Washington Books

You have to buy this one, even if it's only for the cover picture of Richard, circa 1970 (aka Richard Cobain). Dark and kooky - let's hope we get more of these longer works from Papa Peabody.

Sugar Mountain captures the existential spirit of modern America. Its main characters are lost souls, reaching out frenetically to connect. They are aware of their existence only in relation to things, and reverberate against each other like bumper cars endlessly hitting and spinning around.

Peabody writes with a keen eye and a casual cynicism. Sugar Mountain offers an interesting look at the odd relationships that occur in life and the shadows that they cast on the people in and around them. Highly recommended.

Excellent source of information. As a survival instructor, I recommend it to all my classes.

This is the best book that I have ever read on survival. It tells eveything from how to build lean to's to log cabins to igloos. Also it tells how to build traps to catch animals and fish which is a must if lost in the woods. As well it tells every way imaginable to navigate and tell what your long and lat. are. It tells plants that youcan and cannot eat, how to clean your water, how to make bread, bows and arrows, bolas, survival strategies for the weather, and much much more. I would reconmen this book to any one who loves camping hunting hiking or any one who is interested in these sort of things

Mr. Angier presents fascinating and practical information on the very basics of survival-shelter, water, food and warmth. Conventional travellers would do well to carry the few items that he recommends-just in case. Hunters hikers and campers have a bible in this book. I have tested his methods of starting a fire, and finding potable water-He's right on target. Adventure writers will find this book an excellent resource-too bad it's out of print! I was hoping to find an updated version. Mine was published in 1974!

I've been in a reading slump for quite some time...I swear all the series I was reading ended. One day I came home and my mom gave me this book. I didn't really want to read it, but I sat down and started. I was so into it I couldn't put it down! About a month after I had read it I had to read it agian. I can't wait for the next one to come out! If anyone knows when it does, I'd appreciate if you'd email me and let me know.

Good technical stuff on marquetry, salvage diving, professional wrestling, German lieder and history of the NorthWest. I shall order the Adventures of John Jewitt from Amazon. I couldn't figure why someone raised by the Nootka could speak Chinook though. (Amazon has Greenberg's Language in the Americas but Campbell's Languages of Native America is out of print) Plot believability was a problem. A hidden map leading to buried treasure and an amateur sleuth who takes over from the bumbling police. Great descriptions of Vancouver Island. Two pairs of sisters - sub-plot about two sisters with one recalling a horrible childhood and the other not- maybe s literary novel waiting to get out. Some cliches "the room was a shambles" "surveying the scene." People grimace, squint and shrug a lot.

I can't wait for the next adventure. Especially enjoyed the story around Tabor...some of it had me in stitches. I hope to see more of her. I have never been to the Northwest, but French's descripitons were so vivid, I could just "feel" the area.

I picked up the novel at a garage sale a few years ago and read it only this summer on a whim. From the opening paragraph I was hooked. Set in the summer of 1939, the book portrays a privileged Midwestern family in the minutia of daily living. The storyteller, eight-year-old Tommy MacAllister, is surrounded by such an array of well-drawn characters, readers will want to jot notes as they meet each one. The book is strong for its depiction of everyday events and the subtle interactions within the boy's mind as he contemplates the grownups who comprise his world.

Reading reviews of Seamus Deane's new novel about growing up in Derry reminds me of how I haven't yet gotten over the disappearance of this brilliant book from the publisher's active list. Tommy McAllister, the main character, reads his upper midwestern world and people in it. He uses both heart and mind to probe each word he hears and gesture he sees to map out his world of loving, dangerous, sensible, and eccentric people, most of whom try to keep him safely in the dark

I bought this book a long time ago but it's still on my bookshelf (I don't save many books when I'm done with them) and I am pushing it for my book group (if we can find enough copies). I've read it many times and it never fails to grip me. The story is pretty simple -- a boy growing up in a small midwestern city right before WWII -- but what's great about this gentle book are a)the characters -- each one a believable, fully-developed, eccentric (but not cutely so) HUMAN, even the minor characters, and b) the wonderful sense of time & place. It's not a lovely place -- it's rife with class, race and other perennial American problems -- but it's full of life, humor, love, hate -- and it has fantastic women characters. Another plus for the book is that it takes place in (I think) someplace like Duluth MN, not the usual East, South or West coast location. The novel also features Native Americans in contemporary roles (circa 1936) -- how often do we get to read about regular old people who happen to be Indians?

This book is one of those rare gems that, if you're really fortunate, you come across from time to time. I received it as a gift from one of my mentors, Charlie Jones, who had, for some time now, been speaking of Booker T. Washington as one of his heroes. Having only a very surface knowledge of Mr. Washington - knowing that he was born a slave and went on to become founder of the famed Tuskegee Institute - he was a hero of mine, as well. After all, one could only imagine what he had to overcome to have achieved all he did.

However, after reading this book by Pastor Stephen Mansfield, the greatness of Mr. Washington simply came alive for me. He was a man of character, a man of faith, a dreamer and a doer; a man who moved mountains and moved hearts.

He had a plan - he had a dream - for taking his people from a horrible situation and helping them to move up and become successful in every way.

Unfortunately, as the author points out, he was fought every step along the way - often most by those he was trying to help and, in time, and long after he died in 1915, was disparaged by many as simply naïve, foolish, a misguided optimist, betrayer to his people.

Of course, none of this is true. Reading the story of Booker T. Washington in 2007 we can look back in hindsight and see that everything he taught - regarding the importance of character, thrift, knowledge, wisdom, forgiveness, love, persistence, delayed gratification, humility, etc. - is the way to build oneself, one's people and one's nation.

Only now is this man's wisdom and greatness beginning to once again be recognized and embraced. This book should be read by anyone and everyone looking to achieve greatness in their life. Read this book and you'll have the roadmap for doing so.

Booker T. Washington was a wonderful man; a hero. And the author, Pastor Mansfield, did a superb job in telling the story.

P.S. By the way, if you get an opportunity to read the booklet, "Character Building" by Booker T. Washington it will also be WELL worth your time. It's a reprinting of a number of his "Sunday Evening Talks" to his students and faculty members. The advice and wisdom that Mr. Washington shared is simply amazing.

Then Darkness Fled is a celebration of the life of Booker T. Washinghton and tells of a man who dined with heads of state and became the first Afro-American to receive honorary degrees from Harvard and Dartmouth. Chapters survey both his achievements and his life in this lively coverage.

In another sterling volume of the Leaders in Action series, Stephen Mansfield here outlines the life and character of Booker T. Washington. In vivacious voice and moving magniloquence, Mansfield traces Washington's path from slavery to his founding of Tuskegee Institute. He shows the difficulties Washington surpassed in reaching his goals, and the principles that helped him make it. In the words of Washington, "Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome while trying to succed." By this standard, Booker T. Washington was an astonishingly successful man.

Washington wrote his own autobiography, _Up From Slavery_, which must certainly not be neglected. But Mansfield's biography is also a criticial read because he includes facts that the autobiographer was too modest to mention, and he highlights wonderful aspects of Washington's character that humility prevented him from including. This biography doesn't contain the wonderful self-analysis and insight of Booker himself - but it does contain all the benefits of a third person account.

One thing I really appreciated about this book was its terrific analysis of slavery and inter-race reconciliation. Expounding Booker's opinion, Mansfield blames both whites and blacks for the problems that cropped up after the Civil War. Whites needed to repent of their brutal treatment of slaves and actually begin considering blacks more than mere animals; and blacks needed to repent of their spirit of bitterness toward their white enslavers, and begin working hard and leaving no excuse for disrespect of blacks. Too many books on reconciliation have practically advocated bitterness, hatred, and laziness when what is really needed is Washington's outlook of forgiveness and hard work. This book offers relief from such pride.

To wrap up, this is a great biography. Good history, good style, and good content. Buy it.

I live on the east coast, but am originally from the Pacific Northwest. This book is a great, fun way for my daughter to learn about my hometown. I hope that the authors will do more children's books from other regions of the country (and even international). It is a great idea, well-executed.

Both my children loved this book, they are 5 and 8. I bought the book to give them an idea about where we are going to move this summer. They are excited to visit the places in the book, especially to see the shrunken heads at "ye olde curiosity shoppe." It was a perfect start for my 5 yr old to practice reading since it came with a downloadable audio file, helping him sound out the words and keep pace. Overall it was entertianing and a good buy!

We just visited Seattle and Mt Rainier with our children for vacation and found this wonderful book. Not only is it a great learning for our kids, but also an awesome souvineer from our trip. Our kids were so excited that "Tony" vists some of the same places we did. This book keeps on giving every time we read it and teaches us all about the neat things in the great state of Washington. Go Seahawks!

We use this book whenever we are thinking about planting a tree in our yard. For some reason, everything seems to grow far bigger than the nursery tags indicate, and many species look far different when young than as more mature trees. It's great to be able to see not only pictures, but to be able to drive to specific locations to see the tree in a mature state, as it may look in our own yard in many years. That's prevented a few "mistakes" in selection.

This book is great. We use it at least a couple of times a week for ecological restoration.

When this book was published in 1990, it virtually created a new genre: the local tree guide. By combining clear, simple descriptions of hundreds of local area species (about 30 native, and the rest ornamental) and providing information on where you could go see the tree, it became possible for people to both learn a wide variety of trees and to learn more about the natural heritage of a place - in this case, Seattle. A second edition of this book has just (February 2006) been published; it contains almost twice as many species, many more color photographs, and a far longer list of specimen trees.

Earl J. Hess's new "Trench Warfare under Grant and Lee: Field Fortifications in the Overland Campaign" is as good a piece of Civil War scholarship as I have read in years. It is at the most fundamental level a narrative history of military operations in the Overland Campaign of May and June, 1864: the Wilderness, Spotsylvania, North Anna, and Cold Harbor, but it is a narrative history that focuses particularly on how field fortifications evolved over the course of those six weeks of heavy combat and it details how the use of field fortifications influenced the course of that campaign. In his earlier volume, "Field Armies and Fortifications in the Civil War," Hess dispelled the old myths that such entrenchments were a direct consequence of the power of rifled-muskets or that their use suddenly sprang into being in the spring of 1864 (he documented three years of field fortifications, although not on such a scale as became standard by the end of the Overland Campaign) and that these entrenchments were somehow merely the fruit of the teaching of Dennis Hart Mahan at West Point. Or to quote the author: "The use of field fortifications evolved during the Civil War not due to some irrational fear, but due to a real and potent threat: the continued presence of an enemy army within striking distance. Their use was a rational and logical response to that threat."

Hess reserves most of the technical details of entrenchment and breastwork design for an appendix, leaving his main narrative fast-moving and compelling. "Trench Warfare under Grant and Lee" is an important contribution to Civil War literature and should find a ready spot on the bookshelves of any serious student of the era. I look forward to his planned third volume, to examine field fortifications during the Petersburg campaign.

Inevitably, it must be asked how Hess views the Overland Campaign in balance. Was it a Union or a Confederate success? Although Hess does not absolve Grant of errors in too hastily ordering attacks or in failing to recognize the power of impromptu fieldworks, Hess concludes: "Grant's most significant achievement in the Overland campaign was not in capturing territory, or in positioning his army close to Richmond, or in reducing the fighting strength of the Army of Northern Virginia by 50 percent; rather it lay in robbing Lee of the opportunity to launch large-scale offensives against the Army of the Potomac. In laying claim to the strategic initiative, Grant won an important physical and emotional victory over Lee, and he did it with fewer losses than his predecessors had suffered in attempting the same goal ... Most important, he did not give up the strategic initiative and thereby brought the war to an end. The Overland campaign was as much a watershed in the strategic course of the Civil War as the Seven Days."

By the time of the Overland Campaign, the star of Earl Hess's second volume on Civil War fortifications, the idea of bravery that most soldiers had when hostilities began had just about fizzled out. In that more innocent time, soldiers and officers thought it cowardly to hide behiind entrenchments, or anything else for that matter. Battles were about sticking out your chest and, in plain view of the enemy, marching and shooting. (For a good account of this transition, see Linderman's Embattled Courage.)

Three years of the harsh reality of war changed all that, and by the time of the Overland Campaign, troops on both sides were digging in fast and furiously whenever they got the chance. Aside from the Vicksburg and Petersburg campaigns, nowhere was the entrenchment so obvious as in the Overland one. Most Civil War buffs know about the entrenchments at Spotsylvania and Cold Harbor. But many will probably be surprised (as was I) that entrenchments were also dug in The Wilderness and at the Bermuda Hundred.

Hess' account of the evolution of fortifications in this stage of the war is well-written and entirely accessible to the nonspecialist. He tends to protect Grant from the general's worst critics, arguing (much as does James McPherson) that the huge cost of federal lives in the Overland in fact did succeed in strategically defeating Lee.

The photographs are priceless. I've actually never seen most of them before. Moreover, the line drawings of fortifications and entrenchments are brilliant. All in all, highly recommended.

This is the second book in a series on fortifications in the eastern theater during the Civil War. The first book covers the war up to this point, while reading the first book is not required; it is worth taking the time to do so. 1864 produced a major revision in how digging in and fighting behind entrenchments is viewed by both armies. Open field battle gives way to fighting from behind entrenchments as both sides maintain close contact for months. The war is no longer open fields with a mile between the armies. Both sides dug into the earth often closer than skirmish lines were in 1862. The book details this change and the impact on the commanders and men.

The author continues working fortifications into the overall campaign giving the reader an excellent history of the Overland Campaign in the process. This presentation keeps the subject fresh while presenting the nuanced tactical differences in a logical sequential manner. This is very much a battle history but the emphasis is on how fortifications changed the campaign even as the campaign changed fortifications.

Earl Hess is one of our best authors. In this series and this book, he manages to give the reader a rich learning experience coupled with an enjoyable read. This is not a beginner's book but can be enjoyed by anyone with some knowledge of the Civil War.

If your after a book on the Capitol Building, then go no further than this beautifully photographed and well layed out book. Full of rich detail and architectual illustrations.

This building is the perfect imbodiment of the American Democracy, it is an iconic symbol of America the world over. This book does this great building justice, the images are crisp and vivid and the text is almost scholarly. Everytime i enter this building i get a shiver and feel the tingle of goose bumps, and am reminded of what a spectacularly beautiful building it is, and how the building seems to hold the most awesome power. The history in its halls and the majesty of its presence makes the most incredible impression, if you are not moved by this building then frankly you need to check your pulse. If you have any interest in this iconic building or just appreciate beautiful books then i cant imagine you being disappointed in this book.

This is a wonderful book for a number of reasons: its beautiful illustrations, its wealth of detail delivered in a reverent and infectiously enthusiastic narrative, and (most of all) its unabashed defense of classical architecture and passionate call for a return to the style in our great buildings. One has merely to open this book to thank his lucky stars that most of monumental Washington, DC was built before the Marxist-inspired so-called "International Style" and its degenerate stylistic descendants inexplicably washed away centuries (nay, millenia) of Western art tradition. It's appalling to read the sort of vindictives that were hurled against the last exponents of the classical style, men like Bacon, Russel, and Gilbert, by so-called "modernists" when they designed stunning masterpieces like the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, and the Supreme Court Building. And it's galling to see what "modernists" offered the nation as an alternative to classical design: can anyone look at the Museum of American History on the National Mall and not shake his head in sadness? The place looks like an annex to a New Jersey shopping mall.

Reed is a wonderfully able partisan of the classical style, and dismisses so-called "modern" architecture as the "Anorexic" style for its lack of decoration. That may be overly harsh; great architects can indeed produce great buildings even in non-classical styles - the Kennedy Center in Washington is a fine example of non-classical yet non-Anorexic design. But Reed has one undeniably true point: we as a civilization have allowed ourselves to be cheated our of our millenia old Western art tradition by so-called "artists" that have translated their lunatic fringe political views (the International Style was nothing but applied Marxism, designed to reflect the "means of production" to quote standard leftist gibberish) into drab design originally meant for "worker housing" and now applied (ironically) to US government and corporate structures. This "artistic" rabble still to a large degree indulges its proclivities towards lunatic fringe politics, and continues to so savagely attack the classical style (because they in fact hate Western culture and all it stands for) that it has become unthinkable to build a classical structure in the US today. Some are ignorant enough to claim that the classical style makes them "want to throw up," but the best they can come up with is the travesty of soulless design that is present day Houston or any number of Asian cities like Seoul.

The closest we are allowed to claiming our Western heritage anymore is the so-called "Stripped Classical" applied to the new WW2 Memorial in Washington. I suppose we should thank our lucky stars that that we at least got "Stripped Classical" instead of some appalling metal and glass gimmick that - like most "modern" structures - would rapidly deteriorate into a shabby pile of rusty metal, stained concrete, and peeling paint. But like Reed points out, "A building without decoration is like the heavens without stars." Why is "stripped" all we are allowed to enjoy anymore? Because leftist "artists" that can't stand the West, can't stand America, and most of all can't stand the culture from which it sprang browbeat us into standing glumly in "modern" museums looking at unintelligible and ugly "art" (a melting toilet at the Whitney comes to mind) and won't allow us to erect magnificent Corinthian or Ionic columns anymore. Really, it is sad. This magnificent book, at least, shows us what we once had, and what might have been. Let's hope future generations of Western civilization have more courage than we do, and spend their days recovering their own cultural heritage. Perhaps they will once more build for the sake of beauty rather than that of Marxist anti-Western hatred.

Very comprehensive guide for those of us who love to haunt used bookstores in CA (et al). Useful information such as inventory sizes, specialities, phone numbers, special services, and more. Organized by state, city, and also several indices.

An invaluable take-along tote for any who consider a used book store visit an essential part of the trip. Choose the revised, expanded Used Book Lover's Guide To The Pacific Coast States if traveling in California, Oregon, Washington, Alaska or Hawaii: it includes number of volumes, store specialty, and candid comments if the store was visited.

This newly updated and expanded addition of The Used Book Lover's Guide To The Pacific Coast States continues to insure its preeminence as the most comprehensive and important guide to the used bookstores and dealers in California, Oregon, Washington, Alaska, and Hawaii. Featured are 1,500 used book dealers conveniently grouped by location and category; a Specialty Index to help locate dealers specializing in a particular area of interest; easy to follow travel directions for getting where you want to go; twenty-four city, regional and state maps to aid in planning book hunting trips; and practical comments about shops based on the David and Susan Siegal's personal visits. If you are a true bibliophile or antiquarian book dealer traveling the area, don't leave home without your copy of The Used Book Lover's Guide To The Pacific Coast States!