Jack Thompson Books

Last September I painted a mural of "Shoeless " Joe Jackson in his home town---Greenville, South Carolina. His name meant nothing to me until I went to the library to do research for the painting. There I discovered I might be the only person in the world who was unaware of "Shoeless."

Never interested in sports, I thought I was reading about the legendary hero only to acquaint myself with the visual particulars of the man and the game of baseball in the early 1900's. Before I finished the first book I was hooked----not by the sport, but by the deeply moving life story of Joe himself.

Further research led me to read Joe Thompson's GROWING UP WITH "SHOELESS" JOE JACKSON, The Greatest Natural Player In Baseball History. Here was an account, written in the personal first person that makes one feel the intimacy of a hometown boy's acquaintance, and love for the subject. There was no turning back then. I became an ardent fan of "Shoeless" Joe.

Thompson has written in the voice of the South Carolina native he is. Unpretentiously he tells, not only the history of Jackson's baseball career, but of the man as a child of impoverished mill worker parents. He speaks of a small boy who was never sent to school, and who was sweeping the floors of Brandon Mill when only seven years old. He makes you hear the taunts "Shoeless" endured because he never learned to read or write. He makes you proud of the little mill kid who, in spite of everything, made it to the major leagues. And he makes you weep for the wretched debacle which cost an innocent "Shoeless" his brilliant career.

In 1996 the Brandon Mill Baseball Field in West Greenville was finally named for "Shoeless" Joe Jackson. Thompson's vivid fury that publicity and general media coverage was as lackluster as the bitterly cold day of the dedication, fairly sizzles on the pages of his book.

Thompson's infectious outrage that "Shoeless" has been slighted by his own hometown has persuaded me to become involved in the renewal of the once thriving business district of the mill village. Many more murals depicting "Shoeless'" career, and the textile history of the area, are on the drawing boards.

Buddy Hunt, who commissioned the original mural, is opening a coffee shop, Cuppa Joe, so fans will have a place to stop and chat when visiting. Hunt owns a number of large empty buildings across the street from where "Shoeless" Joe owned a liquor store. His hope is to attract investors, restaurateurs and shop keepers---all with sports, or related themes---to the long neglected area.

I have met the author of GROWING UP WITH "SHOELESS" JOE JACKSON, and am proud that he not only approves of the renewal project, but is helping to bring it about.

Whether or not you are a sports fan, this book will tug at your heartstrings, for it is a rich and poignant history written by a hometown boy who tells it like it is.

Polly Hunt Neal

This book is very unusual. When I received it and began reading it, I felt as though I'd been duped. The font is abnormally large making it look initially like a book meant for young adults or children. As I read I was completely shocked to see many misspelled words, subject verb disagreements, problems with modifiers, incomplete sentences, you name it. I considered sending it back, but I'm a serious fan of Shoeless Joe, so I kept on reading and discovered something very interesting. This book isn't the product of a huge publishing conglomerate, in fact, it's a truly home-spun effort. I examined the credits and realized the author published it himself much the same way an underground band would market it's own music. Members of his family provided the photos. It looks like he may have had friends proofread and edit it. It seems to have been printed locally as well. The upside is that it has a "down home" charm that a true fan of Joe Jackson can appreciate. I'm sure Joe would considerate it a literary masterpiece. I'm currently writing a one-man-play about Joe, and I've found things in this book that I haven't read before. After allowing myself to digest its differences, and accept what it really is, I can honestly say I'm thoroughly enjoying it. Thanks very much Mr Thompson.

As web master of the Shoeless Joe Jackson Virtual Hall of Fame (http://www.blackbetsy.com/), the Official web site of the Shoeless Joe Jackson Society, I highly recommend this book. I have been to every town and city that Joe played ball in and have read most, if not all newspaper accounts of the day and every book on Joe Jackson. Unlike the other books on Joe Jackson, this one is written by someone that actually knew Joe and it shows in this great work. Joe Thompson grew up in the forties in the Brandon Mill community where Joe Jackson ran a liquor store. Jackson would take Joe and his friends to the school yard and teach them how to play baseball. Jackson also taught them lessons about life of which Joe Thompson speaks about in this book. This book is more than just about Joe Jackson the ballplayer, it about Joe Jackson the man. This book will give you insight into the man, to let you know that he held no grudge against baseball. It will show you that he would go out of his way to help his fellow man and he gave of himself to help young kids grow up and lead a productive life. This is a must read for Jackson fans, as well as baseball fans in general.......get the real story about Joe Jackson!!!!!

In baseball there are some memorable moments, Carlton Fisk hitting the game winning home run in the 1975 World Series for example. In baseball there are also some darker moments, The Black Sox Scandal is probably the most notable of these.

In the book Growing Up with Shoeless Joe, author Joe Thompson takes you inside baseball's past and gives you a first rate look at the Greatest Natural Hitter baseball has ever seen. Thompson's book is the first I have ever read that is more than the typical slander on Joe Jackson.

Thompson takes a look into the man, more than the ball player, and allows you to see a side of Jackson never before revealed. What Thompson gives the reader is by far the best accounting of a true hero in the game of baseball.

This book is so much more than a story about a World Series in 1919; it's so much more than a story about baseball. This book is about the man Joe Jackson and the side of him most of us have never seen. I am extremely proud to be allowed to review this book

I love this show and have been a fan for years. When a character leaves that has been on for a really long time it feels like we lost a member of our family. I do want to thank NBC for Actor Jesse L. Martin - Detective Ed Green for not killing him off or finding him guilty. That would ruin this show for me. Why I'm thankful because he can comeback if he wanted to (I hope). It did seem that since the death of (my favorite) Actor Jerry Orbach - Detective Lennie Briscoe he really hasn't found a someone to compliment him even though he did work with a few partners one can see he could use a break. It cant be easy. When NBC finally found someone (new character) Jeremy Sisto - Detective Cyrus Lupo to partner with I thought it was a perfect fit they complimented each other. One quiet, the other not and so on. But he seemed to be hired to late for I think Jesse (burned out) needs the break. I hope he has a very good retirement from the show (hopefully it's just a break) for we will miss him, greatly!

They got it right this season! Linus Roache and Jeremy Sisto are great additions to the cast and Sam Waterston as the new DA is fantastic. This was my favorite show back in the Jerry Orbach days and it has become my favorite show again. It's back to being entertaining with twists and turns and wondering what the EADA is capable of. The writing is back along with great acting. Maybe being a bubble show was enough to wake up the powers that be. Whatever the reason, Season 18 shows why "Law & Order" will break the record set by "Gunsmoke".

I was thrilled to see that Law & Order on Unbox. I'd say Law & Order was great for maybe fourteen of its eighteen seasons, which is an amazing record when you think about it. The last few years there has been a mad shuffle of cops and AADAs (assistants to the assistant district attorney - there's a mouthful) that have made the show less enjoyable.

I'd say I've seen probably 95% of all episodes on TNT re-runs, but I found a few here that I'd missed. I love the fact that you can buy individual episodes, since it would be a huge waste of money for me to buy the full dvd when I've seen most of the material already.

After picking a few from seasons 1 & 2, I looked forward with great anticipation to combing though seasons 3, 4, and 5. Perhaps you can imagine my disappointment when I saw that Amazon only provides five of eighteen seasons, and only two of the early ones. This saddens me especially since I consider the last few seasons of the show to be almost unwatchable. I hope that I will see more seasons available for Unbox soon.

For those of you who haven't seen seasons 1 & 2, I'd urge you to take a look. The show started out with a grittier edge, and focused more on the fine points of New York law. They also have fewer "ripped from the headlines" episodes, and of the ones that are, you're much less likely to remember the original events, which makes them more fun.

Thank you so very much to Amazon for bringing this fabulous show to us. I have neer seen a show with the longevity that surpasses and great behind the seens production that has made the show what it is today. Any show that can say it's been around for 18 years is nothing short of amazing. All the cast, past and present, deserve all the accolades possible. I hope L&O does surpass "Gunsmoke" and make it for 20 years. If anyone has never seen the show, I recommend buying one episode to try it out. It's a good $2.00 investment. Thank you Amazon, NBC, and all the incredible talent that makes the original the best.

Forget the business books. I'm getting CDs like this one from now on. This is fast and easy, and I really loved hearing the CEO summarize his strategy, tactics and belief system without some consultant or professor drone on for hours. Super idea.

You don't know Jack about Jack Welch until you spend an hour with him during your commute. That's what I liked about this CD: During my long LA drive, this program didn't dance around -- it got right to the point -- it cut thru the bull about Jack and delivered on the fundamentals that worked for over 20 years. If you want a long boring management book by some stuffy guru who has never run anything, or if you want to pretend there is some secret formula to leadership -- don't buy this CD!

If you want straight talk about what works and what doesn't from actual CEO himself, this is a great way to do it.

Forget everything you've heard or read about Jack Welch. This is by far the best way to capture the freshest insights from the man himself all in under an hour. One-on-One with Jack Welch is like getting the best of your MBA over lunch.

People either seem to love or hate Jack Welch. I happen to be a fan. He built GE into world power house and in this interview he gives most of the principles that were his foundation.

I greatly preferred this audio book over the others I've heard. Instead of someone else talking about Jack, or him reading his book to you, you actually get to hear him talking and telling his stories in a realistic conversation.

The rapport between the interviewer and Jack was good. The informal style made it quite listenable. The short segments made it easy to listen to while I commute.

Overall an excellent choice.

I agree wholeheartedly with the following Wall Street Journal Review of November 30, 2001: "Some of the best specimens of the human animal show up in "The Importance Of Being" by Christopher Felver. And by this I do not mean the "beautiful people" but the accomplished ones - writers, artists, musicians, activists. No pretense here, just straight-ahead, black-and-white portraits of a staggering 436 "creative revolutionaries," as Mr. Felver calls them, photographed by him over the past two decades. He presents here an incredible collection of the most creative spirits of our times and it is fascinating to see the immediacy with which the subjects posed for this bohemian photographer.

When you leaf though the pages of this book you will be amazed about how many creative people Chris Felver has met, and not only that, he has managed to get almost all of them to pose for him. A few of his potential subjects refused, but perhaps being able to start out with a small but potent portfolio of Bay Area poets gave him early on the aura of integrity. It wasn't as though he had been surprising Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee on their honeymoon, no, he was taking black and white studies of Czeslaw Milosz and Jack Hirschmann looking grim.

In the decades that followed, Felver took his camera everywhere and waited until the moment was right. He was in New York in the very early eighties and managed to create a whole new body of work with the leading world artists who were there at the time, though he was too bemused, he says, by Warhol to take his picture, he got nearly everyone else. He is a artist himself of course and so I shouldn't speak in the crass language of "gets," however in this book it's plain that what is being sold is the fame of the subjects, the nearly intangible scent of celebrity contact. Though there will be plenty of photographs for each reader in which the reader wil feel a little stupid for not, perhaps, knowing who the subject is. That's what "Google" is for, to recover from moments like this one. And Felver dos provide brief captions under each photo that say, for example, "Jasper Johns: artist" or "Doris Lessing: English fiction writer."

For some reason those who have won the Pulitzer Prize get that accolade inserted into their captions too.

The subjects are gathered in alphabetical order, which makes for some unusual pairings. One double page spread features Yvonne Rainer on the left and Tony Randall on the right. They could be identical twins!

I agree wholeheartedly with the following Wall Street Journal Review of November 30, 2001: "Some of the best specimens of the human animal show up in "The Importance Of Being" by Christopher Felver. And by this I do not mean the "beautiful people" but the accomplished ones - writers, artists, musicians, activists. No pretense here, just straight-ahead, black-and-white portraits of a staggering 436 "creative revolutionaries," as Mr. Felver calls them, photographed by him over the past two decades. He presents here an incredible collection of the most creative spirits of our times and it is fascinating to see the immediacy with which the subjects posed for this bohemian photographer.

This is an excellent book to help ease a child's transition from the orphanage to a home. It covers topics such as the plane ride, new smells, leaving the orphanage, etc... It reads like a diary of an adopted child's experiences. It also gives adopting parents some insight as to how their new son or daughter may be feeling.

I really wish this book had been available when we adopted our two daughters from Russia a year ago. These children get exposed to so many new things so fast, and they usually can't communicate very well with their new parents so everything is all the more scary. Just knowing that other kids have been through the same thing is very reassuring, but this book takes things further and provides information for the kids on what's happening and how life may be different for them with their new family.

The calm, reassuring tone of the book is especially great, and the parallel text in English and Russian will help the kids start to recognize some English words. My girls, who can read in English now, were laughing over trying to read the Russian parts and figure out which words were the same. They also loved the illustrations and wanted to go meet Jack and his family.

The first months home are very hard on some older kids, and this book is just one more way of helping them to feel safe and loved. I recommend it highly to anyone adopting an older child from Russia or a Russian-speaking country.

This book is wonderful to own for any adoptive family. It would also make a super gift for a family adopting an older child. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this story from the child's perspective of coming to America from Russia and being adopted by an American family. As an adoptive family, many of the words rang true. My child also enjoyed reading it and could relate to many of the feelings expressed by the boy in the story. I would highly recommend this book which has lovely and creative illustrations and is printed in both in English and Russian.

Cymbelline, a lesser play by the great bard, is rather strange on several counts. It has more plot twists than one play can handle and the characters do some rather strange things. But forget that. This is a great value since it combines fine performances with incredible dialogue and a plot which will keep you guessing.

Wonderful!!

This gorgeous gem of a book is perfect for reading aloud. Thompson's words flow as gorgeously as Springett's spooky illustrations. And just when you think something really *awful* is following her home... Well, now, that would be telling, wouldn't it? : ) The surprise ending of this book, after the delightful creepiness, really is surprising... and yet, utterly perfect.

I adore this book. I love the art, I love the story. It's one I read and enjoy even if my child's not around to read it to. The repetitive and cumulative nature of this book also makes it a great book to read to children if you want them to help you tell the story. It would be a fun classroom book in that respect.

I simple could not have got through my Nurse education with out this book and it's comprehensive knowledge of Mental Health problems. Lyttle is the ultimate expert and Tutor and this book has use and appeal outside the Nursing Profession for interested parties.

This is a presentation-quality, two-volume boxed set with marker ribbons attached to each book. The first tells the story of the development of the Miata and also traces the history of the many sports cars that inspired the designers. The text is accompanied by beautiful photos of everything related to this wonderful little car. Photos include versions of the car through sketches, clay models, alternate body style mock-ups, to the final production machine. There are even photos of the many individuals who contributed to the design and manufacturing of the Miata. The other volume is a gorgeous photo essay showing the car in many locales. If you are a Miata fan this set belongs in your home or office

We found the book amusing, absorbing and thrilling; a page turner. We hope the author will be writing a sequel soon.

Susan M.