Washington Books

Book arrived much more quickly than I expected...especially it being over the holidays. Great information. A lot of recognizable wineries, close too! Good purchase.

Elisabeth Frater's lovely travel guide is great for both residents and visitors. I have lived in Northern Virginia for 13 years and don't even drink alcohol, but I found this book to be useful. Frater gives clear, concise information, but also offers opinions. You hear the facts about each winery, but you also here the stories behind each one.

I have enjoyed living in this area much more after using Frater's book to plan weekend trips. Her book was invaluable when family came to visit recently.

Comprehensive review of the wineries in Virginia and Maryland. Describes how each of the wineries got started and a bit about the owners, growers, and/or winemakers. Also offers a brief summary of the wines produced. Includes sidebar-type sections on such topics as individual varietals, wine festivals, and competitions.

A wonderful resource if you like weekend getaways, beautiful farms, and, of course, sipping wine! Indispensable for budding regional wine connoisseurs and casual travelers alike.

Butterflies through Binoculars: A Field, Finding, and Gardening Guide to Butterflies in Florida (Butterflies and Others Through Binoculars Field Guide Series,) This is an excellent reference book for butterfly lovers in the State of Florida. I take it with me on my butterfly field trips and when I sit in my yard to observe them. The book has excellent photos, detailed information for each species, and the habitat locations. It's an easy book to carry and pack.

This is one of the best presented field guides I have ever seen. Each and every species of Florida butterfly is pictured and described. Most butterfly guides I've seen use pictures of preserved specimens in a collection. This can be confusing because parts of the wings normally hidden are exposed when the collected specimen is mounted. This book avoids this problem by using only pictures taken in the wild (except for a few rare species). No more unnatural poses!

The text is easily readable without extensive knowledge of obscure scientific words and has enough humor to keep it from getting dry and technical, but not so much that it overpowers the book.

This book deserves a place on the bookshelf of anyone interested in Florida butterflies.

If you are looking for a filed guide to the butterflies of the northeastern United States, this is THE book to get. Written for a relatively small geographical area, the book contains only those butterflies likely to be seen in the regioon...unlike other guidebooks which offer many photos of butterflies not native to the regioon you are in. Excellent photos and the reduced subject area result in quick identifications. Although written for the northeast, the book is useful over a wider range...I have even used it in Texas to great effect. Don't put too much stock in the information about flight period and abundance, though. And don't expect much info on larval hostplants, etc

This book is packed with information that will help you if you've never bought a home, or have done so a dozen or more times. Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, should read Chapter 3 on selecting an Agent... If you are buying, selling, thinking of a career in Real Estate, or are already an Agent!

We have read both of Dave's books and he is certainly knowledgable in real estate. Dave also has helped us in the buying process, and all has run smoothly. We consider Dave a professional in all aspects of real estate. The book is filled with data that we did not truly know about concerning the market.

For many people like me, the home buying process is alien, confusing, and full of pitfalls. What I needed was a guide to help me quickly and effectively understand the entire process, along with the plethora of associated considerations.

David Rathgeber's home buying book gave me almost everything I needed to quickly make sense of the home buying process. He introduced me to all the major issues and considerations that I was about to face. Not only did he clearly address the most pertinent issues, but he also concisely provided abundant advice on each aspect of home buying, to include difficult issues such as understanding the emotional and psychological aspects that both the buyer and seller face. In this book, David even helps the reader understand how to get the appropriate professional help at the right time. This is done in a constructive manner that demonstrates to the reader that he is only one part of a team that is focused on making the home buying process successful.

Along with David's personal help in purchasing a home, this book provides almost everything that a home buyer needs, especially if the buyer is completely new to the home buying process. It is actually quite comforting to read this book in that David teaches the home buyer how to develop a healthy respect for all the participants no matter what their role may be. Toward this end, David articulates the human aspect of a stressful process that often can appear to be impersonal.

a great example of a leader in many respects. mostly self-educated, g.w. was wise in so many ways. i am amazed at his character and have enjoyed sharing these with my family. what i like about this book compared to others with similiar info is that the author puts the manners into modern day use, although they are first presented in the old english style which is good for the kids to see and hear. a definite library must!

By George! is a delightful and insightful compilation of George Washington's rules of civility, written when he was only 14 years old. The author does an outstanding job of adapting these basic rules of good conduct, written in the 1740's, to current society. These rules, illustrated by timely stories of people doing the right thing, not only help us understand the high standards George Washington expected of himself and others, they are a timeless treasure trove. In a world torn apart by violence and hatred, this little book teaches us that a little civility can make a big difference in our lives. I highly recommend By George! by Steven M. Selzer.

I was most impressed by the tone of the book. I expected a "stuffy" list of do's and don'ts only to find each of George Washington's rules of civility applied to today's social and business situations with great insight and a touch of humor. I was amazed to learn that the civil behavior we learned from our parents and teachers is based on the same rules of civility that George Washington lived by 250 years ago. Some things are truly timeless. We could all use a refresher course. I highly recommend By George!

This isn't actually a review - I'm a bit biased, being the author of this book. I want to share the exciting news that BY THE SWORD is on the International Reading Association (IRA) Children's and Young Adults' Book Award 2008 Notable Books List in the Intermediate/Non-Fiction category. BY THE SWORD is 1 of 3 in this category.

I hope you enjoy my book, in which I aim to add a human face to history.

BY THE SWORD is a touching Revolutionary War story told from a unique perspective. A young teacher, just twenty-two years old, is moved to enlist in George Washington's army. Neither he nor his beloved horse, Highlander, is prepared for battle. As Selene Castrovilla begins her story, "Benjamin Tallmadge had never killed before." When he fires his musket for the first time, he takes off, "not looking to see if he'd hit anyone." Young readers will identify with his reluctance.
The Battle of Long Island unfolds with breathtaking intimacy. We are close to the man and his horse as they weather a British assault, the lack of sleep, poor food, drenching rains, contradictory orders, and their own fears, in order to help save Washington's army from annihilation. Selene Castrovilla's prose evokes the anxiety of war with painterly details, but without drenching young readers in the carnage.
When Benjamin, in the heat of retreat, forgets Highlander, he receives permission to go back, by boat, to retrieve him. So this story is also about a brave young man who risks his life to save his beloved horse. As cannonballs from the fierce, advancing Hessians (mercenaries on the British side) narrowly miss Benjamin's retreating boat with Highlander safe on board, readers of all ages will be cheering.
Bill Farnsworth's expressive oil paintings on canvas enhance the text, from the flash of musket fire to the thick blanket of fog that kept the British fleet idling long enough for Washington's army to escape. Detailed endpaper maps enable readers to follow the troops. The author's research notes, timeline, suggested places to visit, and detailed bibliography of sources makes this an absolute must-have book for all teachers and students of history, for anyone interested in the birth of the United States of America. .

Do you want your kids to actually read a book, enjoy it and learn something too? Well, this is the book for them. It's a good read, action packed, interesting and surprise, surprise ... you learn some local history. Selene Castrovilla sucks you into Benjamin Tallmadge's world even if history is not your thing. Coupled with wonderful illustrations by William Farnsworth this book is a must have.

In Soldier's Home, Hemingway's fictional account of a soldier returning from the Great War, the protagonist struggles to communicate his experience to the residents of his small town:

"At first Krebs, who had been at Belleau Wood, Soissons, the Champagne, St. Mihiel and in the Argonne did not want to talk about the war at all. Later he felt the need to talk but no one wanted to hear about it. His town had heard too many atrocity stories to be thrilled by actualities."

Captured Honor, a work of non-fiction, begins in similarly painful territory, with a moving description of Jack Elkins' homecoming after service in the War in the Pacific. Elkins had an extremely bad war as a prisoner of the Japanese in the Philippines and Japan, the details of which are frankly told in author Wodnik's compelling account. At war's end, Elkins finds himself pushed to the microphone on the stage of his small town church before an audience that includes his grammar school principal, old girlfriends, the hardware store clerk and his parents, among others. Their eyes search him for clues as to whether he remains the high school quarterback they remember, or has instead been transformed into "some sanitarium freak returned home to mom and dad."

Like Krebs, Elkins finds words inadequate to describe the enormity of his wartime experience. "You either tell all, or tell nothing" he thinks, and elects to keep the awful details to himself for more than 50 years.

Fortunately for us author Wodnik, a good listener and a fine writer, is able to engage Elkins and others who suffered as prisoners of the Japanese in their painful memories. Elkins, who fought bravely at Corregidor, survived the brutal Cabanatuan POW camp, and ended the war as a slave laborer working in the Mitsubishi shipyard in Yokohama, is a compelling subject, an ordinary man enduring extraordinary brutality in wartime. The book includes stirring memories of others including Fran Agnes, an apple picker turned Army aircraft mechanic who witnessed the Japanese destruction of Clark Field and survived the Bataan Death March and Henry Chamberlin, a medic, who is dispatched by his captors to Japan on a Hellship in conditions of unspeakable squalor.

Wodnik's important history is interspersed with scenes from the home front in Everett Washington, such as Veronica Lake flying in to sell war bonds to the star-struck citizenry. The correspondence of Ed Fox, an Everett hotel clerk and book fiend whose deepest influence seems to have been Dashiell Hammett, shows us the underside of a town emerging from the Depression, and fully engaged in wartime production of Boeing aircraft.

Captured Honor is a beautifully written book that presents with unsentimental empathy the stories of nine Americans who fought on Bataan and Corregidor. It juxtaposes these stories with an account of what was happening on the home scene -- specifically, in Everett, Washington, a town busy with war work -- as recorded in the diaries of a bookish hotel clerk. The juxtaposition works; it offers relief, and with these stories, I needed it.

Recently I learned much about the POW experience on the Bataan death march, on the "hell ships" and in the camps in the Philippines and Japan when I found a privately published 1959 novel written by a survivor. To me the other book was fantastical, so hard to believe that I started reading other veterans' narratives in an effort to make sense of it. Now Wodnik's nonfiction account has confirmed just about everything in it.

I think Captured Honor is an essential contribution to the history of the Pacific war -- and that Wodnik must be a gifted interviewer; these are often horrific, unglamorous memories that might have remained unrecorded. Time is running out for gathering these kinds of oral histories. But as hard as it is to read them, I am grateful for this book.

For anyone who is interested in the accounts of these brave men, this author has the ability to translate their memories into a fasinating and heartfelt read.

He put's you as much as is possible "at Corregidor, Bataan, and the infamous Zero Ward at Cabanatuan with Henry Chamberlain. Jack, Galen, Hanson, Johannsen,,, hero's all. It is to men like these we truly owe our right to walk in Freedom.

The book also gives you an account of what is happening at home which is an important part of the telling of the whole story. The auhor's command of the descriptive phrase makes people like Gracie, and Ed come alive. "the window in the room must have looked out onto a sky hanging so low in winter it seemed to scrape bricks from the faces of Seattle's tallest buildings".

Captured Honor .. thank you for capturing the memories for us before they were lost and faded...

If this book is all that Alan Sandage did for astronomy it would still be an enormous contribution. It provides semi-technical survey of all the work and people at the Mt. Wilson observatory up to early 1950's. Sandage does not merely list papers and projects and reproduces somebody else's opinion on them, he provides his own excellent authoritative analysis and summaries. As a scientist, he is known for strong opinions, but such personal angles can either be easily spotted or are largely smoothed by the perspective of a lifetime experience. The book is a work of love, actually worship. Anyone interested in MWO, or history of solar physics, stellar physics, or observational cosmology will benefit from this book.

I received my copy of this book in fine condition and very promptly. The price of $80 is in line with what everyone selling this book is asking. The price is a bit high but that is true with any book of limited release. The book itself has a few very minor errors. This is the best history of the Mount Wilson Observatory which I have every seen. The only way to get a more comprehensive history is to have access to the Observatorys libary. Then you would have to spend years reading thru hundreds of volumns of techincal work for the same information.

The first half of the 20th century was a golden age at the Mount Wilson Observatory. It was there that many of the most important steps in riddling out the secrets of stellar evolution and the expansion of the universe were made. Allan Sandage's delightful history recounts both the scientific advances made at the observatory, and tells the reader something of the brilliant but often eccentric people behind those discoveries. The author does have a distinct point of view -- he is a champion of the role of this observatory in the progress of astronomy -- but that brings a unity to the story. Some minor errors and typos have slipped through the editing, but overall this is a wonderful book. It is, however, a book that will be of most interest to readers who are already familiar with topics such as spectral classification and the Hubble Law.

This is an articulate and visually stunning book on Chinese Opera. Better pictorial research on the costumes, make-up and architype body poses is not available in English speaking countries. This is a must have research book for those in film and theatre.

If you're looking for a gorgeous book on the fascinating world of chinese opera, this is it. Has quite a good text featuring stories of the more popular operas. Furthermore, discusses regional variations, history and development and modern developments in the art.

This is an extraordinary book filled with pictures and information about every facet of Chinese Opera. It not only describes the operas and the regions from whence they originated, but also provides details such as the musical instruments used, and descriptions of the various the role types. Everything is illustrated, with color pictures on almost every page. The book certainly exceeded my expectations.

Ever wish you had a book that had certain qualities, and then find one that just meets your needs?

If you are interested in gardens around Washington DC, this is the guide book!
I have quite a bit of free time this spring and wanted to plan several garden visits, but couldn't find anything other than detailed histories of some of the major gardens in the area. In a stroke of luck, I checked out from the library and liked it so much I had to buy a copy.

It's a wonderfully detailed, yet readable description of each of the gardens with lots of nice historical detail without getting bogged down. I am very familiar with oneof the gardens and found the description to be very good.
It is aimed at the gardener, with descriptions of plants.

A real joy for the gardener looking to explore the gardens of Washington, DC.

Judy Karpinski's photos and Karen Thompson's illustrations enhance Barbara Seeber's A City Of Gardens, an impressively informative surveying of public gardens in and around Washington D.C. Any who live on the East Coast will find City Of Gardens to be an excellent destination-oriented guide which invites gardeners and tourists to enjoy the city's garden wonders. Notes on rare plants, old trees, and more pinpoint what makes each destination special.

I left D.C. over five years ago for Southwest Louisiana. Ms. Seeber's wonderful book "A City Of Garden's" allows me the priveldge to re-visit some of the most wonderful public gardens in D.C., such as Dumbarton Oaks and The Bishop's Garden at The National Cathedral, via a book. And, introduced me to a garden I have missed: "The Old Stone House," which Ms. Seeber astutley points out, "you could walk by and miss." For anyone interested in discovering the real splendors of the D.C. (and vicinity), the public gardens, there is only one source: "A City Of Gardens." Kudos, Ms, Seeber. This is a walk through my past, and a treasure of the utmost to anyone seeking the original and finest destinations in the Washington, D.C. metro area.: the glorious public gardens in and around our Nation's Capital, as the cover rightfully conveys.

Latino Voices in the Pacific Northwest is a collection of immigrant stories written as loosely translated spoken monologues, each written from the perspective of recent Spanish-speaking immigrants to the Pacific Northwest, with stories based in the healthcare setting, as well as at work and at home. The book speaks to the experiences of many immigrants and travelers across cultural boundaries. After reading this book time and time again, I still find myself laughing aloud or holding back the tears as different stories move me, which is especially impressive and touching as I wrote the book myself.

Wonderful book, reading it has been "deja vu" page after page. In my opinion, this book should be mandatory for all of those who work with the hispanic community in the medical as well as the legal arena in the United States. Like the author said: it makes you laugh out loud on one page, and moves you to tears the next. I'm seriously thinking on buying at least ten books just to have my community clinic co-workers read it!

A wonderful book. Sensitive and though-provoking. I look forward to more by this talented author!