Stevens Books

The third book of Steve Erikson's Malazan series picks up where the first book left off. The Empress Laseen has outlawed Whiskyjack, the Bridgeburners, and Dujek Onearm after their failure to capture the jeweled city of Darujistan. The seasoned soldiers are not long out of work. On the continent of Genabackis there is word of a terrifying new threat. A deranged prophet known as the Pannion Seer is on the march with a massive army of powerful mages, undead lethal warriors and thousands of cannibalistic zealots. He has set his sights on the city of Capustan to conquer the city and for its citizens to serve as food for his ravening hordes.
Realizing that the city's lone defenders, The Grey Swords, are woefully outmatched, Whiskeyjack and Dujek offer assistance. Because there are other more powerful forces propelling the Pannion, former enemies of the Malazans also offer alliance. The Warlord Caladan Brood and the mysterious Tiste Andii Anomander Rake march with WhiskeyJack and Dujek to Capustan amidst an uneasy truce.

In the midst of this, the child, Silverfox is aging at a rapid rate as she attempts to fulfill her destiny. Ganoes Paran learns the price of having walked within the sword Dragnipur, a tribe is reunited with their Gods, an ancient wrong is righted, ordinary people become heroic, heroes are shown that they are all too human and a mortal man attempts to save a God.

Right from the start in the first book where we are plopped in the middle of a devastating war and see a young girl possessed with the spirit of a deadly assassin, we are immediately wrapped up in the lives and fortunes of a great many interesting people. There is Whiskeyjack the beloved leader, who is weary of war and politics. There is Tattersail the clever mage whose reincarnation comes at a devastating price. There is Ganoes Paran , once a pawn to be played, becomes a master of the game. There is the fat, affable Kruppe who confounds everyone he meets. There is the mysterious (and wonderfully monikered) Anomander Rake, who has untold powers and hinted at sorrow. There is Empress Laseen, who may not be as evil as we think. And there is Quick Ben, who has many surprises up his sleeve.

Although the subject matter of bloody, horrible war (along with rape, torture, cannibalism and possible world destruction) can be quite heavy, there are still glimpses of humor and wonder in his writing. I like the world he has built. I like the deep history that we learn as the stories progress. I like the idea of the Deck of Dragons where the hierarchy of Gods manifests itself in a deck of cards. And I especially like the fact that while I am pretty sure whom to root for, I am not always sure whom I should root against. Even the seemingly unsympathetic characters seem to have good reasons to do what they do.

While I did read the books in order, I found that I actually had to go back and reread the first book in order to bring myself up to speed for this third one. The second book takes a bit of a detour and, rather than picking up right where the first book left off, it instead follows the story of Ganoes Paran's sister, Felisin and her travels in the deserts of the Seven Cities. While this was a bit of interruption in the action, it does whet the appetite for the eventual reunion of the two siblings both of whom have undergone both physical and metaphysical changes.

I've read fantasy for over 20 years. From Tolkien to Brooks...from Moorcock to Guy Gavriel Kay...from Jordan to Keyes. This series, which does owe a bit to Glen Cook's series (but not a ripoff at all like Goodkind to Jordan's series)...this book starts where Gardens of the Moon (book 1) leaves off. Paran, the Bridgeburners, Quick Ben, Kruppe, Anomander Rake, Whiskeyjack...they all play big parts as they begin to set off to the new threat of the Pannion Seer. New allies come onboard...the Grey Swords...the Barghast White Faces....but with much cost and their own issues. This is not your grandfather's fairy tale...these are adults with issues and flaws which affect others. This is not a happy tale. This is a tale of war, battles, victories, defeats, mayhem, and honor. This is Platoon meeting Fantasy. Told from the warriors. Gods are humanlike and falliable...playing their games, but also very flawed and power-hungry, themselves. In a time where we are in a place of uncertainity with terrorism and a world at large that is out of control, this series carries great power, insight and a realism that most fantasy books lack, or can't even touch. These are complex characters, with complex thoughts, and not always laid out for you like a connect-the-dots. And BOOK 3 is a fantastic over 1000 pg. tome that simply redefines the genre itself.


Other good books:
Tigana: Guy Gavriel Kay
The Barbed Coil: J.V. Jones

After 2 reads and a good number of quick skims through this book I still find it hard to explain exactly why it is one of the best I've ever read. As a great fantasy series this book has it all: It has an amazing cast of characters all in shades of grey, there is a great web of plots and sub plots intertwined and tangled from over three hundred thousand years of wars, dictatorships, genocide and alliances. And for such a hard, gritty and - some may say - dark world, humour regularly and unexpectedly shines through. The Malazan world has so many different races, species and cultures with each having a unique history of losses, great triumphs, kindness and unspeakable acts of cruelty. But every act carried out by a civilisation or person has a good chance of being remembered and there will always be those who seek atonement, revenge or simply comfort. Welcome back to the Malazan world, but there is so much more.

Memories of Ice continues with the stories of most of the characters from Gardens of the moon. Welcome back Kuppe, Paran, Rake, Quick Ben, Tool and others, there are also a number of new faces such as caravan guards Gruntle and Stonny, Lady Envy and the mercenary company called the Grey swords. The main story is centred on the expansion of the Pannion Domain, a newly formed empire which has devoured its neighbours and poses a great threat to the continent of Genabakis. But the horror is that citizens of defeated cities are actually eaten by the armies of the Pannion seer as human flesh is the reward for conquest. In light of this threat Dudek Onearm's host has formed a fragile alliance with Anomander Rake and Caladan Brood to snuff out the Seer before it all gets out of control. The Pannion's starving armies are marching upon Capustan and everyone knows that defending Grey Swords are far too few to hold the city.

Once again Erikson's writing is of the highest calibre, his descriptions are vivid and the action is well paced. There are no info dumps and the revelations are spread thought the book, so don't think that mysteries, dreams or even the chapter prologues are just filler as their importance will probably be revealed in later books (I found out). Even with all the super-beings running amok wielding enough power to flatten cities, Erikson tends to focus on the more human desires and fears of each character making them unique and easy to understand. While all aspects of Erikson's writing are top notch, it is the grand plot unfolding that really sets him above the rest. And finally after 2 books with only hints, we get a glimpse of the great plots, the undercurrents that push the story along. So for those who have followed the complex subplots, this book will be nothing short of astounding.

Deadhouse Gate has a similar subplot but it is not as pronounced as in Memories of Ice. While every character in this book has a good reason or motive to join in the fray, the origin is much deeper and darker than an ordinary war would warrant. Started long before humans, crimes of the highest degree and painful mistakes have caused much suffering and even though the world has moved on, those memories remain. The rich history of the Malazan world rages to the surface and we find that this is not simply the story of an expanding empire. The ancient yearning for redemption and revenge draws old powers and creates new ones, and the inevitable convergence will shatter any illusions of triumph as each party counts its losses.

The term `Epic Fantasy' has been ridiculed of late by the sheer number of appalling offerings that have flooded the market. So it is great to see new standards being set and also a good reminder of what to expect from a true master of epic fantasy.

In Gardens of the Moon, the world of the Malazans was unfurled and the daunting potential of Steven Erikson became evident.

In Deadhouse Gates, book two of the series, the inimitable Chain of Dogs with Coltaine wrought and forged the universe into the fantasy series history books.

With Memories of Ice, amazingly, dazzingly, wondefully, Steven Erikson has bested the first two books in the series. Perhaps, as a whole, better than the first two combined (but (admittedly) with singular event better than the closure of Coltaine's march).

Back are Ganoes Paran (my favorite), Whiskeyjack and Korlat and Anomanader Rake, Dujek and Quick Ben and Mallet and Troc. Introduced are Itkovian and Gruntle and Stonny and Anaster and the Pannion Seer. Additionally greater (much Greater) depth is given to the conflict between the Jaghut and T'lan Imass and the Tiste Andii (with a little mentioned of the the Tiste Edur).

The book, as is Erikson's hallmark, has a bitter end with several not-insignificant characters dying. However, the tale holds together well. Very well.

The bottom line: A classic series is expanded. The whole of literature is the better for it.

[note: approximately 150 words cut from review due to Amazon length requirements.]

Steven Erikson, Memories of Ice (Bantam, 2001)

That a book makes me cry is something of a rarity, despite the fact that movies make me cry at roughly the drop of a hat (one of the reasons I usually avoid chick flicks). That a book makes me cry for fifty solid pages? Unheard of.

Memories of Ice is the third novel in Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen series, which is already a major player in the current field of high-fantasy epic series. That's saying something, because that field is probably more crowded than it has ever been, and with that much more being published, an author has to do a whole lot more to write something truly exceptional. In Steven Erikson's case, he's focused on two aspects of Tolkein that have been sadly neglected in most fantasy writing since-- martial writing and the gritty detail of worldbuilding. Post-Tolkein martial writing in fantasy languished for a number of years before finding a worthy outlet in Elizabeth Moon. I'd hoped that we'd get some really good stuff after that, but Moon started writing more science fiction, where there's always been more good stuff on troop movements, and it disappeared for a while. Erikson has revived it, and on a far wider scale than either Moon or, indeed, Tolkein ever imagined it. Sure, anyone who writes sword-and-sorcery stuff that involves fighting has to do some martial writing, but comparing most authors' battle writing (including such greats as George R. R. Martin) to Erikson's is like comparing a level 1 wizard with a dagger fighting a kobold in Dungeons and Dragons to an all-out epic-level "we need eighty more boxes of miniatures for this..." battle in Chainmail. They both have their place, but for grandeur, there's no comparison.

As for the world-building, again, everyone does it. You have to. And most people will throw in an odd detail or three to make you sure that this isn't, in fact, an alternate Earth (unless you are the aforementioned Martin, whose epic does, in fact, take place on an alternate Earth). What Erikson has done with this series is impressive; about the only things his world has in common with Earth is that they both have ground, water, and air, and you may question even those assumptions a time or two. This is a world that is, for all intents and purposes, utterly alien, and with overwhelming amounts of complex detail, and yet Erikson has written it all in such a way that the reader will be able to get it all figured out in his head for too long.

Here I'm going on about the brilliance of the whole series, rather than this book. Deadhouse Gates, the second book in the series, was a brief diversion from the continent of Genabackis and the exploits of the Bridgeburners. Memories of Ice picks up where the first book, Gardens of the Moon, left off, and the timelines of the two books run concurrently. This time, the Bridgeburners are fighting the Pannion Domin, a tyrannical empire looming up from the south who seem unstoppable. In order to do so, they have to ally with their enemies from Gardens of the Moon, Anomander Rake and his pal Caladan Brood, as well as gathering as many allies from the surrounding areas as possible. Needless to say, though, there are machinations within machinations, and both allies and enemies are cropping up where the Bridgeburners never expected to find them.

Unlike the first two books in the series, Memories of Ice gets a faster start, and is more readable from the get-go, but it's still a pretty slow starter. Erikson is obviously happiest when he's writing big battles, and fully the latter half of this nine-hundred-page doorstop is taken up with descriptions of two battles and their surrounding events. Despite us having a number of old friends to look forward to seeing again, there are a number of new characters we need introduced to, and we get them in the first hundred fifty pages or so, along with some reacquainting of ourselves with the Bridgeburners still on Genabackis, Anomander Rake, Kruppe, and the rest of the bunch. Everyone eventually sets off for Capustan to stop the Pannion Domin in its tracks, and once again, as with the first two books, when the swords start swinging and the cussers start blasting, you will forego food and sleep to find out what happens next.

It's about as good as Deadhouse Gates, and I had intended to give it the same rating until I got to the last chapter. The last battle has been fought, and all the loose ends are being tied up, but it's the way in which Erikson ties them up that's so stunning. He'd already given new meaning to the phrase "kill your darlings," laid the groundwork for the next two books (House of Chains and Midnight Tides are both presaged here) at least, destroyed a couple of major cities, etc. What more can the man do? In short, wraps things up, and in Memories of Ice, he does so with the same spirit and depth that infuses his martial writing. These are characters with whom we've spent, in some cases, upwards of sixteen hundred pages, though the most poignant passages in the wrap-up here occur with characters we've met just in this novel. It is testament to Erikson's ability to characterize that a reader can empathize so deeply with Erikson's characters, despite so much of the book taking place on so massive a scale.

This is an amazing novel in an amazing series. If you're a fan of fantasy-- and even if you're not-- and you haven't given Steven Erikson's Malazan books a try yet, you're doing yourself a disservice. This one will easily be on my ten-best list this year. *****

The book is a short description of legends of Maniilaq -- an
Eskimo prophet of the 19th century. I found it beautiful. God speaks to all people and his message is the same everywhere. Highly recommended.

An awsome book a story of a Prophet "Maniilaq" from
Northwest Alaska a story worth telling and should be known
worldwide and would probably make a good movie with the
right director and actors etc.. Get this book you'll be
glad u did -jg in alaska say's HI to my people- :)

Wonderful! If you are looking for an uplifting book without it being preachy, this is the one you want.
Historically accurate, imaginative, and well researched.
The cover art is beautiful.
The content is wonderful; it would be a great book for a multi-cultural class.

Further evidence that God speaks to man and would free us from superstition and fear, this is a story for adult and child in every nation and culture. Its narrative allows the reader to sit with Inupiaq Elders and experience the oral tradition of American native culture. I'm currently reading it to my six-year-old, a real critic.

This is a wonderful book for anyone and any age. It can inspire us and give us all comfort knowing that the "grandfather" in the sky cares for all of us. It is an easy read told through the words of the elders. It is a very wonderful book and is a reminder of how we are all God's children. I highly recommend it!!!

This is a great book- but it has nothing to do with a Native American boy living in the east! Mindy is a Hopi girl living in Arizona!

Susan has a lovely writing style and a deep understanding of her Hopi culture. I recommend this book for those wanting to learn more about the Hopi culture from the Hopi viewpoint.

This is a timely book, especially with the typical flurry of Native American activities that start in November in schools around the nation. One of the best qualities of this book is that it shows that Naiche is like any other American boy: has a family, lives in a house, eats pizza, plays soccer, and wears cargo pants. Native Americans are still the subject of stereotypes fueled by many aspects of society. For example, sports team mascots that reinforce people's ignorance. This book goes a long way toward showing that Native children have the same dreams and needs as all of our children.

This is a beautifully written and photographed book that should be on every teacher's reading list, public library, and family bookshelves.

Having seen an advance copy of this extremely informative and enjoyable book, I can urge teachers and parents looking for entertaining material on how Native Americans in the East live today to buy this book. It tells the story of a multi-tribal boy and his daily life. Dr. Tayac has an engaging writing style and the history and culture are presented in a very accessible manner.

Naiche is described so stirringly in this book by Dr. Tayac that any native or non-native American would want to know him. Many American children in 2002 grow up multi-culturally and this wonderfully written children's book clearly evokes a compelling portrait of Naiche's world. The richness of Naiche's Indian culture will expand the horizons of any child who reads this page turner.

This book will inform and entertain youngsters from second to sixth grade. Youngsters from about third to sixth grade can read this book independently while first and second graders can have it read to them. It demonstrates the daily life of a real native child and shows how many American Indian children live in the eastern region of the U.S. today. It also corrects common beliefs that many youngsters between ages 6 and 11 or 12 hold, that native children live in teepees and wear deerskin clothes etc. The author, Dr. Gabrielle Tayac, a Piscataway Indian and Naiche's cousin writes clearly and is obviously familiar with her reader and subject. She knows Naiche and his family well and communicates this to her audience in a interesting manner. The photography and the text mesh beautifully to tell the true life story of a contemporary native family through the eyes of a child.

Steve Rudd's medical/academic mystery fills the void left by Kate Fansler's exit and gives readers a savvy new profiler, Chris Van Zant. Like Irving's A Widow for One Year, Midnight Red may teach the reader more than he/she wants to know. The mind-stretch is worth the risk.

This is a great book by a new Southern author--a lawyer, physician, and now a writer. The book is both suspenseful and descriptive. It is a screenplay in the making!

This is terrific fiction. The characters are varied and interesting. The plot is engrossing but not too complicated. The ending is terrific. It must be fiction, but a previous reviewer said that the Tuscaloosa Werewolf and the Buckhead Vampire were real cases. How could the author know so much about these unsolved cases? Could he be one of these famous serial killers coming up for air? Or both? Frank Freemon (Nashville).

I just finished this book and it is great! It has a lot of twists and turns and the plot is fast paced. I would recommend it to anyone looking for a good book that you can't put down! Some of this may be based on actual facts because I think I remember some of this in the news...that makes it even scarier! Great book, highly recommended...but lock your doors if you are reading it at night.

This book is about a string of serial killings in Atlanta back in the summer of 2000, when a bunch of high-profile people wound up dead in their houses in Buckhead (kind of the Beverly Hills 90210 of the South) with all their blood sucked out of them & all the doors & windows locked & all kinds of high-end security systems still online. Police had no clue, really. Then this kind of scary but hot little supersmart psychiatrist named Kristin Van Zant showed up & it was like she would see what was going on where nobody else could. She even went on a local talk radio show & called the killer out & led to his capture. (Kris is kind of like Jennifer Love Hewitt's character on the Ghost Whisperer except with her it's psycho killers she can communicate with like nobody else can & not dead people) Then when the "Buckhead Vampire" comes up for trial, Kris gets the judge to make her the expert witness for the DEFENSE & pretty soon she's treating the Vampire herself at this max-security psych ward at Grady Memorial Hospital. Then there's this shocker scene at the end where Kris brings about justice for all concerned where the courts can't...but I better quit with the plot here cause I'm getting into spoiler territory, I think.
Anyway, I know this is supposed to be fiction, but the sister of a friend of mine was like an intern for an Atlanta TV station back in 2000 & she says that really WAS a Buckhead Vampire serial killer back then, but the powers that be hushed it up. Too, in the book Kris' family got killed when she was a little girl by a serial killer called the Tuscaloosa Werewolf, & this uncle of mine went to Bama back in the '70s when this was supposed to happen & he says there really WAS a Tuscaloosa Werewolf. But I guess that's a whole other urban legend, huh?

Very helpful manual for the advanced modeler. I am not an advanced modeler but even I found the book helpful. So it is suitable for all skill levels.

Steve Zaloga is a superb historian of US and Soviet military equipment, and a very capable model builder, as well as an extremely talented writer, so you really cannot go wrong with any title he has written. Where Amazon has gone wrong is that they have confused his two books on "Modelling the US Army M4 Sherman Tank" as different editions of the same book. If you click on the "paperback" edition link above, you'll find the companion volume, which deals with building the early variants of the Sherman family with the 75 mm gun. This second volume deals with the later, 76 mm gun versions.
Since space is at a premium in these little booklets, Zaloga just addresses variants actually used by American forces (some, like the M4A4, and late M4A2 versions were used only by Allied troops). He points up some basic improvements needed to make the available kits accurate, and includes very helpful "in progress" photos to illustrate the fixes. He also shows the novice how to deal with the individual link tracks included in some Sherman kits, which are challenging to assemble, unless you build a simple jig. And since he likes to display completed models in small vignettes, you get some nice tips on producing dioramas, as well.

This book is really geared for advanced modelers. It does have some nice color photos including some beautiful models by the author. But the modeling tips are really more advanced and are a bit beyond my current abilities. Maybe someday I'll be able to put this to better use.

I am an experienced armor modeler but I am always looking for new painting and weathering techniques. I found this book to offer several color schemes and painting approaches for the Sherman tank. I have been able to take and adapt the author's ideas to my work on some recent models. My litmus test for modeling books is simple: whether it helps me improve my skills in the hobby or not. This book did.

I do not have the time or patience for scratch building using styrene plastic and I seldom use aftermarket parts on my models--in part because I have a hard time making large cuts on a $40 plus tank model that I may or may not be able to repair. The author provided information about upgrading Sherman tank models with aftermarket parts and scratchbuilding parts. That is not, as stated, my interest, albeit it may be interesting or valuable to another modeler with different skills.

I have three other books of the same genre by the same author; I have ordered another. My opinion is that these are good products for the serious modeler and worth the money.

Dr. Mark McDonald

Mr. Zaloga, a noted armor historian, strikes again with this volume in the Osprey Modelling series. This volume is themed around the famous M4 "Sherman" tank with the 75mm gun. The later "Shermans" with 76mm guns will be in a follow-on volume. This voluime has a brief overview and several model projects in different scales. The quality of workmanship is tremendous and each chapter has lots of historical information as well as modelling techniques. Each model has in-progress photos as well as descriptions and photographs of the finished project. This book is very handy for beginners as well as advanced modelers and should be in the collection of any person who enjoys military vehicle modeling.

If you're looking for a book that will free you to think for yourself independent of church rules, this is the one.

I first read the book in 1969 and have re-read it many times over the years. It helped tremendously with guilt I felt from being raised in a strict religion and freed me to find my own spiritual path. An honest and exceptional book.

I read this at the age of 14.....I have read better books over the years but to me, it was as influential a book as I have ever read. I am a former Catholic clergyperson hoping to be ordained in the United Church of Christ. If anyone reading this knows how to contact James Kavanaugh, please thank him for me. If you know his email, please get it to me!

I read this book in the early 70s & remember thinking: Blow out your lantern Diogenes, here is YOUR MAN! After that, I read every thing James Kavanaugh wrote. And am still reading. Not only honest, he has style, class and a way with words unequaled in modern poetry. Nuff said.

Poet and former priest James Kavanaugh continues to write and publish poetry that changes lives, encourages souls, inspires unfettered spirituality, and helps us embrace the love that is loose in the world and beyond. This title, one of his earliest, and the many more that he's written since, have sold over 16 million copies, and every poetry reading he gives is sold out. This quiet man writes prose and poetry that sings of the love of God that we return to God and share with each other, and it helps us recognize the sacred in our lives.

James Kavanaugh tells us amazing and startling things about the priesthood and the Catholic Church in general. As a Roman Catholic, I find this book very enlightening and informative.

Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/R338H2QE35SZT9 Professor Knowlton has only gotten better in the years since I was privledged to be in his classroom. Anyone needing to learn to think critically about ethical quandries - be you a journalist or a student of life - can learn from this great book. Be sure to also check out another book I have found of great value from Professor Knowlton The Journalist's Moral Compass: Basic Principles

Thanks!
Andy Greider

This is an extremely well written collection of essays and case studies outlining the ethical issues behind journalism, which can be useful to both practicing journalists and media watchdogs. The book starts by dividing journalistic ethics into political, philosophical, and economic categories, in addition to issues of objectivity and privacy. This is followed by real-life case studies in which reporters and editors had to make tough ethical decisions regarding everything from crime to suicide, AIDS to car accidents, and political scandals to war reporting. The most refreshing aspect of this book is its insistence that none of these ethical crises have clear cut-and-dried answers, and that the process of examination and decision making in the face of such dilemmas is most important, while much can be learned from the experiences of the real-life journalists profiled here. This book impressively covers these very difficult questions. [~doomsdayer520~]

A terrific and entertaining read for anyone but a nessesity for any and all journalists.

This is a very good book and any journalist should read it. This is a very thorough book. A good read.

The book was thorough and efficient. The cases are challenging but are given to expand and open a journalist's mind ethically. The commentaries help the reader sort out what they just encountered while it presents all sides of a possible ethical decision. The commentaries doesn't demand that the reader take on a certain ethical decision, but instead produce options that exercises the student's mind. Literally, a reader's brain will hurt after closing this book. However, it's a good thing, the book works to produce ethically thoughtful journalists who will venture out into the field. It is a book I plan on keeping on my shelf, while keeping it's teachings in the back of my mind.

Santoka was a royal pain in the posterior for his long-suffering wife. No doubt he reeked from days on the road and a daily diet of sake and pickles and not much else. His manners, too, were less than couth. Not much about his personal life comes through the sometimes barely permeable wall between Japanese and English, and perhaps that's good for Santoka's English readers. The Japanese are a bit more tolerant of this kind of behavior, especially when one has a real literary genius to contend with. It's a fact: telling simplicity, and an incredible ear for saying (in the originals) just enough to make the magic happen. I've wrestled with translating this man's work and English doesn't even begin to begin to convey what Santoka does with the layers of meaning in the Chinese characters (Kanji) as well as the very sound of the Japanese itself. Take, for instance, that famous poem that sounds a bit like a commercial for a clothing company (Blue Mountain is a clothing chain in Japan that sells cheap suits to salary men)--that goes something like: "Push apart/ enter/ push apart/ enter/ blue mountain"? Well, it mimics, among other things, the sound of a work gang in the original. No kidding--that repetitive drum-beat in miniature. You can't get that into English, folks. No translation into English--not even these--can help you "get" Santoka's rightness as well as his breath-taking simplicity. The most one gets is an approximation here, a pointing. The original Japanese is where the real Santoka shows his stuff and no translation, however deft, is going to give him to you. I lived in Kyushu for eight years and am familiar with Kumamoto and those blue mountains that you can't look away from. On the train going to work in the morning and coming home in the evening I'd watch them and think "Santoka walked there."

This is a good book of translations, and one sturdy enough for those who want to take it along on their own forays into "walking Zen," though only a fool would elect to follow Santoka's path. Those blue mountains are steep and dangerous and you have to be sturdy and single-minded as a mule to climb them.

Kaneda Santoka, Mountain Tasting (Weatherhill, 1980)

Kaneda Santoka, itinerant Zen monk, storied drunkard, and haiku poet, never achieved the fame in the West as did more traditional haiku poets like Basho and Soseki. Some few admirers of his work have been silently pulling strings offstage to change that, and while it hasn't happened yet, things slowly progress.

Santoka was on the cusp of the nontraditional haiku movement when he began writing, and was drawn to the idea of haiku that didn't use seasonal imagery, nor stick to the exact seventeen-line syllable used for traditional haiku in Japan. In the hands of a good enough poet, nontraditional Japanese haiku remain haiku; short, image-laden pieces that beg reflection from the reader while offering a quick view through the eyes of the poet. And Santoka was assuredly a good enough poet.

This selection of just over three hundred haiku from his works was, to my knowledge, the first collection of his work published in English (a complete works has been published in Japan, along with a few biographies). Santoka's haiku are deceptively simple, but open farther upon meditation (which is why the books' subtitle calls them "Zen haiku," presumably):

Going deeper
and still deeper
the green mountains.

or

The green grass!
I return, barefoot.

A wonderful little book, well worth reading. Especially recommended for aspiring haiku poets who write in English, as Santoka's haiku translate very well and are also excellent examples of nontraditional haiku in English. *** ½

MOUNTAIN TASTING : ZEN HAIKU BY SANTOKA TANEDA. Translated by John Stevens. 126 pp. New York and Tokyo : Weatherhill, 1980 and Reprinted.

Santoka's life may seem tragic. Son of a womanizing father who lost the family property through an unwise business venture; a mother who committed suicide by throwing herself into a well when he was eight; himself a university dropout; failed jobs; alcoholism; a failed marriage; a series of nervous breakdowns; a suicide attempt which failed when the train was just able to stop in time. How could such a man have become one of Japan's best-loved poets? And what, we wonder, could we ourselves possibly have to learn from him? The answer to this last, in a word, is everything.

Santoka was pulled from the tracks and taken to a nearby Zen temple. The head priest, Gian Mochizuki Osho, a shrewd and kindly man, simply took him in without any reprimands or questions, and offered to let him stay as long as he liked. Santoka had always been interested in Buddhism, and after one year of Zen meditation, chanting sutras, and working around the temple, at the age of forty-two he was ordained a Zen priest. The Zen he was ultimately to practice, however, though traditional, was unusual. It was the Zen of solitary walking. The open road was to become his home and his monastery.

John Stevens has provided a truly interesting and moving account of Santoka's life and work which will fill you in on the details. Suffice to say here that Santoka's first walking pilgrimage through Japan, begging as he went from village to village, began in April 1926 and was to last for four years. During this trip to Shikoku, he visited the 88 shrines and temples associated with the Buddhist saint Kukai (774-835) to pray for the troubled spirit of his departed mother.

There is a wonderful photograph of Santoka on page 30, which shows him setting out on a similar pilgrimage in 1933. With his straw sandals, white cotton pants, long robe, monk's staff, and large woven straw hat, he looks an odd, if not laughable, figure. Few would suspect they were looking at a person of incredible courage, someone who had undertaken the most fearsome and difficult task of all, the full acceptance and savoring of the moment, despite what it may bring.

All told, Santoka is said to have walked more than twenty-eight thousand miles, starting out each morning penniless and with no food, and not knowing where he would stay or even if he would find lodging for the night. These were very hard miles, miles which brought sun and rain, generosity and hostility, food and hunger, smiles and scowls, health and illness, thirst and pure water, loneliness and moments of companionship, grief and intense happiness, but moments always lived with the thought that everything should be welcomed, whether good or bad, just as he himself was not judged but welcomed and taken in by the kindly Gian.

The record of his various thoughts, feelings, perceptions, and of the myriad sights and sounds he encountered on his walks of self-discovery, will be found in his poems. The poems are characterized by an absolute simplicity, an absolute honesty, a total absence of artifice. In a world such as ours, brimming over as it is with lies, disinformation, propaganda, and the totally phony, Santoka's spontaneous utterances come to us like a pure, cool, and refreshing breath of air. He is even, as Stevens points out, honest about his failure to solve what for him was the ultimate Koan - sake.

After his very fine 29-page Introduction, Stevens has given us 372 of Santoka's free-style haiku in excellent translations. Since the poems are linguistically very simple, their literal meaning carries over easily into English. What is lost, however, as Stevens points out, is the beautiful rhythm, assonance, and onomatopoeia of many of the poems, and to offset this he has thoughtfully provided, at the bottom of each page, the romanized Japanese of the originals, a few of which are accompanied by his notes. He has also provided a useful Selected Bibliography of both Japanese and English sources at the end of the book.

Here, to give you a taste of Santoka, is Poem 18 as translated and annotated by Stevens (with my indication of pronunciation added). A halftone of Santoka's striking brush calligraphy of this poem has been used as frontispiece to the book:

"Going deeper / And still deeper - / The green mountains.

Wake itte mo wake itte mo aoi yama [wa-ke it-te mo wa-ke it-te mo a-o-i ya-ma]. This was written in early summer in the mountains of Kumamoto Prefecture and is perhaps Santoka's best-known poem. Deeper and deeper into the human heart without being able to fathom its depth. . . ." (page 37).

The human heart, yes, but also self, nature, time, reality, the mystery of existence, and, ultimately, the world of Buddha, or, for others, God.

Santoka's great merit is that he returns us to a reality that is also ours, though most of the time we choose to overlook it. I can't even begin to do justice to him here - he's just too big. But what can be said is that there is a depth and resonance to his poems that will evoke a powerful response in all sensitive readers. His love of the simple things in life, of nature, and of all life-forms and living creatures, is infectious.

'Mountain Tasting' is a golden book that would make a wonderful gift for someone very special to you, but you'd better not start reading it - or you won't want to part with it!

There is a notion of the spiritual life especially prevalent in Christian circles that our shortcomings are something we should seek to eliminate. As in so many other aspects of our life these days, we "wage war" on the many things that make us less than ideal specimens. Obesity, drinking, sexual hangups, shiftlessness, and a hundred other vices are seen as antithetical to the spiritual life. One of the things that Santoka has helped me to understand is how narrow a view of the life of the spirit this kind of thinking is. Santoka was by most people's standards a shiftless drunk. He was poor, unemployed (in fact he lived as a beggar) and content to remain so. His family and marital life were pretty much a disaster. That he was also one of Japan's greatest haiku poets is, according to the narrow, eliminate-the-vice, make-something-of-your-life mentality, an achievement in spite of his failings. I see his poetry as a measure of his success in living with his vices, and at least in part of deriving from them some of the depth and simplicity that makes his work so appealing. As psychologist Thomas Moore tells us, the things we seem to fail in may in fact be our path to greater spiritual depth, not necessarily by overcoming them, but in learning from them about a spiritual reality that is direct and earthy and real. It is a spirituality of not arriving, or, what amounts to the same thing, of arriving with every step. There is no destination, only the journey. Although there were other poor, itinerant haiku poets, none, not even the great Issa, is as earthy as Santoka, "earthy" not in a vulgar sense, though he and Issa too could be delightfully and sometimes not-so-pleasantly vulgar, but in that he lives very close to the physical reality of life largely unmediated by social security, health insurance, family, friends, and a "real" job.

Santoka finds a very sympathetic interpreter in John Stevens, whose translation and brief biographical summary are the best introduction you'll find to this great poet. Burton Watson's For All My Walking: Free-Verse Haiku of Taneda Santoka is also worth reading, especially for the translation of Santoka's diary excerpts, but the haiku selection is (deliberately, because he didn't want to duplicate Stevens) not as rich. Stevens gives us the cream. Of course, there are also many of Santoka's haiku in Reginald Blyth's still unsurpassed anthology of haiku (Haiku, in four volumes), and Blyth's translations are unfailingly insightful. But in Stevens we have more, and we have it all together.

If you're interested in other books on haiku, I've posted a bibliography of my personal recommendations (in PDF format) at http://www.redrockyellowstone.com. Once there, go to The Art of Haiku and click the link entitled "Read more about haiku..."

Beware! The haiku of Santoka is nuanced and subtle - deceptively simple:

The green grass!
I return barefoot.

Upon my first reading I had the overwhelming impulse to race through the book which I gave into. But then, I found myself reaching for it and savouring one or two of these wonderful translations.

For those writers of haiku, trying to imitate Santoka's style is quite an exercise. How to approach:

Even the sound of the raindrops
Has grown older.

or

The moonlight

pierces
my empty stomach

These haiku will resonate long after you put the book down.

I agree with everyone who loves this book, which combines the historical scholarship of Fernando Ortiz with careful transcriptions of New York-based bata drummers, including Jesus Perez, Julio Collazo, and Puntilla.

This book is all rhythms, marvelous if you are a drummer or other musician, do not get this if you are looking for a history of santeria.

This book DOES include the CD, which is indispensable for learning the rhythms. There is only one ISBN for the BOOK/CD set, which is 0-941677-70-2. If your copy doesn't contain the CD, return it for one that does, and do NOT buy the CD from dealers who try to sell it separately for as much as $200 on Amazon marketplace and elsewhere.

Happy drumming!

This is a great book for learning about the music of santeria, but it has some short comings as far as TEACHING how to play the bata drums. This book covers historical background, musical structure and provides notations for many traditional bata songs. I would not consider it to be an instructional book.

My book came with a CD, which is perhaps the best recording I have been able to find of traditional bata drumming (most discs have vocals with the drumming that make it difficult to specifically concentrate on the drums). This disc consists of recordings of specific songs being performed on bata drums.

I wish that the CD would have broken up the parts for the indivdual drums to make that easier to hear. I would also have liked to have some instructional demonstrations on the disc to hear various techniques of playing the bata drums. The text is also weak on instructional techniques for the drums with only 9 photographs and 1 page of text dedicated to teaching technique. There is no discussion or demonstration for the use of bata drums with contemporary music. I realize that this is not the intention of this book, and apparently teaching technique is not either. (I sure would like to find a book dealing with these issues!)

Having been a student of Amira's, and having travelled to Cuba several times, I know a little about what this book means for people who study Afro-Cuban sacred rhythms. Cornelius is also a drummer and ethnomusicologist.
This book is accurate, interesting, and extremely informative. But it is a shame that Amazon doesn't carry the CD that goes with this book--it is a clearly laid out study of the most important rhythms. I have known some drummers who grew up playing in Havana to get excited when they heard this recording, and ask to play specific sections over again to study them in detail.
This book is satisfying to all levels--from the beginner who wants to start learning a little about the rhythms, to the advanced scholar who is ready to dive into the details. The authors are completely trustworthy sources of information and this is a work of devotion and years of study.

The book did what I was looking for to do in regard to the bata drumming styles and rhythms. This is the real timimg of the Yoruba-Nigerian and Cuban expressions of the bata drums. I hope it would had the same effect on you as it did to me. Even if you are not a musician or just love community drumming the bata rhythms are the original trive toques(Spanish)of the Afro-Caribean Cuban Santeros and the Latinos Musicians that used them in Salsa Music of today.

This book is great!!!! This book provides the only transcription of sacred rhythms of Santeria I have been able to find. The transcriptions are accurate. The authors are also very respectful of the religious nature of the music. This book is useful for both musicians and non-musicians.

The collaborative editorial effort of Steven Gould Axelrod, Camille Roman, and Thomas Travisano, The New Anthology Of American Poetry: Volume Two, Modernisms 1900-1950 compiles over 600 poems by sixty- five American poets from the era of 1900 to 1950, including T. S. Eliot, Gertrude Stein, Robert Frost, Langston Hughes, and many more. Offering a diversity of styles, and themes, this second volume of The New Anthology Of American Poetry also presents introductions, bibliographies, biographies, up-to-date footnotes and endnotes, and more to assist the reader in both understanding poetry and find more works by a given author. Very highly recommended both as an introduction to early twentieth-century American poetry and as a broad smorgasbord to experience and learn from a panoply of magnificent classic works.

The collaborative editorial effort of Steven Gould Axelrod, Camille Roman, and Thomas Travisano, The New Anthology Of American Poetry: Volume Two, Modernisms 1900-1950 compiles over 600 poems by sixty- five American poets from the era of 1900 to 1950, including T. S. Eliot, Gertrude Stein, Robert Frost, Langston Hughes, and many more. Offering a diversity of styles, and themes, this second volume of The New Anthology Of American Poetry also presents introductions, bibliographies, biographies, up-to-date footnotes and endnotes, and more to assist the reader in both understanding poetry and find more works by a given author. Very highly recommended both as an introduction to early twentieth-century American poetry and as a broad smorgasbord to experience and learn from a panoply of magnificent classic works.

Edited by Steven Gould Axelrod, Thomas Travisano, and Camille Roman, this anthology is a joy. It will make you want to read--and re-read. The editors, not limited by any one canon, worked together to present the range of American poetry of the period. The anthology lays out the richness of the "modernist" American literary heritage with care and love. There are generous selections from a range of the "modernist" writers in addition to surprising selections from immigrant and native american poetry and from popular song. The introductions and notes are thoughtful and deeply intelligent. This anthology promises to be a classic.

This is not an anthology which aims to select and represent the finest examples of American poetry. It is an anthology which aims to ' represent' various groups, including the recognized schools of poetry, but also including ethnic and minority groups. Thus it opens with Native American verse, and closes with verse written from Japanese interred in America during the Second World War. I may be mistaken but it seems to me that it does not represent in a great way the American experience in the Second World War.
This does not mean it does not have generous selections from all the major poets. It does.
It does not mean that it does not contain tens of little known poets whose work may be interesting in one way or another. It does.
It does mean that it mixes up a vast amount of material of different levels. And that it does have a certain political agenda.
What is moving and meaningful as poetry, I would suggest, is some part of this. But the reader should certainly be able to find work here which is moving, inspiring and meaningful poetry.

The previous review by Mr. Freedman is misleading, I believe. I myself am quite a conservative scholar and have little time for what some call "political correctness." (I would note in passing that I never heard anyone on the Left use this silly phrase seriously until a number of useful idiots from the Reagan era took up the mantra in an effort to let bigots feel comfortable fighting back.)

Regardless, I adopted this text for my Modern American Poetry course this fall not because it features the sorts of poetry Mr. Freedman describes. (I have no intention of assigning any of it.) Rather, I adopted it because it gives a much fuller representation of modern American poetry than most of the Norton knockoffs now on the market. For instance, *The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry* doesn't offer a single line by Trumbull Stickney, one of the "Harvard poets" of the genteel tradition, who was greatly admired by the likes of Conrad Aiken. This anthology prints five poems. Moreover, several other "white penis people," in Robert Hughes's phrase, appear here after having been summarily banished from ostensibly conservative anthologies. (Here, "conservative" appears to mean "too damned lazy to read much.")

Yes, this anthology has a political agenda. However, to pretend that others don't is to insult the intelligence of readers. From my perspective (a good liberal who believes, nevertheless, in Milton, Dryden, Pope), this is a genuinely democratic anthology. True, it includes poems by Native Americans, immigrants, and migrant workers. However, it also includes "The Old Rugged Cross," "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?", "You're A Grand Old Flag," "Alexander's Ragtime Band," "I'm Just Wild About Harry," and "Goodnight, Irene." The anthologists' agenda, simply put, is to open the canon back up and paint a more genuinely representative portrait of American verse in the modernist era.

In sum, if Mr. Freedman fears the "The Idea of Order at Key West" can't stand the competition, all I can say is that his faith in Wallace Stevens is far weaker than mine.