John Waters Books

Absolute page turner. It provided great detail on not only the life of Henry Mrogan but many sub plots as well.

This book is the story of a criminal. Infamous Henry Morgan and his bunch of criminals attacked, sacked, murdered and raped in my hometown of Maracaibo in the 17th century. Although this was a long time ago at it's moment it was the equivalent of 9/11 for the town. It was a traitorous, unprovoked attack on a peaceful city. Same thing happened to other Spanish American cities such as Panama. It is interesting to read that he was later an admired citizen of Jamaica. As don Quixotte said, " You will see things Sancho!". The book is interesting reading such as one would read about Hitler's story.

My review is simple and to the point. While at the airport without a book to read, and facing a long delay, I picked Empire of Blue Water up and thought "what the hell..." and bought it. I was engaged from the first until the last page. It is an outstanding to unbelievable account of Captain Henry Morgan. How this has not been made a movie yet, I do not know. I have read many books on leadership, the Shackelton's etc., and the fact that Morgan led such an "army" and was so successful (relative if pillaging and robbing can be described as successful) and actually survived to an fairly old age is astonishing. You don't have to be a fan of Pirates, Buccaneers, etc., to enjoy it. I found myself wanting to visit the city under the sea after reading this book.

A good book on the history of piracy in the Caribbean. The book focuses on the life of Capt. Morgan, a pirate / privateer / colonial official, who undertook some daring missions on behalf of England against Spain. The book really centers on Morgan, and then at the end focuses a bit on the devastating earthquake that Jamaica soon after his death.

I think the author could have spent more time on the earthquake than the final few pages. It was like he hinted at the coming devastation throughout the book then did not spend that much time on the subject of the natural disaster. Just a slight critique. Overall a fun and fast read.

Joseph Valentine Dworak

I picked up this book based on backcover praise (Washington Post, NY Times), but was clearly deceived. The book is mediocre, shallow and incredibly childish in its view of historic events and international politics.

What is more striking is that the author seems to have been in contact with at least some sources and historic documents to be able to put together a good quality account. However, he does very little with that information, and instead is taken overboard by his manicheistic view of things, depicting a crowd of disgrunteld murderors and thieves as emblems of some free-trade democratic ideal. He can ramble on for dozens of pages on his own hollywoodesque interpretation of pirate life in Port Royal, and then condense Morgan's first ever expedition into Mexico in a couple of pages full of gross innacuracies, such as the detour he takes in approaching Villahermosa (which goes from 300 to 3700 miles in the space of a paragraph - not a bad trek for a bunch of pirates on foot!).

The only advice I can give is: save your time and money, go look elsewhere for a good reliable book on the subject.

Diablo is one of the easiest games to beat.Also, its usually only fun on B.net, and on B.net people are always hacking. There is just no need for a strategy guide, only for D2, its fun on the single-player mode.

biadlio was a wonderful romantic comed

This book is very helpfull with Diablo. The most helpfull thing about it is the shrine listings. This book also helps alot to get through the single player game very well. It list all of the items (even unique and enchanted) and lists their stats too. In short, this is a very helpfull book for playing Diablo.

I love it, but i have a queston how do you get a trainer(AHH)? E-mail me at sportschik83@yahoo.com

This book is a good one to become proficient at this classic role-playing game. It's key info is needed to quickly defeat Diablo. I wrote this review after winning Diablo as all three characters; swordsman, archer, and sage, over 6 months as a single player. Diablo won the 1996 game-of-the-year by the computer mags and is phenomenal game that one grows to appreciate its complexity as you get better.

In a nutshell, Diablo is a first person shoot-em-up game against 19 classes of enemies. Diablo stays interesting as the 16-playfield layouts change for each game and the 1000s of creatures have a complex variation of personalities, strengths, and weaknesses. The first 4 levels have sprawling layouts of Dungeon rooms; levels 5-8 have Catacombs which are smaller layouts of rough rock walls; levels 9-12 are Caves with large excavations and meandering streams; and the final 13-16 Hell levels are laid out as interstitial quadrangles. The game play is a nice blend between isometric 3D visualizations, character animations and sounds, and multimedia video clips.

With this book, playing success is an exercise in developing strong Diablo problem-solving skills. Initially looking on the Internet for Diablo cheatz which were few as its a legacy 6-year old game. What this book provides is info and strategy that can help you defeat the myriad of creatures and quests. My book has become a much thumbed, reread, indexed, and enhanced with scrawled notes on how to defeat them.

For example, I found that the easiest character to win was the Rogue archer-woman and won Diablo in 3 games, as archery is a distance scenario. The next easiest character to win was the Warrior swordsman, completed in 5 games, mainly because of hand-to-hand combat experience as a kid. The most difficult character, of course, was the sage Sorcerer, which took me 9 games to win because of the myriad (26) magic potions that need to be mastered. This book gives you an informal discussion and tables of characteristics without all the trial and error. Although it discusses general tactics, it is weak in overall game strategy and specific tactics on specific minions.

This book provides details on the power of weapons and armor and strength and weaknesses of enemies. It also covers the 17 special Quests quite well. The author writes in an entertaining prose and presents key info is in complex tables. I found that Blizzard's production release of Diablo v1.04 and internet update download to v1.08 was very stable and reliable on a P5/233MMX, Socket7 PCI mobo TX chipset, ATI Rage PCI video, 64MB RAM, 52X CD, 10GB HD, and SB16 running Win98SE.

The book is divided into 10 chapters including the making of, but has no index or glossary, which is a serious beginner's omission as the game's jargon is voluminous. There could have been a List of Tables too. And these tables could have had summaries or group breakouts so that the many character(s)(istics) are better organized. The screen shots could be larger and less dark. I bought it at a local used bookstore and the game at a garage sale. Of course, certain key subjects and data tables had erroneous or omitted information.

Each game is saved in the game folder as single_X.SV, where X is 0 to 9; ten games max. Thus create a historical archive subfolder and keep old and partially played games there. Second, game files vary from 200KB to 3MB. So burn game files onto a CD, email, or save on a Zip to impress friends and foes. Finally, do judicious saving for replaying level(s) that eventually went sour. Use the keyboard Ctrl+Alt+Esc to toggle to Windows for making notes and performing file maintenance.

To win maximize building experience points and accumulating gold and key special weapons. Finding, identifying, and redeeming EVERY single weapon, armor, chest, scroll, staff, book, ring, tomb, library, and shrine on every level to maximize your power. Often the first 5 levels and what you accumulate therein can give you a premonition on the final outcome of the game.

For example, the Sorcerer is quite vulnerable in the beginning and the player must strive to play almost perfect levels. Waste the least amount of resources on the minions and don't let them touch you. Learn to run away and lead them into a trap. Accumulate and convert your operating weapons and armor from standard to special ones. Sell as many of the std weapons for health, mana, and ID scrolls from Adria, the Witch. Buy ID scrolls from her as much as possible compared to paying Cain to ID. Categorize the specials and unique weapons and armor into red and blue (fire and lightning resistant), in rows on the ground so that best combinations can be easily selected. Run a pre-level scouting expedition to find what's new on each level. Return to town near the beginning of each level and always re-visit Adria. Apparently attacking minions on a new level triggers her to provide a new list of scrolls, books, and staffs. Accumulate and deploy key fire, lightning, and mana shield spell books rapidly, compared to duplicative staffs and scrolls which are redeemed for more gold. Spell books, and their cumulative power from multiple units, will affect later quest outcomes. If it is taking too much to finish off a minion; its probably because you are doing it wrong. Finally, Quests do not have to be completed serially; do the first five levels without doing the Butcher and King Leoric. Then when stronger and with Arkaine's Valor armor, return back and efficiently finish off the buzzards. Use fKey to Holy Bolt for dealing with skeletons, zombies, King Leoric, and finally Diablo.

Item as described and received in a timely manner... an excellent buying experience!

An intrigeing book, different from all others on the subject.

Indepth and very profound Treatise on the Knights Templar paradigm. The book discusses the Eastern and Islamic (Sufi) influences upon Templar knowledge. Mr. Pinkham also expounds on the "Female Principle" or the "Sacred Feminine". The "Kundalini" and how one can and did achieve this state is a major part of this work. This book is not for your conventional thinking reader or religious type. Mr. Pinkham also highlights the significance of the "black" Madonnas of Europe. The interviews with current Templars and the Sinclair family lends the book a certain authenticity that other authors on the subject have not achieved. Some of the modus operandi afforded the Templars by Mr. Pinkham I might tend to question in regards to (Tantric Sex and ritual etc.)for achieving Kundalini power. But nonetheless a very thought provoking work and I would highly recommend this work with "The Huevolution of Sacred Muur Science Past and Present" 2005 by Noble Timothy Myers-El.

If you are the type that gets annoyed by bad editing, you probably won't be able to read this book. Flat out, this has got to be the most poorly edited book I have ever seen - if you can even say that it was edited at all. One sentence early on started with "12". Come on! Who does that? It's brutal in terms of typos, gramatical errors, and just poor definition.

Editing (or the lack thereof) aside, the content is fairly interesting. The book's structure leaves a bit to be desired, but by the time you get to the end you have a good idea of what the author is trying to convey. The interviews at the end are quite interesting.

Whether some of the content is believable is another story. The author says things like "it's been proven" or "it is fact that.." in regard to a few things which are still very much in debate and/or have been debunked entirely. That definitely introduces a credibility problem.

I'm a big fan of anything Knight related (though nowhere near an expert), and am willing to read even the most 'out-there' theories, but in this case, Mark takes a great leap into the history and myth, then falls off the planet - literally.

He rehashes a lot of already known history of the Knights, which is fine in case some readers are just starting out learning about the Knights, but then he goes pretty much X-files when he adds in extraterrestrials to the mix, then adds other cultural legends into the story of the Knights, which kind of confuses me. I'm all for looking at the Knights from the view of other monotheistic and polytheistic religions around from the time of the Knights, but some seem to be just grasping.

To add to his image as a head honcho Modern Knight, his WIFE is his 'co-knight' (I thought the Knights were supposed to be MONKS and CELIBATE), maintains the present Earl Sinclair is the Fisher King (which I thought was supposed to be attached to the Arthurian legends and not the Knights Templar, and the Fisher King was supposed to be suffering from an unhealable wound), and I think that halfway through the original editing of this book his proofreader/spellchecker either quit or died.

He DOES add some little-known data of the Knights, which is why I won't use the book for kindling, but I was sort of hoping he would have organized the book a little bit better. I learned a bit more about some John the Baptist lore, but ended up confused. I'll try to read through the book again in case I missed something, but I was hoping for a better read.

Most of the book is a wash by now. It could use a little updating. The book can be summarized into the following:

Sites should be designed to allow for effective and efficient two-way communications between you and your clients... (that's my Cliff's Notes version of the book.)

Everything else supports that main theme. It's all pretty superficial information. If you've read other Web Design Business books, you've already seen this information. I still like Jim Smith's book (How to Start a Home-Based Web Design Business) the best.

The first eleven chapters were very nice and useful to read. From chapter 12 on, I found it a bit boring.

As the other reviews say, it has quite a lot of good tips and information about how you have to conceive a web-design business.

But in my humble opinion the marketing chapters failed, they all ramble around the same concepts too many times without giving fresh ideas.

From chapter 20 on it gained some new interest to me.

I just want to add a note of caution to prospective buyers. I can appreciate a book about the internet, business, and the history of the web. If that's what you want, buy this book! Don't read any further!

If you are looking for a book on designing a web site however, this may not be the book for you. You have to really search to find good advice, and who has the time? Go out and buy a book like "Don't Make Me Think?" by Steve Krug if you want good advice. Buy this book if you're interested in web history.

After reading this book, I was able to start my own Indiana web design business, Stormfront Productions. It focuses on the basics of starting a web-based business, which has always been a goal of mine. I would recommend it to anyone wanting to start a business.

There are a lot of books on how to create a web page. They vary from simple, use Front Page type books, to books on the back end process like those on .asp or php. There aren't many books that take a step back and ask questions like 'what is it that you are trying to do with this web site,' 'how easy is it for the visitor to find what he wants,' 'how does the web help fulfill the overall business mission of the organization.'

This is not a teckie book. It doesn't tell you how to do HTML, instead it is on the things you need to think about first before you start to cut code, or have someone else do the site. One of the big mistakes is who to pick to design the web site. An artist tends to make it pretty. A programmer makes it clean looking. A marketeer wants to sell things. Management has to decide the goals of the site. And management often isn't prepared to do that because of a lack of knowledge about what is possible. This book attempts to bring management up to the level of specifying a web site.

Great book with lots of pictures of species. I hoped that there would be photos for EACH species of fish but there was not. Each fish is documented though even if there is no picture for each. Many species are shown. I still have to give it 5 stars. This book is a great size too. It is not oversized. Perfect for travel.

It might interest the reader of this review (since your looking at the book) to know that while fresh water only represents about 1% of the available aquatic habitat on earth over half of the known species of fish live in it. I'll leave it up to you to find out why. Peterson Field Guides have a winning formula, find an expert, set them up with a good illustrator and see what comes out. This book finishes the trio that covers all of the fishes likely to be encountered by a North American fisherman, diver or naturalist. Like the Fishes of the Atlantic Coast and the Fishes of the Pacific Coast it is well organized, well written, all inclusive (of species) and as informative as space will allow. If you are curious about fishes in general or encounter fresh water fish with any kind of regularity you owe it to yourself to find out what they are. And, if you live in North America you should have this book.

I perform wildlife surveys for corporations all over the east coast. Half the weight of my equipment is Peterson Field Guides, which give me quick and easy identification of flora and fauna found and often eliminates the need for dicotomous keys and microscope work. This particular guide has helped me puzzle out a lot of small fish I come across. Well written, excellant illustrations, an important part of my library.

This book may be of interest to an icthyolgist, but it's not much use to a fisherman. The color illustrations are very poor. They all have a washed out yellowish tint, and thus the illustrated fish tend to look all alike. The non color illustrations are better, but the book relies mostly on descriptions.

This book has some of the worst fish illustrations i have ever seen. Text is far too brief. This volume tries to cover too much and does not cover anything well....

I buy this magazine as soon as it comes out. It's fun to read, stylish and one of the last magazines that has a personality. It's like listening to your coolest uncle/aunt telling stories of the good ol' days, and then hearing about all the newest stuff too. Long LIVE Paper!

Paper magazine has always been a few steps ahead of the mainstream as the true arbiter of cutting edge style - and this gorgeous book is the best of the past 20 years! An amazing document of the most exciting moments in style culture - Bravo!

It's amazing how if only a few people keep telling themselves they are special for a long enough time, they may eventually get someone outside of themselves to believe it. I feel sorry for the poor soul who greenlighted this book and was assuredly fired soon after. These guys have some how managed to write about the same group of nobodys for twenty years and call themselves cutting edge. The makers of this magazine must thank their lucky stars for their parents giving them a trust fund to ride all the way to the retirement home. How old are the founders of this magazine now anyway? They must be very close to entering that big drag show in the sky. Save your money and go buy a book from a true cutting edge magazine like Vice, Tokion,Vibe or Interview. You will be happier.

IF YOU THINK OLD DRAG QUEENS ARE COOL AND BUY CLOTHING MADE BY SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF RICH PARENTS WHO CAN'T DESIGN THEIR WAY OUT OF PAPER BAG, BUT HAVE DECIDED TO CALL THEMSELVES DESIGNERS ANYWAY AFTER THE FUN OF CALLING THEMSELVES ARTISTS, OR ACTORS, OR WRITERS HAS WORN OF THEN THIS IS THE BOOK FOR YOU.

THIS IS A MAGAZINE THAT BRAGS ABOUT HAVING "ANN MAGNUSON" ON THEIR COVERS MORE THAN ONCE...

WHO IS "ANN MAGNUSON" YOU SAY?...MY POINT EXACTLY.

WHAT A BUNCH OF SELF GRATIFYING WANNABEES.

THANK
GOD
THE
ERA
OF
THESE
PURVEYORS
OF
POOP
IS
JUST
ABOUT
UP.

I CAN'T THINK OF ANOTHER MAGAZINE THAT WILL BE LESS MISSED.

BYE LOSERS.

I started reading paper about a year ago, and was so pumped when I heard a book was coming out. It truly couldnt be better! its a culture textbook and should be taught in schools no joke! this book is what VH1's I Love The 90's wanted to be but failed you love it trust me.-Nick

No expecting parent or childbirth professional should be without this book. It is a treasure of knowledge about what to expect, and what effects both mother and child during this miraculous time. As for the massage, just read about how the wrong position or pressure can harm both mother and child. This is not a do it yourself manual or picture book.The author is giving vital information for the safety and comfort of mother and developing child. This book should be in every expecting parent's and professionals library. As a professional, I do not teach a class without it.

An excellent book about prenatal massage. It is good for massage therapists and anyone else interested in relieving some of the discomforts if pregnancy. There is even a mail-in test so that you can become certified in prenatal massage. I've taken classes in this subject and found the book to have comparable information plus you can use it as a resource.

Michelle Wright, CMT

I'm a massage therapist and found this book to be a helpful resource in a number of areas (detailed below), but was disappointed that it didn't include any pregnancy massage techniques. (Instead, the author simply suggests using the same massage strokes used for other clients.) The author is a midwife, and the book is written from this perspective, rather than that of a massage therapist. That said, I found this book to be a good reference on the anatomy of pregnancy, the mother-to-be's experience through each trimester, safety precautions for massage, and some comfort tips to address symptoms such as headaches & nausea (for the mother to use at home.) This book is an excellent pregnancy education resource, rather than a pregnancy massage instruction manual.

This is a comprehensive, yet understandable and useable text. It shows the benefits of massage while pregnant and continues on to include the new baby. Most importantly, it warns of improper use to prevent complications. I highly recommend this to all pregnant mothers, nurses, doctors, and all health care providers. An important work, deserving to be read and utilized.

I am a Massage Therapist and I loved this book! It has a lot of information but is still a very easy book to read. I would recommend it for Massage Therapists, as well as expectant moms and anyone working with them (Doulas, midwives, etc.)

From Abfab to Zen is the sweetest candy. Pop Culture is covered from A to Z, drawing from Paper Magazine's exploration of its emergence. This book is definative and thorough. Its authors know their material and are committed to letting people know where things start. Lucious images accompany a list of everything no one should have missed. If it's not here, it's o.k. that you missed it.

filled with pictures of some of my favorite people, places, and things from the past decade. Waters' intro is a scream and the art direction fantastic.

The best thing about this book were the stickers attached to the inside back cover. Besides that, I must say, I really liked the entry on "Black Hair".

The ultimate cool, hip guide to Pop Culture icons! I'm having so much fun reading this -- and there are even free PAPER stickers included with the book. It's a fun trip down memory lane for those who have lived in New York City (or kept up with it)during the 80's and 90's -- it totally covers the downtown art, fashion, club and entertainment scenes. Amazing how many street trends PAPER covered early on have gone mainstream. Don't miss this one!

From Abfab To Zen is a must-read for anyone who yearns to be inside the mind of New York's pre-yuppie downtown. This summary of Paper Magazine's in-your-face visuals, sly takes on the media and seditionary stance on fashion, is a valentine to all the people and institutions that have been thinking outside of the box for the last 15 years. If you dare to be hip, buy it and refer to it.

If you like memoirs, written by great writers about themselves, you'll love this one.

I was born in 1970, this was written not long after--my sense of being is way different than this guy. He wrote this himself in his later years, meanders here and there, but more in the end. Charming all the way thru.

I'd heard that maybe this was a little racy, but again--only in the beginning. And even then, not nearly what you see when you tune into any television station. Really, just a glimpse into what gay men of his era went through (a good glimpse).

When I realized what gold I had in my hands I slowed way down with this one--he writes in a way that makes you want to savor. It's a whole different time, you hafta listen.

Thank you older gay men, you paved the way.

This book shocked and disappointed many upon its release in 1975. Many were expecting something resembling a predictable literary auto-biography, though, with the authors notorious history and reputation, should have been prepared for what they got instead. This is a fascinating book about and by the man many called genius, the author of "A Streetcar Named Desire", "The Glass Menagerie", "Cat On A Hot Tin Roof", "Sweet Bird Of Youth", "Night Of The Iguana", etc..., and the events in his life that help one better understand just how autobiographical many of his works were. From his upbringing by a tyrannical, indifferent father, who was disappointed in his "sissy" son, his overbearing mother, and his relationship with his lifelong, deepest love, his sister Rose, whose tragic mental illness and lobotomy froze her in time, and perhaps was the most important factor in his troubled life and his creative genius. He was all too human, in his relationships and insecurities. He exposes himself, warts and all, at once being an extremely sensitive, caring human being, who at other times in his life, could turn into an irrational, paranoid, abusive chore to be around. Substance abuse certainly played a major part in his progressive personal and professional demise, and he is brutally honest about that also. He is also unapologetic about the many promiscuous periods of his life, the bluntness of his recounting of sexual escapades usually so humorously told, that it defuses what could have been just vulgar bad taste, to some. His 14 year love relationship with Frank Merlo, who died of cancer in the early 1960's, was, aside from Rose, the most important relationship of his life. Though he and Merlo were estranged towards the end of Merlos life, then had a reconciliation just prior to his death, Tennessee was to never recover from the loss. He also tells about the beginning of his career, and certain pivitol moments in his professional life when, before fame and praise came, it was doubtful that the poor, struggling writer might ever find success. There are also wonderful first hand insights into his contact with the likes of Brando, Anna Magnani, Capote, to name a few. But, admittedly, this book is more about the man than the career. He readily concedes that he is not about to bore himself and some readers to death with chronological descriptions about the fruition of each play. As he says here: "The plays, what about them? If this was a book only about my plays, it would be a very short book. The plays speak for themselves". In fact, there is nothing chronological about this book. It was published about ten years before his tragic death, a period in his life that , after a brilliant career with successive hits, was marked by professional failure, the progression of which was publicly recorded by ,what many perceived to be, unusually aggressive critics who were intent on destroying him personally. If you're looking for a standard auto-bio of a literary career, you may be disappointed. But you also may enjoy, as I did, this wonderfully touching and often humourous book by a sad, troubled, brilliant human being, who battled with his demons his whole life, trying to give a voice to the lonely, the outcast, the misunderstood...the "gentle people", as he referred to them. We are all contradictory, perhaps those the Gods touch with genius more so than others. It's the totality of a life that matters, and the total sum of his life was that he tried his damndest to be a GOOD MAN. An honest man. And, he also created some of the most brilliant works, with some of the most memorable characters, speaking some of the most beautiful words, in the history of theater. Don't judge dear Tennessee too harshly.

Before reading this I knew absolutely nothing about Tennessee Williams....after reading it I wish I knew even less.

Williams writes with no continuity, constantly jumping back and forth with stories from different times in his life, making this book difficult to follow.

His drug addictions, prima donna temper tantrums, numerous homosexual trysts, and infidelity to his dying lover are nothing to be admired yet he writes about them as if they were badges of honor.

Don't waste your money or time on this one.

I think "badges of honor" (from a previous review) misses the mark. "Badges of dis-honor" would be closer to the truth. I think Williams' extremely destructive drug abuse and alcoholism are obvious escape hatches - escapes from his inner deamons, his possible self-loathing, and certainly an attempt to reconcile the loneliness that each artist has to contend with. The same isolation and deamons that Williams faced nearly destroyed Michelangelo - and they did kill Virginia Woolf, Francis Bacon, and Oscar Wilde. I still think "Iguana" and "Streetcar" are among the finest literature in the American canon, while "Suddenly Last Summer" is among the most compelling psychological (if not philosophical) horror stories ever written. In fact, it's worthy of Poe. Tennessee Williams can be difficult and disturbing, because he NEVER lies to us. Every one of his works renders him defenseless - and by extension our defenses are stipped bare as well. Only the greatest authors, artists, and poets are able to do this. No thoughtful person is quite the same after delving into the work of Tennessee Williams. I think that's an awesome power to possess - and William's never abuses it. Instead, he saved the abuse for himself. I'm still coming to terms with this.

If you are looking for a well organized overview of TW's life and career, look somewhere else. For someone truly interested in Tennessee Williams, I would suggest first reading a biography of him, and if you are still interested, read this to find out what made this man tick, what made this man get out of bed each day and write, and what a (....) guy he was. This is a nitty-gritty, confessional look inward at the personal aspects and thoughts of the life of a very talented writer.
I am sure what shocked his public when it was published in 1975 was his frank description of his love life and sexual affairs. For Ernest Hemingway it was okay to describe his love life because he was straight, but for a gay man it was (and still largely is) expected to be kept discreetly sub-rosa. But Tennessee was not ashamed of his nature and not ashamed of his life and in that way this memoir (and his life itself) is an act of cultural defiance. It pours out in a fairly disjointed stream of recollections. To be honest, it reads like a rough-draft that needs a lot of editing and filling in. But all-in-all, the inherent drama, passion and thirst for life itself jump out of the page and carry one through to the end and you can't help but be touched by his humanity and his passion and his drive to express himself through his art.

John Waters is a very funny, albeit very warped, man, but if you're considering buying this book, you probably already knew that. In this book he tells his life story (up to about 1980, when this book was first written), focussing on the making of his movies; on his friends (such as Divine, Mink Stole, Edith Massey etc) who became his regular cast and crew; and on some of his more unusual hobbies and obsessions (such as his fascination with high profile criminal cases and his love of Baltimore); and it is every bit as hilarious as his movies (although slightly less disgusting). In addition, it also includes interviews with Divine and Waters' heroes, Russ Meyer and Hershiell Gordon Lewis; a brief biography of Edith Massey (the egg lady from "Pink Flamingos"); and a large number of black and white pictures.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, although I did find the interviews to be a bit tedious, particularly since I am not a fan of Meyer or Lewis (to me they felt like filler, put in solely to make the book a publishable length). Nevertheless, this book should appeal to all fans of Waters' work, and to anyone interested in the process of film making.

John Waters is a very funny, albeit very warped, man, but if you're considering buying this book, you probably already knew that. In this book he tells his life story (up to about 1980, when this book was first written), focussing on the making of his movies; on his friends (such as Divine, Mink Stole, Edith Massey etc) who became his regular cast and crew; and on some of his more unusual hobbies and obsessions (such as his fascination with high profile criminal cases and his love of Baltimore); and it is every bit as hilarious as his movies (although slightly less disgusting). In addition, it also includes interviews with Divine and Waters' heroes, Russ Meyer and Hershiell Gordon Lewis; a brief biography of Edith Massey (the egg lady from "Pink Flamingos"); and a large number of black and white pictures.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, although I did find the interviews to be a bit tedious, particularly since I am not a fan of Meyer or Lewis (to me they felt like filler, put in solely to make the book a publishable length). Nevertheless, this book should appeal to all fans of Waters' work, and to anyone interested in the process of film making.

I was hoping to learn more about John Waters, the man, when I bought this book, and I was far from disappointed. This book is a great memoir of his life from start to finish, with lots of juicy inside info on all of his films. Throughout the book the reader meets all of the outrageous and delightfully politically incorrect characters that inhibit his movies and his life. There are lots of inside stories about Mink Stole, Divine, and everyone else ever seen in a Waters film, as well as the sweet low-down on that famous poop scene as well everything else you've ever wondered about. Waters is surprisingly honest about all sorts of rude and criminal acts that I'd never have known about if I hadn't read it. Underneath it all he shines through as a lovable guy who adores his hometown of Baltimore as well as the genre of trashy movies. If you love Waters, or even don't particularly like him but want to know more about him anyway, you must read this book.

Before reading Shock Value, I'd read John's other book - Crackpot - and found it to be extremely witty and insightful. He seems very humble and able to communicate with anyone. I like this book Shock Value, however I am giving it 4 stars b/c I would rather not see images and snapshots. I'd rather just have had a full book I could read. Also, I didn't find his career-oriented to be interesting.

John Waters is fantastic. His true talents are not in his films, but in his writing. He can take the mundane and make it extraordinary, the creepy and strange and make it funny, and the ugliest of the ugly and make them things of beauty. Though he's an old man now, and his movies have gone mainstream, this book is a look back at his hilarious youth and all the mischief making that made him and the Dreamland cast stars.

This book covers the making of all his films, the biographies and interviews with his famed cast members, as well as his inpirations (ex. Rus Meyer). You enjoy their antics and feel as if you are right along side them in the making of their hilarious movies and tasteful adventures in bad taste. You can't put it down and are actually laughing out loud as you read. And he even writes about his family. How punk rock!

One thing he taught me to do was to love my hometown. People never seem to like their hometowns, whether they are in the most flashy of cities or the tiniest one horse town. Life is what you make of it, and John put the hairdo capital of the world (Baltimore) on the map with his hijinx and adoration of all things weird and wonderful. He takes his enemies and makes them into glowing monsters we can all throw rotten tomatos at in his absence. The creepy weirdos aren't monsters, they're glorious, misunderstood creatures we are to embrace. Look for the scariest, craziest places and have the most rip roaring time with the clientele. I've taken his advice and now have the ability to talk to anyone, because there are loads of lonely lunatics out there just dying to be friends with you.