Ball Books

DeFleur does an excellent job of first providing the historical background for each theory, then moving on to provide both detail and context for the most significant theories in mass media development.

Logically enough the authors begin with a chronological sequence of events in the study of mass communication. They talk about the theories, assumptions, and personalities who shaped the field in its infancy. Various media forms are given attention in subsequent chapters.

A seque is made to viewing media holistically from a systems perspective. From here we're taken to a discussion of media effects. This section of the book starts with the assumptions of the magic bullet theory in the early days of media research. It is explained how these assumptions and early theoretical works proved inadequate to explain the complexities of the actual workings of media upon audiences.

In the final section of the book media in contemporary society is addressed. This book accomplishes its goal of providing a history of media research and bringing readers up to date on current theoretical thought.

This book was excellent at explaining in detail some excellent well known and lesser known mass comm theories. Not only does the book give excellent theories but also gives numerous examples of how these theories apply to daily life and the many facets of communication as a whole. Well worth the price and the time. Especially helpful if working on a thesis.

These stories carry in them a slice of the memory of the world from a certain corner of the globe. As one who grew up in those places where these stories are set in, I am able to see myself in the midst of the characters that come alive in this anthology. One could come from any part of the globe to see the universal human story in these tales. The unrelenting march of technology in the information age and in the era of globalization clearly sometimes out paces us- making us believe that speed regardless of direction is all important. Once in a while we pause and wonder what really the essentials that make up life are. These villages, the simple and cultured characters and their hardships will come to remain with you making you ponder long after you have kept the book down. The writing style is simple yet absorbing and the pictures are candid speaking their own stories in their own way.

The author talks about the beauty of an Indian village and the Great values held by these Simple people in the village.
Alamelu, Santhosam and vidivelli are some of the unforgettable characters. The simple narration make the reader live with the characters. I couldn't resist the temptation to live a village life after reading this book.

It's simply superb.

Waiting for the next set of stories...

I have nothing to gain from writing this brief review of Kumar's "Ticket to the Moon." However, I was one of two volunteer editor's, and the major one. Kumar and I are members of the Tampa Writer's Alliance critique group. I became entranced with his stories of rural life in a poorer region of southernmost India and asked him if he wanted me to take a look at them.

If you, as a reader, want to learn a bit more about the culture of this region, I highly recommend this book to you. I learned a lot from his short stories. And, I continue to work with him, presently reviewing (no money is involved) a novel he is working on, set in the same area of India.

This is a p. xiii: "Jewish spiritual guidebook [but] offers its fruits freely to anyone who feels a resonance with it...celebrates their commonalities & underscores their differences" while p. 175: "Looking at the Jewish path from the vantage point of the Far East." The author demonstrates that the Jewish spiritual tradition (as opposed to mainstream Judaism) parallels Eastern mysticism in many areas including: mantra, mandala, meditation, karma, immanence, spiritual sexuality, visualization, the infinite/nothingness, reincarnation, spiritually healing the world, etc. He explains Eastern/Western parallels via psychology: p. iv: "The religious psychology of Carl Gustav Jung offers a key to understanding the unity & diversity among spiritual paths" & p. 106: "Eastern & Jewish tradition both draw their inspiration from the same universal archetypes." Nevertheless, p. xii: "Other spiritual paths can frequently illuminate Torah in new, wonderful & unexpected ways." This open minded approach is valuable because, p. 176: "As religious institutions mature, spiritual experience frequently takes 2nd place to institutional stability. Every human institution, if it is to endure & mature, needs periodic fine tuning of its routines & image." Thus, IMHO cross-cultural comparative religion can help with religious paradigms & religious life cycle [my terms]. The author also provides a number of exercises. Many of these seem aimed at bringing secular Jews into observant practice--stressing the spiritual aspects & interpretation of normative Jewish observances. He does, however, IMHO inject some personal assumptions, untenable arguments (e. g. that kashrut was intended to promote vegetarianism--then why sacrifice animals on the altar & then eat them?), & equivalences religion & spirituality. I liked the final exercise (pp. 231-2) best--it includes visualizing oneself climbing the spiritual mountain then riding a sunray to the sun--and back. As in the Eastern archetype of the Bodhisattva, the spiritual Jew's work is here on Earth--raising the spiritual level of humanity.

For years I had been trying, usually unsuccessfully, to convince friends that my interest in (and practice of) such New Age ideas as the studying the seven chakras and reading the Tarot were NOT incompatible with traditional western religion. So not surprisingly, Rabbi Blank's title caught my eye as a promising means of validation of my own views; it was the first (and so far, only) book I'd ever found that attempted to show how one can indeed take the best philosophies and practices of several worlds--spiritually speaking--and make good use of those tools. But don't let the whimsical sounding title fool you into thinking that this slim volume is lightweight, however; the Torah is definitely in there, too, especially toward the end of the book, and Blank's take on a lot of issues, in fact, caused me to reexamine some of my most deeply held beliefs. I found myself reading familiar old stories, but seeing them as if for the first time. Blank's book, for me, was a moment of serendipity that drove me deeper into Judaism on one hand, while allowing me to retain my other "tools" on the other. This book is truly a rarity among the plethora of "guides" of every description available now for us Seekers, and our numbers are legion. Perhaps the meta-message here is that we CAN all work together, particularly in the important work of reaching toward the spirit, seeking a higher self.

The title of this book attracted my attention and so I purchased it. I have studied Tao and Tantra and now as someone returning to a somewhat traditional Jewish lifestyle I was wondering if he had any new take on things. It is a large undertaking to put together a book like this and on that criteria he is to be congratulated but his take on things is decidedly from the reform Judiac backround that he represents and as such some of his arguments are highly opinionated not looking into how traditional judaism would spin it. Of course this would make the book 3x the size and again I can't blame him. Overall an interesting read but if you want to synthesize tantra, tao, tarot, meditation, etc, books by Aryeh Kaplan are suggested. Although not specifically talking about those topics, books like Jewish Meditation discuss auras and kundalini energy from a traditional Judaic perspective and give interesting historic backround. For those interested in the structure of the spiritual universe and angels, demons, realities, Steinsaltz's The Thirteen Petalled Rose is highly reommended. Blank's book is an interesting read nevertheless with some interesting historic facts I was unaware of. One complaint was that although some of his references were great such as Mantak Chia's books on Taoist thinking, the recapitulation of those facts was slightly incorrect. Ok would I recommend the book? Yes, but I would disregard any statements of opinion and definitely read Aryeh Kaplan to get a traditional and more classic reading of those things I mentioned.

Why would someone write a "biography" of a BUILDING? Well, if you've ever been to Chartres Cathedral, just a few dozen miles south-east of Paris, you'd immediately know why. Chartres continues to prod us with its emotive power, and its place in the history of Gothic architecture is firmly secured near "page 1" of our texts. That's why it was so exciting when we found out that there was a new treatment of Chartres being released this summer, and many reviewers, including those at The Economist and The Financial Times, took time to present the book to their reading audiences.

Ball's treatise on Chartres is a truly wonderful additional to the evolving library of Gothic. As a person who has read much on this subject, I can easily say that his work here will make possible the introduction of this topic to an entirely new generation of people who are captivated by this most evocative of art forms. Ball has done what can be classified as nothing less than a superb job of collating, digesting, and then restating in clear, meaningful prose the voluminous amount of material available on the subject today. And this is no small task: the topic is the subject of attention of everyone from mechanical engineers, masonry experts, art historians, medieval historians, and even education historians. I've read many of these books, and a number of them are fascinating, insightful, and tremendously enjoyable to read. But you will find yourself having to put on your "engineer's hat" to read Heyman's "The Stone Skelton," then put on your "art historian's hat" to read Coldstream's "Medieval Architecture," and your "Photographer's hat" to read Schultz's "Great Cathedrals." There are dozens and dozens more books still on the open market just like these, and they all play an important role in helping us further understanding this fascinating topic. But Ball's book deftly summarizes and explicates many of the major themes of this content, and allows one to absorb it all in one text. I must confess that the book exceeded any expectations I had, and I am thoroughly impressed.

Ball's book covers far more than the physical elements of Chartres cathedral. We peer into the world of medieval scholasticism and Platonic thought in the cathedral schools of the 12th century to investigate what role, if any, such thought had on the development of the Gothic style. We read about Chartres' predecessor building, St. Denis basilica, just north of Paris, and the impact Suger had on this form there, and consider the potential linkages between these structures. We also take a quick course on medieval construction techniques, and listen to some of the hypotheses engineering architects have devised to explain how such buildings could be constructed without electricity or power tools. We see how stained glass was manufactured, and why the blue windows of Chartres are so famous, and perhaps, were even "imports" from other glass foundries. And there is much, much more. But all along the way, we are provided a wonderful, comprehensive introduction to the times, history, and settings of that "vulgar style called `Gothic'" which is regarded as one of the pinnacles of architectural and artistic achievement.

If you are a Gothic enthusiast, get this book to enjoy and savor, the first new book on the subject in some time. But also buy a copy for a friend. There is probably no better way to introduce Chartres cathedral and Gothic Architecture to today' reader.

The Crusade of European Christians to overtake Jerusalem and Constantinople is famous. There was another crusade at the time, though, a "cathedral crusade" between the mid eleventh and fourteenth centuries. In France alone over eighty cathedrals were built, not to mention large and small churches. Arguably the greatest of all the cathedrals is the one at Chartres, beneath the vaults of which, according to Napoleon, even the atheist would feel uneasy. To examine just how Chartres works and how it can impress anyone with a sense of reverential awe is the purpose of _Universe of Stone: A Biography of Chartres Cathedral_ (Harper) by Philip Ball. Ball, who has written about diverse subjects like Renaissance medicine, water, and the history of pigment making, says that understanding Chartres is made difficult by all the centuries that have laid on since its construction and all the different academic and philosophical views that have often made confusing issues even less clear. Ball writes, "It is only by embedding the church in the culture of the twelfth century - its philosophies, its schools and its politics, its trades and technologies, its religious debates - that we can begin to make sense of what we see (and what we feel) when we pass through the Royal Portal of the west front." His book accomplishes this goal, clearly laying out spiritual, social, and technological trends of the era in a thoughtful and entertainingly discursive book of architectural history.

There is much we do not know about how the cathedral was built. We do know that it was built quickly, in the first 26 years of the thirteenth century. We don't know the architect who planned it all out, or if an architect actually did so, nor how educated the planners and builders were. There are no plans or models. We do know that it represented a change from Romanesque to Gothic architecture. Romanesque builders piled stones for the chief purpose of having them not fall down, and their resulting vast walls and narrow windows were a reflection of darkness and monastic seclusion. Chartres was in the vanguard of Gothic construction, changing the way the church regarded itself. It is not likely that the builders had in mind a celebration of the light of reason, but it is not far-fetched to imagine that the increase of light and banishment of the old gloom both reflected and inspired a process from fearing God to investigating with wonder God's works. Most of the hundreds of stone carvings in Chartres were done by masons who knew the stones would then be hoisted to a high nook where human eyes could never again see them. Only upon the invention of powerful spyglasses, tools the masons could never have imagined, were these sculptures seen again. The erection of the cathedral was not always so idealistic, however. Ball makes clear that those who worked on it expected to get paid, and that the those who got paid did not like the idea of volunteers doing the work for free in religious ecstasy. There is a legend of the "cult of the carts", whereby spontaneous fervor caused laymen to harness themselves to bring stones from far away, but much more likely is that any such show was organized by the clerics. Certainly, surviving accounts show that all unskilled manual work went for a fee, despite any bouts of fervent free labor.

Ball writes that Chartres is "nearly a pristine document, miraculously preserved from a distant world, bearing a message that is barely diluted." There has been a bit of remodeling and a huge baroque sculpture of the Assumption in the choir, and it is alarming that what Ball calls "the arrogance of eighteenth-century artistic chauvinism" permitted the interior to be completely whitewashed. The building never did get finished according to original intentions, because it got only two spires rather than the nine that were proposed, but it still has a unity and a clarity that few structures of the time can claim. It was also a showpiece for the era's understanding of flying buttresses, pointed arches, and ribbed vaulting, all of which are pictured and diagrammed here, along with illustrations of what might go wrong if stresses on the structures were not in balance. If you can't get there to see the cathedral itself, Ball's book is the perfect vehicle for informed armchair traveling.

Philip Ball's "Universe of Stone: A Biograpahy of Chartres Cathedral" seeks to explore and explain the philosophical roots of a society and culture that produced Chartres Cathedral, an archtypical masterpiece of Gothic architecture. Balls himself admits the hurdles he faced: "Arguably, then, it is a foolhardy eneavour to say anything about 'why' Chartres Cathedral was built, which in the end what this book attempts to do. But to my mind, it is only by confronting that question that we can fully experience what this most extraordinary, most inspiring building has to offer."

Ball is inevitably limited in his efforts by the lack of extensive detailed records from that distant era, as well as by the profound differences in our perceptions of the world than those held by people of the 11th and 12th centuries.

The first half of "Universe of Stone" is especially challenging to the reader as the author lays out the background to the medieval mind: Aristotle and Plato and Augustine and Bernard of Clairvaux and Peter Abelard and the rise of Neo-Platonist philosophy with its emphasis on rational order. The pace of the book's narrative picks up when practical matters of design and finance and construction are considered, with the author citing records of numerous other Gothic building projects to explain what must have happened at Chartres. Along the way, Ball addresses and discards many popular myths, such as the design of the Cathedral incorporating mystical knowledge and that cathedral-building was a manifestation of popular civic enthusiasm.

The attentive reader of "Universe of Stone" will be rewarded with a better understanding of the medieval mind as well as the practical realities of constructing such marvelous buildings.

For anyone who has stood in awe of the splendid architecture of Notre Dame de Paris, Saint Denis, or Chartres itself, this is a delightful book. In his engaging and smooth prose, Philip Ball guides the reader through the religious, social, and philosophical milieu that produced the quintessentially Gothic cathedral at Chartres.

The essence of Gothic architecture is hotly disputed (Ball navigates neatly through the variety of scholarly opinion), but it certainly incorporated into a unified whole a number of different elements that had previously existed--all for the purpose, it seems, of achieving a soaring height and lightness inside, heaven on earth. Contrary to what the name suggests, Gothic was really a French style, and Ball discusses Chartres in the context of the nearby and near-contemporary cathedrals, especially St Denis, Sens, Soissons, and Strasbourg. (He occasionally brings up the adaptations of the Gothic style further afield.)

Like many other important churches, Notre Dame de Chartres was erected on an even more ancient sacred site: a sacred well (not a druidic temple, which is a Renaissance misinterpretation of Caesar's writing). The earliest churches that stood over Chartres's sacred well (which can still be seen in the crypt beneath the cathedral) were wooden and burnt down repeatedly: rebuilding was undertaken in 743, 858, 1020 (at which point the bishop Fulbert decided to make it an impressive Romanesque cathedral), 1134, and finally in 1194. At this point, it was decided to rebuild in the new Gothic style--a style introduced in the west front and choir of St Denis that had been completed a half-century before.

In a long middle section reminiscent of Ross King's Brunelleschi's Dome, Ball keeps the reader waiting to find out the answers to some key questions: Who built it? How long did it take? He explains thoroughly the intellectual context of the Gothic cathedral and its material features in alternating sections not in chronological order.

The monastic trends of the era are pointed out, together with the structure of the cathedral's ministry (and the tension between Chartres's and the local bishop); and the cathedral's original interior colors, ochre and white, are revealed. The Aristotelian, Platonic, and Augustinian foundations of medieval philosophy and theology are laid; and important figures such as Bernard of Clairvaux and Peter Abelard are profiled. The state of the art in medieval science is discussed, and its incarnation at the cathedral school in Chartres; and Geoffrey of Leves and Bernard and Thierry of Chartres are profiled. The roles of architects, masters, and builders are discussed, together with their building materials (chiefly limestone in the Isle-de-France); Villard de Honnecourt and his drawings are discussed, as are the uses of military technology in building projects. The engineering challenges of a Gothic cathedral are presented, including forces and stability, cracking and buttressing. (It seems that the argument over whether to buttress or to vault first was never really settled.) And in a chapter reminiscent of Ross King's on pigments in Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling, the making of colored glass is discussed, and it is revealed why blue and red were the dominant colors in medieval stained-glass windows.

In the second-to-last chapter, Ball describes the actual building of the cathedral at Chartres, and he debunks the legend of the townspeople putting their shoulders to carts of stones in a frenzy of enthusiasm. As for the cost of the project, Ball estimates that perhaps 5% of the total cost (around 4000 livres) came from the town; maybe another 5% from the French king; a little could be expected from pilgrims who came to see the town's prized relic, the Blessed Virgin's Sancta Camisa; but most of the funds probably came from the bishop's own salary and the rents on church lands. Ball addresses the age-old question of the order of construction--east to west? west to east?--amusingly, observing as evidence against the west-to-east theory that "the nave doesn't so much join up with the west end as crash into it." The question hasn't been settled, but in any case it seems that the architects had thought they would be able to replace Bishop Fulbert's two western towers. (Just one remains--the southwest, less elaborate one.) But funds ran out, and it was in retrospect a happy accident, because it forced the architects to simplify the design (nine spires were originally planned), thereby unifying it and providing a template for the great cathedrals that followed. One wonders how things might have turned out otherwise--would the great Gothic cathedrals all be like the colossal Duomo in Milan?

This was a very enjoyable book, filled with great pictures and diagrams (unfortunately not indexed, though) and eventually answering those key questions: No one knows who the masters or architects were, but there were probably a number of them. And it took just 26 years to build, much less than the century or so needed for Amiens or Reims. This is a great book for the traveler--armchair or otherwise--who is interested in Chartres or medieval architecture.

Cam Jensen's real name is Jennifer and she has an amazing memory. Her memory is like a camera: she has a picture of her head of every thing that she has seen. Whenever she wants to remember something she closes her eyes and says, "Click." Because of her great memory people started calling her "the Camera," and then they shorted it to just "Cam." "Young Cam Jansen and the Baseball Mystery" takes place one afternoon when Cam and her friends are playing a game of baseball at the park. When Amy hits the ball so far that it sails over Robert's head, she ends up hitting a home run. But the ball disappears and Cam and her friends have to find it because otherwise the game will be over. Can Cam catch all the clues?

Written by David A. Adler with illustrations by Susanna Natti, "Young Cam Jansen and the Baseball Mystery" does a nice job of finding a comfort level for its young readers when it comes to solving the mystery. Kids reading this book might not be as quick as Cam to figure out the clues, but they should be ahead of Cam's friends in that regard. There is also an opportunity for readers to test their own memory and see if it as amazing as Cam Jansen: Right before the opening chapter there is a full-page illustration of Cam and Robert walking through the park. Young readers are supposed to look at the picture, blink their eyes and say "Click," and then turn to the last page of the book to answer some questions and see how well they remember the details of the picture.

There are other books in the Young Cam Jansen series, including "Young Cam Jansen and the Dinosaur Game," "Young Cam Nansen and the Missing Cookie," and "Young Cam Jansen and the Library Mystery." These are all Level 2 readers aimed at ages 5-8 (Grades K-2), and students who are beginning to read. The reason these are all Young Cam Jansen mysteries is because Adler has written even more books about his young heroine in the Cam Jansen adventure series, which are aimed at ages 8-12 (Grades 1-3) and kids who are reading alone. Helping young readers make the transition to chapter books, this series includes "Cam Jansen and the Mystery of the Babe Ruth Baseball," "Cam Jansen and the Mystery of the Monkey House," and "Cam Jansen and the First Day of School Mystery." I certainly like the idea of Adler different types of books for readers at two different levels and think it would be interesting for Adler to write a Level 1 Cam Jansen story and another for her at some reading level higher than 3.

You have to love Cam Jansen. When you're a kid, you read all of these stories about magic powers, mystery, and adventure. But everyone tells you magic can't exist. Cam Jansen manages to solve every case without the use of magic... she's a real girl. That's what makes her special and what makes you want to red more and more. Cam Jansen is a real kid superhero, and the thought that a person like her could actually exist... makes her the best kid detective ever! Our family loves Cam Jansen!

This book is great for those who are just becoming independant readers. The sentences are short and the vocabulary is simple enough so it is easy for them to understand. Also the pictures correspond well to the story. The story will keep their interest, they will follow the pursuit to find the baseball, seeing how Cam uses her photographic memory to help solve the mystery. This story teaches young children how photgraphic memories work in a simple way. I liked how they used Cam, short for camera as her nickname.

Behind The Eight Ball: Sex For Crack Cocaine Exchange And Poor Black Women (Haworth Psychosocial Issues of HIV/AIDS) (Haworth Psychosocial Issues of HIV/AIDS)
This was an eye opener for me. We take so much for granted. When I read this book and realized how many poor, young Black women were killing themselves from the use of crack, I was saddened. I can't believe a country as rich as the US doesn't have enough resources to help these poor women who because of circumstances and wrong choices were being victimized. Until Dr. Sharpe brought attention to these women, I'm sure most people didn't realize this group of hlepless women existed and continue to exist by any means necessary. This is a must read for young women and men to get a glimpse of what life is like for women who feel they have no other choice but to sell their bodies for something that can eventually kill them.

Dr. Tanya Sharpe has managed to provide an in-depth look at crack cocaine and its impact on urban poor black women. This text is a wonderful resource for disciplines working with poor black women, HIV prevention, and of course those in addiction and public health. Very few books of this kind successfully capture the intersection of crack cocaine use among poor black women with the HIV/AIDS epidemic, societal and psychosocial implications. I highly recommend this book.

The CFL is the oldest and best Pro
Football League (barely) on planet
Earth. Jeff Giles, who I called and
talked to once has written the quin-
ticential book on the 21st century
for this troubled League. If the CFL
Board of Governours had taken Mr Giles
advice back in '99-'00 they could have
had a great realtionship and partner-
ship with the fastest growing League on
planet Earth; the Ar.FL(&Af2) family.
But alas, as the Thomas Wright's and
Mike Lysko's have tried to ruin this
fine League, Giles looks more like a
CFL prophet all the time. Read espec-
ially Chapters on Ar.FL and XFL!

As a huge football fan with ties to the CFL and Canada I found this book to be entertaining. Jeff Giles pulls very few punches in this book. The way he views Canada and the CFL is very interesting! I have well over one hundred books on football in my collection and this one is a fine addition!

I very much enjoyed this book. I am a Blood Bowl fan, so I may be somewhat biased. If you are not a Blood Bowl fan, you will still enjoy this book because it is humorous and fun to read. There are some creepy parts, and some adult concepts, so I would not recommend this for a child or early teen.

I'm glad to see Black Library is publishing more of these stories. I am excited to read the next installment.

Dunk Hoffnung, with the Bad Bay Hackers, returns for a starring role in Book Two of the Blood Bowl Trilogy.

Without enough teammates to continue playing the sport of Blood Bowl, Coach Pegleg's team sets sail for Far Albion. Spike! Magazine sends reporter Lästiges Weibchen with them to make a documentary of anything special that may occur; after all, chaos just seems to follow this particular team around more than any other. Pegleg wants to hunt down the location of the legendary Far Albion Cup trophy and retrieve it in hopes that the myth surrounding it is true. The legend states that the team with this cup in its possession will be unbeatable.

Olsen Merlin (an elf) is a former team wizard of the Notting Knights. His own fate is linked with the Far Albion Cup, so of course Olsen steps forward to help the Hackers get the cup. While doing so, Dunk and the (few) teammates left run into trouble. Bandits, a diseased cult, and even a treeman (which are all but extinct) are just the beginning of the mess the legendary cup gets them into.

***** Not as many Blood Bowl games in this, the second book of the trilogy, than the first. However, author Matt Forbeck keeps things entertaining with his twisted imagination, funny dialogue, and lots of action. I can hardly wait to dive into the third installment. BRAVO! *****

Reviewed by Detra Fitch of Huntress Reviews.

I enjoy reading books from new authors, even though most are "rough" at best. This is one that really suprised me!

Michael Ball's first novel is expertly told. The story is intense and extremely professional. The characters are well developed and interesting, and the plot is presented in a very believeable manner.

This is probably the best book from a new author that I have ever read! If Ball isn't soon considered one of today's top authors, I will be very suprised!

You will not be disappointed with this one, I assure you!

I picked up a copy of "Brothers Seven" at my local bookstore and am glad that I did! The story is extremely clever, with a huge amount of suspense! The characters are very interesting, and readers can understand their different points-of-view.
The story deals with greedy businesses and their upper management doing whatever they can to make a profit. The Brothers Seven take justice into their own hands to teach corporate America that there is more to life than profits.
I don't want to spoil the story for anyone, but it is an extremely satisfying and entertaining book!
I will be looking for more books from this author!

I love this book. The text is a bit of a tongue twister but reads liltingly once you know it. The illustrations are beautiful. We find new things everytime we look at them. It's my favorite book in my son's library.

I loved reading this book as much as my 2 year old. The creative outfits were better than the words. My daughter requests this book often. Only draw back is that it implies that fun things happen while we are asleep at night......not good for my noctural princess.