Freeman Books

This book is interesting and entertaining for anyone who has read her first book in this series. It has great structure with the tiniest hint of a spooky story. This will keep your eyes glued to the page. Awesome book!

Most people who wrestle with getting to sleep on a regular basis are totally unaware that they are not really "insomniacs" at all! They just need to "adjust their internal clock." In Wide Awake at 3am, Dr Coleman brings real scientific research to bear on the twin problems of insomnia and sleep-deprivation. Bottom line... The book is extremely informative and entertaining. But the most thrilling part is this: 1)The descriptions of the problems caused by insomnia are exact, 2) the diagnoses put forth by Dr. Coleman make sense, and 3) the treatments proposed in the book really work! I would suggest this book to anyone who has problems with sleep or fatigue, even on an irregular basis.

My children and I loved this book and can't wait to finish her other books too. This was a great children's christian book and I wish there was more in her series. Enjoy the simplicity of life and adventure.

The William Freeman Murder Trial: Insanity, Politics, and Race by Andrew W. Arpey (Syracuse University Press) Antebellum culture is compellingly exposed in this book of horrific multiple murder and madness in Upstate New York. Andrew W. Arpey offers insight into a wide variety of subjects that will have broad appeal to historians and scholars of law, journalism, religion, psychiatry, politics, and race and reform.
In 1846 William Freeman, a young man of African and Native American descent, stabbed to death four members of the Van Nest family with no apparent motive. His victims, all of whom were white, included an elderly woman, her pregnant daughter, and her two-year-old grandson. Free-man was quickly apprehended, but his mental health soon became a matter of controversy. Led by future Secretary of State William H. Seward, his counsel entered a plea of insanity, one of the first uses of the insanity defense in the nation.
The Van Nest killings and the trial of William Freeman, though illustrative of many aspects of antebellum society and culture, have never received in-depth attention. Drawing on newspapers, trial accounts, and private papers, Arpey firmly shows the political machinations of the case, the heated debate it set off on the relation-ship between race and crime, the use of punishment, and the boundaries of legal responsibility. His superb reconstruction of the trial, the motivations of the many actors, and the trial's status in American history place this book alongside the best crime novels of its kind.
Excerpt: On Friday, March 13, 1846, the editor of the Albany Evening Journal received details, via telegraph from Utica, of a `Most Horrible Murder' that had taken place the previous evening. The earliest details of the bloody scene were shocking, and were made all the more terrifying by the fact that the perpetrator was still at large... . Freeman's arrest did not result in an immediately satisfactory answer to the question being asked across the state: Why did this man kill violently this particular family? That the victims included a pregnant woman, a two-year-old child, and an elderly woman made the crime seem incomprehensibly brutal and bizarre. . . . In Auburn, local residents of `every class and sex' flocked to the county jail to cast their eyes upon Freeman. ... The brutality of the killings and Freeman's bizarre behavior following his capture thrust his mental health into question.... Anger and suspicion regarding the man in custody for the atrocities committed at Fleming only increased with time. `Since his confinement he has endeavored to convince him [sic] that he is insane, by talking to himself, saying that they were asleep that he killed, and using all sorts of incoherent expressions,' the Rochester Daily Advertiser reported several days after Freeman's arrest. . . . Suspicion that Freeman feigned insanity was not surprising. To many, insanity seemed but a clever conspiracy concocted by crafty lawyers to spare their depraved clients appropriate punishment."

It is a very sad fact that this book is so overlooked, as it is a rare gem that everybody should try to get hold of, filled with amazing characters, strange creatures and stereotypes that get twisted on their heads!
The most unique thing about this book however is that it does not as such have a clear plot structure, but rather each chapter relates an encounter or experience with its heroine Princess Betony. In fact, the story actually starts years before her birth when the Crown Prince Max, searching for an adventure comes across the dryad Salixia and falls in love with her. Their love story reminded me a bit of 'Aragorn-and-Arwen' or 'Romeo-and-Juliet' for children, as they too are star-crossed lovers: Max is trapped within the confines of his royal duties, just as Salixia is confined to the life of her willow tree and the rules of 'Wild Magic' that condones love between a mortal and a magical creature. But their love is stronger than rules, even when Salixia's tree is destroyed, and a birth of a child seals their bond - a daughter named Betony.

Also on the scene within the royal court are the delightful characters Ralph the wizard, who gives a mysterious prophesy over Betony's crib, the wizard-in-training Clover who despises the pink her family makes her wear, Basil the gardener's boy who falls in love with the unabtainable princess, and Rosie, Betony's dear godmother, who may just be a *fairy* godmother!

As I mentioned earlier, each chapter tells the tale of an adventure that befalls Betony and her friends and each one is original, imaginative and unconnected to the rest - it reads like a series of short stories, and you can read them out of order. If you read this to children they'll no doubt find a favourite chapter they'll want you to read out over and over again - whether it's Betony discovering her long-lost grandmother Queen Cassandra, King Max frantically hunting down the hobgoblin that gets loose on the ground, Clover learning the secret to unselfish magic, Basil becoming entranced by a treachourous water sprite, Queen Salixia resisting temptation to return to her magical ways by the dragon Windrider or the final love story between Betony and Basil. My personal favourite however, is the encounter between Betony and the unicorn in the chapter "Unicorn Dawn". There is no silly, sickly-sweet narrative here that is found so commonly in other children's stories about unicorns and young girls who ride them like horses. The author's narrative here is poignant, joyful and bittersweet: it really is the lovelist version of a unicorn tale I have ever read.

So I very highly recommend this little gem, and the other 'Floramunde' books - you won't be sorry you picked up this delightful series of tales!

The theme:

"Judging wine with all your senses. A state-of-the-art guide for the connoisseur."

Amerine is the godfather of UC Davis viniculture study. This book is highly academic, but quite readable. And, if you are interested in scoring wines using any of the numeric systems -- or one of your own devising -- this book is essential.

Briefly described, Amerine and Roessler describe an approach to wine evaluation, explaining how to rely on the senses of touch, taste, sight, and smell and how to make meaningful judgments about quality. The authors also make a valiant attempt to standardize descriptive terms.

In the 1990s, Ann Noble came up with a user-friendly "Wine Aroma Wheel" based in part on this work; the wheel helps wine lovers organize their thoughts, using broad categories (such as "herbal") as well as more specific descriptors within those categories ("rosemary") [available at winearomawheel.com ].

But as the review of any set of tasting notes will reveal, we are a long, long way from standardizing the descriptions of wines.

Nonetheless, as Professor Orley Ashenfelter writes: "An indispensable analytical book for anyone seriously interested in the sensory evaluation of wine ... Although this book can be tough going it is an extremely rewarding discussion of many of the most important issues raised in wine tasting evaluations."

A simplistic, easy to read & understand book of wise quotes & words to grow on & live by, from many of the great men & women of our history...in common modern language reflecting many of the logical and Christian principles found in the Holy Bible. Wonderful book for gifts, to pass on for wisdom & encouragement!

I first bought this book freshman year in college, five years later; I still reference it for not only papers, but also thoughts. Each article is well written, compassionate, and definitely dedicated to it's chosen topic. There are a large diverse section of topics within this book. "Women: a Feminist Perspective" should be a mandated book within all colleges. There is a topic of interest for not only every woman, but man as well.

Women On Power: Leadership Redefined aptly edited by the collaborative efforts of Sue J. M. Freeman (Professor of Education and Child Study, Smith College), Susan C. Bourque Esther Booth Wiley Professor of Goverment, Smith College), and Christine M. Shelton (Associate Professor of Exercise and Sport Studies and codirector of the Project on Women and Social Change, Smith College) is an impressive selection of bold essays on the changing role of women in the workplace, politics, business, and more. The issues address range from how has gender affected today's ideas of leadership and power?, to how can mothering be a catalyst to social activism? All of the manifold issues addressed are thoughtfully discussed and grappled with at length in this scholarly work. Women On Power is very highly recommended to Women's Studies reading lists and reference collections.

Julie Freeman's 'Working in Theory but Failing in Practice?' will ring true for anyone involved in performance appraisal. She persuasively identifies the critical problem - that managers find it difficult to talk about performance. The solution is simple and straightforward and is explained in a few pages, but anyone interested in the subject will want the whole book. This book is the condensed wisdom of an expert in performance appraisal presented in a way that is straightforward and accessible - with clear headings, convincing arguments and helpful examples. The author makes significant and specific criticisms of other approaches to performance appraisal, but she recommends adapting them rather than scrapping them. What I particularly like is how the book practices what it preaches: the whole book could be seen as a large scale example of the PAF technique in practice. It is a performance appraisal of performance appraisal. You are left with a better understanding of the problem and plenty of good ideas about how to overcome it.

These sentences stood out as the crux of the whole book:

''If we are serious about wanting to boost employee morale and organizational productivity, then overcoming the problems that managers face when talking about performance is critical. It is a goal worthy of our money, time and effort because it is the only 'non-gimmicky' way to bring those visions of a happy and engaged workforce to reality.''