Judgment in Death (In Death)

Book Description

When a cop killer cuts loose in a club called Purgatory, Detective Eve Dallas descends into an underground criminal hell.

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Eve Dallas enters into an investigation that uncovers a private strip club that's more than an uptown hot spot.

Customer Reviews:

Good.......2007-07-19

Nora Roberts Rocks! Lt. Eve Dallas makes the best protagonist and it's like a ongoing series so there is always a new story!

Roarke and Eve are at it again!.......2007-07-11

An off-duty cop has been killed in Roarke's Club, Purgatory, and as Eve unravels the mystery, not only does she find bad cops, but one of Roarke's oldest and deadliest enemies, Max Ricker. Ricker wants to destroy Roarke and what better way then using Eve. And as the story unfolds, the body count rises as more cops turn up dead, but why? Is it a vendetta or something more sinister? You won't be necessarily surprised, but you will love the character and plot development.

On top of everything else, while trying to solve the murder, Eve begins to have memories about her childhood, and realizes that Max Ricker has ties to her disturbing past. She is extremely surprised to find that Roarke's oldest enemy probably knew what her father was doing to her in Dallas, and made no attempts to stop him. (In later installments, you find that Roarke and Eve's lives were intertwined long before they met, since childhood. Both of their fathers knew each other and were involved in criminal enterprises. So, it would seem that Roarke and Eve were destined to be together.)

In summary, I think this novel is one of my favorites in the series. Not only did we see Roarke "lose his cool", but we get to see how he feels about the appearance of Eve's past lover, Webster (an internal affairs detective who appears to know more than he is willing to say). I think it was nice to see Roarke "off stride" for a change. I will also say that one disadvantage for me is that I am not reading the series in order, so I am not sure if what I am about to say is relevant. What I would have like to read is a story about how Ricker's son (who was mentioned a lot) handles the fact that Eve and Roarke stopped his lunatic father? I think that would be a wonderful story and an interesting villian in a future story.

Page Turner!!.......2007-06-13

I've read all of Nora Roberts/J.D. Robb's books and this is one of my favorites for the In Death Series. If you haven't read any of them I would suggest you start at the beggining (Naked in Death) and make your way from there. I'm sure you won't be able to get enough. All the books are absolutely amazing and you just fall in love with Eve and Roarke and everything they go through together.

Wonderfully plotted and well thought out!.......2007-04-05

A stale plot is made masterfully refreshing in the hands of one of the greatest writers to ever put pen to paper (or finger to keyboard as the case may be).

Nora Roberts (writing as J.D. Robb) takes the tale of "cop killers" to new heights of suspense in the futuristic Eve Dallas series. Readers are taken on a journey into an imagination as vivid and lively as any Walt Disney movie. The difference, of course, being that Walt Disney only killed the parents of cartoon animals whereas Robb expertly tackles a more real world (if futuristic) human death. The imaginative effect is nonetheless incredible!

A little lackluster.......2006-08-28

I'm a huge fan of this series, but I didn't enjoy this book nearly as much as the others. I have to agree with another reviewer that said that the identification of the killer was so abrupt that it almost left me wondering if I missed some pages or something. I think that Roarke's behavior in this book became a little annoying. And I did not like the angry sex scene in this book. These two are always so loving with each other that it seems way too out of the ordinary. It's also starting to wear on me that Roarke has his nose in every little thing that Eve does. Give me a break! He should be more of a peripheral character than being thrust into the middle of every mystery.

Average customer rating:

Interesting mystery idea and likable detective but unable to develop story
Fun book to read
Not Grafton's best -- but still a fun ride
Punchy read even third time round
J is for Just Under Par

J Is for Judgment
Sue Grafton
Manufacturer: Fawcett
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback

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K Is for Killer (Kinsey Millhone Mysteries)
L Is for Lawless
I Is for Innocent
M Is for Malice
N Is for Noose

ASIN: 0449221482
Release Date: 1994-04-02

Book Description

"Ms. Grafton writes a smart story and wraps it up with a wry twist."
THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
Wendell Jaffe has been dead for five years--until his former insurance agent spots him in a dusty resort bar. Now California Fidelity wants Kinsey Millhone to track down the dead man. Just two months before, his widow collected on Jaffe's $500,000 life insurance policy--her only legacy since Jaffe went overboard, bankrupt and about to be indicted for his fraudulent real estate schemes. As Kinsey pushes deeper into the mystery surrounding Wendell Jaffe's pseudocide, she explores her own past, discovering that in family matters, as in crime, sometimes it's better to reserve judgment....
A MAIN SELECTION OF THE LITERARY GUILD

Customer Reviews:

Interesting mystery idea and likable detective but unable to develop story.......2007-07-11

As soon as I read her earliest books, Sue Grafton became one of my favorite writers of light, straight, credible detective fiction. She can be a terrific storyteller. After being badly disappointed by the skimpy, disorganized "G" and "H" stories, but buoyed by the "I" book, I was looking forward to "J," which promised a very interesting tale. Unfortunately, I was disappointed again (though not as badly as I had been by "G" and "H" or as I would be with "L"). It is difficult to get a handle on exactly why. The book is quite a mish-mash.

Grafton opens the "J" book with a complex and fascinating premise, even if it was not exactly original (for example, see John D. MacDonald's "The Empty Copper Sea") -- a slick, near-bust land developer/real estate wheeler-dealer disappears under mysterious circumstances, is presumed dead, yet is spotted elsewhere years later. The early part of the book is interesting, with some good attention to detail. But the book never really takes seriously and runs with its opening plot idea.

Instead, the book strings it out for a while, deteriorates into a series of subplots (about the kids, about the wife, about the cop, about the partner ...) that lead nowhere, and then diddles away any life the story has left with a let-down ending involving a marginal character with a confused motive. This is not helped at all by a last-minute attempt to suggest that the person was a master criminal after all, despite what appears to be impetuous, emotional, out-of-control, lunatic behavior. It leaves the reader wondering why it was worth slogging through all of the pointless personal subplots and complicated original premise.

The book's excellent opening premise seems to be used merely as a gimmick to kick-start an aimless, pointless story. All of the characters' motivations are obscure and confusing: the son, the husband coming back, the partner, someone turning murderous overnight. The murder happens far too late in the book. The story bumps along to a conclusion using one contrived "confession" scene after another (cop investor tells about money still in existence; leads back to partner, etc.).

The opening premise promised a finely crafted complex crime by a single mastermind. Yet, in execution, the promise evaporated because no one person in the story has his/her act together. No one is acting deliberately. Whatever happened -- the storytelling is so obtuse at times it is not entirely clear -- is a mass of completely haphazard and unconnected events (husband returning home because of son; son getting into trouble; cop homing in on extant money). No clear villain emerges who was responsible for one overarching, clever crime, just a bunch of disconnected people spinning their wheels. The attempt on literally the last page of the book to suggest that what had happened had a larger meaning is flip, inadequate, and unconvincing, as is a melodramatic end scene in which a character "swims out to sea."

Generally, Grafton is a witty, upbeat writer, and Millhone is a fun character, and there is evidence of this in the book. The book provides some personal details of Millhone's family history that are mildly interesting. But in this book they feel distracting and painted-on. They fail to gel with the rest of the story and are not presented, much less resolved, in a meaningful way. Not since "H" has Millhone looked as haphazard, disorganized, procedure-oriented, coincidence-driven, and unprofessional. There is simply not enough of a coherent story to support her. The tone of the book is remarkably upbeat, but increasingly comes across as empty flippancy and scenery-chewing utilized just to get through a sagging, aimless plot.

Again, a likable, comfortable lead character and tone and a good premise and beginning made me want to like the book. But it simply fell apart to the point where I cannot in all honesty give it any more than three stars.

Fun book to read.......2007-02-12

Sue Grafton writes a great series,you feel like you know the people in the book. Will read the whole series.

Not Grafton's best -- but still a fun ride.......2006-07-02

I have always believed that a sub-par offering from Grafton is still head-and-shoulders above most other mystery series out there, and "J is for Judgment" proved me right. It has some disappointing flaws coming off of the superb "I is for Innocent", but for a fan like me they are easily forgivable. The tight, fast-paced plotting that made "I" so riveting is lacking here -- partly due to the nature of PI Kinsey Millhone's case. Here she is on the trail of Wendell Jaffe, a man who disappeared on the ocean one night when he was on the verge of being arrested by the police and has been presumed dead for five years. When a claims adjuster for California Fidelity Insurance (the company that Kinsey used to work for) spots a man with an uncanny resemblance to Jaffe in Mexico, the company hires her to find out if Jaffe is indeed alive so that they can go after the life insurance policy that Jaffe's 'widow' has just collected on. There is some great fun to be had while Kinsey heads down to Mexico to pick up on Jaffe's trail and tries to fit in lounging poolside, but once she returns to Santa Teresa, California she reaches an impasse in her investigation that even an expert like Grafton struggles with. Is Jaffe returning to his old stomping grounds to save his son from a murder trial? How do you look for someone that has left no trace? The plot bounces precariously while Grafton tries to align the stars, so to speak, for her readers, but comes out with some nice moments to balance things out. Kinsey also has to struggle with the sudden emergence of a family she never knew -- or cared to know -- existed. It is fun to see Kinsey forced to undergo a little self-examination, but the sub-plot sort of peters out in the book's climax. I assume that Grafton will re-visit the idea in the next book (at least I hope she will) so I'm not too upset about it. "J" is, ultimately, a book for the already initiated fans of Grafton's alphabet series. There's nothing wrong with that, but I do hope that it doesn't become a habit.

Punchy read even third time round.......2005-12-29

I really enjoy Grafton's books even on repeat reads. There is a lot more to them than just figuring out the mystery. Grafton writes a personal story which has been developing for 10 books up to this one (at the time of writing this Grafton has just published S is for Silence) and in all of them the essence of Kinsey is both strong, and with all relationships - it is developing.

In J is for Judgement Kinsey is now working for herself based in the law offices of Kingham and Ives. However Kinsey's boss from the Insuarance company, mac Vorhooies comes to visit her - apparently Wendell Jaffe has been spotted in Mexico - trouble is Wendell Jaffe is supposed to be dead. Kinsey is hired to investigate.

This book draws us through a whole heap of usual twists and turns, but also draws us deeper into Kinsey's own past. We have slowly been learning about her strange past and why she has turned out as she has. Each novel usually reveals a few more scraps. In this we get a dinner plate full.

I liked this book for its inconclusive finish. While there was a neatly wound up conclusion to the mystery, the ending in itself shows the possibility that this might all come up again in the future. I thought it was neatly done.

I have to admit that I am a huge fan of Kinsey Millhone and the only novel I have not really enjoyed - or should I say, felt disappointed in was P is for Peril. I liked the first three best - they were shorter and punchier than the later ones. But I just love the way Kinsey works through things. I also like the way we just visit with her for a short period and some things in her personal life are sorted out and other things hang inthe balance to the next installment. Pretty much like real life!

J is for Just Under Par.......2005-04-15

Sue Grafton is a little off target with this mystery and Kinsey Millhone, her now famous female sleuth is doing what she does best -- she's solving a case that seems simple and turns into something unexpected.

If you've been reading along the alphabet as I have been, we've learned that Kinsey was fired from California Fidelity Insurance, the employer who occupied all of her time with their cases. Now they need Kinsey back working for them on a tough case and are willing to pay her price. The case itself is a little confusing (and has been overdone by other writers): guy is missing from his boat while sailing on the ocean, leaves suicide note, wife and children are left with nothing, his business partner is put in jail for fraud. Then five years later, he's officially declared dead and his wife receives $ 500,000 from California Fidelity Insurance. Everything seems on the up and up so far, until an insurance agent spots the dead man in a Mexican hotel. Off Kinsey goes to find the evidence so the insurance company can get back its money only to have the guy elude her. Rumor has it that his son is in trouble and she's sure he's back in his hometown to try and help.

Sue Grafton had the story line down pat and the characters were born in detail. I'm not sure where she loses her momentum but it's somewhere along the way with this story. It could be in the fact that she's trying too hard to give us glimpses into future books with the bits and pieces of Kinsey's family and not concentrating on the story at hand. The ending is a bit lame and it seems as if she's trying to tone down Kinsey's personality that we've all come to know and love. The story itself is in need of a serious rewrite in order to achieve the greatness that Grafton so often emits.

This is still a good book, better than most, but it's starting to go downhill fast and I hope Grafton can get the future books back on track or I may have to stop the alphabet series somewhere along the way. As my daughter said when she was learning the alphabet, "A, B, C, D, E, F, G, I'm done with this" if it doesn't get back to where she was around G is for Gumshoe.

Moral Leadership: The Theory and Practice of Power, Judgment and Policy (J-B Warren Bennis Series)

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Moral Leadership: The Theory and Practice of Power, Judgment and Policy (J-B Warren Bennis Series)

Manufacturer: Jossey-Bass
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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On Leading Change: A Leader to Leader Guide
Contemporary Issues in Leadership
Ethics: Discovering Right and Wrong
When Jesus Came to Harvard: Making Moral Choices Today
Bass & Stogdill's Handbook of Leadership

ASIN: 0787982822

Book Description

Moral Leadership brings together in one comprehensive volume essays from leading scholars in law, leadership, psychology, political science, and ethics to provide practical, theoretical policy guidance. The authors explore key questions about moral leadership such as:

How do leaders form, sustain, and transmit moral commitments?
Under what conditions are those processes most effective?
What is the impact of ethics officers, codes, training programs, and similar initiatives?
How do standards and practices vary across context and culture?
What can we do at the individual, organizational, and societal level to foster moral leadership?

Throughout the book, the contributors identify what people know, and only think they know, about the role of ethics in key decision-making positions. The essays focus on issues such as the definition and importance of moral leadership and the factors that influence its exercise, along with practical strategies for promoting ethical behavior. Moral Leadership addresses the dynamics of moral leadership, with particular emphasis on major obstacles that stand in its way: impaired judgment, self-interest, and power. Finally, the book explores moral leadership in a variety of contextsbusiness and the professions, nonprofit organizations, and the international arena.

Blackwell Handbook of Judgment and Decision Making (Blackwell Handbooks of Experimental Psychology)

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Blackwell Handbook of Judgment and Decision Making (Blackwell Handbooks of Experimental Psychology)

Manufacturer: Blackwell Publishing Limited
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Psychology & Counseling | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books

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The Construction of Preference
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Economic Theory and Cognitive Science: Microexplanation (Bradford Books)

ASIN: 1405157593

Book Description

The Blackwell Handbook of Judgment and Decision Making is a state-of-the art overview of current topics and research in the study of how people make evaluations, draw inferences, and make decisions under conditions of uncertainty and conflict. Chapters are contributed by experts in the field from various disciplines such as psychology, cognitive science, business, and law. The selection of topics reflects current trends and controversies in judgment and decision-making research. Each chapter provides an overview of important past research and a report on current research and future directions in various areas in the study of human judgment and decision making.The book:provides a glimpse at the many approaches that have been taken in the study of judgment and decision making, including bounded rationality, computational modelling, and the heuristics and biases approachportrays the major findings in the field and covers topics such as probablistic reasoning, hypothesis testing, multiattribute choice, and decision making under risk and uncertaintypresents examinations of the broader roles of social, emotional, and cultural influences on decision makingexplores applications of judgment and decision-making research to important problems in a variety of professional contexts, including finance, accounting, medicine, public policy, and the law.

J.D. Robb Collection 4: Witness in Death, Judgment in Death, and Betrayal in Death (In Death)

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J.D. Robb Collection 4: Witness in Death, Judgment in Death, and Betrayal in Death (In Death)
J.D. Robb
Manufacturer: Brilliance Audio
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Audio Cassette

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J.D. Robb Collection 3: Holiday in Death, Conspiracy in Death, and Loyalty in Death (In Death)
J.D. Robb Collection 5: Seduction in Death, Reunion in Death, and Purity in Death (In Death)
J.D. Robb Collection 2: Rapture in Death, Ceremony in Death, and Vengeance in Death (In Death)
J.D. Robb Collection 6: Portrait in Death, Imitation in Death, and Divided in Death (In Death)
J.D. Robb Collection 1: Naked in Death, Glory in Death, Immortal in Death (In Death)

ASIN: 1593554133
Release Date: 2004-11-25

Book Description

Witness in Death (Engineer: Mike Council)

Opening night at New York's New Globe Theater turns from stage scene to crime scene when the leading man is stabbed to death center stage. Now Eve Dallas has a high profile, celebrity homicide on her hands. Not only is she lead detective, she's also a witness - and when the press discovers that her husband owns the theater, there's more media spotlight than either can handle.

Judgment in Death (Engineer: Jill Sovis)

In an uptown strip joint, a cop is found bludgeoned to death. The weapon's a baseball bat. The motive's a mystery. It's a case of serious overkill that pushes Lt. Eve Dallas straight into overdrive.

Betrayal in Death (Engineer: Jill Sovis)

At the luxurious Roarke Palace Hotel, a maid walks into suite 4602 for the nightly turndown - and steps into her worst nightmare. A killer leaves her dead, strangled by a thin silver wire. He's Sly Yost, a virtuoso of music and murder. A hit man for the elite. And Lt. Eve Dallas knows him well.

Pragmatism, Critique, Judgment: Essays for Richard J. Bernstein

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Pragmatism, Critique, Judgment: Essays for Richard J. Bernstein

Manufacturer: The MIT Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Critical Resistance: From Poststructuralism to Post-Critique

ASIN: 0262524279

Book Description

The work of Richard J. Bernstein has achieved a groundbreaking synthesis of the analytical and continental modes of thought. Countering the highly technical metaphysical and epistemological puzzles of analytic philosophy in the early 1960s, Bernstein offered a model of philosophy in a democratic society as the work of the engaged public intellectual. Working within the tradition of American pragmatism, he also changed that tradition by opening it to the international intellectual currents of phenomenology, deconstructionism, and critical theory. These essays by leading philosophers and social thinkers pay tribute to Bernstein and reflect the themes that have engaged him throughout his career.

Pragmatism, Critique, Judgment opens with a group of essays that examine the place of philosophy in a democratic society; included in this section are Richard Rorty's exploration of the legacy of American pragmatism and Jürgen Habermas's reconsideration of ethics in philosophy. The essays in the second section examine postpositivist social critique and include Jacques Derrida's consideration of the philosophical paradoxes of the death penalty. The third group of essays considers the theme of radical evil, and includes discussions of Bernstein's nuanced reading of Hannah Arendt. The book ends with a biographical essay based in part on a series of conversations with Bernstein himself.

Epistemology and the Psychology of Human Judgment

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Long Overdue
Great book!

Epistemology and the Psychology of Human Judgment
Michael A Bishop , and J. D. Trout
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0195162307

Book Description

Bishop and Trout here present a unique and provocative new approach to epistemology (the theory of human knowledge and reasoning). Their approach aims to liberate epistemology from the scholastic debates of standard analytic epistemology, and treat it as a branch of the philosophy of science. The approach is novel in its use of cost-benefit analysis to guide people facing real reasoning problems and in its framework for resolving normative disputes in psychology. Based on empirical data, Bishop and Trout show how people can improve their reasoning by relying on Statistical Prediction Rules (SPRs). They then develop and articulate the positive core of the book. Their view, Strategic Reliabilism, claims that epistemic excellence consists in the efficient allocation of cognitive resources to reliable reasoning strategies, applied to significant problems. The last third of the book develops the implications of this view for standard analytic epistemology; for resolving normative disputes in psychology; and for offering practical, concrete advice on how this theory can improve real people's reasoning. This is a truly distinctive and controversial work that spans many disciplines and will speak to an unusually diverse group, including people in epistemology, philosophy of science, decision theory, cognitive and clinical psychology, and ethics and public policy.

Customer Reviews:

Long Overdue.......2007-06-11

An extremely good book that describes what epistemology could be, as compared with the tedious academic exercise it has unfortunately become. As it stands, if traditional epistemology disappeared tomorrow, nobody outside of its small group of practitioners would notice or care.

Bishop & Trout's argument for a reorientation of epistemology is based in the "Aristotelian Principle" that in the long run, poor reasoning tends to lead to worse outcomes than good reasoning. That simple assertion licenses empirical testing of the relative goodness of competing reasoning strategies. It is also "a necessary precondition for the practical relevance of epistemology," because if better reasoning doesn't lead to better outcomes than bad reasoning does, then it wouldn't matter how we arrive at our beliefs, and epistemology in any form would be a pointless enterprise.

Reliabilism is the theory of epistemology that holds a belief to be justified if it results from some process of demonstrated reliability, one that has been shown to yield true beliefs. The purpose of this book is to make the case for something the authors call Strategic Reliabilism. SR is an epistemological theory that defines epistemic excellence as (1) efficient allocation of cognitive (reasoning, problem-solving) resources (2) to robustly reliable strategies, (3) applied to significant problems.

The goal is a more prescriptive, reason-guided epistemology, relevant to problem solving in the real world by offering practical recommendations about how to reason better and thus achieve better outcomes. It would be based in empirical research on the limitations and foibles of human reasoning and how to avoid or compensate for them. Strategic Reliabilism is not a theory of justification; its focus is on comparing reasoning strategies to identify the better ones so they can be used instead of ones that are less good. The importance of this effort can be seen in the enormous costs connected with poor reasoning. A patient with a positive result on a diagnostic test for cancer or AIDs needs good information about the likelihood that he actually has the disease. In fact, one study showed that only 18% of faculty and staff at Harvard Medical School were able to reason to the correct interpretation of a positive diagnostic test; the average estimated likelihood was 28 times too high.

"Ameliorative Psychology" is Bishop & Trout's term for the empirical discipline that searches for better reasoning strategies and, from the results of empirical tests, makes normative recommendations about how to reason better. The specific techniques described that have so far been found to improve reasoning include: Statistical Prediction Rules; thinking in terms of frequencies vs. probabilities in Bayesian problems; and recognition of common sources of bias and error (overconfidence, the interview effect, the generalized attribution error, lack of comparison in causal attribution, regression effects, leaping to plausible but ungrounded causal fictions for rare events). The many examples of these common problems in reasoning are highly interesting and troubling, especially as they show up in professionals who you assume would know better.

Traditional epistemology (referred to SAE: Standard Analytic Epistemology) emphasizes knowledge defined as justified true belief. But it provides no guidance about how to arrive at that worthy goal. SAE emphasizes a priori intuition as the method of evaluating clever examples involving strange hypothetical situations. B&T argue that these word games make little contact with real-world problems, that such intuitions are not, in fact, a priori, and that there is no evidence that the intuitions of philosophers produce trustworthy judgments about epistemic matters. SAE has failed to deliver.

This is a terrific book, one that offers a meaningful future for epistemology, joining it with scientific psychology to create a specialty with something of real value to offer the world. Whether it will be received that way by philosophers is another question entirely, although one can always dream.

Great book!.......2005-02-12

Great book! I am what the authors call a "Standard Analytic Epistemologist", and I'm finding it hard to escape their arguments. The book is intelligent, fair, and beautifully written. It is also funnier than most philosophy books (not very hard to do, I know). Epistemology and the Psychology of Human Judgment is not written to preach to those already converted to naturalism. Rather, it is an honest experiment in naturalism, in all of its multi-disciplinary splendor. In developing their version of naturalistic epistemology - called strategic reliabilism -- they expose contemporary epistemology for the insular field that it is. Highly recommended.

The Judgment (A Charley Sloan Courtroom Thriller)

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Like reading two books at once.
Good but not greatý3 ½ stars
Coughlin is among the best
Evil and innocence
Slow, slow, slow

The Judgment (A Charley Sloan Courtroom Thriller)
William J. Coughlin
Manufacturer: St. Martin's Paperbacks
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Binding: Mass Market Paperback

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The Stalking Man

ASIN: 0312962444

Book Description

The death of innocenceIn a rural area outside of Detroit, bodies are being found in the snow. One after another. Neatly washed, wrapped in platic, methodically laid out like sleeping angels. And very, very young.The birth of evilForty miles away and at the other end of the world, an honest cop, the deputy chief chief of police, has been framed for a corruption charge. In a world of big-city politics, he wants ace lawyer Charley Sloan to get him off.The only hopePulled into the two very different cases, Charley faces the heat of a perplexnig serial murder investigation and the heavey hitters of the Motor City's inner circle. Interviewing witnesses, putting together clues, Charley Sloan, a man who has been at the bottom and at the top, is about to uncover the explosive difference between true innocence-and the most dangerous guilt of all....The Judgement

Customer Reviews:

Like reading two books at once........2006-10-23

Despite some creepy and very graphic scenes, I enjoyed this book. I have to admit, however, that I suspected the murderer from pretty early on. I did not, however, suspect the story that unfolded in the last couple of pages.

There were really two story lines running concurrently, with no connection other than Sloan. This format wasn't distracting, just a bit hard to reconcile once in a while - like reading two books at once.

After reading the comments by Mr. Coughlin's son on this site, I will go find some of the books he really wrote and check those out.

Good but not greatý3 ½ stars.......2001-01-02

This is the first book by Coughlin that I have read. It was engaging and enjoyable but not a pageturner. Coughlin spins two parallel but unrelated stories through the book. This leaves the reader to wonder if the two story lines will come together in the end or remain separate vehicles that develop the main character, Charles Sloan. As the novel progresses in a somewhat meandering fashion, the reader comes to know Sloan, who is a lawyer of keen mind and thought process, a recovering alcoholic, and, at times, a tortured soul. The story is able to hold the reader's attention but the ending is rather predictable. The story is written in the first person perspective of Sloan, much like the Paul Mandriani novels from Steve Martini. Personally, I will seek out a Martini novel before I again reach for Couglin.

Coughlin is among the best.......2000-12-12

I have read a number of Coughlin's books. Some are better than others, but this one proves again, as do his other novels, that Coughlin is among the best of the lawyer-novel authors. His plots are always interesting and developed; his writing is very good; there is humor and sophistication to a degree that is rare in this genre.

Evil and innocence.......2000-09-07

Recovering alcoholic attorney is involved in two different cases. In one he is representing assistant police chief who's accused of stealing money used to pay drug informants. The charges seem to be political in nature. In the other, he is called into to represent various suspects being questioned in murders of seven year old children. The child murders cause him to question God although he is a lapsed Catholic and also cause him to slip in his alcohol recovery program. In the end, He's able to vindicate the police chief and secrets of the police chief's past are revealed. In the other, he discovers who the child-murderer is (really not too hard to figure) and confronts him.

Slow, slow, slow.......1999-09-23

I expected a true thriller. Scott Turow had said "Vintage Coughlin. Sharp, tight and full of suspense." I found this book to be none of these. It took forever to get started and once it got going the outcome was predictable and offered no suspense.

Social Psychology and Economics (The Society for Judgment and Decision Making Series) (Society for Judgement & Decision Making)

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Experimentalists talking to each other

Social Psychology and Economics (The Society for Judgment and Decision Making Series) (Society for Judgement & Decision Making)

Manufacturer: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Similar Items:

The Construction of Preference
Behavioral Economics and Its Applications
Economics and Psychology: A Promising New Cross-Disciplinary Field (CESifo Seminar Series)
Blackwell Handbook of Judgment and Decision Making (Blackwell Handbooks of Experimental Psychology)
Economic Theory and Cognitive Science: Microexplanation (Bradford Books)

ASIN: 0805857559

Book Description

This book combines chapters written by leading social psychologists and economists, illuminating the developing trends in explaining and understanding economic behavior in a social world. It provides insights from both fields, communicated by eloquent scholars, and demonstrates through recent research and theory how economic behaviors may be more effectively examined using a combination of both fields.

Social Psychology and Economics comes at a particularly fitting time, as a psychological approach to economics has begun to flourish in recent years, and papers exploring the intersection of these two disciplines have appeared in peer-reviewed journals, opening a dynamic dialogue between previously separated fields. This volume, the first in the Society for Judgment and Decision Making Series since acquired by LEA, includes chapters by economists and psychologists. It addresses a variety of economic phenomena within a social context, such as scarcity and materialism, emphasizing the importance of integrating social psychology and economics.

Social Psychology and Economics is arranged in seven parts that discuss:
*an introduction to the topic;
*preferences, utility, and choice;
*emotions;
*reciprocity, cooperation, and fairness;
*social distance;
*challenges to social psychology and economics; and
*collaborative reflections and projections.

The market for this book is students, researchers, and professionals in the disciplines of economics, psychology, business, and behavioral decision making. Graduate students and upper-level undergraduate students will consider it a useful supplemental text.

Customer Reviews:

Experimentalists talking to each other.......2007-07-27

Northwestern University psychologist (and coeditor of this volume) J. Keith Murnighan and Harvard University economist Alvin E. Roth have worked together for some thirty years. Murnighan exclaims in their joint paper in this collection "It is completely clear that psychologists and economists take decidedly different approaches to understanding the same phenomena". (p. 330)

This should be a startling revelation, and a source of deep consternation to both disciplines. Do not both psychology and economics consider themselves sciences? How can two scientific disciplines disagree in explaining the same phenomena and yet not attempt to resolve their differences? In fact, the two disciplines appear to share a public culture of mutual respect and tolerance, despite the fact that such a culture has no place in the scientific enterprise.

There is no theory in this book. There is no social psychology theory because none exists (just lots of little nano-theories), and no economic theory because economic theory is of no value to social psychology, at least as far as I can ascertain from the editors' choices for inclusion in this collection. Rather, this book consists of social psychologists and experimental economists trading stories and bad-mouthing economic theory. While I take the experimental results discussed in this book as highly important, and they certainly imply that there is lots of work for theorists in coming to terms with actual human behavior, as a person interested in social theory, I am not thrilled with its complete absence in this book. In the rest of this review, I will discuss only how a theorist (in economics or psychology) might react to reading this book.

One theme that comes through several papers in this volume is that economists value a small number of highly general, parsimonious but somewhat inaccurate theories, while psychologists prefer a large number of highly specific theories, each of which is relatively accurate in its domain of application. Is accuracy vs. parsimony, then, an explanation of the differences between the fields? If so, the psychologists must be the winners, because there is little intrinsic value in parsimony, and great intrinsic value in accuracy. However, there is no ultimate value to the proliferation of models, each accurate over a short range of phenomena, unless they can be generalized to a common model of human behavior. For in the absence of generalization, "accurate" simply reduces to "descriptive." The problem with descriptive models is that they reveal little about the underlying behavioral and physiological processes. Economists may have not achieved the goal of scientific explanation of human behavior, but at least their underlying theoretical method offers this as the goal of research. Proliferating descriptive nano-models, by contrast, is an inherently limited enterprise.

Of course, neoclassical economic theorists have their own weakness in their renown lack of interest in "the facts." This bizarre group promotes a culture that treats economic theory as a set of axiological truths that may or may not have real-world application. There is no justification for this position. Indeed, if natural scientists had this attitude over the past few centuries, we still be in the scientific Middle Ages. The Great Equations of Science are the product of painful, direct, extended empirical explorations, not the sort of sui-generis theorizing favored in economic theory.

Social psychologists have a contrasting temperament. Like nature-lovers admiring strange shells on the beach, social psychologists delight in happening upon interesting fragments of human behavior. Do humans distinguish between causing harm and not preventing harm? Wow, that's really interesting! Are many people implicit racists, even though they don't know it? Excellent discovery! A prize find for a social psychologist or behavioral economist is even more cherished if it violates some Grand Theory, such as the economist's rational actor model. Showing that some Grand Theory is wrong, preferably a theory full of sophisticated mathematics, is to the social psychologist and the experimental economist the prize above all prizes.

There are some fine essays in this book, including those of Kevin McCabe, Iris Bohnet, and Max H. Bazerman and Deepak Malhotra. But, experimentalists talking to each other is not the answer to the deeper questions in the two fields. Pretending that this is the answer, and in particular accepting the social psychologists self-satisfaction with a situation in which the field is a collection of experiments connected to "nano-theories" that apply to tiny areas of social existence, is unsatisfying.

Economic theory should expand its horizon by applying decision theory, game theory, and perhaps other analytical tools towards developing a more general framework that explains the phenomena treated in this book, as well as other aspects of human behavior that are absent from the standard model of the self-regarding actor. Social psychology should adopt the far superior experimental methodology of behavioral economics, and since this methodology is firmly based in Bayesian decision theory and game theory, social psychology should take decision theory and game theory as the basis for modeling human behavior. Going beyond game theory and decision theory to embrace neuroeconomics may also have great explanatory value.

Social psychology is like anthropology and political science in that all must borrow certain basic principles of human behavior and social organization from other behavioral disciplines (biology, economics, sociology, cognitive and developmental psychology). By so doing, social psychology could become a field based on substantive social theory rather than a plethora of fascinating but ultimately descriptive insights.

God's Judgments: Interpreting History and the Christian Faith

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Does God still act in human history?
3 stars

God's Judgments: Interpreting History and the Christian Faith
Steven J. Keillor
Manufacturer: IVP Academic
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Christianity | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books

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Similar Items:

This Rebellious House: American History & the Truth of Christianity
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ASIN: 0830825657

Book Description

Steven J. Keillor pursues the thesis that divine judgment can be a fruitful category for historical investigation. In fact, he argues that Christianity is an interpretation of history more than a worldview or philosophy.

Grounding his thesis on a study of God's judgments in both the Old and New Testaments, the author then takes up two events in US history, the burning of Washington in 1814 and the Civil War, to explore and make his case. He concludes by suggesting the relevance of his thesis to some contemporary concerns, including the attacks of September 11.

Market/Audience

History buffs
Students

Features and Benefits

Noted historian and author of This Rebellious House
Makes as his point of departure biblical teaching culminating in the teaching of Jesus on God's judgments
Provocative interpretations of two significant events in US history to assess his thesis
Demonstrates how significant the notion of divine judgment is for interpreting contemporary situations and events
Challenging and perhaps even prophetic for Christian thinking and acting

Customer Reviews:

Does God still act in human history?.......2007-07-19

Steven Keillor is an American historian, who also happens to be a Christian. He argues that a primary way of understanding Christianity is to see it as an interpretation of history. The Judeo-Christian religion is indeed grounded in history.

Jews and Christians worship a God who acts, and who is very much involved in the affairs of this world. As such, they reject deism, the idea that God initially created the world but has had nothing to do with it thereafter. No, the Biblical God is one intimately involved in this world, and in human history.

And part of this involvement is the judgment of God. This judgment, which can be understood in part as a sifting process, is a double-edged sword. There is not only judgment of unbelievers, but of believers as well. It is often a testing process, one that allows us either to come nearer to God, or to get further away from him.

And this sifting happens to nations, not just individuals. This is quite clear in the Old Testament. The question is, are nations still judged by God in New Testament times? Keillor believes God still does judge nations today, even though there is relative silence about this in the New Testament.

Such questions especially came to the fore after September 11. Was God judging the US?, many asked after that tragic event. Keillor rejects any simple yes or no answer to that difficult question, and he rejects many of the explanations offered by those on the left, the center and the right. But he does allow for the possibility that God was somehow involved in that fateful Tuesday morning.

Keillor tries to deal with these current situations by first examining what the Bible has to say about judgment. That God is judge is clear, in both Testaments. And Yahweh certainly was judge of the nations in the Hebrew Bible.

Of course modern man is squeamish about the idea of judgment. The Enlightenment did give us deism, and many are unwilling to believe that God - if he exists - is even remotely concerned about the affairs of men. But the Biblical picture is a far cry from this view.

God is overwhelmingly concerned about us and our activities, and is involved in what happens on planet earth. But New Testament believers may still ask if God is the same as Yahweh in terms of judgment. Keillor argues - rightly, I feel - that God has not changed between the Testaments, and is equally a just, holy and judging God, as he is loving and merciful, throughout all of Scripture.

When Jesus was on the scene, his life and teachings constantly brought separation and division to his hearers. Sifting, or judgment, in other words, was the inevitable result of confronting Christ and his claims. As Jesus said in John 9:39, "For judgment I have come into this world".

Says Keillor, "From beginning to end, Jesus' life and teachings involved a sifting-out based on responses to him". And he experienced the judgment of God on the cross, when he suffered for our sins. Moreover, one day he will come back as judge of the entire world. Thus judgment is part and parcel of the life and work of Christ.

After seeking to make the case that God may well still judge nations today, Keillor offers two test cases: the 1814 burning of Washington, and the American Civil War. He notes that many people living during these events did see God's hand of judgment at work. For example, Lincoln was convinced that the Civil War was God's judgment on the evils of slavery, although he saw both sides as sharing in the guilt.

In all this Keillor rightly recognizes that unlike Old Testament times, we have no clear prophetic word from God on the events of the day, so great caution must be exercised here. What Keillor is mainly trying to establish is that God is actively involved in this world, and has not become an absentee landlord in the New Testament dispensation.

This is an intriguing book. One may not agree with every detail found here. But it seems that the general theme of the book is heading in the right direction. And Keillor is quite right to begin his book with a quote from Os Guinness: "The cross of Jesus runs crosswise to all our human ways of thinking. A rediscovery of the hard and the unpopular themes of the gospel will therefore be such a rediscovery of the whole gospel that the result may lead to reformation and revival".

We certainly have shrunk away from proclaiming the whole counsel of God, and his holiness and justice must be maintained as adamantly as his love and grace. Anything less is a distortion and truncation of the Biblical record. Thus Keillor is to be commended for getting us to think more carefully about who God is, and how we are to understand his current dealings with planet earth and its inhabitants.

3 stars.......2007-03-23

*** Right after Nine Eleven, there was a host of cries declaring it to be God's judgement on the nation. While much of the hue has died down. the author presents the thesis that such was the situation, citing two examples of "case law," as it were, the Civil War and the burning of Washington D.C. in 1814, as well as the Old and New Testaments, to back up his claim. Though the concept of God judging us is not at all popular, the Bible makes it clear that such things happen. Though the reading will be often uncomfortable, somewhat dry, and slightly esoteric, academics and historians will find it interesting and if its thesis is valid, others might be wise to overlook the lacks and pay attention to the message. ***

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