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Since Amy Candler was built in a lab, she was made specially so that it was impossible for her to get sick. For all her life, Amy has never had a single disease--not even a cold. And whenever she gets a scab, it instantly fades away. But now, things are a little different. After visiting a mysterious teens' club, Amy begins to feel odd. Her special abilities aren't working, she can't think straight, and she's always passing out. Tasha and Eric are worried for their friend. They have no idea how to cure her. And if they don't figure out a way to make her better soon, their closest friend might not be able to live.

This Replica book can only be described in one word--chilling. Throughout the whole novel, you feel "chilling" as you wonder if Amy will survive and what could possibly be making her sick. I was pretty surprised at the end, although some people will easily be able to figure it out. The plot was good, but there's one scene in this book that's absolutely amazing where Amy has a vision of all the dead people she's experienced in her life. I don't know why, but that part really made me enjoy what I was reading. You should read it too!

This was an excellent book. I was glad it was so good, since the last two, I didn't care for particularly, but this one renewed my interest in the series. My guess at what was going on was totally wrong. I liked the way Amy thought everyone was against her, that was cool. I recommend this book, without a shadow of a doubt, to anyone who is into this series. You can't miss it.

This is a great book in the series.So great I can't put down. Amy,the "perfect" clone gets a fever.what is this all about? Is it the new club in town which might be giving kids drugs?Or maybe something is affecting her in a way or another?

The nineth book in the Replica series. Amy is a perfect human clone with superior hearing, smelling, seeing, and health. She has never been sick, shes never even had a cold! But in this book Amy catches a deadly virus and her friends and family believe a tycoon guy who just opened a teen nightclub may have been putting drugs in the kids drinks. That is the only explaination and since they have never seen drugs in Amy system (she doesnt go to regular doctors) they dont know what is going to happen. But there is more that I cant tell you! Youll have to read it. But it was a great story and I would recommend it for anyone.

Amy and Tasha are excited - Nancy Candler's very good friend and colleague Dr. David Hopkins has come to Los Angeles. And he has agreed to pierce the girls' ears! The girls are thrilled - but Amy is puzzled when it hurts her so much, especially since pain is never a problem for her. Soon after, Amy starts to get a bad fever and starts hallucinating. Tasha, although she knows Amy is a clone and shouldn't be seen by anyone who could figure it out, calls a doctor to take some blood from Amy. Soon after, Tasha realises it was the wrong decision. She needs to think of something fast, so she pulls Amy into the closet and gets into her bed, and even though she hates needles she doesn't make a sound when the doctor arrives and gives her the shot, and luckily, Tasha's quick change of mind produces a "normal" reading on the tests - something the orginization was hoping would show something of Amy's special genetic makeup! --This is one of the three best books in the series! I was impressed! Marilyn Kaye did a fantastic job on this one!

While T.S. Eliot's "Love Song of J.Alfred Prufrock" is what he is most famous for, "The Four Quartets" merit much to reckoned with. I remember the first time I read "Burnt Norton". I was crashing at a friend of a friend of mine's place at UC Berkeley. I wanted to learn how to be poetic, and "Burnt Norton" was great help with such a matter. It is one of my favorite poems.

Even though Eliot's stock had dropped somewhat among academics in recent years this text will long be remembered for centuries to come. It is through this poem that Eliot heals the "soul disease" of the Wasteland. In our own hectic life where there is so little time for pause, so little time for reflection, Eliot reminds us of the experience had, but the meaning missed or misunderstood. Those isolated moments:the moment in the garden, the moment at the beach, or in a secluded chapel at nightfall, restore to us our spiritual humanity. Those who regard Eliot simply as a bitter and misanthropic poet should revise this opinion of him by reading Four Quartets to see that he was a very real man, a flawed man, struggling with the deformities of his soul.

The Four Quartets by TS Eliot is a classic and should not be missed. It is of the type of poetry that evokes meanings from their hidden places in us through the use of word trails that are only partially logical. Our own emotions connect things, so when it is read, don't approach it with the usual straining to decipher the meaning. The ring of a gong lingers after it is struck, something of a parallel to how the poem works. Fascinating, too, is its approach to understanding the elusive sense of time, but it is couched more in the sensibilities of the East than the West.

Among all these reviews, not one comes to terms with the very title of this opus: Four Quartets. When was Eliot anything but precise in his choice of word?

The inspiration for these poems -- or reflections -- are the late string quartets of Beethoven, those numbered from 12 through 16. It is the 5-movement No.15 in A Minor,Op.132, that seems to have exerted the strongest influence, with it's famous adagio movement, which Beethoven inscribed as the thanksgiving song of a convalescent.

Actually, No.15 was the 13th in order, but the Quartets were published out of sequence, which was not uncommon in Beethoven's time. The Late Quartets progress from the classic 4-movement No.12 and add a movement to each work up to the 7-movement Op.131 in C-sharp Minor. The 16th and final quartet returns to the classic 4-movement form. There is an expansion of form concluding with a contraction and return over the course of 5 works.

Like Eliot's Four Quartets, Beethoven's Late Quartets reflect upon time and faith -- and the 'speech' is often plain: repeated phrases that appear stuck in a groove, hammered chords, cheap tunes that seem to be lifted from a band in a local inn; from long-breathed melodies that look beyond what Wagner and Mahler will eventually bring to music, to cell-like motivs not heard again till Bartok and Webern.

The 'learned' aspect of Eliot's verse can lead us astray, so that we are forever parsing the meaning of the lines. I am taken with the sounds he makes as I read the poems aloud, and the sounds he chose to convey what the poems mean are, in a sense, the essence of meaning. From the first I was struck by the sheer sound of 'time' in the context of these Quartets, which are Eliot's swan song.

This is a tiny book, more like a pamphlet, only 58 pages long with large print and some blank pages as part of the design. But it is mighty in its impact. These "four quartets" are four of T. S. Eliot's poems meditating (among other things) on the nature of time - time past, time present, time future...If you are of my generation and have read the poems before, you might love carrying this little book around just to dip into it for a line or two, and maybe understand something you never understood before. (T. S. Eliot is not always an easy read.) If you have never read them before, I envy you!

I use this book as a grammar reference and conversation stimulus in my ESL classes and private tutoring.
It's very well organized although the cd only contains every 4 chapters which is a bit disappointing. However the students like it which is essential.

I love this book. It should not be used as a reference but for practicing your American English. Perhaps the exercises should be a little harder. It is well organized into sections and explains things in a clear way.

Great grammar book for anyone whose grammar is rusty. This would be a great tool for ESL teachers because each 2-page lesson is self-contained with grammar explanations and exercises. I like the format that lets someone do one lesson at a time at his/her own pace.

Students love this book and so do I as their teacher in English as a Second Language or ESL in the El Paso TX area. This puts the polish on the vocabulary, comprehension, pronunciation, and confidence I attempt to instil in my students...the answers are in the back to aid self study and the CD allows them to hear correct pronunciation prior to coming to class so the class acts as a review for thier homework. Thank you.

My children studied the basic version of Grammar in Use. As non-English speaking family, I am happy that our children are enrolled in GT classes or in a Magnet school. They have gotten 'A's in Reading and/or English. Now they are learning this version. Well organized expressions and rich examples are guiding them to the 'fast track'.

Groovy Recipes is an excellent introductory book into Groovy programming. The first few chapters give clear instructions for learning how to use Groovy. The remaining chapters give clear instructions for using some of Groovy's cool features: using Groovy with Java, Grails programming, metaprogramming, working with XML, File manipulation, and web services).
Much akin to the fun and energetic manner that Davis speaks in his presentations he writes Groovy Recipes.
If you haven't heard him speak(and even if you have), do a quick Google Video search for Scott Davis Groovy and you'll find a presentation or two of his. I recommend them.
One technique that I found especially useful is how Davis compared performing a simple task in the Java world, and then showed how it could be done in the Groovy world. Of course, it's easier in the groovy world for all the examples. It's nice to see areas where we can take advantage of Groovy's strengths.
Groovy Recipes has enough content to sit on an experienced Groovy developer's book shelf, but the more novice Groovy people will find more value in Groovy Recipes.

It is a nice little book to have by your computer, if you are working with Groovy. I give this book 3 star review because this could have done without first 5 chapters. I think Groovy is a great language, and in my humble opinion it is more useful to a Java programmer, then Ruby, however the quality of Ruby books is far superior to books available in Groovy.

I got this book after hearing the author speak at JavaOne. His talk covers the content of the first chapter along with a few other items, but I didn't mind. It was quite helpful to read through the points and examples he made and try them out at my own pace.

The book is driven by a series of insights rather than complete, formal coverage. I found this approach very useful to getting started and experimenting. The writing is clear, light-hearted, and relaxed, especially in the beginning.

Towards the end of the book, the explanations wane a bit. The sample code is more often given without an introduction, beyond the section header. I was less sure what was going on in some of these cases, as I had gotten accustomed to picking things up very quickly in the beginning. The explanations that followed these code bits were good enough, but I missed that sense of the author's energy from beginning to end of each section.

I don't understand at all why it's called Groovy Recipes. There aren't any. The examples illustrate very well the power of this tool, but I didn't see anything that amounts to, say, the Groovy way to mine a web page, create an IM interface, read mail, etc. If you are looking for code you can apply immediately to some series of problems, this isn't the one.

'Groovy Recipes: Greasing the Wheels of Java' is a typical Pragmatic release in that it is written well, free of bells and whistles, and jam full of relevant and useful information. There is 250+ pages of information here on how to use and implement Groovy, the wonderful Java addition that makes programming easier and more exciting for any and all developers!

Content is spread over 12 chapters:

01. Intro
02. Getting Started
03. New to Groovy
04. Java + Groovy
05. Command Line Groovy
06. File Tricks
07. XML Parsing
08. Writing XML
09. Web Services
10. Metaprogramming
11. Grails
12. Grails + Web Services

As can be seen by the TOC, this is a book for programmers of today living in a networked world. The focus is on writing efficient, good code that is fast and useful. This book is extremely beneficial to any and all Groovy developers that want to learn better and faster this wonderful technology.

***** RECOMMENDED

So you're in a hurry to pick up Groovy, and you're not a big fan of books that while informative, fill you with more language theory than useful knowledge. This buck, while around 240 pages in length, manages to take you from Hello World! to Web Service programming and Grails rapid development in a short period. If you know Java, you'll feel right at home with Groovy, and will feel good about your skills after you're done reading this book.

This was a great resource book- and I am not one to read teaching books!

Couple this with two great literature books for all beginning teachers.
Life's Little Lessons: An Inch-By-Inch Tale of Success
and The Big Squeal: A Wild, True, and Twisted Tail...each come with a wonderful 10-page guide with strategies and activities for teaching reading built around these lovely stories. Every fall I recommend them to parents to share and use with their kids at home.
Written by two teachers, they are great tool for the classroom as well.

This book has many great ideas! It is very simple and to the point. YOu can turn around and use these lessons tomorrow.

I wish every teacher in America could teach reading this way- we would have classrooms full of kids who LOVE to read instead of kids who get DRILLED to death with phonics and word attack skills.... phonics is important but learning to choose appropriate books and LOVING them will create LIFE LONG readers... this author knows that and shares her thoughts in a fabulous way :)

We just finished a Book Study @ school using this book! We all thought her suggestions were great (especially the one about not ONLY using running records & DRA levels to "label" readers) but using individual conferencing also.
Mini Lesson Ideas abound! Specifics are included throughout! A must-have in your personal/professional library for ANY Elementary School Reading Teacher!

Overall Review:

Gryphon's Quest by Candace Sams is an outstanding creative beginning of the Tales of the Order series. Heather, a brave, non judgmental, caring and honest strong heroine is the perfect match for Gryphon both in their love for one another and their love for the world and others no matter their kind. Gryphon, a hero with so much inner torture and anger about his difference from others in the order, his unhappiness with his life and the loneliness he experiences from others avoiding him due to fearing him, is one that the reader will so much see his gifts in beauty just as Heather did. Gryphon's Quest will have the reader's heart racing with the adventures that Heather and Gryphon travel. And even more, the reader's heart will feel so much empathy for the want of Gryphon and Heather's quest to be together. The author, Candace Sams, creates a series that the reader will want to know every legend of those that live within the Order. This suburb mystical story is definitely a keeper that will remain in the reader's mind for weeks and weeks to come. Scenes will be pictured in the readers mind with beauty and joy. This story in its entire deserves all the attention of any reader of fantasy and romance.

Book Summary:
Gryphon's Quest by Candace Sams is book one in the Tales Of The Order series. Gryphon O'Connor, a Druid warrior, is summoned by the Sorceress Of The Ancients, Shayla Gallagher, to report to her for a deed she needs him to attend to. Shayla had supreme power among all in the Order. Her responsibility is to uphold the law and punish those who break them. One of the rules of the Order is that those people outside of the Order must not learn of their existence. If someone in the order tells an outsider, both would need to be killed.

Upon receiving the news that he was needed, Gryphon took his time arriving from the Goblin meadows, where he finds peace away from those who ridicule him. Those in the Order, consider him a freak, monstrous and fear him except for one Fairy friend, Lore. Gryphon's parents, James and Gwyneth, had meddled with powers before he was born, so that he would be born with the ability to protect himself and others. But something went wrong and this resulted in him becomings a shape shifting creature that was different and out of control. For Shayla helping with this, Gryphon's life was to serve her as she commanded. Gryphon feels disgust for all the deeds that Shayla had him complete but when he finds out the urgency of this deed, he takes it upon him to complete. Gryphon had to bring 3 Rune Stones, which were artifacts taken from an unapproved burial site in Ireland and sent to the museum, and return them to a hiding place where they will never be found again.

Heather works at the museum and finds crates filled with mislabeled and inappropriately tagged artifacts. Unknown to her that they were taken illegally, Heather works long hours to sort through these items. Gryphon, against the advisement of his parents, requests Heather's assistance in entering the museum to find these stones before they are used for the wrong reasons and danger occurs. Gryphon, while not revealing who he is, finds respect and trust with Heather in assisting him. Heather and Gryphon find love with one another knowing they could not be together forever. Gryphon too thought he would never experience love because of how he and others viewed him and their pairing is forbidden since she is an outsider of the Order. Danger comes to both and they must battle injuries and their hearts to get the 3 Rune Stones and bring them to safekeeping.
Tales of the Order: The Gazing GlobeStone Heart

Sams has a unique ability to create an alternate world as opposed to the modern world. She calls this the "Order". Here mythical, or are they, beings inhabit our world by keeping themselves hidden from modern unbelievers.

By creating believable characters with all the emotions and attributes of humans, but with the added special characteristics of each type, she can meld the two worlds together.

In this book, the hero is just like any other hero in any other book, except he has unique talents and abilities. He is called upon to save his way of life and all the people who depend on the secrecy to keep them safe. Unbeknownst to humans, he is also saving them.

By enlisting an "outsider's" help, he breaks the rules, but isn't that what a good hero has to do sometimes?

These books are quick reads, and by making the mythical beings seem real, Sams has us wondering if they really do exisit outside the pages of her books.

Candace has let me get a view of her creativity and I can't wait to read the 3 books that follow.... they are already on the way!

Since there are reviews including adequate details from the book, I just wanted to throw in my two cents on how much I loved all of the characters and the plot. Gryphon and Heather have a permanent home on my bookshelf and I have found a new author to read. I hope to enjoy Candance Sams' other books this much.

Gryphon's Quest took me on a mystical journey that I did not want to end. With astute, diverse characters and beautifully descriptive scenes, I feel in love with all parts of this story.

An excellent read, I would highly recommend this book.

Quick, name the ten top novelists from Nicaragua. Give Up? Well extend it then to the top ten from anywhere in Latin America.

After reading this book you will almost certainly put Gioconca Belli on this list. The Inhabited Woman is Lavinia, a modern woman of our time, she becomes 'inhabited' by the spirit of an Indian woman warrior and she joins the revolution against a violent dictator.

At least semi-biographical, Ms. Belli joined the revolutionary Nicaraguan FSLN in 1970 until forced to leave the country in 1975. After Somoza was ousted and th Sandinistas came to power she entered Government service to 1986 when she resigned in to write full time.

Una escritora increible para una historia verdaderamente emocionante donde el presente con su guerra civil en Nicaragua y el pasado con su Conquista espan~ola tienen aspectos en comun, se unen, se cruzan, se mezclan, pero todo tiene siempre sentido. Es una de las novelas mas intensas que haya leido de toda la literatura hispano americana. Lo aconsejo a todos los latinos.

This is a book that is a must because it helps to understand (or at least to have another point of view) about latin american "guerrillas", but also about the subtle and not so subtle differences between men and women, that havent changed so much in hundred years. Going back to the past (to the spaniard invasion)and forward to our days, Belli knits a unique beautiful story of two eras distant in time, but very close in their needs. Not perfect in its "literary structure", but an original, passionate and enlighten story.

As a retired English teacher longing for a "good read". I was delighted from the first chapter of Inhabited Woman. The concept of one woman from one period/culture being a factor in another woman's life sent a tingle through me. As I read on, I was excited in the insights gained by the main character. As she struggled with choices, I found myself rethinking my life and values. The characters are well drawn and the plot complex enough to be interesting. Furthermore, the author's use of langauge and images is sometimes almost poetry. BRAVO!!

Gioconda Belli is one of Nicaragua's most highly regarded writers. Her poetry and fiction have been published in Spain, Mexico, Germany, Denmark, Holland, Finland, Greece and Turkey. She currently lives in Los Angeles. THE INHABITED WOMAN was awarded "Best Literary Work of the Year" by the Union of German Publishers and Editors.

"[It] is a passionate story of love, courage, solidarity and death, where reality and legend blend harmoniously. The lives of the characters are intertwined with the destiny of a country and the struggle of a people for dignity. There is so much truth in this book, that it is impossible for the reader to remain indifferent. This is a story that needed to be told and Belli does it with talent." --Isabel Allende

"THE INHABITED WOMAN is engrossing, reading like an action adventure...[it] opens on a stunning, magical note..." --The Daily News

"THE INHABITED WOMAN revitalizes two literary genres that in recent years seemed to have lost their grips on the imagination of new writers and, as a matter of course, readers-magic realism and social realism." --The Hartford Courant

A sympathetic portrayal of a very admirable young scientist, "Invention" also conveys a sense of the popularization of scientific culture at the beginning of the 18th century. Hamblyn touches on the effects of the emergence of periodicals, societies of (nongentry) scientists, and even the postal system on this new culture. Diverse facts (half-kg hail and volcanic eruptions) balance the overall somewhat romantic tone. Hamblyn was obviously acutely aware of the tension between instrumented science and romantic arts; that is an explicit theme of the book as well as modulating his writing. My only complaints: too many long unnecessary quotes (Goethe!), tables not adequately explained (were Smeaton's data calculated as I think or measured as Hamblyn elliptically suggests?), and the seminal article by Howard was never really systematically discussed (just rather disconnected dribs and drabs).

This book takes you to England of around 1800, when a young amateur scientist managed to come up with the nomenclature we use to this day to classify clouds. The life of Luke Howard is fascinating in and of itself as he goes about his scientific and business dealings. The author also notes why Mr. Howard's system became the system used today, even though it was only one of several major attempts to classify clouds as meteorology became more systematic. The book covers its topic well and would be of interest to anyone interested in the history of meteorology or scientific inquiry.

A young man, obsessed with clouds and their formation, makes a detailed study of them. All this has been done before, but never in such a concise, visionary way, nor with a naming convention as brilliant in its simplicity, expressiveness and utility as Luke Howard's.

His story is dealt with in a series of chapters that digress from the main thrust of the book to outline the history of the philosophical changes that were taking place, in Europe particularly. Almost any cockeyed idea found a ready audience, who were equally ready to dismiss ideas out-of-hand. The trick was presentation. Many of the famous names in science at the end of the 18th century were showmen, financing their researches by giving displays or private shows... getting your name known was half the battle.
Luke Howard was born into a world where being in the right place at the right time meant more than any social connections or political clout.
But, being a Dissenter, he had no formal education, no political clout and no social connections - not much chance for him to get his ideas aired, it seemed. Nor was he a showman - his Quaker upbringing saw to that - so luck, and dedication, came to his assistance.

Philosophical societies and journals were in their infancy, and were ready to embrace anyone who could increase membership or circulation. This was the chance, and in an hour-long presentation, young Howard captivated his audience and introduced a naming system for clouds, which is still in use today, 200 years on. This was what meteorology had been waiting for - a standard method of logging cloud formations. This was invaluable too for poets and writers, who suddenly found a new addition to their descriptive vocabulary. Small wonder that cirrus, cumulus and nimbus quickly entered everyday conversation (the Englishman's main topic being the weather).

The book is very well written, giving us a feel for the social, political and philosophical climate in the Napoleonic era. By various pertinent descriptions of people and events directly and indirectly connected with Howard, we are introduced to some of the greats of the Age of Enlightenment; but none of it feels contrived or beside the point, nor is it ever boring.

This is an enthralling read, illustrating how easily a single person or idea can change the direction and thrust of a science... Well worth reading.

Luke Howard was an amateur in the true sense of the word; Luke Howard named the clouds for the love of them. Richard Hamblyn does a fine job telling the story of Luke Howard's life, his naming of the clouds, and Howard's milieu in the book The Invention Of Clouds. Howard, a Quaker and a pharmacist, went from unknown working man to celebrity when he presented his paper "On The Modifications Of Clouds" to the Askesian Society in London on a night in December of 1802. The paper had the right combination of insights, poetry, and luck to insure that the terms cirrus, stratus, cumulus, and nimbus [or derivatives] are still being used by meteorologists today. Hamblyn's weave of biography, history, art, and science was enjoyable to read and held together most of the time [Chapter 10: The Beaufort Scale was not as well connected to book as the rest of the material]. The hardback is such a beautiful and unusual book, I shelved my copy, waited for the paperback to read it, and then donated the paperback to the high school library. I highly recommend The Invention Of Clouds to anyone with an interest in meteorology, history, Quakerism, or biography.

"The Invention of Clouds" is an endearing little book about a generally forgotten moment in the history of science. It seems obvious to us today but until Englishman Luke Howard, a chemist with an interest in the then-young science of meteorology, gave a public lecture on cloud classification in London in 1802, nobody had been able to categorize cloud formations in an easily-understood and consistent manner. The terms we take for granted-cumulus, cirrus, stratus and so forth-were applied by the 30 year-old Howard for the first time. He drew upon his classical education to find suitable Latin names for what he termed "the modifications of clouds." He understood that clouds pass through stages and in his lecture he described the changes they underwent. His audience understood immediately the importance of his lecture and it was published soon afterwards to great acclaim.

Luke Howard became famous throughout the world. It is clear that he must have viewed this with mixed feelings. As a modest Quaker, he did not seek celebrity but as a scientist he was undoubtedly proud of his accomplishment. It is a beautiful achievement. By naming that which was ever-present but unnamed, Luke Howard helped forge the language of meteorology and provided some of the most important tools for weather observation and forecasting. His Latin names speak to the universality of climate and his detractors, who felt that the classifications should have been in English, were soon silenced. The book describes the reaction of artists as well. On the one hand, there were those who believed that clouds, as objects of great natural beauty and a symbol of freedom, would lose something by being systematically classified, as if they were species of beetles, but others, including the painter Constable, used the classification of the clouds as a basis for their art. The great genius of the period, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, completely enchanted by Luke Howard's work and personality, dedicated a series of marvellous poems to him, with each stanza based on one of the new cloud-forms.

But even having poetry dedicated to you by Goethe is not enough to claim enduring fame. Luke Howard seems to have lived a quiet existence, marked by some success in business and a happy family life. He died at the age of 91, remembered fondly by only his relatives. Richard Hamblyn, in writing this book, must have struggled to develop enough material as it appears that the lecture of 1802 was the high point of Luke Howard's scientific life and his attention was then taken up more by commerce and religious issues. Mr. Hamblyn gives us a history of the earlier attempts to define clouds, reaching back to Aristotle. He throws in the story of the Beaufort Wind Scale, which was inspired by but not as readily-accepted as Luke Howard's cloud system. He deals with the subsequent amendments to the cloud classifications and we learn of the International Meterological Conference and its winsomely-named Cloud Committee, which was to produce the International Cloud Atlas.

All very interesting, but it is in the sections about Luke Howard and his contemporaries, fascinated by the rapid progress in science at the end of the 18th Century, where the book is most alive. Richard Hamblyn ably paints a picture of London's crowded lecture halls where science was popular culture, of dangerous experiments and fantastic personalities. Men of brilliant and adventurous minds, often denied higher education due to their religion, could look into the future and stake a claim. The author, in sharing Luke Howard's triumph with us, has written an elegant work brimming with enthusiasm.

As a former student of Ms. LaPlante's, I have first-hand knowledge of her teaching talent. She has somehow managed to get her priceless lectures into a book that is thorough and accessible. Teachers and writers of all shapes and sizes will find a way into their material with Alice LaPlante's guide. Not all teachers are excellent writers and not all writers are excellent teachers. Alice is uniquely both. Lucky us that Alice decided to write this book. Enjoy!

Alice LaPlante's "The Making of a Story" is textbook-length (well over six hundred pages), and should appeal not only to serious writing students, but also to teachers and readers who would like more insight into how writers create. Creative writing is not for the faint-hearted; that is clear from the outset. It is easy to feel overwhelmed when staring at a blank page or screen, trying to come with original ideas and fresh ways to express them. LaPlante gently and slowly guides her readers through the entire process from getting off the ground to putting the finishing touches on the final draft.

LaPlante's scope is encyclopedic. She includes such topics as: making the ordinary extraordinary, employing imagery effectively, writing a good opening, developing plot and characters, choosing a point of view, writing believable dialogue, generating suspense, and revising one's work. She also discusses the strengths and limitations of writing workshops. The author emphasizes that there are no hard and fast rules; rather, she is passing on "conventions" that have worked for many but not all writers.

How does this work differ from others of its type? "The Making of a Story" covers more territory than most writing handbooks. Part of the book's length results from the inclusion of quite a few full-length classic stories, such as Tim O'Brien's "The Things They Carried," John Cheever's "The Swimmer," James Baldwin's "Sonny's Blues," and a non-fiction piece, Barbara Ehrenreich's "Welcome to Cancerland." Each work is followed by thought questions such as "How do the opening paragraphs set the tone for the story?" and "Can you point to some sections of narration that are convincing because of their specificity?" There are also dozens of exercises sprinkled throughout the book. For example, the student should pretend that she is a camera and record everything that she sees in a place rich with visual stimulation.

"Reading Like a Writer" by Francine Prose is another excellent work of this type; in fact, LaPlante quotes Prose and even uses the phrase "Reading as a Writer" repeatedly. "The Making of a Story" is well organized into fourteen carefully constructed chapters. There is a useful table of contents, a glossary of literary terms, a bibliography, a list of stories, and a thorough index. This guide cannot be absorbed in one sitting. It should be savored slowly and kept as a ready reference book. Used judiciously, it can serve as a source of inspiration to help writers bring out the best in themselves.

This book has great insight into what it takes to be a creative author. My only complaint is the content of some of the sample stories. I realize they are very well written and serve the intended purpose. However, when limited pieces of suspense and crime stories are included it leaves the readers (who are simply trying to to get an education) with a terrible feeling in the pit of their stomach.

The Making of a Story by Alice LaPlante is the BEST BOOK I have read on creative writing--a truly "modern" version of older books like Janet Burroway's Writing Fiction and John Gardner's The Art of Fiction. The book is broader and deeper than previous books: for example it contains information on writing creative nonfiction as well as fiction; it describes the traditional models of shaping a story (conflict-crisis-resolution model, epiphany and change models) but is inclusive, allows for a wider, organic, more creative definition (stories must surprise us and convince us at the same time Alice says); it contains 26 complete short stories from outstanding writers (Baldwin, Carver, Cheever, Chekhov, Cooper, Didion, Ehrenreich, Hemingway, Johnson, Lamott, Oates, O'Brien, Packer, Sharma, and others) AND has exercises for writers at the end of each chapter--and examples of each exercise completed by students from Alice LaPlante's classes whose writing excellence is equal in many cases to that of the published authors in the book. What is really helpful is the ability of these exercises, or "constraints" as she explains, to help writers (beginners or advanced) access their personal, authentic, most inspirational material. This book teaches how to combine method (craft) with madness (inspiration) and is fascinating to read! I recommend it to anyone who loves stories--readers and writers.

Alice LaPlante's THE MAKING OF A STORY: A PRIMER lucidly explains the craft basics of fiction and creative nonfiction, presenting numerous examples from both genres. However, this massive book's subtitle, " a primer," led me to expect a multi-genre approach as in Burroway's IMAGINATIVE WRITING: THE ELEMENTS OF CRAFT, which covers not only fiction and creative nonfiction but also drama and poetry. (See my Amazon review of the second edition of Burroway.)

Several of the illustrative short stories LaPlante includes are the same as in the classic WRITING FICTION: A GUIDE TO NARRATIVE CRAFT by Janet Burroway and in Tom Bailey's ON WRITING SHORT STORIES.

For introductory writing courses that discuss fiction and creative nonfiction (but exclude drama and poetry) LaPlante's detailed primer could well be a better choice as it is relatively cheap, nearly one-fourth the price of the two Burroway books. For teaching yourself the basic craft aspects of creative writing, I recommend Burrroway's concurrent multi-genre IMAGINATIVE WRITING as the best primer. For the beginning short-story writer, I recommend Tom Bailey's ON WRITING SHORT STORIES & SHORT-STORY WRITER'S COMANION.

-- C J Singh

Such a great resource I always buy it as a gift for my student teachers - both books make a valuable investment - in th elives of their future students!!!

This is a must have for any classroom. I had trouble organizing groups for all my different levels. Now I feel like each child is getting the attention they need to become a skilled reader.

Being a teacher I found this to be a valuable asset to my personal library. I have referred to it several times.

Whether you have taught for a while or are just starting out, this book is a good resource. It goes through the components of reading and shows how to plan lessons according to what your students need. I found it very helpful in organizing materials and plans.

This book is really good. I saw it in a workshop I was in and definitely recommend it. It has a lot of really good information and for a good price on here.