Shaw Books

Most books on self-defense are page heavy in photographs. Obviously, most martial artists don't read. Though this book has its share of photographs, providing the necessary how-to, what I like most about this text is its presentation of a self-defense mindset not dominated by the macho kick-butt attitude which most books on the subject present. Instead, this book details a way of encountering each type of self-defense circumstance from a conscious frame of mind. This is something I have not seen presented in other texts on the subject. I also like the fact that the author, Scott Shaw, goes back into history and references the more mindfull self-defense idealogies of ancient masters. Shaw then brings these concepts to this modern era by commenting on their applications.

This book may not be for the macho martial artist who thinks he or she can kick everybody's butt. But, it is for the martial artist, like myself, who appreciates the deeper understanding of the true art of self-defense.

As a martial artist virtually forever, I really enjoyed this book. It is not one of those books on self defense that you pick up, skim through the pictures, and then put on your bookshelf. Nor is it one of those macho who can kick who's butt the fastest type of mindless self defense manuals. This book really needs to be read. I think any martial artists, or for that matter, non-martial artists, who really wants to gain a new insight into not only the realms of self defense but a new and different way to look at life and life encounters should read this book.

What I like most about this book is that it teaches a very refined method of self defense. This book is not about how to develop the hardest punch or the fastest kick. It details a much more subtle style of self defense than that. As a female martial artist, I really appreciate the way the author outlines a method where your victory is based more in a calculated understanding of fighting than a fist to fist, knock down brawl. In fact, I have taught several of the techniques presented in this book to my students. I hope to see more on this subject from the author

The reason I like this book is that it is not just another martial art book which simply presents a bunch of photos on hand-to-hand combat techniques. As martial artists, we already know a bunch of those. What this book does present, which is absent from so many other texts on self defense, is a way to encounter combat situations with a more complete understanding of how to deal with your opponent and your environment. It is not just a bunch of photos on how to kick somebodies butt. If you get this book, Read It. Don't just look at the pictures.

My Instructor told me not to waste my $$$ on this book. The first two or three chapters are acceptable, yet the remainder of the book is very poor. It has the simple basic strikes and counters that all "How To" books of Karate manuals have.
It is not the Way of Self Defense as the title would attempt to allude one.

Seldom do I use the word extraordinary, but seldom is there a poet like William G. Carrington. I read this newest endeavor of his in one sitting and have gone back to re-read it several times. Through his words this extraordinary man takes you along as his heart journeys through life. Not only does he open up his heart to the reader he also gives us a glimpse of his soul. This book along with "Cowboys on Chrome Horses" which was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize should be on everyone's book shelf lover of poetry or not. Good poetry paints for us a picture. Mr. Carrington is an artist of the highest order. May his pen never run dry.

I realize that I've already done a review but I just read this book again from cover to cover and found again some things that I didn't see before. William Carrington is indeed a wonderful poet! His words have sincerely touched my heart.

I would recommend this wonderful book to anyone that likes poetry at all. When I read it the first time, I was only going to scan it, but as I read...there was no way to put it down until I read the entire book. You can feel the warmth, love and also the hurt that this man has endured. I have personally met Mr. Carrington and he seems to be a fine man. I was so impressed with this book that I bought several and gave them to friends and even had one of the poems printed on the new menus for my restaurant chain. I placed copies of the book on the counters in my restaurants and printed several of the poems and displayed them. Everytime I read the book, I see something new in a poem. This book was written with feeling and depth. I have read these poems when I was happy, when I was sad, and just needed something to do, and I've enjoyed every time. I would be proud to give this book as a gift to anyone....it is just that I honestly enjoyed reading the poems.

I LOVED the poems in this book. They are heartwarming and sincere. A great book to read while curled up in front of a fire with a glass of wine and a special friend.

Absolutely wonderful! The author's words touched my heart. He has the ability to speak only to the reader. I think every woman's dream is to hear words like these spoken to her, if only once in a lifetime.

The text is exactly as described and promised. A very practical tool for the bachelor's or master's student.

the shipping for this item took forever! book is in nice condition though.

It's interesting that books on fieldwork tend to exclude extended discussions of note-taking as a part of fieldwork. The focus of many guides on fieldwork methods usually is on completing audio or video interviews and on the use of photography in fieldwork. This book fills this gap in research methodology. The writers show good, practical techniques for taking notes during ethnographic and oral history field research. More importantly, they convincingly demonstrate how creating good fieldnotes is essential to completing good ethnographic studies. Each section of the book blends practical ideas with theoretical generalizations in ways that not only show readers how to complete field research, but the discussion also reveals why these techniques are useful. The chapter that provides ways to turn fieldnotes into written ethnographies is an especially helpful discussion of a challenging task. In this particular chapter, and in the book in general, readers can find ideas that can also be applied to the use of other field-generated resources such as structured audio/video interviews and photo sessions. This book is also valuable as a resource for understanding and examining various written ethnographic studies. In this respect, the insights offered by Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw give readers good ideas for evaluating written ethnographies and useful perspectives for understanding the process of completing ethnographically-grounded research and how ethnographic study contributes to the representation of culture.

I had checked out several research methodology books to find out 'how' to keep fieldnotes. I had been looking for very 'practical' and 'down to earth' reference which can offer me the real examples and approaches of fieldsnotes. Although there were good research methodology books, I could hardly find the reference for 'fieldnotes'.



The content of this practical and theoretical guide to fieldnotes is quite satisfactory and now I think I know how to keep my own fieldnotes. The text size, however, is so small that I got tired of reading it. On the whole, I am satisfied with this little booklet (small in size but big in quality) and I would love to recommend this book to those who are interested in writing qualitative research articles.

Jimmy Lee, PhD Student, mmed, Florida State University

Emerson, Fretz, and Shaw have put together not only an excellent handbook for writing ethnographic fieldnotes, but an insightful study of the practical issues confronting anyone doing interpretative writing about culture.

The book's primary focus is on how to effectively take and maintain fieldnotes. They appropriately begin at the ground by discussing how to take jottings and other quick notes, providing memory cues for the later write up of complete fieldnotes. Always keeping the focus on the task of writing, while balancing that with the task of honest and rigorous reporting, they give excellent advice for how to create a clear record of your field experience. While their focus is primarily on an ethnographic style of careful observation of interactions, their ideas remain useful to those with other theoretical concerns. Because they are always keeping an eye toward the end product of a finished, written document, this book also provides and excellent resource for how to use your fieldnotes in order to write a finished ethnography.

But this is not just an excellent book for ethnographic fieldworkers. Reading the book not only gave me solid ideas for my fieldwork, but also for the task of reading and note-taking around text-based and image-based culture. Additionally, I see this as an invaluable tool for someone engaged in more journalistic research, and for those of us who teach and tutor writing.

This is a great look at the Japanese mind that is actually turns out to have universal applicablility. After reading it I saw the western world in quite a different way, there are so many things that we can not see because we live in one culture. I did have a problem with the book though , which might be the author's or translator's fault, the constantly sexist language. The word man is used over and over again for both sexes which makes the book confusing at times. The author is also a died hard fruedian and so the book carries with it all the applicable baggage.

In The Anatomy of Dependence, Takeo Doi presents a psychological study of Japanese society through the concept of amae. Amae is a Japanese word that means to act in a self-indulgent, or childish, manner toward people with whom one is very close. It is this idea that Doi believes is "the essence of the Japanese psychology" (65). However, he makes it clear that amae is universal to everyone and that even animals show signs of it. What makes the Japanese unique is that they have the only language with a word for amae. This difference in vocabulary, Doi believes, is one of the reasons why the Japanese and the West have developed such different psychologies.
Doi does a really great job explaining how having a word for amae can shape the way Japanese people think. Doi argues that "it should be possible to discuss the psychological characteristics of a people in terms of the language it speaks" (66). This is because one must use language to express oneself. If there is no word for a certain emotion in a language, it is difficult for the native speaker to logically think about or express that emotion. In this way, the Japanese are able to speak of and deal with amae; whereas Westerners have trouble with it. Since Western languages do not have any words equal to amae, the concept of amae has not taken hold. This is part of the reason why, Doi asserts, the West considers feelings of dependence on or "passive love" (21) from a group to be inferior to individualism - we do not fully understand it.
Doi shows us that this concept of "amae lurking in the heart of each individual Japanese" (61) is the underlying cause of many social norms. For example, the honorific language system in Japan is an attempt to amaeru (the verb form of amae). By using language that exalts the listener, the speaker is allowing the listener to indulge in their own selfish desires. In other words, it is used to baby one's superiors. Another example comes from the fact that Japanese tend to prefer doing things with a group. Doi shows that amae's origin is the need to cope with separation from the mother during early childhood. Due to this fact, the group is most important because it takes the place of the mother by allowing individual members to amaeru without fear of rejection.
Compared with Benedict's The Chrysanthemum and the Sword, Doi's work is much more credible. Whereas Benedict was not able to do any field work in Japan, Doi is able to give us specific examples of where he gets his ideas. For instance, Doi tells us of his experience of traveling to America for the first time and how the phrase "help yourself" struck him as terribly rude. He took it to mean "nobody else will help you" (13), when it simply means to "do as you please." He also refers to an English patient of his who switched into speaking Japanese solely to be able to use the word amae during a session. Examples like these really help give this book credibility. They help show us that the author is not making rash generalizations in an attempt to prove a theory.
With The Anatomy of Independence, Doi is able to present us with a convincing argument for one of the reasons why Japan has developed in such a different fashion than the West. Although I enjoyed reading this book, I believe that Doi spends more time explaining Freud's theories, especially in the chapter 5, than is hardly necessary. I also believe that parts of the book rely too heavily on the assumption that the reader has read many other psychological studies, leaving the reader unsure of how an idea makes sense. Despite these two flaws, Doi's psychological analysis of Japan is worth reading for its insights into the Japanese mind, especially if one has not read any other books on Japanese psychology.

The Anatomy of Dependence was first published in 1971 under the title 'Amae no Kozo' and almost immediately gained national and international recognition. The author, Dr. Takeo Doi, is one of Japan's leading psychiatrists. His experience in the US, where he made several extended research stays, allowed him to reflect on the nature of the Japanese mindset. He begins his book by recording common experiences of minor alienation that every Japanese living abroad has undergone, such as being given the choice between several options of food or drink that Americans propose "as if to reassure themselves of their own freedom."

A peculiar trait of Japanese medical studies is its heavy use of terms borrowed from the German, which entered the Japanese language at the turn of the twentieth century and which are pronounced in a way that makes them understandable only by Japanese trained in the medical sciences. Doi's main breakthrough is to record the feelings and emotions held by his patients in Japanese terms, and to show that these terms form a constellation of meaning structured around the notion of `amae'.

Part of the interest of this book comes from the fact that amae is very difficult to translate but very easy to grasp--it is the emotion felt by the baby at the breast towards his mother, the need for a passive, unconditional love, the unwillingness to be separated from the warm mother-child circle and cast into a world of objective `reality'. Such a relationship implies a considerable blurring of the distinction between subject and object; it is not necessarily governed by what might be considered strict rational or moral standards, and may often seem selfish to the outsider. Doi contends that it provides an invaluable key to Japanese behavior.

In a way, the Anatomy of Dependence belongs to the field of Nihonjin-ron, or commentary about Japanese-ness, a genre much reviled by social scientists but that still enjoys a high degree of popularity among the Japanese public. Its quest for `the soul of a nation' or `the structure of the Japanese personality' will appear as naive and uncouth to sophisticated readers, who might nonetheless remember that Freud also made sweeping generalizations about the future of Western civilization. To those who might object that Dr. Doi's analysis lacks intellectual rigor and smacks of culturalism, one may object that, first, the description of Japanese behavioral traits is grounded in language structures and that, second, these structures are enacted through speech acts and clinical situations.

Takeo Doi spends some time discussing the New Left and the students movement of the 1970s, which he interestingly compares with Momotaro, the monster-slaying character born out of a giant peach. Interestingly, he doesn't apply his frame of analysis to the most evident of all dependency relationships: that of Japan towards the US, all at once the indulgent motherly figure and the domineering hegemon that blocks Japan from becoming a power in its own right. The anatomy of this political and societal dependence has yet to be written.

The Anatomy of Dependence by Takeo Doi is a look at one facet of Japanese society. Unlike other authors who study Japan as an entire society, Doi focuses on the aspect of unconditional love between parent and child and how it relates to the overarching characteristics of Japanese social structure. Doi relates many theories from many fields of study, notably psychology, anthropology, and sociology. Doi relates his theory of amae with Western schools of thought and how these schools relate to Japan. He is remarkably capable of writing without expressing culture bias, and much credit needs to be given to John Bester for translating the book so well. With Anatomy of Dependence, Doi is able to explain many traditional Japanese behaviors to a Western audience by relating them all to the concept of amaeru, a verb expressing a concept that has no equivalent word in English. Amaeru is `to act in a self-indulgent, or childish, manner toward people with whom one is very close' and Doi's main argument is that amae is the crux of Japanese psychology. It is the attempt to explain the full nature of amae that allows Doi to explain the connections as a psychologist.
The concept of amae is a characteristic of humanity and many other mammalians such as dogs and apes. The term itself and its implications are mostly ignored or misunderstood by people in Western cultures. A basic definition of amae is `to depend and presume upon another's benevolence.' This definition may be applied to common everyday relationships such as mother-child, master-apprentice, sempai-kohai, and between friends. Amaeru, described above, is best stated as the need to be loved, to depend and to be dependent on others. The way that every native Japanese citizen handles amae is the core of the mental psyche. He is able to write confidently about Japanese social nuances and psychology after being a psychologist himself for over twenty years. Amae is the root of the Japanese psyche because everything relates back to it, from apologies to the development of the self-awareness. The instinctual awareness of amae is in every human being, but Japanese society is more in touch with it. This is the crux of Doi's thesis and argument, an argument that has valid arguments and falters only every so often.
Doi does a very good job of explaining things in this account. Anatomy of Dependence is not a book for someone who does not understand psychology. Psychology and its many ways of analysis are the bases of Doi's perspectives. Oftentimes in the book he will recall a patient of his whom suffers from a lack of amae or one who fails to amae properly. He does this with care and ease to the subject, explaining social concepts like enryo, tanin, giri, and sumanai. These four words relate to the Japanese sense of companionship, its inner and outer circles, its duty or loyalty, and its way of apologizing. There are many concepts explored in the book and they are explained with appropriate depth for the time spent on them. Doi is definitely a highbrow writer, assuming that his reading audience is as intelligent as he is. While the more casual reader will be put off by this tactic, it allows for more knowledge and depth to be conveyed. Additional reading can benefit almost every topic that Doi speaks of. There are entire books on the insider-outsider social structure, but Doi can only focus on them for just a few pages. The basis of Anatomy of Dependence then is not to make someone intimately familiar with all the social ambiguities of Japanese society but to make the readership aware that each aspect is influenced by the amae.
Thus Doi is able to explain amae in the Anatomy of Dependence. He does not leave many stones unturned by the end of the account. There are a few places where Doi falters, however. A section on Eastern and Western appreciation for aesthetic beauty falters. Doi is a psychologist, not an artist. He is able to make surprisingly few cultural generalizations, but one that he does make is that the Japanese have a greater appreciation for aesthetic beauty because they are in a culture where amae is recognized and practiced many times daily. While the Japanese society has been hailed for centuries as having many beautiful pieces of artwork, poetry and philosophy on the subject of aesthetic beauty, the explanation Doi gives is a little weak. Apart from this, Doi makes about .1% of the cultural generalizations that Ruth Benedict makes in Chrysanthemum and the Sword. Doi's highbrow writing may also be considered a pitfall of the book, but it was written for people in the psychiatric field and not for the layperson uneducated in Japanese society. This book is not a casual read for a person who is just getting into the study of Japan.
That said, the book fulfills its primary objective. The primary objective is to make people, namely psychologists, aware of the Japanese sense of amae, a cultural sensitivity that is not to be found in Western cultures due to the greater sense of individuality that is placed on them as soon as babies develop self-identity. Doi writes and speaks as a psychologist and that can be perplexing to the reader. However, he is able to explain amae with such remarkably clarity and his experiences as a psychologist make the book highly credible.

Takeo Doi's "The Anatomy of Dependence" is in truth a psychological analysis of Japanese society through his linguistic interpretation of the Japanese concept of amae. Though the title of the book translates amae as "dependence", the semantic meaning of the word has a much deeper importance in Japanese culture and has a more positive connotation. The originality of Doi's hypothesis of Japanese psychology stems from his refusal to accept that the peoples of Japan and the rest of Asia cannot be understood through psychological analysis. Here, Doi explains his basic argument against using Western terminology to describe Japanese emotions, "...the forms of a person's thoughts are controlled by an inexorable laws of patterns of which he is unconscious. These patterns are the unperceived intricate systematizations of his own language-shown readily enough by a candid comparison and contrast with other languages, especially those of a different linguistic family, " (67). What Doi proposes is that Western psychology has yet to understand Japanese culture because it lacks a Japanese vocabulary.
Doi's text ventures to create a Japanese psychological vocabulary branching off from his concept of amae and built on the structure of Western principles of psychoanalysis. Amae, as Doi interprets it, is the interdependence of indulgences afforded between Japanese people of close relations. In Japanese society, Amae is expected to be given by parents to their children throughout their lives. Amae is also afforded to the elderly, leading some outsiders to wrongly assume that the elderly in Japan are in some way slighted, being treated like babies or small children. Within romantic or marital relationships, amae is expected to be exchanged freely as a way of expressing love and affection. The idea of dependence in Western psychology has connotations of weakness or inability to cope with reality. This is mostly due to the individualistic structure of modern Western culture, in particular, America.
Some of the most satisfying and convincing analysis in Doi's text are the parts of his argument where he openly attacks the Western interpretation of Japanese society. Doi daringly takes apart almost 20 years of Western analysis when he confronts Benedict's conclusion on Japan's total lack of guilt in her pivotal book, The Chrysanthemum and The Sword, "...[Benedict] seems to postulate guilt and shame as entirely unrelated to each other, which is obviously contrary to the facts, " (48). Benedict tried to say that Japanese people feel shame towards the group to which they belong but have no sense of guilt on an individual level. What Benedict is really talking about is the concept of betrayal.
Guilt in Western thought, as Benedict uses it in her text, is defined as a betrayal to oneself. This inner conflict is an individual experienced when there is a conflict between the id, ego and super-ego as Freud used them. Though Japanese people may not feel guilt towards themselves in the Western way, they do feel guilt towards the group. This is what Benedict defines as shame. Doi uses this idea to conclude that, "Even with the Western sense of guilt one might, in fact, postulate a deep-lying psychology of betrayal, but the Westerner is not normally conscious of it, " (49). Doi continues to hypothesize that at one point in history Western civilization did feel guilt towards the group as they do in Japan. With the advent and spread of Christianity, guilt was shifted from the community to one's individual relationship with god. With the industrial age, god was essentially dead. This left the only source of guilt to be found within oneself.
Doi is able to, within a page of text, turn the West's perspective on Japanese culture right back around at itself to create a very convincing and audacious psychological analysis of both the West and Japan. This book is one of the few satisfying texts written about Japanese society and the Japanese self. For the first time I feel that Japan can be described as something more concrete than merely inscrutable.

To prick a thorn out of a lion's foot one will surely gain new friends and old enemies. The story of Androcles, a Christian who is about to be sent to the lions for being a heretic in the Roman Empire. A cynical, humerous, poignant, and hypocritical story of religion versus humanism. The book is intended with the introduction with Shaw's discourse on Jesus and Christianity. Although I found it dryly written, which some wit involved, he makes some good remarks on the problems of Christianity. Mainly is the devout in which they will surely go to the lions before giving up their gods. Hypocritically the Romans could care less who their gods were or whether they believed in them, so long it was not a Christian god. The introduction acts as a set-up to put one in the mind set of Shaw and to understand his point of view which makes the play that much easier to understand and funnier to read. The play itself is a wonderful entry into the classics of the thearter.

Do not be tempted to pass over the essay that begins this book. It is a delightfully thought provoking essay that sets up the story of the play. Shaw writes of his views of organized religon with support for his thesis. It is important to read this before diving into the play itself.

The play is wonderful, but the theater program must be 200 pages long. You need all the 111 pages before the play to get all of the meanings of the play.

Androcles and the Lion is an allegorical work which points out that kindness is not necessarity altruistic - it can be of worth. Shaw's writing is brilliant and well worth the reading.

I first this read this book in Baltimore, MD at the tender age of 7, 1952. I thought that I would never see this book again in my life time. But fate has it that I'm able to read it again. I've used this book in my lectures and motivational speeches. Because I love the message that it portrays and illustrate to children as it did mine. Thanks for letting me share. I'm 57 yo now.

I teach 7th grade learning disabled students world history and I use Androceles and the Lion to teach sequencing skills. After I read the story, I ask the students to number in order in which they occur, several events in the story.

After viewing the movie Glory for many years I came across this book and purchased it immediately. Robert Gould Shaw grew up in an influencial home which had amazing political and social connections with the abolitionist movement. His words preserved from the past through today and gives us insight on what he was thinking about after fighting at Antietam as well as his feelings about his role and service for this nation.

A must for any civil war reenactor or student of the American Civil War.

Robert Gould Shaw's letters home are a very realistic look of the Civil War battles by a unique individual with many perspectives. The brutality of battle along with the emotional turmoil from such a young officer bring the war to life. The authors have given us a true picture of a brave officer and the war. As you read the letters of Shaw you want to pull the blankets closer on the cold winter nights he spent in the field. You can share the suffering along with Shaw at the loss of friends. The courage and love of family and devotion of country are evident throughout his premature adult life. God bless the 54th and may Robert Gould Shaw and all that served with him and under him never be forgotten.

Russell Duncan's compendium of letters both exalts and puzzles.The job of editing the letters and setting them in the context of war, family ties, friendships, etc. is thorough and, for the most part, makes them accessible. Let's not forget, though, that the editor omitted some letters that don't support his main thesis: that Col. Shaw was a rich young pleasure-lover who fought to get back to his privileged existence, never changing this outlook throughout the war; he "never fully understood nor dedicated himself" to the cause of Black freedom (pp.1-2). So here we are presented with a young man raised by abolitionists who went to all the hazards of preparing and leading something new, a black regiment, before dying in the middle of it, without understanding what he was about, or dedicating himself to it. It's fashionable to "debunk" the heros of yore, but even those letters we have tell us otherwise, and Duncan reverses his appraisal, back and forth, several times. We should also beware of measuring citizens of other times against a modern baseline on classism, racism, etc. Apart from these problems, found in the introduction and some footnotes, the book lets Shaw speak for himself (he does it eloquently and enjoyably) and the reader can draw his/her own conclusion on ideas, events, and character development.

If, like me, you have seen the film "Glory", where Matthew Broderick plays Col. Robert Gould Shaw, white commander of the black 54th Massachusetts Regiment during the Civil War, you will see only a brief a glimpse of who Shaw was in his short life. Broderick does a masterful job of capturing some of Shaw's personality, but if you want to get inside this young man's head and find out who he really was, I highly recommend reading the book, "Blue Eyed Child of Fortune", ed. by Russell Duncan.

This collection of Shaw's letters shows a far more complex and conflicted young man than Broderick was given a chance to play. While his parents burned with the abolitionist spirit of Boston's intellectual elite, Shaw struggled with his own prejudices and his own self doubts throughout his short life. Never an exemplary student, he dropped out of Harvard to work in his uncle's New York firm, but rapidly found the work boring and unsuited to him. Struggling to find his place in the world, the Civil War came along and gave him a sense of purpose and direction.

Enlisting first in the 7th New York Guards, he served until his enlistment was up, and then joined the 2nd Massachusetts, gaining position as an officer. He "saw the elephant" at Winchester, Antietam and Cedar Mountain, was slightly wounded in two of those engagements, and found out first hand about the horrors of war. During winter camp in 1862-63, his father visited with word that Shaw had been tapped by Massachusetts Governor John Albion Andrew to command a new black regiment. At first, Shaw refused this offer on the basis that he felt a strong bond with the men he had fought and bled with, but then changed his mind and accepted the position of Colonel of the 54th Massachusetts.

Returning home to Boston to take command of his new regiment, he was deeply conflicted over whether these men would pan out to be good soldiers, but as time wore on and they proved their worth, Shaw's respect for his men grew, as did their respect for their commanding officer. After three months training, they left for duty in South Carolina after a grand parade down Boston streets. Shaw chafed for some action for his men, and the first that they saw was the tragic raid and burning of Darien, Georgia under the command of Kansas jayhawker Col. James Montgomery. Shaw was outraged at this action and very nearly refused his orders from his commanding officer, but reluctantly had to obey and ask his men to do what he felt was utterly immoral and against the codes of war. He would write letters of protest to his father and to others.

Eventually, in his quest for real action for his men, they were assigned a diversionary action on James Island to allow Union troops to land on nearby Morris Island for a planned assault on Fort Wagner a few days later. Sustaining light casualties in a skirmish, Shaw was impressed that his men were indeed up to snuff as soldiers, and so, a few days later, after a long exhausting march in a storm to Morris Island during which they got no rest, they were assigned to the lead attack column on Fort Wagner on the evening of July 18, 1863.

Sadly, Union intelligence on Ft. Wagner was badly flawed. It was originally thought that the fort held a complement of only 300 men and that after days of relentless shelling by the Union navies, that the fort would be softened up enough to withstand a frontal Union assault. However, most of Wagner's nearly 1500 men were in a massive bombproof riding out the shelling, and so, when the Union assault began with the 54th leading the attack column, they took the heaviest casualties, including the young Col. Shaw, who foresaw his own demise while speaking to Lt. Col. Edward "Ned" Hallowell, his second-in-command, while on a steamer on the way to their assignment: "If I could only live a few weeks longer with my wife, and be at home a little while, I might die happy, but it cannot be. I do not believe I will live through our next fight."

Rather unfortunately, Shaw was right. He was killed upon reaching the parapets of Wagner, a bullet through his heart killing him instantly. His body was stripped and thrown into a common grave with his men, and his father asked, when the Union finally took the fort a few months later when it was abandoned by the Confederates, that his body be left there with his men. Shaw's burial spot now lies somewhere under the Atlantic Ocean, the island having eroded significantly in the past 140 years since Shaw's demise and burial there.

This book will give you a great insight into a very conflicted, complicated and yet reluctantly heroic young man who was just coming into his own at the time of his tragic death. I am sure that he would have shunned the limelight had he survived the war to live to old age and would have been content to live life with his beloved Annie, to whom he was married a mere two months before his death. Annie would never remarry and lived the rest of her life as his widow, dying in 1907. The war would doubtless have made Shaw and given him the potential to focus his life and go on to great things had he lived to do so. Having lived so much of his young life with such rebellion against his mother's domineering apron strings and not quite sure what he wanted out of life, the war gave Shaw a brief opportunity to find out what it was he was made of. In so doing, he achieved the one thing he never dreamed of, immortality.

Read this book if you are eager to know the "real" Shaw. Letting him speak for himself is the best way to know this fascinating man who died so tragically young at the peak of his life. Follow it up with "Where Death and Glory Meet", Russell Duncan's excellent biography of Shaw. By the time you finish these two books, you will feel as if you know Shaw quite well. If you want to know a few of his men, read "A Brave Black Regiment" by Capt. Luis Emilio, a regimental history of the 54th, "On the Altar of Freedom" by Cpl. James Henry Gooding, a black soldier in the 54th, and "A Voice of Thunder", the letters of Sgt. George E. Stephens, another black soldier in the 54th. I just hope that more letters and diaries from this regiment surface and are published someday. Doubtless there are more hiding in attics and other unknown places.

This book comes highly recommended for good Civil War reading of a primary source, along with the other books mentioned that are by Shaw's soldiers. Together, they beat any historian's account of this historic regiment. Read them all if you are interested in Civil War or black history.

it's must have book I love this book

This was truly one of the best books that I have read. I find it very compelling and the smilies that the writer used to explain the spider that he kept seeing and fearing was unbelievable. It just seemed so surreal to me, and I'm not so sure why.

I read this book in grade six and it showed me that the world wasn't really a perfect and wonderfully great all the time. I owe a lot to this novel.

I enjoyed the concept that was displayed in this story, and I swear every second a emotion streamed down Charlie's back I felt it too. The scene that I enjoyed the most was when the two boys went outside and Charlie's dad showed up. I didn't know what was going to happen at that point to be honest, I thought that it was going to be very climaxic, by his father dragging him away, but than the foster family to take him out of his hands.

This book will make you think about all the things that you have, have had, are going to have, and all the things that you will leave behind when you die. Charlie didn't have that in the begining of the story, but as time progressed he was given more and was earning more and most importantly he had a family, foster one maybe, but at least they cared about him and wanted to help him out.

I would recommend to anybody, to READ THIS BOOK.

Ever wonder how a young child could escape out of child abuse? Charlie (main character) knows exactly what it takes. His story takes you through the brutality, hard-ship, and recovery of child abuse. Recently I read The Boy from the Basement, by Susan Shaw for my freshman English class.
The main character in the book is a young boy named Charlie, who has been locked away and kept prisoner in the basement, by his easily angered father, as a "punishment". He has never been to school, heard of holidays or even used a phone. He believes he deserves this because he has been bad. Sadly, this is all Charlie has ever known. But when Charlie gets accidentally locked outside one night, he sees a world he had never seen before. When he gets picked up by police officers he is sent away to a foster family, where he is haunted by hallucinations and his father's anger.
I think that there were some very good parts in this book. One being was when Charlie was playing outside at his foster home and his father shows up. This was a big deal because his father was not supposed to even see Charlie because he had abused him. He also never let him outside before or he would make Charlie stay in the basement for even longer.
The reason why I'm recommending this book to you is that I think that it had a message I think that people should understand. The main idea was about a boy's escape and recovery from extreme child abuse and finding a new home. In my opinion this is a big problem still today. I also think that the author did a good job explaining the journey and how the main character got through it. On the other hand one thing I probably would have changed was about the mother in the story and that she really didn't have anything to do with the story line. I think it would have been better if they would have included her in it.

I teach Reading to struggling readers in high school. My goal is to get them engaged, because, if they're engaged, they read. This book hasn't been on the shelf more than 5 minutes since it was received in the mail. I haven't read it yet, but intend to over the summer. The teacher who recommended it was 100% correct.

I love this story, I wish it was a memoir, but that would mean it would have to be true. and there is enough going on in the world today , we don't need this story to be one that is seenon the news. However, it IS a very good read. I suggest that organizations that deal with children who were abused and neglected need to read this book, it relates to the childrne. It makes the reader keep reading to find out what happens to the little boy. I am older than a teen, but study things for children. I think this is a good teen or adolescent read for children who have been through this situation.
Has a great ending, you will love it

I think this book deserves this award. It is a great book but not the best I have ever read. I think this book was a little depressing but at the same time joyful. This book is suspenseful. If you like suspense you'll love this book. I would recommend this book to ages 11 and up and anyone who loves dramatic endings.

I purchased this book as a gift for a friend who is a choral director and Minister of Music of my church. I had originally read the book in the early '80's, soon after the first edition was released. I had despaired of finding a copy to give to my friend, and was overjoyed to find that Hinshaw had picked it up after it was no longer available from the University of Indiana Press, its original publisher. It is a wonderful book, giving great insight into the personality and accomplishments of Robert Shaw, one of the great choral conductors of our time. Thanks to Amazon for making this edition available.

When we left the Atlanta scene of ASO and Robert Shaw's profound influence on that whole city, even the state of GA. It was as if Choral Culture flew out the window of our Church Lives! When his Minneapolis Homily on "Worship and Fine Arts" appeared on NPR in 1984, I made an effort to write Sir Robert's ASO Secretary, Nola Frink, please send me a copy of "Dear People?" Within one month the Postal Service shipped an Autographed copy of Dear People... Robert Shaw! Even using my favorite spacing of three holy dots!

In addition to several personal family pictures of the Shaws in different time frames and settings, there are noteable shots of Robert with his Glee Club in San Francisco and Fred Waring Workshop! Next an early rehearsal picture of Collegiate Chorale, calling-it "...the melting pot that sings." An early Tour Poster from the 1950-51 season, introducing that yet famous Robert Shaw Chorale wearing dress-black outfits, until they began wearing Choir Robes or Tuxedoes.

His most collectable pictures included, Norman Dello Joio, Fred Waring, Robert Merrill, Paul Hindemith, Serge Koussevitsky, and Pablo Casals. Many singers & Soloists became known and 'oft used in Major Symphony concerts. When Florence Kopleff had retired from teaching at GA State University, in the audience sat Alice Parker, Adele Addison, Saramae Endich, Clayton Krehbiel of FSU, John Wustman, Pianist++ other names from Robert Shaw Chorales.

My most fun Amazon reviews included, Brahms' German Requiem, The Bach B-Minor Mass, Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, Mozart's Requiem, Schubert Masses, Choral Masterpieces ++ other CD's. All of these musical giants became known to us and admired through rehearsals with an artistic creative, immanent touch of the only one whose choral genius will be missed, yet always an invisible Spirit in choral rehearsals, especially in Georgia! With grandioso thanks, Retired Singer and Chaplain, Fred W Hood

The late Robert Shaw had an incredibly long and distinguished career. This authorized biography by Joseph Mussulman, a one-time Shaw chorister, covers Shaw's life and career up to 1979 in detail, with a Foreword added in 1996 which briefly covers those later years. But a revised edition, with full detail in the period 1979 to Shaw's death in January, 1999, would fill in a lot of blanks for those who know him best through his Telarc recordings with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus and his Chamber Singers and Festival Singers, or through his Carnegie Hall Choral Workshops and Tanglewood appearances in the later years of his career.

I came by my appreciation of Shaw relatively late in life, and by a somewhat unusual means. When he founded his Collegiate Chorale in 1941, I was all of two years old. I was still way too young to latch on to him seven years later, when he had disbanded the Collegiate Chorale and founded the Robert Shaw Chorale. For three decades after that, I had a somewhat different musical agenda, and he was a musical "ship passing in the night" for too many years.

The signal event which brought Shaw to the forefront of my musical consciousness was the launching of Telarc's digitally-mastered LP's by Bob Woods and Jack Renner, in 1977. The second of these LP's was a performance of Stravinsky's Firebird Suite and Borodin's Polovtsian Dances by Shaw and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and Chorus. Shaw had earlier assumed the directorship of the ASO in 1968, and Woods and Renner had been associated with Shaw during the period when he was assistant conductor and choral director for George Szell and the Cleveland Orchestra. In a very real sense, Woods and Renner were, by bringing this new technology to Shaw, thanking him for past friendships and associations. And the history of his role in leading the ASO, and bringing it to prominence with its recorded repertoire, was dramatically changed by this event. But much of this later history, and what followed Shaw's "retirement" as active music director of the ASO, has unfortunately been compressed into the all-too-brief Foreword, and the last three years of his life are not documented at all.

It is fair to say that the Telarc "gift" which Woods and Renner presented to Shaw made the difference between a career which would have been insufficiently documented by recordings (except for a handful of earlier RCA Victor recordings of the Robert Shaw Chorale) and one which will now stand the test of time. The ASO, good as it became under Shaw's leadership, served as much during his tenure as the recording instrument which would provide support for the "ultimate" Robert Shaw Chorale, the remarkable, and totally amateur (in the best sense) Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Chorus, as it would as the civic orchestra for the greater Atlanta area.

I could wax eloquent about the dozens of recordings this orchestra and chorus produced over a 20-year period of Telarc support. But there is one recording which stands out above all, of a work which was the closest thing to a cornerstone for Shaw's career: Bach's B Minor Mass. His professional life with this work is well-documented in Joe Mussulman's book. There is a wealth of anecdotes about how his performances of this work could reduce folks to tears, from Alaskan Aleuts to college kids everywhere to Soviet apparatchiks at the height of the Cold War.

One anecdote stands out above all others regarding his mastery, as well as his unassuming modesty in the face of it all, regarding the B Minor Mass. It occurred after a performance that must have really come together in a very special way. Following the concluding "Dona Nobis Pacem" of the Mass, Shaw left the podium and darted behind the curtain, awaiting the applause. He waited, and waited some more. Finally, not understanding why it was that the applause never arrived, he poked his head out from behind the curtain, only to find both the audience and the musicians facing each other and bawling their eyes out from what must have been a rendering of the final "Dona Nobis Pacem" of the Mass for the ages. Those who were at that performance carry a very special event around in their memories.

This single, simple paragraph of an anecdote says volumes about Shaw's largely underrated mastery. When you read this book, you too will cry. And you will laugh. And you will likely do both simultaneously. For all the right reasons.

Now, if only someone would fill in the final missing 20 years or so of "Dear People," we'd have it all.

Bob Zeidler

This book is welcome principally because it is the only systematic discussion of the life (or a good portion thereof) of one of the important musical figures in the second half of the 20th century. Unfortunately the author fails to capture the essence of what made Robert Shaw successful as a performer and how his inspiration largely fueled the "choral renaissance" in this country. The definitive critical biography of this singular talent remains to be written.

People who think Robert Shaw was something special and who come across this book will be delighted with its readability. While it certainly captures Shaw's unique ability to command your respect and warm your heart, it is especially successful in putting the phenomenon that was Shaw into the context of music in America in the Twentieth Century. One often doesn't think much about what it must have been like, especially in the earlier part of the era, to champion and perform the "modern" serious music repertoire; this book forces us to think about it, to put ourselves in the places of those who felt, like Shaw, compelled to do it. Along the way, there's a good overview of the evolution of recording, and how Shaw fit in there, not so much exploiting the medium as using it to serve the larger purpose of his art. Compelled throughout his career to make popular recordings, Shaw's final one for RCA ("Irish Songs," August `67) is in fact finished by a capable associate while he runs off to do more important things with his latest love, the Atlanta Symphony. The "popular" Shaw was to always dog the "artistic" Shaw throughout his career. He was once stung by a critic who said of his light encores, "They drew lots of applause mingled with the soft plash of the cognoscenti being quietly sick in their hats."

Everyone will have their favorite quote from Shaw after reading this book. Mine is a long, affectionately comic poem on Mahler's Eighth Symphony, which concludes, "So, grieve not, Gus! Our new Apollo! // Where you lead us, we will wallow!" Indeed, the many quotes from Shaw as he speaks and writes to his choruses are the principal glories of this book.

But always, always the music. You can feel the march of performances as they are roll-called before your eyes. This may not be the most authoritative, most definitive book on Shaw possible, but it is the one I wanted most to read. A real five star recommendation, and no apologies to the cognoscenti!

Samantha Shaw stumbles into a murder investigation when she discovers Faye, a friend and client of Heart Mates, Samantha's dating agency, strangled in a hotel room. This is the second time Samantha has been involved in a murder investigation-the first was the murder of her husband, during which Samantha discovered some unwelcome truths about her marriage. Thrust into creating a new life for herself and her two sons, she runs a dating agency, reviews romance writers, and dabbles in private investigations. As part of this earlier investigation, Samantha developed an acrimonious relationship with the local police department, and gained a new boyfriend-a younger, handsome stud named Gabe.

The plot of Dying to Meet You focuses on finding Faye's killer among the citizens of their small town. Suspects include Faye's estranged husband, the married man Faye had an affair with, his wife, and the partner of someone Faye met through the dating agency. Samantha becomes involved to clear Faye's husband of suspicion, and relies on Gabe's private investigation business to attempt to legalize her work. The romance between Gabe and Samantha is complicated by Samantha's growing attraction to a new police officer in town-one who writes romance novels in his spare time!

Well written for the cozy genre, Dying to Meet You is a quick and easy read. Some unfortunate plot elements and awkward handling disturb the flow and are inconsistent with the characters personalities and intelligence. The Samantha Shaw character has great potential to develop into an intelligent, madcap heroine series.

This second installment of the series is much improved from the first one.

Sam is still no Stephanie Plum, but she's not nearly as annoying and unlikeable as the first book. Sure she still does stupid things that put herself and those around her in danger, but there seems to be a little more believability to the things she does. And her transformation from soccer mom to slut isn't beat over your head like it was in the last book.

The supporting cast really should be fleshed out a bit more. I'm not wild about Gabe and think that Vance has much more potential as a suitor. Barney has the promise to be a terrific character, a more toned-down version of the over-the-top Grandma Mazur. And even Sam's mother has the potential to be fun.

There were still some little things that bugged me in the book, but they were mostly from an editing standpoint. Early in the book, Sam tells us that she keeps pepper spray on her keyring. About three pages later, she gets herself into trouble and reaches for her keyring, "where I keep a canister of pepper spray." You just told us that...I can figure out why you're reaching for your keyring. I also found it highly annoying and lazy that throughout the book, the author misspelled "Acura" as "Accura."

Looking forward to the next book in the series.

Samantha Shaw bought Heart Mates, a dating service, after her husband died of a peanut allergy as a tribute of their love. They'd met there. Then she discovered that for 13 years she'd been married to a drug dealer who collected women's panties. He was murdered by one of his mistresses. And he'd planned to run out on her and their two sons with a half-million dollars of stolen drug money.

Now she is mentoring Faye Miller. She is helping her launch her business Faye's Printing and Design by having her design and print advertising brochures for Heart Mates. When Samantha shows up at Faye's motel room for their breakfast meeting, she finds Faye dead, murdered. Samantha did some investigating into her husband's murder and Detective Vance makes her promise she won't get involved in this murder.

Adam Miller, Faye's husband, asks Samantha to look into Faye's murder. He is their number one suspect and he swears he didn't do it. He wasn't happy Faye had gone to Heart Mates, but they were separated and he now swears he finally agreed to the divorce. He was at Faye's the night she was murdered, but other cars were seen outside her room as well.

With the help of Samantha's grandpa, he's a whiz on the internet, and working under her sexy boyfriend Gabe's PI licence, Samantha begins to poke around. Detective Vance is not happy and tries to stop her at every turn. But as Samantha gets deeper into the investigation, she puts herself and others in danger.

This is one of the best new series around. I love the sexual tension between Samantha and Gabe. I wonder if this author didn't write romances before. It gives enough details, but doesn't go too far.

Her grandpa is a great character too. He was a magician before he retired and has so many magician friends and can find out information from the computer. Samantha often doesn't want to know how or where he got the information!

Her mother is another great character. She is always trying to get Samantha to sell the dating service and become a realtor like her. Samantha has no interest in becoming a realtor but her mother just doesn't get it.

I highly recommend this book. It is a fun, fast read and leaves you wanting more!

Samantha Shaw stumbles into a murder investigation when she discovers Faye, a friend and client of Heart Mates, Samantha's dating agency, strangled in a hotel room. This is the second time Samantha has been involved in a murder investigation-the first was the murder of her husband, during which Samantha discovered some unwelcome truths about her marriage. Thrust into creating a new life for herself and her two sons, she runs a dating agency, reviews romance writers, and dabbles in private investigations. As part of this earlier investigation, Samantha developed an acrimonious relationship with the local police department, and gained a new boyfriend-a younger, handsome stud named Gabe.

The plot of Dying to Meet You focuses on finding Faye's killer among the citizens of their small town. Suspects include Faye's estranged husband, the married man Faye had an affair with, his wife, and the partner of someone Faye met through the dating agency. Samantha becomes involved to clear Faye's husband of suspicion, and relies on Gabe's private investigation business to attempt to legalize her work. The romance between Gabe and Samantha is complicated by Samantha's growing attraction to a new police officer in town-one who writes romance novels in his spare time!

Well written for the cozy genre, Dying to Meet You is a quick and easy read. Some unfortunate plot elements and awkward handling disturb the flow and are inconsistent with the characters personalities and intelligence. The Samantha Shaw character has great potential to develop into an intelligent, madcap heroine series.

Jennifer Apodaca's first foray into the writing world of light hearted mysteries, Dating Can Be Murder, was a rousing success. With heroine Samantha Shaw she had created a protagonist to whom we can all relate - by turns upbeat and angry, incorrigible and adorable.

Readers were eager to see what Sam would be up to next - now we know.

Remember that Sam runs a dating service, Heart Mates; she's divorced with a current heart throb named Gabe, a private investigator. Things are running smoothly or so she thinks until she finds a most unexpected surprise - the dead body of her once client, Faye Miller.

Sam knows better than to get involved in the solving of this murder, but she does anyway because the media ties Heart Mates to the killing. After reading through Faye's files she finds several promising suspects: a jealous husband, and a former date, Dominic Danger.

Bad enough that Sam has to try to defend her business but she also has to put up with the insufferably sexist, braggadocios Detective Logan Vance. She doesn't need antagonists, but she does need all the help she can get or she may wind up just as dead as Faye.

Another mixture of crime and comedy from the promising Jennifer Apodaca.

- Gail Cooke

If you are looking for a book that has a lot of meat of the Word, this book is for you. It is definitely not shallow. It also stirs the heart to desire more of God, and to passionately fall in love with him. There aren't very many books that I think so highly of that I recommend it to others, but this is one of them.

This book dives deep into the experience of "knowing" Christ. It has been a breath of fresh air to me, an opportunity to hear again the wonderful grace of Christ. Moon didn't write this to be the end all of theological discussion, instead to offer real, practical insight to walking in communion with Christ, dealing with the humanity we struggle with and embracing the love that has been offered us through Jesus. This is a must read, I highly recommend it.

I bought this book at the recommendation of a friend. It has really moved me deeply, helping me to increase in my walk with the Lord. There is humor to lighten in places, but also much practical advice. Can't wait for my best friend to read it, so we can compare notes.

I have the same problem with this book that I had with Dr. David Benner's ... while it is well-meaning and steeped in a love for God and humanity, its methodology is immersed in subjective mysticism.

Like many evanglelical mystics, Dr. Moon and Dr. Benner have both seem to embrace the ambiguous nature of faith at the expense of its objective underpinnings. Obedience to the call to love our neighbor is the essential manner in which we are to realize and express the character of God through our humanity.

In my fallible opionion, surrender to this call does not necessarily involve contemplative 'listening' to God's Spirit, and transformation does not involve an eradication of our selves ... our true self is the result of the transforming grace and love of Christ that comes through, not at the expense of our humanity. Christ made it very clear that to abide in His love means obeying His command to love one another, a truth echoed by Paul, John, James and Peter throughout the New Testament. This involves practical compassion and sacrifice, and while there is an experiential, mystic element to our faith, it is not an end in and of itself. Faith is realized through works of love or it is no faith at all.

While Dr. Moon would never argue against the compassionate nature of faith, his emphasis on the subjective relationship with Christ, in my opinion, at the expense of the objective nature of love for neighbor, could prove a danger to a seeking soul.

"This book is about life lived in constant, close contact with God," writes Dallas Willard in his foreword to FALLING FOR GOD. He then lists qualities a Christian needs to maintain a life of "grow[th] in grace and knowledge of" Jesus (2 Peter 3:18): information, imagination, persistence, patience, and realism. And these are the faithful qualities that Gary Moon directly or indirectly addresses in this gently provoking guidebook for Christians desiring intimacy with God.

The overriding image of the book is love --- as in "falling in." What does it entail? How does it work? How is intimacy maintained over time? The first chapter, "The Three Cs of Lasting Love," sets up the three-part outline for the book and the elements of the "romantic relationship with God": conversation, communion, and consummation.

Moon --- a well-connected and well-positioned Christian counselor whose academic history is never clearly laid out --- is well versed in classical Christian spirituality and spiritual formation that may be "standard fare" to Catholics attuned to Ignatian or Benedictine spirituality and people committed to 12-step recovery programs but new material for conservative evangelicals.

For starters, the definitions of and exercises regarding prayer center on listening to God as much as or more than on talking at or to God. "Silence is the most foundational of all Christian disciplines." The chapter titled "Learning to Listen" ends with a helpful list of "indications of the voice of God."

Part 2 of the book, "Communion," focuses on fidelity (willingness versus willfulness), transparency before God (overcoming a fear of total commitment), and the meaning and reality of surrender. "Many of us are like the rich young man, unwilling to place our idols in the dumpster. We cannot do it on our own. We need God's help, and often that help comes in the form of pain." We also need the help and accountability of a community of believers.

As I said, this book is written gently --- replete with personal anecdotes and humorous quips; it's clear that Moon is with his readers on this journey --- but Moon, as the saints before him, notes that the intimate relationship with God involves becoming more and more like Christ, who ultimately surrendered his life.

Part 3, "Consummation," first addresses the issue of relational forgiveness, including a powerful example of the salvation of a devastated marriage, with Hugo's "Les Miserables" being the facilitating counseling tool. Moon then turns to spiritual reconciliation before ending with a discussion of "Union with God" and what it means.

Each of 10 chapters ends with more-than-cursory study and prayer "helps": a biblical passage, followed by a short commentary and reflection questions, a meditation exercise, and a spiritual (prayer) exercise. Each of the three book parts ends with a short bio and sample writings of classic spiritual writers: Frank Laubach, a Protestant (conversing with God), Thomas Kelly, a Quaker (communion with God), and Teresa of Avila, a Catholic (union with God).

Moon ends his book with a challenge: "Don't settle for brief encounters instead of intimate dialogue; don't become content with a salvation contract instead of enjoying communion; and don't withhold parts of your heart. Instead, pursue union. Say yes to God's extravagant proposal."

--- Reviewed by Evelyn Bence