nor the budget to throw blindly into security.

Ironically, all of the money and effort corporations put into computer and network security could be rendered useless if a particularly virulent worm infects the millions of unprotected home users and bogs the Internet down to the point of crippling it.

Greene has seen this same gap in security and wrote this book to fill that gap. He covers a broad range of security topics in language and terms designed for computer security novices to be able to grasp and understand.

One thing this book does that is admirable is that it goes beyond the simple security and recommends open source and alternative solutions- even debating the use of Linux over Windows, giving the user an in depth look at their options.

Home users need this information and I recommend they check this book out.

(...)

This could have been a useful book, if it had lived up to its promise: Computer Security for the Home & Small Office. But, for example, the book (page 175-176) discusses securing Internet Explorer in the sentence "Fortunately, there's Mozilla", and then proceeds to discuss how to secure Mozilla. (Firefox as a separate product is not mentioned.) This simply is not helpful to the 90% of Windows computers that use Internet Explorer.

Similarly, a great deal of text discusses Linux, both historically and from a security standpoint, and urges Windows users to switch to Linux as a security improvement. While this is arguably true, it fails to serve the users who have Windows, and the consultants and administrators who must secure Windows. A chapter on how to harden Windows and its associated programs, with recommendations on what Microsoft should do in future versions to improve Windows security, would have been most helpful.

However, parts of the book are quite useful. The discussion of what Windows services can be disabled (pg.49-55) is important. The functional listing of Windows processes and TCP/IP ports (pg 351-387) is valuable.

Surprisingly, for a 2004 book, it fails to mention some current technologies: the Firefox browser, WPA wi-fi security, and Windows XP Service Pack 2.

Any book with the word chocolate in the title is bound to grab my attention. Thankfully, Ms. Greene's BLAME IT ON CHOCOLATE lived up to my sweet-tooth cravings! This is a story that's actually nice-in the true definition of nice-in that there are no bad guys, no cheating, no broken hearts, and a happy ending. The characters are truly believable, the dialogue is funny, and the situations this couple find themselves in are ones anyone can relate to.

Lucy Fitzhenry loves her job at Bernard Chocolates. She gets to spend her days working in the greenhouse, developing new species of plants for the company's newest brands of chocolate. She knows she's found a real winner with Bliss, and eagerly awaits the reaction of the bosses-owner Orson Bernard and his grandson, Raul Nicholas "Nick" Bernard. Lucy was right-her new plant has a direct effect on the future of Bernard Chocolates in that it could end up making them millions. When the first batch of Bliss chocolate comes off the line, Lucy decides to give it a taste test. Who knew chocolate could taste so heavenly, or that it would turn this shy woman who only fantasized about Nick Bernard in private into a sex-starved woman who lets a kiss lead to "the Night of the Chocolate." Suddenly, one wild night of passion turns into a whole lot more, when the nausea Lucy starts experiencing turns out not to be an ulcer, but a pregnancy.

Nick Bernard has always done the right thing. So when he learns that Lucy is pregnant with his child, he's determined that they'll get married. Unfortunately, the quiet, shy Lucy has a whole lot to say about marrying the boss's grandson-and none of it seems to be good. Somehow, Nick has to convince Lucy that he cares for her, that he is, in fact, falling in love with her, and wants to marry her for more than just the sake of their child. Bliss chocolate is a huge success, and Nick wants nothing more than to make his relationship with Lucy a success, too.

BLAME IT ON CHOCOLATE is, in a word, charming. A down-to-earth romance with likable characters who find themselves in a situation that many people deal with in the real world, Lucy and Nick are a couple that everyone can relate to. Nick tries so hard to be nice that he doesn't realize that Lucy needs to know he loves her, and Lucy is just naïve enough to think that what they have isn't strong enough to keep them together. All in all, BLAME IT ON CHOCOLATE is a sweet indulgence for a satisfying afternoon read.

I don't get this book as a romance. Nick explains several times how he would never be interested in Lucy. She says several times how Nick would never be interested in her. I kept reading hoping that the author would make this believable when they finally get together. She never did although I learned a lot about making chocolate.

It's just no fun starting a book from the first knowing that the characters are so totally miss-matched!

Even the secondary characters are boring. Her father, a brilliant surgeon who can't do anything in the real world. A cute cousin who needs her to tell him he is not gay. Her mom who no longer is interested in her brilliant husband the surgeon.

Weird triangle between Nick's older brother & grandfather. The same story plays out with the older brother not marrying the mother of his child. Grandfather loses all respect. Nick doing the same thing with Lucy. Surely we can come up with something more original.

Blame it on Chocolate by Jennifer Greene was fun romance novel. Lucy is a developer at a chocolate factory and finds her life in chaos ~ is it the new chocolate or her handsome boss? I read this book in a day and it pure chocolate bliss. If you enjoy this genre, I would also suggest, Falling For Gracie by Susan Mallery,The Care and Feeding of Unmarried Men by Christie Ridgway and Underfoot by Leanne Banks.

Lucy Fitzhenry loves her job as a horticulturist working on experimental strains of cacao plants for Bernard Chocolates. She's riding high at work after a great success in developing a cacao tree that can be grown in the company's Minnesota greenhouses. The chocolate resulting from this cacao tree is the most exquisite in the world. In order to produce enough cacao for the company to launch a new line of the gourmet chocolate, Lucy is put in charge of the building of new greenhouses and growing the new trees for the project.

While Lucy's professional life soars, her personal life flounders. In addition to loving Bernard Chocolates, Lucy also loves the owner of the company, the handsome and urbane Nick Bernard. Due to Lucy's open personality, everyone--including Nick--is painfully aware of this fact. Unfortunately, Nick doesn't return Lucy's feelings, despite a night of shared passion that occurred when they were euphoric over the development of the new chocolate. Both have tried to pretend that The Night of the Chocolate never happened, but neither is able to avoid the repercussions when Lucy discovers she is pregnant w/ Nick's baby.

Things go form bad to worse for Lucy when her parents break up and her father shows up at her door to stay. He's followed by her cousin Russell who brings his problems for Lucy to help sort out. Nick has his his share of family woes when his grandfather Orson, Lucy's number one fan, becomes enraged over the situation between Nick and Lucy. Nick is also trying to smooth over a long-standing rift between his brother and Orson.

The book has a lot going for it. The storyline about chocolate production is different and interesting. The secondary characters--including Orson, Lucy's cousin, Nick's brother, the Bernard Chocolate employees, etc.--are also likable and well-drawn. (Lucy's unappealing, self-absorbed parents are an exception.)

Ultimately, tho, I wanted to like this book more than I actually did. The biggest problem I had w/ the book was Lucy herself. She's smart, hardworking, and sweet--but I just didn't like her very much as a romantic female lead. Without a baby in the mix, it's hard for me to imagine Nick and Lucy as a long-term couple. But, this may just be a matter of personal preference. While I was disappointed in the book as a whole, there were enough positive elements (Nick, chocolate) that may appeal more to other readers.

This was my first book by Jennifer Greene and it made me a fan!
Lucy creates a new cocoa plant and when she tastes it's first batch of chocolate, Bliss, she knows she has a winner. She shares it with Nick, the owners grandson, and soon finds herself sleeping with him.
Later she is not feeling quite right and she blames it on the chocolate. Which is partly true, since she is pregnant from that one night of passion with Nick.
This book has a lot going for it. You have the relationship with Nick and Lucy. Also there are some secondary characters with their own issues thrown into the mix to make this and exciting story. It is fun and funny. Sweet and and exciting. I couldn't put it down. I can't wait to read the follow up story Blame it on Cupid!

Here is what the author says about his novel:
"`The Confidential Agent' was written in six weeks in 1938 after my return from Mexico. The Spanish Civil War furnished the background...I was struggling then through `The Power and the Glory', but there was no money in the book as far as I could foresee. Certainly my wife and two children would not be able to live on one unsaleable book...so I determined to write another "entertainment" as quickly as possible in the mornings, while I ground on slowly with `The Power and the Glory' in the afternoons.
The opening scene between two rival agents on the cross-channel steamer--I called them D. and L. because I did not wish to localize their conflict--was all I had in mind, and a certain vague ambition to create something legendary out of a contemporary thriller: the hunted man who becomes in turn the hunter, the peaceful man who turns at bay, the man who has learned to love justice by suffering injustice. But what the legend was to be about in modern terms I had no idea.
I fell back for the first and last time in my life on Benzedrine. For six weeks I started each day with a tablet, and renewed the dose at midday. Each day I sat down to work with no idea of what turn the plot might take and each morning I wrote, with the automatism of a planchette, two thousand words instead of my usual stint of five hundred words. In the afternoons `The Power and the Glory' proceeded towards its end at the same leaden pace, unaffected by the sprightly young thing who was so quickly overtaking it.
`The Confidential Agent' is one of the few books of mine which I have cared to reread--perhaps because it is not really one of mine. It was as though I were ghosting for another man. D., the chivalrous agent and professor of Romance literature, is not really one of my characters, nor is Forbes, born Furtstein, the equally chivalrous lover. The book moved rapidly because I was not struggling with my own technical problems: I was to all intents ghosting a novel by an old writer who was to die a little before the studio in which I had worked was blown out of existence. All I can say as excuse, and in gratitude to an honoured shade, is that `The Confidential Agent' is a better than Ford Madox Ford wrote himself when he attempted the genre in `Vive Le Roy'".
From `Ways of Escape', pp.69-71

A foreign government has sent agent D. to England on a confidential mission, alone. D. is to buy coal at a fair price now with a bonus promised later. But the other side has sent their agent to foil D. in accomplishing his mission. The story tells about D.'s adventures on his trip to London. Greene's "subtle characterization and accomplished craftsmanship" result in a slow-paced story. It is the dialogue that moves the story along. D.'s mistake allows his enemy to search his coat and take his notebook of schedules. When he arrives at his hotel he learns of an appointment at a language school. The language teacher is his contact. D. seemed to be surrounded by enemies, or people he could not trust. D. learns of a new danger from a beggar in the street.

D. sleeps that night, then leaves to meet Lord Benditch and negotiate a sale. He meets someone on his walk there. At the meeting he found he could not complete the sale. Then things get worse: a dead body was found. The police come for D. but he manages to escape. D. changes his appearance. D. has failed at his mission; the other side made a better offer. [Greene creates a comedy from the travel of D. and K. This highlights the tragedy of this story.] K. tells what happened. D. continues to hide from the authorities.

D. travels to the coal mining town. If his side can't get the coal he will try to prevent the other side from getting it. His appeal falls short, and he must escape again. D. gets unexpected help. But D. is finally arrested and jailed. The police can't make the charges stick due to a lack of identification by eyewitnesses. D. finds he has some friends, and is released on bail. But he must be smuggled out of the country that night. The publicity over this has accomplished D.'s mission: the coal contract was canceled. There is a surprise at the ending. [Is it believable to you?]

This is one of Greene's "entertainments" and it seems less substantial than any other book of his that I have read. D., a university professor, comes to England as confidential agent for the socialist government in his unnamed European country in the midst of civil war. He soon finds himself fighting agents for the other side and evading the British police. He also meets two young women, one of whom stirs his feelings for the underdog, while the other provides love interest of a sort; neither is very fully realized. Although Greene is a master of portraying the dark gritty world of spies and traitors, the novel never quite rings true, at times having more of the phantasmagorical quality of Chesterton's THE MAN WHO WAS THURSDAY than a work like BRIGHTON ROCK or THE THIRD MAN. Also, whether adopted to lend a Kafkaesque air or to avoid identification with a real country, the convention of calling the hero (and all his countrymen) by a single initial does have the effect of reducing his reality as an individual.

A former university professor attempts to secure British coal for his government, which is enmeshed in civil war. He must contend with both the enemy and untrustworthy agents on his own side. Graham Greene presents an unlikely, introspective hero who pursues his goal doggedly out of duty rather than passionate ideology. Shell-shocked and traumatized by his war experiences, his emotions and sense of outrage gradually begin to stir as he witnesses the human cost of his own mission.

When D., an agent from an unnamed country, presumably Spain, arrives in England on a mission to buy coal for his side in a civil war, he discovers that L., an agent for the other side, is also there for the same reason. Coal is now as valuable in his country as gold, and whoever obtains it is likely to win the war. With ambassadors, government officials, and agents constantly changing sides and selling each other out, D. is unable to trust anyone. Formerly a professor of medieval French and an expert in the Song of Roland, D.'s world has been shattered. In the past two years, his wife has been killed, and he's been buried alive, tortured, and jailed. Soon he meets an attractive, young Englishwoman, is implicated in the deaths of two people, has his credentials stolen, and ends up on the run from both the police and his own compatriots.

Published in 1939, this is one of Greene's most exciting "entertainments." A thriller of the first order, this novel also deals with big themes, not religious conflicts of his major novels, but the idea of justice, as a good man finds himself hunted for his political allegiances and learns that his own survival and that of his country depend upon his willingness to kill his enemies. A formal, courtly scholar, D. has discovered war is not glamorous, as it is in the Song of Roland, that innocent people are killed, and that survival is not a matter of divine intervention as much as it is a result of forethought and cleverness.

Told entirely from D.'s perspective, presumably the "right" perspective in Greene's mind, the reader sees D. as less heroic than he might be and the villains as less villainous. D. is well developed and realistic, however, and he wrestles with issues as his readers might. Set just before World War II, Greene here foreshadows some of the themes with which he struggles in his more contemplative novels--the nature of good and evil, man's constant struggle with guilt, the trauma of betrayal, and the fear of failure. Though there is a female love interest, Rose Cullen, the daughter of Lord Benditch, who owns the coal mines, she is neither plausible nor sufficiently thoughtful to add to the themes here. Ironies abound, and while the novel lacks the light touch and humor which make a novel like Our Man in Havana so successful, this is an exciting story which casts light on important ideas. Mary Whipple