Western Books

Barnabas Sackett's life from his evasion of the Queen of England in Europe to fighting and befriending different tribes of Indians North of Jamestown and South of Plymouth. Makes a long drive seem much shorter! John Curless has a perfect voice for this story. One of Louis Lamour's best!

I discovered books on CD from a coworker. Having a one hour and ten minute commute each way makes listening to books on CD a great way to enjoy the travel time.
I found this book very well written and very well spoken. One person having to read the voice of many characters is probably not the easiest thing to do. This reading is well done. I found myself sitting in the company parking lot just to finish a chapter before facing my workday. This was my first L'Amour book on CD and it was very enjoyable.

Sackett's Land and To the Far Blue Mountains make a complete story of the life and times of the Sackett progenitor. The combination is entirely satisfactory. L'Amour had the ability to tell the story well, and he developed that ability with years of work and research. It is probably fortunate for Sackett enthusiasts that he wrote the first books in the series later in his writing career. We benefit from his seasoned skills.

As in his westerns, in this book L'Amour focuses on what he finds interesting and what he thinks the reader will like to know. For the most part, he doesn't go into the technical detail that some authors pursue, but he paints a clear picture. The reader has a feeling of being there, or the strong sense that they could be there, right along with our hero.

The Sackett family saga is the story of an American family. Like all of L'Amour's work, it is wholesome and educational. He consistently hits on themes that his readers recognize, the importance of education and critical thinking, respect for our fellow creatures and the world in which we live,loyalty to family and friends, and taking positive action to shape one's own life. All that and a fun story too, for the cost of five bucks.

Dramatically narrated by John Curless, To The Far Blue Mountains is an flawlessly recorded audiobook presentation of yet another of Louis L'Amour's classic western novels featuring the hardy endurance of the Sackett clan as they addressed the challenges of life in the Old West. To The Far Blue Mountains follows Barnabas Sackett, who is on the run with his steadfast wife Abigail and his only escape is to the west. This is a superbly written adventure story of earning a life for oneself on the frontier, surviving all manner of hazards both human and environmental, and eventually prospering despite the hostilities of nature and man alike. To The Far Blue Mountains is an enthusiastically recommended audiobook for personal and community library collections!

I picked up this book because the intro on the back cover sounded good and I've liked almost every L'amour book I've read. Its written in a first person narrative as though he was sitting across from you on the couch telling the story.

The first half of the book is terrific, following his escape from England. We learn of his thirst to be out in the wild open spaces of the newly discovered America, he is falsy accused and is running from the law collecting people to join him as he describes the new beginnings they can have in the New World. Its very tightly written (though I think his escape from prison was way too easy) and you really love the character.

Once the group got to America things changed. In an effort to show the WHOLE life of Barnabas the whole story changes, now we have 50 years of history in 100 pages. So the narrative changes from a day-by-day upbeat story where friends are joining the group to a list of significant events, usually where one of the group dies from an indian raid. It becomes a series of "we built a fort", "xxx died in an indian raid", "the fort burned down", "we went down to sea and traded our skins for supplies", "yyyy died in an indian raid", "we built another fort", etc.

I didn't like the ending either, I think the whole story basically got pretty depressing towards the end with all the group dying or leaving to go off and do other things. All the next generation were grown up and strong but we don't have the emotional connection with them that we did with the first group.

At last out in paperback, this unusual novel finally gets a foothold. It's not a "Western" at all. There are no blazing guns, sheriffs, or bad guys. There is just the beauty of the western high country bringing sustenance to a kid farmed out from a depression defeated Montana ranch to a find life packing mules and horses into the mountains. . . . We see the mountains grow into Ty Hardin as he grows into them, even when yanked from them to fight a war he is obliged to fight and which wounds him physically as his mentor, Fenton Pardee, knows it will, somehow. . . . Hardin returns to his high country to repair, and subsequently suffer the failure of a love that cannot be. He soon finds the deeper love of the woman he marries. But that too goes awry, his love dying with their child in a botched delivery. . . . That sadness takes him from the Montana mountains where he found life into the High Sierra, the west's highest range, where he knows life. He becomes a legend and dies there, trying to rescue a drug addled boy who should never have tested a country so high. . . . The book is a startling testament to something we have cherished but have never quite resolved in our literature -- the perennial allure and majesty of the American west.

I admire a spellbinding story where the characters are real, their choices and dilemmas have a grab that keeps you absorbed by their story. Then you add to this a complete understaning of the settings, the profession, the way people behave in the wilderness West, and it becomes an insight into a vanishing breed as an extra bonus beyond being a great story. The prose is as good as it gets - it often has a poetic quality. This book should be a best-seller: that is the bottom line, plain and simple.

Great book, hard read, must find a place that has no noise, then you will get through, you will enjoy it. Sound like a prop from a college wrote it.
Over all I enjoyed it.

Read this. It will stay with you. And it will probably lead you to check internet sites for pack trips into the mountains of western Montana and the Sierras of California so that you can experience what the novel describes and visit with the characters even more closely.

I loved this. One of my favorite reads of the last year. It communicates a life ethic that is 180 degrees from the culturally promoted one of contemporary American life. The persons you meet within its pages will awaken memories of folks from the margins of your life.

I can't say enough good things. It deserves to reach a wide audience. Make sure you've got plenty of time to give to this novel because you'll find you want to keep going and going till you've reached camp.

Great book if you love the mountains and enjoy escaping into a great story line with wonderful descriptions of the life of a packer in the mountains. I could not put the book down!

A Home For A Bunny was my son's all-time favorite book. We read it over and over again. Now my son is nearly 27, and I still have the same book and read it to his 5-year-old-daughter, whom I am raising. It was her very first book and she demanded it be read every single night. We had fun using different voices and she especially liked the happy ending. She decided that the bunnies were a "Mommy Bunny and a Daddy Bunny", and would kiss them goodnight each time.

I highly recommend this book! I buy one every chance I get, whenever I know someone is going to have a baby.

I purchased this book (my first "big" little golden book) and love the larger size and pictures. My two-year-old daughter loves this book and often picks it from her huge selection of books. A great sweet story to share. I'm now looking for more "big" little golden books to buy.

This book is such a sweet, cute book. I am 24 years old and still read it to my nieces every once in a while. I have grown up making my parents read me this book over and over again every night and day. My copy is worn out but it also shows how much I enjoyed it. I hope you decide to buy it and read it to your children they will love it!

I read this book 20+ years ago to my two children and it was their favorite and most requested Little Golden book. It is such a sweet and well illustrated book. My only regret is that I didn't keep it over the years because I now had to go on a search for another copy for my brand new grandchild. My new copy of "Home for a Bunny" will be extremely well used, I'm sure!

This is such a sweet little book! Probably not much past age 5, but the story has a bunny looking for a place to stay or a home of his own. He proceeds to ask everyone he meets if he can live with them and they all say no. However, when he meets a little white bunny, the bunny takes him in and they then live together. The last picture is just so sweet with the two bunnies snuggling together. The illustrations make you touch the page because the bunny looks so fuzzy! It is very much loved in our house and we highly recommend it!

...this novel is far, far superior! A truly great exploration of human loneliness and the desire for companionship. Quite funny and bizarre in parts, too.

Not being an expert on the modern American novel, I'm reluctant to state that "Midnight Cowboy" is one of the great American novels, but I will, anyway. It's vastly superior to the film, a shallow and perverse adaptation. (Please see my Amazon review.)

Herlihy's characters are so vividly realistic, and his writing so elegantly simple, that one is not immediately aware that the story is an attack on American society's grossly materialistic "values".

The ending leaves the reader hanging. Joe has decided to abandon prostitution, to find a regular job and get Ratso the treatment he needs, but before he can do any of these things, Ratso dies. Lacking another human being to help -- and thus, no unselfed purpose in life -- what will Joe do?

The implication is that Joe will fall back into a life of aimless prostitution (he's learned enough to know how to turn tricks), as he no longer has the motive -- a sincere personal relationship -- for changing. If Herlihy _wanted_ Joe to be "saved", would he not have shown it?

Herlihy might be suggesting that we are what we are, and it is almost impossible to change our values. But that is perhaps reading too much into the novel's intent. Nevertheless, this is hardly an "uplifting" story. One might even interpret it as cyncial.

However you interpret it, "Midnight Cowboy" is an exceptional novel, one of those rare books that rewards the time spent reading it. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Herlihy has brought us a classic. The American Dream and the struggle to attain it. Certainly not the happiest of storylines but well worth reading. I've yet to see the film, but if it's half as good as the book then it has to be a winner too. 100% Recommended.

I have watched the movie many times and recently, based on the reviews here, decided to read the book. While I am not a big reader of fiction, I could not put it down!!! Herlihy is one of those rare authors that can articulate the human condition in a way that resonates with everyone. I found myself reading certain paragraphs over and over because they were so beautiful. Joe is a symbol of loneliness and alienation. Emotionally stunted by a neglectful past, he becomes a full human being through a series of events that enable him to become aware of how broken he really is and what he really needs.

If you loved the movie, I highly recommend reading the book -- you will never see Joe Buck or Ratso Rizzo the same way again.

Herlihy's gift to American literature was this novel. Though the rest of his work is less remarkable, the author created a special vision of American life in Midnight Cowboy. Herlihy's reputation was founded on his ability to write about "grotesqueries" in an authentic voice, and nowhere is this talent better illustrated than in the exploits of Joe Buck and Ratso Rizzo. The novel is full of contrasting elements that go to the heart of Buck's desire to be more than he has been in his young life. His failures as a son, as a military man and as a women's man were only glossed over in the movie, but are fully explored in the book, and serve as impetus for him to continually seek what he perceives to be his destiny. Buck's transition from southwestern hayseed to knowledgeable New Yorker (with the characteristics of each location carefully explored) is painfully rendered; his ignorance of sophisticated (if not corrupt) urban behavior is contrasted against Rizzo's phenomenal knowledge of all things sleazy (though Rizzo maintains a kind of corrupt righteousness in his appraisal of his own bizarre talents). Joe Buck moves from the Purgatorial heat of Texas to the frozen Hell of New York City, and, with the help of the complex mentality of Rizzo, manages to find redemption in the dream of Florida sunshine. Again, this Dantesque journey of a naïve dreamer is beautifully explored in the most grotesque environments. That Joe Buck was able to carry Rizzo with him into that light of redemption is the most poignant aspect of the novel.

"The Pity of It All" is a masterful accomplishment of scholarship, insight and tone. It describes the world and history of German Jews before the Holocaust in ways that illuminate the catastrophe that follwed, but with a wise restraint that holds back from glib or pat theories. For instance, Elon is careful to insist that the outcome for Germany's Jews was not inevitable, and that although virulent, persistent anti-semitism was widespread in German culture, Hitler's and Nazism's rise also benefitted from the blunders and complacency of competing politics, and from other random hazards. In focusing on and describing the preceding two centuries of rapid development of a German Jewish community of prosperity and accomplishment, Elon gives these people back their identity and dignity as something other than doomed or pathetic foreshadows of predestination. While the book provides valuable food for thought about the Holocaust, it also, and predominantly, honors and rewardingly brings to our awareness the rich and fascinating parade of Jewish life and individuals in Germany from the mid-18th century forward.

There are many strengths to this book- one of the main strengths is the variety of uses that it has. It's obvious purpose is to relate the history of German Jews from the rise of the Enlightenment to the rise to power of the Nazi party. But it serves other purposes as well. I came to it for an understanding of the intellectual background of both Leo Strauss and Hannah Arendt. It could serve as background reading for anyone interested in Einstein, Benjamin, Adorno, Horkheimer, Freud, Adler, Fromm, Marcuse, Mannheim, Popper, Bernstein, Cassirer, Schoenberg, Husserl, Weill, among other German-Jewish intellectuals to numerous to mention. Which brings me to my third purpose. I have never read anything that made me realize just how badly Germany damaged itself intellectually during the rise of the Nazis. It serves as the primary example of politically ripping your heart out because your brain commands it. Who knows what the country could have become if it had embraced it Jewish citizens? Finally, for me, this book makes me understand why Zionism became such a political force. At some point, when you are treated like the Jewish citizens of Germany were, what else can you do? Elon makes it clear that their suffering began long before the twentieth century.
I want to talk about Elon's methodology. His book is basically a series of well chosen capsule biographies of prominent German Jews whose lives and struggles for emancipation and assimilation serve as to tell the stories of all German Jews. His focuses on people like Moses Mendelssohn, Rahel Varnhagen, Heinrich Heine, Ludwig Borne, Ludwig Bamberger, Gershon Bleichroder and Walter Rathenau. Along with this main biographies are several dozens of shorter ones. Elon then surrounds these stories with a certain amount of sociological history (two of his favorite statistics are to look at the rate of conversions from Judaism to Christianity and the rate of intermarriage). He tries to relate those stats to larger historical events. Finally, he also uses a bit of cultural history,e.g., he sees Goethe's idea of Bildung as having an even larger impact on German Jews than on the rest of the German population.
This methodological approach to his story has some drawbacks. Non-intellectual and/or lower class German Jews remain in the background in Elon's book. I am not sure how this could be avoided. There may be some sort of historical record that would tell us more about this part of the population but it is hard to imagine what that record would be. It is also easy to imagine that life for the poorer and less literate parts of the German Jewish population would have been even worse. Most careers were closed to them, all civil and political rights were denied to them and many times, entire cities or districts were closed to them. In most cities they lived in ghettos and were not allowed to go out into the rest of the city on Sundays or Christian holidays.
Elon also makes it clear that in many ways, Germany was one of the most liberal countries toward its Jewish citizens. I found myself sometimes reading this book wondering when the revolution was going to start. As I said earlier, reading this book makes the appeal of Zionism easy to understand.
I have a few other minor laments about Elon's book. I would have appreciated much more of a history of both Zionism and reform Judaism within the context of his history. I would also have learned from a history of how the understanding of the galut changed over time. But this is a minor quibble. Elon's books fulfills its own purpose and many other purposes magnificantly. There are other books that can tell the story of the missing pieces.
I came to this book from my reading of Strauss. It makes me appreciate Strauss's ideas about the theological-political problem so much more. Strauss basically used the place of the Jewish citizen within a liberal polity as his basic metaphor for the challenge of the other to a community/state. He also saw it as a metaphor for the role of the philosopher in the community/state. In both cases, it stands for an outsider who can never be other than an outsider. Strauss felt that this issue tears at the core of the liberal state. It is one that we can never run from and must always face with all our wisdom and humanity. Reading Elon argues strongly that Strauss may have been right. But mostly, reading Elon leave you with a sense of how much all of us have lost from what happened to the Jewish population of Europe during the thirties and forties. The Pity of It All is right.

This is one of the best books I have read in a long time. It combines history with interesting narrative. It tells of the heartbreaking saga of the relationship between Jews and Germans for the 200 years preceding WW II. It spoke of histories of people and how devoted they were to the Fatherland....especially sad were the thousands of conversions, forced and voluntary, which in the end did the Jews no good. It is an enlightening read and not very flattering about the Germans and their anti semetic history of thought.

I had wanted to read something about Jewish assimilation in Europe after snippets and references from Goethe's biography by Nicholas Boyle, a musical essay on Mendelssohn that touched briefly on his grandfather, Moses, and the liner notes on several classical music CDs of composers who lived in the 19th century. When I saw this book at my neighborhood bookstore, I grabbed it and stayed up all night reading it. Since I want information when I read a history, I don't require great writing, and prose that's merely adequate can be forgiven if the research is thorough (and the author doesn't have an axe to grind). Elon is a good enough writer that I will seek out his other works. This book shed light on the ambivalence that must have been unbearable for so many. And as another reviewer mentioned, its nice to have a chapter of German/Jewish history that doesn't begin with Weimar. As one of the best histories I've read, I can't recommend it highly enough. Hopefully high-school and college courses on Europe in the World War years will use this book as a prelude.

The author describes the history of German Jewry in such an eloquent, informed and story-telling way that is just fascinating. Easy to read too. Excellent buy.

Author Terrell T. Garren's dramatic story of war crimes in Western North Carolina is a captivating, dynamic true story of what happened to his own family members during the American Civil War. What an adventure! This book will capture the reader as if the reader is there, in person, living in the community, experiencing the events as they are happening. How intriguing to have the photos of the leading characters! The secret kept by the author's great-grandmother for one hundred forty years is now known and the historical facts leading up to the event are told in this epic story of war, war crimes and, romance on the homefront. This story left me with deeper empathy for the suffering of not only the troops but, of the women left alone to suffer on the homefront the crimes of the Civil War. I will never forget this moving story of "The Secret of War".

I found it difficult to put this book down. I've read a number of histories and historical novels about the civil war. This one was more personal as it followed members of a family through their war experiences and tragedies.

War is ugly. Up close and personal it is an abomination. Observing its impact on the Russell and Youngblood families and how the war brought out the best in some and the absolute worst in others, was a sad reminder of the horrors and atrocities being commited in wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Sudan.

At least at the end of the Civil War for these two families, honor was restored to some degree and healing could occur.

I don't know when a first chapter (can be read on Amazon website) has "grabbed" me like this one. As a lady who normally avoids war stories, I found this one extremely interesting, and very relevant to our current war in the Middle East. This book will keep you thinking about the situations involved long after you've finished reading it.

The Secret of War is an indelible and pivotal contribution to our understanding ot this most disturbing passage in American History. Against a backdrop of beautiful Western North Carolina mountains, we learn of a grim and silent history that has often been ignored.

Without taking either Union or Confederate side, Garren lays before us a spread of heart-touching and terrifying events. He shines a bright light on the fact that war begins and continues with power-hungry men on both sides who do not realize the full ramifications of their actions.

Through the story of Delia Youngblood, Garren gives a voice to women everywhere who have for too long fallen silent victims of the senselessness of war. That voice says: "Look at this. It will destroy us, even as we are destroying ourselves."

I read the book about a week ago, and I am still thinking of Delia. For the spirit of women and men, past and present, I am glad that her story has finally been told.

The Secret of War
Terrell T. Garren

I once believed historical fiction was a corrupted form of non-fiction. Thanks to Terrell Garren, "The Secret of War" has changed my mind. Mr. Garren has written an absorbing, completely engaging book, from start to finish. As Mr. Garren said, when he graciously visited our book club to discuss his book, "fiction can be used to tell a greater truth." Amen to that.
In July, 1861, Joseph Youngblood, a reserved, yet love-struck young man from a German immigrant family, left his beautiful western North Carolina farm and the woman he loved, to fight for states' rights against Mr. Lincoln's invading Union Army.
What this cost Joseph, his family, his fianc?, Delia Russell, and that region of western North Carolina, is the subject of Mr. Garren's book. Based on a true story, this is a magnificent and poignant study of Mr. Garren's family history. "The Secret of War" is an apt title; not only because of the "dirty little secret" that we rarely hear about - the brutality that faces the families who are left behind in war, but also his own family's secret that was kept for generations. The story was told, finally, to Mr. Garren by an 85-year-old great aunt three days before she died. This quest to unearth his family's history was an obvious labor of love and an exploration that consumed Mr. Garren's life for 15 years. The more he dug, the more he found.
Mr. Garren delivers us to this time in our young nation's history, carefully relating the struggle of his family, and tries to make sense of Delia Russell Youngblood's (Mr. Garren's great, great grandmother) daemons caused by a disastrous, ludicrous set of steps that led to her mental and physical breakdown. I won't give it away here, but the anger one feels for uncaring, unsympathetic, and violent characters while Delia is left, with the help of two very old, loyal slaves, to manage the homestead without safe, secure help, is just one of the ways Mr. Garren's story consumes you.
Western North Carolina's economy was, like most of the South's at that time, agrarian and rural. Yes, slavery was entrenched in this part of America. Some small farmers may have owned one or two slaves, yet it was the large, "corporate" farmers, who owned and contracted the most slaves. This was big business for these select few, mostly leading Southern politicians who were the slave owners.
The 19th century was also a time when honor and dueling among men were not only an integral part of upper class society, but also encouraged. Fight or light were the only options. This historical detail was, according to the author, one area usually not covered by historians as to one of the reasons for the War Between the States. When Mr. Lincoln's troops invaded the South, it was an act of dishonor to all Southern men. There was no choice but to fight the North's obvious disrespect. States' rights were a convenient excuse to protect the economic machine known as slavery.
Fort Sumter, and its aftermath, were just means to an end for the wealthy Southern slave and largest landowners used to protect their wealth and position. Thus, honor was the South's talisman for the Civil War. The Fort Sumter bombing and the Union Army invasion became a rallying cry for the Southern elite, who often bought their way into commissions and jobs away from the actual fighting or could afford to pay someone else to fight for them.
The young men like Joseph Youngblood and his brothers, who did not own slaves, were caught up in that rallying cry for states' rights, and ultimately went to fight the Union Army bravely and without reservation.
"The Secret of War" cuts back and forth between Joseph's constant struggle to survive and return to his beloved Delia; and Delia and the events surrounding the Union's Army advance on Asheville, North Carolina and surrounding area. However, the most crucial detail is the horrific loss of the Southern men. An entire generation was lost. Mr. Garren has meticulously set forth the numbers of soldiers lost in Western North Carolina - 25% or 27,486 of the men died in service. The number of soldiers who were permanently maimed, who lost limbs, etc. is staggering. The young, independent farmers - an entire generation -were either killed or maimed and unable to support their families.
Mr. Garren has delivered a stellar work of historical fiction. He helps us relive this awful time in our history and to understand the despair and ultimate loss. We live in the hearts and minds of his characters soaking up the descriptions of the land and the tragedies. We are forced to acknowledge the criminal element, (a historical reference often forgotten) and the men, like Delia's father, who pushed for war to support their own economic means; not necessarily for the good of their community.
There is no question that Mr. Garren gets it. War is hell and our country lost more men in the Civil War, than all of our other wars combined. The nation lost a part of its soul that was tied to the land. It was the beginning of the end of the family farm and homestead. We will never fully comprehend the result of the exodus from this part of the country to find ways to support families devastated by the war.
"The Secret of War" folds us into all the secrets of war and we are better informed. Unfortunately, this information has not taught us anything because of our obvious inability as a nation to learn from our mistakes.

This book is great. I loved how it just picked up after the 1st. It was like the first just kept going. page turner the 1st was great but this was better. Again i didn't like the religousness and enough with the flash backs.

SWEET BOUNDLESS picks up where THE ROSE LEGACY left off. With the town of Crystal now free from the evil that had held it captive, Carina DeGratia Shepard takes hold of the house that had once been promised to her. Though Quillian refuses to acknowledge their marriage, Carina refuses to let him go. With grit and determination, Carina creates for herself a small restaurant, bringing her Italian charm to a bustling town. Carina continues to learn more about Quillian's past, a past that has made him the closed-off person that he is. Carina is determined to break down those walls and love Quillian like he deserves to be loved.

At times SWEET BOUNDLESS is difficult to read because of the distance between Carina and Quillian. You want so badly for them to be together it's hard to read as they continue to go their separates ways. Knowing THE TENDER VINE will pick up where SWEET BOUNDLESS left off, I'm off to read the final book in series

This is such a great series! I was hooked from the first series and could not put them down. The second is my favorite, I love the change she shows in each of the characters because of their change of heart towards Christ. What a GREAT example of how God's love changes us and allows us to love others.

This book was just as promising as it's prequel! I couldn't put it down! The plot wasn't as thrilling, but Hietzmann did pick up on the unanswered questions that nagged at you in the first book. Well, as you know if you've read the first book(if you haven't you are VERY NAUGHTY), Quillan is having trouble allowing himself to love his wife, Carina. Meanwhile, she is suffering while he is away...heartbroken that he "doesn't" love her. Well, when a new man comes to take care of the New Boundless(the deceased Cain's mine, now left in Quillan's hands), his budding love for Carina threatens to lure her away from her love for Quillan. When disaster strikes, will Carina's husband comes home to her? Can he ever make peace with his dreadful past? The ending was wonderful, although Quillan's doubts about Carina's feelings for him were somewhat dissappointing. Anyway, I loved this and highly reccommend it!!

Carina is now married in name only. Quillan is fulfilling his duty to "take care of her material needs" but that is all. However, one real fact draws her attention to the validity of this hurried wedding...she is expecting. Problem is, she really does not have a "husband" in the truest sense of the word.

Determined to make it on her own, Carina occupies her original little house and becomes the darling of the mine and professional men by cooking her original Italian dishes and starting her own restaurant. We are introduced to Alex, the man brought in to oversee and perhaps run the mine owned now by Quillan and D.C. He plays a huge role in this book and the reader cannot quite decide if he is terribly good or terrible cunning. Obviously, Carina and Alex have mutual respect for each other, or is it more?

The cave of Quillan's parents still haunts and draws Carina and she discovers Wolf's "own diary" and now owns both his Mother's and his Dad's stories.

A horrible accident at the mine and a subsequent humanitarian act by Carina causes a major uproar, ending up with a savage beating and the reader is brought to tears.

Definitely a page turner and I am already a good ways into book three. Thanks Kristen, for a great series.

I collect cookbooks. I like this book because the recipes are original and the ingredients aren't too esoteric. I don't like the coffee table size, it's too hard to browse through. I recommend if you are an experienced cook and always searching for new, interesting recipes.

As an individual who is dedicated to eating local, healthy, and tasty food, Michael Chiarello once again creates supreme recipes with delicious flavor and divides the cookbook by season. Each of the recipes has a bit of flare and contain simple and fresh ingredients that should be easily found in any local grocery store, farmers market, or organic store such as Whole Foods, Wild Oats, or Fresh Market. My cooking style is still developing, but all of these recipes are always winners even for the novice cook. The recipes are easy to make and always satisfy. This is a definite recommend for anyone looking for tasty, seasonal cooking.

I have had this book for over a year and have tried several of his recipes which all comes out great. It is one of the few cookboos that I have which I use often. The recipes are easy to follow, simple, and most important of all, delicious. I espcially like the stuffed pepper recipe. It is also a book one can sit down to read for leisure. Plus there are lots of tips, not just recipes.

I've had the Tra Vigne Cookbook for a few years now, and I use it regularly. It's an attractive book, with beautiful photos and intriguing introductions to the recipes. It's hard to stop browsing once you open the book, and an inspiration to actually do some cooking. The dishes are great. The Chicken with Roasted Lemon and Rosemary Sauce is a favorite, as is the Fusilli Michelangelo. My niece from Thailand, for whom I made this dish several years ago, still remembers and asks for it. (Read the intro to either of these dishes and you're likely to cook them.)

The book is arranged seasonally, with chapters on essential ingredients for each season. Spring ingredients include asparagus, garlic, peas, and potatoes. Summer ingredients include corn, tomatoes, and bell peppers. And so on. I shop at a grocery store, not a farmers market, and I've had a less-than-happy relationship with vegetables since infancy, so I was skeptical of the whole seasonal-cooking thing at first. But I enjoy browsing through the new season's recipes as the year changes, and I've tried dishes and ingredients that are not usually a part of my diet. It's hard to object to broccoli when it's served in a creamy Very Green Soup sprinkled with crunchy gremolata.

It would have been nice in book a subtitled "Seasons in the California Wine Country" to have more information about wine. Few recipes actually use wine and there is no advice on what wines to pair with the food.

Despite the elegant presentations shown in the photos, none of the recipes are too difficult to try. They're just challenging enough for the amateur cook who likes to do a little more than the usual home cooking. The Tra Vigne Cookbook is a lot of fun, and the food is delicious.

This is a wonderful culinary book. It's more than a cookbook, as it focuses on various vegetables, etc. of the season, then uses those featured ingredients in several great recipes. If you've ever eaten at Tra Vigne in the Napa Valley town of St. Helena, you can even picture in your mind Michael in the kitchen, and almost taste the restaurant's just-pressed olive oil. If you know anyone who likes to read culinary books (like my mom, who literally reads cookbooks cover to cover, then goes back to earmark certain recipes), you should give them this book for the holidays. It is a beautiful, coffee table-quality, glossy work.

An inspiring account of the Apache campaign to defend their way of life against both the American and Mexican armies. The Indians are the original defenders of these lands. They can teach us much about being fully committed to the struggle, using bold and innovative tactics to defeat "superior" forces, and using our connection to the land as a source of strength.

I found this book more believable than all of the "White Man's" history books combined. Mr. Carter is an excellant storyteller, and I experienced irritation when I was required to put it down.

This book is extremely strong, touching, beautiful, realistically painful and raw in description of the historical facts.It is a book that i will never forget, and one of few books i most probably will read again. The historical character of Geronimo is fascinating. A warrior, a killer, AND a deeply spiritual man. A shaman with power to call on spirits of nature for help. I diagree totally with the reviewer below who claims the descriptions of anglosaxicans to be negative stereotype. I just read the book and was moved by the few incidents of friendships and respect between whites and natives. That a many anglosaxicans and mexicans had no human consideration for or respect for the indians is a historical fact. Frankly, in my view, there is still an issue today in the US, among a conservative minority, which speaks of incredibly stupidity, bloodthirst and greed, and of thinking - like religious sects - "us and them". This "philosophy" is the darkest sideeffect of the most rigid and dualistic christanity, and has nothing to do with pure religious feeling. It is sad that this model of "thought", that this tradition has been "in the seat" of the nation for a while now. It is the same forces that this books speaks of - forces of greed.

But speaking of the book again: Read it! - you will have your own experience of it. There is a lot to learn about history and authentic native spiritual understanding. It is filled with pain, beauty and painful beauty. My (lack of) demand of the english language cannot do it right!

This review is based on the norwegian translation.

In addition to the same author's "The Education of Little Tree,"this is one of the best books about the Native American experience that I have read. As a teacher of Native American Traditions, with an extended family that includes relatives of Apache heritage, this book is very special to me. Forrest Carter touches places inside of the spiritual aspects that few writers can reach. His writing is not only historically accurate, it has a depth and poetry that is so moving. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is a student of the Native American way.

Whatever the court of public opinion is on Forrest(Asa) Carter, one thing is for certain..this guy could really write. In this book he takes much of the history of Geromino and writes a fantastic story. The Chiricahua Apaches had a great hatred for the Mexicans and spent many years and blood warring with the Mexican soldiers. That hatred was caused by the Spanish taking the Apaches as slaves, stealing Apache women, forced religious conversions, placing a bounty on the their scalps and generally trying to wipe out their settlements. That hatred was so fierce that the Apaches, for a time, even allowed the US Cavalry free access acrossed their lands. Alot of this action took place among the Sierra Madres along the Mexican border. From this culture came Geronimo..a spiritual medicine man and battle tactician...the Apache Chiefs relied on his wisdom(how much is certainly debatable). When the US Cavalry got involved and the Apaches were forcibly moved to the San Carlos Reservation(Eastern Arizona), he and one of the Chiefs, Juh, fled with a band of followers back into old Mexico. Carter fills the pages with treachery, vengance and pathos making this a fantastic page-turner. The book is written, as expected, from Geronimos' and the Apaches' point of view and generally favors their actions...Carter was no great respecter of the US Cavalries position either Gen. Crooks' or Miles'.
Forrest Carter certainly had his prejudices and problems but these in no way should detract from what is otherwise a great read.

This is a beautiful and interesting book. Peter Brown and Kent Haruf have resisted the simply pretty to go deeper with the images and text. The book conveys the beauty and emptiness that is really the great plains. It also shows the hardy people who still inhabit the land in spite of its challanges in an honest, but sympathetic way.

This book is about the interaction of man and land. It is simple and yet profoundly touching. The images show the stark beauty of the land, and how it has, at times, been abused by man. It is a storybook of what the land has witnessed throughout the years - events of use, misuse, and sometimes even crime. And, it tells you how a land can change a man by its harshness or its beauty.
In these pages the reader will see that Peter Brown, and Kent Haruf have created a beautiful, moving, and altogether unique book.

West of Last Chance
Kent Haruf has long been one of our favorite fiction writers, and we love Peter Brown's sensitive photography of the majesty of the West. In this book the two combine and show us the 'beauty', not necessarily the 'pretty' of the high plains.
Reading this book, prose and images, makes one want to go out there, get off the Interstate, and wander the back roads to also be able to see what they show. An America that we have feared lost to urban and exurban growth.
This book is a song to the West.

Much more than another gorgeous coffee table book, West of Last Chance begs to be read again and again. As you begin to decipher Brown's images and Haruf's words a sense of what the high plains, and perhaps by inference, what this country is all about emerges. Clearly the product of two artists with both a passion and a calling.

Like Kent Haruf I first came across photographer Peter Brown years ago through his excellent book 'On the Plains'. This latest book with 151 photos continues the theme with the same vigor and passion. I thought it was a wise choice to stick to the back roads of the Plains, so much more interesting visually than the cities. The photos really convey the hugeness of this area of the Nation though about a third of the photos are of small towns in Texas.

The photos that I think work best are of the buildings. Shot in the classic tradition stretching back to the FSA photos of the Depression: no-nonsense straight on at eye height and mostly they are framed in the composition, too. I would have been satisfied with the book with just the building photos. Brown's composition framing really does bring out the best in so many of the images. For instance there are a couple of wonderful shots taken in Buffalo, Wyoming (plates 118 and 119) that just grab when you turn over the page, full of shapes, color and what appeals to me: plenty of signage.

Throughout the book there are signs and lettering, again very reminiscent of the thirties FSA photos. Now, many photographers (in rather elitist thinking) would deliberately avoid photographing hand-made signs, billboards and commercial lettering but these seem such a part of America that I think it would be foolish to avoid them. Fortunately plenty of photographers go out of their way to capture this silent form of communication because of its visual appeal.

There was a possible interesting theme that could have made the book even more enjoyable: the center of town image. On page eighty-five Brown has positioned his camera in the middle of the main street in Apache, Oklahoma, to take a stunning shot looking to the horizon with the shops and other buildings diminishing into distance. To avoid the highway leaving a huge open space for a large part of the image there are a couple of vehicles filling up this area. I would have liked to have seen more of these in the book. In 'On the Plains' there was a similar wonderful photo but taken from the first floor of a building and looking down the center of Duncan, Oklahoma.

As with any book with over a hundred photos there are bound to be some duds but surprisingly few I thought. The pork producing plant in Yuma, Colorado (page ninety-one) makes a nice horizontal shapes of sky, building and grass but lacks sparkle for repeat viewing, the same for the yellow marked road on page fifty-three.

The book's production, like 'On the Plains', follows the classic photo book style with large images (in 175 screen) centered on the page with generous margins. It does though, have the typical photo book annoyance of placing all the captions on a back page, so plenty of page turning to find out where some place is. This does seem so unnecessary because on many pages there is text by Kent Haruf and a one line caption centered under each photo would hardly spoil the editorial flow.

West of Last Chance does a wonderful job of capturing the Plains with photos as unique as the places.

***FOR AN INSIDE LOOK click 'customer images' under the cover.