Virginia Books

This mystery held my interest throughout, both the evil guys and the good ones. After reading this book, I went out and bought the ealilier ones in the series which captureed the purity of life in West Virginia.

Plot overview: Transportation investigator Owen Allison recently left his lucrative consulting practice in California to help his mother back home in West Virginia in her fight against cancer. His ex-wife and current lover, Judith, is also back on the West Coast, and now that his mother has mostly recovered, he's itching to get back to his life, to stimulate both his portfolio and his love life.
But before he has a chance to leave his small hometown of Barkley, West Virginia, a local dam breaks, sending a black ribbon of coal sludge cascading miles and miles through the hollows across the region. Four people lose their lives in the accident, and the ambulance chasers gnash their teeth and formulate strategies for the inevitable lawsuits against big coal.
It turns out that Owen knows the owner of the coal mine, a good ol' boy from his high school class whose success has surprised everyone, even himself. What's more, the classmate knows that finding out why things fail is Owen's specialty, and he hires him on the spot to figure out just what went wrong. Judith and his California practice will have to wait, but Owen is only half-worried about letting those things slide. He's thrilled to be back in the thick of things, and readers will be, too, in another quirky, engaging installment in John Billheimer's unusual and winning series.

Failure analyst Owen Allison plans to return to Palo Alto to reconcile with his ex-wife Judith though he was delayed by his need to be with his mother in West Virginia when she underwent chemotherapy (see DISMAL MOUNTAIN). However, further problems in West Virginia postpone Owen's trip to the West Coast.

The dam by the Canaan II mine erupts, killing four and filling DRYBONE HOLLOW with coal sludge. Owner Anson Stoke hires Owen to persuade environmentalist Judge Carter Vereen that despite the toll, his operations remain safe and should stay open. Judge Vereen orders an investigation of all impoundment dams sitting on mines, which leads to state attorney general Hayes Boyer asking Owen to head the inquiry, but demanding a kickback of 15% of Owen's fee. Owen rejects the offer, but turns to his friend Sheriff Thad Reader to set a trap to expose those using fixed contracts, but the law enforcement official deals with a full plate already as a local has probably been abducted. So Owen plunges ahead knowing he will receive limited support from his buddy, but mine engineer Emily Kruk makes it worth while to stay in West Virginia a bit longer.

Though the "will he reconcile or not" becomes a bit annoying, readers will appreciate the latest Owen Allison investigative tale. Most of the audience will kick themselves when they see how obvious John Billheimer's plot solves the mystery as the clues are all provided, but so devilishly done that most fans (including this sore reviewer) will fail to see it. The cast is a delight with the hero at his best when he investigates.

Harriet Klausner

Another great Owen Alison book. As usual, we get to meet an array of quirky, well-drawn characters, including the larcenous Cable Stokes, his brother Anson, and mining engineer Emily Kruk. Billheimer's book are always a fun blend of humor and excitement--the book really races along.

One of the pleasures of this series is watching Owen's relationships with other characters deepen an grow as the books progress. Though you don't need to have read any of the other books to enjoy this one, if this is your first Owen Alison book you'll want to go back and read the others just to find out what's happened in the past. These books are one of my favorite mystery series.

Fans of John Billheimer's Owen Allison series will enjoy this latest episode. Billheimer's talent for dialog reveals more about the West Virginia psyche in this book than all the others combined. And the action is fast paced from beginning to end. I could not put it down. Especially interesting is the re-emergence of characters from earlier books who play a key role. Billheimer character development continues to an unexpected ending. You come away asking if there could be other scams this region of the country could suffer. I expect we will see this answers in upcoming books from this fine author.

"Duel Between the First Ironclads" is probably the best book I have read about the historic clash between the CSS Virginia (Merrimac) and the USS Monitor. It relates the fascinating tale of the development and fight between the two great ironclads and their meeting on March 9, 1862.

William C. Davis is both a historian and a storyteller. He expertly weaves memoir and journal accounts from actual participants to reveal a human side to what many would consider 'dry' history. That Monitor and Virginia were the first Ironclads to meet in battle is notable. But it is the men who commanded those ships, fired their guns and worked their engines who were behind it all. Davis expertly captures that and brings it to life. It is this mesh of human drama and military might that makes this book so valuable.

Then there's the fact that it is simply well written, well paced and just entertaining. While this subject has been covered before in countless books on Civil War Naval history and military, none I have seen has gone into this much depth, both for the human side and the historical background.

I really enjoyed this one. I think it's written well enough that I could suggest this book to just about anyone who has an interest in military history, or just likes a good story.

The USS Monitor and the CSS Virginia (ex-Merrimack) were not the "first" ironclads... rather, it was the First Duel of Ironclads. It can only be supposed that the title was forced on Mr. Davis by the publisher. Still... this is perhaps the best of all books on the historic fight between the Monitor and the Virginia, stirringly re-created and well annotated, and is a vital work for anyone wanting to know what really happened on the water in the Civil War. Highly recommended.

I reviewed "The Battle Of The Ironclads" by Quarstein and called it the best book that I'd read on the Monitor and Virginia/Merrimack. That was before reading this book. This book has more source material and, consequently, more detail and is a better text. "The Battle Of The Ironclads" has more contemporary illustrations so both books complement each other in some ways. Despite the additional source material there are strange omissions in Davis' book, for one he does not mention why the Navy Department disliked Erickson: "The Princeton" affair wherein a gun, not designed by Erickson, blew up killing some high govenment officials when tested on the Princeton, a ship designed by Erickson, and Erickson was blamed for the deaths. Davis also casually mentions that the Confederacy was working on an ironclad called the Richmond when the Confederates abandoned the Norfolk Boatyard. In fact, work was proceeding on both the Richmond and Virginia simultaneously and it is possible that the Virginia could have been completed earlier with more devastating affect on the Union fleet if all work had concentrated on her.

Davis' work is the more scholarly of the two with an index and list of references. Either one is a great read with much detail and the true student of the Battle or of the Civil War will want to read both.

Wiliam C. Davis chronicles the race to build the ironclads as well as the dramatic battle that ended unresolved. All of the colorful charactors on both sides of the war are portrayed as both human and visionary, in their desperate gamble to win.. More importantly, however, Mr. Davis places this battle into its proper context as a crucial turning point in military and naval history. The chapter on the development of ironclad technology after the battle and war is the proper ending. For the first time, the true importance of this battle and the race to build the ironclads was brought home to me. Highly recommended.

When my mother first began work on her second book, I thought, what is she up to now? At any rate, she saw the project through, and it actually came out very good. It truly gives the reader or looker, a feel for life in Jackson Hole in the early days. My mother gave birth to me in 1951, (not the early days) and I had just opened my eyes, and she said "son, "Life" magazine is for people who can't read, and "Time" is for people who can't think. Her book covers both basis (bases), so is something an entire family can enjoy. If it passes my test, it's worth a peek. Jim Huidekoper Jackson Hole Wyoming 4/11/97

When my mother first began work on her second book, I thought, what is she up to now? At any rate, she saw the project through, and it actually came out very good. It truly gives the reader or looker, a feel for life in Jackson Hole in the early days. My mother gave birth to me in 1951, (not the early days) and I had just opened my eyes, and she said "son, "Life" magazine is for people who can't read, and "Time" is for people who can't think. Her book covers both basis, so is something an entire family can enjoy. If it passes my test, it's worth a peek. Jim Huidekoper Jackson Hole Wyoming 4/10/97

This wonderful book shows you the real spirit behind the town of Jackson. Before it became a resort and a vacation town, Jackson was a gateway through the Teton Mountains.

Through vivid photography, the author relay to the reader the struggles and hardships associated with living in a small western town during the turn of the century while also expose them to the joy and beauty that make people move to the Jackson Valley today.

Seeing Jackson in this early state makes you appreciate what is there today and what is lost of yesterday.

The photos collected in this book, about 150 of them, capture a period in time from 1872 to the early 1930s, when the area along the upper Snake River below Yellowstone was explored and settled. There are photos taken by seven photographers, the earliest of them William Henry Jackson (1843-1942) traveling with a scientific expedition and working with cumbersome equipment and 11x14 wet glass negatives.

The bios of all seven of these men recount the lives of 19th and early 20th century adventurers, intrepid trekkers across the wilderness and frontier to make a visual record of the West during its early years of settlement. Their images are joined by those of scores of amateur photographers, whose snapshots were collected for this edition and fill many of the pages of the book.

The book is organized by various themes, from rodeo (see cover) to farming and ranching, communities, dudes, hunting, and so on. An interesting sequence captures a landslide which blocked the Snake River for 2 years in the 1920s and then gave way, causing a flood that inundated the valley, wiping out the town of Kelly. Another sequence illustrates the years of change at Teton Pass, the only winter access to the valley, transport progressing from horses to automobiles.

Lest we think of this as entirely a man's world, there's a photo of the all-woman town council of Jackson, the first U.S. town to be governed entirely by women (1920-1924). There are photos of the first aeroplane landing, winter dog sled racing, and the environmental devastation caused by the damming of Lake Jackson. Photos record the vists of European royalty and the John D. Rockefellers, whose influence and money helped create Grand Teton National Park.

For lovers of the Old West and old photographs, the images reproduced here are a rich treasure. From significant and historic events to everyday life, the book is a picture album of Americana. I also recommend another excellent collection of old Western photographs in Richard Collins' "The American Cowboy."

A good resource for faculty. Well written with nice integrated examples. I always recommend this book to faculty looking to develop rubrics for their teaching.

While it may not seem like it to students, grading is a very complex exercise for teachers and instructors. Anyone hoping to go into that line of work will have to learn about how complex and uncertain the art of grading can be, and this book is a strong compendium of current theory on such matters. An especially valuable aspect of this book is its coverage of the different schools of thought on whether grading is really an accurate assessment tool at all, and how all parties in the education process (students, teachers, administrators, parents, employers) have different conceptions of the usefulness and value of grades. But while this book is hugely informative at the practical level, beware of a few larger theoretical weaknesses. Frequently, certain practices that are currently held in high esteem become overused examples of larger concepts. The most glaring example is the inaccurately-titled chapter "Establishing Criteria and Standards for Grading" which is entirely about just one method, Primary Trait Analysis. At a higher level, this book assumes that all instructors will have the privilege of smaller class sizes, or welcoming administrative environments, in which experimenting with grading methods is possible or practical at all. Meanwhile this book (and many others like it) fails to distinguish between future advancements in theory and the real world in which such theories and practices have yet to be implemented on any appreciable scale. [~doomsdayer520~]

Do you love to teach but hate the grading process? That's where I was when I picked up this book. Very practically written, "Effective Grading" shows you how to choose the proper grading model for a class, how to motivate students through properly communicating your grading system, and how to structure your assignments to increase student learning. All this while drastically reducing the amount of time you need to spend on grading papers. Within a week of reading this book, I've made some drastic changes in my courses which will benefit both my students and myself.

I admit I was skeptical when I started this book--so many pedagogically oriented texts seem to sacrifice content and standards for "feel-good" solutions to education. However, I have found this book to offer excellent suggestions for every aspect of structuring classes to teach and evaluate what you most want your students to learn. In my college English classes, I've used variations of Primary Trait Analyses and Gateway Criteria and they have made a big difference in the levels of thinking and writing in my own students. Giving students specific guidelines allows them to focus on what's important about the assignment, set their priorities appropriately, and makes things much easier for me when the time comes for grading. I highly recommend this book.

Virginia's intimate words flow easily, evoking vivid images and feelings about familial relationships and childhood memories. I have never read so many poems in one sitting!

The very best writing paints in three dimensions - and Virginia Chase Sutton's first book is a garden of sculptures. Her statuary is brittle glass, glistening steel, tough-textured granite - and the reader's mind feels the need to touch and stroke and rotate these remarkable poems to feel every inch of them. The sharpest edges have been worn smooth by long handling, but there is still danger here. The reader must be careful.
Ms. Sutton's stories are revealed in the details...each poem a vignette, a tableau, a deer in the headlights...and with each comes greater understanding of this author who has invited us to share her therapy, and of ourselves. Her timeless poems are classical stories of blood and bonds, of nature and nurture, of love and whatever. The author's gift is to reveal her stories so carefully that we don't feel the hard parts until we are past them, when it is safe to look back. Still, this book is not for the faint of heart. Self-knowledge lurks here, and readers will close "Embellishments" enriched and themselves embellished.

Virginia Chase Sutton's poems create a world of sensual detail and brutal honesty that pull the reader into a journey they would not dare travel on their own. Every day objects and events become exotic images capturing the fragility of the moment. Embellishments is to be read over and over again as a constant reminder of the power and possibilites of the heart. If I could recommend only one book of poetry this year, Embellishments would be it.

Here one finds poems of hope and renewal. Virginia Chase Sutton's book offers to take the reader into a circle of fierce light where the constructs of an "ordinary American life" are savagely rendered. Yet, utlimately, the reader is made aware of an authentic voice which speaks with brutal empathy about the complex nature of human relationships. Finally, this book stubbornly refuses to "give up." Despite it's unflinching look at despair, these poems shimmer with an unspoken clarity of vision which sees--and believes in--in our common future.

I hope they do a reprint of this book, as there are a few errors in it. As my family is included in book. My family & I bought this book for $25, and it shows a price of 150.00 . I cannot understand why...Please let me know, as it is a great book, and the inaccurate info can be re-written, (like spelling names of my first name, and sisters son's name...just to note a few.
It is a remarkable book, that I am proud to be a part of.

The book was fine and I would have loved it if it had turned out that this was my family. I must keep searching.

This book is a wonderful resource of information for my genealogical research of my family. This book covers the immigration of the Lewis family from Ireland in the early 1700's and the early settlement of Virginia. I enjoy it immensely and reference it often.

This book is just what you're looking for if your family line goes back to John Lewis. Plenty of information and great pictures.

This is a great book for teachers and Christians to read! I really enjoyed the different perspectives that the two voices shared.

This is an excelent book for all people all ages.Mrs.Whited I am so happy for you,and I hope that you continue to suceed with your writing and teaching.

Parents, students, future educators, and Christians should all grab a copy of this book. I thought it was a very insightful book into a world in which we tend to overlook. Very few people realize the impact that educators have on our children and the challenges that face them.

I was unable to put the book down. This book gives a new perspective on educators and the hard, thankless job they perform day in and day out. Now throw in the fact they are Christian educators with an even higher responsibility! Wow, you just have to read it to understand.

The 2 voices speak loud and clear.

You must own this book. It will open your eyes and change your heart.

I agree that great men have been neglected in the overtures of history, such as General Lewis.However, he is intered at East Hill Cemetary just above downtown Salem, VA.

I really enjoyed this book after searching for it for years! The General was one of my ancestors. My Gr. Grandmother was Samantha Lewis Westfall. It was a well researched book. However, the General's burial is in Hampton W. Va. As a small child I used to put flowers on his grave. This is near Buckhannon W.Va. I feel the same way that Johnson does, that so many greats were ignored while too much attention was paid to George Washington. General Lewis was at the very least, equal to Washington during and before the revolutionary way. A great book for history buffs!

I really enjoyed this book after searching for it for years! The General was one of my ancestors. My Gr. Grandmother was Samantha Lewis Westfall. It was a well researched book. However, the General's burial is in Hampton W. Va. As a small child I used to put flowers on his grave. This is near Buckhannon W.Va. I feel the same way that Johnson does, that so many greats were ignored while too much attention was paid to George Washington. General Lewis was at the very least, equal to Washington during and before the revolutionary way. A great book for history buffs!

I really enjoyed this book after searching for it for years! The General was one of my ancestors. My Gr. Grandmother was Samantha Lewis Westfall. It was a well researched book. However, the General's burial is in Hampton W. Va. As a small child I used to put flowers on his grave. This is near Buckhannon W.Va. I feel the same way that Johnson does, that so many greats were ignored while too much attention was paid to George Washington. General Lewis was at the very least, equal to Washington during and before the revolutionary way. A great book for history buffs!

In the meditation entitled "Night," Bunin's unnamed narrator says: "Why did God choose to brand me so deeply with wonderment, thought and `wisdom', and why is that fatal mark constantly growing inside me?" Although the voice is abstract, I think it works as a description of Bunin himself. He wasbclearly a man with (again in his own words) "the capacity to feel with a singular intensity ... not only their own identities but those of other people...." And although he may feel that his capacity is somehow unusual, he does a remarkable job of imagining (or is it projection?) that capacity in others. Everybody, he says somewhere (although I can't put my finger on it), has a story that deserves to be told.

In his introduction, David Richards calls Bunin "egocentric." In context I think I know what it means, but it's an odd choice of words and I suspect misleading. Conceded that Bunin is not a "social" novelist in the sense that Tolstoi is, nor a dramatist like Dostoevsky: his metier is, indeed, the minute attention to feelings. In some sense I suppose these feelings are "his own," but in some sense, every artist's feelings are "his own." Perhaps closer to the mark to suggest that at some level every one of us is an egocentric, and that Bunin may be able to capture the egocentricity in all of us.

Caution: Bunin won a Nobel Prize, but don't be misled into disappointment. He's a fine and rewarding writer, but not better than several others who did not win the prize, the award of which inevitably has more to do with politics than with intrinsic merit.

Ivan Bunin is a great writer. And as for the readers, reading his stories and enjoying them are a mark of achievement. As you read his stories fierce chill pierces through you simultaneously as grand pictures fill your imaginations.

No wonder he won the Nobel Prize! Four hauntingly magnificent short stories, all but the third with death as the end. Or maybe not the end, but the raison d'etre of the story. "The Gentleman from San Francisco" almost half the book, translated rather badly, I suspect, in the version I read, by D. H. Lawrence; "Gentle Breathing", an incredibly subtle story; "Kasimir Stanislavatch", and "Son". In each, he takes the human tragedy and contrasts it with beautiful nature. His detail is remarkable. The stories are all short, plots not intricate or even eventful, but he manages to make each one simply live and breathe and have being. It rather reminds me of all Russian writers; they're all so tragic. What is it about being a Russian? And nobody remembers him as they do Chekhov, or Tolstoy. I wonder why. Perhaps his volume of writing was not large enough.

Bunin is one of the most brilliant Russian writers of the early 20th century. His short stories express more in a couple of pages than most novels do in hundreds. It is poetry in prose.

I openned this book expecting to read a story about a house and how it was built. I was surprised, and impressed, to discover that what went on as Mt. Vernon took form was far more interesting than I had expected. This is not so much a book about a house as it is the story of how George Washington related to the slaves on whom he relied to execute his architecture. In other words, the story here reverberates far beyond the boundaries of the plantation. It went to the heart of the republic, and it goes to the heart of this nation. Slavery is encoded in our national DNA (sorry, Jefferson). The Dalzells make it clear that it is also mortared in the wood and plaster (cut and painted to look like stone) of our national edifice. Are you tormented, or at least intrigued, that a slaveowner could style himself father of a republic dedicated to freedom? Maybe Washington was, too. Find out. Visit Mt. Vernon, and do it by reading this book.

Knowing Professor Dalzell and Mrs. Dalzell personally, I was incredibly curious to see how they blended the two seemingly connected but perhaps contrasting topics of George Washington and his home. Essentially, they were connected very successfully. The entire history of the home itself is told vividly with photographs, anecdotes, and objective descriptions of its development. Following, Washington's own personal, military, and political history is told in light of the times, and in the book's shining ability, in relation to the home itself. The Dalzell's cleverly-melded arguments and discussions leads the reader to a full knowledge of Mt. Vernon and its inspiring owner.

For an Architect practicing in any era since Monticello was built, it has always been easy to enter into Jefferson's process--to commune with the models and the methods he sat down with as he designed (time and again) the house that he built as a monument to his ideas and his place in history. In part, this has been because he planned and drew much as we do today. We have the drawings. We know (and can quickly avert our eyes from) the form of labor. We can hold these two-dimensional maps up to the brilliant artifact, and be satisfied, with ourselves, that we have made a connection to the past. Mount Vernon, however, has had to wait for the Dalzells to read, for us, the full and fully three-dimensional process of its becoming. This beautifully written book brings to George Washington's home, a context of meaning and National symbolism that time and distance had almost obliterated. The book is a restoration project: and as such, it is a key compliment to the preservation work so ably executed over the years by the Mount Vernon Ladies Association. I heartily recommend this book to architects (amateur and professional), their clients (who may find comfort in learning that building has always been a trial), architectural historians, or anyone at all who is curious about the faithfulness of our democracy to the designs of one of its primary draftsmen.

Mount Vernon was both architecturally innovative and a true mirror of Washington's feelings and mind. He never wrote an autobiography and his diaries consist largely of farm accounts, but in Mount Vernon, the authors write, "he produced a text from which it is possible to coax a remarkably full sense of his political convictions and of how, over time, they changed." The book, George Washington's Mount Vernon, combines the public and the private sides of his life and uses the combination to enrich our understanding of both.