Living History Books

if you are standing in the flames you must read this book

This is an excellent book... Wanda Davis Turner is a wonderful evangelist and speaker, so I knew her book would be great! She tells her own personal story of pain, deliverance, and healing through sickness and the death of her husband among other incidents. IF you have been through any time of pain and hurt in life then this book is for you, the bible backup and personal testimony of this awesome woman will minister health to your body and mind.

This one is a best seller. Wanda Davis-Turner has taken me back to my first love... That is Christ. When you read this book,and examine your own relationship with the Lord, you will know if you are too, standing in the flames.

I have used this book to instruct boy scouts in Native American and early New England craft with great success. The broad range of projects can easily provide you with a year's worth of activities that fit perfectly within the scouting program. The sketches and instuctions are easy to follow and the required materials are not expensive.

Indian Handcrafts by C. Keith Wilbur is a great primer for people who actually want to MAKE items in the manner that native Americans. There are countless illustrations in here showing you exactly what the item looks like - in many cases drawn direction from historical artifacts located in museums (which are named). So if you really want to go see the arrowhead, or the rubbing stick, you can literally take a trip out to the named museum and see the actual artifact for yourself.

It's important to note that while this book simply claims to have "Indian Handcrafts", they are ALL from the northeast US area - primarily Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island. This isn't a bad thing at all, but they should more clearly identify that on the front of the book. There are a ton of crafts NOT mentioned in here, because they weren't practiced by the tribes in this area. Also, for example when they talk about gardening like a native, and list out the foods that you should grow, the list is: corn, beans, pumpkins, squash, jerusalem artichokes, ground cherries, gourds and tobacco. This is a great list for Massachusetts, and certainly *similar* to what they grew in Florida or Arizona, but it is again important to know that this is a regional summary.

The book is good about both providing a "super 100% authentic" way of doing things - but also giving you shortcuts if you wish. As the author notes, native Americans were very quick to adapt new technologies when they encountered them. When they met up with people who had easy access to metal, they took those metals and melted them down rather than going through the labor intensive trouble of making their own metals from scratch. When they met up with people who had pretty glass beads, they didn't spend weeks and weeks hand grinding stones down into bead shapes. So in the same manner, sure, you are provided with instructions for hand making dyes from plants and flowers. But if you want, you can also use commercial dyes. This is not really "cheating" - it is efficient, and the natives were efficient where they had access to those supplies.

The book is also cautious in its environmental impact. Yes, the natives would strip birch bark off of trees to use it for various crafts. However, in modern times we do not have huge forests of birch - and stripping off birch bark would kill the trees. We can't afford to kill off trees just for "fun crafts". The author gives you ways to get your hands on the ingredients in a more environmentally friendly manner.

Keith was apparently 67 when he published this book in 1990, and you can see his lifetime of research clearly here. He talks about the different ways he practiced making stone tools, tried carving out canoes, and much more. This is a man who actually learned how to do these crafts and is now sharing his knowledge. I really appreciate that! The drawings are very detailed. I still wish, though, that they used a "regular font" for reading, instead of the calligraphy-style handwriting which is sometimes hard to read - and I wish they included some photos. Drawings are great, but sometimes it is so much more helpful to see actual images of things.

Still, these are minor complaints about a treasure trove of knowledge. Whatever your reason for wanting to learn more about how native Americans lived, I highly recommend this book as a part of your library.

This book describes many of the material goods made by Native Americans, and gives the reader an intimate understanding of their construction. Each item is described, with drawings of museum-piece examples. Wilbur then describes how Native Americans made the item (drawing from eye-witness memoirs where possible), and finally describes ways to make reproductions using modern techniques. Really gives one an appreciation for iron. Ideal for a youngster interested in Indians (and what youngster isn't?)

I've long been interested in the Japanese approach to design of all sorts, but especially architecture. Coming from a much different tradition, the solutions to problems and needs for shelter are often very different than those arrived at by architects with Euro-American tastes and training. Some of the examples depicted so beautifully and discussed so shrewdly in this volume are rooted strongly in Japan's history, such as an old farmhouse relocated to Tokyo and fitted into an urban neighborhood. Others are playful, like the house with a lawn on the peaked roof, watered by a sprinkler system on the ridgepole, and with the courtyard floored in clay roof tiles. There's a two-story "miniature" house with a footprint not much larger than two parking spaces, but which still manages to be a very comfortable environment for actually living in. And, naturally, there are structures *so* experimental, you might not realize they were houses if you weren't told. There are homes in this collection I would love to live in, and others that would probably give me nightmares, but all of them are fascinating.

This book is filled with page after page of stunning rooms and living spaces in Japan. A must for anyone who believes all Japanese live in cramped, dark, unattractive homes. An excellent conversation starter and coffee table book.

This book provides total eye candy for design enthusiasts. Not your typical formulaic shoji screen stuff. Very original solutions to design problems from a Japanese perspective. I find it very inspiring and look at it all the time.

This is a wonderful book that takes the reader into the depths of Japanese culture and relationships at the turn of the century. Japan is leaving behind the world of the samurai and the shogun, and cautiously opening up to the influence of the politics and values of the west.

Kenichi Yamamoto is a samurai who ignores his wife, Lady Masa, as he pursues his mistress, Osen. But Kenichi and Masa have a son, Renzo, around whom the story revolves. Renzo is confronted by the changes in Japan, which previously had sealed itself off to all outside influence. Though he must perform his traditional duties to family, he experiences life in London and Paris, becomes an art dealer, and befriends westerners in his country. The interactions in the relationships among the characters are poignant and strange, as they should be to readers of a foreign place and time. The author creates a wonderful picture with these characters-their customs, thoughts, feelings, and dress. You can easily visualize the houses they live in, and the various locations from a coastal seaport to the stinky streets of Tokyo. This book added to my knowledge and understanding of Japan.

This is a wonderful book which I really enjoyed reading.
The narrative painted a vivid picture of what life might have been like in Japan before the country was opened to the Western world and the modern day.
It fills the reader in to the customs, expected roles of women
and the entitlements of men in the early days of Japan.

It even touches on a bit of history. This really is a wonderful book.

This is a wonderful book which I really enjoyed reading.
The narrative painted a vivid picture of what life might have been like in Japan before the country was opened to the Western world and the modern day.
It fills the reader in to the customs, expected roles of women
and the entitlements of men in the early days of Japan.

It even touches on a bit of history. This really is a wonderful book.

This book is a good source to balance the word and image of Islam and Muslim in the western world. Muslim is not only in Arabian peninsula or Gulf contries, in fact Indonesia is the largest muslim population in the world. Many pictures on the book can give the different side of Islam in Southeast asia. They don't speak arabic, they don't have big nose,they are short, skiny etc. I recommend this book for the people who wants to know Muslim in Southeast asia without reading a long history book.

But there is unbalance information in the book I noticed, specially information about Indonesian muslim in the introduction. Steve Raymer seems doesn't have a good source that he can get the information about Indonesian muslim. Might be because they are so many and he tries to put it in the same ammount as Malaysian which is only about 1/6 or 1/8 of Indonesian in comparison. It is best if he can consult or clarify his information with the Indonesian sociologists, historians, or scholars in order to validate the information. One of the examples is on second page, the picture doesn't not macth the note (citation). The picture is showing the people who are suplicating, is not always in arabic, but he says those people are reciting the koran. This is just small example.
I recommend people who have this book to check with the Southeast Asian people to clarify the information.
More than that, good work and well done.

As one who's lived in Southeast Asia off and on for the past seven years, the thing that strikes me about the book by Raymer are the brilliant photos, yes. But the way they are put together gives a human face to Southeast Asia's Muslim peoples. A fair and realistic look at them is refreshing in light of many Western reports that tout them all as gun-toting extremists.

Steve Raymer has done an exceptional job at capturing the humanity of Southeast Asian Muslims through the lenses of the faithful camera. The pictures are breathtakingly beautiful, while the accompanying caption and text serve as an easy-to-read commentary especially for those expecting only an excursion into the subject. His attempt at a sympathetic understanding of a culture that is relatively obscure to the average Westerner is commendable; the journalistic objectivity being a salient feature of the book.

Raymer, in my opinion, succeeded in shattering the perpetuated myth surrounding the perception of Muslims. Not only does he cogently disprove the notion of a monolithic Muslim culture across the Muslim world, but he also demonstrates the existence of diversity with which Islam is practiced in this forgotten region. The cognitive image of either a rich Middle-Easterner or a terrorist brandishing an AK-47 so often associated with Islam must now be relegated to the domain of stereotypes. The book is probably a silent apologist for the peace of Islam.

Caveat emptor for those expecting their stereotypes confirmed and prejudices accomodated; the book is sure to frustrate them.

The maxim that a picture is worth a thousand words had never been truer. The picture is now worth millions of humans.

Living Icons brings to life the work, theology, commitment ment to Christian unity and holiness of ten of Orthodox Christianity's persons of faith. Maria Skobtsova, Gregory Krug, and Alexander Men are three of the profiled persons in this remarkable work. All are representatives of Russian Orthodoxy forced to emigrate from their homelands and develop their faith in a western environment. This transplanting resulted in a group of people who challenged the lethargy of their own church and opened the road of dialogue with their sister churches in the west.
Through the witnesses of these living saints of the twentieth century you can see the seeds of hope for a reunited church of all believers endowed with their diversity but united as one in Christ. I found the book fascinating as it discussed the challenges and struggles that these individuals faced. Many were rediculed for their views within Orthodoxy and declared heretical while others were murdered for their witness.
This work is a great primer for introducing you to some of the significant persons in Orthodoxy who have impacted the church in both Roman Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox circles through their theology, iconography, academics, pastoral care and lay witness. Although not an exhaustive work, Living Icons, makes you hungry to know more about Orthodoxy as well as its profiled living witnesses. This is a "must" have book for all Christians who desire to know more about the gifts and graces of the Orthodox church as embodied in these individuals.

Living Icons: Persons Of Faith In The Eastern Church by ordained Orthodox priest Michael Plekon (Professor, Department of Sociology/Anthropology, religion and culture, Baruch College, City University of New York) is a close look at the lives of ten Eastern Orthodox Christian faithful, each of whom lived in the eighteenth through twentieth centuries. Fascinating, uplifting, and evenhanded in its study of characters, foibles, and faith, as well as highly recommended for students of Orthodox Christian History, Living Icons is a profound testimony to the path set by just a few among many amidst constantly changing and conflicting headwaters of religious belief worldwide.

Plekon has done a very good job in making available to american readers the lives and thoughts of several 20th century Eastern Orthodox theologians and "lovers of mankind". Each essay examines the main currents of thought for each person and their influnece upon the world in this century. Included are essays about St. Seraphim of Sarov, Sergius Bulgakov, MAria Skobtsova, Fr. Lev Gillet, Paul Evdokimov, Fr. Gregory Krug, Nicholas Afanasiev, Fr. Alexander Schmemann, Fr. Jean Meyendorff, and Fr. Alexander Men. With many first-hand accounts of their lives, the author gives keen insights into their personalities, the context of their actions and writings, and their continuing relevance for the 21st century.

I would also recommend "Light From The East" by Aidan Nichols for an intro to some other Orthodox thinkers. It is out of print, but available from time to time. Enjoy!

...Ms Bolgiano is both a skilled researcher and a talented writer.

The newest of Ms Bolgiano's books, Living in the Appalachian Forest, zeros in on relationships between man and the wooded lands of our eastern mountains. In its pages, the reader meets people who care enough about the trees to dedicate their lives and often to risk their livelihoods to develop sustainable ways for humans to live with the forests, to use them wisely and in ways that keep the woods growing more and more healthy instead of descending into destruction. Of course, the folks who care about nothing but a quick profit appear here and there. The emphasis of Living in the Appalachian Forest, however, is on the conscientious, caring people who love the forest and the hope their activities inspire.

There's some interesting history in this book. Though I grew up in West Virginia, I had never before heard the real stories of the 1920 Matewan Massacre or the famous feud between the Hatfields and McCoys. Ms Bolgiano shares well written accounts of both these incidents, and many more.

In the pages of Living in the Appalachians, I learned quite a bit about forestry. I also became aware of several government and private organizations that involve themselves in the forest industries. Some are harmful, while many others are working diligently for sustainability.

There is a fine account with a lot of excellent description of the odious practice of mountaintop removal. This mining technique, a giant step beyond the destructiveness of even poorly managed strip mining, is used widely in the Appalachians by supposedly legitimate mining companies under the watch of supposedly honest government agencies.

Living in the Appalachian Forest is truly a fine book. It is a work of considerable insight and love and of hard research and fine writing. It holds the reader's interest like a really good novel...

Fun, serious, and thoroughly readable. Chris Bolgiano weaves grounded environmentalism and ecological awareness with history and stories/case studies to bring our awareness to a complex subject. This book presents solid Appalachian forest information to the reader in a manner that keeps one reading. Forests are complex, there are many approaches and techniques to sustainability, and Ms. Bolgiano seems to get to most. Simply, I found this book a delight to read and I learned so much from it.

Those of us who own and/or treasure portions of Appalachia's forest will find in Chris Bolgiano's concise 200 pages a wealth of useful information. She interviews a wide spectrum of foresters, loggers, strip-miners, nature lovers, and other "shareholders"---bringing us up-to-date about the use (and too often the abuse) of what might be the most diverse temperate forest in the world. When Bolgiano visited mountaintop- removal stripmine sites, she found that over 99 percent of the natural diversity had been destroyed---but that western elk had been imported to the stripmined land as a sort of fig leaf to cover the devastation. She describes ways that land can be put in trust and legally protected against such abuse--including against abuse by future owners. One of the book's main themes is sustainable logging---which can best be done with horses rather than machines, and which increasingly now rejects the "high-grading" system of timber selection in favor of "low-grading"---thereby leaving the best trees in place to reproduce. These practices are spreading fast in Appalachia with the help of Smartwood certification and also thanks to professional forestry consultants such as Appalachian Sustainable Development, based in southwestern Virginia. In first-person prose that often sparkles, Bolgiano relates her adventures while visiting all sorts of people whose lives and livelihoods revolve around the forest. She embeds a major delivery of crucial history and current facts in a light-hearted telling of her personal adventures. Her book is not only a pleasure to read but highly informative. It's a major resource for anyone who wants to pitch in and try to save some special part of the Appalachian region from becoming a national sacrifice area. -Paul Salstrom

Comprehensive guide on everything you need to know about living in the USA. A must-buy for those who intend to migrate to the Land of Opportunity. Best value for money.

Alison R. Lanier's book is part cultural explanation, designed to help those from other countries understand Americans, and part relocation guide, offering practical advice ranging from food customs to how to select a good school. The book, which anticipates newcomers' needs and helps ease their transitions, is more than a guidebook; it's a training manual. Intercultural expert Jef C. Davis, who updated this sixth edition, explains how post-9/11 aftershocks have changed things for visitors from abroad. He includes useful advice on cooperating with airport security, staying safe in major cities and complying with immigration regulations. Davis realizes that, due to its cultural and ethnic diversity, America tends to elude effective characterization. The book also offers information on some groups within U.S. society, from Native Americans and Asian Americans to gays, retirees and the disabled. One small caveat: the sobriquet "American" should rightly include folks from Canada and all of South and Latin America, grammatically if not in common social exchange. U.S. citizens are Americans, indeed, but hardly the only ones. Such petty Yanks aside, we like this useful, time-tested presentation of logistical and cultural knowledge for making a new home in the U.S. Now about those sidewalks paved with gold...

Now in a completely updated and revised sixth edition, Living In The USA rightly continues to be regarded as the ideal guide for recent emigrants and new visitors to the United States, a country which has undergone substantive changes in the last five years since the events of September 11, 2001. This comprehensive, 243-page guide is now enhanced with timely information on American subcultures (including Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, retirees, gays and lesbians, as well as the disabled), contemporary American social and political issues (including the rise of religious fundamentalism and the tensions between security issues and personal liberties), rapidly changing immigration rules, conditions, and American business conditions (including negotiation, life in the office, and time spent at work). From American values, to American social and civic life, to money, medical care, food customs, communications, housing, child care, education, privacy, and so much more, Living In The USA covers everything the newly arrived need to know whether they intend to stay a week, a year, or a lifetime.

Just what the professor ordered! My son is quite pleased with this purchase. He needed the text for his theatre class in college. Thanks for the speedy delivery.

This is a [must have] for anyone who desires to study theater outside of high school and into college. Throughout my studies in college, I constantly referred back to this piece for references. It is an expensive book, but trust me. You will get your money's worth out of this one.

This has been the only textbook I have enjoyed in 4 years of university. Great pics. Very well done.

This book is so full of amazing insight and profound wisdom I may read it again with a pencil and highlighter in hand! The author teaches Buddhist philosophy by weaving it around the story of his mother's death from Alzheimer's disease. But, don't be fooled. This is not a book about dying. It's a book about living - without regret - and with a sense of awe and purpsose knowing that all things are impermanent.

Here is quote from the book which, I believe, is representative of the whole.

"We usually experience time and an external pressure and our relationshiop to it is strained. We look at the clock: 'Oh my, is it already that late?' We feel time nipping at our heels; it seems there is never enough time. Still, we believe there is plenty of time left before we die, although, in taking time for granted, we are likely to waste it."

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and know I will be turning to it again and again like I would return to a great teacher. I highly recommend it.

Not being a Buddhist, I was wary about how much I would understand in this Book. I found it was an easy read and it gave me comfort in the current situation of a relative dying with Alzheimers. The Author wrote the book after his Mother died from Alzheimers. Anyone would benefit from this book but I would especially recommend it to those going through some terminal relatives illness.

My grandmother recently passed away and I recommended the book to my mother. This was easy since the book concerns the formidable experience of dealing with aging parents, but also is a poignant account of Tibetan Buddhism. So to give this book to a loved one who has lost thier own parent is a natural. The book itself can help people of any age deal with these traumas. This is a book that people who have an "interest" in Eastern spirituality will enjoy very much. It is also evident from reading the book that Living Without Regret is a labor of love. The book is concise and yet packed will all sorts of Buddhist teachings.