UK Books

The philosophers stated here were brilliant minds, no doubt about it. The scientific revolution created a new way of thinking about and carrying out solutions to problems that was attempted(poorly) by Descartes and their ilk. It's takes a while for good thinking to develop when one starts from a completely new framework. This starts the era when something substantial is said outside the school of classical greek thought that isn't completely idiotic.

The first empricist is Locke, who is really quite mind numbingly dull to read, but very important in how the empricists after him build off of(and subsequently demolish much of) what he said. His philosophy, even if not very agreeable, is straightforward and quite logically fleshed out.

Berkeley, in contrast, was a joy to read. The funny part about him is that he wanted to save philosophy from abstract notions that have no application to real life, then expounds a philosophy that denies the meterial world in its entirety! It must be said that his critique was phenomenal, and rightly states many of the things taken for granted such as substance have no empiricial basis, as well as rightfully stating objects have no qualities in themselves, but only what we perceive as qualities, thereby refuting much of Aristotle.

Hume goes even further than Berkeley in refuting spiritual substance, doubting cause and effect, in essence doubting everything. He does so with lucidity and style that makes for another enjoyable section. His views on morality is his main weakness, and essentially boils down to Pain=Bad, Happiness=Good.

There were a couple others also, but after those three guys I can't remember anything substantial they said. Reading this History was akin to watching a wrecking crew destroy an entire village, laughing gleefully as they do it. The problem is they left next to nothing to rebuild it with. For that we have to wait for Kant.

Copleston's series, "The History of Philosophy", is quite possibly the best introduction to the history of philosophical thought that has ever been published and certainly the best currently in print.

You will be hard pressed to find a better collection of solid philosophical surveys in one place. The beauty of the series is that Copleston has clearly done his research on each period and each thinker of Western philosophy.

I cannot recommend this series any more highly. It is a must-have collection for anyone who is a scholar (professional or casual) of philosophy, theology or any of the arts.

If this isn't on your bookshelf, it should be!

"A History of Philosophy" by Frederick Copleston,S.J., is a very complete work. All volumes, including #5 - Modern Philosophy The British philosophers from Hobbes to Hume, are first class. I recomend with emphasis!

mgs

This is series is a good way to get involved in the thought of the world. You'll want to go further than what is discussed in the book but it is a very good start.

At one point I went throught a British Empiricist phase. This book was an invaluable resource. I've never noticed any misinterpretations of the author's original texts in this volume.

Let me be upfront and tell you that I am from Belgium (although a long time resident of the US), where these events took place. It is quite difficult to comprehend how much these events shook Belgium on its political and constitutional pillars.

"I Choose to Live" is the retelling by Sabine Dardenne on how she was abducted and abused (in May, 1996) when she was 12, by Marc Dutroux, a convicted sexual predator (released early on the basis of "good behavior"), and how she survived her 80 days of captivity and abuse. It makes for a devastating read. Sabine comes across as a survivor, and an extremely courageous person. The book was originally released in Belgium in 2004, 8 years after the events.

The events (which include not only Sabine, but a number of other young girls who were abducted and/or murdered) proved to be a devastating insight on Belgium's judicial system, resulting in the "White March" in the capital of Brussels, in which hunderds of thousands of people demonstrated for a better judicial system, and leading to a resignation of several high-level politicians and a subsequent reform of Belgium's judicial and police system. Sabine Dardenne is to be commended for sharing her story, even though it must have been extremely difficult and painful for her to write her story. This is not an easy read, in fact it will make you squirm, but please read this book. It needs to be read.

Everyone should read this book written by one of the victims of the Belgian child molester and muderer Marc Dutroux.Sabine Dardenne tells her story without seeking cheap sensationalism and obviously strives to come to terms with her horrible plight and concentrate on the here and now and the positive aspects the future may hold in store.

While reading this, and afterward, I just wanted to say to Sabine - Forgive Yourself! You are not the author of anyone elses fate. In now way were the author of anyone elses fate - Laetitia was not Kidnapped because of what you said. Dutroux was a horrendous excuse for a human being and did what he wanted with no reference to anyone elses needs. Your 12 year old terror and loneliness was just another excuse to weave a tale of guilt around you!

This is the bare and honest story of Sabine Dardenne, one of two survivors of Belgian paedophile, Marc Dutroux. She spent 80 days in his captivity, and while the details are (thankfully) not given in detail, the sheer horror of being a 12 year old child and subjected to the physical and emotional torment she suffered is enough to horrify.

Sabine was snatched off the street by Dutroux, the Slug as she later calls him, and his wife. That a woman with children could be complicit in this appalls me but she was responsible for at least two earlier deaths of young children kidnapped by Dutroux when she failed to feed them. But Sabine was not aware of this.

Taken by Dutroux she was forced to live in a small cell and basement, eat horrendous food, and assaulted by him. She was not allowed to wash often nor was her cell or environment kept clean so she gradually became more and more unkempt. Once when Dutroux went away there was a power cut, trapped in her stinking cell, 6 feet by 3 feet wide and not tall enough for a short 12 year old to stand up in. She panicked, her only light and ventilation failed - a 12 year old girl alone. Luckily it came on again shortly afterwards.

In her loneliness and desparation she wrote long letters to her mother. Dutroux had told her that He was holding her safe from a gang of terrible men, torturers who would take pleasure in killing her in terrible ways, and that she should never call out and onlyrespond to his voice. She believed these stories, she also believed him when he said her parents weren't cooperating with them over paying a ransom, they couldn't afford it and other disgusting lies which made her desparate.

In her loneliness she asked Dutroux for a friend, an idle suggestion, but one be must have been already considering and enjoying. Soon afterwards he turned up with another child, Laetitia kidnapped from another Belgian town. She was to be directly the author of his downfall. IN his stupidity he was seen, along with his van and other details. He was tracked down and 6 days later the girls were rescued.

The brain washing of Sabine was so complete she could not comprehend that Laetitia had seen missing posters of her in her town. Nor really understand that her family, in fact teh whole of Belgium was desperate to find her.

Painfully Sabine catalogues the post kidnap years. The troubled home life which followed, the typical teenage behaviour, the struggle for acceptance which would probably have happened with her family whether or not she had been kidnapped. She also talks about the inability to control what was being talked about in the press, the lies which were perpetrated and her anger at Dutroux and his lies which were constant and inventive.

The final part is the court case, which was all about discovery - and her continuing her life.

Sabine, you are a survivor. Thank you for righting this book, you are an extraodinary person.

On 28 May 1996 twelve-year-old Sabine Dardenne was kidnapped by the man who turned out to be one of Belgium's most heinous paedophiles. She was his prisoner for eighty long days.
'I need to write this book for three reasons: so that people stop giving me strange looks and treating me like a curiosity; so that no one asks me any more questions ever again; and so that the judicial system never again frees a paedophile for "good behaviour".'
'The Dutroux Affair' shook the whole of Europe. In the middle of the immense machinery of investigation and justice there was Sabine Dardenne hrself, Dutroux's last victim. She was held captive for eighty days, and astonishly she survived. Far from sensationalizing the horror, her story, dignified and restrained, is ultimately uplifting. Says Sabine Dardenne: 'I choose to live'. -- from book's back cover

"I Choose To Live" describes the ordeal that Sabine Dardenne went through living as the captive of a pedophile for 80 days.

Sabine is such an honest, brave, and inspirational person that to read in her own words about the ordeal and how she dealt with it was very inspirational and very fascinating. I couldn't put the book down and really found myself marvelling at her courage and her refusal to look at herself as a victim.

I never imagined that there were people like her. People who could go through the most horrible abuse and come out strong and well-grounded. Hats off to her.

By the way, there weren't any detailed descriptions of the rapes so that made it easier to read (although there were some disturbing parts to the book, of course).

... then buy, borrow or steal a copy! Never before have I read such a good exploration of Irish exile. Stranded in a dismal flat in England, the protagonist remembers his happy childhood in Ireland, the rough living and working conditions in England, and his only love. The language is quite simple and often Hiberno Irish, but deeply imaginative and so lyrical, that the line between prose and poetry gets blurred. The beautiful black/white pictures added to this book, and the author's ability to portray Irish music help to give an insight into Irish culture. Sometimes it's like watching a documentary, and suddenly you can't help but feeling you're listening to a song; a song of heartache and terrible longing. Despite far from being soppy the book is very moving in the end; you actually hope for a happy ending. But that wouldn't be Irish.

Tim O'Grady creates exquisitely wrought, archetypal prose that could even overpower Pyke's perfect documentary photos. (Without offense to Walker Evans, now I'm wishing Pyke had been around to collaborate with James Agee).

Amazingly, requires very little interest in Ireland or the Irish - O'Grady is from Chicago anyway and this book is more about experiences of all mankind. His crystalline narrative is hardly bound by ethnicity.

Extraordinary and inspiring new use of the verb, can. If you read poetry, you couldn't regret buying this experimental novel.

This book is beautiful and tragic and joyful and moving, all at the same time and independently over the course of the story. Through the poetic language of the text and the poetic imagery of the photos, the drama of every day life in Ireland is brought across as quietly epic, if such a thing can be.

... then buy, borrow or steal a copy! Never before have I read such a good exploration of Irish exile. Stranded in a dismal flat in England, the protagonist remembers his happy childhood in Ireland, the rough living and working conditions in England, and his only love. The language is quite simple and often Hiberno Irish, but deeply imaginative and so lyrical, that the line between prose and poetry gets blurred. The beautiful black/white pictures added to this book, and the author's ability to portray Irish music help to give an insight into Irish culture. Sometimes it's like watching a documentary, and suddenly you can't help but feeling you're listening to a song; a song of heartache and terrible longing. Despite far from being soppy the book is very moving in the end; you actually hope for a happy ending. But that wouldn't be Irish.

I am very familiar with the works of old time Irish writers including the works of James Joyce who wrote about Ireland in exile. I still don't know much about modern Irish novelists until I had the opportunity of meeting and listening to parts of Timothy O'Grady's novel at Perth Writer's Festival early this year. Immediately afterwards I bought a copy and later talked to Timothy briefly about writers in exile and their struggle with dislocation. This story is not only about dislocation and exile. This is the story of a man coming of age and following a journey during which he struggles to make sense of his life, dislocation, loss of love and loneliness.

This lyrically crafted novel is a great collaboration between O'Grady and photographer Steve Pyke. They collectively create a visual journey of a musical Irishman, his journey from one location to another, looking for work and the love of his life. O'Grady's begins his novel with a description of the protagonist's life back at home as a child:

"This room is dark, as dark as it ever gets - the hour before dawn in winter. I have sounds and pictures but they flit and crash before I can get them..."

For me, it is a metaphor of not been able to recreate the places and the people he left behind as a result of his journey.

O'Grady ends his novel with a similar narrative:

"In the room now a breeze comes in through the window and on it there is the smell of spring. Downstairs the girl turns on her radio... There is a time after long work when you can look for strength and there is nothing there....

In the morning light I let go."

In between, we learn about his journey, his recollection of Irish landscapes, the places left behind, the music he played and his love. But this is not just a mere description of a nostalgic mental journey of an Irishman in exile. This can happen anywhere, anytime, and to anyone.

Reading this novel is like watching a visually crafted documentary embedded with voice and music that we can see and hear.

I'm glad that I met O'Grady and read his novel as my introduction to modern Irish novelists. But this novel had another positive effect on me. When I met O'Grady I was writing a novel about my own dislocation. This novel inspired me to look at my private journey again and again, and continue my writing in exile!

I recommend this book to anyone interested in the beauty and tragic of moving from one place to another.

The bygone days of steam-powered logging railways come back in this fascinating collection of B/W images.
As the title says, the locomotives are the protagonists, but many other details about the whole life of a logging railway in the Pacific Northwest manage to sneak in around the main subject - logging crews, base camps, service cars, rails and trestles - and of course the trees, both standing and felled, some quite awesome by their sheer size.
For the steam enthusiast, a visual feast: the logging locos were often quite off the beaten path - literally, of course, on their crude, temporary rails, but also in their design; several types of odd-looking engines were developed for the particular needs of this job, and rarely seen on mainline rails: all were different fron the conventional, side-rod driven locomotive and especially suited to sharp curves, uneven right-of-ways and, above all, unbelievable grades (happily, they very uniqueness made them survive until comparatively late in the steam era and some are to this day under steam in tourist service).
And for any other one, an interesting and entertaining trip down nostalgia lane; the well-written text complements nicely the images and makes the book enjoyable also to the newcomer.

This is an excellent book with great photos of many geared locomotives. A must have for anyone wanting to detail a model of a geared locomotive, or just for looking at the pictures. Each photo has a short narrative describing the photo. A well done book.

This book is a source of absolutely excellent photos of Shays, Heislers, and Climaxes used in the logging industry in the Pacific Northwest. With his huge box cameras and glass image plates, Kinsey was to B&W photography of the period as IMAX is to color motion pictures of today. The photos are the best B&W photographs I have ever seen on any subject. They are definitely of museum quality.

Geared Steam Locomotive Works

This is a beautifully produced work of a master photographer. The large format duotone prints are a joy to look at, with crisp detail and lovely tones. The book provides excellent examples of Darius' ability to capture the majestic beauty of hard working (but well cared for) steam locomotives (both geared and rod), along with the people whose lives they touched (engine crew, loggers, camp crew and families). I would have paid $20 each for several of the prints in this book. This is primarily a "picture book", but the additional commentary from railroaders and loggers of the Kinsey era adds that personal touch that the photographs so often contain.

I have looked at many hundreds of railroad books (and well over 100,000 photos), but the photographs in this volume are the best I've ever seen. Kinsey used a view camera and 11"x14" glass plate negatives to produce large contact prints for sale to the subjects (locomotive crew members) early in this century. The results are absolutely stunning; every photo has extraordinary tone and detail, impossible to produce with the small format (35mm and rollfilm) cameras commonly available today. This is a "must have" book for any photographer who wants to see what print quality large negatives are capable of producing. Darius Kinsey is the "Ansel Adams" of railroad photography.

This is the second of Phil Rickman's stories featuring Merrily Watkins that I've read. Originally, I wasn't sure that Merrily, who is an Anglican minister and Deliverance Consultant (exorcist) would be the kind of character that to whom I would be attracted. Stories with romantic underpinnings put me off, and Kay Scarpetta stories have permanently put me off troublesome teenage daughters. Because Rickman has written several horror stories that I like I decided to take the leap of faith. I have to admit that I've been very pleasantly surprised.

Let me say right off that if you are expecting these tales to be horror stories you are in for a surprise. Rather, thing of them as detective/suspense with a spiritual element. Merrily Watkins, having lost her husband, was drawn to the church, and then into the ministry. When a surprising turn of events revealed some unexpected sensitivities, Merrily is trained as a Deliverance Consultant and given Ledwardine as her post. With her is her daughter Jane, a seventeen-year-old with a sharp, questioning mind, who hovers between mature insight and girlish obstinacy. Another frequent participant is Lol, a recovering addict and musician who has a close, but difficult relationship with Merrily.

The Lamp of the Wicked starts out as the story of one serial killer, Roddy Lodge, who Merrily accidentally 'outs' while helping a friend. But it quickly becomes the story of another killer entirely around whose periphery the likes of Roddy and the citizens of the town of Underhowle are entangled. One killer dead for three years, and the other shortly into the book, this story is really about the web of evil that grew out of a set of chilling events in the past and how it took on a life of its own. One doesn't exorcise ghosts, only demons, but hidden in a deserted Baptist chapel in Underhowle is something that desperately needs to be laid to rest.

As Rickman likes to do, there are parallel themes that tangle the plot. The foremost of these is a building study of the effects of close exposure to radiant power (as in electrical towers). This has been an issue in the states for some time, but it rears its head in the little town of Underhowle as well. Rickman comes up with enough facts to disquiet the reader as this thread moves from alien abduction to temporary insanity. In addition to this, Jane is in the midst of a crisis of faith that has her in a permanently sarcastic and depressed mood. In fact, all of the Ledwardine characters have something on their minds, from a contractor whose partner went up in flames with his business, to Lol, who is struggling with his fears of performing again.

These stories are apt demonstrations of Rickman's abilities. He brings to life this part of England with its conflicts between the modern and old with an easy, fluent style. His characterization, no longer driven by the need to have inhuman monsters, has grown by leaps and bounds. He manages to create interest in characters that seem unlikely heroes. Even his theological meanderings avoid the dry or overly dramatic and simply become part of the developing atmosphere.

The Lamp of the Wicked can stand by itself, but I found having read one of the early books helped in understanding some of the key relationships quickly. As you might suspect, this helps. But nothing happens that you can't work out on your own, so dive in where you may.

After reading the first Merrily Watkins novel, Midwinter of the Spirit, I grabbed every Phil Rickman book I could find. Although I enjoyed them all, it is the Merrily series that has won my heart.

What a fabulous job Rickman does at creating three-dimensional, believeable characters! Merrily and her daughter are modern women, spirited and complex, with all the doubts and insecurities of any modern woman. Merrily, a single mom and Anglican priest, has been made the diocese exorcist, which is bound to put a strain on her relationship with her teenaged daughter, Jane, who leans more to paganism than organized religion.

As a background for these mysteries, the complex relationship between the troubled teenager and her mother provides a counterpoint to the greater conflict between good and evil that permeates these books.

This book in particular is especially interesting. A village man has confessed to horrific murders, and there is no doubt that his fellow villagers consider him very odd indeed. But, as Merrily is dragged into this situation, she has to deal with the fact that his actions may have been influenced by something beyond his control--but is the evil that influenced him man made or demonic? And are there other evil-doers at work?

I found this book to be a very satisfying mystery, and enjoyed the way that the relationship between Merrily and her daughter continues to unfold.

This is a well-written and thought-provoking book which transcends any classification as a genre novel. I'm a generalist reader with no special preference for horror, the supernatural, or detective fiction. I look for books with believable characters and interesting situations, and this book certainly delivers. There are several story lines which the author for most part weaves together well, but a novel this long and complex presents some challenges that I didn't think were completely met. The biggest problem for me was the author's obviously sincere effort to arouse public interest in a real mystery story that will perhaps never be fully investigated. The author combines the imaginary adventures of his fictional community and characters with the career of an actual serial killer, the notorious Fred West of Gloucester. West's arrest made the headlines in the mid 1990's, and he was widely believed to be guilty of many more crimes than the ones to which he actually confessed. While it is not unusual for fiction to include real historical events, it is tricky to make this narrative device work when the real history is so recent and so emotionally charged. The strong element of horror in the novel comes not only from the events that the reader knows are fictional, but also from what he or she believes actually happened to West's victims. For me, this uneasy mix of fascinating fiction and horrifying fact made the book alternately hard to put down and hard to pick up. Seriously, expect disturbing dreams if you read this book! In addition, I found the plotting a bit messy and hard to follow at times, but the superior quality of the writing kept me going.

Be advised that this is not the kind of suspense story in which all is neatly explained at the end. The main characters are all in their own way on a philosophical journey of discovery, plagued by doubts, fears, and confusion. The reader who travels with them will have a challenging but exciting journey.

I've read all of Phil Rickman's previous novels, and this is yet another winner. Rickman has perfected the art of creating characters that become 'real' enough to care about - and his best creation to date is the smoking, slightly confused but always sincere female minister, Merrily Watkins.

This story is made all the more interesting because it addresses some of the pressing but as yet officially unrecognised problems of today's society, such as the mental and physical effects of living in close proximity to high powered electricity lines and telephone towers. The electrical hypersensitivity suffered by one of the characters and his subsequent actions are frighteningly close to home. I've suddenly become aware of how many telephone towers surround us - and lo and behold - I've actually seen them on church steeples!

The inclusion of the horrific real life monsters Fred and Rose West adds another chilling dimension to the story. An unsettling mystery thriller and a cracking good story.

Over the years, I have gotten used to the fall off of quality as series stretched out. In this, Phil Rickman has proven himself to be a delightful change of pace in this "rule".

This is, imo, the best Merrily Watkins book yet with a clever blend of real life serial killers and the supernatural. As for Merrily, Rickman continues to allow the character to grow.

I'm glad the US market has finally wised up and made the acquisition of Rickman's books easier on us. For years, I've had to rely on British book dealers to feed my hunger at very steep prices for mass masrket paperbacks. It's nice to see RIckman finally getting the notice that he should here on this side of the pond.

One of the best fly fishing books I have ever read, may just read it again.

From page one, this book has you yearning to get outside and cast a line. The amazing photography and the author's attention to detail really captures the true beauty of each destination visited during the author's epic fly-fishing expedition across the globe. Any avid fly-fisherman or anyone interested in finding out about great places to fly-fish around the world should buy this book.

Alex Taylor is the architype angler poet. He takes the reader on a journey of dream like discovery.

Everybody has a friend (a relative, a mate!) who lives to fish. This book's for her. Well, there are lots of good fishing books. This one interested me because it looked at fishing as a cross-cultural experience, as one of those things that defines us as being part of the same species. The author and some National Georgraphic-class photographers went around the world and brought back stories and images that made me feel better about being alive and liking to fish.

I have been fly fishing avidly for 20 years and have read several books on the subject. This work is by far the best piece I have come across. Anyone who is interested in fly fishing will find this book truly enjoyable - I consider it a must have for any enthusiast.

Tolkienýs ýThe Lord of the Ringsý is the first fantasy ý science fiction book I have ever read. It is hands down the best. No one writes with such prose and detail as Tolkien does. Granted, it does not have as much magical pyrotechnics as other fantasy books out there, but it makes up for that in a well-structured plot and the resourcefulness of the characters involved. The magic that does happen in the book is spectacular and well worth the wait. Tolkienýs battle scenes are excellent. He unfolds the story as it happens. There are no chapters that begin with ýTen years laterýý rather the story progresses in real-time. No wonder many people think that this work is the greatest of the 20th century.

This collection features six works of Alan Lee who, along with John Howe, was one of the principle conceptual artists for Peter Jackson's films based on J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings".

The six works featured in this collection are:

1. The Stone Trolls
2. The West Gate of Moria
3. The Battle of the Hornburg
4. The Black Gate
5. Gorbag and Shagrat
6. Mount Doom

The six works are large, stand alone posters on heavy stock contained within an attractive folder featuring The West Gate of Moria on the front cover. The prints--the originals were done in watercolor--have a black border with the name of the work and the artist at the bottom in small print.

These prints are an excellent addition to any Tolkien fan's collection.

In the world of Tolkien artwork, two artists sit at the top of the heap: Alan Lee and John Howe. These two artists have devoted a lot of ink to sketching scenes from J.R.R. Tolkien's masterworks, and in the "Lord of the Rings Poster Collection," we get to see some of Lee's best work.

"The Stone Trolls" shows the three trolls that Gandalf turned to stone in "The Hobbit." Now they're mossy and immobile, as the hobbits and Strider walk by. "The West Gate of Moria" is an exquisite play of light and shadow, showing the Fellowship looking up at the glowing doorway. And the best poster of all is "Battle of the Hornberg," a grimly detailed picture of the orcs flooding through the smashed fortress wall.

On the Mordor front, we get three different posters. "The Black Gate" is a panoramic look at the hobbits and Gollum lurking on a stone outcropping, and watching as troops pass through the spiky Black Gate. "Gorbag and Shagrat" shows a pair of creepy orcs in full armor, waiting against a stained stone wall, apparently in conversation. And "Mount Doom" is a bleak slope of barren rocks, but with a light shining somewhere behind the mountain.

Perhaps the only flaw of this collection is that three of the pictures are from "Return of the King," and only from Mordor. Don't expect any coronations or Grey Ships in this. A little more variation would have been nice, but the posters themselves are lovely -- high quality paper, clear reproduction. As for the pictures themselves....

Alan Lee does "still work" the best -- even when his subjects are in motion, they look very quiet and almost dreamlike. There's a lot of detail poured into these, since even small twigs, cracks and stains make their way into his artwork. They also tend to have muted, faded colours, lots of soft greys, browns and greens. Some of them look like sepia photographs.

Looking at these beautiful posters, it's easy to see why Lee was one of the designers for the "Lord of the Rings" movies' exquisite sets. A wonderful collection of fantasy artwork.

Having never owned any of Alan Lee's LOTR artwork before, I bought this collection on the advice I had found in many places online. Needless to say, I was not disappointed.
It is true what is said about Lee's visual mastery of Tolkien's words. The images are often much like what I pictured from the books . . . even Gollum.

My only issue was with the scenes chosen to be depicted in the collection. Three of the six are from Mordor (Gates of Mordor, Gorbag & Shagrat, and from the foot of Mount Doom), the artwork of which is not at all bad, but it is repetitive, when there is so much more. I'm most anticipatory to find Lee's depiction of the Ents somewhere. ^_^

The paper quality is good & thick, and the posters come in a glossy protective folder with information on the artist, text bits that were the basis for the paintings, etc.

As a collector of Tolkien artwork, I must say that Lee's paintings of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are some of the best in circulation (or out). This poster set is one more addition to a venerable stack of Lee artwork. If you're a Tolkien fan, this is a must!

My children own hundreds of books we buy them constantly after awhile they lose interest but this is the only book we have had to replace from reading it so often that the pages eventually came loose. Each of my 3 kids (even the 12 year old) still love to listen to it, and it has become a part of their childhoods I am sure they will always treasure. The story of a child living under a monsters (named Dennis who lives with another, much larger monster who is Dennis' mother) bed is very funny, written in charming couplets it transends genders and decades. And I have read it so much that I can now recite it without the book. This is one book you won't regret bringing into your home and allowing it to become part of your little one's cherished childhood memories.

I was given the soft-cover version of this book upon leaving pre-school in England and almost twenty years later, I still have it,and glance at it from time to time, tattered and torn as it may be.

It captures the fear of many if not most children and flips it around geniously showing that even if monsters were real, they would not be scary and mean, but just as frightened as a four year old little boy or girl might be of going to bed.

Simple in style and language, and written in rhyming couplets, children who aren't yet able to read will be able to recite the book by heart even if they get the slightly altered "americanized" version.

This charming book was enjoyed greatly by myself and both my children. The illustrations are delightful and the clever 'table-turning' where a monster is afraid that the 'Humans will get me' is very smart. I regretted that the American version had some modifications that, to my ear, broke the balance of the original rhyme. Still, an excellent story for the child starting to experience 'Bed-Time anxiety'.

I thought this book was so clever, charming, and witty. I love the little monster, and the equally afraid human. The illustrations are perfect for the story. All in all a great read.

He borrowed the book at school and would not let it out of his sight! I was happy to finally see his huge interest in reading. He asked me to buy his very own book and I am doing just that.We both have enjoyed it so much I want him to have his very own to remember the fun we had together. sharing it.

I return to Nigel Slater's cookbook, Appetite over and over again. He give's us great recipes, and then teaches us how to vary the recipes - an invaluable skill in the world of cooking and eating! Bravo Nigel.

Nigel Slater is a real cook. His books are a joy to read. He makes you want to jump-up and cook. He inspires.. A no-frills cook. Comfort food is OK. His traditional recipes are soothing, pleasing, comforting. - Food Porn!

This is an inspiring read. Slater writes about real food the way real people like to eat. His recipes are practical and unfussy. They are irreverent and certainly do not submit to any soul and appetite destroying preoccupation with ersatz low-taste,low-fat food. Worth reading for the description of how to roast a chicken that is almost poetic

`Nigel Slater's Real Food' and `Real Cooking' by Nigel Slater (name above the title, of course) are two great expositions on the real joy of cooking. Slater characterizes his point of view in the motto to `Real Cooking' as `There is too much talk of cooking being an art or a science - we are only making ourselves something to eat.' With this sentiment, Slater dismisses the Shirley Corriher / Alton Brown `kitchen science' camp on the one hand and the Keller / Boulud / Girardet `haute cuisine' camp on the other. In some ways, this also dismisses the high-end culinary magazine crowd as you may find in `Bon Appetit', `Gourmet', and `Martha Stewart Living'. While this seems to dismiss a goodly portion of the modern culinary establishment, it really does not. Slater is certainly in the same camp as his nibs, Jamie Oliver, his good friend, Nigella Lawson, and Oliver's mentors, Rose Gray and Ruth Rogers of London's River Café. In fact, if I did not know that Oliver was primarily influenced by Gray, Rogers, and Gennaro Contaldo, I would have guessed that Oliver was a Slater disciple from the word `GO'. I am happy to say that there are plenty of important cookbook writers in the United States who can easily be considered to be in Slater's camp. Leading the list is probably Jacques Pepin, especially with his various quick cooking books such as his latest `Fast Food My Way'. I do not wish, however, to give the impression that Slater is all about fast cooking. He is certainly about simple cooking in the same sense that Richard Olney describes in `Simple French Food', but he is a whole lot more about being in love with the sensual qualities of food and how well those qualities of various foods mix together in the most effective way.

What is certainly true is that both Slater and Oliver represent the kind of cooking I enjoyed on my two trips to England, primarily the kind of cooking I saw at some of the better pubs in Hampshire and in London suburbs.

Both of these books are primarily about recipes and the salient qualities of particular classes of food. For a study of Slater's `philosophy' of cooking in depth, see his recent book `Appetite'. These two books are even organized in very similar ways, in that each chapter presents a particular raw material or class of raw material. The more traditionally organized `Real Cooking' has chapters on:

Fish & Shellfish
Chicken & Other Birds
Pork, Bacon, and Sausages
Lamb and other Meats
Pasta, Beans, Rice & Grains
Vegetables
Cheese, Snacks & Puddings

The later book, `Real Food', which is also the tie-in book for a Television Series (not seen in the US, to my knowledge) is more to the point, with chapters entitled:

Potatoes
Chicken
Sausages
Garlic
Bread
Cheese
Ice-cream
Chocolate

The chapter on bread is a good indication of Slater's point of view, in that he gives us nothing on baking bread, but just about everything you may want (this side of Nancy Silverton's sandwich book) to know about making some really interesting and unusual sandwiches. Similarly, the sausage book says nothing about how to make sausages, only how to make the very best use of them.

True to his word in his `motto' quoted above, you will find not one word about the relative fat content of milk and cream, the emulsifying power of an egg, or calibrating the temperature of your oven. On the other hand, you will find much about, for example, the relative tastes of pork, beef, and lamb fat and the virtues of free range raised poultry. Here is one strong point of contact between the articulate and reflective Slater and the ebullient and emotional Oliver (or our own Emeril Lagasse, if you wish). Both will rhapsodize at length over the qualities of a nice thick layer of fat on a chop from an artisinally raised hog.

For those of you who do not like `chatty' cookbooks, both of these books may be preferable to the very discursive `Appetite', although both of these books do have their share of culinary poetry before the recipe details. Neither book is as extreme as `Appetite' in the direction of teaching us to cook without a book. You can easily pick out a recipe from these books and make them without a lot of background reading or culinary skill. But never confuse `simple' with `easy' or `fast'. While Slater may do the Rachel Ray gig in other books, these books have their share of slow marinades and braises. They also have their share of whisking, filtering, and thickening techniques.

The other side of the coin is that Slater's palate is extremely simple. Aside from his protein or starch of choice, few of his ingredients go far beyond the simple pantry of milk, cream, butter, basic cheeses, parsley, flour, lemon, lime, bacon, sage, thyme, bay, bread, olive oil, rice, stock, garlic, and mushrooms. Unlike Sir Jamie, Slater is about as down home English cooking as Paula Deen is about Savannah cooking.

The biggest difficulty an American is likely to have with Slater's recipes is that they are all make heavy use of metric units for weight and larger volumes in place of ounces, pounds, and cups. Even though I was a chemist thoroughly familiar with the metric system, I had to dig out a good conversion table to remind myself that a pound was about 450 grams. A lesser difficulty may be with Slater's names for common food varieties such as potatoes, although he almost always specifies `waxy' or `floury' potatoes rather than the English varietal name.

The other main difficulty with Slater's recipes is that they are all paradigms of high fat, high sodium, and high cholesterol preparations. They are definitely dishes to be eaten when the occasion calls for serious comfort food.

If you like Jamie Oliver or Nigella Lawson, you will really like Slater!

In Real Food, Nigel Slater manages to invoke the feeling and quality of comfort food but goes beyond that with some of the bold and certainly delicious flavours he encourages us to explore. Every recipe that we have tried out of this book has been a huge success. It's great to find a book where the recipes are simple without being boring. Don't comb through the book looking for the low-fat gems, instead enjoy these delicious recipes in moderation.

THIS BOOK SEES ART FROM ANOTHER POINT OF VIEW TAKING A DISTANCE FROM DECORATION AND BEAUTY
AND HELPING US REACH MORE PROFOUND LEVELS IN THE UNDERSTANDING OF AESTHETICS

I was a little worried this book might be really dry and difficult to read but it has been enjoyable and interesting so far. I decided to buy Umberto Eco's Beauty book too.

I've enjoyed Eco's fiction (The Name of the Rose, Baudolino), but was never familiar with his work as a semiotician. This book gives a wonderful taste of his intellect outside of fiction. "On Ugliness" is Eco's companion volume to his excellent History of Beauty, and takes the same style: here you will find descriptions of the Western world's ideas about ugliness, from the classical era through the modern, discussing things such as the devil, monsters, death, age and decay, damnation, camp and kitsch, etc. Eco examines this subject broadly, and provides great insight. This book is essentially a collection of visual art related to the different subjects, juxtaposed with passages from literary works from a number of Western cultures.

What keeps this book from receiving my full 5 stars is the fact that none of the pieces (whether literature or visual art) include any kind of analysis or description. Eco simply writes bookending snippets for each chapter and then basically lets the works speak for themselves, which is largely unsatisfying. However, for anyone interested in conceptions of beauty or ugliness, or who would like a fascinating addition to their library, this book is for you.

'One man's trash is another man's treasure' might be a apt conclusion after spending the significant amount of time required to digest Umberto Eco's semiotic approach to 'ugly'. Eco's brilliance as an author is well accepted, yet his informed academic investigation (upon which many of his own novels are based) is only now being appreciated. It is difficult to read ON UGLINESS as a treatise, so lush and provocative is his prose style. Rizzoli International spared no expense on supplying Eco with images and design of this art treasure, and the result is a volume about art history and our manifold perceptions of the signs and symbols that through time have defined 'ugly' versus 'beauty.'

Eco wisely uses the chronological approach to his discourse on the semiotics of ugliness. After a superb Introduction in which he suggests the response of an alien visiting our planet, trying to determine what our civilization labeled beautiful (!), Eco launches into his presentation with gusto. He presents chapters on ugliness in the Classical World, religious use of ugliness (passion, death, martyrdom, apocalypse, hell), monsters, witchcraft, sadism, 'obscene pornography', the appearance of ugliness in architecture and industrial buildings, and finally the transition of the 'ugly' in the popular kitsch and camp.

Coupled with the fascinating written words by the author are copious reproductions of paintings, details of images (some of the details of Bosch's complex canvases are amazingly clear), by both well known painters and unknown painters, displayed with short excerpts from writers who wrote on the subject of the ugly versus the beautiful. Eco brings us to the absolute present (punk art, Cindy Sherman, current film, etc) and as his images emerge from the book's pages, so does his commentary quicken. And so we are left with a book on the subject of Ugliness, which as an art volume is quite the opposite: this is a very beautiful and informed new art book. Highly recommended reading and viewing. Grady Harp, November 07

Since I am only a hundred-some pages into this book I hope you'll forgive the premature nature of this review, but thus far Eco's latest work has been so movingly fascinating that I wanted to step up and urge anyone who might be considering buying and reading it to go ahead and do so. Initially I had reservations about beginning it but have no regrets that I did. Although it should become apparent early on that this is honestly less a companion volume to History of Beauty than it has been touted to be, this study of perception, beauty, and above all beauty's often more charismatic twin, ugliness, takes on the entire sweep of history and makes an investigation of the output of some of the biggest names in western art and literature. Why are, say, Goya's more gruesome works his most enjoyable? What makes villains the best characters in fiction (and life)? Why does the repugnant occur so frequently as a theme in art, music, literature and even in everyday fashion? Most of all, why is one object or individual deemed "ugly" and another not? Less (at least thus far) an indictment of the cult of beauty which seems inextricably bound up in human affairs and more an exhaustive investigation that intelligently asks numerous questions from many angles, Eco's challenge here is to compel each of us to contemplate the nature of perception itself. I have loved what I've read so far and can't wait to read the rest.