New Mexico Books

I thought this was a good book. My son who is more educated in Creek Indian culture differs in opinion. He felt that it wasn't authentic enough. My personal feelings are that it held plenty of knowledge for my interest level. It was a quick and fun read. I leave it in the guest room for visitors to browse. I had a few visitors who have stayed up too late because they got caught up in reading it. I would classify this as a book that might get you interested in knowing more. The author doesn't claim to be the last and only expert in this area.

If you are descended from any of the Nations that are from the SE of the US, you should read this book. It is a great book that gives a first person account of traditional Mvskogi medicine traditions passed through a particular family of the bird clan. Ok, there was an anthropologist involved...but he keeps his distance and admits his shortcomings. I really commend him for that. The account is what the medicine person himself wanted to say...

I was drawn to the book by the powerful and fun photographic images. Ledbetter does an outstanding job capturing the images of Cuban life in a way that allows you to both celebrate it and to empathise with the struggle of the Cuban people.

The Essays are an unexpected extra in a book of this nature that make the work a multi-dimensional experience. It appeals to those interested in both Photography and Cuba. I highly recommend it!

This magnificent collection of photographs captures the beauty, spirit and mystery of Cuba, the USA's often-overlooked neighbor... Ledbetter's clear, passionate and respectful eye has created a stunning work -- the book takes us far more deeply into the Cuban culture than the soundbites of recent news stories (Elian Gonzales, President Carter's visit) allow. Ledbetter's photographs and the accompanying essays make this book essential for anyone who wishes to understand Cuba more fully; the book also richly rewards the reader who simply appreciates great photography.

My parents bought this book in the early 50s on our trip to Yellowstone Park, and my mom read it to us several times, as we kept asking for it. Later, I had the same worn and cherished copy and read it to my own kids, who also loved it. Now I'm buying copies for them for Christmas, so they can read it to my grandkids. It's not only a highly entertaining animal story, but it teaches children a lot about the natural world, as well. When Cubby and his mother visit Yellowstone Park in the summer, he is introduced to the whole array of animals who live in the park, and learns about their habitats and their ways. Fun, and a great learning tool.

My grandmother read this to my father when he was a little boy and he read it to me when I was very young. Now I am going to read it to my children. It is a great tale of a young bear cub experianceing the world for the first time and learing about different animals that inhabit Yellowstone National Park.

A must read for any young child.

I really enjoyed this book. I am an adult beginning/intermediate Spanish student and am always looking for opportunities to practice my limited skills. This books is filled with wonderful folk tales which are a joy to read, and the English translations provide me with immediate assistance.

This is a very entertaining collection of folk tales in bilingual Spanish/English format. The stories range from funny anecdotes of life, to tales that teach the wisdom of the people of the Southwest, to tales of witchcraft.

The translations are sometimes even better than the originals. No wonder because one of the translators, Rudolfo Anaya, is a best selling author and superb writer.

This book offers an opportunity for people who want to improve their Spanish. Read the original Spanish first and refer to the English translation when you get to the parts you don't understand.

The book is great campfire or bedtime reading for kids. Both you and your kids will come out wiser for it.

In the era of the probably unconstitutional, Orwellian-entitled "Patriot Act," Dark Matters examines class warfare and the suppression of civil liberties on several levels: social, political, and moral. Like most good novels, it explores the intersections of landed aristocrats with middle-class strivers, principally academics, as well as the exploitation of the working classes by management, and with compelling psychological insights and unexpected flashes of humor it presents an international cast of well differentiated characters espousing varying political beliefs. The principal constituencies of a public university are perceptively portrayed, from the toadying administration bending to the state legislature's will through academic politics among the faculty to the students coping with hypocritical parietal rules and issues such as abortion that remain timely and controversial. It candidly reveals the limited career possibilities for humanities graduates, such as working in a regional post office's dead letter department, and it captures the incipient sexual revolution of the mid-twentieth century. Structured as a universe of credible characters interacting in a realistic plot, Dark Matters is a serious, well crafted novel written by a full professor of English and writing, published by a neighboring state's university press. This work is highly suitable not only for all readers of substantive fiction but also for aspiring writers as a grounding in the traditions that must shape the flowering of their individual talents.

For example, a character is described as having a "butterfly mind" because her conversation flits from topic to topic in an associative stream-of-thought pattern. As a gifted author should, Professor Levitt then illustrates this characteristic with a typical manifestation:

"A guy and three gals sat down at the vacant table to my left. One of them, Brenda Oates, I knew from my Italian Renaissance history course. She always wore a butterfly pin on her right shoulder, and must have owned dozens of them because I never saw her wear the same one twice. The pin aptly corresponded to her butterfly mind. She flitted from one subject to another, talking in a stream of associations.

"The fellow said: 'You'll never guess what I heard today. Some Negroes are forming their own fraternity. Christ, what next: hog maws and chitterlings on the school menu?'

"Brenda took her cue. 'We used to have a Negro cook, Jemima, I never liked that name, you know. My favorite is Darlene. A cousin of mine had that name: Darlene Densmor. She acted in a movie. But she retired, you know. My dad says that as soon as he retires he's going to take me canoeing in Acadia State Park. That's in Canada. Did you know that they speak two languages up there? English and French. God, I really hate my French class! The other day, the other kids in that class laughed at me when the professor said he knew children this high' - she held her hand about two feet above the floor - 'who could speak French fluently. "Well, of course, they can," I said, "they're probably French." I really thought I'd like to visit France, but not any more. They all speak French there.'"

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. It is funny, fluent, passionate, sad and contemporary. Dark Matters offers a hilarious and poignant look at four very different students attending college in the 1950s. They respond to controversy re: the forced signing of the loyalty oath, learning on a local level about the evils of McCarthyism and repressive politics. Of course, being college students, political affiliation is only one of their challenges: they also enjoy love, sex, religious debates, familial reminiscences. There are hilarious scenes in which at least one political radical attends a sorority party! From the local scene at University of Colorado, the students follow each other and their good intentions to New Mexico to support a mining strike. While fighting repression and exploitation on a state level, they learn more about themselves and each other. Finally, we follow the foursome through graduation (or not) and into adulthood. Each makes different choices, for better and for worse-and all are entwined as a result of their shared youthful passions. Marriages, children and jobs unfold with surprising twists and turns. Finally, more than a decade after college, the political stage shifts to international concerns: the reactionary regime that follows the overthrow of Dubcek in Czechoslovakia. We see the heartbreaking harvest of this regime and the terrible cost of resisting it. Throughout the novel, individuals respond to institutional disregard for personal freedom. I closed the novel feeling satisfied and uneasy: satisfied by a good read, including laughter, tenderness and sorrow as young students, more and less idealistic, tangle with the life and politics of their time; disturbed by the contemporary implications of our own choices as we encounter abuses of individual rights in our own societies.
Read this book: you will have a wonderful time, learn some fascinating history, be challenged and uplifted.

My friend was delighted with this gift, and tells me it is the most entertaining way to learn Spanish.

The only way these stories could be better is if Hayes could tell them to you personally. All children, but especially those from the American southwest, will appreciate having a collection of these oft-told tales. Get ready to laugh about the day it snowed tortillas and get shivers when the wind's moans down by the ditch sound like those of a woman.

Dead Pawn is full of interesting characters. In addition to the characters, Richard Peck has painted such a lush portrait of New Mexico that I feel as though I've just returned from a vacation.

More than once I was rooting for Bob Wince.

Well done!!!

Dead Pawn is New Mexico author Richard E. Peck's initial entry into crime fiction, in fact, into the genre of the caper novel. Not a light-hearted one like Donald Westlake writes, but more reminiscent of Elmore Leonard (Get Shorty, Rum Punch, and many others). Don't be fooled by the title. It has nothing to do with chess, but refers to the most valuable pieces of Indian jewelry, unclaimed pawned items. But Dead Pawn can be taken to refer ominously to the fate that may await Peck's protagonist.

We meet Bob Wince as he's being given an early release from prison after having been framed for fraud. He has made enemies in the slammer and now he returns to confront enemies in the mean streets of Albuquerque. He's trying to go straight--or is he?

Not everything is what it seems, nor are all the characters sympathetic to Bob and glad to see him home again. We gradually meet a cross section of Duke City criminals and Peck's multiple POV technique allows the reader to keep one step ahead of the dangers piling up on Wince. Or are we one step step ahead?

Stick with this novel and you'll learn things--about prison, about the restaurant business, about adobe construction techniques, about an ingenious purse snatching scheme that leads to burglary, and especially about Southwest silver and turquoise jewelry. In short, surprises galore await you and, like Leonard, Peck hands you bits and pieces of information that will keep you guessing right up until the end who will be left standing when the smoke and dust clear.

Better get your copy of Dead Pawn soon. I have it on good authority that Peck is hard at work on a sequel.

Well,I had heard of this book before I saw it in a local bookstore,but I thought it wouldn`t be good,as the desert book "Western Horizon" was said to be better.
But I was wrong at this time. Already when I first looked inside it,I knew it would be amazingly suggestive for me. And I bought it. It was rather cheap for beeing such a book.
It features all kinds of deserted landscape from the US.
Some times,it doesn`t look much like desert,mostly in the Mojave,which the first chapter is about. Deserts are not at all lifeless places - in fact,it is full of wild palms,beautifull flowers and cacti with artistic shapes.
The second chapter treats the Sonoran Desert,and it,too,contains more of the diverse flora,especially the red cactus flowers.
In the third chapter,called Colorado Desert - Life on the Rocks,there are lots of such pictures too,but there is one special image that catches your attention immidiatley - pressure ridges in a salt pan,which looks like the finest crystals ever found!
The fourth chapter shows other kinds of desert. For you who like rocky deserts,this is something. It has fantastic sceneries from hundreds of feet high rocks,as well as a picture of dunes with white sand. That is the most lifeless of all deserts and the quietness is sometimes even frightening.
The fifth chapter is about The Great Basin Desert,and that is the largest desert of North America. Many pics in this chapter contains really fantastic views,and you`ll even find SNOW here!In a desert!Just amazin,isn`t it?Some of the most inspiring pictures are found here,and therefore,this is my favorite chapter. The special with those pictures are the mud formations at dusk.
The sixth chapter is "Painted Desert",which is also very inspiring,and here there are some pictures of the Colorado Plateau,which is fantastic rock formations where fossils of my favorite animals can be found (dinosaurs!). Many of the formations here are well-known from Western Movies. In this chapter,amazing pictures of Grand Canyon can be found as well.
I have now realized that this is my No.1 inspiration source for my animal stories. When I am drawing them,I am always looking at pictures of this book to find a suitable background for my dinosaurs. I am combining the best pictures. And then it is just to add the dinos. When I read this book,I pretend that I am trying to create a good dinosaur movie when looking at the pictures. It is incredibly inspiring,and ABSOLUTELY something for anyone who likes painting or look at landscapes.
You could spend (money) for "The Western Horizon" or (less) for this one. The choice is up to you. But I have made mine. Get inspired and save a lot of money by buying this one!

Jeff Gnass and John Murray have managed to convey with in the pages of this wonderful book the incredibly diverse and colorful landscapes that makeup the desert regions of the south western United States. Their photographic images are with out a doubt some of the best ever put to film. Tne text is entertaining as well with personal insights relating to visiting a particular area photographed. I never grow tired of looking at the images- they are as close as you can get without actually being there. Highly recommended for lovers of the desert regions or for those that would like to experience them but cannot get there.

All our states have wetlands. But the wetlands in the Chihuahuan, Great Basin, Mojave and Sonoran deserts play a much more important role than wetlands in the east. For northern birds and mountain animals migrate down south to these deserts for food, mating and water. They can't count on water from rainfall. The area's so hot rain dries back into the air. That's exactly why they're called deserts. The original word in Latin means abandoned or forsaken. And deserts have been abandoned or forsaken by water.

But that's in terms of rain water. In fact, these deserts have water. The water's found in areas called wetlands. Wetland water comes from three sources. One's mountain snow melting in spring and fall. Much of that water stays in mountain bogs, lakes and ponds dammed by beavers. But some always trickles into the deserts during the summer. Another's the underground water table. That's becoming a problem. More cattle-grazing also means more cows drinking water. More people working, playing and living in the areas means more Americans using water.

The last source is area rivers, such as the Rio Grande and the San Pedro, San Juan, Escalante and Colorado rivers. All the great area rivers start out as source number 1. For they trace back to melted snow of the Cascade, Rocky, San Juan and Sierra Nevada mountains. River water's also becoming a problem. More cattle tanks, dams, reservoirs and stock ponds change river water levels and routes. Changed water levels and routes will change living conditions for area plants, bugs, birds and animals.

Specifically, two main types of plant communities grow up along southwest rivers. One's a mixed broadleaf of willow, walnut, sycamore, cottonwood, ash and alder. That's usually found along rocky streams. The other's a forest of cottonwoods and willows. That's usually found on flooded sand, gravel and clay plains. But non-native Russian olive in the north and tamarisk in the south are giving native cottonwoods and willows a beating. White pelicans and sandhill cranes see native trees as familiar landmarks of desert wetland homes. In fact, cottonwoods and willows are homes to more breeding birds than anywhere else in North America. Breeding birds and their babies find the healthest foods, full of proteins and vegetables, in cottonwood and willow leaves full of insects.

Desert wetlands make up only 3.5% of total U.S. lands. But after tropical rainforests, they're the world's second largest supporters of plant, bug, bird and animal life. Also, they're homes to 50% of all our endangered animals. It all comes down to link after link between native plants, bugs, birds and animals built up over time in one area.

Photographer Lucien Niemeyer and writer Thomas Lowe Fleischner have come up with an impressive book. The writing's clearly organized. The photographs are stunning. The examples are to-the-point. The last chapter's followed by a list of all plants and animals covered by the book. The book ends with a helpful set of notes and a current bibliography.

Without drama and with supported facts, this team has given us what we need to know about that problem area where people and nature are closing in on each other. It's what Virginia Tech master gardening calls the wildlands-urban interface between people and nature. That's the big concern nowadays. And it's not going to go away.

Lucien Niemeyer and Thomas Lowe Fleischner's Desert Wetlands is a 'must' for any collection focused on ecology and desert environments. 'Desert wetlands' may seem an inconsistent term, but there are indeed wetlands in the desert, as photographer Lucian Niemeyer and environmental scientist Thomas Fleischner demonstrate. While Niemeyer photographs such wetlands in Arizona, Utah and New Mexico, among other states, naturalist Fleischner provides stories about water and his encounters with desert wetlands during his field research in the southwest.

Although this book is geared toward young teens, adult readers will be enchanted with it as well.

The confusion and fears of the main character, 13-year-old Marilyn, are clearly presented and the way that Marilyn deals with them creates an entirely believable story. At times, Marilyn acts much older than her age and at other times, she seems much younger. Exactly as real-life teens do!

In "Discovering the Long Way Home", Julie Larose has created an exceptionally well-written account of how parental emotional abandonment feels from the child's perspective. This issue alone could have made this book depressing for the reader but Julie has filled the pages with hope, caring and understanding. Then, she continues the action to bring the whole issue to a most satisfying resolution.

Young teens will enjoy reading this book for Marilyn encounters many situations that they will be able to relate to but for parents everywhere, this book is a "must read" for it is truly enlightening!

Marilyn's life is not as fun and exciting as you might think. Sure, her mom and dad are famous actors, and they're rich, and she's traveled all over the world -- how could that not be amazing? Well, mostly because both of her parents are so busy working, getting randomly married and divorced, and maintaining their "images" that they're too busy to be interested in Marilyn. The reason she's seen so much of the world is because she keeps getting shipped from parent to parent, based on whose life she'll interfere with the least, or who's tired of having her around. She's had a ton of different half- and step-siblings, but never a family, and never any real friends.

Marilyn has had enough. She's taking charge this time. She's going to run away. Better yet, she's going to make it look like she's been abducted. Then her parents will have to pay attention to her. And when the press gets a hold of the story, they'll have to at least pretend that they care.

Needless to say, things don't quite work out as planned. The first person she hitches a ride with sees through some of her stories. He doesn't know who she is, or why she's running, but he takes her to a place he knows is safe. The small town he drops her off in is completely different than anywhere she's ever lived. And the people... They are unlike anyone in Marilyn's memory. They seem genuinely good and caring. It's almost too bad she'll have to leave and go back to her real world. Speaking of her world, why hasn't there been any mention of her disappearance in any paper?

Marilyn is forced to take a good look at her ideas of life and people. She eventually forges her own path to a life she almost lost, but not before she gets herself into some trouble, meets some people with much bigger problems, and finds exactly what she wasn't looking for.

This is an interesting look at the darker side of Hollywood life, as well as a view of the brighter side of humanity. It's pretty hard to find yourself when there is no one to guide you.

The book is told by Marilyn, with regular trips into her memories. She is a very real and developed character, as are most of the characters. Her history is disturbingly believable. The public knowledge of her parents is a great touch, and done very nicely. I found the very end to be a bit abrupt, but it doesn't really detract from the story itself. All in all, I was pleasantly surprised by this book.

Reviewed by: Carrie Spellman