Parties Books

Firstly, I have to declare an interest - my novel, Stag: A Story About Coming of Age--In a Bar, is set on a bachelor weekend and David Boyer used a contribution from me in this book so I'm bound to be a bit biased. That said, it's brilliant. My copy arrived here in London this morning - and I haven't been able to put it down all day! It's funny and full of fascinating insights... some of these tales make the bachelor parties I've attended look positively boring by comparison. This would be a great book to buy a male friend (or a woman who's keen to know what happens when guys get together!)

I was at the bookstore trying to get some ideas about planning a bachelor party for one of my best friends from school, when I came across this hilarious,(and often warmhearted),account.Makes me totally look forward to the party and I got some GREAT ideas.A cool read too.
My wife is going to give it as gifts to some of her friends. She said it was quite the eye opener!

And I thought I had been to some crazy bachelor parties!

Boyer -- a trained journalist -- collects some pretty hair-raising stories here of the age-old tradition of bachelor parties. But this book is more than just a collection of accounts about the funny, surprising, erotic and sometimes embarrassing last-nights of freedom. The author provides both a history the bachelor party ritual (yes, it goes WAY back) and -- more interestingly -- a real behind-the-scenes look at the "industry" itself. The interviews with strippers, dwarves, and adult-entertainment clowns (NOT to be missed!) are pretty interesting and definitely give you a window into the lives of people who, even if you meet them one day, you'd never hear the real stories about.

This would be a great gift for a guy about to take the marriage plunge, or his bride who's wondering what could possibly go on at a bachelor party. Highly Recommended.

In answer to the main review of the book just below the publishing informaton above: In fact, I found this book to be very, very sociological: a good ethnographic method of participating and observing the parties and a good historical method of interviewing participants. That its prose is fun and wry does not lessen its documentary appeal. Why does convoluted language and theoretical name-dropping constitute sociological (or scholarly) all the darn time? Can't sociological, historical, and journalistic writing be fun to read and clearly written?

I love this book. Only problem is it is not a board book so I have to be careful when using it around my one year old. Maybe I missed the information on it being a paperback.

This is a very nice Barney book that demonstrates not only good manners but also cooperation and cleaning up. In the story, Baby Bop is having a pretend birthday party for Mr. Bear. Baby Bop and Barney decide to use the pretend session to practice their manners. They then set up a party table, blow up balloon, get out toy plates, make peanut butter sandwiches, make music, have a puppet show, etc.

Besides practicing say 'please' and 'thank you', Barney shows children that you don't speak with your mouth full, and that after you are done playing that the right thing to do is to clean up. (Go Barney!)

One of things that I wanted to add was that this book is appropriate to use as a beginning reader. My daughter, who is six, reads this as one of her practice books. Since there is no "search inside this book" feature I'll give you the text from the last page so you can judge the reading level for yourself. This is perhaps the most challenging text in the book.

The two friends take turns
washing and drying dishes.
Barney says, "Thank you for inviting
me to your nice party, Baby Bop."
Baby Bop smiles happily.
"You're welcome," she says.

Five Stars. Here's a Barney book that demonstrates the wonder of please and thank you, as well as demonstrates that you don't talk with your mouth full, and that part of manners is also cleaning up after yourself. Good Read-Aloud. Typical and good Barney artwork.

Engaging story line. Lots of good examples of proper please and thank you use. My daughter enjoys it every time.

As always, with all Barney books, we find brillant colorful illustrations in this wonderful book of learning the importance of please and thank you. Mr. Bear is having a make-believe birthday party and Barney is takes us through a lively story using the words,"please" and "thank you," throughout. This is a great teaching help for parents to use to encourage their young ones to have manners. Great storyline! Great illustrations and great educational value.

I thought this book was one of the best I read. You can still be a great friend even if you don't shoplift. I would reccommend it to all ages.

This book is a goood example which shows us that in some cases, friends think that if they stole or did something for you, you must do something in return. Most of these things are rather not good. From my point of view, friends are not worth stealing for. If that's the way you might think, then you are on the wrong side of friendship. think positive and don't let your friend dow. Also, it shows you how to take responsability for your own positive and negative actions and outcomes.

I like this book because it was about peer preasure.The girl in the book is named Claudia.She lives with her to bigger brothers Charlie and Baily.She also lives with her sister and her little brother named Julia and Owen.It is about a girl that gets preasured into shoplifting.She steals a jacket,football,lip gloss,and a Dress.She starts to like it and it gets her in trouble.She steals a ball for her brother and gives it to him. She regrets stealing the ball and tells her brother Bailey and he gets mad at her.Well you really have to read this book so you can found out ALL the details.

Hi I love this book it is the best i read so far. I am planning on getting more party of five claudia books. I let all my friends borrow it and they all loved it. Hope youll like it too!

A delightful story, not only bilingual, but perfect to teach children about Latino culture. A helpful tool for teachers to expand students' knowledge of the traditions of a vast minority in the United States and a way for Hispanic children to be proud of their heritage. The illustrations are also great and the writing style excellent!

The Dynami Duo strikes again! My seven year old boy, eight year-old girl and nieces and nephews have fallen in love with Chavi. The book is bilingual, in Spanish and English, and is set in a Latino Community. The writing is exhuberant and entertaining and the illustrations are vibrant and cartoon-like, something kids love. Our family can't wait till the next Chavi book in the series is out. Kids love this series!

Birthday In The Barrio/Cumpleanos en el Barrio is the collaborative bilingual picturebook by the Cuban/American team of author Mayra L. Dole and art critic/visual illustrator Tonel. Chavi is a young girl who proves that with a little determination and creativity she can do anything. Now she must find a way to throw a birthday party for her friend's sister. Lazarita is turning 15 and wants a special "quinces" party, but her family does not have enough money for such a fancy event. Chavi decides she can help by rallying together her neighborhood friends to donate food and decorations. Before long, the entire Cuban American community of Miami is working together to organize a birthday celebration.

I'm a librarian and read this book for review before its publication date. Chavi and Rosario (Drum, Chavi, Drum!) are back! Rosario's sister, Lazarita, is mad because she can't have a quinces after her Pipo lost his job. But don't think for a moment that Chavi can't mastermind the wildest, most fun quinces street party ever! She enlists the homeless, the mayor, and the entire community. But can she pull it through? How can a little girl possibly throw such a colossal fiesta? Mayra L. Dole's imaginative and exciting prose and Tonel's vivid illustrations make this a delight for readers of all ages. This is a gem of a book.

I got a number of these books for my 4-year old nephew for his birthday, and he has absolutely loved reading them.

I purchased this book for my son (almost 4) and he loves it. He asks me to read this every night and also requested that I prepare the snacks from the book (they're actually healthy snacks and could help to influence picky eaters). This was a very good choice.

My son is 2 1/2 and love Blues Clues, so this book was a win. It is interactive: lifts & flaps, and searches for "blues clues." Very colorful and exciting for a young child.

Blue is having a snack party. All her friends are bringing snacks. We discover what each is by lifting flaps that show the ingredients and recipe with the finished dish underneath. These are healthy snacks made by Steve, Mr. Salt and Mrs. Pepper, Mailbox, Tickety Tock, Shovel & Pail, and Magenta. In the meantime we help Steve solve Blue's Clues to discover what snack Blue will bring. A final picture of everyone with their snacks suggests the upcoming party will be festive indeed.

A nice addition to the Blue's books.

Lenin, after Marx, is the great figure in the pantheon of Communism, and distilled Marx's discoveries about the nature of capitalism and class struggle into concrete revolutionary practice.

This sweeping, authoritative volume gives deep insight into the construction of the Bolshevik party over the two decades leading up to the first World War. Lenin's crucial contributions to the struggle in terms of organization, theory, strategy, and tactics are presented in an accessible and illuminating style. Lenin's insight that a highly organized 'vanguard party' of dedicated professional revolutionaries would be necessary to focus the struggles of the workers sufficiently to overthrow the rulers is presented with great clarity, and the narrative of his tireless efforts to put these insights into practice in struggle is fascinating and instructive.

Highly recommended for those interested in the history of revolution.

This work is a politcal biography, in the sense that the major focus is on Lenin's revolutionary activities - specifically in building and organizing the Bolsheivik party - in the years before the first World War. The beauty of this book is that it exposes the "sacred capitalist myth" that ascribes the Marx-Lenin-Stalin progression as one that arises naturally. In 'Building the Party' we see Lenin not as a rutheless bloodthirsty dictator but rather as a brilliant tactical organizer and one of the foremost intellectual-revolutionaries of the Twentieth Century

This is a great biography on Vladimir Lenin, focusing on his early years. It chronicles Lenin's youth and the history of the early Marxist movement in tsarist Russia. Later chapters focus on his efforts to craft an effective revolutionary party.

This book is chock full of information, but is still very engaging. It is pretty down to earth and doesn't make use of high-falutin language wherever possible. Compare reading this book to the official Stalinist biography of Lenin, or those put forward by right-wing cranks.

Overall, this is a must-read for all activists, especially socialists. I highly recommend this book to people with an interest in politics.

I think this is an amazing book which displays the application of Marxist theory to the real world. In reading, I found it extremely helpful in clearing up the contradictions ahout Lenin I'd held onto for so long. Tony Cliff's analysis, true to Marxist principles, shows how the revolutionary movement was shaped by the struggle. It shows that Lenin's ideas weren't just bright ideas that popped into his head, but the result of a process including open debate and active participation in the struggle. Overall, Tony Cliff gives a positive view of the kind of open, democratic principles which served as the framework for the Russian Revolution and provides a sharp contrast to the distorted picture of an authoritarian and elitist Lenin we're usually shown.

This book is absolutely ESSENTIAL reading for anyone interested in building a revolutionary organization and it provides plenty of hope for those who wish to see a world in which decisions are made based on human need instead of profit.

Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/RIOGBMEF9HCGS Ludwig von Mises' stuff is worth reading twice and this book remains highly pertinent today.

This is a short economic tract from the acclaimed Austrian economist known for his stern defense of free-markets. Mises' sharp verbal logic and analysis of the adverse affect that bureaucracy, socialism, and a bloated public sector has on the economy. This book is a classic. I recommend reading in tandem with his other classics like Human Action, Liberalism in the Classical Tradition, Socialism.

Bureaucracy is the clearest and most concise version of the calculation critique of socialism. This books is vastly easier to read that the original 1920 article on socialist calculation. It is far shorter and more focused than Human Action. It is also much shorter than Socialism, an Economic and Sociological Analysis. Mises managed to achieve brevity without sacrificing much important content. Bureaucracy is probably his best written book.

There are many subtleties to this book, but the main points are straightforward. Mises contrasts profit management with bureaucratic management. To Mises Bureaucratic management is necessary as far as a few basic public services are concerned. However, the adoption of socialism would mean the extension of bureaucratic management to all areas of the economy. The problem with this is that bureaucracies are inflexible. Changing economic conditions require the adaptation of production. Entrepreneurs implement changes in production because they seek profit. Mises explains why bureaucrats would act irresponsibly- they are not checked by profit and loss accounting. Since public services lack a cash value as generated by markets the costs of increasing public services are unknown. Bureacratic managers would thus over expand their operations without realizing it. Such bureaucratic excesses must be limited by restrictive rules. Hence bureaucracies lack the flexibility of entrepreneurial capitalism.

Mises also considers psychological and political issues, but these points are not as well developed as his economic arguments. One could see this as a weakness, but those who want a more complete version of the von Mises critique of socialism can read his 1922 book- Socialism.

Bureaucracy is the shortest and surest path to understanding the merits of free markets and the dangers of socialism. I can think of no other book that contains so many important insights in so few pages. The closest contenders for this honor would be Menger's Principles, Buchanan's Cost and Choice, and Hayek's Road to Serfdom. Fortunately one can find accessibility and genius in some books, and Bureaucracy excels in both of these attributes.

Written by professor former Vienna Chamber of Commerce economist Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973), Bureaucracy is a classic economic treatise, first published in 1944, about how the efficient aspects of private ownership and control of public good production ultimately produces superior results compared to the mishmash of publically administrated plans laced with codes of "officialdom", government incompetence, unforeseen legal wranglings, graft, and other ills. "Bureaucracy in itself is neither good nor bad," Mises states; rather, bureaucracy is a valuable resource for managing certain spheres of human activity, such as policing and courts of law, yet ultimately a failure or even harmful when applied to private enterprise, simply because forced obedience to strict rules hobbles entrepreneurial managers' room to maneuver amid fluctuating market situations, and stifles their innovation in response to evolving consumer wants. "Under socialism... the beginner must please the already settled. They do not like too efficient newcomers. (Neither do old-established entrepreneurs like such men; but, under the supremacy of the consumers, they cannot prevent their competition.) In the bureaucratic machine of socialism the way toward promotion is not achievement but the favor of the superiors... The rising generation is at the mercy of the aged." As timely and insightful now as it was over half a century ago, Bureaucracy is highly recommended especially for college library and economic studies shelves.

My son is 3 and loves the Caillou series on TV. I bought him a few CAillou books recently and this one by far is his favorite. The stickers add fun, the pics are interesting and it's not too long a story. And everyone can relate to birthdays.

It is hard to find a book my son likes. This is one of them. He loves Calliou, and the pictures on this book catch his eyes. Story about CAKE and PRESENT does the trick too. Stickers are plus.

This is a great book for Caillou lovers. My 3yr old son loved reading this story and the stickers were the best part!

I like all the Caillou books. They are wordy but you can skip some of the sentences if your toddler is too young and wants to read more books before bedtime. This is a book you can use for a few years at least.

I loved the cover. How did Mandery draw all of those characters onto the book jacket? Very impressive!

This is not only an interesting, easy to read book, it shows a side of politcal campaigning from an interesting point of view. Mandery is an objective observer with an inside seat. He was part of the campaign, but not part of the culture. That, in my opinion, is to his credit.

The book he has written is rife with funny anecdotes, touching scenes and aggravating politics as usual. Mandery keeps his perspective through the whole mess.

This book is the most insightful book about the nature of the modern campaign I have ever read. As a professional campaigner I know this from first hand experience. Here is a chance for the citizen to peel back the veil and view the inner workings of the campaigns that, in so many ways, choose our officials and shape our nation.

The great thing about the book is that much of it is universally true and important. The issues that Mandery writes about from fundraising, to polling, to the dangers of ethnic politics, to the motivations of the press are as true in the high-flying campaigns of Bill Clinton as they are the failed campaign of Ruth Messinger. The mayoral campaign is, in many ways, simply an entertaining backdrop to a thoughtful guide of the ins and outs of American politics.

That said, the book offers particular insights into the mind of the Mayor who would be Senator. New Yorkers in general and reporters in particular would do well to sit up and take notice before the coming election.

Mandery has a superb lucid writing style. The text brings to bear Mandery's unique perspective combines the laser like analysis of a Harvard lawyer with the ironic sense of humor of one of New York City's hottest amateur stand up comedians.

Mandery brings to life a host of characters that range from the entertaining to the downright bizarre that will keep you turning pages even though we all know how it ends.

In his literary debut Mandery delivers a unique and thoughtful rumination on the machinations of a modern political campaign. With the fresh perspective of a campaign neophyte and his considerable skills of lawyerly analysis, Mandery offers a refreshingly honest chronicling of the 1997 New York mayoral race. Mandery's razor-sharp wit adds zip and readability to a topic lesser authors have consistently made bland.

Mandery asserts that the book is about modern political campaigns in general, and only "incidentally about the 1997 mayoral campaign." Indeed, his position as research director for the Messinger campaign affords the reader a fascinating insider's view of the nuts and bolts of a political campaign at the end of the twentieth century. We are privy to all of the key players, the sometimes-stilted decision-making process, strategy sessions, various private letters between campaigns, focus group sessions, and the research operations. We are even told how much the famous political consultants are paid (it will make you consider a career change!).

At each step of the way Mandery offers his insightful analysis of campaign maneuvers and press coverage. He asks the commonsense questions that any thoughtful outsider might ask. His logic is consistently solid, systematically and lucidly cutting through the muck of political "spin" to reveal the truth of the matter at hand. Though he often wonders aloud whether he can possibly be objective given his position, Mandery scores points for his even-handed critique of both sides.

Perhaps more importantly, and most interestingly, Mandery brings into high relief the cast of characters involved -- the men and women who eat, drink and sleep politics, whose lives move from one campaign to the next. From his boorish campaign manager Jim to colorful rival Sharpton and hilarious longshot Menendez, Mandery describes real characters to rival any of fiction's most entertaining. As Mandery himself might agree, 'you can't make this stuff up.'

This book is specifically for Australians but most of the info is applicable for Americans as well. I ordered the book mainly for ideas when writing my wedding vows. The first half of the book is all about weddings, vows, wedding ceremonies etc. It provides many examples of wedding vows and readings (for bride & groom, officiant, bridal party etc.). There is a mix of more contemporary vows and readings along with some more traditional ideas as well. I am still in the process of writing my vows. I am confident that I will find everything I need for my vows in this book.

As an Australian Civil Celebrant I have found this book a most valuable resource in my work and a marvellous tool for anyone wanting to create their own ceremony, whether it be a marriage ceremony, a namegiving ceremony, a funeral ceremony or any one of the many other transition ceremonies that are becoming popular and a part of people's lives in today's society. The book provides many ideas and guidelines on how to create a ceremony with easy-to-read sample ceremonies. It has a wonderful selection of some of the most appropriate poetry and music so essential to a ceremony. For marriage ceremonies - many sample vows, words to say while exchanging rings etc., and for other ceremonies, some very creative ideas. I recommend this book to professional celebrants and their clients alike, and to anyone wanting to create the most wonderful and meaningful ceremony of their lives. Kathy Hurley, Civil Celebrant, Australia kathyh@netspace.net.au

As an Australian Civil Celebrant I have found this book a most valuable resource in my work and a marvellous tool for anyone wanting to create their own ceremony, whether it be a marriage ceremony, a namegiving ceremony, a funeral ceremony or any one of the many other transition ceremonies that are becoming popular and a part of people's lives in today's society. The book provides many ideas and guidelines on how to create a ceremony with easy-to-read sample ceremonies. It has a wonderful selection of some of the most appropriate poetry and music so essential to a ceremony. For marriage ceremonies - many sample vows, words to say while exchanging rings etc., and for other ceremonies, some very creative ideas. I recommend this book to professional celebrants and their clients alike, and to anyone wanting to create the most wonderful and meaningful ceremony of their lives. Kathy Hurley, Civil Celebrant, Australia kathyh@netspace.net.au

If you're planning a wedding, this book is the one stop shop for wedding vows! My husband and I were recently married and wanted vows which were different from the stock standard ceremony. Dally's book offers so many alternatives and suggestions that it is almost impossible not to find something to suit. Not only does this book offer vows and readings, it gives you the courage to write your own words. There really is no substitute for Ceremonies and Celebrations for couples planning to have alternative wedding vows.

Good Luck with the Wedding!