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Loss of Innocence
Published in Hardcover by Virgin Books (2007-04-17)
List price: $23.95
New price: $4.01
Used price: $0.39
Used price: $0.39
Average review score: 
Read this book....
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-03-16
Review Date: 2008-03-16
Believe those of us who know Mr. Clem and his family - this book is true, comes straight from the heart, and was written to help others going through the same battles with addiction in their families, as well as to help in the healing process. Mr. Clem spends his time (and money) selflessly helping others, and wrote this book with that intent. He does not need to show pictures of Carren at rock bottom, or to prove that it actually happened. Anyone that lives in Northwest Montana, knows first-hand what he and his family have been through. Read the book, and be thankful if your own family doesn't have to go through this. Ron Clem's only agenda is to help others with what he has learned. Read the book, you will not be sorry, and you might be all the wiser.
The most important book you don't want to read...
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-03-02
Review Date: 2008-03-02
This is not a book I wanted to read - but my wife talked me into it. I also live, like the Clems, in Montana and have always felt this is a very safe environment. The Clems do a fabulous job of showing both sides of the drama - that of the daughter and the father. As a father, I can relate to his side of the story better and I appreciate how Ron puts his mistakes in the book as well as what he did right. I found myself thinking "that's exactly what I would do..." as I read about his reaction to first picking Carren up after she had been raped. The painfully explicit and eye-opening description of the fall-out from that reaction has caused me to have a number of difficult but necessary conversations with my own daughters, some of whom are now teenagers.
I am most appreciative of and impressed by Carren and Ron for being willing to share such a painful story - pain that must be re-felt each time they talk about the experience or in writing the book. By sharing their pain, they may have helped me avoid the mistakes they made and know how to better help one of my daughters, if ever the same circumstances find us in our "safe" Montana home. It also gives me hope that despite the unbelievable process, Ron and Carren have re-created the bonds of father and daughter. The book helped my children - boys included! - realize the amount of pain to everyone around them their own drug use would cause. I think it opened their eyes as well and cut through a lot of the "sales hype" drug users or sellers would tell them.
One can only hope. I encourage every parent and teenager to read this book - they may not like what they read, but it could well save their life and that of those around them.
I am most appreciative of and impressed by Carren and Ron for being willing to share such a painful story - pain that must be re-felt each time they talk about the experience or in writing the book. By sharing their pain, they may have helped me avoid the mistakes they made and know how to better help one of my daughters, if ever the same circumstances find us in our "safe" Montana home. It also gives me hope that despite the unbelievable process, Ron and Carren have re-created the bonds of father and daughter. The book helped my children - boys included! - realize the amount of pain to everyone around them their own drug use would cause. I think it opened their eyes as well and cut through a lot of the "sales hype" drug users or sellers would tell them.
One can only hope. I encourage every parent and teenager to read this book - they may not like what they read, but it could well save their life and that of those around them.
The Reality of Meth Addiction
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2008-03-02
Review Date: 2008-03-02
Loss of Innocence is one of the best and most compelling books I have ever read. After I found out my daughter was a meth addict and later came to find out the tragic circumstances surrounding her addiction, I began searching for books about drug addiction. Loss of Innocence is by far the best I found. The books makes very effective use of offering contrasting perspectives of the father versus the daughter. Neither one knows the whole story that is unfolding. While I could relate to the father's perspective, it was most helpful to see the daughter's.
Loss of Innocence is a must-read for every parent or future parent of a teen. It points out how parents can seemingly do everything right and a child can still be victimized by a very evil world. This book provides invaluable information on detecting drug abuse. Oh how I wish I had read this book sooner than I did.
This book helped my daughter and I to heal. Loss of Innocence will most assuredly save thousands of lives and families. Parents think something like drug abuse will never happen to their children or family. Please read this book so that you will not be as ignorant as I was.
Loss of Innocence is a must-read for every parent or future parent of a teen. It points out how parents can seemingly do everything right and a child can still be victimized by a very evil world. This book provides invaluable information on detecting drug abuse. Oh how I wish I had read this book sooner than I did.
This book helped my daughter and I to heal. Loss of Innocence will most assuredly save thousands of lives and families. Parents think something like drug abuse will never happen to their children or family. Please read this book so that you will not be as ignorant as I was.
Every home needs a copy of this book!
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2008-02-06
Review Date: 2008-02-06
No child comes with a "How To Raise" manual; parents do the best they can with the tools THEY have from their own life's experience. I greatly admire this family. When they realized they were in trouble, a comprehensive search began to find ways to correct the problem. Carren is no different then Teens anywhere in America in this day and age, in that she chose to take her own way. For every choice there is a consequence and these parents had the courage to make new choices to save their child's life. There is pain, suffering, laughter and positive growth between the covers of Loss of Innocense; this is a must read for every citizen! We all are involved with our youth in some way and this book gives great insight into positive interaction. We CAN make a difference!
An amazing true story!!!
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2007-10-20
Review Date: 2007-10-20
This story was so amazing, I couldn't put it down. I have never written a review before, but this book compelled me to do so. This story is too true of so many of our teens today, and so many parents don't know what to do or how to help. Ron (the father) shows incredible courage and strength in trying to bring his daughter back. He refused to give up, and for most teens that is what it takes. I have recommended this book to everyone I talk to. I loved the way the story told both points of view - Carren's and Ron's. Carren is also a strong and brave individual, her story is chilling, yet shows her incredible determination on both sides of addiction. I love that they told their story together for the rest of us to read and learn about addiction, teen troubles and parents who fight for their teens. The support network and the programs like the one Carren went to in Jamaica are real and amazing. They are committed to making a difference for our teens, one child at a time. I am glad they were mentioned in the book. I absolutely love this book!!
Lust: The Seven Deadly Sins
Published in Hardcover by Oxford University Press, USA (2004-02-12)
List price: $18.95
New price: $4.87
Used price: $1.31
Used price: $1.31
Average review score:
Sexual optimism
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-02-26
Review Date: 2008-02-26
In the uneven 7 Deadly sins series, copublished by Oxford University press and the New York Public Library, three of the volumes are stinkers, one is above average, and three are quite good. The best of the lot is Robert Thurman's treatment of anger; third best is Francine Prose on gluttony. Second place goes to philosopher Simon Blackburn's witty, urbane, and analytically precise treatment of lust.
In Blackburn's hands (pardon the bad pun) lust loses the automatically pessimistic sheen of sin that the Christian tradition has bestowed on it. As Blackburn says (p. 27), "we [should] no more criticize lust because it can get out of hand, than we [should][ criticize hunger because it can lead to gluttony or thirst because it can lead to drunkenness." Looked at in itself, lust--desire for sexual pleasure--is neutral. Context and disposition are the dividing lines in separating moral from immoral lust.
Lust that fully recognizes the partner as a fellow human being and desires his or her sexual fulfillment in the encounter is, says Blackburn, the optimal situation. There's a kind of feedback look that occurs when sexual partners mutually recognize one another: I desire your pleasure, and seeing it enhances my pleasure, which enhances yours... Blackburn refers to this as Hobbesian unity (from a passage from Hobbes in which he writes of the relationship between imagination and mutual pleasuring in sex). This doesn't mean that all lust which falls short of Hobbesian unity is tarnished. One of the healthier aspects of Blackburn's approach is his recognition of degrees. As he says (p. 133), "if Hobbesian unity cannot be achieved, it can at least be aimed at, and even if it cannot be aimed at, it can be imagined and dreamed."
Blackburn's book achieves what all good philosophical treatments do: it simply has the ring of familiar common sense.
In Blackburn's hands (pardon the bad pun) lust loses the automatically pessimistic sheen of sin that the Christian tradition has bestowed on it. As Blackburn says (p. 27), "we [should] no more criticize lust because it can get out of hand, than we [should][ criticize hunger because it can lead to gluttony or thirst because it can lead to drunkenness." Looked at in itself, lust--desire for sexual pleasure--is neutral. Context and disposition are the dividing lines in separating moral from immoral lust.
Lust that fully recognizes the partner as a fellow human being and desires his or her sexual fulfillment in the encounter is, says Blackburn, the optimal situation. There's a kind of feedback look that occurs when sexual partners mutually recognize one another: I desire your pleasure, and seeing it enhances my pleasure, which enhances yours... Blackburn refers to this as Hobbesian unity (from a passage from Hobbes in which he writes of the relationship between imagination and mutual pleasuring in sex). This doesn't mean that all lust which falls short of Hobbesian unity is tarnished. One of the healthier aspects of Blackburn's approach is his recognition of degrees. As he says (p. 133), "if Hobbesian unity cannot be achieved, it can at least be aimed at, and even if it cannot be aimed at, it can be imagined and dreamed."
Blackburn's book achieves what all good philosophical treatments do: it simply has the ring of familiar common sense.
Lust: The Seven Deadly Sins
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-05-21
Review Date: 2007-05-21
Well, it's good to see at least one philosopher who understands lust better than most historical figures.
I had more fun reading this book than I have reading any book on such a serious moral topic. Simon Blackburn lives in the real world and he writes as if he intends to help everyone else who lives there as well.
Absolutely must reading for the serious and not-so-serious minded as well. The press that printed this book is to be commended for having selected Simon Blackburn for this task (writing clearly about the meaning and importance of "lust".
I had more fun reading this book than I have reading any book on such a serious moral topic. Simon Blackburn lives in the real world and he writes as if he intends to help everyone else who lives there as well.
Absolutely must reading for the serious and not-so-serious minded as well. The press that printed this book is to be commended for having selected Simon Blackburn for this task (writing clearly about the meaning and importance of "lust".
Best of the series
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 7 total.
Review Date: 2004-07-24
Review Date: 2004-07-24
Blackburne's book is the best of the series, yet they all tend to be of a high calibre. It is highly readable yet carefully researched. As with all the books in the series, it is quite short and can be read in a sitting or two. The book has a wonderful dustjacket and nice tight binding, although for such a slender little book it does fetch a bit of a high price--worth it though!
A Book Anyone would Lust Over!!
Helpful Votes: 6 out of 7 total.
Review Date: 2005-11-01
Review Date: 2005-11-01
+++++
This book that contains an essay by philosophy professor Simon Blackburn, analyzes one of the "Seven Deadly Sins," namely lust. (The other six are pride, envy, anger, sloth, greed, and gluttony.) Lust and even more so the "ideas about lust" are examined from an historical, artistic, religious, psychological, and philosophical perspective.
Even though there are different types of lust, Blackburn is concerned with sexual lust. He explains: "Lust is a psychological state with a goal in mind...the desire that infuses the body, for sexual activity and its pleasures for their own sake."
Specifically, some of the topics Blackburn looks into with respect to lust are as follows: desire, excess, suppression, Christian viewpoint, cultural consequences, and evolutionary psychology. Perhaps, the most important concept presented in this essay (at least for me) is the idea of "Hobbesian Unity" developed by seventeenth-century philosopher Thomas Hobbes. Here, there is a "pure mutuality" of lust. That is, "I desire you, and desire your desire for me."
Who are some of the people you will encounter in this book? There is mention of Aristotle, Plato, Aristophanes, Shakespeare, Saint Augustine, Bill Clinton, Dante, Richard Dawkins, Freud, Thomas Hobbes, David Hume, Immanuel Kant, and Bertrand Russell. If you're not familiar with some of these names, don't worry. Blackburn tells us who these people are. In fact, Blackburn's entire essay is clearly and precisely written.
Finally, there are two sets of artistic photographs or plates in this book (eight pictures per set). The first eight are in black and white while the final eight are in color. These are used to highlight points that Blackburn makes throughout his essay.
In conclusion, I found this slim book to be very insightful. It cleared up the many, many wrong and contradictory ideas regarding the most misunderstood and interesting "deadly sin," namely lust!!!
(first published 2004; preface; introduction; 15 chapters; main narrative 135 pages; notes; index)
+++++
This book that contains an essay by philosophy professor Simon Blackburn, analyzes one of the "Seven Deadly Sins," namely lust. (The other six are pride, envy, anger, sloth, greed, and gluttony.) Lust and even more so the "ideas about lust" are examined from an historical, artistic, religious, psychological, and philosophical perspective.
Even though there are different types of lust, Blackburn is concerned with sexual lust. He explains: "Lust is a psychological state with a goal in mind...the desire that infuses the body, for sexual activity and its pleasures for their own sake."
Specifically, some of the topics Blackburn looks into with respect to lust are as follows: desire, excess, suppression, Christian viewpoint, cultural consequences, and evolutionary psychology. Perhaps, the most important concept presented in this essay (at least for me) is the idea of "Hobbesian Unity" developed by seventeenth-century philosopher Thomas Hobbes. Here, there is a "pure mutuality" of lust. That is, "I desire you, and desire your desire for me."
Who are some of the people you will encounter in this book? There is mention of Aristotle, Plato, Aristophanes, Shakespeare, Saint Augustine, Bill Clinton, Dante, Richard Dawkins, Freud, Thomas Hobbes, David Hume, Immanuel Kant, and Bertrand Russell. If you're not familiar with some of these names, don't worry. Blackburn tells us who these people are. In fact, Blackburn's entire essay is clearly and precisely written.
Finally, there are two sets of artistic photographs or plates in this book (eight pictures per set). The first eight are in black and white while the final eight are in color. These are used to highlight points that Blackburn makes throughout his essay.
In conclusion, I found this slim book to be very insightful. It cleared up the many, many wrong and contradictory ideas regarding the most misunderstood and interesting "deadly sin," namely lust!!!
(first published 2004; preface; introduction; 15 chapters; main narrative 135 pages; notes; index)
+++++
A flawed romp, like a one-night stand.
Helpful Votes: 7 out of 9 total.
Review Date: 2006-06-07
Review Date: 2006-06-07
Simon Blackburn has given us one of the top two of the 7 Deadly Sins series - hugely enjoyable, highly informative and one of those rare things: an intelligent book that neither patronises nor bores the reader to death. (For the record, I think the other one is Envy)
Most philosophy books fall into two deadly and sinful categories. They tend to be either simplistic, so that anyone with a serious interest beyond degree level becomes frustrated and dissatisfied; or they're way too 'academic' and technical, forcing the reader to tear his (or her) hair out by the roots and retreat to the sports channels on television. Blackburn avoids both hellish places here, giving an intelligent overview of his allocated sin while keeping the reader pinned to the pages as though reading a novel.
His amusing and often almost poetic writing style not only grips, but leads you down alleyways of the history of ideas that both entertain and get you thinking. But that's his chief problem, because once you think a little about what you're reading, you realise the flaw in his method of argument. He's simply enjoying himself too much.
This shouldn't hurt, and really it doesn't; on the other hand it leaves you with the feeling that he's missed something along the way. Sin is, after all, quite deadly, and rather than condemning as prudes or psychologically scarred misfits those people who have historically told us that it's bad, it would have been helpful to have been taken along the darker streets of lust for a change.
Hell, it's fashionable these days to defend things like lust. John Portman's In Defense of Sin is a shining example of reader-friendly 'diet academia' which gets the blood flowing and the mind racing, but it's ultimately little more than an excuse to be naughty and dress it up as a "serious examination of why we believe x y or z". For anybody who has experienced lust and got their fingers (or anything else for that matter) burnt, Blackburn just doesn't go far enough.
Every one of the Deadly Sins has its friendly brother whom we mistake for the real thing. Envying somebody else's car while we drive down the street in our Skoda may technically be called envy, but it's a barmy thought process that would lead anybody to think that because it only scratches us and doesn't cut us, envy isn't necessarily that bad after all. The same goes for lust. While a 'Hobbesian unity' sounds fantastic, it doesn't account for the darker or more destructive sides of the thing.
We don't need to mention the agonies of rape or other forms of sexual abuse to see this. Imagine simply lusting after other women while your wife waits at home with the dinner, or think of the discomfort you might feel upon seeing a boyfriend looking hungrily at another girl's legs...
Lust can hurt love. Lust can cause us to turn away from more giving feelings. Lust can draw us away from, not always 'Hobbesianly towards', our partners. Why didn't Blackburn discuss this? Why did he do no more than nod once in its direction?
Why didn't Blackburn discuss the husband whose lust is tethered and never actually acted upon, but fairly indiscriminate nonetheless, and whose wife is consequently devalued even when never technically cheated upon? Why didn't he mention the wife who has no indiscriminate lust but forms a lustful attachment to one of her work colleagues, and while never acting upon her basic urges knows full well that her husband would be devastated to find out (and rightly so - this isn't some childish jealousy that he'd be feeling)? Why doesn't he mention the girlfriend who has neither indiscriminate lust nor lust for a colleague, but who suddenly finds herself chomping at the bit on just one occasion? I'm no prude, I feel and will hopefully continue to feel powerful lustful urges, but I recognise that they're not always fun and happy. Lust can damage people beyond recognition. Having lustful dreams about a friend is bad enough, but waking up and being disappointed to find my girlfriend lying next to me was injury to insult; finding my commitment (but happily not my fidelity) to another girlfriend tested and found wanting by an urge I may never lose reminds me, over and over again, that there's more to lust than fun, the fulfilment of love, or pointing a disapproving (although in Blackburn's case eridute) finger at Mediaeval philosophers and theologers.
It's a great book. I don't want to knock it. But it seems to think that lust is a great sin, rather than just a great big dirty one. I just can't help thinking that while Blackburn intelligently defends, explains and even to some extent promotes lust in his book, all those occasions that I've been torn apart by it and all those times where otherwise beautiful relationships have been damaged, sometimes irreperably, by it have been done just a little disrespect by the notion that, well, you'd have to be a puritan or a prude not to see its advantages.
I also don't believe that Blackburn has deliberately led the reader to challenge him and think about the other side of the coin; he spends so much time examining so many of the minutiae of lust that his feels like a book that sets out to inform rather than lay down a gauntlet. Yet I still, after all this, urge you to buy it.
Why? I don't know. Perhaps it's just because while I didn't always agree with him, I don't think that disagreeing with someone means that his book can't be enjoyed and recommended. It IS intelligent; it IS readable; it IS informative. It even prompted me to buy more of his work.
If we could choose when to lust, if we could choose whom we lusted after, if we could choose how much we lust and if we could choose who lusted for us, the world would be a better place, and perhaps more accurately reflected by Blackburn's otherwise excellent little book.
Most philosophy books fall into two deadly and sinful categories. They tend to be either simplistic, so that anyone with a serious interest beyond degree level becomes frustrated and dissatisfied; or they're way too 'academic' and technical, forcing the reader to tear his (or her) hair out by the roots and retreat to the sports channels on television. Blackburn avoids both hellish places here, giving an intelligent overview of his allocated sin while keeping the reader pinned to the pages as though reading a novel.
His amusing and often almost poetic writing style not only grips, but leads you down alleyways of the history of ideas that both entertain and get you thinking. But that's his chief problem, because once you think a little about what you're reading, you realise the flaw in his method of argument. He's simply enjoying himself too much.
This shouldn't hurt, and really it doesn't; on the other hand it leaves you with the feeling that he's missed something along the way. Sin is, after all, quite deadly, and rather than condemning as prudes or psychologically scarred misfits those people who have historically told us that it's bad, it would have been helpful to have been taken along the darker streets of lust for a change.
Hell, it's fashionable these days to defend things like lust. John Portman's In Defense of Sin is a shining example of reader-friendly 'diet academia' which gets the blood flowing and the mind racing, but it's ultimately little more than an excuse to be naughty and dress it up as a "serious examination of why we believe x y or z". For anybody who has experienced lust and got their fingers (or anything else for that matter) burnt, Blackburn just doesn't go far enough.
Every one of the Deadly Sins has its friendly brother whom we mistake for the real thing. Envying somebody else's car while we drive down the street in our Skoda may technically be called envy, but it's a barmy thought process that would lead anybody to think that because it only scratches us and doesn't cut us, envy isn't necessarily that bad after all. The same goes for lust. While a 'Hobbesian unity' sounds fantastic, it doesn't account for the darker or more destructive sides of the thing.
We don't need to mention the agonies of rape or other forms of sexual abuse to see this. Imagine simply lusting after other women while your wife waits at home with the dinner, or think of the discomfort you might feel upon seeing a boyfriend looking hungrily at another girl's legs...
Lust can hurt love. Lust can cause us to turn away from more giving feelings. Lust can draw us away from, not always 'Hobbesianly towards', our partners. Why didn't Blackburn discuss this? Why did he do no more than nod once in its direction?
Why didn't Blackburn discuss the husband whose lust is tethered and never actually acted upon, but fairly indiscriminate nonetheless, and whose wife is consequently devalued even when never technically cheated upon? Why didn't he mention the wife who has no indiscriminate lust but forms a lustful attachment to one of her work colleagues, and while never acting upon her basic urges knows full well that her husband would be devastated to find out (and rightly so - this isn't some childish jealousy that he'd be feeling)? Why doesn't he mention the girlfriend who has neither indiscriminate lust nor lust for a colleague, but who suddenly finds herself chomping at the bit on just one occasion? I'm no prude, I feel and will hopefully continue to feel powerful lustful urges, but I recognise that they're not always fun and happy. Lust can damage people beyond recognition. Having lustful dreams about a friend is bad enough, but waking up and being disappointed to find my girlfriend lying next to me was injury to insult; finding my commitment (but happily not my fidelity) to another girlfriend tested and found wanting by an urge I may never lose reminds me, over and over again, that there's more to lust than fun, the fulfilment of love, or pointing a disapproving (although in Blackburn's case eridute) finger at Mediaeval philosophers and theologers.
It's a great book. I don't want to knock it. But it seems to think that lust is a great sin, rather than just a great big dirty one. I just can't help thinking that while Blackburn intelligently defends, explains and even to some extent promotes lust in his book, all those occasions that I've been torn apart by it and all those times where otherwise beautiful relationships have been damaged, sometimes irreperably, by it have been done just a little disrespect by the notion that, well, you'd have to be a puritan or a prude not to see its advantages.
I also don't believe that Blackburn has deliberately led the reader to challenge him and think about the other side of the coin; he spends so much time examining so many of the minutiae of lust that his feels like a book that sets out to inform rather than lay down a gauntlet. Yet I still, after all this, urge you to buy it.
Why? I don't know. Perhaps it's just because while I didn't always agree with him, I don't think that disagreeing with someone means that his book can't be enjoyed and recommended. It IS intelligent; it IS readable; it IS informative. It even prompted me to buy more of his work.
If we could choose when to lust, if we could choose whom we lusted after, if we could choose how much we lust and if we could choose who lusted for us, the world would be a better place, and perhaps more accurately reflected by Blackburn's otherwise excellent little book.
A Man Without Words
Published in Paperback by University of California Press (1995-08-29)
List price: $17.95
New price: $6.00
Used price: $2.95
Collectible price: $16.95
Used price: $2.95
Collectible price: $16.95
Average review score:
Excellent read
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2007-07-21
Review Date: 2007-07-21
I bought this to read for a class, but was taken aback by how good this book was. An excellent read for anyone.
Made me question long-accepted beliefs
Helpful Votes: 14 out of 16 total.
Review Date: 2003-01-28
Review Date: 2003-01-28
Like a lot of university educated folks, I heard in Psych 101 that once you hit your teens, your capacity to learn languages takes such a nosedive that if you haven't learned by then, you'll never be better than "Me Tarzan, you Jane" no matter how hard you try. I'm not ashamed of accepting this "language expiration date" -- there was no reason not to, and besides, it tracked with my own frustration learning foreign languages. For decades, I accepted this Psych 101 nugget without question.
When I started reading A Man Without Words, I had no idea my old Psych 101 nugget's days were numbered. I heard about the book as something a fan of Oliver Sacks would enjoy, and I associated it with Oliver Sack's book The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, about neurological dysfunction, not Sacks's Hearing Voices, about the deaf. I assumed until I started reading that the "man without words" was aphasic -- had brain damage that prevented him from understanding language. Turns out, though, the book's namesake is deaf and poor and had simply, at 27, never been taught any language. No one had ever bothered. Susan Schaller then proceeded to overturn the Psych 101 sacred cow I never knew I had by describing how she taught this young man the beginnings of ASL over the course of a few weeks. Then, so I couldn't think of him as a freak or fraud, Schaller goes on to show that many deaf people receive no language training and can also be taught to sign long after the Psych 101 "language expiration date."
Schaller claims that almost every deaf teacher, and most hearing teachers, of ASL know of adults who have grown up without language. While her book is anecdotal and therefore fundamentally unscientific, she makes a passionate plea for academic study of the acquisition of language by adults, which makes her more plausible than those who would brush science aside where it does not prove their case. A Man Without Words is a powerful request, and a strong basis, for further research in this area.
A Man Without Words is also very well written. Schaller is both artful and precise in her descriptions of sign idioms and grammar, to the point that I, who know little of sign other than what I read here and in Hearing Voices, felt I understood what I needed to and enjoyed learning it. Her narrative case study is better written than many novels, and besides being fascinated by the information Schaller imparts, I also became submerged in the story.
Learning that something I believed for decades may be dead wrong gives me a feeling of loss of equilibrium (I got the feeling a lot when I first started reading about urban legends). No matter how skeptical I try to be, I always seem to be assuming something. A Man Without Words is a convincing argument for skepticism about the "language expiration date," and it raises concerns that the "expiration date" idea may make us give up up too quickly on languageless adults. It is also a fascinating read as a story, which makes the loss of equilibrium easier to take. Now I just hope that since this book was published in the nineties, someone in academia has taken the hint and done some study on linguistic development in adults. I'm off to cruise the Web to find out -- which, I'm sure, is just the kind of reaction Schaller was hoping for.
wow!
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2001-10-04
Review Date: 2001-10-04
This book really opened my eyes to the world of adults without a communication system. I just took for granted the fact that everyone had a way of communicating when in fact, this book shows clearly that there are many who don't have just that. In addition, this book is a real page turner and packs a lot of interesting information in just a little over 200 pages.
An incredibly compelling story -- WOW!!!
Helpful Votes: 5 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 2005-01-02
Review Date: 2005-01-02
Wow! A must-read for parents of deaf children, linguists, and SLP's. The author expertly describes the isolating effects life without a shared language. She tells the story of a deaf man who grew up in a poor town in Mexico. The man was never provided any education and was never taught how to communicate. At the start of the story, the man uses only gestures and miming to express himself. He lacks the concept of "language" --a system of symbols (spoken words, manual signs, or written text) that can be used to express an individual's thoughts & experiences and be understood by a whole community of people. The author recounts her struggle to figure out how to teach language and the man's struggle to learn. In addition, she clearly articulates the need for social change, the need to develop resources & programs for teaching the many languageless deaf adults who exist today. While I thoroughly enjoyed the story, I found that the numerous quotes throughout the book detract from the overall story. In this respect, the book seems somewhat like a hybrid --it is a positive & triumphant story of two people embarking upon a difficult journey with no map to guide them, AND it is an informal dissertation on the needs of an overlooked segment of the deaf population. Either way, it is a great story and is well-worth reading.
Intriguing case study with enormous implications...
Helpful Votes: 7 out of 7 total.
Review Date: 2002-03-04
Review Date: 2002-03-04
I've read many of the previous case studies of languagelessness in children. We studied Genie and the Wild Boy of Aveyron in an education class on language and it's place in education. This was my introduction to this particular group of disenfranchised, neglected, and abused people...except I thought it was all children usually discovered in late childhood (around age 13). From my neuroscience classes I remember being taught that the brain continues neuronal growth (to targeted synapses in the brain) until about age ten, then begins to cut back. This was supposedly an explanation for why language learning is so difficult later in life. So coming across this book, with its story concerning adults with no obvious psychiatric problems (just a physical difference in lacking hearing) who had managed to survive to adulthood with no language, came as a complete surprise.
This book got put aside as I had to read other books for school and work, but I picked it up again and finished it. Schaller basically is providing a qualitative study, a case study, to draw attention to this apparent problem. This method of educational research is used more and more in writing dissertations, and I actually didn't recognize what it was until I took a qualitative research class myself. The writing and book tend at first to repeat itself. I am not sure what Schaller was doing in writing this way. Perhaps the book had to be a certain length or she felt readers might not pay attention to the seriousness of this problem for Ildefonso and other adults without language. This repetition caused the first half of the book to drag a bit.
After I picked the book up again, I finished it in two days. The addition of the search for other adults with no primary language, Schaller's introduction to other adults like Ildefonso, and then her search for Ildefonso really added to the pace of the case study.
This book throws a bit of a wrench in much of the things I have been taught in both neuroscience and education. There are a few things the book illustrates better than any other book I've read on this topic. First, given the amount of adults who were deaf and had no language that Schaller found in Southern California really illustrates this has to be a major problem internationally. If we are finding such a large group in our nation which pushes education and literacy, what about in countries such as China where there are many deaf (due to overuse of gentamycin) and there are many people with no access to education. Second, again, we obviously don't know everything there is to know about the pliability of the brain. Third, I am very concerned about discrimination against this group, and the possibilities that there are many of these people in psychiatric wards or prisons or other institutions, merely because they have no way to assert their rights. This possibility would be criminal.
I'd like to see more books by Schaller on this topic, and hope to learn more about this in the future. For the most part, this is a great book, and it definitely is a great story which needed to be told.
Karen Sadler
Science Education
University of Pittsburgh
Marilyn in Art
Published in Hardcover by Chaucer Press (2006-05-01)
List price: $40.00
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Average review score:
marilyn in art
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-01-07
Review Date: 2008-01-07
This is an awesome book for any Marilyn Monroe fan - hundreds of amazing art images, most rarely seen. There was a time in the 20s and 30s when movie stars were not photographed for magazine covers but drawn by artists. MM missed that period during her life but she is now probably the subject of the work of more artists than any movie star before or since - many of these art works are to be found in this lavishly illustrated volume. Highly recommended!
Marylin in Art
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2006-11-13
Review Date: 2006-11-13
Anyone who loves the image of Marylin Monroe will enjoy its rendition by various artists in this book.
Awesome
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2006-06-21
Review Date: 2006-06-21
I am an artist in this book and recommend it to the fullest! Check out page 164.
A Tribute in Art
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2006-08-26
Review Date: 2006-08-26
Marilyn Monroe was an icon of our time. It is hard to believe that if she had lived she would have just had her eightieth birthday. And it's hard to believe that she has been dead for forty four years. She was only 36 when she died.
This book, MARILYN IN ART is a beautiful collection of drawings made of her by a wide variety of artists. In some cases she is cartoon like, others more like classical photographs. Each seems to manage to capture some essense of the woman. The art is combined with short quotes from a wide range of people who knew her, worked with her, photographed her or had some kind of relationship with her.
The book doesn't attempt to answer any of the questions about her death, it doesn't go into a psychological analysis of the likelihood of suicide. Instead it is a tribute to her, to her work, to the times she helped to create. And in this it is a great book. Perhaps the art shows more of the inside of Marilyn than photographs could. It's a book hard to put down, even after you've been through it once.
This book, MARILYN IN ART is a beautiful collection of drawings made of her by a wide variety of artists. In some cases she is cartoon like, others more like classical photographs. Each seems to manage to capture some essense of the woman. The art is combined with short quotes from a wide range of people who knew her, worked with her, photographed her or had some kind of relationship with her.
The book doesn't attempt to answer any of the questions about her death, it doesn't go into a psychological analysis of the likelihood of suicide. Instead it is a tribute to her, to her work, to the times she helped to create. And in this it is a great book. Perhaps the art shows more of the inside of Marilyn than photographs could. It's a book hard to put down, even after you've been through it once.
Beautiful tribute to an outstanding Star!
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2006-07-01
Review Date: 2006-07-01
The book has finally reached me and waiting for it was well worth it. What a great feeling to see some of my art work in it! A lot of the art works published in it is truly beautiful and there is everything to fit all tastes! What a pleasure it is to see some friends' paintings: William Davies, Albert Leonard, Mary Belzunce, Frederic Cabanas... Thank you to Roger Taylor for compiling such a superb book.A must for all fans!
Marc Gélis
Marc Gélis
Mathematical Analysis - Vol 1: Elementary Real And Complex Analysis
Published in Hardcover by The MIT Press (1973-11-15)
List price: $37.50
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Average review score:
Possibly too simple
Helpful Votes: 11 out of 23 total.
Review Date: 2004-05-19
Review Date: 2004-05-19
As Shilov write in the introduction "I have tried to accomodate the interests of larger population of those concerned with mathematics" and at that he seems to do. However, the book does require some mathematical background as he appears to omit defining a few things. I believe the book would be ideal for those who want a handy reference, or an easier book when struggling with an analysis course.
However, for the more mathematically inclined readers, the problems are often too easy, and many things are proved that could be better left as exercises. For a more difficult Analysis book, I would reccomend Rudin.
An excellent pure maths text.
Helpful Votes: 13 out of 16 total.
Review Date: 2005-10-10
Review Date: 2005-10-10
I purchased this book to study some complex analysis. Being a physicist I would like to brush up on this. The book was completely different to what I expected.
Some applications would have been nice, but this text is pure maths. The book is well written, easy to follow and concise. I ended up reading it and gained and appreciation for the thorough consideration of elementary real and complex numbers.
Shilov is thorough and avoids making leaps and assertions. This would make the book readable to lower undergraduates. However the significance of some things is not explained, or explained in a very dry manner so people might miss this.
I highly recommend this book if you are interested in real and complex analysis from a pure mathematics perspective.
Some applications would have been nice, but this text is pure maths. The book is well written, easy to follow and concise. I ended up reading it and gained and appreciation for the thorough consideration of elementary real and complex numbers.
Shilov is thorough and avoids making leaps and assertions. This would make the book readable to lower undergraduates. However the significance of some things is not explained, or explained in a very dry manner so people might miss this.
I highly recommend this book if you are interested in real and complex analysis from a pure mathematics perspective.
A wonderful text -- Highly recommended!
Helpful Votes: 14 out of 14 total.
Review Date: 2004-01-12
Review Date: 2004-01-12
I purchased this book as a reference book for my first analysis course. It is very well written, and easy to follow. Dr. Shilov has a very nice way of organizing this text: He puts all the definitions at the beginning of the chapter and the subsequent sections are results of those definitions. It makes for a very quick reference. His presentation of the included proofs is also very nice. There were several occasions I found myself thumbing through it for a second perspecitve.
As far as the actual material presented, Dr. Shilov starts off with funtions of one real variable, then rather quickly generalizes to complex variables and N dimensional functions, so you'll quickly see metric theory and some topology. He does keep in mind this is intended for undergrads and first year grads though.
Oh, another nice feature is the price! I'd recommend this book to any math enthusiast as a reference, or to someone going through an early analysis course.
Getting started in math analysis
Helpful Votes: 56 out of 56 total.
Review Date: 2005-01-08
Review Date: 2005-01-08
This book by Shilov covers the fundamentals in beginning analysis(both real and complex). It has in common with Walter Rudin's book (entitled 'Real and Complex Analysis') that it covers both real functions (integration theory and more), as well as Cauchy's theorems for analytic functions. Shilov's book is at an undergraduate level, and it can easily be used for self-study. The Dover edition is affordable. Rudin's book is for the beginning graduate level, and it is widely used in math departments around the world. Both books have stood the test of time.
Comparison of Shilov with Rudin: Rudin's 'Real and Complex' has become an institution, and I have to admit I have loved it since I was a student myself, but conventional wisdom will have it that Shilov is a lot gentler on students, and much easier to get started with: It stresses motivation a bit more, the exercises are easier (some of Rudin's exercises are notorious, but I find the challenge charming--not all of my students do though!), and finally Shilov gets to touch upon a few applications; fashionable these days. But that part easily gets dated. I will expect that beginning students will enjoy Shilov's book.
Personally, I find that with perseverance, students who keep at it with Rudin's book, will end up with a lot stronger foundation. They are more likely to have proofs in their blood. I guess Shilov can always serve as a leisurely supplementary reading to Rudin.
There will never be another book like Rudin's 'Real and Complex', just like there will never be another van Gogh. But the fact that we love van Gogh doesn't prevent us from enjoying other paintings.
Comparison of Shilov with Rudin: Rudin's 'Real and Complex' has become an institution, and I have to admit I have loved it since I was a student myself, but conventional wisdom will have it that Shilov is a lot gentler on students, and much easier to get started with: It stresses motivation a bit more, the exercises are easier (some of Rudin's exercises are notorious, but I find the challenge charming--not all of my students do though!), and finally Shilov gets to touch upon a few applications; fashionable these days. But that part easily gets dated. I will expect that beginning students will enjoy Shilov's book.
Personally, I find that with perseverance, students who keep at it with Rudin's book, will end up with a lot stronger foundation. They are more likely to have proofs in their blood. I guess Shilov can always serve as a leisurely supplementary reading to Rudin.
There will never be another book like Rudin's 'Real and Complex', just like there will never be another van Gogh. But the fact that we love van Gogh doesn't prevent us from enjoying other paintings.
It is one very interesting book
Helpful Votes: 9 out of 10 total.
Review Date: 2006-03-13
Review Date: 2006-03-13
To me, the best chapters of this book are that about series and integrals. The text is plenty of interesting notions, like that of direction that is related with the notion of limit. I appreciated very much the study that Shilov does about parameter-dependent proper and improper integrals. The topological notions are placed in one intuitive manner. Without doubt, this is one very good and clear exposition about the subject. However, I think that the problems are not easy. Also sometimes Shilov states the theorems with additional conditions that are not useful. For example, this happens usually in the chapter about derivatives because the definition of derivative given by Shilov imposes that any function with derivative in the interval of the domain has continuous derivative in the interior points of its domain. However, Shilov charges some theorems with the extra condition of continuous derivative.
When the Taylor's formula is presented in page 252 - Theorem 8.22, it is stated that the error of the approximation is computed in some interior point of the interval, what is not completely correct. For example, take the second degree Taylor's approximation around x = 0 of the function x raised to the third power, and you will see that in this case the error is computed on one extreme point of the interval.
Also the proof of the theorem 10.49b (page 415) has logical problems of the kind that may arise during the translation.
However, these remarks are small questions without consequences for the course of the exposition.
When the Taylor's formula is presented in page 252 - Theorem 8.22, it is stated that the error of the approximation is computed in some interior point of the interval, what is not completely correct. For example, take the second degree Taylor's approximation around x = 0 of the function x raised to the third power, and you will see that in this case the error is computed on one extreme point of the interval.
Also the proof of the theorem 10.49b (page 415) has logical problems of the kind that may arise during the translation.
However, these remarks are small questions without consequences for the course of the exposition.
Memories of Summer: When Baseball Was an Art, and Writing about It a Game (Bison Book)
Published in Paperback by Bison Books (2004-03-01)
List price: $19.95
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Collectible price: $25.56
Average review score:
Readable and Heartfelt
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2005-12-21
Review Date: 2005-12-21
The flowing pen of author Roger Kahn provides readers with books of nostalgia and heart. Here he covers baseball in New York City in the bygone 1950's, his love affair with the Brooklyn Dodgers (whom he covered as reporter from 1952-1953), plus the Yankees and Giants. Readers learn a few things about Jackie Robinson, Willie Mays, Leo Durocher, etc. There's the author's take on baseball racism, on the slow retreat in the 1950's. Kahn also traces his upbringing and close relationship with his baseball-addicted father. The book has a definite sense of loss, due to his father's passing, the Dodgers and Giants fleeing to California, and the urban decline that has since afflicted New York and many other once-tranquil cities. This moving book is something of a follow-up to THE BOYS OF SUMMER, the author's superb look at the Brooklyn Dodgers that was published in the early 1970's (this book came out in the late 1990's).
This book doesn't quite match BOYS OF SUMMER, but it's another gem by a writer whose heart clearly belongs to baseball.
This book doesn't quite match BOYS OF SUMMER, but it's another gem by a writer whose heart clearly belongs to baseball.
A Glimpse of a Past Era in Baseball
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2004-06-30
Review Date: 2004-06-30
In "Memories of Summer," Roger Kahn takes the reader back to a time when the Dodgers were an integral part of the life of a Brooklynite, through his career as a writer for several different newspapers and magazines, up to modern times where he interviews former baseball stars, including Jackie Robinson, Mickey Mantle, and Willie Mays.
Though he grew up a Dodger fan, forced to wait 'til next year seemingly forever, his love not just for the Dodgers, but for the game, is made manifest through his memoir and his reprinted articles. His painting of baseball in his earlier years as a game engulfed in wonder and mystique is shared by many who cherish old-time baseball.
Kahn is not remiss in placing baseball in the context of the social realm in which it was played--a time where writers were reluctant to write about the off-the-field lives of players and where racism, which barred blacks from playing in the majors for almost 50 years, slowly gave way to integration, very slowly. He saw the Jackie Robinsons and the Willie Mays and the Monte Irvins in Major League Baseball as baseball players, not black baseball players.
This book is funny at times, sad at others, but always piques interest. Kahn does an outstanding job of painting vivid images of a time when baseball truly was an art, and writing about it truly a game.
A poignant volume that reads like a novel.
Helpful Votes: 10 out of 12 total.
Review Date: 1999-09-27
Review Date: 1999-09-27
Mr. Kahn turns back the clock to the days when baseball was the true American pastime. His anecdotes and interviews about Mantle, Mays, and Early Wynn bring these individuals to life more than any statistics possibly could. His love of his father is written about in such a profound manner that is timeless. In all a classic piece of Americana that hopefully will be read fifty years from now.
an enjoyable look to yesteryear
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 1999-07-09
Review Date: 1999-07-09
Kahn's most recent work, _Memories of Summer_, is a very thoughtfull look to the golden years of baseball, set in the context of Kahn's childhood and career as a journalist. Simply put, it is a must-have for any serious baseball fan, cultural anthropologist, or anyone else wondering how the game used to be and the importance that it played in the lives of fans. Throughout, Kahn manages to capture, quite superbly, the romanticism of the era, focusing specifically on perhaps the very epitome of that romanticism, the bumbling bums of Brooklyn. He very adequately portrays the love affair that so many in Brooklyn had with the team, as well as give an indication of why they are remembered so reverently today. Kahn also laces his story with his interactions with baseball celebrities, including Leo Durocher, Willie Mays, and Jackie Robinson. My one drawback is that Kahn occasionally gets somewhat preachy when addressing race and racial discrimination during the time. Obviously, a certain amount of preaching is in order, but in my humble opinion it goes a step too far. Otherwise, however, the narrative that Kahn weaves, beginning in his childhood (the relationship with his father and how that relates to baseball is especially noteworthy) and tracing his career in journalism through newspapers and magazines is wonderful, easy to follow, and extremely well-written. I completely agree with the earlier reviewer who commented on the issue of "turning corners" in the book, and I would add one more - expansion to the West Coast and baseball turning the corner to become a two-coast sport. The reader can't help but feel the sorrow and bitterness that is left following the move of the Dodgers to California. This is a fantastic composition, a true gem by one of America's premier sports writers. Happy reading!
Great man, great book
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 1998-09-11
Review Date: 1998-09-11
I was fortunate enough to receive a preview copy of this book a few weeks before its release because I was interviewing Mr. Kahn on a radio interview program.
As soon as I started reading, I was hooked. Although I was not alive during the 1950's, I have always been fascinated with baseball during that era, particularly the lovable Brooklyn Dodgers. Kahn's latest book does such a wonderful job of describing what it was like to be around baseball every day in that bygone era.
The easiest interview I have ever done was that one I did with Roger. His love for baseball was evident from the first question I asked him. His insight gained from covering the Dodgers in the 1950's is something every baseball fan could use. In this season of home runs, the average fan is once again starting to appreciate baseball. Roger Kahn will make you appreciate it even more.
Mine in the Sky
Published in Paperback by Publication Consultants (1998-07-01)
List price: $21.95
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Used price: $49.95
Average review score:
Great Book!
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 1 total.
Review Date: 2006-11-05
Review Date: 2006-11-05
I lived in Scheelite from about 1954 to 1957 while my Dad worked at the mine. I really didn't know much about the mine or history related to it until I read the book. I enjoyed the book because: it covered the entire history of the mine, provided a good overview of all aspects of the operation, and shared some interesting events that happened. The pictures were greatly appreciated and the author's style kept me reading. Maybe I'm biased due to my personal connection so I gave it a 5.
My Husband's Childhood Memories.
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2007-09-17
Review Date: 2007-09-17
The book's cover is wonderful and my husband loves it. He told me that it brings back many memories of his childhood, when his family lived near the mine, where his dad and elder brothers worked.
The book tells it just as he remembers his life up there. The most often retold story of his is, when the school burned down, do to a heater.
The book is well written and I myself have a better understanding, how life was many years ago. So many men worked up there in the mine.
The book tells it just as he remembers his life up there. The most often retold story of his is, when the school burned down, do to a heater.
The book is well written and I myself have a better understanding, how life was many years ago. So many men worked up there in the mine.
Mine in the sky
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2007-08-01
Review Date: 2007-08-01
this is a wonderful book with a rich history of the land and people of the pine creek mine. I highly recommed this book to anyone that likes to travel around Mammoth, CA
Brought back good memories!!
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2007-07-07
Review Date: 2007-07-07
My dad, uncle, and grandfather all worked in this mine from about 1953 into the mid 1960's. We lived in Scheelite when I was very young, and then in Red Houses, and Rovana. I went to Round Valley Elementary school. It was a wonderful life..and this book brought back many wonderful happy memories, and made me wonder what happened to so many people I used to know!!!!!
It is a good read for anyone..not just those of us who lived it!!!
Theresa
It is a good read for anyone..not just those of us who lived it!!!
Theresa
Memories!
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2007-03-12
Review Date: 2007-03-12
I was born and raised in Bishop. My Dad worked at Union Carbide in the 1930's and my husband worked there in the early 70's. I went to High School with kids from Rovana, including the author's brother, Danny. The mine was just a part of our everyday lives. This book represents a history of this area of the High Sierras that few people are aware of and I will read it again and again!!
Vickie Keough Taylor
Vickie Keough Taylor
Miraculous Air: Journey of a Thousand Miles Through Baja California, the Other Mexico
Published in Paperback by Milkweed Editions (2007-04-05)
List price: $15.00
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Average review score:
journey of a thousand milesin baja
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2008-06-09
Review Date: 2008-06-09
good, worth reading.the book" one hell of a ride " the life and times of Lou Federico " A FANTASTIC READ . COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN SAY ALL READERS .NONFICTION on Baja and many more true stories.
you should promote this book more.No one will be dissapointed .
you should promote this book more.No one will be dissapointed .
Wonderful!
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2002-12-30
Review Date: 2002-12-30
I loved this book. It will make you laugh, make you cry, and make you want to go to this amazing peninsula asap. Or go there again. (What else is a Baja Buff to do?)
The best book ever written on "the Other Mexico"
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 2002-12-18
Review Date: 2002-12-18
Miraculous Air was very enjoyable to read. It has lots of historical & political information but it's a "page-turner" all the way to end, which was a quite a surprise.
A Wonderful Book
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 2004-07-06
Review Date: 2004-07-06
This book is a series of real-life stories as experienced by the author over the course of about 5 years travel throughout Baja California. The stories paint a fascinating picture of many facets of life in Baja, both contemporary and historical. Ms. Mayo's writing style is also painterly - the words are pared to only the essential needed to convey the picture. The result is an extremely well-crafted book that is pure pleasure to read. Read this book if you are interested in Baja, or plan to travel there - it's one of the very best.
Don't go to Baja until you've read this book
Helpful Votes: 8 out of 8 total.
Review Date: 2003-02-17
Review Date: 2003-02-17
God, what a read! Like a novel, almost, full of surprises and little historical bits that will enrich your visit to Baja beyond measure... it was my first visit to Mexico, in 1957, and reading this book takes me back to my childhood visions of a place where the air is miraculous, the sand clean and white, the people like brothers and sisters. Read this book in the teeth of winter, to survive the snowbound months. And if you want to give someone a gift when they're Baja-bound, give them this book. Truly a miraculous treasure.
Mourners: A Nameless Detective Novel
Published in Hardcover by Thorndike Press (2006-06-02)
List price: $30.95
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Average review score:
Great Premise Developed into a Thought-Provoking Conclusion
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2008-04-15
Review Date: 2008-04-15
The subtitle of this book could be "Love Is All There Is." Yet the characters in Mourners struggle without love. In the absence of love, they become brittle, unhappy, and bitter.
Like Nightcrawlers, this novel is about the three detectives in Nameless's agency, Nameless, Tamara Corbin, and Jake Runyon. Nameless is dealing with a suddenly cold and remote Kerry, his wife. Tamara Corbin is in agony over her lost boy friend. Jake Runyan is still in mourning for his second wife and in emotional pain due to his estrangement from his son, Joshua.
They are asked to trail a successful investment manager, James Troxell, how has taken to ignoring his work and his wife. It soon becomes apparent that Troxell is addicted to attending funerals and visiting grave sites. What's that all about?
The answers reveal some very dark secrets that are not easily brought to light for safe consumption.
You'll be haunted by this book and its powerful references to the noir tradition of detection. You'll also feel closer than ever to the characters in the book as you share their hurt through reading about their pain.
At the end, you'll come away with a deeper appreciation for the good things in your life. You won't want to trade your life with anyone in this book.
Like Nightcrawlers, this novel is about the three detectives in Nameless's agency, Nameless, Tamara Corbin, and Jake Runyon. Nameless is dealing with a suddenly cold and remote Kerry, his wife. Tamara Corbin is in agony over her lost boy friend. Jake Runyan is still in mourning for his second wife and in emotional pain due to his estrangement from his son, Joshua.
They are asked to trail a successful investment manager, James Troxell, how has taken to ignoring his work and his wife. It soon becomes apparent that Troxell is addicted to attending funerals and visiting grave sites. What's that all about?
The answers reveal some very dark secrets that are not easily brought to light for safe consumption.
You'll be haunted by this book and its powerful references to the noir tradition of detection. You'll also feel closer than ever to the characters in the book as you share their hurt through reading about their pain.
At the end, you'll come away with a deeper appreciation for the good things in your life. You won't want to trade your life with anyone in this book.
Another fine Pronzine book.
Helpful Votes: 1 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2007-01-03
Review Date: 2007-01-03
I always look forward to the release of a new Pronzini book. This one did not disappoint.
Excellence extends into 30th title in the series
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2007-05-15
Review Date: 2007-05-15
Mourners is Bill Pronzini's thirtieth entry in the Nameless P.I. series which has a bust in the Pantheon of P.I.s. Nameless (now going by "Bill") is probably in his 60s, married to Kerry, and has an adopted daughter Emily who is growing up too fast. His awkward fatherly "sex talk" with her is a classic scene. Yes, Nameless as a family man reveals a gentler, funnier side -- the result of mellowing age. In this case, the affluent financial consultant James Troxell attends all funerals of women who've died violently (thus the book's title). Naturally Troxell's wife is alarmed and hires Nameless to find out just why this erratic behavior. Nameless soon uncovers a women's brutal murder and her distraught sister. The P.I. firm's other two workers, Tamara Corbin and Jake Runyon, inject the subplots of their personal lives. Tamara is getting over her old boyfriend. Runyon does much of the heavy detective work, and his sections give the story its gritty, hardboiled flavor. The prose remains lean and vivid. I've read enjoyed reading all the titles, and Mourners is as good as any.
Mourners
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 3 total.
Review Date: 2006-04-22
Review Date: 2006-04-22
"Mourners" is the 30th Nameless Detective novel by my favorite mystery novelist, Bill Pronzini. Lynn Troxell hires the agency to find out why her husband, James, ia acting strangely. Nameless finds out that Troxell is attending funerals of women who died violent deaths and putting flowers on the grave of Erin Dumont, a young woman who was raped and murdered. Is James Troxell a murderer or someone who witnessed Dumont's murder? Jake Runyon, the agency's operative also helps in the investigation. While Nameless works on the Troxell case, Runyon looks for Erin Dumont's murderer to help her sister Risa Niland whom he meets at Erin's grave. The title refers to many people and situations. Troxell is mourning people who died a violent death because he witnessed one as a child and probably also saw Erin Dumont's murder. Jake Runyon continues to mourn the death of his wife Colleen. Tamara Corbin, Nameless' partner, mourns the loss of her relationship with her long-time boyfriend, Horace. Risa Niland mourns her sister's death. Nameless continues to mourn the death of his former partner, Eberhardt. There is also a serious situation for Nameless' wife, Kerry. This situation will have to be dealt with in the next novel. I was a little diaappointed in "Nightcrawlers", but I didn't ralize why until I read "Mourners". In "Nightcrawlers", Tamara and Jake were the focal characters and Nameless played a minor role. In "Mourners" he is back as the central character and that makes this novel a return to form. "Mourners" is highly reecommended.
Pronzini is a master author.
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2006-07-11
Review Date: 2006-07-11
The "Nameless" agency team knows about separation and death. "Nameless" friend and partner committed suicide, Jake Runyon's wife died of cancer and Tamara's love has moved to Philadelphia. The agency has been hired, by his wife,to follow James Troxell. Rather than another woman, they find he is attending the funerals of women who have been raped and murdered. At a cemetery, Jake sees a young woman who reminds him of his late wife and who's sister was a victim. What is Troxell's connection to these victims?
Pronzini is such a fine writer. He takes, what could be, a basic mystery and layers it with text that deepens and enriches the plot. On the top level, this is a very good mystery. It leads the reader on a fascinating trail finding out exactly what the object character is up to. The sense of place, dialogue and suspense are all very well done. You become involved with all the characters and care about them. Even the minor, and somewhat unlikable, characters are ones you recognize. On a second level is the story of grief and mourning; it's many forms and the impact it has on various people's lives. I can't' say enough about this book. I am ready for the next in the series, and determinedly looking for the ones I'm missing. If you've not read this series, even with a few slight misses, start at the beginning and enjoy, enjoy, enjoy!.
Pronzini is such a fine writer. He takes, what could be, a basic mystery and layers it with text that deepens and enriches the plot. On the top level, this is a very good mystery. It leads the reader on a fascinating trail finding out exactly what the object character is up to. The sense of place, dialogue and suspense are all very well done. You become involved with all the characters and care about them. Even the minor, and somewhat unlikable, characters are ones you recognize. On a second level is the story of grief and mourning; it's many forms and the impact it has on various people's lives. I can't' say enough about this book. I am ready for the next in the series, and determinedly looking for the ones I'm missing. If you've not read this series, even with a few slight misses, start at the beginning and enjoy, enjoy, enjoy!.
Mr. Lunch Takes a Plane Ride (Picture Puffins)
Published in Paperback by Puffin (1997-02-01)
List price: $4.99
New price: $72.88
Used price: $2.50
Collectible price: $65.00
Used price: $2.50
Collectible price: $65.00
Average review score:
Whimsy for Children and Adults
Helpful Votes: 0 out of 0 total.
Review Date: 2005-05-04
Review Date: 2005-05-04
While not as explicitly enjoyable as "Free Lunch" or my personal favorite "Mr. Lunch Borrows a Canoe," this book still holds a great deal of charm. All of the Mr. Lunch book s-- and the "Olive" books for that matter -- are illustrated in such a funky, eclectic manner and written in a hip, endearing style, that adults will enjoy reading them as much as children.
Funny Pet Tricks: Mr Lunch!
Helpful Votes: 12 out of 12 total.
Review Date: 2000-07-10
Review Date: 2000-07-10
We thoroughly enjoyed this book, from the wonderfully implausible story to the extraordinary Matisse/Braques-like pictues. The story concerns a dog's flight for a television appearance--to demonstrate his bird-chasing skills. (No animals were injured in the writing of this book.) The pictures are very detailed and a bit abstract, but not unrecognizable or too cluttered for our 4 year old.
A very unique and funny book, it's great for children between about four and nine. It's a lot of fun for adults to read as well: Highly recommended!
Wonderful for all ages!!
Helpful Votes: 2 out of 2 total.
Review Date: 2001-03-25
Review Date: 2001-03-25
This is a wonderful and imaginative book. Children will enjoy the sweet simple story of Mr. Lunch (a dog who loves to chase birds, but not catch them)and the adults will certainly not mind reading the story again and again. The illustrations alone are fabulous, I would highly recomend the entire Mr. Lunch series. This is the first in a series of three books starring the "professional" dog. I would also check out, "Olive, the Other Reindeer" and "Monkey Buisness" if you want books both you and your child can enjoy together! I also think they are just fine to have in your collection, if you don't have any children, you'll enjoy them just the same.
Picasso for the preschool set
Helpful Votes: 3 out of 5 total.
Review Date: 1999-12-26
Review Date: 1999-12-26
I just love the style of this illustrator. The surrealist style is fun to look at and the detailed drawings are sharp and colorful. This is a double edged sword, however. Little kids are going to have a very hard time recognizing familiar objects. For instance, my 3 year old couldn't even tell that Mr. Lunch was a dog.
This book is rated for ages 4-8 but I think it would be wise to veer to the upper end of the scale. The pictures are very complex and the story and vocab is more sophisticated than you usually find in books aimed at the preschoolers.
Quirky, Goofy Fun with Great Lessons for Kids
Helpful Votes: 4 out of 4 total.
Review Date: 2003-03-13
Review Date: 2003-03-13
This is without a doubt one of my favorite children's books. The book is for 4-8 year-olds, but most 4-5 year-olds might not understand the artwork's quirky, abstract nature.
Mr. Lunch is a dog, but a very intelligent dog who gets invited to appear on television for his bird-chasing abilities. Mr. Lunch and his bird-pal Ambrose have many great and goofy adventures along the way (especially on the plane) to the television appearance...which doesn't go exactly as planned...
`Mr. Lunch' gives kids a whole cargo plane full of wonderful learning opportunities in: aviation, identifying animals, how to say "goodbye" in several languages, city and country life, airport procedures, music, science, cooking...you name it! A very imaginative, wacky, fun book!
Ages 4-8
30 pgs.
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