Z Books

Everything you always wanted to know about historic Billings, Montana! Brief encyclopedic entries cover local history from Air Shows to Zimmerman Trail. Includes Calamity Jane, mysterious tunnels beneath city streets, local pioneers, famous fires, plane crashes, parks, etc. Unique source of local historic information researched and written by two long-time librarians.

My college bookstore wanted this book for $185.00, I paid $137 on Amazon. This book also comes with a CD (student access kit). Amazon will continue to get my business when it comes to textbooks, if the price is right.

I completed my B.A. in biology over 30 years ago and got this book for self-study and to catch up with progress in topics outside of my work experience. The sections seem well written and illustrated. Since this is an introductory text it has sidebars and interviews meant to interest the intro student. I'd leave those out, if only to make the book less massive.

I was able to purchase this book through Amazon.com for my class for $35.00 less than what it was sold for at the college book store, with free shipping. As much as college text books are, I was thrilled to save the money. I found out afterwards that a national book store chain contracts at my school book store. No wonder it was $35.00 more there! I will check Amazon.com for every class from now on.

Biotechnology from A to Z, 2nd edition, by W. Bains With the current explosion of interest in biotechnology and the application of the basic techniques of genetic engineering to medicine, agriculture, forensics, environment, it is becoming increasingly difficult for any one person to stay abreast of all the applications. A handbook such as Bains' is invaluable in cutting straight to the point and providing the appropriate jargon for the particular discipline. Scientists, science writers, environmental activists, everyone will find this book an invaluable reference source. My favorite few pages go from Affinity Tag, Ageing, Agrobacterium tumefaciens, AIDS, to Airlift fermentor. All the entries are explained in clear concise English, with the just the right amount of cross-entries. As is appropriate for a biotechnology book, there are frequent practical examples. There is a good index and a list of books for further reading. It's a shame OUP couldn't have kept the internet address stable. This book is a definite good buy.

Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics Bilkent University, Bilkent 06533, Ankara, Turkey

Great book about an unknown Native American leader (at least by me) and a not widely known Native People, the Sauks and the Fox. I highly recommend it because this is a story about a Native American people that is not often told about. We usually concentrate on the Plains people. The time period for this book is the Revolutionary War to about 1830.

The title-story alone is worth the price of this book. The survivors of a crashed spaceship awaken to find their craft carefully disassembled, as if by an unseen hand. This is just the beginning, friends. Let me tell you, if you haven't read Sturgeon, you haven't read science-fiction. ASF

This comprehensive, rich and exciting volume contains some of the greatest works of fiction, based on Biblical themes, from 1919 to 1963.

This is indeed a compendium of some very rich literature.

Some of the works worth commenting on.

The Creation of Man, from Adam and Eve by John Erskine is done fondly and with tongue in cheek. His
Adam represents all innocence, his Lilith all women, while Noah's Ark from Two By Two by David Garnett puts, in the words of the author 'a frivolous gloss on charming story of the Bible', at the same time as illustrating the relevance of the account to modern generations.
Some of the richest works of Biblical fiction is Thomas Mann's Tales of Jacob and Joseph And His Brothers by Thomas Mann.
In Jacob's Wedding taken from Tales of Jacob, the hero has a strange dream of meeting up with the Egyptian deity Anubis before richly describing the wedding and Laban's deception of Jacob. Richly described is the beauty of Rachel and the appearance of Leah, who is described as having blue eyes and blonde hair.

Other interesting perspectives include the murder of Abel by Father Murray Sheehan , the'reinterpretation' of the David and Goliath saga by Elmer DAvid and Frank Werfel's moving reflection of the last vision of Jeremiah.
Excerpts in this volume are taken from Edith Simon's The Chosen which depicts the events of Exodus from an Egyptian point of view, but the richest stories in my opinion are The Scarlet Cord by Frank Slaughter about the beautiful harlot turned heroine Rahab and the spies, very vivid and sensual, and Queen Esther and Haman's Plot by Norah Lofts, which recounts the story of the miraculous deliverance of the Jews from the genocidal intentions of the evil Haman, a theme paralleled in Jewish history throughout time.

All in all this book, through a variety of styles and perspectives, should provide hours of interesting reading. What all these works have in common is a rich imagination and insight by the authors.
It is a digest of some really rich works of 20th century literature.

If you ever wanted to know what the odds are of your being fired, getting hit by a bus, or being injured by your lawn mower, then your at the right place. This book gets a ten because it includes the sources for all of its trivia facts. That's a very classy touch in the trivia book world.

This book has 128 pages, with almost every page covered by two black & white photographs with a short caption. Chapters are: The Early South End, Places of Worship, Schools, Hospitals, Temples of Fun, Transportation, The 20th Century, The Library, and Business & Industry.

The picture captions are interesting and credit their source. The book may have benefited from more text, but it is chock full of great photoographs that bring this interesting neighborhod to life. Volumes on the Back Bay and the North End are interesting also.

Although I do not own this book "yet" I have borrowed it from a friend. Every page I turn I smile, laugh, or am in awe of a story that tells about God's grace. This is a book for mature 16 year olds and on I think. I think possibly younger children may not appreciate some of the humor, but it is definatly a great buy.

How did this little gem go unreviewed for so long? If you want a "one stop shopping" place for Operation Overlord, this book is the choice. The organization, content, and execution are all excellent. My only suggestion would be more illustrations but that's a small complaint in a book that contains a tremendous variety of subject matter and presents it in comprehensible, readable form. There's even examples of D-Day movies with favorite lines from each. Altogether a top-notch effort.