Beard Books

Goes into very much detail. You'll find yourself hating this woman. But don't be too harsh; possibly she was a product of her biology.

A great book. Could there ever have been a more accurate portrait of a true-blue gold digger? Why some women (and men) feel a sense of entitlement to the money/property of others simply because they are (or were) married to a financially successful person is beyond me! You want money? WORK for it! Some lazy people would rather marry for it -- or kill for it! Great book. I felt so bad for Steve's family. They were helpless and had to sit by while Celeste planned, plotted and executed her plan to murder Steve -- all for the money. What a shame. Kathryn Casey is a great writer. I used to be hooked on Ann Rule, but got tired of her "Series" books. Now, I'm going to be looking for more stories written by Ms. Casey. She did a wonderful job of showing what a shallow and callous gold-digger Celeste really was.

My first Kathryn Casey novel after finding her as a recommended read searching for more "48 Hours True Crime Mysteries".
A very well written book that I could not put down. The evil of Celeste Beard was captured in the pages. There's sex, murder, lesbianism, wealth. A must read for fans of true crime.

Kathryn Casey might be the Ann Rule of Texas true crime. This book is a complicated web of interesting characters including a bisexual, sociopathic gold-digging monster in the form of a beautiful woman named Celeste Beard who has no conscious for her actions. She would do anything to get what she wanted which was easily lying, cheating, having sex with men and women, manipulating her lesbian lover Tracey Tarlton who comes across as sympathetic but disturbed character, her ex-husband Jimmy Martinez who was having an affair with her during her last marriage to millionaire Steven Beard who tried as hard as others to get away from the monster in his bedroom. Celeste manipulated people as easily as she breathed. She was worse than any hurricane or tornado to hit Austin high society on it's knees. Her first husband was so terrified of another nasty divorce that he committed suicide even though he was married to a different woman and far unlike as Celeste was even in her youth. She made outlandish claims of abuse by her own adoptive father. Worse, she was a mother to beautiful identical twin girls who wanted nothing more than to be loved by their mother. They were also victims of Celeste's abuse to the worst degree. She manipulated Kristina to cover up for most of her own crimes. Jennifer and Kristina's relationship were always strained by Kristina's loyalty and devotion to Celeste, their mother. At one point, they stopped calling her mom and referred to her as Celeste. In my opinion, Celeste is more terrifying than any monster as this book makes her out to be. I felt sorry for Tracey who got caught up in Celeste's web of lies and terror and that she shot an innocent older man who she believed was terrorizing Celeste and abusing her. She is serving 20 years in the same prison as Celeste but separately away from her.

Being a true crime sleuth, I used to think Ann Rule was the best true crime writer ever. This book wiped my thought on that completely away. This author had such an amazing way of telling a great story, kept the book flowing from one page to the other, had amazing details about all of the characters. It felt like I was actually there witnessing it all myself. And the courtesy photos were superb too. I like to check back and forth while reading who the main characters are while I'm on that certain chapter. And while I did say "characters" I do know these are true stories. Still after I read this story, I went online to find out more about everyone involved. I have recommended this book to all of my fellow true crime pals.

Excellent advice on how to write, what to write, and where to send it once you've finished it. A realistic look at the romance industry.

I have pretty much every book on romance writing I can get my hand on, and while there's certainly a lot of overlap among them, this is definetly the best.

While all of the books have helpful information on the romance industry, this one really stands above the rest. It's wonderfuly organized - it's the one I turn to first when I need to find something quickly. It's also well written - the information doesn't differ a whole lot from the other books, but this is by far the most fun to read. I've also found that the suggestions are truly helpful. The hints/suggestions sound really basic, but have made the writing process MUCH easier (I'm a beginner).

Most of the books in this genre have something new to offer, but if you're only going to buy one, this is definetly your best option.

This was the first book that I had ever read by Julie Beard. After reading her thoughts and ideas, I'm sure that it won't be the last. The book was intresting and to the point. Her ideas were well organized and thought out. A two year old could understand and utilize the information. At points there was humor and it felt as though you were talking to an old friend. Julie Beard has a new fan in me. Even if I find that I'm not intrested in her romance novels, when I am asked who is my favorite author, my answer will undoubtably be Julie Beard. The help and confidence that she offered me in this book were well worth the price. I'm not sure that I'll ever be an author, but if I fail it won't be due to anything that was lacking in her book. If I were given the opportunity I would send her a personal thank you. My out look and my life were changed in a couple of hours.

Having read hundreds, maybe even thousands of historical romances over the last 20 years, I always dreamed of one day writing my own novel. This book is an extremely helpful tool for anyone that dreams of one day becoming a bestselling author. Julie Beard shares information about the industry and the various tricks to getting published. For those aspiring historical romance writers bogged down by the research process, Beard also gives insight to resources with which to build your historical framework.

This book is a great read. It's funny and inspiring. I highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to break into the romance industry.

If you are truly serious about becoming a successful romance writer then you MUST have this book. I've read TONS of books on writing, not only romance but fiction and non-fiction as well. None of them were as user friendly and focused on how-to info as this book. Most other books quickly brush over the how-to. This book actually shows you step by step what to do from choosing the type of romance to write, structuring your book, synopsizing each major part in 4 paragraphs to getting published!! This puts other writing books to shame and it makes me feel like I've wasted so many years with the others when I could have had this gem the entire time.

If you want to write romance and you want to get started on the right foot then you MUST HAVE THIS BOOK. No exceptions. And if you are trying to decide between this book and another (or several others), get this one! The others can't hold a match to this one. Not by a long shot.

This cookbook has become the one I turn to for any American dish I want to recreate from childhood. American cooking is so varied that trying to recreate a dish from childhood can be difficult with all the variations out there. James Beard doesn't always produce what I remember a dish tasting like, of course (I'm from the Deep South), but his version is always good. I trust his taste much more than Joy of Cooking's, especially since he has firm opinions and doesn't leave you guessing with multiple iterations like in Joy. His rendition of the following are excellent and well loved at my house: pot roast, corn bread (make with Bob's medium grind cornmeal and buttermilk), chili con carne, baked ham, vichyssoise, deviled eggs, and his mother's cream biscuits. You'll probably end up customizing the recipes to suit your taste, but the originals are never disappointing and usually amazing. The short histories of each dish and foodstuff are engrossing as well.

This is not the best cookbook I have on my shelves, but I wouldn't want to give it up. I love to read this cookbook and learn how my ancestors prepared their food. There are many recipes presented as they were originally written with measurements offered in non-standard methods, for example as, "a teacup full". There are some surprising omissions, but all in all, it is a good cookbook.

One of the 3 basic cookbooks (Joy of Cooking, Better Homes & Gardens) you must have. Check out the blue cheese burger... worth the price. This goes out of print from time to time, so get it now.

According to the editorial material, this is Mr. Beard's definitive cookbook. He is a culinary journalist of the highest caliber, and this is his penultimate collection of recipes gathered over multiple decades of culinary journalism. While it might be an impressive compendium of recipes, it is no better than many other cookbooks of similar intention. It is an interesting historical document, but is also a rather mediocre culinary resource, despite its distinguished pedigree. Considering the author's celebrity status, I was rather under whelmed by this cookbook. I do recommend it, but not enthusiastically. It does function as an all-purpose cookbook for today's typical home cook, but you can do better.
La Cuisine: Secrets of Modern French Cooking
The gold cook book
The Fannie Farmer Cookbook: AnniversaryThe Joy of Cooking Standard Edition: The All-Purpose Cookbook (Plume)
Selected Recipes from the Saturday Evening Post: All-American Cookbook
American Heritage Cookbook
New Cook Book (Better Homes & Gardens New Cookbooks)
The Good Housekeeping Cookbook

There are 2 distinct aspects to this cookbook. Over time, it has been widely hailed as important cultural anthropology. It is also an extensive compendium of home cooking. Neither aspect is especially convincing, but together, they make a decent culinary resource. Its main strength: for those who like to 'entertain at home' (OK, this an archaic term also from the era of the 'housewife'; by this, read: superbowl sunday, sunday dinner with the neighbors, baby showers, cocktail/diner parties, celebrations where food is expected, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Mother's/Father's day, etc.), and you need a source for reliable, decent recipes that will feed a crowd.

The recipes themselves are the weak point of this book. Mr. Beard has openly cribbed recipes from far and wide, and expertly assembled them as the good journalist that he is. He has a tendency to present several recipes that are only marginally different. This is a good sign, inasmuch as this indicates that the author has significantly altered the original recipe to fit a mold that he knows works correctly, and it also indicates that the author has tested it or a similar recipe (`authentic' is not one of the words I would use to describe the recipes). On the bad side, it means that the scope of the recipes is not as comprehensive as you might think by counting recipes or pages. There are substantial gaps, including entire categories of recipes you would normally expect to find in such an all-purpose cookbook. It also means that much of the original techniques in the recipes have been filtered through Mr. Beard's au courant (circa 1970) sensibilities. I am also not convinced that ALL of the recipes have been thoroughly tested by Mr. Beard.

I also note a couple of format deficiencies. The recipes do not specify the yield; you have to read the recipes closely to discern how many servings the recipe makes. The TOC of this book is woefully inadequate: it simply lists the chapter title. The chapters are thoughtfully divided into sections and subsections, but these are not listed in the TOC. You are more or less obligated to leaf through an entire chapter, which can be 100 pages long, to find something specific, or try your luck prospecting in the index.

The copyright of this book is 1972. It is mainly a collection of recipes of `home cooking' from the 50's and 60's. During this period, all females were `housewives', who did not go to work but instead got married, stayed at home, cooked, cleaned, and raised children. On the good side, the typical `housewife' had acquired substantial cooking abilities (not unlike the abilities expected of a newbie line cook applying for a job in a smallish restaurant) much superior to today's household, regardless of sex. There are many such collections of recipes, and Mr. Beard's effort is only fair to middling when compared to the competition. On the down side, this book has its share of recipes that are incomplete or vague, requiring the experienced touch of a `housewife' to make the recipe work correctly.

On the good side, this book is a valuable source of culinary anthropology, and it is this aspect that has made this cookbook justly famous. Throughout the book, Mr. Beard regales the reader with stories of what Americans ate, why they ate it, and how they prepared it. While this may be important to a writer or culinary journalist, it is at best an amusing anecdote for the typical home cook.

I got one of these when they first came out in print, in hardback, back in the 1970s I think. It's obvious when you look at mine that it has been well-used and loved. I bought a recent edition for my daughter who is just starting out in her own place. I haven't compared hers to mine to know how the editions differ, so my review is based on my old hardcover. If you are looking for a cookbook with the basics of classic American foods I would highly recommend this -- far better than Joy of Cooking. It would make a great wedding or shower gift. It is logically organized, easy to understand, and interesting to just sit and read. The basics of how to cook a turkey, how to choose and cook various cuts of beef, basic bread and cookie recipes, it's all there. The recipes are easy to follow and reproduce and I've had great results every time.

Beautiful story about how a family deals with the loss of someone they love. Excellent writing and character development, I was sucked in from the first chapter and was crying by the end of the book. I would highly recommend this book to anyone that has lost someone close to them.

Thank you for this wonderful, wonderful book. I wanted to stop reading it because I was afraid I'd be too sad but I couldn't stop once I'd started.

Dear Readers --- If you want to spend a few days curled up with a book that may change your life, then "Dear Zoe" is, hands down, the paramount choice. Have a full box of Kleenex nearby, though; I became a human waterfall while reading this book, empathizing with this young girl and her pain. I saw so much of my ownself in her, even though it has been decades since I was that age. Yet, I too went through the soul-shifting lifechange that was 9/11. I know my worldview will never again be the same after that day. I can distinctly recall thinking that was the beginning of the end of the world, and I spent the whole day on the phone gathering my husband and girls to come home so we could die together. God, how quickly we forget! I/we lost an innocence, a groundedness that day. We took so much for granted. This book reminded me, however, that one terrible occurrence, such as the death of a loved one, can shift one's world in much the same way. Additionally, my husband and I have raised three daughters, and I saw so much of each of my own girls in these three. A note for the author: Mr. Beard, you somehow managed to insert yourself into the psyche of a 15-year-old girl and you were right-on with frightening precision. I felt my own past exposed and I don't know how you did it, but seeing you do it was redeeming. Kudos to you and yours for tapping into and laying bare for us, the readers, the angst of a teenage girl! Lastly, I do not often buy books to keep; I usually read from the library. However, this is one book I will buy to keep on my shelf and to loan out to loved ones, with the only request being that it come back to me so that the cycle can continue.

"Maybe 'Z' is the shape of everyone's life," writes Philip Beard. "You're going along in what feels like a straight line, headed for one horizon, the only one as far as you know, and then something happens..."

But my zigs and zags were few in Philip Beard's slim novel, "Dear Zoe." On this level of writing, it's smooth sailing. Beard is a skilled writer, and his style is seamless enough that he accomplishes the very difficult writer's task - not only of crossing genders in this first person narrative by a female, but with the voice of a very young female - all of 15 years old. And he does it convincingly.

So convincingly, in fact, that I felt myself as reader engage as I should, that is, to lose awareness of self and surroundings, soon immersed completely into the storyline and characters. "Dear Zoe" is a letter, written across time, from one sister to another. Zoe, however, will never read this letter. Zoe is gone, killed in a car accident, and this letter is, perhaps, how older sister Tess copes with her loss, her grief, even her guilt.

This extended letter is about Tess but also about her extended family. It is family like any: not without its dysfunctions, not without its baggage and broken places, with elaborate wounds and still healing scars. When a member of a family unexpectedly dies, everyone grieves, each in his or her own way and own pace, and it can at times meld a family together, at others rip apart. Beard portrays all of this messy and zigzagging process, but without any melodrama, always sensing when to draw the appropriate line.

Then comes the true test. Nearing end, the storyline veers into an event in American history that is almost impossible to mention without imploding into melodrama. When I realized the backdrop this author was setting up for his story, I nearly winced, but, wait, what's this? Oh, my. Beard makes it work. Work so well, in fact, that he accomplishes the individualizing of something nationally, even internationally shared, and brings it down to one heart, one life, one experience, felt by one person at a time. This personal tragedy is of a size, immense and miniscule at once, that each reader will be able to absorb and comprehend, and through comprehending the miniscule, the immense suddenly gains full impact. Just as numbers that trail off into endless zero's at some point become incomprehensible, so perhaps we as human beings cannot truly comprehend tragedy unless it happens one soul at a time, passed gently on from one hand into the next.

Having accomplished this feat, the author, and "Dear Zoe," has earned my highest recommendation.

On September 11th, 2001, nearly 3,000 people lost their lives in numerous acts of terrorism against the United States. Even now, five years later, people still ask the question, "Where were you on 9/11?" I remember watching, on that fateful day, news coverage that left me horrified, aghast, and haunted. Where was I on 9/11? At work, on a day that started out like any other and quickly turned into one that no one will ever forget.

If you asked Tess DeNunzio, the fifteen-year-old girl at the center of DEAR ZOE, where she was on 9/11, she'll be quick to tell you that she was at home with her younger half-sister, Zoe, waiting for the school bus like any other day. Except for that one moment, when she let her gaze wander elsewhere, and Zoe ran into the street, into the path of an oncoming car. For Tess and her family, 9/11 is a day they'll never forget.

DEAR ZOE is Tess's letter to Zoe, her way of healing from her sister's death and coming to terms with the changes that have taken place in her extended family. This isn't a story about September 11th, 2001, in the ways that most of us have come to view that day. As Tess puts it, "...just like all the people who go to New York and cry over the rubble. I want to tell them all to go home. I want to tell them to go home and hold their children or their lovers or their parents. I want to tell them that they are using that place as an excuse to be sad and afraid when there will be reason enough for that in their own lives if they just wait."

According to recent facts, nearly 150,000 people die every day. That's about 1.8 people every second. And yet no one seems to remember the other 147,000 people that died on 9/11. That includes myself. Until reading DEAR ZOE, I had never stopped to consider that there were other people around the world who were grieving for lost loved ones who had
nothing to do with an act of terror.

Thanks to Mr. Beard, I now have a new way of looking at that day in history. I also have the story of Tess and Zoe, which will stay with me for much longer than it took for me to read the book. Love, loss, regret, and forgiveness mingle within the pages of DEAR ZOE to form a story that, quite possibly, you'll remember even five years later.

Reviewed by: Jennifer Wardrip, aka "The Genius"

I bought this book when it was first published and used it as a primer to learn how to cook. It is highly practical with the chapters arranged by technique (boiling, braising, sauteing, etc). And it is well illustrated with simple drawings that effectively communicate how to execute those techniques. I would recommend it to anyone, especially those who are just learning to cook. Unfortunately, even though it was re-issued a few years ago in both hardcover and paperback, the used booksellers think this book must be worth its weight in gold. It isn't. If you can find a copy in good condition at a reasonable price, consider buying it. If not, look for James Peterson's -Essentials of Cooking- which, in many ways, is a superior book and should be available at a sane price.

Selection, technique and associated recipes from this legend make this a book one turns to often. Mine is worn out from over fifteen years of usage. You'll put it profit in your kitchen.

This is the classic of American cooking, the first cookbook to own and the one you go back to all your life.
Beard had a brilliant sense for food, and in this book he shares concepts and approaches, explaining the equipment you use, and the techniques, methodically, clearly and with his particular elan.
Anyone can follow this book. But between the recipes presented throughout the book (organized in the unusual manner of by technique - things you boil, things you bake, things you roast, etc.) and the concordance (organized by food), you can find great recipes and just plain information and direction to help you make just about enough food to last a lifetime.
I brought it with me to France and still rely on it.

This classy reprint of a standard cooking guide deserves a spot on the shelf of any serious cook's collection: this edition provides an introduction by Julia Child and a foreword by Barbara Kafka as it covers the basics methods and ingredients of good cooking, with a healthy dose of Beard's philosophy added for spice.

A must for anyone who loves good food. I bought my copy about 20 years ago in my bachelor days, and still refer to it regularly. If you can learn the techniques in this book and in "From Julia Child's Kitchen," you'll be in the 99th percentile of home cooks. Add a couple of Pierre Franey's 60-Minute Gourmet or Cuisine Rapide volumes, and you and yours will eat well for life.

This book is a boot lovers dream come true! The quality of photography is excellent and the historical discussion brings the art of bootmaking to life. There are so many styles of boots represented here as well as bootmakers past and present from all over the United States. The art of the boot is a love affair that covers the world and this book gives ample voice and photographic interpretation to that subject.

This book is worth more than it's monetary cost. Simply by the historical content so hard to find. I enjoyed reading it. The pictures are great and the fine examples are totally mindblowing. I definitely recommend this book to anyone who is interested in learning of "boots".

Big rich photo detail (that many baby-boomers will appreciate.) The cowoby boots in this book are the closest you'll ever find to life-size.

Tyler Beard asked America's finest bootmakers to send him their most spectacular boots...and they did, many remarkable pairs were made especially for this book. These new and vintage cowboy boots range from wowzie-zowie to "museum-quality." No pair could be counted as plain, or the least bit ordinary.

This book is a must for every collector. Tyler gives an unmatched, detailed history of cowboy boots and portrays the life and lore of America's top bootmakers. (A few who have since retired or passed on.) This book is one of my favorites.

Howdy, For all of you boot fanatics around the world, Jim and I will be serving up a new helping of bodacious beauties in the form of "photographed boots" in an upcoming book, which will complete our boot trilogy. Start hollerin' and stompin' and callin' 1-800-748-5439 to demand what is rightfully yours!!!! The book will be published by Gibbs-Smith Books in 2005.

Cowboy boots aren't just your functional black or brown work boot; but can be works of art in themselves: just take a look at Tyler Beard's ART OF THE BOOT for evidence! In 1992 THE COWBOY BOOT BOOK was published to celebrate this fact; since then the number of boot-makers around the country has nearly doubled. ART OF THE BOOT combines Jim Arndt's lovely color photos throughout with in-depth surveys of the companies and bootmakers involved. Highly recommended for any with an interest in cowboy culture or boots.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

I was looking for ideas on simple structures for the homestead. The book is a bit dated, but you have to go back to find simple, uncomplicated ideas. We have grown so accustomed to specialized fasteners, tools and other hardware. Building a simple shed can be expensive when you have to buy materials. We have an abundance of raw materials and this book provided some ideas towards cost effective structures.

This book is great! I would recommend this to anyone 12+, because the shelters are quite hard to build. It is excellent for boy scouts. I got this for Christmas and in my troop were starting on plans already! Great for any wilderness lover and I recommend all the related books!
1/16/08

I know that most people will find this book to be anything but "green" however, I found this concept to be perfect in a world that sometimes forgets what it is like to be young at heart. Some of the shelters are not safe and one should always supervise young children who if left alone will build forts and such, yet there is a certain allure about thinking you are back in time and surviving on your own wits. Great ideas for survival campouts or if you like getting out "there" and just might once or twice get too far out "there" and find yourself in the need of an overnight shelter. Loved the book and will use or adapt many of the detailed plans.

This book is great! I would recommend this to anyone 12+, because the shelters are quite hard to build. It is excellent for boy scouts. I got this for Christmas and in my troop were starting on plans already! Great for any wilderness lover and I recommend all the related books!
1/16/08

This book is geared towards building structures that were used by outdoorsmen from years past. It covers how to make a bed from natural materials, a log cabin, Native American log house, and how to work an axe just to name a few topics covered in this book. The drawings of the dwellings in the book are simple (but not in depth plans or charts). The author does a great job of explaining how to construct these devices, but as I said a drawn picture is all your going to get if your a visual learner. Over all the book does what it says it will do, gives the reader good information, and I personally wouldn't be caught dead without it if I was trapped in the middle of nowhere by myself.

Fantastic, one of my favorite cat books. Every time I pick it up, I change my mind about what the best poem is.

I actually remember lines from these poems sometimes, in circumstances where less happily placed people would recall lines from the original
poems !

By the way, 'Beowulf' is about the least wonderful, perhaps because the original was of no interest to me; too bad that that is the one Amazon used as the excerpt.

I've read some of these as "friendly email" forwards, with no attribution. Folks, always use accurate attributions; People like Henry Barber (the 'editor' of these works) deserve to make a living out of what they produce. :-)

Also by the way, 'French for Cats' by Henri B. The little furfaces gather when I practice the French phases in it. Tell me French is not the natural language of cats! :-)

The only thing wrong with this book is that one has to both love cats and be educated in poetry. (In other words, there's no one else I know who can appreciate this book!) I like some of Henry Beard's poems even better than I do the originals. I'm especially glad that he chose to interpret some of my favorite poems (e.g., "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," and "Xanadu.") Henry Beard is extremely talented; this sort of thing is very hard to do. (I know; I've tried.) This is a MUST for anyone and everyone who loves cats and poetry.

Readers of Poetry for Cats: The Definitive Anthology of Distinguished Feline Verse by Henry Beard will notice how much influence humans have on cats. Cats will not enjoy having this pointed out. They work hard to protect their free will and try to dictate the terms of their relationships with humans. You can not just pick up a cat and expect it to be happy being held; you have to wait until the cat is ready. Cats will not play with toys just because you want to play. Cats appear to think independently, but their poetry betrays them.

Here is a bit of verse written by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's cat:

I chased a mouse beneath the stair,
It went to ground, I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it ran, my sight
Could not follow it in its flight.

Sound familiar?

There is more. Samuel Taylor Coleridge's cat wrote the following:

In Xanadu did Kubla Kat
A splendid sofa-bed decree
With silken cushions soft and fat
A perfect feline habitat
Set on a gilt settee.

Here is another sample, this time by William Shakespeare's cat:

To go outside, and there perchance to stay
Or to remain within: that is the question:
Whether `tis better for a cat to suffer
The cuffs and buffets of inclement weather
That nature rains on those who roam abroad
Or take a nap upon a scrap of carpet ...

Have you noticed a trend? It appears that cats listen more than they let on, and they even identify with the humans with whom they relate. They certainly borrow verse as freely as they claim their favorite chairs.

Cats do deserve some credit for knowing what poetry to borrow and adapt as their own. They are able to turn bits of Chaucer, Keats, Frost, or Ginsberg into works that serve their purposes, such as catching goldfish, breaking vases, or berating Whitman for sleeping too late. In near unison they raise their voices to complain about their vets.

One thing that surprises me about Poetry for Cats is that Henry Beard never reveals the cats' names. I can not imagine that Emily Dickinson had a nameless cat!

Poetry for Cats is an attractive book with colorful illustrations and is still in print after eleven years. I found our copy when inventorying the poetry collection. I am afraid few people have borrowed it lately, so I am going to put it on display. The cats need to be heard.

Henry Beard has both a good knowledge of the original poems and of cats. His spoofs are tremendously clever, and he chooses the most common poems in English literature, so most people will recognize them. I laughed myself nearly sick. It's as good as jogging! ;-)

This book is funny in and of itself; however, if you are familiar with the poems on which these are based, you're in for a special treat. Beard doesn't just substitute words: his premise is that the poets' cats wrote these poems, which makes "She Walks In Booties" or "Abyssinias" even more feline, er, sublime...

I bought this book as a recommendation from the girl at the comic store and I re-read it almost every night, and I *still* laugh (it's been a month). If not for the "I DEMAND PIE" argument.

Embossed with golden print on the book spine, with the soft dark linen binding and filled with glossy smudge proof pages, David Malki hands over not just his comics, but additional footnotes and quips. Happy to see that this book is labeled 1, with hopefully more to come. Look forward to page 73, all is reveled there, hopes, dreams, and whys.

Bravo, I say!

Like all of Shelley's poetry, the works in this volume impose something of a pre-postmodernist matrix of assumptions about the nature of incipient reality upon the reader -- assumptions, I might add, not properly appreciable by those unfamiliar with the lovely depredations of absinthe or the glory of beards. As a proud possessor of several sprouted facial whiskers myself, I found myself deeply moved throughout.

If you can't have William Blake croon gentle poetry into your ear, this, then, is the next best thing.

This is a beautiful collection of David Malki ! 's anachonistic webcomic potpourri. Likely to pry a wry grin from the lips of even the most humorless or otherwise sedated reader, Beards of Our Forefathers is a volume I am proud to have on my shelf. Highly recommended for both jocular humans and ursine connoisseurs of whimsical hats.

Even though I have read all of Wondermark's free online material, this purchase was still absolutely worth it. Not only for the bonus material, which went well beyond just extra strips, but because the comic holds up, and it's great to have a portable book for re-reading.

What a great book from a great person. the different chapters and the different adventures. I have never seen a book quite like this one. Will keep you reading from chapter to chapter. Keep up the great work and look forward to the next one. The children you are supporting from the proceeds of the book also a very noble cause.

AWESOME BOOK! You will not find a more personalized, "real life" travel book out there...Excellent photographs from around the World! Once I finished reading it, I started it all over again--couldn't put it down, it's a real page turner...

This book is not at all what you might expect. If you open it expecting the diary notes of someone who descended into insanity, you won't find that here. What you will find, instead, is a big, lush, lavish volume, rich with pictures and personal notes, splashed with artwork and experiences of the author's cross-global journey through South America, Africa, and Asia. It is as much as work of art as it is a book.

What Garner calls his "madness" is what he refers to as his previous obsession with making money and building corporate empires. He spent years of his life at this until one day, he just dropped it all and went off in search of himself. For two years he and a companion, Heather (whose last name we never learn), wandered the world living with the people of the countries they visited and looking for adventure. They found plenty of it--from a fearsome night they spent in Mexico thinking they had been kidnapped, to being attacked by the most unusual brigands in Central America, to living among the Masai in Africa. Everywhere Garner went in search of answers, he found people in every part of the world who were honest, hospitable and somehow managed to live happily even without water, food or school supplies to educate their children.

Not only is this an emotional journey of discovery, it is also a treasure hunt. The author has placed a secret code in his volume and given readers the key to deciphering it. All over the world, he has hidden objects which he invites readers to find as they unravel the code. He has dedicated sales of the book to helping poor children worldwide, and every time a new child is helped, he places his or her picture on the website.

And the website is as lavish and artful as the book. It contains more information about the secret code and Garner's personal campaign to save the world, one child at a time.

And he gives the most unique explanation of typos I have ever seen. On little cards inserted in the pages, he says things like: "Think you saw a typo? Think again." Now that's a stroke of genius that other authors could envy. It automatically excuses every error missed in proofreading.

On the book's gorgeous full-color cover, he says, "This is more than a book, it is an experience."

Armchair Interviews is inclined to agree with him.

I have to say, being an avid book reader, this book was truly a wonder. This is a book for everyone who is interested in travel, adventure and buried treasure. It has 40 amazing chapters of travel stories from around the world. The stories themselves are so well written and it amazed me they are all true. Also, inbetween each chaper you get to see full color artwork and photography that the author has taken from all over the world. In addition to all that, GD Garner has actually hidden clues inside the book that lead the reader to a buried treasure! The clues are hidden on all 7 continents as well as online and the reader can use the book and website to uncover the buried treasure! This book is really an amazing and unique experience for every reader. It is an absolute MUST READ for anyone interested in travel, photographgy, or just really amazing true stories. I highly recommend this book as a next purchase for your book collection.

It only took reading the book's prologue for me to completely commit to following the author through his journey. The perspectives on geography, culture, and humanity were vivid, enlightening, and entertaining. The artwork and photography included alone has value way beyond the asking price. I've dreamed of traveling the world. I can only hope that I would receive the experience a fraction as well as the author. Add that part of the proceeds from the book benefit children's charities makes this book a must buy!