D Books

I live in the northeast, so I was looking for something for my area. Excellent book. Down to earth, easy, good ideas for the average gardener. We moved our garden and I am going to try his ways. I always had a garden, but did the "old" single row ways. He shares lots of little hints that will help anyone. Good pictures. Not bogged down with extreme details. Highly recommend the book. It was just what I was looking for. I based my decision on the reviews this book got, and they are right.

I added this book to my resource library and glad I did. Lots of useful information presented in a clear and concise manner. The pictures are clear and presented in a manner that allows you to understand.

I grew up on a farm with my mother having a vegetable garden, so growing plants is not a totally foriegn concept to me, but non-the-less, it's been a while since I've "hoed a row." I read the reviews of several books, including this one, and felt confident I was getting a good "go to" book with most everything I would need to start my garden - I was so pleased to be right! I live in the MN, Zone 4, which happens to be the same Zone the author lives in. So though the specific exampels I can apply to my garden, the information is so thorough and sound, I believe the principles can be applied to any Zone! The non-traditional ideas he presents in the book make so much sense! If you want the traditional straight skinny rows your grandmother or neighbor has, this book is not for you, but if you are interested in producing more with less space this book is a must have. I am a good third into it, and I felt every page so far has plenty of good advice without being too wordy, or technical. A very easy read, I can't wait to finish it and start planning my garden!! A thanks to the author for putting his knowledge and love of gardening on paper!

I am a beginner/novice/newbie to the growing food world so I want to get myself empowered with as much info as possible.

So this is just one of an arsenal of info I'm getting.

But the book is well written, came in good condition and was very prompt on delivery

What an incredible person. Ed wrote an invaluable book. There is so much information and it is so detailed. He makes gardening easy. Read this book and it leaves the guess work out of managing your garden!

Lavryle Spencer is my all time favorite romance writer. When she retired in 1997, I seriously mourned. Pick up any of her books and it will leave you with tears, joy, laughter, and a full heart. It's hard for me to choose which is my favorite book from her, but Years has to be right there at the top (along with Bitter Sweet, Vows, Bygones, Family Blessings, Separate Beds, Forgiving). The movies in my opinion doesn't do her books justice at all. I read her book over and over again and they will never leave my library. I have yet to find a writer that matches her skill in spinning an emotionally-driven romantic story.

I purchased this book because of the high number of very good reviews here and was in need of something new and engaging to read. This was my first Lavyrle Spencer book and I didn't really care for it all that much. I thought the development of love between the characters was bumpy and their constant fights (which, I know are supposed to masquerade as their resistance to their irresistible love) were just annoying and I found Teddy's unwavering focus on the difference of 16 years incredibly senseless - I just didn't get that.

The characters were all rather weakly developed and I had trouble following and understanding their motivations for their actions: Why was Linnea suddenly throwing herself at Teddy? Why did Kristian want to join the army? Why was Linnea so angry and worked up about the older boys not attending school immediately? Why was Teddy so angry about the baby? Also, I thought Linnea's character underwent an abrupt change once she married Teddy - she became very subdued, very different from the chipper person at the beginning. It was almost as though she disappeared from the book. Very strange.

There were parts of the book that I liked - the sudden snowstorm was a surprise - the detailed descriptions of horse tack and saddling were interesting and the heated, enclosed wagon was something new. It was set in an interesting time and place - with some "modern" conveniences (cars and airplanes), but much still so primitive (wagons and chamber pots). But overall, not a draw for me to want to read it again.

Read this book right before I read Morning Glory, which I found to be a horrible read. Years is the complete opposite--wonderful story, interesting characters, sparkling dialogue, an absolute joy to read. I can't believe the same author wrote both books! I'm buying this for a Christmas gift for my mother, I loved it so much! My only two complaints about it are that the heroine is almost too pure and loving to be believable, and too many characters were killed off at the end of the book--but that's like saying that you loved the movie but the popcorn was a pinch too salty. READ THIS BOOK!! You will love it!

I absolutley loved this book, from start to finish. Lavyrle Spencer has a way of writing two people falling in love, that you feel as if you're falling in love too. My heartstrings were tugged, pulled and squeezed countless times over while reading this book. It was paced perfectly and remained interesting throughout. I couldn't turn the pages fast enough.

This book is about Linnea and Teddy. Linnea, 18 and fresh from her parents home, has traveled a long way for her first job. She is the new school teacher in Alamo North Dakota who is to room and board with Theodore Westgaard and his family. She has high hopes about her future and is constantly daydreaming about what her new life will be like. Parties, operas, romance.... Then she meets Teddy, a 34 year old, bitter and cynical wheat farmer, who's been badly wounded in the past and cannot bear to even be around women, much less this young and hopeful girl.

Teddy picks her up at the train station expecting not a woman, but a man and refuses to allow a woman, or this "girl" as he calls her, into his home. But because of no other alternatives, she's forced to stay there, against his wishes. Linnea's hopes and "daydreams" are shattered when she discovers she isn't very welcome in his home as she'd expected to be and also becomes bitter towards Teddy for his reactions to her. Bickering and small battles ensue as they spend more time around eachother, but at the same time, neither can understand why they both think of eachother all the time.

Teddy's 17 year old son, Kristian takes an instant liking to Linnea against his father's wishes, because she's his teacher and more importantly because his father recognizes he has feelings for her as well. This makes him uncomfortable, to say the least, but understands his son's heart and tries to stay away from Linnea as much as possible. Linnea notices Kristian's attraction and does her best to keep him at bay and remind him, that even though she's only one year older, she is his teacher and those boundries musn't be crossed.

Over time, Linnea and Teddy get to learn small things about eachother and begin to see eachother in a different light. But there is one thing that is keeping Teddy from giving in to his attraction to Linnea...the years between them. He is 16 years older, and sometimes feels like a pervert for even looking at Linnea in a romantic way. He is constantly battling with himself and refuses to give in to his feelings. Linnea on the other hand, does want to give into these new feelings she's having, she doesn't care about the years separating them, only about her heart and her heart keeps coming back to Teddy.

Overcoming their hurdles is the best part of the book and you'll have to read it to find out what happens. I'll just say....it's perfection. You will NOT regret reading this book! A true romance indeed!

I felt this was more about family and community life than romance. It took place in 1917 in a N. Dakota wheat farming community. The title "Years" refers to the age difference between an 18 year old school teacher falling in love with a 34 year old farmer. The development of their romance was interesting, but the story had its share of tears from tragedies and the harsh life. It was a nice story, but I prefer a little more romance than this offered. Sexual content: mild.

My husband was experiencing crippling lower back pain, that was also running down his right thigh. We were wanting to avoid pain pills and another surgery. I bought this book based on the reviews, and he has been faithfully doing the back exercises at least every day. He found relief within a few days. It's worth a try if you are going through this kind of stuff. He had been through one back surgery that relieved his pain, but we misunderstood the need to do exercises initially. When the pain started coming again, in a different area, we thought he should try this first. I would highly recommend this book.

This book is excellent. Suffered for over 20 years with back pain, diagnosed with degenerative discs and multiple level herniations. Experienced many times the kind of intense pain that finds you on the floor. Tried physical therapy, chriopractors, acupuncture, pain management, anything to avoid surgery. But I was afraid that surgery was my only hope. Now since I've read this book I no longer worry about surgery. Because I'm pain free and can even do yoga - something I never thought possible.

As someone who has had back pain for many years, I learned alot of helpful techniques and strategies to ease the pain. I am now practicing many of ideas outlined in the book and am feeling somewhat better. Definitely worth reading for anyone with chronic back pain.

I purchaed this book for my elderly mother, a retired nurse, who had been to four back specialists and resorted to pain block injections for her spine, which looks like a twisted road in an X-ray. Nothing the doctors told her to do or take, including physical therapy, seemed to alleviate the pain. But when she started doing the exercises in this book, she was able to sleep and function 85% better than before. She does the excises in bed morning and evening. I would recommend it to anyone with back pain, regardless of their age.

This is a wonderful book! When you read it, you know instinctively that what you're reading is true. If you're in enough pain to try even some of the exercises and ideas in the book, it will help you.

Right from the gitgo Ben Hamper's Rivethead grabs you with gritty gusto of passages such as the above; Hamper is an extraordinary writer about life for the ordinary guy... at least the ordinary guy who winds up as an automotive assembly-line worker for General Motors in Flint, Michigan--once considered the Automobile Capital of the World. The author is a natural shop rat, growing up in Flint, with an alcoholic mostly absentee father and a long-suffering, working-three-jobs mother trying to raise the family as practicing Catholics.

...

For my complete review of this book and for other book and movie
reviews, please visit my site [...]

Brian Wright
Copyright 2008

The endless monotony and idiot bosses drive anybody with an IQ above their shoe size to do something to kill the thought that, if they're lucky, they only have 30 more years of mind numbing drudgery to go before they can retire. I'm not saying alcohol abuse is the proper outlet, but it does seem to be the most common and most convenient. Good book, excellent portrayal of what exactly "blue collar America" does for a living.

Ben Hamper shares his life as a worker on the GM assembly line in Flint, MI. Bold, frank, honest and often hilarious. This book was recommended to me years ago and for some reason I never read it until now. Hamper chronicles a part of American history (manufacturing jobs) that seem to be going stateside or as Ross Perot once described in a quip about NAFTA, what's that whoosing noise? manufacturing jobs headed to Mexico. This is prose for the ages. Loved the book.

I didn't really like reading this book because I too work in a (once) major three Auto plant. I didn't feel that it properly portrayed some of the workers. It made it sound like all workers are like the author where they just really don't give a damn about anything except having a joking time on the job. It also made the workers sound like they were underachieving, undereducated, bottom of the barrel workers and I didn't care to have that stigma for all of us. I hold two bachelor degrees, like my job and take it serious!

I grew up with people like Ben Hamper in a place which was much like Flint. For the first couple years of my adult life, I did the kind of work he did. What he describes is the tail end of a lifestyle; the lifestyle of the shop rat. It's dirty, monotonous and smelly. Many of the people you work with are either below average in intelligence or in sanity. Drugs, booze and having no concept of "forethought" are fundamental parts of the culture. It's nihilism with a rivet gun. If you come from a place like that, chances are, your only way out is via a jail cell or a career in the military. Or, you could win a workmans comp suit. Which is presumably how Ben got out.

I miss rust-belt working class america. It's a hard life, and it doesn't have much in the way of rewards, but the people who make it up are genuine in ways that others are not: they have a lot of heart and spirit. Ben's book brought it all back in a great galloping rush of memories. If you've ever wondered what the factory working classes are, or at least were like (back when we had factories); read the book.

Very good. Can't wait to read the second part. Author came to our Bookclub Meeting and discussed the book, very nice guy. E-mail him may attend yours.

Was somewhat disappointed in this book---every page was just drama, drama and more drama. Instead of the author trying to explain why the characteres were the people they were today throughout the book he waits until the last 50 pages to explain why they were this way. I can see that this author has a way of keeping you interested but was disappointed in the way it was put together.

This is one the best books I have read in a long time. Dywane takes you through a full gambit of emotions- he mkaes you laugh, cry, angry, sad etc. Its a very well written book and I look forward to his next one- From My Soul to Yours. You end up loving and hating some of the characters at the same time, but its a journey thats well worth it.

Kudos!!

If you want to elevate your reading a lil, get this book,, Go ahead, just trust me,, get this one!

Four friends, Britton, Indera, Damascus, and Chyna all seem to function as normal . . . well, practically normal adults.
Feeling introspective, Britton leaves the U.S. and moves to the Dominican Republic where he can contemplate his past.

Indera is an astute and financially successful business woman with a curious penchant for dating only married men. Seems she's a vigilante of sorts. She punishes married men for cheating on their wives by mercilessly separating them from their most cherished asset: their money!

Then, there's Damascus affectionately known as Tee and professionally known as T-Bone. Damascus is a highly paid, highly sought after, male exotic dancer. He has an unusually large, um, T-bone, and an out of control libido. Though he treats women like scum, they line up to give Damascus their goodies and yearn for the opportunity to wrap their lips around his big uh, lemme see, how can I say this without sounding crude... Hmm. Okay, the women fall over each other to get a chance to taste Tee's big, juicy steak!

Chyna appears to have it all. She's pretty and well-educated. She's been married for twenty years to her high school sweetheart. Her husband owns four successful businesses and showers Chyna with plenty of material things. They live in a big, expensive home and have four beautiful children. But Chyna and her husband don't share the same bed.

In this psychological drama, it turns out that all four friends are haunted by secrets from their childhood. The author skillfully slips into the storyline and begins peeling away the layers, exposing the secrets that prevent the characters from evolving. With each heart wrenching revelation, the reader is taken off guard. So, get out your tissues because this novel will tug at your heart strings and all your emotions. It will make you fall out in laughter; draw in a sharp, shocking breath at some of the antics of Indera and Tee. But it will also make you cry. Real tears.

Kudos to Dywane D. Birch for this exceptionally well-written novel. I am a fan and a friend forever.

Four friends. Four survivors. Four conflicted souls. Four vastly different paths leading to one inevitable destination: no matter how long they try to run from their past, Brit, Tee, Indy, and Chyna are destined for a head-on collision with fate. They soon learn that denial is not an option, and only honesty holds the cure, in Dywane Birch's aptly titled Shattered Souls.

As a former director of an adolescent crisis shelter, Birch is more than familiar with the kinds of lives depicted in his tale, thus ably lending it the requisite humanity. He has seen and heard first-hand the scars left in the wake of years of mental, psychological, and physical abuse. Learning in more detail, then, about Brit's abusive father, Tee's molestation in foster homes, Indy's wicked stepmother, and Chyna's familial history of mental illness - you get a very real sense of the muted pain millions of children are made to endure everyday.

The tribulations of Birch's protagonists bring to mind the old phrase, "That which doesn't kill us only makes us stronger": even though it fractured their souls, the years of abuse, neglect, and mistreatment at the hands of others has actually strengthened the friends, bolstering their collective survivor's will. At the same time that date/gang rape has inexorably tainted Indy's spirit, it's also fostered a fierce independence within her that shields her from ever being so wounded again. Likewise, Brit comments to his father on his dying bed that the years of his brutal treatment of Brit's mother has, in turn, made him realize just how real men should treat their families, making him vow never to subject his own children - or anyone else's, for that matter - to such treatment.

Shattered Souls evokes many of the same feelings as Antwone Fisher before it: we cringe at the gruesome depictions of abuse & molestation and their damning consequences, but we also rejoice at the redemptive power of healing. You may not agree with every choice that the friends make, but you root for them nonetheless; after all, who among us isn't striving daily to liberate ourselves from the chains of our past?

Dywane Birch does a commendable job piecing together seemingly unrelated phenomena in relating them to a greater, more troubling whole. In so doing, he skillfully reminds us that everything we do yields karmic repercussions the likes of which we can't begin to imagine. Beneath it all, though - and as Indy herself tragically discovers: no matter what others have done to us, the only fate we ultimately have any control over is our own.

For its uncomfortable honesty, its striking candor, and chiefly its unapologetic humanity, Shattered Souls is a highly recommended read.

This is my very favorite story to read at Halloween. I read this story to my preschool class every year. The children love the pictures and the repetition. After a few pages they will begin to recite the verse "Drat" along with the characters. I ordered several copies so I could put it in the listening center. I also have the cassette tape to play along with the story.

This book is one of my favorite of all time! It takes Halloween characters and makes them fun. The story is all about working together toward a common goal-making pumpkin pie. This story can be acted out with preschool students. It also has an audiotape that you can't miss with! Even my students with short attention spans pay attention and participate with this one. When we are done reading it for the week, we make pumpkin pie. A great ending to a fun week!

This is a great book for kids 3-5 my kids loved it thought the pictures were wonderful and a good non-scary alternative for halloween stories.

This is a great for the kids. Teachs the young to problem solve. Drat! it's also a fun read.

Big Pumpkin is so Big in our house, it's read all the time...Oh and our son loves it too!

Once my son (4 years old) discovered and fell in love with Big Pumpkin it didn't matter if it was Halloween or not. The story is nothing short of hilarious, the illustrations could not be better suited and truly compliment this book where so many others fall short. My husband and I get such a kick out of reading this book as well, we practically know it by heart and have been known to recite it in jest around the house. One of my favorite things about this book is that it introduces the so-called "scary" characters of Halloween, the Ghost, the Vampire, the Mummy, the Bat, and the Witch in the most loveable manner with such simple and innocent humor that it completely removes any possible thought of "scary" for our little ones. Big Pumpkin can make you befriend a Witch, want to help out a Vampire, and just love your "Mummy"! Don't wait until Halloween, buy it now, it's too cute to pass up.

The 4 volume set of Catwings is an excellent collection of books. It makes a great gift. Even if your child reads well on their own, these books are marvelous for a family "read aloud" time. If you do not have that time, shut off the TV and make the time...it is well worth it!

Great book for any cat lover

author of "Hobo Finds A Home"

I've given several friends (adults) Catwings, all of whom were completely charmed by the books.

Firstly, these 4 books are written exquisitely well. We've seen what wonderful things Le Guin can come up with before in her "Earthsea" trilogy. This trilogy became so popular they made a movie about it! But when she steps back into the softer world of children's fiction she proves her skills yet again to the reader. These are books even I, at age 23, enjoy reading again. And I enjoyed them immensely the first time I read them in second or third grade.
This is the story of four young cats with wings venturing into the countryside from their rough city life. It's all about the journeys they have along the way. On top of the wonderfully crafted story, there are great illustrations showing you just how lovable the kitties are!

This particular edition is paperback. The holder it comes in is not particularly sturdy, just a glorified cardboard, but the books inside are a true treasure. I looked everywhere to find these loved stories from my childhood, and I'm glad Amazon could provide me with them. You will not be disappointed!!

My 1st grader's teacher read these as read-aloud books at the beginning of the year. My daughter loved them so much, we bought the set and she read the again on her own. The stories are sweet and very imaginative - my daughter and her friends played "Catwings" on the playground for weeks - each one taking on the role of a different cat, acting out the stories and creating new ones. To me, a book that can capture the attention of a child and help them create new things out of it is a great one. Love the illustrations too.

I do not have much to add other than what has already been said. The only thing I found frustrating is that I could not buy some of the ingredients to the recipies here where I live. That wasn't a common problem throughout the book though. It happened on just a few of them.

Everyone seems drawn to this book on my coffee table. It captivates you and makes your mouth water!

I've tried some of the recipies and they all turned out excellent. There are a lot of new ways to combine familiar ingredients here. (But I am from Mississippi so what is familiar to me might not be familiar to you.)

Enough said! If you love cajun cuisine, you must buy this book!

My co-worker received one of these books for a wedding gift. Three other people at work ordered it after looking through the wonderful, mouth-watering recipes, the beautiful historical and contemporary photographs and after reading the informative history of our cuisine! As a Louisianian who really enjoys cooking, I was most impressed! Cudos to John Folse and to Amazon for making this wonderful book available.

Wow!! I just received this and spent most of the night reading it! This is my first Cajun & Creole cookbook. I see that I made a most excellent choice in purchasing this book! If it ain't in here, then it's not supposed to be!!! I was going to purchase some of Folse's other books, but I think this one covers just about everything I need. Also, I must add, the price for this book is excellent. A whole lot of book for very little money.

This is the most impressive book yet on cajun/ creole cooking. Outstanding in every way (except perhaps the cornbread, all of which had sugar in it, and grandma would whop him over the head with her iron skillet for THAT). Can't wait to cook from this.

The recipes, history, festivals, photos, and everything else make this HUGE book indeed an encyclopedia. Impressive that the Italian and German settlers to the state were included in the history and recipe tradition as well, as they generally seem to be left out.

What a gift this was. Was delivered by accident two doors down, and my eldery lady neighbor had it loaded in her car to deliver it to me. Really. I was recovering from neck surgery and had to drag it inside my house. Must weigh 100 pounds. The wonderful part is all the history. The best part are the recipes. Trust me, they work. It is Chef's attitude and touch that comes through for me. It affirms and validates my cooking, moreover it gives me great techniques and ideas. Buy it for the history, relish it for the flavor. If you need a Creole/Cajun Cookbook, this is it.

You will laugh out loud, this book is truly hysterical. I am a new Tim Sandlin fan - Sorrow Floats and Social Blunders are just as good. Highly recommended!!

On the positive side this book was sometimes amusing. The story idea of two thirteen-year-old's experimentation with sex and resulting in a pregnant seventh grader was promising though poorly executed. None of the main characters are believable, not the narrator, Sam, not his girlfriend Maurey, and not his mother Lydia. The motivations and thought patterns of the adolescents especially lacked any power to convey belief. This novel should probably have stayed in the form of Mr. Sandlin's puerile fantasies, from which it sprung.

In Sam Callahan, Sandlin creates one of the great characters of recent American literature. Equal parts Walter Mitty and Holden Caulfield, Sam is a hilarious narrator with a truly unique voice. If the book were nothing more than a series of comic misadventures of Sam and his irreverent Southern Belle mother, Lydia as they are transplanted from the good ol' south to rural Wyoming, it would be a great read.

However, Skipped Parts is far more than that. Beyond Sam and Lydia, Sandlin populates GroVont with no end of fascinating characters--almost all multidimensional and colorful--the kind of folks you only find in quirky places like Sicily, Alaska. In this book, its easy to imagine that folks like Dot,Hank Elkrunner and the old guys who populate the local diner have interesting lives and stories outside of the light they shed on the main characters and that they didn't just show up in the scenes to move the plot along. This gives the story an incredible richness.

Beyond that, the book has a heart as big as the Tetons and frequently wears it on its sleeve. Rarely is a book so laugh out loud funny also so poignant and touching. There are moments that are truly noble, truly sad and truly beautiful and its a credit to Sandlin that none of them seem contrived. If you can get past the stuff about precocious 13 teen year olds experimenting with sex, you find a great novel about growing up, dealing with family, redemption and the endless disappointments and possibilities of life. A wonderful, wonderful book.

A dazzling story about love, anguish, despair, and every other pure emotion, "Skipped Parts" immediately jumps into the top ten for any reader.

Each character is well-crafted and dichotomous. Lydia's pithy, nasty wit fights her neediness, her desire for love and companionship. Sam's prodigious intelligence and story-telling talents are overshadowed by his incredibly childlike naivety. Even Caspar, the grandfather who I envision as a Col. Sanders look-alike, who has a heart of stone and a solitary focus on business, shows a bit of tenderness.

At its core, the story is about sex, the transition from childhood to adulthood, and the bonds of family. It's laugh out loud funny at moments, sick and startling at others. "Skipped Parts" covers the entire gamut of emotions while relating a well-crafted story, with all of the essential details, but nothing extra that may take away from characters or plot.

By the end of the book you won't know what is going to happen. You'll be cheering for your favorite character(s), and hoping for your own personal ending to come true, but it turns out slightly off from what you expect, and nearly perfect in every way.

This book is not for the faint of heart. The title, "Skipped Parts", perfectly sums up what the book is about: letting us directly in on the dark, dirty secret that teenage sex and extramarital sex actually occurred in the United States before the invention of the Pill, that there were abortions before Roe v. Wade and they skipped all those parts when they filmed Gidget.

Sam Callahan uses a rich fantasy life to mask the fact that he has had to be father to his own mother because she is too young and immature to take care of herself and her own father treats her like a bought pariah. Exiled to rural Wyoming in the fall of 1963, they survive by building real connections to real people for the first time in their lives. For Sam, the transformation begins on the day of JFK's death, when he comforts Maurey Pierce, the only kid in his grade who can read besides Sam. Maurey's Stepford mother, cowboy father and Dennis the Menace brother drive her to make an unusual pact with Sam: together, they will learn sex so that when they want to have it with someone they really desire, they will know what to do. Egged on by Lydia, Sam's mother, and some of her friends, they learn it quite well, until the inevitable happens the moment Maurey hits puberty. Plot twists that would make J.K. Rowling jealous, humor, beautifully drawn characters, a great sense for the detail of the West and a tremendous understanding of the social mores of teenagers at the time combine to make this a simply irresistible novel.

I only just started this story last night and I'm already wanting to put everything else off to finish it! As a teacher, frustrated with "the system" of education today, this is a refreshing, exciting look at a unique school of railroad car classrooms, lunches of "something from the sea and something from the mountains," student-centered learning (Wow! what a concept!)from the eyes of little Totto-chan. If the rest of the book proves to be as great as the first part, I will be recommending it to all my teacher friends. It's a quick, fun read for anyone! Two thumbs up!

Honestly I read this book over 25 years ago and thought that this book has long been discontinued. I guess this proves what a time-tested treasure it is. The author, a TV celebrity in Japan, recalls her childhood and the unorthodox school she went to. Absolutely adoring in the simple story of how a concerned mother tried to do the best for her daughter and how a simple man did his best to give a bright and meaningful future to the few children who comes into his life.

It is the type of book that makes you wish that there were more teachers like him and that you had a teacher like him.

This is one of my all-time favorite books. First published in Japan in 1981, this beautiful book depicting the true story of innocent little Totto-chan, her family, friends, and above all, the innovating educationer she befriends in the years leading up to, and during the first years of WW2, remains a national best seller in Japan to this day. I don't have any children of my own, but if I did, and if Tomoe-Gakuen (the elementary school Totto-chan attends) existed today, I would immediately enroll my children there. Since there is not, I hope I have the good luck of finding somebody like Sosaku Kobayashi to help make my child the happiest and kindest child in the world.

It was due to this book's beauty that then UNICEF Executive Director, James P. Grant persuaded those working at UNICEF to appoint the author, Tetsuko Kuroyanagi (who is Totto-chan grown up), to UNICEF's International Goodwill Ambassador, enabling her to visit and help children in need all over the world.

For people who have read this book and those who have not, I also recommend "Totto-Chan's Children : A Goodwill Journey to the Children of the World" by the same author. It tells the story of Totto-chan grown up, still big-hearted as ever, striving to help children in need. Check it out!

In 1969 I was part of a group of teachers who created a school much like that featured in Toto Chan. We thought we were on the "cutting edge" of educational practices without knowing that a school in Japan had been delivering many of the same holistic, humanistic educational practices over a quarter of a century before. I'm sure many U.S. educators who thought/think they were/are in the vanguard of educational practices would appreciate this beautiful story of a dedicated educator and his students.

I have not read a better book which has made me laugh, cry, love, and ponder over is such a way! This book is awesome and worth much more than 5 stars.