Burton Books

The Opera Journeys Mini Guide Series is just wonderful; it's like a "Cliff Note" of the opera, and extremely informative and educational. I particularly like the size; these guides are not cumbersome and fit right into my shirt pocket. The ladies will find sufficient room in their pocketbooks.

The story narrative with the music examples is excellent. I prefer it to a libretto; indeed, it's a much easier way to follow the essence of the story. The essay is magnificent; very well written, not pedantic, and extremely insightful and comprehensible. I congratulate Burton Fisher for a job very well done and Amazon for making these handy, information-laden booklets available. The Opera Journeys Mini Guide Series is a wonderful contribution to opera education and opera appreciation.

My tip: acquire the entire collection because you will be in easy reach of superbly presented opera guides consisting of story analysis, principal characters in the opera, story narrative with music highlights, background, analysis, and commentary.

Heinz Dinter, Ph.D.

The legal Thesaurus is the most useful legal writing aid out there. In the legal world, the outcome of a case may hinge on the interpretation of a single word. Make sure you have The Legal Thesaurus on your side so your writing is the most precise that it can be.

For over 20 years I have actively examined "why candidates get hired and who does the hiring" from both sides of the college recruiting process. The most commonly asked question heard over the past two decades remains "What can I do with a major in...?" Liberal Arts Jobs answers this query and many, many more. This, the most recent edition, was a blending of previous works and contains "state of the art" advice for recent and soon to be liberal arts graduates. As a job search coach I teach and reinforces skills required for successful search, including resume writing, correspondence, and interviewing. For those I coach and, I hope, those who read my publicatons, "job search is simple, not necessarily easy," because the process is broken down into easy to follow (yet challenging) behavioral steps and easy to accept motivational attitudes. To date, he I have critiqued over 9,500 resumes (I do count) and worked with over 12,000 job seekers (I guess, but don't exaggerate). Reflected in my writings, presentations, and counseling style, I beleive that job search doesn't have to be taken too seriously and that it is best undertaken with humor and positive affect. You, your son or daughter, or a family friend can be successful, even if they majored in English or Art History. Read the book. Be inspired to take action. Set goals. Establish job search and internship strategies. Create resumes and other job search tools. Go for it! Let me know what you think of the book. I continue to learn through your experiences and comments.

Being an avid collector of books relating to anything fishy (I have a library of probably in excess of 1,000 books!) I found this out-of-print 61 page introduction to fishes an extremely quick and enjoyable read ... very colorfully and amply illustrated it is a wonderful younger child's book and the text though brief was informative enough to hold my adult attention .... there was even a section on "How to Draw Fishes"! I also liked the size (8" x 9") and the sturdy laminated hardbook cover, with colorful fishes on front and back.

Karen Burton Mains shares her journey of soul healing as she struggles to break through traditional mindsets about her life, marriage, ministry and place in Christendom into a more Biblical view of herself, her husband, her place in God's work. She comes to peace and integration over the conflicting parts of her life: she loves her husband and works well with him in ministry situations, yet faces her painful loneliness as she comes to self-honesty about his continued workaholism. She chooses to honor her husband and marriage, to accept and work with the reality that he probably will never stop his workaholism, that she needs to take care of herself where he lacks attentiveness to her. That the traditional church definition of a wife's role and the ways a wife should show love may not be Biblical when it prevents God from being able to get through to her husband. Through dream imagry, Biblical insight and kind male support, she comes to healing as she deals with the fact that each of us have both masculine and feminine inside ourselves.

The book is written in almost a journal format, with intensely personal thoughts and imagry mixed in, very understandable to those of us on the same path. This book may disturb those who are against using any "worldly" psychological insights or symbolism.

For a discussion of "worldly" psychological symbolism, and how God invented the symbols, (Jung etc just document them) and how God wants to use them to bring our whole being first to the Cross, then to New Life in Christ, read Restoring the Christian Soul Through Healing Prayer by Leanne Payne.

The Opera Journeys Mini Guide Series is just wonderful; it's like a "Cliff Note" of the opera, and extremely informative and educational. I particularly like the size; these guides are not cumbersome and fit right into my shirt pocket. The ladies will find sufficient room in their pocketbooks.

The story narrative with the music examples is excellent. I prefer it to a libretto; indeed, it's a much easier way to follow the essence of the story. The essay is magnificent; very well written, not pedantic, and extremely insightful and comprehensible. I congratulate Burton Fisher for a job very well done and Amazon for making these handy, information-laden booklets available. The Opera Journeys Mini Guide Series is a wonderful contribution to opera education and opera appreciation.

My tip: acquire the entire collection because you will be in easy reach of superbly presented opera guides consisting of story analysis, principal characters in the opera, story narrative with music highlights, background, analysis, and commentary.

Heinz Dinter, Ph.D.

Virtually all editions of Macbeth will have at least some annotations. Rummaging through five different editions, I preferred this Yale University Press version, edited by Burton Raffel, as having the most comprehensive and comprehensible notes, as well as an excellent introduction to Shakespeare's play. Raffel not only explains the meanings of obscure words, but also gives brief notes pertaining to relevant history, geography, stage directions, etc, that are rarely addressed as fully by other editors. In addition, Raffel frequently gives the proper way to stress the syllables in a line when reading it aloud, which can be extremely helpful. (However, in most places these stresses need to be very subtle, so that you don't sound like "taDUM taDUM taDUM".) And Yale's page layout is among the clearest that I've seen.

As a bonus, this edition includes at the back a long essay on the play by Harold Bloom. This is not an uninteresting commentary, but Bloom desperately needs a good editor. His essay is not only at least three times longer than it should be, but is startlingly repetitious. Yale would have been wise to have asked Bloom for a rewrite.

This is the biggest, most comprehensive book of quotes in existence and certainly in my collection of 400+ quotation books, dating back to 1590 (I just found out that the library of Congress has 150 quotation books.) It has well over 50,000 quotations, is organized by subject, and is close to 3000 pages.

This book, in one of it's edition prefaces, makes it clear that it is not a book of familiar quotations. It is not uncommon, that you will find a subject area which has several pages of fine print quotations dedicated to it, in comparison to a handful of quotes that are found in the average collection.

If you consider the book, based on the cost per quotation, it's actually a very good deal.

Because it is so comprehensive, some of the quotes are classics, some are highly familiar, but to me, the gems are the unusual ones, all with excellent source information. It's amazing that such a vast compendium does such a good job, and that it was done before the age of computers. (First ed was in the 30's.)

If you want the biggest and best, this is it, whether it goes by the Macmillan name or the Home book of Quotations name. The only thing you will be lacking will be the most recent quotes. So.... get a recent Simpsons Conemporary Quotations, and maybe Justin Kaplan's Bartletts, and the Thesaurus of Quotations, and you should be in pretty good shape, quotation colection-wise . Check out my profile to learn about my website, which has loads of quotations focusing on psychology, health, positive psychology and mind body topics.

The Opera Journeys Mini Guide Series is just wonderful; it's like a "Cliff Note" of the opera, and extremely informative and educational. I particularly like the size; these guides are not cumbersome and fit right into my shirt pocket. The ladies will find sufficient room in their pocketbooks.

The story narrative with the music examples is excellent. I prefer it to a libretto; indeed, it's a much easier way to follow the essence of the story. The essay is magnificent; very well written, not pedantic, and extremely insightful and comprehensible. I congratulate Burton Fisher for a job very well done and Amazon for making these handy, information-laden booklets available. The Opera Journeys Mini Guide Series is a wonderful contribution to opera education and opera appreciation.

My tip: acquire the entire collection because you will be in easy reach of superbly presented opera guides consisting of story analysis, principal characters in the opera, story narrative with music highlights, background, analysis, and commentary.

Heinz Dinter, Ph.D.

I am an internist. During my residency years, I diecovered this book. It made me a distinguished resident in nephrology in a remarkably short time. Nephrology is the most complicated branch of internal medicine but this book has made it unbelievebly easy, meaningful and attractive. It is specialy written for those who want to learn complex issues as soon as possible.