Hart Books

If you are sick of all the Frommers, Lonely Planet Guides etc, - or you have absorbed all they have to give you, have a look at this gorgeous little guide. Great photos, brief but informative and personal narrative. I have been to Paris several times, but plan to take this guide with me next time - just to find those little shops that you might not go into without a nudge, and actually ALL of the cafes look good!!

Beautiful photography, concise writing, enticing descriptions---I already have the basic travel guides telling me how to exchange money and get around on the train, this guide tells what to do to have a truly Parisian experience. If you love locally owned restaurants and boutiques, this is like pornography. Absolutely yummy.

On a recent trip to Paris, this was the only "guide book" my husband and I used...and each recommendation was a pleasant surprise. Unique locations in each arrondissement and a variety of meal options from traditional French dinners to low-key drinks. The shops were unique and interesting as well. This book fills a void for those looking for something off the beaten track and with a strong dose of French flair. I will highly recommend this book to my friends traveling to Paris!

To the interested layperson John Mayanrd Keynes is known as a villain/genius responsible for the theory of governmental deficit spending in a time of economic crises. This book in a concise and understandable manner, without recourse to ponderous mathematical formulas, makes a very convincing case for the necessity of governmental intervention.
When people are unwilling to spend and are hoarding cash, it is up to government to inject money into the system by means of expansionary monetary policy, either it is public works in the most dramatic case or reduced interest rates, intended to stimulate investment in a more commonplace scenario.
Fiscal prudence or austerity will not lift the economy out of the slump, for a very simple reason; if everyone is saving and no one is buying, then no one is able to sell and economy is pushed further into a recession.
Villilfied by countless conservatives as an endorsement of governmental intervention and subsequent domination of the people, the ideas proposed in the book are accepted by such respected institutions as the Federal Reserve and merit attention of a person, who would like to claim general economic awareness.
Apart from the the discussion on public spending, there are highly informative essays on German hyperinflation of the 1920s, ruminations on Gold standard and much more; all presented with great clarity and humor, that few if any economists have mangaged to imitate.

John Maynard Keynes at his most beguiling. A series of essays that have not lost their power despite the passage of 70 years or so. As a prose stylist Maynard Keynes could equal his friends Virginia Woolf and E.M. Forster, and he does so in this volume. Perhaps the apogee of essay writing of the Oxford/Cambridge type, this volume has a charm that is absent from his longer works (General Theory, Tract on Monetary Reform, even the Economic Consequences of the Peace). For those people interested in hard edged macro theory, read elsewhere. For admirers of logic and clarity and the British tradition of enlightened common sense, Eureka! You have found it in this book.

Writing during the nineteen twenties and thirties, when the specter of socialism didn't yet haunt the Anglo-Saxon ruling elites, Keynes didn't feel his duty to sing eulogies to the free market; on the contrary, he felt his duty as an economist to propose ways through which modern society could supersede the "centrality of the money motive". The essays devoted to problems of politics in this collection, specially "A short view of Russia", "Economic perspectives for our grandchildren" and "Am I a Liberal?" are among the best things written from the liberal-conservative viewpoint on the ideological choices of our age. A must-read.

In The Essence Of Buddhism, the Venerable Traleg Kyabgon Rinpoche provides the reader with a comprehensive overview of Buddhist thought and philosophy through the perspectives offered by Tibetan Buddhism: The Hinayana, Mahayana, and Vajrayana. In addition to the Four Noble Truths, we are provided with definitions of fundamental concepts within a Buddhist philosophical framework including compassion, emptiness, and Buddha-nature. The Essence Of Buddhism is strongly recommended reading for those new to Buddhism and its rich, complex, and enduring spiritual heritage.

This is one of the finest and more interesting books I have read on Buddhism in two decades. The author has brought the very authentic tenets of Buddhism together in a wonderful marriage with views of contemporary society. His perceptions and insights into western life are excellent and oftentimes very funny. Traleg Kyabgon explains profound terms such as "emptiness" along with others, in such a way, that even older students of Buddhism will have a much clearer understanding. He explained the notion of Karma and the consciousness that incarnates in such an amazing way, that I had to read it several times with tremendous excitement, the excitement a Christian mystic may have finding and reading the Gnostic Gospels for the first time. If you would like to understand exactly what Buddhism teaches at its core, and how this is applicable to our lives and how it can be of benefit in any situation we find ourselves, then this is the book. It is written in an elegant style that is a pleasure to read. It is evident that much time and effort went into this book and it is sure to become a classic in our Buddhist literary collection.

this is a very good book. i've read many introductions to buddhism in relation to my practice and my teaching of buddhist psychology. at one level, this book is excellent as a beginner's introduction to an overview of the buddhist path and meditation practice. at another level, it is an advanced comprehensive but terse guide to a multitude of perspectives on the path and practice.

I am a DoD federal employee with a bachelor's degree in political science. I still recall how much praise and research questions my P.S. professor (Univ. of Utah) presented regarding FDR, including the accomplishments made for our nation. After reading James Alonzo Bishop's fine book, "FDR's Last Year", I can't tell readers enough today what a fascinating closeup, journalistic approach, this book provides of the greatest American President of the 20th century- one with human flaws and leadership abilities.

The massive task Bishop took upon himself in recreating this nearly 700-page intimate portrait of a dying titan who presided over the greatest war (after inspiring and implementing sociological changes that will still be guiding American thought and action in future social and political science courses) actually got under way 25 years before the release of the book. From my viewpoint Bishop must surely be our nation's most painstaking researcher-writer (comparable to David McCullough, Barbara Tuchman, Joseph J. Ellis). This book, published by William Morrow, is a bulging treasury which will put all future biographers of FDR in Bishop's debt- for sure. Bishop has erected his own memorial to FDR years before the National Park Service opened the "Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial" near the National Mall. Those immortalized words from the walls of this memorial are clearly brought forward in this book- such words as our "Four Freedoms" of what we are still fighting for to this day.

Bishop has done a fabulous job introducing the reader to the flesh and blood of FDR as he deals with the chores of the presidency (family, 4th campaign, travels to Alaska and Yalta), including the world figures of that last year of his life (1 April 1944 - 12 April 1945): Churchill, Stalin, de Gaulle, Eisenhower, Marshall, MacArthur, Mussolini, Hitler, Hirohito.

Of FDR's passing, 12 April 1945, just weeks short of victory in Europe, Bishop took note of a New York Times article that said, "Men will thank God on their knees a hundred years from now, that Franklin D. Roosevelt was in the White House..." In my small library, a copy of this book sits next to other treasures: Sandburg's "Abraham Lincoln" (1940), Boorstin's "The Americans" (1974), Branch's "Parting the Waters" (1989), and McCullough's "Truman" (1993).

Professional historians might slight Jim Bishop's work -- "The Day Christ Died;" "The Day Lincoln Was Shot" -- as "popularizations." So they are. Not much new in either of these: just good writing and empathy. There is a role for these qualities, one would think, even in the footnoted world of the professional.

"FDR's Last Year" lacks footnotes too. Its biblography is barely up to undergraduate term paper standards. It is, without doubt, beautifully written. So far, so good. But, it is more than just a facile rehash of research done by others. It is a moving account of a great human and historical tragedy -- the physical and mental deterioration of the god-like FDR at what should have been his moment of historic triumph.

By the spring of '44, when the book opens, President Roosevelt was already on borrowed time. There was a world of difference between the buoyant and vigorous champion of 1933 (or, even, 1943) and the increasingly depressed, distracted, and enervated Chief Executive of the late war years. Bishop does not dance around any of this -- but he does not succomb, either, to the harsher portraiture that has been drawn of a senile and naive FDR about to be taken to the cleaners by the Russians.

Some of what the tired president did during his waning months defies rational analysis. What was the purpose of his quixotic meetings with three middle eastern kings on his way back from Yalta? What made him think they would be interested in his hare-brained schemes to "make the desert bloom?" Was his meglomania simply in control here?

Yet, Bishop keeps his focus on the main event: FDR's self-destroying mission to create a postwar world that would not self-destruct into war as had the post-Versailles world. For this, his inspiration was his own political mentor -- Woodrow Wilson. While Churchill and Stalin reveled in their own species of cynicism, the tired and dispirited FDR, well-aware he was dying, held to a vision of a world organization that might offer humanity something better than realpolitik.

Roosevelt sacrificed himself to this vision. Burned himself out in pursuit of it. Churchill was interested only in British imperialism and FDR saw him for what he was -- a hopeless reactionary brought to power by a temporary crisis. Stalin was -- well, Stalin was the one man who had as much blood on his hands as Hitler. Of the "Big Three," only FDR tried to rise above chauvinism toward a broader, more humane future.

This broad view of humanity is exemplified by FDR's contempt for imperialism and his determination not to allow the French back into Indo-China. It is a sobering thought that had he been spared, the Viet Nam War need never have been fought.

Bishop gives a compassionate account of FDR's covert romance with Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd. The dying man, and the aging widow, found inestimable comfort in one another's company. It was too late in the day for both of them. The time for happiness was past. But, they clung to one another as the darkness closed about them.

This is a story about a dying god. A self-immolation in pursuit of an ideal. The impossibly handsome and charming FDR, the most politcally astute chief executive in our history, fading away into nascent senility and physical decreptitude. One is reminded of the last scene of "All Quiet In the Western Front," where the soon-to-die soldier played by Lew Ayres reaches out for a beautiful butterfly in No Man's Land in a last attempt to seize beauty out of death.

This is a marvelous book. Parts of it, such as the embalming of FDR's body, are almost too painful to read. Bishop brings an empathy, pathos, and compassion to his subject that is altogether absent from nearly all "professional" works of history. It is a moving and deeply illuminating work.

As a former educator and one who has worked for the State Department in our nation's capitol, I found FDR'S LAST YEAR not only to be enjoyable reading but one of the most profoundly written books of history I have ever come across. It was so detailed and I saw FDR for the first time to be thoroughly human.The fact that I discovered this book to be out of print, surprised and disappointed me, to say the least.

After I finished, I felt that I had not only lived in the White House that last year, but worked closley with the former President. Love him or hate him, FDR'S LAST YEAR is a must read for all those interested in the history and politics of this country.

After working at a Christian bookstore for over two years I have read a large amount of evangelical literature. Rarely have I read a book twice, but with this book I have read it over 6 times! I have bought over 20 copies to give as presents, and continue to recomend it to friends. Stowell has hit the heart of the issue of what it means to be a "Christian", and how we need to re-focus ourselves to be Followers of Christ rather than leaders of a church, etc. Highly recomended to everyone from a non-believer to the veteran, well read, mature believer.

This book is excellent reading for the Christian,an excellent study book guaranteed to lift your spirits and teach you to follow Christ as He instructed us to do.Indepth. This book touches your heart, soul & mind & will bring you to your knees...

Wow! Joseph Stowell challenges you to explore what it means to be a follower of Christ. This is not an easy book to read if you like your comfort zone, but it contains a spectacular and thrilling call to put your life on the line, take up your cross and follow Christ. This is one of those books that challenges your preconcieved ideas of Christianity and life with Christ. I don't think I will ever think of following Christ in the same way again. I highly recommend this book.

Fresh Wisdom is definitely not for everyone, and if you are sensitive about fast-held beliefs you should definitely not purchase this book.

The authors show no mercy as they expose commonly accepted deceptions and delusions in the 5 key areas of life:
Health and Longevity;
Romance, Love and Relationships;
Independent Wealth Creation;
Metaphysical and Spiritual Realities, and;
Sovereignty and Personal Privacy.

Fresh Wisdom has changed my world view entirely, and as a result my life has changed completely.

If you are one of the few who realize 'things are not as they seem', this book will 'make sense of life in a senseless world'. If, however, you are happy in your cocoon of life, you will find some of the revelations too uncomfortable to accept and should perhaps consider a less controversial alternative.

Fresh Wisdom presents a paradigm (or way of looking at life) that will enable one to answer any challenging life issue. Get it if you are in any way frustrated with what you see happening in the world around you - you will finally grok why things are the way they are.

Fresh Wisdom has had an incredible impact on my life. It has helped me escape from that `held back', stifled, chained feeling I have had my entire life. Fresh Wisdom has helped me to break free of so many shackles that have prevented me from living life to it's full. It has helped me to understand so much about my past choices and `mistakes', and to actually change the way I think and live my life. I now live without guilt; am happy and content every day of my life; don't judge those I meet but have a new capacity for love; have that incredible feeling of living with my `eyes wide open'; but most of all have discovered the purpose of my life, which has literally transformed me. I wake up every day with a bounce in my step and anticipation in my heart. I no longer drag myself out of bed, dreading the day ahead and the boredom of life. I know exactly what I want and what I need to achieve every day. I am no longer distracted from this by other people's needs and agendas. I now truly know the meaning of what it is to be FREE.

Paradigm shifting. I wish this book would become a best seller, because this would mean that there has been some sort of great awakening. Regardless, I am delighted to be one of a chosen few who can say he has been laboring to internalize all that this life "textbook" contains.

This book is must reading for anyone who knows that something in this world has gone wrong and is attempting to lift that proverbial veil of deception. It shows the reader how to prepare spiritually, financially, and personally for the coming difficult times. I have a mission in life and that is to edify and admonish others while there is time.

Please read and spread the Truth. Once you learn, you will know why the Apostle Paul preached and admonished as much as he did. He knew that this life was only a test and a preparation for something inconceivably wonderful after this - but only if we pass the test. This makes a great study guide. Please pass the test. God Bless.

"Who asks for me, the Shelley of my age,
must lay his heart out for my bed and board."

In a short, tumultous life, Hart Crane (1899 -- 1932) wrote two of the greatest books of 20th Century American poetry: White Buildings (1926) and the Bridge (1930) as well as some splendid individual poems. His poetry is collected in this outstanding volume of the Library of America, edited by Langdon Hammer of Yale University.

Of the 850 pages of this book, only 144 are devoted to Crane's poetry. Most of the remainder of the text consists of 14 short essays by Crane and of 412 letters from his extensive correspondence written between 1910 and his suicide in 1932. These letters, together with Professor Hammer's notes and biographical sketches of Crane's correspondents, offer the reader a good portrait of Crane's troubled life, and they read with more immediacy and poignancy than any biography.

Crane dropped out of high school and left an unhappy home in Cleveland at the age of 17 to try to make his way as a poet in New York. Many of the letters in this collection detail Crane's stormy relationship with his parents, his father Clarence ("C.A.") Crane, a wealthy chocolate manufacturer, and his mother Grace Hart Crane. Crane was also close to his maternal grandmother, Elizabeth Belden Hart. In the "Quaker Hill" section of The Bridge, Crane said that the he had to "Shoulder the curse of sundered parentage". His difficult, shifting relationship with his family is amply chronicled in these letters.

But this collection includes much more than correspondence with a broken family. They offer insight into Crane's poetic ambitions and into the composition of The Bridge and of the shorter poems. They offer a view of New York City, seen through Crane's eyes, and of his literary friends and contemporaries, including Allen Tate, Waldo Frank, Yvor Winters, Malcolm Cowley, Peggy Cowley, Crane's patron Otto Kahn, and many others. The letters give the reader a portrait of a complex, troubled person who from late adolescence lived life hard and on the edge. Crane was promiscuous with a lengthy series of mostly homosexual affairs together with longer-term relationships with men and women. Crane's most intense male relationship was with a sailor named Emil Opffer (none of his letters to Opffer survive) and, just before his death, he had a passionate heterosexual relationship in Mexico with Peggy Cowley, as she was divorcing Malcolm Cowley. From his mid-20s Crane had deep problems with alcoholism which greatly hindered his ability to write. He was perpetually short of money and cadged and borrowed extensively from his friends and family. He fought constantly and was jailed several times. In a fit of depression -- when his life superficially seemed to be looking up he committed suicide by jumping off a ship, the Orizaba, en route from Cuba to New York City.

Read as a whole, this collection of Crane's correspondence and poetry raises difficult and probably unanswerable questions about the relationship between Crane's life and his work. Crane's excesses and passions in fact are an important component of his poetry. But while the life was a failure, Crane was a poet of romantic vision. Crane struggled for years to complete "The Bridge", a work which remains controversial and not unqualifiedly successful. In this poem, Crane took the Brooklyn Bridge as a symbol and tried to create a myth, in the machine age, that would unite America's past with its future and also give meaning to his own life. (Much of The Bride is autobiographical.) The Bridge is a work of difficult optimism as Crane traces America back to the voyages of Columbus and the days of Pocahontas with Walt Whitman and Edgar Allan Poe as guides. The poems ends on a note of affirmation and hope, as The Bridge becomes a path to transcendence and to the overcoming of materialism and lifeless routine through love and brotherhood.

Crane's short poems are higly concentrated and difficult. The poems I find most rewarding in "White Buildings" include "Voyages" a six-poem sequence detailing an intense love affair and "For the Marriage of Faustus and Helen" which is a predecessor of "The Bridge." The shorter poems include "At Mellvile's Tomb", the subject of an exchange with Harriet Monroe included in this collection, and "Chaplinesque."

One of Crane's masterpieces is his final poem "The Broken Tower" which describes how "I entered the broken world/To trace the visionary company of love, its voice/An instant in the wind." The Broken Tower ends on a note on the redemptive power of love while, soon after completing the poem, Hart Crane would commit suicide.

This is a volume that will bring Hart Crane to his readers. The letters chronicle a sad life cut short by excess. But Hart Crane's poetry, brief in amount though it is, has stayed with and inspired me for many years. Hart Crane holds a high place in America's literary heritage. He deserves his place in the Library of America.

The quotation at the beginning of this review is from Robert Lowell's sonnet "Words for Hart Crane" in his collection "Life Studies".

Robin Friedman

Hart Crane is one of those powerful poetic voices that is its own style and immensely attractive. As others have noted, he was modern for his time, clearly American, and yet full of the great poetic traditions of the English language. His influences are identified directly in his works. He talks to Walt Whitman and discusses Emily Dickinson, Chaplin, Poe, and others. His early death was a great loss to English letters and the American voice in the 20th Century.

This wonderful volume from the Library of America (remember to thank them with your purchases and donations - they are non-profit after all) is more than eight-hundred pages, but only a few more than one-hundred of them contain all of Crane's poetry (including fragments). A few more have some essays and prose. The rest are filled with more than four hundred letters that Crane wrote to his parents, his friends, his literary associates, and others. The letters help us put Crane's work into a richer context, allow us to see some of the published works in earlier states, and make us ache and wonder what might have been if he hadn't jumped off the deck of the "Orizaba" into the Caribbean in 1932.

To provide just one tiny sample that amazed me from "Cape Hatteras" in "The Bridge" (Crane's great work) [the ellipsis in the second line is in the poem]:

Stars scribble on our eyes the frosty sagas,
The gleaming cantos of unvanquished space . . .
O sinewy silver biplane, nudging the wind's withers!
There, from Kill Devils Hill at Kitty Hawk
Two brothers in their twinship left the dune;
Warping the gale, the Wright windwrestlers veered
Capeward, then blading the wind's flank, banked and spun
What ciphers risen from prophetic script,
What marathons new-set between the stars!
The soul, by naphtha fledged into new reaches
Already knows the closer clasp of Mars, --
New latitudes, unknotting, soon give place
To what fierce schedules, rife of doom apace!

We can hear his lyric voice, see his fresh images, and his ability to form the words into powerful energy. This is the result of great talent married to hard work and a special sensitivity to the language. Harold Bloom call's Crane "our Pindar". Now, I think there is more to this image than the linking of two lyric poets. Most of Pindar's poetry is lost to us. One set of odes is complete, and the others survive as fragments. Even though Pindar died old and Crane died young, we wonder about what we might have had from both if Pindar's work had found a way to survive and Crane had found a way to live.

Some say that it was the oppression society put on Crane because of his homosexuality (bi-sexuality?). However, almost all the homosexuals in Crane's time did not commit suicide, and a fair percentage of the people that did commit suicide were heterosexual. The poet grew up in a chaotic family. Yes, his father became a successful businessman with his syrup factory (he also invented and sold the rights to Life Saver candies for a pittance), but Crane's mother and father fought constantly and melodramatically. So much so that Crane dropped out before finishing high school and moved away to New York. The poet's own emotional life was harsh and prone to self-destructive behavior including alcoholism. After 1927 his drinking became much worse. When you combine the home life that formed his emotional responses with his parents divorcing, his father dying suddenly, his mother's neediness, his failure to produce much work during his year in Mexico on a Guggenheim fellowship, the affair with Peggy Baird Cowley (the soon to be ex-wife of a friend), his discovery that the inheritance from his maternal grandmother that had been held in trust for him was gone because of a loan his father guaranteed with it, along with being beaten up aboard ship for making a pass at one of the crew and then getting seriously drunk, well, stepping off the boat into the sea in front of witnesses while exclaiming, "Good-bye, everybody!" isn't as big a leap as one might at first suppose.

But what a loss to us all.

This is a fine volume. The editor has provided biographical material for the people mentioned in the letters, notes on sources, notes for the text (including a fine foreword), and an especially helpful chronology of Crane's too brief life.

Hart Crane is a poet I did not know anything about until I had read Harold Bloom's introduction to his "American Religious Poems". Then I knew I had to get this volume and learn more about this important and brilliant poet. You might want to get to know his work and his life, as well.

As an American boy growing up in Normandy, I would sit for hours, homesick, on the cliffs overlooking the Channel, thinking that if the fog ever lifted I could see Manhattan. And I would recite from WHITE BUILDINGS for hours, crying out to the fates that had separated me from my homeland, as Hart Crane had bubbled his way to the bottom of a purple sea some miles away I assumed. "As bells off San Salvador/ Salute the crocus lustres of the stars,/ In these poinsettia meadows of her tides,--/ Adagios of islands, O my prodigal,/ Complete the dark confession her veins spell." I hardly knew what I was saying, but some charms really do work and it wasn't long before I was repatriated, mouth first. I hope it's not heretical to suggest that Hart Crane's letters, while never less than interesting and often amusing, aren't that superb, and the book seems padded out in consequence to fit the desired "heft" of Library of America volumes. The Board might as well get used to the notion that not all poets have written thousands of pages, and for every Whitman you get a Hart Crane, who just didn't write very much. Does he deserve a place on the shelf with his 144 pages of poetry? Maybe there are some packing issues I don't understand, but otherwise, sure, throw in four hundred pages of Crane's letters.

Though nothing could really top the exquisite if critical presentation that the late Thomas Parkinson gave to his edition of the Crane-Yvor Winters correspondence, Langdon Hammer is able, through the sheer gift of size, to expand upon what we've had and complicate our hitherto too perfect picture of Crane. Crane's letters to Slater Brown and Wilbur Underwood are the liveliest, perhaps, but women also animate him and a recent biography that excoriated Crane for his misogyny seems sadly off the mark. However some biographers will do anything to create a scandal. One might profitably read through these letters to find out what Crane recommends in the way of early American modernism, his peers, because in general his taste is pretty good (and his dismissals of overrated trash are classics of vinegary invective). Of course he can sometimes gild the lily when praising, say, Harry Crosby's poems in a letter to his putative patron.

The index may be the single most useful feature of the poems + letters arrangement, for the index will help us find what Crane had to say about X or Y of his poems as he was writing them. He wrote, for example, a wonderfully impassioned letter to Otto Kahn, the industrial magnate who financed the writing of THE BRIDGE, outlining the different sections he had already finished and those still in the pipeline. Kahn also helped to finance the Metropolitan Opera, and Crane asks Kahn's help in finding employment there as a copywriter. He had the personality of a basso profundo; I wonder if the opera world would have changed if Hart Crane had been more in it.

I greatly enjoyed this book! You get the feeling throughout that the author has a special affection for the town where the book takes place as well as the characters who live there. The romance between the main characters never seems forced and develops at just the right pace.

I also loved the interaction between the young doctor and older doctor. The story flows naturally and is a great read. The action dispersed with the romance and the other plot lines makes this a page turner. The book leaves you wanting to know more about these people and the little town of Renew.

I hope Ms. Long brings us more stories about these characters soon.

This is a well written fictional romance novel that everone will enjoy. The discriptive style of the author is very good. It makes you feel as if you are seeing the story unfold in your mind.

Fresh out of medical school, Hart Pagett arrives in the small railroad town of Renew, Pennsylvania, thinking that God is cruel and life is unfair. He will become the apprentice to the town's Dr. McGuire who is slowly going blind. Dr. McGuire is being cared for by his assistant, who happens to be his lovely and gracious red-haired daughter, Abby. Hart is put off by Dr. McGuire's gruffness and seeming indifference. While tending to the ailing and sick, poor, hardworking people, Hart is drawn to not only the needs of the townsfolk, but to the old doctor and his daughter as well. Through a series of events and a near tragedy, Hart discovers his deep need for God and his love for Abby. Step back in time to a place where life was simpler and sweeter. Let the rugged railroad town of Renew draw you into this wonderful story of life-altering events that gently build Hart's love for life, but most of all his deep need for God through transforming love.

Intercultural Communication : A Reader by Larry A. Samovar (Editor), Richard E. Porter Paperback 9th edition (July 1999) Wadsworth Pub Co;

I have taught with several of the major readers on the market: Samovar and Porter's, Nakayama and Martin, and others. This text has the most well written readings and contains articles on many seminal issues, context (Hall), time (Hall), etc. This text has the LEAST blatantly fluff filled articles intended only to titillate and pander to students. Additionally, if you review some of the other texts, you will see that they often have poorly referenced articles and the work is less than scholarly. It is possible to write a chapter for a reader such as this and support your content with support and references. The articles here are interesting, well written, well referenced, and more-grounded in theory and research than a lot of the competition. I recommend it highly. MLK

I was lucky enough to take a class from Professor Samovar. This was a great book and a good introduction to intercultural communication.

This work is the magnum opus of Irish genealogy, a vast and prodigious compendium of family history and source material. The first volume explores the origin and stem of the Irish nation. The old Irish genealogies assembled here are brought down to the lineal descendant of each family living at the time of the British dispossession, although many of the descents are brought down to the 19th century. Also included is a lengthy appendix with an extraordinarily detailed table showing families that owned land in the 12th century. In addition, there is an index of several thousand surnames.

The first half of Volume II consists of Anglo-Irish genealogies, all carried down at least to the Commonwealth period, and most to the last quarter of the 19th century. Arranged alphabetically by family name, these hundreds of genealogies are heavily annotated, and being supported by references to events of comparatively recent history, they sometimes trace the line of descent to an American branch of the family. There also is data on the Huguenot and Palatine families of Ireland and a chapter on the Ulster Plantation and Scots settlers. The latter half of Volume II is encyclopedic in coverage, bearing reference to countless persons, places, and events associated with Ireland.

If you're researching your Irish roots, this two-volume set is an invaluable resource. I found ancestors that I have been searching several years for neatly described and catalogued. There is a wealth of information here that I haven't been able to find anywhere else!

This reprint of the 1892 edition makes available rare source material on Irish geneaology. Much of the material on which it was based has since been destroyed. John O'Hart traces the genealogy of all the major famiies of Ireland from ancient to late Victorian times. Some families are even traced back to Adam! His material provides valuable clues for reseachers and those fortunate enough to be able to link with families included may add centuries to their pedigress! Not limited to the aristocracy, many quite ordinary people are identified and linked to the ancient families. There are numerous references to American branches of the Irish families. An essential reference work and interesting reading besides.