Shepard Books

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I was not very familiar with the geographical area or with the story of the Cherry Valley Massacre; but, along with the very well developed characters, the time, the place and the story really came to life. There are enough twists and turns to keep it interesting, but not so many that you feel lost or, worse, like the author has lost the way and is desperately trying to get back to something familiar--a not uncommon problem with first novels! I highly recommend this book and hope for more from Ms. Moon.

Imagine being transported over two hundred years into the past without warning and losing access to nearly all of the technologies and conveniences that most of us take for granted. (Forget the Internet - Where is your next meal coming from?) This is exactly what happens to Teresa Riley in "The Fall of the Year," but there's a BIG twist. Not only is she hurled back in time over two centuries, but she arrives at an historically significant moment in the history of the United States. On the eve of the Cherry Valley Massacre, Teresa is forced to navigate the treacherous landscape of Revolutionary War America as she wrestles with the impossibility of her new reality. In the course of the book, she encounters languages that she has never hear before, falls in love with a man who died hundreds of years before she was born, and finds herself wrestling with the ethics of influencing the course of history (in the hopes of minimizing the toll of human suffering) during events that she, herself, once studied as a young girl growing up in the area. It's hard to classify this novel as it blends fact, fiction, fantasy, and a lot of romance, but the author does a fine job of blending all of these elements into a successful narrative. A must read for anyone who has spent any time in the wilds of Upstate New York!

This scholarly work, dedicated to the memory of Matthew Shepard, whose brutal homophobic killing mobilized a nation to cry out in anger and shame, is an important contributor to the understanding of the basis of crimes of violence against minority groups targeted by a shameful segment of the majority. As a research project with multiple contributors, the legal definition of a hate crime is provided as the basis of explaining the reasons that acts of violence against minorities qualify as hate crimes, the origins of various prejudices that fuel and "justify" acts of violence and how many states have failed or ignored the cry to enhance the legal sanctions for acts of violence based solely on prejudice, racism, homophobia and other dynamics that figure into the equation. In addition to addressing prejudice as it applies to the individual, the research here also addresses the prejudice that is inherent in society and some of its institutions and how their discrimination against certain minorities constitute a form of violence (societal vs. individual). It is somewhat disgraceful how many are the states which have not even acknowledged the existence of institutional hate crimes much less provided equal redress. One cannot help but be moved by either anger or shame at the violence perpetrated on people solely on the basis of their sexual orientation, religion, gender, race and national origin, among others. But as other public figures through U.S. history turned their anger and shame into action for equality, this project issues a call to action that empowers the targets of hate crimes with judicial and societal equality. That action alone may well be the optimal expression to the memory of a young, young man whose ultimate death began tied to a fence on a cold, wind-swept Wyoming prairie.

I am a grad student in psychology doing a thesis on gay/lesbian hate crimes. This volume is moving and insightful. I wish the editors had included info from Gregory Herek, who is a leader in the field. All in all a good read with good info.

When trying to help children deal with the death of a loved one, it is most beneficial to have a good story to help them realize that their feelings are shared by others. Children often believe that when bad things happen nobody can understand what they are going through and are hesitant to share their feelings. I think this book would be extremely helpful to parents, teachers, counselors and anyone else who works with children. It provides a platform for discussion. Too bad it's out of print! Children's literature often avoids subjects that need to be addressed. I commend the author for taking on a sensitive subject in an obviously personal way.

When trying to help children deal with the death of a loved one, it is most beneficial to have a good story to help them realize that their feelings are shared by others. Children often believe that when bad things happen nobody can understand what they are going through and are hesitant to share their feelings. I think this book would be extremely helpful to parents, teachers, counselors and anyone else who works with children. It provides a platform for discussion. Too bad it's out of print! Children's literature often avoids subjects that need to be addressed. I commend the author for taking on a sensitive subject in an obviously personal way.

This book wonderfully depicts the Maine coast and all its beauty. Jim Arnosky not only portrays the Maine coast, but also the way the sea provides Mainers a way of life. As a Maine resident I feel Jim has captured many aspects of the Maine coast that make it so wonderful. I recomend this book to anyone who enjoys beautiful paintings of the wonderful coast of Maine.

This book wonderfully depicts the Maine coast and all its beauty. Jim Arnosky not only portrays the Maine coast, but also the way the sea provides Mainers a way of life. As a Maine resident I feel Jim has captured many aspects of the Maine coast that make it so wonderful. I recomend this book to anyone who enjoys beautiful paintings of the wonderful coast of Maine.

I read this book as a child and I still remember how much I loved it...which is saying a lot since I am now 32! I read it several times and enjoyed it each time. My fourth grade teacher gave the book to me as a Christmas gift and I couldn't have asked for a better present. I recommend this for children ages 10 and up...it is a story you will remember.

Cathy, an 11-year-old teetering on the brink of the "terrible teens" has learned to juggle some issues. She tilts at windmills and looks for excuses to rebel, such as insisting on riding a bike on the sidewalk instead of in the park. She has a loving father, stepmother and stepbrother who is a year her senior. Her biggest ally is her paternal grandmother, who is a very astute woman.

Cathy is very silly and infantile, even for eleven. She believes that her mother is dead and has no memory of her. Every year she leaves Manhattan for the bucolic tranquility of rural Maine, the home of her grandmother. In Maine she reconnects with her boy-crazy, irritating, not too bright friend Marianne. Marianne is really for the birds.

Once ensconsed in Maine, Cathy meets a woman summering there. The woman has rented a cottage and asked Cathy if she would pose as a model for a children's book she is illustrating. Cathy jumps at the chance to model and earn money for a bicycle she wants to buy.

The summer appears to drift along up to a point. Cathy's stepbrother Andrew and his delinquent friend Donny arrive towards the latter part of the summer. Marianne hooks up with Donny and entices the other two to eavesdrop on an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. It is there, in the darkness of a church parish hall that Cathy recognizes the woman she thought was just a summer resident in Maine. Masks come off and the results are...well, somewhat of a revelation.

It is Cathy's wise grandmother who puts the pieces together for them all. She was the most appealing character. I like the intelligent conversations she had with her spoiled, silly and very immature granddaughter. I also didn't like the way she playacted at "being a woman with a past" (talk about a very bad cliche) and quoted trite lines from old movies. Cathy was a very annoying, unappealing and tiresome character. A pie in the face for Cathy! Although I didn't like Cathy, I liked the way her extremely articulate grandmother brought truth and logic in where it was sorely needed.

The wise, well-spoken grandmother was what kept this book from receiving 1.5 - 2 stars.

Old John is a story about a family whos Grandfather is coming to live with them. The Parents of the household have a arguement of allowing Old John to stay. They reached a agreement to allow Old John to stay but he arrives late so late that Jacob and Laura(the kids of the family) get back from school when he arrives. When Old John arrives he gets his furniture in place puts a weird picture of Einstein with his tongue sticking on the wall above the couch. Once Old John got settled in the house he started to kind of take over certain parts of the house like the right corner couch in the living room. Old John later showed that he used to dye for a living and started to dye for the neighborhood and then went and painted the house. Other then dye for the neighborhood he never really left the house until one day a old lady friend came to a hotel and Old John started to get ready to visit her. Laura was watching Olf John get ready but when Luara look the other way Old John disappeared and the family got worried. One day Old John went swimming in a public swimming pool with a white with black triangle bathing suit and embarrassed Luara which got them both angery at each other.

The book Old John by Elizabeth D. Crawford is a fasinating and cool book. Some of the parts where sad and other were happy. The book is a bout a family that wanted their grandfather to come visit them. The only problem was that insted of visiting he comes into the Schirmers yard with a moving van to live with them. The Schirmers are the main family. They where sort of mad at John came but they calmed down. Father was upset at Old John because one he only wanted him to stay for a while and plus the house was way to small to fit five people. The kids Jacob and Laura love their grandfather becuase he tells them stories about his past. This book is for anyone who just loves to read.

The more you know about psychological theories and Winnie-the-Pooh, the more you will enjoy this book. Dr. Williams blasts away with tongue-in-cheek satire aimed at the psychologist's belief that everything that is said, thought, dreamed, and done has many layers of significance. Unfortunately, that approach means that your enjoyment will be modest if your knowledge is correspondingly limited in either area. If you know little about psychology and have not read Winnie-the-Pooh, you may not get most of the humor in the book.

In Freud-like fashion, Dr. Williams begins by descrbing the case for Winnie-the-Pooh being a super psychologist. The thrust of this argument is that Winnie employs every method ever recommended by any psychologist or psychoanalyst somewhere in his fictional adventures. In fact, he often combines them in a single fictional encounter.

The book then recounts seven cases and Winnie's role in them.

Case 1 -- Pooh Cures Christopher Robin of Arktophobia (fear of bears)

Case 2 -- Pooh Assists Piglet to Mature

Case 3 -- Pooh at His Most Eclectic with Tigger

Case 4 -- The Problem with Rabbit

Case 5 -- Parenting: Kanga and Roo

Case 6 -- Wol's Problems with Communication

Case 7 -- Eeyore: A Case of Classical Depression

The cases are written up like Freud's with the exception that they are illustrated with many drawings from the original Pooh stories.

As an example of the approach, the book Winnie-the-Pooh opens with a reference to his living under the name of Sanders. That is never mentioned again. Dr. Williams provides a lengthy argument in favor of this meaning that Winnie-the-Pooh is describing himself as the Sand man, the bringer of dreams. This is an indication of his role as psychotherapist.

In the famous story where Winnie eats too much honey and cannot get out of the hole in the tree, Dr. Williams reinterprets this as Winnie-the-Pooh making an example of himself to discourage others from overeating rather than using aversion therapy on them.

To put this prescience into context, Dr. Williams points out that the Pooh stories date in the 1920s. In the text, he finds "frequent anticipation of theories and practices which more plodding psychologists arrived at much later."

I don't know about you, but I didn't think much about Jung when I read Winnie-the-Pooh. Obviously, the references were too subtle for me.

Those who have experienced psychotherapy will probably find humor in the observations made about Winnie-the-Pooh that they may have heard applied to themselves. Could the observations be equally apt?

This book is best enjoyed by a roaring fire on a cold night with a warmed snifter of brandy, and savored slowly.

After you have finished the book, you might consider the many instances where novels do show ways to solve psychological problems through their fictional developments. Could it be that we can use fiction to be our own therapist? Or, is someone else the therapist? If someone gave you the book, perhaps they are the therapist. If so, is the author the propounder of the theory . . . or is the character?

See the possibilities for humor in pomposity everywhere!

I bought this book because I read a lot of books on psychology AND I was introduced to looking at diverse themes through the "Pooh" world view when a frind suggested "The Tao of Pooh," by Benjamin Hoff. I got this book thinking it might be entertaining and illustrative as well.

It is entertaining for the first while, but generally not very illustrative. As the previous reviewer said, the more you know about shools of psychological theory the more you will enjoy the book. But if you are looking to either learn something about psychological theory OR looking for images and anologies that illustrate concepts in a striking or perceptive way, this is not the best book.

It is entertaining, but it can get old if you are not careful. The tone is very tongue-in-cheek, I had some good chuckles. The kick of the book is looking at the world of the Hundred Acre Wood through such over-the-top scholarly eyes. There is an "inside tone" to his dialog with the reader: sort of a "uninformed and unstudied individuals fail to appreciate this, but you and I can clearly see..." attitude runs through the entire book. I enjoyed that in the first few chapters, but after a while the joke got old. To be fair, I did read this in just a couple long sessions in just a couple days. It may be enjoyed more as a nightstand book where you read a chapter or two every few days.

In terms of learning anything new from the book, one is not likely to get more than a few nuggets of information about one theorist or another. The book is orgainized more by character and story than by psychological concept, so one never really gets to see a school of thought fleshed out in a way that enhances your understanding of it. But, if that's not why you're reading the book, you won't experience it as a short-coming.

It is a fun book, especially if you LOVE Pooh or psychology. If you love and know a lot about both this could be a good, light read to nibble on before bed or over lunch.

This book was created as a response to William Cronon's edited volume, Uncommon Ground (1995). Cronon's book ultimately has stood the test of time better than this collection, but the two should always be read together. As a unit, they provide both a thoughtful collection of views on the changing definition of "nature" in American life and also a fine historical view of 1990s environmental thinking.

Essays by various authors from a symposia in California, Reinventing Nature looks at where our concepts of nature originate and how very different they can be. Several of the chapters explore some of the naive myths we hold about native peoples, their values, and attitudes toward the land and its resources. An excellent eye-opener for the general reader.

If you always wondered what the hell the "GIANT" posters meant, now you can read their creator's book and find out. Includes great photography of Shepard Fairey's work from around the world. This new Hardcover edition is a really nice edition.

the book's good if you'r really into the obey giant type stuff. it doesn't have much text, and is really thin. i also wished it covered more of his non-giant work, and more recent graphic design work. but if you like seeing the giant in the star a lot, more power to you.

I've been to South Dakota a number of times and have had many questions about the landscape, etc. This book has the answers and the pictures to go with it. I especially appreciated the glossary and the further-reading list.

I bought this book for a weeklong driving tour through North and South Dakota, and found this book invaluable. If you are interesting in the natural resources and park systems in these places, it has lotsa info you won't get in maps (especially many beautiful color photos) altho the advice given wasn't always useful.