Richard Kennedy Books

This was one of my very favorite books as a child. It took me several years as an adult to be able to rediscover it, as I didn't remember the name or author.

While the story is dark, it is no more so than many fairy tales and I feel children are better able to handle this than most adults give credit. Certainly not more so than Hans Christian Anderson's "The Little Mermaid" with it's original sad ending. As a child I had a facination with melencholy stories, and found this one beautiful. I don't think you can say that dying accidentally while trying to save someone is "suicide", even if they are in love, and the true lesson of the tale is that of seeing the person within, and not being fooled by outward beauty or station in life.

My only complaint is that the pictures are not as lavish as I would like with such a dramatic tale.

I must agree, this isn't really a children's book, but that's beside the point. Have you ever read Romeo and Juliet? This has a slightly similar concept, of death for love but a greater happiness waiting somewhere else. This, as the name suggests, it a dark, almost sinister sounding book from the start, but the flowing words and sorrowful tone lead up to a bittersweet ending. It's definitely not for kids under 5, but if the child is mature enough to see a good book, then this is a wonderful choice. Plus, the pictures are absolutely gorgeous.

I bought a used copy of this book after seeing a glowing recommendation on the web.

This fairy tale book is certainly not for children, and probably not for adults either. This book teaches that two young people may have an infatuation that is a "greater love" than anyone else has ever known. And what better way to show your love? The answer of this book: Commit suicide!

What a vile and dangerous lesson, especially for teenagers.

After years of chemistry and rocket science reading, I came out of my shell in need of some culture, laughs, endearment and enlightment. I stumbled upon "When Elvis Meets the Dalai Lama", which provided me with a little of each, and plenty of entertainement.
Murray Silver manages to explain his grudge against the movie "Great Balls of Fire" I enjoyed so much (think of it, when someone turns your work upside down at will, without your least input, it must be frustrating!), and shows how the complexity of the movie industry attempts to weed out the outsider. Chapter 3, about how he met His Holines the Dalai Lama, kept me laughing out loud! Chapter 5, Strange Angels and Chapter 6, Crazy, take you into a Memphis that hardly exists anymore, and his respect and tenderness for the old bluesman, Booker T., is contagious. In Chapter 7 I felt like I got a two-for-one deal; it feels like a book within a book about the craziness involving the death of Elvis Presley --quite a handful. I was not around at the time, so this new (for me) point of view was fascinating and warrants a consideration. In chapters 10 and 11 Silver accomplishes a rare feat: make wrestling interesting! He does this by focusing on the human element, and you can't help but feel compassion for the messes in which the protagonists get themselves into. Speaking of mess-- by this point in the book, you see a pattern: Murray Silver is himself getting into a whole lot of trouble -- just by trying to do his job: write!
I also got a thrill from Little White Lies, chapter 14, a civil rights story about his father`s case to defend a poor black man in the 60's -- which in the end leads to Murray Silver being the speech writer at the Martin Luther King Jr. Center!
The book is always teaching you, from story to story, how strongly things are connected in life, and the importantce of doing your task to the best of your ability.
But the best compliment I can think of for this book is that Mr. Silver was so didatic in distilling the very complex Buddhist philosophy that the next book I am reading is "The Art of Happiness" by HH the Dalai Lama.

I highly recommend this book.

If you read one book in 2008, make it this one! In compelling, interesting factual basis, this one makes excellent reading. Chapter 7, on Elvis Presley, as well as Chapter 2, How the Best Book Ever Written, are delightful...Chapter 14, Little White Lies is vivid, gut wrenching!

Despite the interesting title and premise, which hooked me in, this book is a mess of memories that are wildly fantastical and probably falsely recalled. I've actually spoken to some of the parties mentioned in the book, such was my curiosity, and they laugh off the tales as "another one of Murray's bids for attention". Claiming that Elvis was murdered got him nowhere, although in this tome he claims it almost got him killed. We don't wish that fate on the author but it might have been nice if the dark culprits he claimed were chasing him had hidden his typewriter. Apparently, Mr. Silver, a UFO buff who insists that the sky lit up the night he was born, has a bit of messiah complex and a wish to have some kind of light shine on him, if only the reflected light of the fame of others. Underneath the brash, probably mostly made up tales of a misunderstood and mystical genius( Mr. Silver holds himself up as some kind of talent the world has trampled) he belies the one thing the Dalai Lama, at least, holds close and that is Truth. If he were really a follower of Buddha and the spirtual man he claims to be Mr. Silver would know that. There is the one reason so many of the followers of the Dalai Lama have a problem with Mr. Silver's fairy tales and fantastical wanderings highlighting himself. This man is not a writer, he's a braggart. This is not a book,it's a fantasy. A huge disappointment for both rock fans and spirtual seekers.

The research that went into this book is incredible. It has been approached from a contradictory method and still reveals almost total support of the original "Skeleton Key" of Bruce Robert's Gemstone File. Every date of each event that is outlined, is backed up by newpaper and magazine articls from the New York Times, Washington Post, Look Magazine. The San Fransisco Chronicle, etc. The information concerning the events leading upto and sourrounding the assassination of JFK, portray a much more believable story then the one we have been told for decades. This book is a must to own!

As the leading civilian authority on the U.S. Secret Service (and President Kennedy's interaction with the agency), I was much interested in this book by Richard Alan. However, I only recommend this book for the collector out there...nothing earth-shattering contained herein. Vince Palamara

Richard Blow is a good writer (see Harvard Rules, Greatest Game). This is a very strange book in which the author waxes more about him and his place in JFK Jr's world, than the Man himself. Blow comes across as an educated posse; he thanks Bernard Bailyn in the acknowledgment section. But unfortunately, the author is no Kennedy. He is a Blow (now Bradley).(At one point, the author waxes poetically about how he wanted his own wedding to be as good as John's, a wedding which Blow was never invited to). In the end, Blow writes as if nothing would make him happier than being John John's full time jock strap sniffer.

As for George Magazine, the advertisers fled in droves for a reason.

This book will entertain you for the three hours it takes for you to read.
If you buy this book for a $1 (plus $3.99 shipping), the book is worth your investment.

On the other hand, I highly recommend Harvard Rules and the Greatest Game.

After reading the sleeper by Robert Littell"The Men We Became", this book wins hands down. First "Littell" criticized "Blow", because he (Blow) signed a confidentiality clause when he signed on for George Magazine. First Littell was a friend of JFK Jr.'s, and he NEVER should have written about him.(He should have had his GOOD friends sign waivers too I guess) As I stated in my review of his book, his REAL friends would never write about his personal life and I do not think that John every alluded to him (Littell) that he wanted him to write about him, he threw that line in to cover himself. However, Mr. Littell is the reason I read the book by Mr. Blow.He trashed his book, so I had to read it. This book I bought, the book by Littell I borrowed. Richard Blow does not hold himself up to be John's best friend, but rather a friendship developed through work.( He was not one of the people invited to the wedding, but certain relatives were not invited because of the small place where it was held.) Mr. Blow does not delve to much into the private life of John, or his marriage to Carolyn Bessette. What is written about Carolyn and John's marriage to her, I think were positives in the book. He painted Carolyn as a nice woman, taken off guard by the complete fasination of her. She seemed to be a helpmate in the beginning of the magazine, but is not portrayed as an overbearing instigator,( again Littell makes her out to be a shrew, weeding out friends, calling people freaks etc..) nor does she come off as cold and indifferent again, the way I felt that Mr. Littell had portrayed her. He showed that the world of journalism is a tough nut for anyone to crack, even with the Kennedy name behind it.After awhile it seemed that even the staff of George were coming to terms with their "celebrity boss". Would the magazine went on if John had lived? No one can ever answer that....but all that were involved really tried to make it work, everyone, not just JFK...

Richard Blow is a former coworker of Joh F. Kennedy Jr. who seems to be attempting to make a couple of bucks off of a respected celebrity who has passed on with this book. While Richard obviously knew John, after reading this book it is apparent that he barely knew him outside of work. Judging by the cover and name of this book one would suspect that it is about JFK Jr. In reality this book is about George magazine and Richard's experience working there, with tales of dinner with John placed randomly about. If you are looking for a book that will give you an idea of what type of person JFK Jr. was, I would recommend "The Men We Became" by Robert Littel. He was John's best friend and knows far more about John than nearly anyone else ever did.

This book was a non-exploitive story of JFK's last few years in relation to his "George" efforts and peripheral personal and professional life. There are no shocking revelations or cutting evaluations, just an honest presentation of an interesting piece of that young man's life. Be forewarned, however (and the reason I rated this as 3 stars instead of 4): there is not one single photo within, and I believe this is a serious oversight in any biography.

Is this book about JFK, Jr. or is it about Richard Blow? After reading this book, it appeared to me that the author just wanted to make sure that in remembering JFK, Jr., that we all remembered that Blow worked with JFK, Jr. It's sad that someone like Blow, who is obviously talented in his own right, would decide to cash in so openly on his association with Kennedy.

The Party did its best to paint Richard Nixon as some sort of war hero, but it didn't have too much to work with. Apparently Nixon spent most of the war amassing a small fortune in winning crap games and poker, gambling and the dog races, making a specialty of fleecing other members of his platoon on payday. He came away from WWII with a substantial little campaign fund, more power to him, but not easy to bulk up into hero status. LBJ too tried to re-cast his war years as his personal voyage into the danger zone but of course that was just so much hogwash. Lance Morrow shows us JFK's war as being the only one really that had the oomph of legend, as witness his book PT-109, which had something Americans identified with, perhaps a willingness to push through even when things look darkest.

And things seemed bleak in 1948, the year Morrow focuses on in his new, exciting psychobiography. Unexpectedly bleak, for Americans had been longing for years for the war to end, when, it was said, they would find the answers and the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Instead what did they discover? Only more uncertainty, and a nation once again divided among itself. It was actually a great time to be a politician; as Morrow points out, pols thrive on misery and do their best work while energizing a demoralized public into action one way or another. For Kennedy, the year involved accepting first the wild love life of his sister "Kick," whose involvement with the Cavendish family would have assuredly led to a Profumo like scandal later in life, and then her tragic death, with its reverberations of his brother's earlier death in the War. The shades of night were creeping in fast for Jack, who learned around the same time something of the dimension of his own Addison's disease, a psychic wound as well as a physical threat. If he hadn't hitherto looked to sex for an escape, he certainly began to do so now.

Nixon wasn't threatened by illness, but the way he jumped onto the Pumpkin Papers revealed a man with a certain mania on his brain. Was it the urge, like all politicians, just to see his picture in the paper no matter what the context? Or did he believe he was saving the country from those who had plunged us into war--a war which, he imagined, was really a liberal jihad unrelated to Americans' ordinary concerns? People liked Nixon because he was one of us, from the lower middle class, he wasn't pretentious like FDR or JFK or, heaven forbid, Alger Hiss; and Nixon's dogged pursuit of Hiss--like a terrier with his teeth firmly in Alger Hiss' patrician ass--carried with it the fanatical strains of Madame Defarge from the TALE OF TWO CITIES. He was the little man pulling down the big man, and the crowd roared in approval.

Johnson's attack on Coke Stevenson is the weak link in Morrow's otherwise brilliant account. Caro did this part so much better and at greater length in Vol 2 of his biography, that rehashing it here produces no new insights, little new info.

I found myself wishing that Morrow had introduced a fourth character, perhaps Truman himself, to give yet more shadows to his picture of a fateful year. Could have been like a new Mount Rushmore! (Or the 4 Marx Brothers, depending on how jaundiced your view of politics.)

This book starts with a great premise -- three future Presidents at a common turning point in their lives, 1948. I bought this book thinking it was history. But I soon discovered that the occasional random historical nugget was buried among piles and piles of pretentious psychobabble, strained metaphors, obscure pop culture references, and delusions of literary grandeur. I'm not sure what's more bizarre -- the discussion of Nixon's sex life, or the pages and pages exploring the similarities between Nixon and Lana Turner.

A history of these three presidents in 1948 would make a great book. Maybe someday someone will actually write it.

I thought Mr. Morrow was a Senior Editor of Time, not the National Enquirer. This is an abysmal attempt to summarize and extrapolate on Caro's Years of Lyndon Johnson, Richard Morriss' Years of Richard Nixon, and most especially Garry Wills' Nixon Agonistes. Wills especially should sue Morrow for impersonation.

Almost 300 pages of nothing - including several pages wasted on the camparison of Nixon to Lana Turner (I still cannot make the connection). Morrow rambles on endlessly about minor details of the 3 main characters lives - and most of it is BS. This book was horrible - no wonder why it was in the discount section of the bookstore. What a waste !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I should have known better. The last book I read that had a title, subtitle, and sub-subtitle confused me and that seems to have happened again. Morrow offers three titles, labels, or come ons: "The best years of their lives," "Learning the secrets of power," and "Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon in 1948." I'm still not sure which one is the `real' title. The three concepts each had promise. These are three American icons, both loved and despised. The year - 1948 - happened to be a pivotal year, not just for these three, but also for the rest of America. The hot war was cold, and the cold was getting hot, and the Baby Boom was booming. Opportunity and optimism seemed unlimited, especially to young, power hungry politicians like Nixon, Johnson and Kennedy.

The disappointment I felt was that none of the promises implied in the three labels for the book earned much attention from the author. Morrow tells us more about Whittaker Chambers and Alger Hiss than Richard Nixon, about George Smathers and Joe Kennedy than Jack Kennedy, and Coke Stevenson and Lady Bird rather than Lyndon Johnson. If these three presidents of the future learned any secrets of power in 1948, the secrets remain undiscovered by me. Maybe I'm not reading well enough into the analysis. Morrow waxes poetic about eerie parallels in lives, like Lana Turner and Richard Nixon, notes the impact of all the dead, diseased and disturbed relatives and their effects on the three main characters, and offers an encyclopedia of armchair psychoanalysis and cultural sidebars, mixing religion, crucifixion complexes, politics, Hollywood, and Albert Kinsey. Theories, not secrets.

It is not even clear how -if at all - that 1948 was the best year of each man's life. The attempt to link these three lives to the Hollywood film reminded me that 1948 was the best year of "our" lives, so I guess all Americans had a pretty good year in 1948, especially war veterans. But Johnson was not much of a veteran (Johnson's Silver Star makes John Kerry's Purple Hearts look like Medals of Honor) and Kennedy, well Morrow acknowledges that the PT-109 story was more of a court martial offense than the makings of a heroic legend. Even Nixon was more of a Mr. Roberts than any battle-scarred veteran. These men had more to be embarrassed about than proud when it comes to war service, but politics makes legends out of molehills and Morrow provides us with three moles. Morrow's tangential summary description of the role, character and accomplishments of George Marshall makes these three men look like the three blind mice.

Reading on, looking for integration or even a consistent narrative, the pages slipped away, leaving me scratching my head. When a 300-page book has only four chapters, maybe that should have been a sign. The stories jump all around, often into Jack Kennedy's sex life and his coarse way of rationalizing his need for sex, and Morrow seems to obsess about dark secrets, homosexuality, suicide, drunkenness and bankruptcy. These may be secrets a lot of people would like to keep a secret, but they don't tell me anything about "the secrets of power."

Stephen Ambrose (Nixon), Thomas Reeves (Kennedy) and Robert Caro (Johnson) are much better chroniclers of the more complete, factual, historic versions of the lives of thee important figures, including 1948.

Dr. Wright's text has really become a classic of the environmental science field for good reason: it elucidates the basic principles of environmental science with depth and readability. This tome is not in its 10th edition because it lacks merit. On the contrary, this text presents the relevant topics in a more organized and rigorous manner than any other on the shelf. Students gain a fundamental grounding in the topics and issues of this emerging field, no mean task considering their great breadth.

The reviewers who have rated this book poorly have done so largely based on personal political doctrine. These people have missed the point. If Dr. Wright (or any other scientist) expresses distate for the current administration's stance on environmental issues, it is precisely because this administration has ignored and censored valid science in furthering their political agenda. Dr. Wright is merely advocating that the existing science be examined fairly and openly so that we can deal with pressing environmental issues like global climate change in the best possible manner.

Bottom line: a great introduction to environmental science, but not pleasant reading for members of the flat earth society.

I used this book to write essays for school and online tests. GREAT book, a must own for its category!

It is a workbook and not what I was attempting to order. I expected a reading/learning media. This is only for use in classroom setting.

I have been using this book for an online environmental science class for six years and for in-person classes before that. The students find it to be very readable and engaging. I've reviewed many other books and found that they never measure up to this textbook. As another evaluator noted, it's a great resource. I also teach science to environmental lawyers, who can use this book for a quick review of a topic.

This book is sadly out-of-date and useful only to those new to biology. The concepts are questionable and Mr. Wright doesn't provide any factual basis for his opinions despite his own strong feelings about "sound science" versus "junk science." For example, most scientists have agreed for over a decade that Natural Selection is too simplistic, and yet the book is based on its principles with no attempt to study them in depth.

"Facts" are thrown out with little reference to studies, competing studies or information about the political leanings of the scientists who conducted the research. Some studies are bashed and a counter-study is presented, and yet the reader is given no reason or understanding about why Wright supports one study over another. It all becomes a he-said/she-said argument. The moral of this book: humans suck. Whether or not that is true, I'd appreciate some sound scientific evidence to support, and I would expect that a book about environmental SCIENCE would be able to point out a sound reason or two.

oddly, you may be surprised about the kennedy's of massachusetts when you finish Whalen's work. It is possible that many have been quick to judge the family in a negative manner. Whalen, however, certainly points out Joseph Kennedy's very wonderful points including love of his family and gracious help for mankind. His charity for a man who wandered into his office off of the streets of Boston having just lost his son-and Mr. Kennedy buying the man a suit and paying for the funeral of that son-is particularly touching. Also of great interest to anyone interested in making a buck is how Mr. Kennedy made so much money in so many different arenas-sold out and took his profit on to the next venture-a sixth sense he had for making big money! author whalen points out this was almost always the case except his keeping ownership of Chicago's Merchandise Mart in the Kennedy name up, I believe, until currently-1998. Buy this work and then be prepared to not put it down for 48! ! hrs.! Of added interest was a historical look at how Joseph Kennedy got into B grade motion picture producing in Hollywood in the early days.

This book reads like a a middle school textbook. I found it impossible to read more than a page w/o falling asleep. After a chapter,I gave up. If you want to learn about Joe K.,look elsewhere.

Back in AD 1964, the sordid details of Joe Kennedy's life were kept secret. So what you have here is a very incomplete picture. But, if you want to understand his stock trading or his ambassadorship to Great Britain, then this book is for you. But compared to Kearns-Goodwin and Kessler, this is very lop-sided.

Although as an avid reader and modest researcher about the assassination of John F. Kennedy, I've had my share of garbage -I remember, for instance, "Mortal Error"-, I can't fathom why someone would write a book like this, full of factual mistakes, half truths and incredible thesis (ie, that Ike ordered the assasination of JFK). I am an Spaniard and, therefore, English is not my native language, but even I can detect that Richard James pretended to say "on that fateful day", but actually writes "on that faithful day" and is unable to write correctly the name of that icon of the sixties, "Che" Guevara. Outrageous, indeed!

After reading this book I can now understand how and why the Kennedys died. As the subtitle clearly states, it is a theory and doesn't delve into crime-sceen evidence, but supplies a interesting historical background that is not widely understood by most Americans--but should be. For one thing, Richard James provides an understandable explanation of how the underworld was involved in the assassination and how gangsters were influencing high government officials--except the Kennedys. James points out that Ruby was a Jew, not an Italian, and was connected to a Jewish-mafia ring headed by Meyer Lasky's who ruled the casinos in Havanna and in Las Vegas. James also points out that Ruby was part of a ring of union racketeers having once ben a violent union organizers for the Dorfman family of Chicago who controlled the Teamster pension fund. James clearly states that Jimmy Hoffa was part of this gang and not the Italian Mafia which is so commonly and incorrectly believed. (The Italians eventually murdered Hoffa, according to James.)I was surprised to learn, in "The enemy Within," written by Robert "Bobby" Kennedy, he mentioned more Jewish than Italian names, and was out to get them as Attorney General, including Moe Dalitz, who represented the Lansky gang in Vegas.The author is not afraid to mention names either. For example, Ronald Reagan was also part of the gang that Ruby and Hoffa belonged to when he was the right-wing head of SAG and, suspiciouly, was governor of Calif. when Bobby was murdered in LA. We learn that Bobby was also in the process of prosecuting Reagan for his questionable actives as union president--that's when the Democrat Reagan became a Republican. Now it's all starting to make sense to me. There's much more too. Its a quick read and a great help into understanding the means, motive and opportunity needed to steal the Presidency. From this prospective it's truly worthy of 5 stars. Read and pry open your eyes!

Excellent book. I like reading about the Kennedy's too, I admit and I liked this book, because it did not trash his wife. Poor Carolyn, her so-called friends (Rob Little,Bill Noonan)all wrote about what a shrew she was. oh they sugar-coated it so if you are truly a nit-wit you would not see it (Rob claims his wife adored Carolyn,Billy claims she was "magnificent") but still you get th idea she ruined friendships, could not stop using drugs. Disgusting. Have they thought about the impact of her family? Never mind his they are used to it, but hers, like Carolyn, I do not think they wished to be in the spotlight. This book really captures Carolyn like Carol Raziwell's book did.Richard Blow does them justice and Rob Littel has the nerve to talk about Richard Blow's book. Why because Blow didn't trash them as he did. If you would like to read a book from someone who DID know them without Carolyn being bad-mouthed, this is the book.

"Himself!"by Eugene Kennedy was written shorty after the death of it's subject,Chicago Mayor Richard J.Daley..Thus it should not come as a complete surprise that the author glossed over much of what was wrong with Daley and his long mayorship in favor of writing fluff...Still,the fluff IS entertaining,if not entirely truthful..Unlike more recent Daley biographies(Like the mammoth"American Pharoah"as an example)wherein every inch of the deceased mayor's life is gone over with a fine-toothed comb,"Himself!"is rather spare in it's dealing with the who and the what of the Daley career..Much of what Kennedy recounts is anecdotal,and few of the mayor's legions of enemies,notably writer and chicago newspaperman Mike Royko as an example,seem to have been consulted..But as a modern-day fable"Himself!"works rather well,documenting the man's rise from poverty,his political campaigns,his transformation of the Chicago skyline and some of his political battles..It is what one might call a "friendly" biography,rather than an objective one...
One problem that I do have with the book,however,is the spirit in which Kennedy seems to have approached this writing project..In the"introduction"the author expounds at length on the subject of "chieftainship"and its supposed application to Richard J.Daley..According to Kennedy a real"chieftain"need not be"perfect",nor fair,nor just,nor even concerned with doing the right thing so long as that one is strong,brutal,willing to to the "gutty"things that"need to be done"Given that Daley displayed hostility to those who disagreed with him,political brutality,was the man behind the bloody debacle that took place in Chicago during the 1968 democratic convention that was held there at that time,gave the notorious"shoot to kill"order during the Chicago riots,and was long accused of being anti-black and anti-poor,this odd notion proposed by author Kennedy about"chieftainship" hardly describes the sort of person who should be in charge of a hot dog stand,much less a city as great and as diverse as Chicago...
Still,despite its many short-comings,"Himself!"is an entertaining read.