Michigan Books

This is an excellent book. It is the second volume in a two-volume series, covering the history of the northern Balkan penninsula from approximately 500 A.D. to about 1500 A.D. For most non-specialists, the material will be almost completely unfamiliar. Fine's approach falls somewhere between a general survey and a technical treatise. Narrative history is emphasized over descriptive history, as befits a work covering unfamiliar matter. The topics are treated chronologically, and within a chronological period, are treated by area (i.e., Serbia, Bulgaria, Crotia, etc.) The subtitle (A Critical Survey from the Late Twelfth Centruy to the Ottoman Conquest) is a bit of a misnomer; the second half of the book is virtually a history of the Ottoman conquest of the Balkans and ends with the Balkans completely under Ottoman control. The research is extensive and the topic is treated comprehensively. First rate.

This book is the second one of the series. And its better than the first book.All the time I wonder how was the pre-ottomanic Balkans. This book is enough to satisfy me. It is comprehensive and (very important) not boring. In this book we can see the formation of the Balkan States and we can clearly observe why this Balkan states fell to the Ottoman Turks without any hard resistance. And we can see how Hungary, Pope and Venetians try to impose their rules to the states. Another important subject is that how the Orthodox branch of Christendhom falls in danger by the declining of the Romans.And I think that the consolidation of the Orthodoxy in these states owes it to the much more tolerable and even supportive policy of the Ottaman Empire.And we can understand that the most peaceful times in the Balkans is the Ottomanic period.

These are powerful lectures on what constitutes a religious revival, how to encourage or promote a religious revival, and what can be done to maintain a revival experience in the life of the Christian and in the life of the church.

Charles Finney understands a religious revival to be the work of man, when we renew our first love with Christ. A religious revival is a new beginning of obedience to God. It results in the backslidden person or church returning to its first love (Jesus), and in the conversion of sinners. God is involved in the revival process insofar as he providentially arranges for men and women to be encountered with the truth of the gospel. Yet a revival cannot take place without the cooperation of the penitent sinner, he or she must repent of their sins and seek the Lord with all their heart (Jeremiah 29:13). This understanding of a revival shows that Finney emphasizes the work of man right alongside the work of God, which would be anathema for Calvinists.

Finney also stresses that people need many revivals. If our love grows cold, or our hearts become crusty, it is because we need to remember the height from which we have fallen and repent and do the things we did that led to our first revival. Finney contends that we need to be reconverted, or a person who was once a revived believer could end up in hell.

He points out that a revival can be expected when God reveals to His people that the time is right for one. Also, when the Christian community and the clergy are united in their intense desire to see a revival that will bring about the salvation of the wicked, an awakening can be expected. Finney would also point out that the church would need to be open to God doing it any way He wants.

He goes on to mention that in order to promote a revival, Christians should confess their sins one by one. Finney regards this as absolutely essential, since we committed them one by one, they need to be confessed and forsaken one by one. Moreover, it will do no good to merely confess them or to trust that over time, God will grant repentance unto life. God has mandated that we all repent of our sins of omission (things that we neglected to do, such as prayer, Bible reading, giving, self denial, etc) and our sins of commission (slander, lying, cheating, hypocrisy, and envy, among others).

Beginning with page 342 of Lectures on Revival of Religion, Finney gives advice to Christians on how to respond when someone asks "What must I do to be saved?"

His advice is to tell the sinner to change his mind about sin, to confess his sins and vow to forsake them, and to believe the gospel of Christ, that He died for us and rose again, and to submit to God completely.

Unfortunately, it seems that Finney believes that a person may need to be reconverted again and again. It is hard to know if Finney is suggesting that a Christian may backslide to an unsaved condition and may need salvation again, or if the expression "reconvert" is merely an expression of being reconverted to a totally sold out lifestyle for Christ. Probably both, since Finney shows contempt for the idea that a person can be "once saved, always saved." If this assessment is true, it would put Finney's understanding of the security of the believer in sharp contrast with Edwards, who would only assume the integrity of a revival experience if the person is faithful to the end.

I should also say that Finney has a plain way of speaking (these lectures were delivered extemporaneously and transcribed), and he is also quite funny, especially in the lecture about the wrong things to say to a sinner on the verge of accpeting Christ.

I recommend not only reading this book, but following Finney's steps in promoting revival in your own life (pages 31-44). But watch out for his erratic theological pronouncements (the need for Christian people to be reconverted again and again, his radical emphasis on man's role in salvation, and in his denial that revival is a supernatural work of God. Get past the theology and take his advice on the practical side of living an awakened life for Jesus Christ.

As a trained lawyer Finney's is very organised writer and the Title says Lectures. This is a clearly written and a very powerful book. Finney sees revival the way a farmer sees crops. You prepare the ground (heart), you plow (pray), plant seed(Word of God), you water (repent of sin) Trust God to give the growth. Not a book on over night jack in the bean stalk growth. But a timely book now as when first written. Read Finney auto Biography to more clearly understand the Second Great Awakening in America. The first being 1740-1750's Johnathan Edwards and George Whitefield's ministry. This book when read with Bible in Hand will do no harm and possibly much good. It is one of a dozen or more great books on religion that has had a great impact on my Christian life. You will be stirred if you read it. It is not perfect but written by a man trying to be perfect even a s God is perfect. A great Book on Sowing and Reaping. Note: Finney was not a get salvation lose salvation preacher. He did begin to believe it was possible for a man to chose to forsake Christ after having been converted. This required a active choice of unbelief not an accidental falling away or by sinning to much. This doctrine was a result of his seeing fruit that he thought was once gathered seeming to fall away back into unbelief. This Book will be a great blessing to who read and to all who read it like the Bereans searching the scriptures to see if it is true. W.A. Criswell wrote of one of his books "Reading this book is like eating fish, if you come to a bone you can't swallow, just chew around it." So take advantage of this reprint Buy, Borrow it from some one who has it. It will stir your soul and provoke you to good works for Christ.

This is a great book if you want to try to understand Prez. There are tons of transcribed solos, and you can listen and read along--or even better--play along. All examples are in Bb transcription, so you can play along on your own Tenor Sax.

Take for example the solo he did with Count Basie on Lady, Be Good. It is something new, something he created, it sounds like a real breakthrough, like music has been pushed to a new level. Worthy of further study. Or dig how modern Prez sounds on I Didn't Know What Time It Was. You can see several different versions of many standards, done years apart, showing the evolving sound. For instance, Just You, Just Me, the earliest version is so classic, but the later version at a quicker tempo is an interesting comparison.

Besides the transcriptions and discography, the prose is good, too. I like the writing, as it seems like it was written by a musician, with a great understanding of the music, and also a musical way of writing.

If you want to understand what the musical elements are in Lester's hugely influential style, read this book and listen to every recording you can afford to lay hands on.
Porter does a great job of transcribing and annotating several Young solos from different points in his career and explains with solid scholarship exactly what Young was doing and some of the whys. Porter is not among those who dismiss Lester's later work with the cliche about all the best stuff being before WWII. Instead he breaks Young's career into three periods and examines each fairly. There are some gaps in his discography, i.e.,the session with Oscar Peterson, but that may be due to the original publication date pre-dating the advent of CDs.
Charlie Parker's idol and cited as a major influence by nearly every jazz saxophonist to follow him, Lester Young was indeed the President of the Saxophone.

This book is a must-read for anyone who lives or vacations in Northern Michigan ... and for anyone who loves to read beautiful essays that share a sense of place. You can dip into this book anywhere you like and find something delightful that will rekindle fond memories of this special and magical part of Michigan. Wonderful regional literature.

I loved this book. Kathleen Stocking has captured what is so very, very special about an area which I have considered my second home for over fifty years. Her descriptions of the locals and the landscape are on target. In as much as we have similar backgrounds, I also stongly identify with her inner quest for what is truly important in life.

John Stuart Mill's "liberty principle" caused a great schism between his and James Stephen's ideas of human nature, the public role of religion, and society's duty in setting moral standards for its citizens. James Fitzjames Stephen lived from 1829 to 1894. After serving as a judge in India for three years, Stephen decided to write a critical analysis of Mill's book, while on his long voyage back to Great Britain in 1872. While Stephen was in India, he observed with great trepidation, political changes taking place back in Great Britain after the passage of the Reform Act of 1867. This legislation granted voting rights to male urban workers. "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity was the most penetrating defense of conservative values written in Victorian times--and after Burke and perhaps Coleridge, the most important work of English conservative thought." However, Stephen's book never really caught on in his lifetime. Alexander Bain recorded Mill's only known comment on Stephen's book. Stephen "does not know what he is arguing against; and is more likely to repel than to attract people." These were very prophetic words, "Stephen suffered the fate of most men out of step with their age: unable to attract any school of thought, his ideas failed to bear fruit in his lifetime." While Mill's book On Liberty has had numerous printings after its publication, Stephen's book laid virtually dormant until 1967, when it finally came back into print. Though Stephen failed while he was alive to garner a multitude of adherents to his cause, his ideas have earned a considerable amount of vindication in the latter half of the twentieth century.

Stephen distilled Mill's "liberty principle" theory down to every person pleasing himself without harming his neighbor. This means that every moral system that interferes with Mill's "liberty principle," "either to obtain benefits for society at large other than protection against injury or to do good to the persons affected, would be wrong in principle." This leads Stephen to think that Mill had made a fatal flaw politically in his "liberty principle," when he said that free discussion was primarily all that society needed to rule its citizens. Once again, Stephen thought that Mill put too much faith in education advancing humanity to a place where a shared social morality would become obsolete. Stephen made his point with a bit of wit when he wrote, "Society cannot make silk purses out of sows' ears." First, Stephen argued that a large portion of the population has been and always would be either uneducated, or of dubious character. Second, Stephen argued that most of law-abiding society did not feel particularly constrained by the moral force and law imposed by society on them. After all, most of the citizens have enacted and supported these moral standards and laws through their elected representatives in government. Stephen agreed with Mill, that people felt most restrained in their actions by public opinion and from social ostracism.

Once again to restate the issue, Mill's main reason for proposing his "liberty principle" was to free people from the constraints placed on them by the moral values, customs, and mores of society. Mill wanted people to have unfettered freedom to experiment with their lives provided it did not harm others. Stephen rightly concluded that societies used force of morality and sometimes the law, depending on the severity of the act, in order to guard against social ills that a society deemed dangerous to its existence. "Laws and moral systems are conditions of life imposed upon men either by political power or by the force of argument." Thus, Stephen took great umbrage with Mill's "liberty principle," because it disallowed three types of coercion that Mill argued society had no business imposing on its citizens, since they did not meet the standard of self-protection, or of preventing harm to others. These three types of coercions are,

1. Coercion for the purpose of establishing and maintaining religions.
2. Coercion for the purpose of establishing and practically maintaining
morality.
3. Coercion for the purpose of making alterations in the existing forms
of government and social institutions.


Stephen pointed out, that all three type of coercion's were examples of coercion used by people in their opinion for the betterment of society. Simply stated, the world of politics and the world of morality cannot exist separately. Since these coercive forces went against Mill's "liberty principle," Stephen concluded that Mill would consign every system of morality to the dustbin.
Stephen believed that the correct answer in how to build and maintain a healthy society came from his readings of the English philosopher, Thomas Hobbes, and from religious morality. Hobbes lived from 1588 to 1679, and he greatly influenced Stephen's knowledge of human history and psychology. Both Stephen and Hobbes correctly perceive that humankind has been constantly in fear and conflict with one another, "Man has a fearful disease..." Stephen wrote Hobbes on Government for the Saturday Review, which illustrated the influence Hobbes ideas had on Stephen. In his essay, Stephen writes, "If no one or more men had the power of issuing to others such commands as appeared reasonable to themselves, there would be no such thing as society amongst men." Stephen understands, as Thomas Hobbes did, that force lies at the root of all government. "People are said to govern others by law, where they influence their conduct by imposing laws upon them." In politics, moral persuasion and coercion went hand-in-hand, and Stephen expanded on this duality of moral persuasion and coercion to illustrate his point. One could not be a political leader without the ability to use moral persuasion to convince others to follow their leadership, and while possessing the capability of consolidating the force and power of their numbers. Stephen correctly realized, that it was only natural for people, when they came together to form societies, to bring with them shared religious and cultural values that would serve as the foundation of the society they wished to build.

Stephen's experience, as an attorney and judge, gave him a unique insight into human psychology, which had him arguing that most of the social ills perpetrated by humankind were done out of evil or weakness of willpower, and not out of ignorance. To illustrate his point in his argument, Stephen used, as an example, the poor plight of the drunkard. No drunkard would admit to making a reasoned choice to become a drunkard. If asked to reflect on their choice, they would freely admit that they had no willpower to stop their drinking habit. Looking at human misconduct, which Stephen saw a lot of as an attorney and judge, he adamantly believed that persuasion of argument alone, an idea that Mill supported, could do little to persuade people to change their mischievous ways. Thus, Stephen refuted Mill's idea of reasoned discussion being an adequate amount of force to change a person's actions. Only people that had control of their willpower would be open to change through the force of a reasoned argument. It was Stephen's experience that coercion through punishment and force of law, more times than not, changed one's conduct when they were devoid of an adequate willpower. Moral persuasion also had the ability to point to the consequences of one's actions. One could say that Society's laws were morality and force working in conjunction. Moral persuasion caused people to act in accordance with the law, because the force of punishment instilled fear in them. Stephen understood the human psychology of how in most cases, when moral persuasion and force were applied together to elicit the same outcome, some people considered themselves persuaded, while others considered themselves forced to commit the same act. This fact becomes abundantly clear for anyone who has raised or worked with children. One can observe how children react differently to the same argument. When adults ask children to conduct themselves in a certain way, some children persuaded by the reasoning of the argument will comply, while other children would have to be threatened with some form of punishment to comply. The preceding examples help to illustrate how society winds up infringing on people's liberty every day. People will always have to make choices based on moral persuasion and force, and once they choose, they will have to take responsibility for the consequences of their actions. Based on their character and psychological makeup, their actions will receive either reward or punishment. As a whole, this is how society operates; it persuades morally or threatens, causing people to act accordingly. Stephen rightly articulated that laws and punishments were nothing more than outgrowths of moral precepts, which were handed down by religious institutions in order to establish and maintain moral values that citizens of a society agreed to follow.

In fact, as a society matured, it would find many of its moral values evolving; thus, becoming constantly debated. Therefore, when Stephen observed what was taking place during the current political affairs of his day, he saw that even small issues before Parliament engender endless debate with seemingly no resolution, until finally a majority forms to solve the issue on their own terms. "Parliamentary government is simply a mild and disguised form of compulsion." Stephen observed that moral force was even more influential in his time, and would be so in the future. The most that one could hope for was that one could regulate and subdue the government's use of force. However, Stephen astutely observes that, "President Lincoln attained his objects by the use of a degree of force which would have crushed Charlemagne and his paladins and peers like so many eggshells."

Stephen knew through his study of history, that no amount of economic progress, improvement in education, freedom of religion, or political equality would change the fact that any society would always embrace shared moral, religious, and cultural values. Simple human nature taught Stephen, that most of the citizens in any society would want to impose their moral values and beliefs on all the members of the society. The majority of citizens in any society will constantly be jostling for the adoption of their beliefs, and will be probing the boundaries of how far they can impose their beliefs on the rest of society. Thus, the very best that citizens of a society can hope for is that those people who are in power, and have the public trust of most of a nation's citizens will follow Stephen's examples of legislative restraint, and respect for people's privacy as he defined privacy.

I read this book for a graduate class in Philosophy. Recommended reading for anyone interested in philosophy, political science, and history.

John Stuart Mill's "liberty principle" caused a great schism between his and James Stephen's ideas of human nature, the public role of religion, and society's duty in setting moral standards for its citizens. James Fitzjames Stephen lived from 1829 to 1894. After serving as a judge in India for three years, Stephen decided to write a critical analysis of Mill's book, while on his long voyage back to Great Britain in 1872. While Stephen was in India, he observed with great trepidation, political changes taking place back in Great Britain after the passage of the Reform Act of 1867. This legislation granted voting rights to male urban workers. "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity was the most penetrating defense of conservative values written in Victorian times--and after Burke and perhaps Coleridge, the most important work of English conservative thought." However, Stephen's book never really caught on in his lifetime. Alexander Bain recorded Mill's only known comment on Stephen's book. Stephen "does not know what he is arguing against; and is more likely to repel than to attract people." These were very prophetic words, "Stephen suffered the fate of most men out of step with their age: unable to attract any school of thought, his ideas failed to bear fruit in his lifetime." While Mill's book On Liberty has had numerous printings after its publication, Stephen's book laid virtually dormant until 1967, when it finally came back into print. Though Stephen failed while he was alive to garner a multitude of adherents to his cause, his ideas have earned a considerable amount of vindication in the latter half of the twentieth century.

Stephen distilled Mill's "liberty principle" theory down to every person pleasing himself without harming his neighbor. This means that every moral system that interferes with Mill's "liberty principle," "either to obtain benefits for society at large other than protection against injury or to do good to the persons affected, would be wrong in principle." This leads Stephen to think that Mill had made a fatal flaw politically in his "liberty principle," when he said that free discussion was primarily all that society needed to rule its citizens. Once again, Stephen thought that Mill put too much faith in education advancing humanity to a place where a shared social morality would become obsolete. Stephen made his point with a bit of wit when he wrote, "Society cannot make silk purses out of sows' ears." First, Stephen argued that a large portion of the population has been and always would be either uneducated, or of dubious character. Second, Stephen argued that most of law-abiding society did not feel particularly constrained by the moral force and law imposed by society on them. After all, most of the citizens have enacted and supported these moral standards and laws through their elected representatives in government. Stephen agreed with Mill, that people felt most restrained in their actions by public opinion and from social ostracism.

Once again to restate the issue, Mill's main reason for proposing his "liberty principle" was to free people from the constraints placed on them by the moral values, customs, and mores of society. Mill wanted people to have unfettered freedom to experiment with their lives provided it did not harm others. Stephen rightly concluded that societies used force of morality and sometimes the law, depending on the severity of the act, in order to guard against social ills that a society deemed dangerous to its existence. "Laws and moral systems are conditions of life imposed upon men either by political power or by the force of argument." Thus, Stephen took great umbrage with Mill's "liberty principle," because it disallowed three types of coercion that Mill argued society had no business imposing on its citizens, since they did not meet the standard of self-protection, or of preventing harm to others. These three types of coercions are,

1. Coercion for the purpose of establishing and maintaining religions.
2. Coercion for the purpose of establishing and practically maintaining
morality.
3. Coercion for the purpose of making alterations in the existing forms
of government and social institutions.


Stephen pointed out, that all three type of coercion's were examples of coercion used by people in their opinion for the betterment of society. Simply stated, the world of politics and the world of morality cannot exist separately. Since these coercive forces went against Mill's "liberty principle," Stephen concluded that Mill would consign every system of morality to the dustbin.
Stephen believed that the correct answer in how to build and maintain a healthy society came from his readings of the English philosopher, Thomas Hobbes, and from religious morality. Hobbes lived from 1588 to 1679, and he greatly influenced Stephen's knowledge of human history and psychology. Both Stephen and Hobbes correctly perceive that humankind has been constantly in fear and conflict with one another, "Man has a fearful disease..." Stephen wrote Hobbes on Government for the Saturday Review, which illustrated the influence Hobbes ideas had on Stephen. In his essay, Stephen writes, "If no one or more men had the power of issuing to others such commands as appeared reasonable to themselves, there would be no such thing as society amongst men." Stephen understands, as Thomas Hobbes did, that force lies at the root of all government. "People are said to govern others by law, where they influence their conduct by imposing laws upon them." In politics, moral persuasion and coercion went hand-in-hand, and Stephen expanded on this duality of moral persuasion and coercion to illustrate his point. One could not be a political leader without the ability to use moral persuasion to convince others to follow their leadership, and while possessing the capability of consolidating the force and power of their numbers. Stephen correctly realized, that it was only natural for people, when they came together to form societies, to bring with them shared religious and cultural values that would serve as the foundation of the society they wished to build.

Stephen's experience, as an attorney and judge, gave him a unique insight into human psychology, which had him arguing that most of the social ills perpetrated by humankind were done out of evil or weakness of willpower, and not out of ignorance. To illustrate his point in his argument, Stephen used, as an example, the poor plight of the drunkard. No drunkard would admit to making a reasoned choice to become a drunkard. If asked to reflect on their choice, they would freely admit that they had no willpower to stop their drinking habit. Looking at human misconduct, which Stephen saw a lot of as an attorney and judge, he adamantly believed that persuasion of argument alone, an idea that Mill supported, could do little to persuade people to change their mischievous ways. Thus, Stephen refuted Mill's idea of reasoned discussion being an adequate amount of force to change a person's actions. Only people that had control of their willpower would be open to change through the force of a reasoned argument. It was Stephen's experience that coercion through punishment and force of law, more times than not, changed one's conduct when they were devoid of an adequate willpower. Moral persuasion also had the ability to point to the consequences of one's actions. One could say that Society's laws were morality and force working in conjunction. Moral persuasion caused people to act in accordance with the law, because the force of punishment instilled fear in them. Stephen understood the human psychology of how in most cases, when moral persuasion and force were applied together to elicit the same outcome, some people considered themselves persuaded, while others considered themselves forced to commit the same act. This fact becomes abundantly clear for anyone who has raised or worked with children. One can observe how children react differently to the same argument. When adults ask children to conduct themselves in a certain way, some children persuaded by the reasoning of the argument will comply, while other children would have to be threatened with some form of punishment to comply. The preceding examples help to illustrate how society winds up infringing on people's liberty every day. People will always have to make choices based on moral persuasion and force, and once they choose, they will have to take responsibility for the consequences of their actions. Based on their character and psychological makeup, their actions will receive either reward or punishment. As a whole, this is how society operates; it persuades morally or threatens, causing people to act accordingly. Stephen rightly articulated that laws and punishments were nothing more than outgrowths of moral precepts, which were handed down by religious institutions in order to establish and maintain moral values that citizens of a society agreed to follow.

In fact, as a society matured, it would find many of its moral values evolving; thus, becoming constantly debated. Therefore, when Stephen observed what was taking place during the current political affairs of his day, he saw that even small issues before Parliament engender endless debate with seemingly no resolution, until finally a majority forms to solve the issue on their own terms. "Parliamentary government is simply a mild and disguised form of compulsion." Stephen observed that moral force was even more influential in his time, and would be so in the future. The most that one could hope for was that one could regulate and subdue the government's use of force. However, Stephen astutely observes that, "President Lincoln attained his objects by the use of a degree of force which would have crushed Charlemagne and his paladins and peers like so many eggshells."

Stephen knew through his study of history, that no amount of economic progress, improvement in education, freedom of religion, or political equality would change the fact that any society would always embrace shared moral, religious, and cultural values. Simple human nature taught Stephen, that most of the citizens in any society would want to impose their moral values and beliefs on all the members of the society. The majority of citizens in any society will constantly be jostling for the adoption of their beliefs, and will be probing the boundaries of how far they can impose their beliefs on the rest of society. Thus, the very best that citizens of a society can hope for is that those people who are in power, and have the public trust of most of a nation's citizens will follow Stephen's examples of legislative restraint, and respect for people's privacy as he defined privacy.

I read this book for a graduate class in Philosophy. Recommended reading for anyone interested in philosophy, political science, and history.

Written by the late Neil Shine, longtime editor and former publisher of the Detroit Free Press, Life With Mae: A Detroit Family Memoir is the true story of daily life in Detroit as well as a biography of the author's strong-willed and spirited mother Mae. Born in 1909 in a small Irish town, Mae worked as a housekeeper at fourteen, and saved enough money for a one-way ticket to the United States by age eighteen. Life With Mae recounts her quirks, enthusiasm, protection, and love, as well as her identification with and compassion for the poor and downtrodden. An inspirational memoir and tribute.

If you are looking for good writing, a good story, a happy and moving biography; if you're interested in Ireland, in the immigrant experience and a true story that screams to be made into a movie; if you're interested in the newspaper world, in short if you for once want your money's worth when you buy a book, this one is unputdownable.

It's the sort of book that when you reach the last page, you start reading all over again at the beginning and enjoy it just as much - or more - the second time around.

In sum: A classic.

This is a delightful book about a delightful person and place, and I think most kids would love it. I also think most parents (and grandparents) would love the way it imparts not just information, but understanding, without being preachy or school-bookish at all. That it is also a coloring book makes it even more fun for the little ones and even a better buy for parents (and grandparents). I don't want to give away the story, but it gives children a fresh insight into the Christmas story, as only a doting grandfather could do it. Maybe the best thing is that it "transports" kids away from the cartoons and television commercials of the season, and back to the true meaning of the holiday. I keep coming back to the word "delightful" and I guess that is my review in a single word.

The Little House on Buchanan Street is a very sweet little book that crosses the ages; small children can color the pages while being read to, older children may get a good message about what Christmas really means by reading it and adults can enjoy the book and interact with the children in their life. I loved it!

I was impressed to find this book at my public library. It is an important remembrance of some of the movements that were occurring during the 1940's through the 1990's. Lots of acronyms! Some of the history of the splits in the Party got tedious.

It was interesting to read about some of the options people had besides the Panthers, to hear the view of taking responsibilty, not only blaming the man for the situation. And to reaffirm the idea that a great shift in society needs to occur before we can have true equality.

NO JUSTICE, NO PEACE!

Con Hilberry, a gifted poet and lifelong academic, attempts to get inside the minds of two sociopaths. It is an interesting experiment. Written in the first person, and interspersed with long quotes from his many recorded interviews, this is nothing like any other true crime book you will have read. Well worth reading, it is a shame that this book has not been more widely distributed. This is the book that could have rejuvinated the stagnant and gory genre of true crime. It's time to put Capote and In Cold Blood aside. This is the real deal.

In 1964, Luke Karamazov (then known as Ralph Searl) killed 5 men in cold blood. He was arrested, confessed, tried, convicted and sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole. In 1972, the Michigan Supreme Court reversed his sentence. While Ralph was awaiting retrial in Kalamazoo, 4 women were raped and murdered in the area -- and a few weeks later, Ralph's older brother, Tommy, was arrested for those crimes. Unlike Ralph, Tommy never confessed, but he too was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. Ralph accepted a plea agreement to avoid retrial and was again sentenced to life; as part of the plea, he was allowed to change his name to Luke Karamazov.

Conrad Hilberry was a Professor of English at Kalamazoo College at the time of these crimes and the resulting trials, and became interested in the story of two brothers who were both convicted of serial murders. "I began to wonder who these men were and how they got that way. I wondered if I could talk with them." (25) Talk with them he did, as well as with Julie, the woman who was married first to Tommy (before his crimes) and then to Ralph (while in prison). This book is largely a record of those conversations, along with Hilberry's observations and attempts to make sense of their personalities. Hilberry gives us long extracts from his recorded conversations -- mostly with Ralph and Julie, less with Tommy -- and largely allows the events to be told by them, in retrospect. This is not an attempt to reconstruct the crimes or the circumstances of the Searls' childhood, but an effort to understand who they are now, in prison, and who they may have been when they killed. Because Hilberry allows the Searls to tell much of their story in their own words, we obtain a unique insight into their thought processes and feelings.

Hilberry is not an investigative reporter, nor is he a psychologist, criminologist or lawyer. Some people might conclude that he is not qualified to write this book. Hilberry is, however, a poet, and he brings a poet's close observation and insight to his comments on these men. I found his perspective unique and fascinating, and his efforts to understand the Searls in the larger context of the human project -- balancing the assertion of the individual ego against the desire for transcendence -- persuasive. Highly recommended.

This is the only really serious study of the Lyceum in American culture. I think Merle Curti would have been proud to mention this study in his "Growth of American Thought" where he bemoans the fact that no satis-
factory study of the Lyceum movement exists in 1951. But even today there is a surprising dearth of serious studies. So, Prof. Ray deserves all the admiration for a job well done!

The word "lyceum" is a Latin word with a Greek derivative that was a name for the god of the sun. The association with classical learning and culture and the "enlightening" the audience of lyceum events would undergo were intentional. The idea of the lyceum in America arose in the early 1800s as a means to provide common knowledge and ideas, or at least some common experiences, for the population of an America that was expanding geographically, changing demographically from large numbers of immigrants, and engaging with the early phases of industrialism and new inventions such as the steamboat. Lyceums throughout the U. S., including frontier areas, were seen by both promoters and audiences as matrixes for unity and communication for the increasingly complex democratic society. In spite of the high-mindedness and vision of their originators, it wasn't long before lyceums were holding circus-like entertainments and other events straying from their intended purposes. But lyceums drew large local audiences wherever they were held, inevitably playing a large part in forming the democratic public culture, much as the universality and eclecticism of television does today. The lyceum--the numerous ones in all parts of the country--is studied not only as representing the diversity and interests of 19th-century America, but also as a central, fundamental ground of rhetoric as "that art by which culture and community and character are constituted and transformed." Though "lyceum" is now an antique word and only traces of the idealism of its originators remain, one recognizes by Ray's historical and social study that the lyceum contributed greatly to the foundation of a unique American culture. This author is a professor in the Department of Communication Studies at Northwestern University.