Writers Books

This volume assuredly would be a welcome addition to the libary of anyone who loves Charles Dickens and/or the history of film. The style of writing is quite engaging, yet it does not descend into sentimentality or nostalgia.

The opening chapters, which provide a relatively brief yet surprisingly insightful treatment of Dickens' Christmas writings and social conscience, are a concise picture of the setting in which Dickens brought his classic to life. For those unfamiliar with the period, I would find this to be an essential background, lest A Christmas Carol be reduced to a fairy tale, as it is in certain film treatments. Those who are acquainted with these matters undoubtedly would find the quotations from Dickens' more obscure Christmas writings, and references to such other Christmas scenes as those in The Pickwick Papers, to form a comprehensive image of the combination of commentary and imagination in these works, and underlying themes which influenced a Christmas Carol itself.

The treatment of film adaptations, including the earliest silents, is extremely well researched and comprehensive. Even the biggest fan of "Scrooge pictures" would find some in this collection which were unknown. The classic films (for example, Alastair Sims' version) are analysed with an insightfulness that would increase anyone's understanding and enjoyment of their content.

As a Dickens lover, and also as one who is a "Christmas nut" (for whom the insights in this volume were a welcome and lovely nutcracker), I would highly recommend this book on all counts.

Dickens dose a great job introducing this book. He has very high vocabulary and his words are sometimes very confusing. However, that should not cloud over the book because it is a great read. In my opinion it is a must read. I think if any Christmas hater reads this book they will love it. It certainly was interesting.

Everyone has a favorite film or television version of Dickens beloved "A Christmas Carol." But few of us have any idea how very many adaptations there have been. Mr. Guida's wonderful book examines first the written "Carol," then goes on to detail some of the hundreds of adaptations and variations, from the early stage versions and magic lantern slides to modern made-for-television Carols. Mr. Guida discusses the major Carols with wit and humor as well as rare discernment: his love for his subject is evident. Minor Carols and variations are also covered, albeit more briefly. If you cannot find your favorite version in the text, you are sure to find it in the superb and very thorough filmography. The filmography is worth browsing in and of itself; did you know that there have been Western, country-western, rock-and-roll, and even science-fiction variations on "A Christmas Carol"? Or that actors as disparate as Cicely Tyson, Basil Rathbone, and Mr. Magoo have played Scrooge? If you love "A Christmas Carol" or simply dote on film trivia, I promise you will enjoy this book.

Fred Guida has presented an incredibly well researched and beautifully written book that blends the literary history of this story along with the history of its various screen presentations. Thank you for this unique presentation.

I've been a fan of the 1953 version of a the Carol for as long as I remember. It was family tradition every Christmas eve to watch it. I've looked at as many possible versions and have yet to find it's match. This book is an amazing resource of all the various interpretations of the Dicken's classic has gone through from early lantern projected pictures, through the silent era, talking films, television, and animated specials. The early version were fascinating and I found it a special bonus that the author made note of various television shows which featured a special Christmas episode inspired by A Christmas Carol. Who could ever forget the "Six Million Dollar Man" Christmas special using the ideas from the novel. This brought back a lot of great television special memories. I was even able to track down two hard to find T.V. animated specials shown in the early 1970's but not seen since. (I found them on Amazon). All in all a great read, especially for fans. I did not agree with all of the criticisms, and the text is a rather dry read, maybe a little too academic. But still great stuff!!

I happen to live in the Cotswolds, the setting for this beautiful book, this Monet of literature. And, complying with the below reviews, I have to say that Stroud has become a concrete river, choked with litter, sidelined with Burger Stars, neon lights; a MacDonalds is in the blue print stages. Hills are lined with new developments. It's like, and I quote my mother, "A disease is spreading."

Yet there are places untouched by Americanisms, consumerism, electricity (and here I apologise, as this becomes less of a review, more an account of personal experience). But there are still rivers afloat with leaves, valleys deep that welcome sunsets. They frost the sky in winter, burn it by summer.

"There's beauty in decay," as someone said. Haven't got a clue who. But there you go. Although dying of shallow needs and commercial interests, snippets of the old way can be found. And in all their glory, too.

This book was required reading during my childhood and, of course, I couldn't have dragged myself more slowly through it. How wise we become with age. This is an astonishing book. Lee is such a master of description that, after only a few pages, you slowly start to smell the fresh country air and hear the languid sounds of summer as you are inescabably drawn into the world of his childhood - a world that you realize has already faded into the mists of history. But this special time has not been lost - it has been captured forever in this irreplacable series of pictures. The people in these stories become more real than seems possible with only pen and ink: his characterizations are as clever as anything by Dickens or Dostoevski, and he catches the very essence of the sights, sounds and people around him with a charm unmatched by any other English writer. But this is not a story-book universe: the people in his young life have all the frailty, vanity, delight and tragedy that you would expect in any small community - but what other has been crystallized with such talent and wisdom. A wonderful work of art.

A book to read & re-read. Finely crafted & evocative of a now long ago & far away time and place.

There should be more than five stars for books like this one. All the reviewers who wrote about how poetic yet concrete, magical yet real this account of boyhood in the Cotswolds have said it much better than I can. It is pure magic. I wish it was 20 times as long. You might also find this book under the title "The Edge of Day". If you loved "Cider With Rosie" you might also enjoy "Lark Rise to Candleford", "The Golden Evenings of Summer" and the movie "A Christmas Story".

Rooted in the earth and shining with long gone summers and freezing winters this is a beautiful and poignant flower of a book. Written in a sensuous and lyrical poetic prose it tells the story of the authors's boyhood in the Cotswolds of the West of England. Spinning round the great orb of his clutter-minded and loving mother are his sisters and wider village life. There is Illness, murder, private sorrow, boiling summer and frozen winter and finally the running down of the feudal clock as long awaited change comes to the valley. A book, more even - a place to be visited again and again...

SMARTISH PACE remarks on "Egan's brave choice of form in a time when the designation 'new formalist' threatens to pigeonhole her work. But no formulated phrase can pin Egan's poem to the wall." This is true, as is the fact that it is language itself and not theme or narrative that draws us in to these poems and holds us there the way, as Egan herself writes, "he held me--a lover's lie, a dying friend, /the nights too drunk and dark/ for any arms but his to understand."

Not just brilliant, not just sensual, Moira Egan's "Cleave" is the rare art through which words express something seemingly inexpressable. Beyond mere categories, beyond mere emotions, she captures experience itself, by turns glorious, bland, and miserable. And this conclusion I reached before I even reflected on the collection's structure, a helix of the semantic idiosyncrasies that a single word is capable of serving up to us. As Moira Egan puts it in her poem "Love & Death," "How else to express the brazen philosophy, the teleology of flesh beyond love, the ontology of sex that can lead to death?"

In case you couldn't tell, I liked it--a lot.

I was delighted to find Moira Egan's book after enjoying her poems in magazines like Poetry, West Branch, and Literal Latte. She truly writes for the heart, the brain, and the rest of the body all at once. Cleave will not only please fans like myself, but will also introduce her witty, deft, and thoughtfully accomplished poems to a new crop of lucky readers.

"Poets are born, not made" they say and Moira Egan is one. (And the daughter of one.) They also say "true art conceals artifice" and that magic is no where more present than from cover to cover in the master-crafted poems of Cleave. BUT--and this is the part I love--every once and a while she coyly lifts the skirt of her craft to reveal a far more broken and beautiful world than any well-behaved surface could withstand. That is the push, pull doubleness, the seduction of Cleave.

Moira Egan is one of the few neo-formalists whose lush, exquisitely crafted, risk-taking poetry evokes words like "juicy" rather than "fusty." Rooted thematically in all the major meanings of "cleave" (including the seemingly opposite "adhere to" and "divide"), Egan's poetry's rich language explores both meaning and sound with intellectual and artistic profundity, yet manages to speak to a reader's human-ness and (I'll just go ahead and dare to say it--)to GIVE PLEASURE. YES, EVEN ENTERTAIN.

--Clarinda Harriss
Professor of English, Towson University
Editor/director of BrickHouse Books, Inc.

God, I love these short stories. These are a must, must read for anyone interested in France during this time period, and someone interested in the nuances of human relationships. Colette was given as a gift to me some 20 years ago, and I have reread these stories so many times, the book is falling apart.

Her short stories are superb! Much much better than any of her novels. If you like short stories, try reading John O'hara (A completely different vein, but excellent also).

The Collected Stories of Colette by Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette, ed., and with an introduction by, Robert Phelps. Highly recommended.

According to the introduction, this collection represents 100 stories taken from a dozen volumes published during Colette's lifetime. They are categorised as "Early Stories," Backstage at the Music Hall," "Varieties of Human Nature," and "Love." Some, like the Clouk/Chéri stories, appear to be fiction, while many, like "The Rainy Moon" and "Bella-Vista," seem to be taken straight from Colette's varied life and acquaintances.

Whether writing fiction or chronicling fact, whether writing in the third-person omniscient or in the first person, Colette herself is always a character-rarely as an influencer, that is, one whose actions or choices drive the plot. Colette's preferred role is as observer-and it is one for which she is well suited.

An inveterate sensualist and a former music-hall performer, Colette integrates her characters (real and fictional) with everything around them-their clothes (costumes), their abodes, dressing rooms, and haunts (sets), and their neighborhoods and towns (theatres). Much of Colette's writing, no matter how mundane the surface subject, is about art-the art of living and, notably, the art of loving. In "My Goddaughter," the subject tells her godmother how she injured herself with scissors and a curling iron and recounts her mother's reaction. "She said that I had ruined her daughter for her! She said, 'What have you done with my beautiful hair which I tended so patiently? . . . And that cheek, who gave you permission to spoil it! . . . I've taken years, I've spent my days and nights, trembling over this masterpiece. . . ."

Colette is attuned to everything, every sense, every nuance. "A faint fragrance did indeed bring to my nostrils the memory of various scents which are at their strongest in autumn." ("Gibriche") ". . . set in a bracelet, which slithered between her fingers like a cold and supple snake." ("The Bracelet") " . . . the supper of rare fruits, an[d]of ice water sparkling in the thin glasses, as intoxicating as champagne . . ." ("Florie") "Peroxided hair, light-colored eyes, white teeth, something about her of an appetizing but slightly vulgar young washerwoman." ("Gitanette")

Colette does not pretend to be an objective observer of human behaviour; she does not hesitate to express to the reader her weariness with certain individuals or situations, and her stories of her vain, pretentious, overbearing friend Valentine reveal her jaded and waning affection. She knows this woman so well that she sees her almost as Valentine sees herself-a drama queen acting out stories, roles, and games without depth of feeling for them. "What Must We Look Like?" becomes Valentine's driving philosophy, to which Colette responds with "a mild, a kindly pity." In "The Hard Worker," Colette says, "I can see she does not hate him, but I cannot see she loves him either." What Colette sees-and does not see-is to be respected.

Some stories, such as "The Sick Child," are vivid and imaginative and reveal Colette's amazing ability to think and dream like a gifted child. "The Advice," with its mundane beginning and premise and twisted, horrifying ending would enhance any collection of gothic or mystery tales. Other stories, like "Gibriche," several of the other music-hall stories, and "Bella-Vista," tackle topics that even today remain controversial. "Bella-Vista," in which Colette's moods seem to wane with every familiarity achieved with her hostesses, offers an ending that is heavily foreshadowed throughout but is surprising and gruesome nonetheless.

Most of the stories, whether fiction or nonfiction, seem to come from life in one way or another. The quantity of stories and the quality of the collection reveal the incredible scope of experience of Colette, the dry, often weary yet obsessive observer, interpreter, and chronicler of human nature. As Judith Thurman says in her introduction to Colette's work, The Pure and the Impure, "This great ode to emptiness was written by a woman who felt full." As well she should.

Diane L. Schirf, 27 May 2003.

Ok. You've read the Claudine novels, and Cheri and the Return of Cheri. Now what? There are other novels (The Vagabond, Gigi, My Mother's House) but there are these short stories that are "must-reads."

Colette was one of France's most distinguished writers. Though not a writer of massive books like Victor Hugo or Proust, or of psychological novels like Zola or Flaubert, she caught that French essence of individuality and quirkiness and the golden age of La Belle Epoque before World War One changed France forever. Her books are pure joy as are these short stories. If you have NOT read Colette, you are in for a treat. (And don't neglect Claudine or Cheri. )

If you're looking for a refreshing deviation from the mean of women writers, then Colette is it. Her stories offer a pleasurable clearing of the literary palate.

Williams's ear for dialogue, his eye for character, his exploration of love, longing and loneliness are as powerful in these short stories as they are in his plays. On occasion, the glimmer of a future work rises out of the text, such as the line, "But the sweet bird of youth had flown from Pablo Gonzales..."

Rarely do we assimilate Williams with short fiction, but Williams rivals Hemingway as being the greatest American short story writer. Never have I enjoyed every story in a collection before. His descriptions are concentrated and explode visions in the mind. The characters are richly unique and completely human and explore all the details of life so many never see. Good for a big time read, a partner on the beach, and as a study guide for society. A must own!!

For a small price you get the best of Tennessee Williams with forty-nine stories packed into 570 pages of crisp oblique dialogue that will keep you awake at night as you laugh in bed with the turn of each page. His characters are so unusual that you can only describe them as cast of freeks that we all recognize at one time or another in our travels. Mr. Williams short stories are a wonderful contribution to his craft and the American reader. The only negative is that I could not buy this in hardcover so I could share it with my yet-to-be-born children and grandchildren!

During his career as one of America's most distinguished playwrights (The Glass Menagerie, Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, A Strretcar Named Desire), Tennessee Williams also produced four volumes of short stories. The contents of these volumes are combined with Williams's unpublished stories.

As Gore Vidal, the author of the introduction, notes these stories are "the real autobiography of Williams's art and inner life."

The stories are arranged chronologically, beginning with a vignette about his father and the Williams family. Whether written early or late in his life, the prose is pure Williams, related in his distinctive voice.

Together these pieces form a mosaic of his life and work, splendid dramas and vignettes that puzzle, surprise and enrich us.

- Gail Cooke

Tennessee Williams: Collected Stories (1985) is a highly readable if frequently unpleasant volume by an author who, like the Scottish novelist Muriel Spark, is one of the uncelebrated masters of the short story form. Beginning with Williams' first published work and including stories written just before his death in 1983, most of the pieces, which originally appeared in literary journals, are very much of their time, and thus powerfully reflect the degree to which Williams internalized the shame and self hatred he experienced as a homosexual male in a predominantly heterosexual and anti-homosexual society.

Never less than forthright to the point of bluntness, several of the stories wantonly revel in the repulsive and the grotesque, and thus seem intended not merely to illuminate but to shock and repel. In essence, many of the pieces seem like both acts of revenge and blows against the empire, but Williams was awkwardly wielding a double-edged sword, one which did not by any means only reveal the hypocrisies of those he intended to mock and revile.

In 'Hard Candy,' for example, an obnoxious elderly man who has been a lifelong 'secret' homosexual dies by choking while on his knees during a sexual act with a young drifter he solicits. Thus the story's title refers not to the sweets the man carries in his pocket as a means of establishing an opening dialogue with attractive strangers, but to a portion of the drifter's anatomy. Williams clearly intends the irony of the title to be so blatant as to be unironic, and this doubling, reflexive quality unequivocally establishes 'Hard Candy' as a piece of dark, unabashed camp humor. But such humor will always find only a limited receptive audience, especially since most camp humor today seems like little more than a long and happily outmoded culture artifact.

Throughout Collected Stories, most of Williams' homosexual characters are depicted in caricatural fashion, whether as overly poised, somewhat brittle aesthetes or as shrill, irresponsible merrymakers whose singular goal is continual sexual interaction with as many partners as possible. Those that fit neither of these categories are poorly socialized and isolated, but never developed in other ways so that they become shadow-casting, three dimensional characters for whom homosexual responsiveness is but one factor in their existence.

Not surprisingly, it is the objects of these characters' desire whom Williams depicts sympathetically, but these men, who are usually young, handsome, muscular, and somewhat unintelligent if not brutishly stupid, are typically one dimensional caricatures as well. In his short stories, Williams was at his best when describing those "betwixt and between" men who are ostensibly heterosexual but nonetheless nonchalantly open to passive sexual intercourse with other men, especially if money is involved. Thus, 'One Arm,' the story of a boxer who loses a limb in an automobile accident and then drifts into hustling before finding himself on death row for murder, is one of the most fully realized works in the volume.

Collected Stories also includes a number of powerful stories which revolve around heterosexual characters, such as the Caldwellesque 'Kingdom of Earth' and 'Miss Conte of Green,' but in these, as in the others, brutality, coarseness, and lasciviousness are the order of the day, and qualities such as integrity, respect for others, and fundamental human decency are presented as little more than sham social hypocrisies that have little genuine presence in actuality. Also included is 'The Knightly Quest,' a brilliant, extended piece of sociological science fiction which hilariously examines governmental attempts at cultural control and world domination as Williams perceived it in the Cold War era.

This is an amazing, wild ride of a book. There is nothing else like it. The authors call it a 'rant', which is as good a description as any, I guess. It is funny, insightful. Very literate, tongue-in-cheek, but at the same time perfectly serious. That's what I found so amazing, the combination of humor and seriousness. Perhaps this is subject matter that can only be handled seriously by doing it with humor. And it is funny.But it's refreshing too. I've read a lot of self-help books, and sex books and none of them had the sheer nerve of this one. It's rare to read something both genuinely original and entertaining at the same time. I am still reeling.

"Edwards' and Stephen's COMING CLEAN is an unflinching exploration of every dimension of human sexuality: the good, the slimy, and the grotesque. It is a bawdy, brilliant, wild ride of a book, by turns hilarious, poignant, and scatological. The book's importance lies in its unraveling of cultural attitudes about sex and sexuality. I recommend it to any adult, especially anyone who has puzzled at our culture's awkward and inconsistent maneuverings around all things sexual." Beth Gylys, Ph.D., Author of Bodies That Hum

I started reading your book. I like what I've read so far but there are still too many big words in it. Here's what I mean. "Then the man put his penis into the young woman's bottom to disentagrinize the moment into one, long dirty filamigtorism. As the man orgasms the woman screams "Oh, oh estigalitistic demophore!".

Were just plain, simple working forks. On the next book, please try and give us mouth-breathers a break and use words we can understand. Nothing breaks the flow of a paragraph than having to stop at every third word and go running for the dictionary.

I read this titillating tome cover to cover on the way home, laughing and being illuminated. I love it. I've already loaned it to my kid. I can't tell you how much I laughed. It was so good to find two people with a sense of humor and smarts and no-holds-barred courage. The honesty, coupled with the humor, sets a challenging example, I think, to any writer who reads it. Loved the raving about Viagra. Loved the actual conversations reproduced -- or produced. Loved the jealousy stuff, the women conspiring together against the guy stuff, the faked orgasm stuff -- if I keep going I'll end up citing every chapter and verse. I'm going to be recommending it far and wide.

"Edwards' and Stephen's COMING CLEAN is an unflinching exploration of every dimension of human sexuality: the good, the slimy, and the grotesque. It is a bawdy, brilliant, wild ride of a book, by turns hilarious, poignant, and scatological. The book's importance lies in its unraveling of cultural attitudes about sex and sexuality. I recommend it to any adult, especially anyone who has puzzled at our culture's awkward and inconsistent maneuverings around all things sexual." Beth Gylys, Ph.D., Author of Bodies That Hum

I FOUND MS ALBA BUILDS HER CHARACTERS SO WELL. IT WAS A WONDERFUL READ FOR ME AS I LOVE MUSIC. THE STORY HELD MY ATTENTION. I RECOMMEND IT HIGHLY.

GEORGIA LEHMAN

Concertos in D Major is a well-crafted and compelling read! Alba blends several elements of great fiction into a seamless narrative. Her characters exhibit real CHARACTER. This is a wiltingly romantic story without overt eroticism. Replacing that is a jet-stream of sexual tension and an uncompromising pursuit of moral truth. I highly recommend this book.

I LOVED the book. Wow, when is the author's next novel coming out? She really knows how to grab hold of a girl's heart! I
stayed up several nights reading--I just couldn't put it down. What a wonderful escape!

I really enjoyed the book and had to read it all in one day. I appreciated the way she developed the characters. . .my imagination was able to run wild. I loved the book and hope to read many more by the same author.

The author is a poet as well as a novelist--her writing style is so colorful and beautiful!

This book rules! Jonah spent ages and ages not watching TV while writing it, and Cosmo was nowhere to be seen! Plus, there were exclamation points galore! Many! Really!

This is one of the best books I have not read on conservatism. The sheer depth of insight that I did not see is blinding. I most certainly look forward to not reading his next book.

...than most books currently in print. ("Living History" comes to mind.) And unlike Al Gore's recent tomes, no one can make jokes about Jonah's book being in a remainder bin in two weeks or being used as a doorstop. Possessing the sort of evanescent quality one only otherwise finds in libraries of books on French military bravery, Jonah's book is accurately described as "the quickest, most transparent, and brief listing of the world's top conservative thinkers" (from "Oh Say Can You See: Reviews of Hard-to-Find Books"). I highly recommend this book to people who, quite frankly, confess that they can never find the time to read.

Jonah, err, Mr. Goldberg, do you ever read the reviews to your non-existent book?

If Jonah never finished this book, how come you can buy it used (see above)?

This handbook provides a comprehensive overview and useful explanations of copyright, fair use, permission releases, and libel. It's well-organized and easy to read. Helpful summary checklists are provided at the end of key chapters. The book is a good resource for authors to have in their reference collections. It's a bargain--reasonably priced and loaded with relevant information.

This is a must-read for all writers. It's a great guide for copyright and also for releases. A friend of mine is a professional photographer and teaches photography. She just made all of her students buy a copy.

(From my book Successful Nonfiction: Tips and Techniques for Getting Published)

1. How can I guard against others stealing my writing?

Relax. The moment you create a written Work, it is automatically copyrighted under Common Law. Once the book is published, you may send two copies to the Copyright Office with the two-page Form TX and $30 to register or perfect your copyright.

Some (new) authors copyright their manuscript. Later, when they turn it into a book, they print the original copyright date. This makes the book appear to be old, and that hurts sales.

Most authors wait and send the finished book to the Copyright Office for registration....

A registered copyright only gains the author some extra rights. The difference is between copyright and registered copyright, not between not copyrighted and copyrighted. Copyright occurs automatically with creation-when you initially write it.

Publishers rarely steal manuscripts. They are in the publishing business not the writing business. Manuscripts are cheap and publishers do not even have to pay the authors until months after the books are sold. There is little incentive to rip you off.

"The instinct of ownership is fundamental in man's nature." -William James (1842-1910), American philosopher and psychologist.

2. How much may I borrow from others?

Borrow ideas, borrow facts, but do not steal words. Copyright covers the author's presentation or expression-a sequence or pattern of words. It does not protect ideas. If you read and blend the ideas of other authors and put the collective thought into your own words, that is perfectly legal. This is how most nonfiction books are written-from research.

Do not repeat any of the research materials word-for-word. Some of the material is not yours so copying could be plagiarism and you would be guilty of copyright infringement. Adapt the ideas from many sources so that your work is not substantially similar to any of them.

In Feist Publications, Inc. v. Rural Telephone Service Company, Inc., 111 S.Ct. 1282, 1287-88 (1991), the court held that the listings (facts) in a telephone directory were not protected by copyright.

Facts may not be copyrighted either; they are free for anyone to repeat or use in a manuscript.

"Copy from one, it's plagiarism; copy from two, it's research." -Wilson Mizner, screenwriter.

The Copyright Permission and Libel Handbook is divided into two parts: the first covers copyright and the second covers libel (written defamation). For coverage, click on Table of Contents in the left-hand column of this page. The appendix has sample copyright forms, disclaimers and resources.

Lloyd Jassin is a book attorney. Before becoming a lawyer, he was Director of Publicity for Simon & Schuster Reference Group.

Steven Schechter practices media and publishing law and teaches media law topics.

As a publisher and an author of 113 books (including revisions and foreign-language editions) and over 500 magazine articles, I highly recommend this reference to publishers and authors. DanPoynter@ParaPublishing.com.

Presents clear, lucid overview of the many trickly and, potentially toublesome, legal issues in using another's copyrighted work. The libel discussion is equally clear and lucid. Quesion and answer format is a plus.Contains no legalize as it written expressly for nonlawyer. Highly recommmended for both publishers and writers.

While preparing to publish my second book (with number 3 on the way) I realized I needed some basic information about publishing and libel law. I found a copy of this book in the reference section of the law library at my university. The sections on libel were concise and to the point. I have not compared the book to other sources, but found it was very clear on the issues of importance to me. I've decided to order a copy to keep for reference, and I think it would be useful to most writers.

For those of us fascinated by the Lewis and Clark Expedition, this new novel by Jeffrey W. Tenney uses fiction to bring history dramatically to life. With an engaging style and a superb breadth of knowledge, the author has crafted a masterpiece. Reading this book will reveal the challenges and eventual triumphs of this first "Man to the Moon" quest in the nascent United States.

This one, plain and simple, has made me a believer in historical fiction. Too much of what I have tried in the past has suffered from weak and glorified characterizations, improbable, synthetic, hyped, and ultimately lifeless re-portrayals of media-worn events. Jeffrey W. Tenney provides us with a ground-level view of the historical, wherein the epic is broken down into its smallest, untidiest increments, and characters falter as much as they charge ahead. Everyone knows the basic plot and the 'star' characters of this epic story. Who would not now, after so many conventional renditions, prefer to see the Lewis and Clark Expedition through the eyes of characters like William Clark's slave, York? Or through those of the hunters, who spend most of their time in the backcountry where 'captain's orders' pale in the presence of the onrushing grizzly bear or the hard-faced Indian warrior? Tenney's narrative, pacing, and dialogue take the reader on a smooth, entertaining ride, but characters are the heart of this novel. The soldiers, hunters, guides, and boatmen of the Expedition, as well as the Indians met along the way, come in those mixes of flaw and virtue that make people interesting and sympathetic. Characters must battle their own inner enemies while contending with the layers of outer conflict the author heaps upon them. Using a highly creative structure, in each new chapter Tenney shifts perspective to portray different characters' experiences with these struggles. This device makes for chapters as vivid as short stories, the whole of the novel unfolding like a carefully pieced and brightly hued quilt. I recommend Corps of Discovery highly for the history buff, but even more so for the novice of that genre, as a guide to what it can be at its best.

Excellent novel, interesting characters, both heroes and scumbags. It may have been just like this on the real journey.

This one, plain and simple, has made me a believer in historical fiction. Too much of what I have tried in the past has suffered from weak and glorified characterizations, improbable, synthetic, hyped, and ultimately lifeless re-portrayals of media-worn events. Jeffrey W. Tenney provides us with a ground-level view of the historical, wherein the epic is broken down into its smallest, untidiest increments, and characters falter as much as they charge ahead. Everyone knows the basic plot and the 'star' characters of this epic story. Who would not now, after so many conventional renditions, prefer to see the Lewis and Clark Expedition through the eyes of characters like William Clark's slave, York? Or through those of the hunters, who spend most of their time in the backcountry where 'captain's orders' pale in the presence of the onrushing grizzly bear or the hard-faced Indian warrior? Tenney's narrative, pacing, and dialogue take the reader on a smooth, entertaining ride, but characters are the heart of this novel. The soldiers, hunters, guides, and boatmen of the Expedition, as well as the Indians met along the way, come in those mixes of flaw and virtue that make people interesting and sympathetic. Characters must battle their own inner enemies while contending with the layers of outer conflict the author heaps upon them. Using a highly creative structure, in each new chapter Tenney shifts perspective to portray different characters' experiences with these struggles. This device makes for chapters as vivid as short stories, the whole of the novel unfolding like a carefully pieced and brightly hued quilt. I recommend Corps of Discovery highly for the history buff, but even more so for the novice of that genre, as a guide to what it can be at its best.

This one, plain and simple, has made me a believer in historical fiction. Too much of what I have tried in the past has suffered from weak and glorified characterizations, improbable, synthetic, hyped, and ultimately lifeless re-portrayals of media-worn events. Jeffrey W. Tenney provides us with a ground-level view of the historical, wherein the epic is broken down into its smallest, untidiest increments, and characters falter as much as they charge ahead.

Everyone knows the basic plot and the "star" characters of this epic story. Who would not now, after so many conventional renditions, prefer to see the Lewis and Clark Expedition through the eyes of characters like William Clark's slave, York? Or through those of the hunters, who spend most of their time in the backcountry where "captain's orders" pale in the presence of the onrushing grizzly bear or the hard-faced Indian warrior?

Tenney's narrative, pacing, and dialogue take the reader on a smooth, entertaining ride, but characters are the heart of this novel. The soldiers, hunters, guides, and boatmen of the Expedition, as well as the Indians met along the way, come in those mixes of flaw and virtue that make people interesting and sympathetic. Characters must battle their own inner enemies while contending with the layers of outer conflict the author heaps upon them. Using a highly creative structure, in each new chapter Tenney shifts perspective to portray different characters' experiences with these struggles. This device makes for chapters as vivid as short stories, the whole of the novel unfolding like a carefully pieced and brightly hued quilt.

I recommend Corps of Discovery highly for the history buff, but even more so for the novice of that genre, as a guide to what it can be at its best.