Abbey Books

Of course I'm slightly biased being a graduate of Saint Martin's, but this is an amazing book. The history contained in these pages comes alive as you take an illustrated walk though the best private college in Washington. It does an incredible job memorializing the first 100 years of the existence of Saint Martin's and gives many interesting facts that even students and faculty are unaware of. A must read for students and residents of Southwest Washington.

A great love story and at moments really scary! I loved it.

As with the other anthologies in this series, this one is written in a braided format - in fact, more so than the preceding volumes, so that there is a nearly seamless flow from story to story.

Abbey, Lynn: "Strange Bedfellows" - Further development of Marina Kamat's infatuation with Mondragon, mainly from the Kamats' point of view. Once Richard becomes aware of some of what's been going on, he steps in and meets with Mondragon. For one thing, Richard takes action to see that a promise made to Raj by Marina is kept - help getting accepted at the College as a medical student. This story also sets up Richard's working relationship with Mondragon, as Richard works to create the Samurai, a new security force for the merchants' docks and warehouses.

Asire, Nancy: "By a Woman's Hand" - This thread follows Justice Lee, his mentor Father Rhajmurti, and various figures at the College, and introduces his fellow-student Sonja Keisel. She's a wizard at math, willing to tutor Justice at Rhajmurti's suggestion - and the daughter of two families at the top of Merovingen's hierarchy.

Cherryh, C.J.: "Troubled Waters" - This thread weaves in and out of the others, mainly following Jones and Mondragon.

Fish, Leslie: "Treading the Maze" - We find out more about Black Cal, the only honest cop in Merovingen - such as why he only seems to show up when Rif's around, and why the blacklegs at the Signeury know it's time to clean out the blueblood's cell when Cal takes out rookies on his beat. The Janists, Rif among them, are busy trying to get permits for Master Milton's Magic Show - but why? :)

Lackey, Mercedes: "A Tangled Web We Weave" - Raj finally cracks under the strain of letting Marina Kamat think that his love poems actually come from Mondragon (among other things, it's potentially dangerous for Mondragon). Being a Takahashi, Raj does what he considers to be the honorable thing.

We find out a bit more about Raver and May, the swampies who were closest to Raj in his days out there...including that Raver was once Raven, a Janist agent, and that he scooped something very interesting out of the harbor after the 'sharrh overflight' in FEVER SEASON.

Morris, Chris: "Saying Yes to Drugs" - Michael Chamoun, having been introduced to deathangel powder during his catechism sessions with Cardinal Ito Boregy for past-life regression, proceeds to introduce his wife, Cassie Boregy, to the stuff - and she begins to acquire a reputation for prophecy.

Morris, Janet: "The Prisoner" - In case you're wondering why one faction or another never grabbed Jones as leverage against Mondragon, well, everyone in Merovingen knows that it's crazy to lay hands on the Trade; they stick together against landsmen. But Chance Magruder, the Nev Hettek ambassador, doesn't know the rules.

Rogow, Roberta: "Nessus' Shirt" - If the title doesn't mean anything to you, grab a book of Greek mythology and turn to the end of the section on Hercules. (Yes, I read way too much mythology when I was a kid, if there is such a thing as too much.)

419 pages, excellent index for research, published by Abbey Library, London. Naval battles of the ancient world, the medieval and rennaissance periods,battle of Chesapeake Bay, Trafalgar, Napoleonic Wars, early torpedos, Navarino. Lissa, Tsou-Shima, and many more, ending with Midway. Lots of helpful maps and illustrations.

This book is a fantastic read for all business persons, corporate staff, travellers, "Asia-philes," writers, teachers, and other students of language and culture, worldwide, with any interest in or association with Japan.

By now it's a standard, a classic in the field!

Just look at these chapters: Conformity and Rage in the Japanese Male, Conformity and Rage in the Japanese Female, Japanese Conformity and Insanity, Do the Japanese Integrate or Merely Copy Western Psychoanalysis?, Japanese Identification withe the Enemy, ... and much more!

Highly recommended!

This revolutionary and influential volume is now reprinted and updated. In 1980, when it was first published, it was the starting point of interest in the vital historic role that American women have had in all genres of music in America. Ammer's book bore rich fruit in so many recordings and performances, as well as other studies. Ammer's searching curiosity and the range of her interests makes for fascinating reading. Armed with extensive documentation including interviews, she investigates women's roles in the traditions of classical, jazz, and folk traditions. Liane Curtis, Ph. D., Musicology, Brandeis University.

This book gives an excellent translation of the 12th Century writings of one of the Waltham monks. It also gives the original Latin version which would enable a Latin scholar to gain practice or make their own check.
The book also gives the 11th & 12th Century history of the Secular monastery with many interesting facts of the times.
Ideal for Latin scholars and historians interested in the period immediately prior to, and after the Norman Conquest.

A fantastic book that is hard to come by these days. One of the only first hand accounts of a man who searched and reached the ancient "Abbey of the Seven Rays" in southern Peru. A great story of how he had to continue looking for clues with everyone around him denying that the abbey actually existed. How he had to climb to dizzing heights and battle cold, fatigue, insanity and starvation along the way. A truly inspirational tale of a man willing to die to find the meaning of his life and the truth about hi3 place in the universe.

Westminster Abbey has long been a seat of royal and ecclesial significance; certainly since the time of Edward the Confessor (before the Norman Conquest), up until the most recent times (royal weddings and the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales, perhaps the most watched funeral in history). According to the introduction of Jenkyns book, it is 'perhaps the most complex building of any kind'. It still bear the stamp of being a 'royal peculiar' - in that the clergy and ecclesial hierarchy of the abbey fall outside the standard patterns of the church, and instead fall under a more direct jurisdiction of the monarch.

Its history is as impressive as its architecture. It has been a cathedral church and an abbey, a coronation church, a 'national church'; it houses Poets' Corner, the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, the shrine of a Roman saint, and more. The national legislature (the House of Commons) has met here, and it has been both the National Archive and the National Treasury. Still, it is not as large as the French Gothic cathedrals upon which it is based, and (Henry VII's Chapel excepted) much of the art and architecture of the building, each element taken separately, can be better represented elsewhere. However, as a package whole, Westminster Abbey is second to none.

Jenkyns' book on Westminster Abbey is not a tourist guide, but rather a wholistic history of the building. Looking in detail beginning with the medieval church (there were much older structures on the site, but what we come to think of as Westminster Abbey today was really born in the medieval period), Jenkyns continues chronologically through the Renaissance, Reformation, Baroque and Victorian periods. Jenkins then explores particular aspects of the Abbey overall - as a place of ceremony, as a national cathedral or shrine, as a church in and of the city, and the church as a masoleum of sorts of the famous and historical (this last chapter is somewhat out of place, put among the chronological listings).

Jenkyns draws on wonderful material for a complete picture of the spirit of the place. There are poems from the Renaissance up to the twentieth century - Betjamin's portrayal of a woman visiting the Abbey during the war time is a classic example. He has historians and royals with their own reflections of events that have taken place, and material from clergy and monastics who have lived, worked and worshiped here. 'The world changes, but as a building and as a community, the Abbey continues to do what the Benedictines called the opus Dei, the work of God, to teach and preach and praise.'

Jenkyns is not shy with his opinions. For example, in discussion the change in the north transept rose window, he has little good to say about Pearson's replacement of it in the restoration of the late nineteenth century. 'Pearson was a very fine architect and it is a pity (and puzzling) that he chose to blot his escutcheon in this way.' Jenkyns similarly describes others' attempts at restoration and improvement as 'impertinent', 'controversial', and 'destructive'.

The book could benefit from a few more diagrams and a few colour photographs (the only colour prints are on the sleeve on the outside of the book; the rest are black-and-white, which, while they have their own character and excellence, still do not give a sense of the glory of certain aspects, such as the Henry VII chapel). However, the text is interesting, easy to read and interesting without being simplistic or not engaging with its subject, itself a complex Gothic creation.

Part of a series published in the United States by Harvard University Press, published previously in the United Kingdom by Profile Books Ltd., this volume is a joy to have.

I believe this book is like all of Marion's other great books that she has writen. You can learn from this about how much a person who is not their childs friend, does not have a good friend in life.