Scott Glenn Books

I've participated in several Companions in Christ classes, and I can't recommend them highly enough. What I liked best about the class that this workbook is for was that it gave me the chance to explore spiritual exercises I would not normally have thought "were for me." This included several methods of reading scripture, several methods of relating scripture to my own life, and several methods of prayer. I decided at the beginning of the class that as an act of faith I would do anything asked of me in a daily exercise, whether it seemed to be "me" or not; that I would treat each as a learning experience and that I would get more out of it by putting more into it. I am glad I did this, for the class was a very rich experience, and four years after I first took the class, I am still enriched by things I tried for the first time as an exercise from this book.

I am sure it would be possible to have a not-great Companions class, but all three of the ones I've taken at my Episcopal church have been personally fulfilling and also have brought about much deeper relationships among the people who have participated.

Wonderful and balanced book. Great inspirational quotes from the best!! Good solid Christian teaching and formation.

If you are looking for a way to bridge the gap between church and world, this is the course to use. Approaching the Christian tradition as spirituality, Companions in Christ uses daily Bible reflection and simple, but profound journal questions and a weekly small group meeting to build community.

I cannot think of a better way to introduce the poetry of Shakespeare than this small volume. The selection is excellent and of interest you the young reader. The commentary is quite relevant as are the pictures which accompany it. I find that often now, our young people go all the way through the early grades in school and many of them have never heard of Shakespeare,much less read their poetry. This was the sort of stuff my generation and the generation before it grew up on and cut our teeth on. I do not feel I am any worse for the wear. I am fearful that we are bringing up an entire generation (rightfully or wrong, although I feel it is the later) of young folks who will have no appreciation to this great art form and will miss a lot. This book helps. This entire series helps, as a matter of fact and I certainly recommend you add this one and the others to your library. Actually, it is rather fun reading these with the young folk and then talking about them. Not only do you get to enjoy the work your self and perhaps bring back some great memories, but you have the opportunity to interact with your child or student. It is actually rather surprising what some of the kids come up with. I read these to my grandchildren and to the kids in my classes at school. For the most part, when I really get to discussing the work with them, they enjoy it. Recommend this one highly.

A perfect selection from Shakespeare's greatest plays with gorgeous artwork. An ideal introduction to Shakespeare for young people. With a smart and easy to read preamble describing Shakespeare's life and work and wonderful introductions to each poem, the book does a fantastic job of explaining how Shakespeare's work is both drama and poetry.

Joy! Shakespeare--undiluted--for everybody, either kids or adults! The layout of this book couldn't be more helpful. After a brief introduction, the compiler gets down to business. Each speech or poem is preceeded by a brief explaination, and after the selection, a small word-list to aid understanding. All are swathed in beautiful, dramatic paintings that are truly helpful for comprehension. All the famous lines are here, from Henry V's Agincourt "St. Crispin" speech, his inly-ruminating soliloquey about the nature of power, scenes from Macbeth, Midsummer Night's Dream, Hamlet, and a couple of sonnets, and much more.

There are two things that are very impressive about this book. First, the compiler manages to introduce very adult themes about power,loyalty, etc., as well as the vocabulary of 400 years ago,even a brief explaination of iambic pentameter in a tone so chatty that you hardly realize you are learning. Second, the rich pictures impart a thirst for MORE Shakespeare. You'll hear, "Can we hear more? What's the rest of this story?" often!

Any publication that presents the Bard as accessable and enjoyable deserves a place in every school or public library, and certainly every home. Add this to Charles and Mary Lamb's "Tales of Shakespeare" as a new classic.

This book is beautifully designed and well organized. Full color photography enhances each page. It includes basic information on gardening with native plants, planning a garden, attracting birds, butterflies, and other wildlife to your yard. Photographs and desriptions of plants and trees, organized by geographic location, are accompanied by maps, field notes, tips, and drawings of animals prefered by each. Lots of references are included in the back. It may be geared more towards the layperson than the expert, but this book really opened my eyes to the possibilities of gardening. Gardening is not just picking pretty flowers anymore! Natural Gardening a joy to browse through and to read.

I don't have children, but I found this in a children's asile in my local bookstore and I had to buy it! This is the book I have on my backyard picnic table right now and I read thru it daily and love it! It's NUMBER 1 on my list of books to read right now with summer here. The photos are wonderful; the small editorials are written so that anyone can understand them, and as an adult I don't see the "child -like" reading here, but rather a book that everyone can enjoy and learn from and all of Time Life Books are finely manufactured. For a book I'd rate them as "Excellent Quality" and suggest this along with the other's from this series would make a wonderful gift for children and adults alike. You'll learn alot about gardening, how to attract butterflies or hummingbirds to your backyard; wild flowering, A-Z, way too much to mention.

This book review is different, because Power Tools:
Top Executive Coaches Put You on the Fast Track to Success
is different. The brainchild of Ann Mah, a Legislator in State of
Kansas, in her spare time brought nineteen of the best Business &
Personal Coaches to share their insights, in one chapter. "Success
is what you do in your spare time."

The result is a three-part focus with six chapters in each section:
essential tools for managers, tools to build winning teams, and high
impact leadership. For the reason that this is a multi-authored book
gives it a special diversity of solid viewpoints, but on a far-reaching
area of topics: from giving and receiving feedback, office politics for women, career management (hang on for the ride!), to foreign service etiquette and an amazing array of foundational leadership skills for success.

If you struggle upon occasion with the "boss" or as the leader, struggle
with your employees, the book is a must-read. At just 227 pages and the
suggested $14.95 price, it's a steal for your library - or gift to your boss!
In the back of the book are more pages of resources for personal-development minded people representing the 18 coaches superb products. The book may change your paradigm -- your pattern of thinking -- about supervision, management and leadership -- lessons that often spillover to your personal life quality.

I had the pleasure of meeting David Nelson at the Navigator 2007 conference for 911 dispatchers in Las Vegas, his classes were fantastic great man, when I got home I bought this book.!!!(david nelson is one of the authors)
Outstanding ideas for anyone who wants to be a great supervisor. It takes alot more than just telling people what to do and this book will help you with that!! I recommend this book to anyone who is thinking about becoming a supervisor anyone who doesnt want to be like the last supervisor you had!!!

whenever i need a book it is so easy to go to amazon and if they are not selling it they have a list of sellers and it is so easy to purchase and check out from amazon. i have never had a problem with their sellers they ship quickly package well and send the product i want thank you so much for being dependable

I've read all of the Harry Potter books aloud to my son (who is now 10), and, while we're not yet far into Deathly Hallows, we can see that it will be as fun as all the others. We became engrossed in it from Page One. We're excited to see how the series ends, but we'll miss reading it. It's not only been a good read, but a great experience for us to have together. He could certainly be reading it alone at this point, but we wouldn't miss the shared enjoyment.

Product true to description, good condition, great seller, moderately timed shipping. would buy from again! thank you!

My book is missing pages 83-114. I've looked all the way through my book, but it's not there. Has this happen to anyone else?

Overall:
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4 stars - A fairly satisfying ending to the Dark Lord / Harry Potter saga -- the ending is a bit weak, slightly cliched and a lot of dead cool characters.
Harry controls the final confrontation with the Dark Lord yet gives the Dark Lord a way out (why?). The Dark Lord's insanity combined with meglomania is his downfall not Harry Potter. It is a cheapening of what one expected from Harry Potter.

The search for the Horcruxes is only really possible due to Hermiene's knowledge of magic and magical skills. Harry does show much character and pushes for understanding the Deathly Hallows but really it is more a plot device than anything else. The Dark Lord is blinded by power (searching for the Elder Wand) when he should be finishing off the opposition with the ruthlessness of hardened, paranoid war lord.

The great losses by the forces of good seem to be trivialized by the epilogue. I was looking for some type of memorial / recognition of the sacrifices made. The life as usual with the references of respect by naming of the various children is touching but not enough.

Characters:
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The deaths of main characters "off-screen" is disappointing and cheapens their loss. Frankly, I cared much more about the characters that died off-screen than the potential loss of Harry's life. It is strange to think the side-characters were more important; I guess the sacrafice they were willing to make for a friend and the side of good is more compelling than Harry's battle with the Dark Lord.

The assault on Hogswort showed a tremendous amount of the internal qualities of the side characters than Harry. Harry raised the you can not do this as I will not have your death on my conscious non-sense again. Harry is clearly missing the point of friendship, trust, sacrafice and need to fight evil/darkness at all costs. Why does Ron and Hermiene have to be Harry's conscience all the time? The characters understand the risk but they also understand what is at stake -- please give them some credit!

Mrs. Weasley: She rocks! It was great to see her step up as it is hinted that she is a formittable witch in the other books.

Snape: He is one of the best characters in a very long time for me. He is very complex and well developed. I did not like how it was all tied back to silent love of a character that is barely developed. If you are going to tied up so much of your life for a lost love, the lost love should be developed in more detail.

Harry: The sudden rash of logistical ability to get the horcruxes is out of character for him. The sudden wisdom to appreciate what Dumbledore had setup is out of character and seems forced just to get the story to a conclusion. It is good that he finally accepts people for being able to think and work as a team (not guided by him).

The selflessness of Harry that the ability to turn down the Deathly Hallows is not done well as it conflicts with his selfness internal discussions. I appreciate that Harry is supposed to be the bright shining light of all that is good but the suddenness of being selfless does not quite work for me; it needed more development as I have found Harry to be very selfish in a lot of ways through out the series.

Ginny: She is a good character that deserves more development.

Dobbie: A good tie in here and lead up to the final battle. A way to turn an annoying character from early on into a real character.

Plot:
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The plot is pretty straight forward as it needs to resolve the Dark Lord vs. Harry situation...does the evil triumuph over good. The race between the Dark Lord and Harry's small group is reasonably well done. However, the Dark Lord would have realized the problem with the Elder Wand before the final showdown.

The Deathly Hallows is an interesting plot device but should have been mentioned in the prior books. It seems like it was added as a way to wrap up the series while the rest of the books show a clear well-developed back story. Note: this is a minor point given the level of complex back story JKR has developed for the other books.

Action:
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The final assault is well done with good pacing. The "good" guys should really have been wiping out attackers more effectively as they would fight together better than typical one-on-one tactics of the Death Eaters...the concept of surpressing fire, area of effect spells and defensive casting would really have helped the good guys. Also, it is a war and killing the attackers is ok...war is hell!

Prose:
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The prose is on par with the other stories.

Summary:
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Overall: 4 stars
Characters: 3 to 3.5 stars
Plot: 3 stars
Action: 4 to 4.5 stars -- the assault is well done
Prose: 3 stars

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7)

This is the last book in the Harry Potter series. Before the book was released, I had a lot of questions that remained unanswered. I wondered how J.K. Rowling would tie up all the "loose-ends". I began reading this series in first grade, and as I read each book found that the story line became darker because it focused more on Harry and Voldemort, and less on how wonderful it would be to be a wizard. This was sort of disturbing because Harry lived through such horrible events. However, since I wanted to know what would happen to each of the characters, I read the book and quickly began to enjoy myself.

Harry's skills as a wizard and his endurance are put to the test when he is attacked by Death Eaters at Weasley's home. Harry, Ron and Hermione set out to find and destroy a series of horcruxes which contain different parts of Voldemort. They learn many things about Dumbledore during their journey and learn that he had a complicated life. Their journey eventually takes them back to Hogwart's where the join forces with Neville, Luna, Ginny and others who battle against Voldemort in a final confrontation. In the end, it is Neville who proves that he is a powerful wizard too.

The book had a lot of twists and turns, but in the end good triumphs over evil. We know that Harry finds some well deserved peace and happiness, and that Ron and Hermoine were destined for each other. We are left to imagine what the next generation of wizards will be like. Can you imagine what it would be like to be Harry and Ginny's child? I think this might make a good book...or two.

I basically enjoy the "Dummies" books... I find the information often extremely insightful and helpful. It also is a great pleasure to order the books through amazon.com and be spared the 'embarrassment' of having to march up to the local bookstore counter with a "Dummies" book in tow. That being said, this book at times seems painfully silly. Although obviously now somewhat dated, comparing Paganini to "Saddam Hussein," Vivaldi to a "Xerox machine," and commenting that without Beethoven, "we'd have no Barry Manilow," are just a few examples of pithy comments from the authors. Of course, the basic aim of these books is to be entertaining and to reach out to individuals. The book is funny and perhaps needs to be given the fact that most people approach the subject with a lot of trepidation and a readiness to be bored out of their minds. However, fewer sarcastic remarks and far reaching attempts to be 'humorous' is something this book could do without.

This book is incredibly well written. It was totally absorbing, entertaining and informative. By the time I finished it, I felt like I had earned a degree in classical music appreciation and another in music theory.

My husband had never been exposed to classical music and when we got married, he wanted to be able to carry on a conversation with the rest of my family. He has loved this book and it has really taught him a lot about classical music.

If you love--or would like to at least understand--classical music, then this is the book to read. It is fun, quick and not so technical or snooty as many books on this subject. In fact, it's not snooty at all. I learned a bunch I had no idea of, reaffirmed things I did know, and corrected several misconceptions. Read this if you are going to be around "high-brow" snooty types and then just smile quietly as they rattle on and on. Little will they know that you "understand the language."

You have to be careful with the Dummies series. Some authors use humor with discretion, others, as in this case, lard on so much humor that it gets in the way of learning and turns what should be a pleasure into an ordeal of extracting the useful information from the attempt at clever wise-cracks, puns and general satire.

Yes, there is information here if you are willing to work to get it, but a good 50% of the text is gratuitous laughs. There are other books, such as "The Classical Music Experience" by Jacobson, that treat the reader as someone intelligent who seeks to know rather than to be entertained.

The best advice is to go to the library and look in the music appreciation section. You'll find many superior alternatives to this book.

Eugenie Scott and her colleague Glenn Branch - who are both from the National Center for Science Education - deserve ample praise for editing this terse, yet quite insightful, primer that explains what "Intelligent Design" is, and why it shouldn't be taught in our schools. Scott, Branch and several other writers ranging from other scientists to educators and lawyers, not only review the history of the so-called "Intelligent Design" movement from both a legal and educational perspective, but also demonstrate that this "scientific" idea is not scientific, but rather, a cleverly designed revision of "scientific creationism" which thinly disguises its religious origins. In short, "Intelligent Design" is nothing more than a Fundamentalist Protestant Christian religious idea masquerading as science, and one that is still receiving ample financial and intellectual support from the Seattle, Washington-based Discovery Institute. This terse book remains timely and important, inspite of the harsh verdict rendered against Intelligent Design by Republican Federal Judge John Jones in the Kitzmiller vs. Dover Board of Education trial (He ruled that "Intelligent Design" was a religious doctrine masquerading as science.), because staunch advocates like fellow Amazon.com customer reviewer "The Professor", Michael Behe and William Dembski refuse to acknowledge the intellectual bankruptcy of their pseudoscientific idea (Moreover, distinguished conservative pundits like Charles Krauthammer and George Will echoed Judge Jones' ruling, by concurring with him in published newspaper columns, noting that "Intelligent Design" wasn't scientific.). Eugenie Scott begins this book with a fine overview of the history of the Intelligent Design movement, and explains in clear, concise English why Intelligent Design isn't scientific, using much of the same logic which I have used in my own Amazon.com customer review of the "Intelligent Design" textbook "Of Pandas and People" (It was originally a textbook which purportedly offered a scientific rationale for "scientific creationism"; later editions have shifted emphasis to support instead "Intelligent Design". The history of this book's origins was noted during the Kitzmiller vs. Dover Board of Education trial, and was an acute source of embarassment for "Intelligent Design" advocates.). Glenn Branch's essay which closes this volume is a well-reasoned, passionate plea explaining how the average citizen can help defeat ongoing efforts to introduce the teaching of "Intelligent Design" in American primary, intermediate and secondary school classrooms. If you don't think that "Intelligent Design" is a serious threat to ensuring first-rate scientific education in American schools, then you must buy this terse book.

"Not In Our Classrooms" is a concise (152 pages) and thorough collection of essays explaining why pseudoscience based on religious beliefs has no place in public science education. Eugenie Scott begins by showing the ironic evolution of creationism to "intelligent design" within the fundamentalist community, but the book does not concern itself merely with court defeats incurred by the religious right in the U.S. Including writings from theologians like Ted Peters and noted science writers Nick Matzke, Glenn Branch and Dr. Paul Gross, "Not In Our Classrooms" ends on a positive note, showing how citizens can become involved in protecting the integrity of science education in public schools.

Despite the Kitzmiller (2005) decision where expert witnesses for Intelligent Design were clearly shown to have lied on the witness stand and stated that astrology is science, the Discovery Institute continues to try to push religion into public schools.

Eugenie Scott and the National Center for Science Education clearly state that "belief" compared to "evidence" is not science and that science, as taught and modeled in K-12 and university classrooms must be robust, reproducible, falsifiable, testable, peer-reviewed and based on evidence, not belief. The Discovery Institute that promotes Intelligent Design is producing textbooks, DVDs and other media in an effort to push religious belief into public schools -often these books and DVDs are poorly written or produced imitations of existing robust and credible science materials.

This book is a useful tool for anyone with a child in school who wants to make sure they are being taught science rather than religion. It explores the history of the creationism/evolution debate, shows the legal cases relevant, and explains what issues the creationists/ID folks keep bringing up. Most of them are laughable, but I'm glad to know about them before I get sprung with them at a PTA meeting. It's sad how well-informed we have to be to beat the ill- and misinformed. I majored in biology as an undergrad and took a class in evolution. Despite that, many of the arguments brought up by the I.D. camp were new to me, so I was glad to read about them in full before hearing about them in a debate.

...and a rebuttal to "The Professor"

This book nails the debate on the head of the nail. Ms. Scott and Mr. Branch have done a wonderful job of laying out the factual reasons why I.D. is false as science. But even better, in an attempt to counter-point the books contents, we actually are allowed to see another reviewer lay out the very arguments that have no merit. Normally, I ignore such attempts at blatant falsehoods, but I think in this case it is worthwhile in order to better underscore why - and why the book he attempts to slander causes him to engage in this rather blatant exercise.

The "professor" starts his argument by claiming the book contains misleading and flat-out wrong information by claiming "the oft cited claim that ID has not produced any science or has not published in the peer reviewed literature ". The truth is there is no peer reviewed material available to be found, except wherein it is pointed out that ID has no merit. Further, ID has contributed NOTHING to science. The Discovery Institute itself has publicly admitted it has produced nothing.

The Professor goes on to show how transparent his false argument is by adding: "In my work in the area of cell biology research, we in fact proceed on the assumption that the cell was designed and asked the question "how was it designed, i.e. how does it work" often assuming that the mechanisms we are researching are ingeniously designed." This is a blatant falsehood...no \where in biology will you find any self-respecting scientist who will make this claim - it is counter to the basic premise of the scientific method, where EVERYTHING is in question. Such an assumption as the Professor claims would never happen, because it demands that you make a conclusion before you examine the phenomena!

I could go on, but the point is "the professor" makes a number of unsubstantiated claims that anyone with a passing understanding of science regarding how scientists behave is false. He offers nothing actual, cites to nothing published (because, as I pointed out above, there has been NOTHING of a peer reviewed nature published) and essentially engages in a hand wave to support his claims.

He finishes with the claim that ID advocates are in the closet. This is the most transparent of falsehoods - scientists love nothing better than proving other scientists wrong. If there were any merit to ID, you would see many scientists out there showing why.

To close, I apologize to any who find my response outside of the norm for an [...] review, but I feel very strongly about letter people such as "the professor" spread these falsehoods without some objection. The real bottom line: educate yourself. Learn why science works as it does. Once you do, it becomes rather easy to understand why these people are selling you snake oil.

This is a fast read on gender differences. The basic premise is that women have to care for children and so they are wired to take as much as possible from men. Men don't have to care for children and so are wired to have sex with and impregnate as many women as possible. Statements on sex are backed up by references to psychology studies and accompanied by a description of how this would have evolved into that gender. As you might guess given the premise the book deals primarily with gender differences and intercourse, not gender differences and how emotions are handled or other types of differences. That isn't clear from the title, but now you know.

The high point of the book for me is that it constantly referred to statistical analyses of data on sex, especially a survey given to men and women (about 1000 men and 2000 women, not to couples). Basically Wilson is going through the published psychology literature on sex and arranging information pulled from these studies into themes. This is what I want to see in a sex book.

One thing I didn't like was that Wilson often pushes his own biases in this book. Much of the "offensive" material is simply refutation of feminist viewpoints. For example feminists claim that sex differences are cultural and not biological is well refuted by Wilson when he presents data on factors like guilt and desire for frequency of sex from the 60s and compares it with more recent data. Liberation and much more widespread information on sex has not changed the percentages of these feelings in either sex since more "repressed" times. So there are sex differences that are innate. This din't bother me and I agree with Wilson here.

However Wilson is not just challenging theories. He is also pushing his own biases. The chapter titled Origins of Genius clearly demonstrates this. Here Wilson strays from the book's subject of intercourse and presents a very short section which claims that men are naturally more intelligent based on the fact that few women win Nobel Prizes. He refutes the argument that women are disadvantaged socially by saying, well this man was poor and he did this. He does not give a percentage of male Nobel Prize winners from poor families, so there is no way to compare the proportion of disadvantaged male winners of the Nobel Prize with the proportion of female winners. Also he does not once mention pregnancy and child care as being potential added barriers to careers for women. (Note that pregnency and childcare are his basis for all the gender differences so far. But wouldn't childcare require more intelligence than not caring for children?) When he is not talking about sex as a verb he is perhaps out of his field and unable to give a discussion that really grasps the issues.

If you are curious about sex from a psychological viewpoint then you are sure to find some gems here. This is an excellent overview of literature for the layman and I recommend it to the curious. However Wilson also brings his own biases, which show through when the citations to other research thin out. Some of his conclusions are likely to offend, so be aware of that.

Entertainingly written, a leading University of London psychiatrist refutes the invalid psychological assumptions on which extreme feminist arguments rely and shows that men and women have reciprocal roles in society, based on identified psychological differences.
Contents: Sex and Evolution; Evidence from Human Biology; Evidence from Animals and other Cultures; Can the Differences be Suppressed?; Sexual Anomalies and Difficulties; Talent & Achievement; Aggression and Crime; Social Forces and the Sex War.

This book deals about the differences between males and females and why the two sexes think and behave in different ways. Wilson, from Darwinist evoloutionary theory, proves that the differences are ordained genetically because males and females have different roles to play in the reproduction of the human species. This fires the cannon through feminist theories that the sexes are the same. The sexes are not the same, but there is no issue of equality involved because the sexes have both strong and weak points in different areas.

Men are more agressive, prone to anger, more sexually adventurous, have better visuo-spatial skills and are slightly smarter. Women are more passive, conservative in thier sexual behavior, empathetic, caring and take a more subjective view of life. These, of course are generalizations, not the exceptions, as the author notes.

At the end of the book, it seems that men come off as smarter, more intellegent and in control than women. But the author is free to admit that women are morally superior to men, because it is the male drive towards crime and agression that is the fault of most social problems and wars. Feminism does have legitamite claims, but it is dead wrong by postulating that "society" forces males and females to act certain ways when these are dictated by simple biological function. Feminists should make thier case by appealing to senses of morals and honor towards females rather than making dictates based on faulty scientific theory.

This is the second copy of this book that I have (the first being the 5th ed.). It seems that the authors cannot settle on a cohesive system in which to arrange the material. Like the 5th ed., I think that the material does not follow a logical course of organization (but admittedly better than the last ed.). Nevertheless, the material presented is of good quality being that it is easy to understand and difficult to become lost in the material. Overall, it is a good book.

The book was delivered the second day after booked on the net, and in a fair price.

The seller sent my item quickly and it arrived exactly as it was described. Thank!

A well priced product and from its description ideal for lecture purposes.
Unfortunately it does not work using Windows Media Player, Nero Showtime or Open Source media player on my computer using Windows XP.
Amazon returns system worked well with full refund but I would have liked a version that worked.

after being utterly discusted with this poor excuse of a study guide, i thought i would read some horrible reviews on the guide to make me feel better. to my dismay, people can't read and they only posted reviews for the text book, which is actually good but those reviews should be posted elsewhere.

You know there is something wrong with this guide when you see them call CH3-CH3 methane (pg 3 not to mention they got linoleic and linolenic mixed up) or on the multiple choice on page 19 has ribosomes as one of the right answers for proteins involved in transcription.

i have not done a lot of the questions in the book and all ready i see errors on every second page. i wonder if i will actually recieve lower grades if i study from this poorly written book.

I love study guides and have used them for stewert's calculus, campbell's biology and bruice's organic chemistry in college. were there some occasional mistakes... yes but overall they were good. this study manual however seems to have been written by a tribe of wild monkeys pounding on a keyboard. Save your 23 dollars