As a fan of murder-mystery books I was excited to get my hands on Clive’s book. From the moment I did, I wasn’t able to put it down! The author’s details on the life inside private clubs is so intriguing, you almost feel like you shouldn’t be allowed to read it. This book is filled with witty banter that makes the journey throughout the book not only suspenseful but also enjoyable! I couldn’t stop myself from smiling the entire time. The characters in the book are so distinct, but all believable in their own way. With everyone being suspects, I couldn’t close the book for more than a minute before I was back to read more. If you’re a fan of the “who-done-it” literature, and always wanted to know what tales go on “behind the gates” you will fall in LOVE this modern laughable twist of murder-mystery that this author brings to the table! Highly recommended!

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Hello “Clive” -

I hope all is well. Things have been going great here at my new club. You will be glad to hear that you have many admirers on my Board of Governors. A few days ago a group of them purchased 17 of your books and asked me, since I know you, if you would be willing to sign them. They want to give them to the rest of the Board and Executive Committee as Christmas gifts. Would this be possible to do? I can ship them to you with a return shipment back to me. Although, I have always admired you greatly for your talents, never thought I would also be asking for your autograph. I guess there is light at the end of the “club management tunnel.”

Again, as always I appreciate your professional mentoring and personal friendship and wish you and your family a healthy holiday season.

With kind regards,

Patrick D.

http://poconobusinessjournal.com/featured/seven-hallmarks-of-a-great-workplace

I just finished Norm’s most recent book. For anybody who belongs to a member-owned club this is a MUST read. The humor and wit is sobering. Heck, it might even get a rogue board member or two to think twice about who should REALLY be running the club!

- McRedmond Morrelli

Wow! Am I ever proud to be your aunt! What masterpieces! I always knew you were extremely intelligent and smart – your parents told me so – but what outstanding, clever, witty and humorous works. I don’t claim to understand everything but I did very much enjoy reading your two great books. The only fault I could find is that “Toni Dumbwit” should have been Hortense Thumble. Keep up the great work!

I’ll tell all my friends about the books in hopes that poor Clive gets a few more sales. I’m sure he will appreciate my efforts.

- Toni Kissell

Following in the footsteps of Private Clubs in America and Around the World, Murder and Mayhem.. is a laugh riot from the word go. With a foreword by that immortal philosopher Aristotle himself (an honour he apparently begged the author for ), Murder and Mayhem.. is about just that – the chaos Old Bunbury (greatest, by far, of all the private clubs in the world) is thrown into after one of their members is found bludgeoned to death out past the fourteenth green. Not that Alfie Johnson is missed or mourned in any way; rather, it is the threat of media intrusion and police tape across the golf course that has Bunbury in a tizzy. That, and the loss of their beloved head chef as a possible suspect. All this at a time when the club teeters on the verge of making history by breaking the gender barrier that keeps its Pillow Committee an all-female preserve. Enter Esther, amateur sleuth and cantankerous waitress , who may not be depended upon to get you the food you ordered, but certainly knows more about the goings–on at Bunbury than any one else, and is determined to sniff the killer out , even in the face of death threats.

Narrated by Bunbury’s president Clive Endive Ogive IV (the pseudonym author Norm Spitzig chooses to write this series under), ‘Murder..’ is a gleeful parody of the private club, with its selective membership, distaste of the hoi polloi and a zany cast of uber-rich oddballs with some of the silliest names you’re likely to encounter outside of a PG Wodehouse novel – Eaton ‘Eat-o’ Swank, the cheerfully adulterous Muffy Inglequat, the resident skinflint Hortense Thumble, Danny Bumbery aka Tuxedo Man. Spitzig keeps the plot simple; this isn’t really a conventional murder mystery so much as a peek into the inner workings of the secret universe that is the private club, and the many absurdities intrinsic to breathing its rarefied air. He gifts his hero with a distinctive voice – wry, pompous and unabashedly Republican, with a penchant for digs at President Obama. Bunbury is nothing short of a temple to old school capitalism and certain rigorously upheld standards of behaviour (adultery, embezzlement and golfing being fondly looked upon, but a leaning towards swimming, playing tennis or supporting the Democrats swiftly dealt with) and Ogive its devoted high priest. Another highlight of the book are its illustrations – a sprinkling of grainy black and white portraits of some of its more colourful members, the odd spurious bill of services from a past club president, even a pictorial history of the club’s entrance gates.

As Aristotle himself promises, belly laughs galore!

- Lavanya Karthik