New Zealand Books

With a copy of this guide at hand, I've tried several times to read the whole thing front to back in order to digest all of the information and be able to come up with a coherent plan to visit New Zealand, but I find the writing dense and unentertaining. Perhaps the subject matter is difficult-- as a primarily outdoor destination, New Zealand may not lend itself easily to a list of places to see and things to do. Nevertheless, in despair at wading through this long but boring tome, I have ordered the Lonely Planet guides in the hopes that they will be more readable.

This first edition of the New Zealand Rough Guide has taken its place as the best overall travel book for the country. As with others in its series, this Rough Guide gives a thorough description of all the cultural and recreational aspects that a first time or a seasoned traveler "downunda" should know. For the basic information concerning accommodation or eating, the Rough Guide follows its practice of offering choices for every price level but it doesn't act as listing agent for each and every hostel, hotel, B & B or cafe. In that regard, the Rough Guides encourage the traveler to look for him or herself instead of following the standardized tourist formula.

But it's heavy on the activities for specific woderful areas like Kaikoura, the Otago Peninsula, Wanaka and many, many more. The color photographs are an appealing addition, also.

Just returned from a 21-day journey to Kiwi-country, and used the Rough Guide extensively. From Dunedin to Auckland, the book spells out excursions, accommodations and lifestyle samples in various price ranges better than most other guide books.

Format is simple to read, easy to find just what you need. We were turned on to some great motels and B&Bs, excellent eateries and a few adventure tours along the way. Maps of cities were quite helpful. Other books have prettier pictures, but this one does the best job of finding stuff to DO in NZ.

This review refers to the 2000 2nd Ed.

The author in this true story builds a 32' sailboat boat from driftwood in his parents front yard to fulfill his dream of sailing in the south seas. The story is interesting historically , entertaining and inspiring and I recommend it.

I read this book whist sitting on a yacht in the southern ocean...which is not the best place to read it. Jonny Wray does not write exceptional prose but if you are not sitting in the South Pacific when you read South Sea Vagabonds you will spend years hankering for the place.

If ever a book needed to come into print in the 1990's this is it. Freedom in 200 pages..... ........If you can find it

John Wray is one of those characters who doesn't fit the urban workaday lifestyle of most of us. His daydreaming about the sea and wind in his hair led him to get the sack from his office job, which was a good thing really. He made use of the time on his hands to build himself a cruising yacht. But he had no money. Not letting a small thing like lack of resources get in the way, he scrounged the materials and built his boat. The first half of the book is taken up with the fascinating details of acquiring the materials and building on a shoestring budget. An interesting and funny chronicle - especially if you're interested in building boats. The rest of the book focuses on his adventures with the boat after he gets it in the water. A pretty-much run of the mill travelogue of the South Pacific, but written with humour and the interesting prose of a hands-on blue water sailor. You can't help liking the man. The book was written in the 1930's. I hope it made him enough money to enjoy a long and happy life at sea.

I really enjoyed the book and wish I could take a year off and go for a ride like the writer did. It's a funny book and it's clear that you don't have to have ridden a horse to be able to ride 3000 miles. There are some great phrases and expressions in the book too.

I really enjoyed the book and wish I could take a year off and go for a ride like the writer did. It's a funny book and it's clear that you don't have to have ridden a horse to be able to ride 3000 miles. There are some great phrases and expressions in the book too.

This book offered hysterical insights into the travels that we all could have had. What a treat. If you are a fan of Clive James, pick it up.

I'm not sure why I waited so long to read this book by Jennifer Fulton. I've read and enjoyed everything else she's written - under all three of her pen names. However, this older book has been sitting on my shelf as I've been reading new releases. Finally making time to read this one is one of the better decisions I've made in a while.

Similar to Saxon Bennet's style, Fulton brings a myriad of characters to the table. At first they are difficult to keep straight, but the story is well-written and is easy to follow.

A group of women get together to openly discuss their dating woes. They agree to always be honest and to never date each other. Of course, as they begin supporting each other in their failures, sub-relationships begin to form and that's where all the fun really begins.

A well-developed story with (mostly) likable characters, this not-so-recent release is sure to keep you entertained.

At first I thought this was simply a well-written entertaining look at lesbians on the prowl for love and sex. But Fulton really brings surprising challenges to the story and depth to the main character. I hope she writes a sequel.

I have read all of Fulton's books and I must say that I was a little bit disappointed that this was not the happily ever after that the previous ones were-however-once you get over that the book is a laugh out loud peak into the world of some kinda unhealthy lesbians.

This novel is pure surrealism in prose. Blake is a dangerous, fast and loose running kid - falling out with his school masters for raping a sportsfield, failing at a series of jobs, he finally finds transcendence from the sterile bonds of society by stealing a plane and crashing it into the Thames at Shepperton. Believing himself dead, he undergoes a transformation and finds himself melding and soaring with the dormitory suburb of Shepperton (Ballard's hometown). Like some kind of winged messianic creature, he transforms the town into a surreal paradise with vines dripping from suburban street properties, and mysterious tropical plants blooming in the cornices. With his mercurial sperm, he mates with the entire town, flora and fauna alike, both possessing and dominating the climate, treating it as his plaything, leading to an apocalyptic and transcending climax: a complete fusion of the self with nature.

I can't agree more that this work captures the true spirit of alchemical transformation and of elemental spiritual forces. A man crashes his plane in a small town and miraculously returns from the threshold of death. His return from the grave transforms him into what can be best described as a pagan god, though that does not even go half of the way towards explaining the story. This book is really about life and freedom, the bondage of civilization and the crude fortress of reality that we have walled ourselves into. It's about morality, the morality of a man made god and the truth of the universe. Does this sound interesting? Get this book.

This intensely visual book has the depth and mystery of the 17th Century alchemical works...like them, it is about transformation, and the solidification of the heart's essence, in this case, the desire to fly. Endlessly imaginative and obsessively generous, a glorious torrent of images that is almost an assault...this is one of my favorite books.

The book was good

Many years ago a group of friends got together and tried to scare each other with scary stories. Among the group were Lord Byron, The poet Shelly and his wife Mary, and Byron's physician John Polidori. Mary Shelly's tale, Frankenstein: A Modern Prometheus, has lived on as has The Vampyre by John Polidori. The Vampyre was the first major English vampire story. Fleshcreepers attempts to bring this classic tale to a younger audience.

The story opens as a young man of means encounters a dead woman one night. The scene haunts him as he seems to get drawn into other dark scenes. He becomes fascinated by a the Lord Ruthven, an aristocrat of mysterious nature. He even goes so far as to go on a tour of Europe with him. But soon the young man begins to suspect that not is all as it seems with the Lord. His suspicions and their resolution make up the rest of the story.

This is an entertaining tale, and while intended for younger readers, is far from genteel. The adaptation does a good job of building the terror and horror and inevitable conclusion. A pretty spooky little book.

Well i must say that this book was given to me when i was like 8 yrs old, i read the book and have been hooked ever since on horror books especially vampire books and it's more than 10 yrs later and i still read this book! I give it 5 stars because this is a great book for young readers that want to start reading horror or vampire books..

My Dear Sister your poetry is very decent
This is a sparkling collection and attractive by the fifteen year old daughter of Murtaza Bhutto, who was gunned down during the premiership of his sister, Benazir Bhutto. Though written two or three years before the assassination, they are largely premonitory and speak of a life of loneliness and separation.
Asif Hyder Bhurgri C/O Bhurgri House Nindo Shaher District badin Sindh Pakistan.

When I read her only some few poems,I thaught,How Deep She is,
I found her in the state of solitary.
but she did very fine work,I like it,
well,
If she can hear me,I advise her to continue her poetry.

...

IT WAS A GREAT EXPERIENCE FOR ME TO READ THIS BOOK.AND I RECCOMAND ALL OF U TO READ THIS BOOK .. ITS A GREAT EFFORT FROM FATIMA ................................................................................................. BABAR ALI MASTOI mastoi01@hotmail.com

King takes on no small feat in writing the biography of an author Time magazine once called "the greatest writer of this century" and one who has remained so secluded and private throughout her career. A facinating and rewarding book on an amazing literary talent.

This enthusiastic and respectful biography accomplishes so much. Michael King's affection and deep understanding of Janet Frame - and her cooperation with him - inform this work. She is a very private public figure. In this book one gets to know her quite well, with so sense that her privacy has been compromised. One guesses that is due to King's considerable talent for people as well as for biography.

King gets the emotional tenor of events just right. He looks into Frame's entire life and work - and focusses on the little things along with the big picture - down to mentioning (for example) that Frame attended one of many dinners in her honor in Wellington, NZ - wearing a formal dress that she had bought for $1.50 from a Salvation Army shop. It's a detail that he could have left out, but that Frame herself would have included. I was grateful for details, for the inclusion of Frame's considerable and insightful analyses (often only a few words long!) of the works of her writing peers, and liberal use of quotations. This biography manages to be comprehensive, graceful, and not wholly uncritical - although clearly and reasonably charmed by its subject. In addition there are great photographs and notes.

Admirers of Janet Frame and of the art and craft of biography will like this book very much.

At first sight this is a dauntingly long book of 500 pages plus. However, even after reading a few pages, one is quickly drawn into an amazinly frank and totally engrossingly private "interview" with a remarkable writer. There is a vast amount of private detail of the emotional and intellecual life ot Janet Frame. Yet with all the detail, one never has the impression of gratuitious intrusion. The reader is led on by the depth of the feeling and the necessity to reveal all the amazing diversity of this writer. Michael King exposes the rawness and richness of a literary genius. Facts of childhood and young passion satisfy the voyeur. The devastating experince of primitive psychology and brutal mental health treatment give way to her emotional awakening in Europe, far from the strait-jacket of the censure of a puritanical and uncomprehending New Zealand public. This book offers far more than the superficial film of Janet Frame's early life, scarrred by the malady of "being different." The book's supreme achievement is that it allows the reader to understand the psyche of the writer, and thereby, allow a far richer and more rewarding understanding of a truly superb writer. Any reader of this book will gain not only a closer relationship with the literary figure but also, a more informed knowledge of a New Zealand writer who belongs to a world fraternity. Her years in America at Yaddo and her acceptance into an esoteric literary group let the reader share a rare experience of intimacy and brilliance. Michael King is a direct writer. He is clear and direct. There is no pretence of showmanship or precious explanation. This book is a must for those interested in the life and writing of an author who overcomes all obstacles for the sake of true genius.

Daniel Rodgers' thesis in Atlantic Crossings is simple and direct: "the reconstruction of American social politics was of a part with movements of politics and ideas throughout the North Atlantic world that trade and capitalism had tied together." (3) He concludes that from the 1870s through World War II, America was not an internalist or an imperialist nation, but instead these years saw an "opening" for social reformers in the U.S. to import foreign models and ideals from other North Atlantic countries. Furthermore, these imported policies and reforms (mostly from Britain and Germany) were not adopted in America (if at all) unchanged upon reaching the Atlantic's western shores, but instead were adapted to the peculiarities and idiosyncrasies of American society and political structure. Finally, Rodgers argues, the seeds of the New Deal can be found in the activities and positions of the social reform activists of the last two decades of the 19th century and the first thirty years of the 20th century.
Rodgers convincingly supports his thesis by describing "a largely forgotten world of transnational borrowings and imitation, adaptation and transformation" (7) from the 1870s through the 1940s, a time during which Americans had an abundance of solutions to the myriad social problems of their day. This "borrowing" was a process that changed significantly over time. Initially, Americans were primarily recipients of reform ideas from abroad. Later, during the prosperity of the 1920s, a more even exchange of social solutions took place among North Atlantic countries, which eventually led to "a great gathering...of proposals and ideas" in the New Deal. Finally, by the end of World War II, the differing experiences of the nations of the North Atlantic world and the varying effects suffered by each from the conflict largely ended the former transnational exchange, and saw the Cold War rise of American exceptionalism.
Rodgers provides numerous convincing examples of the cross-national exchange process of ideas and reforms to illustrate his arguments. Workmen's compensation insurance in America, for example, was based upon a pre-World War I British model, a "ready made solution with a history of success behind it" (248) that made similar acts in the U.S. possible. Additionally, housing, health and streetcars were a major concern of American social reformers in large cities, who often borrowed ideas about municipally-guided urban and industrial projects from experiments and visions in Berlin and London. As Rodgers notes regarding the new "self-owned" city, "municipalization was the first important Atlantic-wide progressive project...[that] borrowed experience and transnational example." (159) European precedents gave American progressives "a set of working, practical examples." (144) "He describes, however, in chapters 5 and 6, the impossibility of wholesale American import of strong European municipality due to the unique and equally strong traditions in the U.S. in favor of property rights, a tradition buttressed and maintained by legal tradition and the courts. One need only look at excess condemnation, widely practiced in Paris and London, to see an example of reforms disallowed by the courts, which held that public interests of taste and beauty did not surmount the rights of property owners. Housing in America "was a private matter," (196) unlike the European examples progressives saw.
Although some reviewers have taken exception with Rodgers' claim that within the progressive movement's ideology one can see the footers of the New Deal, his argument is convincing. What New Dealers "did best," he asserts, "was to throw in to the breach, with verve and imagination, schemes set in motion years or decades before." (415) A large number of New Deal projects came out of the old Atlantic progressive connection, and in "gathering in so much of the progressive agenda, the New Deal gathered in large chunks of European experience as well." (416)
Perhaps the weakness in Atlantic Crossings is that which is left out, not in the arguments Rodgers articulately presents. First, it is surprising that Rodgers presents no detailed discussion regarding education reform, particularly when this issue was so important to the Germans at the time. Second, one would never know that there was an American South during this time period, a region where progressives were active even despite a lack of urban areas there. Nevertheless, Rodgers has done a masterful job of comparative history by emphasizing trans-national borrowing and cooperation.

This is the policy-side answer to Kloppenberg's UNCERTAIN VICTORY. While that book focussed on intellectual links between European (esp. German or French) thought and early American pragmatism, Rodgers seeks more practical applications, well into the 20th century. He is so well versed in the literature that scant references are made to secondary sources. It is rich in the literature of the time, particularly journals, magazines, and newspapers from several different countries. Interestingly, unlike Kloppenberg this book examines England and Scotland which provide springboards for American reforms. Rodgers' thesis is that the Europeans tried numerous policies which Americans learned about and then implemented, almost always later than their counterparts across the Atlantic--and sometimes with very limited success. The book is also noteworthy for some of the most practical applications of MODERNISM yet seen in contemporary scholarship. This is a hot topic, largely seen in discussions of art or literature. Here Rodgers takes all that knowledge, absorbs it, and then demonstrates it in action across the POLITICAL spectrum. Despite the enormous research behind it, Rodgers has written an enjoyable, readable work that is of considerable importance. After all, this is the author of the famous article, "An Obituary for the Progressive Movement," (1970) which claimed that there NEVER WAS such a movement. Here Rodgers answers his own claim, saying that the American reform impulse built upon a European foundation and produced policies which survive to the present. My only complaint is that this book is slanted TOWARDS Europe, with maybe 60% of the discussion dwelling across the Atlantic ... the format gets a little tedious, with most chapters beginning in Europe, then the Americans pick up on the policy (welfare, municipal gas/water etc) and then they try it themselves. This is nitpicking, though, for such a substantive, well-researched, lucid work that defines this generation's scholarship on the Progressive Era.

Analysis of the Royal Australian Navy in the 20th century. Third volume in the Australian Centenary History of Defence series. Explores the effects of changing strategic circumstance, technological innovation, and differing national needs and expectations. Reviews Australia's naval involvement in operations that have ranged from global war through to peacekeeping and natural disaster. Includes illustrations, notes on contributors, notes, further reading and index. Editor served for 20 years with the Royal Australian Navy and became the inaugural Director of Naval Historical Studies within the Maritime Studies Program on retirement in 1994. He has authored or edited several books on maritime strategy and naval history. Series editors Professor Peter Dennis and Lieutenant-General John Coates are both connected with the Australian Defence Force Academy.

This is a well written book - Volume 3 of a series
"The Australian Centenary History of Defence Services". This volume is written by 6 contributors including the editor Dr D M Stevens.
All the contributors served in the Royal Australian Navy.
The first chapter deals with the formation of The Commonwealth
Naval Forces from five colonial naval forces and then the creation of the Royal Australian Navy in 1913.
The conflicts in which the navy was engaged are covered in some detail as well as the periods of peace with all the professional and political problems of how the navy should be developed.
There are good black and white photographs as well as fold-out plans of significant ships. There is a list of major ships giving the fate(i.e. sunk sold scuttled etc) of those no longer in service.
Also of value is a list of abbreviations for reference - for example
it may not be known to everyone that a DDG is a "Guided Missile
Destroyer"!