Pulp Books

I loved this book. Every page was filled with interesting facts I did not previously know. Who knew the word Muzak was invented in the 1930s? Not me. I was constantly reading passages aloud to whoever was nearby to hear, (my mother, my best friend, my boss, a random student in the Starbuck's).

I would suggest this book for anyone interested in the socio-cultural aspects and impact of shopping.

This is a good read, certainly for those interested in history. It was a bit light and wasn't helpful in terms of marketing or research, but interesting none the less.

Journalist, culture columnist, and avid shopper Pamela Klaffke presents Spree: A Cultural History Of Shopping, which covers the ritual of purchasing and its evolution from "need" to "want" to "sport". Spree covers how inventions in modern history have transformed the shopping experience, from cash registers and shopping carts to the online shopping revolution; Spree also examines cultural differences in shopping around the world, from American malls to Parisian arcades. Black-and-white photographs, sidebar anecdotes, and a wealth of research presented in a cheerful narrative style make Spree more fun to read than an trip to the mall - also more educational and very likely less costly!

Spree is a fabulous and fun book. Whether you're a trivia buff, curious shopper, or just want a little defense of your favourite pasttime, this is a great book for understanding and appreciating all that is shopping. Klaffke's style is witty and sharp, and the book is consumable in short bits - perfect for waiting in long line ups.

I picked up Spree; A Cultural History of Shopping thinking it would be a quick and enjoyable read. Enjoyable, yes. Quick, no.

For such a small book (trade paperback, 230 pages including an excellent bibliography and index), Spree is packed with more information about shopping than you would have imagined.
Canadian author Pamela Klaffke examines shopping from a multitude of angles, taking only a few pages at most for each topic. She really knows how to distill information down to the basics, while remaining informative and entertaining. Learn about Muzak, malls, Tupperware, infomercials, pawn shops, mystery shoppers, dysfunctional shopping, mall walking, and more. My favorite chapter is Shopping and the Media, which examines how shopping is portrayed in movies, television (sitcoms and game shows), and music.

The text is interesting enough, but in the wide side margins of many pages are additional tidbits, such as a list of celebrity shoplifters, a list of celebrity cheapskates (Katie Couric!), and the evolution of Buy Nothing Day.

Great to browse through or to read from cover to cover.

This entertaining and educational book shows us the development of a great TV series from a unique perspective rarely seen before: the Locations department. The first 5 seasons of The X-Files are brought to life behind the scenes with the people on the front line. The book is filled with lots of great and funny stories about the adventures of the Locations folks and their desire to turn Vancouver and environs into numerous settings across the U.S. and around the world while simultaneously enabling the producers and directors to make top-notch television. Highly recommended.

This book was an excellent read for myself, an X-Files fan and a resident of Vancouver. It expresses the love and dedication that all the X-Files crew members had for the show.

Anyone who likes the X-Files will get a kick out of reading the various stories behind acquiring all the locations for the show. A synopsis of *every* episode shot in BC is given, making this a useful episode guide as well.

After reading the book, I can say I am truly lucky to live in a city that stood for so many diverse places during the X-Files run.

After watching Sunday's finale episode, I pulled out my "X Marks the Spot" book to reminisce about the "good ol'days" when the X-Files was filmed in Vancouver - which was seasons 1-5. This book, written by Louisa Gradnitzer and Todd Pittson (who were location managers on the X-Files for 5 years) and an introduction by Tom Braidwood (also known as Frohike of the Lone Gunmen), shows the viewer the places that the X-Files filmed in Vancouver, a map to show where they are located and behind the scene facts about the episodes.

What is great about this book, it is split into seasons and episodes so that you can find your favorite episode, what locations were used for it and trivia about the filming of it.
This book also contains black and white behind the scenes photos featuring the cast, crew, buildings, props, cast parties and the final shots from Vancouver, which closes the book.

This book is a must if you're an X-Phile planning on visiting Vancouver.

Welp, unfortunately I can't tell you the whole behind the scenes look at what it took to get The "X-Files Phenomenom" going (It will take Forever and a Day, plus I wouldn't want to spoil the joy of you reading it), but I can say this is worth the money. Find out what it took to get the show on the road, how it was for everyone when they first got together, to the time they had to leave Their Vancouver Home where it All Started.
Written by Tom Braidwood (Fohike of the Lone Gunmen) so you know there is more than what an ordinary journalist can get a hold of. I guess you can call this Book "The little Diary of Tom Braidwood, and Friends."

Learn Everything you need to know about how They found the perfect location for each episode from Seasons 1-5, and find out how the weather was at the time of filming. . . hmmmm. It also has many Black and white pictures for your enjoyment, some funny, and others that illustrates how each set looked at the time of filming. It's definitely a keeper.

Great look at what goes on behind the making of the X-Files. From set and actor problems to the interesting adventures with Vancouver locals. X-Philers and fans of the show will love this inside look.

I sincerely enjoyed the book!!! However, there is a mistake in the very beginning which jolted me. John Denver died at Lover's Point, Pacific Grove, CA not off Santa Barbara as the author indicated. His "experimental plane" failed him. The people of Pacific Grove held a candlelit ceremony honoring him. They played and sang John Denver songs.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. As someone who lives outside of the unbelievably rich areas of Colorado, it's always fun to see what these places are really like (and yes to have some prejudices confirmed). I hope this won't be Hasburgh's only foray into fiction - finding out what happens next to Jake and the love of his life Annie would be great fun to read.

As "Aspen Estreme" is a movie for skiers, so is this book. It's a wild ride.A great book to take on a Ski vacation.

This is a brilliant novel written in one of the freshest and most original American voices in years. The plot (an intricate and page turning whodunnit) is not the point. What is the point is Hasburgh's signature style which is hilarious and unlike anything in recent American fiction. By turns satiric, sentimental, and then unexpectedly profound, this book is one of those rare animals that actually exceeds its publisher's hype.

Highly recommended.

Former TV writer Jake Wheeler was a big success in Hollywood scripting some very popular shows, but he lost his lofty standing and his wealth to what he felt was the two "A"s: age and alcohol while the community dropped him for a string of flops. Jake returned to his hometown of Aspen struggling to make a living while drinking diet coke with sugar to overcome the "Stolichnaya Flu".

Long time friend Chief of Police Rick Rankin offers Jake work as a private sleuth. Laura Keller (whose surname is now some cereal company) needs a detective to find her missing seventeen years old stepdaughter Tinker "Bell" Mellon while her spouse (Tinker's genetic dad) is spending the season in Alabama watching football. Seeing easy money, Jake visits Laura who has tasted every male's Jimmy except his. Using Jim Rockford (rather than Mr. T) as a mentor, Jake investigates. Except for the aid of Winston (the dog) and in spite of his intimate knowledge of Rockford, Jake fumbles the ball time after time.

Readers who appreciate hours of laugher from the asides, self deprecations, puns, and buddy shots will want to read ASPEN PULP, a private investigative tale that feels more like Inspector Clouseau, Rocky Mountain amateur sleuth. Though played for laughs, the Jake is a complete person holding the plot together even when he'd rather have a "Virgin" than a "Bloody Mary". Though totally irreverent, the story line is cleverly designed so that the twists and turns down Aspen Mountain add depth while the secondary cast provides insight into the Rockford wannabe or the avalanched working class. Patrick Hasburgh opens his new series with a gold medal grand slalom run.

Harriet Klausner

A somewhat personal account at times of the editor's interest in pulp magazines.

He mentiones when he first saw them in Woolies in the 50s - saying they were used as ballast in ships, then sold cheaply. That is whacky, but good for him, after scoring a Weird Tales.

He goes through various different types, spicy, detective, fantasy, shudder, hot, etc.

Also, being a pom he talks briefly about the magazines there, especially when the yank imports where banned, and some of the artists.

That is where a heavy focus of this book is, the artwork.

He does detail some of the publishers, who put them out, the strategies they used, etc., but also talks a lot about the artwork and styles used as far as what they could and could not get away with as American became more and more puritanical moving into the 50s.

He deliberately ignores the superheroes, or the major variety, mentioning a couple in passing like the Black Bat and the Crimson Mask. Nothing much on the Lone Ranger or various Westerns either, or major science fiction magazines.

So partly interest, partly what has been covered already drove his editorial decisions, presumably.

People who like those covers will like it, hardcore pulp historians maybe wouldn't be so thrilled, but would still be interested somewhat.


3.5 out of 5

Note: There are a couple Mormons who are angry over my negative reviews of books written in defense of the Book of Mormon, and they have been slamming my reviews. Your "helpful" votes are appreciated. Thanks.

As a non-artist, it's hard to write a review of an art book, but I know what I like. So here's a non-expert's opinion.

This book is well worth the price. It is full of color covers of pulp magazines from the 1930s through the 1950s. I've owned it for many years, and I still love browsing through it. I've copied a couple of them and hung them on my wall.

Also, if you don't already know about Bud Plant, then also check out his site. You'll go broke ordering from it. What a wonderful collection classic illustrations!

Check out my download pictures.

Peter Haining has published a huge number of volumes on a variety of topics, which tend to be both well illustrated and very carelessly researched. This latest addition to the stack unfortunately follows that pattern.

First the good stuff: the book offers a large number of well-reproduced covers from a wide variety of pulps. The images are photographs (two are out of focus slightly), and so do not have the problems seen in several similar recent books which had electronically-scanned covers displaying a color palette nothing whatsoever like the actual covers.

Now for the bad part. The text is mainly just a description of particular magazines which happen to be in the author's personal collection. Where the text departs from what is really just a catalog of the collection, to provide background on publishers, specific titles and authors, the material is so riddled with errors as to be of very limited use and reliability. So much of the text is clueless, every reader will have his favorite (and different) gaffe. Mine is the reference (p. 203) to "famous American space artist Chester Bonestall." He's apparently not as famous as I thought!

To summarize the contents: Chapter 1 provides a confused account of the origins and types of pulp magazines. Chapter 2 is devoted to the very-soft-porn pulps usually sold from under the tobacco shop counter. Chapter 3 deals with detective, crime and gangster pulps. Chapter 4 covers the "spicy" pulps and their imitators. Chapter 5 introduces the weird fantasy pulps, of which the best and best known were WEIRD and UNKNOWN. Chapter 6 surveys the "shudder" pulps which featured heavy doses of sadism and torture. Chapter 7 fairly casually dips into the huge sea of science-fiction pulps. Finally, chapter 8 shows us a little bit of the little-known world of British pulps and pulp publishing. (About half the space actually is devoted to paperbacks rather than pulps.) Notable complete omissions from the book are the most popular pulp genre, westerns (perhaps half of all pulp titles at peak), and the justice-figure pulps such as THE SHADOW, DOC SAVAGE and the SPIDER, which are the best remembered pulps today. Also largely ignored are the general fiction titles, such as BLUE BOOK, ARGOSY and ADVENTURE. With such omissions, the present book cannot be considered very valuable even as a pictoral survey of the pulp era.

Buy it for the cover reproductions and you won't be too disappointed. But if you try to read the text, you're in for dismay and frustration.

Obviously the politically incorrect covers are the first attraction. You can't ignore the cultural significance of the covers and thus, if you are a teacher of semiotics or visual interpretation, I can't think of a richer source. Congrats to the publishers for printing such a glorious book. For those more interested in what's between the covers, Haining gives insightful critical analysis of the different genres. A great gift for anyone; a wonderful coffee table book for yourself. It's worth every penny.

The colorfully covered, cheaply printed pulp magazine of the 1920s and 30s great out of the 19th-century dime novel and served as the forerunner of the comic books and paperback novels of today. In its heyday, pulp magazines were a staple of popular culture that offered every genre of readership the thrills, adventures, and entertainments they craved -- often to the dismay of parents, teachers, and clergy! Virtually creating the now popular literary genres as science fiction and the hard-boiled private eye mystery, these magazines were the incubators of such American literary talents as Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Raymond Chandler, James M. Cain, Dashiell Hammett, and a legion of others. An outstanding recommendation for personal, academic, and community library collections, The Classic Era Of American Pulp Magazines tells the complete story of these colorful pulps and those that wrote and published them, with a wealth of colorful cover art giving today's readers an accurate sense and taste of what the glory years of pulp magazines had to offer their enthusiastic readers.

Dance Till Tomorrow is an excellent manga series. The humor is adult natured, but is not the typical romantic-comedy that is prevelant in much manga. The main characters are flawed, complex, and often don't even know what they want themselves. I find that a nice change and fairly realistic. The art is high-quality with little use of filler or stock images.

Fans of manga like Ranma and Ah My Goddess will find the humor to be a little more adult and the characters more complex.

Without a doubt, Dance Till Tomorrow is an essential manga for the mature and discriminating reader. The story is complex, funny, and sexy all at the same time. Best of all, it portrays realistic characters in realistic situations. While it is not a kids title, all the sexy situations are very tastefully done and unless you have some real problem with sex, you'll have no problems with this title. So go ahead and read it, you won't be disappointed!

Poor Sueichi- but his situation does make for comic-relief. The author prefers to use everyday life in his stories, the story and art are great! Just enough sexiness to give it that spark of life.

This book is all about a young college boy who's suddenly came across MILLIONS! But the strict condition of striking it rich is that he better not touch a single dollar bill until he at least graduates from the college and gets a wife. And along comes a very mysterious con artist in the form of a sleek young sexpot to cattily manuipulate and guilt the poor kid into giving in - though he VERY STUBBORNLY refuses to despite the actual sexual scenes which are very titillating indeed as well as home-cooked dinners (which the girl obviously isn't as good at). In addition, the young hero's got a role with a play he's rehearsing and he happens to be IN LOVE with a much older but nevetheless pretty young woman in charge of the whole setup. And what really tangles things up is the sudden involvement of the scar-faced gangsters at the play that the young "harlot" had secretly invited along! Though this stuff is supposed to be from "Pulp", a special new manga for the mature audience, the characters themselves seem to be forever in their pubescent stage as in virtually all the other cartoons from Japan, both hand-drawn and animated.

This manga is just great! It features a young student who inherits millions (in condition he graduate and marry) and a woman who probably just wants to get hold of the money. Viz were very brave to publish this book because it doesn't offer violence and fantasy related themes and it targets mature readers while the american comics market is pretty much juvenile. It is a very witty book, but if you want porn or violence look somewhere else.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone who enjoys reading about the behind the scene antics of rock bands on the road. It is very amusing and you can really picture all these things happening while the band is trying to get back together etc. The characters are really fresh and make you feel like you are a part of the crowd.

I read this book for a creative writing class, and it was WAY better than I thought it would be! It's a realistic approach to seeing how music works and what goes behind it. A very engaging, and often hilarious read.

I originally heard of this book because one of the characters(so far my favourite)is one of my favourtie bands namesake:Billy Tallent.(except the band's name is spelt minus one L).The book is mainly about the band Hard Core Logo that made it big as a seminal punk bad back in the late 70's. It starts off with the lead singer,Joe Dick, (yes that is his name) telling us how the band got started and ended. The band broke up mutually but exagerated it into a story of spite for eachother in oder to "fit the mold". The band, towards the end of their carreer, were also said to have sold out, and I don't mean selling all their tickets for a show. about 10 years later the four men that made up the band find their lives in a rut. Joe's a druggie, Billy's(guitarist) a drunk, John(bassist) was depressed and is lonely, and Pipefitter(drummer) is a poor garbage man. Their lives start to go back to the old days though after they get a call to do a benefit/reunion gig for some enviromental thing. Afterwards they decided to do a tour and their crazy hellish rock and roll days suddenly return...but is it for the best? Anywho back to the review: The characters are at times hateable and likeable but most importantly believable(in this kinda setting). The format in which the book is written is unique but it times confusing and side tracks, however the book and concept are clearly well-thought out and this makes for a really interesting read if your into this kinda stuff. All in all, very awesome.

I had seen the movie Hard Core Logo years ago when it first premiered here in Canada, but never picked up the book until a friend recommended it to me. He read it in one sitting and told me I wouldn't be able to put it down. Well, I took it to work with me and finished it before the shift ended! This is the most amazingly written book I have ever read.

Hard Core Logo is the story of a punk band on one last tour trying to regain not only the glory of their past days atop the Punk Genre, but also to rekindle the flame they used to have for the business, and get paid as well.

What makes this book so interesting is that it is written in verse, telling the story through poems, song lyrics, answering machine messages, letters and the diary of Ox, the bands neurotic bass player.

The characters, the setting and the entire story is laid out just by the spoken and written words of the band members. You don't need any more explanation beyond what is given to you. It may sound strange, but no book has ever grabbed me the way this one did! You just have to read it to understand how different and how good it really is!

It seems like Hard Core Logo is an example of a book that was not quiet as good as the film that was made out of it. Perhaps I expected too much upon seeing the excellent film first, but I can't help but be disappointed with the book. It's novel in verse format is clever, although skimpy. I feel that Turner had a great story to tell, but left out all the best parts. The characters are underdeveloped and the whole story feels empty and unfulfilling. It is a very short book (it took me about three times as long to watch the movie than read the book), and while this is not necessarily a bad thing, I felt that there had to be more in this book to make it work. A great idea, a great basis for a movie, this book is a bit too hollow to be thoroughly enjoyed. Check out American Whisky bar instead, it's way better and a great book in itself.

Aside from being one of the funniest books I've ever read, it has a special quality: Certain paragraphs will spring out at me and I'll think: "I've always wanted the words to describe that kind of feeling or circumstance, and there on the page are the perfect words."

I tend to devalue words but S.S. reminds me of the power of well-chosen words to strengthen your position in the world. I wonder if that's what people mean when they talk about 'identity'.

Maybe one of the most intricate and elaborate work about identity I have ever read. Sarah Schulman's writing makes us dive into a historical pool of events and questions each and every one of us have experienced in our own special moments.

Sara Schulman, Empathy (Dutton, 1992)

Until roughly twenty minutes before writing this review, I was getting ready to say Empathy was going to be a definite for my best twenty-five reads of 2003 list. Then I read the last three chapters.

The first twenty-seven are brilliant. The story's two main characters are Anna O., a lesbian attempting to get over an old relationship and find someone new, and Doc, a post-Freudian therapist who finds prospective clients by handing out business cards on the street and will never keep a client for more than three sessions. Eventually, their two stories intertwine as Anna, finding one of Doc's business cards, makes an appointment with him. The two of them then proceed to take on relationships of all sorts, Jewish funerals, AIDS, the homeless, and a rainbow of other topics with a wicked wit. Doc obsesses over an old girlfriend as well, and feels an almost supernatural connection with Anna. When one of the main questions in a book is "will Doc end up having a fourth session with Anna?", it's impossible to write a review in a way that makes it sound as important as it actually is, but Anna, Doc, and the supporting cast of characters (Anna's family, Doc's patients and mentor, Anna's old girlfriend's mother, Doc's old girlfriend) are so well-drawn and engaging that it's well-night impossible not to be drawn in to the point where you sit up at night thinking about such things.

Then Schulman hits you with the kicker, the novel's climax, and though it's nothing we haven't seen before (telling you where would be the ultimate plot spoiler, however), it's a sucker punch delivered with such aplomb that it demands a "thank you, ma'am, may I have another." I had figured I knew where the book was going, had it mapped out in my head (and it was a brilliant ending, too), then Schulman flipped all my expectations on their heads and delivered what may have been the only climax that was actually better than what I thought it would be.

Then we get to Chapter Twenty-Seven, and everything goes to hell in a handbasket. We spend two chapters involved in political polemic that has absolutely nothing to do with the rest of the novel, and while they are two brief chapters, their very existence in the book poisons the whole thing. Schulman attempts to wrap things up in the last chapter by going back to the original topic of life-after-Doc Anna, but by then it's too late. The rhythm, the style, the all-around beauty of the book has been dashed against a curb on a dark, rainy street.

My advice? By all means, read this novel. Up to chapter twenty-six. Then skip ahead to chapter thirty. You will still find an ending that is an anticlimax, to say the least, but you will at least be spared pointless political diatribe along the way. ** ½

She uses formal invention to evoke (not describe) what lesbian life is like.When I took her writing class here at UCSD, I realized how sophisticated her writing is. Before that I think this book got overlooked because people think that novels about lesbians can't be art.

This book is perfect for anyone who works in or is curious about the pulp and paper industry. It covers all the different stages of the pulp and paper creation process starting from tree to finished product. The book covers such topics as mechanical pulping, chemical pulping, paper making, and environmental concerns. If you work or want to work in the pulp and paper industry, you should own this book.

I am a member of the Pulp and Paper Manufacturers Association and I hold a degree in Chemical Engineering. For the Pulp and Paper Industry, Smook's textbook is one that you will commonly find that is used a reference. It was recommended to me by another enginner active in the industry as well. It is an excellent source for interactions with unit operations in relation to several different types of papermaking methods currently in use. I highly recommend it!

This book is the standard in the industry for a reason. It is concise and complete, touching on every aspect of papermaking.

I work in the field of computerization and I manage the technology sales for my company in the P&P Industry. This is a book that I have given to several of my colleagues who need to get up to speed and understand how the industry works. Smook is very concise and describes all types of mills in our Industry. For the Engineer who needs an explaination of the unit operations in a mill and how they interact, this is the book. It is the de-facto standard.

As part of the epic clash between the great cultures of the world, markedly the West and Islam, Westerners have often discredited Islamic civilization's contribution to the global propagation of paper. In his book Paper Before Print, Jonathan Bloom details Islam's contribution to the proliferation of paper from its birth in China and through to Europe. Bloom's argument that Islamic civilization has a major role in the proliferation of paper is extremely plausible and convincing; however, many of his claims about the artistic and intellectual growth resulting from its proliferation are questionably misguided in that they are inferred from Bloom's own logic rather than compelling historical evidence. Nevertheless, Bloom's book makes an interesting reading experience and is very useful in the study of Middle East history.
Bloom's claims about the proliferation of paper through the Muslim world to Europe are both plausible and convincing. He provides an abundance of information and details to prove his points. He details numerous factors, changes, and events, all of which coalesced to create a flourishing of paper throughout the world. His notation of multiple events and his diverse range of evidence converge to form a cogent and logical explanation of the growth of papermaking. The actuality that his claims are based on a variety of different factors make it extremely difficult to refute his argument, since even the successful rebuttal of one or two of his claims would be outshined by a tremendous amount of additional substantiation provided by him.

The subject of the proliferation of paper throughout the world is an extremely important part of Middle Eastern history for a number of reasons. The most simple and obvious of these is that to understand paper is to understand the survival and existence of written records. It is conceivable that in the absence of paper, there would be a significant reduction in written documents that would survive to the present day. Much of the history we know of and study today is derived from primary documents of various time periods. The durability of paper ensures that these documents survive the test of time. Paper is a medium of recording information so that subsequent generations can study the events and tales of that time. Another reason that the study of Islamic civilization's proliferation of paper is important is the increasing acknowledgment of this civilization's achievements among today's scholars. As mentioned by Bloom, many scholars and individuals are reluctant to accept the validity of Islamic civilization as a great and inspirational one. It is important that we understand and value the contribution of Islamic civilization in spreading paper through to Europe and eventually globally, and that we recognize Islamic civilization's impact on the West, especially in a time of increasing hostilities and conflict between the two cultures. If there is ever to be a reconciliation or assimilation of the two cultures, it would have to involve recognition of each other's greatness, if not an outright appreciation and admiration of it. Historical interpretation can be, and often is, the source of many conflicts and death throughout the world. However, it can also serve to advance civilization and bring upon an unprecedented global society in which peace and understanding prevail over war and hatred. Only through understanding the greatness of the various cultures of the world, in addition to their misdeeds, will we be able to improve intercultural affairs and avoid further escalation of violence and hatred.

Jonathan Bloom's book is extremely compelling in its attribution of the proliferation of paper to Islamic civilization. His argument is extremely persuasive and based on good evidence and research. Paper Before Print is interesting, and provides an argument that is seldom discussed in today's history books. The book, however, is not without flaws. Adding to his faulty implications of the proliferation of paper is his incorporation of various uninteresting aspects of the preparation of paper. The book focuses a lot on the manufacture of different kinds of paper, and how it differs from place to place. Although this may be of some interest to such paper-producing corporations as Avery and Kinko's, it is of no interest to me personally. These tedious facts are detrimental to the reader's enjoyment of the book. The book is extremely interesting at times, but it is definitely not captivating. It is very easy to put this book down, and it is quite enjoyable to abstain from reading it for long periods of time. The book is so extremely dry and uninteresting at times, that it may throw the reader into a spiraling descent of deep sleep. It seems somewhat ironic that Bloom, a man who clearly values the contribution of paper to society, would waste so many pieces of it on the dull facts of papermaking. I would not recommend this book to anybody, precisely because a large part of it is unexciting. Rather, I would recommend anybody interested in the subject to visit the historic centers of papermaking mentioned, such as Baghdad, Damascus, Tehran and Cairo. I do realize however, that a trip to these places would require a significant amount of capital. Those who choose to embark on such an enlightening journey may giggle at the thought that the monetary exchange of legal tender for airline tickets is made possible by the contribution of Islamic civilization to the proliferation of paper.

This book was absolutely great. It tells the history of paper before it reached the Christian world. This is the time before the printing press was invented. Paper had just come from China. This book tells about this time that is sometimes forgotten. This book is the best

Paper Before Print is a glorious achievement from all perspectives: historically, culturally, and as an impeccable model of how books of this sort should be presented (though too often they do not). Jonathan Bloom's text is revealing and intellectually stimulating without alienating the average reader. His premise, though not a popular one -- that the Middle East played a far more important role in refining and introducing paper to the West than is usually acknowledged -- carefully unfolds with unassailable research and arguments. The illustrations, mostly early Islamic texts (700s-1300s), are tastefully selected and compliment the text perfectly. The typography, layout, and presentation are superb. Anyone interested in history, art, and printing will profit from having this book on their shelves.

Paper Before Print is very iconoclastic. It suggests the European Renaissance is related to declines in a commodity cost (writing material), rather than the birth of now-familiar geniuses and renewed interest in ancient classics. While the scope of the book outlines a complete history of 'cellulose pulp using people' (paper users), the central theme addresses the cultural transmission of technology. Specifically, it describes the transmission of paper making skills from China to Europe via the Muslim Caliphates. Most of the narrative covers the period between 700 and 1200 AD, but ancient and modern detours intrude regularly. This is entirely appropriate, since most readers will have a difficult time giving credence to commodity prices playing any role in European intellectual development. Bloom seems to have decided to zig-zag back and forth across 3 thousand years of history, hoping to keep the 'big picture' in view.

The book makes an excellent argument for 'cultural' issues dictating technological change. For example, paper emerged in China as a 'wrapping' material. It wasn't until Buddhist influences from India made 'writing' important that it's utility as 'voice recording substrate' was discovered. In other words, until the economic demands for precise and voluminous reproduction of Buddha's voice emerged, 'paper' was only used to bundle things together. The combination of a cultural need (reproducing Buddha's voice) blended with a Chinese skill (making a cheap membrane that happened to soak up ink), what we know as the 'writing' industry never got off the ground. Of real interest is the fact that India ignored the Chinese innovation for 2000 years. Paper was not used frequently there until Muslim culture was imposed on it 2000 years later.

Since Bloom's perspective relies on continually falling paper prices for explaining cultural revolutions, the reader is presented with a sound foundation in the mechanics of paper production. It is advances in these mechanical arts that drives down commodity prices. Equally important are the mechanics of educating 'paper' users and stabilizing an infrastructure for the system's continued existence. In this light, most of Bloom's time is spent describing educational and institutional practices of Muslim bureaucracy. It seems this was a unique interaction between Mediterranean 'mystery writing' (Greek logic plus Jewish/Christian/Muslim truths) and the Chinese (via silk road) paper bureaucracy. Bloom makes it clear that Muslim bureaucracy, and the paper using skills it relied upon, were invented by interaction of Middle East and China. The new technology was not a revolutionary technology discovered when Muslims captured Chinese paper-makers during 8th century military exploits, instead the bureaucratic needs of Muslim authorities saw in 'silk road cellulose membranes' an means to 'better government' during a time when anachronism of Roman government bureaucracy made change (better government) a possibility.

With the expansion of Muslim bureaucracy around the southern half of the Mediterranean basin during the 8th and 9th centuries, paper production skills became available to Germanic peoples of Europe. Unlike the Byzantines to the east, they were less attached to high priced writing membranes such as papyrus and vellum. They showed far less resistance to changing manufacturing and institutional practices. A good example of this is the 11th century 'corporate charter' revolution in Spain. This bureaucratic revolution relied upon cheap paper for incorporating numerous Spanish towns into a cohesive military defense force against Muslims who brought the paper in the first place. At the same time in Byzantium, the institutionalization of vellum record keeping practices retarded development of efficient government practices and an inability to address military threats from the Muslim east.

Bloom goes on to suggest that 3-D perspective as a communication skill emerged as a cultural force only when paper prices and reproduction costs fell to levels where 'mass readership' became possible. Bloom locates this emerging phenomena in the 10th century Caliphates, where mass readership of the Koran was a cultural priority. Bloom goes on to suggest that the Germanic peoples of Europe, who had no institutional focus on reproducing Koran-based beliefs, transmuted the phenomena of 'mass communication' into what we now know as the 'modern world'.

In She and Allan, we see the coming together of three of the most exciting characters in all of H. Rider Haggard's novels. The ever intrepid Allan meets the great and grim Umslopogaas of the Axe, son of Chaka, and there is born an interesting and in some ways touching friendship between them, as they have both dealt with many of the same troubles and loss over the years. And of course they meet with the immortal SHE, Ayesha, whom they seek in order to see their loved ones that have passed the realm of death. Many of the same elements from much of the Allan Quatermain body of work is here. But it serves to tie the many things from the different novels together. Such as the friendship between Umslopogaas and Allan that we see in the novel Allan Quatermain. It also offers further insight into the origin's of Umslopogaas's great axe, Inkosikaas, which is in a way a Zulu version of Excalibur. A fantastic novel for anyone who enjoys Haggard's body of work. Great to read especially after reading Haggard's novel of the early life of Umslopogaas, Nada the Lily.

Haggard combines his two most bankable stars-- Ayesha and Quartermain-- and it ought to be twice as much fun. The problem ultimately is that we know from page one that nothing is going to happen that might conflict with any of the history established for these characters in their other books. Particularly in Ayesha's case that's mighty limiting-- we know that Allan is going to pass through her life without making any particular mark, because all the significant people in her life are already accounted for. Consequently, the work doesn't really show anything new about either character, and instead of two great prizefighters duking it out, we get a couple of characters dancing around trying not to make a mark on each other. Still the basic two-fisted Anglo-Saxon hambone adventure that Haggard does so well, but there's a little less zip in this outing.

Allan quatermain is the iconic white hunter. He can and has tracked his way across Africa into lands unknown to most white men.
She (also known as "She Who Must be Obeyed) is the eternal seductress, the half goddess/half woman who cannot die. SHE is the ultimate in the spirit world.
Allan, perhaps, can be seen as the ultimate in the world we call reality.
She and Allan plays out this conflict between the material and spirit against the backdrop of the adventure of pushing into unknown darkest Africa.
Not as well known, or as well done as "King Solomon's Mines" or "She" -
then of course few books are-this is a worthwhile sequel to both.

Rider Haggard did an astonishingly good job of bringing together his two most venerable characters. I completely disagree with Mr. Greene and his review. We read Quatermain stories to feel comfortable in the company of an old friend. By the time this novel was published, we were aware of nearly all that hunter's foibles, and there was not a whole lot that needed to be elaborated here. We already know his thoughts and reactions before he himself does. We already know his views on spirituality and destiny and love and friendship and loyalty. Ayehsa also behaves just as we would expect--evasive, vague, saying one thing one minute then something quite different the next. It's impossible to pin her down. But she is another we know well and can anticipate and feel comfortable just being close to. It's Umslopogaas the Zulu and the provenance of his Axe that are the real attention grabbers here. And there are some marvelous battles to be relished vicariously as we learn about that Axe.

And just as some say that Sam is the real hero of the Lord of the Rings, for it is no more and no less than his steadfastness that gets Frodo to the end of the quest, so Hans' s role also needs to be raised up, for it is his pithy but invariably wise remarks and his own version of steadfastness that are the "heart" of the Quatermain stories in which he appears. Would that Haggard had written more of Quatermain and Hans!!