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Space Books sorted by Average customer review: high to low .

Space
Demontech: Gulf Run
Published in Kindle Edition by Ballantine Books (2003-12-30)
Author: David Sherman
List price: $6.99
New price: $5.59

Average review score:

Lord Gunny says " Buy this book So we can get more sales and more in the series!!!"
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-02-27
1500, 2000, 3000, 5000, 7000!!! refugees in the company and under the command of our Marine duo, Haft and Spinner. Our band reachs Dartmutter to find it smashed and sacked by the Jokapcul armies.

They are forced further along the coast in search of a port to find passage back to Frangeria. Along the way the refugees runnig from the evil armies keep coming and joining the company.

They run the coast and reach the low desert and come upon the secrative desert men. At the same time they discover that the Jokapcul armies have landed on the coast. Haft and Spinner are joined by a fellow Marine who is a Sergeant, named Rammer. The problems of how to handle a troop of this size, train men to fight, escape the foes they are stuck between, and reach a port the can get passage back to Frangeria.

The problems mount, the enemies are engaged, the demontech is employed, another fine book in this series, leaves you satisfied, yet desperatly wanting the tale to continue and revealed.

The Lord Gunny says" DEL RAY WHAT WERE YOU THINKING!! This is the finest of the three tomes, giving history to my Marines travels! and ya pull the plug over a mild lack of gold pieces!! ARRGH!!!!! I order you to reinstate the histories and allow our Marine Duo to continue!!!"

To all readers of this series, the more you reccomend thes books the more they sell and the better chance DeL Ray will tap Dave Sherman and get him a deal to finish the series.

Bring On the Marines! Great series!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-12-05
I have been waiting for years for more in this series! To to find out the publisher zapped it is a major dissappointment! Note to Mr. Sherman: find a new publisher!! Give us more Haft and Spinner! I think this series is just as good as the much ballyhooed HALO series! Haft and Spinner are like Spartans without the armour! Note to Publisher: there are a lot of Demontech fans out here!

Bring back this sereis
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2006-12-05
I love this series. I bought all three books at once and read them all in one sitting, only stopping long enough to take bathroom breaks. I am most interested in finding out more about the demons. They don't really seem to be bound to help unless they like you or they think helping you might be fun.

Buy This Book Now ( and buy the rest of the series too)
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2006-08-30
This is a great quick read series of books. The characters are well developed and you root for them throughout. Unfortunately the series has been cancelled by the Del Rey publishing firm. Every fan of the Starfist series should give this series a try and hopefully if enough buy all three, as I did, the series will resume. Fans of SciFi/Fantasy military epics will thoroughly enjoy Sherman's work. I long for the day to read more of the adventures of Haft and Spinner, two marines who prove that great training and tradition can turn ordinary men into heros.

The Entourage Continues to Grow
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2006-08-09
Spinner and Haft are still one the run from the invaders and still looking for a safe pot in which they can seek passage back to their home islands but that goal is looking more and more remote because their entourage keeps growing. Refugees keep joining their caravan and the occasional fighting man shows up from time to time as well. That's a good thing because they need all the fighters they can get with the bad guys in pursuit.

Having a couple of marine privates become feudal lords is not without its difficulties. This is especially true when their sergeant, long presumed dead, turns up. He naturally feels that the privates are still "his men" (they are) but the 7000+ camp followers and men at arms have other ideas on the matter..

The series seems no closer to reaching a resolution than after the last book but it is still a series of interest.

Space
Dingoes at Dinnertime (A Stepping Stone Book(TM))
Published in Library Binding by Random House Books for Young Readers (2000-04-11)
Author: Mary Pope Osborne
List price: $11.99
New price: $7.15
Used price: $0.01

Average review score:

Love these books!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-03-04
My four year old son is in love with this chapter series! A friend suggested it to us since he seemed ready for a more advanced reading material at bedtime. My husband reads him a chapter every night...sometimes more because they don't want to stop. It's become a great tradition for them, and something they both look forward to. We love that there are so many in the collection! Start with number 1 and just continue. :)

Beloved Children's Series
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-11-12
My daughter loves these books and this one is the only one she was missing. Happy to have found it through Amazon!

MY BOY LOVES READING
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-01-07
My 1st grader hates to put it down, he would rather read Magic Tree House books, than play video games. He even reads them to his class and explains the story for show and tell. In his kindergarten class the teacher would also let him read the Magic Tree House books out loud, not to give her a break, but to promote reading out loud. Great books!

Amorrea's review
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2006-05-31
Jack and Annie are helping Teddy get all four presents. They're going to Australia to find the last present. They go on all kinds of adventures like helping a little kangaroo get back to its mother. Will Jack and Annie help the little kangaroo find its mother? If you want to know, you'll have to read Dingoes At Dinnertime. I like this book. It's good because I like the Dingoes because they remind me of my dog Paco.


David's review
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2006-05-20
Jack and Annie are trying to get the last present to free Teddy from the spell .Can they get the last present? My favorite part was
When Teddy helped Jack and Annie to get out of the wild fire.
I really liked this book you should too!

Space
The High Frontier: Human Colonies in Space
Published in Paperback by Bantam Books (1978-01-01)
Author: Gerard K. O'Neill
List price:
Used price: $0.01
Collectible price: $10.00

Average review score:

Memory update
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-10-06
I'd read this book in college and wanted to read it again as part of my research for a new book I'm writing.

High Frontier
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-09-16
Very informative, well-researched, and interesting discussion of the potential for human presence in colonies in interplanetary space. One criticism is the lack of attention to the need for a human presence on the Moon, for astronomy, for tourism, and for raw materials for space colonization. Another criticism is that the author was overly optimistic about NASA; this is partly offset by more recent contributions.

Almost 30 years older...but not wiser
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2007-01-21
I read this wonderful book as an undergrad in the seventies. I found out about O'Neill from Stewart Brand's journal of the time, "The Coevolution Quarterly". O'Neill was the outer space guru of the age, just as John Lilly was the inner space pioneer. I assumed, as an enthusiastic youngster, that there would be millions of humans living at L5 by now. Unfortunately, we have a government run space program that, like any government bureaucracy, is inefficient and at the mercy of inferior minds (Congress and the White House). Nevertheless, this book is a good read and shows what one professor and a handful of grad students can come up with. For present day forward thinkers, review the ideas of Bill Stone (Stone Aerospace).

A review of reviews
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2005-12-19
I'm writing this review of the review dated September 8th 2001, wherein the reviewer challenges us readers to implement the ideas of O'Neill's book RIGHT NOW.

I wonder if anyone took that challenge, or if we were all distracted by what happened 3 days later?

Looking back over the past 4 years, I think, like the other reviewers who have written since that fateful day, that those events and their consequences show us that getting off this planet, and what we will learn from the effort, is an idea that becomes more imperative day after day.

If anyone is involved in a "mini-biosphere" project called for in the September 8th, 2001 review, or knows of such, please e-mail me with contact info.

Congratulations to all who can see beyong the curve of our Earth, to the endless horizons of space.

The Classic!
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2006-04-28
This is the classic proposal for the human expansion into space by the originator of the idea himself, Gerard O'neill. In it, he shows how space settlement could be done using boring 1970's technology.

A very good and thought provoking read, it is the ONLY space book that presented a plausible way for the rest of us (not just the "experts" and scientists) could go move into space in style AND the only one to show a semi-convincing way to pay for it all (space-based solar power).

Space
Hypersonic! The Story of the North American X-15
Published in Hardcover by Specialty Press (2003-05-17)
Authors: Dennis R. Jenkins and Tony Landis
List price: $39.95
Used price: $98.96

Average review score:

hypersonic the story of etc
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-12-13
DENNIS R. JENKINS &TONY R. LANDIS are THE best AERO/SPACE historians.I have other titles by them.

Please provide list of ALL titles by them.

THANX VLC

The book thats as good as the machine!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-11-14
Dennis R. Jenkins and Tony Landis write wonderful books about amazing machines.. (Check out America's super bomber XB-70)

Their style of writing is pure technical eloquence. They can take a complex subject and make it compelling reading whilst not dumbing it down or glossing over it.

The story evolves at a terrific pace and is neatly framed in the events and context of the era they occurred in.

The quality of the images matches the quality of the text. This is a book you will come back to year after year!

X-15 Review
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-01-10
This book is an exceptional addition to anyones library on aviation. If you are a X-15 freak, it is an absolute must to have.

Hypersonic! - finally, a definitive history of the X-15
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2007-02-17
This research work was obviously a labor of love and reverence for the authors. They gave credit where it is due, from the pilot astronauts, research scientists, program managers, air force personnel, senior engineers, technicians, and even a handful of glad-handing politicians.
For the first time, the reader wil learn details of the B-52 mothership personnel.

The photo-documentation is vast; I find it hard to believe that a companion volume ("Scrapbook") was needed for photos and illustrations beyond Hypersonic!'s coverage.

For modelers, the AFFTC blueprint on page 179 is definitive data on the X-15 fuselage. Info in the text will enable accurate reproduction of wing and tailplane structures.

Hypersonic! will remain the standard reference volume on the X-15 for decades to come.

Very good
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2006-04-18
Not to take from old Chuck's efforts, but I've always thought the X-15 was the more interesting program. It's amazing the level of accomplishments they made, yet the X-15 is far from being as well known to the public as some other programs in aviation. If you like the X-15, this is definitely the book. It's not the kind of book you just fly through and look at the photos, then throw on a shelf... It is definitely worth your while to take the time and really read through the details of how the aircraft worked, what the Pilots went through, and how the milestones were achieved technically. The flight log in the back is amazing in it's detail, evening listing the chase aircraft and chase Pilots involved in each mission. I purchased it along with the X-15 Scrapbook, and they work well together.

Space
N Space
Published in Paperback by Orbit (1992)
Author: Larry Niven
List price:
Used price: $11.54

Average review score:

Not Free SF Reader
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-03-01
Anyone who likes Larry Niven's work at all should be happy with this book.

From Tom Clancy's introduction, along with others by co-authors and editors, through all the stories - and this basically includes his best work of all (Inconstant Moon and All the Myriad Ways), along with some other good stories. In fact, even with the excerpt scores averaging almost 3.50.

Even the excerpts are well done, the fun scene from Ringworld a good choice, for example.

Throughout, Niven offers commentary, and non-fiction pieces include an extensive look at how they put together the setting for The Mote In God's Eye, and also a piece outlining plans to write something that would satirise Known Space as all a hoax.

Then at the end a few thoughts and an advice paper apparently that he and some other writers, including Pournell did for some political body or other.

I'd probably call this a 4.25 I think.

N-Space : excerpt from World of Ptavvs - Larry Niven
N-Space : Bordered in Black - Larry Niven
N-Space : Convergent Series [short story] - Larry Niven
N-Space : All the Myriad Ways [short story] - Larry Niven
N-Space : excerpt from A Gift from Earth - Larry Niven
N-Space : For a Foggy Night - Larry Niven
N-Space : The Meddler - Larry Niven
N-Space : Passerby - Larry Niven
N-Space : excerpt from Ringworld - Larry Niven
N-Space : The Fourth Profession - Larry Niven
N-Space : Inconstant Moon [short story] - Larry Niven
N-Space : What Can You Say about Chocolate Covered Manhole Covers? - Larry Niven
N-Space : Cloak of Anarchy - Larry Niven
N-Space : excerpt from Protector - Larry Niven
N-Space : The Hole Man [short story] - Larry Niven
N-Space : Night on Mispec Moor - Larry Niven
N-Space : Flare Time - Larry Niven
N-Space : The Locusts - Larry Niven and Steven Barnes
N-Space : excerpt from The Mote in God's Eye - Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
N-Space : Mote Lite - Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
N-Space : Brenda - Larry Niven
N-Space : The Return of William Proxmire - Larry Niven
N-Space : The Tale of the Jinni and the Sisters - Larry Niven
N-Space : Madness Has Its Place - Larry Niven
N-Space : The Kiteman - Larry Niven


She puffs on Pluto.

3 out of 5


Overcee project farm people find.

3 out of 5


Demon summoming time limit Atom solution.

3.5 out of 5


Murder maybe multiverse.

4.5 out of 5


Slowboat reservation.

3 out of 5


Vaguely lost.

3 out of 5


PI no Martian Manhunter.

3.5 out of 5


A specially adapted ramscoop ship pilot gets in trouble in space, when he sees a large golden alien humanoid. He finds himself rescued and transported 12 light years instantaneously back to Earth.

3.5 out of 5


Various biffo, with or without laser beams.

3.5 out of 5


Alien alcohol test case quad pill investigation.

3.5 out of 5


Really lunary weather we're having.

4.5 out of 5


Strange party alien trip.

3 out of 5


Free Park experiment not bright.

4 out of 5


Three stage dude adjustment.

3 out of 5


Quantum black hole is ridiculous overkill.

3.5 out of 5


Offworld mercenary Cabell nightwalker Spectrum Cure.

4 out of 5


Fuxed up entertainment production mission.

3.5 out of 5


Monkey kid form peak.

4 out of 5


Abandon ship, the little bastiches have weapons.

3.5 out of 5


Hey! That looks different.

3.5 out of 5


Sauron attacks Dagon City. Who'd like to see that?

3.5 out of 5


Heinlein time alteration.

3.5 out of 5


Harem sneaky story.

3 out of 5


ARM to schizo arm.

3.5 out of 5


Flying lessons.

3 out of 5

A feast for the mind
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-04-20
This book is at the top of my "If I were stranded on a desert island..." list. I don't love everything Niven's ever written, but this sampler has something for everyone. This isn't just the best of Niven, it's some of the best SF written in the last 40 years. What's also nice is the inclusion of hard-to-find stories like "For A Foggy Night" and the non-fiction slice of life stuff. NSpace, Playgrounds of the Mind, and the later Scatterbrain provide an unparalleled look at the career of one of SFs greats. If you read no other science fiction this decade, read these books.

Dizzying collage of hard SF from a master SF writer
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2003-02-15
I purchased "N-Space" and its sequel "Playgrounds Of The Mind" in summer of 1992, totally unaware of who Larry Niven was, or that he already had such a lengthy history in the science fiction community. At that point (my first year in college) I had not read a lot of SF beyond the confines of Star Trek novels; save the space opera of W. Michael Gear and the military SF of Chris Bunch & Allan Cole. I didn't even really know what 'hard' science fiction was, and picked up "N-Space" and "Playgrounds Of The Mind" because I was pining for something different--perhaps more challenging?

Oh boy, did I ever get my wish! I soon discovered that "N-Space" is not a straightforward science fiction novel, but rather a mega-compilation of short stories, novellas, and outtakes from novels, spanning Niven's (apparently) decades-spanning SF career. I spent the fall and winter of 1992 totally falling in love with Niven's various universes, and the characters that inhabit them. Moreover, I fell in love with the 'hard' aspect of Niven's work, which compared to the space opera I had been previously reading, was rigorously rooted in the realities of physics and science. I was enchanted by the idea that you could stick to real science (mostly) and still tell amazing and adventurous science fiction stories. In fact, much of Niven's hard SF ranks superior to a great deal of softer material precisely because of its 'realistic' flavor. The generic, and often rubbery gadgets and technology of softer fare is religiously replaced in Niven's work by concrete extrapolations, based on what we understand about the universe in the present time.

Now, with that in mind, I would caution younger or less experienced readers, where "N-Space" is concerned. Especially since the book is not a novel unto itself, it's easy to get lost or distracted in this book. So many different ideas, concepts, times, places, and characters, are all hurled at you at once. If you're not ready to hang on for the ride, you're liable to get thrown off! Thus, if you're brand new to science fiction, or if you were like I was, and only familiar with media SF or military/opera, you need to understand that "N-Space" is a very different kind of book that gives a very different kind of read.

Still, Niven has enormous talent, not just for telling hard SF stories, but for telling them with wit, insight into character, and not just a little humour. His imagination when it comes to world-creation is dazzling, and his alien races and places are some of the most memorable I have ever read. Like a smorgasbord, "N-Space" gives us a healthy portion from virtually all of Larry's playgrounds, both well known and obscure. By the time I was done with "N-Space" I launched voraciously into "Playgrounds Of The Mind", which is essentially the second half of "N-Space"; the two books serving as the first and second parts of one, giant collection.

I've since gone on to explore the majority of the works that "N-Space" touches upon, and after a decade of consuming Niven I consider him to be, perhaps, my all-time favorite SF writer. "N-Space" is not his best single work, it is the best from his best, and as such, makes an outstanding primer for anyone who has never read Niven, but wants to becoming broadly and deliciously acquainted with his work.

The book that brought me back into the Niven fold
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2003-05-19
I am a lapsed Niven fan having discovered him in the late '70s as a kid. Something spurred me to buy N-Space as a way to rediscover what I cherished about his unique mix of hard sci-fi and realistic human emotion.
Thank goodness! When I was done I had to immediately start picking up where I left off with "The Mote in God's Eye" and I look forward to re-reading treasures like "Footfall." Perhaps I'll just start at the beginning and work my way up? :)

A collection as unique as the author
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2004-07-16
At one time the term "science fiction" caused eyebrows to raise. "Isn't that reading for losers who can't relate to others well?" Larry Niven is one of the authors who forever changed the way SF is perceived, one whose fiction emphasizes science without cutting short on any of the tools of your typical brilliant writer of fiction. This gives us well-sculpted characters, even in the shortest of stories, with eye-opening and theoretically sound scientific concepts, plot twists, and remarkable endings. Satisfying story after satisfying story.

What's unique about this collection isn't that it includes a foreward with comments by other authors and fans, or that the author comments on each piece within the collection. Those are commonplace. But in Niven's world, he likes to let you into his world in a special way, perhaps by dishing some dirt on an SF mag who rejected a story that turned out to win a Hugo, etc. He openly questions his finished product, saying that "Today I'd write this story differently," etc. As if we could lift the lid on his cranium and step inside for a moment, seeing how the stories are crafted. Very interesting.

Not as interesting as the work, however, another unique thing about this collection: Not only short stories are collected here, many of which only appeared in one issue of some now-defunct SF mag or other, dating back to the mid 1960s upward to 1990 when this book was first published. He also includes essays, such as an unforgettable commentary on the problems Superman would have if he tried to mate with Lois Lane, as well as excerpts from his published novels at the time. A terrific sampler of a terrific author, whose early-70s work "Ringworld" stands as one of the most brilliant works of speculative fiction of all time. Intelligentsia still debates the validity of its scientific assumptions, and while even Niven admits that most of these have been disproven, how many SF works do you know that sparked so much debate while still being so widely admired?

Niven is far, far beyond any alien shoot-em-up author. This ain't "Star Trek." This is real scientific fiction told by a natural storyteller who loves what he does. We readers love him for it.

Space
Parallax: The Race to Measure the Cosmos
Published in Hardcover by W. H. Freeman (2001-05-01)
Author: Alan W. Hirshfeld
List price: $23.95
New price: $7.68
Used price: $1.19
Collectible price: $23.95

Average review score:

A biography of a scientific puzzle
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2006-03-06
Parallax is a marvellous book that will interest almost anyone who likes to read popular science and popular astronomy. It is an example of a new genre of science writing: writing a biography of a scientific puzzle that had a long life. In this case the puzzle is to find small changes in the positions of stars, due to the Earth's annual motion round the Sun. In learning about this, we find unexpected discoveries, such as the aberration of starlight. Alan Hirshfeld, a professor of physics at the University of Massachusetts, tells the story at a rattling good pace. All the science you need to grasp is explained clearly. The book truly captures the adventuresome spirit of the astronomers involved.

If you like science history, don't overlook this book
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2003-09-26
There have been a lot of history of science books over the last few years - Dava Sobel in particular is very popular. If you like books by her or Jared Diamond or Amir Aczel, you'll love this volume. A smooth read, but with plenty of meat. The theme of the book is also rather more important than that of Sobel's Longitude; the program for the search for parallax was laid out in Galileo's Starry Messenger, and drove astronomical progress for centuries, and is still an important area of research, while remaining mostly unkown to the public. The only scientific theme which lasted longer, or generated more incidental progress, was the search for a proof of Fermat's theorem.

I don't think you can grasp the history of science without being exposed to the material in this book. Give a copy to the budding bookish teenager in your life.

Sometimes It Takes More Than Just A Clever Mind
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2004-12-22
In science, clever minds and precision equipment go hand in hand. Take string theory - it sounds great [and I personally hope it's correct], but we don't have the equipment needed to do the experiments. In the book Parallax by Alan W. Hirshfeld, we take an almost two thousand year journey through history trying to confirm or deny the existence of stellar parallax - the apparent motion of a star due to the Earth's revolution. Hirshfeld introduces us to great scientific mind after scientific mind, all who knew exactly what they should see, but all thwarted in their efforts until the science of telescope making caught up with their brilliant minds. Since we know where the journey ends, part of the fun of reading Parallax comes from Hirshfeld's vivid portraits of the lives of the philosophers, astronomers, and instrument makers involved with finding stellar parallax. My favorite portrait was of Joseph Fraunhofer, telescope maker extraordinaire and survivor of incredible childhood trauma. I highly recommend Parallax by Alan W. Hirshfeld to anyone with an interest in astronomy, the history of science, or instrument making.

A Truly Well-Written Labor of Love
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2003-09-26
This is very simply a great book. The writing is clear and engaging and the history and the science are well presented in a logical chronological order. The love of the author for his subject stands out on every page; and his enthusiasm is contagious - one feels like getting a telescope (if one doesn't already have one) and start exploring the heavens. The book also illustrates in the best and most painless of ways how scientists' work complements that of others - hence progress. Highly recommended!

magnificent
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2004-01-06
This is the best book on popular astonomy that I have read in many years, perhaps ever. It is hard to imagine a more balanced, better organized and readable description of a thorny technical topic than is presented here. In the mini-biographies of astonomers for 2,500 years, one is reminded ot Richard Rhodes book "The Making of the Atomic Bomb" in which he capsules 20th century science, Chemistry in particular. Hirshfeld provides interesting and often amusing thumbnail sketches of all the Parallax protagonists from Aristarchus to the present. His descriptions of Tycho Brahe, Galileo and Kepler are particularlly vivid. I had always read that Tycho had his nose bitten off in a drunken brawl, but, alas, not so! It was in a drunken duel.

The balance of the book is outstanding; each progression of understanding of the magnitude of the problem is presented with equal weight. The actual magnitude and dimensions of the problem (physically measuring the movement of a star from the exremes of the earths orbit) are described in bite sized increments, until by the time that the problem is surmounted in the mid 1800s, the full appreciation of the achievement is inescapable. If genius is "an infinite capacitiy for details", then the astronomers, and Dr. Hirshfeld both fully qualify for the title.

I am enthusiastically recommending this book to every literate person I know. It is satisfying and mind stretching, beautifully constructed, illustrated and edited. A great book!

Space
Planet Quest: The Epic Discovery of Alien Solar Systems
Published in Hardcover by Oxford University Press (1999-03)
Author: Ken Croswell
List price:
New price: $14.98
Used price: $15.00

Average review score:

Most enjoyable and readable
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-09-03
This is one of the most enjoyable and most readable books I've read on any aspect of astronomy. It does show that some planetary astronomers are a bit more human than they ought to be, putting fame ahead of knowledge, but at least they're fussing about something that might conceivably be useful (but hardly, right?) and not about how old Time is, or how to convince me that there is no center to the universe although 'it did so start with an explosion!'. Much of astronomy, and all of cosmology, is just a big boondoggle for smart graduate students and their mentors, but at least the ones Ken Croswell writes about are almost 'down to earth'.

Easy Read: It moves you forward
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2000-04-06
I generally liked this book. I will mention here that the author does tend to write in all the politics amongst the different astronomers and their institutions, making these people real and their discoveries intriguing. However, the bitterness he dotes on gets tiring in some places. Also, he writes to keep you in suspence and only a few times does the anticipation get annoying.

Accessible, humanizing book on the search for planets
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2002-02-02
This is an excellent book on the given subject, covering the history of the search for other planets in a technically proficient but accessible way. Croswell frequently brings in the scientists involved and lets us hear what they have to say. Since the search for planets has often been controversial, this makes for exciting reading sometimes, as two leaders in the field take turns taking potshots at each other.

Mostly, though, it brings more of a human face to this arcane endeavor. Croswell also takes pains to explain how the search is progressing and how so many false alarms have managed to take place over the years.

Again, an excellent book.

Planet Quest: Great for beginners!
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2001-06-13
Planet Quest is a great book for all you armchair astronomers who want to learn more! I am not an astronomer or even an amateur astronomer, in fact, Planet Quest is only the Third book I've read on the subject but my interest is growing. Planet Quest is very easy to understand because all of the scientific jargon is followed by words and explanations that beginners, like you and me, can follow. Read this book, you won't be disappointed!

Excellent, detailed, informative and a good read.
Helpful Votes: 5 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 1999-10-24
Ken Croswell's book, "Planet Quest" is a must for anyone interested in the search for planets outside of the solar system. The book reads well, telling a fascinating story from the beginnings of speculation about the existence of alien worlds right up to the present when information is coming to us all the time about strange new worlds around distant stars. Anybody with an interest in the possibilities of life elsewhere must read this book.

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Star Wars (Star Wars (Penguin Audio))
Published in Audio Cassette by Highbridge Audio (1993-05-01)
Authors: Ltd. Lucasfilm, National Public Radio, George Lucas, and Anthony Daniels
List price: $39.95
New price: $18.67
Used price: $3.94
Collectible price: $39.95

Average review score:

You'll like it or Hate it.
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-06-25
I have loved this since I was a kid. I only have it on tape (I'm old). Once you get used to the actors and once you stop trying to compare it to the movie, you will like it.

The only scene I hate is the one where Vader is torturing Leia. It is laughable. Actually, you should listen to it because I guarantee you will laugh it is so poorly done.

A wonderful story for the whole family
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-04-04
I remembered listening to this production on NPR when I was a kid and now that my own children have discovered Star Wars I decided to share this version with them on a recent trip to visit grandma. We loved it! The Star Wars story is expanded and the writing and voice acting is so well done that it will keep the kids and adults entertained. Our trip seemed almost too short because we enjoyed listening so much.

Don't waste money on a DVD player in the car. Stories like this one are much more entertaining and leave the special f/x to the imagination.

Excellent Companion to the Movie
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2008-03-30
I recently wrote a review for the Return of the Jedi adaption on NPR which I gave a mere three stars. I cited poor directing, acting and lack of added material.

These complaints cannot be levelled against this, the first of the NPR dramatisations.
The acting is spot on, with Perry King providing a rougher verion of Solo that goes over well, as opposed to the next two adaptions where it begins to grate. Mark Hamil and Anthony Daniels are naturally perfect at the characters that defined them for a decade and more after the original trilogy finished. Bernard Behrens does a surprisingly good Ben Kenobi, and Brock Peters likewise with Vader. They are not Alec Guinness and James Earl Jones, but they're good enough not to cause problems.

The direction is great, and I never found myself noticing the obvious radio 'cues' which tell the listener what is happening. THe music and sound effects are good and the pacing is not rushed, unlike ROTJ.

And as for added material? Deducting front and end credits gives us roughly five and a half hours, nearly triple the length of the film. The vast wealth of extra material is great and never seems out of place.

In all I would recommend this to anyone with an interest in the Star Wars original trilogy.

A long time ago...
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2007-10-07
In 1981, the phenomenally popular movie Star Wars was adapted into a radio drama. The series ran as 13 half-hour episodes. This being about three times as long as the movie, a lot of extra scenes were added, especially back stories for many of the characters. The only actors from the movie that reprised their roles from the movie were Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker and Anthony Daniels as C-3PO, but most of the actors taking over the other roles do a good job. Most Star Wars fans will probably enjoy this.

Splendid Radio Adaptation of Star Wars, Episode IV
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2005-06-10
I have fond memories of myself eagerly awaiting each installment of this fantastic radio drama adaptation of the original "Star Wars" film back when it aired originally in 1981. Brian Daley did an excellent job via his superb scripts giving us more details of the relationships between Luke Skywalker and his Tatooine friend Biggs Darklighter and between Princess Leia and her father on Alderaan. We also learn here how Princess Leia obtained the technical plans for the Death Star. Both Mark Hamill and Anthony Daniels give superb performances of their screen characters, Luke Skywalker and C3PO respectively. However, the rest of the cast is just as fine with a fine - if somewhat restrained - Darth Vader voiced by Brock Peters and Ann Sachs as Princess Leia. Both the sound effects by Ben Burtt and of course the original film score by John Williams are absolutely splendid. This is a spellbinding radio drama that should appeal to diehard fans of "Star Wars".

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Three Lives to Live: A Novel
Published in Hardcover by Little Brown & Co (Juv) (1992-05)
Author: Anne Lindbergh
List price: $14.95
New price: $548.96
Used price: $0.01

Average review score:

Suspenseful!
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2000-05-04
My favorite aspect from the novel is the setting. It is a great setting because you can picture what the people are wearing and what they're doing This book is fantastic. It is mysterious. Once you read the first chapter you won't let the book down. It is a good book is about a girl named Garet and her grandma Gratkins, but there's a girl who comes through a mysterious chute. Could that be Garet's sister or is it Gratkins? You'll have to read the book and find out. I recommend this book to other kids because it is a mysterious book and it has action in it. This book is great; you should read it.

You'll never put it down!
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2000-02-29
I choose this book because I needed to do a report. At first it was a little confusing, but when I got farther in the book I couldn't put it down! This is a must read for everyone! You'll never guess what happens to Garet!

Three Lives to Live
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2006-01-05
This is wonderful book written by Anne Lindbergh (the daughter of Charles Lindbergh)about a girl, Garet Atkins (age 13) and a mysterious laundry chute. Garet lives with her grandmother Gratkins (short for grandmother atkins) when suddenly a third person enters their lives. Daisy Atkins, a strange girl wearing an old fashioned peach-colored party dress falls into Garet's basement and into her life. This story is a autobiography that Garet is writing for her 7th grade english teacher. Daisy's true identity is never explained to Garet and she is determined to figure out just who this prettier, smarter, more polite, "twin" is.

Highly entertaining
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2002-07-04
I first read this book in third grade and have loved it ever since. It's cute, mysterious, and humorous. The narrative is frank engaging, and full of energy. The main character is someone you can identify with, as she's a normal middle school student whose life as been totally messed up. It's worth buying and reading.

Be fifty years ahead of your time!
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2005-12-04
It is a great pity that Anne Lindbergh has been forgotten so soon after her death; she was one of the few writers who carried on the wonderful tradition of children's literature that started with E. Nesbit. Lindbergh writes the kind of children's fantasy that doesn't involve elves, dragons, or even wizards. In her books, ordinary children (or teens) stumble across something magical and make the best possible use of it. The magical something, in this case a laundry chute that transports you (or replicates you - it's complicated) fifty years ahead of your time, is not always fully explained. Why a laundry chute should be a time stutter, or why a height chart should allow everyone who is 5'5" to travel to the future, is left unclear, and in Lindbergh's fiction that works.

The basic plot of Three Lives to Live is this: Garet Atkins is an orphan, living very happily with her grandmother Gratkins, who is also her best friend. Then one day, when Garet is peacefully reading in the basement sink, a girl her own age comes flying out of the laundry chute, wearing an old-fashioned peach-colored party dress. To Garet's surprised resentment, Gratkins knows the girl's name (Daisy), takes her in and insists on enrolling her at Garet's school as Garet's twin sister. Garet documents all this, including her increasing jealousy of the pretty, popular, and opportunistic Daisy, in the autobiography she is writing for her English class. As as result, Garet spends a lot of time struggling with Mrs. Magorian, her well-meaning, incompetent teacher, who patently doesn't believe a word of the autobiography. These scenes will induce flashbacks in anyone who has ever had a truly terrible middle-school English teacher. When Garet writes a hilarious conversation between herself and Daisy using only "said" and "asked" as verbs, Mrs. Magorian insists that she rewrite it. She gives Garet, as examples, a list of verbs starting with "beg, bellow, blubber, blurt," and Garet duly sticks them into the dialogue at random. This is funny even for younger children; as read by older children it becomes very pointed satire. The entire book is like this - perfect for many different ages, and worth re-reading as an adult.

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Hard Rock Lovers
Published in Audio CD by Ronin Audio Books (2006-01-03)
Author: Paul Kyriazi
List price: $24.00
New price: $21.83
Used price: $19.99

Average review score:

Didn't Live Up
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2007-07-02
I absolutely love "The James Bond Lifestyle Seminar," but this audiobook fell short. The plot was decent, but nothing better than you'd expect based on the synopsis. The main character is supposed to be 33 years old, yet his voice sounds like an old man. He sounds very unsure of himself. Also, a lot more could have been done with the sound effects. They did not immerse me in the scenes, as another reviewer claimed.

An all-star cast of my generation! I swooned over Rod Taylor and Robert Culp!
Helpful Votes: 12 out of 12 total.
Review Date: 2006-05-22
Wow! My sister pointed me to this audio book and I couldn't believe my ears. I just relaxed on my bed to listen and was absolutely delighted with the movie-quality of the sound effects. Not only is this a masterful, well-written plot, it's also a quality production. The best I've heard.

And those stars that the magnificent author/director Paul Kyriazi lined up for this special version of his book!!! Well, all I can say is that I remember swooning each time I saw any of them on the big screen. (I hope my hubby doesn't read this.) But when I saw Rod Taylor--who narrates this story, with such a come-hither voice--starring in The Birds with that gorgeous Tippi Hedren, I almost fainted. Yes, he was that much of a hunk ... and still is, according to my sister!

Incidentally, people used to say I looked like Tippi. Ah-hhh, memories ... But getting back to this audio book, I loved it to pieces.

Keep up the excellent work, Mr. K. You're terrific, and almost as handsome as the great Rod! Ciao, baby ...

I never wanted it to end!! Fabulous!
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2007-01-16
Mr Kyriazi's production of Hard Rock Lovers was just fantastic! I was on the edge of my seat on a daily basis! I put the audio book on my iPod and listened while I jogged. I gotta say it motivated me to get out there and I am so sad it is over! I cannot wait for his next Audio production!

The story is fantastic, gripping and sexy. I absolutely loved it!

Bravo!!!!

"Hard Rock Lovers".....Beautifully done!!
Helpful Votes: 7 out of 7 total.
Review Date: 2006-03-14
The "Hard Rock Lovers" audio book was not at all what I expected, but what a wonderful surprise! It's a twisted, tangled web of events played out by a handful of multi-leveled, intertwined characters. The story is well written, beautifully told and convincingly enacted centering on the heights of a successful rock star and the terrible costs that are paid when that success is abused. People and events are manipulated by all the characters to satisfy their own needs and agenda.


"Good" and "evil" are blurred. "Life" and "death" are blurred. Relationships are blurred, but the irony of fate is boldly presented and it's made abundantly clear that our "next" existence offers another chance to hopefully do better. The inevitability of change, the subtle and sometimes dramatic interrelationships between cause and effect as well as the ever-present, ever-looming scales of divine and poetic justice are persistent threads. A beautiful blending of drama and melodrama are used to develop both the story and the characters. The audio presentation is top-notch entertainment, particularly when you consider that all acting is accomplished solely through vocal artistry. The actors do a fantastic job of inviting the listener into their world and moving you effortlessly through the story.


I really enjoyed listening to this audio book. It is wonderful from start to finish and my congratulations go out to all involved. It's a winner on all levels.

WONDERFUL cast, beautifully performed, an EXCITING thrilling journey you won't forget!
Helpful Votes: 8 out of 8 total.
Review Date: 2006-03-14
From the moment Hard Rock Lovers comes on ... it takes you by the hand and mind, and immediately draws you into this intriquing story, narrated by the imcomparable Rod Taylor, of revenge, love, lust, cold reality and spiritual enlightenment.

Robert Culp kept me laughing with his perfect low-life agent performance, always the best! James Darren was the perfect rock star, mean, talented but sad, his performance was # 1. Ishtar Uhvana was great as Medusa, she added the sweetness to keep some reality in the rock world and her ending dialoque brought tears to my eyes. Loved Russ Tamblyn, George Chakiris was brilliant as the evil Reynaldo, and Nefta Perry as Connie played the perfect Rosie Perez.

The ending gives you hope and leaves you with happy feelings. You will want to play it again and again; it only gets better each time you listen.

Paul Kyriazi is my hero. I am his BIGGEST fan.

Thank you Paul for the fun and exciting adventure!


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