Missouri Books

Armies have to learn to fight as more than an armed mob. Officers have to learn how to fight their command too. Missing these classes makes all the drill worhless and a defeate possible. US Grant understood this and Belmont is his first training class for himself and his army. This small battle is either overlooked, ignored or used as an example of Grant being beaten on the field. All of those ideas are the wrong approach to understanding this battle. Was it important to the war? Not really. Was it important for giving semi-trained troops a taste of combat and instilling in them the habit of victory? Yesand this was Grant's objective. When he had accomplished his objective, he pulled back. Did everything go well? No, some officers didn't control their men, some men went off on tangents, orders were missed and a series of small problems made for a harder day than planned.

All of the above makes for a good story and Nathaniel Hughes Jr. tells it well. After laying a good foundation, he takes us through each phase of the battle telling us what is going well and what isn't. Move and counter move occupy the book as Polk & Pillow, move to first stop and then try to destroy the Union invader.

A series of good well placed maps allow us to follow the action. A series of illustrations place faces to the names. Coupled with good clear writting make this an enjoyable and informative reading experience. This is a very good book about one of the small battle of the Civil War.

This is an excellent synopsis of the Battle of Belmont. Belmont was a relatively small battle on the Missouri side of the Mississippi River. Though small, Belmont was important, partly because it was the first battle fought by General Grant. The writing style of the book is clear and easy to follow. There are 10 high quality maps, 7 that cover the battle itself. It is easy to correlate the maps and the text to keep track of units and their movements.

Hughes writes in an interesting style. Instead of describing the battle from start to finish in a linear fashion, he switches back and forth between the Union and Confederate perspective. That is, he covers one part of the battle from the Federal point of view, then switches to the Confederate point of view and describes the events again. This approach could easily have come across poorly or been confusing. Instead, it leads to a very balanced and in depth account of the battle. I highly recommend this book to Civil War enthusiasts.

For many Americans the Civil War consisted of battles at Gettysburg, Vicksburg, Manassas, Antietam, Shiloh and a few other major battles. What is often overlooked are the smaller engagements than provide the glue that strings together the major battles. It is also in early small battles that generals like Grant, Lee and Jackson learn valuable lessons that pay dividends in subsequent battles.
The Battle of Belmont is one such battle. As the other reviewers have noted this battle is best known as Grant's first battle of the war. It would prove a training ground for Grant and his men. Grant learned much from this battle.
In some ways, Belmont is a smaller version of Shiloh with the sides reversed. Like at Shiloh, an army was surprised and their camps captured while the men fled to cover along the river bank. Like at Shiloh the attackers failed to drive the defenders into the river and win a clear cut victory. Like at Shiloh the defenders then went on the offensive and drove the attackers back.
Given the similarities between these two battles, what did Grant learn at Belmont that would help him at Shiloh? 1) Grant learned that being caught by surprise and being pushed back to a river did not necessarily mean defeat. 2) Grant learned the importance of rallying your troops and counter attacking. 3) Grant learned the importance of following up on an initial success and aggressively pursuing your opponent. These lessons would serve Grant well at Shiloh and future battles as he continued to learn from his mistakes. However, Grant did not learn all the lessons that could have been learned at Belmont - eg. his surprise at Shiloh.
Mr. Hughes has written a fine book that makes sense out of the chaos of combat. The text is easy to read and there are helpful maps.

This book is one of those that combines clear fact, with interesting narrative and extremely useful maps. The book quickly sets the stage and highlights some of the more unknown aspects of the early years of the war for control of the north central Mississippi River. The reader quickly learns the importance of Cairo, Illinois to the course of the war as well as the CSA defenses in Columbus, Kentucky (which is one of the few remaining areas of the original battle that one can visit).

And of course, this is U.S. Grant's debut. He conducts a pretty tight little campaign until victory in the CSA camp causes his troops to run amok (Jubal Early would experience a similar problem at Cedar Creek). The quick reinforcement of fresh Confederates from the Kentucky side puts Grant to rout back to his small flotilla and back to Cairo.

The Battle of Belmont is a fascinating study of combined arms, logistics and some pretty good tactical movements. Certainly, there aren't too many battles in the Civil War where both sides win and lose and where both land troops from the river.

Ultimately this is an engaging and interesting read about a little known battle that taught some valuable lessons to U.S. Grant.

For the more serious Civil War buffs, it is also one of the first excursions of the union gun boats, Lexington and Tyler, both of which will see more well remembered service at Shiloh.

This book offers the reader a well researched and presented account of the Battle of Belmont, the first battle in the Western Theatre and one of the first battles fought by Ulysses S. Grant. The book covers Grants attack on the Southern forces under the command of Leonidas Polk and Gideon Pillow at Belmont on the Mississippi River in Missouri on the 7th of November 1861. The maps in the book are easy to understand and guide the reader through the fighting, the narrative runs smoothly and offers a good overview of this battle. There is extensive notes and bibliography to assist the reader with further studies. Overall a decent book covering this battle of the American Civil War. An enjoyable read.

CITY SMART: ST. LOUIS is a great book describing both the Missouri and Illinois Sides of the St. Louis Area. It tells you where the best restaurants, shopping malls, museums, neighborhoods, and transportation are. However, being that it was written in 2000, some information needs to be taken like the humor in AMERICAN WEDDING, SIMPLY IRRESISTIBLE, THE SISTERHOOD OF THE TRAVELLING PANTS, HARVARD MAN, DRIVE ME CRAZY, HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER, 13 GOING ON 30, GARFIELD: A TALE OF TWO KITTIES, or DATE MOVIE, because many statistics have changed since then. Even so, this is still a wonderful book to own.

Jody Feldman's guide to St. Louis is well-written, comprehensive and interesting. Feldman, a St. Louis native, includes everything from hotels & restaurants to sporting events & night life. Interesting factoids are interspersed throughout and a brief history of the city is also included.

A very helpful feature is added to this second edition: website addresses for almost every listing. This book was published in the spring of 2000 and at the time, it was very clearly up-to-date - it even mentions the Rams' Super Bowl victory in the winter of 2000.

If you're a tourist looking to visit St. Louis, this is definitely the book you want to take with you.

In general I like travel guides written by natives of the area, but often they don't tell the whole story to the visitor. Such is the case with this book. There are lots of off-beat sidebars and native perspective. While it contained lots of good information and "inside scoop" it also falls short in some respects. For example, many restaurants and other attractions are described as being on "the hill" and there is even a sidebar that explains the culture of "the hill" yet no where in the book was the geographical location of "the hill" given. Hotels, restaurants, etc. are also categorized by neighborhood which is an idea I LOVE, and there are descriptions of what type of environment comprises each area, yet there are no maps or other descriptions to tell you the boundaries of these neighborhoods.

Another area in which this book fails miserably is in the maps. They would be OK if they were ACCURATE. They are not -- in fact the location of several restaurants on the restaurant map are flat-out wrong, and the map of Forest Park was misleading at best. It also seems that a book of this publication date would have noted the extensive renovation, redesign, and road construction in Forest Park that was years in the planning and which is in the first year of a multi-year project. The Jewel Box is closed for all of 2002. Given the lack of signage in the park itself as well as the many construction-blocked routes, an accurate, detailed map would have been invaluable. As it was I got LOST and spent an hour wandering around on foot before reaching my destination.

Finally, this is a 100% positive book. I'm sure that made the tourism board in St. Louis happy, but I appreciate a guidebook that has the guts to say, "XYZ is not worth a visit because ...." I also got the feeling the author ran out of steam with a lot of descriptions and couldn't think of anything to say beyond a generic thumbnail.

So, since I never buy only one guide book to an area I was happy with what I got out of this book, but was also glad I had another guidebook and an excellent map with me as well.

Ms. Feldman does a fine job in capturing some of St. Louis' more sublime features. She writes this book as only someone who loves the area and has lived there for a long time can.

My family and I use this to find out about some of the lesser-known (at least to those not from St. Louis) attractions in the St. Louis metro area. For example, we were able to track down a real pumpkin patch so that my son could pick out his own pumpkins for Halloween. Also, we learned about the Butterfly House, an amazing climate-controlled "greenhouse" that houses several colorful species of butterflies.

Ms. Feldman also gives tips on getting around St. Louis, discusses the variety of restaurants available, and spends significant time discussing evening activities such as plays, opera, and nightclubs.

This book was instrumental in helping us dive in and enjoy what St. Louis has to offer. I appreciated the author's insight into St. Louis. She added opinions and insight that readers will not find in other city guides.

I moved to St. Louis about 1 year ago, and I bought this book to get myself familiarized with lovely St. Louis. Becauise of this book, I've known restaurants and places that many locals have never heard of. I still use the book as a reference when looking for something else to do, read on a restaurant, or when out of town guests come.

If you will visit St. Louis for some time, get this great little book. If you live here, then get this book and pay tribute to where you live!

What a joy to read an author who *knows* about women. Having found myself on the floor under the dining room table (with cereal in my hair) more than once in my 49+ years I applaud the author. She spins a tale that is real. How refreshing.

I stumbled across this book at the library and checked it out on a whim. I am so glad I did ... This is a book you want all your friends to read so you will have someone to discuss it with -- was Pete a bad guy or a good guy? Was his death justified? All things considered, did these people treat each other the way friends are supposed to, especially 'the girls'? Bottom line: An Excellent Book.

This book provides different points of view on the same man after his death. The reader is able to see that although a womanizer, this man had something to contribute to his relationships with the 4 women featured. A profile by his sister is also included in this tale of lust, friendship, and family ties. Kagan does a remarkable job of showing the same person as 4 different personalities as seen through the eyes of these friends who each mourn his death in his own way. After the reader finally decides that he has a clear picture of who this man was and why he his dead, Ms. Kagan suprises us further

I really tried to get into this book, but infortunately, it never reached the point of "flowing" for me.

I thought the plot was well conceived. In "The Girls," we get to know four women, who have been friends for decades, through the death of one man, Pete Chickery. One of "The Girls" was married to Pete, but all of them had a relationship of one type or another with him. After he is killed, the story of who Pete was, what he meant to each of them, and their relationships with one another come into focus. While this core group intrigued me, the peripheral characters - children, parents, housekeepers, etc., really gummed up the works for me. The story was simple, but the more characters that I was intoduced to, the more my interest waned.

I also didn't particularly care for the structure of the first three "chapters," when each character was speaking directly to another person to whom we had not been introduced. Yet, when we finally meet that person, she is simply a part of the story, and not the omniscient presence that I was prepared to meet. Perhaps the reason that the story failed to "flow" for me, was due to that fact that once I became accustomed to one voice, it changed dramatically into another, then another. It never had the rythym that it needed to keep me turning pages.

What can I say, this book was surely one of the best and most thrilling, I've ever read. During the first few pages I hadn't got a clou what the hell all this was about, but once I had the point, I couldn't stop readin. I wanted to know all about the girls, about the different characters, their lives, fears and their relation with Michael. You should go to the next bookshop and get it. Thrilling, funny and excellently written. If there were mor than 5 stars, I'd give more

Not the best book for beginners. But once you get the basics down online or elsewhere, this book can give you an all-out fully comprehensive overview of the general language designed for intermediate level students. You'll need to be very dedicated to the book if you really want to learn.

i have purchased several other books from amazon in order to learn polish in addition to the few that i have picked up on ebay. most of them have been helpful to an extent but NOTHING has come close to helping as much as this book. after reading the other person's review, i purchased this and everything that was mentioned was completely correct. you will learn a tremendous amount in a very short amount of time when studying this book. there are exercises that will test your knowledge and will benefit you greatly. 1000 people could purchase this book and have a money back refund and none would send it back. this book is invaluable. don't spend your money on 12 dollar books because you think it's a better value. just drop the 30 dollars and this is the only book you'll need.

I needed to cram some Polish fast and since the reviews here have been raving about this I bought this book for self study. However, I found that I was stuck in the first lesson because it is about pronounciation and it's impossible from the text to figure out the pronounciation from the text alone.

Not wanting to give up, I contacted the Yale Center for Language Study which, according to the book, has a set of tapes you can obtain. After a long and drawn out request that took a month (and maybe would have even taken longer if it hadn't been for a friend in Yale who physically went up to the center to get the tapes and post it for me) I listened to the tapes and found they were actually drills to Volume II (the classroon drill book). Which meant they were useful but not as useful as I had hoped.

I think this book, if you stuck with it, maybe could be a brillant course. I'm going to try it some more. The fact that it has no pictures and is not 'fun' makes it less appealing for me than other self study courses. After surveying a bunch, I think the Pimsleur tapes - expensive as they are - were the best in getting me started.

This is without a doubt the most useful and versatile Polish language instruction book I have found. It's not the colorful, cartoon-filled textbook you might remember from high-school or college French class; rather, it's organized in a way that makes it wonderful for independent study for anybody beginning Polish.

Each chapter begins with a large number of mini-dialogues one sentence in length. For example, "Co to jest? To jest pioro." Translations are included with each example, of course. The earlier chapters then proceed with sections describing spelling and phonological rules of the Polish language. Following that is my personal favorite section, grammar! Grammar is explained in a way that may perhaps be a little unclear in the beginning, but as your familiarity with the language improves, it WILL become clear quickly.

Nearly every topic you could want to learn about is covered by Mr. Schenker in this book, including noun and pronoun usage, verb inflection, verbal particles, prepositions, dependent clauses, conditional phrases, and so on. I don't think I would be exaggerating to say that you could pick up this book with no knowledge of Polish whatsoever, and with a reasonable effort become quite capable of conversing, reading, and writing in Polish.

Whether you're looking for a starting point or have studied some and want to improve, this is an invaluable resource.

For some years I have STARTED to learn the Polish language as a mental exercise. Didn't think it would be too difficult, since I had already taught myself German and Italian and used these languages when visiting Germany and Italy: and had used my high school French and Spanish to good effect when visiting France and Mexico. So you can see that I thought of myself as a natural linguist without formal training. Wanted to learn a slavic language, but not Russian because of the cyrillic (sp?) alphabet, so settled on Polish. I started with the Hugo series. Was baffled. Went on to... shall I name them or only count them? FOUR other teach-yourself methods. I think the trick was the organisation. I'd almost given up hope when I ordered Schenker's Beginning Polish. I opened on Page 1 sometime in October 1998, and now, in January 1999 I am starting on Lesson Eight on page 117 and going to the races. Gentlemen, I raise my proverbial hat to a text which is slowly and inexorably opening the mystery of slavic language to me. The complexity and beauty of Polish are evident even at this early stage. The lessons are so subtly organised, so logically presented, that I am only held up by the need to memorize words that used to leave me baffled and upset, but which in this text gain for me an expanding picture of the interrelationships of words that have very little reference in the languages I already know. Am I making sense? Alexander Schenker in a master at putting the puzzle together in logical baby steps. The only possible problem is that the student had better read EVERY WORD of the explanations, because every word is vital. And when we study alone like this, we don't have a professor to answer questions, but the answers are there if you read carefully. My only regret is that I cannot seem to obtain Volume Two, which is no longer in print.

This book is one I would recommend for any reader interested in family and real life drama,adventure and pursuit of a life dream. It begins rather slowly, but once the book is finished you appreciate the amount of detail given to each character and situation. You are able to understand the mother's anger, the father's passive ways, and the daughter's passion to fulfill her dream. This book depicts life on the road as an entertainer and the life of African Americans during some very tense and tragic times in our history. Reuben (one of the characters) tugs at your heartstrings and gives insight of the fear that African Americans must have faced during those times. The ending became quite predictable, but was not exactly what you would call the perfect ending. I found myself wishing I could turn back the hands of time, right the wrongs, and have an ending that would leave me feeling comfortable and at peace. However, had the author had chosen to end her book in that manner, real life would not have been accurately portrayed.

This book is about a 12 year old girl named Orphelia Bruce. She wants to be a star,but her mother won't let her perform anywhere except for in church.Orphelia's idol is coming to town to do a talent show named Madame Meritta.Orphelia can't perform because she had gotten into trouble earlier that day.So, Orphelia does what she has to do.That includes stowing away in in Madame's storage wagon.Pretty smart,huh? Anyway....oh, yes.She(Orphelia)gets to tag along with the show and even perform.She also unravles a secret to her family's past.LUCKY!!!!!!!

It's 1904, 12 year old,Orphelia Bruce has always wanted to sing and play her piano at the World's Fair in St. Louis and she wants to meet the famous Madame Meritta. She lives in Calico Creek, Missouri, and her mother finds it sinful to sing "Sassy" music and that only church music is acceptable. Her mother favors her daughter Pearl, who lies all the time, and her father just smokes all day. One day after she is forbidden to perform in the talent show she runs away and finds herself in one of Madame Meritta's coaches! There she gets acquainted with the strange and scraggly Reuben, Othello, and the glorious Madame Meritta herself. Orphelia finds out that show business is not as glamorous as she thought it would be and finds out spooky things about her family's past.

Twelve-year-old Orphelia Bruce lives in Missouri in 1904. She's musically gifted and wants nothing so much as to play piano and sing. Orphelia's straight-laced mother wants Orphelia to confine her music to church. Madame Meritta, leader of a traveling minstrel show, is scheduled to conduct a talent show when she passes through Orphelia's town on her way to a performance at the St. Louis World's Fair. Acts from all over the county are coming to compete. The best act gets to be part of Madame's show at the Fair. But, when Orphelia gets into trouble, her mother won't allow her to take part in the talent show. Frustrated and angry, Orphelia runs away to join Madame Meritta's troupe. As events unfold, Orphelia learns some things about her family she didn't know. She also learns something about life on the road. Will Orphelia get to play in Madame Meritta's show? Will she get back to her family? Is the show business life as glamorous as Orphelia imagines? The answers to these questions and several others are in "The Minstrel's Melody".

This "history mystery" is more about Orphelia's adventures on the road than it is a mystery. Still, some interesting questions are raised and answered in the course of this book. It also has the more general virtues of all the books in this series: it is a good snapshot of life in a historical time and place removed from the present day, it has some worthwhile things to say about life in general, and it features a good leading character that most kids will identify with.

We (my daughter and I) rate this, and the entire series, a solid four stars. If you look at our reviews of other books in this series, you may see five stars on them. We tried to change that after reasoning that, if the Harry Potter books rated five stars, then these (being not THAT good -- few others in this genre are) rated four, but we didn't succeed. With four stars, though, "history mysteries" are still good reading and we still recommend them. If you haven't read any, give 'em a try.

The year is 1904. Twelve-year-old Orphelia Bruce hates her uneventful life in tiny Calico Creek, Missouri. She longs to leave her small town behind to join a traveling minstrel show. Singing and playing the piano is Orphelia's dream - but her mother disapproves. After her mother refuses to even let her perform in a local talent show, Orphelia runs away from home and joins Madame Meritta's traveling musician show, which is headed for the St. Louis World's Fair. But when Orphelia's hiding place is discovered, Madame Meritta decides to send her back home. Can Orphelia persuade her idol to allow her to remain with the show so she can finally achieve her dream? Although the beginning of this book was a bit slow-moving, after the first couple of chapters, I got caught up in the story. I reccomend this book to all readers of the History Mysteries series.

Stalinist Russia - no one will ever say that was the pinnacle of Russian civilization, and in fact is well and below considered one of the nation's lowest points. "A Red Boyhood: Growing Up Under Stalin" is a memoir focusing on the life of one on the outskirts of society, one who lost countless loved ones to Stalin's purges, and under a mother who struggled just so that her and her boys could manage to survive. An even darker look into a dark era for the country's history, "A Red Boyhood: Growing Up Under Stalin" is highly recommended to community library memoir collections, especially those with a focus on world events.

A wonderful history told from the eyes of a boy, whose intelligence and curiosity contrast with the brutal, senseless politics of the Soviet world he lives in. Konstantin manages to write from the naïve perspective of his own youth, while adding the essential contemporary insights that give his journey a solid frame of historical context. The autobiography is written as a wandering tale of survival, that somehow manages to echo the universal stories of youth, the love of parents, the rejection of hypocrisy, the discovery of romance. Far from a polemic about the evils of a particular world view, it none the less exposes the absurdity of a Soviet state that venerates obsequious functionaries one week, and executes them the next. The author does not aim to play to our emotions, but we are moved. While the sophisticated comedy of underground jokes leaves us chuckling, the more lasting humor emerges from darkly comic moments we experience as fortunes change at the whim of Stalin or Hitler. We can easily imagine the irony of using expunged encyclopedia entries for rolling papers and bathroom tissue.
Konstantin begins his story with the events that shattered a happy childhood, and led his family to wander the Soviet Empire. He ends the book with his arrival in the United States, where he will eventually become quite successful. In choosing not to write about the later years, he forces us to meditate on the plight of refugees everywhere. Success is simply escape, freedom, the opportunity to grow up in a reasonable place. By not updating us to the current world, he keeps the past alive, and we are left with the sense that life in a free land is indeed an open book.
--Dr.Greg Hampikian, co-author of Exit to Freedom

Kirkus Reviews

A boy's-eye view of life during wartime-first the Soviet Union's vicious internal struggles under Stalin and then its horrific ordeal after the Germans invaded in 1941.

Konstantin begins his memoir in dramatic fashion, recalling the night of April 17, 1938, when his father was taken away by the Soviet secret police and never seen again in their little town in the Ukraine. The early passages of the book do a fine job of explaining the climate in which such an incident could occur; Konstantin describes an Orwellian regime full of furtive police activities, mysterious disappearances and a terrorized populace.

What makes Konstantin's recollections so captivating is his ability to effectively divide the text between small details vividly rendered, such as a trip to the movie theater, and the larger story of a global political and military struggle. Despite the upheavals that roiled his childhood, the author somehow managed to get a decent education; he refers frequently to inspirational teachers and to devouring books ranging from The Grapes of Wrath to Das Kapital. But these moments of enlightenment in Konstantin's young life were tempered by the unbearable wartime conditions; often, as he left school for the day, he saw corpses piled high on wagons to be carted away.

His mother married a Polish refugee in 1944, and they were able to return with him to Poland in 1945, happy to escape the "cursed" Soviet Union. But the Soviets soon consolidated their grip on Poland, and the family fled west, finally winding up in a UN refugee camp in Germany. As a displaced person, Konstantin qualified for free tuition at a local university, and after three more years of struggle was finally able to emigrateto "the land of my dreams"-America. Uneven, but full of engaging details about a tumultuous period in world history.

An incredible story of survival in the most horrific of times. This book is testimony to the human spirit - to a young man's determination to prevail. His commitment to books, to learning and his ability to recall and describe the details of his difficult life are admirable. Unfortunately - like so many books of this ilk - it lacks an index.

One of the most touching and riveting war memoirs I have ever read.
Anatole Konstantin's life is a triumph over incredible pain and suffering during the Stalin era. This is a must-read.

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.

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.