Controls Books

This order was completed just fine. Delivery was prompt and it arrived in good condition. No complaints.

The book is an excellent summary on the topic and more! It provides excellent coverage of state-of-the-art production techniques and the influence of particular procedures and components on device reliability. I suppose that complete newcomers might find it sometimes difficult to understand the background of some contents due to the compact style. However they are rewarded with one of the most comprehensive and up-to-date texts I have ever seen on this subject. Moreover the reader is provided with many references for further in-depth reading. Considering the wealth of information the book provides the author did an excellent job in writing a well readable text.

I would recommend it as a textbook as well as for the experienced scientist/researcher.

This book gives the basic and latest issues in the semiconductor device reliability as well as issues that nails the failure analysts. This book covers all the major issues, including oxide reliability, ESD and electromigration. This book will be and should be considered for the aspring Rel and FA engineers as well as act as a refresher to those hardcore professionals.

I have a filing cabinet full of papers on various aspects of materials reliabilty: solder stress calculations, mechanical behavior, diffusion, corrosion mechanisms, etc. Professor Ohring's book neatly summarizes all of that into one coherent text, covering topics such as electromigration, electrostatic discharge, solder mechanics, corrosion, semiconductor devices and more. But rather than touch on the practical aspects of these failure modes, as do several reliability books I already own, he delves into the underlying fundamental mechanisms involved, providing equations and explanations. This is why I consider Ohring's book a true textbook on the subject. The detailed explanations are valuable to me in that they provide a springboard from which to analyze more complex issues. For anyone involved with reliability of materials in electronics, I highly recommend this book. And one more thing: in some places Prof. Ohring writes with a refreshing informality. For example, he talks about defects and KILLER DEFECTS (his words and capitalization!). I just laughed when I saw that.

Kelly has created a program second to none. In just a couple of days this program helped me to reprogram my subconscious and allow me freedom from nicotine and emotionally driven food. Thank you Kelly for your lifetime of work in order for this change to come about and put me back in the driver seat of my life!

Burris has my full endorsement. I recommend that all of my associates and clients get his book, do the homework and listen to the reprogramming CD. I personally have benefited from his mind fitness techniques as a individual and especially as a teacher. His methods are easy to learn and implement. They empower you from within, not tell you what to do. Burris is original and brilliant! Truly an 'Aha!' sense of this really works, when I've tried EVERYTHING.

Carol Miller
President
Encore Personal Training
Las Vegas, Nevada USA

As the author of this book I can tell you definitively that the quotes Trisha Brudsal put in her review do not exist on the CD. You can read the first two chapters of the book or listen to the first track of the CD by going to KellyBurris.com.

Kelly Burris' Reprogramming The Overweight Mind is at the cutting edge and one of the most valuable assets I have come across. I should know. I tried and was successful on Atkin's. I loved the thought that I could eat food and still lose weight. But, you know after awhile, you get tired of steak, prime rib, etc. and desire a big fat carb overload. And in fact, that is what I did after losing 20 pounds on Atkins. And soon I was back to my old weight plus a few pounds. As a 55+ male, I felt frustrated and was not eager to start the climb back to monitoring my carbs. So there I was stuck. Again.

When I first encountered Kelly's book, I was skeptical. Another gimmick. Another diet. So I did nothing. And yet, something happened along the way.

I encountered a new mind set. It was NOT done consciously. But I started to look at food differently. I made better choices. I made conscious choices. I started to avoid a few of the key ingredients Kelly pointed out as being "bad" for you. I read labels and found High Fructose Corn Syrup was all over the place...even in one famous person's Old Fashion Lemonade. I stopped putting sugar in my coffee. I drank more water. I found if I bought convenient size bottled water, I drank more. All of these changes were made by me as a willing accomplice. My mind set had changed. And I had a new perspective.

After awhile, I noticed that my pants were loose. That I could bend over more easily. But I didn't pay much attention to it. After all, I wasn't dieting so I figured I was imaging it.

At one point, I decided to get on a scale...and to my surprise, I found I had lost 20 pounds. I had gone from 251 pounds to 231 without any effort. And yet, I did not feel like I had deprived myself of anything. In fact, I felt well fed.

And that is the moment I realized what Kelly was talking about. Reprogramming the Mind. Subconsciously. Indeed, I had done just that without the trauma of dieting, deprivation and all the other things that go along with losing weight. And I have no desire to go back to my old habits.

I don't know about you. But if you were like me...overweight, late 50s, less than optimistic...maybe you should consider Reprogramming Your Mind.

Anyone who has ever worked in an organization has witnessed the paralysis that sets in with failure, reprimand, disappointing results or unfulfilled expectations. That recognition is palpable throughout this book. The deepening loss of power that follows seemingly small pitfalls or mediocre human interactions is extremely damaging and spreads to each and every aspect of an organization. Martin does a great job of both carving out the territory of these viral disempowerments, and of showing us how to bring greater authenticity to our work and communication to turn around these conditions. A correction in the psychological or cultural environment can be powerfully segued into an opportunity for more strategic thought and alignment of behavior with an organization's vision. Having seen so many of these cultural viruses do irreparable harm to both people and business results, the book has become a wonderful addition to an arsenal of tools that is never complete. I highly recommend The Responsibility Virus to business-people of any level of authority.

Amie Devero, Author of Powered by Principle: Using Core Values to Build World-Class Organizations

Ever notice how offices (maybe even yours) are split between the doers and the idlers? Ever notice the resentment that accrues in workplaces where control freaks do everything and ne'er-do-wells do nothing? Ever wonder how such jaded office environments came to be, and whether they ever could change?

Well, step right up, dear reader, because this book decodes the phenomenon that cruelly saps the morale out of even the most capable of offices. Labelling this task imbalance as the `responsibility virus,' Roger Martin seeks to render a diagnosis and prognosis of this nefarious sickness. Martin, with the assistance of psychological and biological principles, explains how the basic `fight or flight' response leads many to assume too much or too little responsibility in times of stress. This results in a causal chain reaction where the other workers correspondingly take positions on the opposing end of the spectrum to best complement this initial game opening. As Martin ably explains, these positions are never static; over-responsible persons eventually become under-responsible, and vice versa. This is essentially a never-ending dance that may eventually destroy an entire office.

So what to do, you ask? Martin proposes four separate strategies that are designed to purge the workplace body of this virus, all of which may be used on their own or in combination with the others, depending on the state of the virus' evolution and the players' goals. These different methods all have the share the same central goal: maximizing inter-office collaboration and thereby ridding the workplace of the responsibility virus. They are all very easy-to-understand and readily adaptable to many workplaces. Martin's generous use of case examples also provides a context to identifying problems and their respective solutions.

Martin's most intriguing strategy is to redefine the nature of true leadership and, by extension, corresponding `followership.' Martin entreats the reader not to accept the canard of the `man on the horse;' the heroic, all-knowing, all-powerful leader who can jump into the fray at any given moment and single-handedly solve a vexing problem, while his minions listlessly stand by waiting for the hero to save the day. Rather, true leadership fosters collaboration; followers contribute to the best of their abilities and open lines of communication are maintained throughout the various levels of management.

In all, this is a persuasive read that is very ably argued. Although I felt the conclusion was a bit rushed (where Martin makes a u-turn from his central argument that people's actions are dictated by their governing values), readers would be hard-pressed to write the book off as unhelpful. Use it in your business life or even your personal life; the book is a powerful suppressant of the responsibility virus.

This book explains in very simple terms why some people are so driven while others just go on a cruise and the relationship between the two.
If you ever feel overwhelmed at work and often find yourself wondering why others don't pull their own weight - this book is for you.
If you feel like you could do so much more at work if only given a chance but lack the confidence or the knowledge to go for it - read this book.

Roger Martin has lain down business organizations in the therapist chair, but you won't notice it because the author avoids skillfully the psychological labels currently in vogue.

If you often wonder about why you end up working more than others, why some people don't understand what you clearly state or why everybody sees what is wrong in the company and they don't do anything to fix it, this book is for you. It goes to the root of the problem, explains it plainly and offers a step by step program to solve it. The book also provides a better understanding of what's behind the Enron debacle and the government agencies mishandling of security issues before, during and after September 11.

It doesn't matter if the reader is a CEO, a manager, a professional or a secretary, he or she will find familiar faces and situations; people that could be your boss, your vice-president of sales or your managing editor. Why do we have the chance to see ourselves and others in these pages? The book is simply about human nature. It deals with the underlying emotions, culture and language that make many bureaucracies what they are: an incompetent and unfulfilled mass of otherwise intelligent, good and hard working people.

Martin explains that lack of collaboration between leadership and other parties in the organization brings an unbalanced approach to responsibility. The author describes what he calls the "heroic leader", which takes more responsibility that he or she should. Conversely, the other parties react giving up responsibility. Once the leader is unable to meet the goals, he or she sits back and takes the position of the followers. Meanwhile the frustrated followers take responsibility for their part, but because they can not attain the needed broad or bold solutions, parties induce the leader to take again more responsibilities that he or she can handle, and the infectious cycle of dependency starts again.

The mysterious Responsibility Virus is nothing more than the very human fear of failure. According to Chris Argyris, cited in the book, there are "governing values" that guide the way we interpret and deal with the world. They reside so ingrained in human nature that they apply to people across ages, cultures, economic status, and educational levels. Humans-Agyris claim--will always try to win, maintain control, avoid embarrassment and stay rational in any situation. Fear of failure triggers the governing values and they make us either take more responsibility (fight) or abdicate responsibility (flight).

Martin proposes the use of some "tools" to improve collaboration (choice structuring process), eliminate the mistrust and misunderstanding (frame experiment) and to balance capability and responsibility (responsibility ladder) among the parties in the organization. All these tools have the general objective of untying the person from the situation that requires attention and put aside the biased frame of mind from which we see the problem. Once all the parties involved in decision-making have a better perspective of the issue, they are in a position to find a middle ground between capabilities and responsibility.

It is at the end of the book, redefining leadership, when Martin describes the leader as what sociologists or psychologists would call a mature personality. According to the author, a leader should be capable of splitting responsibility through dialogue, apportioning responsibilities in keeping with capabilities, but more importantly, making apportionment discussable and subject performance to public testing. Although he doesn't mention it, you have the sense that it is the leader a significant carrier of the responsibility virus and also accountable for spreading his or her fear of failure throughout the organization.

In these times of leaders finger-pointing at each other and frustrated managers turned into audacious whistle-blowers this book is a timely required reading to understand not only organizations but the world around us.

I have struggled my entire marriage with disabling feelings of shame, guilt regarding sex. In counseling I was able to use this book to pin-point the specific things that were bothering me, and with specific information I was able to approach my husband in a way that he was able to understand that he wasn't to blame and to change his methods to be supportive to my healing. We're both committed to life-long marriage, but this book may have saved our relationship.

Men who are loooking to give their spouces fullfilment in all aspects need to read this. It has helped us in our mariage.

My wife and I have used this book in working with the Penners and were able to transform our sex life from having problems to a fun filled and exciting time that has brought us much closer
together in our total marriage

This book is very thorough and offers great step by step guides to enhancing sexual intimacy among married couples with many biblical references. Great book and unbelievable resource. Still a work in progress.

For the first few million years of life, time was measured by sunrise and sunset. Now we have switched to clocks. But the biological clocks that are within all of us don't know how to read clocks. Breakfast, lunch and dinner occur at standard times. Tooth pain is lowest after lunch; proof reading and sprint swimming are best performed in the evening; labour pains more often begin at night and most natural births occur in the early hours; sudden cardiac death is more likely in the morning (from Chapter 1).

The study of biological clocks has gone on for a long time, but as a science is a fairly recent development. Research in just the last few years has dramatically altered the way scientists view them. This book is a snapshot of the way the science appears right now. The pair who wrote the book are a leading researcher in the field and a professional science writer. This is a good combination that gives good enjoyable writing combined with accurate reporting.

What do the disasters of the _Titanic_, the _Exxon Valdez_, Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, and the Union Carbide plant explosion in Bhopal all have in common? They involved human error, and they all happened when the humans ought, by biological fiat, to have been sleeping. We are ruled by our clocks now, but even in the unnatural world we have made for ourselves, we cannot get away from the natural clocks that our cells expect us to follow. Like almost all living things in the planet, from plants to bacteria to birds, we have "a biological clock that was first set ticking more than three billion years ago." In _Rhythms of Life: The Biological Clocks that Control the Daily Lives of Every Living Thing_ (Yale University Press), Russell G. Foster, a professor of molecular neuroscience, and Leon Kreitzman, a writer and broadcaster, have examined the investigations of a relatively new science, chronobiology, to show just how much sway natural time has over us and other organisms. It isn't just a tale of sleepy people in control making bad judgments, although cognition and prudence do have their daily cycles. We tend to have babies (natural birthing) in the early mornings, and heart attacks in the later morning, and lovemaking around 10 p.m. Physical coordination, liver metabolism, body temperature, heart rate, kidney function, and much more all are paying attention to the biological clock, and when we jump time zones or do shift work, we do so at our peril.

Many of these cycles are specifically examined here, along with the historical hunt for the biological roots of the rhythmicity. A couple of the chapters dealing with the dance of molecules will be daunting for those uninitiated into the basics of cellular biology, but they do well to show the intricacies of the molecular mechanisms and the depth of work that has been done in this field. There are not just daily rhythms, but annual ones. Migratory birds the whole world over know when to start their travels north or south; they do so not by counting the days or paying attention to when the weather changes, but by regulation from the annual changes of lengths of day and night. Plants cannot migrate, but they are regulated by day length, too; wheat flowers, for instance, when the days get long enough, and barley does so when the days start to shorten. The almost universal attention that species pay to daily or annual changes indicates that success comes from being able to predict when winter, or summer, or nightfall, or other events, are coming, and from timing leaf drop, coitus, or swimming upstream to meet the optimum times and conditions. Evolution has selected the species that are best able to predict the future.

In the famous experiments where humans lived in caves or other light-deprived environments, with no capacity to tell time, they eventually locked into their own cycles of a little more than 24 hours. Like most creatures, we have an internal daily rhythm which is not exact, but only approximate; the day night cycle (or for us, such cues as an alarm clock) "entrain" the internal cycle and keep it synchronous with the rest of the creatures on Earth. There are mutant rats and flies who have cycles that are too long or too short, and researchers have productively transplanted brain parts to find out where the actual clocks are. Chronobiologists (a term that even some chronobiologists think of as pompous) are not just doing ivory tower investigations. There are many practical implications of this sort of work. Breast cancers, for example, have an annual pattern of increased and decreased growths, and so searching for the cancer would be more productive at certain times of the year. Chemotherapy for cancers involves poisoning the cancer cells with drugs that are also poisons for regular cells, but cancer cells, with their out-of-control growth, lose their rhythm of growth and division that normal cells retain. Thus it is possible that administering anti-cancer drugs at the time of day when they will interfere the least with the normal cells could reduce the worrisome side effects of the drugs. Asthma is most prevalent at night; medicine for it would be best taken in higher doses at nighttime, rather than every eight hours. The timing of doses in some cases may be as important as what the doses contain. The authors have given a detailed but readable introduction into a new science that will have increasing importance for human health as more is learned.

A comprehensive and fascinating book about the last few decades of chronobiological research. Are you a "early bird" or a "night owl"? Do you want to know how to deal with jet lag and winter blues? Are you interested in biological rhythms from a scientific or professional point of view? The you have to read this book immediately. It contains nearly everything you always wanted to know about rhythms but were afraid to ask. It's a must-read for medical professionals, psychologists, teachers, trainers and consultants of all kind.

A comprehensive and fascinating book about the last few decades of chronobiological research. Are you an "early bird" or a "night owl"? Do you want to know how to deal with jet lag and winter blues? Are you interested in biological rhythms from a scientific or professional point of view? The you have to read this book immediately. It contains nearly everything you always wanted to know about rhythms but were afraid to ask. It's a must-read for medical professionals, psychologists, teachers, trainers and consultants of all kind.

Excellent book with wonderful advice and recipes. I really am seeing results following this way of eating. :)

I started the Rice Diet Solution on 2/16/2007. Today 9/20/2007 and I have lost 93 pounds and am still going strong. I highly recommend this diet to anyone who has tried every diet and failed!!

This really is a very worthwhile book to read, and I feel it is a very healty way to shed some pounds. I could only give it three starts because the serving portion examples were SO limited. You really have to read the author's previous book "Heal Your Heart" to get the full spectrum of food choices for this program. The Q&A section was lacking, and only a few questions were raised and answered. I didn't get a sense of what it's really like to follow a program that is so different from the mainstream diets. Protein is extremely limited, for example. All that aside, I still would recommend buying this book if you are really serious about losing weight and gaining health.

This diet really works for me. I love pasta and rice. I lost 20 pounds in one and a half months and I didn't feel deprived. I have since slipped a few times but it is very easy to get back on the right track.

I have 6-8 gardening books by various authors- all good - but this gives the most specific information for each vegetable crop. This will be my ready reference for all my garden problems. This is a good book for both the novice and the experienced gardener. A great resource for those wanting to try growing new varieties.

This is a very good book. Very easy to read. This book covers just about every problem in the garden. It is easy to understand. It covers preventing problems to troubleshooting problems. Just about everything you need to know about problems in your garden is in this book.

In "Rodale's Vegetable Garden Problem Solver", lifelong organic gardener Fern Marshall Bradley has knowledgeably compiled and skillfully organized a wealth of practical, applicable, 'user friendly' advice and instruction on dealing with pests, diseases, weeds, and other problems that beset the vegetable garden. The solutions to these diverse issues that vegetable gardens must commonly deal with are based on the cutting edge of horticultural research and offer gardeners hundreds of organic and natural solutions for plant disease, pests, and weed problems. From polytape and mesh fences, to deer repellents, to flea beetle infestations, "Rodale's Vegetable Garden Problem Solver" offers safe, effective remedies that will enhance a vegetable garden's performance producing healthy, bountiful, 'bumper crop' yields. If you have a vegetable garden of your own, you need to avail yourself of the "Rodale's Vegetable Garden Problem Solver", Fern Marshall Bradley's essential 'how to' manual.

I am not a novice to organic gardening, but I have never focused on growing vegetables before. I bought this book thinking it would be a good reference book to get started. It is that and more.

The book is extremely easy to navigate; everything is arranged alphabetically. Under each vegetable there is a section on crop basics; site, soil, timing of planting, planting method, crucial care and harvesting. I was also very pleased and surprised to find information on growing each vegetable in containers, with the size of the container often mentioned. There is also sections for secret to success, regional notes, preventing problems and troubleshooting (diseases, pests, etc.)

If you are looking for a specific pest, these too are alphabetically arranged. There is a pest profile, pictures of the various stages, control methods and a control calendar. Under diseases, there is a description, crops at risk, etc.

The book also contains information on crop rotation, companion planting, composting and many other topics - all organized alphabetically.

I am sure that I will be using this book often during the growing season. I am now looking for a book just like this for growing organic fruit.

Having met Christian myself, I can only say that the glowing reviews posted here are nothing short of the truth. Not only were his arguments in this book presented with glowing erudition, he will only strengthen your convictions about his insight and honed skill if you ever get the chance to speak with this man.

Since many of you will not, I highly suggest you read his book. Whether you love Reagan or hate him, you'll certainly come out with a much deeper understanding of the man and his role in American politics during the most critical period of the Cold War. Bravo to Mr. Peterson!

I found this book very informing. The writing style kept me moving through quite quickly. I had trouble putting it down.

As the Undersecretary for New Acquisitions at a prestigious New England institution of higher learning, I have to say that any current events or political science collection would be incomplete without this tremendously thorough study of such an intriguing Cold War subject.

Mr. Peterson has gone to great lengths to research and develop a compelling and interesting story. I highly recommend this book for any college or university library and will include it on my next list of recommendations for history books in the New England College of Library Science Monthly Newsletter.

This has to be one of the best seminal works I have ever read on such a critical and relevant topic to the landscape of today's political debate.

Mr. Peterson has literally transcended the bounds of academic historical analysis, by bringing his own wit and wisdom to bear on deeply seated precepts ranging from Mutually Assured Destruction to the SALT treaties. The way he wordsmiths his input throughout this brilliant tome kept me coming back for more though 187 nail-biting pages.

I think I do not mince words myself, when I say "Watch this Peterson, he'll be back on the political history scene in spades." In a word... WOW!

Leadership against the bomb (WMD) including the Reykjavik summit and Gorbachev defined SDI policy review shifts. "The soviet policy review group submitted the dreaft decision directive to the NSC in early December 1982." (p. 77) The center of the book inquires deeply into the results of that start. It was aimed toward Soviet imperialism. It was anti-elitist. That defined Reagan and ultimately undermined his constituency. Gorbachev pressured Reagan. It didn't work well. The President stood. There was START and INF, ABM and NSDD. It was a tangle. Reagan provided leadership. He stood his ground more sucessful with the Soviets than the U.S. Eric J. Lindblom PhD Harvard

Paul Lettow's "Ronald Reagan and His Quest to Abolish Nuclear Weapons" is an important scholarly account of Reagan's aims for his Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) - perhaps better known - if incorrectly - as "Star Wars" and his strongly felt desire to abolish nuclear weaponry. It is a scholarly account which deserves to be read by a wide readership, since it demonstrates convincingly what Reagan actually thought of nuclear weaponry. Lettow observes that Reagan's keen interest in the abolition of nuclear weaponry is one that isn't widely known, even today, and that this interest arose immediately from the 1945 nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Lettow not only does an admirable job in exploring Reagan's interest in the abolition of nuclear weaponry, but also makes a persuasive case as to why Reagan may be the most visionary leader of the late 20th Century, having created the world which we still live in.

Using both recently declassified documents from the National Archives and extensive interviews with former Reagan Administration officials and Reagan historians, Lettow makes a very compelling case for asserting that Reagan's quest to abolish nuclear weapons was the key underlying theme of his foreign policy with the Soviet Union, especially with respect to nuclear arms control. It was an issue Reagan was personally involved with, often overriding strenuous objections from key aides like National Security Adviser Robert "Bud" McFarlane, who thought that Reagan was quite naive in his advocacy of eventual abolition of nuclear weapons. Lettow also illustrates how Reagan's insistance on substantial American military spending, coupled with Soviet opposition to SDI, led not only to substantial reduction of nuclear weapons on both sides, but eventually to the dissolution of the Soviet Union itself. This relatively terse book may be the most important history I have read yet on the Reagan administration and its relations with the Soviet Union, especially with regards to nuclear arms control. For this reason alone, Lettow's book deserves to be read by as wide a readership as possible.

While reading this book, I had the distinct impression that it was actually a dissertation aimed at proving to a doctoral committee that beyond any shadow of doubt Ronald Reagan's primary mission in life, particularly during his presidency, was to abolish nuclear weapons from the face of the earth. Few would have believed that in the 1980s, but the author of this book more than proves it. He does so by thoroughly researching his subject and then meticulously analyzing Reagan's thoughts as distilled from his writings, interviews, broadcasts, speeches, and actions from the early 1960s through his presidency. In the process, he also clearly demonstrates that Ronald Reagan's thinking was so far beyond that of his contemporaries that even his closest advisors had difficulty understanding him or even taking his ideas seriously. Who, in the 1960s-70s, for example, seriously believed that by stepping up the arms race you could bring the Soviets to the negotiating table, let along get them to negotiate in good faith? But Reagan did.

The one fault which I found with this book was that by concentrating on his one theme, almost to the exclusion of everything else, the author presents a somewhat one sided view of what was really taking place during Reagan's presidency. For example, the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), although the most powerful tool, wasn't the only tool being used by President Reagan to bring about the demise of the Soviet Union. He also supported subversion within the Eastern Block, supplied arms to those fighting the Soviets in Afghanistan, pressured the Saudi's to bring down the price of oil so as to starve the Soviet economy, and curtailed technical and monetary support to the USSR to slow its economy. All of these efforts, taken together, brought the "Cold War" to an end.

All that aside, however, this is a remarkable book which sheds a great deal of light on the historical Reagan and further substantiates his legacy. And, as the author intended, after reading it, there can be no doubt that Ronald Reagan was obsessed with eliminating the nuclear threat to the people of the world; almost as obsessed, in fact, as the author was in proving it. For content, this book certainly rates five stars, but for readability it only rates three, so I'll have to give it four.

This brilliant book about Ronald Reagan's greatnessshould be read by President Bush, leaders in both parties and heads of state around the world. Lettow shows through diligent research and first person sources that Ronald Reagan throughout his life aimed at nothing less than the abolition of nuclear weapons and combined true vision and hard headed pragmatism to achieve enormous and historically profound successes that will be remembered in a thousand years. I remember those years well, for a good part of Reagan's Presidency I servedwith the Democratic leadership in Congress and have written myself about how Reagan deserves a special place in history for the same reasons that Lettow documents so thoroughly. From the first use of nuclear weapons at Hiroshima, Reagan set himself on a determined lifetime course to eliminate nuclear weapons. Throughout his life, as both liberal and conservative, Reagan steadfastly pursued this noble and visionary goal that remained constant through his shifting ideology and political parties. As Lettow documents, Reagan understood more than his contemporaries on the left or right that national security is protected not by war without diplomacy, or diplomacy without military strength, but by building enormous military strength for leverage, then applying that strength diplomatically to achieve visionary goals. Lettow traces the history of nuclear weapons spreading alongside the history of Ronald Reagans evolution, and demonstrates how Reagan employed combinations of vision, ideology, pragmatism, boldness and the negotiaing skill natural in a former President of the Screen Actors Guild. Reading Lettows accounting, one can see that Reagan was neither a warmonger looking for wars to fight, nor a pacifist who feared military strength, but a visionary realist who had a large lifetime goal....abolishing nuclear weapons....and pursued that goal courageously and relentlessly. Standing ovation for Reagan, in achieving historic goals of immense and lasting magnitude, and standing ovation for Lettow, for dispassionately telling Reagan's story with integrity and depth.

This book takes us on an incredible journey through time and space, as we can stare lenghthily , without being on a frantic tour bus schedule, at the architectural wonders of our world . Without getting too technical , this volume , which will be enjoyed by all ages awakens a sense of wonder in us , by taking us in theses wonderful places , all over the planet. A tremendous wealth of visual inspiration.

Great photos as there always is in the DK series. Takes the viewer from ancient Egypt to 1994 completion of the Osaka Airport designed by Piano. Great introduction to architecture.

Probably the only thing better than owning this book, would be to travel to all these locations with someone you absolutely loved and who absolutely had a love for life and architecture.

Features:

-Every important architectural style from ancient Egyptian to Contemporary

-50 sites illustrating changes and developments in architecture in all cultures

-Authoritative text to explain developments in technology, materials and styles

-Detailed annotations

Some of the sites featured: Notre-Dame-du Haut, Ise Shrine, The Chrysler Building, The Parthenon, Taj Mahal, Temple of Amun, Karnak, The Colosseum, Santa Sophia, Pisa Cathedral, Durham Cathedral, Sydney Opera House, Tokyo Olympic Stadium and Notre-Dame, Paris.

Favorites: Santa Sophia, Kandariya Mahadev Temple, Pisa Cathedral, Durham Cathedral, Angkor Way, Florence Cathedral, St. Basil's Cathedral, Hardwick Hall, Taj Mahal, Castle Howard, Sagrada Familia and The Ark.

Each site has a two-page spread. You can see a large picture covering the middle/center of the two pages and then it is surrounded by facts about the specifications, history, floor plans, sketches, inside views, specific decorations and styles.

When viewing the pictures of the Leaning tower of Pisa, you also get to see the inside of the Pisa Cathedral and read about Romanesque vaulting.

My favorite site is the Notre-Dame, Paris. This is the most amazing Gothic cathedral ever and was well worth the bus ride to Paris! Unfortunately they don't have room to show you the interior, which is rather amazing in itself.

An exploration into human creativity. This book will make you want to travel the world to see these fascinating buildings in person. Just to imagine walking amongst all this inspiration makes one feel overwhelmingly alive.

Who would not want to walk along the stone-vaulted corridors in the Castle Drogo?

Feeling Inspired.

~The Rebecca Review

Every D-K book I have had the pleasure of reading has been a feast for the eyes as well as the mind. This one is no exception. I enjoyed it because it explores many famous structures as well as some which should be famous but are not. I knew little about architecture before I opened the book and so I learned a great deal and enjoyed every minute of it. I love this book!