Richardson Books

Jacket Blurb: "A LADY'S SWEET REVENGE...
A little wild, a lot mischievous, heiress Annabelle Richardson set society abuzz by rejecting three suitors in one season. Two were disreputable rakes after her fortune. The third, Luke Wainwright, was simply too foolish and too young. Nonetheless Annabelle never would have written a scathing satire making them the laughingstock of the ton if the spurned trio hadn't tried to tarnish her name...
CAN LEAD TO A DANGEROUS DESIRE
Now Annabelle has made three enemies -- and sent Luke's older brother into a rage. Thorne Wainwright, the handsome Earl of Rolsbury, angrily intends to put Annabelle in her proper place...until one look, one touch, one kiss convinces them both that her proper place is in his arms. But in a London where gossip thrives and reputations falter, a dastardly plot is under way to force Annabelle to the altar with the wrong man. Will Thorne be able to rescue her--and make her his bride--in time?"
I think I have been spoiled by Wilma Counts' early works which I considered 5-star material. She usually writes so well and has excellent characters. I was somewhat disappointed in THE TROUBLE WITH HARRIET but I am more disappointed with this follow-up book (Annabelle was the ward in THE TROUBLE WITH HARRIET). Still, Wilma Counts wrote it so it is still worth reading because of her writing talent. But I cannot say I particularly was interested in these characters so I never came to really care about what happened to them.

It's just not anything more than okay. It's a romance novel, like many, many others. I had high hopes when the author referred to the famous World War II Christmas Truce... but that was on page 19 and it was all pretty standard from there.

Darian and Tom are both busy folks, with busy lives. Tom has a family business and ranch to run and Darian has a law career and a son. Neither of them has time for the usual wooing and winning of love, but they do enjoy each other's company. Jason, Darian's son, is a handful who responds well to Tom and bonds with him from the first. So, why not get married? Tom wants a family, Jason needs a father... and Darian... Darian wants to be a partner. Eventually, they all get what they want, and more!

I did find Jason calling Tom "Dad" after knowing him for all of a couple months to be a little annoying, but other than that, My Dearly Beloved is pretty standard fare.

I am curently reading this book, and it is great! My friend's mom wrote this book! I know the author!!! It is about a girl named Jenna and she gets lost in a "enchanted" forest. I strongly recomend this book to be your next book! ENJOY!!!

[[[Note: Dear Reader, I have made an error and accidently posted this with 3-Stars where you can plainly see in the summary that I thought it a below average book. Alas, Amazon lets one edit and correct most parts of a review, but not the Star-Rating. Forgive me for the annoyance.]]]

The short of it is that this book is part of a series called "Tales from the Odyssey". Why the publisher thought it was a good idea to break up the story into separate books, I can't say. However, I don't particularly like it as it creates a rather disjointed effect better handled by chapters than volumes. [See another recommendation in my Summary section.]

Still if you think your child might like this format I can say that you won't find anything untoward in this volume: no cursing, no violence, or adult themes (they've all been suitably whitewashed). And that's the good part. The negative is that the the actual storytelling is not that good, and the book reads more like an outline than an adventure tale.

Two Stars. A G-rated retelling of Odysseus' encounters with Circe. The artwork is nice. However, the book reads more like a summary than a story and it failed to draw me in (and I didn't read it to the kids).

I thought Robin Lister's "The Odyssey" was preferable even though it was more PG-rated. In general, Lister's retelling was more engaging and more comprehensive, telling the tales of Odysseus in a coherent fashion from Poseidon's attack on his ship to his return home.
The Odyssey (Kingfisher Epics)

And Rosemary Sutcliff's "The Wanderings of Odysseus" is also very good and would be a superior selection.
The Wanderings of Odysseus

This book is good but, makes to many assumptions about ethnicity Severino's parents that he no proof of. It also takes much from Chavez's "But Time and Chance" much better book.

It epitomizes the current trend of large, motivated computer "users" suddenly getting the whim to write a book. Despite this glaring fault, I found his style of formatting-forgetfullness to be rather amusing.

HIST2301.01 critique of book
Texas: The Lone Star State by
Richardson/Anderson/Wintz/Wallace
ISBN 0-13-028414-9


Noticed the following terms were not indexed:
sitios*
varas*
league*
forestry dept
highway commission is listed incorrectly
petticoat lobby
Black Mutiny, p409

*I'd like to suggest a glossary for future editions of the book
for words such as these. There were many more terms, especially
the Spanish terms, for which I'd have appreciated a glossary.
Add to the list above empresario, labor (of land) for the
glossary.

General comments

I would like the next edition to use some form of chapter
numbering in either the header or footer of each page so that
when I am looking for Chapter X, I don't have to know the name of
all chapters to know if I'm in front of or behind that chapter.

The map on Page 50 is bad in that it appears to show the Neches
River emptying into the Gulf of Mexico, whereas it should be
shown disappearing into the Neutral Ground territory on the west
of Orange County. It would be good to show the outline of the
Sabine Lake in this map.

Page 124 implies that the women "manufactured cartridges..."
during 1836. I do not think that even paper cartridges were
introduced up north until the late 1840s. They may have well
been involved in casting balls, packing powder, etc. but I think
cartridge case bullets are still in the future from this war.

Page 138 - the spelling of Lamar's middle name as "Buonaparte" I
question from documents I saw years ago in the special records
collection of the Gray Library, but I am not certain of this.

Page 173 - it is not clear at first reading to me whether 27% of
the population was slaves (text) or 27% of the population were
slave owners (graph) or both.

Page 274 Chart - No indication of the beach railroad between
Galveston/Bolivar and Sabine Pass. I also found no mention of
Arthur Stillwell in the index and think that story is worthy of
at least a sentence or two. When did the Southern Pacific RR
cross the Sabine River into Orange? It appears here that it did
not as late as 1890, but I think it was prior to that.

Also on this same chart, the line types are not differentiated
enough to be certain what railroad is what in some places.

I think a good county reference map that is indexed would be a
welcome addition. Too often in the text, the county name is
mentioned, but the frontpiece map is not indexed and is too busy
to enable a student to find a county easily.

Also, a good boundary map with all the meridians marked would
help. The map on Page 163 misses three of them or it would
suffice.

Page 292 Chart - again, the trail line types are not easily
differentiated, especially where they cross or run together.

Page 293 - Santa Gertrudis is not explained as the name of the
Creek on which King built his ranch HQ, nor after which the breed
of cattle (only breed developed in the US) was named.

I was also disappointed to not find Richard King's role in the
transport of cotton out of Mexico mentioned. The chart on page
217 implies a skirmish at Corpus Christi, but I seem to remember
from Ben Lea's _History of the King Ranch_ that the yankees came
ashore and went to King's ranch headquarters, and King narrowly
escaped the skirmish, when the Yankees took up residence in his
house for a spell. Maybe that doesn't qualify as a military
engagement, but I think it was.

Pages 350... I found it difficult to follow which governor
followed which with the subject matter jumping around so.

?When did Texas pass the election of US Senators to the popular
vote instead of electing them in the state house? I could not
find this.

I think a good opportunity was missed on Page 399 to inform young
students of the wordplay that was used to permit the San Jacinto
monument to be built taller than the Washington Monument.

Page 407 - Texas and Texans In The War :
The second sentence in this paragraph appears to be scrambled, or
is a poor construct, or is missing a comma behind "San Antonio"
and "war."

Page 435-6; The story of the Killer Bees/Dirty 30 and the tactics
used would be noteworthy, I think.

The Constitution makes provision for the return of "fugitives from labor." You remember it doesn't like to use the word slave because of the country's proclamation of "certain unalienable rights" for its citizens. The laws founded on this constitutional guarantee were found inadequate between 11789 and 1850. So as a part of the great series of compromises known collectively as the Compromise of 1850, a new Fugitive Slave Act was passed. This one stirred up more trouble than anyone expected.

While the idea of returning a slave who had found his freedom to slavery was unpalatable, the worst part of the law was the part the citizen was expected to play. A slave owner, or more likely a slave hunter, identifies some hapless black as a runaway slave and goes to a marshal to have that slave taken into custody. It is determined that help is needed to subdue and restrain the runaway, so any bystander can be drafted to assist in the capture. If this citizen does not cooperate he can be fined and/or jailed for his refusal. Of course, Boston was one of the most contentious places any catcher could pick to redeem a fugitive. While several well-known cases occurred in Boston, the most famous is the rendition of Anthony Burns. Our author says he played a part in or was witness to this capture, trial, and return. He was one of many well known men who formed the Committee of Vigilance. This committee whose purpose was to uphold the rights of the escaped slave and aid in his safe passage to free land had many famous people in its ranks: A. Bronson Alcott, John Andrew, Anson Burlingame, William Channing, Richard Dana, Theodore Parker, Wendell Phillips, even Lysander Spooner.

Bearse worked as a mate on a coastal steamer that wintered in Charleston, S. C. and conducted some river trade during this time throughout the coastal states and on the rivers in the South. While engaged on this ship he carried groups of slaves from their homes to inland plantations to whom they had been sold. He recounts some of the horror stories from these voyages, but the main interest is in the rendition of fugitives in the Boston area. Unfortunately the author dedicates considerable space to extolling his own virtues and high place connections in the committee. This brief recounting will show the form the book takes:

"Hardly had Shadrach [another famous fugitive] fled the grasp of the slave-hounds, [and emotions cooled when on the night of April 3, 1851] Thomas Sims was seized . . . by the police, who, disguised as city watchmen, violated the law of Massachusetts that forbade an officer of our Commonwealth to aid in arresting a person claimed as a fugitive slave."

During the ensuing struggle Sims was heard to say he was being kidnapped. This was all it took to activate the Committee of Vigilance. They worked unsuccessfully to free Sims. Other cases are given of fugitives captured and returned, and we end with Anthony Burns, counting his original purchase price and the mammoth expense to the U. S. government to effect his return, the most costly slave in America. For anyone interested in the workings of the Fugitive Slave Law the story of Burns is the most elaborate and widely written and a better choice than this little book.

The 5th Edition (6/9/00),... has the lakes, rivers and ports covered, but in black and white; all land formations are sepia. No greens, no blues, no magenta. Using Richardsons' is like going back to 1-2-3 V.2.2: the data is right but the data is unfriendly. Colors are there on NOAA charts to make navigation buoys leap out, starboard or port, to cite only one use of color.

This criticism aside, lots of good information is assembled here, general as to navigation and specific as to port facilities. If the chart reproductions were not so insipid, Richardsons' might take two more stars.

Well it's not exactly "up to date" or contemporary, being written in 1900, but really- what more is there to know about a writer from the 1700's.

In that sense- it is what it is- written in flowery Victorian prose with some citations to authority but not always. You'll certainly get a lot of interesting facts and opinions about the author, but not so much insight.