Brandt Books

This is an excellent small, focused tome reviewing the history of the monastic movoement within Christianity -- with emphasis on the West. The author's research is relevant and full of the mythology which forms stories of the early days of an order. For anyone new to this field of study I would recommend the text.

One thing stands out. The copyright for the text is 1900. That significant date reveals a certain style of writing, as well as a certain way of understanding Catholic history. With the mid-sixties energy of Vatican II, religious and those interested in religious were invited to discern the original charism of the founder, thus to look at the hermeneutic of the early days, founder, and service to the church and world community. This fine book focuses more, however, on handed-down stories and popular legend than on the original need for the order and how that impacts today the way the charism is lived. In sum, it really sheds no new light on themes long developed, but reviews legend based history.

For a novice in this study, it borders on excellent. For the more sophisticated student, it is a bit, a tad, of a disappointment. Its too bad the blurb on line promoting the book declares it is a recent production, when in fact it is a republication of a work over a hundred years old. With all of that said, I enjoyed the review it provided, and the reminder of how we used to study these movement.

THOMAS P. HULL
CHICAGO

I realize this is a highly sensitive topic and lots of people have different opinions. It is also true that although most people aspire to and certainly expect fidelity, many people end up straying despite good intentions. One school of thought on how to best handle this is to hide the facts, which is what this author holds out as the gold standard of behavior. The rationale is that sharing this information would hurt the other partner and that since affairs are basically unavoidable, if you love someone you are almost morally obligated to hide the truth. This doesn't sound like love to me, but if you subscribe to this line of reasoning you will be very happy with all of the suggestions this author has for disorienting your partner, avoiding the responsibility of an authentic relationship and addressing relationship problems or issues head-on and co-creating a win-win situation (or making a difficult decision that your partner may not like).

This author is obviously intelligent and her book is entertaining. It is fairly well-organized and it does recognize the difficulty of struggling with the shame and guilt associated with affairs and the lack of cultural understanding of how people's social and mating agendas are often in conflict. I think Ms. Brandt is compassionate, but misguided in some fundamental ways and I disagree with her approach for reasons that I explain in more detail below. If you were turned off by my review so far, you may not want to read on.

As a personal growth coach, I regularly work with clients who are on the receiving end of an affair. My experience is that it is NOT the extra-marital sex itself that is the most basic problem, but rather the fact that one has been deceived by someone who is in a position of extreme trust. It goes without saying that both people are extremely vulnerable emotionally.

I'm not sure one can call something an authentic relationship if it is characterized by deception i.e. outright lying, half-truths and lies of omission. This seems to run contrary to the very definition of love. In my opinion, if you read this book and in your heart-of-hearts you can say that this is how you would want YOUR partner to behave toward you, then I would say it's a good fit. If not, I would suggest either Private Lies: Infidelity and Betrayal of Intimacy or Will Our Love Last?: A Couple's Road Map for either dealing with these temptations or coming to agreements that work. Another good book in this genre is Conscious Loving: The Journey to Co-Committment.

I have compassion for people who cheat on their partner and on the partner cheated on. I think in these situations both people suffer and often other innocent parties such as children are hurt by the fallout. Marriage and commitment is certainly a difficult road to travel and some situations are very difficult. Life is not clean and simple and while affairs do happen, I'm not sure the answer for the society at large is this approach. Certainly, our inherited biology makes being loyal a challenge, but I suspect there is a benefit in struggling with these tendencies. An interesting perspective on our evolutionary tendencies around this area can be gained from reading the The Evolution of Desire: Strategies of Human Mating. This book explains that both sexes do indeed have short and long term mating strategies that are hardwired and at odds. It's a great book, however, it doesn't go into the fact that we are hardwired to bond in as great detail or talk about the fact that we may have evolved to a point where we can hold our biology with respect and choose to act in a manner consistent with our values. I think this is a point that this book misses and instead of encouraging us to reach higher, it seems to encourage us to regress.

If you want a good read on the biology of love and bonding, then you might try A General Theory of Love. This provides more balance to the picture. While it may come across as so, this review is not meant to be judgmental or moralistic. I understand how difficult it is to struggle with temptation, admit difficult truths to your partner, etc. One way to look at these are things to hide, another is as steppingstones to growth and intimacy. This is where my bias lies and if what I have observed in my practice is true, for most people affairs are often nothing more than very temporary, but costly pain killers. In many cases, affairs seem to make a bad marriage bearable, which often leads to partners not facing their problems together from the same side and working out a solution that serves both people and the family.

This review is my opinion and I tried to be balanced. There are many reviewers who are outraged and others that think this is great stuff. What I tried to offer here is what I have learned from my own experience, extensive reading on this topic and working with couples. My intent is not to slam the author or make people who have affairs feel "bad" or "ashamed." What I so want to offer is another perspective that will be useful to some and not useful to others. However, I think if you are entertaining something as serious as an affair with lots of potential consequences, you might want to try out many different perspectives before making a decision that can cause your life to come crashing down around your ears overnight. I believe people are responsible for their choices and the more their choices effect others, the more responsibility is involved. I'm sure there are many readers out there who share this view and I suspect that even those struggling with strong temptation in some cases for very real and painful reasons can see the grain of truth in this point of view as well.

I had a hard time not chuckling through the whole book. I am sure there are those who might not appreciate the humor and could feel intimidated by the subject but IT IS A GREAT READ!!!! A well rounded view of the human animal at play. Lots of information as well as good advice on both sides of the fence. Her style reminds me of Bryson who also melds information with humor. Just don't let your spouse see you reading it. Actually my girlfriend did and I recommended it heartily to her..........she is now chuckling her way through it.

Never read it, heard her on Howard Stern and I was laughing at all the rules she says not to do. My question is what about the book? She left out rule number 1: do not buy the book to have your spouse see it. that would be a tell tell sign, would it not
?

There goes her marketing, maybe that is why she was on the radio.

I read this book because I was curious, wanted to pick apart her arguments, and also pride myself on being able to expose myself to other viewpoints occasionally. I'll begin by saying that my Christian principles and other core beliefs would still prevent me from seeking out an affair. That being said, this book has helped me better understand, and perhaps be tolerant of, those who do make the choice. It's similar to abortion--I've been pro-life for 25 years and will never change, but my attitudes towards pro-choicers have softened somewhat over the years.

Some of her insights were refreshing to me as a middle-aged single woman--for example that there really aren't enough available men out there for all the available women. Period. So the Harvard study was right after all. Single women have always sort of known these things in their bones, yet most of media and popular culture just tells us to try harder, be less picky, try online dating, blah, blah. She also asserts that singles, single women in particular are devalued in our society. No kidding. She is reminiscent of Tom Leykis in that she makes some pretty politically incorrect assertions that are nevertheless mostly true--for example, that women marry the best man their looks can attract and men marry the best woman that their incomes can afford. So you can see that a lot of mainstream relationship experts and others in the singles industry might have an interest in discouraging people from reading her. She's definitely a pragmatic utilitarian, not a romantic idealist. And in some cases she's a flat-out cynic. But so are some of my best friends. I did find myslef wondering what if any spiritual beliefs she subscribes to--I would guess atheist or agnostic but she doesn't say.

I am absolutely outraged at the concept of this book. I was just cheated on by my boyfriend and came to amazon to search for helpful books on affairs and this was the first book to pop up!! How to HIDE an affair? This makes me as sick to my stomach as my boyfriend did when I discovered the affair. What ever happened to being honest in a relationship. If you don't want to be with someone that you say you love then save them the pain and heartache of discovering that you have been unfaithful. They will find out, cheaters are always caught. The author of this book simply disgusts me. I now wonder what has happened to the world because people apparently believe it is ok to hurt someone they care about enough to write a how-to book on the subject. disgraceful.

It is a funny collection of stories about some foreigners in Japan, Kenny is an American English Teacher, Nigel is a British news writer, and Sharon is an Australian hostess. In Japan, they are simply gaijin. Taro is a Japanese-American who is gaijin as well, but he doesn't look like the others, so he is never called gaijin. I have lived in Japan for about 3 years, and I can say that there are many similar stories that happen in Japan every day. I have read this book twice, and these stories made me laugh too much.
However, many of the terms used in this book are outdated and the dialect used is "adequate" only in Tokyo, and truly obscene.
A Japanese friend who is from Hokkaido and lives in Nagoya doesn't understand some of the words used in this book.
As I have said, this book actually doesn't improve your vocabulary, unless you want to be a Yakuza in Tokyo, but as other reviewer said maybe it encourage yourself to learn more Japanese because it presents many truly stories that happen even today.
They are 12 stories:
-Alien Invaders.
-The ABC's of Japanese.
-Street Jive.
-Waiting at Hachiko.
-Talking about people.
-The gay life.
-Hookers and Gangsters.
-Disco City.
-Foreign Drinking Holes.
-After Hours.
-Romance and Low life.
-Talking about Sex.

The dialogues are presented first in Romaji, followed by their English translations, and there is a vocabulary list at the end of each story. I gave it 4 stars because I consider it much better than "Japanese Street Slang", both are outdated, but "Zakennayo" is much more humorous and easier to read.

I read this after my first year of Japanese study. I would not recommend using any of the terms or phrases discussed in this book without first bouncing them off a few native Japanese speakers. I suggest this because you run the risk of sounding like a total fool if you try some of these phrases out on strangers. Problems: First, the author does not point out that many of the phrases used in the book would only be used by women or school girls (if you want to appear effeminate, use these terms recklessly). In addition to this, many of the expressions discussed are terribly outdated. Finally, several of my Japanese friends told me that they had never heard the word "Zakennayo" before. To be fair they did tell me that the term might be from a dialect they were unfamiliar with. However, I think they were just being polite. Anyway, please don't take my opinions and experiences with this book as gospel. I'm in my third year of Japanese study, so I'm no way near fluent. Rather, go to any well known internet search engine any type "Zakennayo" in. Be sure to take note of the number of hits you obtain. Now type in an equivalent term in English, German, French, Spanish, or any other European language you may be familiar with. Compare the number of hits. Well, this was fun, Thanks for listening.

I don't own this book so I can't really comment on it but I'd like to comment on one of the reviews below. "Zakennayo" is very much a real phrase known to anyone who has studied basic Japanese. It's a contraction of the phrase "Fuzakeru na yo" which means something along the lines of "Don't mess with me". If you are Japanese you most certainly have heard it by the age of 5.

I found this book pretty useful- but would have liked it more if it had some way to easily find a word you're looking for, or an index in back so you can look up what page a word is on.

This book is for English speakers struggling with learning Japanese and want a comic book to stimulate some interest in continued learning. The slang is out dated and mostly likely used a few decades ago. The converse would be a Japanese coming to the USA speaking like Austin Powers, "Groovy Baby!" Naturally proper etiquette requires you would not speak such words in civilized company. As in the USA using out of date slang is most likely going to result in you getting laughed at, beat up or a combination of both. I say buy the book for a few good laughs and encourage yourself to learn more Japanese. I recommend Barrons CD set although it too is a little dated and when the Japanese women narrators speak they are almost inaudible.

For the newly diagnosed patient, for the patient who has lived with IBD for years, and for their families, the book's objective is to "make you a better informed patient who can understand what your doctor is doing and why". This book is rather outdated and doesn't include recent medical research and drug treatments.

For the newly diagnosed patient, for the patient who has lived with IBD for years, and for their families, the book's objective is to "make you a better informed patient who can understand what your doctor is doing and why". This book is rather outdated and doesn't include recent medical research and drug treatments. At last check this book was out of stock indefinately, but you can check it's availability

Nothing new here - nothing that you haven't heard before. This is basically one long advertisement of Brandt's products. You could go bankrupt trying to hold back the years this way and wouldn't have time for anything but beauty regimens.

Dr. Perricone's books are far more informative and even though he has a product line, too, his books focus on scientific studies and facts, nutrition and health, and he provides information that you can use even if you don't buy his products.

Here is a doctor who talks about cleansing the body through diet, and then suggests you inject every possible thing into your face. I was not impressed. I was under the impression the book would have good diet tips to keep one looking youthful.

I learned so much from reading this book. Things I never knew about your skin. I use Dr. Brandt's Poreless line already but this informative book just adds to that. I would recommend it to anyone.

This is a tiny book with only a very few reperesentative items from Brandt's work. Look elsewhere for a fuller set of Brandt's amazing work.

Drawings are great. The information on formulas,when written, was probably the best available, however would now prove to be wrong and possibly life threatening to the neonate raccoon.
Information on diseases, both zoonotic (able to transfer to humans) and general, is extremely sketchy.
Over all, if someone has update information and was adding this book to their library for how it use to be, and what we then knew, it would be ok. Using this book as a guideline for raising one now, even for release back into the wild, would be horrible.

I have lately been looking for good westerns to read having recently read some great Louis L. and Larry McMurtry books and this book looked like a good read (based on the cover and description on the back.) Nothing like the "man avenging a lost love" storyline to really rev up the action in a book. This book really doesn't accomplish what most books in that type of genre do though. I really wasn't that interested in the hero, Matthew Price, even though I sympathized with his plight and wanted him to catch and kill the bad guys. I think I was more interested because the bad guys were written better, or at least the were more than one-dimensional. I think the book could have used a bit more background into Price.
There were a few other things I didn't particuarly like about the book too but if your a huge western fan (although I like the occasional western I am no 'huge' fan of the genre) I am sure you'll at least enjoy most of the book.

I did the think the action was very well written and liked how Brandt didn't make Price the 'best gunslinger ever' but more of a man who is getting lucky.

I give it a 2.5 (rounded down)

A VERY disappointing book!! Full of general information that applies to everyone. For the price I was expecting some really good research information regarding different people named "BRANDT" in history. I got none of that. I do not recommend that you waste your money on this purchase.

This is the worst textbook I've ever come across. Tons of grammatical errors and inconsistencies with monetary units, such as using British pounds and Dollar signs intermixed when they shouldn't be. Basic math skills seem to be lacking from the authors because many of the numbers don't add up. This is totally inexcusable for an accounting-based text. No website for the errata either. Avoid at all costs.