Scouting Books

I had thought this book would be great for my scouting son, but was disappointed in its content. It has some funny anecdotes, but not as much nor as amusing as what you can read in any Scouting magazine.

I found no humor what so ever in this book. Erroneous Scouting information. Poorly concieved, poorly written and poorly laid out. 50 pages of nothing for $7.95. Somebody thought he had a good idea and should have kept the thought to himself. Would not even make a good campfire starter. Save your money.

OK - I like the Three Stooges and any move scene with a good fart makes me laugh and this book falls into that genre. It's not meant to be a "serious" book about scouting (at least I don't think it's supposed to), but the little glimpses of scouting and the skits written around them are actually written quite masterfully and definitely in my opinion would deserve a scouting patch. For those who don't necessarily like childish type humor, then you probably need to look elsewhere. But if you're sitting on the can and need a good laugh to get things a goin' then this here is the book you want. :>)

Madcap Scout Tales is a fun book, especially the ads in the back. The book is colorful, cleverly put together and a quick read. The author is an Eagle Scout himself, yet has enough of a sense of humor to see the lighter side of scouting.

As a Woodbadge trained adult leader, I have to say I am completely dismayed by this book. There are enough real-life events on any given Scouting event to twice as many pages with humourous anecdotes. This book contained little more than humorless stories with even worse punch lines. Seriously-- a story about a kid getting carsick all the time culminating in a punchline where he took medicine for it may be funny to a first grader with a poor sense of humor, but hardly worth the effort to read the page where the story appeared. The only things remotely funny in this slim overpriced pamphlet were the fake ads in the back of the book--and they weren't all that funny.. I recommend that everyone save their money and avoid this rubbish.

The last book James Fenimore Cooper wrote about Nathaniel 'Natty' Bumppo (Hawkeye) and the Mohican chief Chingachgook is the first from a chronological standpoint. 'The Deerslayer' is a fontier adventure set in New York state in the decades before the Revolutionary War.

Overall it is a good read, though Cooper's dialogue can get very repetitive. I often found this frustrating but, on the other hand, I could certainly believe these young, rustic characters would converse the way Cooper presents.

Cooper is a good enough writer to comfortably show his characters limitations. For example, in one scene Hawkeye worries that an ornate chesspiece is an idol and runs on about the evils of idolatry while a more sophisticated character is amused at his simplicity. Elsewhere, one of the female characters lectures Chingachgook about his wife in a way that is pretty condescending. Such well-intended misfires were probably common on the frontier, and I found them to be good characterization even though these scenes weren't really relevant to the plot.

Charm or no charm, it's impossible to read Cooper without noting that his plots are often glacial in their pacing. Frankly, this will be a deal-killer for many modern readers. However, I prefer to accept the slower pacing in this book. This was frontier America in the 1700s, not downtown New York City in 2008. Things and people would have moved at a slower pace. For me, the pacing is an element of the setting and characters. It's certainly true that when the action does kick in Cooper's writing becomes surprisingly tight. Inconsistent pacing or integrity of vision? You be the judge.

Cooper's main flaw that cannot be debated about or excused is his habit of painting 'tableaux' scenes that make you want to toss your lunch. He has a dreadful tendency to insert sour notes of Victorian sentamentality, which are as dissonant in his rustic tale as as a loud fart during a violin solo.

Bottom line, I enjoyed 'The Deerslayer' although, admittedly, I adapted myself to Cooper's pacing and intentions. I also believe that, if you read the novels in their actual written order, 'The Deerslayer' will be a very touching coda because it provides some interesting back story: the origin of Killdeer, Uncas' mother, and there's even a tantalizing hint about how Natty came to be among the Delawares. Cooper does a fantastic job of 'ending with the beginning.'

At the end of the day, the Leatherstocking Tales stand alone in their depiction of frontier life. Though Cooper wrote decades after the foundation of America, he gives me the feel of the colonial frontier and our American heritage like no other author I can think of. For this reason, his works are an American treasure.

Kent Rasmussen's editorial review is best left to the literists who cannot publish or write themselves. This was a wonderful tale full of adventure and is highly recommended to be read with the complete 5-book set of the Leatherstocking Tales. Enjoy.

James Fenimore Cooper wrote his Leatherstocking tales out of chronological order. The Deerslayer or The First Warpath was the last of the Natty Bumppo novels and because Cooper had matured both in age and artistic ability it is perhaps the best.

From the beginning we know this is a darker novel than the preceding tales. In the first few pages Deerslayer's companion, Hurry Harry, asks the young man, "...Did you ever hit any thing human, or intelligible: did you ever pull trigger on an inimy that was capable of pulling one upon you?"

Bumppo's answer is, of course, no. He is at the beginning of his career. He is known as Deerslayer by the Delawares because that's what he does. He has yet to take a human life. As soon as we read this we know this novel, above all else, is a coming-of-age story and someone's life is ticking away....

In the interim Deerslayer meets Tom Hutter and his two daughters, the dark-haired Judith and the feeble-minded Hetty. The family lives on a castle-on-piers in the middle of Lake Glimmerglass, a secluded spot akin to the Garden of Eden -- the perfect setting for a coming-of-age story. Except things are not what they seem. This area is actually more of a haunt of savagery, with not a little of it supplied by both Hurry Harry and Tom Hutter against the local Native American tribe, the Hurons.

Judith Hutter, however, is the engine that drives this story. She's a woman with questionable morals, and though she's somewhat older than Deerslayer she falls in love with his open honesty and his natural way of looking at the world. In a telling exchange she asks him if he has a sweetheart. He answers:

"She's in the forest, Judith--hanging from the boughs of the trees, in a soft rain--in the dew on the open grass--the clouds that float about in the blue heavens--the birds that sing in the woods--the sweet springs where I slake my thirst...."

Judith perseveres. Has he never heard the laugh of a girl he loves? Deerslayer remains true to form:

"...To me there's no music so sweet as the sighing of the wind in the treetops, and the rippling of a stream from a full, sparkling, natyve fountain of fresh water, unless...it be the open mouth of a sartain hound, when I'm on the track of a fat buck."

In the pages that follow Deerslayer kills a man, a Native American attempting to take his life by deceit. He earns the reputation as "Hawkeye" for his deft shooting and helps Chingachgook secure the safety of his future wife, Hist. (She will be mother to the Last of the Mohicans, Uncas.) Further violence and treachery abound as Deerslayer is captured by the Hurons and tortured. Tom Hutter dies in an extremely gruesome manner and there's the mystery of Judith's past --even down to her parentage-- to be solved. But her love for Deerslayer is true and in the end she gives him her father's gun, a weapon of exquisite manufacture and excellent bore, which he will make famous--the long rifle, Killdeer.

In the end Deerslayer leaves Judith after yet more tragedy ensues. The novel ends fifteen years later with Hawkeye returning with Chingachgook and a stripling Uncas to Lake Glimmerglass. Everything has changed. The castle is abandoned and in disrepair, and the graves can no longer be found. Hawkeye tries to find out what happened to Judith, and we are awarded a glimpse of her fate, but no more.

As I said earlier this is a fairly dark book in the Leatherstocking Tales, but well-written. It's a good story and the characters really do come to life. There are the usual elements of humor and long-winded conversations but they don't detract too much from the overall enjoyment of this tale. Cooper also doesn't hold back in showing that violence, both necessary and ignoble, can come from anyone for any reason...at anytime.

This is one great book and I highly recommend it.

"The Deerslayer" is the sequentially first in the Leatherstocking series of America's first, great, professional novelist, James Fenimore Cooper. I read it in preparation for a trip to Cooperstown, New York and I am glad that I did. Set in upstate New York in the 1740s, it provides the reader with an idolized introduction to the society of white and red of this colonial frontier.

The criticisms that the dialogue and actions are totally unbelievable, while justified, do not detract from the story. While the simple, faith-filled actions of the "Feeble Minded Hetty" and the dialogue between Deerslayer and Chingachgook seem highly improbable, the do hold the readers' interest. While I am generally not one to pick up readily on character development, this novel is an exception. The contrast between Deerslayer and Chingachgook, the romance between Chingachgook and Wah-ta-Wah, the romantic web among Judith, Hurry Harry and Deerslayer, and the varying responses to changes in circumstance coming from sisters Judith and Hetty all contribute to the persistent popularity of this work.

Despite all the criticisms directed against Cooper as to form, the one thing that cannot be denied is that this book is very difficult to put down. I found myself always wondering what would come next and what would happen to the characters whom I had come to know. Whether you are looking for an insight into early American literature or just a good story, your search should lead to "The Deerslayer".

Race relations, environmental concerns, independent womanhood, the importance of personal character, survivalism, heroism, religion, cultural relativism, nature v. nurture, independence v. inter-dependency--sound like the latest hot topics in American TV, movies, and magazines? Actually, these constitute the bevy of themes that James Fenimore Cooper explored as foundational to the American experience when he wrote *Deerslayer* in 1841, setting it even farther back at the time of the French and Indian War, 1754-63. Some readers, not surprisingly, are put off by the ornate writing style of the early nineteenth century, but it doesn't hurt us post-moderns to turn off the TV and take a slower pace, interacting slowly with the writer and his thoughts. In Natty Bumppo, we find the first--and definitive--delineation of the American hero: selfless, dependable, restrained, tolerant, cagey, and moral. A generation raised on anti-heroes sometimes has a bit of a problem with the morality of Bumppo, but since 9/11, we have seen a revival of the American ideal that Cooper first defined in his Leatherstocking Tales. Don't give up on this one because of the language. Sit a bit and mull it over. You'll find Cooper will deliver remarkably well.

I bought this book for my husband and he loves this one also. He can't believe some of the attacks on the boy scouts. He is only half way through and he loves it. Some people just need to get a life and leave the Boy Scouts alone. Just a thought: This is the only guidance that some of these boys get, being raised by a single parent or grandparents. The Boy Scouts ROCK!!

Every scouter should read this book.If we don't speak out for what's right. We will have no scouting or any youth program . Loose the youth,we loose the country.

Lt. Col. Oliver North's foreword to Zeiger's book says the Boy Scouts have come under fire for promoting "what many of us euphemistically call traditional values." (p.vii).

Euphemistically???

North's choice of words inadvertently reveals what he and other "social conservatives" obviously know in their hearts -- that the Boy Scouts of America's current campaign against gay youth and religious liberals is grounded in something other than America's proudest traditions and values. Hans Zeiger removes any doubt, by launching a spiteful attack not just on religious liberals, but on the American mainstream's respect for religious pluralism and the rights of minorities.

Zeiger denounces as "superficial" the values "espoused from the mainstream pulpits," for example, charging that "Christian churches are largely to blame" for destroying "manly virtue" with a "gutless ecumenism." (pp. 40, 56). Zeiger apparently prefers sectarian strife to the loving acceptance of our neighbors that Jesus preached.

Zeiger lauds the BSA's adoption of policies hostile to the values of religious liberals in particular. "At the beginning of American Scouting," Zeiger acknowledges, "progressive Social Gospel churches were among the biggest supporters of the movement." (p. 147). Zeiger oozes contempt for what he calls the "sissified, watered-down Social Gospel" of churches that originally fostered Scouting. (p. 147).

As it happens, the BSA was launched from the White House in 1911 by President William Howard Taft. A dedicated Unitarian, Taft served both as president of the General Conference of Unitarian and other Christian Churches until it was absorbed by the American Unitarian Association, and also as president of the International Congress of Religious Liberals. The BSA's official history explains that "[t]he national character of the Boy Scouts of America was strikingly brought before the people of the country, in the very beginning, by holding the first annual meeting in the White House, on February 14 and 15, 1911, at the invitation of President Taft, Honorary President of the Boy Scouts of America." (William D. Murray, The History of the Boy Scouts of America p.309 (1937)).

President Taft might be surprised to learn that by 1992, the youth organization that he helped launch had banned his own denomination from its Religious Relationships Committee. In 1998 the BSA threw Taft's denomination out of its Religious Awards Program. The BSA, writes Zeiger, "was forced to drop the Unitarian Universalist religious patch from its program." (p. 151).

The denomination's offense? Teaching its children that discrimination is wrong.

Taft's denomination, it should be noted, includes many of America's most celebrated churches: The church of the Mayflower Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620, the churches that John Winthrop's Puritans founded for their shining "city on a hill," the Philadelphia church that the Rev. Dr. Joseph Priestley helped organize after fleeing persecution in England, the church of John and Abigail Adams, where the second President and his wife are buried, and the church that their son, our sixth President, John Quincy Adams organized so that Unitarians could have a place to worship in Washington, D.C.

The BSA is so fundamentally hostile to these churches that it will not allow their children to participate in Scouting on an equal footing with children of other faiths. They are not permitted to earn or wear their denomination's religious award, or to have their denomination represented on the BSA's Religious Relationships Committee. And those who refuse to subscribe to the BSA's "Declaration of Religious Principles," which labels nonbelievers as not "the best kind of citizen," are excluded from Scouting altogether.

The BSA's discriminatory policies are similarly hostile to the values of mainstream Judaism - - so hostile that in January 2001 Reform Judaism, the largest movement in American Judaism, had to sever sever longstanding ties with the BSA. Reform Judaism's national leadership called upon synagogues to stop sponsoring Scout troops, and urged Jewish parents to withdraw their children from Scouting.

Many Jews, both Reform and others, felt compelled to leave Scouting. Steven Spielberg, who was not just an Eagle Scout but a "Distinguished Eagle," resigned from the BSA's Board of Advisers in 2001 - - so "deeply saddened" to see the BSA "publicly participating in discrimination" that he could no longer serve the organization. (p.10).

Zeiger's response: "If a Scout declares himself incapable or unwilling to do his best to do his duty, he is no more a Scout than a rat is an eagle." (p.10). That Zeiger himself may have Jewish grandparents cannot excuse such offensive rhetoric.

Not content to defend the BSA's discrimination, Zeiger feels compelled to denounce any organization that will not similarly shun homosexuals and exclude religious liberals. Zeiger calls Big Brothers Big Sisters, for example, "the vehicle for the destruction of thousands of young lives." (p. 81). The Girl Scouts of America, Zeiger insists, "have thoroughly accommodated themselves to political correctness in order to suit the tastes of radical feminists." (p.155). As a consequence, writes Zeiger, "[t]he Girl Scouts have become a more accurate reflection of modern culture than the Boy Scouts." (p. 157).

And that is Zeiger's problem - - he detests American culture, and the value it has traditionally placed on democratic pluralism. His cause is a "culture war, of which the Boy Scouts is perhaps the most salient symbol," using children to battle against mainstream American values. (p. 173).

Zeiger's book demonstrates just how far the organization has strayed from its original mission and values.

Eric Alan Isaacson

[For those who may be interested, my full-length review essay on Zeiger's book has been published in volume 5, number 3 of the Pierce Law Review, as "Assaulting America's Mainstream Values: Hans Zeiger's Get Off My Honor: The Assault on the Boy Scouts of America," 5 Pierce L. Rev. 433 (April 2007). It is archived on the Pierce Law Review's web site, and can be found with a little Googling. My study documenting the BSA's systematic discrimination against Unitarian Universalists has been published in volume 17 of the George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal.]

The scouts need to be freed from idealogical idiots like the one who wrote this book.

When I first heard about this book, I knew it had an important message, but I never expected to have to quell the urge to highlight or underline nearly every sentence in the book.

This book succinctly summarized numerous ails of our society, and explains not only the root of the problem, but the solutions for fixing the problems that threaten our youth, our nation, and our very way of life.

Scouting is not about bigotry, or discrimination. (A scout is a friend to all) It is about internalizing a moral code that makes boys into men. Not herculean, testosterone-crazed, muscle-bound, abusive men, but men with values, morals, and character worthy of admiration and leadership.

Many of the worlds leaders would do well to implement even a small portion of these ideals into their own life.

If the Boy Scouts ever fall, it will be yet another signal of the irreparable damage done by the "liberal left's" policies of appeasement and persistent alleviation of responsibility and accountability for one's own actions.

Leaders, Teachers, Parents, and young men around the globe would do well to read and internalize the instruction contained in this book.

it was a rather hard read and need more details, but a OK read on Jim Bridger. Would like to have detais on Morman fights ect.

So far so good. The book tells the life story of Bridger, which is what I wanted to see.

I'd like to give the book another star, but just don't think I can. I found it an interesting and well researched description of Bridger's life. It has both an excellent index and references. The author gave a fair and balanced assessment of Bridger. It appears that some previous books on him might have been unfair or too praiseworthy about his life. Somehow the descriptions lacked a little spark, although there are a number of vivid passages. Perhaps this has to do with the fact the book was written 100 years after Bridger's death. In fact, this book is now 30 years old, and I believe the author wrote his first book on similar topics back in the 30s. Nevertheless, it's a good and complete description of Bridger's life.

One of the sadder aspects of the story is near the ending when the author reveals that during the last 10-15 years of Bridger's life no writer took the opportunity to interview Bridger. He was in his sixties and seventies, I believe, but was a rather ignored individual, except by his family. He had an exceptionally good memory. Someone missed the opportunity to get more of his rather amazing life straight from the source. The 2-3 page description of his last years, and his desire to keep moving summarize his deep need for adventure and discovery.

He was apparently quite a wit and teller of tall tales. Only four of five of his short tales are found in the book. Interestingly, he told many of his stories in sign languages to the indians.

The book contains on chapter of the famous Hugh Glass incident. It's worth reading if you have not heard it. The story was incorporated into a movie, A Man Called Horse , starring Richard Harris, in a slightly different form. I also found the long passage on "medicine wolves" quite intriguing.

I think this book might disspell a notion that the indian's scalping and body mutiliations of their enemies was derived from copying Europeans might be false. I read such an explanation in another book written at about the same time as this one. However, here we find repeated references to such carnage. In fact, it seems this savagery also been deeply engrained into the mountain men and other early frontiersmen. I suspect such carnages placed on one's enemies has deep roots in all of human history.

I just finish reading this book. I thought it was very excellent and intriguing about Jim Bridger. A man, who took no pleasure in killing, following the number one rule, "Survival of the Fittest and Kill or be Killed. I would've like to have gotten more information on his wife and children. It's sad about what happened to his daughter and that he was widowed twice. But it's good to know that his last years were spent with his children and grandchildren. I was brought almost to tears upon reading the final chapter of this book. I'm very fascinated with the Mountain Men and the Indian women they married.

Bridger is a larger than life character. The author portrays Bridger as a character who was unimpressed with developed society. His treasure was the mountains and the mystery of an undeveoped land and people. His humility and lack of concern for unbelievers of the wonder of the mountains aligns him with someone who has a tremendous fishing hole but doesnt want anyone to fish it dry.

If you are going to use quotes from my work, you should cite your sources. The quotes you used were not given to you; they were used in The Wave Magazine, the publication I worked for at the time that originally printed that article.

Sandy Brundage

Mr. Henderson was definitely on to something huge here, and provides tons of evidence to show that fraud was taking place with the tacit blessing of then Attorney General and now Governor Charlie Crist. Henderson probably wasn't even aware that the wheels were already in motion to uncover the largest Ponzi scheme and bank fraud case the US has every seen.

Recently boy-band Svengali Lou Pearlman (featured prominently in this book) was taken into Federal custody and has been indicted for bank fraud. Simultaneously, civil suits and forced bankruptcy proceedings are taking place. Transcontinental Talent (aka Wilhelmina, Options Talent, eModel, Studio 58 and others) is one of the businesses alleged to have been used to move and launder money for Pearlman's fake investment scheme estimated to have stolen half a billion dollars.

Lawsuits allege that Crist knew this was going on, and allowed it to happen. Certainly he received campaign contributions and special favors from Pearlman and his companies.

Mr. Henderson is to be commended for his simply amazing depth of research, getting his hands on documents the state of Florida certainly wouldn't want you to see. Unfortunately, we will probably never see a prominent republican like Crist prosecuted for virtually giving Pearlman the green light to steal.

As someone who was conned by the 'businessmen' mentioned in this book, I have to recommend it to anyone else who found themselves unknowingly caught up in this scam.

Whether you were (like me) a talent scout, an aspiring model, a parent of a child who was told that your kid has model ability, a vendor, a franchise owner, a landlord, whatever... we were all duped and none of us will ever see a penny of what we put into this company.

For me, there's a certain amount of closure that this book brought to me. It made me realize that no, I wasn't dumb to get caught up in this, they were just THAT GOOD at the game. And all of the things that I thought were shady, actually were. And that this whole thing was a giant, manufactured LIE of a business.

Yes, it's very detailed. And it's history starts long before the WSN scam. But, the background helps to paint the picture of what was to come. And though the details can get tedious, it's the details that really made this business able to thrive, despite all of our government regulation of business in this country.

It disappoints me that this book couldn't have had a happy ending, but I already knew that. But i'm glad to see that the WSN scam didn't just fade away in some people's minds.

WHAT A DISAPPOINTMENT. I'm a fan of TRUE investigate journalism: Dateline, 20/20, Primetime, and local reporters who do the research.

First, when I lived in Tampa in 2001, my (ex) girlfriend was scouted by these guys, paid $495 and got a whopping 2 jobs (earning about $150 total). So I'm more than familiar with these scammers and was eager to read a great book detailing their nightmarish existence.

I've also taken journalism classes, so I was expecting not just a well documented book on this scam(which the author provides), but a WELL WRITTEN one as well. On the second account, this book fails miserably and it's why I regrettably have to give it a bad rating. I'm rating the BOOK, not whether the companies investigated were scams, which in my opinion they certainly were.

What you get instead is 60 chapters (SIXTY!!) of childish writing by a self-styled "investigator", Les Henderson. He does not list his qualifications as an investigator other than a previous book he wrote.

He then proceeds to lay out the history of some of the bigwigs behind the con. But I started noticing by about the third chapter how his personal hatred was creeping into the language of the book. A scammer was not simply a manipulative person, but described as: "fat, fat cat, wicked webmaster, the deceiver, wolf in sheep's clothing", etc. I actually started writing them down; that's how noticeable they became.

In addition, he points out that one main scammer was born in Egypt, although he is presumably a full US citizen, and another scammer was a Jew. Why didn't he tell us if the rest of the main characters were white Christians? He also calls the Egyptian scammer a "terrorist" late in the book. Writing about the guy, Alec Defrawi, he says Defrawi "decided to attack American financially." Wow. A none too subtle Muslim stereotype. Very classy.

By the end of the book, I was so disappointed in the way the "investigator" let his personal biases creep into the writing that I started marking pages where any editor would have simply taken a red pen and scratched out the ridiculous phrases. In court, a judge would've admonished Henderson, "stop badgering the witness and STICK TO THE FACTS". No editor is listed and the address of the "publishing company" and its website link back to Henderson's first book- making one think that he edited and published this himself. Nothing wrong with self-publishing, but self-editing in this case clearly was a mistake.

My other two big issues with the book may have been out of Henderson's control. First, as we ALL know by now, one of the main scammers, Lou Pearlman, is now in jail, accused of massive financial fraud in some investment scheme.

So as much as Henderson does a good job early on in laying out a history of total fraud by Defrawi and Dave Elliott and Cort Randell, it appears in hindsight that Lou was not some innocent victim unwilling to make the hard changes to improve the program; it appears Lou himself may have been just as bad if not worse than the main scammers.

Second, Henderson's whole conspiracy theory centers around how a former assistant AG (Jackie Dowd) got "fired" for trying to sue TCT/Options. But could it have been that the AG was investigating Pearlman's financial scam, told Jackie to slow down with the modeling stuff because they wanted to get him on the investment scam, and if she refused, they fired her? Nobody knows and the book was written before the Pearlman stuff hit, so I don't begrudge the author.

The other issue for me was that my ex DID actually get two modeling jobs off the website in Tampa. Didn't pay the "hundreds per hour" they lied and said, but she did make about $150. Yet Henderson does not interview one single model of the 150,000 who signed up who got booked on one single job??? Was my ex the ONLY ONE out of 150,000 to get a job?

She still feels she got ripped off (as do I), but I can't believe he couldn't locate a single model who got a job to ask them about it and offer some factual balance. After all, he's an "investigator."

In the end, the ONLY reason these scammers were shut down was because Monster.com and Hotjobs.com refused to let them advertise for scouts. Without scouts they couldn't recruit new models and they died quickly.

Yet he underplays that. That and that alone appears to be the only reason they're out of business. If Henderson's conspiracy is to be taken at face value (the new Pearlman financial scam notwithstanding), then every single one of the 150,000 models got ripped off and yet the Attorneys General of dozens of state did nothing. The New York consumer protection board couldn't do anything. The economic crimes unit of Florida did nothing. The Financial Litigation units of Florida did nothing. THE LARGEST class action law firms in the country thought about suing but did nothing. (????!!!!!) The Orlando Police did nothing. Only 1 local TV station did any pieces and they took "bribe hush money" to stop running bad stories.

Personally, I know this company was a rip off from my own experience. Yet Henderson takes 400 pages with all sorts of insider info and all he can come up with is that one new Assistant A.G. killed the case for unknown reasons. None of that explains how any OTHER Attorney General in another state couldn't sue to shut the local franchises down. Or why the class action law firms (including the one that beat Microsoft) wouldn't want to sue a billionaire like Lou Pearlman???

It just doesn't add up, much as I'd like it to.

In the end, there probably were some models who got work. But "investigator" Henderson didn't find a single one who could explain why employees like Chris Roberts (who provided lots of info to the AG) would keep working there instead of running for the door after a week. So not everyone could've thought they got ripped. My ex only paid $495. Maybe when they raised prices people got more suspicious??

Who knows the real truth.

But as glad as I am that these guys are out of business and Lou is in jail, I have a hard time swallowing 400 pages of a huge conspiracy theory as well as Henderson's terribly biased, childish name calling of people he clearly wants us to hate because they're "fat, Egyptian" or whatever personal biases he holds.

Next time I humbly suggest the author hire an editor (there were also about half a dozen typos, missing words, etc.) and leave the name calling for the schoolyard, not a presumably serious journalistic tome.

In the late 1990s I stumbled across the web pages of the Wilhelmina Scouting Network. I could not believe that the world renowned modeling agency would cheapen their brand on such a low-grade idea brand. It turns out I was right. They never had.

I did not realize that until I read Les Henderson's expose Under Investigation. It is the tale of the largest modeling scam in America and secret political corruption at the Florida Attorney General's Office.

It is the story of models who paid $995 to pursue their dream, only to discover they were scammed. It is the story of more than 2,000 consumers who filed complaints at the Florida Attorney General's Office expecting state action. Instead they got nothing.

I have always been fascinated with great sales people who can only find scams to pursue. The legal road to riches is within their grasp. Instead they dedicate themselves to lives of deceit. Henderson is a skilled investigative journalist of the old school. He spares no one writing this book.

Thoroughly researched and aggressive told, this tale leaves one wondering why we place any faith at all in our government to protect us from ourselves.

I thought the way the story is told, i.e. after the fact, was quite interesting. However, the last part of the story dragged. I think it was a bad idea to lead with the climax of the Indian Wars, the Battle of the Little Bighorn...there isn't anything that comes after that measures up in excitement and interest.
The Romance between the main character and Melisande is ridiculously unrealistic. The dialogue between she and Brules was terrible, and her dialogue style was...very whiny.

This is a good book but not as good as Brules by Harry Combs. Brules was the best western Iv'e ever read

While this book does not move with the pace of "Brules" it is, never-the-less an excellent story from start to finish. The part that I found interesting was why Mitch Bouyer chose to accompany Custer at the Little Big Horn. I have not read extensively about that battle, but have long wondered why, when Custer dismissed the scouts (Bouyer was the favorite scout), Bouyer chose to stay with Custer. Combs provides a credible scenario for Bouyer's role in the battle. Whether this is original research or not I do not know, but it fits well with what I have read.

This one is a totally bore! Mr. Combs lost his focus and digress himself from a once great hero, and made him into a boring soldier. The whole book is unreadable and bore to death! Don't waste your time to read it, unless you are trying to get some boring historical study of the early stages of US military strategies of how they kill so many Indians! Just read the BRULES we all rated a big 10! After finish it, if you like it, absolutely don't try to read this sequel, it will totally ruin your wonderful taste

After Brules, which was spectacular, The Scout was somewhat of a let-down. It should have been a continuation of the magnificent Brules, but it was not. Harry Combs just didn't seem to write with the same flare. In parts I had to fight boredom, as the story became monotonous. It was just "Brules the soldier" for a long time. The Scout was good, but it just didn't seem like the the same book as Brules, which I thought it should have been.

I've purchased many books (new and used) dealing with Scouting, and this is the first one that I had an almost physical reaction when I opened it. For the rather expensive price ($21.95) for a paperback, I was expecting a book on the par of Kett's "Rites of Passge" or MacLeod's "Building Character." Needless to say, the small paper size, the large font size, the paltry number of endnotes, and the limited bibliography was a disappointment.

To be perfectly honest, it looks more like a college paper than a published professional biography. This sense was confirmed when I noticed that the author was citing an undergraduate unpublished paper as a source! And a source for a US Congressional Report that any good researcher can obtain with no problem.

Unfortunately, a serious biography of Boyce has yet to be written and published. If you'e wanting to read such a work, you'll have to wait. If you really want to read this book, then wait a year and you'll be able to buy it when it is marked down to it's real value in the used book stores.

Unlike the "reviewer" from Houston, I liked the book.

William Boyce was a man of whom little is truly known. There is no Boyce Library and Archive and there is not any overflowing amount of information about him in the BSA National Archives. He was an important fringe character whose story should be known.

Due to this lack of information, LONE SCOUT is the first book that goes into the persona of the man, the man who is generally credited with bringing the idea of Boy Scouting to the USA in terms of the present organization known as the BSA. In my research of the beginnings of the worldwide Movement of Boy Scouting, LONE SCOUT has been a rather good resource on this topic that enabled me to delve further into the story of Boyce with regard to his role in the BSA. And since this is the first substantive biography on him, it should be the one upon which all future ones should be compared.

At this point in time, Ms. Petterchak's book is the most definitive look into Mr. Boyce's life, and to my literary knowledge, font size has never been a critical determinant in discerning the quality of content. A panning argument of "large font size" is cursory and of little importance.

Give this book a read, it's highly worth one's time.

For readers interested in Boy Scout history, and especially about the organizaton's founder, this is a valuable biography. No previous book on the Scouts has offered more than a few sentences about Boyce. The "Lone Scout" research, index, and narrative style are all excellent. I especially enjoyed the chapter on his African safari, the "Balloonograph Expedition." What an adventure!

After reading "Life of Tom Horn", the fictional account did not quite live up to expectations. Apparently freely borrowing for "Life of Tom Horn", "I, Tom Horn" was a disappointment.

Once Tom Horn leaves the Horn farm and heads west, the story quickens and never lets you go. We follow Tom Horn through his early years, just after the civil wars, through his formative years (14-16 yrs old) and his involvement with the 10 year long Apache Wars, all the way up to Chief of Scouts, U.S.Army and the capturing of Geronimo. Next we follow Tom Horn through the Cattle Wars and his evolution from a rustler chaser, to manhunter to a gunslinger for hire to a killer. And finally to his Hanging (righteous or not). The legend is here. I couldn't lay the book down wondering what would happen next, and I knew the history. You won't either.

If you have a junior this book is really handy if you want to earn interest badges.

...so if you have a daughter who is a Junior, please buy her
the handbook. It is considerably more difficult to earn badges
if you don't have a copy of the handbook at home, as earning
many of the badges requires that you do the activities in
the handbook. If you are trying to save money, get a
used copy or do without a uniform. Besides a
sash or vest to put earned badges, the handbook and badgebook
are the most necessary objects a Junior Girl Scout
needs to have to get the most out of the program.

Among historians in Kentucky the name Thomas D. Clark is almost as important as Simon Kenton. Clark has had a remarkably long and fruitful career as a historian in Kentucky. Too many historians after a long career of teaching and writing history will retire into anonymity, but not Thomas Clark. Many years after the age when most people retire, Clark wrote a book about a frontiersman who first came into Kentucky when it was known as the Hostile West. This story of Kenton will not only come alive for adults, but could also be enjoyed by younger readers due to the audience that Clark had in mind when putting this history together. When first learning about the history of our nation, Kentucky students learn about the great military leaders of Virginia, and the men of the North East who dared to dream of being great political leaders, etc; It is hard to find a book that a young reader can sit down with and read about a person who will forever be known as a great Kentuckian. The life of Simon Kenton was not polished up by Clark and made into a politically correct story that will fit perfectly into our historical revisionistic modern textbooks. Clark doesn't cover up the fact that Kenton killed Indians, stole horses and guns, and took land away from people who certainly had rights to this beautiful hunting ground; this is REAL history, and it is written for an audience that may not otherwise hear this story. All young people, not only those who live in Kentucky, should learn about the life of Simon Kenton. Like Simon Kenton, Thomas D. Clark will forever be known as a great Kentuckian.

Being an avid Simon Kenton fan, I was really looking forward to this book but found it quite boring. I suppose after reading Allan Eckert's "Frontiersman", any accounting of the life of Simon Kenton pales in comparison.