Park Books

Thus far Iboga: The Visionary Root of African Shamanism is the best book on the subject of Iboga to the credit of Nganga Mallendi's input. For some reason, Mallendi is the first Ngagna to inform on the subject. I only regret that Nganga Mallendi did not write the whole book.

I have read everything on the subject of Iboga since 1990. My interest in Iboga (folkloric Benzogho similarly) has to do with coming to terms with loss of a loved one. I have used Iboga w/Nganga, to mediate the forces of life & death & to soothe (not remove) the grieving process with very positive, enduring results.

New age collections strong in visionary plants and African shaman rituals will be intrigued by the very specific discussions of iboga, which has been suppressed by the FDA since the 1960s and which provides the power to break addictions. The followers of the Bwiti religion know well its many attributes, which are surveyed here in an overview of the traditions, techniques and spirituality of African shamans and iboga's use in their world.

I love this book because it reminds me of how sweet, magical, and all too brief childhood is. I've read it to and now with my daughter and we laugh at the specifics of the role reversal fantasy. The soft illustrations complement the gentle goodness of the story. It's a favorite at our house.

This book is beautifully crafted, with extremely clever dialog. The author clearly demonstrates her understanding of the bond between mother and daughter. The book evokes wonderful images of a warm moment shared with a child. The illustrations too lend a great deal to the story.

Paul Park is one of the most intriguing of SF writers. He made quite a splash with his first novel, Soldiers of Paradise (1987), an exotic and ambitious science fantasy about a world of tailed humans with a extra long year, facing revolution and upheaval as the seasons change. This was followed by two sequels, then by Coelestis, a challenging novel set on a colony planet, somewhat reminiscent of Gene Wolfe's The Fifth Head of Cerberus, and by The Gospel of Corax, about a lost episode in the life of Jesus Christ. In the meantime, he has produced occasional short stories, almost every one striking and different from the others.

If Lions Could Speak and Other Stories is his first collection, and it assembles, to my knowledge, all of his published short fiction to date, with one story first published here, two other stories new to 2002 (though published elsewhere), and stories dating back to 1992, as well as an excerpt from Soldiers of Paradise. It is truly a first-rate group of stories.

Highlights include the title story, "If Lions Could Speak: Imagining the Alien", in my opinion one of the best stories of the year, a vivid meta-fiction in which the narrator, SF writer Paul Park, is preparing a talk about the difficulty of imagining alien intelligence from a human perspective. The story spirals inward to contemplate the writer's own mind, in the end suggesting, perhaps, that we are as alien to ourselves as any extraterrestrial intelligence. "Get a Grip" was one of my favorite stories from 1995, anticipating The Truman Show as its narrator, also named Park, learns that his life has been a TV show. "Self Portrait, with Melanoma, Final Draft", from 1998, also plays with meta-fiction, at a remove, as the narrator, a middle-aged man trying to become a writer, finds that his stories have apparently been previously written by somebody else. Interesting enough -- but Park twists things yet again, tying in his relationship with his writing teacher, who is dying of cancer. At least one more story here, "Untitled 4", is essentially meta-fictional, this time treating a blocked writer charged with a crime in a totalitarian state who cannot even write his confession.

Occasionally Park's stories are closer to traditional SF, though always challenging the genre's assumptions. "The Last Homosexual" is a striking story of a future in which draconian approaches to treating AIDS have wiped out the homosexual population. "The Tourist" seems at first a fairly straightforward story about time travel to multiple alternate pasts -- but by the end the SFnal setting is used to tell the story of a marriage. And "Rangriver Fell", the novel excerpt, is lovely and mysterious, a fine introduction to a beautiful series of novels.

This is certainly one of the landmark SF story collections of the year. Highly recommended.

Paul Park is the master of getting a point/theme across without ever having to be blunt, didactic and/or preachy. Ever story is a tease, a tickle, a skipped heartbeat. He is so damn subtle, half the time I have no idea what he's getting at. Therein lies the beauty of his work. The reader is never fully satisfied, never fully briefed, thus rereading Park is always a new experience. These stories are so vivid, yet so sparse. I can smell them, yet I don't always recognize the scent. Paul Park is a writer for a hard core Taoist; he says without saying. If you want something challenging and provacative unlike any author, Park is your man. Check out all his work, stat

Prior to reading this I've always had an intense fascination with African Antelopes, particularly the Tommy(Thomson's Gazelle), Spring Bok, Impala, and Wildebeest. There is something so wondrous about their elegance, gentle beauty, and astounding grace, agility, and speed.

I've always wondered why I could never find ANYTHING pertaining to African antelopes, particularly Thomson's gazelle, without their presence being solely limited to food stock for roving predators. Literally, there are no PBS television specials or extensive research material on these wonderful creatures...

That is until I read, "In The Country of Gazelles." My goodness this book was the breath of fresh air that I longed for. Fritz R. Walther--unknowingly--wrote this book for me, I'm convinced. I love those speed racing little Tommies even more now. Walther, in his adoration for the antelopes, allows the reader to learn about an animal that everyone knows so little about. I've always wondered how, in the midst of numerous threats(predation being only one), these animals-gentle plant eaters-managed to survive, thrive, and proliferate, in the face of such gargantuan obstacles.

The end of the Thomson's gazelle installment, literally, brought a tear to my eye. Walther had so much respect and admiration for gazelles. It comes through in every word he writes. This makes me long for the day when I can take my own journey through the Seregeti and see a herd of Tommies for myself.

If you love Gazelles and tire of them spoken about in terms of predation...Then this is the book for you. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

You would have to possess a heart and mind of stone to read this book and come away not only understanding gazelles much more deeply, but also falling in love with them. It is a fine gift to be able to both convey the factual nature of animals and their charm, and Fritz Walther has it. Walther is an accomplished and respected zoologist and ethologist, and fine illustrator and (if you read a little bit between the lines) a philosopher and poet as well.

Of all the field study/memoirs I've read this is my favorite. If you have a love of and interest in hoofed animals, you simply must own this book.

I read this book and it was very interesting,the folks of Nicholson Hollow are my grandfathers parents. I never knew any of this until I read the book. The pictures are great,the stone work displayed is a tradition that was passed down to my grandfather, father and brothers.I was truly amazed at the article .This is a great piece of history ,the sad thing is this part of the forest was distroyed by fire around 2000 or 2001.

Acheologist Audrey Horning has written a brilliant and startling reappraisal of the people who lived in the mountains of Virginia prior to the incorporation of Shenandoah National Park. The infamous book "Hollow Folk" had unfairly portrayed these people as broad stereotypes -- unlearned, uncouth, and totally removed from the rest of society -- characterizations that have persisted for decades. Horning has used a combination of archeological research and impressive genealogical work to debunk many of the myths of the mountain society. Her book is an enjoyable and informative mixture of text and photographs, both period and contemporary. The Epilogue is especially concise and considered.

Horning has done a great service to the descendants of these remarkable mountain people. I have read many books on the subject, and hers is by far the best.

Experts in the field Donald R. Snyder, Anne Rothschadl, and Marcy Marchello present Inclusive Outdoor Recreation for Persons with Disabilities: Protocols and Activities, a guide for outdoor recreation staff, therapeutic recreation specialists, rehabilitation counselors, special education instructors, students, teachers, and anyone else seeking to adapt outdoor recreation programs to serve individuals with a variety of disabilities. Chapters cover general guidelines and protocols, suggestions for tailoring programs to individuals, common disabling conditions to take into account, basic disability etiquette ("Introduce yourself by name to people who are visually impaired and use their name when speaking directly to them. Let them know when you are ending a conversation or moving away from them.") and much more. An easy-to-use, all-around solid handboook to selecting and hosting activities that build self-esteem and positive expectations.

The ideas are so well organized that this will be an invaluable text for anyone who is interested in sharing the great outdoors with friends or family that may have a disability. The innovative solutions for access and particiation should generate other creative ideas from readers once they start thinking about overcoming the barriers that exsist in public areas.

I have read the draft of this book, and it is undoubtedly one of the most revealing, enlightening and entertaining writings on modern gay life in Israel. A must not only for readers interested in gay culture, but for anyone who wants to know more about young people - gay or straight - in modern Israel. The book comprises of a tapestry of interviews, whose translation artfully captures all layers of spoken Hebrew. These are complemented by the authors comments and shrewd observations, making it an accurate and up-to-date survey of modern Israel. Enthusiastically recommended!

This book presents a series of interviews conducted in the early 1990's with twelve self-identified gay Israeli men. These men are from a variety of backgrounds, social classes, and ethnicities. They are purported by Fink and Press to represent a broad selection of gay men in Israel. In fact, the majority of them are in their early to mid-twenties, Ashkenazi, single and non-religious. Two are immigrants. Two are married to women. One is a Christian Arab. Most of them are closeted.

The book has twelve chapters; each based upon an interview with an individual man. Chapters begin with a brief vignette about how the authors encountered the subjects. These introductions provide an almost poetic description of the settings in which the interviews occurred. For example, one especially closeted man selected to meet at "Mt. Herzl, the official Israeli military cemetery and the serene, wooded burial site of Theodor Herzl, the founder of the Zionist movement"(p.50). One interview of a Jewish-Russian immigrant took place in his mother's apartment. She greeted the interviewers with refreshments, making them uneasy because she and her mother remained within earshot throughout. This particular interviewee was not out to his mother and grandmother. He promptly soothed the authors' anxiety, though, with the reassuring information that his family did not understand enough Hebrew to comprehend the nature of the discussion. While generally less ironic, there is always a sensitive description of the ambience and elaborate explanations of the events leading up to each interview. Other, more banal, meeting places included a kibbutz and some Tel Aviv apartments.

Chapters seem to follow a similar structure. They all begin with childhood experiences, move on to periods of military service, discuss relationship and family issues, and conclude with the interviewees making declarations about their position on Zionism and contemporary politics. The final version presented in the book reads as a series of free-flowing monologues. Fink and Press note "we were continually amazed at the willingness of these men to share their secrets with us" (p. XVII). Indeed, these confessions derive much of their gripping charm from the genuine earnestness in which these men bare their souls. The only exception, "Dan," who immigrated to Israel from the United States as a teenager, "has reviewed the text of his interview with a censor's pen. `I expect that my kids will read this,' he explains" (p. 165). As a result, his sanitized account lacks the characteristically Israeli raw sincerity seen in the other accounts.

The interviews were recorded in Hebrew and translated into English. "We have done our best to keep the vibrant spoken Hebrew of these men from becoming homogenized into a stagnant literary English" (p. XVIII). They succeed in communicating complete and differentiated personalities. These translations are a literary feat in their own right.

A provocative introduction prefaces the entire book. It starts with a news item from an Israeli daily titled "Four Soldiers in Basic Training Had Oral Sex Party" (p. 1), which describes the Israeli army's mind-boggling tolerance and sensitivity in handling gay issues in the military. The authors conclude this amazing item with the comment, "The lives of gay men in Israel are not what you would think" (p. 4). They proceed to describe dramatic positive developments in Israeli politics regarding gay issues, manifesting in a "mad rash" (p. 9) of bills passed by the Knesset and court rulings granting various forms of equal rights to gays. They also describe a very positive public attitude to these developments. These glowing appraisals of the political scene in Israel regarding gay issues created an expectation that the lives of the men described in the text would be equally positive. Specifically, one expected that they would have succeeded in integrating their sexual identities with the rest of their personalities in some kind of holistic manner.

Sadly, this expectation remained unmet. Reading this book, I felt that the upbeat promise of the introduction contrasted sharply with the picture of gay life in Israel described in the body of the work. The young authors, who state that they were in love with each other at the time, seem oblivious to the fact that these men were recounting dismal existences. Practically all of the men described continuing struggles with coming-out issues. Seven of them refused to give their real names for the book and, instead, chose to use aliases. They all articulated a longing to reach out to a gay community that seemed hardly present. All of them expressed a sense of marginalization in Israeli society and a fear, be it real or imagined, of rejection by loved ones. It seems that these men manage to cope by mobilizing significant denial and various forms of compartmentalization of their lives. Only one, Rafi Niv, provides a lucid assessment of the closeted nature of gay life in Israel. He is presented as an extremist by the authors. Yet his disillusioned views seem echoed in all of the other chapters. This gloomy vision I interpret from the text may simply result from the relative youth of the respondents, and possibly as well as that of the authors. Confusion about sexual identity, fear of the consequences of separation from family, and anxiety about the possibility of significant romantic relationships are all stage-appropriate concerns for young adults. The authors' uncritical acceptance of this pessimism startles. Either they do not recognize the problem, or it is one that is so pervasive in Israeli culture that they see no alternative. The older and more experienced interviewees seem to support the later view. They, like the younger men, do not envision the expectation of leading an integrated life in an accepting and respecting milieu with a committed, long-term partner.

The authors allude to the political subtext of gay existence in a Zionist state. Linking the struggle for gay sexual identity with the struggle of the Jewish people to create Israel, they read the nascent gay movement as a similar kind of liberation. Independence Park in Tel Aviv is the best-known meeting place for gay men in Israel. Its name celebrates Jewish national independence. However, Fink and Press fail to perceive how individual struggles clash with the collective one in these histories. The authors define Zionism as "a form of Jewish politics developed in nineteenth-century Europe which argues that the Jewish people properly constitutes a nation and that its condition of geographic dispersal is an anomaly in need of correction in the form of political autonomy in the ancient Jewish homeland" (p. 6). A consequence of this is that Israeli society is based on the premise of similarity and conformity, rather than diversity. There is a constant tension that is felt in these accounts between living as a sexual minority in a society defined by its desire to emancipate itself from its minority status. The title of the book is very apt in a way unintended by the authors. Independence Park, rather than being a place associated with anything to do with independence, is infamous in Israel for furtive anonymous sex and bias attacks. It is a symbol of shame rather than of hope.

This book is based on more than a decade of practical experience in R&D and innovative projects conducted by the Urban and Regional Innovation Research Unit (URENIO) in Thessalonica and supported by the European Commission. It pays particular attention to concrete examples of innovative projects in less favoured regions and offers a well balanced analysis of policy models and theoretical issues.

The essay is about the contribution of the environment of innovation to the creation of new knowledge. The analysis is articulated around two dimensions: the first focuses on the areas of technological innovation, i.e. cities and regions whose development relies on research and technology; the second concerns the newest development in areas of technological innovation where the information society offers new avenues to handle knowledge and increase the `intelligence' of cities and regions.

The originality of this book is that it combines two complementary strands of analysis which are usually not researched together: theories and planning models for innovative regions on the one hand, and virtual cities and digital applications for the dissemination of innovation on the other hand. By doing this, the author pushes the debate on innovation and regional development a step forward. His central reasoning is that innovative regions evolve from relatively simple structures (such as industrial districts and science parks), to more complex ones where institutional arrangements and digital (non-material) procedures of learning and knowledge diffusion take over. The author's novel contribution is to extend the debate on innovative environments to the next paradigm of technological innovation, based on the de-materialization of basic processes and their digital transcription.

This important book in the field of regional policy should be required reading for policy-makers, and students of regional policy, interested in the creation or development effective support networks for stimulating innovation in enterprises. The book provides a comprehensive overview of recent trends in regional innovation and technology policy. It illustrates the link between theory and practice through a number of case study projects which Nicos Komninos and his team have implemented in Greece; as well as at EU level through innovation networks with partners in other European regions.

Drawing on this experience, the author sets outs some ground rules for building such virtual innovation management systems at regional level. The argument that is developed is that policy implementation must increasingly focus on diffusing knowledge and learning through virtual support environments.

The book explains how the move from 'real' infrastructure driven innovation and technology enviroments (science parks, innovation centres, industrial districts) has developed towards the need for knowledge diffusion techniques in all sectors of the regional innovation system. It does so through case studies and examples but a final chapter drawing together the conclusions of all these experiences in a summary critique would have been perhaps a useful addition to this otherwise excellent book.

For the range of information covered and the practical information on both policy development for regional innovation strategies and specific techniques such as innovation management tools and regional technology, the book is recommended reading, notably for policy makers and stakeholders in the candidate countries to the European Union faced by the need to 'catch-up' in policy terms.

This text book is a wonderful resource for all wanting to learn more about economics in the international arena. It is packed full of facts, graphs, and explanations. One problem I did find in this book is that it tried cover too broad a field. If it would have concentrated on one specific topic like the international economics, and left out the finance, it could be a much stronger work. I grew tired of hearing "as you already know..." It could have not made so many assumtions about what students already knew and used the extra area to cover them. All in all, it was a helpful resource for extra learning, however, I would suggest looking further for a book that will stand alone in teaching an international economics course.

I have taken a few international economics courses and of all the textbooks this was by far the easiest to read and understand. The authors do an excellent job of making the models clear by giving detailed examples. This is one book I am definitely not selling back to the bookstore at school.

A friend of mine gave me this book, and I will be eternally gratefull to her. It was one of the most beautifully worded books I've ever read. I've read it at least 20 times. I bought 5 more copies of it to let friends read. I chose to believe this as a God given vision. I have loved ones in heaven and as I read this book I envisioned them there in her description of what she believes is heaven. One day I will view all of this myself, and I'm sure earthly words can't describe what it will be like. I think Mrs Springer did a wonderful job describing her venture. This book is at the top of my list of books to read. One comes away filled with joy and wonder at her description of the revelation that God gave to her.

Jim Mou... from Somerset, Ky. "Immanuels Book and Gifts" , January 30, 1999 Comforting, to say the least This little book was given to me by my Pastor, when I confided in him concerning my ultimate fear, 'death'. I was both comforted, and given hope for eternity via this book. Every Christian should read it, own it, and keep extras on hand to give to others who are wrestling with lifes ultimate fear, and/or grieving the loss of a loved one. Wonderful reading!