Park Books

A wonderful book worth its price. It gives a lot of deep images with incredible pictures of one of the few remaining true wildernesses on earth. Additionally, the text gives excellent insights of this fragile eco-system in the Amazonian rainforest. Overall, one of those books a nature lover should have on his/her book shelves.

MANU is an absolutely first rate book, with superb photography by Andre Bartshe, an extraordianry talent, and text in both English and Spanish by world traveler and adventurer, Kim MacQuarrie. Mr MacQuarrie and Mr. Bartshe have each lived and explored Peru for several years. They are authorities on the region. Mr. MacQuarrie has also made several award winning films for the Discovery Channel on Manu as well as on Siberian Grizzly bears of Kamtchatka. This MANU book is also a pleasure for its production value. It is a joy to hold and turn the pages. The color process used is excellent and the paper is of the highest quality. MANU is a treasure. Highest recommendation for serious book lovers.

The beautifully photographed book, Manu, is dedicated to Celestino Kalinowski, my father. Sadly, after my Peruvian dad, married my Chicagoan mom, they discovered that they weren't able to handle the vast differences that existed between their cultures. Within a few years they divorced. Celestino remained in Peru; months after I was born there, my mom returned to Chicago, with me.

While I didn't have a chance to see my dad after the divorce, I discovered, about 10 years ago, that he remairried and I have 4 siblings in Peru! My younger daughter visited her new aunts and uncles, soon after this amazing discovery.

While there, she found this book and brought it home to me. Imagine my fascination with the information this massive book contained about my father AND my grandfather! Details about their work and their lives were ones I'd never heard.

Manu is filled with excitement and beauty. Much of it is captured in its pages. I am thrilled to have a connection to the man who did so much for its preservation.

I have read everything that can be found pertaining to the rain forest areas of southeast Peru, as an adjunct to my in-the-field research into the legend of the legendary "Paititi," ultimate refuge of the Incas. The information that writer/film-maker Kim MacQuarrie compiled and put into words for Manu is among the most informative and interesting to be found on the subject in English (or Spanish, as the text is bi-lingual). The author obviously did his homework, and presents the facts and current theories in clear and colorful prose. The book gives a good representation of various ecological zones found within "Manu," from the harsh and frigid highlands, the "alturas," on the west; to the penetrating cold mists dripping moisture onto the dense vegetation of the "ceja de la selva," the "eyebrow of the jungle" that lies just below the highlands, along the high eastern edge of the Andes; down into the eastern rim of the Amazon basin, the dense riot of vegetation that is the "selva alta," the high altitude jungle; and finally down into the endless carpet of jungle that makes up the "selva baja," the lowland jungle that spreads away from Manu ever deeper into the Amazon. The text covers all aspects of the Manu area, from history to archaeology to ecology to anthropology. The photographer Andre Bartschi's photographs, which grace most of the book, are lush and exquisitely sharp, capturing fully the riot of color and feeling that are a part of the Manu experience. This is one "coffee table" size book that is as worth reading as any thriller, with illustrations that are a real "turn on" for anyone interested in the exotic or natural history. An additional interesting and useful feature is found in the fold out "bird's eye view" maps, which help one understand and "feel" the unique topography that makes up this pristine and magical place, Manu.

The author did a great job helping my wife and I plan our first trip with our young children to WDW. The book made it easy to look things up in each park and evalute what might be appropriate for us to do. We took special notice of the hints he provided and tried to hit some of the many extra's that were listed. Included is an easy rating scale based on ages on each attraction.

Overall, our trip would not have been the same without this book!

I love all books about WDW, and this book is no exception. WDW in No Time does exactly what it claims - to give you the essential knowledge and understanding you need to know before you go to WDW. A simple, easy to follow format gives you the basics about rooms, the parks, attractions and beyond. It does not pretend to be anything it is not. If you're looking for in-depth descriptions of every little detail, this is not for you. However, my wife, who has accompanied me on dozens of trips since we met, picked it up and immediately said, "This is the book for me!" Plus, it has great callouts of tips and tricks, and some money-saving ideas as well. It is a fun, fast read, and one i highly recommend to first-time visitors, those who may be visiting for the first time with children, as well as those people who are looking to enhance their vacation, without having to go through a book that has so much information that it becomes overwhelming. Well done!

I loved this book! It had great information to help me plan our family trip to Disney World. I loved the Notes and Tips throughout the book. I also liked the To Do lists that were in each section. I have read other Disney vacation books and this one was fun to read, and made it easy to plan our trip. I especially liked the index cards provided. I was able to plan ahead and use them when we got to the park. I just marked which rides we wanted to go to and had a game plan when we got to the gate! It saved us from going to a ride that I knew my kids were to short to go on and them being disappointed when we had to walk away.
I would recommend this book to anyone planning a trip to Disney World.

Plan Your Walt Disney World Vacation In No Time by Doug Ingersoll is a book I wish we had had before we spent a week at Disney World and came away wishing we had done this or skipped that to make the most of our wonderful vacation. This book is well laid-out to walk you through three stages: Part 1 gives advice on how to plan getting there and where to stay. Giving basic vacation planning strategies such as how to budget realistically, where to search on the Internet, which exits to take from highways, how to rent a car, etc., this is NOT an advertisement for specific properties or businesses but names each with the price range and outlines amenities, transportation, etc. The same is listed for restaurants in the area. This section alone will save you lots of money and exhaustion and frustration once you arrive at your dream destination. In the second section you will find each area of Disny World mapped,and a basic description of each ride or performance. There are some MUST SEE notes and for each place there is a rating of 1 - 5 for each age group from pre-schoolers to seniors. At the back of the book are trip cards so you can make notes of which attractions to do and which to skip, placing these cards in your wallet for on-site use. There is a section to help you plan what to do after dark and the final section is devoted to other attractions in the area outside Disney World. Using this book before you go will assure you make the very most of your money, time, and energy on this trip of a family dream.

Like a good naturalist or interpreter, this guide provides not only a concise way to identify the most common flora and fauna, but adds interesting facts and folklore. It will surely make the living things in and around Rainier very accessible, and provide even the most knowledgeable biologist/naturalist with enjoyable new information. Illustrations are detailed and beautiful, and the general information and references are an added bonus. And it all fits into your pocket! Great!

An excellent guidebook to the Mount Rainier area. As a former Mount Rainier Ranger, I would recommend this book to anyone considering a visit to Mount Rainier National Park. The illustrations are beautifully rendered and the accompanying text is accurate and insightful. The book is small enough to fit in a daypack or take it along for a backpack along the Wonderland Trail.

Excellent field guide with great illustrations

The problem with most field guides is that they've forgotten they are field guides and not coffee-table art books.

Not so with Joe Dreimiller's POCKET GUIDE TO THE PLANTS AND ANIMALS OF MOUNT RAINIER!

Sure, this book has plenty of pretty color pictures made by its three illustrators, but they are diagnostic illustrations, just like Roger Tory Peterson emphasized in his bird books. So, you have something pretty to look at but you also have something that will help you identify the common plants and animals to be seen in Mt Rainier National Park.

Pictures are nice, but after you've used the illustrations to identify an Elephant-head pedicularis, Golden-mantled ground squirrel, a Varied thrush, or a Mountain hemlock, Dreimiller tells you the field marks so you'll know what makes these things different from their closest relitives. That way, if you don't have his book next time, you've learned what distingushes each plant or animal from every other plant or animal.

And the help you get from this little gem doesn't stop there. Let's say you've used this pocket guide to identify a False hellebore [Veratrum viride]. Next time you're in the Park, hiking with a friend, and you spot it, you can say, "Oh! Look at that False hellebore! Did you know its botanic name means 'green plant with the black roots?'" And so you look at the roots and, "Wow! They're black."

For all the organisms in this book, there are not only field marks but an extensive list of notes to help you remember why each is so important to know.

Not only that, but there are descriptions of all the groups so you'll learn why mammals are different from birds which are different from amphibians. There is an extensive bird list for the Park including accidentals. And, unsual for this kind of book, there is a mammal list too. And to top off the list catagory, each habitat has a list of common plants as well as suggestions for places to walk.

Did I mention that Dreimiller's book is also pocket sized? How many field guides have you bought in recent years that don't even fit in the pocket of your daypack?

I also liked the short reference list at the end of the book, referring me to other helpful resources. The index is short, but complete.

Evidently Dreimiller worked as a ranger at Mount Rainier for a number of years and it shows. He knows his plants and his animals. All in all, I would reccomend this little gem to anybody who wants to know more about what they see while in the Park. And the best thing about this field guide is that it teaches you things that can be used elsewhere in the Cascades.

I write for a number of newspapers in the Seattle area and I'm pretty sensitive to writers who wastes my time trying to copy the prose of Muir, Leopold, Pyle, and all the other good nature writers. I liked this book because it tells me what I need to know without the usual cumbersome "awesome beauty of nature" rhetoric that encumbers so many field guides. Leave the literature for the coffee table. Take Dreimiller's book into the field.

Most Civil War buffs are aware of Brigadier General Buford's famous delaying action at Gettysburg on July 1, 1863. Fewer are conversant with the July 3 cavalry fight on Rummel's farm, in which George Custer first came to prominence, and fewer still with the previous day's combat on Brinkerhoff's Ridge. Ignorance of these affairs is no longer an excuse since the publication of Eric Wittenberg's "Protecting the Flank: The Battles for Brinkerhoff's Ridge and East Cavalry Field."

Wittenberg covers both engagements thoroughly and with style, providing the most accurate, detailed and readable account of the cavalry's role at Gettysburg after July 1 to date. He traces the movements of General David Gregg's Division in a clear and lucid manner, giving that commander his due as a master of combat analysis and tactical application, and his analysis of General J. E. B. Stuart's intentions on July 3 are logical and sound.

When I needed a succinct, accurate and yet detailed account of the cavalry battle of July 3 at Gettysburg for a book project, the first secondary account I consulted was Eric Wittenberg's.

Eric has penned a wonderful work on both a minor and major fight between the cavalries of the Army of the Potomac and the Army of Northern Virginia during the Gettysburg battle. The fights at Brinkerhoff's Ridge and on the Rummel Farm (East Cavalry Field) are infinitely interesting scraps between the two opposing horsemen that have long deserved such an in-depth study. Every student of the Gettysburg campaign and those particularly interested in the "saddle boys" need this book. One cannot wholly understand the more glorious fight on East Cavalry Field, and it's impact on the battle proper, without also understanding the prior clash at Brinkerhoff's Ridge, and Eric has provided an extremely well-written work which does just that. His footnotes are most helpful, and his sources, as always, dominate in the primary and are second-to-none in backing up his explanations of the tactics.

A necessary edition for the Gettysburg, Cavalry, and Civil War bookshelf that will stand the test of time.

It is not often that a small inexpensive book provides a valuable in-depth account of a battle. When that happens, I feel that I have cheated the author by getting much more than I paid for. Eric J. Wittenberg often gives me this feeling. This is an invaluable account of the cavalry battles that maintained the Union right flank. This is the best book on this action that I have found, clearly written with good maps and photos.

Protecting the Flank: The Battles for Brinkerhoff's Ridge and East Cavalry Field, Wittenberg, Eric J., 201 pp., softcover, index, bibliography, endnotes, appendices, Ironclad Publishing, 2002.

In print Brandy Station, Aldie, Middleburg, Upperville, Hanover and Hunterstown may one day get their due as important and crucial components in the Gettysburg Campaign. If so, then this reader hopes that it is Eric Wittenberg who give it to them. He has produced a clear, concise and probably complete picture of the cavalry battle on Brinkerhoff's Ridge and on the Rummel Farm. I doubt if Wittenberg is an armchair historian. His presentation of these two crucial battles is well grounded upon an understanding of the terrain. (Yes, that was a pun.)

Three and a half miles east from the main Gettsyburg battlefield park is another portion of the park, one that did not contain the huge number of casualites that the main park has. Neverless, the importance of these battles are recognized when the Baltimore Pike is less than three miles away. As many have begun to realize, the eastern portions of the battle: Culp's Hill, East Cemetery Hill, Brinkerhoff's Ridge, and the Rummel Farm may have been more crucial to the outcome of the battle than Pickett's Charge.

The fight on Brinkerhoff's Ridge was between a portion of the Stonewall Brigade of Johnson's Division (CSA) and McIntosh's Brigade of Gregg's Divison of Federal cavalry. This book furthers the agruement in favor of Ewell's decision to use a portion of his infantry on the evening of July 1st, 2nd, and 3rd to cover his left flank due to the constant rumor that Federal troops were coming up the Hanover Road that runs straight through the cavalry actions of July 3rd.

The fight on the Rummel Farm was between three brigades of CSA cavalry and parts of three brigades of Federal cavalry. Chambliss', Lee's, and Hampton's brigades were to be the rope in the snare set for the Federal cavalry. Fortunately for Gregg's division, the commander sniffed a trap, triggered the bait, and then attacked those CSA troops that were advance to capture the Union force.

In dramatic fashion, Wittenberg combines descriptions of personalities with strategy, of hand-to-hand combat with tactics, and of heroism with fighting. The author balances the human element and the tactical element on the battlefield. He uses the soldiers words to both advance the story and bring the action to the climax.
Wittenberg handles the Custer anecdotes even handedly with the Hampton stories, the Wolverines tales with the Palmetto heroics.

The last third of the book is a driving/walking tour of these two cavalry battlefields, illustrated by 20 modern photographs, the majority of which are well composed. There are those several that are covered in shadows and do not give a clear idea of the monument.

The maps are informative and clear; the captions under the portaits include unit in which the officer served. The appendices are the Federal and Confederate order of battle of those units that served on the field that day.

This book is a welcomed addition to the body of literature on the Battle of Gettysburg. Well written and easy to use as a guide, this book is both informative and entertaining.

First there were the fires in Yellowstone in Summer of Fire, and now we have earthquakes and volcanoes in Rain of Fire. Wow! What a ride! I could not put this book down. It grabbed me from the first page and had me sitting up late at night devouring it until the very end. The details of Yellowstone and the surrounding areas is fantastic.

When the Utah Institute Director Professor Stanton suffers a debilitating stroke, he wants geologist Kyle Stone to replace him. Instead ambitious Dr. Hollis Delbert pulls a stunt and takes charge. He removes Kyle's earthquake reading equipment slated for Yellowstone, which has had some activity of late, and uses it for his study of the Salt Lake areas though that has been inundated with equipment since just before the 2002 Olympics.

Still she defies Hollis and brings some portables to the area where her parents died during an earthquake in 1959 when she was a little girl. Desperate for help, she turns to her former lover volcanologist Dr. Nicholas Darden, who assists her with some of his equipment. As the tremors increase, Hollis manipulates the Institute brass leading to Kyle's firing even as Ranger Wyatt Ellison and Nicholas heat the air as much as the geo-thermal activities do the ground as they compete for her affection.

RAIN OF FIRE is an exciting thriller that grips the audience with the tremors that threaten Yellowstone as a time when there seems to be an increase in major natural disasters. The story line is action-packed but driven by the rivalr between Hollis and Kyle in which he behaves totally unprofessional while she is absolutely dedicated. The romantic triangle is deftly handled, but the tale is more a cautionary thriller warning people about the potential of natural disaster in a place where most people fail to realize the danger.

Have read both of Linda's Yellowstone books and loved them both. Makes you want to get in your car and go!!. Linda knows the park and her info is right on target. Rain of Fire will scare you with its natural activites, and you can not wait for the next page.

The world's largest volcano does not reside beneath Hawaii's mountains, or in Washington state, but Yellowstone National Park. Past eruptions have darkened our continent and covered it with a blanket of ash that smothered both plant and animal life. Now the supervolcano, with its earthquakes and geysers, is monitored on a daily basis for signs of the beast reawakening. As a terrified child, geologist Kyle Stone watched her family die in the 1959 Hebgen Lake Earthquake near Yellowstone. Fighting a lifetime of fears, she is one of the scientists with a finger on Yellowstone's pulse. When a new hot spring appears overnight in the park and a noted naturalist is scalded to death, Kyle mounts an expedition into the Yellowstone backcountry to unravel the mystery. Accompanying her are Ranger Wyatt Ellison, former student and friend, and Dr. Nicholas Darden, volcanologist and former lover. More than just a volcano is heating up. Amid personal conflict, earthquakes uprooting the land, and poison gases killing wildlife, Kyle finds herself in the unenviable position of convincing park officials to evacuate Yellowstone before tens of thousands of people die. As the earth shudders, Kyle must also choose between past and present, and defeat her darkest terror simply to survive. According to NY Times Bestselling author Robert Vaughan 'Rain of Fire is a thrilling vision of what might happen tomorrow. Based on fact, the book details the signs, warnings, and the eruption that could take place in Yellowstone - tomorrow. Fast-paced, yet with touchingly human characters, Rain of Fire is a page-turner of the first magnitude.' Yellowstone Superintendent Bob Barbee says, 'Linda Jacobs is in the zone. This book is a grabber for sure.'

This is my all time favorite book. It is about thirteen year old Eric Kirby. He went parasailing in hopes of seeing real live dinosaurs. His parasail crashed on Isla Sorna. He made
friends with a young iguanadon he named Iggy and at the end of
the book he rescues Dr.Grant. It is continued by Jurassic Park 3 the Junior Novelization.

Thirteen-year-old Eric Kirby goes para-sailing above Jurassic Park with his friend Ben, with hopes of seeing real live dinosaurs. But after a minor accident where Ben dies he is trapped on the island... With no escape. It's just him and a dynasty of ferocious dinosaurs!
This isn't a very good adult book, but children with an intrest in dinosaurs or Jurassic Park will love it.

All thirteen-year-old Eric Kirby wanted was a chance to get to see real, live dinosaurs up close. So when his mom's boyfriend, Ben, offered him the opportunity, he jumped at the chance. Eric and Ben will get to parasail over the Jurassic Park Island, observing the dinosaurs from a safe distance. But something goes very wrong, and the two fall from the sky onto the island. Only Eric survives the fall, and he is trapped in a hostile prehistoric environment where he is the prey. It will take all of his wits and courage to stay alive until help arrives - but how can one kid survive among the deadliest predators ever to walk the earth? This was a thrilling story, not only for fans of the movies, but for readers who like adventure stories. The book ended with a cliffhanger that will lead into the new Jurassic Park movie, so now I have to wait until the movie comes out to find out what happens to Eric, which won't be for a whole month, or read the novelization. Still, this was an exciting, although short, book.

Jurassic Park Adventures One Book Review

Jurassic Park Adventures One is a book about a kid named Eric Kirby who has to get to a test safe house to escape dinosaurs on an island. When he tries to get out of the test house, he can't. Some people have to save him. Their plane crashes in the rescue. If you like dinosaurs, this is the book for you. The stars of the book are Spinosaurus, T- Rex & Raptor. Eric makes friends with an Iguanadon & names it Iggy. Eric is a hero. He goes out to save a man, but does not know who he is.

By James

We purchased this book while in Wyoming after we came across the Roadside Wyoming book at Devil's Tower. The geology so intrigued us and the kids that finding this book in the National Park Service store made our summer trip even more enjoyable. As you travel through Yellowstone, this book is like a personal guide to the geologic features. It goes beyond the typical travel guide explaining the sites since it is from the geologic perspective. We have purchased other titles in this series after our Wyoming/Yellowstone purchase. Recommended reading as you travel through Yellowstone.

I'm a nerd. I was left with nothing to read in the cold nights. I was also having trouble sleeping. I thought this book would help.

Yes it put me to sleep because reading about rock and millenia of dirt moving is tiresome.

But what I absorbed made me look at yellowstone in a new way. The book was quite clear-and I could see and easily understand how Americas greatest monument to beauty was madeof millions of years.

It's like seeing the Louvre after taking an art class. The paint on canvass comes alive with history and meaning.

So too if you read this.

The title sums it all up. The book is indeed useful, you can find all sorts of neat features by using it, but it really is a bit simplified. Perhaps it's just me, but it was GREAT for my kids (8 and 11) who are both, well, they read. Anything. As long as they can catch it.

This was the text for part of our Field Camp. I was fortunate enough to have the Dr. Fritz as my personal guide to Yellowstone National Park. I still use the book as a reference in my personal studies of U.S. Geology. It is must for anyone traveling to Yellowstone with even the most remote interest in Geology.

I am a zookeeper in an accredited zoological institution and this book is a must read as we care for captive animals. A comprehensive enrichment program is critical for wild animals in captive environments as these programs provide the animals with choices, complexities, and change. The guiding principle for enrichment is based on the animal's natural history. This book very appropriately emphasizes the requirement of enrichment for the animal's well being. Read this book and it will give you hope.

A book that had to be written. This book is a good and basic guide for people working or interested in environmental enrichment. Several aspects are covered by the book, from theoretical bases to the implications to use enrichment for the conservation and welfare of wild animals. However, although it gives a lots of examples on mammals and some on reptiles, it forgets birds.

I bought "Ethics on the Ark" at the same time as this book, and was disappointed with that book. This book, however, was a very nice surprise. I felt it gave a unbiased view of captive animal enrichment, and the ethics behind keeping animals in captivity. I appreciated the completeness of this book, starting from a historical perspective, straight through to modern reasoning. I would say this is a must have for anyone working with animals in a captive environment.

This is my must have book (bible) for my research on environmental enrichment. If you work with animals in a captive situation, you need to read this book. The book also deals with stereotypy. A lot of excellent information on enrichment and its implications for captive animals. If you are at all interested in environmental enrichment or currently implement an enrichment program for your animals, do yourself a favor and read this book.

Robert Frost graduated from Lawrence high school in Lawrence, Mass. I mention this fact in my Book about growing up in Lawrence "A Summer with Charlie". It was because of this common heritage that I was first lead to Mr. Frost. I must have read his poem about picking apples a thousand times. And since my wife and I also attempted to become "back-to-the-landers" in Mena, Arkansas, his poems about exploring the back forty and laying up a stone wall I also visit frequently. He is very rural. When he began writing poetry America was for the large part farmers - or recently off the farm. He writes a simple small farmer type poetry. This is a nice volume and Robert, like all poets, was a thoughtful man. Robert Frost was famous for a very short poem that is very hard to find. It is not in this volume either.
"Forgive me God for my little joke on thee,
And I will forgive you for your great big one on me."
He had another one, also hard to find, about his visiting heaven and finding God nice but rather inadequate and not very handy.
I don't consider Robert Frost a controversial poet. Any reactionary flavor is very subdued. His poetry is simple, honest and down to earth.

This selection of Frost's poetry contains his first three volumes, " A Boy's Will", "North of Boston" " Mountain Interval". It contains some of his most well-known poems, "Mending Wall"," Home Burial", "The Road not taken" "Birches" " The Hired Man" " After Apple Picking".It also contains a brief biographical sketch and survey of the works of this volume by Gail Harvey.
Frost in my own judgment does not quite make it to the top-of-the -top of American poetry, where Whitman, Dickinson and Wallace Stevens stand. But his insistent dialogue with Nature and Life do make for an often harshly beautiful poetry. He often seems to me somehow stronger in mind and will than in human sympathy. But the messages are clear and resound as part of the American heritage in poetry.

" Two roads diverged in a wood,and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference."

Julie-Anne Dentici "Jewels" said her favorite Frost poem was "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening." She neglected to mention that this poem is not included in the book. "Often overlooked," indeed!

Robert Frost is my favorite American poet. My favorite poem written by him is "Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening." This poem is generally overlooked, because people tend to associate "The Road Not Taken" with Frost. Both are great, but "Snowy Evening" is better, I think! For anyone who is a Robert Frost fan, this book is a nice addition to any library, and a nice edition to have.

If and when you go to Shiloh, they have a marked battlefield tour that includes 14 stops, but all they do is catch the highlights of the battle. They do not have chronology in mind. But this book does. It presents the action according to day, because it was a two day battle, as well as according to time. Then it divided the battle into its east and west campaigns, which successfully portrays the battle in its entirety. Without this book, I would not have known what I had missed out on. I am extremely happy I used this book and highly recommend it. Also, check out this series on Chickamauga (I bet it is good also).

I have walked much ground that was fought over by the men who fought the Civil War, but one field I have yet to reach rests in southwestern Tennessee, in the countryside near a little chapel called Shiloh Church. There one of the Confederacy's stars, Albert Sydney Johnston, fell like a hawk on the unsuspecting army of Ulysses S. Grant on the morning of April 6, 1862. What followed was the first massive struggle of the war. Dead and wounded were counted in the tens of thousands rather than in the hundreds. There Grant's quality of coolness under fire first showed itself, as on that first day it appeared that Johnston's men might push the Federals back into the Tennessee River. Instead, Johnston suffered a mortal wound, Don Carlos Buell landed with a huge reserve of additional Union soldiers, and on the next day Grant swept back across all the ground he had lost.
The University of Nebraska Press has undertaken the publication of a series of excellent battlefield guides, of which the two noted authors of this volume are editors. Each has contributed to at least one other book in what is now a five volume series.
When I get to Shiloh, I will have this guide at my side. It provides an excellent overview of the battle and a very logical plan to see and understand the events of both days. The maps, prepared by Christopher Brest, are numerous and clear. The illustrations, nearly all taken directly from the original four-volume printing of Battles and Leaders of the Civil War are both nostalgic and crisp. They use both battlefield sketches and portraits of many of the principal actors. Only William Tecumseh Sherman, whose Battles and Leaders image was one of him long after the war, festooned with medals and sash, seems a little out of place.
According to the authors, if I use this guide, and if I take all the time I need to take at all the stops they plan, I will spend most of a day on the field. I know it will be a day well spent for everyone who picks up this book before setting off on that tour.

I used the "Battlefield Guide" May 18-19 while touring Shiloh, and could not have been more pleased with it. I re-read Sword, Daniel, and McDonough first, and used the Guide in conjunction with the Trailhead Graphics map of the battlefield. The tour stops were aptly detailed and quick & easy to read. I strongly recommend the Guide for anyone planning a walking tour of the Shiloh park.

I've been a fan of _Gettysburg: A Battlefield Guide_ since its publication in 1999. When I saw that Mark Grimsley and Steven E. Woodworth had teamed to co-write a guide to Shiloh, I was excited. Grimsley and his co-author on the Gettysburg guide, Brooks Simpson, did a great job (see the several Amazon reviews, which give it 5 stars). Woodworth is one of the most knowledgeable historians of the western theater. His new book, _Nothing But Victory_, on the Union Army of the Tennessee, tells the story of an army that was more or less born at Shiloh.

I haven't yet had the chance to use the Shiloh guide on the battlefield, but it looks very promising. They had the Shiloh park historian vet the guide (the historian, Stacy D. Allen, is a well-regarded authority on the battle), and they created an ingenious two-axis tour, so that instead of constantly zig zagging back and forth to follow the action, you choose to follow the battle's progression first on the Confederate right or left flank, and then on the other. This keeps the action clear.

The narrative, analysis, and vignettes follow the pattern of earlier guides (Chickamauga as well as Gettysburg.) The discussion of the confused Confederate command arrangement is especially good. It is justifiably critical but never scornful and tries to be as understanding of the Confederate high command's predicment as possible.

I'm glad spring is here, because it's time for a road trip to Shiloh!