O Books

Eugene O'Neill is definitely one of the greatest playwrights of all time. I saw Long Days Journey Into Night a few years ago and was just struck by the true dysfunctional family that hearkens to society of today.

Moon takes a character from that great play, James Tyrone, Jr, (who incidentally is O'Neill's brother -- the entire play is autobiographical in nature) and draws readers into the tragic world of the Hogans, and Tyrone. The raw emotions of the characters become apparent with the read -- a difficult thing to do for readers if they have not seen the play -- and also is startling honest about how jealousy, fear and desperation all meld into one.

Definitely a must read, if you want to consider yourself in the know of American literature, but Moon does at times seem trying, with blatant symbolism(the moon is quite noticeable throughout the play) scratching at the reader.

Sometimes plays are rediscovered after what seems to be utter failure, a valuable insight for all, I think. O'Neill's A Moon for the Misbegotten was rejected by pre-Broadway audiences in Michigan and Ohio in the 1940s, effectively preventing the play from having a New York premiere during the author's lifetime. In each of the following two decades, attempts at New York productions failed. It took Jason Robards and Colleen Dewhurst to ignite the play for New York in the 1970s, under the direction of the legendary Jose Quintero.

O'Neill's playwriting career is oddly similar to that of Sam Shepard: He had an early series of realistic short plays, followed by a period of experiment, when he explored a variety of artistic impulses and writing styles. Eventually, he wrote a handful of plays, rooted in realism, sometimes autobiographical, which revealed, nevertheless, what he'd learned through experiment. In the best of these, The Iceman Cometh, Long Day's Journey into Night, and A Moon for the Misbegotten, O'Neill built vehicles of immense emotional power with psychologically rich characters and fairly organic plots.

MOON revolves around the Irish-American earth mother, Josie Hogan, a tall, rough-hewn woman, who promotes a course image of herself to cover a fragile and vulnerable interior. The other two "imposters" of the play are her father, Phil Hogan, and the landlord of their tired Connecticut farm, James Tyrone (based on O'Neill's brother), a third-rate Broadway actor, who has drunk his life away, chasing loose women and acting a fool. Nevertheless, Josie secretly harbors feelings for him. The play hinges on what happens when her father, through a clever, inebriated deception, convinces her to blackmail Tyrone into selling them the farm rather than selling it to their rich, obnoxious neighbor (for a much higher price). The subterfuge leads to one of the most poignant love scenes in American dramatic literature, as Josie and Jim Tyrone discover that they know and understand the person beneath the mask better than they each thought, and it's still not enough to unite them.

O'Neill's original title for the play was The Moon Bore Twins. We can be grateful for the change, though the original title does carry a measure of insight with it, for Josie and Tyrone are, if not identical twins psychologically, at least inversions of the same chord-doomed to occupy separate, mutually exclusive worlds.

The play contains an amazing shift of tone from the first half to the last half. In act one and two we are treated to a rather comic display of Irish inflected patter between Josie, her father, and the rest of the five characters. In the last two acts, the tone becomes more serious and bittersweet, which may explain why it took so long for audiences to catch up with it. The play definitely catches the viewer or reader off guard ... wishing that these two ne'er-do-wells could save each other from the future they have each envisioned. O'Neill's revised title says a lot about the play, for Moon is not as dark as Long Day's Journey, nor as demanding as Iceman, but it is O'Neill deploying all his gifts as a dramatist, writing fully realized roles containing emotional power, wit, humor, and pathos. His language reflects people who are driven to speak to stay alive. No one is writing like this today, except perhaps August Wilson.

O'Neill's "last" play, written and revised several times concurrently with his other four late plays, never made it to Broadway during his lifetime. After a lukewarmly received tour through the Midwest, O'Neill became dissatisfied with the production, in part because he was increasingly in poor health and also because he was never happy with the play to begin with. He finally gave up on the work, and published it with a curt, apologetic prefatory note, saying "I cannot presently give it the attention required for appropriate presentation."

In spite of its inauspicious beginnings, many consider it his greatest work. I reserve that laurel for "Long Day's Journey," but of all O'Neill's works, this one reads as well on the page as it looks on the stage. Its lead character, James Tyrone, is a thinly disguised version of O'Neill's brother, who drank himself to death in a sanatorium the year after their mother died. O'Neill resurrects his brother for the theater and throws him drunkenly into the arms of an impossible match: Josie Hogan, the daughter of a tenant living on land he inherited. She is, perhaps, O'Neill's most fully fleshed female lead--literally and figuratively. Strong-willed and strong-armed, she simultaneously flaunts and scorns her reputation as a "terrible wanton woman" (an image that is more invented than real), but it is immediately obvious that her true love is Tyrone himself.

The plot of the play rests on a swindle planned by Josie and her father, who mistakenly believe that Tyrone plans to sell their land to an insufferably pampered blueblood from the neighborhood. Their attempt at conning Tyrone with alcohol and blackmail, which resembles a tawdry version of every outrageous scheme concocted by Lucy Ricardo, quickly misfires as a half-comic caper that brings to all concerned a melancholy (but not exactly tragic) sense of loss and wistfulness.

You can see O'Neill struggling to redeem the brother he loved but never quite understood or forgave. But it is Josie who ultimately wins the audience's affections and sympathy.

I loved this play the first second i saw it on broadway. it gave me vibrations all over my body every time Cherry Jones said a line. It was an amazing story of true love and to give yourself over to someyone. And talking to Hope Davis made me cry after, because she said to me "I've never seen love so strong." I do hope you give Eugene O'Neill a chance and buy this amazing play. And try to see any production of his work being broadway or smaller productions. Thank you!

I saw the play on Broadway back in May 2000. If Eugene O'Neill's ghost were walking the aisles of the theater that night he would be proud of the performance that night. The play is timeless as it is cherished as the best love story created. The actors were superb in their portrayal of O'Neill's character. Gabriel Byrne was excellent in his role as James Tyrone the sometimes actor, full time drunken landlord of Phil Hogan (played by Roy Dotrice) and Josie Hogan (played by Cherry Jones). Cherry Jones' character Josie brought out a beautiful heart of a hulking frame of a woman with a reputation of being ornery like her father, who longs for the man she loves, James Tyrone. Every moment is the ebb tide of emotion stirring in the hearts of the two misbegotten crossed lovers. Even to the very end, of the misfortunate disappointment it will stop your heart and make you take a deeper breath again.

A theory so plausible and eloquently argued that you want to give yourself a V-8 forehead slap. Freedman looks at the Ten Commandments (yes, he addresses ALL ten of them) in relationship to the Primary History in the Bible (the nine books from Genesis through Kings, minus Ruth). Along the way he disburses some very interesting information that will enhance Bible readers' future experience with the Bible texts: he explains the practice of "the pairing of texts" in the Hebrew Bible, makes compelling points about Jeremiah's relationship to the Primary History, contrasts monotheism with henotheism and monolatry, and gives a fascinating explanation of how the Hebrew divining stones, the Urim and Thummim, probably worked.

I've always felt Bible readers have made the mistake of elevating the Torah/Pentateuch at the expense of the rest of the Old Testament. Freedman's thesis seems to defend the integrity of the Hebrew Scriptures as a whole. He shows how the Israelites broke each of the Commandments they received in the wilderness. Not only broke them, but with minimal adjustments to sequencing, Freedman shows that they broke them in order. This breaking of the Commandments constitutes a "scarlet thread" that runs through the Primary History and that ultimately explains why the Israelites suffered defeat and exile at the hands of God's enemies. But there are ten commandments and only nine books in the Primary History. Which commandment does not get represented by a specfic sinful act in a book of its own is a mystery Freedman does not answer until the last chapter. The suspense makes this highly accessible scholarly work, a bit of a page-turner.

If you read this book and enjoy it, you might also like the equally fascinating but more ambitious "Surpassing Wonder: The Invention of the Bible and the Talmuds," by Donald Harman Akenson.

No bones about it, this book is well-written. Freedman gives a quick review on the development of Hebrew monotheism out of the older Canaanite polytheism, and then proceeds onto his argument. The argument is well-written and at least superficially persuasive, but after thinking about it I'm not sure I'm convinced. Freedman makes too many assumptions about the "symmetry" of the Ten Commandments that have no precedent in the text itself; in his discussion of the symmetry of the Bible as a whole I was afraid he was getting dangerously close to numerology or such similar pseudoscience, but thankfully, as befits his reputation, he stuck to accepted methods of analysis in the end. But sticking to accepted standards does not make your argument air-tight: as Freedman himself admits, there are many exceptions to his "rule," which he dismisses, but which I find personally to be damaging to his thesis. The fact that he has to make covetousness a "background commandment" is, as has been noted, special pleading, as is the placing of the first two violations in Exodus, with none in Genesis (none that he counts anyway; in reality there are many in Genesis). This means that the nine commandments are broken in eight books instead of nine. His rearrangement of the order of commandments 6-8 is not as solidly based as he claims either, and there is actually no breaking of the fifth commandment (the example Freedman gives is in reality a law, not an actual event, but he makes an excuse for this as well). Overall, I think the "patterns" Freedman claims to detect are just coincidence, but this is a great book to read none-the-less because it is honest, scholarly, and novel.

It's rare to find a well-written, well-informed, highly-original book on any subject, much less the heavily-mined territory of Biblical Studies. Unlike Bloom's The Book of J, this book is actually written by a respected biblical scholar.

The book explains many of the unusual word choices and locutions you encounter if you manage to read the whole thing, especially the differing order of commandments across the Old and New Testaments. Some of the discussion smacks of special pleading (can't make the commandment against covetousness fit your theory? must fit in as a 'background commandment' for the rest...).

Overall, however, the author makes a very persuasive case for an outside editor who edited in references to the 10 commandments thruout the early books of the Old Testament. The author treats the subject matter with reverence and tact, and the 'editor theory' helps explain the remarkable cohesiveness and literary quality to a book compiled over a millenium.

Nicely illustrated and written almost as a detective novel, this book is highly recommended. Plus, you now have only nine commandments to worry about (oops, forgot that covetousness one)!

Freedman's premise is a little stretched. He has to eliminate one commandment and shuffle the order of three others. Nonetheless his work is an intriguing, thematic study of the Hebrew Bible. His conclusions challenge conventional notions of Biblical authorship and compel the reader to dive in and explore both the narrative and the moral message of the Bible.

Re: the omitted "10th" commandment -- it's no mystery that coveting was also the commandment that tripped up the Apostle Paul (see Romans 7). While breaking the other commandments would be known by outward acts of disobedience, the commandment against coveting was the commandment that preceded and underlay the breaking of the others, yet remained hidden within a man's soul (and sometimes even hidden from himself) until it manifested itself by the breaking of one of the other commandments. James also lays the blame for man's sins on coveting (James 4:1ff). Freedman is right to single out this commandment from the other nine, as it's the scarlet thread (Freedman's oft-used term for his thesis) that ties the other nine -- indeed, man's whole fallen nature, INCLUDING the cause of the Fall (Eve's desire/coveting of the forbidden fruit) -- together. Recognizing this leads one to the Apostle's cry (and solution) in Romans 7:24-25. Failing to recognize this leads to the abortive attempts at righteousness that the Apostle also describes in Romans 10:3.

But back to the book: This is so well-written, so accessible, that the most ill-educated (biblically) layman or laywoman can read this with pleasure and understanding. Bravo, David Noel Freedman! Even if you don't agree with all of it, it's worth reading all of it.

Now, the first Nuisances is absolutely hilarious. It's creative and unique, and adds a whole new dynamic to your regular D20 campaign. The directors cut gives you a whole lot more of that, it takes what Nuisances did well and does it even better, and the full color art looks great too. I look forward to even more Nuisances stuff in the future.

Expanded with a new introduction, still crazy, developed to deliver laughs and groans in play as well as in reading, this is a worthy return to one of Skirmisher's deserved flagship titles.

There is, quite possibly, no other fantasy roleplaying game book as irreverent and off-color as this one, and I would not have thought something with so many scatological references could be so funny. Nuisances: Director's Cut is, however, absolutely hilarious, and even better than its predecessor, Nuisances: A Comprehensive OGL (d20 System) Sourcebook for Fantasy Role-Playing Games. I am glad to have a copy of both, however, as the original is available in print format and this expanded version only on CD-ROM as a PDF.

You can't keep a good half-human down! This latest edition of the highlariously playable Nuisances has been playtested and expanded upon to give gamers more to groan about and DMs more to smile about, and vise versa! Nothing like an already tiny halfling with the Dwarfism defect (which grants and extra Feat choice as well) to really ankle bite and frustrate the legions of tall gnolls around the countryside!

Seriously- the first Nuisances book made me laugh until I cried and my stomach hurt so of course when I saw this extended version, I had to own it... The beautiful new design is awesome and the additions to the original material made buying this book worth every penny! This book is a lot of fun and anyone who likes d20 games needs to have it!

I normally don't really care for a book that is so full of sadness, but although its sad this book is so full of hope that it makes you believe happy endings are possible. After her husband of 19 years decides he is bored with her and starts having affairs and leaves her and their twin teenagers, Maureen seriously considers committing suicide. Just as she is about to drive her car into direct traffic, the ghost of her childhood/teenage boyfriend Bobby appears and stops her. Bobby was killed in a traffic accident years ago when he was traveling home to tell Maureen that he loved her. Now Bobby has been unable to "move on" and knows his mission is to teach Maureen how to be happy. Maureen's selfish husband Dan has erased all her self esteem and confidence, with the help of several dreams where a self aware Maureen revisits the past and makes a couple of subtle changes, Maureen learns that she has always lived to please her family not herself. When Maureen meets the perfect man "Matt" she learns what it really feels like to be loved by a man but she is terrified of being hurt again. Not to spoil the story, but there was a time when I was really upset about how the story was going but I hung in to the end and there was redemption. Happy endings are delivered in several different ways. Wonderful, unique story...Great!

This is a great book if you want a quick read. It is a terrific vacation book. The character is a very likeable person and her story is terrific.

I recommended it to my daughter and she then gave it to some friends to read. This book shows character growth.

This is my absolute favorite book. I read this book as a teenager and fell in love with the book. I misplaced it and have been looking for it. I am excited to fall in love all over again with the characters of Once in a Lifetime. If you haven't read this book it is a must to pick it up and get to know the characters.

I discovered Flannery years ago via a friend. If you want some romance,intrigue and fantasy for a respite from the awful day's hectic rat race, cut off the phone, get in your pj's,some popcorn and dream along with the BEST writer to melt time,space and hopefulness and LOVE into one heck of a good read,yet you will be wistfully waiting in your day dreams for a man just like you heard it could be. Your prince has arrived, yet worth the work to nab 'im. A author definitely needing to have her books come to us in film formulation.

I found this book 5 years ago. I have read it 4 times. Ms. O'Day-Flannery hits the bullseye. Forty-something women finding herself with no husband after 20 years of marriage and dedication to her family. She caught the essence of feelings, hopes and dreams. Mine at least. I believe my guardian angel lead me to this book. I want to thank the author for giving hope, that there is light at the end of the tunnel. Each time I read it, there is something more I learn about myself and Maureen. Thank you.

Petersen's "One Year Book of Psalms:Devotionals" is an enjoyable read. It takes the appropriate amount of time with each Psalm. The shorter ones are given a day, while longer ones are broken up so that one really gets a chance to get into it. This can be used for personal reading and it could also be shared and done with a group. I highly recommend it.

If you are like me and find reading the bible sometimes too daunting a task, pick up this devotional and you get a little dose of spiritual blessing every day and in a format that you will relate to.

I love the book of Psalms and this is a great little devotional book. There is so much comfort and guidance in the Bible and I like the fact that this breaks Psalms down into bit size pieces to chew on all day long. I do wish the book was spiral bound though to make it stay open easier for my devotional study.... but then again I wish ALL books were spirial bound.

Not only do you get to read the psalms... but a nice explaination with each one as well. Very well written... it's worth a lot more than I paid for it!

Peterson's Book, 365 Days in the Psalms is excellent filled with good illustrations from ancient days as well as modern. Peterson does a fine job and I highly recommend this book for those who want to know God better.

Ann Everitt

"çà, c'est paris"! is a popular french song from WWII period. Parisians sang it when Paris was delivered by US and french troops. This is the song I started whislting when I read the first pages and table of contents of this book. It's good to read paris guide books where you're not obliged to go through 50 pages of historical descriptions before you understand what paris is all about. This book is not dull. It is well documented even if this documentation has nothing to do with "classical" culture. It belongs to a tradition in French publishing business: collection of essays written by famous writers about a specific place. In this case, I do not know the writers (I am french)and am not influenced by their past works. One could imagine to publish the same kind of books with texts from Victor Hugo, Ernst Hemmingway and other famous writers.

I took one of the Traveler's Tales books on my trip to Paris, and bought this one when I got back. One of the stories made me miss Paris so much that I wept. I'm doling the stories out slowly to make them last. If you love Paris, this book will keep your psychic connection alive.

If I had not already been Paris-bound, this book assuredly would have had me calling the airlines. What a wonderful, eclectic collection of essays! The piece on Ste. Chappelle, for example, actually manages to convey the jaw-dropping, heart-clenching, breath-taking sheer beauty of the place. Other pieces, such as SOS Medecin, captured utterly the blend of whimsy and solemnity that is Paris. You don't have to be headed for Paris to love this book; you don't even have to be a traveler.

Ahhh Paris. As a graduate student fortunate to be studying in Paris, I found myself falling into the dull routine of class and studying. I was failing to appreciate one of the prettiest cities on earth. This book opened my eyes to the multitude of interesting "trucs" around me in the Latin Quarter. Although some of the stories are more interesting than others, there is genuinely something for everyone's taste in this book. I now often study at the "Deux Magots" cafe due to its history and popularity with Jean Paul Sartres and Simone de Beauvoir that I read about. This book is wonderful for anyone interested in Paris, wanting to take a mental journey there, or a seasoned traveller who thinks they already know Paris. Anyone armed with "Paris Traveler's Tales" can discover the "Joie de Vivre" en Paris!

Like TT: France, this book is a perfect way to prepare psychologically for entering La France. Its collection of essays on living or traveling in Paris has passionate tales and historical accounts.

A book like this is an excellent way to give you pointers on Paris city life. I would never have thought of experiencing the Turkish bathes of a Paris without the wonderful story in TT: Paris. And many would find it maudlin to go exploring Pere Lachaise cemetery, until reading some stories of the experience.

Rick Steves' travel guides do a good job of highlighting particular things to see. Travelers' Tales take the experience to a deeper level.

When I bought this book I never realized how handy it would be. Reading it from cover to cover is a pleasure but it's also very easy to use as a reference -- I've never spent more than a minute trying to find whatever I need. This book has saved me uncountable hours both while debugging software and while porting to various platforms.

After 10 years of developing real-time software for DOS and embedded systems, I needed to develop software for the real-time O/S, QNX, a POSIX compliant O/S. Unlike DOS, QNX is a real operating system which demands a different programming paradigm. Without Lewine's book, I'm not certain I could have made the shift.

This book may be too complicated for somebody unfamiliar with C programming. But, if you know the language, it provides all the basics to successfully create software on a POSIX system. The first half of the book elaborates on how to do things in POSIX. Lewine does not assume that the reader knows anything about UNIX. Plenty of example code clarifies the the theory. All the examples are heavily annotated. One cannot *not* learn the POSIX programming paradigm from this book.

For real-time programming, information about POSIX.4 was needed, and I gleaned this from Gallmeister's PROGRAMMING FOR THE REAL WORLD: POSIX.4, also an O'Reilly book. Once through these books, code began to flow from my keyboard. The QNX library manuals made far more sense.

As an "expert" (I've been doing this for about 5 years), I still refer to the back of Lewine's book. The last half is a reference to the POSIX library functions. Although I haven't done much programming under LINUX, I presume this would be a useful reference for that O/S. The latter half of the book documents the function calls at least as well as any manual for a C programming library that I've ever seen. I've gotten to the point where this book mostly sits on my shelf--but it's comforting to know that when I can't remember the arguments for sigprocmask(), I can take it down and find the answer quickly.

For many programmers, interoperability is the name of the game.
Write once, compile everywhere. Yes, compile, because a compiled
program runs 80 times as fast as an interpreted program. Now comes
the gotcha: different compilers come with different libraries.
C source written for HP-UX might look different from C source written
for Solaris, which might look different from C source written for AIX
or Linux. What features of the language should we use? What library
calls should we use? Answer: Use ANSI C with IEEE 1003.1 POSIX
standard library calls. This gives you the most bang for your buck,
because nearly all C compilers support these standards. Write your
code on one platform, compile it on the other platforms. If you
conform to the POSIX standard, you will minimize your porting
headaches. Follow this book and you'll conform to the standard.

When I bought this book I never realized how handy it would be. Reading it from cover to cover is a pleasure but it's also very easy to use as a reference -- I've never spent more than a minute trying to find whatever I need. This book has saved me uncountable hours both while debugging software and while porting to various platforms.

After 10 years of developing real-time software for DOS and embedded systems, I needed to develop software for the real-time O/S, QNX, a POSIX compliant O/S. Unlike DOS, QNX is a real operating system which demands a different programming paradigm. Without Lewine's book, I'm not certain I could have made the shift.

This book may be too complicated for somebody unfamiliar with C programming. But, if you know the language, it provides all the basics to successfully create software on a POSIX system. The first half of the book elaborates on how to do things in POSIX. Lewine does not assume that the reader knows anything about UNIX. Plenty of example code clarifies the the theory. All the examples are heavily annotated. One cannot *not* learn the POSIX programming paradigm from this book.

For real-time programming, information about POSIX.4 was needed, and I gleaned this from Gallmeister's PROGRAMMING FOR THE REAL WORLD POSIX.4, also an O'Reilly book. Once through these books, code began to flow from my keyboard. The QNX library manuals made far more sense.

As an "expert" (I've been doing this for about 5 years), I still refer to the back of Lewine's book. The last half is a reference to the POSIX library functions. Although I haven't done much programming under LINUX, I presume this would be a useful reference for that O/S. The latter half of the book documents the function calls at least as well as any manual for a C programming library that I've ever seen. I've gotten to the point where this book mostly sits on my shelf--but it's comforting to know that when I can't remember the arguments for sigprocmask(), I can take it down and find the answer quickly.

POSIX is only one operating system standard in IEEE/IEC.
But now ISO have another oerating sysm standard, OSEK OS.
OSEK OS is more slight, simple and real time oriented.
Why Posix is not so portable and not so Open.
NIST made a POSIX Test Suite based on old POSIX standard.
But where is POSIX Test Suite based on new POSIX standard.
This book was based on old POSIX.
So, you can understand this with NIST posix test suite.

Gallmeister splits this book into two main sections, an introduction to the material and a reference section, which provides detailed documentation for the various function calls and header files. Somebody new to the material will find the first section indispensable, while the pro will flip to the reference section to answer questions.

Chapter one provides an overview of the problems this book addresses. The second chapter examines POSIX, POSIX options, and POSIX namespaces. Chapters 3 - 6 define real-time problems and POSIX.4 solutions. Chapter 7 considers the issues of real-time performance.

Gallmeister provides many example code fragments to illustrate his points. He would have done better to have annotated his examples, instead of writing a number of descriptive paragraphs after each fragment. A particularly useful feature is his discussion of "current UNIX practice."

Overall, this book provides a reasonable introduction to the concepts of real-time programming, and a number of "recipe" examples for the POSIX environment. Recommended if you'd like to develop real-time skills or need a reference work on the subject. I found it useful learning to develop QNX software, even though QNX implements a number of "optional" features differently.

This is the best book on the subject. One can tell that the author is an expert and knows very well what he is talking about.
Unlike one reviwer mentioned below - I dont think he has read any part of the book - this is not an "reasonable introduction" at all. This is an in depth handling of the topic.

If you know C and know UNIX, this book is for you. Simply put, he knows what he's writing about and he presents the material in a logical, methodical manner.
This book was written just before the POSIX4a standard was completed, so no PThreads are covered.
As long as you're not expecting PThreads coverage, you won't be disappointed. Most of the topics you need to know about mutli-threaded programming (besides PThreads) are here.

The book consists of 2 parts. The 1st part is a detailed guide to the real-time POSIX programming. The 2nd part presents a reference to all POSIX real-time functions. The book also has an appendix with various sample and exercise code.

All explanations in the first part are very clear and complete. Writing style resembles the best programming books (like those from K&R or R.Stevens). At the same time everything is given in a distilled manner without unnecessary water, so that you might handle the stuff surprisingly fast.

The second part is less valuable since all this material can be found in UNIX man. But if to see it as just a free bonus for the 1st part it is not bad at all. In any case having printed manuals is quite useful.

Sample code in the appendix is also interesting to look at.

Actually I didn't notice any considerable drawbacks in the book and recommend it to everyone interested in the subject.

The prerequisites are minimal. You should know C and be familiar with the basic UNIX/POSIX API (like working with files, etc.). The next reading is obvious - some book on POSIX threads (I'd recommend one by Mr. Butenhof).

When I first purchased this book, I was searching for material to shed light on the Win32 security model. After extracting what little information was available on the topic from this text, it made it's way to the book shelf.

Sometime later, I needed information on Code Access Security, and off the shelf it came. I later needed information on Assembly evidence, and down it came again. Next, was a need for .Net cryptographic and secure programing documentation -- it came down from the shelf and hasn't gone back again.

This is one of those books you need to live with for a time before you realize how great it is. I turn to it 2 or 3 times a week, and regularly carry it back and forth from the office. I've discovered embedded in it's pages are program perls, tips, and background information. It has become and invaluable refefence -- one I whole heartedly endorse.

Programming .NET Security does a great job of breaking down the various aspects of security in a well thought-out manner. In particular, they spend 7 chapters explaining how the .NET Framework has been built to provide a secure infrastructure and how applications can take advantage of this environment to become secured. This book provides one of the best examples I have seen to date covering Code Access Security (CAS). The inclusion of topics on both ASP.NET and Enterprise Services security make this book wholesome for any developer.

To follow, there are an additional 6 chapters that are devoted to cryptography, including sections on providing your own symmetric and asymmetric encryption algorithms. I would highly recommend this book to any developer working in the .NET Framework, regardless of skill; you will take something away from this book.

One of the best book that I will strogly recommend for any one who wants to understand .NET security subject. I was grappling with CAS for some time and how hard I would try, still I could not explain code group, permission and evidence and how they are interlinked. Not only authors have done a tremendous job at explaining CAS but cryptography is yet another section they have done great justice to. The diagrams in this chapter very clearly explains the key concepts of cryptography. A great book that will not disappoint you.

While there is a lot of talk about .NET security, relatively little can be found in terms of documentation, which is one reason why this book is so refreshing. In addition to discussing some of the reasons behind certain security schemes, the theory is explained as well as the C# implementation. While there are some .NET specific security issues discussed (e.g. configuring worker processes), the section on cryptography should be required reading for everyone in the computer industry.

I get really excited about a book when it contains a lot of good information and I am able to actually use it to solve real-world problems. After reading this book, I was able to help solve a really tricky (and politically challenging) security issue quite quickly. If you have anything to do with your company's security systems or write any .NET code, I think this book deserves a place in your reference section. This is certainly the best book on .NET security I have read thus far.

Some books are not going to be easy or approachable, one must already be familiar with either the C# and or Visual Basic language (the easy part) and the .NET programming enviornment to attempt this book. The authors are quick to jump from a discussion of the issues to meta code and sample code, but that is a feature, not a bug to the book's intended audience of very sharp, (as opposed to very basic), well educated coders. I would like to have seen more of an effort to discuss testing, validation and assessment, but at just under 700 pages this is a focused work and a serious coverage of the hooks that make it possible to secure .NET. (Of course that is assuming the underlying function calls are not riddled with buffer overflows and the like. Blaster on a .NET scale is a pretty scary prospect.)

The bottom line, we are awash in bad code and the vulnerabilities that result are the fundamental reason there are so many exploits. When you consider that in the scale of a federated system it is not a pretty thought. Someday there will be building codes for software, but in the meantime, if you are a responsible citizen of this planet and you are involved in .Net development, buy your coders this book. Invest the time to be able to quiz them and do so. Make sure they understand the issues, especially with Chapters 18 and 19, ASP.NET and COM+.

Viscosity estimation and other properties of gases

When you need physical property data, and you don't have exact information; this book provides best available estimations of the physical properties. It has been a great help to me, over the years.

Having worked on a piece of an earlier edition, as a grad student at U of Mo - Rolla; where Bruce Poling was a professor, I know how much work it is putting this together for the industries. My hats off to Bruce and his co-authors, and especially to Nanci, his wife, for doing yoman's work on this 5th edition of a classic!

If you are a chemical engineer and do not own this text, you will have a hard time. This text covers all physical properties of organic, and some inorganic, gases and liquids. It offers complete theoretical development and practical equations which are amenable to spreadsheets and numerical analysis. Particularly useful is a comparison at the end of every topic showing the accuracy of each method in predicting a property. Presented in tabular form, it allows the reader to choose a method which is sufficient for his/her needs. You may decide to choose a method that is less accurate but easier to program. Every chemical engineer should have this text. My only regret is that we did not have time in undergraduate to use this text. I learned its value from watching the graduate students.

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The book is an absolutely practical treatise of applied thermodymamics. The explanations of how to use property estimation methods are excellent, but invaluable are the comments on their accuracy and recommendations as to when to use which method.

The book served as my operating manual for the ASPEN software for modeling chemical processes. The book documented nearly every method used by ASPEN.

I was a bit unconfortable when I bought this book since I was suspicious that this one was one of those unreadable thermodynamic books. Fortunately I was wrong. This book provides you with a complete treatment of the properties of gases and liquids in a plain language stressing the understanding of the basic laws governing the behavior of liquids and gases instead of the mathematic that goes with it. The treatment of the topics is very suitable for engineers since it allows quick understanding of the phenomena and provides a wealth of correlations and methods for estimating properties. The appendixes contain all kind of basic information indeed helpful for applying the correlations showed. Without any hesitation, this book is well worth its price.