Ross Books

This is a great book for anyone with a yen to cast off from their burdens, and set sail for far-off places. Mr. Norgrove tells it like it is. He does not sugar-coat the Cruising Lifestyle, and is very plain about the pitfalls & dangers of blue water sailing, but he also weaves a tale of the joys & adventure that can accompany the crew of a sea-worthy vessel. He tells his story from the perspective of the "cruising couple", and gives great detail about preparation & planning for world cruisiers... It was after reading his book that I desided that I too want to join the cruising community, and hope some day to circumnavigate the planet... Thank You Mr. Norgrove for this dream... you really gave me the bug... Which way did you say the wind was blowing? Yeah, I think I'll go that way... haven't been there before...

This is the book for the serious do-it-yourself sailor. From the drudgery of scraping paint and diving for lost gear to the excitement of running before a storm with 40 foot waves (or was it 50 foot the McAlister's account has everything but the pirates. For that you have to wait for the sequel.

A good read!

Glynn Wood, Professor of International Affairs
Monterey Institute of International Studies

Illustrated

Through the Demorests, arbiters of fashion and pasionate reformers, the author tells the turbulent story of New York City from pre-Civil War days to the Golden Nineties.

William was an editor and more deadly than Carrie Nation when it came to saloons. Ellen developed the tissue dress patterns used in dressmaking...Madame Demorest's Mirror of Fashion. She also founded Sorosis, a women's club, and chartered a clipper ship to bring tea from China to be sold by indigent women. She also believed women should vote.

We don;t care about winning, we care about what happens between the foul lines. We are America's team. Except for the Yankees and Red Sox. We rule Chicago! Winning a World Series on the South Side just makes it more obvious that we do NOT care about winning records, we care about showing up for our team. We have the hottest girls, the best bars and ivy on our outfield walls. That makes us No. 1! I'm so sick of the stat-heads that keep bringing up 1908. Hey, wise guy, 1908 this! All the way to HiTops! We'll show them how baseball is done -- done the tequila way! We're hopeful for a great year next year of 3 million+ in the stands. Playoffs? Ah, whatever! We'll leave that to the materialistic teams in the MLB. The Cubs are about ahving a good time, not about winning. Sammy Sosa! come back!

This is a book about love, violence, the outsider against society: the forbidden love of Tristan and Isolde, the problem violence in Boiardo's Orlando in Love, Ariosto's analysis of women and society, Spenser in Ireland, and Shakespeare's use of the old romance trope of the custom of the castle.

Good hard-boiled detective work with a sense of humor. I read this book 20 years ago and have never forgotten it...one of my all-time favorites. I'm happy to see more books by this author and I plan to read them.

Genuinely good, and full of usefull and clear informatio

This is a book whose value goes way beyond its subject matter. This book is so valuable because Dennett's participation in fundmental issues of cognitive science, evolutionary theory, and philosophy of mind have drawn comments from so many other leading intellectual figures. By looking at what different authors think of Dennett's various distinct ideas in basic issues of philosophy of mind and evolution, it is possible to learn more about their own, and that seems to be part of what the editors intended to do. That makes this examination of Dennett's ideas, and especially their influence outside of his field, a kind of rosetta stone for understanding many current issues in philosophy and biology.

For example, there is a chapter on the evolutionary psychologists' critique of social sciences, showing how it builds on Dennett's evolutionary cognitivism but strays from it at some points. The contrast helps point out the strengths and weaknesses of both the evolutionary psychologists' and Dennett's views, as well as helping clarify what might remain of the foundations of social sciences once the smoke clears. Similarly illuminating is the chapter on Dennett's participation in debates with Stephen Jay Gould over the search for adaptations in studying human evolution.

Dennett's ideas are presented very clearly in a way that non-specialists can appreciate, and the choice of authors who are experts in other fields (rather than solely philosophers) works well in most cases, showing that ideas do matter, and that good philosophers sometimes do have an identifiable and positive impact on other areas of culture.

This book was written by the prolific Gothic writer Dan Ross aka Clarissa Ross~Marilyn Ross~W.E.D.Ross.

The description on the back of this paperback is as follows::>

Lovely raven-haired Madeline Renais gave up her dazzling stage career when handsome Raymond Copeland asked for her hand. But when she came to live in the old family mansion, Raymond's family treated her with inexplicable hostility and hatred. And then, one terror-filled night , a malevolent hooded figure placed its icy fingers around her throat...and Madeline awoke in a charity hospital, a victim of amnesia!
But her memory soon returned-- and with it, a relentless determination to discover the truth. Disguised, she returned to the Copeland estate as a companion to elderly Grandmother Copeland. Though none of the family recognized her, someone--or --something--had discovered her true identity...and with a series of tragic, near-fatal accidents came the realization that Madeline must play her part as though her very life depended on it, for she faced the severest critic of all : death!

My expectations of The Dark Tunnel were rather low. After all, Kenneth Millar wrote it in the early 1940's. Well before he renamed himself Ross Macdonald and many years prior to finding the narrative voice that characterizes his "mature" crime novels.
So, I was pleasantly surprised when I picked up this early entry in the Macdonald canon and found I could not put it down.

The protagonist and narrator of The Dark Tunnel is Robert Branch, an assistant professor of English at a fictitious university located some 50 miles outside Detroit. On the same day he is rejected from enlisting in the Navy because of poor eyesight, Branch becomes embroiled in a fast and furious mission to expose a Nazi spy ring that has infiltrated his school's campus.

To describe this compelling novel as fast paced would be an understatement. Much of it consists of nonstop action that unfolds like the TV show "24". But that's not its only virtue. The dialogue is wonderfully clever and the descriptive passages are remarkably original and evocative.

Some readers may object to the insensitive and politically incorrect ways homosexuality is referred to in the pages of this 60+ year old novel. But one has to remember that the social mores of that remote time differ radically from those of today. Hence one has to judge the book as a product of its time.

The Dark Tunnel is a very entertaining work of fiction. It demonstrates that Ross Macdonald's considerable talent as a novelist was evident early on and extends beyond the hardboiled crime genre. Highly recommended.