Missouri Books

Russell Kirk was the preeminent American conservative thinker in the 20th century. He produced a huge volume of nonfiction, literature, essays, and also edited many important works as well. Although Kirk is occasionally praised by the "conservative" establishment (in reality, the neoconservative controlled beltway establishment), he is for the most part ignored today. There hasn't been much in the way of secondary studies of Kirk. James Person's book is fairly good, but is more of a biography of Kirk and an overview of his thought, rather than a critical study. Prof. McDonald's book should go a long way to restoring Kirk to his place in conservative thought.

As I've said before, Kirk tends to be a rather opaque writer. Kirk rarely presented definitive plans to solve specific problems. Instead he offered a general approach to society based on respect for tradition and some general "canons" of conservative thought. For this reason, Kirks opposed libertarianism. Besides libertarianism being wrong on certain issues, libertarianism represents an "ideology" -- a preplanned approach to society which (to that extent) is similar to socialism. As someone once said, certain political systems offer the "One Big Solution" to the "One Big Problem." To Kirk, society's problems are more complex.

The best part of this book concerns the chapter on "moral imagination," which plays a central role in Kirk's thoughts. McDonald also highlights the influence of Irving Babbit and Paul Elmer More on Kirk. There is also an excellent discussion of Kirk and the Natural Law. I enjoyed the brief discussion outlining the differences between the Old Right (writers such as Kirk and Nisbet), paleoconservatism, and neoconservatism.

I would imagine that most people who call themselves conservatives have no idea - or very little knowledge - of the man who started it all. Russell Kirk published "The Conservative Mind" back in the 1950's, the book that was the impetus to the soon-to-be Conservative movement. However, over the past half-century, Conservatives have lost knowledge of their pedigree, and often espouse doctrines - or ideology - that might be alien to the origins of Conservatism.

McDonald's book, "Russell Kirk and the Age of Ideology," attempts to rescue Kirk from those who might distort Kirk's ideas or who might not understand his approach. The author begins with personal anecdotes about the time he spent studying at Kirk's home in Mecosta, Michigan. Some of these stories explain a lot about Kirk's relation to the public. He was a very shy man who often stuttered in conversation. Although he was not a master in speech, he was indeed a master with the pen. McDonald explains that Kirk worked for hours each day writing on his typewriter. Sometimes when asked a question about a particular subject, Kirk would silently point to a book, figuring that McDonald could figure out the answer on his own.

Kirk explained that Conservatism in its modern sense did not exist before 1790 when Burke published "Reflections on the Revolution in France." The French Revolution was based, for the most part, on abstract ideas divorced from historical development, and wished to overthrow the order of things in the form of a new world, supposedly replacing the old world of custom, tradition, prejudice, and local connections. It appears that Burke's critique attenuated the British impulse to copy the French Revolution, which would soon drown Europe in horrible bloodshed. Abstract ideas that are a priori or posteriori, without prudent consideration of fact and circumstance are opposed to conservative principles.

In the second chapter, McDonald explains the moral basis of conservatism. To understand Kirk's approach, one must understand the concept of ethical dualism and the "inner check." To explain in detail, McDonald refers to Irving Babbitt, Paul Elmer More, and Folke Leander, because Kirk was not a philosopher in a technical sense, and thus there is some philosophical imprecision in Kirk's writings. One must understand in this context, man's Lower Self and Higher Self. The Lower Self is prone to evil: selfish arbitrary and socially destructive behavior. This is in opposition to man's Higher Self: that which pulls us in the direction of our true humanity or our ultimate spiritual purpose, McDonald explains.

Kirk emphasized the importance of the moral imagination to provide an inner check on our destructive natures. Great literature, religion, parents, and teachers would hopefully fertilize the moral imagination. When a person would come to a choice between his higher noble nature and his destructive lower nature, hopefully, this wealth of imagination imparted into him would point him in the proper direction, instead of him choosing the easy path or the path for the thrill of the moment. He might recall the Ten Commandments, or the honor of his mother or any other such things that provide for the moral imagination. Actually, Kirk, on a technical point departed from strict Natural Law, as might not be obvious to the casual reader. In this connection with the Moral Imagination, Kirk emphasized the quality of the will over reason in making the choice of the higher over the lower. But, overall, Kirk's thoughts are compatible and complimentary with Natural Law.

Kirk emphasized the importance of culture before politics. One could not just pass a law and hope to make things less decadent or debased. If one wanted to renew society, one should focus upon the religious institutions; strengthen the families - or what is left of the families - and work for an education of virtue instead of an education for the bureaucracy or corporation. One should brighten up his own little corner of the country. After the culture understood the virtues properly, then the society could be renewed. But a society void of virtue produces men incapable of understanding their situation and it would be futile to simply pass abstract laws since there would be no order in the people's souls in the first place.

An important concept to understand about the recent degradation of our culture is deracination. A deracinated person is one who is cut off from his roots. During mass industrialization and urbanization, people abandoned the farms and the local communities of which they were an integral part, and went to the big cities. Upon arrival, they were simply one person among other similarly interchangeable parts, as Eli Whitney had done to their machines that drew them from the country and villages. Thrown among unknown people and cutoff from their traditions, they could not pass on their traditions to the next generation. The next generation was thus rootless, usually ignorant or contemptuous of religion, and distained the traditions of their elders and became decadent.

When we depart from the inherited customs of moral imagination, and attempt to remake society anew from scratch based on an abstract principle, we have the problem of ideology. Ideology distorts the images and the visions of the moral imagination and leads many astray on destructive paths. For to have this imagination with the power to check out lower selves, if the images and visions therein are abstract and distorted, our choices and our will, will be diseased and we will be lead astray from the true path.

With Kirk, tradition is also paramount. The trials and errors of our ancestors have been encapsulated into custom, prejudice, and prescription. This wealth of knowledge is ignored at our peril since there is not enough time in one's life to accumulate such knowledge gained over centuries.

McDonald supplies humorous anecdotes in the process of writing this book, which might have taken longer than he expected. He mentions that his wife would occasionally ask him, "When are you going to finish the damn book?"

Russell Kirk stands today as one of the intellectual giants of our time. The work under review is the first in depth study of Dr. Kirk's intellectual legacy since his death ten years ago. It is a must read for anyone who is interested in exploring the roots of the modern conservative movement.
The book covers the depth and breath of Kirk's thought. The author focuses on the key points that formed the infrastructure for the conservative movement that has transformed American politics over the past fifty years.
More than a biography, this is a detailed exegesis of the work of a lifetime. The greatest strength is the author's detailed summary of the points that formed Dr. Kirk's intellectual construct, which revolved around tradition and the moral immagination. Rejecting ideology, Kirk's conservatism is a prism through which the issues of the day may be seen in true perspective. It was his opinion that moral and ethical truths, the permanent things, formed the basis of the political, economic and social institutions that comprise our culture and support civilization as we know it. Without the moral imagination, we are doomed to follow the latest fads and fashions in a continuing degeneration, mistaking mere change for reform and inprovemnt. The end result is the end of civilization as we know it and the dawn fo a new dark age.
Of equal imortance is the carefull explanation of the differances that exist between Kirk's thought and recent developments in the conservative program, especially since first achieving power in the early 1980's. The reader who thinks he/she knows what conservatism is all about will be in for some interesting surprises.
I strongly recommend this book to anyone who has a healthy intellectual curiousity about contemporary polics, philosophy and the world of the mind. Reading this work you will learn to appreciate the importance of the conservative vision, the moral imagination and the permanent things.
This is a survival manual for our cultural future.

"Conservatism," so far from being the lock-step ideology pictured in the left's caricatures, is a plural noun. In this book, W. Wesley McDonald points readers to one of the core figures of this political tradition.

Kirk, who died in 1994, is best known as the author of "The Conservative Mind" (1953), a book which galvanized young thinkers -- McDonald was one of them -- disaffected with the prevailing political culture of America. "The Conservative Mind" appeared at a time when received wisdom about conservatives in politics hadn't evolved since 1861, when John Stuart Mill pegged them as "the stupid party." American political scholars seriously argued in print that political conservatism was not a philosophical position but a mental maladjustment.

Kirk was a "traditionalist." He believed that an objective universal moral order exists, and that it ought to be defended from ideologues of the left and right. He disliked unbridled free-market capitalism (which fuels "the dream of avarice"), and he believed the state has a constructive role to play. He believed that traditional patterns and institutions -- "the permanent things" -- preserve order, and they are the best foundation of a political system that can offer real freedom rather than mere anarchy.

"Strictly speaking, conservatism is not a political system, but rather a way of looking at the civil social order," Kirk wrote. It is not a sharply defined program or an ideology -- a word Kirk loathed, it seems. As a result, even sympathetic critics lamented Kirk's "lack of philosophical precision." McDonald has made great progress, in this book, in stripping down Kirk's vast and diverse body of writing to reveal its philosophical framework.

Kirk's critics considered him anti-rational because he rejected the Enlightenment's fetish for reason as humanity's best guide. Like Burke, he saw reason unguided by tradition as a path to bloody Jacobinism. But McDonald rescues Kirk from this charge by emphasizing the concept Kirk used to balance reason: an elusive quality he called "moral imagination." Kirk held that "ethical and normative truths are often best conveyed through a symbolic veil, as found, for example, in the medium of great poetry, rather than by the means of discursive explication."

Kirk could call T.S. Eliot friend. His belief in the power of myth and literary tradition makes one think not of Republican politicians but rather of Harold Bloom or Joseph Campbell. Literature "is the breath of society," Kirk wrote, "transmitting to successive rising generations, century upon century, a body of ethical principles and critical standards and imaginative creations that constitutes a kind of collective intellect of humanity, the formalized wisdom of our ancestors." No wonder Kirk's writings through the years especially have sparked the imagination of young minds.

McDonald works to keep his subject elevated above contemporary politics, but it is difficult to read the book without applying Kirk's thought to modern problems as you go. For instance, with a tight election looming, in an age when a few thousand votes in New Mexico can decide the presidency, some Republicans fret about the potential Libertarian threat to President Bush. It was Kirk who sounded the warning that conservatives and libertarians were not natural allies. In fact, as he knew, liberals and libertarians have more in common than the Latin root of their names, and more in common with one another than with conservatives.

How does a conservative know he is not a reactionary? Absent ideology, how does he know which changes to embrace, which to accept conditionally, which to resist? He must know that even the most conservative institution (such as the Catholic Church, to which Kirk was a convert) was at one time looked upon as a dangerous innovation. "Life is always presenting us with new possibilities, and hence our applications of the good must be constantly adjusted to emerging circumstances," McDonald writes. "The ethically ordered society is realized by the creative acts of successive generations of virtuous people striving to apply universal standards of the good to concrete situations. In this process, as traditions are preserved and renewed, society maintains a healthy balance between the twin necessities of change and preservation."

McDonald's connection with Elizabethtown College, the great center of Anabaptist studies, may have made him think when he wrote this passage, as I did when reading it, of the Amish.

If you think conservatism in America means international military adventurism, "compassionate" expansion of government entitlements, open borders, free trade and the embracing of unencumbered secular capitalism, think again. Dr. Wesley McDonald re-examines the works of the father of post WWII conservatism in America, Russell Kirk, to reveal that conservative ideology as we know it today is 180 degrees from what is was just 50 years ago.

If you believe yourself to be a conservative, this book will reveal to you the extent to which modern conservatives have strayed from the principles laid down by this pioneer of American conservatives. If you are of a different philosophical bent, McDonald's book will cause you to reflect on your political orientation based on Kirk's deeply intuitive understanding of law and its effect on culture.

A must read for any political junkie who wants to examine the philosophical underpinnings of a political movement that began after WWII and remains a strong, if compromised, force in politics today.

You won't be disappointed. Really, this is organized and presented the way you'd do it, and the tone is as relaxed as Missouri itself. The arrangment is a point-by-point presentation starting at the Western end and running East to St. Charles. At a glance, you can see the mileage between points, resources available (including bathrooms and parking), and a description of conditions. "Trivia" and some regional histories are also available. This could probably use an update insofar as thie businesses along the trail can come and go, but the mileage, topography, and general geographic information should remain accurate for a few hundred years. Really, this is a must (and a no-brainer) for anyone considering any ride or two on the Katy Trail.

The author knows his subject so thoroughly that his advice and detail help us plan our trip to the Katy Trail. Each portion of the trail is described regarding services but, even more importantly, the sights and scenery to be expected. I can't wait to use the guide and ride the Katy Trail next year. Our plans will be based on this book.

This book is a great resource! It has profile of each town on the trail, including the services available. It also includes lots of interesting history, as well as many off-the-beaten-track points of interest. However, things along the trail change every year, and this book is almost due for another update.

I used this book on two seperate trips on the Katy trail from end to end. I used the 5th addition in 2000 when cycling from St. Charles to Clinton, and the 6th addition in 2003 when cycling from Clinton to St. Charles.

This book is great for planning out your itinerary before your trip. It includes, campgrounds, bed and breakfasts, resturaunts, motels, bike shops, contact information, and more. There is also stories, history, tidbits of information, and suggestions for side trips that will add to the experience. There is also a section that lists that answers to frequently asked questions about the trail and planning a trip.

Businesses along the trail come and go, so it is best to have the most up-to-date version of this guidebook with you. Also, be sure to stop at Bret Dufer's bookstore in Rocheport. There, you can meet that author, and find many interesting books.

I liked the Complete Katy Trail Guide Book so much that I recommended Brett Dufurs book in my Biking Missouri's Rail-Trails guidebook!!! Brett's book was an excellent companion for me to carry in my front bike bag as I biked my one week journey across the "Show Me" state from St. Charles to Clinton. This book also really helped me out in my planning for this trip; Especially the restaurants and the overnight stays. The "sag service" information was also very helpful in my plans to return back from point B to point A, not to mention, the information to making my Amtrack reservations. This book is a must for any cyclist who wants to make a multi-day visit to the Katy Trail State Park.

As an avid reader of western books, I have to say Mr. West did a wonderful job with this one. This story of young Trace McCall growing from youth to manhood is epic adventure. This book was very hard to put down, I read this book in two days. I look forward to the next book in this series. If you like to read about the adventures of American mountain men you will love this one.

Trace McCall has a love relationship with a pretty Shoshoni maiden. Her father does not approve of this relationship and steels her away. The father does not know it but his daughter is with child. She marries a member of the tribe so the child will have a father. She names her son White Eagle. Several years later a renegade band of Sioux raid and kill off most of the Shoshoni people. White Eagle must now wander into the world of the white man looking for his paternal father. Mr. West gives us another great story.

This was a wonderful book, with well developed characters. I couldn't put it down. The young herois outstanding, the plot fantastic. Mr. West did an excellent job on this one. I am saving it to read again.

I have read several books by Charles G. West before, most of which have been very good. Except for the beginning this one is no exception. The first of the book is impossible for me to believe as a 14 year old could not do all the things Mr. West has him doing. If you can get past that it is a prety good book. Jim Lacey is out west with his father. His father is killed and he things it was just a band of Indians but later finds out it was not. Someone else wanted this done. He goes back home to tell his Mother about his Fathers death and while there kills someone. He then heads back west again. It is a good story about his relationship with Buck Ransom and Frank Brown, two mountain men. He spends four years with a tribe of Indians led by Buffalo Shield. His is a story of growing up and how he handles the death of his whole family. Has some good "mountain man" experiences. The ending is good and I am sure Trace McCall will be in more books.

"Wings of the Hawk" is the first book by this author I have read, and I have to start out by saying that this is a well-paced, well thought out book. Mr. West writes an excellent Western novel. The flaws (and admittedly this is a bit of nit-picking) come in some research errors, to wit: The cap-lock rifle, while defintely superior to the flintlock, was not used to any great extent prior to late 1840's. The mountain men hung on to their flintlocks long after the caplock was proven, the main reason being simply that there was no way to resupply yourself with caps if they became wet or lost, but a piece of flint (or a workable substitute) was relativly easy to find...The other problem here is that the hero, Jim Tracy, a.k.a. Trace McCall, ALWAYS wins...and always with little or no problem...As a 14 year old in the beginning of the book, he escapes Indians, "professional" hit men (so to speak), tops a horse trading con man and always without significant problems. Despite this (and I admited I was nit-picking remember)the book is well worth reading...the "downfall" of the rendevous system is acturally pictured, and the future adventures of Trace McCall are eagerly awaited...

Wow.....wow....I mean, really, this book is just amazing. Abso-f-in-lutely wonderful. It's role as the quintessential American novel is so well deserved you can't help but wonder if this is the best read you might ever have. I m currently going through all the classics of the world, and have such joys as Moby Dick, War and Peace, Robinson Crusoe, among many, many others awaiting me. However, I feel like I ve already found the love for the written word that I felt I may aquire after reading perhaps a dozen or so of the worlds finest.

To the novella: He tells the tale with such heart, such character, such life that I will attest that I dont think I ve ever felt so strongly for a character as I do for Huck Finn. He is so vivid and alive and real; its absurd.

Yes, it is quite racist on the surface, and during the 250 odd pages of the story you might read more racial slurs and statements than you have in your life, but in the heart there is nothing racist about this story. I ve heard it defended because thats just how it was in Twains time, and alas, that is how it was then, and the reason it is all so blatant, but there is really nothing racist about the portrayal of Jim. He is so loving and deep and pure. Surely one of the sweetest people you could ever want to meet.

The charm of this story, the unending humor and delight of all the dialects and wordage, the manner of conversation and the subjects....my loves for this story are unending. Its a must read. I know you ve heard that;I know you know that. But damn it, off your ass and DO IT!

Twains masterpiece, and for that matter, a masterpiece of all literature in the history of the world.

This is a collection of two books that are often considered for children. However, they are suitable for both adults and children. The kids will love the adventure, the wonderfully irreverent and humorous view of childhood and the characters with their loyalty and friendship. The adults will also enjoy the satire of life in the "proper" lower middle-class society of the South with the sendups of hypocricy, false religiousity, racism and slavery and the like.

Tom Sawyer is probably more oriented for children than the other one. Here, the focus is Tom, who is largely a child prankster. His romantic ideals of doing things like running away to be a pirate are the source of great amusement and reflection for him - and worry for his family.

Huckleberry Finn has more adult themes. Here, the mockery of society is much harsher as Huck escapes from his abusive, drunk father to sail down the Mississippi with Tom and Jim (a runaway slave). Along the way the get to see the best and worst of what America on the river has to offer.

These books should be treasured and deserve their fame. Twain informs and relates in a totally entertaining and warm way.

Back in junior high school (ie, MANY moons ago) I read Tom Sawyer and/or Huckleberry Finn. However I couldn't remember which one, nor did I know one story from the other (like most Americans, I've seen more film adaptations of these stories than I care to recall). So I decided to read these little jewels once again. And I'm so glad I did.

First of all, I don't believe either story is suitable for children really. Both Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer seem too, well, immature compared to the youths of today. And the crude racist language is certainly unfashionable nowadays. But as an adult one can appreciate these stories as Mark Twain's trip down memory lane, looking at life on the river with rose-colored glasses. No, the stories (..which we all know) are not realistic. But they are fun, harmless and well-written.

The Wordsworth Edition is very nice little package of both stories. And I certainly recommend reading both stories back-to-back since they flow together well.

So I recommed all middle-aged kids (like me) revisit Mark Twain's memorable boys. They will bring a smile to your face.

A wonderful edition which includes both Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn (very handy for the Twain lover). It also has a red bookmark attached to the binding so you can easily find your place. The book is small and light so it is ideal for travelling and reading out of your home. It also includes a nice introduction and a comparative chronology of Twain's life. For a Twain collector, this is a lovely, readable copy.

I've always been interested in all types of animals. My parents bought this for me when I was about 10 or 11. I played outside a lot, as a child, and was always discovering frogs, toads, lizards, snakes, and turtles. I was constantly referring to this book to identify the various specimens I found and sometimes caught (I always let them go immediately after). I practically had this book memorized. This is a great book for any Missouri outdoors person. Especially if they are going into areas where they might encounter snakes. I think it's important to be able to identify which snakes are venomous and which are nonvenomous. So many people mistake harmless species for venomous snakes and kill them. Anyway, this is a great book.

I do a tremendous amount of close-up photography, "critters" of all sorts, flowers, etc. I spend quite a lot of time in the field. I have found this book very handy for initial identification of species. I will grant you that there is a bit of outdated material in this volume, but for my purposes this does not matter as I use other books for further research. The photographs and distribution maps are great and for the most part the text is quite helpful in identification. The book is easy to pack (along with my flower and bird books) and as I said, it is quite useful and helpful. For an indepth study though, you will want other works to supplement this one. Recommend this one highly.

Poor choice of common names, contains some out-dated scientific taxonomy. Photographs and artwork are great. Text is good. The only book available on Missouri's herpetofauna; buy it, and wait for a newer, modern version.

This book shows pitures of every reptile and amphibian in the state of MO. It also has everything about them as well. I would really like to meet Tom R. Johnson.

When I picked up this book on Missouri River politics I hardly expected it to be so engrossing! The author is a reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, and he recounts here some of the stories he collected that were too in depth for that publication. He writes in a journalistic style; focusing on interviews he lets the voices of people affected by river management carry the book. In sidebars after almost every chapter he presents well-chosen histories not directly related to the politics that add a great deal to the main text.

I learned a great deal about the Missouri River from this book, from its recreational opportunities to its commercial usage. I did not know the government was still taking so much land from the natives so far into the twentieth century; it is hard to imagine that so many people could lose their way of life at the signing of a pen. If the book has any weakness, it is that the interviews necessarily focus on people whose needs are not being met by the politics, so it is something of a downer. Still, it well communicates a love of the river and the history of man's intervention to change it.

This book has it all: exquisite text, well-researched material, interesting format, a "plot" with as many twists and turns as the river itself, and an ability to haunt the reader long after the book is done. Lambrecht's book reveals the history of 20th century activities along the Missouri that is seldom (if ever) taught in our schools. From industrious ambitions, the battles over water, and an account of the indigenous tribes who have lost their culture to Western ways of industry, Big Muddy Blues also presents a hope of reclaiming the wild nature of the Missouri River. The author guides the reader along a closer examination into ways public policy, administration and private interests prioritize the work of government agencies. Lambrecht--the Washington DC Bureau Chief for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch-- travelled the River and talked with people affected by it, now and in the past. Anyone interested in the interplay among government bodies, grassroots efforts, concerned individual action and politics in general will love this book. Readers of nonfiction will appreciate the engaging manner the material is presented. People living in states that border the Missouri River or have water supplies and wildlife affected by it should add this to their reading list... sooner rather than later. One of the best books I've read in a long time. Big Muddy Blues is a gift to citizens, government agency administrators and law-makers everywhere.

In "Big Muddy Blues", Bill Lambrecht has woven intriguing, though somewhat unsettling, tales of one of our most precious resources - water. Specifically he speaks of the Missouri River, but I found myself drawing correlations to other bodies of water dotting our country. If man's need for control has so skewed the patterns of the Missouri, how many other rivers, streams, lakes and bays have suffered the same fate - and with what result? Asking questions of various individuals and groups whose livelihoods are intertwined with the Missouri, Lambrecht presents their answers, but allows the reader to draw conclusions.

Disjointed though the writing style appears from time to time, there is a pattern. Lambrecht's tales, of politics and special interest groups, take the reader back and forth through the life of the Missouri - from the days of Lewis and Clark to the present.

I praise Lambrecht for raising awareness, of the great Missouri River itself as well as of the politics and factions that are affecting our water resources and environments that rely upon them.

Bill Lambrecht's BIG MUDDY BLUES takes a timely look at the history and the future of the longest river in the United States. It is full of intriguing detail about the river's geography and its inhabitants (notably the pallid sturgeon), the characters who depend on it for their livelihoods, and the woeful land grabs, degradation, and politics that have altered the course of one of the U.S.'s greatest natural resources. But Lambrecht's admiration for and belief in his river (he comes from St. Louis) leave us with glimmers of hope for the future health of the river. His engaging style and neatly-organized chapters contribute to an excellent read.

I would have given this book 5 stars, but the writing style is a little simplistic. However, the plot is great and the tone is WONDERFUL. I hated to put this book down. I kept wanting to know whodonit - and what happens between Meg and the Detective!

prose, clean and precise, propels this mystery/bittersweet love story. The first-person narrative is vibrant and sexy: P.I. Meg Darcy and her elusive object of desire Sarah Lindstrom stay with us, whetting our appetites for the subsequent 3 volumes in the series (the 2 that are published don't disappoint in their interweaving of mystery and romance). Though the excellent J.M. Redmann's Micky Knight has more more kinks in her personality (and more baroque mysteries to solve), Meg Darcy compares well in her 3-D characterization.

Not bad, for a first time out. Characters are well defined, the story line was plossable, wished that one of the "Loose ends" would have been assisting Womens shelters or Homelessness but got theme anyway. hope to see more of these authors

P.I. Meg Darcy works for her Uncle Walter, at Miller Security where they are steadily active in both investigations and security for local unions, businesses, and individuals. When a friend, Ann Yates, comes to Meg for help in the wake of her grandmother's murder, Meg reluctantly takes on the case. The old woman had apparently wandered away from a nursing home and was strangled by a serial killer who the cops have been unable to catch.

In the course of the investigation, Meg meets up with an old acquaintance, the enigmatic and distant police detective, Sarah Lindstrom, to whom Meg has always been attracted. The further Meg delves into the case, the more contact she has with the taciturn cop, and it's only a matter of time before fireworks begin, both on the case and with Lindstrom. As it turns out, all is not as it seems in the cemetery murders.

The story is told in first person, and Meg's sense of the world around her is wry and insightful. She is particularly amusing when pondering over the remnants of her love life. The cast of characters involved in this twisty mystery, including her best friend Patrick, are richly drawn, and the writing is crisp and focused. Cemetery Murders is an excellent debut, and I look forward to reading the next three installments.
-Lori L. Lake, Midwest Book Review

As a Missourian and a professional historian, I looked forward to reading what many consider a classic (even Boatner cites Monaghan). I was misled. This is an insufferable book, almost unreadable, a waste of time. Presuming to knowledge he cannot have, the author is pleased to describe (without citations) the innermost thoughts of historical figures. He insists on calling William Clark Quantrill "Charles;" writes Elias Boudinet for Elias Boudinot. Wallows in cliches (e.g. calls James Lane "the Grim Chieftan" at every opportunity until you want to gag) and racial stereotypes (e.g. his characterization of the "primeval passions" of naturally savage Indians, p. 210; see also every reference to black people). His writing style is so florid and bombastic at times as to rob it of clarity. Thus, while he describes obscure battles covered by few other scholars (hence the second star), it's sometimes hard to tell what's going on. If you want the politics of Bleeding Kansas and the early days of the war in Missouri, see the second volume of Nevins's classic "Emergence of Lincoln" and the first volume of "War for the Union;" if you are interested in the bitterness and hatred that fueled the violence in Missouri during and after the war, Fellman's "Inside War" is the book to read. But don't bother with Monaghan.

This book explains very well why there was so much violence in the Western scenario. If you like, it also explains the violence following the civil war in the reconstruction era. If you are used to draw a gun whenever you see a political opponent one should not be surprised about the cruelties committed by the Klan after the war.

This book also shows the problematic stand the civilized (Indian) nations were confronted with, being forced to choose between Union or Confederacy.

To all Southerners, this is a ballanced account descibing that particular period of time. Buy it.

A very well written book on the history of the Civil war west of the Mississippi. Monaghan covers many of the battles I had tried in vain to locate details on. Covered are the battles of: Carthage, Wilson's Creek, Pea Ridge, Prairie Grove, and Westport. I especially found interesting the involvement of the Five Nations out of Oklahoma. Much is covered concerning the conflicts between Kansas and Missouri, but Texas, Arkansas and others are treated with some detail. Monaghan's writing style is excellent, giving you a good feeling for what happened. You will read and re-read this one.

Fanatical politics of the western frontier, immigrant abolitionists with loaded Spencer rifles funded by mysterious personages back East, cut-throats, gin heads and horse thieves, colorful character descriptions... This book ranks up there with Pea Ridge by Shea and The Civil War by Foote. Absoltuley a must read.

i thnk this was a good book except for the fact that at the ending it did not tell who the spy was it left the reader hanging too much but overall it was good like i said the ending was bad when it did not tell who the spy was!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(IM AM 13 IM NOT 12 I PUT 12 SO I CAN PUT THIS REVIEW)!!!!!

As an educator of upper elementary students, I think the whole Orphan Train Adventures series is outstanding! It tells a tale while weaving in historical events. It makes learning history more interesting because the stories are told from a young person's point of view!

This is the best book i have ever read and it is very exiting packed with adventures and friends to learn. i was so exited when i read almost every page. the only bad part was at the end when the book didn't tell you who the spy was.

The guns swirling around you make you want to turn and run, but you wont.....at least Mike wont. Want to read a wonderful story of the Civil War and the urge that gripped the teens in America during that great war and made them run and join the army? Want to know why the nickname for the Civil War is "The Boys' War"? Well, you'll find out in this wonderful book about the war that claimed the lives of so many and destroyed and brought families together. A wonderful book, that can be a curse because you wont let it down. Enjoy this wonderful tail of the bullets flying and the men dying at your side...........

DEAR PAPA, DEAR HOTCH: THE CORRESPONDENCE OF ERNEST HEMINGWAY AND A.E. HOTCHNER isn't a light introduction: it's a scholarly collection recommended as a college-level pick for any collection strong in the works of either writer, presenting for the first time the collected correspondence between writer and agent. Hotchner adapted Hemingway's works for stage, movies and TV: these letters cover the final quarter of Hemingway's life and packs in nearly two hundred letters, cables and cards between the two. The result offers plenty of intriguing details and will prove a 'must' for any serious Hemingway scholar, in particular.

In his Preface, Hotchner writes:"I was young and struggling and vulnerable." What these Letters reveal is that "Hotch" was ambitious, greedy and manipulative. Just read the exchange concerning the "True" article (pp 172-179).Though De Fazio and the University of Missouri Press are to be congratulated for their Herculean accomplishment, those familiar with other Hemingway letters/memorabilia and scholarship, published and unpublished, know why Hotchner "had fallen out of favor with Mary"(Preface 12), as well as with other family members, true friends and many Hemingway scholars. Conrad Aiken, who early on saw Hemingway's genius, wrote, on the occasion of T.S.Eliot's death 40 years ago, "that this is the age of the ex-wife and the editor."I would add a third category: the "so-called friend."

I had a hard time rating this collection of letters, postcards and cables between Hemingway and A. E. Hotchner, Papa's friend during the last decade or so of his life. If I give "Dear Papa, Dear Hotch" 5 stars, what do I give my favorite book of all time - Hemingway's "In Our Time"? Since Amazon's rating system won't allow for more than 5 stars, I plead "nolo contendere." This book deserves 5 stars because it is the best it could be. Comparison with Hemingway's crafted work is not the point.

That said, "Dear Papa, Dear Hotch" is a gift to all who love Hemingway. I congratulate DeFazio for a job well done. Gathering all the pieces of this intriguing story must have consumed countless hours and required lots of legwork. The process of deciphering Hemingway's penmanship and the necessary research to illuminate arcane references was surely daunting at times. A.E. Hotchner's Preface & DeFazio's Introduction are fascinating and admirably set the stage for what is ultimately a poignant story of friendship & loss.

_Dear Papa, Dear Hotch_ is a triumph of precise editing: of scrupulous annotations that make this record of the final years of a great American writer come to life. The reader goes along effortlessly, instructed as necessary in diverse particulars-baseball trivia, the names of well-known trapshooters (!), the identities of guests at long forgotten gatherings, advertising slogans, specs for aircraft, Hemingway's confusion of a story by James Thurber with one by Ring Lardner. Those who have ever tried to run down one such datum will appreciate the scholarship, variousness, exactness, and energy of Albert J. DeFazio in presenting this collection.

The 161 letters here were written in the final dozen years of Hemingway's life, in his decline, after he, arguably the most famous writer living, had said what he had to say. As such they make for increasingly sad reading. We see Hemingway's effort to recapture the vitality and tragic dignity that make at least two of his novels and several dozen short stories key documents in American literature and in American self-concept. The letters from A. E. Hotchner-at once a slick, opportunistic sycophant, a cheerfully dutiful factotum, willing to do whatever the once great man asks, and a competent adaptor of original work-do not brighten the picture, nor is it always easy to read "Hotch's" imitations of Hemingway's deliberately scabrous language ("Goddam but I'm glad about the [Nobel] prize," etc.) Sometimes the interplay between them has a sick fascination, "Hemingstein" trying to persuade himself "Everybody will be okay" and "Krotchner" feeding this illusion. One comes to the notes with a sense of relief. They are the real gen.

A six page appendix, in which Hemingway objects to Hotchner's proposed deletions in _The Dangerous Summer,_ reveals more about the drift of Hemingway's writing practices than anything else I have read on the topic.