I Books

This book was such a fun take on wedding planning.

"The wedding obsessed story of a bride to be who believes that matching napkins colors to bridesmaid dresses will determine her future happiness - hilarious!"

Whether you are planning a wedding or about to attend a wedding, I recommend reading this book. Hana Schank will take you step-by-step through all that one goes through when venturing down this path.

For the bride and groom, Hana's book will help you think through many of the important decisions that one needs to make in wedding planning (location), as well as to help you to decide which trivial details you may choose to avoid without regret (the city of the postage cancellation on the invitations.)

If you will be attending a wedding anytime soon, Hana's book really will help you to appreciate all the excruciating fine-tuned detail that goes into planning a wedding. (Don't complain if there's no cake, there's a dessert bar and there's a reason for that, that's what the bride and groom wanted!)

Personally, what I really liked about the book is that it gives some explanation and history about certain wedding traditions to help you put into perspective those ideas which you may want to preserve and those that you may want to drop. Hana also encourages people to be creative at their wedding, even if they are breaking tradition.

Best of all, Hana describes all of this with her great sense of dry humor as she describes the various characters and situations she is confronted with while dutifully attending to weddingland antics.

Hana is definitely a non-traditionalist. As a reader, I felt sympathetic to Hana while trying to buck convention on various wedding traditions. However, we realize that even the staunchest of people can get caught up in the pressure of the media, and our guests expectations in dictating to us 'how a wedding should be.' Thank you, Hana, for giving me a fresh perspective on weddings. I will never look at them the same way.

Hana Schank lives up to the promise of the subtitle ("How I Survived the Happiest Day of My Life") to her marriage memoir A More Perfect Union with humor, history, and a self-aware look at just how this modern, feminist-minded woman got caught up in everything from flower colors to save the date cards. "In just a few weeks they had become my new vital statistics," Schank writes about the post-engagement facts of her life as strangers swarm her to find out every detail of her nuptials, her "Rosetta stone" of a ring blaring to anyone she meets that she is about to get married.

Using her own foray onto wedding website The Knot's message boards and reading of wedding magazines as background, Schank proceeds to recount the ways the process getting married changed her, and what she learns about the wedding industry along the way. She's telling the story as both an observer and participant, going back and forth with facts she doles out about the corporate and cultural pressure on brides to how these intimately affected her.

Schank talks about the things one isn't usually supposed to mention when it comes to the joy of weddings--namely divorce, baby pressure, the picking and choosing of religious traditions. She acknowledges the clashes she and her husband have over the wedding planning, such as his anger that he's not once asked his opinion about their flower choices.

This is not simply a tirade against the wedding industry, or it would not be such a delight to read. Schank and her fiancé Steven are able to laugh at those around them--and themselves--pretending to shoot at each other with the scanner while adding to their registry, or joking on their way to retrieve her wedding dress:

"I feel like I should be yelling at some imaginary kids back there or something," I said.
Steven turned his head to the back of the van. "Stop hitting your brother!" he yelled.
I laughed. "Who wants to watch the Finding Nemo DVD again?" I asked the backseat.

What becomes crystal clear from page one is how much of their wedding planning is not only inclusive of, but dependent on, their families, from what to wear during the wedding weekend softball game to how Schank's divorced and divisive parents will be able to come together. Reading her final chapter, in which her fiance's brother gets a concussion during the softball game and various mishaps occur, I certainly teared up when Schank's parents join her to walk down the aisle, adding a blissful conclusion to the often-stressful weekend. "And right then I realize that this was the moment I planned the entire wedding for. If weddings are about fantasies, then this was mine: I wanted my family back together again, even if it was for a few fleeting seconds. And right then, as I bask in the warmth of my family, it is all worth it. The months of tears and obsession and ribbon and Martha Stewart. It is all worth it."

These sentences show that while her marriage is, in large part, about, as the rabbi tells Schank, "sovereignty," an us-against-the-world partnership between the bride and groom, in many other ways it is about joining two people, and two (or more) families, about the negotiations and compromises Schank and her relatives and her fiancé and his relatives all have to make to create this "happiest day" of her life.

Her final chapter, a post-script about the reactions to her book from various sides of the wedding world, is the most illuminating. Schank concludes that even so-called "bridezillas" don't think they're any more wedding-obsessed than anyone else, and even though she has herself marveled at why anyone could care so passionately about ribbon, she emerges with a sympathetic attitude toward brides of all stripes. When Schank writes about her feminist critics that, "It makes it easy for people to tell you you're not being the right kind of girl," she could be writing about any number of female realms, from mothering to sex work to bikini waxes to breast implants, in which women's choices are debated and attacked with viciousness. This isn't a how-to book (or a how-not-to book), but I'd imagine that many prospective brides and grooms will enjoy and learn from Schank's story, or at least have someone to commiserate with.

What makes this book special is that it's both a laugh- and cry-out-loud memoir, and an insider's look at the ways wedding hype has descended on Americans, particularly New Yorkers. Schank is smart enough to know when she's being manipulated, but it's her very awareness, sharpened by historical facts long with the very modern reality of one-bride-upsmanship and the quest for perfection in every area, even as she goes through the process of being (sometimes) swept away, that adds depth to A More Perfect Union.

Hanna Schank's story of "How I Survived the Happiest Day of My Life" is essential reading for any bride, groom, family member, wedding party member, newlywed, wedding guest, literature fan, or memoir fan. I read this book just a year after planning my own wedding, I had repeated moments of identification with Schank's experience. I would have loved to have been given this book as a bride-to-be.

Schank was a highly successful 30-year-old New York woman when she got engaged. She experienced a year of the tug of Bridezilla-ness despite her best efforts to keep her wedding plans in check. The became obsessed with her wedding colors despite her original plans to allow everyone to dress as they wished. She initially spurned registries and then became irritated with people who didn't believe in them. After laughing at the notion of Save the Date cards, Schank painstakingly hand-tied bows on hundreds of them, and was then crushed when they didn't garner effuse praise from the recipients. At some point, Schank succumbed to the belief in "My Day" and flew off the handle at vendors who refused alter their standard packages to meet her unique needs.

In addition to her first-hand bride experience, Schank possesses research skills and an MFA in non-fiction writing, so she is supremely qualified to reflect on her experience with the modern bridal industry. She muses about the invention of the registry, about the social networking of wedding site The Knot, about the "once in a lifetime" mantra of the wedding industrial machine (spend the money, this is once in a lifetime), and about traditional Victorian etiquette versus the realities of modern life.

Grammy serves as the perfect foil to all of Schank's wedding planning. Over the telephone, Schank has to repeatedly explain to her aged grandmother the wedding plans, the reasons behind traditions, and what she needs from her relatives. Schank's witty prose ties the story together well. One of my favorite passages is about the trickle of wedding gifts that start arriving after the invitations are mailed: "Other people called our parents and informed them that they didn't see anything on the registry they liked, and therefore wanted to know what else we might want. This was particularly confusing because the whole point of having a registry in the first place was so that people won't have to call you up and ask you what you want. In theory, everything you want is on the registry. And really, who cared if the gift-giver didn't like anything on the registry? It wasn't going to them ... People want to sent you something that they see as representative of their personality, even if their personality representation isn't necessarily something you want hanging around your house. You therefore must live with a butt-ugly set of ceramic dessert plates or a set of Judaic art depicting a Jewish bridge and groom in renaissance costume, as opposed to the really nice set of crystal highball glasses you spent several weeks hunting for."

The combination of personal experience, terrific research and historical perspective, and witty naration makes this memoir a surefire winner.

This all happened in a town. The problem was that this guy named Davy was addicted to alcohol. He started to hang around with other people that also drink. That only made it worse. Davy would have fantasies about a girl name Linda. Those people who he hangs around, Linda hang around with them too. One day he went to a place, the cops showed up, his friends started to ask if he was still a virgin and responded to that and he said, "yes." So his friends take him to Maxis house to do it. But he doesn't remember what had happened. Pretty soon they start dating. Davy had fell in love and so did Maxi. One day she told Davy that they should stop drinking, he agreed. They started to go to alcoholics anonymous. Both of them went, but at first they had problems, but as time passed Maxi didn't had any problem but Davy did. When they were one month with out drinking then they had dinner and went to the beach. That's when Maxi drowns and at the end Davy realizes he needs help, so he gets it.

I read this book for my 10th grade IGL Class!! I though it was a good book I know some people that were just like Davy and Maxi! In the beging of the book Davy has no friends and he starts haning out with the popular kids. Davy really like this hanging out with the popular ones because Linda this girl he really like was one of them!! All they did was sit around and drink all the time Davy started hanging out with Maxi one of the popular kids and they did stuff toghther and got drunk all the time!! They finally decided that they had a alcohol problem so they went to a counselor to get help. At the end of the book they are both clean!! That is my review and when you read this book I hope you take it serously and not be stupid and become one your self.

This is a chilling story, especially if you're an alcoholic! You want to hear a story that's not just a number on a page (statistic), then read this. You'll see how low you can get if you're not there already!

This book is awesome. it is deffenitly the best book i have ever read. i would probably read it again if i liked books but it seems that i hate them. i like the story of how davy gets drunk and gets horizontal with maxi. he finally starts to make friends but that all ends when maxi gets naked and drunk. She goes swimming and dies. he was sad. Davy went on a drinking bingeand wound up in the gutter.

This was a very good and scary book. It shows the truth of what happens to an alcoholic when they don't get help. When I first took this book off the shelf of the public library here, I was a bit skeptical of it because of the title. But since I've read it, it is one of my favorite books in the world!!

Few veterans describe themselves as "heroes." It's a painful word - filled with aspiration, horror and loss. Many veterans who write memoirs avoid the most devastating echoes of war - their own perceived culpabilities. It's understandable. Who wants to poke a finger into a festering wound?

Douglas Bergman is a brave man. Using a magnifying glass, he focuses a scorching sunbeam onto his own soul - allowing the reader to see his demons in great detail. It is unsettling in a world where few want to accept responsibility for their mistakes - where confessions are whispered litanies of shame washed away with a few penitential rosaries. My initial reaction was to look away but I soon found myself examining the author's broken heart like a curious onlooker drawn to a fiery car wreck.

This book is many things - a memoir, an adventure, a tribute, a confession and a sob. From the shiny hearse-white cover to the imagery-dense prose, Mr. Bergman's tale perplexes and intrigues. Vietnam was a conundrum for everyone. For the men who fought there, growing up was like peeling a scab off a half-healed wound. Boy soldiers drawn to the service to resolve other problems found new sorrows to occupy their nightmares. "Names I Can't Remember" is a close up view of a Vietnam Veteran's reaction to war - and a description of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) that still torments many who were mere babies in the 1960s.

The author plunges into his story with profane vigor. He amuses and shocks with an almost adolescent glee - as though he has returned to his rebellious, angst-ridden youth and is set on taking the reader with him. He uses literary flourishes that complicate the read like a translucent veil draped over lovers laboring together for their love. You can see the movements, hear them moan - but their faces are dim behind the silken sheen of the fabric. Mr. Bergman peoples "Names I Can't Remember" with garish characters that touched his life but have now faded into ghostly symbols - a motherly whore, a man with a cat on his shoulder, a doofus unable to function in the jungle, an alcoholic CO who confuses courage and foolhardiness -- a nun and a Vietnamese child trying desperately to survive. Despite this distance - or perhaps because of it, this book is powerful and literate. I found myself lingering over the pictures the author created in my head - almost as if this was a novel. It was easier to appreciate this work on that level than to acknowledge the reality of Mr. Bergman's anguish.

The Vietnam War was not a Disney Movie -- neither is this book. However, if you are a student of psychology, a poet - or someone who wants to understand the warrior in your life, this is a wonderful read.

"Names I Can't Remember" is a tough, brilliant read of one man's journey into Dante's Inferno. All human foibles and flaws are put out for display. Mr. Bergman dares the reader to forgive him as he hasn't been able to forgive himself for thirty years. A piece de la triumph! 5 military gold stars - Lillian Cauldwell

"...there is something Keseyesque or Hunter Thompson - like about Bergman's prose: often profane and at the same time, image rich." - Daily News, Clem Richardson 7/8/05

This is not a book filled with words on a page, it is a capturing of a mans inner guts spewed upon pages from his tortured memory. We see the ramblings of a young boy yanked from the unsafe world of his home and the bottle, to be immersed into the world of drunking decisions, adult behavior expected from a still nursing infant. You need to digest every word and feel his feelings. Some of his experiences will fill you with disgust, horror, the need to nurture, but your diet will never be the same after you digest this meal of feelings.
Devour it...chew it... spit it out if you need to... But dont just sit there and read it........

"You'll be on an emotional roller coaster ride while reading this work. The author has given us a very raw look at a young life destroyed by a dysfunctional family drowning in alcoholism and how he carried that with him during his No Slack tour. Doug was in the same company as I was and we walked the same villages, but never met, the places he describes are familiar to me as they will be to others who read him. I wasn't ready for the constriction I felt in my chest as parts of this book made me wonder how he slipped through the cracks as he performed his duty as a platoon leader in an alcoholic fog. Read the book, it's a raw look at a personal battle with a life almost destroyed by abuse, mingled with war. Names I Can't Remember will shake your senses and make you ill but you will find that once you start reading it you can't put it down."
"Yankee Jim" Simchera - A Company 2/327th Infantry,101st Airborne Vietnam: 1969-70

Delerfield's engaging history of the men who led Napoleon's armies across Europe is essential for anyone who is interested in this period of history. While not an in-depth study, the author did an excellent job of bringing the marshals to life, especially the larger-than-life Ney and Murat. These men made their imprint upon Europe as no one before or since. The reader practically becomes a part of the great campaigns of the Grand Armee across Europe and the torment of the Peninsula War.

While this book is not exceptionally well written it is very readable and keeps the reader engrossed in the events of the time. Even for any accomplished student of the Napoleonic Wars this is a must read.

Aquellos que les guste un poco de historia es un buen libro para conocer más alrededor de Napoleon Bonaparte

My only gripe is that it wasn't 2000 pages so it could have really covered all of the ground. As it was the book offers lots of good insights into many of the lesser known Marshals like Suchet and Davout, two fighting marshals who were sorely missed at Waterloo.

Buy and read this book.

You will give Delderfield credit for his vision, his ambition and his broad coverage to the Age of Napoleon. This book is a synthesis of the age and a complement to all your other Napoleonic reading. It is an enjoyable book which weaves back and forth and round and round as the author tells about the personalities of and interrelationships among the 26 men who became Marshals of France.

There are many reasons I like Delderfield himself. The leading reason is that he values selflessness, effort, merit and ability. Though British, he could have hardly been more American in that respect. He was not the often encountered British snob who promotes the view that Napoleon was an ogre.

I share Delderfield's view, unabashedly, because I am a Son of the American Revolution and I hope also a true Patriot. While we owe our cultural heritige to the English in very large measure, I believe we owe our freedoms mostly to the French.

Delderfield is critical about the 26 men and their Emperor when needed, but he understands the great achievements of the time. He appreciates the blows that the French made and took in the name of liberty and progress.

I thought I was buying a book biographical portraits like Aubrey's Brief Lives, Seutonius' Twelve Caesars or Plutach's Lives. But, what I got was the whole story of the Age of Napoleon retold in a dramatic serial fashion (it would be a great HBO story) and in the action story form of Delderfield's own fiction Seven Men of Gascony.

The book organized according the normal conventions around the coalitions and campaigns. The story line begins at the end of the Age of Frederick the Great in order to bring the early lives of the oldest Marshals, such as Augereau, into focus. The story finally ends about 70 years later with the Funeral of Napoleon led by Marshal Soult to the tomb in the Invalides.

The story revolves around the twelve or so basic campaigns and the role of the respective Marshals. The book is fresh and it does not repeat known erroneous myths or trite cliches.

From this book we get insights into the interacting character of the 27 men (Napoleon included and chief among them). Very few of the faults of the Marshals are left unexposed by the end of the story. Those who achieve the highest place in Delderfield's pantheon and remain relatively unscathed are Davout the Iron Marshal; Ney, the Bravest of the Brave, Lannes, the Roland of France; and Poniatowski, Prince of Poland.

The other Marshals are treated well and complimented for their roles and abilities -- though depreciated for their weaknesses and vanities. They are put on a lesser shelf revealing more than anything the values of the author. I happen to agree with Delderfield that adherence to duty, bravery and loyalty are the three highest standards to judge these men.

All of the Marshals have an interesting personal story. We have to give all of them credit for ability and bravery beyond the common varieties. None of them became Marshals of France because they were incompetents or cowards. The abiding values of the Napoleonic Creed were merit and joie de virve or elan. The Marshals, on the whole, personified these values.

The Emperor could forgive vanity as in Murat; disloyalty as in Bernadotte and greed, as in Messena. He forgave them all, and many times, in the name of merit (also probably in the name of necessity which is often a reflection of the same thing).

I recommend this book for three reasons. First, it is organized. It gives a compact lucid picture of the chessboard of the age. It tells us a about how the campaigns and politics were structured. Second, it is complementary to other work such as Gallo, Tolstoy, Chandler and so on. It provides an additive perspective on the events which can enhance and enrich your reading of all the other literature on Napoleon. Third, it is literate and enjoyable. As I have already said, I share strongly the values and sensibilities expressed by Delderfield.

I suspect Delderfiled's perspectives on the French and Americans were shaped by interactions in World War II and World War I. The 20th Century Delderfeld, if placed in the 18th Century, would have been a political sympathizer in the American Revolution and he might have crossed the Channel to march with Davout, Lanne, Bessieres, Oudinot or Ney.

I don't mean to say he would be a traitor to England, I do not wish to dishonor him that way. What I mean is, from the benefit of perfect hindshight, he would have seen the vision of marking men by ability. He he would have marched off of the old Road to Serfdom, as Hayek called it, and onto the new Road to Freedom which was then being beaten across Europe by the French.

As will all books about this age the principal subject is Napoleon himself, who by any objective standard was the greatest leader of men in battle the world has evern known. As is usually the case with a leader, you will see in this book that any given leader cannot do everything in a complex enterprise and so must organize around himself a way that expresses his own goals, interests and competencies.

By examining the complexities of the individual Marhals and their interactions, you will be looking into the heart and mind of the Emperor himself. You will see why at Waterloo Napoleon was no longer himself. He was no longer able to articulate his visions without his Marshals of years gone by. You can speculate, for example, that if Berthier was present at Waterloo, the calvary would have stayed in reserve for the coup de grace and that Grouchy would have not been lost, hence blocking Blucher from the field, while Napoleon finished Wellington -- who was at the time already beaten on the hillsides of Waterloo.

While Richard the III would have given his kingdom for a horse, Napoleon lost his Empire for want of his Marshals.

I flew through this book. The narrative style of writing lent itself to a quick and enjoyable read. I came away with a better overall picture of those who were surrounding Napoleon.

Although the subject is broad in the sense that the author tackles so many people. He none-the-less does an excelent job of rounding out a solid picture of Naploeon's marshals, their personalites, their ambitons...flaws and credits.

There are several marshals that I would like to read more about based on the information gleaned from within these pages. Understandably the author could not devote as much time as he may have liked to each and every member of this group. He did, however achieve the goal of introducing us to all of them and more than just a basic glossing over.

What I liked most is that the author took the events and let time itself introduce and develop the marshals rather than simply lining each one up and giving the reader an encyclopedia type synopsis of each individual. This really brought each marshal into better focus in terms of what was going on at the time and why they entered the picture whent hey did, as well as what they were doing prior to entering into the service of the Empire.

I would recommend this book to anyone interested in Napoleon and also intersted in getting a better feel for those around him and what drove them to thier positions.

This is a well-crafted, very modern story about the joys and sorrows of friendship. Cant wait to read more from McKinnon.

I loved this book. It dares, which is more than I can say for most of the novels I've read in the last few years. Fiction has become all the same thing, seemingly meant to make both writer and read feel good about themselves. This novel isn't about that. McKinnon's writing is alive, her characters are vivid and her story is wickedly fun. Reading the other reviews, it is clear that the author's refusal to tell the reader what to think has [upset] some readers and perplexed others; the smart ones, though, know that she purposely encloses you in the suffocating point of view of a narcissist--here's what it's like to live in the skin of a vain, short-sighted, self-glorifying young woman 24/7--as if to say you'd better watch out, world, or this is what we'll all become. But Becky is not a mouthpiece, she is a character whom McKinnon embodies fully and without flinching. I can't wait to see who and what she'll take on next.

Recently, we've been bombarded by the fiction publishing industry with woman characters that are ambivalent about their independence and obsessed with the desire to be all things to everyone (especially to men). The women of Narcissus Ascending cannot be reduced to these banal caricatures. Instead, Karen McKinnon, in her darkly ironical first novel, gives us two rivalrous characters - Becky and Callie - whose complex, obsessive, self-delusional personalities jumps off the page. The seeming authenticity of these characters makes them fascinating to read about. This is a unique and wonderful book that I highly recommend.

Narcissus Ascending, the initial novel offering by transplanted New York psychologist and writer Karen McKinnon is exactly what you expect it to be when you first see it on the bookstore shelf. And it is things you never expected it to be.

The title of the work and its modest size (214 pages) may lead you to believe it contains the usual dose of pretentious self-indulgence that often accompany a first novel, which this one does. Two of the first four words in the opening paragraph are "I" and unless you are among the most voracious and academic of readers, not a few times will you find yourself reaching for the Roget's to get a handle on the sometimes reachng vocabulary. But don't let that keep you from picking it up. This look at the relationships between a group of late twenty-something friends that don't spend their lives huddled in a New York City coffeehouse immediately grabs hold of your interest and rarely lets go.

Written in a unique "diary-like" narrative from the perspective of the main character, Becky, McKinnon's writing structure here is perfect for the subject matter and is a large part of what makes this such an enjoyable read. The lack of dialogue punctuation and the often combined thoughts and sentences make the reader have to work a little harder, but helps to stay atuned to the story line and each of its subjects.

The story is centered around four friends wrapped up in the melieu of New York's East Village who, aside from the day-to-day travails of Manhattan life are each dealing with the mental residue deposited by a fifth character, Callie, whom, though we don't actually meet until the last 80 pages of the book, we come to know and loathe...and fear, but are anxious to meet. The setting is well written and through the interaction and thoughts of each character, we are given a look into four distinct lives and points of view; neurosis, desire, ambition and all. McKinnon walks us through their relationships, individually and collectively, and as we progress, have no choice but to make comparisons with our own lives. Their private thoughts, personal battles and betrayals and the rationalizing of sexual indiscretions and desires are upfront and honest, to the point we are left to wonder how many of the characters and experiences are autobiographical or if the writer is just this good.

McKinnon does deserve a little slap for not reaching further into the character Dahlia and how her life as an incest survivor fuels her thoughts and actions, but should be highly praised for her research into modernist artist Becky. If we didn't know the writer was a psychologist, her depth of detail regarding her artist's struggle for professional self-definition and the art world itself would have us looking forward to her next show at the MoMA.

The storyline focuses largely on the angst and fears of its main players and their shallow, adolescent need to acquire revenge for past deeds done them by the protragonist Callie. But there is an unspoken subtext you can not help but delve into, questions about the foundative solvency in today's society you can not help but ask. Because most of the character development is so thorough and well defined, we can't help but wonder if present-day adults are really this [messed] up and whether we fall into one of two categories; those as equally disfucntional and in need of therapy as the characters we're reading about or those who are fortunate enough to have grown up.

A quick-paced, cozy-up-on-the-sofa-for-an-evening novel, Narcissus Ascending is a fun read that takes an naked, revealing look into the self-centered aspects of the human condition we all enjoy...or suffer from. But don't believe for a second that after you close the cover, it won't have you thinking.

Perhaps more than you'd like to.

I came across this debut novel recently and on cracking open the cover I didn't look up until I had finished all 200 plus pages several hours later. McKinnon's style of writing is impressive and her ability to render the novel's characters into flesh and blood is mind-whirling. The examination of the complexity of friendships that form when self-absorbed people (and aren't we surrounded more and more by them) find each other is sobering...and, I hate to admit it (and so will you), familiar. I can't wait to read more of her writing.

In this third part of Adams' technical writings, you'll find a guide to go from what a camera recorded (it talks about a negative, but can be well applied to a digital raw file) to a fine print delivering "what you saw and felt" to the viewer.

Even if it applies to B&W, I find that much of the content can be applied to color work if you think a bit more about it - mostly now, in the digital age with separated luminance and chrominance controls.

You'll also read some good ol' kitchen recipes about developers and toning... These will be less and less useful, but can bring back the smell of the darkroom to your memory ;o)... And quite often, the principle that based the recipe can be applied to another media.

A reference, whether shooting film, digital or glass plates (and of invaluable interest for the two former).

Ansel Adams is the master of photography, black and white, but still photographic principles and concepts have been throughly tried and tested by him and he teaches you so much in his series starting with "The Camera" and ending up with this book which focuses more on the final piece. The 2nd book in the series is also so very crucial because it outlines and describes his "Zone System" in great detail. A must have for any avid photographer and a great shelf reference for any professional. Now go out and shoot.. waste some film for crying out loud and get some awesome shots :)

The book is excellent. Although these techniques are not widely applied today, with appropriate experience and thinking this knowledge can be applied and transferred to modern software like Adobe Photoshop. It can help relate modern and classic photography printing processes (traditional vs computerized).

One little remark would be for the publisher. The paper the book is printed is gloss with quite a high reflectance index. This results in making reading the book at certain angles quite impossible for your eyes.

This is one of a few books in this Ansel Adams series. He discusses a number of aspects of the print, it's limitations, and many techniques that can be used to exploit print characteristics. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is at all serious about B&W photography whether developing your own prints or not.

In this book, Adams said Expression is more important than reality, idea more important than fact, the print more important than its subject. For it is only in the print that such magnificence can be unfailingly orchestrated. Those words made me think that what is good photograph. The book opens with a thoroughly enjoyable, albeit brief, history of photography before getting down to explain printing techniques.

The majority of the text concentrates it's efforts in educating the reader in the art of B&W photography. This book tells readers that what are good prints making techniques. After reading this book you will feel like that your printing skills are very improved. The reader will see many wonderful pictures as examples, that will surely create a better impression as to what type of pictures Adams takes.

Eddie Dee is one of the finest detective story writers today. He has the unique ability to keep the story captivating without sacrificing details.

As a retired NYPD Lt. and a great admirer of Ed Dee's writing I find his latest effort his best. His vignettes on police work jog my memory and I recall the way "The Job" used to be. Dee is by far the best writer of police procedurals today and the heir apparent to Ed McBain.

Start at the beginning and work your way through Ed Dee's marvelous stories. You'll be captivated by his "arresting" tales of police work in the Big Apple. You'll fall in love with Anthony Ryan and his beautiful wife Leigh. You'll laugh at his partner--even find yourself counting his sneezes. You become a part of their lives, because Ed Dee's characters jump off the pages at you.

My only complaint is how long we have to wait between books!

As a retired cop from the NYPD Ed Dee has taken me back to the old "Job" that I have missed. He shares the NY cops best and worst fears and experiences. This is the most accurate telling of a cops life and the way investigations are conducted. From his descriptions of the station houses from the front desk to the politics at the puzzle palace, (1 Police Plaza)and the real cops good and bad. And I thought me and my old partner were the only guys who called each other "Pally"! An old term we heard many moons ago in an old Bogart movie! If you want to see what it used to be like to pound the beat and investiagte crimes in the Big Apple this is the guy to read...Ed keep'em coming, Pally! I can't what to start my next tour and collar up!

I'm a police officer with a fifty man department in Idaho. Much about how my department functions and how the NYPD works is very different. But I've also been suprised to see there is more that my dept has in common with the gigantic NYPD. Dee is expert at capturing the feeling of law enforcement, the undeniable truths of being a cop no matter where you're at. this is Dee's best work to date. He takes his characters to new levels, and his writing has achieved a sophistication. It's a daring move in having one of the characters lose his son, but it's effective. Not something that one sees very often in a book franchise. All in all I can't reccommend Dee's books highly enough. I find his work to be engrossing and fast moving, he's one of the authors whose newest book I'm always keeping an eye out for. Try him. I think he'll enjoy his books as much as I do.

SUFREN SUS PROPIAS TRAGEDIAS ...¡QuÉ error !
Este libro sabio, te guìa para que guìes a su criatura a que no solamente no sufra, sino hasta llegue a celebrar ( o por lo menos a aceptar ) la llegada de su "rival "

muy sencillo.
Pero preparar a tu hijo o hija mayor para que lo acepte con alegría auténtica, SON PALABARS MAYORES.
Luego anda uno por ahi de quejoso de que "los hermanitos no se llevan bien"
¿Cómo se van a llevar bien si al mayor no se le pidió su opinión y no se le preparó debidamente, y el chiquito siente los celos del mayor?
NO se trata simplemente de anunciarle que va a tener un hermanito: ESO ES MUY CRUEL.
HAY QUE DARLE LAS ARMAS Y LA SEGURIDAD EN SI MISMO AL NENE MAYOR !

Y TAN SABIA ES LA AUTORA DE ESTE LIBRO !
Ella si nos transmite la tragedia del mayorcito cuando sabe que viene otro nene en camino.... Y NOS DA EL REMEDIO !

ANTES DE COMENZAR A COMPRARLE COSAS Y ROPA...¡COMPRA ESTE LIBRO !
Es indispensable para que no sufra tu hijo o hija mayor, y NOS GUÍA A PONER LAS BASES PARA QUE HAYA UNA RELACIÓN DE AMOR Y NO DE CELOS ENTRE LOS HERMANITOS...
De veras, amiga...es vital para el futuro feliz de toda la familia y para el corazoncito del primogénito !

Nos fue muy ùtil cuando naciò nuestro tercer hijo..porque cuando el segundo anunciò su llegada, el primogènito sufriò lo indecible en el aspecto emocional !
Esta obra psicològica, te DA LOS PASOS MÀS INTELIGENTES PARA PREPARAR AL MAYORCITO PARA LA LLEGADA DEL NUEVO BEBÈ !

I have one and will give you information on the Hummel Silk Carpet.(The Book lacks this information)
On the back is a tag stitched to it saying:

M.J. Hummel
ORIGINAL HUMMEL SILK CARPET
HANDKNOTTED IN BEIJING, CHINA.

ARS AG, ZUG, SWITZERLAND

LIMITED EDITION :10 /50

Also there is a tag attached to the SILK CARPET written in both Chinese and English
ZHE JIANG SILK RUG

I am giving this information because the book does not have a picture of this HUMMEL SILK CARPET and not sure about the information I just posted.
VALUE UNKNOWN but it is Very Beautiful

not only is this a complete guide -- but it is so easy to use -- anyone owning or buying Hummel's should have this -- I only wish I could find Guides like this for my other collectables --

This book is very well illustrated, well layed-out, easy to use, and the pictures are very beautiful. It's full of information, explains more than I expected, and it is a MUST for Hummel collectors.

I have all, since the first publication, of Robert Miller's Price Guide to MI Hummel Figurines, Plates, Miniatures and More.
Mr. Miller has all the knowledge one would expect & want to find in his books after much research and many trips to Germany to gain this knowledge. This is THE HUMMEL BIBLE! I highly recommend this book to all Hummel collectors or to anyone interested in the collecting of fine arts. Very well written with explicit details about Sister MI Hummel's life in Massing, Germany & her schooling. Each known Hummel is pictured & tells of the Master Artist who molded each three dimentional figurine from the drawings by Sister beginning in the 1930's to the present TMK markings. A great investment for Insurance purposes when appraising your figurines by The Hummelking!

Even though it's proclaimed by expert collectors as the absolute source of information about Hummel figurines, Robert Miller's reference work is easy for amateurs as well. He provides insightful guidance in determining value and quality as well as interesting tidbits about production and variations in the figurines. His work is referenced by many sellers in internet auctions, but is also helpful in figuring out just what you already have. As a rank beginner, I had no problem in following his material and ascertaining the value of an inherited collection. It was also useful in helping me determine additions that I wanted to make to the collection.

My daughters loved this book. Both of them start to play peakaboo when I read this too them. They always laughted everytime I read the book.

I purchased this book for my son when he was about 10 months old and it's been a huge hit from the very beginning. His eyes light up when I ask him to get his "peek-a-boo" book. He loves to lift the hands to show who's hiding. It's a family favorite!

My son loves to play with the flaps on this book. There isn't much educational about the book, but he smiles when he opens the hands of each sesame street character. It is more of a fun book.

My 9 month old loves this book. He has a great time looking behind the flaps to play 'peek a boo.' I highly recommend!

My 20 month old was given this as a gift. I thought it would be much too young for her, but found she absolutely loved it! The flaps are easily rippable, yet she hasn't tried to tear them off (another surprise). I think she likes trying to identify which Sesame Street character is on each page.

All in all, though it's a very simple book, babies will really love it. It's especially good on airplanes (or the car I'd imagine), as babies seem to like to read it again and again.