Carousels Books

Parts of this review were used in a review of Algren's classic Man With The Golden Arm and of the collection of short stories in The Neon Wilderness. These short stories in the Last Carousel reflect the same milieu that Algren worked in that novel although he has taken some of the stories out of Chicago and some of them are from a later period in the 1960's and 1970's. In a strange sense Algren throughout his literary career was working that same small vein- but what a mother lode he produced.

Growing up in a post World War II built housing project this reviewer knew first hand the so-called `romance' of drugs, the gun and the ne'er do well hustler. And also the mechanisms one needed to develop to survive at that place where the urban working poor meet and mix with the lumpen proletariat- the con men, dopesters, grifters drifters and gamblers who feed on the downtrodden. This is definitely not the mix that Damon Runyon celebrated in his Guys and Dolls-type stories. Far from it.

Nelson Algren has gotten, through hanging around Chicago police stations and the sheer ability to observe, that sense of foreboding, despair and of the abyss of America's mean streets down pat in a number of works, including this collection of his better stories. Along the way we meet an array of stoolies, cranks, crackpots and nasty brutish people who are more than willing to put obstacles in the way of anyone who gets in their way. But to what end? They lose in the end, and drag others down with them.

We, of late, have become rather inured to lumpen stories either of the death and destruction type or of the rehabilitative kind but at the time that these stories were put together in the late 1940's and early 1950's this was something of an eye-opener for those who were not familiar with the seamy side of urban life. The dead end jobs, the constant run-ins with the `authorities' in the person of the police, many times corrupt as well. The dread of going to work, the dread of not going to work, the fear of being victimized and the glee of victimizing. The whole jumbled mix of people with few prospects and fewer dreams.

Algren has put it down in writing for all that care to read. These are not pretty stories. And he has centered his stories on the trials and tribulations of gimps, prostitutes and other hustlers. Damn, as much as I knew about the kind of things that Algren was describing these are still gripping stories. And, if the truth were told, you know as well as I do that unfortunately these stories could still be written today. Read Algren if you want to walk on the wild side.

There are some excellent stories (tales of growing up on Chicago's south side in the 19-teens), some very good stories (about bookies, railbirds, and down-on-their luck jockeys), and some mediocre stories (essays from a trip to Viet Nam and stories of pimps and prostitues in Saigon) in this collection. The best pieces made the collection well worth it for me.

Algren is one of the most lyrical writers that I've read. Few have written prose that gives me the sense of rhythm and melody in the English language that I get from Algren's best stuff (Toni Morrison comes to mind). My favorite passage in this book, from EVERYTHING INSIDE'S A PENNY -- "My father was a fixer of tools, a fixer of machinery; a fixer of tables gone wobbly and windows that had stuck....Other men wished secretly to be forever drunken. He wished to be forever fixing."

This book Love Is A Missing Person by M.E.Kerr is about a fifteen year old girl named Suzy Slade. She lives with her mother in Seaville, Long Island. Her sister Chicago lives with her dad in New York. When she was two years old her mother and father had divorced. Her sister is feeling unwanted and unloved and wants to move back in with her mom. And she wants to have Suzy move in with her dad. Chicago came down to Seaville and they all lived together for a while. Suzy is always into everyone elses love life and worries about their problems and not hers. She always had to care for others and not herself. I would recommend this book for girls thirteen and up that care for family problems. i would rate this book with three stars.

I've since read that M.E. Kerr was criticized for her unrealistic dialogue and portrayal of the black characters, but I still think this book is wonderful. Its theme is, natch, love, and how it can change you so much that people don't even know you (or, you become a missing person). Suzy watches everybody around her falling in and out of love, and how they change as a result, from Miss Springer, her library supervisor, who has nurtured her love for a man who left town thirty years ago, to her father, falling in love with a woman only a few years older than Suzy herself, to her sister Chicago, who breaks all taboos (this book was published in the seventies) by falling in love with Suzy's co-worker's black boyfriend. Some of them change for the better because of love (Chicago, for example, develops a focus in life and becomes less reactionary just for the sake of attention), some worse (Suzy's father treats his child bride like, well, a child), but everybody becomes a missing person to Suzy. I loved the theme, and I think this book is really an underappreciated work of M.E. Kerr's! Anyone wishing to dicuss M.E. Kerr with me, please feel free to email!

In this story Tom Swift is once again united with Benjamin Franklin Walking Eagle and Anita Thorwald in another adventure. They are on board the Daniel Boone en-route to Jupiter. Tom and Ben, who is a computer genius, are in the process of building a robot that they eventually name Aristotle. They use the computer in Anita's artificial leg to interface with Aristotle and when the experiment goes awry, the CPU in Anita's leg is fried beyond repair.
Fortunately, Tom Swift senior is also on board and he supplies a duplicate chip that works even better. The new chip somehow manages to turn Anita into an empath, capable of sensing events via the interface with her leg. She is also capable of electronically communicating with Aristotle.
As the story unfolds, Aristotle somehow manages to develop skills far beyond his programming; he is capable of understanding human communication to the point of analogies. Aristotle is also capable of high level reasoning skills, although unfortunately some of his dialog is similar to C3PO of the Star Wars movies.
The Daniel Boone arrives at Jupiter and the story starts going off on unrealistic avenues. Tom, Ben, Anita and Aristotle take a small shuttle ship commanded and piloted by a Navy officer. The officer is arrogant to the point where he is willing to risk destroying the ship rather than admit failure. Fortunately, Aristotle is able to intervene in time.
When Tom and crew arrive on Io, they discover a mechanical creature that is an alien probe from Alpha Centauri. It was sent to seek help in a war that the Centaurans are engaged in. The creature is hopelessly stuck in the frozen ice but in exchange for the possibility of help, it allows its' CPU and core memory device to be taken by Tom. That core memory supposedly contains the means of creating an interstellar drive. The story closes with Tom and crew arriving back at the Daniel Boone and a hint of the next story, Tom Swift: The Alien Probe.
This story reminded me of the Tom Swift Jr. books of the fifties and sixties where the aliens were occasionally mentioned, but never really encountered. Having Aristotle act like C3PO diminished the character and there should have been at least a mention of Asimov's three laws of robotics. The naval officer acting the way he did further diminished the story; no naval officer would act like that in such a critical mission. An interplanetary probe to Jupiter would be so important that the crew would be heavily screened against the psychological flaws that he so easily and clearly exhibited.

This particular incarnation of the Tom Swift series is a great place for young boys to discover science fiction. The stories are entertaining and do a good job of holding one's attention, plus the author attempts (with varied success) to weave in actual science here and there. I say the books are good for young boys because the protagonist is of course Tom Swift, and the format the adventure-story favored by many young boys, but the character Anita does offer a strong (but almost tomboyish) female role as well.

This second story in the series features Tom on a mission to explore the moons of Jupiter, where he and his friends find an alien space probe trapped on Io. They must free the probe while avoiding deadly sabotage from within their mission and the harsh, volcanic environment of Io.

A 519 page book of the American musical theatre, full of personal observation and the prevailing critical consensus. This is easy reading, sometimes spending 4 or 5 pages on a single musical, with gossip about the cast or a recent television appearance. Abe Laufe had an old-fashioned-gentlemen prose style that is endearing and he clearly loved his work. The book begins with the early hits of 1884 and concludes with the arrival of 'A Chorus Line'. The last pages of this edition has an extensive list of hit musicals, replete with song-titles and original cast members.

This series of short stories took me on a wild ride from the time I stepped into a musty old pawn shop on page one until I walked out of a little house in Port Vendres, France, some fourteen fables later. And what a ride it was! Pearse has pasted together a collection of tales running the gamut from nail biting fiction to quaint homestyle humor. You can even hear the thick English accent narrating these pages, as this author's style leaves no doubt about his origins, and his material leaves no doubt about his experience - he's obviously been around the block and around the world a few times. I definitely recommend this ride - very engaing, very amusing, and well worth the price of admission.

Anyone who finds the history of old amusements parks fascinating and in particular holds a fondness for old wooden carousels will enjoy this book. It's well written and contains multiple interviews with amusement park owners past and present recalling the days of small trolley parks and the great rides of old. It contains many photographs of grand old carousels, some still in existence, others gone the way of tragedy or to the auctioneer's block. It's definitely an enjoyable read.

They were dubbed the ABCs for as much for their first names as their competitive need to win. However, the most daredevil of the trio Charles Moreland has watched his lifestyle go up in the same flames that killed his parents, badly burned one of his sisters, and left him with a mountain of debt. Still the worse aspect is returning to Hidden Falls, New York after he seen and lived in New York City.

While Charles frets his fate, his buddy Anthony has become engaged to Susannah Deere and their other friend Brad is infatuated with Charles' sister Jane. Charles shakes his head at the folly of his two pals thinking of marriage and no one even thirty until he meets Susannah. Charles begins to fall in love with Susannah, but will do nothing because he honors his friendship with Anthony. Meanwhile Susannah is confused between her desires for Charles as opposed to her fiancé even as she struggles with caring for her ailing mother.

CAROUSEL OF DREAMS is a strong historical romance that provides a wonderful depiction of life in Upstate New York in 1908. The characters make the tale work quite well as they seem genuine and thus insure a taste for the era as well as forming a complex romantic triangle. Though Amanda Harte leaves a few too many threads dangling for the next tale, readers will relish the opening gamut of a strong story that focuses on a bygone Americana period.

Harriet Klausner

This book is not only creative -- it is beatiful and spiritual! I was so moved by it and was in love with the illustrations. It is a delightful Christmas gift! For the organized.. It is a smashing gift! I will buy it for all the children I know from my church!

I love A.G Smith's paper models. Because, His models is very easy. This is a book for beginner or kids. There are all modules for "simple old steam Train". (Module : Box car, Passenger car, Baggage car, Tender, Flat car, Caboose, Station, Baggage Wagons, Water Tower, Engin) But, there is a shortcoming - "Not detail".

In this book Ms Simpson sets out to construct an accurate image of what is known about Viking life. She succeeds remarkably well.

Ms Simpson points out that both those who see the Vikings as mere bloodthirsty savages and those who depict them as perfect heroes tend to ignore a great deal of what is known about the Vikings. She then seeks to describe in great detail what life was like, from the construction of farm houses to life in the cities, from warfare to religious rites.

On the whole I felt that Ms Simpson's work succeeded in its original mission-- to depict accurately the typical elements of Viking life. Additionally, she supports even those ideas I thought were questionable well enough that it is clear that she has important points to make on these subjects.

I would highly recommend this work.