John Gray Books

A story presented in comic book form that follows an ordinary Joe (named Gray)in uniting his company's division to make changes before the division is eliminated. Tremendous wisdom presented in thinking about others viewpoints and dealing with sensitive (ie aggressive) egos in getting things done. Humorous and engaging -it's a great way to introduce those who are entering the work world or the world weary who have forgotten the subtleties it takes to motivate others. Questionaires and questions, specific recommendations about what you can do to help with sales or cost savings.

"I never really wanted to be a PM but the company recognized my efforts in supporting Widgets XYZ and therefore they decided to promote me by becoming a PM!!" I am sure most of u ended up like that. Well I certainly did. I will tell you that this job is not easy and especially if u are not an IT background PM, u r in trouble!

This book believe it or not I used to read in between trips to Italy before I took this new job I am in. Forget PMI (well don't forget but ...) this book will give you're the instant PM Adernialin u need and it will also manage your expectations of how things should happen. It ahs a people side in this book which most other techs books fail to see. It was allot of fun to read. I have been 12 months on the job now and I think I like it now!

This is the first business book I've read that teach you great lessons about how to succeed in business and in your career in a humoristic manner.

It references stuff like the 8 commandments for selling people on your ideas, and the 7 Deadly Workplace Sins and how to overcome them.

This is definitely a must read book.

I approached this book with an attitude of "I know this content already," "I could have written this book". . . . But a few pages into the book, I realized I was learning.

The content is surprisingly complete. When skimming the Table of Contents, the topics did not seem comprehensive. But after reading this book, the important things were covered; including sensitive areas that are usually not discussed.

I appreciate that much of the content is in comic strip format. I know, I know, this doesn't sound good. But I have so many books that I've started and stopped because I don't have time to read it all. So it's very gratifying to get through the content of the book in one evening.

In summary, I learned some important stuff from this book and know that I can return to this book for reminders and details. Five stars!

Gray matters is disappointing in many respects. First, the cartooning is crude and not up to standards set by syndicated strips. Second, there's not a single laugh in the whole book -- this is no Dilbert. Third, the advice is common sense to the point of being patronizing -- it features such brilliant insights as "listen to people." Wow, who'd ever think of doing that? Finally, several character actions are highly unethical and could get you in hot water if you did the same, such as breaking into a co-worker's computer, or moonlighting without your boss's knowledge at a customer company strictly to get inside information. You want to talk lawsuit? Read "The Dilbert Principle" instead -- its insights are hilarious and telling.

I bought this book in London and I couldn't put it down! I was exciting reading about places that I was visiting with wonderfully descriptive scenes. There were many nights of reading until the wee hours of the morning.

Sean Bryant
St. Louis

Gray's gifts as a dramatist are in evidence throughout this fine novel. The dialouge and period detail are marvelous. Strange that this ambitiuous entertainment didn't get the reviews lavished on Mr. Timothy which was fine but not as well-written.

This book I would recommend without doubt and is a very enjoyable read. The description of 19th century London and the characters are accurate and interesting.

With no small amount of national pride, I'm thrilled to report that mere superlatives somehow seem insufficient to convey Gray's debut success with The Fiend in Human.

Edmund Whitty is a profligate, dissolute freelance journalist who has succumbed to every known Victorian vice save womanizing - snuff, cigarettes, gin, opium, laudanum, and Acker's Chlorodine (a potent mixture of opium, marijuana and cocaine in alcohol!) Despite having achieved a measure of journalistic fame and public notoriety by assigning the moniker "Chokee Bill" to William Ryan, currently awaiting execution for the strangulation and grisly mutilation of five ladies of questionable virtue, Whitty struggles with an ongoing desperate need to produce the income required to stave off gambling debtors who won't hesitate to use a physical beating to persuade payment. In the course of searching out new "crisp copy", lurid sensational pieces he can submit to his tight-fisted editor, he meets the impoverished Henry Owler, a "patterer" who wishes to render Ryan's last confession before his hanging into "true crime" verse. But Ryan (not unlike other convicted criminals, of course) protests he is innocent and circumstances begin to persuade Owler and Whitty that Ryan is indeed telling the truth. The signature white scarf killings have continued, swept under the carpet and hushed up by one and all - the police, the merchants, the petty criminals and even the poverty stricken residents of the local neighbourhood! Whitty in a desperate bid to achieve real fame in a fading, limpid journalistic career and financial freedom from the debtors who are relentlessly hounding him, decides to stake all on proving Ryan's innocence.

Gray has masterfully married the ascerbically witty, comic and always flowery Dickensian dialogue with Anne Perry's superb, elegant atmospheric descriptions of Victorian London life and then improved both by taking a step down into a much grittier, earthier representation of real characters living real lives. Two gentlemen Oxford swells pass wastrel days around gaming, sex and booze. The pain and wretched difficulties of daily life in a London slum are portrayed in exquisite, graphic detail that might warrant a warning to sensitive viewers were the medium television instead of a novel. Older female chaperones, quaintly termed "confidential friends", are employed to protect the nominal virtue of young ladies of marriageable age. The surviving local champion bare-knuckles boxer is portrayed as a friendly publican quite capable of acting as his own bouncer. Steet walkers and hookers are picked up by "gentleman" johns with a ritualized stylized dialogue and negotiation that, by today's standards, is absolutely hilarious.

You'll be treated, for example, to Gray's wonderful Dickensian variation on a simple theme that you and I would have written as simply "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder":

"For in truth there exists no young female (charwoman or countess, schoolgirl or flower-seller) in London who does not exist in some male mind as a tantalizing fantasy, in whose honour some schoolboy does not regularly engage in self-abuse - fantasy which, when he becomes an old boy, he will seek to make real. Hence, the relation between the brothel and the theatre: success in both depends upon one's observation of the world, of the human mind, as well as one's own outward identity in the calligraphy of sex."

The whodunit succeeds admirably with a couple of superb twists reserved until the final pages. In fact, the final twist, a brilliant piece of mis-direction by Gray, is held in reserve until the very last paragraph! On a somewhat deeper level, Gray manages, like Dickens, to also make probing critical comment on a number of issues without disrupting the flow of the story in the slightest. For example, his criticism of the ethics of journalists and the vested interest they have in creating news where none necessarily exists is quite apparent.

What a find! The Fiend in Human qualifies as perhaps the finest, most enjoyable read I've had the good luck to encounter over the last few years!

Paul Weiss

With no small amount of national pride, I'm thrilled to report that mere superlatives somehow seem insufficient to convey Gray's debut success with The Fiend in Human.

Edmund Whitty is a profligate, dissolute freelance journalist who has succumbed to every known Victorian vice save womanizing - snuff, cigarettes, gin, opium, laudanum, and Acker's Chlorodine (a potent mixture of opium, marijuana and cocaine in alcohol!) Despite having achieved a measure of journalistic fame and public notoriety by assigning the moniker "Chokee Bill" to William Ryan, currently awaiting execution for the strangulation and grisly mutilation of five ladies of questionable virtue, Whitty struggles with an ongoing desperate need to produce the income required to stave off gambling debtors who won't hesitate to use a physical beating to persuade payment. In the course of searching out new "crisp copy", lurid sensational pieces he can submit to his tight-fisted editor, he meets the impoverished Henry Owler, a "patterer" who wishes to render Ryan's last confession before his hanging into "true crime" verse. But Ryan (not unlike other convicted criminals, of course) protests he is innocent and circumstances begin to persuade Owler and Whitty that Ryan is indeed telling the truth. The signature white scarf killings have continued, swept under the carpet and hushed up by one and all - the police, the merchants, the petty criminals and even the poverty stricken residents of the local neighbourhood! Whitty in a desperate bid to achieve real fame in a fading, limpid journalistic career and financial freedom from the debtors who are relentlessly hounding him, decides to stake all on proving Ryan's innocence.

Gray has masterfully married the ascerbically witty, comic and always flowery Dickensian dialogue with Anne Perry's superb, elegant atmospheric descriptions of Victorian London life and then improved both by taking a step down into a much grittier, earthier representation of real characters living real lives. Two gentlemen Oxford swells pass wastrel days around gaming, sex and booze. The pain and wretched difficulties of daily life in a London slum are portrayed in exquisite, graphic detail that might warrant a warning to sensitive viewers were the medium television instead of a novel. Older female chaperones, quaintly termed "confidential friends", are employed to protect the nominal virtue of young ladies of marriageable age. The surviving local champion bare-knuckles boxer is portrayed as a friendly publican quite capable of acting as his own bouncer. Steet walkers and hookers are picked up by "gentleman" johns with a ritualized stylized dialogue and negotiation that, by today's standards, is absolutely hilarious.

You'll be treated, for example, to Gray's wonderful Dickensian variation on a simple theme that you and I would have written as simply "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder":

"For in truth there exists no young female (charwoman or countess, schoolgirl or flower-seller) in London who does not exist in some male mind as a tantalizing fantasy, in whose honour some schoolboy does not regularly engage in self-abuse - fantasy which, when he becomes an old boy, he will seek to make real. Hence, the relation between the brothel and the theatre: success in both depends upon one's observation of the world, of the human mind, as well as one's own outward identity in the calligraphy of sex."

The whodunit succeeds admirably with a couple of superb twists reserved until the final pages. In fact, the final twist, a brilliant piece of mis-direction by Gray, is held in reserve until the very last paragraph! On a somewhat deeper level, Gray manages, like Dickens, to also make probing critical comment on a number of issues without disrupting the flow of the story in the slightest. For example, his criticism of the ethics of journalists and the vested interest they have in creating news where none necessarily exists is quite apparent.

What a find! The Fiend in Human qualifies as perhaps the finest, most enjoyable read I've had the good luck to encounter over the last few years!

This is possibly the finest single volume history of the Sioux War of 1876. I never realized from the Army's position what a concentrated effort, involving thousands of soldiers, this was. I also never realized that the Sioux inflicted not one but two significant defeats on the Army, both by 2 different groups of Indians and each within just a few days of the other.

From the Army point of view this was a determined campaign, involving 3 separate, converging columns over thousands of square miles. From the Indian point of view this was an uncoordinated, chance thing, with 2 different groups rendezvousing with each other within just a few days.

This is an excellent work about a strange pseudo war whose centerpiece is the Custer massacre. John S. Gray provides a meticulously researched, somewhat controversial, account of what appears to have been a totally unnecessary war. The maps are very well done, allowing a greater understanding of the tactical issues and terrain faced by both sides.

fair, balanced and packed with incredible information
worth 6 stars !

This is a great book to learn everything about the 1876 Sioux War from the political and economic situations that fueled the conflict (gold and the Black Hills, dissolving the 1868 Peace Treaty), the behavior of the independent Sioux, Grant's ultimatum, the Sheridan three prong attack on the Sioux, the political (Custer and Grant) and weather problems hindering he start of the campaign and General's Crook and Terry's frustrating attempts to catch the Sioux and Cheyenne who fragmented into smaller groups after the Little Big Horn. Also covers Crook's March campaign that resulted in a controversial but failed battle on the Powder River and the critical battle of the Rosebud in June 30 miles southeast of the Little Big Horn which occurred just 8 days prior to Custer's annihilation. Crook, the great Indian fighter with twice Custer's number, becomes displaced out of the Sheridan attack plan due to the furious attack by the Sioux and Cheyenne. Gray also documents how the winter roamers left the agencies to join the summer roamers (Sitting Bull, Gall, Crazy Horse, Two Moon) which peaked with one of the largest villages ever on the North American continent at the time of Custer's attack. The book completes the story by detailing the aftermath of Custer's battle with Crooks and Terry's joint and separate campaigns and the addition of General Nelson Miles. Not a total story on Custer, for that you should read Gray's "Custer's Last Campaign" but start with "Centennial Campaign" to get the complete picture.

In 1981 I made a phone call to a retired medical doctor named John Gray. I told him I had just finished reading his book, CENTENNIAL CAMPAIGN, and would love to talk with him. I figured we would talk on the phone, so I was surprised when he invited me to visit him in his home in Ft. Collins, Colorado. I accepted his invitation without hesitation.

We spent the entire afternoon talking about his book. There was one question that I was anxious to get answered. Why did he write less than a page about the Custer fight itself? Gray didn't really know what happened during that battle, so there really wasn't much to say. I laughed but it made sense.

This book is not about the Custer fight, but about the entire campaign of the Sioux War of 1876 and it is filled with new revelations about the causes and events of this war. Most interesting is Gray's narrative about the White House meeting between Grant and his aides concerning how they should deal with the Sioux problem and why they started a war.

The book is filled with detailed maps of the Indian movements during the campaign, where and when they camped and for how long. The same is done for soldier column movements.

There is an excellent analysis of the size of the warrior force at the Little Bighorn that historians accept to this day. The numbers will surprise you.

If you have not read much on the Sioux war, then I highly recommend this book. You'll learn that the Custer fight was just one of many events of a long brutal, bloody war.

This is the best book on this subject! You should also get his book on the last stand.

1970's "The Crofter and the Laird" is John McPhee's graceful account of an extended stay on the Scottish island of Colonsay, ancestral home to his clan and a living fragment of an almost feudal lifestyle in the 20th Century.

Author John McPhee is rightly known for his keen observation, his simple but highly descriptive prose, and his ability to capture a sense of place. These skills are very evident in his clear-eyed yet sympathetic narrative of a vanishing culture in the Hebrides. The residents work small crofts, or rented farms, for a thin but apparently rewarding living in the solitude of a remote and beautiful island. The laird, owner of the island, lives in England but visits every summer. The crofters and the laird are enmeshed in an ancient legal tradition of mutual obligation, an anachronism which neither party was quite yet prepared to give up when McPhee stayed on Colonsay.

Colonsay's culture sits on a couple of millennia of history contributed by Picts, Celts, Scots, Vikings, and others. Some of the best parts of McPhee's narrative are his observations of the ancient remnants, such as ruined chapels, and the myths, stories, and customs forwarded by the islanders. Every physical feature on the island seems to have a name and a story.

The center of McPhee's narrative is his host on the island, one Donald McNeill, who pursues a variety of vocations to feed his family and make a living, and who provides insight into a close-knit society that regards "incomers" with some suspicion. McNeill is entirely comfortable in his life, appreciative of his family's long continuity on the island, yet honest about the hard work required by what is nearly subsistance living.

This book is highly recommended as a fascinating and enjoyable read on a small fragment of a vanishing island culture in a place time seemed almost to have forgotten.

I really enjoyed this book. It was refreshing and light but great in detail. John McPhee explains his move from the U.S. with his wife and 4 daughters back to his Great Grandfather's ancestral home on the island of Colonsay in the Hebrides of Scotland. The population is around 150 and he learns all about the small town life in a feudal environment. McPhee talks about everything from farmers, crofters, and general laborers and their daily lives on the island. He also shifts from what he sees and experiences with first person gossip and comments from the islanders to stories and legends from the island's and his clan's past.

All the islanders talk of the Laird Strathcona who owns everything. Then John meets him and sees he is just a minor peer in the Scottish Court and more of a landlord trying to bring the island of Colonsay a little out of the past. The book is lightly sprinkled with simple sketches of the island which brings everything together.

A really enjoyable read for anyone with Scottish roots or just interested in Scottish life and history. Not everyone is descended from Scottish Kings and famous knights. Most of us are of the poorer stock like those portrayed in this book. I am even more proud of them now.

The finely detailed observations and vivid turn-of-words which we have come to know so well from McPhee's books on North America and its geological history, is applied here with great skill in this look at the tiny Scottish island of Colonsay and its inhabitants. The small population of under 150 people can trace ancestry to two castes or clans. Most are crofters or farmers. Some are true islanders with family roots going back hundreds of years; others are "incomers". It's not a derogatory term but simply another social distinction. Then there's THE CROFTER AND THE LAIRD. McPhee offers a distillation of this social concoction. "The usual frictions, gossip, and intense social espionage that characterize life in a small town are so grandly magnified...everyone is many things to everyone else, and is encountered daily in a dozen guises. Enmeshed together, the people of the island become one another. Friend and enemy dwell in the same skin."

McPhee deals with his usual areas of interest such as the environmental past of the island, but its the people that fascinate him. Here it's also a little closer to home as Colonsay is the home of McPhee's ancestors. The book is as much a narrative of the strife torn history of clans as it is one Americans' exploration of the "sentimental myth" that he attaches to his Scottish surname. McPhee quickly sees that, rather than myth, the clan is as real to Scots as it ever was. This is only amplified in a feudal and cloistered social setting such as on Colonsay.

The McPhee's (or Macafee, MacPhee, Macheffie, or MacDuffie, as the various septs are known) are part of the ancient clan MacFie. They're Celtic, and the Gaelic origin of the name means "son of the Dark Fairy or Elf". Such fairy-tale-like legends seem incongruous when set against the treacherous and bloody reality of clan history. The McPhee's are a "broken clan", the last chieftan was murdered by the MacDonald's in the 17th century. The MacDonald's however got their comeuppance in the way of the clans. A group of MacDonald's were butchered in their sleep by the Campbell's of Argyll in the Glencoe Massacre of 1692.

And just to show that clan history dies very hard, many Scots, even until today, when pressed just a little bit can usually find something uncharitable to say about my Campbell clan. Time and geographical distance may make the clans of only historical interest to McPhee, myself, and other North Americans with Scots ancestors. In Scotland it's a lot more real and present, and this wonderful book gives us a slice of that life.

THE BOOK HELP INSPIRE ME, MY SON, AND BROTHER TO GO TO COLONSAY IN THE SPRING OF 1998. MOST OF THE PEOPLE YOU WROTE ABOUT ARE DEAD. HOWEVER CHARLIE MCKINNON AND HIS WIFE, GIBBIE MCNEIL, KEITH RUTHERFORD, AND A FEW MORE ARE STILL LIVING. I HAVE WRITTEN AN ACCOUNT OF MY VISIT AND WILL MAKE IT AVAILABLE TO THE AUTHOR IS HE WISHES. LAN NA LEF. JERRY D. MCAFEE

My family also originates on Colonsay, and we go back to visit occasionally. We were asked if we were related to John McPhee, because our name is McAfee. We were told that it was a good thing we weren't, because John had given away more secrets than the islanders thought wise. They told us that if he ever returned he would not make it off the ferry onto the dock. This is a great book and should be read and appreciated by all.

This book is amazing. The writing is different from anything else out there. The plot is excellent, the dialogue is clever and charming and frequently funny, the characters complex. I liked it better than the Fiend in Human. Gray is a truly unusual talent who hopefully will write many more books of this quality.

Edmund Whitty, A London newspaper correspondent who can usually be counted upon for crisp and lurid copy, has fallen on lean times. After his triumphant expose of a notorious serial killer, he has inexplicably lost his knack for sensational reporting. Broke and desperate, he seizes upon a generous offer from a mysterious American to discredit a quack psychic. But how, he ends up wondering uneasily, does the psychic know so much about a scandal involving Whitty's late brother?

When the psychic is brutally murdered, Whitty finds himself accused of the crime and thrown into Milbank prison, the most bizarre institution of its kind in England. Help comes unexpectedly from "the Captain," a gangster not known for charity work. To save his own skin, Whitty must find the men responsible for the disappearance of the Capatin's young niece, Eliza.

Whitty's search takes him to Oxford, where he meets the brillant and eccentric Reverend William Boltbyn, a renowned children's author who delights in playing croquet, devising elaborate stories, and taking artistic photographs of little girls. There he uncovers a looking-glass world, the dark side of Victoriana, and the murder of innocence.

John MacLachlan Gray, who evoked "the mean streets and byways of 1852 London with a skill worthy of Dickens"[Publisher's Weekly] in The Fiend in Human, spins an even more irresistible tale of dark secrets behind the facade of Victorian respectability.

It's a sad comment on our times that even thrillers centering around serial killers don't give us a chill anymore. So to evoke the slightest ghost of a horrifed shudder, more and more authors are turning to crimes against children - where they will turn when even these fail to appall us? I gave Gray's first Whitty novel, The Fiend in Human, five stars and likened it to a cross between Dickens and Spillane. This sequel is still plenty good, but it didn't have quite as much bite. The previous book's most vivid parts lay in its descriptions of one of 1852 London's most formidable slums. It's difficult to elicit as much color from a Victorian nobleman's country estate, no matter how depraved its residents may be, as this tale tries to do. The Lewis Carroll and "Alice" analogy here is appealing. Too, Gray shows the same solid command of Victorian diction and cadences of speech (which can be so awful when other authors do them badly). Highly recommended.

If the highest praise you can give a book is that it leaves you wanting to read more, then White Stone Day deserves top accolades. It has just about everything you need in a novel: a gripping plot, a strong sense of time and place that nonetheless doesn't overwhelm the proceedings, a sure narrative drive, a diverse and well-drawn supporting cast of characters, and perhaps most important, an intriguing and entertaining protagonist. White Stone Day would have been a very good book with any other main character; with cynical, dissolute, at times hapless Edmund Whitty as the protagonist, it's a great book--perhaps even more satisfying than The Fiend in Human, to which this book is a sequel.

Gray plots his second excellent Victorian literary thriller around two activities that were all the rage in mid-19th century England: photography and spiritualism.

Edmund Whitty, the earthy London newspaper writer and man of excess, first seen in "The Fiend in Human," has fallen on hard times. All his best ideas are being uncannily scooped by a rival correspondent and he's in "fearsome debt" to the Captain, a London crime boss, "the result of a wager in the sport of ratting, with compound interest growing like a tumour and default a mathematical certainty."

Approached by an American Pinkerton agent to expose a fraudulent psychic, Whitty seizes the opportunity, but the séance does not go according to plan. His brother David, who died in a rowing accident at Oxford, appears, plaintively proclaiming, "I did not live as you think I lived! I did not die as you think I died!"

Meanwhile, in Oxfordshire, Rev. William L. Boltbyn, based loosely on Lewis Carroll, is singularly enchanted by the Lambert sisters, particularly Emma, who is on the cusp of womanhood, a fact Boltbyn bitterly bemoans. He whiles away hours telling the girls tales and taking pictures of them in various romantic and classical poses, some suggestive.

Before it's over Whitty will be accused of murder and cast into the bowels of Millbank prison, only to acquire a new commission - the breaking of a child pornography ring which may involve both his dead brother and the abducted young sister of the distraught Captain, a girl bearing a strong resemblance to Emma Lambert.

Other viewpoints include a comically psychopathic pair of thugs for hire and the daring, foolhardy Lambert sisters keen on ferreting out the sinister secrets of the local Duke. Steeped in Victorian sensibilities of romance, propriety and the gulf between the classes, redolent with London's stewpots and taverns and bustling streets, Gray's witty, suspenseful story builds to a tense and satisfying climax.

--Portsmouth Herald

The process of bringing new talent into an organization is essential and vital for an organizations success. Too often we think we're asking the right questions when hiring employees. We dig deep during the interview process to learn what the person has done in the past, and whey they are right for this position. We use our best judgment to sort through the contrast between our perceptions and reality - hoping to find the truth - and most of all hoping to unearth the best candidates to fill positions.

Yet this seemingly simple task of asking questions and listening to the answer is actually riddled with more challenges than meets the eye. Peter Gray and John Carroll, in this easy to read and use book, get at the heart of what it's all about.

Our "dictionaries for performance" are often limited and therefore what we go after during our assessment process is often limited to what we know from our own experience. The Pocket Idiots Guide to Performance Appraisal Phrases is a great book to expand "our dictionary on performance" and there for give us a whole new palette for seeing potential candidates and employees in a new and fresh way. This tool applies to all phases of the employment process. I highly recommend it!

I have managed people in the military and business world for over 10 years, couseling over 100 people, numerous times. Yet this book contains smart advice and techniques that I have not used in the past that I will definitely reference for my next round of evals. Additionally, the compact size makes it an easy reference to tote around so you can pick phrases /page numbers for employees while at lunch, on the train or on the go. This book will definitely save me time.

Review time comes with mixed emotions, you want to be able to give your employees feedback, but you don't want to take them away from the things they are receving feedback. This book gives you many of the tools to help make performance reviews quick and easy. I was amazed by how many of the thoughts I had were already written out for me in this handbook. A must have for those looking to make reviews easier.

Peter Gray and John H. Carroll's "Pocket Idiot's Guide to Performance Appraisal Phrases" is much more than you might expect from the title. It isn't just a listing of phrases, although it certainly includes quite a few of those. It includes information on understanding what the root of a performance problem is. For instance, if an employee is failing at a task because you didn't give him enough information to figure out exactly what you wanted, or enough resources to achieve the task, then berating him for failing isn't going to result in much improvement. The book provides a very balanced look at figuring out where a breakdown in communications might lie, or how to make the best use of a given employee.

The authors also include plenty of information on planning and holding your meeting--from scheduling it to planning the length to setting it up in order to achieve the effect you want. Included is some particularly helpful information on figuring out the major communication styles of your employees, and using this information to decide how best to tell them what you want them to know.

Even the phrases themselves are more than just empty lists. They're listed alphabetically by trait (things like Communication--Oral, Giving and Receiving Feedback, Problem-Solving, etc.), with a list of both positive and negative phrases accompanying each, as well as a description of the relevant skill. A wide variety of phrases are included so that they can apply to an equally wide variety of personality types, situations, and jobs. For instance, there are phrases to apply to everything from assembly-line factory jobs to management positions. Skills addressed include "soft" skills such as relationship-building, as well as sensitive issues such as personal hygiene.

There are just a couple of minor inconsistencies and typos, but nothing more than momentary confusion. Overall this is a very useful book.

Sometimes it is really hard to come up with the right phrase, especially when giving negative feedback. This book offered some great advice and sample phrases which worked for me. While doing performance appraisals is never a pleasure, I got through mine this year much faster than I have in past years.

This book has many strengths, from the credentials of the experts included to the variety of the topics they have chosen to write about. For some of us, the words "Improve Your Life" are frightening because there is, of course, so much work to be done. David Riklan's book is accessible, though, for each topic is short, sweet and pragmatic. If you're a writer, turn to pages 384-386, where you'll find Kelly Robbins' thoughts about using your words to focus on your life's challenges. If you're struggling with relationships, John Gray has some excellent advice on page 266. I especially like Shirley Cheng's "Dance With Your Heart" essay on page 350 because it presents such a positive approach to life. When it comes to titles, Alan Cohen's "Mistake Salad," is especially apt, and the words that follow are a great story with a thought-provoking question about the role of mistakes in our lives. Each of the essays in the book presents a bite-sized idea that, when pondered, makes for a very filling and nutritious meal.

101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2
by David Riklan

Self-Improvement: The Top 101 Experts Who Help Us Improve Our Lives
by David Riklan

I have deliberately bought these two books to be used as an intellectual resource on optimum performance technologies. Combined them with my earlier acquisition of Tom Butler-Brown's trilogy of books (which I have already reviewed), namely:

- 50 Self Help Classics;
- 50 Success Classics;
- 50 Spiritual Classics;

& my impending requisition of the author's latest '50 Psychology Classics', I now have, in my hands, more than 2,000 pages of well-researched & systematically organised information nuggets. What a formidable intellectual resource!

I have browsed the foregoing two books very quickly & I generally concur with most of the positive reviews by other reviewers, especially Donald Mitchell.

For readers who are still scouting for peak performance technologies, please go no further. Just follow my personal example.

David Riklan has done it again. He managed to get 101 self-improvement gurus to collaborate and share their collective wisdom. The result is '101 Great Ways To Improve Your Life-Volume 2'. The stories will improve your relationship with yourself, others, and the universe. Covering an enormous array of topics, the common denominator of the stories is that they will help you think more positively and feel and function better.

Shirley Cheng's chapter entitled 'Dance With Your Heart: How To Befriend Your Heart And The World Around You' is my favorite. She provides clear guidelines on how to not only dance with your heart but on how to become a dancing heart. It is a beautiful and instructive chapter written by this young woman who is a blind and physically disabled poet and author. I learned more about her by visiting the website [...]

The book is filled with many other stories to help you discover countless ways of feeling better and improving your life. Enthusiastically recommended.

At the time I read volume 1 of this great series, I couldn't imagine how David Riklan could possibly top that accomplishment. But somehow he did! If you liked that book, order this one immediately.

Like volume 1, volume 2 headlines articles by many famous authors: Jack Canfield; Richard Carlson; Alan Cohen; John Gray; and Bob Proctor. Beyond those marquee names, you'll also find many other excellent, previously published authors like: Lisa Angelettie; Ellyn Bader; Deborah Baker-Receniello; Annette Bau; Alex Benzer; Suzanne Blake; Teresa Bolen; Shirley Cheng; Annette Colby; Deanna Davis; Signe Dayhoff; John Dempsey; Shawn Driscoll; Catherine Eagan; J. Victor Eagan; Ronald Finklestein; Jeannie Fitzsimmons; Donald Flack; Mary Foley; John Forman; Leah Grant; Jeanne-Marie Grumet; Anne Hartley; Craig Howe; Anita Jefferson; Karen Jones; Dave Kurlan; Mary Jo Kurtz; Judy Lawrence; David Lazear; Leah Light; Chunyi Lin; Vicki Spring Love; Talia Mana; Peggy McColl; Dee McCrorey; Kathleen McGraw; Barbara McRae; June Marshall; Lesley Moore; Relly Nadler; Neill Neill; Anne Nelson; Michael Norwood; Sally O'Brien; Kara Oh; Heather O'Hara; Samuel Okoro; Sandy Paris; Peter Pearson; Nancy Pina; Susan Ratynski; Michael Rayel; Trish Regan; Nancy Richards; John Rifkin; Kelly Robbins; Michael Ruge; Daniel Saintjean; Linda Salazar; Linda Sapadin; Suzanne Schell; Karen Sherman; Colleen Hoffman Smith; Andreas Stark; Pauline Wallin; Brian Walsh; Margie Warrell; and Cathi Watson.

Lest you think that the best writing is by the best-known authors, the best written piece in the book is by Shirley Cheng, whose work you may not know yet . . . but you should. The title? Dance with Your Heart: How to Befriend Your Heart and the World around You

Here are my other favorites:

Action Today! by Daniel Saintjean
Being Graceful Makes Your Life Happen by Guru Kaur
Believe and You Will See by Peggy McColl
Embrace Positive Fatalism by Samuel Okoro
Failure Can Catapult Your Success by J. Victor Eagan
Finding the Work You Love! by Keri Coffman-Thiede
Five Steps to Creating a World-Class Social Network in Any City by Alex Benzer
Give People What They Are Longing For! by Suzanne Schell
Holding the Key to Your Emotions by Lesley Moore
How Can Writing Improve Your Life? by Kelly Robbins
How the Financial Markets Can Grow More Than Just Your Bank Account by John Forman
How to Use the TV to Help You Save Time by Teresa Bolen
Inspirational Tennis by Dave Kurlan
Learn to Choose by June Marshall
Live Like Your Nail Color! by Mary Foley
Make Small Talk? I'd Rather Eat Worms! by Signe Dayhoff
Mastering Eyesight and Expanding Insight y Jeannie "Viveka" Fitzsimmons
Persistence by Bob Proctor
Putting Your Best Foot Forward Instead of Your Mouth by Jeanne-Marie Grumet
Questions of Love by Ellyn Bader and Peter Pearson
Some Simple Rules for a Satisfying Life by Andreas Stark
Ten Steps to Oratory Excellence by Craig Howe
The Map Is Not the Territory by Christoph Schertler
The Question Isn't How Smart You Are; Rather It's How You Are Smart by David Lazear
The Secret Hidden in Your Favorite Pastime by Leah Grant
Visualize and Affirm Your Desired Outcomes by Jack Canfield
What's Stopping You by Linda Sapadin

The breadth of offerings is also pretty impressive. Here's a partial list of subjects covered: Abuse and recovery; Accomplishment; Aging with Style; Anger; Approval; Aspirations; Awareness; Balance; Barriers to Success; Beliefs; Body Language; Boredom; Boundaries; Breathing Exercises; Budgeting; Business Visualization; Career Satisfaction; Change; Choices; Conquering Negativity; Courageous Vision; Dating; Decision Making; Desires; Determination; Difficult People; Drama; Embracing Opportunities; Emotions; Empowerment; Failure; Faith; Family Wisdom; Fate; Fearless Living: Finances; Freedom from Grudges; Giving; Grace; Gratitude; Healing Eyesight Naturally; Hobbies; Humor; Ideal Life; Inner Change; Inner Voice; Insights; Inspiration; Intimacy; Intuition; Job Preparation; Joy; Legacies; Liberation; Life Simplification; Love and Relationships; Meditation; Memory; Misconceptions; Mistakes; Morals, Multiple Intelligences; Neediness; Negotiating; Networking; Overcoming Resistance; Parenting; Passion; Perception; Persuasion; Priorities; Rituals; Satisfaction; Self-Doubt; Self-Esteem; Self-Management; Self-Talk; Speechwriting Tips; Spiritual Life; Stress-Free Living; Values; Wealth Plans; and Writing.

Each essay is three to four pages, just the right length to be stimulating . . . but not so long as to require a long sit. Many people will find that reading one of these essays in the morning can help set up a more successful day.

Start improving your life today with this great book!

The Essential Man-Thing, Volume 1 is an excellent publication that focuses upon storylines and elements not found in a typical comic book. As opposed to having as the protagonist a crime fighter superhero such as Captain America or a save the world team like The Avengers, Marvel Comics centered this series around an anti-hero guided by primitive emotions, a swamp creature who comes to be known as Man-Thing.

Initially, Man-Thing was a leading government scientist by the name of Ted Sallis, who was assigned to reproduce the serum created during a World War II experiment that made scrawny Steve Rogers into the indomitable Captain America. Whether the serum was truly recreated is unknown. What is known is that Sallis would be hunted down by enemies seeking the newly created formula, and in effort to protect his work, he injected himself with this chemical concoction. After being chased, Sallis loses control of his vehicle and ends up submerged deep in the swampy waters of the Florida Everglades. It is then that the injection reacts with the elements of the swamp, causing Sallis' physiology thus humanity to be severely altered. It is then that the origin of the Man-Thing has arrived!

No longer is Ted Sallis a flesh and blood human being; instead he is a 7-feet tall swamp monster composed entirely of plant and vegetable matter. He cannot speak, nor is he able to go back to civilization due to his deformed state. Thus, he thrives in the Everglades, dwelling among other creatures; any vestige of the cognitive capacity possessed by Ted Sallis has apparently ceased to exist within The Man-Thing, but is anyone really sure?

Under typical circumstances, the Man-Thing would likely remain in isolation and not come into any direct contact with humans. He has become a solitary figure with an uncanny ability to sense and elude those from outside his dwellings. So any record of seeing him might just as well join the ranks of The Loch Ness Monster and Sasquatch. However, this would not be so.

Where Man-Thing dwells is key to his survival. The algae and various types of protoplasm and vegetation serve as nutrition thus sustenance for this wild creature. It is because of both this basic necessity and the disregard for the environment that a selfish, corporate executive by the name of F.A. Schist has that Man-Thing must come out of hiding. Within this conflict is a reflection of the myriad financial dilemmas that parts of America were actually going through and a continual growth versus preservation duality that was not so highly entailed in other comics.

Sure, there were times that the alter egos of superheroes had to move from place to place, but it was only within the confines of financial difficulties or government reassignments. With the Man-Thing, however, none of those particular concerns are in his domain. His home is his way of life; there are essentially no ifs, ands, or buts. And with Schist entering the scene and wanting to demolish much of the swampland so that he can build and expand his enterprises via construction, we have in quite a few pages numerous clashes between the blue collar workers under contract with Schist and environmentalists who want to protect the local plants, trees, and wildlife.

For many readers, it is perhaps this stage that has them wondering for the first time if characters who, in many ways, might be regarded as heroes for doing what it takes to provide for and feed the family within the confines of U.S. law might be vilified as enemies in the broader context for carrying out the plans of a greedy individual whose business dealings have, unfortunately, been protected by law or the loopholes thereof. In one sequence, a construction worker exclaims, "I don't work...my kids don't eat...! That's the simplest ecology there is, right? Heck, we ain't villains--just hard-workin' guys tryin' to earn a dollar!" And it is from the Man-Thing storylines that we witness exploitation of the lowest common denominator: acknowledging the scarcity of resources for the common man and using that predicament to create and perpetuate dire situations setting everyday people against one another!

All in all, this bound volume creates a seeming paradox about comic book publications. Several themes in the Marvel World originated and championed by the Stan Lee/Steve Ditko team were inspired by Ayn Rand, and during the publication of Man-Thing, Rand and her intellectual contemporaries were vehemently against the environmentalist movement, for it was portrayed as a threat to subordinating the human race to other species and also destroying property rights, thus individual rights. Interestingly, Man-Thing simultaneously personifies what could be extrapolated as the best intentions of the environmentalist movement and the darkest, destructive elements of unregulated capitalism. How close to reality these opposing themes are is still up for debate after almost four decades!

In effect, one might suppose that Marvel, because it constantly upheld a pursuit of happiness philosophy in its themes, went off track with issuing Man-Thing. In response, I say that this volume reinforces the phrase "moderation in all things" which was pro-Aristotelian, which even Rand, herself, claimed to be!

The book is a good combination of drama, mysticism, ecology and action, because, unlike other swamp things, "Manny" doesn't spend entire stories feeling sorry for himself; if danger arises, he is there to face it and, if need be, enforce his own brand of mute justice.
Great were the guest appearence of "Ka-Zar", the agents of "AIM" and "The Glob", but the introduction of "Howard, The Duck" was both hilarious and welcome, for that loquacious fowl really "went" with all the bizarre stuff around him!!!
Is there a "Volume 2" coming?

The comic starts off slowly, repetitively, but soon flowers into an existential, anarchic,nihilist-naive, neo primitivist landscape, which prefigures and pre empts and "pre imagines" Charles Burns "Black Hole" and aspects of Alan Moore by decades.

The action takes place in a swamp -- a secluded place, a dank,, threatening, yet pure place, untouched by the corruption of man -- yet it's a place constantly under threat from corrupt, violent men,pushing at its ( mental and physical/psychical ) edges and boundaries.


However, the swamp is protected by the pure of heart, Man Thing -- the beast is a being who instinctively despises corruption, the concept of "might makes right" thuggery and the bully. In other words, a very modern comic figure !!

The art is great too, with lots of good character profiles of 70's hippies, anarchist bikers, draft dodgers, homophobic hard hats, 1950's rockabilly gangs,hippy chicks and eccentric professors.

Get ready to take the man thing trip, from the swamps to the edge of the stratosphere out to the edges of your dreams, blurring waking and sleeping consciousness!

Great stuff, from a somewhat dull start on to a great set of tales : If you are into existential,lonely central figures and very "post modern", apocalyptic themes,expressing a deep mistrust of modern society, then you'll love Man Thing. I can't believe he was left behind and taken over by Swamp Thing and "Black Hole" ! Man Thing deserves a far higher profile and respect in the comics world.

When my local comic book store got its copies of "Essential Man-Thing, Volume 1," one of the clerks made a point of urging me to buy the book because it included a couple of issues of what he maintained was the comic book with the greatest name in the history of the Marvel or any other universe. He was referring, of course, to the first two issues of "Giant-Size Man-Thing." I did not comment on either the appropriateness of this declaration being made in a loud voice in the presence of young children or the attendant irony of this information being gleefully communicated by someone who has six inches and about a hundred pounds on me. But I did let him know that I already had my own copy that I could read about the Man-Thing regardless of size in the privacy of my own home.

Man-Thing made his (its?) first appearance in May 1971 in "Savage Tales" #1, and while there is a tendency to think of the Marvel character as a second rate version of DC's much more successful Swamp Thing, that character first appeared a month later in "House of Secrets" #92, the June-July 1971 issue. The first appearance of Man-Thing was written by Gerry Conway and Roy Thomas, with Gary Morrow as the artist, where as the first Swamp Thing story was written by Len Wein and drawn by Berni Wrightson. To make things even more interesting, Conway and Wein were roommates at the time, and Wein wrote the second Man-Thing story drawn by Neal Adams (originally intended for "Savage Tales" #2, it was incorporated to a Ka-Zar story by Roy Thomas drawn by John Buscema in "Astonishing Tales" #12. Obviously Conway and Wein knew what the other one was doing, and there is evidence that Wein took pains to make their origins dissimilar. Collected in Volume 1 and arranged in chronological order, are "Savage Tales" #1, "Astonishing Tales" #12-13, "Adventure into Fear" #10-19, "Man-Thing" #1-14, "Giant-Size Man-Thing," #1-2, and "Monsters Unleashed" #5 & #8-9.

Originally the biochemist Theodore "Ted" Sallis, the Man-Thing was created when Sallis was betrayed by his lover who was in league with agents from Advanced Idea Mechanics (AIM) for wanted his miracle drug formula. When the origin was revised this became a super-soldier serum (in the manner of how Captain America was created), and it was the mixture of the serum and the swamp were Sallis drown that caused the transformation. When Steve Gerber took over the script and revealed the Everglades includes the Nexus of All Realities, magical forces became retroactively involved in the creation of the Man-Thing as the guardian of the Nexus. Sallis' intelligence was basically destroyed and the defining elements of the shambling muck-monster were that the Man-Thing sensed strong emotions and reacted to fear with rage, secreting a chemical (or magical?) corrosive so that "Whatever knows fear burns at the Man-Thing's touch," starting with the woman who betrayed him and continuing to those the creature comes upon as he stumbles through the swamp and keeps coming across humans doing bad things and deserving such punishment.

Much is made of the first appearance of Howard The Duck in "Fear" #19 (originally a duck whose name is revealed to be Howard), but the story I remember best is "It Came Out of the Sky!" in "Fear" #17, where Gerber takes the well-known origin of Superman and plays out what would have happened if the kindly old couple had seen a space ship crashing to Earth in 1951 and gone the other way rather than face Martians or Communists. It would be 20 years before Man-Thing would release the babe inside, now the fully-grown Wundarr, who thinks Man-Thing is his mother. That issue was the best bit of satire by Gerber and an indication of what was to come when Howard the Duck got his own strip, but when we had Korrek, Warrior Prince of Katharta comes out of a half-eaten jar of peanut butter (also in "Fear" #19), it is hard to take things seriously, which I would think it a prerequisite for a comic book where the end game is supposed to involve things burning because they fear the touch of the Man-Thing.

In reading these early stories again my preference is clear for the later issues collected here when Mike Ploog took over as the artist on "Man-Thing" #5. Frank Brunner was my favorite Man-Thing artist, but all he did were covers (including the one for this collection, which was from the cover of "Man-Thing" #1), and Ploog was the artist who got most of Marvel's horror comic titles off the ground, starting with "Werewolf By Night," but also including "Ghost Rider" and "The Monster of Frankenstein." So it was usual, but quite welcomed, for him to show up in the middle of a book's run. Gerber was focusing more on human stories where the peculiar justice of the Man-Thing's burning touch was most appropriate, as opposed to all the mystical stuff with Dakimh the Enchanter and the results are a lot better. No doubt because Gerber was enjoying unfettered freedom in writing "Howard the Duck."

"Man-Thing" was a mixture of horror and crime along with fantasy and science fiction, and the appearance of other Marvel superheroes such as Mr. Fantastic and Tony Stark in "Giant-Size Man-Thing" #2, usually did not work. However, there was a little more success with villains, most notably the Fool-Killer ("Man-Thing" #3-4). This was one of those comic books where I tended to like the art more than the stories, such as when Tom Sutton finished John Buscema's layouts in "Man-Thing" #13 and Alfredo Alcala did the art for #14. So when we started getting text stories by Gerber with accompanying artwork by Pat Broderick, I would tend to just look at the pictures and not bother with the stories. Ultimately I find Man-Thins is one of those characters were less is more, because there are only so many injustices a muck-monster can address while shambling around the Everglades.

I am amazed at the brilliance and positive approach of Jack Canfield.

This collection of works by the various authors offers the listener an opportunity to have an easily accessed master mind group in the field of human growth. The morning commute's blahs are a thing of the past when the driver plugs in a tape or cd and visits with the likes of Jack Canfield, Marianne Williams and the others. Each offers a conversational monologue which address basic human perceptions and attitudes. Whether at home or on the road, each tape is a treasure of information which offers the listener tools to reshape basic views of life. These tapes are well worth the value. They are like good traveling companions. You welcome their presence, and delight in their gifts. I strongly recommend it to anyone.

This collection of works by the various authors offers the listener an opportunity to have an easily accessed master mind group in the field of human growth. My morning commute's blahs are a thing of the past when I plug in my tapes and visit with the likes of Jack Canfield, Marianne Williams and the others. Each offers a conversational monologue which address basic human perceptions and attitudes. I have listened to all the tapes at least twice and will listen to them again and again. Whether at home or on the road, each tape is a treasure of information which offers the listener tools to reshape basic views of life. These tapes are well worth the value. They are like good traveling companions. You will welcome their presence, and delight in their gifts. I strongly recommend it to anyone.

This set of tapes is diverse enough to keep me interested and also very inspirational and hopeful.. Makes a long drive feel more useful!

In the foreword, John Wallace describes how he encountered a quiet former prisoner of W.W.II in his upstate New York town. Wallace befriends the man, John Mackowski, and soon takes an interest in bringing the amazing story Mackowski had to tell out into the world.

POW 83 is a powerful account of the Japanese atrocities committed against captured American forces whom had occupied the Philippines prior to Japanese conquest. Mackowski's story is compelling and moving, as the reader can only wonder how many times the survivors of these concentration camps had to evade death. Wallace tells the story just as it happened; with all the near experiences Mackowski encountered. However, what is best about this novel isn't in the text. Had the Allied forces not been successful in defeating Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan in the last World War, certainly so many stories like Mackowski's would never have been told. The Democratic freedom of speech would no longer exist had the Allied Forces failed in their efforts. So alas, what is so truly compelling about POW 83 is just that Mackowski's story is finally being told (like so many others). Mackowski's horrible ordeal represents the enormous sacrifice of an entire generation of young men and women, for the sake of Democracy.

In our modern age, it is almost impossible to read POW 83 and accept that such a travesty could occur. The sadness is that everything Wallace writes in POW 83 is fact.

This is an important book told in authentic and entertaining fashion. This razor-sharp tale of American Prisoners of War in the Japanese Death Camps, their struggle, their pain, holding onto their honor while being savaged by guards should be mandatory reading for every American. John Wallace has remarkable talent and has produced an excellent book.! "

Donald B. Hutton Author: Barron's Guide to Military Careers

In the foreword, John Wallace describes how he encountered a quiet former prisoner of W.W.II in his upstate New York town. Wallace befriends the man, John Mackowski, and soon takes an interest in bringing the amazing story Mackowski had to tell out into the world.

POW 83 is a powerful account of the Japanese atrocities committed against captured American forces whom had occupied the Philippines prior to Japanese conquest. Mackowski's story is compelling and moving, as the reader can only wonder how many times the survivors of these concentration camps had to evade death. Wallace tells the story just as it happened; with all the near experiences Mackowski encountered. However, what is best about this novel isn't in the text. Had the Allied forces not been successful in defeating Fascist Italy, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan in the last World War, certainly so many stories like Mackowski's would never have been told. The Democratic freedom of speech would no longer exist had the Allied Forces failed in their efforts. So alas, what is so truly compelling about POW 83 is just that Mackowski's story is finally being told (like so many others). Mackowski's horrible ordeal represents the enormous sacrifice of an entire generation of young men and women, for the sake of Democracy.

In our modern age, it is almost impossible to read POW 83 and accept that such a travesty could occur. The sadness is that everything Wallace writes in POW 83 is fact.

"POW-83" is a very moving and informative non-fiction book. The author details the life story of a young man who grew up on the streets of Brooklyn and is drafted into the army nine months before Pearl Harbor. He fought on Bataan and Corregidor until he was captured in 1942. What happened to those brave American soldiers in the Japanese Death Camps will horrify you. The author also manages to put together the final moments of most of the 750 American POW's aboard the Japanese "hell Ship" the Shinyo Maru, on September 7, 1944. When only 83 men escaped. The events recorded in this book are part of history and should not be forgotten.The author's style was simple and to the point. There's no fluff or filler here. I recommend it highly.