R Books

This book is spell binding, excellently written and so full of history that it makes you want to reach out for more info.

A true story for our time and one that needs to be shared. If you want to know more about the Coast Guard and what it's like to be at sea, this is the book to read. I'm having trouble putting it down.

"Sailing into the Abyss" by William R. Benedetto is to the Merchant fleet what the "Perfect Storm" was to the sword-fishing fleet.

The book gives "arm-chair" sailors like me, uncontrollable shakes and chattering teeth even...with a hot cup of coffee in hand! Benedetto's writing abilities plunges the reader directly into the cold sea next to the unfortunate struggling seaman who has just abandoned his sinking ship.

This is the riveting story of the Merchant vessel "S.S. Badger State" that was taking its deadly cargo of bombs and munitions to Da Nang to help support our troops and the war effort in Vietnam. Shortly before Christmas of 1969, the "S. S. Badger State" runs into two gargantuan storms that seem to converge directly into the men and cargo of the "S.S. Badger State." The bombs break loose in their cargo holds, and then...
you must read the book!

The author is really a superb writer and nautical historian. However, he sometimes gives too many historical examples of similar events to intensify the fate of this particular ship and incident. His examples are extremely interesting but...often too long. These constant historical vignettes only serve to take the readers focus away from the main events at hand. Much of that ancillary information could easily be put into another book on historical ship wrecks.

William Benedetto deserves the highest praises for sharing his expertise and love for those who suffer peril upon the seas.

A truly good book and one that all sailors, past and present should read.

Aye--Aye Captain!

This book is superbly written. The amazing story of the SS Badger State is magnetic, and even more fascinating because it's true! I will recommend this book every chance I get, and I will keep my copy as a prized possession.

I recently sailed with a person who was a crewmember on the S.S. Badger State when this tragic incident occurred. Your book brought the story full circle, thanks for writing such an illuminating account.

Paul J. Gunis

Very few people are likely to have heard of the loss of the American merchant ship Badger State at Christmas of 1969. She was carrying a load of bombs to resupply the Air Force in Vietnam, and a chain of unfortunate events--poor stowage of the explosives, carrying an insufficient amount of cargo so that the ship rode high, bad weather--combined to lead almost inevitably to tragedy.

Benedetto, in very simple and unadorned prose that is not bogged down by a great deal of nautical jargon, provides a workmanlike rendition of the last days of the ship and crew. He draws heavily upon the documented testimony of survivors before a Board of Inquiry and received very significant input from Charles Wilson, the captain of the late vessel.

He also throws in a great deal of material (which at times verges on simple padding) about the tragic experiences of many other ships of the U.S. Merchant Marine over the last two hundred years, particularly about their destruction by, or, in some cases, escape from, Axis forces in WWII.

A small number of black and white photos are included. The diagrams of the ship and of the bomb pallets would have been better placed at the beginning of the book for easier reference.

This is not a lyrical and haunting masterpiece of man's struggle against the hostility of nature, but it's a serviceable enough rendering of an otherwise forgotten disaster and a nice primer about the sacrifices of the merchant marine.

A great book for those engaged in facilitation. It is well written and easy to understand. It is one of the better books I've found on the topic. The reason for 4 start instead of 5 is the price of the book. Books that would compliment this are "Leading Through Collaboration" and Leading Groups to Solutions: A Practical Guide for Facilitators and Team Members

Well written -- brief and to the point. Valuable even if you only read the first and last chapters. If you think you want to work on Facilitation skills -- get this book!

This book starts with good real time situations to describe the common problems in facilitation and how to overcome them. It helps both beginners and serious facilitators. Through a series of real life examples it teaches the best practices for effective facilitation.

I am the Principal of Cohesion Inc, a marketing & business consulting organization, and also a part-time course director in the marketing faculty of the Schulich School of Business, York University in Toronto, Canada.

Facilitation is an important part of my work and teaching, and as such I regularly review literature on this subject to discover new insights and techniques with which to experiment.

Whether you are new to facilitation or already an experienced practitioner, this book will serve as an excellent resource to build your skills in this area.

This is a wonderful, practical, well-written book, with 60 facilitation secrets that are worth far, far more than the price of the pages. In fact, I learned more from this book than I did from a nationally recognized Advanced Facilitation course for $1700.

The chapter on consensus-building, which introduces 4 common techniques for building consensus (Delineation, Strengths and weaknesses, Merge and Weighted Scoring) I found particularly useful. The 6 high-level agendas for common facilitated sessions (among them process improvement and issue resolution) are a must for every facilitator.

I would recommend this book most highly for facilitators who want to build on their existing skills rather than as an introduction to the field, as some of the secrets (those related to dealing with dysfunctional behavior, for example) assume some foundational facilitation skills. However, anyone interested in the field would benefit greatly from the secrets in this book. A truly great addition to the facilitator's library!

this book, i feel, can stand out on its own along with reading the series for backstory. it is one of my favorite books out there from one of my favorite authors and favorite series. not many books really follow the more evil side of dealings in the forgotten realms and i enjoy what is in this book.

For any Drizzt lovers, you must know this novel and Sellswords trilogy is about Artemis and Jarlaxle, but it's no less amazing! Salvatore is always brilliant with his politics and action to create a perfect story. His political issues are just as interesting as the action and interactions between characters!

I bought the whole Sellswords in a set ... this was before I knew that "Servant of the Shard" was actually one of the Drizzt books and I already owned it! Oh, well, it looks good and I needed to re-read it anyway.
I'm only on Book II but if you've read any Salvatore you know that you can always count on an exciting read. The comedy aspects of his writings have never gotten much play, but I've laughed more in these books than in any of the Drizzt (and related characters) saga. Jarlaxle in particular is written with many a good zinger in there. Very entertaining.
Anyway, your travels with Drizzt are not complete unless you read the Sellswords. (Artemis Entreri is one of my favorite anti-heroes. What would Freud have said with him on the couch?) Colorful, exciting, great characters ... highly recommended.

I am quite confused!! What is the 1st book in the Sellswords series? We have the Servant of the Shard - Path of Darkness series. Are there 2 books of the same name?? Please assist asap ljkelly@vance.net

Thanks to all!

L

Best forgottem realms series ever. For me. The relationship between the two main characters was fun to read and all 3 books in this series were great. I doubt it will happen, but if the author can make a sequel to this story, I would preorder now.

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Dino Buzzati, Stuart C. Hood "The Tartar Steppe (Verba Mundi)"

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This is an extraordinary novel where the main character looks into the eternal, emptiness beyond - just as we all look into the unknowableness of the future. And as we do it - sometimes with intimations of things to happen, sometimes with firm and dreadful 'knowledge', and sometimes with hopes - we are alone in our journey, despite those around us. There is only true solace in looking back at the past, in seeing what we have experienced that no-one can take away from us.

There is little humour in this vision, little hope, little respite. Always an aching emptiness prevails. But for all that it does have a crystalline beauty - a clear and shining crystal with cold, sharp edges. Read if you dare, but brace yourself when you do. This is no roller-coaster of action, its pace is slow, slow, slow ......

This one stays with you and haunts you. If you read it when in youth, and then reread it midway in your life, then you'll be stunned by the depth of its truth. And it's almost relentless in its hoplessness, very hard to read because you know you are reading about yourself, in fact about everybody around you. And you cannot quit reading no more than you can stop breathing or hoping that this is it, that at last on the horizon (of your life)...There is something even more hopeless in Buzzati than in Kafka, because it is less fantastic, closer to home, truer to human experience.
"The Tartar Steppe" is, to my sensibility, a great (little known) masterpiece of the 20th century Italian and European literature.

This is a book about how absurd existence is and how men are deemed to deal with the fissure they find between life and its meaning. The question of whether this meaning must come from within man himself or from an event which is external to him lies beneath the whole novel.

Sharing this sense of absurdity with Kafka and Camus, Buzatti creates an atmosphere within which not only the main character gets trapped, but also the reader. They both expect something that never actually occurs, and the tension this anticipation generates page after page makes the novel a compelling read.

The story of Giovanni Drogo, a simple man who attempts to make of his destiny something grand without really doing anything but live and wait and let go, is one of the most fascinating and moving stories in the 20th century literature.

After reading Dino Buzzati's short story collection The Siren I picked up Tartar Steppe(1945) and took it to the beach with me where I read it all the way through in about four hours. Its a captivating novel which takes place almost entirely in a remote hilltop fort which faces a foreboding desert that has never been crossed. The soldiers stationed at this remote outpost keep watch over the desert in anticipation of a confrontation with an enemy they have never seen. We learn about the history of the fort as well as those who occupy it when Giovanni Drogo, a young soldier, arrives there to begin what he hopes will be an illustrious career. Upon arriving at the fort Giovanni is immediately struck by the desolate atmosphere of the place and want s to leave but is coerced by the forts adjutant to stay for at least four months. Four months becomes four years and then four years becomes...... Giovanni like many young soldiers wants to advance his career and yet year after year he stays on in the fort and his career goes nowhere. As the years pass and Giovanni remains in the fort somehow unable to find the will to ask for a transfer Buzzati weaves in meditations on the passing of time, the fading of youth and youths dreams, as well mans infinitely renewable capacity for self-deception. Buzzati might be compared to Kafka for the parable like quality of his writing but Buzzati has his own style and Tartar Steppe is much more reader friendly than either of Kafkas novels. Jean Paul Sartre characterized Kafkas writing as "the impossiblity of transcendence" and that would fit Buzzati's writing as well. There certainly are similarities between the two authors but with Buzzati you feel much closer to real life than you sometimes do in Kafka (whose favorite author was Swift). I would call Tartar Steppe a very effective merging of nineteenth and twentieth-century style and content. Buzzati seems to me to be examining why 19th century adventure stories of war and travel appeal so much with a 20th century sensibility. The result is a mesmerizing read, like Giovanni you never stop believing that the enemy is about to show themselves. This book is often mentioned in the same breath as Julien Gracq's Opposing Shore, a book which I also highly recommend.

I bought this book for one of my children, and my wife couldn't put it down. This is quite simply a classic.

What a great story. We read it to our 6, 4, and 2 year olds. They loved it just as much as we did. The author did a wonderful job of weaving Christ into an intriguing story.

Excellent book for children, best for ages 5 to 16. Rich character development, adventure, strong hero models, and delightful reading. I have read Patricia St. John's books for years, and given countless copies as gifts. A great choice for parents to read with their children. (I'm an educator of children.)

I loved this book. I have never read one that is better. It was a great example of how we should forgive and also showed how love casts out fear. I love how it shows the characters' feelings. It was a very good book.

I read this as a child and it inspired me with a lasting love of Switzerland. I have four children of my own now and we've read the book aloud every couple of years. We also have the audio version. It's just one of those beautiful books that never grows old and is the closest thing to a perfect Christian novel for children that I know of. I'm frankly baffled why Moody felt like they needed to abridge it--the new version is OK but lacks the richness of the old. Find a used copy if you can, but if not, don't miss the story. I couldn't recommend it more highly, and even as an adult it challenges me in my faith.

The movie is delightful as well--beautifully acted and with stunning scenery. Our family was blessed to visit Chateau D'Oex, the village where the majority of the movie was shot. We thought it was the most gorgeous place in the world! Patricia St. John actually spent part of her childhood in Switzerland and I think that's why the whole novel feels so detailed and real.

This is a brilliant, disturbing, engrossing young adult novel, not to be missed. Shusterman paints a frightening picture of a society in which parents can sign orders to have their unwanted teens "unwound," or salvaged for their body parts. Three runaways make a harrowing cross country journey to escape their sinister fate. If they can survive to age eighteen, they'll be free. Shusterman knows how to construct cinematic, emotional scenes, and the plot takes many surprising, unexpected turns. I highly recommend this book!

Unwound is an interesting premise, but the book itself has far too many holes in it to be enjoyable. My biggest problem with the story is the fact that the premise of the is simply too unrealistic. The thought that within 100 years or so that the human race would become so indifferent towards a living person that they would allow him to be carved up for parts against his/her will is just too far of a reach.

It is a terrifying prospect, to have your life taken from you while young, and one that has been previously addressed in stories such as Logan's Run. The difference is that Logan's Run was set in an indeterminant time, so far in the future that it was essentially an alien culture. If Unwound had been set 500 years in the future or perhaps in an alternate reality, the story might have worked better.

The book seems to try too hard to provoke thought about the right to choose/right to life debate. Also, there are several instances where you can see plot points and and complications coming from a mile away. Foreshadowing is one thing, but to be so ham-handed in technique is disappointg.

Just so that this isn't a totally negative review, I did enjoy the evolution of the two lead male characters, though again it was pretty obvious about where things were heading.

This book might be enjoyable to younger readers who can look past the short comings or who might be more startled by the "coming to get you" premise. But for older readers, adults, or those who enjoy a good Sci-Fi yarn, you are going to be disappointed.

Neal Shusterman's Unwind is a true contemporary American classic. It goes far beyond just simply story-telling. It is very similar to Animal Farm. It is so much deeper than its plot. It deserves to be ranked with Catcher in the Rye and The Diary of Anne Frank. It should be mandatory reading for all high school and college students. Neal Shusterman is absolutely the John Steinbeck of Young Adult Fiction.

After the Heartland war, a war between the pro-life and pro-choice armies of the United States, the Bill of Life is created. It states that a child cannot be aborted until they are between the ages of 13 and 18, when they can be "unwound" or have their body parts harvested for other uses. It isn't "killing" the Bill of Life says, but rather changing their form of life.

But three teens, Connor, Risa and Lev who all come from entirely different situations, battle to survive until they're 18.

This book was one of the most impacting books I've ever read. I am a huge reader and read probably two books week. But it took me a day to read this book.

It makes you think about life, and what life means, and what a soul is. Read this book and your thoughts about life will forever be altered. Five stars to Neal Shusterman.

This is a MUST READ.

This was a book I bought on a whim. It had an interesting premise so I thought "why not". That was almost a year ago and I still can't get this book out of my head. It is one of those stories that hit you in the gut just when you think that every topic has been written about. This was an entirely new idea wrought with intense emotion and survival from every character. There was no overlap in 2 dimensional character traits. Each character was fully developed, had a voice and you could feel their point of view. The book was so disturbing in a "Twilight Zone" sort of way. There was no sugar coating or breaks given to the characters. Their was no apology for the situation it just was. The reality of that sets an ambiance that you won't be able to get out of your head for some time. This is a book I would love to see my teenager having to read for an English class. It is wrought with discussion topic possibilities and could stimulate some intense discussion. I could type on all day about the wonders of this literary masterpiece. The emotion, the depth, the color, the pain and the creative world in which it was weaved is beyond description. You must read it regardless of the genre you like. I can't imagine anyone not being in awe.

The Bedford Handbook
I was satisfied with my order, and was delivered as it said

i ordered it and got it in a very good condition and in time. customer service is awesome. my blessings. keep up the good work.

this book is good for when you're writing essays and you can't remember a certain format or something and you can flip through the book real quick for examples of essays, outlines and thesis statements, although I wish i had the cd version of it so i can always have it with me instead of toting around the book. they could have made the format of the book better.

for instance i remember seeing a book called "A Writers reference" both are MLA format and one came from my community college and just the way its put together is better over all than this one.

The Bedford Handbook is an excellent guide for anyone enrolled in a college English course. The book gives details on correct grammar usage, as well as descriptions of different essay styles. The book is very helpful to me with my English class.

Diana Hacker has an English comp book for any possible usage, she grinds them out every few years. My college requires me to use this book as a handbook. That is unfortunate.

Of course, this book provides a basic explanation of English composition, grammar, documentation, and document design and critical reading. However, the attempt in this case is to present something that is lighter than Rules for Writers, a full scale manual that is sufficient to use as the only text for a college composition course or as a full writers reference, and her Writers Reference, which is a good handy handbook that is inadequate as a full course book, but is great as a rule book to be used by students taking a course using another text.

Usuing this book, I have had to create supplements from web material for issues that I expect to be covered fully in a college handbook such as the requirements of formal writing.

To be sure there are interesting illustrations and graphics and like her other books, the text is intimately linked with the enormous online network that Hacker and her publishers have created. It is not an awful book to use, but I would prefer Rules for Writers, Jane E. Aaron's Litte Brown Handbook, or Writer's reference.

My 13yr old son was like "what is this" when he found this book I had purchased for him. Hours later he was still absorbed. He said it was a great read and very interesting.

Historical fiction either works really well, or it doesn't work at all. Those YA historical fiction novels that deftly capture the distinct essence of a time period and place so different from our own that you can hear the unique cadences in speech patterns and visualize details not even mentioned in the text, those novels are to be treasured and savored more than once because they offer not only a well-told tale, by delicious tastes of bygone eras. Recent novels like AL CAPONE DOES MY SHIRTS and OCTAVIAN NOTHING accomplish these goals heroically; you feel as if you are living in the times and that is part of the emotional journey that we love. YA historical fiction that fails is highly awkward, illogical, anachronistic, and MADDENING. We argue with ourselves about why the author couldn't get it right! The guilty (or at least the current crop) shall remain nameless...

Which leads us to Janet Taylor Lisle's latest. BLACK DUCK is (to maintain the metaphor) an odd bird; it captures that time of the late 1920s nicely, but focuses on perhaps the most unusual of young adult subjects: rumrunning. Told primarily in flashback, BLACK DUCK follows Ruben Hart, a fourteen-year-old from Rhode Island who finds himself (as does most of the rest of the town) involved either directly or peripherally with breaking the law (it is Prohibition, after all). This era is brought to life expertly by Lisle's correct decision to have the story told through a first-person point-of-view. That choice allows her to capture the language, mannerisms and trends of the time quite accurately. Building slowly, she offers plenty of historic detail without the weight of seeming to force the historical information on us (like QUAKE!: DISASTER IN SAN FRANCISCO, 1906 does).

I was also taken with Lisle's characterizations, particularly those of the several characters who made unexpected, yet by-all-means organic choices -- always a joy for an English teacher to read -- that took the plot into unexpected, yet organic places.

Though the historical nature of the book is, as far as I can tell, relatively accurate, it is an incredibly bold move on Lisle's part to make practically all of the characters law-breakers (yes, even many of the kids)! On top of that, the reader and a majority of the characters don't want [SPOILER NOTICE] the legal authority -- in this case, the Coast Guard -- to capture the rumrunners aboard the Black Duck. WOW! And it works... beautifully. To take a questionable subject for young adults and approach it in a highly questionable way, and succeed (!!!) deserves real kudos from YA fans.

As an English teacher, this is a great piece for discussion and analysis -- in part for the above-mentioned reasons, but also for the dramatic structure in which the flashbacks are interrupted by the present and newspaper stories of dates in-between.

So, in the categorization of YA historical fiction that soars and those that sink, this rumrunning ship, heavy with cargo, is definitely buoyant.

Black Duck is a great piece of historical fiction. It tells the story of the rumrunners off the coast of Rhode Island. Because of the mystery running through it, this book will keep you reading for more to find a surprise at the end. There is a couple of "bad" words in the book, however, I recommend it for 6th through 12th graders, boys and girls.

I bought "Black Duck" based on the book's description and also based on all the great reviews it has received thus far. I loved the book the entire way through. "Black Duck" is geared for kids ages 9-12 according to the description with the main characters being teenage boys.

I enjoyed how the author intermixes the past with the present in "Black Duck" by making some chapters in the present day and other chapters in the past. Janet Taylor Lisle is able to bring to life what rum-running during the prohibition may have been like on the New England coast in 1929 by using a cast of fictional characters and how prohibition may have effected a community. The story is told through the eyes of Ruben Hart, who was a teenager during 1929.

Currently Ruben Hart is an elderly man. He is approached by a young boy named, David Peterson, whom wants to be a journalist when he grows up. Young David has his sights on writing a story about the the rum-running days and this is where he crosses paths with Ruben Hart. David is set on interviewing Mr. Hart about the rum-running days as he has heard that Mr. Hart knows something about those days. The interview happens over the summer vacation and David learns/hears quite a story from Mr. Hart & quite a tale it is. The two become friends by the end of the novel.

"Black Duck" is a good story with well developed characters!! The story is intriguing and keeps you wanting to know more about what will happen next!!

A year ago three of my sixth graders wanted to read Black Duck, a new book in our school library, for Literature Circles. That was my first experience with the book. I started reading on my way home to Illinois and couldn't stop. Likewise, my sixth graders had a lot of praise for the mystery set in the Prohibition Era. If you parents or teachers are looking for a book that will motivate even the most unwilling reader, this is it. One of the boys confided that although he is a jock, he had to confess he couldn't stop reading it. At first some of the girls were resistant, but soon they, too, had to admit they were hooked. Telling the story in an interview is a unique format. This book also lends itself to a variety of research topics the students enjoyed: Prohibition, the Great Depression, the Roaring 20s, Women's Suffrage, politics, gangs, gansters, Rhode Island, the East Coast, and of course bootlegging and smuggling. What a great way to learn some history! I highly recommend it.

I was a bit disappointed in this book, I have to admit. I was hoping to learn more about Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow, who they were, what circumstances led them to life of crime, and so forth... I was expecting maybe some new never-before-seen photographs in this book, but I guess that's a lot to ask for people who lived 80 years ago. I am very interested in the Bonnie and Clyde story, and I have to rate this book good, but not great.

This is a nice condenced overview of Bonnie and Clyde. If you want a crash course or are just interested in the true story- start here.

This book has a lot of interesting information and tons of pictures. If you want to know anything about Bonnie and Clyde, it's all in this book.

I first became aware of Bonnie and Clyde after a frigid night's motorcycle ride to see Arthur Penn's 1967 movie. Except for buying a DVD thirty years later, I seldom thought of them. Then, last November, my wife and I visited Dexter and Stuart, Iowa. In April of 1934, a month before their deaths, Bonnie and Clyde, along with Henry Methvin, robbed the bank in Stuart. Ten months before, the Barrows had shot it out with a posse at Dexfield Park, north of Dexter. The site of an abandoned amusement park, Dexfield offered Bonnie and Clyde, along with the severely wounded Buck Barrow and his wife Blanche, temporary sanctuary following a shootout in Platte City, Missouri. Penn's movie placed the shootout in Platte City, Iowa, which doesn't exist, ignoring the long ride from the Kansas City area to western Iowa. It also ignored the fact that Buck lived several days after his head wound and actually died of pneumonia. Penn's characterization of Blanche as a screaming ninny isn't accurate, either, and it got him sued.

Penn wasn't after history, but sensationalism. James R. Knight is after history. He is one of those wonderful people who recognize that everything is coming together and seizes the moment. Penn's movie was only the latest in a thirty-year sequence of stylized and mostly inaccurate portrayals of the lovers and their companions. It perhaps began with Jan Fortune's Fugitives, published a scant few months after the fatal ambush in Louisiana. It continued through books by several members of the posse who killed Bonnie and Clyde, and by former criminal companions. As many of the principals, including members of the Barrow and Parker families, aged, other writers began to interview them before it was too late. Given the opportunity to pull together their work with original research, James Knight acted.

This book is the result.

Perhaps only a person who doesn't depend on writing for his income could have done it. Knight, after all, is a pilot for Federal Express who just happens to be an excellent historian. His book shows meticulous patience, coupled with a desire to be what Fox news isn't, fair and balanced. For instance, he gives Fortune's oft-maligned piece credit for what it got right. Though he depends heavily (for the first few chapters) on the recollections of Marie Barrow Scoma, a teenager at the time of her brother's death, Knight sometimes argues, appropriately, with her recollections. After all, she could not have known all that her adult brother was up to. Knight understands that the Barrow and Parker families were far more complex, and far more involved in supporting their wayward kin, than has heretofore been obvious. The evidence has always been there, but Knight uses it broadly and well.

The author is so careful to remain balanced, and to avoid the hysterical tone of previous books, that his prose sometimes seems bloodless. Nowhere is this more evident than in chapters 36 and 37. There, he recounts events around the May, 1934, ambush that killed Bonnie and Clyde. He is meticulous in describing the location and sequence of the wounds each received, the damage to their stolen Ford, and the behavior of members of the posse. It's important, though, because the ambush has so often been misinterpreted. I hope that in a future work Knight will greatly expand these chapters, taking a closer look at everything and everyone who contributed to the ambush and at the questions that still remain. Still, Knight corrects several misconceptions and downright errors fostered by the movie and by previous books. You won't know it, though, unless you read the extensive footnotes.

Which brings me to the subject of how most to benefit from reading this 2003 work. I read it twice. The first time, I had a bookmark in the footnotes and flipped back and forth frequently. The second time, the bookmark was located in the first appendix. This allowed me to review a full history of each character as s/he surfaced in the text. As a result, I have a far better idea of "the story of Bonnie and Clyde" (to borrow the popular title of Bonnie's second poem) than I received on that winter night in 1967.

For all of that, Knight neither whitewashes nor condemns Bonnie and Clyde. Rather, he recognizes the essential tragedy of their story. They lived on their own terms, but everyone paid a price. That they paid with their lives does not obscure the suffering inflicted on their families and on families left fatherless. At the same time, Clyde might have remained a relatively small-time crook (or made changes in his life similar to those accomplished by Ralph Fults) were it not for the brutality he experienced in the Texas prison system. The story of Bonnie and Clyde, then, is in some sense the story of human beings interacting with our surroundings--for good and for ill. I am writing this review two days after a confused and angry teenager murdered people in an Omaha mall. He did it with an assault rifle, at a time when gross inequalities again exist between Americans. Clyde used a 1930's version of that rifle, at a similar time. When will the American people demand gun control? And when will we insist on an end to national policies that lead to the creation of millions of poor people?

"Here they come down that dusty road, and muddy bend; Man and woman welded in crime, together they lived and together...they died. Who else could it be?; But good ol' Bonnie and Clyde!"

The book entitled, "Bonnie and Clyde A Twenty-First-Century Update" by James R.Knight (with Jonahtan Davis )is... "A killer of a book!"

This is a superbly written and researched book. James R. Knight is too young to have ridden along with them, at least in this life. However, his knowledge and interest in this gun toting couple makes me wonder, where he may have been in his last life time?

His writing is informative, easy to read and follow, and...extremely descriptive. In addition, the book is a photographic library in itself!

Sometimes, I could almost hear the heavy "barking" of Clyde's "BAR" and watch the black exhaust clouds rise from the tail pipe of his get-away, 1934 Ford sedan.

Frank Hamer does not appear to be as powerful a figure as he was portrayed in the 1967 movie with Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty. Although, a central figure in orchestrating the couple's final demise, the initial credit seems to flow toward a little known figure of the ambush group listed as, Officer Prentis Oakley.

Author, James Knight also gives the reader what Paul Harvey used to say on his radio program: "and now you know ... the rest of the story."
Knight follows through with information on the fate of each actor who ever played any part on the stage of "Bonnie and Clyde."

A great job Mr. Knight(and Mr. Davis)! When can we expect another publication???

While hiking and taking nature photos for a school project, Lisa
stumbles across a badly abused horse in a paddock. She, Carole and Stevie call the local animal rescue league who impounds the mare. As the mare dislikes men, Lisa assumes most of the care for her. This is a very poignant tale, and I won't give away the ending.

This is the most beautiful Saddle Club book yet. It shows how important love is naturally, as ALOT of books do, but it also shows how important it is to be willing and brave to let yourself love totaly. Lisa risked alot of saddness if Eve would have died, but it wasn't until she named Eve and let herself be vulnerable to the saddness of losing her that Eve started to realize Lisa cared and look forward to life.
The part with the brush was my favorite, like one reader said before. It was the first time Eve showed any sign of wanting to live.
I know Lisa loves Prancer, but Eve and her seem like such a perfect match.

This was an excellent book!The story was very heart felt but not as much realistic and correct like most of Bonnie Bryant's Saddle Club books. But overall this was a great story to sit down and read.In my opinion,the problems that Stevie,Lisa,and Carole have are very rare but can put you in a good mood somehow. BUY THIS BOOK! IT'S WORTH IT!

Hi!!! We're the Stirrup Stars. We love this book because it shows that if you just believe and do your best, you can reach your goal. Lisa took wonderful care of Eve. Also, it was full of suspense that made you want to keep on reading and never stop! Please, read this book!!! It's a great example of a horse/rider bond.

I thought this book was really heart warming. It really showed determination and love for a horse. I think Broken Horse is one of the best books in series.