Chapman Books

What a heartwarming story with such vivid and friendly illustrations. The rhythm is wonderful and the rhymes aren't forced. The story flows and gives the reader ample opportunity to try out different voices for all of bear's friends.

This book has been purchased as a holiday gift for my granddaughter, who is in first grade and 5 years old.

This is a wonderful book with great rhythm and rhyme. My 3 month old already smiles when I start reading it, and I know as he gets older it will be one of his favorites, as he doesn't react this way to any other book. I also think it is a great story... VERY cute pictures!

My daughter loves this book (22 months old) and my husband and I enjoy the sing-song rhyme as well. It has a nice rhythm for reading aloud. We don't mind reading it over and over! The illustrations are great also.

My 11 month old son loves this book and has since he was little. He loves the cadence of my voice as I read the clever rhyming story and he loves the pictures. However for younger children like him this book is also available in a board book format. Just search amazon for bear snores on board book.

Not only do I adore the illustrations and rhythmic text of these too-cute bear books, my 1-year-old daughter has LOVED them since the day I bought them (I got this one when she was about 7-8 months old). She makes me read them each 10 times a day, and she laughs every time when the bear sneezes in Bear Snores On. They are exactly the kind of book I would have loved to come up with myself. Beautiful work! We want them all!

This is a great follow-on to Bear Snores On and doesn't disappoint. The vivid colors and sweet storyline keeps my little one's attention. While Bear Snores On is still our favorite, Bear Wants More is a good addition to our growing book collection.

My kids have taken this out of their school library several times. The story is sweet and the illustrations are charming. I purchased it for them this Christmas-now we have one of our own forever! This author and illustrator have achieved a winning combination for kids with these books.

We love Bear Snores On so this was a must-have as it takes up where we left off, after Bear's hibernation. I love the pictures, the story and most importantly - my 4 year old loved the book as well.

This book as well as "Bear Snores On" are 2 of my daughter's very favorite books. The rhymes and beat are very fun. Now, when we are looking for another book, we always look-up Karma Wilson to see what else she has out.

Wow, just adorable. Great gift idea. Great size book. I pull it out for Christmas and the kids LOVE it. It's such a sweet story of friendship. I love these sweet, wholesome stories. The illustrations are BEAUTIFUL as always with Karma's books. Even after we read it, the kids love to just look through it at the pictures and can read it to themselves that way. Really, I think each little home needs ALL the Bear books.

We have several Christmas books, and this is the favorite in our house. All of Bear's little woodland friends wake him up to join in all the Christmas Eve festivities. The story and illustrations are very simple, yet enchanting. I would love to climb in the pages and stay up for Christmas with Bear!

I purchased this book for my son after receiving the Bear Snores On as a gift. They are his absolute favorites. The pictures are beautiful and the words are lyrical and rhyming. I also like the way it subtly includes both the religious and secular sides of Christmas beneath the overall message of friendship and giving. He has MANY books, but wants me to read this one every night. It's so nice I din't mind.

This book has wonderful illustrations, and is written in a flowing manner that makes it great fun reading to my first grandson. I plan on getting the entire series for him! I want to make sure he knows there is more to life than sports!

My son LOVED this book during the holidays! We are huge fans of this series. It is perfect for kids over 3 years :)

Good for Fern Chapman as she attempts to make sense of family roots in a tourist-level return to Europe, even while knowing that a previous generation is largely inscrutable, fragmentary, and ultimately impressionistic. Much to the book's credit, both mother and daughter, as protagonists, explore this generational divide. The book's stated purpose of pursuing WWII understandings "Beyond the Holocaust" promises new insight into unresolved moral issues. Chapman hopes to liberate the reader from that form of simplistic guilt-conveyance which stifles further thinking about the Holocaust.

Chicago-based Chapman plunges us into a post-Christian and post-Judaic landscape, a brave new world of secular humanism that hopes to compete with the centuries-rooted religious foundation that we've come to respect in the book we've come to know as the Bible. We find ourselves adrift in the modern world of American and European apostates, no longer tethered to ancient heritage, but reluctantly forced to bear the social mantle of being either a Jew or a Christian.

The character Mina is representative of the WWII Christian German who never left: "I mean, I was brought up in the church every Sunday and I prayed. But we weren't a deeply religious family." Her family, dysfunctional to the point of abandoning her to the servant needs of a local Jewish family, attributes their lack of faith to the Christian disorientation resulting from the World War I, untimately a civil war in which Christians and Jews were destroying each other. World War II would be the same unfortunate imploding of the Judeo-Christian bulwark. Our sympathies to mother and daughter! Even so, Mina is forced to shoulder the guilt associated with Holocaust, even while the visitors from America remain speculative.

The mother Edith deserves our sympathies as well. "After the war, however, she had little use for religion. When I asked her why, she said, 'I want nothing to do with it. Look what happened in Germany--that was among mostly Christian people. After that, I couldn't trust any religion. I just couldn't believe in God.'" Edith simply cannot fathom the horrible waste of internecine warfare.

Chapman is often superb in "Getting Beyond the Holocaust" with its propaganda-like group-think. During the war, German Jews seemed to know as little about the Holocaust as did everyday German Christians. Neither knew much, if anything. This accounts for several characters offering only "symbolic" protests against Nazi incursions into their lives. Knowing more would presumably have led to ever more forceful resistance from both communities.

Nor does Chapman attempt to whitewash typical Holocaust guilt formulas. Mina represents the easier vantage, i.e. that "You are a Nazi to the end of your life. You are stamped." Yet the Nazis voiced principle-based (to them, at least) complaints that might be acknowledged: apostate Jews, not faith-based Jews, were leading the godless Bolshevik revolution. Marx himself had descended from a long line of rabbis before his family's desperate plunge into Lutheranism and religious disorientation, ultimately a cogent formula for atheism, socialism, and secular humanism. Overall, the book leaves us with a sense of tragic loss among "should have been" partners in a unified Judeo-Christian Europe, rallying around the Old and New Testaments. Too bad today that a weak, self-propagandized Europe has replaced the Jews with its real historic enemy, jihadist Islam.

I had begun this book and put it down--to pick it up again was a very good idea. This author has a very readable style. A great book to read if you want
to know about the Holocaust and beyond--just like the title says--it says it all.

Edith Westerfield Schumer left Germany in 1938 as a twelve-year-old. She left alone. Her parents sent her to America, removing her from the threat of the Nazis in her German homeland. Her Jewish father mistakenly believed that Hitler would acknowledge his service to Germany in World War I. However, most of her family did not survive the persecution or the death camps. Edith never saw her parents again.

She rarely spoke of her childhood. Perhaps so much loss could not be expressed in words. Perhaps she didn't know how to convey to her family what was ripped apart in her past. Her daughter Fern knew little of her heritage.

"Motherland" tells their story through her daughter Fern's perspective. When her mother finally agrees to return to Germany, Fern accompanies her-hoping to learn about her grandparents, hoping to see aspects of her mother's childhood, hoping to better understand how the Holocaust stole her past when it stole her mother's.

Through their journey Fern and Edith learn much more about each other and about the quest to reconcile the past than they expected, significantly deepening their mother-daughter bond. Fern relates with poignancy how moments from her mother's childhood are revealed during their visit. For the first time she realizes that her mother's inability to speak German without an American accent parallels her inability to speak English without German pronunciations creeping in. Her speech identifies her as different from other Americans-and other Germans. Fern learns her mother's favorite German food only to realize that Edith never learned to cook it before she was sent away. For the first time she hears of her mother's insecurities about leaving her home.

They encounter people from Edith's childhood who through their silence aligned themselves with the Nazis. Their lives still echo with hidden guilt. The mother and daughter speak with others who have never overcome their anger at the Nazis and what they suffered when they tried to help and protect the Jews. The women are struck by how people's lives have never returned to normal.

Their story provides insight into mother-daughter relationships and the role of roots in those relationships. The memoir was named a finalist in 2000 in the National Jewish Book Awards by the Jewish Book Council and a number of schools use Motherland to teach about moral choices.

Edith and Fern acknowledge that the Holocaust has now affected three generations of their family. Somehow those who carry on must remember history and honor those cut down by cruelty, yet let go of the past moving ahead with the new generations into healing.

This book covers the return of a Jewess, at 12 years old separated from her parents from the Rheinland on a Kindertransport, to her small hometown, Stockstadt-am-Rhein in 1990. Her daughter, pregnant, goes with her, although unable to speak German, and writes from her younger, American Jewish perspective on this whole process of reclaiming her mother's past, her Heimat (homeland), her Motherland so to speak.

As you can read, most reviewers rave about this book. It is well-written, if a bit too introspective at times (these parts a reader can skip, such as the daughter's thoughts dwelling on herself and her own children). I'd like to make these criticisms for the author, that she may rewrite it perhaps, or if it should be done in a film version, some negative feedback could also perhaps be useful in making a tighter story:

1. The mother's verbatim words should be used in the text, with footnotes underneath for translation into English. Many who read this book know German and do not want to read about the daughter's struggle to make out this or that trival word. Dare I say it, the daughter might have made a better effort to know her mother's language? How else to understand her own roots, her own mother's culture, her longing for her childhood?

2. Don't introduce side issues that remain unresolved. For example, a very intriguing juicy bit is thrown in, that her older sister was sent a year ahead of her to America, adopted by another set of relatives, and now that the two sisters (her mother and her aunt) are now in their late 60's, they still don't get along. This isn't worth delving into, or at least explaining a little bit? WHy leave it hanging? Why bring it up if not to grab the reader's attention? WHy not go and interview the aunt, find out her own bitter memories or reasons for spurning her younger sister an entire lifetime?

2. Why no mention of this author's father? Who was he? How did he influence the family with his own traditions, career or job, attitudes and hobbies, personality? Reading this book, one could think that there was no father in the author's life. If we are to understand her pain as a daughter in not grasping her parents' lives, then surely some mention should be made.

3. Why not explain her mother's cowardice in not giving her own daughter Jewish names? She says she is named Fern (for a relative, Frieda) and Brenda (for another one, Brondl). This is strange to me, for the names "Fern Brenda" certainly don't indicate the great Jewish heritage that the mother wants kept.
Meanwhile, we hear that the German families are naming their kids Joshua and Sara, with no shame or hiding. Strange indeed.

4. Why not look at Germans more as people? Her impression of a silly clerk called the immigrations controller is that of a nasty Nazi, simply because he is German with blue eyes and blonde hair, and stamps their documents with authority. Don't ALL immigration people behave this way in every airport of the world? They're SUPPOSED to be abrupt, to give people unease. Does she call the ones down in Israel with their "brown eyes and dark hair" typical Mossad types? Nasty because they're Jews? I should think not, it's lame stereotyping at best.


Overall, this book needs editting by a non-Jewish, non-German hating professional editor, who can guide Fern into a more balanced presentation of her mother's beloved homeland. Otherwise, the hatred comes through with the stereotypical slights, and weakens the story's validity.

The best angle, if a movie were to be made - hopefully in Germany's Babelsberg and not here in Hollywood, God forbid - the theme of Mini, her childhood friend. Now there's a morality play full of contradictions! Wilhelmine (Mini for short), a child six years older from a dreadfully poor family of seven kids, is sent to be a servant/maid to the well-off Jews, and becomes best friends with the daughter she is meant to serve. Then her friend is sent to America, making Mini 18 and Tiddy 12 when they separate. Mini is so enraged to have lost her adopted sister and family that she spends the rest of her life documenting the Nazis, and whether they're all prosecuted. Her own grown son, nearing 50, feels himself deprived of a proper childhood or mothering because Mini devotes herself to fighting the evils of the past rather than living in the present. She is a living testament to the folly of grudges, which the author's own mother avoiding doing - she purposefully shunned nostalgia for her lost homeland and family, until her 60's.

In many respects, this daughter and her emotions, this author, is the problem in the story. She should rewrite it from the participants' point of view, either her mother's or Mini's, in the third person, and take her own petulant self out of it.

Now THAT would be a mature and interesting novel.

Hey, also, put in some of these pictures that she dwells on!

"Motherland" by Fern Schumer Chapman centers around an intriguing premise, that of a mother and daughter returning to Germany to discover what happened to the family left behind during the war, in an effort to let go of the war that plagues their relationship. The author's mother was sent as a refuge to America a year after her older sister, leaving her grandma and parents to endure the wrath of the Nazis. Feeling abandoned and unloved, the author's mother never returned until the early 1990s, still hesitant to encounter the past.

For Germans, it seems as if WWII and its legacy is always close to the surface; a feeling a guilt pervades their interactions with those from other places due to the constant association with evil they must endure. Mother and daughter certainly encounter that on their journey to the small town where her mother lived her first 12 years of life. The town, while greatly changed, is still home to many former classmates. Escorted around town by a man eager to make amends for his past actions, the two discover that the past is always present, no matter how hard one tries to forget.

Overall, "Motherland" is a quick-paced read, an accounting of the author's attempt to understand her mother. Yet at times the narrative reads as if the author is trying to hard; she was five months pregnant when the journey was made, and perhaps her emotional swings show through too much. The flow is often interrupted by liteary efforts at similes, comparisons which aren't necessary and do not add to the story. However, the story is one that the author needed to discover and one that she needed to tell. It is an interesting look at how someone who wouldn't necessarily qualify as a 'survivor' did survive, but still passed on that legacy of loss and war to her daughter.

Leaves of Red and Gold is a HOT novel! I loved the main character and his sexy life! The suspense was great, the love story fabulous, and the ending out of control!

HURRAH! This is what I say to "Leaves of Red and Gold" HURRAH to this delicious and delectable novel about a strong gay character that could serve as a role model to all! It is fabulous to see a novel that tells a heartwarming story full of characters that could be a part of our own lives. It is also wonderful to see a "gay book" that is not about sex!

The story of the life of Matthew Schipani is absorbing and stirring; laced with a great deal of passion for his loves and his career.

I was stimulated, aroused, and drawn into this novel by its well developed plot line, with crescendos of suspense beating in the background! This is one of the best "gay" novels I have read in a decade!

Leaves of Red and Gold is a HOT, HOT, HOT gay novel! The storyline is fantastic and the development of the main character by the author is wonderful! I hope a sequel or a movie is on the way!

I agree with everyone who reviewed this novel, Leaves of Red and Gold, except the last reader. The protagonist is not gay, he is a scary dude: (...)!

The main character is gay, and a great gay guy at that! The story is very exciting, not amatuerish at all...it is a NEW story, with a great ending!

Leaves of Red and Gold is definitely worth your time and money!

Leaves of Red and Gold is the best gay fiction I have read in a long time! The main character is exciting as can be, and the supporting characters add to the depth of the story. It is a quick read, one that you will thoroughly enjoy and will tell your friends about! I recommend you order...order two and give one to your friend! It is a great book for straight and gay alike!

I work in hospice and see many lives affected by great loss. Often children are forgotten as adults mourn. I give this book to parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles to provide both attention to the children and a way to help them through a difficult time. This book is helpful and hopeful to all!

Good book, dragonflies are our 'mascot' for my cancer support group and we love this story.

This simple book is the best yet on the subject of discussing death with a youngster. It was enlightening for ME!

Death and Dying are a difficult concept to explain to young children. Water Bugs & Dragonflies gracefully addresses this subject with illustrations that are clear and meaningful enough to share with grieving adults. Because of this book, our family has adopted the dragonfly as a meaningful symbol representative of a beloved friend recently deceased. I highly recommend this book.

I know many pastors who recommend this book for use with children. I recently gave it to an adult friend on the death of her sister. Simply put, it is a tale of transformation told for those who are left behind when a loved one goes on to the next phase. simple and timeless.

This was a great book. I would recommend it to everyone who has children, especially teens.

In keeping with the invaluable information in his marriage book, the information about how to love someone according to their love langauge has proved to be a great help with my son. He has struggled for years since his dad had an affair and walked out. I wasn't listening to how my son was trying to tell me he needed to be loved. I wish that I had known about this book 3 years ago...it would've made such a difference in how he has dealt with things since the divorce.

This is such a positive book. If you are struggling with your teen you should learn their language. This book is very rewarding to parents and teens. Love it !!!!

Great resource for parents on how to help your children feel loved and appreciated. Helps to build their self confidence and show them that they are valuable and special. The book has many insights into the teens thoughts and needs at this stage in their lives. I will listen to it over and over.

I am a probation officer that teaches a parenting class for parents of strong-willed or out-of-control teenagers. I personally believe in this book so much that I purchase them, out-of-pocket, to give to parents who have perfect attendance in my class. This book has helped them not only with their teenagers, but also with all their relationships.

This is the real deal. I first used this book in a class for the USPS when I was around 13 years old (I'm 60+ now). Everything is factual and updated often. If you want the best reference manual on boating get this one.

Our most frequently asked question: "What's the one book you'd recommend for a boater?" Our answer every time: "Chapman's."

Whether you're a new boater just getting started or an old salt needing a little refresher, this is your dependable one-volume reference. When we need material for our "Boating/PWC Basics" course, this is where we go.

The book is continuously updated and fresh, with new information on topics like GPS and how to use it and Digital Selective Calling (DSC) for your marine radio. It continues to present essential and complete information on preparing to get underway, operating and navigating your boat, the practice of good seamanship, docking or mooring your boat, and how to put it away for the winter (which some of us have to do!).

Chapman's has been a fixture in our library (and on our boats) since the 50th edition in 1972. And even though we pay a little more for it now than the $8.95 price in 1972, you'll still find it a great value at Amazon's price shown above.

Our advice: Don't leave home (or the dock) without it.

Chapmans is the must-have for any boater who wants to do things the right way. I regularly go to this book. Easy to read, organized and practical. A bit big to bring onboard, however.

I've been a profesional captain for over 30 years, and I still find myself going back to this book for a quick refresher on the Rules of the Road or a check on the working and breaking strengths for various moorings, ropes, chains, etc. If you were allowed only one reference book on boating, this one, in my opinion, would be the best choice. It has a wealth of practical information on virtually every 'basic' subject of importance to the mariner -- novice and professional alike -- and is completely free of controversy and error. With 64 printings under its belt, you can be sure you're getting the facts and figures straight.

There are indeed other very worthy books that cover individual aspects of boating (heavy weather seamanship, advanced navigation, etc.) in a more comprehensive manner, but none of these will offer more factual, accurate, or appropriate information for such a wide range of skill levels. We all know experience is the best teacher. But when the tuition can kill you, it pays to come to school prepared. In this regard, Chapman's has no equal.

If you could only buy one book on boating, this would be it, but it's overkill for a beginning recreational boater. The newcomer to boating will get lost in all the detail if he tries to use this as a practical manual. With all the books on boating, it might be better to label this as an intermediate-advanced reference book. Sure, it's got everything, but most weekenders don't need to know everything, just the basics.

Bear Feels Sick is a new 'Bear' book by Karma Wilson. Like 'Bear Snores On' it has beautiful illustrations and a fun story. This time it is autumn in the woods and bear isn't feeling well so his friends take care of him.

This is a beautiful book; it is fun just to page through and look at the pictures. My granddaughter will love it. It is not only beautiful in appearance, but the message is beautiful, as well. I highly recommend it.

Our grandson has most of the Bear books now, and he loves each of them. (I think his dad enjoys them just as much as he does!) The text is playful, and the illustrations are rich with little details.

This series of books is a positive addition to any little one's library.

I just got this for my son for his third birthday while coincidentally his sister is sick!

I have always loved Jane Chapman's illustrations and Bear Snores On is one of my favorite picture books. I wasn't as thrilled with the second one in this series but this one is a hit with me.

It's very sweet and thoughtful and stands on it's own.
Very nice!

We got this for my 3 yr old for Christmas and it has become one of both of our favorites. "Bear Snores On" has longtime been in my top 5 of children's books to read to her, and this one is another wonderful story. We've been reading it a lot lately with both of us having bad winter colds and there's something soothing and relatable about it. I love how it ends -- Bear finally feels better, but his friends are now sick and he tells them he'll take care of them. Very sweet. And -- the illustrations are absolutely gorgeous. You will love it!

I got this book because of the reviews. But after reading it
I had a few problems with the story. Things happen super fast between Michael & Libby. One minute Michael and Libby meet (hardly any conversation between the two) and the next he is in her bed in the middle of the night and she's ok with it, and so it goes with things happening between this two that hardly know anything about one anoher but act like they've know eachother for years (no explanation as how they got to that point). The dialogue between the two falls flat. I felt no connection between the two. It was almost boring.

I loved this book and all the "Highlander" books!! Janet Chapman is an excellent author..

I read the fourth book in the series first, as it was a current release and I didn't realize at the time of purchase it was a series. I was hooked and had to purchase all of the series. These books can stand alone, but it was also an excellent series that I would recommend.

A little insite in to the book would be nice. A small peice to read to get a feel for the book and so it would help in my decision on buying. But since i read a book by Janet Chapman before; I knew that this would be just as good as the other. When I read her books it is like a movie playing in my head while i read, because i can picture all of it. wonderfully inviting.

I just discovered Janet Chapman and I will now look for every one of her books. This is a great tale about living in the Maine woods (something about which I am familiar) and I loved every page. I had been seeing her books and not getting them, because I was kind of 'done' with the historical Scots, but I accidentally discovered that these books were about modern life (sorta) and that changed everything I felt about the whole series of books. Get them! They are great!