The Journeys of Paul Books

I was really pulling for this book because I'm going through the same experience, although more at my family's behest, of tracing my Italian ancestry. The first chapter or two show promise, and Paolicelli has a readible style. When his Italian friends insist he detour off the highway into a town whose name he suddenly remembers from his childhood, the resulting episode at the town hall is fascinating. But in the end the book just doesn't hang together very well. The story wanders off into too many dead ends. We read at first about his landlord and guide Luigi, who the book is named after, but that really isn't the focus of the story. And when it appears that the common thread between the author and his ancestors may be music, that theme doesn't get developed either. I could live with that, but the main problem with the lack of focus is with the ancestors themselves. No sooner do you begin to get a picture of one relative from the old country than he jumps to another of the dozen or so aunts, uncles, grandparents and great grandparents on both sides of his family that he's tracing. You'll need to chart his family tree to keep up.

This book was one I found hard to put down. An accurate story about what it is like to visit Italian villages and mix with the locals.
The author has a way of taking you along and making the scene come to life. I do wish he had included a family chart to help keep tract of the family members.
I'll remember this book for years to come!

Nice story, sometimes too sloppy, the book could be cut down 70 or 90 pages, too redundant. I barely trust the find of Mr Paolicelli's grandfather birth record during his last days in Italy; too rushed the editing, many misspellings of Italian names. Needed a much better editor.

When I picked up "Dances With Luigi", I thought the author would put into writing thoughts that I, as a third generation Italian American would relate to in some wonderfully metaphysical way. I was disappointed.

Firstly, the title has nothing to do with the actual theme of the author's journey. I suppose Mr. Paolicelli intended to interperse his musings with his Umbrian landlord, Luigi, as chapter endings, to further enlighten his findings about his family, and the Italians of the Mezzogiorno region of Italy. But, these revelations do not occur consistently enough to warrant the honor of a title. Luigi, a man living through his own tragedy, merely comes along for the ride and acts only, at times, as Paolicelli's sounding board. I believe that Mr. Paolicelli, as a television journalist, intended to follow New Yorker magazine's Adam Gopnik lead in his 'Paris to the Moon' essays that eventually formulated a bestselling book. This would account for some of the redundance in descriptions and events from chapter to chapter that as individual essays would need the refreshment of repeated explanation.

However, this observation is minor. My main problem with 'Dances With Luigi' is that it succeeds only in telling the story of one specific grandson searching for his grandfather's records; it fails in becoming universally emblematic for all the rest of the third and fourth generation Italian Americans in America who know nothing about their roots in Italy. Paolicelli is lucky that he knew anything about his grandfather's life in Italy; many of us were told nothing. The southern Italians wanting nothing more than freedom from the oppression of the Risorgimento government and the prejudice of the Northern Italians. They wanted a better life and chose a strange place with unfamiliar sights and sounds, in spite of their immense sense of family and tradition, over the repression they knew in their homeland. Paolicelli touches on this a little when he talks about his grandfather's obsession with the needs of his children rather than those of himself. For that generation, as in all other founding American generations, the past was over, the present endured and the future awaited.

I am pleased that Mr. Paolicelli found his grandfather's records, but more so that he found a sense of his future----a future that he speaks of only when he describes his musical triumphs and more concretely in a very small epilogue. I sense he finally understands the unselfishness of these strong people of America's past.

I would have rather heard more about how Paolicelli realized his grandfather's dream, rather than the goings on in a homeland that our grandparents wanted to forget. Perhaps more of the reasons why his family specifically left Italy would have been revealing. The book should have been called Francesco's Gift in honor of his grandfather, who gave him a name, a life without stuggle and a dream for the future.

Nevertheless, I will recommend the book to all Italian Americans that have that itch for understanding.

I am an Italophile with southern italian roots. This book grabbed me by the throat. I couldn't put it down. He trudged through the northern Italian stereotypes of southerners, but then colorfully decribed wonderful, vital people, as he finds friends, countrymen, and then, finally family in the Southern Italian towns that his ancestors left so many years before. His story describes a combination of hard work, diligence and good fortune. A great read for anyone trying to find their roots, or who is interested in things Italian.

It may be fair to call this book a meditation on how some places are perfectly fit to induce particular states of mind. As promised by the title, "The Black Room at Longwood" describes the prison by describing its effect on the prisoner.

Kauffmann describes the sights and smells of St. Helen in such detail that its desolation is almost palpable. He makes many self-conscious efforts to find the relics and remembrances of its most famous prisoner. Kauffmann brings the place to life--but such a life--dreary and meaningless--and contrasts it with known preferences and dislikes of Napoleon so that every little pinprick can be felt.

When I tried to picture as active a man as Napoleon Bonaparte in that place, I couldn't help but pity him (from my comfortable vantage point, in 2006). As described in the book, Napoleon's own mind was beginning to give way to the horror of that oppressed place by the time he died.

The author has a seemingly great idea : cruise to out-of-the-way St. Helena and combine a historical hunt with a modern day travelogue of his journey.

The premise works well at some points, but lags quite often. The most annoying trait of the book is the author's tendancy to wax poetic for literally PAGES describing paintings or other works of art to be found in Longwood. I don't really understand what Mr. Kauffmann's opinion of "The Last Phase" has to do with Napoleon's exile.

I've finished reading the book and I'm still actually not quite sure what I just read. It was certainly unique and well-written, I'll give Kauffmann that much. But I don't believe that I learned anything about Napoleon's exile that I didn't already absorb from more thorough, historical works. I genuinely expected to hear some unique tales and speculation about Napoleon's last days... but alas, none were to be had. This was a fruitless read if you're looking for fun or irreverant facts about Napoleon's final days.

Bottom line : Not worth your time and money unless you are completely obsessed with Bonaparte, or if you plan to visit St. Helena at some point.

This is a strange mixture and I have to admit to very much disliking it when I first picked it up. It is a translated version of what was originally a French work and the English to me seemed a bit florid and dramatic. I am not sure if that is the translation or if the French naturally write in that style. I would however recommend people who are interested in Napoleon to persevere - it is a strange sort of book but worth the read.

I say this for two other reasons - firstly because Kauffmann has read just about every primary source about Napoleon's exile on St Helens - a tiny island pretty much in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean and secondly because Kauffmann knows first hand about captivity.

After reading this book a little = and not enjoying it I read the author biography - this man spent some years as a captive in Beirut in the 1980's. Returning to the book I started to realise that this is more than just a book about Napoleon, or about a travellogue to the island. This is a story about captivity and its psychological side. Kauffmann is very clearly the right man to write about it. The oppression of captivity overwhelms the writing sometimes. Kauffman clearly found the place oppressive - he keeps talking of the town itself squeezed between two mountains - it is one of his repetitive themes and I get the sense that if he didn't sail out there expecting to dislike the place, his dislike of it coloured his later writings about it.

I think this book could just as easily be named 8 days on St Helens as the book is divided into chapters for each day. So his trip is dealt with chronologically - the information about Napoleon ducks and dives - often with seemingly little logic to it. However if you are looking to learn about Napoleon's last years they are touched on - more so Napoleon as a man is revealed. His impatience (he drove each day on the island in a carriage with two wives of his officers - but went at such high speed as to throw them around - a demonstration of power?) his arrogance.

There are also interesting insights into the man prior to his captivity - for instance I never knew Napoleon couldn't speak perfect French - (he spoke it badly and confusingly at times - muddling his words and pronunciations). However I don't think Kauffman explains anything new to most scholars of Napoleon. He mentions that Napoleon considered going to America before settling for surrendering to the English - why did he change his mind?

So you can read this book on many different levels - a story of St Helens, a mixed bag of Napoleonic history, or a story of captivity. All have different merits in this - but they are all mixed together. I don't know that I would recommend making a special trip to get it - but worth reading if you haven't much else to do.

I went searching for a book about Napoleon for a friend. This is that book. If you want to know anything about Napoleon's last years, this isn't the book to read. I found this book dull to the extreme. It reads more like "what I did on my summer vacation.' I kept waiting to get into the informative part of the book but it never came. Kauffmann talks of paintings that aren't shown, quotes that came from other works as he wanders around Longwood.What the English women have to do with this book is a mystery. A complete waste of time and paper. Read something else if you want to know about Napoleon.

I read this book on a flight to France, and was mesmerized by the author's lapidary prose and his ability to bring to the reader a keen sense of loneliness and desolation. According to the author, Napoleon spent a good deal of his last six years trying to figure out what went wrong at Waterloo...the sort of torment worthy of Greek mythology. Feeling broken and forgotten, the former emperor, to quote General McArthur, "faded away", dying as much of depression as of physiological causes.

A few days after finishing the book, I visited Napoleon's tomb at the Hotel des Invalides in Paris. It's very grand, and I'm sure he would have loved it. Enshrined, perhaps even resurrected, in this manner, Napoleon has the last laugh.

If you are not a Theology graduate student, but you are deeply interested in the basic aspects of the origin, composition, transmission and translation of the Bible, then this is just the book for you. It does not go too deep technically, but just enough to stimulate further and deeper study of the Scripture. In the presentation of the difficult aspects regarding the above named biblical characteristics, this book does a very good job - especially because the text is fluid and easy to understand, and there is no sign of undue partiality from the author, just the natural enthusiasm of a true believer in the God-inspired nature of the Bible.

This is a great book. I was looking for a book as an "Honors" extra, to read for The Theology Program at [...]. This is an easy and exciting book to read that follows right along with our 10 week semester on Bibliology and Hermeneutics. It has provided extra insight for understanding and discussion of "How do we know that we have the right Bible? How can my 1988 NIV Bible be the same as 400 BC Old Testament? 100 AD New Testament? I had little knowledge of this subject before this semester and this book was very helpful, yet not "Over my head."

I was excited to get this book - when it arrived, I liked it immediately. It is handsomely bound, with a beautiful glossy cover, in a comfortable size and weight, and with a very user-friendly typeface.

I've been searching for a good, modern, doctrinally neutral history of the Bible text from ancient manuscripts to compilation/recension to modern translation, and thought I might have finally found it. But I was mistaken.

After four chapters worth of heavy-handed doctrinal polemics, I decided to close the book and look elsewhere. I want a research thesis, not a Sunday School theology lesson! The author seems unable to set aside his desire to promote his own pet theological bias (and to denegrate all others), and just focus on the objective history of the Bible text. Which is fine for a church lesson-book, but inappropriate in a scholarly treatise in layman's language.

I bought the book based on the strength of several of the reviews I read here on amazon's site, as well as the praise from the back cover, all from sources I respect. But I just couldn't go with the crowd on this one, I have to call it as I see it. A real disappointment.

I got much more benefit from OUR AGELESS BIBLE by Thomas Leishman and THE MAKING OF THE ENGLISH NEW TESTAMENT by Edgar Goodspeed, both of which are basic introductory texts, but unfortunately out-of-print.

The Journey from Texts to Translations: The Origin and Development of the Bible is a highly detailed explanation of how the Bible that Christians use today came to be in its present form. Explaining how various books of the bible came to be collected into a single canon text, describing how the Bible was passed through generations, discussing how and why early versions were produced, exploring myriad subtle differences in English translations, and more. Black-and-white photographs illustrate this extensive and fascinating documentation, as informative and compelling for lay readers as for professional scholars.

God's promise to uphold and protect His Word is a precious and reassuring promise. To observe how God has accomplished this throughout the ages is edifying and faith strengthening. The Journey from Texts to Translations by Paul D. Wegner is a meticulously researched and richly illustrated treatment of the Bible's transmission and translation, from ancient manuscripts to popular English Bibles, showing us the practical means by which God has sovereignly guided the development of Scripture.

After covering some preliminary matters regarding the Bible--it's nature, it's purpose, and some brief introductions into each section of the Bible--Wegner begins the journey at the ground level, with a discussion of the earliest forms of writing and their subsequent development. After some investigation into the history of language, Wegner arrives at the Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek dialect and examines some important factors regarding the languages of the Old and New Testaments.

Wegner continues the journey with a lengthly discussion of canonicity, covering such topics as the Old Testament canon, the New Testament canon, the apocrypha and the pseudepigrapha. In this section we learn how both the Old Testament and New Testament canons were formed and what factors determined why certain books were placed into the canon and why other books were left out.

Textual criticism is treated at length as well, as Wegner examines a host of sources for both Old Testament and New Testament, demonstrating the manifold manuscripts and textual witnesses that provide abundant evidence for the both testaments. Despite the fact that we do not possess the original manuscripts, we are able to construct, by the existing copies we do posses, an extremely accurate text for all the Scripture. God has protected His Word!

From here we are taken to the history of the English Bible. We are introduced great men like Wycliffe and Tyndale, and provided the opportunity to trace the legacy of the English Bible from its beginnings in 14th century England, to its prominence in modern day America. Some noteworthy English translations that are examined are the King James Version, New King James Version, American Standard Version, the Living Bible and the Message. Each translation is studied in terms of its historical development, specific qualities, translation approach and concluded with brief critique.

On the whole, this is an edifying and informative read. It is just over 400 pages, and is thick with charts, pictures, mini-biographies and a host of other helpful materials. It will benefit any student of the Bible who desires to better understand the history of the Bible, whether they read it from cover to cover, or only use it as a reference.

One Heartbeat Away discusses in clear and understandable terms not just about salvation, but why we need salvation. Mark Cahill's method of writing is not 'preachy' but conversational and interesting in how he weaves in stories of his conversations with famous people and atheletes. This is a perfect book for someone who is seeking to understand what the message of the cross is and why it should matter to you and me. I highly recommend this book and suggest getting one for everybody you know.

If you are an atheist, this book will help you thinkoutside of your world view and consider the possbility of a God who exists. if you are a Christian, you'll leave saying I am glad I believe. But if you are neither then know that this is one book that may spell the difference between being in the right place 200,000 million years from now or being in a place of torment called hell all because the free gift of being in heaven was rejected by you.

Once again, Mark Cahill tells us in plain English what the Bible says about life and death in a most honest and compelling way. When you finish this 'very easy to read and follow' book you have no doubt about your journey into Eternity. Thanks Mark you really bless me
Sandi Bonavita - Australia

Something about this book doesn't sit well with me. I am a Bible believing Christian and I personally do evangelism on the streets of Chicago.
The first thing that I found was that the author takes a sort of "cookie cutter" approach to talking with unbelieving people. He uses the same method as Ray Comfort which is to bring up the 10 commandments and show how the person has broken them and is guilty before God. This method can be effective and indeed I have incorporated it as a tool in my own evangelistic efforts, but people are not robots, and there are more ways than one to let someone know that they are in need of the Savior.
The Second thing is that sometimes Mr. Cahill comes across as arrogant. Case in point, there is a story he tells in the book about him (Cahill) asking a kid at a Christian college if he could drive the kid's car, when the kid says "no" (probably because Cahill is a stranger!), Cahill tells the kid that his car is an Idol to him!!! To me that is not idolatry, that is being a responsible kid! I wouldn't let Cahill drive my car either.
Third, Cahill tells a story in the chapter titled Flames, Flames! About a man who had cardiac arrest, and when the doctors shocked his heart back with the paddles, he awoke shouting "the flames the flames" and then his heart stopped again, when they shocked him again, the man awoke shouting "the heat the heat! and then he died. Cahill says that this man was on his way to Hell and he was experiencing the fire from that place. Now I dont know if Mark Cahill thinks he is a prophet, but he has no right at all to say that the guy who died was surely going to hell! perhaps the man felt the heat from the defibrilator! Only God knows who is and who is not going to Hell.
fourthly, getting someone to parrot back to you that he is a thief, a liar, a murderer etc. Doesn't mean that they really understand what being guilty before God is. I dont mean to say that this approach is not somewhat useful, but only that we must be aware of who we are talking to and take into consideration all of the factors involved.
I think that there are many other high quality books on evangelism out there,(Like "The Master Plan of Evangelism") and while I do appreciate Mark Cahill's zeal, I cant recommend his book.

In One Thing You Can't Do in Heaven, evangelist Mark Cahill shared a powerful question for helping lead nonbelievers to the Holy Spirit: "What do you think will happen to you when you die?" In One Heartbeat Away: Your Journey into Eternity, Mr. Cahill describes the most often cited evidence in favor of the Christian answer to that question. For someone who doesn't know the Bible and wants to learn more, this book is a good starting point for understanding the evidence in favor of Christianity. Mr. Cahill also does a good job of referencing his sources so that those who want to study the points in more detail will know where to go next. The book is short and accessible: The format is similar to what having a personal conversation with Mr. Cahill might be like.

The book opens with arguments in favor of Intelligent Design, the spiritual counter to various scientific theories such as Darwinism. He next turns his attention to evidence in favor of the Bible, including archeology and prophesies that have proven to be accurate. In chapter four, he describes experiences that people recall who have been resuscitated while dying. While most of us have heard of the tunnel of light and beings dressed in white that receive us in a friendly place, Mr. Cahill also shares stories of people who have experienced great heat, flames, and the smell of burning sulfur. Next, the book examines the Ten Commandments and helps readers to understand how far we all come in following those Godly rules. You'll come away with a strong sense that no matter how hard we try we cannot save ourselves from sin. From there, the book takes a brief look at comparative religions to show that only Christianity provides a way out of being judged for our sins. Using many conversations with nonbelievers and seekers after the Truth, Mr. Cahill recounts how we can repent, accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior, and become new beings through Christ. He also explains how we need to be witnesses for our faith.

I also found the book to be a good refresher on how to witness, something that Mr. Cahill does extremely well.

Two parts of the book really resonated with me: The stories about those who experienced hell while dying and his points about the terrible loss that occurs every time that a soul is lost to God.

Unless you are a well-informed Christian, you'll probably finds that it makes sense to read One Heartbeat Away before One Thing You Can't Do in Heaven. I highly recommend both books.

May God bless you, your family, and all you do, Mr. Cahill!

In 1935, in the first flush of success of his first acclaimed novel, Greene took off to explore the concept of Africa, building on his notions of adventure from childhood reading. Identifying never-colonized Liberia as the most authentically uncivilized of African destinations, he set off, with his 23-year-old female cousin, a troop of native bearers and virtually no knowledge or experience of trekking. His four weeks of walking a twelve-inch path through the Liberian wilds, stopping at villages overnight, makes an interesting and engaging account, never sentimentalized, and with much thoughtful insight. He gives plentiful narrative detail, but always is overwhelmingly concerned with the psychic reverberations of Africa, and his perceptions of primitivism, in his own life and outlook. He is not unaware of the irony of his deliberate quest for un-self-consciousness flowing from external reflections on the "natural" human world. This book is an interesting counterpoint to observations of modern-day Liberia, for which progress over the ensuing seven decades remains elusive. A few more of the roads have been paved, but most of the country remains bare soil, now soaked in more blood and mayhem than the quaint natives and masked, raffia-skirted tribal "devils" of 1935 could have dreamed of.

This book provides and excellent background about traveling in the country of Liberia during the mid-19th century. A well written and interesting travelogue.

Graham Greene is a famous 20th C novelist ("The Orient Express") who also wrote a few travel accounts. This is his first, when he was 31 years old and left Europe for the first time in his life to experience the uncivilized "dark heart of Africa" by traveling through the back country of Liberia in 1935. It was a 4-week, 350-mile walk, mostly through an unchanging tunnel forest path, ending each day in a primitive village. He had about a dozen black porters who would carry him in a sling, although he walked much of the way.

It's written with a very "old school" perspective, with one foot in the 19th (or 18th) century of romantic colonial imperialism, and one foot in the pre-war 1930s perspective of deterioration, rot and things falling apart. Heavy whiskey drinking, descriptions of the festering diseases of the natives, and plethora of bothersome insects, the run down European outposts and a motley cast of white rejects fill many descriptive pages.

It reminds me a lot of Samuel Johnson's "Journals of the Western Isles" (1770s) when Johnson, who had never left England in his life, decided to go to Scotland to see what uncivilized people were like. Just as Johnson brought Boswell who would go on to write his own version of the trip, Greene brought his female cousin Barbara Greene (who remains unnamed in the book and largely unmentioned), who went on to write her own version of the trip in the 1970s called "Too Late to Turn Back", which mostly contradicts Grahams version.

I can't say I totally enjoyed this book, I found Greene's attitude irritating - but therein lies its value, as a snapshot of prewar European zeitgeist. It is reminiscent of "Kabloona" (1940), another prewar travel account to an uncivilized place (Arctic Eskimos) by a young European aristocrat, who also is deeply inward looking and finds a new perspective and appreciation for the "cave man" people he meets. It's very much a transition period between prewar and post-war attitudes and the fluctuation's back and forth, the sense of things falling apart, but also new-found perspective, make it a challenging but interesting work.

I've read a number of Greene's novels, but this little travel book was equal to his other publications. As usual, his attention to detail, people, and culture creates wonderful images that bring us right to the Liberia of the 1930s. I shared the book with my sister who lived in Liberia for 27 yrs. and she was astonished at the accurate reporting. His prose is the best I've read for a book devoted to travel experiences.

Graham Greene was weary and appalled by the world atrocities of the early 20th century. He decided to go looking for life as basic and unspoiled as it was in the beginning. He chose to do so in Liberia, the African nation that had always been under black rule and not colonized or fleeced by Europe in modern times, though even it was a western construct, carved out of the continent by Americans as a homeland to repatriate freed slaves (or, as Greene says, a place to hide mulatto offspring). His trek on foot lasted the month of February 1935, and JOURNEY WITHOUT MAPS is his account of what became a transformative experience.

The title is derived from the fact that there were no true maps available of Liberia at the time. He relied on a caravan of native porters and a lot of guestimations as to what direction and how far it would be from village to village. Once leaving the ragged European communities near the coast, he and his party plunged into that virgin world he sought. What he describes in exquisite detail is now familiar to us via decades of National Geographics but was then, to someone who had never left Europe at that point, a culture shock. He learned to leave behind his English insistence on time table and surprise at naked, ritually scarred bodies, the persistent sound of drums and the utter poverty of villages. He did not let go his own clothes or whiskey or discomfort over rats and insects. He is eventually waylaid by sickness, and in the healing process comes out with a new, more life affirming personal vision. Though it seems as if the details of the daily marches, the insects and discomforts are so much of the same, by the end you see the impact of the experience. He found what he went looking for and more, and he was not afraid to leave some mysteries unsolved.

Greene's prose is clear as a bell and graceful. His observations of contemporary politics and missionaries, as well as the elasticity of truth in such a setting are valuable today, even seasoned with his candid biases.

I ordered textbooks for a friend for his class at UMKC. I had the book within a week.

I found this book to be redundant of all of the classes I had already taken. However, if you are taking the Praxis in Special Education, there are a lot of things you will find in this book to help you. I read it before I took the exam. It was easy for me to read, but I think it was also do to the fact that I learned everything in another course.

In my class it wasn't even required because he goes over everything in lecture, plus the class is about actually giving assessments.

If you buy the book, don't worry about its condition as long as you can read it!

This book was assigned by my Grad Instructor and it has really helped me grasp the world of Assessments. Thank you.

Easy read yet thorough. Good resource for special educators and general educators as well.

Most special education teachers only see the end product of assessments done by school psychologists. This book helps you understand the numbers and what they represent when looking at a evalutation team report. This book helps you to write more effective IEPs and plan remediation for appropriate areas of weakness and capitalize on strengths.

I found the Audio book to be exceptionally well done. Norman Dietz, the reader, is terrific. He "acts" the narratives using his voice, making the 23 hours wonderfully listenable.

Paul Theroux's means and mode of travel, ability to communicate in native languages, description of landscape, and encounters with peoples, police, bureacrats, etc. extremely interesting and educational.
Theroux at one point says an author's greatest accomplishment is tell the story so the reader feels he is there and experiencing what is being described. Theroux acomplishes this beautifully. I see vividly the scenes and feel I know personnally the people he meets.
Terrific book to learn about the countries of Africa, their politics,different cultures between African countries, the institutionalized violence and histories.
His views on the various "charity industries"of Africa is compelling. His view of their self-interest overiding any good that is accomplished by them. In fact they are counter productive and to so some degree responsible for the lack of any real educational, economic or political progress in most African countries.
It is not a "happy" story that will leave readers with an optimistic view of the future for the continent. You will,however, have a feeling for Africa's potential with leadership. Leadership capable of providing education for the masses, developing economic resources for the benefit of their countries rather than the politicians in power at any given time.

Forty years after being a Peace Corps worker in Malawi and a teacher in Uganda, Paul Theroux returns to Africa and finds things changed--for the worse. Now approaching his sixtieth birthday and wanting to escape from cell phones, answering machines, the daily newspaper, and being "put on hold," he is determined to travel from Cairo to Cape Town. He believes that the continent "contain[s] many untold tales and some hope and comedy and sweetness, too," and that there is "more to Africa than misery and terror."

Traveling alone by cattle truck, "chicken bus," bush train, matatu, rental car, ferry, and even dugout canoe, he tries to blend in as much as possible, buying clothing at secondhand stalls in public markets, carrying only one small bag, and avoiding the tourist destinations. He is an observant and insightful writer, and his descriptions of his travails are so vivid the reader can experience them vicariously. His interviews with residents are perceptive and very revealing of the political and social climate of these places, and his character sketches of Sister Alexandra from Ethiopia (a nun who "has loved") and of two charming Ethiopian traders, a father and son, who take Theroux to the Kenyan border, are delightful.

For most of the countries of Africa, however, he has no kind words. Kenya is "one of the most corrupt...countries in Africa," everything in Kampala, Uganda, has changed for the worse, and in Tanzania "there was only decline--simple linear decrepitude, and in some villages collapse." At the U.S. embassy in Malawi, he finds an "overpaid, officious, disingenuous, blame-shifting...embassy hack" and, in pique, he wonders, "Had she, like me, been abused, terrified, stranded, harassed, cheated, bitten, flooded, insulted, exhausted, robbed, browbeaten, poisoned?"

Theroux has become waspish, and it is difficult to "travel with" a man who sees himself as a hero for making the trip at all, especially after he refuses to give a half-eaten apple to a hungry child when she begs for it. He makes snide remarks and demeans other writers. He admires Rimbaud, who lived in Ethiopia in the 1880's, he visits Naguib Mahfouz in Egypt, and he spends his sixtieth birthday with Nadine Gordimer, an old friend. But Hemingway ("bent on proving his manhood"), Isak Dinesen ("a sentimental memoirist"), Kuki Gallman (a "mythomaniac of the present day"), and V.S. Naipaul ("an outsider who feels weak") are abruptly dismissed. When he ultimately refers to his own "safari-as-struggle," it is hard not compare his temporary and entirely voluntary "struggle" to those of the African people he meets along the way. "Being in Africa was like being on a dark star," he says. His book reflects this darkness--and his own. Mary Whipple

This is not so much a scholarly work as it is a collection of limited information about most of the places Paul went. The best part of the book is the pictures, if you have the imagination to take it from there.

This beautiful volume with its erudite and eminently readable text, illustrated with marvelous photographs, leads us into the magnificent scenery of ancient Asia Minor, Greece and Rome, retracing the footsteps of Paul on the great roads of antiquity, past rivers, mountain ranges and seas, into humble hamlets of simple people and great ancient cities with their rich motley of humanity, their mores, creeds and myths. But it does more than that: it takes us through the great adventure - the fascinating journey of Paul's life.

224 pages. 91 full color illustrations and 31 in black and white. Map endpapers.

The need for understanding among families, nations, church members and individuals has never been greater. In clear, readable language the author tells stories of his efforts to bring peace between warring factions, which at times resulted in threats against him and his family. The chapters are filled with wise words for anyone who may be dealing with deep seated conflict. The book could be life changing for families, churches, or other groups who find themselves caught in a toxic situation. The objective is to transform enemies into friends. It is a book that makes for peace.

A professional mediator and former director of Mennonite Conciliation Service reveals honestly and thoughtfully the heart and guts of the work required for reconciliation. Each chapter weaves stories from personal experience, with scripture and practical advice, into a conclusion. He tells stories that we need to hear. It's an important journal and a helpful guide.

I enjoy meditating on God's name and this book allows me to this in a variety of ways over a year. The reviews are are tied in with the Bible
and the author has done his research to present the meanings of the names of God in an effective manner. I don't always have time to read alot but these brief descriptions help me get through my day and meditate and worship the names of God.

Praying the Names of God is well written, gives insight into
the original language and meanings of words used to describe God.
Mr Grams provides a good backdrop for what was happening when the different names for God were used.
I am really enjoying this tool. I had no idea that there were so many names for God.