Teams Books

Not only are the most basic & most complex techniques explained, the step by step instructions on re-creating their sample paintings are the best. If you do every exercise in the book, you will have all the techniques. Then all you have to do is practice, practice, practice....

I have been looking for an in-depth watercolor reference book for some time and I was not satisfied until I received this book. It is so complete, so perfect, that you'll feel as if you never need another book to draw from. In clear, practical language, combined with vivid illustrations, the book covers all about materials and tools. Then it goes on to cover just about every possible technique and seven basic watercolor subjects. What makes this book so wonderful to me is that it builds its information from beginners level to advanced and it does that so clearly that you have no problem following it or recreating the samples yourself. So apart from being an invaluable reference book, it is also a great confidence builder. Yes, you can paint.

I'd recommend this book for anyone with beginning through intermediate watercolor skills. It is especially useful for learning how to create special textures and surfaces such as skin, trees, fish, feathers, et cetera. As the name suggests, it covers technique rather than design, layout, color harmony, and the like. Its focus is on how to create the appearance of various surfaces used in nearly every painting. I think of it as a must have on every student's reference shelf.

This is probably the best book I have read to date on sculling. It is geared toward the novice and treats you as an intelligent reader.

I have been sculling for the last 6 months, so I am a newbie to the sport. The information contained in this book is wonderfully presented and arranged. It is easy and enjoyable to read.

For those of you interested in training this book lays down a good base with which to further your skills and performance.

I strongly recommend this book to anyone interested in rowing.

VERY readable, very informative, very helpful and very inspiring. I enjoyed it immensely and found the various training drills and chapters on diet and physiology both useful and fascinating. If you wonder why you bother with sculling and are fed up with not getting any better, read this.

When I first took sculling lessons a year ago, this book and Essential Sculling were recommended by the instructor. I ordered both, and though I read both, I didn't really appreciate the wisdom contained in The Art of Sculling until I fell out of the shell a couple of weeks ago.

I had done a capsize recovery drill in the beginner shell, but not in the sleeker boat to which I'd graduated. Fifteen minutes of flinging myself at the edge of the shell sent me back to the book, and a 2 week hiatus while my sore side recovered gave me much-needed time to reflect. I realized that, like trying harder and harder to recover but with improper technique, I was trying to improve my sculling by working harder, not smarter. I realized that if I really wanted to improve, I would need to learn everything I could about exactly how to scull properly.

I had a new appreciation for so many of the points in this book, like "Good sculling is made up of two very basic ideas; using your energy efficiently and allowing the boat to work for you." Nowhere does he say to just strap yourself in and pull like mad. And he's right! The scullers who invoke envy are pulling smoothly and gracefully and efficiently.

The real value of this book is its' exactness. Everything he says is correct and detailed, and though the importance of a seemingly basic sentence like the one above may not sink it at first, with repeated attempts at learning to scull one does eventually relate, and 'get it'.

The Art of Sculling covers buying and rigging a boat, but the real gold is in the Advanced Technique chapter. Paduda tells you not only what you should be doing, but the how and the why, and exactly how you should feel when you are doing it. He explains how memory works, and modeling and visualization in exacting detail. These are not things that most of us can absorb with one reading. I am finding it helpful to row, then read, then row, then read, and I suspect I will for a long time.

If you are serious about sculling properly, this book is a huge help. - I would say indispensable. I also found that learning to erg properly let me get muscle memory for body movement that transferred to the boat, allowing me to concentrate on bladework, boat movement, etc. when I am in the boat. In that regard a Concept 2 erg, and their DVD on the subject, were extremely helpful. I also used the erg to build up the strength and stamina to row on the water with proper technique, to the extent that I am able, for an hour or so.

Good luck, happy rowing, and may you always have flat water.

As always with all the Autocourse CART Yearbooks, the quality is Empire-State-Building-high. You know, it's just awesome. And I recommend it to all the CART fans.

When I saw this book I knew I had to have it. I absolutly love CART racing and this book is for a lover of racing. All the pictures are absolutly beautiful. I was also a big fan of the late Greg Moore and I was very happy to see the tribute they did for him in this book. So if your a lover of CART this book is a must!

This book is the best of its kind, it has a collection of the best picters taken during the whole season and then some also it tells a whole story behind each picture, i first bought 1 and then orderd 2 more. I give it 10 STARS

Very good book, lots of funny, inside stories on a longtime NHL team.

This was an excellent book. Bob Plager tells stories from the blues and his life like no one else. He is truly a legend. This book is a must for any true Blues fan. Bleed Blue.

This book was so good, I was dissapointed when I had finished it, I wanted to hear more tales from the Blues' Bench. Bobby Plager did a fantastic job! I can't wait for his next book to come out.

I enjoyed reading this book. It takes the reader behind the scenes and shows how much effort goes before and behind the actual game. It was a wonderful
reminder of the fun I have when I get to attend a women's basketball game.
Virgil A. Place, M.D.

As an avid fan of college women's basketball for almost thirty years, I found this book enjoyable on several levels. First, it was enlightening to learn some of what it's like inside a national powerhouse women's basketball program; the author's stories brought me inside the excitement of a well respected program. Secondly, the chapters are about Stanford, a university recognized for its scholarship; it grows scholars who happen to be athletes. The narratives about recruitment, coursework, and balance of student and athlete were informative. Thirdly, the details about the boosters who built the Fast Break Club itself were funny and touching. The author brought me along for the ride when she took a tour of the PAC-10 schools, and I was inside the hearts of boosters who traveled in sickness and in health to support their teams, no matter the weather or the time zone.

And finally, the author is a good writer and storyteller, her chapters and narratives flow well, the many photos add to the book, and I didn't want to put the book down. I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in women's basketball. If you don't have a team to cheer for before you start the book, you will want to find one after you finish reading it!

Boosters Always Win! The Fans of Women's Basketball is a very engaging personal account of how a small group of people banded together to form what has become a very dynamic, educational, and highly effective booster organization that contributes enormously to the Women's Basketball program at Stanford University.
Harriet Benson has succeeded in giving little snapshots into behind the scene issues of what it took to develop The Fast Break Club, it's struggles, how it might best serve the program, it's future. For those who have followed the team, this is a bit of a trip down memory lane. It's a great read for anyone connected with the team or anyone interested in forming a booster organization to support any group.
The Fast Break Club now has a life of its own that nurtures not only the program, the players, the coaches, but the boosters as well. "If you build it they will come", and indeed they did!

Recommended by my 5 year old son's pre-school teacher. He and two other boys have constant struggles with alliances. Great book for him to identify with the characters, their lives and who they are playing with that day...Love books that kids can really see themselves in.

After checking out this book from our library, we read it several times a day and can't wait to buy this one. I love how the story is told through this little boys perspective. We just love this one.

My 5-year-old son loves this book, he wants to read it every night. We love the playful language of Jacob and his descriptions of his ever-busy days. The illustrations of the ethnically-diverse youngsters are colorful and delightful. Jacob has quite an imagination - like all 5-year-olds, and the book is great fun.

From Hank Aaron to Jeff Francoeur, Victor's camera captures the heart and soul of the Atlanta Braves for over 40 years. But this is more that a mere picture book for the coffee table. Along with his outstanding photographs Victor provides first hand accounts and anecdotes about the players as only he can tell them. He also includes the story of his own life, how he served his country during World War II and how he became the official photographer of the Braves. This is a book for both Braves fans and history buffs alike.

If you are a fan of the Atlanta Braves, this book is a must! The photos and behind the scenes stories are fascinating, as is the life story of the author.

This book is a must for any Braves fan. Photographers and WWII enthusiasts may want to check it out as well. I was fortunate enough to interview Walter Victor (the subject of this book) recently for a newspaper article I was writing and he is without a doubt the kindest man you'll ever meet. He went through the book with me and described the significance of many of the pictures, some of which are included in exhibitions at the Baseball Hall of Fame.
This book doesn't just chronicle Victor's experience as the official photographer for the Atlanta Braves baseball team though, there are also early photos that Walter took while fighting in Europe during WWII.
In closing, I further want to stress that this is an important book to own if you are a fan of America's baseball team, the Atlanta Braves, or a fan of America in general, Victor one of the last of a dwindling breed of Americans who possess true grit, guts and spirit.

This book was very inspiring. What Brett went through with his painkillers made me more of a fan of him. When he quit his battle with drinking, I thought only a warrior could do that. Hats off to Brett Favre. Bill Gutman told it as it was.

This is a great book if you are a true Brett Favre fan. This is a great book on how Favre became such a great quarterback. He started off a nothing in the NFL, but when you keep trying and work hard you can see what happens. It also shows how Favre overcame the problem he had with over taking pain killers. I thought it was great to see how well he recovered from the incident and the way he handled it with the media and his fans. This is just an overall great to read for all the fans out there.

This book is fantastic. If you are looking for a book to read about a hero in the NFL, this is the book to read. Brett lays everything out for the reader. He talks about his upbringing, college and the NFL, and how it lead him to his painful addiction to pain killers. He is a true "hero"... I would recomend this book to anyone, if all athletes were this honest, the fans would be more forgiving. You can't help but root for him at the end of the book... I have given 10 of these books away for presents, and I am not even a packer fan..I am now a Brett Favre fan...

Business is conducted across all types of boundaries through collaborative strategies and arrangements. These collaborative enterprises can be extremely complex. This book explores what these collaborations look like, the challenges they face, and how to make them work. Based on analysis of three case studies, the authors present an action framework to guide executives in building such collaborations. The challenge is to manage complexity so that it enhances and energizes the collaboration instead of destroying it. Success hinges upon the people and the nature and quality of their interrelationships and interactions, the key to which is structure: well-defined roles, expectations, responsibilities, decision-making processes, and the like. Structure offers a zone of stability within which complex collaborations can develop and successfully function. Three-quarters of the book presents and analyzes the cases, offing many insights. The action framework is formally presented in the last two chapters.

There are plenty of general management advise titles on the market today, but a few stand out from the crowd as specific guides for working establishments - and Don Mankin and Susan G. Cohen's Business Without Boundaries: An Action Framework For Collaborating Across Time, Distance, Organization, And Culture is one of them. With more and more business being conducted virtually, mechanisms for collaborative success in virtual e-business and corporate environments becomes all the more important: that's where Business Without Boundaries comes in, helping managers with real-world examples and principles for successful virtual collaboration. An excellent, action-packed advice guide.

Let's begin with the assumption that many (if not most but certainly not all) limits are self-imposed. Then let us assume that it is in any organization's best interests to eliminate all limits to effective communication, cooperation, and collaboration. If you accept these two assumptions, then you will share my high regard for this volume in which Mankin and Cohen offer a cohesive, comprehensive, and cost-effective four-phase "action framework" to achieve "collaboration [as well as communication and cooperation] across time, distance, organization, and culture." To their credit, they concentrate almost entirely on explaining HOW to apply basic principles, citing benchmark examples which include the John Deere Construction & Forestry Technology Program, Radica Games Group, and Solectron Corporation.

Obviously, all organizations have boundaries and many of them are essential to achieving success. For example, non-negotiable values to which everyone involved is held accountable. Without appropriate behavior, there would be chaos. Also, there are limits on available resources which means that priorities must be set and then served. No organization can afford to be everything to everyone associated with it. Boundaries are inevitable. That said, Mankin and Cohen assert -- and I wholly agree -- that there is an interdependence of structure and relationships which can enable any organization (regardless of size or nature) to collaborate effectively, and do so "across time, distance, organization, and culture." The core concept of this book is a metaprinciple which is explained in Chapter One. With exquisite care, Mankin and Cohen use an especially apt metaphor -- jazz -- to illustrate how the metaprinciple provides the "theme" and the action framework (please see pages 5-8 and Chapters Seven and Eight) provides the "score." Extending the metaphor, Mankin and Cohen urge their reader to use the theme to improvise on the framework and create collaboration within her or his own organization and such efforts will "transcend all boundaries to produce deeply fulfilling performances."

Not all of those who read this book will be willing and able to make and then sustain the commitment required. It may be helpful to recall Henry Ford's assertion that, whether you think you can or think you can't, you're right.

If you share my high regard for this book , please check out Arthur Rubinfeld and Collins Hemingway's Built for Growth: Expanding Your Business Around the Corner or Across the Globe, W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne's Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make Competition Irrelevant, Constantinos C. Markides' Fast Second: How Smart Companies Bypass Radical Innovation to Enter and Dominate New Markets, and Seeing What's Next: Using Theories of Innovation to Predict Industry Change co-authored by Clayton M. Christensen, Erik A. Roth, and Scott D. Anthony.

You will not be disappointed with Professor Challenger and his exploits. I have been a long time Doyle fan with his White Company and, of course, Sherlock Holmes cannon. I must admit I had never read Challenger before this edition. It is most enjoyable and will further entertain all of Dr. Doyle's admirers.

Professor George Edward Challenger is the lesser known creation of Sherlock Holmes' creator, Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930). Unlike the cool and calculating Homes, Challenger is irascible, domineering and extremely outspoken. In short, he is a lot of fun to read. However, unlike Holmes, Professor Challenger never caught on and as such only five Challenger stories were ever written. This book combines all five of the Professor Challenger stories together in one book:

The Lost World - originally published in 1912 - 5 stars - This is the greatest, and the best known of the Professor Challenger stories. Professor Challenger has heard of a plateau in South America where dinosaurs still roam, and he loses no time in setting up an expedition to this strange place. However, when the expedition finds itself marooned on the plateau, the team faces many dangers and adventures.

The Poison Belt - 1913 - 5 stars - Professor Challenger has learned that the Earth is moving towards a poisonous section of space, and has figured out a way that he can save a few members of the human race - the last people left on Earth!

The Land of Mist - 1926 - 1 star - The worst of the Professor Challenger stories, this one is really just a polemic, written to convince the reader of the wonder (or whatever) of Spiritualism. This story might have been what killed the series.

The Disintegration Machine - 1927 - 5 stars - A Latvian scientist has created a machine that can disintegrate matter, and reintegrate it again...or not. This is something that Professor Challenger must see for himself if he is to fully understand its ramifications.

When The World Screamed - 1928 - 5 stars - Professor Challenger is digging a well or mine of some sort in southern England, but what is he up to? It seems that the eccentric professor has a new theory - that the Earth is really a living creature!

Although more than a little dated, scientifically, I found these stories to be well written and quite exciting. (Well, four of the five that is.) They reflects a world that is now gone, but is quite interesting to read about. If you like adventure stories, then you will like this one. Read this book, and learn about A.C. Doyle's other hero!

A fun volume collecting all the Conan Doyle Professor Challenger adventures. As usual, Leonaur editions are of very high physical quality.
These stories, actually a novel and several novelettes, suggest that if the author had not become famous for his creation of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, he might be regarded as a forefather of fantasy and science fiction, a la Rider Haggard and Edgar Rice Burroughs.
Not to be missed.