Educational, entertaining; intended for starter detectives but ideal for anyone interested in the minutia of modern...
Thomson’s debut work of nonfiction—part memoir, part guidebook—provides “the nitty-gritty of worker’s compensation insurance investigations.”
The author, a licensed private investigator, worked primarily for the Insurance Company of Southern California on suspected insurance fraud cases. His beat spanned from Modesto to Capistrano. His tools were both traditional gumshoe and high-tech, the essential components of what’s known in his industry as “sub rosa,” or covert, surveillance. Over a decadeslong career, which Thomson admits was low paying and “often humdrum,” the author recounts covering wrongful death assignments and scoping out cheating spouses. Sometimes, worker’s compensation insurance cases had their own unique and interesting twists; Thomson shares a memorable one in the short chapter “The Woman with Two Claims.” He examines the advances in surveillance equipment since the 1980s but notes that nothing works better than patience, a featureless car with good fuel economy and the ability to make quick U-turns, and old-fashioned note taking. Aside from being crucial to fact-finding, investigative notes serve as the raw material for requisite written reports. The author’s experiences as a process server helped him learn how to keep dogs at bay and navigate large apartment complexes. Thomson shares many small tips, some obvious, some subtle, on the legalities regarding privacy, as well as the importance of notifying local police of stakeouts and how to control the unprofessional and distracting “jiggle” that can mar clandestine camerawork. To identify the right person at an address, he suggests a unique method of mailing a large, bright envelope or a teddy bear, anything innocuous but easily spotted from afar, to establish the intended “claimant.” At times, Thomson’s writing reads as a dry surveillance report, but when he wanders into the shaky area of “pretext” and expresses his thoughts on running red lights or relieving oneself on stakeout, the peculiarity of his voice can be engaging.
Educational, entertaining; intended for starter detectives but ideal for anyone interested in the minutia of modern investigative work.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2013
ISBN: 978-1479781591
Page Count: 76
Publisher: Xlibris
Review Posted Online: July 18, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Schulze’s courageous story fills a major gap in the story of the world’s greatest conflict, and she deserves a wide audience...
This compelling memoir of a German girl’s bitter, frightening life reveals the horrors visited upon an average family caught between two of the most cruel dictators in history.
Amidst the copious histories of Hitler and Stalin, historians have often neglected the horrific tales of innocent girls like Schulze, who early in World War II survived Nazi occupation, then was forced to hide in a secret attic for months at war’s end to escape sexual attacks from the invading rampages of the Russians. The Russian soldiers pillaged her tiny village of Doelitz, where women scrubbed their faces with ashes and dirt to make themselves unappealing to the Red Army’s serial rapists. With professional writer Collier’s help, Schulze tells a ground-level story that is at once haunting and shocking in its narration of ordinary, peaceful lives shattered forever by war. The small, poignant touches are riveting–the family’s favorite horse being dragged away to haul artillery; their argument about whether to follow Nazi orders to display Hitler’s portrait. Her inspiring story concludes with the long, harrowing struggle to escape to West Germany, followed by a months-long wait for a berth on a ship bound for America. Her first tastes of ice cream and pineapple aboard the ship are a fitting climax to a tale of never-ending stress and fear–and ultimately, redemption.
Schulze’s courageous story fills a major gap in the story of the world’s greatest conflict, and she deserves a wide audience of all ages.Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2005
ISBN: 0-58348-072-2
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A daunting but worthwhile journey through the material and divine realms of our universe.
An intriguing if sometimes ponderous examination of man's place in the universe.
Bartow creates a systematic philosophic framework for integrating concepts from diverse disciplines, such as astrology, psychology, metaphysics, theology, eastern and western mysticism and quantum physics. The author uses complex–and often unintelligible–diagrams to create a visual representation of the corporeal and spiritual universe, building layers of complexity that illustrate the dynamic interaction of mind, matter, energy and spirituality. He divides man’s perception of the universe into objective and subjective categories with distinctive subcategories, using piano keys as the primary metaphor–the black keys represent the objective planes, embodied in the concrete laws of science, and the white keys represent the subjective interior planes. The author makes frequent use of the philosophies from such ancient traditions as the Kabbalah, Buddhism, the teachings of Don Juan and Tibetan thought. The massive scope of Bartow’s vision eventually becomes overwhelming, and the esoteric nature of the study will deter casual readers. Ultimately, however, the text will prove thought-provoking and rewarding for the diligent.
A daunting but worthwhile journey through the material and divine realms of our universe.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 0-9760863-0-1
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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