Margaret Walker Books

Every now and then a book appears which responds to a real need, even if you didn't know the need existed. This book breaks new ground on the issue of aging and women. The studies on images of women and how it affects women aging are especially good. Not all is perfect. Many claims are made for the differences between male aging and female aging, but little proof is given. The religious issues which surround aging are strangely absent. Still, this is a first and a scholarly one.

This book is worth the cost. It is exiting compelling and interesting. I can read it over and over again. Margaret Walker is an excellent author.

Maraget Hope Bacon, a leading authority on the Quakers, has done a most impressive job with this biography of Lucretia Mott, a notable Quaker social activist of the nineteenth century.
The book, on the whole, can be described as most impressive in terms of its sheer readability and clarity: we clearly see the contradictions inherent in Quakerism during the time and how she had to face them. Lucretia Mott is shown to be a woman who was exceptionally capable of dealing with criticisms from the Quaker leadership of her childhood and to take up the initiative herself when she believed she was forced to by sheer injustice. All parts of her life are described quite thoroughly but lightly: there is a notable absence of over-dense writing to clutter the book.

Whilst none of the writing is remarkably insightful because Bacon does not go into great detail (as, say, Jean McMahon-Humez does) about the realities of life in a Quaker society, the book still comes across as a good biography. If you want to know where the modern-day women's and peace movements came from, this book should be read.

I used "Achieve PMP Exam Success" as one of my primary study guides to prepare for and take PMI's PMP certification test, this past summer.

I found the book a good supplement to PMI's PMBOK (a must for passing the test) and other material. I also attended a PMP Prep class sponsored by a local PMI chapter and worked with classmates in study groups. It was these study groups were we used this book to ask each other question and disuse the answers.

It gave me the perspective of people who have been there, studied for and passed the test.

Hope this helps

Very good reference with examples, formulas, etc.
BUT (capital BUT): It is written for the PMBOK version 2000, not version 3.

The answers given to the sample exam questions are not in line with the PMBOK version 3, nor are some of the chapters

It is still a good reference to understand the notions, but don't use to learn the key processes.

The authors should updated it ! It would then be a great studying tool.

This book was the most helpful to me in my quest for PMP success. I found the practice questions in the book as well as on the CD, to be very helpful. BTW - I passed the exam.

When I read the positive reviews of this book, I had to double-check to confirm that I was indeed rating the same book!

So, don't just take my word for it.

BEFORE you consider buying this book, I strongly suggest you FIRST find a copy in a bookstore and spend just ten minutes taking a good look at this book's contents, while SIMULTANEOUSLY comparing it chapter-by-chapter with the PMBOK. Then, decide if you want to pay $69.95 for this book. (Note: I passed the PMP with an 86% in September, 2005, after having studied for two months from almost all the PMP study guides, software exam simulation tools, and audio CD products on the market.) It is true that "Achieve PMP Exam Success" follows the structure of the PMBOK. It is also true that the authors provide very little in the way of substantive or insightful material beyond the contents of the PMBOK itself. I was appalled to find that these authors have actually filled much of this book's pages with outlines and line items taken directly from the PMBOK. How can they justify charging people $69.95 for material that they did not create? Further, the study questions in the book were more elementary than those in most other study guides, and likewise were too elementary for the questions on the actual PMP exam. Indeed, the ONLY thing in this book that I found especially valuable was the list of Mnemonic Memory Aids, that a reader can learn and modify to help with memorizing the Processes within the PMBOK's Nine Knowledge Areas.

In summary, of all the PMP Study Guides I purchased (and I purchased and used almost all of them), I would rate this as the poorest quality and the most overpriced.

As I was looking for an updated book to study form my PMP certification, I bought this one. I thought it was updated with PMBOK 2004 reference. In fact, the authors say there is a new version of the PMBOK (2004 one), but it is dedicated for those who want to study for the PMBOK 2000 examination. I did not look well the material as I returned the item without using it. Probably it could be good for those who are studying the 2000 examination (it ends on september 2005), but as we have a reference PMBOK from 2004 I suppose a book released in 2005 should be updated with this reference.

In a nation where the mythology of freedom is so doggedly written in the minds and hearts of its citizens, an unusual gift and talent is required to see beyond the slogans of sublime intentions or constant political artifice. And to further have the courage to staple that vision or idea to the public bulletin boards, where it is sure to provoke harsh criticism from the many who will not be free enough in their minds and thoughts to begin to understand, is honorable.
Lock Step and Dance speaks to the contemporary context of bondage. It shows us the prisons we see and do not see by illuminating the inmates, the wardens, and the governors, and why they are and do what they do. In it we see the struggle for language and representation and the struggle for ownership of one's person.
The book ferries us aptly across a number of cultural enclaves, while explaining the author's position; however, even with the obvious affinity and knowledge shown for areas of Hip Hop, I would like to have seen the issues explored further still through her foray into this significant cultural explosion.
Lockstep and Dance, by examining the modern imprisonment of African American men, and the literal and the unseen "prison writ large," points to the way to make the reality of freedom closer to the cherished mythology. By examining the historical inhumanities of America, it opens us to greater possibilities of humanity. If we have the courage to read with open minds as the author has the courage to write, we may find a deeper meaning in a 21st century obligation to define ourselves as a species that improves upon our transgressions rather than a species that continues to live them out.
I think the book is right on the mark.

This woman was an instructor at the Arkansas University where I was also employed. I read portions of this several years ago. It was a tremendous waste of time. Her syllabus read like something out of an asylum. Did a vanity press publish this drivel??

The other review posted so far for this work resorts to ad hominem attacks on Tucker and does readers the disservice of a review so distasteful, they might accidentally hold the critic's words against this text.

Dr. Tucker's insights into such interesting topics as advertising and athletics required extensive research--and her approach is thoughtful and intelligent. Her work will likely strike a cord with anyone interested in the fields of popular culture or African American studies. I sincerely hope that Tucker turns her academic lens toward African American women; such a work would further the strides that _Lockstep and Dance_ makes as it explores what black and white mean in visual and verbal representations in the U.S.

I came to know Aaron Henry when he was elected to serve in the Mississippi House in 1980. Initially I thought he was a doddering relic, yet pleasant enough, who tended to pontificate. He was in over his head and didn't really seem to have much interest in the legislative process and, as a result, was not highly regarded by his peers. He had a long history of arrests in city parks in the middle of the night, if you catch my drift. He made advances toward me and several other individuals--it was pathetic. Aaron Henry is indicative of the rotten core of the civil rights movement and liberal politicians in general--you don't have to look far for this. He ranks up there with Al Lowenstein and Bill Clinton. I believe this book is self serving and out of synch with reality.

"The Fire Ever Burning" by Aaron Henry and Constance Curry is an important contribution about the Civil Rights Movement. Henry was loved by his friends and was considered to be astute, brave and caring. As was often typical of the times, he was accused of some rotten stuff. How else do you stop people from obtaining their rights? Constance Curry, who wrote this book from Henry's papers, lived the Civil Rights Movement and was actively involved in the Mississippi Delta where Henry lived. She is a careful researcher and writes from the heart. Like "Silver Rights" by Curry, about school integration in the Delta, this book is another good read and I highly recommend it.

The book rehashes ethical relativism. It tries to bring in some trendy takes on power, feminism, and Foucauld, but it just commits the relativistic fallacy over and over. Author seems unaware of logical contradictions.

In Moral Understandings, Margaret Urban Walker not only powerfully argues the case for a feminist ethics of responsibility, but in so doing extends the implications beyond feminism. Viewing moral responsibility from various socially and culturally situated contexts seems common sense enough to all, accept those who imagine themselves to be in some transcendent position, epistemologically speaking.

What I get from reading Walker is not the idea that we should be reading off ethics from these various positions in the sense of doing the usual (traditional) ethics from many vantage points. That would be relativism. Rather, it seems to me that Walker is arguing that we should be responding from these positions. For Walker, moral responsibility is more an expressive and collaborative exercise than the traditional theoretical activity which focuses only on decision-making. It is this practice of responsibility that maintains the other-directedness of ethics embedded in social and cultural context.

For me, the most surprising aspect of Walker's book has been that so many of my applied ethics research students have found it useful in grounding their work in fields as diverse as disability, vulnerable identities, nursing ethics, GM foods, biotechnology, welfare ethics, and community development.

This book was OK. There was nothing spectacular about the story, and the text was pretty boring, as were the illustrations. I think I could have given it a 4 star rating if the illustrations had been similar to the quality and style of those found in One Potato, Two Potato (ISBN: 0374356408). There are 12 scenes (2 pages each) in this short and simple book.

The story is about Tom and Alice who are starting a new school year. Tom is older and has attended school before, but Alice is new to the experience. Tom didn't really want his sister to go to "his" school and the book is about how he copes on that first day when both he and his sister attend the same school.

I would have liked the book better if the father had been left out of the story. And I also would have liked the relationship between Tom and Alice to be developed more. Of course, as I say above, I would have liked illustrations that were not so boring. 3 stars!

I rushed right out to the store the day this was released, I couldn't wait to read this last installment. The first two books in this very creative trilogy had had me riveted and enthralled. This finale is not bad, but not fabulous and I think on the whole I was disappointed. The entire book is one long battle. It picks up immediately after the ending of the second book, and could not be read as a stand alone in any way. If you tried to you would not understand a thing. The battle for Alenium to defeat the Maelstrom is a roller-coaster ride of adventure, battles under the ocean, battles on the ocean, battles over the ocean and the battle in the city itself. Switching constantly from one aspect of the battle to the another, from one of the many characters to another quickly, the story just seems to never end and goes on an on and leaves you a bit impatient to just have it over with. Although the action is there and the magic too, it lacked the plot substance and deep character development that I felt made the first two books more wonderful. I actually too thought in some sections, the story was wobbly and was starting to not make sense. I loved the flying manta rays and the very cool seahorses, Jaconius the whale and the return of the magic mussels, but I did not like the rather dumb twist of what the author did with the Hexhermeic Worm. If you take the three books as a whole, as one story, then this gets high marks and rave reviews. This is a story that is different and extremely well written, with fantasy features that are very creative. But as a stand alone story this lacks quite a bit. I highly recommend then to take all three books and read them one after another quickly to get a better feel for the whole image of the story Meyer creates. I didnt hate this book, but I cant say I loved it either.

Richard Wright, author of NATIVE SON, BLACK BOY, and THE OUTSIDER, is a major American writer. He desrves a major biography.

RICHARD WRIGHT: DAEMONIC GENIUS by Margaret Walker is more like a major hatchet-job.

Dr. Walker is a noted author in her own right, with the bestseller JUBILEE to her credit. She was also friendly with Langston Hughes, Frank Yerby, and James Baldwin. And she had a three-and-a-half year friendship with Wright himself, beginning in 1936.

Much of DAEMONIC GENIUS is based upon Walker's memories of that relationship. That the friendship ended badly (according to Walker, due to Wright) seems to be the central theme of the book. It's also its central fault.

Walker spends pages and pages describing her feelings over the break up. She then analyzes every relationship Wright ever had in the light of those feelings. Along the way, she sprinkles in biographical passages almost as an afterthought. If your interest is in Walker's perspective on Wright's psyche and how it affected his work, this might be fine. If you're interested in an objective presentation of Wright's life and work, you will find Walker's pontifications downright annoying. It might even occur to you that Walker is getting even with the man for some perceived wrong 30 years after his death.

Such are Walker's feelings about Wright that she seems inconsistent in her conclusions. The first few chapters of her book gloss over Wright's upbringing by referring to BLACK BOY, implying that the 1945 work covers those years authoritatively. Yet when she comes to discuss the book itself, she describes it as, "not a book of purely factual and verifiable incidents." There are many such paradoxes in the narrative.

Too, Walker details many unkind psycholgical insights about Wright's widow, Ellen. Much has been made of the fact that Ellen tried to put a stop to Walker's book through court action, claiming violation of copyright. I personally think she could have made a better case for character assassination.

In short, then, the definitive biography of Richard Wright has yet to be written. And students of Wright would probably be better off giving RICHARD WRIGHT: DAEMONIC GENIUS a pass.

This book was hard to keep up with at first I thought it was a biography on Richard Wright.After reading and really getting into the book I then realized that she had a right to speak and write of their relationship. I felt that the book was informative and helpful in understanding a different side of Richard Wright. Everybody has more than one side to them.