California Books

this is a fun guide to the wonderful city of Pasadena and the territory around it--excellent advice and comments about a city full of history, beauty and community

Hometown Pasadena: The Insider's Guide Writer Colleen Dunn Bates, a friendly Pasadena woman nearing 50, thought she had a good idea: to put together an upscale guidebook about her city -- a kind of travel book for people who live there. And given the intensely local focus of the project, rather than dealing with a big New York publisher, she decided to publish it herself, producing it out of her den and delivering it to stores from the back of her car.

Almost a year later, "Hometown Pasadena" has not only sold 10,000 copies, it has also turned into a small empire: Local bookstores, both chain and independent, Costco and even a hair salon now carry it, and Bates is branching out to other cities.

Bates' formula for the books is simple: "It's about how to really live in a place, and be in a place, and understand a place, even if you've lived there for 20 years," she said recently. "I've never seen anything like it. My model was to not have it look like a Fodor's guide."

Bates' book taps into the growing desire to conduct the business of one's life as locally as possible, in an era of crazy traffic, expensive gas and worries about the effect of a sprawling lifestyle on global warming. As Sara Nelson, editor of Publishers Weekly, noted, books about local topics and niche themes are thriving nationwide, helped in part by digital technology that makes it easier to self-publish books with a professional look.

"I think people are interested in themselves. As everything gets more global, the local stuff seems quaint and personal," she said.

"Hometown Pasadena" features well-illustrated sections on eating and drinking, cultural offerings, and where to take the kids, as well as less-typical features: several pages on the Metro Gold Line, a chapter on public and private gardens, and page-long interviews with key local players, such as architectural historian Robert Winter and Pasadena Playhouse artistic director Sheldon Epps. Bates and her four co-authors also know enough to treat the city as the bull's-eye of a cluster of communities that includes Sierra Madre, Eagle Rock and most of the San Gabriel Valley.

Bates' decision to publish on her own press comes from her experience with the New York publishing world, beginning in the early '80s when she edited a series of French-originated guidebooks for Simon & Schuster...
By handling "Hometown Pasadena" herself, she was able to use local talent not only in its creation but in its sales and promotion. One of her co-authors, Sandy Gillis, has kept the book supplied at her hairdresser.

Even more surprising, Bates has gotten the book into a Pasadena Barnes and Noble, despite the difficulty of small presses reaching the chains.

Bates also handles her press' non-bookstore distribution, which for months meant hauling boxes of books into her Subaru and driving them around town.

"I did it all," she said, "and have the chiropractic bills to prove it."

Some of the secret lies in Pasadena itself, the author believes.

"It's a very literary community, very educated," Bates said. "We have, outside of Powell's, the healthiest independent bookstore on the West Coast. There's educational institutions and culture and art and architecture. And food, and neighborhood identity. It has everything that makes for a complete community: There's a 'there' here."

Either way, it takes the right balance of size, cultural sophistication and local roots -- and possibly insularity -- for a city to be right for one of her books, Bates said. San Diego, for example, is too large and sprawling.
"Pasadena has a healthy self-image," she conceded. "It's in love with itself, and that helps."

Scott Timberg, Los Angeles Times

I was surprised by this complete guide. It was so well written and amusing that I found myself reading it for fun! I thought I knew this town, but I learned so much about it's history, places I've never been etc.. I'm giving it as Christmas presents to my partners at work. I think they'll love it and it's great o have on the shelf for guests. X Chris

LA/So Calif travel books have always given this gem of a city only a cursory glance. It's about time Pasadena got its own book! This glossy new guidebook is chock full of everything Pasadena; it is beautifully detailed and highly entertaining. I am a Pasadena native who thoroughly enjoyed reading about my favorite haunts and discovering new spots to explore. Highly recommnend this for visitors or ex-Pasadenans who want to reminisce about their beloved hometown.

The title says it all: not only does this book tell you what a movie technically is made of (differences between film stocks, sound recording techniques, etc), it also tells you how the movie is shot (lighting, lenses, special effects, etc) but finally it also tells the deeper meaning of certain shots or sequences. Especially that last part is very interesting: with examples from Citizen Kane, Close Encounters Of The Third Kind and many others, the author explains how the composition of the picture, movements and sound can communicate concepts like mood, emotion and relationships.

How Movies Work is an excellent introduction to the process and techniques of filmmaking. For any aspiring filmmaker or movie buff, it will introduce all of the intricacies from pre-production to post-production. Usually, the author's style is clear and comprehensible for the layman; however, there are moments when the text is burdened by the minutiae of the trade: trying to comprehend the definitions of film developing and editing practices is nearly impossible. Nevertheless, these moments are few and far between, and any dutiful reader will leave the book with a valuable wealth of knowledge regarding filmmaking.

What is disappointing, however, is that the book deliberately sidelines even a cursory overview of what the author terms "film theory." Admittedly, Kawin does not disguise the fact that he presents a bare-bones overview of the specific, concrete details regarding filmmaking, but a few pages on the psychological and abstract components of film theory would surely have supplemented the book nicely. Kawin argues that the most in depth analysis of film construction cannot be accomplished without a thorough knowledge of the production process, which is certainly true. While his book elaborately details the production process, it may not satisfy those who are interested in the theoretical constructs that deconstruct cinema.

As a final note, the illustrations are almost always beneficial. The text is, however, considerably dated. Films before 1986 are not included. The text discusses nothing about digital photography and very little about computer-generated imagery. Personally, however, in the age of DVD extra features, there is already a superfluity of this information easily located in the world of cinema, and the text does not suffer considerably from its absence.

You must buy this book if you want to find out how movies work, i.e., how they enrich our cultural experience and how they are made. Kawin's textbook is pleasantly readable by anyone interested in the cinema. It contains a wealth of information from film appreciation to film production (including explanations of various special effects!) to film studies. Every aspect of the cinema is clearly explained and illustrated with examples, and the book contains many still photographs, 96 of which are in color.

I think this is exactly how a "how-to" book should be written. I only wish it had been updated to reflect advances in the 1990s -- this book was first published in 1987 and reprinted in 1992.

Kawin is by far one of the brightest minds in film literature and theory today. His text brings the background of film to light and stresses the importance of all aspects of the cinema. This text is an excellent resource for any student of the cinema.

I'm interested in buying foreclosure properties. I've read many books on buying foreclosures but none gave me a better understanding of the whole foreclosure process. Mr. Jensen has a clear, concise writing style that does not leave out the details.
As somewhat of a novice in real estate, I hate the books that are written in a manner that seems to assume you have as much experience as the person writing the book and proceeds to leave out the details that could get a plan of action going. Mr. Jensen assumes nothing, it's all there.
I would hands-down recommend this book to anyone who is facing foreclosure or, like me, just wants a better understanding of the process.
Good job Mr. Jensen.

After reading this book I was not only able to help myself, but have helped a countless number of others. This book is a must read for anyone facing forclosure, or is upsidedown on their mortgage.
Don Viggiano, Rancho Cucamonga, calif.

This is the only book I could find that presents all the foreclosure options -- and it is written in a way that is easy to understand. No other book presents so much information in such an easy-to-use format. You can find remedies for your specific situation in minutes. I think it is a must for anyone who is facing foreclosure or for professionals who advise people on how to stop foreclosure and/or lower their mortgage payments.

Anyone facing foreclosure will find more than enough information in here to deal with it effectively while maintaining their dignity. The author looks at this subject from practical, legal and emotional viewpoints. They are all accurate and very helpful. The author's compassion for people and this subject is obvious.

This book would not even be needed if California (also known as...Kalifornia, and PDRK...The Free Peoples Democratic Republic of Kalifornia.) did not have such a hard time with the phrase "SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED." I just could never understand the concept of "gun control." Since law-abiding citizens police themselves, and criminals ignore the law, why bother? John Lotts book "More Guns, Less Crime", is a very good read. And it shows the disinginous argument of gun control. Which boils down to people control, not crime control.

Gun laws are such a mess, even the most conscientious citizen will have trouble figuring out what is legal and what isn't. In addition, the subject is so culturally polarized, it is impossible for those with a strong opinion on the subject to give a clear answer to common questions. Enter this great book. Too bad it's not available for the other 49 states...

If you live in California and own a gun, this book is as necessary as a first-aid kit and a fire extinguisher in your home.

The author uses common everyday English to explain the web of firearms laws in California. It is complete with examples and court cases that define the current legal condition in the state. This is a very easy book to read and is a must for every gun owner whether you're a firearms expert or considering buying a firearm for self-defense. I bought 10 of these books for friends and family last Christmas.

This is an excellent book about a Sacramento woman who did away with many people and written by a reporter that really got to know her and wrote an exceptional book on her. Gave away my first copy to someone else and then bought myself another copy. . . .

This is the story of the notorious Sacramento Black Widow killer who preyed upon the aged and the invalid in the 80s. Dorothea Puente used the weakness of our social net to exploit the less fortunate while stealing their social security checks. Running an illegal boarding house for invalids, she was able to maintain the illusion of respectability because the Social Welfare bureaucracy was simply to overworked to root her out. Although some did try to bring her to the attention of authorities when her charges continued to cash their checks even after they disappeared. Dorothea, a petty con woman turned mass killer, simply killed them and planted them in her well groomed garden, all without even batting an eye. Her cold blooded grandmotherly persona even allowed her to escape the police and flee to LA as the cops were digging up her yard. She simply walked away, escorted though the gawking public by the very police who were investigating her. While it is true that she was not a serial killer per say (since her killings were not sexually motivated) she still gives lie to the myth that women are less willing to kill to men. Her selfishness dominated her so completely she was unable to feel remorse, indeed, when caught red handed; she still tried to play the injured party and attempted to bask in the limelight. She worried continually about who would own the rights to her story and complained about all sorts of imagined slights, never once acknowledging guilt for her crimes.

One thing that I come away with is that Dorthea Dix said the elderly people died of natural causes . She said she didn't kill anyone. It's a thought. She's guilty of hiding the deaths & cashing their checks.

Great book about one of the most notorious female mass murderers in American history. Human Harvest is like two books in one -- the fascinating story of the woman who killed the people she was caring for, and buried them in her yard, and an indictment of our Social Security Administration, who continued to blindly send the killer the victim's checks long after they had been killed.

OK, so the author is my dad! It doesn't change the fact that any fans of the true crime genre will be fascinated by the story of the old woman who killed and buried those who were supposed to be in here care.

I finished reading David Fine's excellent book Imagining Los Angeles: A City In Fiction at just before 2 am this morning. I was reading in bed in my 1923 bungalow in Whittier, California. It was a quiet night. No winds blowing; even the neighborhood dogs were asleep. It was too humid and Fine's wonderful analysis of Los Angeles fiction had my mind going a mile a minute. I thought about going for a drive; maybe listen to a little late-night radio, but I knew my wife would worry if she woke up and found me gone. I finally got to sleep, knowing I'd have to type up this report as soon as I got out of bed this morning.

Fine's book is not encyclopedic; if you are looking for a complete listing of SoCal fiction, you'll need to look elsewhere. Imagining Los Angeles is an overview - an introduction, a history with examples - of fiction set in the Los Angeles metro area. The first chapter gives you a little background on the area. Then Fine takes the reader on a literary journey from booster fiction, through fiction in the 20's, hard-boiled fiction, tough-guy detectives, the Hollywood novel and finishes with more ethnically oriented fiction and Los Angeles as a setting for disaster. The book is serious - probably not a summer beach read - but it also kept me in rapt attention and didn't read like the textbook Professor Fine could have turned it into. In my opinion, this book should appeal to a wide audience - from the serious literary student to the pop culture buff looking for a little backstory.

A lady just walked into my office (actually, my three legged female mutt just hopped into the 1980 guesthouse behind the bungalow) looking for my attention, so I better end this report now.

Sincerely Submitted, agnostictrickster 13 August 2001

"Fine's research is extensive and thorough, his observations shrewd and penetrating, and his command of the political, social, and cultural matrix profound. A major contribution."--D. W. Madden, California State University, Sacramento--CHOICE, January 2001

This is a terrific book, that rare academic work that is both entertaining and instructive. Having grown up in L.A., but no longer living there now, I truly enjoyed revisiting the city of my childhood and young adulthood via all the stories and authors Fine discusses. Fine's writing style is clear and blessedly free of academic jargon. His treatment of a wide variety of books and ideas is nothing short of a tour-de-force. "Imagining Los Angeles" does exactly what good literary scholarship should do: shine fresh light on books and their authors and make readers eager to discover the books for themselves! (I've just placed a mega-order for several of the titles Fine discusses... )

"A short course in the essential literature of Los Angeles. . . . so full of punch and energy, so mercifully free of the impenetrable jargon that afflicts much scholarly and critical writing. Best of all, Fine sent me back to my old favorites with a fresh perspective, and he added a dozen titles to my own reading list."-Jonathan Kirsch, The Los Angeles Times

I have a large shelf of books on indian basketry. This Shanks book will be put first in line. For the tribes included, the book covers historical, cultural, and ethnographic aspects in a very readable form. But its unrivaled aspect is in diagnostics and the technical details. Boring? Hardly! The authors show how the artisitic and aesthetic values derive from the weaving details. The authors trace the migration and fate of tribal peoples through analysis of their weaving. While the book is of "coffee table" quality, it not just a pretty once over dust catcher. I will certainly buy their next volume in the series.

To anyone interested in the artworks or culture of the American Indian, this is a must have treasure. In fact, it can well stand first in line among any indian textile, carving, pottery, or beadwork books that I have ever seen.

We had the author (Ralph Shanks) as a math teacher in sixth grade-- truly the best teacher we have EVER had! I've never read his books but he used to show us slides of the material, anyway, just be aware when reading this i'm sure fascinating book, that the author is a really good teacher ( which is completely irrelevant we know, but...)

More than exceptionally good regional art, California Indian baskets are amongst the most beautiful and finest baskets in the world. No other book covers basketry with the detail, care and insight of this volume. Approximately 200 baskets are shown in full color along with an enjoyable text that makes reading a pleasure. Basketry studies, anthropology, history, art, archeology and linguistics are all brought together in this unprecedented book. "Indian Baskets of Central California" is full of fascinating information. There are vibrant baskets covered with hundreds of tiny feathers, miniature baskets so small they literally can sit on the head of a pin, feast baskets so large it took several men to lift one when full, and culinary baskets as beautiful as a great painting. You will be proud to own this fine book.

Ralph Shanks has more than one passion that he writes about. He's known nationwide in Coast Guard history circles as one of the country's leading chroniclers of the history of the United States Life-Saving Service, a predecessor to the Coast Guard. But little do those folks know - except maybe those on the West Coast, of his level of scholarship as it pertains to a subject seemingly as far away from motor lifeboats as one can get: Native American basketry.

Indian Baskets of Central California is split geographically into three sections: San Francisco Bay and Monterey Bay, the interior coast range mountains, and the Sierra Nevada and the Delta. Each section highlihghts the basketry of different tribes, both in text and imagery. The book, in fact, is heavily illustrated with photography of existing baskets from collections all over the west coast. The history of the development of each type of basket is told, as is the story behind its ultimate use. The details pertaining to each individual basket's story are as intricately woven into storylines as the baskets themselves were crafted.

Ralph and his wife/editor Lisa Woo Shanks have collaborated on several projects, including the North American Indian Travel Guide. Independently, Lisa is the editor of the Basketry of California and Oregon Series. Their expertise for this very precise subject shines through in this important book, one that will help keep alive fading arts and cultures of the past.

A quick impression of the photographs by Lueders-Booth might cause one to remember conversations about 'colonialist gaze' and other such Postmodernist concerns with the representation of foreign cultures. The photographs, however, are much to powerful and engaging to be defeated by such narrow arguments. They present the people of Tijuana, Mexico, living in and around the large municipal dumps that surround their town. Children play, adults search for valuables or burn wood, while makeshift cemeteries are created from scraps and a broken baby crib.

There is a sense in all of these images that there is nothing foreign here at all. In truth, Tijuana is but a stone's throw from the U.S. border, and there is little about these people or their lives that cannot be found inside our borders. They are the faces of poverty, of destitution, and their representation here makes them doubly powerful as symbols of repressive capitalism and the victims of economic oppression.

If it's true that one picture is worth a thousand words, then Jack Lueders-Booth presents us with a 69,000 word book that you can finish in less time than it takes to read the last night's box scores--or that you can linger over in wonder, page by page, giving yourself over to each, and to the stories implicit in each, for many minutes at a time.

The border has become the topic du jour, and by now the very word border conjures up a reality apart from what, for most of us, is daily life. It's not a particularly evocative or unsettling image, the border, when referring to the dividing line between Italy and Switzerland, or Uruguay and Brazil, or even between two countries claiming, with occasional cross-border skirmishes to italicize those claims, each a piece of the other.

But talk of the border here and it's one and only one you mean and you cross it, north to south, at your own psychic risk. Fictional characters have been discovering it as far back at least as D.H. Lawrence and as recently as Cormac McCarthy, and as actual characters have learned, and continue to learn every day.

Ambrose Bierce was probably not the first and Jack Lueders-Booth will surely not be the last--but Jack's is just as surely as stunning a document of that mythic crossing as we're likely to get.

Now, mythology tells us that heaven belongs to god, hell to the devil, and the borderlands, the wastelands, the shantytowns, the DMZ's, the dumping grounds, the scabby, toxic, orphaned frontier places neither flanking country will acknowledge as its own--these belong to neither the one nor the other but to the trickster.

Call him Hermes. Call him Legba or Exu. Call him Coyote or Lord of the Crossroads. They are one and the same for all their many names. And the Tijuana dumps in "Inherit the Land" seem to have been the classic trickster crossroads for Professor Lueders-Booth.

For it was here that the god unblocked the path to a reality other visitors, perhaps, have experienced, but whose visionary intensity no one's camera ever captured quite this splendidly before.

McCarthy's border trilogy is a masterpiece of modern American prose. Luis Urrea's "Across the Wire," "By the Lake of Sleeping Children," and, now, "Inherit the Land"-is no less a masterpiece trilogy of modern American prose and photography.

Now, we often hear photographers--those who poke their lenses into the sores of the world, that is--accused of aestheticizing their subjects. Yet the poet Rilke tells us that in beauty is the beginning of terror. And the formal beauty of these pictures serve, to my eyes at least, to expose, not distract from, the terror--the terror and the humanity both. And expose them not once, but time and again, keeping them, as only great art can do, fresh, the pain and the beauty just as revelatory on the twentieth viewing, or the hundredth, as on the first.

Anything, however initially exotic or extreme, appalling or enchanting, becomes familiar over time. And while it doesn't necessarily breed contempt, familiarity usually breeds, even worse, complacency and indifference, even oblivion. Oblivion literally in that we forget what first surprised, engrossed, appalled, and bewitched.

"What surprised, appalled, engrossed, bewitched me when I first went to live and work in Calcutta--yet another world," in the words of Luis Alberto Urrea's Introduction, "of stench and dirt and mangled dogs and untouchables--became old hat, hardly noticeable, six months down the line. Even three."

It's up to the artist to keep the knife-edge of perception, reaction and emotion sharp. And that knife's edge is as sharp, in "Inherit the Land," as the light of Mexico itself.

This book by Lueders-Booth was one of the 10 best of last year as rated by American Photo. I take their recommendations with a grain of salt, but this is really first rate documentary photography. Lueders Booth has such respect for his subjects who are struggling to live--with some grace--under the most difficult circumstances. He never
milks the situation, which so many photographers do today. He's also a photographer's photographer. His way of relating people to their environment is informative, moving, and memorable. The images stay with you. This is a book to own and live with. I can't recommend it more highly

A moving essay about the families living on the dumps of Tijuana by a courageous and talented photographer. Every single photograph is testament to the photographer's commitment to bring us closer to the circumstances of their lives. The portraits are poignant, honest, and beautiful.

Love the animated street map. Will not cover all of San Diego, but will hightlight the popular sights.

I don't think I'd go to a new vacation city without the MapEasy Guidemap. I've used them in Seattle, San Fran and now San Diego. They've helped me find interesting places to visit, tasty food and even parking!

This easy to read and informative map shows all the cool spots in San Diego. Great for first time vistors or locals who want to know more about what America's Finest City has to offer. Makes a great gift! Illustrations make this a unique map.

This Mapeasy shows the tourist where things are in the tourist-visited areas. It is not intended to help you find your way if you are lost, though the major routes are there. It has a detail of Downtown La Jolla, downtown San Diego, and Balboa park, with a blow-by-blow of all the shops and restaurants on Prospect and some the streets that head inland. This is the clearest rendering of Balboa Park I have seen yet and I have several other current San Diego travel helps.

It is made of a plastic material that is more durable than paper.
It is worth the current $6.95 amazon price.

...and that is actually saying quite a bit, considering that he is one of my favorite detective fiction writers.

Written in 1968, this is Macdonald at the height of his skills. It features all the classic elements of inherited guilt, needless loss, corrupt manipulation and class barriers. Instead of stumbling over 1960s culture (as so many lesser writers seem to do), it makes free love and drug culture just two more things to be misused by the wrong sort of people.

Tough, smoothly written, well plotted. A must read for fans of Lew Archer and a good place to begin with Macdonald if you have not yet discovered his work.

Sandy Sebastian was only a kid-a lost, lonely, unhappy young girl who ran away with another equally lost kid called Davy Spanner. One was a homicidal killer. Both were kidnappers, and Lew Archer was hired to stop them before anyone got hurt. Archer had followed bloody trails before-but never one as bizarre and terrible as this...The Instant Enemy.

The Instant Enemy is the quintessential Ross Macdonald novel. Why? Because it incorporates so many of the elements Macdonald held near and dear to his heart. These include:

-Family tragedies that repeat themselves over the generations.
-Unexpected familial relationships between characters.
-A young person's journey to claim a birthright unfairly denied.
-The notion that one's destiny is largely determined at birth, if not before.

The book starts out with Lew Archer being summoned to the Woodland Hills home of Keith Sebastian and his wife Bernice. Their 17 year old daughter has run away and they want Archer to find her without involving the police. Archer soon learns that the girl is traveling in the company of a 19 year old delinquent named Davy Spanner. What's more, it appears that they are planning to commit a very serious crime against Sebastian's boss, the fabulously wealthy oilman Stephen Hackett.

Archer wends his way up and down much of the California coast steadfastly seeking to unravel the truth behind the shocking series of events that rapidly ensue. The fast paced narrative unfolds quite smoothly as one unexpected complication after another is brought to light.

And Macdonald's prose is first rate. Whether depicting the scenic landscapes of the California coastline or the changing face of American society as it reflects the turbulence of the 1960s, the writing is remarkably deft and descriptive.

Thoroughly engaging, suspenseful and rich with surprise, The Instant Enemy ranks among the finest novels written by Ross Macdonald. Do yourself a favor and read it.

It seems that the cases Lew Archer takes on are rather straight forward looking at the outset and startlingly complex as he gets into them. This one ranks among the best of the series because of the characters involved. This time, he's hired first by a runaway daughter's father and runs into a plot against the father's employer. A subsequent kidnapping and threat of murder gets him also "hired" by the intended victim's mother. The alert reader will figure out aspects of the whole picture before the revelation, but chances are that reader will run into a few surprises.

The puzzle is definitely an important part of the total story, but it's the depth of character and the implicit tragic developments that make a Ross MacDonald story the rewarding experience that it is.