Queen The Books

This is a great insight written by a young military officer who was Equerry to the Queen Mother for 2 years. It's written with great respect and fondness of his experiences as her close personal assistant. A rare glimpse into the everyday life of the Queen Mother and her association and influence in the Royal Family. An endearing book that touches on her home at Clarence House, other members of her household, his duties, and describes her "little extravagences" like Lobster, strawberries in winter, champagne, and daily fresh flowers in all the rooms. He describes her other residences at Royal Lodge and the Castle of Mey in Scotland. Full of interesting little known facts and antecdotes. No scandals (she never had any)or unflattering gossip. You'll LOVE this book. Easy reading!!

For some American readers like me, the tragedy of Princess Diana's death may have pointed up how little we know about the British royal family and sent us looking for sources. After starting and discarding several tendentious "histories" of the House of Windsor, I found this one to be a breath of fresh air. Peter Fearon has written an objective, concisely-written, exhaustive account of the royal family (beginning with the death of Queen Victoria), and yet has done so in a highly readable way. Unlike every other author I've seen so far, Fearon doesn't seem to have an axe to grind about the Windsors. I'm in my 40s and hadn't been exposed to much of the history here and found it fascinating. I was sorry to finish the book.

I've read this story about James Wolfe, truly he was a hero. Anyone who loves great history would be riveted by the details.

All of Robert Bringhurst's translations of Haida myth are essential reading. None is more strange, beautiful, majestic, nasty, and comprehensive than this third volume, which contains brilliant translations of two vast epics by Skaay, the most impressive of the mythtellers whose Haida was transcribed as well as translated by an anthropologist at the turn of the last century. Skaay was a philosopher as well as a poet--the two jobs originate together, after all--and few other books give such insight into the worlds that people made on this continent before Europeans came and imposed their own. Read and reread, and don't interpret. These are words with power.

Mr. Wilson, a Canadian journalist, has done a remarkable job bringing the little-known aspects of Benedict Arnold to life.

He skillfully describes the political, personal and social factors which made Arnold the man that he was (both good and bad). The focus is on Arnold as an adult, following him through his days as a Yankee trader, as a superb General and leader of men, as a "turncoat", and then as a trader, husband, father and litigant. His years in eastern Canada and England are dealt with in some detail.

Like so many others, Benedict Arnold was, to me, more a symbol than a man. I knew the basic events surrounding the "incident", but virtually nothing else. Thanks to Barry Wilson, this is no longer the case.

A delightful book for children 4 to 9. The engaging dialogue and unique illustrations will bring you evenings of giggles.

These paper dolls are big and easy for even the youngest child to play with. Kate and Charles provide endless play for imaginative children to roll play and make believe for hours of unsupervised play. We are on our second set because of all the fun we had with the first set. Happy Playing

It is difficult to determine where to begin addressing a review as contradictory and pointless as the one offered by Kirkus of Suarez's exciting new focus on kitsch, camp, and fetishism in the Gay Underground Cinema of the the 60's.

To begin with, Kirkus misses or entirely avoids recognizing that this "slightly new conception" of the history of this cinema is an immanently Queer one, fixing as it does on those aesthetic elements which even most theorists of the avant-garde would have preferred not to let out of the closet. The Kirkus review fails to acknowledge how and why Saurez's reassessment of this tradition bears upon the object of this inquiry-- why Peter Burger's notion of the avant-garde as a rejection of decadent aestheticism is particularly problematic for the queer underground-- why Clement Greenberg's derogation of kitsch cannot possibly account for this cinema-- how Theodor Adorno's strictly negative dialectic fails to record the more positive relations established between the avant-garde and mass culture.

Though Kirkus seems to regard the first fifty pages of Suarez's book as pointless, I see them as absolutely essential. Without the context of these earlier notions of the avant-garde, Suarez's formulations would seem to have come out of thin air-- devoid of any relation to those earlier discourses formed and informed by particular socia land ideological circumstances. Instead, Suarez not only offers a new account, but also reveals how and why a number of elements particularly important to the study of Smith, Anger, and Warhol have been systematically overlooked in the theory which precedes him. Ideas never come out of thin air; it is difficult to understand how the detailed framing of a discursive context could be a waste of time.

This rebuttal itself would be meaningless if the Kirkus review hadn't preceded it.

I am very satisfied with the book I received. I was notified that it was sent very soon after the order was submitted. No problems with this supplier and I would place another order.

the authors main source seems to be Gregory of Tours and so some of the tales seem to be more folklore than scholarly interpretation and there are no archaeology finds to prove a point.Also there are no maps.Still it is a vibrant interpretation of Gregory's work and the author uses alot of contemporary sources as well,in addition she has visited most of the sites mentioned.the book gives a good description of the fragmented kingdoms of Europe that were eventually (through much bloodshed) wielded into modern day France.Apparently the Franks were a supertribe who grew to major importance when they were recruited as a military force by what was left of the Roman Empire. The Roman Pope officially sanctioned the Franks and they adopted Christianity during Clovis' reign.(Needless to say but well documented in the book there were scores of "pagan relapses"by the franks and their subjects.The Roman pope wanted to be rid of the Lombards so he hired a "bigger dog",the Franks,a tribe who would not be well juggled by any authority of God or man. I found it interesting that Islam was somewhat welcomed initially during the middle ages by alot of these petty kingdoms.Rulers used Islam as a pawn(as they also used Christianity)to promote their own interests.Charles Martels' victory at Tours seems somewhat watered down as I realized that some of these European kingdoms may have had more fear of Charles the Hammer than the so-called"Muslim hordes".Insane kings.evil queens,religious hypocrites,they're all here,as well as the shining nobility the true unifiers, both religious and secular,from this period.The author obviously has a deep respect and knowlege of classical Greek and Roman works.