U Books

The book is well done except the authors failed to include the ethnicity that was and continues to be among the largest immigrant group, the Irish. The authors dropped the ball on that one.

If there was ever a time when we needed to be reminded that immigrants are the heart and soul of what makes this a textured, rich and interesting country, this is it. This book and its companion museum exhibit, which I was lucky enough to come upon serendipitously at Purchase College's Neuberger Museum, celebrates the gifts we have received as a nation from the diverse people who have struggled first to get here, and then to make a life for themselves here. Before we build walls on borders, before we villify those who are different from us, let's appreciate what we are gaining from the immigrants who choose the US as their home. Let's remember that very few of us are Native American. We have all benefitted from the open door to America.

Book is an excellent companion to a travelling show we saw at the University of Maine in Orono. It captures in an extraordinary fashion the incredible ethnic and cultural diversity within a relatively small section of Queens, NY.

Well done and Bravo for Warren Lehrer and Judith Sloan for this formidable effort! I couldn't put this book down, not so much because the book has stories of gore or thrill, but because of the beautiful and thoughtful way in which it is crafted, laid out and presented. The subjects are treated with complete dignity, affirmation and love, something that is rarely seen when dealing with immigrants and foreigners. I applaud this multi-media venture [the accompanying CD and website are mindblowing as well] and the amount of effort it took. I put down the book feeling like I had had the best world education lesson ever-if only high school were like this I'd be so much further in life! Bravo!

Queens, in New York City, is the most ethnically diverse community in the country. Over a period of three years, from 1999 to 2002, editors Warren Lehrer and Judith Sloan collected stories from a sampling of the borough's 2 million residents. The result is this book, a much needed tribute to the people, most of them immigrants, who make Queens such a culturally rich locale.

The stories are wide and varied: a Congolese man who fled his country to seek asylum in the United States, only to be detained for nearly two years once he arrived here; an Afghan woman and her mother who were separated from each other for 22 years; a gay Colombian couple forced to flee their home; a pair of Egyptian brothers who opened a cafe and restaurant in Astoria. It's impossible to summarize them all here.

The words of the storytellers are, for the most part, kept intact. Everything is quoted directly, and even the speech mannerisms of those with rough or accented English are preserved, making the book feel just as colorful and diverse as the people featured in it. In a few cases, where the interviewee spoke little or no English at all, the stories are translated from the teller's native language. The editors have included helpful explanatory notes where the storyteller's make reference to events and individuals with which the reader may not be readily familiar.

"Crossing the BLVD" is also a refreshing visual treat. There are numerous photographs, pieces of artwork, maps, and other visuals. Each page has clearly been laid out with loving attention. Font style, size, and placement, along with the placement of the pictures, is carefully balanced to achieve certain effects. The book is just as colorful and full of character as the people whose stories it relates.

This is definitely a book everyone should read. Though nearly 400 pages in length, the text is large and makes for quick reading. But this simplicity is only a cover for the rich, inspiring, and heartfelt stories these people have to share. "Crossing the BLVD" certainly has something to offer any reader.

Kirk Johnson of the Denver Museum of Natural History and his traveling companion, artist Ray Troll, take us on a goofy whirlwind tour of fossil sites in the West that is funny and also informative. Kirk Johnson explains a lot of geological concepts along the way, while weaving in great anecdotes and entertaining sketches of the whacky characters who live and work at many of the sites they visit. Ray Troll's art, as always, is great and often quite surreal, and there's lots of it on every page. Highly recommended!

The book was listed in Science News, which is a weekly publication with current news in the world of Science. My spouse, who is a Registered Professional Geologist, asked me to purchase it for her. At first glance she thought it was a children's book, however; in reading further realized the book was intended for adults. Her rating is that the publication was very good, both well written and illustrated. This rating means a lot because it is from someone who must have at least a zillion books on Geology and also has a Masters Degree in the subject.

Caution! Paleo fever is catching. I already had a light dose of it before reading the book. Not many people carry around a small chunk of dinosaur rib in their purse just for the heck of it. (It makes a hilarious conversation piece at security check points. Most screeners don't want anything more to do with the purse after finding the bone.)

Now, after reading the book, I have a full blown case, and am itching to get back on the road. This book strikes just the right balance between hard information and just plain fun.

We went to Montana last summer and met several people who were at least as interesting as the bones - with strange tales of discovery and survival. Guess what! after reading the book, I now know that there is a whole world of fossils and people just waiting to be discovered.

This book answers a lot of questions that I had - i.e. what on earth is a concretion? Before reading the book, I could recognize one, but couldn't define what it was. Now I know more about what they are and how they form.

The book delivers a steady drip of valid scientific information that you almost don't realize that you are getting. (The author is a curator at the Denver Museum.)

The book will also tell you how to recognize and find dinosaur tracks at 65 miles an hour. - I won't give away the secret,but, I'll give you a hint: it involves birthday cake and ants.

Be warned! If you read this book, you will be left screaming for a ROAD TRIP in the great old American tradition.

Funny,thought-provoking story with historic information on paleontological sites and the people who search for fossils.

One part Easy Rider, one part On the Road with Charles Kuralt, and one part "stuff to find by the side of the road." Mix up these three and add an interesting commentary of "how things got to be the way they are" and you'll have some idea of what "Cruisin' the Fossil Freeway" is like. I've read "The Bone Wars" (Cope vs Marsh) and, while I find the topic interesting, I had to drag myself through parts of it. I also have a number of "Roadside Geology" books that I'm generally disappointed with. In "Cruisin'," Dr. Johnson gives details about the first scientists on the scene, plus precise locations & basic geology, and manages to make it all humorous and entertaining. The Easy Rider camaraderie between Johnson and artist Troll is often quite amusing, and the sketches of personalities they meet along the road makes what could be a very dry subject full of personable details. The octogenarian racing to beat Johnson to a fossil, the 16 year old girl with an Allosaurus under her bed, the "King of Trilobites" who has little more than disdain for fossils ... all keep the narrative far from a textbook coverage of geology. No, I don't know the author well enough for him to buy me lunch or have a piece of the royalties. I just really enjoyed both the personalities and the fossil info in the book. If you're serious about collecting, get the separate map as well: not only is it covered in Trollish art, but it provides an accurate index of fossil locales throughout the Western states (in much more detail and over broader areas than the book ... and better than any other source I've seen).

Anyone who thinks life was better in times past should read this book. It is about the Donner party, a group of midwesterners who hoped on the frontier trail to California, only to face misery, hardship and death in numerous forms. In one case, a young boy breaks his leg, and dies in agony following a makeshift operation. In another a sick man is left to die on the trail, unable to keep up. And the party had to deal with hostile Indians and unsavory characters as well. It was a time when travel to the West coast from New York could be done faster by sea than overland.

I am a bit new to the Donner story so I can't compare Limburg's telling to other books on the adventure. But it certainly kept me reading. One could almost feel the optimism present in April when the group set out, and then the agravation and, ultimately, fear and despair. The reader will ask himself what he would have done in the situation, glad all the while for the comforts of modern life.

I, like everyone else, thinks of one thing when thinking about the Donner Party--canabalism. There were many wagon trains headed west in the years just before the Civil War that never made it, or suffered terrible hardship, but it is the Donner group that we all remember. Author Peter Limburg has done a marvelous job separating the sensationalism from the facts, and writes a poignant tale of people, just like us, looking for a better life in a new place. I always appreciate a book that solidly puts me in a different time and place--this book didn't disappoint.

I think people are a bit confused here. The story of the Donner Party is gripping, intense, chilling, gruesome etc etc. It is an incredible story that has survived for a reason. We can applaud Limburg for not ruining that for us - the book is a page turner that I finished in a sitting, however, Limburg's writing was not the reason. Frankly, "Deceived" is a poorly written account that merely spews the research of others into an easy to read format. The book contains far more flat, unnamed characters than can be digested and lets many plot lines drop away without a thought.

You'll note that most books about the Donner party are given rave reviews (probably for the reason I just suggested). I recommend that you look for another book on the subject as there must be better.

From Marisa D'Vari, author of "Script Magic" Sure, travel is difficult ... but count your lucky stars you're not traveling over a hundred years ago, when the travelers were not at the mercy of surly airline attendants but nature's elements. I became fascinated with the Donner party in a fourth grade history class in California, and am not surprised that Limburg's story continues to grip me. An excellent read!

I was fascinated by the detailed unfolding story of the famous Donner Party and how they got to the state that has made their name legend in the field of horror and disaster. With more than 45 photos and illustrations this book was I'm sure the most thourough treatment of this story.

I am always careful about books written by journalists from back East, especially when they deal with Montana's vigilantes. Frederick Allen, however, has made a worthwhile contribution to a controversial field.

I gave him five stars, although I do not entirely agree with some of his conclusions. It seems to surprise him, for example, when Plummer and some of his contemporaries started bouncing off the walls mentally after shooting somebody.

My experience in law enforcement has been that such behavior is normal. There are some sociopaths out there who just like to kill and don't feel any emotion about it, but they are few and far between despite what Hollywood scriptwriters would like you to believe.

This is a well written book, but it didn't change my opinion that the vigilantes cleaned up a situation that had spun out of control at a time when nobody else would, or could. The country was, after all, engaged in a bloody Civil War and the struggling miners in Montana's goldfields needed something to restore order in their isolated, vulnerable communities. Vigilante justice proved to be better than no justice at all.

One tends to associate the dark legacy of lynching almost exclusively with the South of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, but in point of fact the most extensive episode of vigilante justice in American history actually took place in the Montana territories in the 1860s. The Montana vigilantes have long been hailed as heroes in Montana (Montana Highway Patrolmen, for example, still bear a patch honoring these men and their cause), men who took upon themselves the obligation to rid their community of dangerous individuals. In this thrilling historical account, however, Frederick Allen pries open the chinks in the vigilante movement's historical armor to show that their brand of frontier justice eventually descended into something much darker and much less defensible.

In the early 1860s, Montana was a wild country overrun by thousands of men clamoring for the new-found gold in its rivers and streams. Even as gold camps began appearing overnight, there was no government of any sort to oversee justice - just miners' courts to settle disputes over claims and the like. The nearest outpost of territorial authority lay hundreds of miles west of the Montana frontier. Thus, it is easy to see how lawlessness could prevail under such conditions; it manifested itself most particularly in the form of stagecoach robberies on the paths leading away from town. A man could lose a whole season's worth of gold dust in the blink of an eye, and such hold-ups could turn deadly on occasion. What could the settlers do to secure their safety and safe passage back to the States or elsewhere? There was no legal system in place in the territory, there were no cells to hold prisoners, and there were no courts or judges to adjudicate cases. There was a sheriff, however, a fascinating man named Henry Plummer - and he really stands at the core of the entire drama. He came to be suspected of complicity in the robberies and murders in the area, and this growing sense of doubt in their sheriff served as the final impetus for the leading men of Bannack and Virginia City to take the law into their own hands. Plummer was among the 21 men hanged during the first six weeks of 1864. There will always be a level of debate as to Plummer's guilt or innocence, and Allen examines this fascinating man's life in great detail. The real question is how a man twice convicted of murder could have become a sheriff in the first place, but this speaks to the true remoteness of the Montana territory in those days.

In all, 51 men were killed by the vigilantes over a six-year period. Allen agrees with the consensus opinion that the early stage of the movement was justified, as there is evidence that all 21 of the men lynched in the first six weeks of 1864 were guilty, dangerous men - including Henry Plummer. Were the story to stop there, the Montana vigilantes would deserve nothing but admiration for bringing order and security to their local community. They did not stop, however, and their activities inevitably devolved into acts of personal vengeance and the very perversion of justice. In that first crucial period of early 1864, accused men were given trials of a sort, their fates usually decided by the entire community. Hangings took place in broad daylight, and the identities of the vigilantes were in no way kept secret. As time went on, however, men were summarily executed by individuals acting upon little more than their own authority. With no hope or manner of defending themselves, it is very likely that some innocent men were hanged - and there can be little doubt that many of the guilty had not committed crimes serious enough to warrant death.

As is always the case in history, the most fascinating aspect of this whole story is the lives of the men involved. Allen identifies the vigilantes as leading citizens of the area, an unusual amalgamation of men both for and against the battle for Southern independence being waged during that chaotic time. Politics came to play a significant role in the whole saga, as the appointed leaders of the newly-established Montana Territorial government did themselves no favors by immediately alienating the significant number of Democrats among the local populace. This new government was ineffective at best, with the executive and judicial branches nullifying each other's authority - and this provided the pretext for the vigilantes to continue their operations.

A Decent, Orderly Lynching really is a fascinating book. Allen brings to life the mining camps of gold-rush Montana, recreating all aspects of society there on the remote frontier. He offers penetrating assessments of the men at the heart of this story, those on both sides of the hanging rope, drawing a sharp distinction between the early, honorable activities of brave men determined to establish order in their lawless region and the excesses of those who continued to pursue vigilante justice after Montana's new territorial government had been established. Through it all, he maintains an objective air, making his own judgments based on the evidence in hand - and his research efforts were impressive, to say the least. The story of the Montana vigilantes is a most telling part of the history of America, and Allen has done a superb job telling that story to those of us unfamiliar with it.

This amazing book works on three different levels. It is first of all a compelling, action-packed narrative of Montana's vigilante period - carefully researched, engagingly written, and peppered with memorable characters and dramatic action. Western fans will love it. But Allen does not stop there. His brilliant examination of Henry Plummer, the mysterious and elusive sheriff-protagonist, adds deeper and darker shadings to the story. This is less a black-and-white tale of heroes and villains than one about how power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The author does not trade in the romanticism surrounding the vigilantes. Finally, and most remarkably, Allen's book can be read as an allegory about the uses and misuses of all governmental power. In the nineteenth century, Montana's besieged citizens cried out for help against their version of terrorists -- only to discover belatedly that the response by unchecked governmental authorities could be equally lawless. Who would have thought that the Vigilante Trail led to Abu Ghraib?

People who hate "High Noon" have been known to cite the goings-on in Idaho Territory of the 1860s as proof that an enraged citizenry would never back down from outlaws. According to "eyewitness accounts," a locally formed vigilance committee rounded-up Sheriff Henry Plummer and his bloodthirsty compatriots and, with the aid of lots of rope, soon put an end to the rampant murder and robbery in the gold camps.

While this account made for excellent melodrama, it was a bit too pat to stand the test of time, and of late, had become the center of some arguing and fist shaking in the vicinity of Alder Gulch. Frederick Allen painstakingly examines the players and their times. His conclusions will not please the revisionists nor the vigilante apologists. While the vigilantes started out with the best of intentions and went after the worst of the thugs, their focus was lost in the chaos and power struggles of their era. Like many mavericks, they went from being heroes to embarassments.

But Allen confirms that Henry Plummer, George Ives & Co. were not martyrs of misdirected justice. It's too bad the vigilantes didn't have the forsight to stop while they were ahead.

This is the type of book that gives University Presses a good name. The author is a former political editor and columnist with the Atlanta Constitution and commentator for CNN. He has managed to write a scholarly yet reader friendly book that challenges some standard accounts of the famous Montana Vigilantes and their sometimes extra-legal activities. In what was the deadliest chapter of vigilante justice in American history, from 1864-1870, in excess of 50 men were hanged in Montana. The majority were inocent of capital crimes and a disturbing numer were innocent. This is a riveting book that will, in addition to bringing the reader up to date on a significant chapter in western history, cause one to ponder the significance of the Vigilantes on our current political debate over the war on terrorism. This is first rate scholarship in a reader friendly format. Highly recommended.

The legendary Buzz Holmstrom was a more complex figure than I knew. His journal entries express the feeling of all who really love rivers and the famous entry that includes "the doing of the thing" should be read on every river trip.
This is the second Brad Dimock book I've read (the other on Bert Loper) and I am impressed with not only his skill as a writer, but his careful research. His handling of the tragic end to Buzz Holmstrom's life was that of a journalist with a sense of humanity.
I've already loaned this book to friends.

If you like white water rafting, this is a wonderful book about the birth of white water fun.

Even today, with rescue not so far away, few of us would have the nerve to go down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon alone, so imagine the nerve it took when Buzz was totally alone, with no chance of help if he made a mistake. But the most amazing thing about Buzz was that in the midst of an adventure that would leave most people totally preoccupied with survival, Buzz had the soul power to look for and see the poetry in the river and the canyon. Merely knowing how to survive can be much easier than knowing how to live.

Well-written and researched. But the thing that shines through is Buzz and his strong spirit - the writers were careful to be sure this was HIS book, not theirs, which is how it should be. A true boatman's boatman, Buzz was maybe born too soon - it seems the world wasn't quite ready for his singular love of the rivers and nature. This book won't disappoint you - what will disappoint you after reading it is that Buzz is gone.

I remember years ago when I was a kid a story my father told me about an amazing river rafter and boat builder. My Dad grew up in Coquille and went to school with Buzz's younger brother. His story always ended with how Buzz had been on a rafting trip in eastern Oregon and went off and committed suicide. I could never understand how someone who had done the amazing things he did could end his life on that note. I thought about that story many times over the years and always wished I knew more. This book is incredibly well researched and documented. Even though many questions were answered, many more were raised. Such was the enigma that was Buzz Holmstrom.

If you only read one book about the Donner Party, make it this one! The Donner Chronicles tells the story of doomed pioneers and their struggle to survive. It keeps the reader at the edge of his seat and provides great detail of the period and the people. Highly recommended for history buffs who want to read history as though it's a novel instead of a dry textbook. Great photos, maps and graphics add to the text.

Frank Mullen has added an important book to the history of Donner Party. The tragedy has been the focus of writing since the spring of 1847, but Mullen has found a fresh way to make the story understandable and, perhaps more importantly, human.

The book is a daily chronolgy of the year that it took the party to travel from Illinois to California, and each two-page spread of this large book is carefully laid out and presents a mix of graphics and text. It is rewarding if read straight through, yet very accessible if your reading style is more "grazing" than linear.

Mullen clearly has done his homework. The sheer volume of detail and complexity in the story can be overwhelming, and Mullen includes the details that are needed to clarify and develop the people in the story. He includes wonderful quotes from diaries and supporting material, and drawings of interesting side issues such as an analysis of the probable shape of the "Pioneer Palace Car." Additionally, Marilyn Newton's photographs of the trail as seen today make it real for a modern reader.

When I have given this book as a gift to anyone with an interest in American History, it has been very well received. A truly great book.

What a great account of a tragic historical event. I felt like i was right there with them. The day -by-day account made for easy reading and let you understand the exact timeline of what the Donner party went through. Frank Mullen and the Reno-Gazette did a great job and should be very proud to keep this history alive.

Yesterday I flew to California from Charlotte,NC. I spent my time in a jetliner, sipping a cool beverage, watching a movie on my laptop and towards the end of my journey, occasionally pertaking the beauty of snow-capped jagged mountain tops of the Sierra Nevada.

But, it was so different a mere 150 years ago. One had to travel in animal driven wagons carrying enough food and other necessities for the long and perilous journey, which could be brutally and tragically cut short by wild animals, unfriendly Indians or any natural calamity. No maps, no rest areas or highways or motels. Luck was the chief ingredient of success those days. This book tells the story of one such journey, where the travellers ran out of luck when they chose to use a shortcut and got snowbound in the Sierra Nevadas. What followed was a struggle for survival with human emotions running raw.

This book narrates this story on a day by day basis and is adorned with a lavish collection of color as well as black and white photographs of the trail and artifacts from those days. It takes one back all those years when one almost feels like a member of the doomed party. I recommend it highly for anyone with or without any interest in the events described!

On a personal note, I found one photograph especially poignant where the proven and the shortcut trails clearly branched. I could feel the indecision in the minds of the emigrants which sealed their fate.

The full-color, glossy photographs of major landmarks and points of interest along the Emigrant Trail from Springfield, MO to Johnson's Ranch in Bear Valley are stunning. The color photos, all taken by Marilyn Newton, are grouped together in the beginning of the book, comprising 20 slick pages of almost 50 photos. It's hard to believe that wagon ruts from over 150 years ago still exist in places; happily, our continuous farming, building and paving haven't obliterated all traces of the route that so many people rode--and walked--in order to reach California.

Portraits, maps, drawings and sketches from the period are interspersed with sepia-toned contemporary photographs, some taken by Newton and some by other photographers, and appear on every page of the book. "The Donner Party Chronicles" is visually rich and stimulating. The area around Donner Lake and the route the relief parties followed are depicted in all seasons of the year. Even in black-and-white, the photos of Donner Lake and the surrounding mountains demonstrate the ruggedness of the terrain and deeply impress upon the reader the hopelessness the members of the Donner Party must have felt upon being snowed-in at the lake.

The book reads like a journal that would have been kept by one of the emigrants traveling with the Donner Party. The text is reprinted from installments journalist Frank Mullen, Jr. published in the weekly newspaper "The Reno Gazette-Journal" over the course of an entire year. The daily routine followed, problems encountered, and decisions made by the Donner Party are chronicled in a concise manner. The entries are short, most three or four paragraphs in length.

One very interesting feature of "The Donner Party Chronicles" is the map of the Emigrant Trail that appears on every left-hand page of the book, with the progress of the doomed emigrants clearly marked with a red dot. As you read along through the book, you see on every other page exactly where the emigrants were as the day's events took place. I found this map extremely helpful and fascinating. Watching the movement of the Donner Party as they traveled on foot at the pace of slow, plodding oxen made me better able to understand how great an undertaking their overland journey was. I shared this book with my husband, my Dad and my father-in-law, and they enjoyed it almost as much as I did!

This book is well worth the price, for the interesting text as well as the terrific photos; you can easily find what you're looking for in the pages, as each page is dated and the day's entry fairly short.

This is a rare book, and Jesse Reklaw is clearly a rare sort of guy. He adapts and illustrates these dreams once a week for his "Slow Wave" page, and for a few small newspapers, and each one is a lovingly crafted work of art. Frequently hilarious, often disturbingly insightful, and always completely far out, this book and the years of work it represents is clearly a very special labour of love.

This book is great for a coffee table timefiller, but don't be mislead into thinking it as superficial. These little works bear a second or third reading over time. The disturbing night-works of the contributors are full of details and angles that'll have you twisting your neck trying to get into the minds of the dreamers depicted here. Buy it. Love it.

Incredible (third)-eye-opening toons that will appeal to the armchair Freudian or Dadaist in all of us. Floppy logic, zen-like revelations, and surprising celebrity cameos. Salvador Dali, meet Harvey Pekar. Published by Shambhala-- synchronicity or symbolism?

Jesse Reklaw's Dreamtoons is a strange mix of dry humor and strange situations. Everyone dreams, and those who are fortunate enough to remember some of their more insane dreams seem to have found Jesse. His illustrations are clean and add a lot to the dreams. His editing means no more run-on dream sequences, just great entertainment. I sometimes found myself thinking "Someone just made that up", and then remembered some of my dreams. Yes, they did just make that up, but they happened to be unconscious and drooling at the time. For 8 bucks, you have very little to lose, and a lot of great entertainment to gain. I've read it 3 times now and still enjoy many of the cartoons.

That's what I did. Jesse's deadpan cartoon renditions of people's wacky, surrealistic dreams are hilarious. Don't read this book in bed if your spouse is trying to sleep (although you must admit, it'd be thematically correct).

Send Jesse Reklaw a description of one of your dreams, and he might make it come to life . . . in his weekly comic strip "Slow Wave."

"Slow Wave" is available in several underground newspapers and on his web site. This book collects the first few years' worth of strips.

Despite being limited to four panels, Reklaw manages to convey the essence of his collaborators' dreams. Some are disturbing; some are very funny;, all have the twisted logic and unsettling creativity of authentic dreams. Reading them is not only a pleasure, but oddly reassuring: It's nice to know that other people have dreams just as, if not more, bizarre as mine.

For maximum effect, savor the strips a few at a time.

My review is simple. I like using Amazon because it is easy, fairly priced and the order comes quickly. If there is a mistake Amazon does not hassle you. What else would I want. It's all simple.

Robert R. Hilger
Princeton, NJ

I purchased this for my 10 year old daughter, hoping to get her interested in starting to read more nonfiction. She loved the book and read it all in three sittings. It must be very well written, because I saw her engrossed in it for hours at a time.

This is a must have for any historian. I loved the book. I was able to use it for my recent bibliography for college. There was a lot of little tidbits that I did not see elsewhere.

I learned that eleanor roosevelt was a very kind loving person who had a very odd child hood, she was known as the ugly duckling.Her mother did not treat her right and made eleanor afraid of everything.
Personaly, I think that this information was very helpful and would be grate to do a scool project on. this book had lots of pictures that gave wonderful information and were very deitailed, and showed me how to eleanors life was when she was a kid. I also learned that that eleanor loved her father very much, more that enything, and he loved her just as much. eleanor was an orffan at age ten because her whole family died of yellow fever. as I said before this book has a lot of amazing pictures [194]and about half of them showed eleanor and her father together.
I enjoued this book alot and I think you will to. the only thing is I would not try to read this book in one week because it is pretty long. Something I liked about this book is that it gives lots of details and is very factual. I also recomend this book if you like a traditional paper back book. I highly think this book is agreat book for a school project, like I did it on a biograghy. I hope you wil llearn as much as I did reading this amazing historical book, Eleanor roossevelt.

This Newbery Honor Book, subtitled "A Life of Discovery," covers Eleanor Roosevelt's life in 11 chapters and nearly 200 pages. The biography covers Roosevelt's childhood, education, courtship, marriage and motherhood, entrée into politics alongside her husband, and her humanitarian work independent of FDR. The text itself is straightforward and easy to read, presented in a scholarly fashion rather than the sort of fictionalized manner of some biographies. While certain events are dramatized, no dialog is invented - the words the reader encounters are those of the figures themselves, from journals, letters, and speeches. The best passages are the friendly and informative explanations offering children some background knowledge about the time, such as this account of courtship at the turn of the century, seamlessly woven into the chapter on "Cousin Franklin":

Of course, Eleanor and Franklin were never alone together. That would have been highly improper in those formal Victorian days. When Eleanor visited Hyde Park or Campobello, when she met Franklin in New York for lunch or tea, even they went riding in the Roosevelt carriage, a third person was always present. If a relative wasn't available, Eleanor's maid served as a chaperone (38).

These frequent explanations offer the reader a broader insight into time, describing the conventions of the era in order to later set Roosevelt's often unconventional views and activities in contrast. This treatment gives young readers a strong sense of why Roosevelt is worthy of special attention. The text is accompanied by more than 100 black and white photographs, both formal portraits and informal candid views of Roosevelt. Overall, the book focuses on Roosevelt's life as a public figure, though does not shy away from intensely personal matters such as her father's alcoholism, her adolescent insecurities, and even her husband's infidelity. In this way, Freedman manages to create a very intimate portrait of the woman herself and to make a larger-than-life figure, with a highly privileged background seem very real and accessible. Although Freedman's tone clearly indicates an admiration for his subject, the book does not idolize her, often drawing attention to her faults such as her lack of her tenderness as a mother when her children were very young (acknowledged by her son). The book concludes with a photo album, bibliography, and index. The book is readable from beginning to end and usable as a reference for exploration of specific events or issues from Roosevelt's life. Children will likely come to this book because of a classroom assignment, but in the process will certainly be entertained and inspired.

This book is nicely written and gives a good introduction to topics of risk management. The exercices at the end of each chapter are such that you actually understand the subtility behind some of the concepts introduced.

This is *the* book on financial risk management that puts it all together. In a volume that is less than half the size of comparable titles in an overcrowded field, Christoffersen packs the most amount of insight and practical knowledge possible. The best part of the book is how he quickly and directly dives into the empirical part of risk measurement - after all, a spreadsheet with real-world data is worth a thousand formulas, and any risk manager typically deals with the real world. To me the fact that the book is not hung up on a single risk metric (VaR for example) is doubly commendable. The book is superb in its coherence and flow, and choice of topics, not to mention the lucidity of presentation. Work through each chapter and the empirical exercises, and you will probably know far more about the nature of financial risk than most practitioners. Five unreserved stars.

Well structured and well thought out, this book is loaded with material yet presented in a light manner. Highly recommended.

I actually learnt elements of risk management and derivatives in a graduate program using this book.
Though I was a perfect amateur in this area, I could understand the essence without taking so much time. That was because this book is short and to the point. Additionally, it is a fair bit practical by adding Excel work files full of models and functions often used in Financial industry. I think the book is also well designed for independent study. All answer files of exercises are contained in an attached CD-ROM.
The best book without question.

I'm very satisfied with this book. It covers many aspects of finance that should be applied in order to be fully understood.

Well, they didn't, but it's a classic anyway.

This is a terrific book for anyone who wants to learn how great projects are visualized, actualized, and pressed through extremely challenging environmental circumstances. It's a source of inspiration for the dreamers and the practical alike.

If you want to read about architecture and engineering, you get only a small dose here. It's more about the capitalization, visioning and building. But that story is magnetic and wonderful.

Only thing they left out: that it was to this (then half-empty) building that Annhaeuser-Busch delivered the "first" case of legal beer to Al Smith at the end of Prohibition. Smith, the "wet" and the eternal optimist, exemplifies what this building was conceived to be: a vibrant and living testimony to the human spirit.

So, it stands to reason that it survives now as New York's essential symbol.

From the outset, the Empire State Building seemed to have had everything going against it. Although conceived during the 1920s boom years, most of the construction went on during the earliest years of the Depression, thereby putting the idea of high occupancy in the severest doubt. Its location wasn't ideal either. It was three miles north of the Wall Street district and a mile south of the center of the midtown business center. And it was ten blocks south of Grand Central Station and three avenues east of old Pennsylvania Station. The idea of mooring dirigibles was quickly scrapped after failed attempts. And sure enough, although the Empire State Building did get built, the tenants did not come. King Kong did, but he didn't pay rent.

John Tauranac describes all this and more in his exhaustive book, THE EMPIRE STATE BUILDING: THE MAKING OF A LANDMARK. Written in an engaging style, Tauranac's book is as elegant and interesting as the subject itself, while his wit is as colorful as the characters surrounding the Empire State Building's creation. The book covers the idea for the building, Raskob's and Smith's supervision, the monumental task of the construction workers, and, most importantly, the survival of the building to become THE emblem of America's cultural and economic reach while become THE identifying symbol of New York City. The generous amount of photographs add to the understanding and enjoyment of the book. Highly recommended.

This is an excellent work that details the history of the Empire State Building. I was a bit surprised to find how much the author managed to pack into my paperback. Everything from skyscraper height restrictions to land leases and modern restructuring of ownership for tax purposes (and all the "interesting" stuff in between). If you buy this book and you're not from New York, do yourself a favor and get a map of the area. So you can follow along in the early chapters.

This book is a must read for anyone interested in not only the Empire State Building, but in New York City history of the late 1920s and early 1930s. Who would think that a building completed in 1931 at 1250 feet high would still be the tallest building in NYC in 2007 (of course, we can't forget the tragic loss of the taller WTC Towers). This book covers the quick construction of the ESB, but also covers the politics and history behind the building's location (the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel used to be at the corner of 5th Ave and 34th Street) and the people involved. This is an interesting book about an exciting time where anything seemed possible in one of the world's greatest cities.

I bought this book shortly after a trip to NYC in 2000, and found it to be an excellent history of one of the Big Apple's architectural jewels, the Empire State Building. It is full of intrigue, history, great anecdotes and one-of-a-kind photographs. If you're a visitor to Manhattan or a local resident, you owe it to yourself to read this book.