New Mexico Books


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New Mexico Books sorted by Average customer review: high to low .

New Mexico
Farolitos of Christmas
Published in Paperback by University of New Mexico Press (1987-06)
Author: Rudolfo A. Anaya
List price: $6.95
Used price: $7.98

Average review score:

Enchanting Christmas story
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2007-11-24
This is one of Anaya's enchanting stories reflecting the Hispanic culture of northern New Mexico, unique in all the US. This old, deep culture is rooted in high desert austerity. It is a rural life of sparseness. Beauty is found in family life and small traditions. All who read this charming story will be enriched. To see the simple "paper bags with candles" lining roads and driveways on Christmas Eve is to be transported. This story is perfect for the holidays.

The Farolitos of Christmas tells a tale of family love.
Helpful Votes: 10 out of 11 total.
Review Date: 2000-04-08
The Farolitos of Christmas tells a warm story of a young girl's respect and love for her grandfather, who is too ill to keep his commitment to light fires at Christmas time. The story creates how the young girl thought of "farolitos" or "little lights" to be used to keep the promise in an acceptable way and also light the path for the carolers at Christmas time. A wonderful story that reflects the rich family traditions of the Mexican American culture. This book was one of the winners of the 1995 Tomás Rivera Mexican American Children's Book Award, given to recognize books that authentically reflect the lives and experiences of Mexican Americans in the United States.

Farolitos of Christmas
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2007-11-05
This book is an excellent way for children to learn about their own culture or the culture of others with whom they may be attending school. This is a meaningful story of giving the most valuable of all gifts: love and gestures of personal comitment toward those whom we love. There are numerous such stories for children, but this is from the cultural confluence of the Hispanic and Native American cultures and we need many more such stories.

Some Corrections ...
Helpful Votes: 7 out of 7 total.
Review Date: 2003-12-02
This is a wonderful, warm book, and gives an insight into a culture that is different from what most in other parts of the U.S. have experienced. But the culture is not Mexican American, but the Hispanic culture of Northern New Mexico, which dates back to the late 16th Century. I can't, in a short review, list the distinctions, but they are deep and significant. For more information, see the other works by Rudolfo Anaya, Christmas in Old Santa Fe, by Pedro Ortega, and histories of the area such as Horgan's Great River. In short, New Mexico was at the end of a very long journey from Mexico, and the isolation produced its own rich and unique culture.

New Mexico
Fetish Carvers of Zuni
Published in Paperback by Maxwell Museum of Anthropology (1990-12)
Author: Marion Rodee
List price: $18.95
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Average review score:

With personal testimonies of modern Zuni fetish carvers
Helpful Votes: 10 out of 11 total.
Review Date: 2002-09-08
Now in a newly revised and updated edition, The Fetish Carvers Of Zuni is collaboratively written by Marian Rodee (Curator of Southwestern Ethnology, Maxwell Museum of Anthropology, University of New Mexico) and James Ostler (Pueblo of Zuni Arts and Crafts) and offers a thoughtful, fascinating, and informative look at the Zuni Native American tradition and art form of carving fetishes. 103 halftones and 94 color photographs profusely illustrate the history of fetish carving, works of art, and its practice today. Personal testimonies of modern Zuni fetish carvers as well as scholarly appraisals of this art form round out this book about a unique and fascinating Native American art form. The Fetish Carvers Of Zuni is a welcome and much appreciated contribution to Native American Studies reference collections and supplemental reading lists.

The Fetish Cavers of Zuni - worth the effort
Helpful Votes: 12 out of 12 total.
Review Date: 2001-12-27
This book is worth the effort it usually takes to track down. It is well written, easy to read (lots of white space and illustrations). Now we just need for them to write another volume, it's been a while since this was written, and the Zuni fetish world is always evolving.

A must have resource for the fetish collector.
Helpful Votes: 25 out of 25 total.
Review Date: 1997-06-30
When collecting Native American fetish carvings, one important factor in determining a piece's value is the availability of the artist's name. This book provides the only source I've ever seen into the lives and work of modern Zuni carvers. It includes several family trees which show how the particular styles of carving were passed down through families. I have found this book to be a great resource and a fascinating view of these peoples lives

Best Resource for Zuni Fetishes
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2006-11-21
I've been collecting the carvings of the Zuni for some years now and have found this book to be the most valuable and useful source for information not only on the carvers, but on the meaning of their creations. It is an excellent introduction to the carvers, but I also find the family trees very helpful. I keep track of the carvers whose work I have in my collection and this book is the only one I've found that helps me to do that. It is also as honest a guide to this culture and the carvers as you will find. It is very difficult to keep up with the carvers and their families, but this book is as helpful a source as you will find.

New Mexico
Fine Indian Jewelry of the Southwest: The Millicent Rogers Museum Collection
Published in Paperback by Museum of New Mexico Press (2007-08)
Author: Shelby Jo-anne Tisdale
List price: $34.95
New price: $22.56
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Average review score:

A recommended addition to personal, academic, and community library Native American Studies reference collections
Helpful Votes: 16 out of 17 total.
Review Date: 2006-08-07
Painstakingly compiled and with an expert, knowledgeable commentary by Shelby J. Tisdale, Fine Indian Jewelry Of The Southwest: The Millicent Rogers Museum Collection offers an impressively informative history and survey of the southwestern Native American jewelry that is represented in the collection of the Millicent Rogers Museum as the result of art patron and passionate collector Millicent Rogers who assembled a spectacular collection of Navajo and Zuni silver and turquoise, Hopi silverwork, and Pueblo stone and shell jewelry during the late 1940s and early 1950s. Of special interest is the chapter devoted to "The Origins of Indian Jewelry in the Southwest". Profusely illustrated and a very strongly recommended addition to personal, academic, and community library Native American Studies reference collections, Fine Indian Jewelry Of The Southwest is enhanced for scholars and non-specialist general readers alike with the inclusion of a glossary, references, and an index.

GOOD SERVICE
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 8 total.
Review Date: 2007-02-06
I HAVE ORDERED SEVERAL BOOKS FROM AMAZON AND THEY ARE EXPEDIENT AND HAVE A GOOD BOOKS AT A GREAT PRICE. AVAILABILITY GREAT. I WILL CONTINUE TO DO BUSINESS WITH AMAZON AND THEIR SERVICE. THANK YOU, BECKY DYER

must-have book for Southwest Indian Jewelry coll;ectors
Helpful Votes: 8 out of 10 total.
Review Date: 2007-03-14
This is a glorious book of Southwest Indian Jewelry with interesting info on Millicent Rogers, who herself was a work of art.

A must-have for collectors of Southwest Indian Jewelry.

Excellent Reference Book on Southwest Indian Jewelry
Helpful Votes: 9 out of 10 total.
Review Date: 2007-05-30
If you like Indian Jewelry but can't get to the museum in Taos this is a great first book on the subject. If you do go to the Millicent Rodgers Museum, this is the book to help you savor that grand experience for many years to come. And it's a great reference work if you are contemplating investing in Zuni or Navajo jewelry.

Wilford's Trading Post
Gallup, New Mexico

New Mexico
Flights of Fancy - Volume 1: Poetry of Dawn Huffaker
Published in Paperback by CreateSpace (2007-11-23)
Author: Dawn Huffaker
List price: $30.00
New price: $30.00

Average review score:

A review of "Flights of Fancy"
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-05-10
Dawn has refined her poetry to the point that in just a few words, she's able to paint eloquent pictures. Many people are able to use the mechanics of poetry to write something that rhymes and has the correct amount of syllables, but Dawn is a true artist, and every stroke of her brush is masterful.

Flights of Fancy Review
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-01-01
I bought this book as a gift for my mom. I looked it over when I received it and was sure mom would like it. She loved it and my daughter seen it and now I am ordering one for her.

A Review for "Flights of Fancy" by Chase Von
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2008-04-28
Flights of Fancy by Dawn Huffaker is a beautiful collection of poetry by a very gifted writer. As I was reading through this remarkable book I kept getting ideas of my own, and one of them was I knew I was going to be sharing it with my daughters second grade teacher. This work is suitable for all ages but I found myself thinking, "Now here is someone that has captured the voice of nature in such a way it has to be shared!"

Summer has its own unique personality, as does Spring, Winter and Fall although deep meanings are shared through out. Dawn gives a voice to trees, leaves, snow, rain, the changing seasons, the moon, the sun and the stars and as you can tell, I could just keep going, but it is a wise voice, a beautiful voice and an Angelic voice.

Regardless of age you won't ever look at a butterfly, a flower, a tree or a coming "Spring Shower" or "Thunderstorm" quite the same again!

(Excerpts from Winter Scene)

Silent trees
Sleep peacefully
In the cold
Winter's air.

Golden grass
Nod their heads
As they dream
Of summer's dance

(Another excerpt from Flight's of Fancy Volume 1)

'tis Time for Spring

Tree
Yawning, stretching
Deep breath,
Alive
Awake,
'tis time to bloom;
'tis time for spring.

Personally I think this should be included in all the elementary curriculums through out the US and that the state of New Mexico should be honoring this gifted bard by having the process begin there. As well as recognizing her creations and the woman herself as one of the state treasures!

Ridiculously high praise?

Read it then judge for yourself! In a world where children are no longer allowed to really be children, this book clearly captures the magic of nature and what it is to view nature with the eyes of a child, unabashed appreciation for the many gifts God has surrounded us with!

I highly recommend it for children and adults alike who in most cases, sadly I also add, have forgotten what children seem to know instinctively...

Nature has a voice...

And all the nature that surrounds us is intriguing, wondrous, mysterious, magical and worthy of so much more thought and appreciation then we in most cases give it. Almost every day my daughter has to read a book for school, record the title and who the author(s) are, as well as how long she read it. This book is definitely going to be one of the books I personally assign to her for her Reading Log.

Thanks Dawn for sharing your gift with this world of ours and I will be sure to let her know also, that this is Volume one, and that means there is more to come!

Sincerely,
Chase Von
Your Chance to Hear The Last Panther Speak

Recognizing a Contemporary Poetic Voice of Joy, Strength & Hope
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2008-04-28
With her first published volume of poetry, Dawn Huffaker has created a very thoughtful journal of her observations on the seasons, moments of wonder, moments of pain and her joy in the witness of the beauty in nature. Dawn's is a quiet, simple yet direct voice, which communicates the strength of her experience and her vision. These are welcomed words which touch this reader like a much needed breath of fresh air. Best wishes, Dawn, for your continued success!

New Mexico
Gatewood and Geronimo
Published in Paperback by University of New Mexico Press (2000-06-01)
Author: Louis Kraft
List price: $22.95
New price: $12.95
Used price: $9.69
Collectible price: $35.00

Average review score:

You need look no further for the facts!
Helpful Votes: 11 out of 12 total.
Review Date: 2001-04-06
I have not counted the number of books and papers regarding Geronimo's surrender but they are many. Here are the facts, easy to read, accurate, and presented in a very enjoyable read. The author has done an excellent job presenting to the common man the story of bravery, death, and hardship of the early American soldier, and the betrayal of the American Indian. Many thanks to the author and publisher. Where are the awards for them?

Remembering brave men
Helpful Votes: 12 out of 16 total.
Review Date: 2004-04-18
If you don't feel capable of wading through the Western history in this book, I suggest you see the movie "Geronimo." It's an excellent, slightly-fictionalized story of the Apache war chief Geronimo played by Wes Studi and Lt. Charles Gatewood played by Jason Patric.

Gatewood, the U.S. army's foremost expert on the Apaches, persuaded Geronimo to surrender in 1886. Both Geronimo and Gatewood were betrayed by the U.S. government. Geronimo was sent to Florida to prison; Gateway was sent to oblivion, remaining a lieutenant until the end of his military career.

Geronimo is remarkable as a cunning, cruel guerilla leader fighting to keep his freedom from the encroaching Whites; Gatewood is remarkable for the integrity he brought to his job as an indian agent and soldier. It's comforting to see Gatewood's qualities are remembered in book and movie long after more conventionally successful men have been forgotten.

This book maintains a high standard of accuracy and scholarship. It tells one of the best stories from the old West.

Latest reviews from PUBLISHERS WEEKLY and KLIATT
Helpful Votes: 13 out of 14 total.
Review Date: 2001-01-17
KLIATT, November 2000 Reviewed by Raymond L. Puffer, Ph.D., Historian, Edwards Air Force Base, CA

Most historical accounts of Geronimo and the lengthy struggle of his Apache warriors against white settlement have focused upon either the Chiricahua leader himself, or the two U.S. Army generals usually credited with forcing their bitter surrender. George Crook and Nelson Miles were indeed instrumental in planning and leading the campaigns that hounded the remnants of the Apache people into their inevitable subjugation. Neither, however, could convince the holdouts ot lay down their arms and put themselves at the white man's mercy. That role fell to a weary cavalry lieutenant, Charles B. Gatewood, who had won the Indians' grudging respect through hard fighting and his sympathy to their plight. In the course of a final meeting, which was as poignant as it was historical, Gatewood at length persuaded the exhausted "renegades" to lay down their arms to General

Miles, and to accept his offer of farmland and aid. When Geronimo did so, the last native resistance to federal hegemony came to an end. Ultimately, though, Geronimo and Lieutenant Gatewood were betrayed by the federal government.

Louis Kraft has written an important and historically significant study of the final phase of the Apache Wars. Unusual for such books, this one is as readable as popular history, and it will be enjoyed by those who have an interest in looking behind the scenes of history. The book is a fine reminder that earnest, hardworking and suffering people were responsible for the events in their textbooks.

Publishers Weekly, April 17, 2000

This recent addition to the parallel lives genre is a superbly told tale of the vicious Apache wars of the 1880s in Arizona, New Mexico and Mexico. Drawing upon a variety of original sources, Kraft (Custer and the Cheyenne) reconstructs the complex story of the famous Chiricahua leader Geronimo, a medicine man who came forward as a tribal leader and headed resistance to the coerced settlement of his people on reservations where they were to become farmers instead of nomadic hunters. Lt. Charles B. Gatewood of the 6th U.S. Cavalry was posted to Arizona in 1878 and became a respected leader of Apache scouts, who tracked Apache guerrillas for the U.S. The frail lieutenant, sent to administer the Apache reservation, seemingly treated his charges fairly, earning the enmity of civilians and army brass, which led to a stalemated career and a lengthy court case brought by a man whom Gatewood arrested for defrauding Apaches. After meeting at various times and maintaining a mutual respect, Gatewood and Geronimo came together again in 1886, when the former was ordered to track the latter to Mexico and convince him to surrender, even as columns of American and Mexican troops searched for Geronimo's elusive group. The tension and frustrations of what was Gatewood's final mission are palpable, as he convinces Geronimo to allow the tribe's "relocation" to Florida. Gatewood, who gets much fuller treatment here than his counterpart, never got his due for brilliant service in tragically misguided cause, and Geronimo never again saw his homeland or many of his family, from whom he was separated.

Much Needed Study
Helpful Votes: 15 out of 16 total.
Review Date: 2000-10-18
"Gatewood and Geronimo" by Louis Kraft documents the heroic deeds of a man of unheralded greatness, of one Charles B. Gatewood. Many lesser men rose to the rank of general while Gatewood died holding the same rank he held when he played the key role in efecting the surrender of the formidable Apache warrior, Geronimo. The surrender of Geronimo effectively ended the American Indian Wars. Kraft's volume brings focus on the long neglected importance of Gatewood's role in American history, and on the long term effects that one ordinary man's moral integrity can have on human history, even though it was ignored, and even despised while Gatewood was alive.

New Mexico
Ghost Towns of the West
Published in Hardcover by Book Sales (1978-06)
Author: Lambert Florin
List price: $7.98
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Collectible price: $10.99

Average review score:

The best Ghost Town book I have ever read!!
Helpful Votes: 10 out of 10 total.
Review Date: 1998-01-28
This book has the best information of any ghost town book that I have read. I would recommend it highly to anyone interested in learning about the mining camps and people of the old west.

Wonderfull Book!!
Helpful Votes: 15 out of 15 total.
Review Date: 1999-05-18
A great book on the subject! The only reason I did not give it five stars is the lack of maps and the antiquity of the maps shown. Otherwise this book is a great source of information!

It's entertaining, informative and well researched.
Helpful Votes: 18 out of 19 total.
Review Date: 1996-12-21
This book is the most extensive ghost town book I have ever seen or read. I believe the content is well detailed and documented. Though true of many ghost town books, I wonder if Florin's photos illustrate current conditions. Florin does not appear to leave any stone unturned in order to find historical details to compose each town's history in an interesting and many times comicial combination of text and pictures. To the book's detriment, the pictures are horrendous. Many are too contrasty, poorly exposed, and lack detail. I would have rated this book 10 if the photographs complemented the extensive research and text. If you are interested in ghost towns, it would appear that this publication could be a benchmark by which others are judged (exclusive of Florin's apparent lack of photographic expertise)

The ghost town bible
Helpful Votes: 21 out of 22 total.
Review Date: 2000-11-08
I have been to many of the locations given in this book. It is almost a shame that some of them are no longer in the same shape as when this book was originally published. I think that the research used by the author to be very accurate and makes for very entertaining reading. When I wish I was out exploring but can't go I pull this book off the shelf and it is as if I am there. The pictures leave a little to be desired but that adds to the mystery of the ghost town being described. I highly recommend this book for anyone who wants a thorough guide to western ghost towns. Well worth the cost of the book.

New Mexico
Girl of the Manzanos (First Fiction Series) (First Ficiton Series)
Published in Hardcover by Sunstone Press (2001-05-01)
Author: Barbara Spencer Foster
List price: $22.95
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Novel
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2001-11-08
This is a beautiful love story and very informative historically
The author describes events and characters like you were really there and knew these people.
I really enjoyed reading this novel. I couldn't hardly put the book down.This author is very impressive.

Girl of the Manzanos
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2001-09-02
The author grabs your attention by setting you right in the excitement of New Mexico becoming a state, as seen through the eyes of a young woman and her family. Mardee has a captivating personality that draws you into her adventures and her loves, with an ambition beyond her era. The history of NM and descriptions of her beautiful mountains are wonderfully woven throughout the book. You won't want to put the book down. I am waiting for a sequel.

Great book!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2001-08-31
"Girl of the Manzanos" is an amazing story. Even though I am not finished reading it yet, this story grabbed my attention the first time I picked it up to read it. This story is insightful, and I think young boys, and especially young girls, can relate to the main character, Mardee. Barbara Spencer Foster did an amazing job writing "Girl of the Manzanos." It was obviously hard work writing such a good story, but she managed to do it successfully. I think everyone should read "Girl of the Manzanos."

Girl of the Manzanos Compelling
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2001-08-06
Girl of the Manzanos is an easy flowing novel portraying the history of the early statehood era of New Mexico and entertwining romance with the culture of the time. The main character, Mardee, is appealing and believeable, and somebody with whom we can admire and identify. She's ambitious, beautiful, and bright - a girl ahead of her time. I couldn't put the book down and believe it will appeal to readers of all ages.

New Mexico
Glen Canyon: Images of a Lost World
Published in Hardcover by Museum of New Mexico Pr (1999-10)
Author: Tad Nichols
List price: $34.95
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Average review score:

Fantastic Images from before the Desolation
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2006-10-07
Tad Nichols (memory eternal!) left us a treasure: powerful images of a beautiful canyon now buried under water and mud. The art is amazing, very much in the tradition of Ansel Adams. The loss is stunning: it's difficult to imagine how even hardened landwasters could have condemned this wonder to a watery grave. Now all that's left to us are photographs and memories ... of a world most of us will never have the privilege to see. Enjoy!

Beautiful
Helpful Votes: 14 out of 14 total.
Review Date: 2000-03-25
This is the best collection of photos I have seen on the now drowned Glen Canyon. Unlike some other books covering the area, this collection was clearly taken by a professional photographer. These pictures could easily be mistaken for Ansel Adams and I believe Mr. Nichols lists him as a big influence on his work. If you are like me and a lover of canyon country, it will definitely make you a little wistful thinking that this area has been lost--probably irretrievably. I just wish there were a comparable collection of color photos of Glen Canyon to supplement this wonderful work.

Spectacular! A Treasure
Helpful Votes: 14 out of 15 total.
Review Date: 2000-01-04
Anyone will find the pictures breathtaking. If you have an interest in the southwest rivers and canyons you will especially enjoy this book. If you are interested in seeing what they stole from us by the construction of Glen Canyon Dam then this book is required reading. Hayduke lives!

Not enough photos of Tad Nichols...but the photos of Glen Canyon are AMAZING.
Helpful Votes: 9 out of 9 total.
Review Date: 2005-10-01
I have been researching Glen Canyon and Lake Powell for years now, for a book I'm working on, and my wife had always taken a very passive interest in what I was doing. She'd listen to me talk and add a comment or two, but it wasn't until I got this book that she realized just what I'd been rambling about.
The photos are just like that.
The black-and-white photos of sinuos, twisting, sandstone places like Dungeon Canyon and the Cathedral-in-the-Desert will take your breath away; they will make you ache to see the places the photos are of, and then they will break your heart when you realize all those places are currently underwater.
Whatever your position on Lake Powell and Glen Canyon is--whether you think that Glen Canyon Dam is a giant, concrete Satan, or that it's a great source of employment, water, and electricity for the people of the West, you will have to admit these photos are beautiful, and of a beautiful place, and that something irreplaceable has been drowned and hidden away.
By all means, get this book.
And get Eleanor Inskip's full-color "The Colorado River through Glen Canyon: Before Lake Powell." Both books are excellent.

New Mexico
The Great Maya Droughts: Water, Life, and Death
Published in Paperback by University of New Mexico Press (2001-04-01)
Author: Richardson B. Gill
List price: $32.95
New price: $32.95
Used price: $39.52

Average review score:

Speedy Seller
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2007-06-18
The book arrived as promised in like new condition. I am very pleased with the delivery and the sale process.

Informative and very readable book about an important topic
Helpful Votes: 25 out of 26 total.
Review Date: 2000-08-05
This book's central thesis is that Classical Maya civilization collapsed as a result of a drought in Mesoamerica extending throughout the 9th century AD. This particular drought was the local manifestation of Northern Hemisphere weather patterns that the author asserts have been repeated frequently over shorter time periods for thousands of years, even into this century, and which nearly always produce drought in Mesoamerica.

Once you accept the author's evidence for Mesoamerican droughts and their regularity, that evidence provides a parsimonious explanation for the end of Classical Maya civilization. After reading this book, I think many people will accept the evidence and the explanation.

More complex hypotheses, including overpopulation, warfare between Mayan city-states, external invasion, disease, over centralization, exhaustion of a stable environment, and peasant revolt are not needed to explain the collapse. This does not mean that such factors, if they existed, did not influence the course of the collapse, just that the collapse would have happened because of the drought whether or not other factors existed.

To support his thesis, which is clearly stated clearly at the beginning of the book, Dr. Gill takes the reader on a tour of a multitude of scientific disciplines. Each discipline studied adds information about the importance, frequency, possible causes and consequences of drought in Mesoamerican and on civilization and population trends throughout the world. Any one of these tours alone is worth the price of the book, since they are extremely well written and provide the foundation for further study on each topic covered.

In a chapter titled "Geology, Hydrology, and Water," the author describes the geology and hydrology of the Yucatan and the Maya highlands and the major drainage basins, and provides an extensive discussion of the water supply problem and how it was managed in the pre-Columbian period. The basic geology is the standard stuff: seasonal rainfall, permeable limestone, karstic drainage, deep underground fresh water usually inaccessible, except in the north through cenotes and along the east cost from freshwater lakes or lagoons. But, this chapter also explained how the Maya adapted to this environment. For example, the author describes natural surface depressions used as water reservoirs and known as aquadas. The Maya paved many of these small depressions and some were provided with chultunes, bell shaped chambers excavated below the aquada bottom to capture additional water when the aquada was filled. (A single chultun could hold 30,000 liters of water, enough to comfortably supply drinking and cooking water for twenty-five people for one year).

In fact, Mayan city-states and even smaller settlements were designed with water management a primary consideration, with central reservoirs, residential reservoirs, canals, and the terrain and pavement of the city itself all engineered to facilitate the collection and storage of water during the wet season. This was important, because, as explained in a chapter on "Paleoclimatology," small-scale (relative to the great final calamity) droughts were endemic to the Maya area as shown both by Maya water management strategies and more recent evidence from sediment recovered from the bottom of lakes. Records during the Spanish colonial period point to further famines on a regular basis after the conquest. In fact, during the colonial period, population looses from drought in the Yucatan ranged up to 30 or 40%.

In another chapter titled "Volcanoes and Weather" Dr. Gill argues that there is a strong correlation between the eruptions of large volcanoes around the world, and the worldwide weather patterns that lead to drought in Mesoamerica. This particular chapter not only provided evidence to support this correlation, but evidence that the volcanoes may have been a forcing mechanism for those weather patterns. Volcanoes and weather are a topic of some interest to me, and until I read this book, I had trouble finding a good introduction to the study of volcanoes, and to the relationship between volcanoes and weather. Now I have.

To save space and my own energy, I am not going to discuss the chapter on "Thermohaline Circulation." Except, I will say that that I learned enough in that one chapter on North Atlantic deep water formation and three dimensional ocean circulation models for all of the world's oceans to help me understand an article on the subject recently published in the journal Nature. I will also skip lightly over the early chapter titled "Self-Organization" which discusses, among other things, the overall flow of energy in a civilization, and the important roll of exporting entropy to the environment by a civilization to reduce the potentially disruptive entropy in the civilization. I will also skip lightly over the chapter titled "Famine and the Individual" which describes how famine can rapidly lead to the complete collapse of social norms and the massive disruption of "normal" energy flows in any civilization.

Probably the most important or challenging single assertion Dr. Gill makes is changing the timing of the collapse of Chichen Itza. Traditionally dated around 1150 AD, and cited as an example of the ability of some Maya cities to survive the Classical collapse, the author re-dates this event to the 9th century based partly on re-interpretation of inscribed calendar dates attributed to the period after the collapse. This particular assertion is probably one of the most controversial in the book and is critical to the author's basic thesis. I suspect that it will be the focus of considerable argument. In support of this claim, the author provides a new interpretation of the relationship between Chichen Itza and the Toltecs, which itself is probably worth a fair amount of discussion.

I strongly recommend this book to just about anyone with an analytical mind. If you are interested in the general flow of Maya civilization this book has a lot to offer. If you are generally interested in the interplay between climate and civilization, this book also has a lot to offer. If you are just somewhat interested in topics such as global meteorology, volcanoes, tree-ring records in Europe and America, or the debate between uniformitariansm and neocatastrophism in the early study of geology, you will still find useful information that is readily accessible.

Awesome Anthropologic Insight
Helpful Votes: 8 out of 12 total.
Review Date: 2000-07-10
Dr. Gill has truly broken new ground with this startling theory on the demise of the Mayan Empire. Why no-one heretofore considered drought as the primary cause of the Mayan disappearance now seems remarkable. His premise debunks the previous and long-held concepts on the mysterious demise of these ancient people and literally re-writes a major chapter in the history of Mexico. Thank you, Dr. Gill for finally shedding light on this dark topic and providing a conclusive answer to what has long been a nebulous and even divisive black hole in the anthropologic annals of North America.

Definitely worth it for those with a desire to learn.
Helpful Votes: 9 out of 9 total.
Review Date: 2003-11-04
Although The Great Maya Droughts by Richardson Gill is a very impressive collection of information, it's not quite what I had expected. Given the title I had expected an archaeological account of recent finds and what they tell of the decline of Maya civilization. Instead the bulk of the book, eleven chapters of it, deals with a wide variety of scientific information having to do with a number of fields: physics, oceanography, complexity theory, meteorology, geology, hydrology, paleoclimatology, and volcanology among them. Not until the last two chapters of the book, and then mostly in summary form, does the author really discuss the archaeological data. For the average reader interested in the Maya and/or in general archaeology this might be a thirty dollar disappointment. Some of the material is rather complex, and although one might be able to work ones way through it on just the explanations the author gives of each topic, it would probably appeal more to those who already have at least some background in these areas. This having been said, though, I have to admit that I loved the book.

The author's primary goal is to introduce the theme of what he terms an energy failure as the cause of the Maya demise. To do this he approaches his topic as a physical scientist. Modern archaeology has come a long way since W. M. Flinders Petrie and A. Layard, and there is as much "hard" science involved in this discipline as digging in the sand. In fact with funds for excavations difficult to come by these days, there is probably far less digging in the sand going on now than there was in the past. Gill seems to be a model of the new archeologist/scientist. Steeped in what E. O. Wilson calls "consilience," the author calls upon data from a variety of fields to supply him with the building blocks he needs to reinforce his thesis.

At first I was a little skeptical of this type of approach, even though I know a fair amount about most of Dr. Gill's supporting subjects. By the time he got to a discussion of the shifting of the ecotomes in Europe during the Roman period (p. 16), I was totally hooked. I had just read a book covering the rise and fall of the Roman occupation in Gaul, and Gill's discussion of it in his work made perfect sense. With his treatment of human culture and its limitations in terms of thermodynamics and its evolution in terms of self organizing criticality, he had completely reeled me in. Like others, I had considered the decay of the Maya centers to be a "multifaceted" problem. Human culture and behavior being as complex as they are-or seem to be-a multidimensional answer to the problem seemed logical. As Gill presents it, however, there is nothing so logical-or so simple-as the destruction of the human animal by a lack of water. As he points out, a person can live for months without eating but only days without water.

The book is well worth the effort, even for those with limited knowledge of the included topics, as long as he/she has the desire to learn something new and isn't afraid of a little work. Furthermore, the bibliography is a mine of useful resources, both books and periodicals. Some are a little old, 1970-1980s, but many are more current. Of the books that I've read from the author's list: Per Bak's How Nature Works is fun, as is Sigurdsson's Melting the Earth. Jered Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel is wonderful, a "must read" sort of book. Both Decker and Decker's Volcanoes and Bullard's Volcanoes of the Earth, though a little old, are interesting and easy to read. Of the journals American Scientist, Archaeology, Nature, Science, and Scientific American should be readily available in most college and urban public libraries. Those like Geology, The Holocene, Hydrobiologia, Hydrology, the Journal of Human Evolution, Journal of Paleoceanography, and Quaternary Research may be available in some university libraries or in their individual department libraries.

For THOSE WRITING PAPERS on archaeology, history, meteorology/climatology, anthropology, ecology, etc. this book would make an instructive source for "how-to-do-it with science." It would make an excellent source of quotes in support of your own themes, a good source for bibliographical material, and a good bibliographical entry for your own paper.

Not an easy book to get through. Certainly not for those who just want an overview of the Maya. Definitely worth it for those with a desire to learn.

New Mexico
Hide and Seek: A Wartime Childhood
Published in Paperback by University of New Mexico Press (2003-08-01)
Author: Theresa Cahn-Tober
List price: $9.95
New price: $6.95
Used price: $6.60

Average review score:

A powerful account of WWII from a child's perspective
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2003-10-07
Most of us have read other stories of Jewish survivors of WWII; yet young Tereska's account stands out. The author has skillfully combined the small details of a child's life - as a child will mercifully still be a child, no matter how horrific the circumstances - with an account of the war's progression in Poland. Definitely worth reading.

Converting Pain into Compassion
Helpful Votes: 5 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 2002-10-20
I most admire individuals who have gone through great struggles in their lives and convert their pain into compassion and selfless service to humanity. As a specialist in childhood regression I have learned that it is not what happened to us that determines our character -- it is what we do with those experiences. Having close relatives whose experiences in the war hauntingly parallel those of Dr. Cahn-Tober's, I have experienced firsthand how such a harrowing childhood can effect one's ability to cope as an adult. Teresa has made different choices. She deeply understands children and their emotional wounds and has devoted much of her professional life to the path of healing. I felt grateful and validated by her understanding the emotional baggage that comes with being the "child of survivors." This book was not only personally meaningful to me, it was also extremely well-written and an engrossing read. The author has a gift for storytelling and I hope that she will continue to write.

hide and seek...a great literary find!
Helpful Votes: 5 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 2002-10-04
This book begins with one of the best introductions I've seen in a long time. Here, in this short but beautifully written intro, Tober sets the tone for the retelling of her life story which resonates strength, humor, hope and love, all while giving the reader a personal inside view of living through the Holocaust. Educational without being dry or dark, hide and seek gives shining examples of love and humanity which cross over ethnic and religoius bounaries during a time of war and hate. During the book the reader is never burdened with an author's feelings of victimization, but instead inspired by the loving memories of a talented writer. Highly recommended for adults of every age, race or religion.

Hide and Seek: a wartime childhood
Helpful Votes: 5 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 2002-08-12
A compelling account of a child's experience in wartime Poland during World War II told convincingly from a child's pont of view. There is tension and adventure in her story of assuming multiple identities with a Catholic family who protects her as she and her own family hide from Nazis during a bewildering time of anti-semitism. I felt her confusion, her anxiety and her unfailing sense of humor and adventure on every page.


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