Owen Books

Alexander and the Stallion is very well-written with beautiful and descriptive illustrations. This exciting story will appeal to all young children whether reading it with the family or in school. As a former teacher, I strongly recommend this book to all librarians working in children's literature as well as all early elementary school teachers.

I gave this book to my nephew and he loved it very much.
The pictures were very nice and he really enjoyed the horse.

This book does a very good job of integrating folk ancient history (the Taming of Alexander the Great's great horse) with a fun picture book for kids.

Definiate recommendation!

What a fun way to introduce kids to Alexander thr Great!! The text is engaging and well written. E. Westra has a real talent for finding that perfect slice of history and bringing it to life. A great addition to any home, school, or library.

This book took me at about page 2 and I never looked back. A retired criminal justice employee with pen in hand. For those of you who love John Grisham, it's parallel plus...and if you love Mary Higgins Clark, its more than a couple of steps better. Mr. Newton scripts quite a story. Makes you REALLY wonder, IS this fiction...are you SURE this is fiction? Are you up to it?? Colorful characters, surreal settings, the inhumane crumbs of humanity. A wonderful look inside, criminal and non-criminal minds...where few people dare or bother to look. Put this book on top of your list...go ahead, do it now!

This book took me at about page 2 and I never looked back. A retired criminal justice employee with pen in hand. For those of you who love John Grisham, it's parallel plus...and if you love Mary Higgins Clark, its more than a couple of steps better. Mr. Newton scripts quite a story. Makes you REALLY wonder, IS this fiction...are you SURE this is fiction? Are you up to it?? Colorful characters, surreal settings, the inhumane crumbs of humanity. A wonderful look inside, criminal and non-criminal minds...where few people dare or bother to look. Put this book on top of your list...go ahead, do it now!

A most personal and revealing thriller, an electrifying masterpiece of fiction. A startling game of memory, desire and danger that makes you believe the author is facing his own past.

Although Owen Thomas formed the GAG (Girls Are Gross) club with his best friends Zack and Ben, that did not stop him from befriending, albeit reluctantly, his next door neighbor Abby Maconnal. The two friends grew closer until the inevitable happened, they became an 'item' and, later, husband and wife. After ten years Abby and Owen are now exes. Owen's childhood friend Zack has faired even more poorly and has become a single father while Ben remains a confirmed bachelor and incorrigible ladies man.

Realizing that his obsessive focus on his work led to Abby's leaving him, Owen returns to his childhood home of Land's End and, with Zack and Ben, starts up a refurbishing business under the corporate header of Bachelors, Inc, with each man swearing to give up serious, long term relationships with the opposite sex.

Yeah, right.

Then Abby comes to town, stopping by to pick up a few things left in the childhood home that Owen now resides in. The former couple are reluctant to part and Hurricane Alice swoops in to keep Abby there for a day or two and one thing leads to another and then...

But why spoil the fun for you? READ THIS BOOK! The best thing about Marrying Owen is that it is the first part of a trilogy, so all the wonderful characters Colleen Faulkner introduces (especially Ben's father Max, who is so likable that he deserves a story of his own) can be revisited as their relationships mature and grow (as well as their families). Bachelors, Inc is a truly great little series, one that is well worth a place on your keeper shelf.

The first of the Bachelors Inc. miniseries, MARRYING OWEN by veteran author Colleen Faulkner delights readers with the story of an estranged couple forced into close quarters by an unexpected storm, proving love finds a way despite profound opposition.

When the three friends of the GAG club (Girls are Gross) return to Land's End to go into business together, they rename their association Bachelors Inc. and plan to restore old buildings to their past glory. All three men swear off women, just as they had when they were ten, promising to support one another in their efforts to avoid women; that is, until Owen's ex-wife comes back to town. Owen Thomas fell for Abby Maconnal when they were ten years old, despite his agreement with his buddies to stay away from girls. Even when the friends formed the GAG club, Owen couldn't help liking the pretty girl with freckles. Some things just don't change, despite hurt feelings and divorce.

Ten years of marriage ended not with a bang, but with a whimper. Too many hours in the office, too many late dinners, and too many postponements of current pleasure for the promise of something better later left Abbey alone, empty and disillusioned. She and Owen didn't fight, didn't raise their voices, didn't disagree. They simply, quietly drifted apart until the day Owen came home to an empty home. A quiet, polite divorce seemed to settle it.

An editor, Abbey saved until she could take a year off to devote to her own novel. On the way to her rented home in Florida, she stops by Owen's to pick up some precious keepsakes from the past. She didn't check the weather before leaving Boston, and finds herself forced to seek shelter with Owen rather than continuing to Florida due to a hurricane. Then an unexpected illness keeps her there even longer. Besides, Abbey finds she doesn't want to leave, nor does Owen want to let her go. But trusting feelings in the wake of a divorce proves to be daunting and difficult, at best.

The concept of Bachelor's Inc. left this reviewer in stitches. The harder these guys protest against women, the harder the reader knows they are bound to fall. Moreover, Faulkner writes with a passion that brings these delightful characters to life. Even Max, the father of one of the bachelors, captures the imagination as he tools through town on his riding lawn mower. I have a weakness for well created miniseries because they allow the reader to linger in the world just a bit longer, lending the series a depth unequalled by stand-alone books. Although this novel certainly could be read alone, it exemplifies the best qualities presented by miniseries and comes Very highly recommended.

I think "Marrying Owen" by Colleen Faulkner is a realistic and lively romance. As a native of Maryland's Eastern Shore, I loved the background of this book. Ms Faulkner's characters always come alive, and this story is no exception. Owen is a man you could easily imagine falling in love with. This is a warm, funny, and keepable book. Anyone who wants to remember the joy of falling in love should read "Marrying Owen." I rate it 10 out of 10.

A Fan From the Eastern Shore Maryland, U.S.A.

I'm a bookseller who collects quality children's books; Be Blest is one of the best I've seen in a long while. The marriage of exquisite illustrations and lyrical text should make this book a classic. Highly recommended as a gift for child or adult.

I got this book more for me than my 3 year-old son, but he really likes it, too! I fell in love with the moving poetry and incredible illustrations, and he likes to pick out all the different plants and animals he recognizes in the pictures. It has really helped him learn his seasons, and he asks for it again and again.

Short poems (some call them prayers because they were inspired by St. Francis of Assisi's Canticle of Brother Sun and Gaelic Scholar Alexander Carmichael, a collector of Celtic prayers and blessings) and beautiful paintings of the seasons for each month make this a wonderful (peaceful, restful, and inspirational) resource for studying poetry and seasons.

I haven't come across another work which gives such an excellent examination and critique of the development of Princeton Theological Seminary and the underlying philosophies of those connected with this tradition. In doing so, Dr. Anderson seeks to address one of the foremost challenges to the Christian Faith since the Enlightenment: Faith vs. Reason. This incorporates considering the role of reason, how it has been understood, and how there is a need to more fully identify reason in its critical use. He argues that this is necessary to establish the clarity of general revelation which in turn is necessary to establish the claims of redemption within the Christian Faith. I am excited to hear that Dr. Anderson is offering a revised and updated edition to this work which will be offered in the summer of 2008, titled "Reason and Worldviews". It will include some new and updated chapters examining further work in this discussion. I would encourage anyone interested in critically examining the Christian worldview to grab a copy.

'B.B. Warfield and Right Reason' is an insightful work calling its readers to explore the rich history of apologetics with in the Christian faith and to see how B.B. Warfield understood the role 'reason' has in arguing for the validity of the Christian faith inlight of the doctrine of the clarity of general revelation. As the waves of post-modernism and dogmatic relativism flood the american culture, this work provides a light in this sea of intellectual darkness.

Benjamin B. Warfield and Right Reason: The Clarity of General Revelation and Function of Apologetics provides a clear and concise study of the development of Princeton Theological Seminar and a profound study and refutation of common sense realism which was adopted as the epistemological method used to defend the truth of Christian Theism. Dr. Anderson does not stop in the refutation of common sense realism, but goes further in seeing the necessity for Christian apologetics to base its claims in the use of "right reason", that is to say in the critical use of reason employed in the examination of general revelation.
Dr. Anderson exhorts Christian apologists to see where Benjamin B. Warfield and Charles Hodge needed to go further in their affirmation of the clarity of general revelation. To affirm that clarity is needed, requires being able to show it. It is at this point where Dr.Anderson provides a good and needed contribution to the field of apologetics due to the present avoidance of Christian Apologists to engage with the problems that have divided and challenged the Church since the enlightenment.

This book gets right into the atmosphere of top secret special forces operations that have not been covered very much before. That's a shame because the SOG campaign was highly successful and a provided a blueprint for future SF campaigns that was somehow and very unfortunately lost for quite a while. But this novel gets it right - thanks to the author doing painstaking research and talking to all the right people. I'm looking forward to the next one!

One of those "can't put it down" books. Accurate portrayal of SOG and C&C, reflecting the many legendary SOG veterans who the author consulted for primary source material. (Check out the frontispiece). None of the outlandish, ridiculous, Hollywood-action fluff so much in vogue. I was on A-teams in 5th Special Forces Group at Fort Bragg in 1973-1976. Since the teams had fairly senior NCOs, most had been in RVN. I remember well the many war stories, some tragic, some hilarious, whether from the camps and fortified hamlets or from SOG and other "projects." Like the main character in the book, Sergeant Bobby Lake, says, "I'm not a hero, but I can point to ten or twelve heroes."

I took this on holiday with me and finished it in a day. Furiously paced and hugely interesting. Couldn't recommend it more highly....

A moving memoir of an extraordinary man who, despite all the insults and mind-numbing experiences he lived through, overcame all obstacles to serve proudly and with honors in the U.S. Army and complete a college education with postgraduate degrees. As a professor, a researcher, an international consultant, his chosen pathways always involved service and research benefiting his fellow man. This is the story of an authentic hero--not a fly-by-night sports or music idol--a REAL, genuine heroic role model of a man. Should be required reading for today's young men.

White, the military history is fascinating, the truly gripping parts of this book are about his life before and after the war.

It cannot be stressed enough that there was a time when a person could not attend any school or pursue any academic program they wanted just because of the color of their skin. (To correct the previous reviewer, Owens earned his PhD from The Ohio State University . . . there is no "University of Ohio.")

Late in World War II, a severe shortage of combat troops forced the United States Army to rescind its policy of racial segregation. They began assigning African American army units to combat duty. Until then, these soldiers had been relegated to such thankless tasks as burial detail, supply transport, mess hall staffing, and longshoreman work. This change, author Emiel Owens contends, played a significant role in spurring the civil rights movement twenty years later.

The son of a Smithville farmhand, truck driver and jack-of-all-trades, Owens excelled in school and graduated at the top of his high school class. He was serving in an ROTC unit at Prairie View A&M when the United States entered the war in 1941. In the spring of 1943, Owens was thirty-four credit hours from a horticulture degree when his unit was ordered to report to Fort Sam Houston. There they began training on the 155-mm "Long Tom," an artillery gun used by the newly formed 777th Field Artillery, an African American Battalion that fought in major battles in western Europe, from the Hurtgen Forest to the Ruer Valley and over the Rhine.

At the outset of the Rhineland campaign, Owens' gun battery was called upon to fire the opening salvos across the river. The five thousand guns of XVI Corps followed in unison, firing for three hours in preparation for Operation Flash Point, the crossing of the Rhine. "The fire was deafening, and the earth shook ... and gave the impression that hell itself had come ...."

There are many stirring battle scenes and acute observations of war in this book. Owens has a knack for detail, describing the Siegfried Line and the human-made fortifications: Hitler's "dragon teeth" and the hundreds of pill boxes situated with overlapping fields of fire. He also manages to see Texas in the the black furrowed fields and long green valleys his units passes through. They looked "as if they had been plucked from around the Hill Country back home in Central Texas and just relocated to this spot." But there is also an undercurrent of racial injustice glimmering just beneath the surface of the narrative. Sometimes it's seen in a trifling way: the curious stares from Europeans unused to black faces. But other times it's insidious: the army's policy of breaking up African American combat units overseas rather than back in the States, with a result that no homecoming African American troops received a ticker-tape parade down Broadway.

Owens returned to Smithville a decorated veteran. With the help of the GI Bill, he went back to Prairie View A&M, got his degree, and went on to to graduate work at the University of Ohio. He ended his academic career as Professor of Finance at the University of Houston. His story is a uniquely engaging one, giving a view of the social history of an African American soldier in combat, as well as providing noteworthy battlefield accounts of some of the more formidable World War II campaigns.

This book is a gem! The writing is excellent, the plot is engaging, the characters' dialogue is witty, and the setting is so real you feel as though you're walking right along with Captain Owen as he navigates the various neighborhoods of Cairo hunting down a lead. Best of all, the book is filled with that droll, dry British sense of humor. There are some laugh-out-loud moments as Owen has to negotiate/cajole/lightly threaten a number of haughty civil servants and bureaucrats.

I like this series much more than Michael Pearce's "Dead Man" series (A Dead Man in Istanbul, A Dead Man in Athens, etc). The writing is much better and the plots are more interesting. So if any of you out there weren't impressed by the "Dead Man" series, I highly recommend you give this Mamur Zapt series a try. I'm so glad my local library has this series. It's a real shame that these books aren't more readily available.

In 1910, Gareth Owen serves as the Mamur Zapt in the British colony Egypt. Gareth's job is to resolve crimes with political implications. When the economy was booming, Gareth often looked the other way. The recent economic collapse makes those cases he pursues that much harder as no one wants to cooperate.

When A Ministry of Agriculture civil servant dies at his work desk, Gareth claims potential political problems with this death. He leads the official inquiry even as pressure mounts for him to end the investigation immediately. Normally, Owen would heed the advise of the local establishment including his peers and superiors, but this time he stubbornly follows the money trail of the deceased though his actions places his position in jeopardy.

This historical who-done-it will excite readers on several levels. The story line contains an engaging police procedural, a fabulous look at a rarely seen time and locale (at least in western novels), and a glimpse into the hierarchy of the Empire where the sun never set. Historical, mystery, and political fans will enjoy THE CAMEL OF DESTRUCTION as Michael Pearce provides a triumphant look back into a bygone era through the microscope of a strong investigative tale.

riet Klausner

Michael Pearce does it again in this mystery, part of his Mamur Zapt series set in Egypt during British Rule. An additional mystery is why this series isn't readily available at bookstores. I have searched for years and not found them; only Amazon came to the rescue.
The series is a treasure. Intelligent mysteries that are really novels, charmingly written, tongue in cheek dialogue, an engaging hero in an exotic time and place that is generally little known. Descriptions of the hero's contact with the local population outrageously funny. Every discerning reader will enjoy these. Thankfully, he's written a lot.

Bordewijk has a special style of writing. He uses just enough words to characterize people. This book is probably one of the best books he ever wrote. It is the fight between a father and his basterd son. This son tries to get attention from his father by trying to be better all the time. His father forces him into this role by not paying attention. It is a hate-love story. If you want to read something from Dutch literature this is really it!

Character (by Bordewijk) is one of the best books in Dutch literature history! I can strongly recommend you to read it. There is a high chance that you will actually re-read it, as I did!

The movie "Character" was based on this book and won an Oscar in 1997 for the best foreign movie. In fact, the film is also highly recommended!

Probably the main reason for my recommendation is the theme of the book: a man's persistance and his father's challenges.

Dit boek heb ik gelezen in 1983 voor mijn boekenlijst. Een vader zit zijn bastaardzoon voortdurend dwars om hem te harden voor het harde leven. Liefde kan hij niet uiten maar is wel degelijk aanwezig. De relatie tussen vader en zoon maakt het de zoon moeilijk om een emotionele band met een vrouwelijke collega te krijgen. Een aanrader.

I am a curriculum project manager at Houston ISD. I have been researching material for a Story-teller program we are starting this summer and... this is the best!

As a classroom storyteller, I have found this teacher's guide and collection of tellable stories to be extremely useful, clear, and reliable. The experience and common sense of the authors provide teachers with a valuable resource for storytelling. You will use this book again and again.

If I were forced to choose only one resource to help me as I teach kids how to go about choosing, learning and telling a story, this would be it. The authors have extensive experience helping thousands of children to tell stories through their school residencies. Many ideas and activities are spelled out to help teachers or coaches prepare students for the often scary task of getting in front of the audience and telling a tale. A variety of methods for story-learning are detailed, allowing for the variety of learning styles encountered in a classroom. Many ideas for ways to use storytelling in school, from a school festival to an inter-generational fair, are suggested.

Especially enjoyable are the many real-life story maps, quotes and photos of kids involved in this rewarding activity. An anthology of twenty-five stories for kids to tell is included to get your student tellers started.

We do not give kids enough opportunities to get up in front of a group and share something they love. Storytelling bridges so many of these gaps, and even the shyest kids often discover a new-found love when given the chance to tell a story. If you are at all considering having kids tell stories, get this book. It will convince you that you are making the right choice, and give you the tools to carry out your ideas.

(Gwyn is a professional storyteller who has coached many middle school students in the telling of their first story).