Massachusetts Books

I read this book simply because my boyfriend said he couldn't put it down. I was mesmorized by the bravery these men went gave out to fight the fire. After every page, I kept thinking to myself, "This is TRUE." I have a stronger respect for the brave fire fighters aroundt he world. Not only is this book about the fire and the fighters themselves, but it also depicts the family's devistation after the fact. Every page brought tears to my eyes. I would recommend this book to anyone, especially family's of fire fighters. Didn't want to put it down.

I didn't think a non-fiction book about the personal and professional lives of 'everyday' people would be so well composed. Sure, I expected to read about drama and bravery and tragedy, but Sean Flynn writes with well-tuned prose and a well-honed ear for the people and the town he reveals to the reader. He has done a great service in getting to the heart and soul of the protagonists and their loved ones. He does so without exaggeration, false bravado, or romanticism. The heroic fire fighters are shown three-dimensionally, and there isn't a phony note or word in the book. And like the true heroes in history, they are far from perfect human beings. In fact, the profound issue suggested in this book is that they are willing to risk their lives because they have flaws and have felt personal pain. How else could one feel so obligated to save utter strangers at the risk of their own lives and to have such an intuitive sense of how far your body and soul can go when they're up against a formidable foe. George Orwell said that it is the job of a human being not to be a saint. If my life was at risk, and given the choice who would try and save me, I'd pick these guys over any saint, preacher, minister, or holy man.

Note to who ever wrote the Publishers Weekly review. Get a map. The second largest city in New England is Worcester Mass. not WorcHester. Those of us born and raised there pronounce the city to rhyme with mister.

All that I can say is that Sean Flynn wrote this book about a horrific true event in such a way that I feel as if I lost my friends in the blaze. I can only imagine how the true friends of these 6 men felt and continue to feel each time they see a family member of one of their perished brothers. I'm not a crying man, but I cried at some points in this story b/c they hit so close to home for one, but for two you get so wrapped up in the lives of these men that you feel the stinging pain of realizing they have died. It's a sad story, that I actually remembered hearing about after i read the book, but it's also very motivating to anybody that has thought of becoming a FF. It's almost as its a test of your heart to be a FF. Like the beginning of initiation (hazing) to become a part of a fraternity. I know two other people that read it, that upon completion(one wasn't even able to finish) withdrew from the FF applicant process in which we all signed up together. Weeds out the weak...well kinda. :o)

Either way you look at it, this is good reading. I finished in in 4 days and I was continually fussed at for 3 of those days by my 9 month pregnant girlfriend b/c I wasn't giving her the attention she wanted. Now she's reading it and i'm not getting any attention. Go fig!

Buy the book! BTW...my addiction i speak of in my title just means my addiction to FF books.

I really enjoyed this book. My dad was a firefighter and I thought the writer portrayed the firefighters with a tough realisim without taking away their compassion for what they do. The families stories seemed to convey not only the day to day fears that all firefighters families have but, a small sense of what they went through when the unimaginable happened to them. Overall a great read by a writer who seemed to care about the subject.

This book is an interesting historical drama about two families with a long history of not getting along. The book alternates between historical chapters and present day (1991) chapters; the historical chapters begin with the Pilgrim voyage and then slowly progress up to the 1960s or thereabouts. I personally found the historical chapters to be the most interesting and was happy that they tended to be much longer than the ones that took place in the present. I read this before my planned Cape Cod vacation and, while I haven't gone there yet, I think it was a good way to get ready and learn a great deal about the area's history, geography, and character.

American History didn't hold much of an interest for me in school, but as I approach the half century mark, I am becoming more interested in the events that shaped our nation. CAPE COD is an outstanding read dating to the time the Mayflower approached our shores. After completing this novel, I read Nathaniel Philbrick's non-fiction MAYFLOWER, and discovered that, in addition to being a wonderful storyteller, William Martin is an excellent historian.

The author creatively presents the conflicts over the centuries between the Hilyard and Bigelow families, intertwined in the present with the struggles of the married couple at the heart of the story. Having read THE LOST CONSTITUTION, HARVARD YARD, BACK BAY and CAPE COD, this is my favorite Martin novel.

Fantastic book that alernates historical passages with present-day passages. The contrast shows the reader just how different life is today than it was when the pilgrims arrived.

This book is incredible and enduring - the author an amazing talent. I keep my book journal on my desk with the names of all authors that I check on occasionally for new offerings - and William Martin has soared to the top of the list. His characters are full bodied, flawed, human, believable and impossible to leave. The history is infallible and tangible. The story line is akin to your own family history. This book is over 700 pages and I felt like I flew through the centuries and grieved when it was through. I then purchased ALL his other books. This man has an amazing talent and you will do a disservice to your reading life if you miss out on his books. Please read!

This book is, without a doubt, one of the best books I have ever read. The characters aren't loveable, but they are so human and real that it pulls you right into the story. The plot never gets dull, as it keeps changing time periods with different points. Even though I just recently finished it, I feel as though I could pick it up right now and read it again. It is relatively long, but completely worth the time that it takes to read.
The ending isn't as good as it could be, meaning about the last 3 pages, but considering how amazing the rest of the book was, that doesn't really bother me at all.

I reread Deming's The New Economics the other day. For those of you unfamiliar with Deming, he is generally credited with helping to rebuild Japanese manufacturing after World War 2 and with the introduction of the quality revolution. Briefly, this book can be described as being about "people who are living under the tyranny of the prevailing style of management." It is basically an anti-competition, anti-top leadership book.

This book makes a great read and provides a simple introduction to Deming's approach. In his ideas, you can see a great many parallels to issues in the current economic crisis. Deming predicts such a crisis, although one could argue there have been many economic crises and predicting one about every 10 years would make you seem like a fortune teller.

One of Deming's argument, an argument echoed by Michael Moore, can be paraphrased as "everyone works hard and does a good job except top management." If we accept this argument, we have to ask why it is that only top management fails us (and it is a very hard argument to accept, but it does seem clear top management fails at times).

This goes back to our discussion of several weeks ago, and overlaps with the strategy theme. Basically, if we accept the argument that we are all ok except for top management that causes all the problems, there are several possibilities:

= Top management is evil because power corrupts.
= Top management is evil because evil people rise to the top.
= Top management is stupid because power makes us stupid.
= Top management is stupid because stupid people rise to the top.
= Modern organizations have become too large and too complex, making them nearly impossible to manage. We need to develop new methods of managing such organizations, including advanced decision aids.

Obviously, I lean toward the last one. And going back to HR and strategy, this is where HR can make a major contribution - in building comprehensive programs for succession management, including better methods. based on empirical research, of selecting, developing, and supporting leaders.

This book is excellently written by the late Dr. W. Edward Deming who was "heckled" out of America post-World War II by the American management leaders for his less-then-conventional managerial practices. After being heckled in America he was invited to Japan where that countries business leaders were re-building their nation. Dr. Deming's 14 Point Program was an instant success and he was soon heralded as the "Father" of modern Japanese Industrial Revolution. Japan honored him annually with the awarding of the Deming Award of Excellence. He was eventually called back to his native America where he continued to lecture until his untimely death in 1993. He was an icon of American management practices.

This book was very different from other author's quality books, and especially different from what I expected from other books that claimed to speak for Deming. There was no math (for better or worse), no goals of 6 sigma, or 8 sigma, or numerical goals at all. There was no treatment on how to rank employees, but there was a well-written section warning against this practice, and against pay-per-performance. This latter, I found veery believable. There was a good review of the diseases of companies and universities (mostly management diseases) and a clear view of how to deal with them. At the end there was also a treatment of non-management problems: product variation caused by equipment and the like. I found this last section hard to understand. Still, overall I thought I got my money's worth -- more of my money's worth from this book than from the 4 or 5 management books I'd read before.
After reading this book, I bought another Deming book, Out of the Crisis. It was similar though longer and more mathematical -- a plus for me.

"This book is for people who are living under the tyranny of the prevailing style of management," writes Deming in the preface. Deming has strong convictions, many of which are counter to conventional management thinking.

Deming does not believe in ratings and grades. He says performance is mostly attributable to the system in which that person works. "The forces of destruction that come from the present style of reward ... squeeze out from an individual, over his lifetime, his innate intrinsic motivation.... They build into him fear, self-defense, extrinsic motivation. We have been destroying our people from toddlers on through university and on the job. We must preserve the power of intrinsic motivation, dignity, cooperation, curiosity, joy in learning, that people are born with."

Nor does Deming think highly of goals. "Only the method is important, not the goal."

"It is wrong to suppose that if you can't measure it, you can't manage it - a costly myth."

"The customer is not in the pyramid. A pyramid, as an organization chart, thus destroys the system, if ever one was intended." Instead Deming uses flow diagrams.

"With shared responsibility, no one is responsible. Joint responsibility is totally different from divided responsibility... Learning under a teacher is a joint effort between teacher and pupil."

Deming makes the distinction between common causes of variation, and special causes. He quotes Brian Joiner who said, "One necessary qualification of anyone in management is to stop asking people to explain ups and downs ... that come from random variation."

Deming is a legendary name in quality management, especially in Japan through his consulting work with Japanese industry from 1950 onward. He died at age 93 before the second edition of this book went to press.

After reading the "New Economics" by W. Edwards Deming I was very surprised. Mr. Deming's made the book very easy to read and understand. In my case it was the examples that really put things in perspective. "The Red Bead Experiment" was an example that was very good at explaining exactly what it was that, we needed to take away from the example, the difference between common cause and special cause variation. Management should be solely responsible for the well being of the production line. Personally, Deming's did a really good job in describing typical work situations that I personally am aware of. I enjoyed the way he broke everything down into its simplest form. You do not have to be an industrial engineer to understand the message he is trying to convey. The message he is trying to convey is "Team Work" because it is only when every person in the group agrees with each other that everyone can come together for one common purpose. He was very specific in the situation that he believed everything and everyone could work together. In his eyes the hierarchy had to be done away with. There was no one person that was better than the next. This one belief that I have always believed in. I appreciate his train of thought and think that if it could be applied to the small stream businesses it would be extremely effective. It sounds like Deming's was a man of the people because he described every person's job just as important as the next. It sounded like he believed in the chain of command. I enjoyed this book thoroughly and would recommend it to those trying to get a more in-depth feel to what common cause variation and special cause variation really means.

So far, this book is such an easy read. I really enjoy the author's honesty and his ability to put the reader into the story, right on the streets of Boston. I would absolutely recommend this book.

While the story chapters in the book are individually interesting, they somehow don't make a whole. The book feels choppy, as if it needed additional narrative to make if flow more smoothly. I expected, based on other reviews, to become immersed in the life of a narcotics officer. Just a average read.

I truly enjoyed this book. Paul Doyle's experiences were something that needed to be put on paper and published for the world to see. Although the names and the places may change, the core root of the drug world remains the same. In reading this book I found that other than the bell bottom pants and silk shirts, the happenings of the underground drug world are in so many ways similar today. The difference being the technology used and the way the intelligence is gained. I bought this book at a fair where the author was present and signed my copy. I spoke to him for a few moments and told him that I worked for a police department in a neighboring town and that my husband was also a police officer. He suggested that I read it and have my husband do the same. This book was a real page turner and I wasn't able to put it down until I was finished. I was truly impressed with his compassion for people which can easily be lost in the investigative and enforcement field. He points out that he actually had to become 'one of them' in order to take some of these criminals down. It was a different day and age. God Bless Paul and the guys that he worked with. It's not a job for the meek and mild.

Read this book at the advice of a friend and it is a must read for every caring American. Opened my eyes to the sacrifice some people are doing on our behalf and opened my eyes to a life most of us cant imagine. These folks do it for us and then in the end the Author takes us on a learning experience about where the drug money goes and who is behind it - the terrorist connection. He also lets you know the solution to cracking the incredible drug problem in this country lies in our families and not in Washington. Read it

Excellent. Didn't want to stop reading until I was finished the book.

This book was recommended by a friend. I thoroughly enjoyed it. The seller sent it as promised and well within the shipment window promised.

This compelling memoir of Adele Crockett Robertson, known as Kitty, chronicles just a few years of her life during the early 1930's. While her story takes place during the Great Depression, it is uplifting and inspiring. I found myself cheering Kitty on as she describes her exhausting experiences to save the family property from foreclosure.

Kitty was not down and out as millions were. She was young, optimistic, and energetic. Faced with enormous debt when her father died and propelled by childhood memories of her family harvesting bumper crops of apples, Kitty decided to work the old family farm. The farm, in Ipswich, had become a rundown homestead; but the orchard was still there, holding promise. The very first obstacles are members of Kitty's family, her mother and two brothers, who speculate how quickly the venture will fail: "Let the bank take it," they chorus.

Undaunted, Kitty leaves her secure job to take up residence on the abandoned farm. What she finds are a stack of unpaid bills, neglected farm equipment, and leaky pipes. Like her father before her, Kitty believes in the fruit trees he planted for his retirement: "I wanted to preserve what we'd had, even though the animals were no longer there, and it was apples now."

Negotiating with creditors, Kitty settles some of the unpaid bills, while securing credit of much larger amounts to repair the farm machinery. Unable to pay for coal, she moves her bed and sofa to a small area near the sunny kitchen.

One of Kitty's first tasks is the spraying of the trees, a job that normally takes two men to accomplish. Kitty tackles the job alone. More challenges ensue. We are right beside her as she describes her first encounter with a swarm of bees, her frantic search for the old smoker, and finally getting the bees under control.

As a helper, Kitty hires Joe, a memorable figure. With a family of six to feed, he skips meals in order to feed the children. Joe comes to Kitty's rescue time after time, even staring down, with an unloaded gun, peddlers bent on stealing a truckload of apples.

Later, following a good harvest, Kitty despairs as she tells of racing to gather blankets from attic trunks, even her own bed, as temperatures drop and she attempts to cover hundreds of freshly packed boxes of apples ready for market, to keep them from freezing in the cellar.

The Foreword and Epilogue, written by Kitty's daughter, Eleanor Robertson Cramer, tell how she discovered the manuscript Kitty had stashed at the bottom of a bookcase. We learn of Kitty's life beyond the years of her memoir--further struggles, marriage, and later her accomplishments as a local historian, town selectwoman, and journalist.

The Orchard brings the Depression close to those of us who have heard the wrenching stories from parents and grandparents, as I have. Kitty's narrative, like my father's stories, is real, about a lone woman who strives to keep the family heritage with determination and grit, tempered with kindness to those around her in worse situations. Adele (Kitty) Crockett Robertson deserves a place in the annals of literature of the Great Depression. If you read but one personal account of surviving the Depression, let it be this.

by Diana Nolan
for Story Circle Book Reviews
reviewing books by, for, and about women

My only complaint about this book is that it only covers two years of the author's life in detail. I hated for the book to end. I wish she had had time to write more, because she was an amazing person. Kitty's father, a doctor, raised his family in a colonial farmhouse by the ocean. Beginning in her childhood, he made Kitty learn to do a man's work in the orchard. He also gave her a series of boats to sail on the ocean. She loved the farm and the sea. She got a college education and a good job in a college museum, but gave it all up when her father died at the beginning of the depression. None of her brothers were willing to do the backbreaking labor to keep the heavily mortgaged farm working. Kitty quit her good job and immersed herself in running the orchard, which her father had always said would save the farm he loved. She lived alone except her beloved dog, with no money and little heat in the winter. Her own family seemed determined to see her fail. She found good, loyal friends though, and though her life was daunting, it was also full of the joy of nature and achievment. I can't praise this book enough.

This book was truly one of the most interesting and capturing books I have ever read. I felt like I was present in the story and now can't wait to go to Ipswich and see this old farm house.

In this extraordinary memoir from 1932-1934, Kitty Crockett Robertson describes her life on the North Shore of Massachusetts during the Depression, a time when she, a Harvard graduate, became a hard-working apple farmer to save the family farm in Ipswich. Her physician father had died, and Kitty, wanting to keep the farm from being sold for development, which her Boston-based brothers favored, decided to give up her job working at the Harvard Library to try to make the orchard profitable enough to save the land.

Working almost single-handedly, she spent the next two years doing all the dirty work, learning in the process that "The Depression was that time of leveling when she and her neighbors kept going on the strength they learned from each other." From her earliest days on the farm, she personally pruned trees, cleared land, repaired sprayers and tractors, gathered swarming bees into hives, hired five workers at twice the going rate (because they, too, needed to make ends meet), dealt with an arrogant banker anxious to foreclose, protected her apples at gunpoint when necessary, and then fought the weather, storms, and a December temperature drop to twenty degrees below zero in her efforts to bring the crop to market.

In the process she earned the love of her workers (who had regarded her, at first, as an idle "North Shore millionaire"), gave up everything in her personal life to devote herself completely to her task, worked up to 16 hours a day for two years during the apple and peach seasons, and gained new appreciation for the values she saw every day among her workers, the wholesaler who bought her drops and cider apples, and the purchasing agent of Harvard, who helped her make commercial connections to sell her crop.

Robertson, who became a newspaper and radio columnist in her later years, was a formidable writer who always recognized the values which unite people, regardless of their "class," and this quality pervades her personal memoir. Unfinished, because her life became too busy to finish it after 1934, it was discovered upon her death in 1979 by her daughter, and it is she who moves the story to its conclusion after 1934. Filled with personal detail and wonderful tributes to those who helped her, Robertson is never self-serving, readily admitting her weaknesses while stressing her efforts to succeed. A unique look at one farm and its history during the Depression, The Orchard is an extraordinary record of the times, written by a truly extraordinary woman. n Mary Whipple

This book was given to me less than a month after I returned from a trip to Bhutan in the late fall of 2006. If you are seeking only a portable guidebook on your trip, look elsewhere (I used Lonely Planet). But if the objective is to find the best photographic portrait of a very special place, this is the book for you. This is a reduced version of a book that measures 5x7 feet, that weighs 150 pounds, and that holds a Guinness World Record. It is also a charitable project, intended to provide funds for university education of Bhutanese students. Although the book was published in 2004, I noticed that it includes several photos (such as those of Dochu La and Taktsang Gompa) that were taken before some recent and rather dramatic changes. I cannot help but conclude that many of the shots will become historically significant over time. But as an artistic collection, the photos are truly stunning. It is unusual to find not only intimate shots of a beautiful group of people, but majestic views of the incredible landscape. I look at my copy often, for it transports me to the other side of the world.

nous avons visiter le bhoutan l'année passer et vu le livre dans un suisse guest house et depuis on le cherchait. Tres heureux de l'avoir trouver de superbes photos les paysages, monastères, le peuple et coutume que nous avons pu rencontrer pendant notre voyage inoubliable, merci

This book is amazing, it is just like you are there. Extremely well packaged and shipped 2nd day air via UPS. Worth every penny.

The first time I walked into the West Chicago, IL library after the Bhutan book was placed on display, I thought I had been transported to the Himalayas. Standing in front of these gorgeous mountains, I could feel myself being pulled in. Subsequent days as the pages were turned, I was impressed with the beauty of the area, the beauty of the people, the vibrancy of their costumes. I make a lot of trips to the library-don't want to miss a page. Thanks Dr. George Hawley for donating your son's wonderful work to West Chicago. Worth a trip to view where ever it is on display.

Let's face it. You'd be stupid not to get the "Better Together" deal, which includes an $8 map of Bhutan with the $15,000 book!

Gilbert Morris Books are wonderful, with romance, history and a spiritual uplift and reminder that exceed most books I have read.

I have been a huge Gilbert Morris fan for a long time. I seemed to have read every other series he wrote besides his most famous one, The House of Winslow. I am most drawn to his books due to the fact that he likes to take historical events and add to them. His knowledge or rather maybe just the research he puts into each book is what makes his books all the better.

This book is just the beginning of Gilbert Winslow's family line. Gilbert joins a group of religious separatists in order to find out some information for a very high Lord of England. While the group's strict ways surprise Gilbert he comes to have a strong connection with some of them. Will Gilbert betray the group that seems to accept him as one of their own?

I absolutely loved this book; it was a great start to the series. I did not seem to want to put the book down, but to continue reading so that I could find out what happens next.

Follow Gilbert Morris as he spins the tale of Gilbert Winslow and the beginning of the New World!

In this book a young man is hired by an English lord to spy on the Separatists living in Holland, particularly to discover the whereabouts of William Brewster, one of the leaders of the religious dissenters. Gilbert Winslow's task will lead him to travel on the Mayflower, and have to determine where his loyalties truly are. This is book 1 in the incredibly prolific House of Winslow series

This book is . . . nice. Not especially challenging, thought provoking, or whatnot, but nice. I like history, don't mind the religious undertone, good times had by all. Morris is a Christian author, but I've found that his stuff is generally not the `religion shoved down your throat repeatedly" variety, and since I'm a sucker for the nice romantic stories it's a win-win situation. So I would recommend it with reservations

This book kicks off one awesome series. Gilbert Morris may be a bit long winded at times, but his characters are interesting, the history's cool, and the plot twists sneak up on you.

Gilbert Winslow sets out to spy on the Puritans, loses his heart and more to a Puritan and becomes a better man for it.

This is a remarkable story. It is full of history and I learned a lot about the ways of life of the puritans from reading it. You will meet the characters you find in your history books in a way you never knew them before! I read it very quickly because the characters were so well developed and the plot exciting. The romance was wonderful, but this isn't a romance novel so it wasn't overdone. This is the first book in the House of Winslow series and it tells the story of young gilbert winslow who takes on a job as a spy to turn in one of the leading puritan pastors. It follows his journey on the Mayflower and the lives of the settlers. This story is captivating, simply put. Will Gilbert be able to turn in the innocent man even after he has come to love the Puritans? Will he go back and Marry Cecily and forget all about dear Humility? Everyone should read this book.

I have read many books about the cultural revolution but this one stands out amongst them all. The story he tell is a complete one. Finally, we get to hear positive things about communism as well as the negative. I enjoyed reading Zhu's account about what a good communist his father was during his life. I hear the pride in his words. Zhu's father must be thought of as a hero back in China. Usually, you hear about government officials using their position to benefit themselves, but his father believed in the system. Even though I don't beleive in it myself, it's refreshing to hear from those who do. Zhu has a gift with words that I hope he will continue to share with us.

I have read many books about the cultural revolution but this one stands out amongst them all. The story he tell is a complete one. Finally, we get to hear positive things about communism as well as the negative. I enjoyed reading Zhu's account about what a good communist his father was during his life. I hear the pride in his words. Zhu's father must be thought of as a hero back in China. Usually you hear about government officials using their position to benefit themselves. Zhu's father believed in the system. Even though I don't beleive in it myself, it's refreshing to hear from those who do. Zhu has a gift with words that I hope he will continue to share with us.

Having lived and worked as an American teacher in China now for two years, I've been able to read a number of biographies and memoirs of China's modern history. But unlike so many westerners who read such literature, I don't have the luxury of finishing a book and passing it off as some faraway account of a society and system that I'll never personally have to deal with. On the contrary, I see and share daily in the environment that China is - the aftereffects of her history of poverty and oppression, the often-autocratic decisions of the government, the worldview that communism and recent extreme nationalism have shaped, and the now-booming economy and the poor it has left behind - and I have no choice: I must live and interact as a good citizen with a positive attitude in the surroundings in which I find myself, for better or worse.

Jan Wong's `Red China Blues' was the first memoir I picked up and read after I arrived. Though her work is a masterpiece of brutally honest journalism and is invaluable in tracking China's progress and change from Mao to now, Wong herself is Canadian, not Chinese; she can ultimately take China or leave it.

But enter Zhu Xiao Di. Born in 1958 into the home of one of Nanjing's most principled and loyal communist public officials, Zhu learned from his father's undying commitment to personal and public integrity and came of age during the nightmare of Chairman Mao's 1966-76 Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. '30 Years in a Red House' is his memoir of his own youth and growth during this tumultuous time, but even more so a memoir of his father's bitter suffering under the frenzied policies of Beijing's leadership. It is a story not of a starry-eyed outsider attempting to join in China's revolution, but of a Chinese person himself trying to remain loyal to the highest ideals and find sensibility and good even in the greatest of miseries.

Wong shows you China through the eyes of a foreigner who can ultimately walk away from China and its problems if she must; Zhu Xiao Di shows you China through the eyes of someone who will die to save it. '30 Years' is, frankly, much healthier reading for foreigners such as myself who must maintain a positive attitude toward our Chinese environment.

Zhu's picture of every facet of his family's daily life in Nanjing is full of insights into the culture of communism and reasons why the society was structured the way it was. It's full of personal stories of friends and relatives who struggled bitterly through the Cultural Revolution and the economic emergence that followed it. And it's full of perspective on the shifts of government and the way in which policies from Beijing affected every person's life during that time. We learn of his grandparents and their youth and adulthood during three great eras of 20th-Century China; of his father's ten years as an influential and heroic underground communist, leading to a career as an uncompromising and loyal public servant, followed by a severe denunciation and internment as a public enemy, and ending in release and return to public work; and of Zhu Xiao Di's own education as a circumspect youth, his entrance into college and experiences as one among the great Cohort '77, his work as a teacher, and his eventual pursuit of overseas study as a means to ultimately return to China and be a contributor to her economic and social growth. His knowledge of historical and political events, his grasp of western literature, and his ability to aid the westerner (the American, particularly) in understanding and appreciating Chinese and communist values and thought, are marvelous and indispensable.

For those westerners particularly interested in life and work in China, I recommend '30 Years in a Red House' without hesitation. Could I do it over again, this would be the first book I would read upon arriving here. Other memoirs may tell more riveting stories of fear or horror, other biographies and texts may give greater details of the intricacies of history and politics and great figures, but few - perhaps none - will instill you with as much love and appreciation for China itself and burden to see her society become and just and prosperous one.

I have read many books about the cultural revolution but this one stands out amongst them all. The story he tell is a complete one. Finally, we get to hear positive things about communism as well as the negative. I enjoyed reading Zhu's account about what a good communist his father was during his life. I hear the pride in his words. Zhu's father must be thought of as a hero back in China. Usually, you hear about government officials using their position to benefit themselves, but his father believed in the system. Even though I don't beleive in it myself, it's refreshing to hear from those who do. Zhu has a gift with words that I hope he will continue to share with us.

I grew up in China. My family had similar experiences and background as the author. I could identify myself with the characters in the book. My personal experience was very painful before and during the "Cultural Revolution". For a long time, I couldn't look back without crying hard. Thank you for telling your story.
Whenever I read a book about China, either by native Chinese or foreigners, I found certain sterotype about China, Chinese families and Chinese people. A Chinese given name consists of 1 or 2 characters. Since Chinese characters are very rich in meanings they could represent, a name could tell a lot. My name, as well as my siblings' and all my cousins were carefully chosen by my grandfather. My given name, only two characters, tells where I was born. It also represents fountain flowing at great speed, which my grandpa thought was a symbol of life. It may be true that China is a male dominated society. However there are a lot of people who don't follow the trend. I was the third girl in the family. My parents were just as happy if not happier about my birth as compared if I were a boy. As a matter of fact, in the environment I grew up, there was no difference what so ever about boys or girls whom the parents preferred. Many families actually preferred girls to boys as Chinese people all believe when children grow up, girls are more considerate to their parents (this is another sterotype, but many believe it). I guess, after all, it is the parents, not the society decide if boys are preferred to girls. Families are different in China, just like they are different in the States.
BTW, My late father was a surgeon. My beloved mother had been a teacher before she decided to quit her job to be a full time mom.

In one of those odd literary coincidences two Moby Dick fans simultaneously got the bright idea of writing fictional accounts about Ahab's wife, but while Sena Jeter Naslund was writing for publication, Louise M. Gouge was writing her dissertation novel, not really expecting to ever publish it. (One assumes that the critical and commercial success of Naslund's Ahab's Wife: Or, The Star-gazer: A Novel lead Gouge's editor and agent to push her into polishing it up for publication as her third book.) What resulted was the Ahab's Legacy trilogy, of which this is the first volume.

You might think it unfair to compare the two, and you'd be right but for the wrong reasons. Naslund's Everyone Loves Una; Or, The Navel-Gazer: A Mary Sue, as I call it, is one of the worst books I've ever forced myself to finish. In contrast the Ahab's Legacy trilogy was a pleasure to read.

Similarities abound, both authors having decided that an unconventional girl was needed to win old Ahab's heart, but profound differences exist that make for interesting comparison and contrast. Thus, while Una is a laughably absurd prodigy, Hannah is simply a woman slightly ahead of her time due to an unconventional upbringing as the doted on only child of a devoted widower. While Una basks in the worship of mid-nineteenth century New England's thoughtful elites, Hannah reads their books, attends their lectures, and finds her thinking profoundly influenced by them. Compared to unintentionally hilarious Una, Hannah comes across as only slightly more modern than everyone else, an all too human figure.

This first volume is about their love and marriage and his obsession and death.

Note: Louise M. Gouge is a devout Christian, and Christian themes are explored throughout the novels so if Christianity gives you a rash, you have been warned. However, to her credit, Gouge does little preaching and never gets preachy.

The middle book of the trilogy is Hannah Rose, and the final book of the trilogy is Son of Perdition.

Louise Gouge's telling of Ahab's Bride's story is beautifully wrought. The tone is consistent throughout the book, so much so that I was captivated by the time period. She does a lovely job of capturing Ahab's obsession, his penchance for pushing away anyone who longed to have deep ties with him--all in all a great character study of pride and its destructiveness both to the person who is prideful and the person living near the pride-filled one.

I normally don't read historical fiction, but I greatly enjoyed this book.

Ahab's Bride is captivating. Although I am not easily hooked into a novel, I was hooked almost before I could take a breath. I could hardly put the book down until I was finished.

From the first paragraph the reader is transported back in time to 19th century Nantucket into the world of Moby Dick's Captain Ahab and the woman who falls love with him. With an impeccable depiction of the period, Louise M. Gouge walks us through the dusty streets of two whaling communities and into the lives of these fictional, but realistic characters.

Hannah Rose, the viewpoint characer, is a woman who transcends time, a woman we easily identify with, a strong woman who goes after her dreams and faces life with honesty and courage, somewhat reminiscent of Ida in Cold Mountain.

Meanwhile, the person of Captain Ahab, as seen through the eyes of love, takes on new and intriguing dimensions which make you want to brush off your copy of Moby Dick and read it all over again.

Louise Gouge does a terrific job of showing us the real Ahab, both his obsession with the White Whale and his more personal life when on land. Great story.

As the prelude to Herman Melville's Moby Dick, Louise M. Gouge's Ahab's Bride stirs a reader's desire to read the classic novel. Gouge's handling of the text is well done, her characters jump from the page, and the narrative fills in the blanks concerning the life of literature's mightiest whaler, Captain Ahab.

Hannah Oldweiler is drawn to Captain Ahab from their first meeting, as he is to her. They marry, much to the disappointment of both Hannah's father and her young suitor, Jeremiah Harris, both of whom worry for her spiritual welfare.

It does not take long for Hannah to realize that her marriage to Ahab will have no effect on his vocation, as he continues to disappear on the interminable whaling ventures, leaving her to care for the estate. At the conclusion of one of these voyages, Ahab returns with a wooden leg, lost in a struggle with a giant white whale, and becomes consumed with revenge.

Taking second place to Ahab's grudge match, Hannah and her small son are left to face life alone. How will Hannah learn the lessons life is offering her and how long will it take before she turns back to God in her loneliness and confusion?

Craig Hart (...)

Every leftist political movement has its `high holy days' of remembrance, or it should. The international labor movement has May Day and in the America labor movement today, Labor Day. There are, however, other days worthy of celebration by militants here in America (and internationally) like the anniversaries of Sacco and Vanzetti, the great general strikes of 1934 in Toledo, Minneapolis and San Francisco and the subject of this review the great `Bread and Roses' strike in the textile mills of Lawrence, Massachusetts in 1912. That, until recently, this heroic (and victorious) strike was not remembered officially under any conditions by that very representative working class city and that its continues to remain shrouded in ignorance tells as much about contemporary American labor as any other indicator. That ignorance is something that Professor Bruce Watson has with this effort attempted to remedy. As an important work of labor history Watson has done more than a commendable job. Moreover, because he has done such a scholarly, well-written and easily readable work today's militants can draw many lessons from that seemingly long ago labor struggle.

On completion of this book I was struck by the parallels between the conditions that fostered that 1912 strike, the social composition of that work force and the attitudes of those bosses and today's `globalized' capitalist working conditions. The ethnic and racial groupings today that make up the core of the American working class, for example, are somewhat different from those that fought the 1912 where South and East Europeans predominated. However, the much overused sociological term `melting pot' still applies to the extend that the working class is not heterogeneous in its racial and ethnic makeup, a factor that not only aids the breakdown of class unity but is, a more or less, conscious stratagem of the bosses to divide the working class at the base. Moreover, although we are not talking about fighting for nickel and dime raises like those asked for then today the wage system has created a wider gap between rich and poor that would not be unfamiliar to those strikers long ago. And certainly the bosses have not changed, although they are certainly slicker than in those days of William Woods and the other textile magnates. And they put their money where their mouths are, spending over a billion dollars a years to defeat unionization drives and strike action.

One question, on which there is no comparison, or none worthy of mention, is the difference in labor leadership as the 1912 strike evolved and today's labor leadership. This refers not only to the differences in political perspective of the Bill Haywood and Joseph Ettor-led Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and today's Democratic Party-embedded labor leadership which are striking enough but about the nature of society and politics. Fundamentally the old preamble to the IWW constitution drawn up in 1905 is correct in its assertion that there are two distinct and different class interests in the world and at the end of the day they are irreconcilble. Today's labor leadership acts as if there wasn't a capitalist that it did not like. An interesting sidelight to the IWW-led 1912 struggle was the attempt by the conservative traditional craft unions associated with the AFof L during the strike to break away from the bulk of the unskilled laborers who formed the core of the textile industry. That has happened in later struggles as well.

One thing that was clear then and has been muddied by today's labor bureaucracy (with no little help from social democratic and other leftists) is the role of the state. If any mass struggle in the last one hundred years points out the capitalist class nature of the American state it is Lawrence. At every critical point from the first day of the strike and from the lowest level of government the police and military power of the state was used against the working class and in defense of the interests of the capitalist class. This is the class struggle in the raw, up close and personal, that usually only gets exposed in pre-revolutionary or revolutionary situations.

If nothing else, whatever Professor Watson's personal political sympathies may be, he has performed a great service by placing the Lawrence strike in the context of the development of American capitalism, especially in its post-robber baron period; the development of the multi-ethnic working class; the role of the development of light industry and the Merrimack Valley in the development of American capitalism; the creation and furtherance of a radical response to the primitive capitalist production conditions; and, the role of the state in capitalist society. One may fault Professor Watson with a bit of a `kitchen sink' approach to this work when he brings in every possible event and personality that can reasonably or logically be connected with the Lawrence strike in any way. Even Marxists recognize limits to the interrelatedness of events in any particular situation. However, that is a small price to pay for this important addition to labor history. Kudos.

Bruce Watson's "Bread and Roses" tells the captivating story of the 1912 textile strike in the mill town of Lawrence, Massachusetts. Now known as the "bread and roses strike", it united dozens of communities of immigrant workers under the leadership of the radical anti-capitalist Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) to win a months-long struggle against all odds. One of the IWW's greatest victories, it also proved to be a short-lived one. In less than a year, the union in Lawrence had been all but exterminated, victim of a violent reaction the likes of which wouldn't be seen again until the jingoistic hysteria of the First World War and subsequent red scare.

Watson's telling of the story is a beautifully written, meticulously detailed and documented account. His fast-moving, journalistic history stretches beyond the strike itself in frequent tangents, to provide a glimpse at labor organizing and class conflict in early twentieth century America, starring Big Bill Haywood, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, "Smiling Joe" Ettor and hometown organizer Angelo Rocco, with cameos from Gene Debs, Joe Hill, Clarence Darrow, "T-Bone Slim", Morris Hillquit, John Reed, Emma Goldman, Teddy Roosevelt, Nicola Sacco, and many others.

My chief criticism of Watson's account is actually that he makes it too much a story. He gets swept up in the romance and legend of the "Wobblies", which leads him to neglect a serious analysis of their program and goals. Watson never really comes to grips with the radical anti-capitalist agenda of the IWW and the strike itself, characterizing it merely as part of the "struggle for the American dream".

Although Watson tries to maintain journalistic neutrality, it becomes clear that his sympathies lie with the strikers, if not their self-proclaimed "historic mission... to do away with capitalism". This is especially the case when he discusses the aftermath of the strike, when the union was violently suppressed and equal violence was done to history. In the sanitized history of the strike that was then established, Lawrence was a peaceful, idyllic town, with no poverty, no slums, no hunger, no low wages, no oppression. Then a handful of outside agitators descended on the town, exploiting flighty and feeble-minded immigrants, to manufacture a labor dispute where none truly existed.

Nonsense, of course, and Watson does a good job of demolishing it, and an even better job of telling a more accurate tale. The story of the Lawrence strike is one we all should know, and even those already familiar with it are not likely to find a more engaging account of it than "Bread and Roses".

I saw this reviewed on one of the public television shows. I read it, then passed it on to my Union to add to their library. Excellent work, very informative.

I was raised in Lawrence. My grandmother was a polish immigrant weaver at the Wood Mill and my grandfather was an Irish plant foreman at the Arlington Mills as was my father. I have been reading and researching Lawrence for some time. In fact in my book about growing up in Lawrence "A Summer with Charlie" now listed on Amazon, I include a short synopsis of the Strike of 1912. When I saw Mr. Watson's book advertised, I had to have it. He did an excellent job as did Mr. Moran on "The Belles of New England". If you really want some fun books about Lawrence get Images of America, Lawrence Massachusetts by Ken Skulski and friends. These are two volumes full of old pictures and descriptions of good old Lawrence. Whenever I get nostalgic and lonely for the old days and the good times I go over and start browsing through one of these volumes.
Bruce Watson's book is much the same - I loved walking with the strikers up and down all those familiar streets and learning about the history of my old hometown. This book should be a required reading at Lawrence High and Central Catholic, that's for sure.

I grew up in Lawrence and had several members of my family work in the woolen mills....

Although the strike was not talked about, I was very aware of how hard the work was and how much sacrifice was made by each family.

Sadly, the history of the strike was not taught in our classrooms - I strongly believe that it is as relevant today..... I urge everyone to read this book and to take it to your heart. Bruce Watson did an extraordinary job presenting this story.

I always was and always will be proud to be a member of one of those hardworking immigrant families.....and continue to be proud to have been raised in Lawrence.