P Books

Another favorite by author P.K. Hallinan. As always the illustrations are beautiful & help to tell the story. Teaches children how to welcome others into their lives along with their differences.

This book is powerful because of its simplicity. I can not give this book enough praise! Since our family discovered this gem a few years ago, P.K. Hallinan (who does his own illustrations) has become one of our favorites. The subtitle on earlier editions was "A Book to Celebrate Diversity". Hallinan subtly covers many aspects of diversity through his rhyming words and colorful illustrations. This book is not preachy nor is it cheesy. I like that the book does not just focus on ethnicity, disability and differences. A Rainbow of Friends touches on views, interests, dress, strengths and weaknesses; it emphasizes acceptance, understanding, friendship and working together! A great book for all ages! Our family has donated copies of this book to the school library, given copies to each student in my son's class at school and distributed the book at community events. Heartprints (board book edition)Heartprints is Hallinan's best known book; I think A Rainbow of Friends is one of his best. I would also recommend How Do I Love You.

I am a preschool teacher and wanted books to help the children feel better about being at school that first week. It worked!! It was child friendly and the childen enjoyed the story.

I love this book, but the first time I saw it the book was hardcovered. As a child I always liked my hardcovered books. I was disappointed to find that this book is no longer available in hardcover. I think kids and adults handle a hardcover with more care. The message of this book is excellent. I wonder if the publisher would consider making a hardcover version again.

This is a wonderful book about how we can be friends with all types of people--no matter what! :) It is a book I use every year in my kindergarten class!

Unfortunately, it took a catastrophic event like September 11th to bring home the reality of terrorist attacks to most of us. For Paul Blais, he and his family have been dealing with it since June 25, 1996. Paul's son was in the barracks at Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia when a terrorist bomb killed 19 American servicemen. At first he thought his son was among the 19. Days later he found out that his son survived, but had suffered a traumatic brain injury. While the rest of the world got caught up in the next big news story, Paul and his family entered a foreign world trying to understand the magnitude of so many unknowns associated with TBI.

So many of us are guilty of losing interest in a news event a few days after the news hype has died down. We hear a number associated with the deceased and wounded and give little thought to the decimated lives of the victims, or their families. After reading this book, I will never again hear of a terrorist attack without shedding tears for survivors, deceased, and their families. Terrorism is such a cowardly act!

Paul has created a well-written, poignant account of his only son. This is an honest, thought provoking and indredibly moving story of a young man's will to survive and a father's love for his son. I can guarantee that readers will be as engrossed in this story as I was. It was impossible to put this book down.

It is easy for me to highly recommend this book. My best wishes go out to the entire Blais family. They personify what the American Spirit is all about.

Paul Blais's world was plunged into traumatic turmoil when his son Paul became a victim of the June 25, 1996 Khobar Towers tragedy in Saudi Arabia. Had it not been for the fact that young Paul had left his room and the video game he and a fellow Air Force friend were playing to visit a nearby rest room, he would have been killed instantly, as was his pal.

Young Blais lay in a coma for a time, and his father, due to the inability of Air Force personnel to properly identify him, for a time believed he had been killed in the terrorist bombing. When the elder Blais attended a memorial service for the Khobar Towers victims he was able to empathize as a parent who,until young Paul was finally identified, believed that he too had been deprived of a son.

A notable element of this compelling account is the manner in which the author, despite trauma and sorrow, is able to put his emotions behind him and focus on the issue at hand, providing young Paul with all the love and support necessary to surmount a tragedy and helped propel him toward recovery. Paul was a young man with a penchant for vigorous athletic activity and a preference for water sports. As a result, starting from scratch, learning to walk and talk anew, at one point propels young Paul into suicidal depression. The unwavering support of a loving father, his mother Maria, Paul's ex-wife, along with two supportive step parents, help turn things dramatically around. The elder Paul is delighted to participate in his son's graduation from flight school.

The story contains an interesting surprise twist at the end, with the elder Paul being prouder than ever of the progress his son has made. The ultimate triumph demonstrates the results of a solid game plan built around faith and love, two cornerstones Blais emphasizes repeatedly in this moving work.

Blais also focuses on the important element of feeling for others, which he believes enhances human stature on an individual and extended basis. He states with resolute conviction that people throughout the world need to be more aware of and empathize with each other's tragedies, whether the victims of terrorism be in America, the Middle East, Europe or Africa.

This book is breathtakingly powerful. A most amazing journey into human nature, greif, and hope. This family was thrusted into an exhausting unthinkable heart wrenching challenge.

Paul is an immensely gifted writer. He is profoundly open about all of his relationships including his ex-wife. Paul bares his soul with such rich insight, humility, and grace.

Since 9/11/01, Americans have looked at their world with eyes and hearts that have a greater understanding of tragedy. But that was not the first time Americans have been attacked. Pre-dating 9/11 by several years was was a cowardly attack on patriots, housed on what they thought was friendly soil. In 1996, American servicemen died in Khobar Towers, Dharan, Saudi Arabia. And many of those who lived are still fighting battles to reclaim lives so swiftly snatched away. P.E. Blais writes of one such survivor, his only son, Paul.

I had to read this book twice, over a long period of time. The author is so skilled, and writes with such searing realism, that I could not bear to read it all at once. Perhaps I'm just a pansy, or maybe those horrifying scenes of 9/11 were still too fresh in my mind. Resurrecting Paul might not have borne such impact if written by a lesser writer, but Mr. Blais is anything but mediocre. His pain and denial, his raging at this unkind fate that killed so many young men and almost took his son was burned indelibly into every page.

Resurrection does not come easily or soon. Young Paul's dreams are shattered, and at first no one believes he can survive, let alone overcome the obstacles he faces. Each hard won accomplishment is documented in vivid detail. His responses to physical and mental failings no young man should have to face are intensely personal and documented honestly by his father.

Surrounded by loyal friends and supportive family, Paul fights, fears, lashes out, falls, crawls, and stumbles his way to some semblance of his former life. He has written his own book about the incident in Dharan and the aftermath. I have not read Tragedy to Triumph, but if his work is anywhere near the calibre of his father's, it will be well worth reading.

I enthusiastically recommend Resurrecting Paul to those who appreciate good writing and emotions that draw the reader in. As far as I'm concerned, this book falls under the category of must have must read.

"Resurrecting Paul", is a difficult book to read, and an even harder story to comment upon. The book is very well written; it shares a painful, very personal story, and causes all manner of emotional turbulence for readers. It is written by a father about his son, a young man who decided to serve his country, and what happened to him and the balance of their family and friends when Paul became a victim of the single most definitive word of cowardice: Terrorism.

On June 25, 1996 a tanker truck loaded with fuel parked next to a fence in Dhahran Saudi Arabia, specifically in front of Khobar Towers. The invertebrates that drove the truck there, left. The truck exploded, and 19 young men died. The parents of Paul Blais waited 4 days for confirmation their son was dead, only to be told an error was made and he was alive.

Alive in the sense he was in a coma, was unrecognizable from his wounds, was being kept alive via a ventilator and a variety of feeding tubes and catheters, and had sustained a horse shoe sized massive blunt forced trauma to his head causing severe brain damage. Machines breathed for him, tubes fed him, and tubes removed the poisons all our bodies produce, Paul was alive. This young man, still working his way through the second half of his twenties was irrevocably damaged, all his dreams and his career taken from him. To this day despite indictments of over one dozen of these cowards, no one except Paul, his family, and their friends have been punished, have had their lives changed forever.

Paul's father, the author, will take you through a nightmare that is just about unimaginable. He and others around him are subjected to a combination of great care and concern...and hopeless incompetence. One would think that bringing parents to see their son in Germany is something the bureaucrats could manage. They could not, and they did not. One would think that German officials would have the ability to make decisions. They did not. A person should know that their elected officials will be there to help, especially when the incident garners international attention. Some do, and some cannot be bothered.

I expected that The United States Government would place great value on the life of any of her citizens, especially those who place themselves at risk to protect us. It does not. At 27 they discharged this young man from the service; medical retirement with a full pension just over $800 per month. What reaction, other than incredulity and outrage, is a reader of this injustice supposed to feel?

How about rehabilitation facilities for our veterans? One would expect it to be the best, or at least comparable to what civilians have available to them. The facilities they expected the author to place his son in smelled so badly of human waste that standing inside for more than a moment was impossible.

The author gives an extraordinarily balanced account of everyone, and every piece of stupidity his son was faced with. The vast majority of those he dealt with appear to have been excellent and caring people. But in a case such as this, that is not good enough, it is not acceptable. It is not even close.

The author's son Paul has made a recovery that no one thought possible, he is not the person he was, his life is still a shadow of what it once was before the terrorist bomb destroyed his life and ended the lives of 19 others. Paul has come as far as he has because he has an incredible will to fight and the discipline to match. Paul has family and friends who are all heroes, and who, I would venture to say are in large part responsible for helping him fight his way back. Paul is a hero, and everyone who helped him are heroes. The men who died in Saudi Arabia are heroes, and the families and friends they were taken from are all remarkable people in their own ways.

Books like this are rare, always relevant, and particularly so today, as we are on the verge of yet another conflict in The Middle East. More young men and women will come home like Paul, and many will never come home at all. I wish for them to have families like Paul's, who will be there for them when they come home, to help them heal.

I also hope that the politicians who violated the trust of their offices are able to feel shame, and that the next soldiers returning home requiring long-term help are not offered rehabilitation centers that are kennels where you would not choose to board your dog.

I thank Mr. Blais and everyone else for sharing this story, books like this should be required reading, for they are history books, raw and without any romanticism that all too often turns history text books into historically based fiction.

Terrorism shows our species at its ugliest, and the stories should cause anger and even rage. This book will also cause tour throat to tighten and your eyes to fill, whether you are a parent or not, regardless of your political affiliation, regardless of your place of birth or your manner of worship.

Terrorists live outside of society, outside of religion: Christian, Muslim, any other you care to name. They are outlaws wherever they are and should be treated with the same lack of concern they show their victims. We do much better than that, however, for we are a nation, and mostly a world of law and justice, and these cowards will eventually find that out...and that is why their kind will never win.

This 690 pages book is the most comprehensive book I read on the subject. It provides detailed account of the background of the SALT treaties and the complete history of the soviet nuclear buildup. It is detailed enough to describe the complete process, from uranium processing to the MIRV and ballistic missiles deployment. Even, a table of all nuclear tests with every detail, an incredible sort of sometimes scary reality. Sharp pictures, accurate and exhaustive tables, this book is a reference. Russian references and identifications are provided, this is more accurate than NATO equivalences. It is to be read with 'The Kremlin`s nuclear sword, Zaloga', they complement each other.

Worth having in your library.

This book is really exciting to read. I have been trying to find a book on Soviet weapons for a while and came across this book. I must say I was amazed of the amount of content and detail included in this book. The book lists different strategic missiles from the very first ICBM to the latest model that was produced in the Soviet Union. The authors even lists different missile bases and production sites i.e. (closed cities) and warhead depositories, and the nuclear fuel cycle . Even though the Cold War is over I'm wondering if some of the material should still be classified.

This book goes through the early history of the production of missiles, naval fleets, information of strategic aviation sites and production facilites and locations. This book has a section on nuclear tests which lists nuclear explosions. It also describes the decision making process of the strategic nuclear forces in the event of a nuclear war. The chapter that was interesting was the "Strategic Defense" chapter which includes missile and space defense forces, antisatellite and space surveillance the Soviet version of the United States SDI program was interesting. Toward the end of this book includes the present state of Russian strategic forces.

I would recommend this book to anyone that's interested in soviet military thinking and the history of Soviet/Russian weapons systems. A great reference.

Pavel Podvig's Russian Strategic Nuclear Forces was initially available only in Russian, however when it was finally updated and released in English we received the absolute most authoritative and detailed report on the subject available in the civilian sector.

Podvig's effort is to be highly commended, as he has compiled an impressive amount of research, much of it relating to the technical side, though good write-ups and historical overviews are included. From R&D to production and finally deployment, every Soviet/Russian ICBM, SLBM and Strategic Bomber system is discussed in extensive technical detail, including such well researched and hard to find details such as Circular Error Probability of all Russian strategic systems.

The book is a heavy volume containing nearly 700 pages, none of it filler, so you can imagine the sheer amount of information in this volume for anyone interested in attaining a deeper understanding of the subject. Given the price, it really is a no-brainer. Furthermore Pavel Podvig maintains a frequently updated and detailed web site which continually adds newer information, essentially making this a "living research" project on the subject. You can locate his site here:

Seems Amazon edits out any links in reviews, so to try again Podvig's site can be found at russianforces.org

Once again, for the incredibly low price this book is offered at, you have nothing to lose, and a wealth of knowledge to gain.

Disclaimer: I am in no way affiliated with Mr. Podvig, aside from being someone who has been won over by his dedication and research to the subject at hand.

Mr. Podvig's book, "Russian Strategic Nuclear Forces," is an excellent unclassified look into the world of Russian/Soviet nuclear weapons. The book covers weapon systems, facilities and nuclear tests since the dawn of their nuclear age. The diagrams and tables are clear and concise.

This book was very helpful in allowing an individual to quickly memorize (or 'compare and contrast') different missile ranges and warhead yields. Very useful if briefing American missile combat crews on potential nuclear threats, or if writing 'peace-nik' papers on the evils of nuclear weapons. Honestly, I don't care what your bent is - if you want to know about nukes, this book needs to be added to your library.

Nuclear forces, like other branches of the military, are divided into two categories: Tactical and strategic. Strategic division of the nuclear forces covers the armaments that have a wider scope of effect. These are the forces that have kept the MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction) balance between the superpowers so far. Strategic nuclear forces have air, land and submarine launch capability of nuclear warheads targeted for intercontinental targets.
This book covers every aspect of the Russian Strategic Nuclear Forces from the very beginnings up to post-Soviet restructuring. It covers detailed development phases of strategic bombers, land-based launch platforms and the submarine leg of the nuclear triad. There are detailed data on the organization of the nuclear command, early warning systems and launch protocols. There are also detailed data on the Soviet/Russian nuclear complex and their products. At the end of the book, there is a long list of the nuclear tests undertaken by Russia.
All in all, this book should be read and kept as a reference by all those who want to have a well-balanced look at the Russian Nuclear Strategic Command's capabilities and importance. Readers of this book will appreciate why the latest efforts by the United States for a missile defense system will be highly counter-productive.

I have about 20 books on the Titanic and had lost hope that I would find anything new about this sea disaster.This book tells everything about the Californian's role and uses facts to back up every example. I loved this book!!!!!!

The only reason this book got 4 starts instead of 5 is the slight anti-American tone at times (for example, the US inquiries are treated as a almost a joke) and something in this much detail could not help but be tedious at points (the discussion of "port" and "starboard" lights comes to mind),but it is extremely well-done, leaves no point untouched, examines minutely any evidence in Lord's favor, and comes to the point of the matter- he saw what he knew "might have been" distress rockets and did nothing- and really, that is the end of it.

I think you should not only read this book, but the other side of the story to get a full picture - A titantic Myth. I think Lord is given too much blame. He was the scapegoat, and he was not given his full rights when the US interviewed him. That is without a doubt a fact. However, I can't help but believe he could have done more. However, he wasn't the one who hit an iceberg, nor the one who lost members on his ship.

No matter what your view is on this particular aspect of the Titanic tragedy, you cannot help but be impressed by this book. This is, without question, one of the best-researched Titanic books ever written. If you happen to come across this rare gem don't hesitate to pick it up, because it's likely that you won't see it anywhere else!

One may wonder why a book like this should have to be written. Clearly Lord is guilty as sin! On that cold April night he just didn't want to be bothered with a strange ship firing rockets in the distance. It was easier to do nothing, hoping everything would go away. But it wasn't so easy or comforting to deal with the blame that fell on him. How dare we blame such a responsible captain? But the facts are there. Reade goes through them step by step like a first class lawyer. This must be done because many still feel that Lord did nothing wrong. Like OJ Simpson's defenders, they believe what they want to believe. My only fault with this book was that it was not the thriller other Titanic books have been. It tended to bog down in jargon and nautical language.

Simply put this book should be mandatory reading for anyone that feels the American military should always have a "world presence" in the various political quagmires. Both young & old & in-between will benefit from a book that can make you laugh & cry often within the same paragraph.

Very Dry humour... I LOVE IT

This has to be one of the funniest, well-written, smartest books I've ever read. You can find the time to cry and laugh at the same time - it is an example of others in a horrible situation that can find some security in laughing and making their experiences funny to a certain point. I love this book and I intend on having my friends read it.

I was given this book by a friend who raved about it. I expected yet another terrible "Vietnam was hell-don't you feel sorry for me" books. Instead I got to read a book that transcends that conflict and all others. The story and mood could easily be transplanted to any other conflict in history and thats what makes this book so compelling. As a former enlisted infantryman, I rarely read any accounts that accurately portray the bizzare and often irrational logic that one has to adopt to deal with the situations faced by a soldier. Most stories and recollections make soldiers clear-thinking and rational and are usually from the perspective of an officer or high ranking NCO who seem almost to enjoy the experience. Any bad decisions are made "out-of scene" by politcally motivated officers or out-of-touch politicians. They imply that things would be fine without these busybodies. McAfee throws away these stereotypical conventions and gives us the hazy and almost absurdist reasoning that governs a man in times of unrelenting stress and deprevation. Each character in this story clings to each other, and in one case a mortar, to try and ground themselves in an environment of chaos and incoherence. This book should be a classic and the fact that it is out-of-print is a disgrace considering how much junk out there should never have been printed in the first place. However you can swing it, get this book. You will not be disapointed.

Dear Mr. McAfee,

I read your book. I have sent copies to friends. I never understood why it did not become an American classic. Finally, I saw your on-line comments and I understood.

You have done a marvellous thing for veterans and civilians alike. You have captured the essence of the Vietnam conflict. You "Get" it. You also made me weep for the first time in thirty years.

Thank you

This is a nice treat for any mother. It makes you think and remember and someday will make it all happen again. Very nice.

This book makes for a wonderful gift idea for any Mother on any occasion. But the perk is that the giver actually gets a priceless gift in return once the receiver has done their work. It's a gift that keeps on giving and brings families closer together. It will take some time and effort to fill out but the final result will be worth every minute.

This book helped me learn so much about my grandmother AND my mother. I gave my mom two - one for her to fill out and one for her to give her mother. It is really a treasure to have these questions answered in their own words and to know what it was like to be them at so many different times in their lives.

"Someday I'll Ask You," is a thoughtful, imaginative creation, filled with the kind of questions that can be asked from Daughter to Mother, now, instead of wishing they could be answered later. The book has breathtakingly beautiful photos and imaginative poetry commensurate with the theme inserted throughout, that leave you wanting to turn the next page. I purchased a book for each of my two Daughters, my Stepdaughter and my Sister.
The book is an ingenious idea. To this day, I find answers by sheer accident from my Mother about her life and my Grandmother's life that I find fascinating. I have quetions about my Father's boyhood, to which I will never know the answers. I wish I had this book long ago.
Every Daughter should have one. One of my Daughters keeps her book in the kitchen and writes in it daily.
The book is a family treasure and a must buy.

H. Neil Levin

"This is how family heirlooms are created"... a quote by PJ Cloud, from the personalized inscription in my mother's copy of "Someday, I'll Ask You." This truly is the beginning of creating a family heirloom for us...not one of wealth, but of love, memories, advice, concern, and so much more. The pictures are beautiful, the poetry is inspiring and the questions with which to respond to are thought provoking. This is an invaluable gift.

The story of the Loon Society is great. You learn about it from the characters and actions in this early gay pulp fiction novel. I will not tell the story, but hope you can read it and then if you are very fortunate will be able to watch the movie (believe me reading the story will help with understanding the movie). The story of men in the early history of this country may be made up in this book, but I believe it happened more than many people would ever admit. I hope the movie will be reissued, even though it is not well made and did not do well when it was released, it would add to any collection of books/movies.

Ephraim MacIver is escaping his one time lover, following the course a wise man has advised him - a course to discover himself - when he encounters an Indian Singing Heron. Singing Heron already knows Ephraim's name, and begins to instruct him in the ways of the Loon Society, and before sending him further on his journey of discovery they fall in love. As Ephraim's quest continues he meets more Indians as well as Cyrus, and he fall in love with them all.

As Ephraim learns more of the exclusively male Loon Society, and their ways of unselfish love, he tries to understand how he also can love more than one person. Yet at the same time he learns that he may also find a special partner from among all those who have fallen in love with him while on his quest. For this is what marks those of the Loon society out from others, they can share their love while still holding to one partner, they do not know jealously.

This is quite remarkable story, especially considering it was written over forty years ago. At its core is the thought of free love along with its unrestrained physical fulfilment, without jealousy. The story has the feel of fantasy about it as everything falls perfectly in place as Ephraim continues his journey, and with the meaningful dreams. The story is contains many explicit passages of love making; passages which manage to avoid being crude and put to shame much of what is written today.

The story does raise concerns though. The men all seem to be handsome and well equipped, and readily declare undying love within a few days or possibly hours of meeting and before they have had a chance to really know one another. It is easy to get the impression that this love is built on physical attraction; although in fairness it does also speak of the beauty within, and Ephraim at least does not restrict his attentions just to the young. And maybe this is part of the fantasy, this ability accurately to read one another so quickly.

There are two sequels to the Song of the Loon: Song of Aaron and Willow Song.

Given the age of this book, and the fact that it was revolutionary when it was published, this book is well worth reading, if only for the "historical" perspective. The writing is STILTED, the situations, CONTRIVED, and the sex, PREDICTABLE, but...and I must hesitate here in reviewing this book, in it's HISTORICAL CONTEXT, i.e., the period in which it was written and published, it is ground breaking. Is it a scorcer?..Nah!...is it entertaining?...Yes!...will it have you breathing heavily?...uh..that depends upon your imagination and libido. Read it and make up your own mind.

One of my all time favorite gay stories. I'm glad it's back in print for the youger people to read.

Even if the book wasn't attached, Michael Bronski's introduction would be reason enough to buy this edition of SONG OF THE LOON by the late "Richard Amory."

But this way you get the novel too, a groundbreaking, yet oddly ultra traditional novel--really a romance in Northrop Frye's terms--in which the white man and the Indian meet on a field of Eros rather than Thanatos. Yes folks, this is the real Brokeback Mountain in which buckskinned pioneers meet up with and pursue Indian braves on the banks of the "Umpqua" in a territory of long ago. Thinking about the storyline, you realize how ridiculous the plot is, for there aren't very many people on the frontier and every last one of them is a man and every last one of them is either openly or secretly a member of the Loon Brotherhood. Yes, it strains plausibility but Amory's power as a writer is such that while it is taking place you don't really quibble, Sybil.

He was a great poet as well, and the book gets a haunting resonance from Amory's descriptions of American nature, its flora and fauna, in the days before heavy industry moved in to shovel it into parking lots. The skies are an amazing blue, the rivers swift and clear. Over the great forests you can hear every animal's step in the fallen twigs, and the insects hum. "Darker green, the waters of the Umpqua fell in tiny crystals from the paddle--the waves from the canoe sighed in the shadows of white elders and lacy vine maples. A pair of jays screamed high in the treetops, then streaked far into the woods, crying hoarsely."

And because it is porn, it has men galore, all of them with heavily veined, vibrant, pulsating members under their loincloths. Ephraim is a white man on the run from a miserable relationship with Montgomery, a self-hating homosexual who could only have sex when he was drunk, who showed his naked form only to taunt the besotted Ephraim. Breaking free, Ephraim is on a long canoe ride into Indian territory where he meets one man after another, each more luscious than the last, and the members of the tribe teach him about polygamy and the joys of giving up your virginity in the scented wigwam rings. If it isn't Singing Heron, it's Bear Who Dreams--even an elderly medicine man, nice to see that old people have sex in the porn of the 1960s. And finally Ephraim meets his opposite number, the dreamy Cyrus, who is so big it takes three hands to hold all of him steady.

The book comes packaged with a dossier of contemporary reviews, interviews, photos and other invaluable documents, just as though we were reading some "classic" by Dreiser or Balzac or Cather.

It is a wonderful version of time travel and comes highly recommended by thousands and thousands of one-handed readers. What a way to kick off this promising series from Vancouver's estimable Arsenal Pulp Press in tandem with the venerable Little Sister's bookstore of BC.

I've tried more recipes from this book than any of my other cookbooks and have never been disappointed. The pictures are alluring, the instructions are clear, and the flavor combinations have been excellent. My favorite recipes to date are the tortilla soup and the corn fritters.

The whole series of "Beautiful Cookbooks" is first-rate.

The pictures are an added bonus to recipes that are usually easy to reproduce. I bought this for my mom for Mother's Day and she likes it very much. I use my own copy frequently, too.

The styling and recipes in this book reflect the time in which they were encapsulated, but they're still beautiful nonetheless. We keep it on the coffee table in our Southwest rental house as a primer to Southwest cooking and culture for out-of-town guests.

Not only does this book include excellent recipes, it is of coffee-table quality for its beautiful pictures and history of the southwest. Definitely try the tortilla soup, the stuffed pork roast, the fiesta shrimp, etc., etc., etc.

As with the rest of the "Beautiful Cookbook" series, this is more than a cookbook full of wonderful recipes -- it is a book of wonderful pictures of food, of the stories behind the people and of the traditions of the culture.

I collect this series because:
a) The recipes are always incredible
b) The presentation is always unique & intriguing
c) The recipes are simple for beginning to intermediate cooks
d) The stories and information makes it more than just food, but an experience.

The only "watch-out" I give is that the recipes are authentic and on occasion I have found finding some of the ingredients very difficult. However, the book usually will suggest alternatives.

Reviewed by Diane Morgan - Editor, ... .

Pat Mullan takes us on a poetic journey through Ireland, the world and childhood. His evocative poetry creates for us lush landscapes, towering cities and weeping hearts that share the sorrow within all of us.

Relationships are key to his poetry, love, loss and remembering. I truly enjoyed his style of writing; it wasn't at all like the rhyming cliché poetry we are overburdened with as we read aspiring poets; it has a rhythm all its own; one could almost hear an Irish lilt to it.

He adds to the end of his book a section in memory of James Dickey that is poignant and stirring reminding us of the vast heritage we have of poets often forgotten.

Hi I'm Zoe Whilton, and Childhood Hills is an excellent book. Each poem is a masterpiece of its own. My favorite poems are, "The Lie", "The Elevator", and "Your First Day at Dolly's" (by Annemarie Mullan Whilton, aka my mother, I am the girl at preschool, my sister is the one crying). I hope that Pat Mullan continues to write poetry.

Childhood Hills
by Pat Mullan

Reading this collection of poetry and writings was like holding a conversation with a very interesting person who can fascinate with a hypnotic flow of words. His muse is an old country bard who whispered secrets of the ancient days in the poet's ear. Pat Mullan has translated those secrets onto these pages.

You will be moved to joy and sorrow as you traverse the winding path over these Childhood Hills. Within these hills dwells a child who remembers the man he was, not a man dreaming over a lost youth. He still lives in the poetry contained here.

This author is a spirit freed from the fears of childhood that we all have shared, no matter what shape those fears take, what horrid dreams they inspire. If you allow him, this poet will guide you through imagery and images, familiar and strange, to a destination where understanding waits.

A poem is music of the soul that takes its inspiration from ordinary events, places, and people. It is a music you hear with your heart. I recommend you read Childhood Hills slowly and listen carefully. It will quicken the spirit that lives within.

I am the author of "THE FEELINGS AND IMAGINATION OF A BAREFOOT BOY STILL INSIDE MY HEAD!: Poems and Short Stories for Boys and Girls Ages 9 to 12," which will be available online soon! I bought Childhood Hills to read another author's poetry. In Pat's book, here are several of my favorites: THE QUARRY HOLE, WE NEVER TALKED, BICYCLE RIDE, SMALL VICTORY, GRANNY BUNTY'S BUTTON BOX, and MY CAT (this one is by Annemarie Mullan Whilton). As I read, Pat's poetry created a vivid picture in my mind. The poems about Pat's childhood were particularly moving. Great Book Pat!

It's an amazing way of painting a picture from a really interesting life and Childhood of this irish author. For me it was sometimes intellectuall demanding and sometimes easy to follow. My Favourites are: 'The turning point' and 'Granny Bunty's Button Box'

You may not want to eat striped ice cream afterwards but you will want to go swimming and eat cream cheese sandwiches afterwards and get a part time job. I would recommend this book to any one.

I read this book when I was in 4th or 5th grade. I remember going to the local library and checking this book out all the time. A few years ago I had the opportunity to read it again. It still made me cry at the end. I love the story and characters in this book. I have a ten year old daughter now and I am going to purchase this for her for Christmas. I can't wait for her to read it. I hope she enjoys as much as I did.

I remember this book so vividly! It was the first time I realized that there were children in our country whose parents couldn't give them everything they wanted! It seemed amazing to me that they worked so hard to get her something that I took for granted!
This is a must read for all kids, especially privileged children.

I read this when i was a little kid and couldn't bear to give it away when i cleaned out my room because it was such a good story. Very good read and is very entertaining!

I remember reading this for the first time at about the age of 9 and loving it. I read it many times through the years. I recently picked up a copy for my collection of childhood favorites and have re-read it several times since. The story still rings with impact and life-lessons that still apply in today's world. An enjoyable book for a young girl!