Blair Books

"An Introduction to Anglo-Saxon England, 2nd edition" (hereafter, IASE) by Peter Hunter Blair is exactly as it is titled. It is fairly thorough for an introductory book and would be well-suited for someone new to A-S England history, but more advanced A-S scholars might find it a bit too basic. It is also written in a rather dry, "just the facts" style, which made it, for me anyway, a really long read. While I found it very interesting, and certainly instructive, I can't say it was "a fun read". IASE is organized topically, rather than chronologically, however it is chronological within each section. The information is organized very well, and Blair combines various recorded written, linguistic, and archaeological sources to provide as complete a picture as possible while still maintaining an introductory level of information. Blair writes in his preface, "The study of this period is at heart a study of the sources and because this ought to be understood even by the novice, I have tried to tell him something about the evidence on which the narrative is based, about its weakness as well as its strength." Blair uses footnotes, a format I prefer to endnotes, and makes good use of the included maps, diagrams, and illustrations. Numerous linguistic explanations offer an added bonus to readers interested in a very basic introduction to A-S etymology.

The chapters are as follows:
Ch 1 - "The Foundations of England", 8 sections from "The last days of Roman Britain" to "Movements toward unity".
Ch 2 - "Britain and the Vikings", 8 sections from "The Scandinavian background" to "Edward the Confessor and the end of the Anglo-Saxon state".
Ch 3 - "The Church", 9 sections, from "St. Augustine's mission" to "The last century of the Anglo-Saxon Church".
Ch 4 - "Government", 5 sections from "The rule of king" to "Local government".
Ch 5 - "The Economy", 3 sections from "The country" to "Towns and trade".
Ch 6 - "Letters", 6 sections from "Language" to "Learning in the new monasticism".

The book also includes 16 plates (illustrations), 9 maps, 7 text-figures (diagrams, floor plans, linguistic charts), an extensive bibliography, and index.

Overall, I would rate this book as an excellent introduction to A-S history for the beginner-to-intermediate student, but more advanced scholars would probably do better to acquire the books and sources Blair draws on for IASE.

Maybe if you're a grad student in history, this might be an "introduction". If you're a lay reader, this might be a tad much in the detail department. Blair commands the material, but the material itself is a tad on the dry side. I say that as someone who's read a fair amount of books about "late antiquity" and the "middle ages". Part of that is attributable to the obvious fact that Anglo Saxon england was a brutish, hobbseian kind of place. Certainly its a thorough read, but it lacks fun and is a slooooow read for a book of 350 pages.

While enjoying the nightlife of Harlem in the 1920's, June Westbrook, a recent divorcée and newspaper columnist, befriends Mark Thornton, a handsome young man with a secret. As they are leaving one of the clubs, they witness a young, effeminate man named Nelly gets arrested. June pleads with Mark to find out what happened to him.

En route to the courthouse the next day, Mark reads a copy of the Penal Code and learns of the horrible laws society has created against men like Nelly - and men like himself. He attends Nelly's trial at which the young man is sentenced to one year in prison for making advances towards another man and for dressing like a woman. Unnerved by what he has seen and read, he decides to tell June everything, believing she is the one person who can understand him.

Blair Niles' novel, first published in 1931, is a remarkable study gay life during the 1920's.: the powerfully negative views imposed by society, the feeling of loneliness, the secretiveness that gay men and women followed in order to fit in with society. Her main characters are wonderfully drawn: Mark, who is filled with self-hatred because of the way he feels toward other been and because of societal dislike of men and women such as he; and June, who, instead of behind disgusted by what she hears, is compassionate toward Mark, perhaps because she finds a connection between her and Mark. The supporting characters are equally good, ranging from Mark's "mentor" Tom Burden, who first helped Mark to realize and to accept what he is, to Seth Vaughan, the object of June's affection.

It's not a very negative novel at all, most of the time trying to understand and to show a positive light on homosexuality. I found that refreshing for such an early novel, though Mark does come to the typical tragic end for a homosexual character. Definitely a novel worth reading.

June, a young divorcee, becomes friends with Mark, and through him she discovers the world of Harlem nightclubs, drag shows, and the shadowy world of homosexuals. Mark and June are rather alike in that they are both looking unsuccessfully for love. Being gay in the late 1920s is terribly difficult, and Mark struggles with self-hatred instilled in him by society. Even though it portrays society's many prejudices and negative expectations for gays at the time, and the standard-for-the-era tragic ending for the homosexual character, "Strange Brother" reaches for compassion, understanding, and acceptance. It does somewhat succeed through the character of June who realizes her commonalities with Mark, and chooses to embrace life fully, even after the death of the object of her own affection (not Mark, by the way). "Strange Brother" is a wonderful story giving readers a glimpse into the early days of moving towards acceptance of gays and lesbians.

Building Christian Character is a very good resource for parents and christian educators alike. Yet caution must be taken concerning the writer's sect and their belief system.

This is absolutely the best book out there for developing Christian Character in children.

Building Christian Character examines 22 Scriptural elements of character and then gives examples of positive and negative character traits.

Honor is contrasted with dishonor, responsibility with irresponsibility, etc.

Each character trait is also divided into subcategories. Example: the positive trait of being responsible is divided into bringing a job to completion, working as unto the Lord, being diligent.

Building Christian Character shows us and our children what it looks like when a child is showing scriptural character traits. And because a bad attitude can be comprised of so many different facets, we are shown that too.

Not just for use within the classroom, a strong Sunday School program for elementary school age students could be developed by using this important book along with memory verses and a Bible study.


This needs to be required reading for home educators and Christian School educators alike.

Despite its age, "Desertion During the Civil War" remains the standard introduction to the topic. The book's major shortcoming is touched on in William Blair's introduction to this reprint: "Lonn relied primarily on the 'Official Records.' Although adequate for the time, this would be considered merely a good beginning today."

The "Official Records" are the most complete and impartial documentation of the Civil War, and the necessary foundation for any serious research. But they were never edited for accuracy, and many reports were condensed for space, and the information about the South was especially spotty in the 1920s. Modern historians are severely cautioned against relying on them without corroborating evidence.

Historians from Prof. McPherson on down have been saying for years that there needs to be a fresh study of desertion, especially in the Confederacy. But that would require a couple of people to spend the rest of their natural lives sifting through tens of thousands of provost marshals' reports and muster rolls of thousands of regiments.

So we're left with Ella Lonn. Her analysis of the "disease" takes into account both North and South, as well as mentioning the Napoleonic armies, Wellington's experience in Spain, the U.S. military before 1861, and the Franco-Prussian War.

Part of her thesis, now much-shaken by better information than was available in the 1920s, was that the South had a serious desertion problem for much of the war, and that it spiraled out of control in the last months. She wrote that the North seemed to get its own desertion problem under relative control about the same time -- largely by draconian measures.

Her conclusion is that one out of every seven men deserted from the Union Army, and one out of every nine men deserted from the Confederate army. Though the Union lost proportionately more to desertion, she feels the South suffered more because of the initial difference in manpower, and that desertion ultimately was instrumental in the South's failure to achieve independence.

Lonn concludes that Union desertions helped prolong a war that the South was losing, because the news of them gave the South hope and allowed it to cling to a dream of eventual victory long after that was practically out of reach.

Lonn seems to be writing with an eye on her own time, in the wake of World War I, which brought up a great many of the ugly things in American democracy that we think only emerged during the Cold War. She alludes to it often, and seems intent on pointing out that the horrors of war -- any war -- are more worthy of note than the characters of men who desert from armies.

I was prompted to read this book after having read "Cold Mountain" and having someone complain to me about the hero of that book being a deserter. How could someone write a book glorifying desertion! That got me to wondering and led me to Lonn's book. I found it very informative about many aspects of desertion, including: the reasons men deserted, what happened to them if they were caught, the means the governments (both Union and Confederate) used to persuade deserters to return to their units, the bounties paid to capture deserters, and many more aspects that I had never considered, most importantly, the effect it had on the outcome of the war. She also examines the effects of desertion on the civilian population, and how the stigma of desertion became what it is today. Some chapters were a bit redundant (she covers both North and South), and the sections on the numbers who deserted and from which states, etc. bored me, but overall I would recommend it to anyone interested in the Civil War.

A friend of mine once said that this was her all-time favorite book in French, and though that might seem a bit hyperbolic, I've come to consider it as one of my favorites as well (in fact, I ended up writing my Master's thesis on it, 100 pages, all in French, about this book alone!). The English translation does lack something, so if you can read French, by all means read the original, "L'amour, la fantasia". Djebar is a fascinating person- writer, scholar, and award-winning filmmaker- and this is arguably her best novel. Wrestling a voice for herself from the colonizer's language (French), she also struggles with the cultural implications of "unveiling" herself through that same language to a primarily foreign audience. Her innovative approach to this problematic is to structure her novel like a musical piece (a "fantasia") with various "movements" (chapters alternating between her own autobiography, the history of the fight for control of Algeria, and the "voices" of illiterate women whose stories she's translated and transcribed). The "fantasia" is also a traditional North African equestrian ceremony, in which men parade their horses before going off to battle, and in which women participate on the sidelines, as it were, cheering on the men by ululating. Without giving away the full implications of this double analogy (and hence some key elements of the story), the "fantasia" takes the form, generally, of both the means by which some Algerian woman are able to speak, as well as that of their traditional marginalization in the patriarchal society of Algeria. Musicality, orality, and the written word blend in this highly original work to portray the author's fragmented sense of self, and the final product is rendered in a beautiful prose. If you're interested in sampling some of the finest writing by any French-speaking author today, or are fascinated by these kinds of postcolonial aesthetic problematics, read this book! It's a classic!

This is the first novel written by an Algerian, man or woman, that I have ever read. I suspect that could be true for many readers. As a new voice in my world of literature, then, it's an important book. I saw FANTASIA as a kaleidescope, though, always producing patterns and colors, always arranged, but not always understandable. I found it very hard to judge this work because it has many facets, like a shifted kaleidescope.

***** Five stars for the idea or conception of the novel, for language (if it is well-translated), for the whole effort of bringing a woman's perspective on colonialism, on revolutionary struggle, and on tradition. Djebar is obsessed with the "word", especially the written word and its strength. "The word is a torch; to be held up in front of the wall of separation or withdrawal..." Words preserve and pass on memories, tragedies, pain, love and lack of love. Words hold the keys to Algeria's past, the world shattered by the French invasion and conquest of the mid-19th century, when 25 years of war ruined the country. But the French conquerers wrote of it, much more than the Algerian defenders. Their words must be mined for the reality, we must forge the Algerian view from the 'ore'. Words again unite the Algerian women and men who fought France in the 1950s. But those very French words, the language of the conquerers and destroyers, are used to pass on here, in this novel, the very heartfelt, most intimate emotions of the author. She speaks of this. Perhaps silence is more powerful, implying resistance. "Writing does not silence the voice, but awakens it, above all to resurrect so many vanished sisters." Those are the sisters who didn't know French, who could not speak out from their cloistered existence.

****For bringing Algerian history to life from an Algerian perspective, and an Algerian woman's view at that, a woman who, through an educated father and schooling escaped the enclosed future that awaited her. The struggle, the never-ending resistance to the occupation of their land.

***The plot of a novel is a fishing line with some attractive hooks for catching readers. If this line is broken too often, no fish can be caught. The novel becomes a collection of beautiful fragments, leaving the reader to imagine what it could be if it were all joined somehow. FANTASIA suffers from a too intricate sub-division of the voices. It is a layered approach, the conflict between two worlds---a conflict that entered even into the author's soul--- it is effective poetically, but not as prose....we lose track of who is saying what, who is related to whom, where everyone fits in. Overall Djebar reaches us, but the novel has an abstract quality that does not emotionally involve us much with any characters.

This book is one of the best India Folk tale book i have read. I love the authors style in telling the stories, I felt like i was listening to my grandmothers narration when i read this book.

Haviland did an excellent job, as she did in all of her fairytale books, to capture the culture and history of the country in her stories. She created a good interpretation of ancient fairytales from India. This book would be very useful in the classroom when learning about India and surrounding countries. It comes highly recommended.

I have a collection of over 500 books on the Civil War. The best one by far is Gen R.F. Hoke. Daniel Barefoot puts his heart and soul into his work. Daniel has the same qualities as Gen. Hoke and I guess that's why the book is so great. This book takes you through the life of R.F. Hoke from cradle to death. After reading this biography you will understand why Gen. Lee chose Gen. Hoke to assume his command should something terrible befall Lee. A must for every student of the Civil War.

Robert F. Hoke led an interesting life. He was a young man when the Civil War broke out (mid-twenties) and enlisted as a lieutenant in the 1st North Carolina Volunteers, seeing combat at the Battle of Big Bethel in Virginia in 1861. Four years later, a Major General, he was one of the principle players at the Battle of Bentonville, one of the last battles of the Civil War. In between he missed few battles (though Gettysburg was one; he'd been severely wounded), rose quickly through the ranks to prominence, and was roundly and pretty universally praised, at least according to the author. All of these things are summarized relatively competently in 14 of the 17 chapters of this book; the remaining chapters cover his pre- and post-war life, and summarize his achievments. What then is my gripe? Well, I have several.

First, the author is a bit more pro-Confederate than you would expect in this day and age. Granted both author and subject are from the same part of North Carolina, but is that any excuse for the use of the word "Negro?" I haven't seen that in a book published since the '50s, perhaps early '60s. And no, it's not part of a quotation. Captured North Carolina soldiers who enlist in the Union army are traitors, while Union soldiers who wind up in Confederate ranks are "trators" (note the quote, implying the author disagrees with the judgement of treason). It's all a bit much.

Second, the author imparts a great deal of wisdom and skill to Hoke. I have no problem with some of it, but the idea that he was so skilful that General Lee would want himself replaced by Hoke should Lee be incapacitated or killed seems to stretch the bounds of believability a bit too much.

Third, the author is handicapped by the characteristic that he imparts to Hoke in the subtitle; modesty. Hoke never wrote much of anything about his war service, kept no diary during the war, wrote few letters discussing it (at least that have survived), and never gave speeches or anything. He never attended veterans' reunions (very unusual for a Civil War general from either side) saying that the war was over, and it was time to look forward. Consequently, the book is very much Hoke as others saw him, not as he saw things himself. This last point, I will grant you, is not the author's fault, but it does hamper the book somewhat in that the picture of Hoke is almost exclusively external; we have no idea what he's thinking most of the time.

Lastly, there are no maps. In a book of Civil War biography like this where the author is trying to tell you that Hagood's brigade was deployed to the east of the swamp, facing a creek, with Hill's division on his left, you need to be able to look at the map to see which creek or river, etc. No one has the capability to look at all this stuff and visualize where everyone is on the battlefield.

Over the years I have read a fairly large number of these books of ghost stories and have found that the true art of writing this type of book lies in finding a proper balance for each story included. To produce a book that is informative, chilling and plausible requires not only a talent for writing and a general knowledge of the subject but also a willingness to do a lot of research. Elizabeth Huntsinger shows a good deal of talent for the first two categories but has for the most part missed the boat when it comes to research.

Much to the author's credit there are no swamp monsters, UFO stories, or old Indian legends to be found in this book. While stories like those mentioned may be interesting, they have no place in a book of ghost stories. There are also only a couple of really well worn stories here and for the most part the ghosts found in this book will be new finds for even the most faithful reader of ghost lore. Furthermore, the writing style of this author is excellent and very readable and she makes no historical mistakes that I could find.

That leaves only the lack of research to lessen the effectiveness of this book. Mrs. Huntsinger has done a good job of researching the history of the haunted site and it's ghost. The problem is that she never took the time to look for and interview people who had experienced the phenomena in question. Recent eyewitness accounts always lend an air of believability to this type of book and that kind of documentation is almost totally absent from this book. A little more digging and a few interviews would have gone a long way toward taking this from an average book to an excellent one.

Finally, the author includes directions to the haunted places that she has chronicled. This kind of feature is always helpful to anyone who might want to visit the ghosts in the Georgetown area. The directions are too vague however and when I tried to follow them to the burial place of Alice Flagg I got totally lost. These directions did get me to the general area however and after only one stop to ask for directions I found poor old Alice. Vague or not though the directions are a thoughtful addition and I would like to see more ghost books include this information. I truly appreciate the author's effort in including directions.

Last summer while on vacation in Myrtle Beach, I happened down to Georgetown County for a day on the Winyah. The scenery was breathtaking, as was this book. It was an excellent works and I especially liked being able to read history of places I have been. This book is absolutely wonderful.

I have to strongly disagree with the previous reviewer. This is a beautiful, well-organized book.

I was just recently diagnosed with gluten intolerance, so the dietary changes have been overwhelming to say the least. I checked out every book on gluten intolerance/Celiac disease from the library, and this is the first cookbook that actually made me feel hopeful that I wouldn't have to give up all of my beloved baked foods.

The photos are stunning. The muffins, cakes and cookies look "normal", and it makes me feel normal to bake them. This is so important to me right now because since my diagnosis, I have felt like anything but a normal person.

Some notes on the previous reviewers points:

1. I did not find the baking pan sizes a challenge. For example, I also do not own an 11x7 baking pan, but as a lifelong baker, I have always felt it easy to adjust by using a 9x13 rectangular pan or an 8x8 square pan.

2. The previous reviewer correctly stated that this book was not written for someone who needs in-depth information on Celiac disease. I'm uncertain if this was a criticism, but it should not be. This book was clearly conceived as a cookbook only. It never pretends to be anything different. There are plenty of informational books out there on Celiac disease. This is just a pure, straightforward cookbook.

3. As for the criticism that the photos do not correspond to the recipes, this is not accurate. Not all of the recipes have corresponding photos, but the ones that do are adjacent to their photos. The particular recipe the reviewer referred to is in fact on page 56. Its corresponding photo is on page 38-39 but only because it has been used as a chapter photo. This is a common cookbook practice and is not meant to confuse the reader.

I highly recommend this book to any gluten-intolerant/Celiac reader. Since my diagnosis, I have struggled to not feel sad or angry or deprived, and this cookbook has been truly been a bright spot for me on this new journey.

I bought this cookbook because it had great photographs of the prepared recipes which inspire me to try them. I noticed in many other gluten-free cookbooks that even the photos did not look appetizing. The chewy nutty chocolate brownies came out delicious but Blair asked for an 11x7-inch baking pan which is not the norm for pans in the US. The odd sizing is because the author was writing for the British audience. The problem becomes, do you adjust the recipe or hunt down special pans?
This book was not written for someone who wants to learn in depth information regarding celiac disease. However, the instructions in the recipes are easy to follow.
I like it when a cookbook has the name of the recipe on the photo page. The beet speckled cake recipe on page 56 is pictured on pages 38-39. However, the photo reminded me of a carrot cake and I was looking for a recipe for carrot cake. I only accidentally found the comment on page 56 stating that the end product was pictured on pages 38-39.

"Landscape" is a reasonably well-written and fast-moving SF adventure, and although it veers a bit too much in fantasy territory at the end, I recommend it to those readers looking for an alternative to the more lengthy, series-driven genre novels from John Ringo and David Weber.

John Clay is a mercenary recruited by the United Democracies (U.D.) to investigate reports of widespread destruction on the backwater planet Ithavoll. Despite its poverty and squalor (think of the Philippines spread over an entire world) a despot has gotten hold of a superweapon capable of turning square miles of villages and towns into ashes. Clay is a member of a commando team inserted into Ithavoll to figure out the location of the mystery weapon, and covertly destroy it.

Once on-planet in one of Ithavoll's major cities, the team discovers that a significant portion of the native population is in thrall to the psychic domination of some alien force, and young men regularly lapse into homicidal frenzies earmarked by the excessive use of edged weapons. Once they discern the probable location of the weapon, the team heads into remote terrain. It turns out that their interloping has been noticed and Tind the native, an accomplished tracker and hunter, is dispatched to eliminate the meddling UD commandos. Although lacking in both personal hygiene and modern weaponry, Tind is nonetheless a formidable enemy.

Can Clay and his team survive their encounter with Ithavoll's master guerilla fighter ? Is the superweapon somehow linked to alien technology ? Are the residents of Ithavoll hiding a secret of galactic importance ?

Author John Blair is a college writing teacher and he can write a capable and engaging narrative. The novel does have some weaknesses- the real action doesn't start until more than 100 pages into the story, and the ending makes a somewhat awkward transition from the gritty realism of jungle combat, to a psychic encounter more characteristic of a fantasy adventure novel.

But there is little of the over-writing and excessive detail, so common to too many contemporary SF novels, in "Landscape". The battle with the native hunter provides some genuine page-turning moments, without venturing into eye-rolling `superhero' territory. The underlying plot thread about alien artifacts and their malign influence, while not necessarily the most original of topics, is effectively presented and serves to keep the story from becoming what could have been a `Predator' knockoff. It's worth picking up a copy if you find it on the used bookshelves.

"A soldier is trained to fight the good fight...but it helps if he knows who the enemy is."
Blair writes science fiction and about the military as though he'd visited the planets he's writing about while a member of some mobile infantry. In short, though the premise may seem a little far fetched (it is sci-fi, after all), it is told with the exuberance and detail that makes you wonder if it's made up at all. The lead character, Clay, is a good example of the hero, or even anti-hero, in modern literature. If you are into sci-fi, if you liked Starship Troopers, Predator, or Alien, this book is for you. Enjoy.