Kansas Books

For police chief Susan Wren, trouble started the day Hollywood decided to go on location to shoot a film in her small Kansas town, making her tiny force stretched to the max. However, Trouble with a capital T does not start until stuntwoman Kay Bender, a ringer for superstar Laura Edwards, is killed during a shoot.

During the initial inquiries, Susan learns that Laura has been the victim of several threatening notes. Susan also finds out that her current boy friend, police officer Ben Pankhurst, used to be Laura's spouse, disqualifying him from the case. As Susan digs deeper into the lives of the personalities involved, someone else is murdered. The police chief wonders if she can control her jealousy over Ben's former relationship and if Laura is the ultimate target of the killer.

The fourth Susan Wren mystery is an intriguing who-done-it because it brings much insight into the personal lives of the recurring cast. Though the interspersing of the killer's thoughts into the action seems to cause some inertia, MURDER TAKE TWO remains a well-written, often times humorous novel. Wren fans will have plenty to crow about as they soar like an eagle with Charlene Weir's latest book.

Harriet Klausner

Murder Take Two, by Charlene Weir, is the fourth in a series of high-voltage mysteries. Weir is a master of tight, clean prose; characters the reader can care about; and intricate, twisty plots. Susan Wren, a former San Francisco police officer, becomes police chief of Hampstead, KS, when her new husband, the former chief, is murdered. Initially Susan wants the post because she is driven to catch his killer. Now, three years later, she wonders what is keeping her in this small town where she is still the outsider. Realizing that one part of the answer is something she would prefer not to admit even to herself--her attraction to second in command Ben Parkhurst--she tries unsuccessfully to stamp out her interest in him. In Murder Take Two, a Hollywood film crew is on location in Hampstead. When a stunt double is killed, Susan learns that the movie's leading lady, the lovely Laura, was once married to Parkhurst. Susan orders him off the case, but with Laura begging him to protect her, he can't stay away. As Susan struggles with her jealousy and Parkhurst's insubordination, an appealing young officer, Yancie, follows a string of bizarre episodes to the book's explosive ending. This series has everything going for it: fascinating characters, a sense of place so real you find yourself slapping mosquitoes, and ingenuous, complex plots. Don't miss it.

It helps me to undetstand my self better and find may wy bag home. It would be good to have this book translated in german. I would sell it many times in my bookstore. How can I order as al seller?

It helps me to undetstand my self better and find may wy bag home. It would be good to have this book translated in german. I would sell it many times in my bookstore. How can I order as al seller?

This book fills a big gaping hole in economic history. There are probably hundreds of books on Nixon and Vietnam, China, and Watergate. But very few exist on his other policies, including his economic policies. This is especially strange considering that his Administration presided over the final destruction of the gold standard, first sustained budget deficits, and the beginning of the Great Recession of 1970s.

Thus, this book is extremely useful. Almost month-by-month it describes the swinging pendulum of booms and busts that resulted from Nixon's economic mismanagement and the world economy's response to it. This is a very thorough work, meticulously documented. The author carefully documents endless cases of sacrifice of economic policies to blatantly short-term political goals.

It's also a good narrative, it weaves all the facts and explanation together, and it's organized very well. I found it very easy to read and understand it. It sheds much light on the economic causes of all those strange events of the 1970s. It's also a great companion to a more general history of USA during those years.

Over the last decade or so, there has been a substantial rethinking of the Nixon presidency.... Until the appearance of Allen Matusow's new book, however, Nixon's economic policies had not received a similar reassessment. In a very readable and well researched exploration of Nixon's economics, Matusow makes a compelling case that Nixon held no principled position whatsoever and that his economic policies were overtly and explicitly driven by his attempts to create a new electoral majority.... The Nixon presidency, as seen through Matusow's account, becomes an excellent case study in public-choice economics and the failures of interventionism.Three major strengths of Matusow's book deserve special mention. First, he has made extensive use of archival materials that were inaccessible until recently. By using the presidential office files, Bob Haldeman's extensive notes, and the various books and recollections of Nixon's associates, he has assembled a large amount of material from a variety of sources to document various meetings and discussions in great detail. The result is a very ugly view of the politicization of economic policy that puts one in mind of the old saw about not wanting to know how sausages or laws are made....A second strength of the book, of special interest to economists, is Matusow's careful documentation of the role played by well-known economists in the Nixon administration. Arthur Burns, Herbert Stein, Paul McCracken, Milton Friedman, and others all have starring roles in the drama. Except Friedman, none of them presents an appealing picture. Matusow extensively documents the ways in which Nixon's economic advisors were quick to sacrifice principles, particularly free-market principles, for political expediency.... Matusow makes extensive use of Friedman's Newsweek columns to illustrate the ways in which Nixon's policies did not correspond with the Friedman's free-market, monetarist line....The book's third strength is Matusow's use of economics. In more than three hundred pages of analysis of Nixon's economics, I found very few places where Matusow made an obvious error of theory or history.... But in most cases he handles the economics nicely, especially in his discussions of inflation, where he keeps the behavior of the money supply always at the forefront, and the energy crisis, where he does a fine job of documenting the various government interventions that precipitated the crisis and the horrendous policy mistakes that exacerbated it.... Matusow deserves particular praise for his discussion of Bretton Woods and the gold window, in which he deals with some complicated issues in international monetary economics and does a good job of rendering them comprehensible....Matusow has carefully and cogently documented Nixon's use of the instruments of power in pursuit of his own political goals and illuminated the disastrous results (double-digit inflation and the worst recession since the 1930s, not to mention a legacy of interventionism that has continued to the present) that Nixon's economics engendered. Matusow's book, though not couched in such terms, is an excellent case study in public-choice economics and is recommended to students of public choice and recent U.S. economic history.

A well-known author once commented, "You can't go home again." A valid observation, in a sense, but I contend that Deryl Leamng did go home again, as exhibited in his book, and discovered himself.

The book affords the reader not only a trip down Dr. Leaming's "memory lane", but provides incredible insight into the framework of the times. The reader is drawn into the carefree, unsophisticated lifestyle of the author's early years growing up in a small, southwestern Kansas town. We follow him through humble beginnings fraught with tragedy and significant change. Yet, with all the disorder in his young life there is never any indication of resentment or reproach. Quite the contrary, we read about happy-go-lucky times spent with family and friends who appeared to alleviate most of the hardships.

Throughout the book are glimpses of events within the immediate locale as well as the big world "out there somewhere" and how they were relevant in the life of the author. Dr. Leaming begins each chapter with lyrics from songs of an appropriate time period which sets the mood for that reminiscence. He also cleverly inserts a myriad of items at the end of each chapter, which are pertinent to the indicated years, to give the reader a glimpse into the significant contrast of lifestyles then and now.

This "Tale" is definitely one person's story but it goes far beyond that by documenting for the reader the constancy, constitution, and courage of the people of those times in America. I have a feeling that the author took that "trip down memory lane" for self-contemplation and discovery. Very courageous of him!

My mom n' dad were dust-bowl babies, so I grew up tongue-lashed about being "spoiled" and how my ungrateful generation didn't know how good we had it.

So I stopped listening to mom n' dad's more-than-once-told tales of how tough life was during the Great Depression. Now, after reading this "One-Told Tale in Three-Part Harmony..." I think I get it. And (to rip off William Allen White) I know "what's the matter with Kansas."

It wasn't all doom, gloom and dust clouds way back in 1930s Kansas. Life was slower -- much sloooooower. People commuted by foot and time was measured in hours, not milliseconds. Health care wasn't terribly advanced, but American butts weren't super-sized, either -- and there were no diseases of opulence like bulimia.

And Kansans weren't whining about abortion clinics or joining the local militia -- they were busy trying to survive. A liberal Democrat named FDR drew their appreciation and "big-government" was almost a term of endearment. The author brings all this into a new light and gives a deeper meaning to today's well-worn phrase of the moment, "family values" -- that when times are hard, we survive by our love for one another.

But this book is not a political rant, it's a memoir, penned (apparently) by someone who lived the tale, and whose heart was warmed (and sometimes hurt) by manifold moments of caring and generosity; moments which transcended the austerity of the Great Depression and the stark, wind-baked plains of Kansas.

A well-written account of the early years of US involvement with Ho Chi Minh in the second world war. It is a sad commentary on what might have been. Had the US not abandoned their ally to cruel colonialism, the US and Vietnam may never have suffered the long costly and unnecessary war they did. It seems an all too common tale of strange cold war bed-fellows and betrayel.

This book goes far to provide the background to the recent history of Vietnam and the United States. Ho Chi Minh is not portrayed as a saint but neither is French colonialism. In the portrayal, the nationalist rather than communist undercurrents of the Vietnam war are expounded and explained. A worthy addition to the history of twentieth century Vietnam-US relations.

The OSS and Ho Chi Minh, by Dixee Bartholomew-Feis, was an unexpected pleasure. Books written on the OSS or the British equivalent in World War II, SOE, so frequently fall headfirst into a muddy miasma of internal politics, blame and counter-blame, and a fixation on minutiae that they often obscure more than they illuminate. Thankfully, Bartholomew-Feis gives a well-written and lucid account of the OSS in Viet Nam on the cusp between war and peace in 1945. She steps neither into the "Ho was a nationalist and if only they had listened to the OSS then the Vietnam war never would have happened" camp nor into the "Those naive fools helped Ho get to power and brought communism to Southeast Asia" camp, for which every reader should be grateful.

At first, her book gives one pause. She starts off with dual mini-biographies of Ho Chi Minh and F.D.R. and one wonders where on earth she will go with those. However, once she actually gets from contextual background to Vietnam itself, and begins to display the depth of her research and understanding, the book is on much firmer footing. The OSS encountered the Viet Minh in an intelligence-gathering context, so she focuses first on the intelligence networks in Vietnam and how the Allies used them (introducing the reader to a fascinating "free-lance" intelligence network that gave intel to the British, US and Chinese), then shows how the OSS gradually was introduced into this intelligence context. In the process, she illuminates the tensions between the French in Vietnam and the Vietnamese Communists, between north and south Vietnam, and between the Japanese occupiers and both the French and Vietnamese.

Bartholomew-Feis does a good job describing the various OSS missions into Vietnam at the end of the war and the personalities behind them. What is perhaps most striking is how few, how young, and how junior most of these American personnel were, yet the great responsibilities they had in representing their country in matters relating from intelligence to strategy to policy and diplomacy. Almost as fascinating is how, virtually without exception, all of the Americans (conservative and liberal alike) were impressed with Ho Chi Minh, who must positively have oozed charisma. It is quite interesting to compare the personal relationships between the American OSS representatives and Ho and his close collaborators on one hand with the much more bitter, taxing, and dysfunction relations between the British and Tito (see Dedjier's diaries on his views of the British, for example) or the British and the Albanian communists or the British and the Greek communists. Perhaps the only real comparison is with Mao Zedong who managed to win over a bevy of Westerners from left-wing reporters like Edgar Snow and Agnes Smedley to Marine officers like Evans Carlson. In any case, it is quite interesting to see how genuinely friendly the Vietnamese were towards the Americans, more so than almost all of the other communist movements with which the OSS worked.

Bartholomew-Feis does write, rather often, of how the Vietnamese "manipulated" the Americans, yet some of the incidents of which she writes sound not so much as a deliberate underhanded manipulation so much as they seem a genuine (if perhaps temporary) convergence of interests. She is on firmer footing when she describes how the Vietminh used their rather tenuous official contacts with the United States as a way to gain status and legitimacy. The Vietminh were quite clever in that regard.

Overall, Bartholomew-Feis does an excellent job in covering a difficult and--given the fact that any book on this is heavily burdened with foreshadowing to begin with--sensitive subject. It would have been nice to have seen more use of Vietnamese sources but overall the book is well-researched and Bartholomew-Feis demonstrates a considerable grasp of her subject.

I have read scores of books on the OSS and SOE dealing with various resistance movements in World War II and I think this is definitely one of the better ones. Scholars and general readers interested in intelligence gathering during World War II, the origins of the Indochina War, Vietnamese nationalism, and the end of the Second World War will all be interested in this well-written study. I recommend it.

My kids love this series! The story is suspenseful and easy to read at the same time. I'm always looking for good books that will keep my son's attention. As a reluctant reader, my son needs stories with a tight plot and lots of action, and it's sometimes hard to find books he will like. But he really loves the Prairie Skies series. And I know it will help both my kids understand this period of history a lot better.

Here is another book by Hopkinson, but this time a chapter book story for older elementary. This story is about a boy whose family is fighting in the Civil War and his personal experience with finding a runaway slave. The book contains interesting pencil drawings to illustrate the story. Besides the obvious bridge to Civil War history, the availability of multiple books by this author could enable an author study in this case.

Pioneer Naturalist on the Plains.. is more than the story of Elam Bartholomew. His diaries not only gives the reader an insightful look at this remarkable man, we are given a spectacular view of pioneer life. The book does what novels cannot. We see and feel what is like to live the pioneer life through the eyes of Elam. As he carves out a life for his family on the wild frontier, the reader lives his triumphs and tragedies. Anybody interested in the true pioneer spirit of America will find this book a fascinating read.

elam bartholomew kept copious quantities on notes his entire life about the daily adventures of living in western kansas. his life span encompassed travel by horse, then train, then automobile not to mention the advent of electricity and a sod home. a deep and abiding devotion to god country and family propelled this tough individualist thru life. his hobby of plant life and cultures turned into his live work. but his dairy entries on a daily basis opens a window to the reader to feel and experience life on the frontier of america

This book is a wonderful book!!! It really is a great adults book. You feel like one of the gobblers! This would make a great Rob Reiner movie!

The Prairie Adventures of Turk and the Gobblers will keep you in stitches, long after the last page is read. This novel is entertainment at its best!

This book is all the more shocking when you realize that RIGHT NOW the taxpayer, thanks to credulous politicians like Senator Tom Harkin and Congressman Dan Burton and others, is being made to pay for "medical care" that is every bit as crazy as the things in this book. Someday someone will write a book like this but it will be about *present-day* nonsense, including a National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (the only center in the NIH oriented around the needs of practitioners - CAM practitioners in this case - as opposed to the needs of patients) that pays for psychic power therapy, a White House Commission on CAM headed by a former devotee of the Bhagwan guru whose group launched a biological attack in Oregon, and on and on ...

We have had a boom in interest in "alternative health care" recently, but that interest has been with us ever since there has been a medical establishment to which there could be "alternatives." In the American Midwest in the 1930s three alternative healers began a rise to financial, social, and political power. _Quacks & Crusaders: The Fabulous Careers of John Brinkley, Norman Baker, and Harry Hoxsey_ (University Press of Kansas) by Eric S. Juhnke documents the rise and fall of all three medical conmen, and gives a lesson in the dangers of credulousness.

John Brinkley was a licensed doctor, having graduated from a diploma mill. He latched on to the "gland transplant" experiments done on animals, and believed that transplanting animal glands into humans was a key for rejuvenation. "A man is as old as his glands, and his glands are as old as his sex glands," he proclaimed. Male goats were the randiest animals, so they were the tissue donors, but they turned out to be just the thing to boost female fertility and development of the bust, too. He compared himself to Jesus, gave sermons, and demonized the American Medical Association. Norman Baker specialized in cancer cures. He worked as a machinist and in vaudeville before settling down in Muscatine, Iowa. He persuaded city officials to let him start a radio station that would present honest-to-goodness down home programs as opposed to the high-brow fare coming from the cities. Baker called Morris Fishbein, the head of the AMA, the "Jewish dominator of the medical trust of America," and insisted that his clinic was a bastion for personal freedom and against the evils of urban industrialism. Harry Hoxsey proved to have the most staying power. He specialized in herbal cancer cures as well. Not a physician, he was able to enroll renegade physicians into his service, and he was bankrolled by an evangelist minister. In Dallas, he enjoyed poker, nightclubs, and womanizing, and his diatribes against interference by the AMA and the government won him friends from the political right wing.

Juhnke's tales of these colorful characters are great fun to read, even though the rascals bilked many of their patients of money and sometimes their lives. The eventual success of the AMA against them is not a pure victory; the shortcomings of the AMA at the time are examined here, too. Few people remember these quacks now. The towns that boosted them because they brought in business now view them as an embarrassing part of their histories. It is important that Juhnke has brought them again to our attention. We may no longer have such manifestations as goat gland transplants, but anyone who watches television knows that herbal cures, homeopathy, and healing magnets are still taking money from the gullible. There is still a large group of potential patients who view organized medicine (and governmental regulation of medical treatment) as some sort of conspiracy, and of course there are plenty of faith healers who are glad to have their flocks doubting the efficacy of regular medical treatment. People are finding it harder to pay for physicians, and drug costs are up. Brinkley, Baker, and Hoxsey may have eventually lost their power and their millions, but Juhnke's useful study reminds us that there are always healers ready to take their place.

This book is simply outstanding for anybody who has an interest in how the military manages media relations or who wants a different perspective on the Vietnam War. An abridgement of Hammond's two-volume set, this book is still packed with details covering the war from start to finish, providing lessons that remain relevant for today's changing battlefield. As one who is involved in media relations for a living, there's hardly a page in the book that isn't highlighted for future reference. And as one who has read several books on Vietnam, covering everything from tactical operations to strategic objectives, this book put the war in perspective for me as no other book has. However, as I was pouring over every page and sharing what I learned with those around me, one of my colleagues said he had read it as well and found it one of the most laborious books he had ever opened. So perhaps it is not for everybody, but it's a book I will return to again and again as I continue to study the unique relationship forged between the military and the media. And I am also ordering the two-volume set so I can find the even greater detail that was left out of this book.

This is a terrifically important analysis of the way the military and the press interacted during the Vietnam War. Mr. Hammond covers most of the important media events and reports important details of the statements and actions of those in the government and the military as well as those in the press. He also provides keen insight into the implications of those interactions and the effects they hand on later events.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough. I wish I could give it six stars. It is a book that anyone who wants to understand anything at all about the Vietnam War simply has to read. The articles in the two volumes of the Library of America series provide valuable background for this book and I think they should be read first. But even without them any reader would get a great deal from this book.

There are nearly fifty pages of notes, and index, and a generous number of pictures of the main events and participants. Just a wonderful achievement. Thanks to Mr. Hammond!