North America Books

This book was an excellent source of information. The maps were also helpful for planning out my mileage for my weekend adventures.

I've used previous editions of this guide, but the 16th edition includes validated GPS data and is certainly the best of a very good lot. The package includes a guidebook, with detailed trail descriptions for the 174 miles from Kent, Connecticut, to Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area on the New Jersey-Pennsylvania line. There are also four waterproof color maps (scale: 1 inch = 1 mile) which show the A.T., other trails in the area, and roads used to access the trails.

My favorite hike in this book includes the Agony Grind on the west side of the entrance to Harriman Park, just off Old 17. There's a short, fairly steep scramble up to a long ridge walk above Greenwood Lake with great views -- you can often see hawks flapping across the lake far below you, and then rising effortless just out of reach on the thermals formed by the ridge. It's a rewarding out and in hike, of whatever length you have time for. Save a little energy for a careful descent at the end of the hike.

There are other excellent local guides to New Jersey and New York trails. The New Jersey Walk Book: A Companion to the New York Walk Book and the New York Walk Book: A Companion to the New Jersey Walk Book are the pick of the litter.

Nonetheless it is romantic to use one of a series covering the entire Appalachian Trail. One can pretend to be an End to Ender of this most famous of our trails.

Robert C. Ross 2007 2008

If the reader is really serious about hiking the A.T., specifically the N.Y. /N.J. section, this book, along with the 6 very detailed maps that come with it, will be a tremendous help, with all the relevant information all packed into a (large)pocket-sized paperback.
In addition to very interesting facts behind the history and the beginnings of the AT, the information found in this book will guide you, almost hold your hand along the trail and, it will then be up to you to listen to the wisdom, advice and warnings found here or, ignore them and find out -the hard way- why only 10% of the people who attempt to hike the Appalachian Trail will finish it in a year.
Where can you find water?; where are you not allowed to camp?; is it safe to hike alone?;can you take your dog with you? (NO!). Statistically speaking, did you know that you will be safer hiking the entire A.T., than walking the streets of most large american cities?
These and many other topics, too numerous to mention here, are dealt with in this volume.
Having all of that information ahead of time will make it (just a little) easier to put on your backpack, lug your 3 liters of water needed daily, consume the 4000 calories of food needed every day and.....in about 6 months time you will have arrived at your destination, very tired, much thinner and, much wiser.

Here is a book that will help you to get to know your trees, magical beings that they are. This book gives all kinds of information about the trees around us in our yards and neighborhoods, including things like the pheromones exuded by the catalpa helps heart patients, and so on. It is a remarkable compendium of information that will make you want to plant, and help you decide which trees to plant. It will make you appreciate the trees around your neighborhood more as you walk beneath them. For anyone who gardens or loves trees, this is an outstanding book.

In Arboretum America: A Philosophy Of The Forest, botanist, medical researcher, and agricultural expert, Diana Beresford-Kroeger celebrates a diversity of trees and plants including how they can counteract the effects of pollution and global warming; which native plants complement the "bioplan"; how to plan them with ideas and tips; the medicinal uses trees and plants have had from the inception of aboriginal cultures down to the modern day, and so much more. Inviting, full-color photography by Christian H. Kroeger and an informative Foreword by Edward O. Wilson nicely embellish this informed and informative presentation which vibrantly reflects the Diana Beresford-Kroeger's love of nature and enduring passion for scientific inquisition. Arboretum America is an especially recommended addition to Ecological Studies reference collections and Botanical Studies supplemental reading lists.

What a holistic book on the forests of North America. Diana Beresford-Kroeger discuss the ecology of our trees in a scientific fashion as well as including a spiritual and healing aspects of the forest through the history of plants and medicinal properties. Wonderful book and I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to know more about the unique dynamics of forest life.

I really like the way this book is organized. There are sections such as "Desserts" and "Canyons". When I went to Arizona the last time, I wanted to visit desserts, and I wanted to hike some Canyons, so I could simply read these sections and learn pretty much everything I wanted to know, rather than piece this information together as other travel books make you do (since they are usually organized by area). The organization also allows you to skip information such as "Art" and "History". Of course in the end I ended up being interested in these sections after all, so I read them in the care while I was there. And once again, I could focus on these sections rather than finding this information organized by area.

Long story short: I really like reading about an area by topic of interest, rather than by location. It makes travel planning much easier. Of course, your need may be different (you may be in a certain town and want to figure out what to do for instance...). In that case, this book still is useful (it DOES have short sections on individual locations), but there are other books I use for that type of research.

Overall, I can highly recommend this book. In fact, I will order some of the other books from this series for different states.

This book is incredible. It gives all kinds of details ranging from local interest and lore to general information about the state. It reads like a novel and yet is very informative. Even if you have no intention of ever visiting Arizona, this is still a wonderful book to read and the photographs are breath-taking.

Compass Guides are the best series I have ever read. They are literate and beautifully illustrated, laid out well and very logical to use. Of the Compass Guides I've read, Cheek's Arizona is the best (followed closely by his Santa Fe Guide).

He writes with wit and style. He's not afraid to share his opinion, but never takes for granted that his is the only viewpoint. He also adds a human element that few other guides offer. Frequently you'll find sidebar articles that introduce you to a person whose story particularly illustrates the idea or place in question.

I lived in Arizona for 4 1/2 years. This is the guide that I used to learn the state. I would recommend it to anyone. When my wife and I married in Sedona, Arizona we sent copies of this book to our relatives to acquaint them with the wonderful place they'd be visiting. All who read it were delighted. You'll be, too.

This book concisely details the impact of Jorge Eliecer Gaitan on 20th Century Colombian politics. This work begins with an account of Gaitan's days as a student and his early professional life as a lawyer. Gaitan came from a middle-middle class background and rose through the ranks of the Liberal party to eventually become its Presidential candidate in the late 1940s. Gaitan's political outlook was left-of-center and he was a champion of the lower and middle classes. Because Gaitan was the people's candidate, he was not especially liked by the Colombian oligarchy. Gaitan was assasinated in 1948 and to this day it is not officially known who the intellectual authors of that crime were. However, the people felt their candidate had been murdered by the oligarchy and this led to a brutal 10-year civil war that claimed over 200,000 lives. This is a must-read book to understand the root causes of Colombian political violence.

Professor Herbert Braun has authored a monumental book. The author leaves few stones unturned...as a result the research is absolutely profound. "Jorge Eliécer Gaitán" is a legendary Colombian populist who unfortunately is assasinated before he can fulfill his political ambitions. To this end, Braun carefully documents the fact that had he not been killed, Gaitán would have certainly won the 1950 presidential elections in Colombia.

Braun tells the complete story of Gaitán...the politician who boasted that he was not a man...he was a village. The author painstakingly demonstrates the enormous importance Gaitán played among the poor. Moreover, Braun also does an excellent job of showing how Gaitán filled a gigantic void in Colombian politics. Unfortunately, the assasination of Gaitán triggered the conflict that haunts Colombia to this day. In my professional opinion, this is an spectacular book and must be read by everyone with a special competence in Colombian - American affairs.

Bert Ruiz

This book provides the reader with a precise insight on the evolution of Colombia's restrictive political system. In other words, the author shows the way in which this country's ruling elite have been successful in excluding the masses from major political decisions. This situation has been an influential cause for the fall of such popular figures as Jorge Eliecer Gaitan.

Co-written by Eric Hinderaker (Associate Professor of History, University of Utah) and Peter C. Mancall (Professor of History, University of Southern California), At The Edge Of Empire: The Backcountry In British North America focuses upon the interplay between Europeans and Native Americans during the seventeenth century. The "backcountry" that existed just beyond the imperial reach of Britain is the primary subject of this acutely written, meticulously researched, scholarly history which closely examines the manifold causes of conflict, as well as the ordinary situations of daily life which were to significantly contribute to the American Revolut-ion of 1776.

Co-written by Eric Hinderaker (Associate Professor of History, University of Utah) and Peter C. Mancall (Professor of History, University of Southern California), At The Edge Of Empire: The Backcountry In British North America focuses upon the interplay between Europeans and Native Americans during the seventeenth century. The "backcountry" that existed just beyond the imperial reach of Britain is the primary subject of this acutely written, meticulously researched, scholarly history which closely examines the manifold causes of conflict, as well as the ordinary situations of daily life which were to significantly contribute to the American Revolution of 1776.

When an American thinks of the frontier of history, modern day Ohio, Kentucky and the Appalachian mountains are hardly the first thing that comes to mind. When a British subject thinks of the effects of the nation's past in Ireland or Scotland, dealings with Cherokees or Mohawks hardly come to mind. But Professor's Hinderaker and Mancall make the case in their comprehensive yet concise story about the edge of the first British Empire and the first American frontier.

The back country of America is often approached from a modern, American standpoint, from the perspective of the early Americans, like Daniel Boone. This book makes the case that the American back country should be instead be likened to the English experience in Ireland and Scotland in the 16th century, rather than being likened to the American experience in western and Rocky Mountain states in the 19th century. Though to a large degree, it is impossible to understand the later American historical experience of the Wild west without understanding the wild mid-west.

This book can be understood well from three perspectives: the relationship of the settlers along the American frontier to the native Americans, the relationship of the British Empire to the settlers, the relationship between Britain and France in their longstanding struggle for supremacy. As the 170 years or so of the first British Empire in North America rolled on, the conflicting attitudes, alliances and interests of all the parties involved made the time period one of constant change with at times brutal results in economic deprivation and war. What emerged was perhaps the most unlikely event possible, a continental republic where authority flowed from the bottom up, as much as it has at any point in human history.

The authors do a fine job of showing just why the interior of North America was so valuable to all parties involved, and why confusion and misunderstanding often carried the day. The Pennsylvania backcountry is a prime example. Founded by Quaker businessman and pacifists, ruling from far away Philadelphia, they simply had no framework for understanding the disputes, claims and issues involved among the German and Scotch Irish settlers in today's central Pennsylvania. And these decades of misunderstandings often led to unnecessary conflict among the natives, settlers and rising disputes with the ruling class.

The familiar events leading to the American Revolution are told from the perspective that disputes in the backcountry largely led to the conflict that founded the United States. Even given several decades to solve the situation politically, the British Empire could never effectively design systems to deal with trade, backcountry political representation and native disputes. The worldview of the day and the distant London government could never quite understand just how complex a situation they were dealing with. How the early American Republic was able to solve the issues that were raised by the backcountry disputes with London so quickly, such as the removal of nearly every colonial capital from the coast to the interior and the means of creating new interior territories, is told well, with the only losers being the native tribes who were seen as a problem to be pushed away until later by the British and a problem to be swept away by the backcountry settlers.

This is a short book, worth a reader's time, as it shows just how dramatic and incredible the changes were in eastern North America during the 16th and 17th century. Things that began small: land speculation, Indian conflict, individual settlement apart from an often disinterested justice system grew up into something completely unexpected. Few of the actors of the day escape unscathed from this 170 year time period, and the misunderstandings of the time period often met their end in civil war in the American Revolution.

In about a 180 pages, the authors map out a pattern of settlement by Europeans, unlike anything that had happened before, one that was unruly, controlled from the ground up and led to the modern world. This book is highly recommended.

This book is a guide to trees one can encounter in the woods of the Northeast. It opens with a brief yet informative description of the science behind the changing colors of autumn leaves, including some suggestions for easy science experiments to provide further understanding of the processes involved. The main part of the book is divided into two sections: deciduous trees and conifers. In this section, there are short articles for individual trees, presented in order of which trees are most common and striking in their autumn glory, rather than in alphabetical or family order. The articles include common names, Latin names, and multiple high quality color pictures of autumn foliage, as well as notes concerning what the wood might be used for, well-known literary references, and descriptive information. At the back of the book is a short list of titles for further reference and an index. This book is not intended as a guidebook for tree identification, but more a celebration of northern trees when they are at their colorful peak. The depth and readability of its descriptions of individual trees, however, would make it a suitable supplement to a tree identification guide for readers who want to learn more about the trees they already know by sight.

Despite its small size and paperback format, this is one of my most treasured books. I am a resident of Michigan, and the fall is always a highlight of our year. Michiganders, as an army, await autumn leaves and "leaf peeping", as young children await Christmas morning. This is the ONLY book I've ever seen that really gives its reader a good understanding of this beautiful phenomenon.

The first 17 or so pages give a physical, chemical, and biological discourse on why leaves change, and on what goes into the makeup of the various colors. The next 100+ pages cover all deciduous trees of northeastern North America, in turn, with a good discussion of each species being attended by excellent four-color photographs of the subject tree in various formats, including group, solo, and partial shots. Finally a sixty-page section gives the same ememplary treatment to northeastern North American evergreens. These, too, form part of the fall patterns, albeit in a more subdued way.

If you live in the area bounded by Ontario, Minnesota, Missouri, Tennessee, Virginia, Maine, New Brunswick, and Quebec, or are planning to visit any states or provinces in that area this fall, buy this book now, and read it over. You'll be glad you did, this year and every year. I would give this book a ten-star rating if I could, and recommend it highly. An invaluable bargain.

This is really well done. There are numerous color photos (both closeups, some whole tree shots, and often a shot of a grouping of trees showing the characteristics of the tree being described. I highly recommend this for anyone wanting a guide to Fall trees or even for planning your plantings. It's also reasonably priced. My only misgiving is that it isn't longer and cover the entire eastern US!

The discovery of the New World has always been a topic that both fascinated and horrified me. As an American, I recognized that it as the foundation for much of who I am. But as a sensative, caring person, I could not help feeling ashamed of the greed, racism, and cruelty exhibited first by the Spanish conquistadors towards the Aztecs, then by Europeans in general towards all the first nations that were here before us.

By providing a history written by the conquered as well as the conquerors, "Aztec, Death of a Nation" has helped me understand some of the complexity behind the history I learned in school. There are no "good guys" or "bad guys" in this story. Rather, this is really a history of individual human beings.

Some of the people I read about struck me as cruel and barabaric, but because the accounts also provided insight into the social, relgious, and politcial climates and into the personal struggles endured by these people, I came to realize that I couldn't lay blame on any of them. Some of the people I read about struck me as good and kind - more of what I think as as truly civilized - but because I could see that the goodness and kindness came out of individual strength and conviction, I also couldn't judge any of groups of people as being better or worse than any other.

"Aztec, Death of a Nation" is the first book I have found that has been able to help me come to terms with my heritage as a member of the conquering race. Rarely are we given an opportunity like this to see through the eyes of past civilization.

Kenneth Pearce's collection of eyewitness acounts of the rise and fall of the Aztec Empire is a book most fantasy fiction readers won't want to miss. This book weaves many short personal stories together to provide an epic tale of power, glory, and the ultimate clash between two races.

It paints a picture of a culture, religion, and history so different from our own that it feels more alien than many stories set on other planets or in other realities, and it is true.

Those of us who love roller coasters do so partly because they are more than just a thrill; They are real, with a hint of real danger. Reading this book provides that same added edge for the fantasy reader. As this book took me on journeys into the underworld, showed me prophecies from the past, ritual cannibalism and invasion from abroad, a spine tingling whisper in the back of mind kept reminding me that it was all true

I had the pleasure of reading an early draft of this book. The detailed and scholarly endnotes were the only reminder that I was not reading a work of pure fiction, but rather the actual words of soldiers, priests, chiefs, even pesants who were present at the downfall of the Aztec empire. "Aztec, Death of a Nation" is a fractured ancient vase carefully restored by a knowledgable archaeologist.

This book is an example of the new attention ethnographers are paying to writing. Not only is it wonderfully written but it is an honest account of Zuni lives today. Tedlock went to the pueblo with her husband Dennis Tedlock (author of the "Popol Vuh" and the "Rabinal Achi") as a painter and after a number of visits and encouragement from Zuni women she decided to become an ethnographer. During her graduate education she also did work in Guatemala, see her classic book "Time and the Highland Maya." There is now a new book about to appear "The Woman in the Shaman's Body: Reclaiming the Feminine in Religion and Medicine." I've seen the advanced copy and it is fabulous! All these books are must reads for young documentary writers and spiritually alive women and men today!

This is a beautifully written, honest, book about a young woman ethnographer coming of age. She first went to Zuni Pueblo as a young woman painter with her anthropologist husband and fell in love with the people and place. As a result she went on to get graduate degrees in Ethnomusicology and Anthropology herself and began working with the Maya in Guatemala. Since then she has written a book on women shamans worldwide: The Woman in the Shaman's Body. These books are worth the time to read.

I really enjoyed reading Tedlock's work. The writing reverses the notion of "participant observation" to the "observation of participation." Instead of a removed, monological account, we are offered a polyphony of voices, including the authors. In fact, the ethnography reads much like a novel; however, these are real people with real stories to tell. The text offers a rich and evocative account of the Zuni people and their experiences in the borderzone between the past and present. Tedlock's work and writing strategies were central to the writing of my own ethnographic account of a Southeastern Native American Tribe in search of a visible past--the Pee Dee of South Carolina (Title: Native Americans in the Carolina Borderlands: A Critical Ethnography, Carolinas Press, 2000). Tedlock's ethnography is a must read for those on the verge of engaging ethnography, no matter the methodological bent, and students and academics interested in Native American Studies, Cultural Studies, Cultural Anthropology, and alternative ethnography.

This was one of Safire's first books after leaving the government and setting up shop at the New York Times. It's a massive but highly readable memoir of his service as speechwriter at the Nixon White House. His view of the president is highly nuanced but ultimately sympathetic. He unloads on Henry Kissinger for having Safire's phone tapped; writes a revealing portrait of Pat Moynihan and how that administration became more "progressive" than either liberal critics or conservative allies could admit; writes admiringly about Julie Eisenhower as "a glimpse of what her father could have been if he hadn't listened so often to the dark side of his personality." He touches on Haldeman, Ehrlichman, and the dirty tricksters and puts them in context of the domestic civil war that was produced by Vietnam--Safire was ahead of his time in giving Nixon more mercy and judging his adversaries as hypocritical (and disasterously wrong about the consequences of a Communist takeover in Southeast Asia.) Highly entertaining and informative--also see his novel of about the same time, "Full Disclosure", for a "roman a' clef" about his Nixon experience.

Content aside, whether or not you are interested in the Nixon administration, this is a wondeful memoir written in a very readable yet elegant style. I suspect that Safire had the Earl of Clarendon leaning over his shoulder when he wrote this.

It's full of wonderful character studies of the major and minor players in the administration. Safire is not enitirely candid in what he writes and he does pull his punches, but if you are good at reading between the lines, it's all there.

A very enjoyable read. Each chapter focuses on a person or key event during the years. Watergate is covered but only tangentally.

The Watergate break-in was terrible for President Richard Nixon and great for William Safire's Nixon memoir. Because the worst of what went on was already out in public view, it allowed Safire's 1975 account of his time as a speechwriter in the Nixon administration to be brutally frank, a luxury he puts to good use.

Safire had more reason to be disappointed than most of Nixon's former aides: he had had his home phone tapped by his boss, apparently because he had friends in the press. Safire's sharp narrative eye picks out weeds in the Rose Garden, like top Nixon aide Jeb Magruder, "a man of mirrors" Safire writes, for whom "buck-passing and back-stabbing was standard procedure."

But the overall sense of "Before The Fall" is of a man who likes Nixon, warts and all, determined to record the good as well as the bad. This was an unfashionable take in 1975: The book's original publisher-to-be, William Morrow & Co., rejected it on the grounds, Safire claims in his introduction, that it "did not join in the general revulsion."

Because of that, "Before The Fall" may have never gotten the due it deserves as one of the best books ever written by a White House observer. Nixon was one of his nation's most flawed and most interesting leaders, and Safire's book, in nearly 900 pages, keeps a running account of his unique complexities.

"Nixon's Dr. Jeckyl worried about Nixon's Mr. Hyde, and usually tried to suppress him, but mostly only tried to conceal him," he writes of his boss's duality.

Safire, who became best known in his subsequent job as the right-leaning columnist for the New York Times, displays a seeming photographic ability to take it all in. Because he writes about so many aspects of Nixon's presidency in focused chapters (such as his relations with Catholics, his friendship with Bebe Rebozo, his trip to China), you feel a fuller sense of what goes on in a presidency, its many facets and challenges.

Safire augments his eyewitness account with a fondness for historic lore and frequent wit (a footnote notes Cambodian leader Lon Nol's place in the pantheon of famous palindromic names.) The engaged nature of Safire's commentary, its lack of pretense and moralizing, its understanding treatment of human frailty, makes this very long book a very easy read.

Give Safire credit also for not slamming the usual suspects. Bob Haldeman and John Ehrlichman get much of the blame for Watergate and did go to prison for it, but the two top Nixon aides are seen by Safire in a kinder light. Chief of staff Haldeman is an office ramrod, but stands by Safire when a televised Nixon speech goes awry and encourages open discussion around the President. Ehrlichman, receiving an apology from a magazine for misspelling his name, writes back to say he likes it better the way they had it.

Liberals may howl at his supportive depiction of the Christmas bombing of Cambodia, while conservatives may find themselves fuming at his happy recounting of Nixon's domestic policy, which matched LBJ's Great Society for largesse. Too bad for them. Safire's account is middle-of-the-road, but never lukewarm.

As political commentators go, Safire is one of the best. He enjoys ideas and has a way of relating them elegantly but plainly. One gets the feeling that Nixon's hall of mirrors served him well, a training ground that taught him the intricacies of politics and the dangers of excess, and provided material for a very fine book with which to begin his path to Pulitzer-prizewinning punditry.

I received the book very quickly, even though it was ordered over the holidays.

I enjoyed this book very much because it's a part of our history many Americans are unaware of. I was a child during World WarII and I seen the POW's working on the farms. My Grandchildren took the book to school to share with the History class and even the teacher was amazed. It's a book you will keep and re-read.

This is a book about a little known or less remembered phase of World War II history as it relates to Minnesota. It suggets the success of the Geneva Convention regarding treatment of prisoners of war in the United States. In the simple presentation of factual information, the author allows us to feel something of the fears, the loneliness, and concerns of prisoners and their willingness to work rather than be idle. The concerns of citizens are also presented clearly concerning escapes, those of labor unions interested in protecting American labor, as well as the general concern about work necessary to pursue the war. It is a facet of the war that most histories neglect.