analysis of ethan frome essays

analysis of ethan frome essays Ethan Frome is a story of ill-fated love, set during the winter in the rural New England town of Starkfield. Ethan is a farmer who is married to a sickly woman named Zeena. The two live in trapped, unspoken resentment on Ethan's isolated and failing farm. Ethan has been caring for his wife for six years now. Due to Zeena's numerous ailments they employ her cousin, the animated Mattie Silver, to help in the house. With Mattie's youthful presence and attitude in the house, Ethans bitterness of his youth's lost opportunities and the dissatisfaction with his life and empty marriage are reawaken. This resentment leads to Ethan and Mattie in turn, falling in love. However, they never follow their love due to Ethan's morals and the respect he has for his marriage to Zeena. Ethan eagerly awaits the nights when he is able to walk Mattie home from the town dances. He cherishes the ground she walks on and would do anything for her. After a visit to the doctor, Zeena is told that she needs more appreciable hired help. Thus, she decides to send her incompetent cousin away and hire a new one. Ethan and Mattie are desperate to stay together. However, Ethan's lack of financial means and Zeenas health are the deciding factors that will never allow him to leave Starkfield to be with his love. When the two are unable to find any plausible solutions to this issue, Ethan and Mattie decide to commit suicide by sledding into a tree. They figure it is the only way they can be together. The attempt fails, and the two are left paralyzed. Now Ethan's wife must care for the two for the rest of their lives. There were many themes found in Ethan Frome, but the greatest of them all is loneliness and isolation. In college Ethan acquired the nickname "Old Stiff" because he rarely went out with the boys. Once he returned to the farm to care for his parents, he couldn't go out wi ...

Defender of the faith essays

Defender of the faith essays In the short story Defender of the faith by Phillip Roth, we are confronted with several different conflicts: man vs. himself, as Sergeant Marx is struggling to decide whether he should be a military man, or a Jewish man; man vs. man, with Grossbart constantly challenging authority and assimilation into the military; and man vs. society, as Sergeant Marx is worried about how his decisions will be received in the military community. These conflicts all lead to a general theme. The general theme being, that in life, at times, people may come in conflict with others who like to exploit certain things or situations to their own advantage. It may be hard to decide how to deal with these situations, especially if you find yourself in a situation involving a dilemma. Sergeant Marxs dilemma was, having to choose between basing his decision of acting on Grossbarts actions, on his religious principals or his military training. He comes to these dilemmas often in the story, involving minor situations such as the G.I. parties on Friday nights when Jews are supposed to go to services (132) and more serious situations such as when every single trainee was to be shipped... to the Pacific every trainee but one. (152) Grossbart was the one trainee who got himself out of having to go. Sergeant Marx, for the first part of the story, would generally try and help Grossbart, perhaps feeling slightly inclined to do so due to their religious ties; however by the end of the story, Marx has seen through Grossbarts guise and refuses to let Grossbart get away with anything else. This could happen many times in life, where when some one tries to help another, only to find that they themselves are being exploited, as well as everyone around them. All decisions in life may not always be favorable. There may be several different benefits and detriments involved in all choices. ...

Three Summaries for three sections (9.1 - 9.2 - 9.3) Essay

Three Summaries for three sections (9.1 - 9.2 - 9.3) - Essay Example Use of white space is also important, as well as selecting different fonts to highlight different types of information. Additionally, presentation support materials such as slides should be planned carefully. Fourthly, one must think visually. The nature of design projects requires thinking visually. Thus, one should know their purpose and audience, and make an appropriate use of the medium. Finally, writing ethically is paramount. Here, a designer should present designs and other technical results in ways that show what is favourable, as well as what is unfavourable in the design. Additionally, this includes giving full credit to others, such as authors or previous researchers, where it is due. With regard to oral presentations, there are various key needs that must be met. First is knowing the audience. After identifying the type of audience, the presentation can be tailored to hat audience. Second is the presentation outline. This provides a clear structure of the presentation and includes a title slide, an overview of the presentation, a problem statement, background on the problem, objectives, and functions of the design, among other key components. The outline should include both rough and detailed outlines. Thirdly, the team presenting should know the setting in which it will be presenting. This will help them know the types of devices such as slide projectors, are available. Overall, this guides their usage of visual aids. Fourthly, there is need for the team to practice regularly before their presentation in order to gain confidence. Finally, a design overview is key. This is key to helping the team get undivided attention from professionals about their design proj ect. Although this might pose some challenges to the team, it is a constructive and important process to the team. With regard to the final project report, it is

Economics for Business Assignment Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Economics for Business Assignment - Essay Example This product differentiation gives the players in the monopolistic competition pricing power (A.Koutsoyiannis, 2010). The ACCC chairman Graeme Samuel believes that the fuel market is characterized by a comfortable oligopoly. I agree with Mr. Samuel’s opinion. At the retail stage of the fuel market, Woolworths and Wesfarmers Coals each have 22% of the market share. BP has 19%. Caltex has 16% and Exxon-Mobil has 6%. This totals to 85% of the total market share. Therefore these five players definitely dominate the industry at the retail stage. The situation at the refining stage is also similar with Caltex supplying as much as 55% of the wholesale supply in some states like New South Wales. The oligopolistic structure in the fuel industry in Australia arises from the barriers to entry because of intensive capital and technological requirements for operating in the industry. 2) The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is the competition regulator of Australia. The ACCC promotes competition and fair trade in the Australian marketplace to benefit consumers, business and the community ( ACCC, 2011). In the year 2007, the ACCC undertook a detailed investigation in the Australian fuel industry to determine if there was ‘collusive oligopoly’ marked by price-fixing. The investigation found no â€Å"obvious† investigation of price-fixing, but it said that there were operational concerns because of the oligopolistic nature of the industry (ACCC, 2011). The ACCC opposed the acquisition by Caltex on the ground that it would substantially lessen competition across a range of fuel markets in Australia. The ACCC believed that this acquisition would have an adverse impact on competition in the petrol, diesel and automotive LPG markets. During a six month investigation of the proposed deal the ACCC identified 53 Mobil sites that, if they were acquired by Caltex, would result in

School Couselor in charge of presenting a sex education course to Assignment

School Couselor in charge of presenting a sex education course to either the student body or their parents - Assignment Example But majority of them support sex education. â€Å"Over the past 20 years, in survey after survey, local, state or national, 80 to 85 percent of parents indicate they want their children to receive comprehensive, medically accurate, age-appropriate sex education.† (Parents as Advocates for Comprehensive Sex Ed in Schools , 2008). They need their children to come to know about delaying the inception of intimate sexual relationships when they become mature and responsible. The duty vested on parents also includes sharing the skills and information with their children for using condoms and other contraceptives when they are likely to be sexually active. A school counselor has to consider many factors when counseling the parents of the school aged children. As sex education is a broad field that includes the study of human sexual anatomy, sexual reproduction, sexual intercourse, reproductive health abstinence, contraception and other aspects like human sexual behavior, a counselor has to make the parents aware of these factors. It is common knowledge that majority of the parents are embarrassed to talk to their children or teenagers about sex. A counselor can assume a vital role in sex education by encouraging the parents to share such matters with their children. Parents should understand the fact that their children will listen to them carefully, if they will only talk. It has been identified that the communication gap between parents and teenagers often causes for many issues related to children. A counselor should make the parent aware that a parent should always be ready to extend the hand of help, when a child seeks for it. It would be better for a parent to talk to a child around the age they first become sexually active, or when they are getting to that point (Parents and sex education, n.d.).They should be revealed of what can happen and the methods of birth control. One of the difficulties of parents in revealing or discussing sex

Hotels in Bangkok

Hotels in Bangkok The Regency Grand Hotel is one of the most prestigious and luxurious hotels in Bangkok, Thailand. Since its inception, it has earned a brand name in the industry owing to the exceptional salaries and benefits offered. The hotel staff and managers felt privileged being a member of the hotel, and perceived that they were being taken well care of under the leadership of the then General Manager. The following case study illuminates the dilemma of the employees undergoing the management changeover following its acquisition by an international group. In the earlier set-up, the employees were expected to follow the orders of their managers without questioning them. Initiatives to solve problems at personal level were discouraged and it led to lack of innovation and risk-averse behavior. Eventually, the hotel staff got accustomed to the style of management over the past fifteen years, and it made the work go smoothly with minimal number of conflicts. However, the recent sale of the hotel to a new American group introduced an altogether new style of administration to the employees. The management style of the new GM was entirely opposite to what the staff was familiar to, and it caused problems bringing the hotels performance and reputation down the drain. Problem symptoms and indications The former style of management gave limited authority to the front line employees and did not permit them to take any action on the spot without referring to their superiors. On the contrary, the new General Manager (John Becker) encouraged them to perform beyond their routine duties to provide customized services and thus make them feel special. This is directly related to empowerment, which is a key aspect in the service industry especially the hotels (Hubrecht Teare, 1993). Beckers motive in employee empowerment was linked with his intention to achieve competitive advantage through upgrading the staff competencies. As stated by Wall, et.al (2002, p.147) employee empowerment results in motivation, inventiveness, implied knowledge, participation, and enthusiasm necessary to survive in todays cutthroat competition. Although, Becker saw empowerment as a means to enthuse employees and delight the customers (Barbee Bott, 1991, p. 27) the hotels current managers expressed their disappointment. They were discontented with the idea of giving bottom line employees more authority and decision powers. The disparity in management approach is attributed to the cultural differences in these countries, for instance power distance, and uncertainty avoidance (Hofstede, 1980, p.45-55). Thailand and USA fall in the extreme ends of the cultural continuum presented by Hofstede (1980). Efforts are generally focused towards equal distribution of power in USA, while only a few people are given authority in Thailand given the larger power distance in the latter. Also, there is strong uncertainty avoidance in Thailand, calling for more written rules regulations, whereas uncertainty is easily accepted in USA and emphasis is laid on minimal formal rules (Hofstede, 1980, p.51). Becker failed to recognize these cultural differences while implementing his theories into practice. Joining a new organization and country demands awareness about the various social and cultural issues involved before transforming the existing practices (Lane Beamish, 1990, p.88). What worsened the situation further was his previous experience in places with poor performance and low employee morale. It is noticeable that his new assignment was doing sound business; therefore, his approach ought to be different in this case. Becker spent a great deal of time with the employees in an effort to elucidate his expectations from them. The role theory (Bush and Busch, 1981; Teas et al., 1979) mentions that the frontline employees have a greater need for role precision to carry out their duties efficiently. Role clarity perceived by the customer-contact employees is not only advantageous for customer satisfaction, but is also associated with employees job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and performance (de Ruyter et al., 2001). Yet, he did not succeed in putting a clear demarcation between complex and small issues. This kind of uncertainty was a continuous threat and led to higher anxiety and stress among the employees since strong uncertainty avoidance prevails in Thailand (McShane and Travaglione, 2007, p.47). The employees did not have a clear role perception due to role ambiguity. In this regard, Saks (1996, p.301-23) states that role perception is a result of role ambiguity, and with time this may result in stress specially when working under a new management. In addition to that, the employees were not able to distinguish between a major and a minor problem because of the lack of training (assumption). They had never been assigned a decision-making role before, and unfortunately did not receive a proper guidance from their seniors in such difficult situations. A further study into the Regency Grand Hotel shows that in quest of employee empowerment, power was transferred from the middle-line managers to the lower rank staff. Daft (1995) suggested that the recent trend of flatter organization structures have considerably altered the traditional role of supervisors. Consequently, the managers found their job meaningless and reversed employees decisions by terming them complex issues. They insisted that upper managements approval is required to address such problems and thus, tried to regain their supremacy. The managers reactions are associated to their control needs, achievement needs, and recognition needs () that forced them to maintain their grip on routine decisions. Furthermore, the employees did not receive any kind of support, feedback or appraisal for taking initiatives and going out of their way to enrich customers experience. As per Herzberg (1959) theory, motivation techniques such as superiors support and a positive and timely feedback have enduring productive influence on the employee behavior and resulting performance. In this context, experts have referred to the ABCs of behavior modification theory (McShane and Travaglione, 2007, p. 85-86) which states that employee behavior can be modified by managing its antecedents (for example encouraging staff to take initiative) and its consequences (for instance approving their decisions and constructive feedback). The theory further states that people have a propensity to repeat behaviors and actions that are followed by pleasant consequences, and extinction occurs when no consequences follow at all. Since the managers did not provide any support to the employees engaged in the desired work behavior, their self-driven decision-making process disappeared. The absence of motivation from the superiors eroded the employees self-confidence and they started to totally rely on their superiors to make decisions on their behalf. This is because of the high collectivism in Thailand (Hofstede, 1980, p. 45) where there is a strong need for consensus. The overall problem with the Grand Regency Hotel is directly linked to the MARS model, which identifies four key factors that have a direct effect on employee behavior, viz. motivation, ability, role perception, and situational factors. The employee performance levels drop if any of these factors is absent from the organizational context (McShane and Travaglione, 2007, p. 36). It is apparent from the study that the employees were not motivated to continue the new task behaviors, and they lacked the ability to define the complexity of the decisions, which again led to ambiguous role perceptions. Moreover, the dissatisfaction of the hotels staff affected their work behavior as evident by the increase in the number of turnovers and absenteeism. These are undoubtedly identifiable with the EVLN model of employee responses to dissatisfaction at work. It is found that exit is the most frequently used response of the four reactions in a notion that no better alternatives exist. (Withey Cooper, 1989, p.533). As indicated by (Lau et al., 2003, p.77) role conflict and a low degree of job involvement leads to a higher absence rate. Low levels of supervisory support and immediate social control resulted in increased absenteeism. (Price, 1998, p.227-246). The number of employees mistakes reported to upper management increased; this is because of the lack of training, feedback and motivation. With passage of time, an organization wide culture emerged in the hotel where lower level employees throw their work over the wall to upper level employees indulging in counterproductive act (Lau, et al., 2003, p.75). As a result, the performance of the employees dragged the overall hotel performance down leading to an increase in the number of guest complaints.(Heskett, et al., in Koys, 2001, p.113) This was demonstrated in the heightened criticism in the newspaper and magazine reviews where the hotel was named as one of the Asias nightmare hotels. The hotel General Manager and the employees experienced high levels of stress. Beckers stress was clear from his statement unless the hotel is on fire dont let anyone disturb me. He was annoyed by the increasing number of consultations from managers regarding minor issues, which otherwise were supposed to be sorted out by themselves. This reflects lack of training on the managers front as well. The role ambiguity was the main reason behind the employees stress as they misunderstood their roles. Role conflict and role ambiguity have been found to be the major causes of role stress (Boles Babin in Siegall, 2000, p.427). The ever-increasing stress levels experienced by the employees weakened all the good relationships that were existent under the older management. The employees were no longer united, and because of that, counterproductive behaviors surfaced in the form of backstabbing and employees not taking responsibility for their actions. In brief, even though Becker introduced empowerment with kind intentions, his plan failed because of poor implementation. He acted too fast that the spontaneous empowerment in fact snatched power from everyone involved. He did not give sufficient time to the newly empowered to be trained or get mentally prepared for their new roles. The next blunder Becker made was of believing that the managers would readily pass on their powers to their subordinates the minute he declared empowerment program. In his zeal to initiate empowerment, he ignored all other factors to support his decision. RECOMMENDATION The recommendations for improving the performance of Regency Grand Hotel are presented for all the three hierarchal levels mentioned in the case study. General Manager The current managers of the hotel backlashed on the new General Managers decision of giving more decision powers to the front line employees. Those dissatisfactions were the consequences of cultural differences (low power distance in America, while high power distance in Thailand). Obviously, dealing with cultural clashes is difficult since cultural patterns change very slowly (Hofstede, 1980, p.53). Therefore, Becker should consider these issues and address them beforehand. We would recommend higher degree of compatibility in his leadership style. In this situation, he should conduct meetings with the managers in order to clarify their doubts, and communicate the same down the hierarchal levels. It would be logical to check on their performance on regular intervals of time. Next, he should try to lessen the power distance between the managers and the front office staff by means of social events and gatherings. It would definitely ease out the managers egos and identify the hidden potential of their subordinates. In the end, this would help them to act like mentors to facilitate change rather than being directive in their approach. As said by Quang William (1998, p.361) influence of multicultural leadership on flexibility, empathy, understanding problem solving, and communication leads to a successful organizational change. Moreover, emphasizing on trust, communication and mutual objectives should be taken into account. Becker should train the managers in their new roles as coaches to assist the employees in taking independent decisions. Goal sharing for improving customer service and hotels overall performance should be implemented to bring them together as a team. In order to have a successful implementation of empowerment we must have strong self-determination, meaning, competence and impact. If any of those four dimensions is weak then it reflects directly on the empowerment process. (Forrester, 2000) Though Beckers idea of empowerment was positive in itself, yet his plan proved disastrous. One way to make the process more effective is selective empowerment, which limits delegating power to employees who display the appropriate competencies. Invest in enhancing their knowledge and skills through formal training, mentoring, and self-learning because rightful application of power depends on ones capabilities. Employees should be given a chance to demonstrate expertise by employing simulations, case studies, mentors, and supervised trials. They should be assigned low-risk decisions first, and progressively work up to challenging judgments since achievement at the safer levels would boost confidence through expectancy of success. The employee pe rformance could be improved due to the self fulfilling prophecy of the managers. (McShane and Travaglione, 2007, p.80) Becker should influence the managers perceptions that better results are obtained through empowerment than not. This may be done by following a sequential approach. First, focus on empowerment that does not steal complete authority from the mid level managers. Instead, enhance employees power by widening their knowledge set and providing them with more training and development opportunities. Second, begin the process from the top levels of management and trail down the changes to the subsequent lower ranks. This would allow the seniors exercise greater power and, going through a successful empowerment experience would raise their expectations from the change. Finally, concentrate on specific materialistic results, for instance initiating a performance appraisal and reward system based on the level of power demonstrated by a managers subordinate and reward more generously to team work as compared to individual performance. For successful implementation of empowerment, managers need to believe that they are in control of their outcomes. Middle Managers The employees were confused in differentiating major and minor problems, which originated from their lack of role clarification. Role clarity implies the required information that is provided for employees in order to do their jobs efficiently (Kelly and Hise, 1980 cited in Mukherjee and Malhotra, 2006, p.446). In the given case study, it could be prevented by following the three key essentails of role clarity, i.e. feedback, participation and finally team support. The effectiveness of employees depends on their perception about wielded power by superiors. (Yukl, 1981). Managers should focus on providing their employees with feedback, paying more attention to normative feedback as it positively affects the individuals performance by improving either perceived competence, competence valuation (Sansone 1989) performance pressure (Butler . Nisan, 1986; Ryan, 1982) or a combination these factors. The effect of positive normative feedback on the performance would not be relevant unless employees were well trained in a way that their skills would match the tasks they were entailed to handle. This would enhance their perceived competence (Sansone 1988), which is handling customers minor problems without referring back to their supervisors. The employees were uncomfortable in their newly assigned role and hesitated to accept the responsibilities. In addition, lack of motivation from the seniors wore down their confidence. Instead, the performances should be followed by adequate rewards to ensure staff that they are on the right track (Locke and Latham, 1990, p.241). Providing on the job training to employees should be one of the middle managers priorities, as it has been proven a good way to learn (Wood, 1994). Also, well-trained employees will be better prepared to face the organizational change (Lange, 2006) occurring at the Regency Grand Hotel, which will in return help them overcome the challenges involved with the process of empowerment. Employees Apart from General Manager and the managers, the front line employees should also share responsibilities for making the empowerment program successful. McShane Tavaglione (2007, p.186-89) identifies four core necessities in employees behavior, namely competencies, self-monitoring and designing natural rewards. To participate in the empowerment process, employees should possess adequate capabilities to deal with the additional decision making roles. Another suggestion for the employees proposes practicing self-leadership. Certainly, it was the managers duty to provide the employees with proper training and feedback, but we should not overlook the part of employees themselves. They should try to set goals for themselves to create self-direction and self-motivation required to execute the new tasks. Self-leadership incorporates five key elements that is personal goal setting, constructive thought pattern, designing natural rewards, self-monitoring, and self-reinforcement. Employees who indulge in all the above-mentioned practices would perform jobs better than the ones being supervised by others, and as Larkin asserts, high self-monitor generates more confident individuals to adapt to the empowerment approach. In addition, speaking up of the employees should be regarded as an important solution (Premeaux Bedeian, 2003, p.1537). They should express their point of views about work related issues, recommendations, or requirement of changes and alternative approaches. The problem rose in Grand Regency Hotel because employees were hesitant to speak out their positions due to the fear of punishment. McShane Travaglione (2007) argue that the voice of employees should be established as a way to communicate dissatisfaction and to propose ideas to the manager to improve situations. Finally, employees who possess self-awareness, as one of the four dimensions of emotional intelligence, would have better emotional responses. Higher level of working emotions and attitudes would help employees attain better performances and prevent the tensions among the hotel employees. REFERRENCES Barbee, C. Bott, V. (1991). Customer treatment as a mirror of employee treatment, Advanced Management Journal, Vol. 5, p.27. Boles, J.S., Babin, B.J. (1994). in Siegall,M., 2000, Putting the stress back into role stress: Improving the measurement of role conflict and role ambiguity, Journal of Managerial Psychology, Vol. 15 (5), p.427. Retrieved from www.emerald-library.com on 25 September 2009. Butler, R., Nisan, M. (1986). Effects of no feedback, task-related comments, and grades on intrinsic motivation and performance, Journal of Educational Psychology, Vol. l, p. 210-216. Cohen, J., Ryan, R. (1982). Control and information in the intrapersonal sphere: An extension of Cognitive evaluation theory, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 43, p.450- 461. Daft, R. (1995). Organization theory and design, 5th Edition, West Publishing Co., St Paul, MN. Forrester, R. (2000). Empowerment: rejuvenating a potent idea, Academy of Management Executive, Vol. 14 (3), p.67-80. Herzberg, F., Mausner, B., Snyderman, B. B. (1959).The motivation to work(2nd Edition) New York: John Wiley Sons, p.134. Heskett, J.L., Sasser, W.E., Schlesinger, L.A. (1997) in Koys, D.J., 2001, The effects of employee satisfaction, organizational citizenship behavior, and turnover on organizational effectiveness, Personnel Psychology, Vol. 54(1), p. 113. Hofstede, G. (1980). Motivation, Leadership and Organization: Do American Theories apply Abroad? American Management Association, p.45-55. Hubrecht, J. Teare, R. (1993). A strategy for partnership in total quality service, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 5 No. 3. Lange, T. (2006). Knowledge and Innovation for New Zealand: Dynamic Benefits of a Two-Stage Wage Strategy an Its Unlikely Application, Policy Studies, Vol. 27(1), p.71-85. Mukherjee, A., Malhotra, N. (2006) Does role clarity explain employee-perceived service quality? A study of antecedents and consequences in call centres, International Journal of Service Industry Management, Vol. 17 (5) p.446. Price, J. L. (1998). Estimation of Causal Model of Absenteeism, Indian Journal of Labour Economics, 41(2), p.227-246. Lau, V.C.S., Au, W.T., Ho, M.C.J. (2003). A Qualitative and Quantitative Review of Antecedents of Counterproductive Behaviour in Organizations, Journal of Business and Psychology, Vol. 18(1), p.75-77. Saks, A.M., Ashforth, B.E. (1996). Proactive Socialization and Behavioural Self- management, Journal of Vocational Behaviour, Vol 48, p.301-23. Sansone, C. (1989). Competence feedback, Task feedback, and Intrinsic interest: An examination of process and context, Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, Vol.25, p. 343-361. Wall, T.D., Cordery, J.L., Clegg, C.W. (2002). Empowerment, Performance, and Operational Uncertainty: A Theoretical Integration, Applied Psychology: An International Review, Vol 51 (1), p.146-169. Withey, M.J., Cooper, W.H. (1989). Predicting Exit, Voice, Loyalty, and Neglect, Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 34 (4), p. 533. Wood S. (2004). Fully on-the-job training: Experiences and steps ahead, National Centre for Vocational Education Research. LARKIN, The implicit theories approach to the self-monitoring controversy, European Journal of Personality, Volume5, Issue1, Date:March 1991, Pages:15-34 Premeaux and Bedeian, Breaking the Silence: The Moderating Effects of self-Monitoring in Predicting Speaking Up in the Workplace, Journal of Management Studies 40:6 September 2003 p1537-1562

The Rainmaker Essay -- essays research papers

The Rainmaker   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Enticing readers and basically giving people something good to read, John Grisham is an established star in literature. What makes his books so great is that they are so realistic. He applies his personal law and trial knowledge into the books he writes. Put together with creative story telling, his makes his novels hard to put down.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Rainmaker starts with the last semester of law school for Rudy Baylor. He was assigned to give free advice to a group of seniors. It is at that very time, and that very place, that Rudy encounters his first and most important clients, Dot and Buddy Black. A powerful insurance company with millions of dollars has apparently swindled them. They have caused the suffering and inevitable death of a young man, Dot and Buddy's son. The coverage that was obliged was not issued, and Donny Ray, stricken by Leukemia, therefore lost his chance to live.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  This case plays out for a matter of months, while the broke Rudy Baylor rents a room from one of his clients, a Mrs. Birdy Birdsong. He is also forced to work for a felonious lawyer when the firm he was going to be initiated into merges with a larger one. Eventually, he goes to head with one of America's most experienced and accomplished defense attorneys.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  From the beginning of the novel to the last word, Rudy is plagued with a series of mishaps and problems. When somet...