Personal Pages Books

Great. The info guides and motivate me! I follow Suze Orman's advice for all my financial and spiritual needs.

I have almost finished this 2001 desktop calendar. And I have learned a lot. Suze Orman's tips are sometimes related directly to money, but just as often to your attitude towards money. Both are important! She does help you look at things differently and having this calender on my desk all year has kept my finances (and my control over them!) at the top of my to-do list.

I just bought the 2002 version of this desk calendar and after flipping through the pages, I can tell that it was money well spent! I've had other money-oriented desk calendars before but Suze's surpasses them all in terms of variety (she discusses debt, mortgages, the stock market, retirement, wills, insurance, mutual funds--everything!) and general usefulness (there are no "take a break from money" days, and she gives her financial advice even on the weekend days, something many of the other calendars I had did not do). Her added psychological anaylsis of why people make money mistakes in the first place is very interesting, too. I plan on buying next year's calendar.

supposing that this book is accurate in what it explains (as a novice to investing I can't say whether it is) it was an awesome book to read because of its conciseness (something lacking in most books) and its clarity as to what means what. I don't plan to invest in individual stocks, bonds, futures, options anytime in the near future but at least I know what the hell those things are.

I checked out this book in an attempt to learn more about the meanings of all those acronyms and abbreviations you find in the listings and tables for stocks, funds, etc. both in the paper and on the Web. It does just that plus a tad more. It dedicates a section to indexes (DJIA, NASDAQ, etc.) and where they come from, what do they "say," etc. Finally it wraps up with a section dedicated to covering some basic economy concepts that affect investing: inflation, recession, fed rates, etc. It's pretty comprehensive for such a small book. Check it out if you want to get a primer. Don't go to it for answers on what or where to invest, because it's not meant for that.

I have always wanted to learn how to write essays and this book is very good as a foundation type of book for essay writing. I recommend it highly.

The author walks the reader through 8 basic types of essays, and provides writing exercises for each of those types. Where this book is most helpful, however, is in the critiquing of the essays written by one of the author's students. Ms. Bender shows you her process of critique in the samples of the student's first draft and second draft.

First, she singles out those "velcro words" (the nouns and phrases in the first draft essay that stick with her) -- and she encourages you to take your own note of your "velcro words". She then walks through her feelings as she reads the essay -- where she is intrigued, for example, or confused by the images the student uses. Finally, she shares this information with the student so that the student can choose to elaborate or minimize certain parts of the essay in a second draft, thus producing tighter writing and more polished images.

I find Bender's process of critique quite useful and relatively painless.

Mr Lukeman's advice is incredible in this age where all rules, mores and sexes are blended. After this book in which he defends classic methods, I felt good again about returning to Melville and Dostoevsky, not to mention one of my all time favorites, Conrad, for reading and observation of their techniques. Thank you Mr Lukeman for writing this book. I read it twice, then made notes. For aspiring writers, if you want to sell a book, first get this one; if you want to write for the internet, you would'nt be interested.

This book was a bit of a slog for me, and much of the advice Mr. Lukeman provides seems somewhat outdated, especially in this era of the internet when so many agents and editors blog and there are so many more resources for writers on the net. There was one particularly wretched piece of advice about sending your query letters out express which made me wince. I can think of 5 agents off the top of my head who say NEVER do this. EVER.

Mr. Lukeman also belabors his points in his end of chapter "examples", bludgeoning the reader over the head with points which he had already expressed well enough previous. His "bad" writing samples are so awful they entertain instead of illuminate. Here is an example from the dialogue section on melodramatic dialogue:

"Oh, Henry! You know I've loved you so!"
"Oh, Magaret! If only words could express my love for you!...
"Oh, darling! What would I be without you? My love, my sweetness!"
"The world would stop in its tracks without you, my Magarita!"

A few of the exercises he assigns at the end of each section are helpful if for no other reason than to make a writer really focus on the words and take a look at what they've written. I liked the exercise at the end of the "Sound" section where he assigns the writer to rewrite one of their paragraphs "and reformat it on the page as if it were a poem" (51). This helped me smooth out flow and melody in my manuscript immensely and it was fun too.

I'd say if you're looking for really germaine advice about getting published you might want to start reading agent blogs instead of this book. Kristin Nelson. Nathan Bransford and the Bookends Literary Agency blogs are good places to start your publishing education. I wouldn't say this book is unless you lack even the most basic of writing skills and publishing smarts.

If you never want to do another rewrite DON't BUY THIS BOOK - if you want to get published and be professional - buy 2 copies! Great book, enough said.

In the First Five Pages, Noah Lukeman reveals the quickest ways a manuscript is tossed into the rejection pile. Think your numerous alliterations are clever? Manuscript readers don't. Believe you're subtlety slipping in backstory when your characters discuss their pasts? Nope, it's annoying and contrived. Subscribe to the belief that the more drama, the better? Please unsubscribe.

This book's value ultimately lies with Lukeman's editing credentials. He organizes this book according to what an editor first looks for when reading a manuscript. He tackles preliminary problems (adjectives, adverbs, comparisons, etc.) that can get your manuscript axed right away, and then focuses on bigger picture items (hooks, tone, setting, etc). At the end of each chapter, Lukeman provides helpful exercises to help you practice what you've just learned.

His book isn't without flaws. His own writing needs a little polish (he *loves* using passive voice). I also disagreed with his frequent recommendation that writers should choose "unusual" words. He later interchanges unusual with precise (which is much more appropriate), but he should have added a caveat telling writers not to go overboard. I can picture amateur writers using this advice and swapping boxers for pugilists (not a good idea). Finally, his examples of what not to do are way over the top. Lukeman admits this, and to be fair, his examples clearly illustrate his points. But he should have added mediocre examples, writing that will *just* tip the writer into the rejection pile.

However, Lukeman provides great advice with regard to dialogue, and I especially liked his chapters on subtlety. He provides much more good advice than bad, especially in his later chapters. It's funny in a way that his own book starts off rocky, but it's worth finishing it. Overall, first-time writers will get the most benefit out of the First Five Pages. More experienced writers (especially those who have been published) can do without it.

I have to agree with the February 2001 review by "A Customer": This book doesn't teach much about writing. I would go farther and say that some of what it says is either wrong or at least very unhelpful.

One can. of course, empathize with literary agents and editors who are deluged with manuscripts and must move as quickly as possible to extract a few needles of quality from the haystack of junk. There is value in this book in terms of bringing a writer -- particularly an unpublished one -- some sense of reality as to what he or she faces in the competition for attention. There is also value in making people sensitive to some of the most common "red flags" that will kill their chances for consideration.

But I found this book maddening, for a couple of reasons. First, Lukeman himself has much to learn as a writer. He writes in an overly elegant, self-absorbed style that should have earned the red pen of any competent editor. It becomes a little difficult to accept his wisdom about how things should be written when his own product is deficient. He constantly switches from the first person (both "I" and "we") to the second and third person, for example, often within the very same paragraph. What grated most on me, however, was his addiction to purple in his prose: "If you look back at your dialogue and realize you have scenes that are unsalvageable (like the last example), don't collapse in despondency." (p. 90). Collapse in despondency? Puh-leeze.

The second problem, to me far more serious, is that many of his exercises and proposed solutions to the problems he identifies are either useless or wrongheaded. For example, to solve the problem of pointless and mundane dialogue ("Hi there, how are you?" "I'm fine, and you?" "Nice weather we're having, huh?") he doesn't send people to reputable sources of help for writing effective dialogue; rather, he suggests that a writer should "train [his] ear." He writes: "Begin to pay attention to how dialogue is used in everyday life by different types of people. Eavesdrop on people -- in the subway, in a diner, walking on the street, in a store; especially try to eavesdrop on people who might be similar to your characters." (p. 89).

This suggestion is a recipe for disaster. Writing effective dialogue requires far more sophistication than the aimless guesswork that Lukeman suggests here. It would be far better for an aspiring writer with problems in this area to spend time with Gloria Kempton's Dialogue or Tom Chiarella's Writing Dialogue, to name just two helpful resources.

My suggestion, then, is that this book might be worth a look for the insights it provides into the most common mistakes that inexperienced writers may make in writing and submitting their manuscripts, but not for much help in solving these problems (except for those that can easily be avoided, like improper formatting of manuscripts). Rather, a writer who wants to create a commercially viable work should take advantage of some of the excellent resources available that really get into the hard issues that a writer must confront.

Some of the most valuable books I have benefited from include:

Beginnings, Middles & Ends: How to Get Your Stories Off to a Roaring Start, Keep Them Tight and Crisp Throughout, and End Them With a Wallop by Nancy Kress;

Plot & Structure: Techniques And Exercises For Crafting A Plot That Grips Readers From Start To Finish by James Bell; and

Characters, Emotion & Viewpoint: Techniques and Exercises for Crafting Dynamic Characters and Effective Viewpoints, also by Nancy Kress.

There are many others, of course, but a writer who thoroughly applied the advice in these three -- provided he or she had the basic ability to write in proper English -- would have a significant leg up in getting into print.

As a student in college, I want to learn some advanced web programming language. I found this book is very helpful for beginner. I also get a discount from couponsky.com when buying this book. This book is not only useful for beginner's studying, you also can take it as reference after you finish the studying. I recommend this book to the beginners in ASP.

I was an ASP programmer several years ago after which I moved to a different technology. Now, I need to come to speed on .NET, but unfortunately all the ASP.NET books make innumerous references to the old ASP which I have almost forgotten.

The book helped me *VERY* quickly go through ASP 3.0 and now I feel very comfortable reading the .NET books and can now truly appreciate ASP.NET.

A GREAT reference book!

Somewhat in a rush and while trying to learn ASP I purchased this book. I thought it was aweful and it collected dust for nearly 6 months while I searched elsehwere to boot myself up on ASP. However, now that I'm fairly proficient at ASP, this book has been helpful as a reference. No so much for the actual reference value but becasue the sample code helps put things in perspective.

This is an excellent companion book to 'Professional Active Server Pages'. Like most O'Reilly Nutshell texts, this book is designed more as a reference aid, rather than a learning text. If you buy both the Professional ASP tome, and this reference guide, you've bought everything you need for ASP.

Be warned, if like I did, you think that this is the only book you'll need to be able to build ASP scripts; you're very much mistaken. Whenever I recommend this book, I always recommend it alongside VBScript in a Nutshell as you really need knowledge of an ASP supported scripting language before you can use ASP in a Nutshell to it's full potential!

This is yet another reference book that I've owned both editions of because I thought it was useful enough to update; but then, my site is developed using ASP, so I'm probably biased in this respect. Ok, so I got the 1st Edition late on in the game and was a little reluctant to part with cash for the new edition - but as IIS 5 started to become standard for Windows hosting, and I had access to it after getting Windows XP Pro... I thought it was about time I updated it.

ASP in a Nutshell is my first point of reference when I'm looking up the properties of a particular ASP object. I've also found it an invaluable guide for connecting and manipulating ASP scripts that used ADO for data storage and manipulation. For a while it was the only book I owned that covered the issue of connecting ASP scripts to databases.

Most of the installable components I'd never heard of before getting the book, just as well really because few are of much use - even if they aren't available on your system, a lot can be easily reproduced. The areas I find myself most frequently refering to are the main set of ASP objects, the FileSystem Object and the ActiveX Data Objects. These go into enough detail to keep all but the experienced programmers happy.

For those new to the Windows scene, there is a brief but detailed guide to setting up ASP to work with your IIS server; but it's hardly rocket science since a clean install of IIS will set up most (if not all) of what you need anyway! If you use ASP regularly, or you intend to, then ASP in a Nutshell should be on your desktop... but please remember it won't fulfill all your ASP development needs without another book to fill in the language gaps. What book you choose to accompany it depends on your language and experience... I personally like VBScript in a Nutshell.

This is not really a book about professional wrestling.

This is a book that is partially set in the world of professional wrestling. The subject of the book is really positive thinking.

It's out of print, and it may be hard to get, but if you are into human potential and the power of change - combining discipline with positive thinking - then this is a VERY good book.

If you know (or if you are) a wrestling fan who needs to hear this message, then this may be the PERFECT book.

Some people think that Dallas Page is a relentless self-promoter, but they're the ones who haven't been listening. He believes that anyone can do anything that they really want to - if they're willing to work hard enough for it. He uses his own life as the example.

It's worth a read.

I guess everyone and their mother decided it was time to write their gripping life story. This poorly written book is yet another discredit to the wrestling business. This is a business where so many people have given pride back to the business and then Page Falkenberg produces a book written on a third grade level full of wrongful facts.

The question is obvious, why does Diamond Dallas Page even have a book? I can't answer that one. If he has a book then why doesn't Marty Jannetty, Pat Tanaka, Buff Bagwell or even Scotty Riggs? Why don't they? Because with all due respect nobody would want to read a full book about these wrestlers. Certainly one shoot interview on video or 4 page one on the Internet would be enough for a fan. Just like Bill Goldberg, Page is another guy who was convinced by Eric Bischoff that they were a star and even though he is by the way one of the worst champions of all time according to the ratings, Page bought it.

This book was the fire back from WCW to the WWF at the time for having Mick Foley's book. Well if that is the case, that is a bigger joke of a fireback then the debut of the Maestro. If you are looking to buy a good wrestling autobiography, pass on this one at the bookstore. It is a terrible book!

It is a well known fact that DDP is a no talent in the wrestling business who got to the top by kissing Eric Bischoff's ass. They were next door neighbors for godsakes. DDP's book is full of crap. He never drew flies. His workrate sucked. He was over, but not to were he drew money. The book itself is bad. 400 someodd pages of his life. 200 of it on wrestling. He writes about how he was a bar manager for 200 pages. This was incredible dull. He puts himself over so much that it is tiring and he positively sucked. He was a product of the WCW Bischoff era and we now know why WCW went under. DDP you will never be in the Wrestling Observer Hall of Fame. And that's not a bad thing, that's a good thing.

good book and all, ddp's a cool guy and everything, but none of the books compete to foley's 2. but hell, ddp still made a good read. get foley's 2 first (like you haven't) then get bobby the brain's second.

All the History comes flooding back with each word. The times and places so easily parallel life and it's many hits one takes, leading to a the ultimate take-down. We all wish the best and try our best, some deal with the injuries better than others...some will always keep the bag of ice handy so the swelling doesn't show. We can all take a lesson and hope that our trials will bring us back to the same familiar places so near and dear someday. Here's to happy summers on the shore with those we'll always treasure. One Jersey girls' dream.

I've picked up 4 or 5 other books on dating (can read my other reviews for a few). Most of them focus on how to contort yourself into this or that person to lure a man into your commitment "lair"... or at least that is how it feels reading those books.

How refreshing it was to finally come across a book that suggests that the desire for a committed relationship is nothing to be ashamed of...and even better, how to spot and avoid commitmentphobes and better than nothing (BTN) relationships.... all things that drain your time and energy from finding someone you can share your life with. It also does a fabulous job helping you unearth all of the other ways you may be undermining your success in your search...such as hidden ambivalence and internal dialogues(there are no ways to meet people, there are no good ones, etc) that only serve to lower your odds.

I had to laugh when she said "don't expect dating to be fun". It IS like a job interview! Pace yourself, have a plan, and keep at it! All great advice...

This book was recommended by a psychologist I met while traveling in southeast Asia. Even though the title is a strong, the book is amazing. It is an easy read and really helps you look at yourself. This book does NOT put the blame of being single on others or your environment. Each chapter focuses your issues/hangups with relationships. You will need a small notebook or a few sheets of paper to do the exercises at the end of each chapter.

In addition to looking at your issues/hangups, it also helps you realize what you are looking for in a partner and reflecting on past relationships.

Now that I have finished reading it and have talked about it with my friends, they want to buy it too.

I enjoyed this book because it forced me to take a long, hard look at myself and what I have been doing to get in my own way. If you are serious about changing old patterns get this book.

I found this book too be a little depressing and misguiding. The author gives many examples and discussions of realtionships that went wrong which may be helpful in deciding to get out of a relationship but doesn't do much to help find a good one. The viewpoint is definitely biased towards the female side of what intimacy should be like which I feel is unfair to men and not helpful. Men are men, thank goodness. The author also prescribes to the idea that no one will love you unless you love yourself, that you have to get past your fears of intimacy before you will find the right person and that commitment phobes are people with "issues" (as opposed to being just your standard every day jerk). In general the book is unmotivating and not real world.

If you have ever wondered why you're single, this is the book for you. It surpassed my expectations and is something I'll be recommending to friends. The book deals with the complexities in personal relationships and causes you to analyze your own behavior and confront some of your issues. It is LESS about men and their behavior and more about you: Which is the way to find healthy love by having happiness begin with you. Some great topics it covers are: examining your hidden ambivalence, how to say no when you're in the wrong relationship, how to detect and avoid men who aren't going to commit, and the best part: how to identify and say no to "BTN's", which are better than nothing relationships. A pivatol point in the book was when she discussed how you can be with a really great guy, but there might be one thing missing. And if it's something big then you have to walk away rather than settle for someone who is "almost" Mr. Right. I think many people settle and this book will show you how not to.

I came to this book with considerable experience in ASP, and with fair experience over the past year with ASP.NET, mainly in C#. I also have some experience with Java and object-oriented programming. I wanted to learn how to create custom web controls, and this is one of the few books on the subject. The authors are members of Microsoft's ASP.NET team, so they know the inside story, and technically, they show their knowledge of the topic.

However, the book basically assumes not only that you know C# thoroughly, but also that you understand the event model that is more along the lines of desktop applications. Chapter three hits you with an abstract discussion of component and event programming that is difficult if you're not already familiar with the topic, and the book never really looks back after that. I struggled through the first thirteen chapters before giving up, not feeling like I have a grasp of how I could build controls. At this point I'll either have to painstakingly go back through much of the book again, hoping to catch on, or else find another resource.

The other problem is that when introducing a topic, the text rarely gives a good explanation of why the topic is important; instead, it jumps into details of interfaces and methods. A good example is in chapter nine, when the book turns to processing postback data. Sure, it's important that the control be able to interact with the data in a form, but what does that mean for the control? An example of how this would work and be important would be key here, but instead, the authors open the section with:

"We'll now look at the postback data processing architecture that enables a control to retrieve form data submitted by a user, update its state, and raise events in response to changes in its state. To participate in postback data processing, a control must implement the IPostBackDataHandler interface and render elements whose HTML name attributes have unique values on the page" (p. 203). The discussion continues with the technical details of implementing the interface. By the time they get to the code sample, it's tough to see how the snippets of code added to the previous example helps handle postback data.

I expect that if you are an experienced C++ and C# applications programmer, you'll find the book a great help and reference. If you're fairly new to programming, or most of your experience is with Web applications, I would look elsewhere (perhaps the O'Reilly book by Lowy, though I haven't read that one so can't endorse it either). I realize that topics like event handling are more advanced, but there should be a book that can convey it understandably to the intermediate-level Web programmer.

This is the de-facto "advanced" book on authoring ASP.NET server controls and components. I read a couple other "for dummies" books to get up to speed, but I still had quite a few unanswered, nagging questions. Well, this is the book to take your development of ASP.NET controls and components to the next level by removing the veil for some of the magic going on behind the scenes.

It may be a nice reference but in no way it is a good explanation of how to get things done! The authors wrote the book without thinking of what readers might want to see.
This is technical writing not a tutorial. I've read great tech books (like .NET Framework by Jeff Richter) where one doesn't have to read a paragraph twice. This book is not one of those.
It is also very difficult to trace how things are related to each other and where they come from.

If you are a proficient ASP developer and are familiar with advanced C# progrmming topics like events and delegates, this book gives you a thorough knowledge about server controls. After looking into many ASP.NET books, this is the first book which doesn't waste the reader's time to describe non-related topics.

I have been a C++ (Visual / MFC/ WinAPI) developer for nigh on 10 years and I think this book is extremely confusing.

I've written my own navigation control in VB and wanted to learn more, in depth, about how to create controls and implement design-time behavior. This book just kills me.

I read the first 3 chapters with a question mark imprinted on my brain. In those first 3 chapters the authors explain (I guess you could call it explain) delegates, page programming model, and event-handling and none of it sinks in. I've read the chapters 2 times and still I'm staring at a question mark.

And, after 3 chapters I expect a sample relating to a control, but here I have nothing.

And I really like Jesse Liberty's books and I see his compliment above. I guess this book is for PURE GENIUSes. So if you're a PURE GENIUS, then you may like this book. Otherwise, keep on searching. Maybe chapter 4 will be better.
I can only hope the question marks go away.

This has to be the worst computer book I have ever read. It is very confusing, badly explained and full of mistakes.

It starts off with an overview of the .NET architecture which is totally meaningless. Nothing is explained, jargon is thrown about without clarification and there are some obscure diagrams which are not explained and don't mean anything.

The book is supposedly aimed at Classic ASP programmers (amongst others), yet spends a very dull chapter giving an overview of ASP.NET, without bothering to point out that almost everything explained is EXACTLY the same as Classic ASP.

The chapters on controls are really badly explained. He doesn't bother telling you what's going on, just gives some code (which is as full of mistakes as the text) and doesn't explain most of it. He throws in new controls and code without saying why or what it does.

Most of the text is self-contradictory and confusing. It swings from stunningly basic explanations of simple concepts to complex ideas that just aren't clarified. You are elft in total confusion.

The book is supposed to have a companion web site, but it doesn't exist.

In short, this book is not worth receiving as a present, never mind paying good money for. Given the normally high standards of Que's books, I can't imagine how they allowed this one to be published, especially with so many errors in it.

Don't buy it. Don't even steal it, it's that bad.

I would mirror the concerns of many reviewers above. Code samples contain frequent errors, including this gem:

void page_load(Object Sender, EventArgs e)
{
Dim myDataSet as DataSet;

... switching between language mid code-segment is obviously incorrect - and demonstrates to me that the author hasn't bothered to test the code he's written. This suspicion is further evidenced by his habit of leaving out crucial lines such as includes in other code segments.

Add this to his amusingly frustrating behaviour of referring to important concepts in an introduction to a section then never elaborating, I can't help but think this entire book is some sick joke written out of some sort of psychosis he developed as a child.

It says in the introduction the author lectures - I pity his students.

That this book was written in beta is very unfortunate indeed. That it has gone this long without an update is tragic. And that the publisher will not accept a trade-up for a more recent book is downright dirty.

The book is not worth its price. There is no CD and the book is laden with beta code that often times does not give the beginner the slightest hint as to what to try to make it work.

Yet this piece of work has its qualities. Not able to get anything to work past page 150, I put the book down and began reading two other books on .NET. At a certain point, the .NET light clicked on in my head. And now, a year later, I've returned to this book to find many valuable gems that my other books never mention.

This book is best suited for the intermediate .NET programmer, who has grasped the major differing concepts between ASP classic and .NET. Until then, the book is a jumble of listings that seem like you'd never use them. I've found this book to be a helpful (albeit inaccurate) resource when I need to quickly acquaint myself with a new object or class (the only reason I give it TWO stars instead of ONE)

If you're a beginner to .NET (or programming) I highly recommend "ASP.NET for Web Designers" by Peter Ladka.

The book has no coherent structure. He never relates the abstract information to a practical application or to specific examples of code.

If you don't have a background in programming, you're not going to be able to make sense of what he's trying to get at when he talks about programming languages. This is a pattern indicative of the entire book. If you don't have a background in what he's taking about, you won't understand him, but if you do have a background in what he's talking about, you don't need the book. Classic catch 22.

The examples include 99.5% of the code needed to work, and the author assumes you can figure out the remaining 0.5%. If you can't, the entire example won't work.

This is by no means a reference book on any kind. So often when reading through the book, the author will say that x, y, and z are the most common features/attributes, leaving me scrambling for information on all the features/attributes he left out, which happen to be the ones I need to use.

I don't know why I'm getting such a radically different opinion from the other reviews, but I certainly did not link this book.

This book understandable unlike another book I have on ASP.NET. I don't know why, but authors love to show you their programming prowess at the expense of the material. Leinecker doesn't fall into that trap, but delivers unencumbered content that's understandable.

This book is different from other decluttering books in that it focuses on finding balance in your life and helps you get to the root of problem. This way you begin to become healthy instead of just throwing your junk away and later accumulating more.

I've discovered my need to keep stuff around, particularly books, knitting supplies and old clothes, stems way back to my childhood when my mom threw away my stationary, sticker, toy & book collection. Often I'd come home from school to find my stuff gone, either given away to a cousin or friend or thrown in the trash, because she went on a crazed cleaning frenzy while I was away. This makes sense to me but I never put two and two together until reading this book. Fortunately this is one of the easier "causes" of cluttering to overcome (especially since I dealt with mom issues years ago), unlike compulsive shoppers or people with serious depression, anxiety or OCD conditions which I'm thinking this book won't do much in the way of helping without some therapy and medication.

This book gives me hope that if I can just do a little at a time, he recommends working in 15 minute increments, one day all of the junk will be gone and I will actually be able to park my car in the garage!

The one section that I disagreed with is the one about dealing with clutter you may one day inherit. The author recommends confronting your parents, grandma, etc. and pretty much forcing them into weeding through and getting rid of their junk (with your help, of course) so you don't have to deal with it later. To me that sounds so invasive if not insulting. Getting rid of your junk has to be a personal decision you make, not forced upon you by someone else and the author is a bit contradictory here. I'd rather hire one of those gotjunk places and have them haul it away instead of alienating and offending my relatives to save me some work when they die.

There's a bunch of info. here for businesses dealing with clutterbugs and home office clutter, etc. that I didn't find particularly useful because I am strangely organized at work but I'm sure it would be helpful for others.

A big bulk of the book focuses on the emotional issues which cause clutter and features true stories written by real people struggling with their clutter problem. I don't know about you but it sure makes me feel less strange to know there are others out there who have more clutter than me!

This book is jam packed with information and is a very helpful starting point for those just beginning their decluttering lifestyle change. And as the book states many times, it is a lifestyle change.

This book really fills a niche that other books on cluttering aren't covering. What do you do if you are a person with a real clutter problem - a problem that needs more help than just a few pithy tips on how to organize or some guidelines on what to toss? This is the book for you.

I think the biggest value of this book comes from the situations and people who are presented that you might recognize yourself in, and the advice on what they did and what you might do if you are hanging onto your clutter for one of these reasons.

This book walks you through a real process of discovery, if you let it, and if you follow the steps you will change your life.

I'd recommend this book if you feel you have a real problem with clutter that goes beyond things just getting away from you. Start with this book so you can begin the process of untangling your emotions around this issue, then move on to It's All Too Much for some games and tips for how to begin going through your things.

I read this book because I enjoy things and my partner is a clutterbug, so I was looking for tips that would make me feel inspired to declutter and maybe some help for how to live with or organize my partner's things. It didn't help me much with that, but what is here is much deeper and is sure to be of value to the right people. When the people I love who have this problem are ready to tackle it, I will be ready to share this bok with them in a loving way.

I started reading Stop Clutter From Stealing Your Life: Discover Why You Clutter and How You Can Stop and then it vanished. I have lots more books so I moved on. When it turned up under the seat of my car, I thought I must need to read it, so I did, and I was gratified to find that while I may be a little messy, my issues positively pale in comparison to the stories in this book.

Author Mike Nelson delivers the clutterer's Bible in this volume, which delves into the psychology behind the behavior of cluttering. He's been there: he is a reformed clutterer who now runs an organization called Clutterless Recovery Groups, Inc. Nelson lost jobs and relationships due to his inability to let things go; his personal story is representative of the first-person stories in Chapter 8: CLUTTERERS' STORIES.

Nelson breaks the behavior down into degrees, starting with "mildly disorganized," moving through behavior based on rebellion, fear, and procrastination. He lists the groups of people who value time "too much" to clean up, information junkies, chaos junkies, and on to the hoarders; the last is an actual medical diagnosis. He asserts that clutterers are more likely to suffer from depression or anxiety disorders than ADD. The book contains many references to the psychology of the problem, and while you may not think that will help you to get organized, he states that understanding WHY you clutter is the beginning of change. He began his metamorphosis when he found a self-help group and discovered he was not alone. "Once I realized that my clutter was an outward expression of my inner conflicts or emotions," he writes, "I was able to do something about the problem and not just treat the symptoms by organizing my mess."

If what you want is a simple plan for organizing yourself, you'll find a high-level plan in Chapter 4: 40 WAYS TO LEAVE YOUR CLUTTER. These steps -- many are more like affirmations -- are admittedly Zen-like, but they are intended to focus your attitude about your stuff. He advises setting small goals and committing to 15 minutes at a time, until you have taken control of your environment and your life. He gives us the "HIII" rule: how important is it? What's the worst that can happen if I get rid of this?

Stop Clutter devotes several sections to behavior that has a negative impact in the working world, with many practical routes to organizing paper and computer files; again the key is understanding what stands in the way of good habits. Later sections of the book deal with maintenance of the newly clutter-free environment, how to retrieve from a bout of backsliding, and deciding whether a self-help group can help you.

If you just plain hate this kind of theoretical approach to behavior change, this book won't be for you. But if you have an appetite for understanding what makes us behave the way we do, and especially if your surroundings are out of control by a little or a lot, this book could be life-changing. Beautifully organized and presented, it's a five-star book of its type. Get it, read it, commit to its principles -- and take back your life.

Linda Bulger, 2008

I wanted to read this book because I thought it might give me some ideas about coaching others on how to organize their lives and businesses. I never even considered that I myself might be a clutterer, but the more I read STOP CLUTTER FROM STEALING YOUR LIFE by Mike Nelson, the more I came to realize there are areas even in my life where I have allowed clutter to take over.

When my wife and I married 8 years ago, I had a house full of stuff, she had a house full of stuff, and now we have a two and a half car garage full of stuff. 8 years! This book has made me realize it's well past time to take action and rid our lives of some of this stuff we will never use! I also found many other useful ideas such as better organizing my own office, even finding ways to make better use of our closet space.

Clutter is all around us. This book will help you get things under control again. It's the old AA mantra of first admitting you have a problem. Often things we don't even realize put our lives into a state of turmoil. For instance, after reading this book, I realized when returning home from a business trip, it takes me much longer to unpack (sometimes up to a week) than it took me to pack! Putting something like that off just disrupts our lives.

There's a lot of information here. Some you will find useful, some not so much. But there is no doubt you will find something that applies to you and ways to make your life or business run smoother.

Mike Nelson writes, "Whatever your religious affiliation, you'll find something that will help you get closer to your God through decluttering." (p. 189)

He's not kidding around, and by golly, I believe him. If cleanliness is close to Godliness, as we have been taught, then neat and organized is at least saintly.

Personally I think Nelson is on to something profound. He opens the book with these words of wisdom: "This book is about more than just decluttering. It's about balance. A cluttered household is an unbalanced household. It's about not recluttering. It's about not having to buy more and more stuff to fill a hole in our souls. It's about learning what's really important in our lives and not using stuff to hide from life. People and pets are important; stuff is not...."

Nelson digs deeper into clutter than I thought humanly possible. Frankly I'm amazed. He asks first of all, "Are You a Clutter?" (Chapter 1). He makes a distinction between "hoarding" and "cluttering." "...[H]oarding is more dramatic...If you're a hoarder, it's unlikely that even a book as good as this one, by itself, is going to help you much...A clutter's mental attic at least has more lights on, so you can see your way around the boxes of mental eddies." He adds, "Hoarding is a medical diagnosis. Cluttering is a layman's term." He quotes John P. Zak, who is a psychiatrist, to the effect that the distinctions are not entirely clear, but "A hoarder finds it very difficult to get rid of the stuff without the occurrence of severe distress unless it is done in a very systematic, well-planned-out, therapeutic approach." (p. 143)

I would like myself to make a distinction between cluttering and polluting. Cluttering only messes up our own lives and those who have to live with or very near us. Pollution can destroy far and wide. So relax, fellow clutterer, you are not a polluter, at least not in my view. By the way, I'm known as neat, but I know the hidden truth: you should see the files on my computer!

Nelson gets down to the nitty-gritty of getting rid of clutter in Chapter 4 "40 Ways to Leave Your Clutter" (with no apologies to Paul Simon, or to those used to an ordinary 12-step program). First there is kindness and understanding in the guidance: "Be kind to yourself...Start small. Make small, reachable goals...Your goal is to have a home where you feel comfortable...Think locally, not globally. Try decluttering in 15-minute increments...." (pp. 54-55)

One gets the sense that Nelson has been up against it for a long, long time (and he has). But is he getting soft? Well, no. Consider some more of the 40 ways: "Make cluttering an area you've decluttered a crime in your house...Shopping is not a sport. The less you buy, the less you have to declutter...You're allowed to have more than one shredder...Never, ever, ever, ever give up. I have enough faith in you for both of us." (pp. 55-57)

Here's an answer to the joke question, "how do you know you're a redneck?" "The new TV sits on top of the old TV." More probably this could be a clutter joke-on-the-square. I've seen it, and I've heard the excuses for it. "Better height this way. The new TV isn't broken in yet. You never know..."

Nelson understands all this and a lot, lot more. There's even a chapter on "OPC--Other People's Clutter." You think you're doing your surviving relatives a favor by leaving all that junk to them so they can go through it after you're dead? Forget it. You are just giving them a burden. Nelson emphasizes that it can be very emotionally painful for your loved ones to go through all that junk. Shape up and ship it out before you go-go.

Chapter 7 is on paper clutter, and paper clutter leads to computer filing, and yes, you can be (I am! I've already confessed) a file clutterer and an email clutterer

I'm going to work on it. I promise. Yahoo gives me unlimited space (ah, the riches), so why should I delete a single email? Well, because I can't find anything. Nelson's advice is succinct: "Read, respond, delete." (p. 225)

Chapter 7 also includes a little multiple choice test to find out what kind of learner you are, so you'll know how to go about learning to clean up the clutter. I'm a "D," a logical learner with A (visual) tendencies. C's (emotional learners) declare, "I can't breathe. I'm drowning in clutter." D's state firmly that they'll start "at the left corner of my desk and work to the right." Yeah, but how about the procrastinator learners?

Nelson also guides us on how to live with clutterers. He makes this salient point (among many others): "Cluttering is about control. In a household with a clutterer and non-clutterers, the clutter always wins." (p. 162) He adds, "For clutters married to each other, each one sees the other's clutter as "a real mess," and will be sure to point that out." (p. 163)

Dang! This is a good book! I could go on and on. Fortunately Amazon has a word limit... Well, one more thing. Nelson ends the book with affirmations and promises. Here's one of the best for clutterers: "I live in a clutter-free environment, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally." (p. 245)