Dean Books

DEVELOPING THE MANAGER'S RESOURCE BAS

I stumbled across this book and was intrigued by the beautiful pictures of the children. What was even more special was the fact that the pictures were from families around the world. The set up of the book was very well laid out. The verses were tender and full of joyful statements. When you think of children it always brings a smile to your face and that is exactly what this book did for me.

The best way to keep your kids fit (and even help them lose weight if they need to), is to get outside and start playing.

This wonderful book, Go Outside, has loads of great play ideas. If it's been a few years since you were a youngster, open to any page and you'll soon be smiling with memories. There's things to do at home, the beach, the pool, and every season of the year.

The photographs are wonderful, full of smiling happy children, and every idea includes a "What You'll Need" list so you'll be sure to have all your materials gathered. Most can be done with everyday items anyway.

This book is a great gift idea for parents too.

don't remember when I had read about the book God and His Image: An Outline of Biblical Theology by Dominique Barthelemy, but I am glad I added it to my Wish List and got around to ordering it. Fr. Dominique Barthelemy O.P. was an internationally recognized expert on Old Testament studies and a member of the Pontifical Biblical Commission who died in 2002.

The book is exactly as it advertises an overview of Bibical Theology and thus salvation history. Fr. Barthelemy asks very interesting questions throughout and then writes to answer them as to what can be known from the scriptural evidence. What I like is that he doesn't overstep what can be known just to advance some theory. He also has the ability to write deeply on scripture while at the same time not becoming too technical and overwhelming the reader. I certainly don't claim to be any kind of expert, but I found at no time in the book did I get lost in the points he was making.

I think just the chapter he wrote "The idols and His Image" to be worth the price of the book by itself. When he writes that when man tries to build bridges to God he creates idols and when God builds a bridge to man it was the Incarnation. His insights make you look at what you might already know and to see it fresh and more deeply. Viewing Biblical theology in this outline view helps you to see the big picture of salvation history that is mainly concentrated within the Old Testament but sees its fulfillment in new Testament.

I do hope that more of his work is translated into English if this book is any indication and since this book was published by Ignatius Press I hope they bring more of his work to us if possible.

A timeless collection of poignant Bible verses with succinct explanations of how it applies to your daily life.

This is a short board book about a bunny who can't sleep even though all of his friends have already drifted off to dream land. My 3 year old loves for me to read it to her just before bedtime. I plan to purchase the other Thumper books.

An outstanding array of New Testament scholars here document the profound shift in Gospel research away from narrow preoccupation with traditional historical questions and toward investigation of the literary dimensions of the Gospels. The contributors focus on the plot, characters, and theological themes and points of view peculiar to Mark, Matthew, Luke, and John and on the societal and cultural milieu in which each of the original Gospel audiences was at home.

Specifically, Gospel Interpretation:

* shows how narrative-critical and social-historical methods can produce new insight into the meaning, theology, and societal background of the four Gospels

* illustrates the power of new methodologies to provide solutions to old and seemingly intractable problems of interpretation

* encourages the reader to surmount the obstacles of a piecemeal reading of the Gospels by attaining a holistic understanding of the plot, story, and character development

* lays bare crucial implications of what the quest of the historical Jesus holds for Christian faith and theology

* underlines the enormous potential of narrative-critical and social-historical methods for the preaching, teaching, and understanding of the individual Gospel stories
--- from book's back cover

In 1985, I registered for, and then attended, a seminar at the Foundation for Economic Education. I was sent this book to read before the conference, and found it a fascinating little book. I must confess that I often have a short attention span (if I were an elementary school student, I would be diagnosed as having Attention Deficit Disorder--but as a real person, I realize that I just get bored easily), and don't always care for books that require me to read dozens of pages for an obscure point. Russell's book is a series of short chapters (8-12 pages), and each is broken down into 3 or 4 key ideas (2-3 pages each). Thus, a busy reader can read 3 pages, learn something worthwhile, and then put the book down. A person doing a little reading during a break at work can easily read a chapter, and understand it, without being docked for failure to be back on time. An aggressive reader can probably devour the entire book in a single reading.

Russell makes use of a lot of little stories, much like Aesop's fables. They are easy to read, the point is clear, and the lesson is learned painlessly.

The book is subtitled "Bastiat Brought Up To Date" because Russell closely follows the lead of Frederic Bastiat a member of the French Chamber of Deputies in 1840, who told little stories to his colleagues during debates, in his attempt to get them to vote his way. Interestingly, Bastiat, in his own classic book "The Law," wrote a book which is astonishingly descriptive in its modern-day accuracy. Consider this little quotation from Bastiat (and cited in Russell):

"The government has been perverted. And the police powers of the state have been perverted along with it. The law, I say, has been turned from its proper course and made to follow an entirely contrary purpose. The law has become the weapon of every kind of greed. Instead of checking crime, the government itself is guilty of the evils it is supposed to punish."

One can only wonder whether Bastiat was foretelling the Cl! inton presidency, or if maybe, just maybe, politicians have always been the same, and Bastiat faced the mid-18th-century French equivalent of Bill and Hillary. Indeed, the timelessness of the ideas found in both Bastiat's work and in Russell's American updating is all the more reason to read these books.

As a political economist geographer, I was wary of reading about post-modern governmentality. However, this book analyzed governmentality studies in a systematic, thorough and chronological order that actually made the topic enjoyable. Other than Nikolas Rose's "The Powers of Freedom" book, no book is as approachable as this one. In fact, this one is the best book I have read on the topic. Very useful for anyone studying political and power processes. I highly recommend it.

I spent a week or two going through it and got in the 95th percentile on the exam. It's comprehensive, though I have to say the test was dumbed down.