Machines Books

Yes a must have book if you follow the Iso Rivolta automobiles. Loads of real info in the years of production of the Iso cars. Covers all models built from the "egg" car to the one off Varedo, and gives a peek at what the Rivolta group is doing with boats,city cars, and the Grifo 90. Just buy it to look at the picutes its full of full color prints and text to make it a can't put down book.

Winston Goodfellow provides a tantilizing, well written story of of a family's quest to build beautiful, fast yet reliable automobiles. More than a dry history of an obscure Italian car manufacturer, this book highlights the great GT cars of the late 1950s and 1960s, in addition to giving a cultural snapshot of Italian design heritage.

This could be one of the best automotive books ever written. Mr. Goodfellow does more than just detail the history of the Iso car company, he tells the stories behind all of the personalities that helped build these amazing machines. This book gives the reader a detailed behind the scenes look at the Italian car industry during some of the most interesting years. Lots of technical information too! Can't wait for his next book on Giotto Bizzarrini.

Mike Clarke

Downside is few visuals and no color printing inside.

The best book on the Leadership Development concept & practice. Should be part of any HR degree curiculum covering leadership development.

MUST READ for people who want to development themselves, line managers and aspiring HR professionals.

Challenges many long held assumptions and written in a no-nonsense, engaging sometimes ironic way such as "12 surefire ways to derail your worst enemy".

I've used this book many times to educate Leaders in organizations how to build a leadership pipeline and WHY it is important. This is one of the best "sleeper" books on the subject of leadership development, the business case behind succession planning and what a company can do about it. I've worked with the tools from their company for years with great success.

I have read the The Leadership Machine and other books by the authors. This book is a great tool for managers, Human Resources professional, and anyone who is in a position to help people develop professionally. This book is not your typical managerial self-help book; you won't find any fables or references to FISH here. If you are looking for a guide to developing people in your organization based on research and the experience of the authors this is the book for you. I have used this book to plan my own development and to help others think about their development. If you are going to read this book I would recommend you purchase For Your Improvement (FYI) as well. This is a great starting point, but be aware this is only the tip of the iceberg for what these Lominger offerings can do for you and your company. My organization has worked with Lominger for a number for years and have had great success implementing their strategies.

This is a hot book! I coached a team of manufacturing managers who worked in a large traditional factory. Our job was to study manufacturing operations in companies that had adopted Toyota's productivity methods and policies. While the men and women on the team had read about lean production, they were disquieted and perhaps even disturbed by obviously highly performing plants that were organized and operated according to principles foreign to their beliefs. At each plant we visited their discomfort deepened. Then, somewhere between the second and fourth visit, each manager had an epiphany. There was some kind of logical reorganization of the manufacturing furniture in their minds and they "got it", as they described the event. Others said, "the light came on." They saw the fundamental logic and sense underlying each lean factory even though each facility assembled pieces of Toyota's productivity methods and policies into its own unique manufacturing system. Interestingly, each member of the visit team became a passionate believer of lean manufacturing. The greatest skeptics became the most outspoken advocates. They called it "getting religion."

People who successfully implement lean manufacturing must be strong believers and must have a personal mental model of lean that functions at the level of a craft - a creative skill for assembling productivity methods and policies into powerfully efficient manufacturing machines. As the great Japanese coaches from Toyota teach Westerners, there is no cookbook, lean is a way of thinking.

The literature on lean production is disappointing. Lean manufacturing books tend to be long dreary laundry lists of productivity methods and technical techniques for quality. There is little available that gives insight into how the great master craftsmen and craftswomen put together marvelous lean machines of production - until now.

This book by Richard McCormack finally brings us face to face with the creative processes of great designers of production systems. Imagine yourself as a novice artist sitting down for a conversation with Auguste Renoir, Vincent Van Gogh, Toulouse-Lautrec or Michelangelo. That is what McCormack brings us in this book - chats with the virtuosos of lean production. Forget those paint-by-numbers books. Either go see the real thing or read "Lean Machines".

A lot has been written about lean, but nothing yet compares to what this book has done.... It's the first time anyone has provided straight answers about the true nature of lean. The author asks the right questions and gets surprising responses. Having spent 20 years in the automotive business, I found this book extremely useful.

This is a hot book! I coached a team of manufacturing managers who worked in a large traditional factory. Our job was to study manufacturing operations in companies that had adopted Toyota's productivity methods and policies. While the men and women on the team had read about lean production, they were disquieted and perhaps even disturbed by obviously highly performing plants that were organized and operated according to principles foreign to their beliefs. At each plant we visited their discomfort deepened. Then, somewhere between the second and fourth visit, each manager had an epiphany. There was some kind of logical reorganization of the manufacturing furniture in their minds and they "got it", as they described the event. Others said, "the light came on." They saw the fundamental logic and sense underlying each lean factory even though each facility assembled pieces of Toyota's productivity methods and policies into its own unique manufacturing system. Interestingly, each member of the visit team became a passionate believer of lean manufacturing. The greatest skeptics became the most outspoken advocates. They called it "getting religion."

People who successfully implement lean manufacturing must be strong believers and must have a personal mental model of lean that functions at the level of a craft - a creative skill for assembling productivity methods and policies into powerfully efficient manufacturing machines. As the great Japanese coaches from Toyota teach Westerners, there is no cookbook, lean is a way of thinking.

The literature on lean production is disappointing. Lean manufacturing books tend to be long dreary laundry lists of productivity methods and technical techniques for quality. There is little available that gives insight into how the great master craftsmen and craftswomen put together marvelous lean machines of production - until now.

This book by Richard McCormack finally brings us face to face with the creative processes of great designers of production systems. Imagine yourself as a novice artist sitting down for a conversation with Auguste Renoir, Vincent Van Gogh, Toulouse-Lautrec or Michelangelo. That is what McCormack brings us in this book - chats with the virtuosos of lean production. Forget those paint-by-numbers books. Either go see the real thing or read "Lean Machines".

What strikes me each time I open this book is Mr Kecman's sense of pedagogy: it is a lesson in the matter. Not only his book delivers the - sometimes complex - techniques in a highly readable manner, but the concepts behind each of the main tools (SVM, NN & FL) he chose to highlight are always brilliantly put in context. One comes out of the reading with more than a set of equations but rather with a clearer picture of the field.
Mr Kecman is - without a doubt - a great teacher.

This effort to deliver a clear message is furthermore underlined through the numerous original figures: if you are like me and feel that a (good) picture speaks more than a thousand words, you will sure appreciate the way the illustrations complement the text and truly help the understanding.

I have read several other books on the subject but if I had to chose one for teaching purposes, this would be the one. I you want to build a better understanding of the field, get this book: it will pay on the long term.

This is a very good book. Another reviewer has commented on Vojislav Kecman being an excellent teacher. I whole-heartedly second that opinion. Often times, while reading this book, you will pause with a doubt or question. What you will find surprising is that almost certainly the author has answered that question in the next paragraph. Many times, the author's answers will tally your own answers.

The first chapter of the book (entitled: Learning and Soft Computing: Rationale, Motivations, Needs, Basics) is 119 pages long. It is an essential reading. By the time you finish reading this chapter the things will start falling into place and you will be more motivated and ready to read the remaining chapters. Until you are highly aware of this topic, do not skip this chapter.

A book is made up of a lot of things other than the text that it covers. Does it contain many/any stupid jokes? Is it printed on the highest quality paper? Is the font size good? Is it printed too dense? Is the cover page inviting enough? Are the dimensions/weight of the book correct? On all these counts the book scores high.

Consistent with the subject matter that it covers, this is not an easy book. You will perhaps like to read it with paper and pencil. But if you are willing to spend time with this book, this book will do a lot of good to you. This is a very good book.

This book is a nice and, I would say, a successful attempt to provide a unified survey of important theoretical and practical machine learning tools: neural networks (NN), support vector machines (SVM) and fuzzy systems (FS).

Book consists of nine chapters, covering SVMs, one- and multi-layer perceptrons and radial-basis function networks, as variants of neural networks, and basics of fuzzy theory. This is followed by interesting case-studies (in financial, control and computer graphic applications) and concluded by basics of optimization theory and an overview of necessary mathematical tools. All the MATLAB programs needed for the simulated experiments are available on the book web site.

Authored by Vojislav Kecman, a prominent researcher in the field of soft computing and previous MIT visiting professor, this book is an excellent material for advanced undergraduate and introductory graduate courses in machine learning applications and soft computing....

Facinating book with gorgeous drawings. We bought it for our 8 year old son who has always loved inventing and drawing machines of his own creation and were so impressed with it that we bought a copy to donate to his school library too.

excellent illustrations. this book is a must for anybody contemplating building any of Leonardo's machines. Particularly for school projects. Disappointed that the crossbow wasn't included. Otherwise probably one of the best books available on his machines.

I bought this book because I have tickets to see the traveling exhibit, "The Da Vinci Experience", in a couple months. It is a gorgeous book. Each machine covered has copies of the Da Vinci original plans, plus the editor's illustrations breaking the machine into it's components, with the placements of said componenets. Each machine has explanations of how components and the full machine work (or are supposed to work). Also, each machine has a history of Leonardo's drawings, purpose, client or personal notebooks, etc. It's a great book and looks gorgeous. I wouldn't think it would be a how-to for a school project unless the kid/parent had a lot of mechanical experience beforehand. All drawings show "real" components that you'd need a full shop to put together. There are no measurements, per se, just comparative sizes shown in the drawings. In the case of Leonardo's original drawings, it looks like this was deliberate. For example, the book's Introduction tells of Leonardo's problems with Giorgio Tedesco, an assistant of a prominant Medici. He wanted Leonardo to build him wooden models of several inventions. Leonardo successfully argued that he could only give Tedesco the scaled drawings. Historians surmise that Leonardo suspected that Tedesco would take the models back to his country, and take them apart to make full-sized machines out of iron without Leonardo's help. Job security was no laughing matter in the 1500's! Love the book. Can't wait to see the working full-sized (except for the half-size helicopter)models made from the drawings in the exhibition.

The pastoral image is alive and well, certainly in my mind anyway!

As an airline pilot observing the land below I often mused, sometimes in conversation with my fellow crewmembers, what it would be like to fly over the landscape as it existed in an earlier time. Of course, I would still want to be comfortably ensconced in my aluminum cocoon, able to zip thither and yon for whatever my allotted time. Today Hawthorne's peace in "Sleepy Hollow" is more likely to be disrupted by the "long shriek, harsh, above all other harshness...[that] the space of a mile cannot mollify it into harmony" of a jet engine than the whistle of a locomotive.

Leo Marx very capably traces the origin of the literary ideal of the "garden" and pinpoints its contradictory meanings through the literary creations of some of America's greatest writers. At its core is the contrast between two worlds, that of rural peace and simplicity or urban sophistication and power. The shriek of the locomotive whistle is a metaphor for industrial power.

Shakespeare's "The Tempast," provides a recurring theme "of a redemptive journey away from society in the direction of nature," but the pastoral design circumscribes the pastoral ideal, and is therefore out of reach. Nonetheless the image of a pastoral retreat is so believable that it almost seems a possibility. Marx goes on to explains how the pastoral ideal is modified by American writers to New World circumstances.

But, Robert Beverley in the "History and Present State of Virginia" confuses the two meanings of "garden." One results from man's improvements, the bounty of the land; the other is the language of myth.

This relationship between nature and man is evident in Jefferson's agrarian ideal in "Notes on Virginia." But Marx highlights Jefferson's paradoxical view toward industry. To Jefferson the machine was a "token of the liberation of the human spirit."(150) His vision of the machine was while it was at work, blending in harmoniously with the countryside, not the factory system which became the manifestation of technological progress. Jefferson's quandary, as Marx observes, was that "to put the pastoral theory of America into effect it would be necessary at some point...to legislate against the creation of a system of manufactures. But to curb economic development in turn would require precisely the kind of government power Jefferson detested."(134)

Opposing Jefferson's rural agrarian ideal, Alexander Hamilton was "an undisguised advocate of continuing economic development."(167) The "Report on the Subject of Manufactures," which Hamilton presented to Congress, articulated a different attitude toward manufactures. Marx, understandably, does not spend much space discussing Hamilton, since his ideas were so much at odds with Marx's thesis of pastoral idealism.

Marx concludes the machine's increasing dominance precludes the possibility of pastoral redemption and a new "symbol of possibility" is needed. Until then the machine remains in the garden, except as an image in my mind, of a land that no longer exists!

In writing this review I am attempting not to duplicate the excellent review by panopticonman below. Thus, I would refer all readers of this review to that review.

Marx's thesis, roughly stated, is that: Americans applied idea's developed about landscape in the old world to the landscape they discovered in the new world. In doing so, the landscape became a "repository of value" (value meaning economic, spiritual, etc.). The main idea about the landscape that travelled with them from Europe was the idea of "pastoralism".

Pastorialism, roughly expressed, represents the yearning by civilised man to occupy the space in between "art" and "nature". Marx does an excellent job of explaining the pre-modern understanding of "art" (which is different then our modern understanding of the word). Marx also distinguishes the a "simple" conception of pastoralism with a "complex" conception. Using the writings of Jefferson, Marx argues that Americans were more comfortable with the idea of a "complex" pastoralism that acknowledged the conflict inherent in the occupation of a "middle landscape" between art and nature.
Marx then attaches the concept of pastoralism to the symbol of the "garden" as representing a mediating space between art and nature (apply "arts" to "nature" and produce a garden).

After a further differentiation between the idea of the garden-as-continent vs. garden-as-garden, Marx moves on to the idea of the "machine".

What Marx means by the "machine" of the title is a relationship between culture and industry that was irrevocably altered by the industrial revolution. He details the attempts by writers to deal with the looming conflict between pastoralism and industrialization. Perhaps the most interesting portion of the book comes when Marx discusses the period when many saw NO conflict between the "machine" and the "garden".

However, the tour de force comes when Marx analyzes this conflict as it appears in the works of Emerson, Thoureau, Hawthorne, Melville and Fitzgerald.

Personally, I thought the analysis of Hawthorne's "Ethan Brand" was first rate.

Marx concludes by congratulating the authors he uses for "clarifying" the situation of Americans and noting that the ultimate resolution of the problem of the machine in the garden is not for writer's but for politicans.

In this way, the book is significantly more political then one might expect. It really belongs to the genre of "American Studies", even though my 1970's edition refers to it as belonging to "Literature".

Marx achieves greatness by tenaciously explpicating the troubled relationship between America and its technology. Although written in 1964, this book retains great relevance.

I highly recommend "The Machine in the Garden".

Marx's book is roughly 50 years old now, but it still sparkles with insight into the myth and symbol discourse surrounding America's fulfillment of the 18th century idea of the "Garden of the World," a new Eden that would redeem mankind. Starting with "The Tempest" as reflective of the West's view of the geographic discovery of "primitive" and "unspoiled" lands, and moving through Hawthorne, Emerson, Thoreau, Melville, Twain, to Fitzgerald "The Great Gatsby" as an exemplification of how the simple"pastoralism" of the Enlightenment (based on the Virgillian pastoral form), Marx shows how the American artists and writers slowly came to grips with the penetration of the machine into the garden. He talks about the idea of the "middle landscape" a notion poised halfway between primitivism and progressivism, about the apparent perversity of "lazy" early settlers who, in the view of some commentators like Jefferson, never cultivated their own gardens, unlike the English aristocracy. The section on Melville's rewriting of the pastoral ideal in "Moby Dick" is a masterful excursion into the imagination and motives of Melville, as he questions the boosterism for industrialism which has infected even Emerson, who apostrophizes about how industry will forge a newer, better millenialist garden.

At some point before the industrial "take-off" there was hope that technology would extend and even democratize the garden. Stunning inventions one after the other -- the railroad, the telegraph, the industrial weaving machies -- and their introduction so soon after the American revolution portended a great unemcubered American future. But still Emerson noticed the change when he wrote in the 1840s that "Things are in the saddle and ride mankind," and Thoreau pointed out that men had become tools of their tools -- focused on the means but not on the ends, and instrumentalist view without ideals.

James in his notes on trip he took to America in his later career was struck by the "acquiesence to monotony" in the small New England towns. The railroad crossing had made them all the same. Thomas Carlyle had warned America about the insidious effects of industrialization on the spirit. So did Blake and Wordsworth and other Romantics. However, many Americans like Emerson, believed the degradation of the "dark satanic mills" would never happen in America. None could believe that the apple-cheeked farm-girls of New England working in the first mills would ever fall so low as the wretches in London. The "Garden" would not permit it to happen that way.

Some other highlights: his keystone use of a Hawthorne essay in the Virgillian mode penetrated by a railroad whistle. The mixture of Thoreau's hard-headed "empirical" approach to pastoralism, Melville's skillful metaphors, particularly the skeleton of the whale on an island of natives which looks half like a hanging garden and half like an industrial loom. Twain's pastoral America in Huck Finn, Twain's recognition that the pilot (as he was) had an entirely instrumental view of a sunset on the river (with its hidden dangers that required constant attention), while the passenger could actually enjoy the sunset. Finally, although short, Marx's retelling of Gatsby whose "Country House" on Long Island is founded of the spoils gained by factory workers a little bit up the railroad line, is compelling too.

Science fiction writers have exploited the machine in the paradox ever since the genre began. Indeed the genre began with Mary Shelley's whose monster was a creature of technology. And also, the myth is everywhere apparent in the suburbs of America -- the middle landscape between the country and the city. The myth and symbol approach of Marx and Nast was attached by the next generation of historians, but now that the dust has cleared we can see how influential a book this really is. Great stuff!

Lynn's knowledge about quilting and her ability to explain and share this knowledge to a wantabe quilter is superior. This book will become your quilting bible.

The latest in the Basics & Beyond series by Landauer Books once again shows why they have become staples in every quilter's library. Before you read the first word - and believe me, you will read every single one - you will appreciate the attention to detail incorporated into each book.

It is a hardback with a hidden-spiral so the pages will lay flat next to your sewing machine. And, there are over 200 pictures and illustrations so you can visually view the process - every step of the way. Whether you would like to machine quilt a small project - or a queen size quilt - Lynn will walk you through the process, step by step. She has been quilting and teaching her techniques for years so she's incorporated her no-fail techniques into each and every page. Lynn Witzenburg is truly an expert!

Let's face it, many of us love to applique and piece projects but when it comes to actually finishing them, we turn them over to the experts - and send them out to a machine quilter. But, what if YOU were the expert? That means you would no longer have to wait in line to complete your quilts. In our area, many of the machine quilters are booked six months in advance! And, the money that you would spend on quilting could be used to finance the materials for your next project.

Think about it. You could buy everything Lynn recommends to get started - including her book - for the price of sending out one quilt! So, why not give it a try?

The Tricks of the Trade

Lynn includes tips and helpful hints on almost every page. And, frankly, I looked at the pictures and read the tips during my first sitting. But, she drew me in. In the middle of a blizzard, I got a cup of coffee, snuggled in a quilt, and sat down to savor every word.

I have always been intimidated by machine quilting. I've even tried it a few times - but with less than stellar results. But Lynn went into such detail that she gave me solutions to the problems I encountered - and instructions and tips that stopped me from trying anything bigger than a placemat!

And Then Move on to the "Beyond"

After you have mastered the basics, Lynn explores more advanced techniques such as trapunto, bobbin-quilting, and free-form feathers. She even explains how to design original borders. So this book is a must have for all machine quilters - even those of you who are more experienced.

Lynn has also included several projects with the machine quilting designs included. If you are a shop owner, why not consider teaching a series of classes using the same book. Start them off with the basics and move on to the more advanced techniques. Trapunto, bobbin-quilting and free-form feathers could all be demonstrated with white on white fabrics to make an assortment of pillows.

Your students will be able to finish it in class - and will learn how to adjust the bobbin tension (without shuddering); use water soluble thread; and quilt larger projects.

This book covers it all - and explains it in such simple terms that you will refer to it again and again. I shared it with all of my favorite machine quilters - and they gave it a five star "must read". But, don't stop here. Check out the other books in the series - Applique the Basics and Beyond: The Complete Guide to Successful Machine and Hand Techniques with Dozens of Designs to Mix and Match and Knit Book: The Basics & Beyond. You'll be glad you did.

The machine as a labor saving device is never so perfectly illustrated as the advent of the sewing machine and the making of a quilt. A hardcover, hidden-spiral bound, 'user friendly' instruction manual, "Machine Quilting: The Basics & Beyond" by quilting expert Lynn Witzenburg offers the novice machine stitch quilter with a complete, step-by-step, visually illustrated guide to successfully creating quilts with the assistance of a sewing machine. As fun as it is informative, "Machine Quilting: The Basics & Beyond" includes twelve do-it-yourself projects complete with full-size patterns, as well as favorite and original quilting designs that even the most novice of needlecrafters can employ to good effect. Such issues as choosing a stencil design, working with quilting paper, adapting motifs to fill spaces, making border designs fit, even the creation of 'feathers' in round, square, triangular, and free form. From the needed equipment and supplies, preparing to machine quilt, to free-motion stitching techniques, and so much more, "Machine Quilting: The Basics & Beyond" will prove to be an invaluable reference and a popular addition to personal and community library Needlecraft reference collections.

I am new to programming in general and will start to learn Assembler next quarter, our instructor has told us that if we learn assembler well, (meaning to document correctly and make our code 'elegant') we will be in the highly sought after group of people they call Professionals. This is of course a great goal. But you know about the alligator/ swamp thing. I am now at this part of the learning curve - so overwhelmed by the sheer volume of things -to remember, that it is too easy to just get job done and make it work. Well, Jeff has taken a most unique approach to this problem - he has written a book for absolute beginners - and he does so with out making me fell like I just arrived on the planet. He assumes that you are knowledgeable about your PC and nothing more (how to turn it on, etc) He seems truly interested in making this and his future books to come - a book that we would want to have on our reference shelves for years to come. My highest recommendation for an author would be - if I cared - if he would write another book on this or a related subject. In this case, I am going to write him a letter to ask him to do so. It is, as if I had just read my first book by Clive Cussler and can't wait for the next book to come out.

I am new to programming in general and will start to learn Assembler next quarter, our instructor has told us that if we learn assembler well, (meaning to document correctly and make our code 'elegant') we will be in the highly sought after group of people they call Professionals. This is of course a great goal. But you know about the alligator/ swamp thing. I am now at this part of the learning curve - so overwhelmed by the sheer volume of things -to remember, that it is too easy to just get job done and make it work. Well, Jeff has taken a most unique approach to this problem - he has written a book for absolute beginners - and he does so with out making me fell like I just arrived on the planet. He assumes that you are knowledgeable about your PC and nothing more (how to turn it on, etc) He seems truly interested in making this and his future books to come - a book that we would want to have on our reference shelves for years to come. My highest recommendation for an author would be - if I cared - if he would write another book on this or a related subject. In this case, I am going to write him a letter to ask him to do so. It is, as if I had just read my first book by Clive Cussler and can't wait for the next book to come out.

This book is a must read for every serious developer. I was greatly pleased with the book except that it was a little thin. It is an excellent introduction for assembly language programming and the very effective use of macros. I highly recommend this book for programmers who are interested to write fast and tight code in a high efficient manner. This book needs to be owned by developers doing assembly language programming on a higher level.

This superb book discusses why language was mans most valuable tool ever developed and critiques opinions that say other wise. Enjoy, Mumford was a true geniu

Lewis Mumford was one of the 20th century's most important philosophers, and the two-volume set Myth of the Machine (Volume 1 is Technics and Human Development; and Volume 2 is The Pentagon of Power) are probably his most important books: the summation of his life's work. In writing as elegant as it is clear, Mumford makes plain the death urge that has always underlain civilization, which Mumford calls "the machine," and later "the megamachine." This is a social structure organized not around any organic human needs, but around the "needs" of the machines that have come to characterize and control our lives. These are crucial, incisive, devastating books. I cannot praise them highly enough.

rather than the typical modern myths about mankind and its evolution - evoked by TV-series like "The X-Files" - this great book - as an amazing anthology of the human intellect - shows the "whole truth" ( that is not outhere by the way, but in our brains ) and how much we are going to lose of our human capacilities if we adore the principle of the machine!

It just hit me on so many levels, I can't nail down any single one. There was some bursting of icons, maybe even lampooning the idea of heroism itself, with a possible interpretation being that the story is a satire on Christianity or whatever messianic religion or cult. It really seems to needle you with questions about faith and following, winding up being a very funny satire on modern times and culture, and on hero worship.

This guy is cool. The story is awesome

Preston Coleman's "The Oinky Boinky Machine" is one of those books that reveals new meanings each time it is read. A simple story about a likable ostrich's near-single-handed demolition of a murderous bureaucracy, Coleman's fable is a brilliant indictment of whatever parasitic system the reader chooses to superimpose onto the Oinky Boinky Machine itself. To some, the machine will be the government, to others the University system, to still others corporate America. As the reader slides different allegorical interpretations into place, he or she realizes that the various machines are simply different heads of the same hydra--and the humble Jonathan Livingston Ostrich the voicebox of all oppressed, exploited and damaged folks who never thought they had it in them to triumph over the unbeatable. Coleman tells his story with humor, charm, and thankfully some good scatalogical satire. "The Oinky Boinky Machine" is an easy read that raises difficult questions.