Great company and leader - Outdated and dubious book
	I wavered awhile between three stars and two stars, because a company and entrepreneur as brilliant as Sony and Akio Morita seem to deserve at least three. However, in the end, the book's errors just piled too high. It opens well, with the story of Sony's founding and rise from leaking offices in a half-wrecked department store just after World War II, to becoming one of the world's great companies. This is a fascinating and inspiring story, and Morita tells it with flair.

Then, unfortunately, the downward spiral begins. Morita consistently takes his experience at Sony and assumes that every other Japanese company operates the same way, which is a fantastically wrong assertion (as the last thirteen years of Japan's seemingly endless recession have shown). He also frequently takes good basic management techniques, like trusting employees and giving them creative leeway, and tries to brand them as somehow uniquely "Japanese".

Then there are all the claims which are simply out-and-out false, such as Japan supposedly having the world's best construction technology. (It actually has perhaps the worst in the industrial world, as the Kobe earthquake unfortunately demonstrated.)  Or how Japan is supposedly a nation fanatically devoted to not wasting anything. (Yet it only recently discovered the concept of "second-hand goods", instead of throwing nearly-new furniture and clothing away. Plus, Japanese garbage trucks groan under the weight of the world's worst overpackaging.)

Reading between the lines, a person can see the roots of so many of the problems that Japan faces today. For example, Morita spends a good deal of words attacking the excess of lawyers in the United States. While this can, of course, sometimes be a serious problem, it also gives U.S. consumers a way to protect themselves. Japan's consumers, on the other hand, without an accessible court system, are almost completely at the mercy of bureaucrats and executives. Complaints about dangerous products or chemicals in drinking water are simply ignored, because they lack any threat of legal action. In another example, Morita praises the "trust" and agreements without contracts that exist among Japanese corporations. In reality, this "trust" is a death pact, as bankrupt inefficient companies are propped up by their buddies, instead of letting them fall and create openings for fresh and innovative entrepreneurs.

Other than the glimpses into Sony's history and corporate culture, this book is only interesting as a museum piece - yet another in the flood of "Japan is going to take over" books that came out in the Eighties. Although, of course, considering all the "Internet companies are going to take over" books that came out in the Nineties, not even this is a uniquely "Japanese" phenomenon.

PS: Anyone wanting a healthy reality check about the current state of Japan should read "Dogs and Demons" by Alex Kerr.


Bible Comparison
	[Joshua 6:23,21]Joshua said to the people of Israel, "The Lord has given you the city of the all silver, and gold, and vessels of brass and iron, are consecrated unto the Lord: They shall come into the treasury of the Lord.
The people utterly DESTROYED ALL THAT WAS IN THE CITY, BOTH MAN AND WOMAN,YOUNG AND OLD, AND OX AND SHEEP, AND ASS, WITH THE EDGE OF THE SWORD.

Deuteronomy 17:3-5 "And he should go and worship other gods and bow down to them or to the sun or the moon or all the army of the heavens, .....and you must stone such one with stones and such one must die."

Romans 1:20-32 ....32. "Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them."

Numbers 31: And the Lord said unto Moses, "Avenge the children of the Mid'-an'ites.. They warred against the Mid'-i-an'ites, as the Lord commanded Moses, and they slay all the males. And they took all women as captives, and their little ones, and took the spoil of all their cattle, and all their flocks, and all their goods. And they burnt all their cities wherein they dwelt, and all their goodly castles, with fire. Moses said, "HAVE YOU SAVED ALL THE WOMEN ALIVE? NOW KILL EVERY MALE AMONG THE LITTLE ONES, AND KILL EVERY WOMAN that has known a man by lying with him, but all the young girls who have not known a man by lying with him keep alive for yourselves."

[Quran-60:8-9] GOD does not enjoin you from befriending those who do not fight you because of religion, and do not evict you from your homes. You may befriend them and be equitable towards them. GOD loves the equitable. GOD enjoins you only from befriending those who fight you because of religion, evict you from your homes, and band together with others to banish you. You shall not befriend them. Those who befriend them are the transgressors.


One point story. . .
	I was more upset with this book than anyother. I've loved every book in the series , but this one was more dissapointing.
 I pictured EVERYTHING the sasme as in the movie though... thatrs just telling you how welll it's written and described. But, it was more about the Triwizard tournament the whole entire time. Still, i am addicted to the series . Either way you should read the story just to understand whats going on. I just wish it would have been more exciting and less predictable


Interesting ideas poorly communicated
	Galbraith's insight on society unfortunately gets lost in a maze of double negatives and confusing sentence structure.  His ideas are sound, though he has a very off-putting pompous delivery.  In fact, his verbosity and poor structure is so bad, that it turns what should be a slim read into a fairly mind-numbing experience.  The book really needs to go back to an editor


A book that will make you laugh and frighten you
	Mr. Galbraith is smart, accomplished, and learned man who knows what is best for all us.  His view of a good society differs from past visions of societal utopia.  Rather than a completely coercive state directing the  actions of its citizens to some hirer calling, Mr. Galbraith aims to be  `practical' and just further defines the third way.  Nonetheless, his  proposal of what makes a good society is not the classical liberal view and  it is more attuned to the European model of society.  Many of his proposals  are so silly you won't take them seriously.  But sadly, he is quite  serious.  For example, Mr. Galbraith states that in a good society everyone  should have a rewarding life.  Of course, he never defines the standard by  which society should judge whether or not a life is rewarding.  Neither  does he address what one should do if their life is un-rewarding and what  the obligation is of society to fulfill that vision of a rewarding life.   And, of course, who is the `rewarding life judge' and does this judge have  the authority of the state to take something from someone (who has a life  that is deemed too rewarding) for someone who has life that is too  un-rewarding.  Mr. Galbraith fails to convince the reader of the  practicality of his proposals and ends up straddling a line between  socialism and capitalism, and saying nothing new


Christian fundamentalism dramatized
	Even the avid "trekie" reader of the Star Trek science fiction novels, movies and television series must suspend disbelief, when he finds Captain Kirk saying "Beam me up, Scotty."  But the biblical literalist reading this book need make no such effort, when he reads in this book that Jesus will effectively beam millions of true Christians up to heaven in the world-wide "Rapture."  Though the characters and their roles are fictitious, the book specifically references the relevant biblical passages for the believer.

The story line opens with the chaotic moment of discovery after the historic mass Rapture event, and the remainder is a moral melodrama concluding with emotional born-again conversions.

In the September/October 2006 issue of Foreign Affairs Walt Mead writes that fundamentalists are not hospitable to the idea of gradual progress toward a secular utopia driven by technological advances and the cooperation of intelligent people of all religious traditions.

Instead fundamentalists separate themselves from the world and have a premillennial pessimism about prospects for social reform.  Billy Graham's biography by Strober notes that they criticized Graham's "new evangelism" for its inclusiveness and for its involvement in addressing social problems. Yet their separatism does not preclude proselytizing as portrayed in these novels by the "Tribulation Force" or as exemplified by Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority.

They are also committed to an apocalyptic vision of the end of the world and are hostile to international institutions such as the United Nations. Mead notes that it is no coincidence that the Left Behind novels show the Antichrist rising to power as the secretary-general of the United Nations.

The U.S. Statistical Abstract reports that the per capita numbers of fundamentalists are growing exponentially, while evangelicals and liberals - e.g. Southern Baptists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, Methodists - and Catholics are continuing their per capita declines.  Such data and the reported popularity of these Left Behind novels indicate fundamentalism's growing appeal in reaction to contemporary American society.

I see the readers who seriously respond to this book as the "left behind" in the backwash of the tidal flows of cultural change in modern American society, and as conservative Christians who believe it is better to stay behind.  And in not just a few respects, they may be wise to do so.

Thomas J. Hickey


Hard to read, misses the mark
	While the author rehashes some basic business writing theory, she consistently fails to follow her own rules:
- The text is full of fluff
- The style is flippant instead of useful
- The lecture style puts you to sleep

There are much better books on the subject. A textbook approach is necessary for this subject. Not this dopey-run-on-crap.


Don't waste your money...
	If you walk into B N and flip through (not even buy!) the other "well known/recommended" pregnancy books you'll get much more information than what Douglas offers.

If you're lazy/want a quick read, this book is for you.
If you're looking for a comprehensive tell-all (which the title and reviews lead you to believe), this is *not* the book for you.

This was a total waste of money! If I had know it was this bad I would have just used my money to buy diapers instead.


This Angel Fell Flat
	Hmm, quite a disappointment, especially after splurging on the hardcover edition.  Set as a kind of "Rockies Rear Window," this is one slow story.  Endless pages of crazy-making when I'd already guessed the outcome about halfway through.  Finally skipped ahead to finish the book.  I had really looked forward to Angels Fall, too :(  If you are a Roberts fan, don't spend the money on the hardcover, wait for the paperback, go to the library, or borrow from a friend.  Not worth the price.


Abolutely boring
	There were several good scenes, but they didn't make up for the rest of the book.  Not worth reading.


Not one of Quindlen's best
	This book was easy enough to read, it just wasn't what I expected from Quindlen.  I usually find her writing style and her way of thinking about things so captivating, in this book I really did not find either of those traits to stand out.  The back-and-forth from current day to the past was somewhat confusing, and sometimes I was in the middle of a paragraph before I realized this paragraph was a jump to the past, whereas the previous paragraph was present time.  Although I got used to that writing style, I always found it annoying.  The storyline itself never sold me either: a typical, young "sew-your-wild-oats" boy finds a baby and decides to keep it and is the "perfect" father. I just did not find such an occurrence likely.  And, as a mother myself, all the times he either left the newborn alone or took it with him while he labored on the land just made me squirm. Anyway the whole story seemed far-fetched and disjointed to me, and a disappointment especially since I have been a Quindlen fan for many, many years


just awful
	just awful

save your money, this book is not worth it. The pictures are dull and lifeless, boring composition. Mann hasn't captured anything here but a bunch of worthless photos. Any 10th rate amateur photographer could have done better.


And yet more elitist filth in print
	I was recommended Borges' works by one of his innumerable over-educated sycophants and I will never forget the tremendous time I wasted attempting to grasp the supposed value of his life's work (when I should have been writing my dissertation). Each time I read one of his pedantic, mediocre peices of short fiction, I was convinced by these elite book review troglodytes that I would like other examples of his work if I continued reading since  quot;all of his stories are so unique. quot; I found the exact opposite to be true. One story after another about mazes, mirrors, mystical mathematical formulas and books, books, books. The ideas were transperant, the language boring in the extreme. His poetry is trite. Who needs this? Borges reads like a petulant graduate student at University of Chicago who failed repeatedly to get his/her short fiction published in _The Atlantic Monthly_. Particularly among academics, literary elites and like people, many seem to cite Borges and worship his genius more than read him--and certaintly _no one_ reads him critically. I read most of his work, and I can tell you, outside of a few interesting turns of phrase, you'd be better off reading a Yale dissertation on the semiotics of self-superiority. People incessantly talk about how imaginative Borges is. The vast majority of popular SF and fantasy writers are more imaginative. Even many of the despicable magical realist  quot;geniuses quot; make Borges look rather plain. Borges merely litters his works with elite literary references and a kind of faculty cocktail party wit to make it more palatable to the kind of people who never step foot out of Manhattan or Cambridge. If you're this kind of pompous fellow, you'll want to sleep every night with a portrait of Luis by your side and a series of mirrors, as it were, slowly attempting to seek some kind of trans-substantiation with this benighted old librarian. If you're the kind of person who prefers reading about interesting characters, enjoying nuanced use of language, and grasping subtle, daring ideas that transcend purile academic banter, run far, far away from Jorge Luis Borges. Even top authors from all over the world and every historical period get bad reviews. The adulation of Borges merely underlines the fact that this is more about a cult of personality among (those who think themselves) intellectual elites than a serious attempt to evaluate his fiction. I think his fiction is better considered a kind of academic experiment, relegated to quirky local fiction publications and coffee house poetry slams, and not an example of literary genius. In that sense, 30min spent on one of his short stories gets you the drift of his entire body of work, and that's about as much attention as he deserves


Nothing New Here
	I have read a bunch of poker books and play regularly.  There are a lot of good books out there, Dan Harrington's the very best, but this isnt one of them.  Too much ego here and not enough helpful information


Not Bad
	I use "The Notebook" and "A Walk to Remember" as optional films in my upper division sociology courses. After hearing many positive student responses, I was curious about Sparks as an author--one of the few males writing commercially successful romance novels.  After a slow start with "True Believer," I was more satisfied with "The Rescue."  Taylor's friendship with Mitch and his emotional growth add dimension to an otherwise standard tale of boy meets girl, etc., etc.,


Neocon babble
	Ann Coulter is unbelievable in her unrelenting hatred of anyone not in aggreement with her warped sense of reality.  To her there is no middle ground.    I am an educated, well travelled adult who while born in the United States, spent a good portion of my childhood living overseas and consider myself to be fairly open minded.  To be called a communist, a traitor, and an enemy of America just because I don't buy into the ultra conservative mind think is an insult to the freedom that this country was founded on.

I have never in my life considered buring or destroying a book because of it's evil, until I read this one.

Be afraid, be very afraid of these people


200 Pages of Total Immersion Italian
	The is by far the weakest Grisham novel I've ever read.  The first two hundred pages creep along at a glacial pace as the protagonist (Joel Backman; more about him later) wanders Italy for nearly 200 pages, learning to speak the language and spending way too much time sipping espresso in quaint trattorias with Italian carictatures that would make Chico Marx cringe.  When Grisham finally rachets up the action and suspense, it's all for naught, as the story eventually limps and staggers to a completely listless and anticlimactic ending.

As for Joel Backman, I can't think of a more unlikeable and unsympathetic protagonist in recent memory.  A disgraced lawyer, lobbyist and traitor that plowed through life in a meaningless quest for wealth and power, all the while causing numerous deaths, and alienating numerous wives and children is supposed to be someone we care about?  Does this character redeem himself in any meaningful fashion?  You read the book and decide..


Too Predictable
	Not a bad beach read but nothing in this story is unexpected. I didn't really connect with the main characters. I was interested by the description in the supernatural aspects (the lights) it seemed like a mystery/love story that may have been unique but instead was a way too predictable love story.


Not funny.  Waste of time.  Distasteful.  Boring.  Awful.
	If the Kranks really did what they set out to do and skip Christmas, that would have been a good story.  The end.
Instead, they end up having to scramble to try   make Christmas "happen" for their daughter unexpectedly coming home.  In other words - a typical stressful material holiday, instead of a celebration of friends, family, or even, gasp! Christ's birth.  I agree - if you don't want to celebrate Christ's birth, if you don't want presents and holiday decorations and family time - skip it.  Why torture yourself?

It would have been a good story if they did this.  Instead, the plot deteriorated into a very stupid, ridiculous and unrealistic dash to the finish line of "making Christmas happen."

A completely unsatisfying and unfunny read.  Threw it away so others wouldn't have the displeasure of reading it


Don't waste your money...
	...you can waste your time and save your money by checking this out of your local library.

If you want to get an "inside view" of the inner workings of Wall Street during the excessive gyrations of the '80s, then read Den of Theives - that book is well written and well worth the money!

What turned me off about this book was the structure and the writing style.  The first half of the book was essentially the author relating fortuitous circumstances that were the product of Serendipity.  He was simply in the right place at the right time, had virutally no idea how he got there, felt out of place the whole time (even when he was raking in the Big Bucks in NY and London), and so now he thought he'd wwrite a book about it.  I also got the sense that he was trying to assuage some guilt from his association at Salomon Brothers.  He was there, he made a lot of money, good for him - get over it!

I was also pretty disappointed because the subject matter has A LOT more potential.  I might have actually enjoyed it - had I not read Den of Theives 7 years earlier, and already had some idea of how things took place.  But, if you can get it for $5 or less (including shipping), and you have little to no knowledge of what an investment banker's life is like (and you haven't also seen the movie Wall Street (which covers the same highlights in this book)), then it's probably worth it.

I did like the wrap up he did towards the end of the book, relating where he had heard everyone from the firm ended up...althought that seemed a little rushed..


the world is flat
	it is juust a copy of the frist book. if you read the frist the world is flat, then don't waste your time.
jo


Fluff and poor philosophy
	What a disappointment!  Based on reviews, I couldn't wait to get this book.  Don't let the 48 pages fool you...half of the pages are pictures, and the half with writing on them are double-spaced with wide margins.  Took me all of 20 minutes to read (and only that long because of all the page turning).  Nothing wrong with being concise....except that the philosophy here is overly simplified.  Quindlen goes to great lengths to equate "Pefection" with "Conformity" and condemning it as inauthentic.  I do believe that women tend to set unrealistic expectations for themselves (i.e., wanting to be the perfect mother, perfect daughter, perfect wife, perfect businesswoman); therefore, it creates warm, fuzzy feelings to hear someone criticize perfection as being "boring".  Unfortunately, to claim that "[well-behaved women] don't make good lawyers....or businesswomen" just doesn't follow.  This is not deep reading.  20 minutes?  Don't waste your time.


really bad sociology
	My understanding is that this book is an accessible summary of the ideas Catsells presents in his three volume magnum opus, the Information Age (which starts with the Network Society). If this is so, I am definitely not missing much by not having read the trilogy. This is a really bad piece of sociology, characterized by a technologically deterministic analysis. Why did I give it two stars instead of one then? Well, it does have some OK parts. Catsell's analysis of the origins of the internet is an interesting bit of the sociology of technology and what saves the book from pure technological determinism. He also presents some convincing data (gathered by other people) that use of the internet for socializing does not suck people into an on-line world, alienating them from the world of face-to-face interaction; this happens in the case of a few troubled people, but most people use the internet to enhance their already existing off-line relationships. The rest of the book basically argues that the network format of the internet is reshaping the rest of society in its image, with everything from big business to governments to social movements adopting a network form in response to the rise of this new technology. This is, frankly, ludicrous reductionism. It doesn't even stand up to a simple test of chronology--a lot of the developments that Castells argues are driven by the internet predate the explosion of ist usage in the mid-1990s. As Castells himself admits, businesses were already taking on more of a network form before the internet appeared big time on the scene, and social movement scholars have shown the same is true of transnational social movements. On top of this, Castells shows an effusive enthusiasm for all things networked, whether they be transnational corporations or the transnational social movements that oppose these same corporations. I'm really at a loss to understand how one can enthuse about both of these opposed phenomena. Castells does see some of the problems with the new network society--loss of job security and the digital divide, for instance--but he tends to downplay these. And his solution to these problems tends to come down to more of the same--more internet access, more network social organization. Talk about a narrow vision


Drama, Constant Climax   Hysteria Do Not Make a Novel
	This "novel" would be better suited for the stage.  It reads like a play, often.

It's not realistic as the author goes overboard in depicting "high drama" within a family.  They suffer a tragedy that would certainly affect a family but to the extent the author has them changing is not realistic at all.

There are far too many scenes of shouting, histrionics.  The father goes from being Ward Cleaver to a verbally abusive monster.  If I had to see the mother one more time with her calling "Robin!" I was going to scream.

The author needs to understand that high drama and a climax will be inferred by the reader after seeing the conflict.  This author forces the climax onto us in every scene.  He's desperate for this end result of angst, high drama and shock.

It's overkill.  I don't believe that a 14 year old would become this promiscuous.  Sure it happens but this was the Leave it to Beaver family at first.  It just doesn't make sense that because of ONE incident, all members of the family devolve into sordid disasters.

In short, the author needs to be focused more on telling a story, allowing the reader to infer.  Instead, he thrusts high drama and climax onto us at every turn.  It's ironic, actually, as he's trying to make us feel drama but he did it so much that I just felt tedium.

Very, very contrived and forced novel.  Not believable.  I do not recommend


Make sure you read some of the reviews before you read
	Please take the time to consider what kind of reader you are.  I hated this book.  It took me at least 6 months to read this because I could not force myself to read it.  But that being said I also hate stream of consciousness and now wished that I had looked at some reviews and realized that was what I was getting myself into.  I read 'As I Lay Dying' in High School and hated it too.  There is no plot, and no point.  I hated it.


Fabulously Biased "Research"
	It still amazes me that anyone takes Gould seriously. He is an admitted Marxist, and he allows his social beliefs to influence science. That is not science. Science is a dispasionate search for the truth. I get the feeling reading this book that Gould doesn't like what the truth is, so he wants to shape the way we see the truth. They used to do that in the middle ages when it started to look like the earth revolved around the sun.

Gould tries to claim that Samuel George Morton fudged his data on measuring skull sizes. This is not true. Morton conducted his tests with integrity, and only one error was found which actually benefited the measurements of a non-Caucasian group (Kevin McDonald, "Culture of Critique", 36). General intelligence is not a "statistical artifact" as Gould wants to promote.

Gould or any other scientist who wants to take Darwin out of biological sciences should be viewed with extreme skepticism


Too popular to bother trying anymore.
	J.K. Rowling successfully put me off this book series within the first two chapters of this book.  The characters personalities were wavering in book 5, in this they completely vanished or mutated.  I'll only be getting the 7th one because it's the last one and I've read this far so I might as well go the whole way.

In books one through four the trio of Harry, Ron, and Hermione were loveable characters tenaciously and cleverly seeking out the answers to the mysteries that came up each year and saving the day.  Book 5 had them doing more angsting and screaming than mystery solving, and more whining than day saving. Book 6 made them stand in paper doll doing a bad job miming the motions the real characters would have done.

This book Harry seemed to care more about romance.  A very poorly done romance littered with cheezy phrases and romantic moments on par with the worst of bad fanfiction; which had no background or build up from previous books.  A female character from the background, whom Harry barely even notices all through the past five books, is suddenly the most perfect and beautiful girl in the school in mary-sue fashion.  Several other characters in both the foreground and background were also unfortunately treated to Rowlings amature attempts at romance, none of which bore any revelance to plot or story.

Harry also had a significant decline in morality and intelligence.  The clever boy who put clues together with his friends now cheats in one of his classes and makes one stupid mistake after another.  The image of Harry that stuck with me and seemed to glare off the pages every time he spoke or did anything was of him lying, frozen in a curled position on the floor of the train with blood coming out of his broken nose, under his invisibility cloak and rolling around with the trains motion after a particularly stupid episode with Malfoy.

As to the general plot of the book.  Poorly done.  Continually backstaged by sickeningly done romance and angst it barely made an impression on me.  Most of the 'revealations' in the book revealed nothing not already known or obvious from old information, and the culmination of what Harry was not-quite-solving didn't amount to anything.

My final opinion: Don't bother to read past book 4 if you're just starting the series and care anything at all about characterization.  A very disappointing book


Not worth it
	This was the first book by Daniel Steel that I laid my hands on....Really could not make out how she strikes the chord with the readers. There are so many open ends in the story...chartacters are not distinctly outlined...Tremendous scope of improvement on the story is there


Confusing on audio
	Woolf's style of writing (changing between several characters' thoughts) causes difficulty for one to follow this novel on audio. The paperback proved to be easier for me.


Sad Sorry Snoozer
	This book is not what I thought I bought.  I was expecting information useful to left handers.  Instead I found out why society belives left-handers are evil and research on how left handers are formed.  I  enjoyed reading the encylopedia more than this book.  By the way, it was  written by a right-handed person


Borrrrrrrrrring
	When I picked up True Believer, I was anticipating a good mystery as well as the chance to empathize with sensitively drawn characters.  Neither panned out.  This book is boring.  The characters are one-dimensional and there is no mystery.  Too much detail and not enough substance.  Not sure what the point of the story was as I didn't get it


Ouch!  Worse than Most Paperback Romances
	This book proves once again, that you don't necessarily have to be a good writer to make lots of cash and sell huge quantities of books to the mass market.  "True Believer" is an all-star team of cheap, shallow cliches.  There is no plot.  No one really believes anything, and everything is a contrived, superficial mish-mash.  The dialoge has no depth, and when you've had too much dialoge, there's paragraph after paragraph of the main characters, "thinking" to themselves.  Wow, is this bad.  "Message in a Bottle" was a great plot idea, but its been a slow, steady descent since then.  You might have a good laugh at it like I did, but otherwise I was very disappointed.


where's the spark?
	I have 50 pages to go and I can't wait to finish this boring waste of time. Very predictable, sappy, sweet and quite meaningless.  I give it a minus 1


There is no number, only a lot of assumptions and risks
	"The number" poses an interesting question but provides no helpful answers. A four percent draw on invested assets is as much an old wives' tale as a piece of scientific wisdom, even if it is a number. Eisenberg's number is the inverse of that draw down, or twenty-five times.... well, there's the rub, twenty-five times what? income? expenses? income less savings? projected discretionary spending? Post-mortgage payoff and college tuition expenses? The proverbial bottom line is clouded by conversations with an eclectic collection of consultants, experts, philosophers, and casual acquaintances. Eisenberg, a former Esquire editor and short-timer with Lands End, ruminates about a simple question: How much money do you need to feel secure? The problem is that security comes in multiple forms: happiness, comfort, excess consumption, ego. And the accuracy and stability of those measures and outcomes is compounded by key assumptions about how long you will live and how healthy those years will be. Constructing a one-year budget is hard enough. Constructing a thirty-year budget is nearly impossible.

Eisenberg doesn't help his case by the offbeat and idiosyncratic examples and profiles he chooses. Doctors, divorcees, `downshifters', and very little real data shed little light on the real issues. Maybe I knew too much going in. Maybe I expected too much from a few positive references from other sources. In the middle I was confused. By the end I was simply disappointed. And I have my own number, and it changes every day


Worst Advice Book in History
	This is, without question, the WORST book ever written on one's financial life.  To begin with, it's useless: ZERO information, ZERO new analysis of old information, ZERO advice, ZERO interesting anecdotes.  Additionally, it's rambling--meandering from summaries of old data, to poorly written schmaltzy 'new age' feel-good blathering.  What exactly is this guy's point?   No way to tell.
Seriously, this book is SO BAD that all the people who allowed their names to be associated with blurbs on the cover have, in my opinion, lost all remaining credibility.
What a waste of my $16 and 4 hours.
I want my money and time back.


Disappointing
	This book has a lot of names.  I'll give it that.  But, there are some relatively common names that are missing.  And so many invented names.  My favorite of the invented names are Schmoopie and Poogie.  As if these names will show up on a birth certificate!!
The definitions/origins of the names are poorly researched and confusing.
For the name "Cowboy" the book tells you it means "country"  for the name "Country" it tells you it means "western".
Not that either of those is a standard name, but, for "words as names" aren't you going to pick it because it has meaning to you?
Also, the lists are totally false, something the author (if you can call her that) made up while sitting around drinking with her buddies.  And some of the names on these lists aren't even found later in the book.  (ex. Lynus on the "Party animals" list)
I wish I had held out for a trip to the bookstore instead of just picking up the first book I saw at Walmart.   I figured with so many names I would find one I liked, but I am just so distracted by all the junk that I will never find a good name here.


Decent/lofty ideas... but lacking...
	The trouble starts early. There is an apologetic preamble which states that the author(s) would not dedicate precious space to titles that are well known and well documented beyond the gaming community. This is an enormous assumption about the general public's knowledge - both of video games and more-so it's history of design. Many people that have heard of these games or seen their children watch the TV-spinoffs, most likely would not be able to identify what the games actually look(ed) like or anything about their play dynamics in a gaming environment.

Even though Mario, Zelda, Pokemon, Donkey Kong, Defender, Asteroids, Missile Command, Frogger, etc. are mentioned briefly there are no images of reference for these classic games for us to (a) review and recognize, and (b) learn from. If this is supposed to be a sort of retrospective of the graphic art of game design (this is not about studies of techniques for rendering) then why not show some of these all-time classics as well as the 'new-time' classics? The latter are better represented throughout the book but some of the choices are omissions are questionable. The brief smattering of 'classics' that are shown tend to be more human-looking figurative than 'iconic' which seems lacking to me in breadth and style of representation.

Beyond this much of the work - but not all - feels and looks rather 'same-y' to me. Lots of brooding dark scene-scapes and characters clearly inspired by countless horror/goth/fantasy masters such as Boris Vallejo or much of the work seen in Heavy Metal. When there is mention of games that are actually considered modern art on display at world-famous museums, such as "Rez," -- we are not shown any images of it because space was taken up by two nearly identical renderings of Lara Croft(!) in the same spread. One has to ask oneself: what was the author/picture editor thinking?

The fact of the matter is that for all the long-winded talk in the intro there is little to graphically show us where the industry came from verses where we are now. And from what I can tell, there is absolutely no mention of the explosion of games and utterly unique designs being done in FLASH. Arguably one of the largest and least expensive/complicated environments for making a unique game. Furthermore, all the games covered and talked about (that I can tell) are from very large corporations and as such tend to be slanted and biased in a number of regards.

My biggest problem with this book was the editing - particularly with regard to choices of art. Far too many examples if things that look the same versus examples of unique design concepts and forms as well as proper representations for an historical analysis. Very nice printing, some nice layouts, and some interesting topics are raised with relation to character conception versus form, versus environment - but I would not recommend this for critical graphic design analysis or critical anything


300 Pages of Misandry
	If you are a man, you will not like this collection of feminist essays.  This book is worse than bad.  It is an abomination


Holy Moly
	This is the book Dan Brown's bestseller "The Da Vinci Code" is based on. Indeed, Michael Baigent et.al. have even sued Brown in court, charging him with plagiarizing their book. The ideas behind "The Da Vinci Code" have been exposed as completely bogus by many real historians. Obviously, this exposure affects "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" as well.

This book is methodologically flawed. It claims that Jesus survived the crucifixion and sired children with Mary Magdalene. But if this happened, there should be ancient documents telling us about it. There are essentialy only three ancient views of Jesus: the Christian, the Judeo-Christian and the Gnostic. None of them includes the notion that Jesus married and had children with Mary Magdalene. It simply isn't serious to reject the ancient documents in favor of modern texts of questionable value, as Michael Baigent does. Of course, a conspiracy theorist might claim that the ancient documentation is lacking due to a massive cover-up. But such an argument, compelling as it may sound, is worthless to the historian, who must work with the real evidence, meager as it may be. A claim that can neither be proven or disproven is of little help. Besides, how many sects or cults have managed to keep their esoteric secrets? Very few indeed. There is always a defector or infiltrator somewhere. The idea that the biggest secret of all times was revealed by a confused French right-wing extremist only 40 years ago is very hard to take seriously. Indeed, the fact that not even heretical groups like the Gnostiscs claimed that Jesus had sired children, is good evidence against the claim. The Gnostics, after all, made all kinds of peculiar statements. But not this one. Why?

Why are books like "Holy Blood, Holy Grail" and "The Da Vinci Code" so popular? Perhaps they say what many people want to hear. That in itself is somewhat damning, I think. For how many people want to hear the truth?


Sucks
	Eve Dallas is a cop in the future, chasing drug dealers, killer and being a badge heavy bitch in general. Her foster mother shows up and tries to get money out of Eve's rich husband and ends up dead.I hated this book, the characters are all unlikeable and the story drags


Big Book of Minimal value
	Much repetition and too little of artists neither western nor white...or male for that matter. Though the sections are a lovely idea the same art is used in each. A not terribly risky venture, this


Beauty Bites Off Too Much
	Buy a Girls Gotta Do What a Girls Gotta Do instead.  Snortland's book is more of a feminist's political treastise on how males and females are raised and nurtured versus a pragmatic approach on skills to identify potential threats and strategies to deal with them.  She does hype Impact training which sounds like a beneficial program. I bought it for my daughter, but read it first. Actually, I tried to read it; halfway through the book I  decided to toss it.


Margaret Mitchell is rolling over in her grave
	Although I really do like Ripley's writing and her stories, this one was shameful what she did to the memory of GWTW. I have to blame this on the editors. Scarlett was not the colorful character as in GWTW in this so called sequel. Publishers and editors should know there is no sequel worthy of the original great classic


Sociology, more of the same
	This is a revolutionary book. It introduces the stage metaphor into sociology; all of social interaction is a performance on a stage. It's questionable how novel this metaphor is, but this is certianly its first explicit statement. The language used to present the ideas of the author is, like most sociological writing, unecessarily complicated. There are some problems with clarity and structure; the book just doesnt have a holistic feel for me. No sociological background is presupposed, there is extensive quoting from other sociological sources, many footnotes, and various other ways to enter sociological literature throught the book. So if you are interested in reading sociology, this is probably a good place to start (again, the language is unecessicarily thick and this may be it's bane as an introduction).

However, the book is misguided. The idea of viewing social interaction as a performance on a stage is unecessary. The authors motives for saying this will make my position clearer.

(The following is a charicature of the author's argument). There is certianly a large amount of social behavior which is directed towards other people (the audience) in order for the audience to build an impression of the actor. Well, if it can happen here we can draw a parallel with other situations, infact all situations and therfore all of social interaction is like a performance on a stage, "All the world is not, of course, a stage, but the crucial ways in which it isnt are hard to specify" (p 72). The performances can either be with individuals, or groups of people, and they can be performing conciously or unconciously. (end of charicature)

There are other arguments, obviously, and the statement "we can draw a parallel with other situations" is most of the content of the book, which i dont like to gloss over with a sentence. But the real question here is, is the view worthwhile? My answer: No. Social interaction is a complex phenomena that cant possibly be summed up with a signle metaphor. Yes, some social interaction is like a performance, where indivudals are intentionally making impressions on one another. Yes, some social behavior can arise from unconcious beliefs. However, most social interaction is exactly the way we see it, conciously controlled, meaningful, purposeful interaction with individuals; it is not some kind of performance with the purpose of creating a "reality".

I hope my view of the book is clear so that the biases on the final part of my review can be sorted out: the book is a waste of time. Where the author is right, the statement is little more than common sense. Where the author goes outside of common sense, he's wrong, sometimes plainly so. This book is part of the tradition in sociology of thinking that society pulls the wool over each individuals eyes, that reality is a social construct with no purpose other than social control (here the wool is the performance, and the control has to do with impressions ... but this quickly degenerates into an obscure mess of assertions). There is no real empirical support given for most of the claims. Where "evidence" is given, the evididence is so heavily intepreted that it fails to correspond to facts in the world but rather to facts about the views of the reporter. Where there is no correspondence to the world there is no truth. Various sources of sociology are cited, but this is more like intellectual bullying. Saying that some author, which also didnt have any empirical support for his claims, agrees with you is just to bully your reader into acepting your claims. The claims in the book have no practical application in the world, but only serve to intepret situations differently, and in personal opinion, less correctly. Nothing said here will lead to better predictions about social behavior or a better understanding of psychology. In short, this isnt a scientific study at all.

My final qualm with the book deserves its own paragraph, the use of language. The best example is the definitions given at the end of the introduction "A performance may be defined as all of the activity of a given participant on a given occasion which serves to influence in any way any of the other participants" (15). This is a curios definition. Me breathing while i work is a performance, it changes the percentages of O2 and CO2 in the atmosphere near my co-workers. Me staring into space is a performance, other people see me stare into space and are therefore influenced. Infact, me simply existing is a performance, since my existance causes a gravitational effect on the other participants, as well as influencing them to create beliefs about me existing. Its as if Goffman created a definition for performance which included all possible actions taken by any person, and then wrote a book about how all possible actions taken by any person fall under the category of performance. He didnt. He used a word that we associate with controlled behavior (performance) and defined it in a way no one is used to. Then he used alot of word play to show that behavior has no substance, its all for the purpose of maintaining social reality. I hope this very limited example shows the terrible use of language that is endemic to Goffman and sociology more generally.

So an ode to sociology is in order ... actually no it isnt. Why wont this subject go away? This book is an integral part of sociology, and it espouses the methods and style of sociological researchers and writers by being an archetypical work within the tradition. The methods are questionable; the style is obscure. Like it or hate it, sociology is a part of modern thought. Read the book to be an educated person and keep in mind its intellectual failings


Extremely Boring and Devoid of Stories or Examples
	I'm surprised that someone so seemingly intelligent does not know that stories and specific examples are what make a book interesting. This book was totally devoid of them, but instead used vague generalizations from beginning to end. I read the whole book and was waiting for it to get good. It never did. Don't waste your time or your money. Any positive review must have been written by the author's friends. I would rather eat cardboard that read this book again.


Hassan's Review - Get another Translation
	I do not think the man who "translated" the Koran here is a true Muslim. One cannot shuffle and reorder the Suras to suit one's own taste. This man does not have the right to mess up our Holy Book in this way. Plue the style of writing is not nearly as engaging as the Ali version. I have not been in a Mosque yet that had this version of the Koran on its shelves. You can go into any Mosque in this country and pick up a copy of the Ali Tranlation for free. Why waste your money on this Infidel sham version?


False advertizing.
	I would love to read a neutral book on Barry Bonds, I hate cheerleader type books about players but I also hate one-sided ones as well. The only good things he really has to say about Bonds are about his baseball brain and his relationship with the famous Marge (whom he then sarcastically remarks that Bonds was only her second favorite player).

The book covers a wide variety of topics, some are puzzeling. While most of the book bashes Barry Bonds is also bashes his ex-wife for being an exotic dancer. I was pretty upset to read that, I was a fan of Pearlman but I thought he had more class then that.

This book came out right after (or because of) Game of Shadows. This book here actually praises Game of Shadows while bashing Bonds for illegal activities when 3 weeks after the book came out the writers of Book of Shadows are being subpeoned for illegally optaining information, guess that backfired Pearlman. In fact Game of Shadows may be taken off the shelves soon as well.

The book uses many annoymous sources (there is a reference sheet in the back, most of those articles all include quotes from many unidentified sources), so its really hard to take alot of the harsh quotes that Bonds says seriously because it is heresay.

The book pretty much discredits itself at the end when Pearlman proclaims that sports writers do not actually try or want to dig up dirt on people, they like to find good stories. That quote alone will have any Bonds hater rolling thier eyes at the sheer stupidity of it. Sports writing has became essectially a tabliod now. Even Skip Bayless publically admitted that most writers do that.

So once again, the biggest problem is that it fails to stay on neutral ground. This would be like writing a book about Babe Ruth and only mentioning that he beat up umpires, ran into the stands to attack people, slept with hookers, drank all the time, was mean to Lou Gherig, etc.

While that may be true it would also only tell one part of the story and would be a waste, just like this


No Substance to 'Substance'
	I was disappointed with this purchase. If you read the book jacket, you have gotten about all of the information out of it that's coming.


Surprised by animal cruelty and mishaps throughout book!
	Wow, I was expecting a fun, light read, and in the first chapter already had to skim over a couple of paragraphs relating to "mishaps" that happen to animals in Zippy's life. Well, I thought, next chapter will be better. NOT. The next chapter included a graphic scene of chickens being slaughtered by shovels! Every chapter so far has had something very disturbing about animals in it! If you are sensitive to these things, I would not recommend the book. I'm not sure I'm going to finish it at this rate. Granted, I AM super-sensitive to any animal suffering, but this is really overload. I'm halfway through and so far this is the list: The aforementioned chicken slaughter, a neighbor stealing her cat and starving it in the basement, another neighbor looking to poison her cat, dog-sitting for friends and losing the dog and not worrying about it that much and finding him dead days later, her father going out with a shotgun to kill the dogs who massacred Zippy's pet chicken, joking about a neighbor enjoying "puppy stew", keeping her two dogs penned up, torturing a raccoon by holding in front of 30 braying hounds.... I mean, does that seem like a lot to you??? For a light-hearted "tender" memoir???? Jeez louise! I can't sleep at night from this book


Not impressed...
	I picked this book up after reading both Books in the Bartimeus Trilogy and was excited to see what else Jonathan Stroud could conjure up. This book was a let down. I just couldn't get into the plot. I even found the story somewhat disturbing and eerie, especially for young children to read. There are very evil characters in this book who would be much better suited for an adult sci-fi novel, rather than a book marketed for children and young teens. The characters were unlikeable, and the plot just never seemed to grab my attention. I was very dissapointed that this is from the same author who wrote the amazing Bartimeus trilogy books! Well, I figured I would add my two cents in and let people know I just didn't like this book


Love the restaurant, the cookbook.... not so much
	I have to preface this by saying that I absolutely love eating at the candle. So delicious.
before we moved from NYC, I thought we HAVE to get this book. We've tried several of the recipies, following them to the letter, and have been really dissapointed everytime - with the exception of the  hummus.  I think that they must be leaving out some key ingredients in a lot of these recipies, because all of the ones we have attempted have been either completely flavorless, or tasted like salt. Don't even bother with the soups unless you are a gourmet cook and can figure out how to punch them up somehow after following these directions, because they all end up runny and bland. so sad


Minimally helpful text
	Don't be excited about this book's small size and light weight, the text needs more examples to support you while doing homework.  Breif chapter explantions caused me to nearly fail my class.  Was NOT a gret book, in fact many students complained to the Dean regarding this book.  Good luck


Christiane L. Aubry "wants to know more" Pennsylvania
	All over the place.
Confusing. Poorly organized.
I was unable to read this book and would love to return it.
Bad very bad.


A waste of perfectly good paper.
	I had expected an insightful analysis of the motivations behind modern terrorism. Instead I got a diatribe against western liberalism. Lee Harris is the poster child for the modern John Birchers, people who believe our way is not only the best way, its the only way. In an increasingly global economic and political system, his view of the world can be said to be outmoded, at best quaint, at worst pathological for if we are truely to address the problems facing humanity over the next 100 years, we will need tolerance and inclusivness.


Where's the beef?
	I enjoy this work, lots of fresh observations and connections.... but having read it in the light of recent trends in the e-biz world, it sounds thin and delusional...a lot like Tom Peters after way too much espresso. There ARE consequences from CONTINUALLY embracing change...and, in my experience ALL of them are BAD. I wonder on what real-world  EXPERIENCE Mr. Kelly bases his thinking. My advice, embrace chaos and change, but do it VERY CAREFULLY...because it will definitely have consequences.  Truth  amp; Beauty!  -Bv


Patterson readers beware of this dog
	The only explanation is that James Paterson churned this dog out to make a buck. I've read a number of James Patterson books and while I'm not a hard core fan, I've enjoyed most of them. I know this will outrage some Patterson readers but I'm not much of a fan of Alex Cross who frankly I find boring as hell.

As mediocre as Patterson often is as an author, readers should beware, London Bridges is especially bad. The novel reads like an abridgement, moving at a frantic pace without ever generating any suspense. The premise is ridiculous - super criminals with silly names join forces to blackmail world leaders (sounds like the plot for an Austin Powers movie - without any of the humour).

Patterson is not remotely qualified to enter the international terrorist thriller market. An author who churns out 3 or 4 novels a year doesn't have time to do the kind of research that is needed to produce a plausible terrorist thriller.

The twists at the end - "he's the wolf - no, he's the wolf - no, she's the wolf - no...." by the end, I just didn't care.

James Patterson has written some decent crime novels but his fans should beware. Quantity, not quality seems to be Patterson's priority these days. London Bridges is a mess from beginning to end.


Self Reliance: Can we really Rely on Waldo!
	Not his best book,I Thought Waldo Lost in New York is more authoritive. I mean who honestly belives that someone who is always lost can be trusted to help other people become self reliant, when he can't even rely on himself


A Different Definition of a Classic
	Mark Twain once said that (and I paraphrase)the definition of a classic is something that everyone wants to have read and no one wants to read. That is my experience with this book. For some reason, A Tale of Two Cities never made it onto any of my high school reading lists, and I figured it was one of those books I should have under my belt. So I picked it up. What a slog! A book that might have been fascinating due to its French Revolution subject matter was a mass of rambling descriptions and melodrama. We were supposed to shed tears for Sidney Carton, a character who you barely get to know, and root for Lucie Manette...the highly unrealistic paragon of unspoiled goodness. The only thing I liked about this book was how Madame Defarge knitted a list of people on which she planned to take revenge. An admittedly cool concept. Maybe this book speaks to another era, maybe it's past its prime, maybe I don't have the required literary sensibilities, or maybe I couldn't relate, but A Tale of Two Cities bored me to tears.


Chased by the Light: A 90-Day Journey: 2001
	While it is true that Brandenburg is a tremendous photographer and the majority of photos are simply breathtaking.  I returned my copy because the datebook also contained disturbing photos of dead wildlife.  I'm very tender when it comes to wildlife, and while I know that death is a natural part of the life cycle, I am disturbed by dead wildlife and would never chose a book or datebook containing such pictures.  For anyone who is animal sensitive and dislikes any death photos, then this IS NOT the book for them.  Otherwise, I would recommend it


Confusing Snore-fest
	I saw this book at a friend's shortly after seeing the movie.  I asked her if I could borrow it.  She said I wouldn't want to.  She'd been trying to read it for awhile, and didn't like it.  I decided to try anyway.  Unfortunately, my friend was right.  This is a definite case of a movie being much better than a book.  I really liked the movie.  However, the book is too long and boring.  There are so many tangents in it that have nothing to do with the central story.  I can't believe I even finished it.  Rent the movie-don't waste your time on the book


Great concepts that go nowhere.
	I zipped through the first 100 pages of this book unable to put it down.  Unfortuneately the author seems to run out of gas after that.  The main character just goes on a big, boring sight seeing tour.  It reminded me of that show on the Travel Channel where that girl visits hotel after hotel fawning over the interior design. There is not a hint of conflict until the final pages and then it's very short-lived and quickly followed by one of the worst non endings I've ever read.  The book just stops.  Not a hint of resolution or even a cliff hanger pointing to a sequel.

It's a shame because Grimsley had some great concepts to work with.  In my experience novels that mix technology with magic usually fail at both, but Grimsley had a workable foundation he could have developed into something unique if he had focused on the SF concepts instead of minutiae.

Once in a while the characters stop admiring the drapes long enough to notice the GIANT FREAKIN' PORTAL BETWEEN TWO WORLDS--but enough about that.
Gee, what a lovely sofa..


What Crash?
	This book contains some useful historical information and some insights into the mass psychology of booms, bubbles, and busts.

Prechter should have left it at that.  Instead, he offers up predictions.  Big mistake.  This guy bases his forecasts on Fibonacci numbers and so-called Elliott "wave counts."   He labels all market patterns so that they fit the preordained Elliott Wave 5-up, 3-down pattern.  If you see more or fewer waves than he does in any given market move, you just don't understand that there can only be 5 waves to the top of a bull market.  He's imposing his theory on the market, but surprisingly enough, the market doesn't care.  It does whatever it wants, in however many waves it wants, and Bob has been very frustrated at the market's aberrant behavior lately.  He got lucky early in his career, but it seems he's been fairly consistently getting the market wrong since missing the '87 crash.

Any superstitution can "seem" to work if you only look at its happenstance apparent accuracies and disregard its abundant failures.  Keep looking for certain numbers of waves and Fibonacci ratios and you'll find what you're looking for.  Pick any set of numbers or patterns or wave counts, and you'll find those too.  The market doesn't care about any of those things, though.  It's nothing more than an aggregation of billlions of individual choices, which are influenced by an infinite number of factors none of us can ever understand fully.  University studies of various investing methods have found that Elliott Wave, like most, is no better than random stock selection.

If Prechter had chosen the random method, he and his followers would at least have a good chance of keeping pace with the market.  Unfortunately, he has been getting everything from the Dow, to oil (he thought it was going to $10), to gold (he didn't think it could break $400), to deflation (the "deflation" scare ended shortly after this book came out) WRONG in the past couple of years.  He apparently STILL believes that the Dow will go to 400 (not 4,000 but FOUR HUNDRED) because his charts tell him it should (they've been telling him that since about 1990, actually).  Prechter doesn't understand demographics or economics or markets or the monetary system, all of which render "Dow 400" among the goofiest of forecasting absurdities -- unless you believe a giant asteroid will hit and wipe out two thirds of the population (I don't think Prechter is counting on that).

Our debt-heavy economy may have a significant crisis soon, perhaps by the end of the decade.  It will most likely be spurred on by inflation and rising interest rates.  But it's not happening now and it's not happening in the way this author has been prematurely forecasting for over a decade.

This book came out near the bottom of the 2000-2002 stock bear market, just in time for a reader to short stocks as they began a new bull market.  How typical.  While promoting the book, Prechter said it was "definite" that stocks would "crash"
in 2003.  He said that 2003 would be "the best year yet" for bears (short sellers).  Late into 2003, when it was clear that the market had proven him wrong, Prechter declared on a radio show that by the end of 2004, the Dow would "certainly" fall below 5,000.  Wrong again!  Since his Fibonacci turn dates and Elliott wave counts fail to portend the future, maybe next he'll tell us he's found the secret code to the stock market from the text count of Nostradamus' writings.

Bob Prechter couldn't call the market if it was listed in the Yellow Pages.  This guy couldn't time the market if you gave him a stopwatch.  He's throwing out guesses and misleading people by describing them as "definite" and "certain."  He's either a liar or a true believer in his own irrational superstitions.  In either case, he's not credible.

Here's all you really need to know: Buy dividend stocks.  Buy short-term bonds.  Buy gold.  Hang on to them.  Do that and you'll do better than you will trying to follow the prognostications of market gurus.  Plus, you'll have a lot more time to devote to family, fun, and productive activities


One of Koontz's Worst
	This is truly a disappointing book.  It starts incredibly slowly and I found it very hard to become interested in the plot.  Another disappointment is Koontz's recycling of elements from other novels: (1) plucky, highly intelligent disabled girl (the young female protagonist in "The Hideaway" had almost identical deformities and personality), (2) devoted, super-powered canine companions, (3) bad guys driving around in ultra pimped-out RVs, and (4) evil bioethicists.

The Leilani character is patently ridiculous.  She conveniently has a genius IQ, but that does not make the absurdly adult manner in which she speaks any more believable.  I found it so disconcerting as to detract from the plot.  Koontz clearly has trouble writing for children, and this book is no exception.  Almost all the children featured in his books are either autistic/MR or genius wunderkinds; the latter, however, does not justify his habit of making smart children talk like genius adults.  Dean heaps the hardships on poor Leilani, with all the subtlety of an episode of Walker, Texas Ranger.  In case you miss the anvils, you are supposed to really, really like her and fear for her safety.

I don't know how or where Dean Koontz learned about bioethics, but he has a terribly misguided view of the field, taking an extreme sect of it to represent the main viewpoint of the field.  Further, he states multiple times that these eugenic bioethics principles are being taught to medical students at major universities (who will have to pay for their involvement with evil bioethics) -- as a medical student, I can assure you that this is patently untrue.  That Koontz could be so off-base on a topic that directly relates to the central motive is disconcerting and makes an already weak book even harder to swallow.

The final issue is Koontz's near-deification of dogs, particularly Golden Retrievers, which is a common motif in his more recent works.  It is ridiculous and unintentionally funny to an almost painful degree.  His obsession with dogs and their mystical powers borders on the psychotic (and I like dogs).  This novel probably features the most egregious example of Koontz's tendency to create overly sappy, sugary-sweet endings.

Dean Koontz has written many books better than this one.  Spend your money on one of his stronger efforts


The Careless Characterization of Helping Professionals
	McKnight's concerns about communities' dependency on professional assistance are legitimate, but disturbingly overstated in this book.

In the end I felt McKnight's trashing of the already well-trodden government provision of social services may not be altogether helpful to distressed communities.  He sidesteps concerns of capital mobility and exploitation and the pernicious effects wrought by years of discrimination.  Any debate over when and where and how social programs can be effective is cast aside as well, since in McKnight's picture, social programs and the professional service providers are, in fact, the vilains and culprits for most of what ails society.

One of the damaging fallacies that seems to be perpetuated in this book is that service professionals are not able to be both professional and caring - the two are deemed mutually incompatible.  Mcknights views resonate with employers' caring rhetoric - conveniently invoked every time a healthcare worker tries to claim she does care about patients but is still entitled to a living wage or, perhaps, health insurance.

What is further implied is that communities will readily and ably take up the reign of providing for themselves and their members when denied more institutionalized professional services.  It seems implied that communities had no problems before the social programs to solve them came into being.  In this, I think I see McKnight is invokeing an idealized notion of an society at an earlier time; maybe his argument would have seemed more reasoble in a time when families were less geographically mobile and may have constituted an economic unit, when the elderly lived shorter lives and were less numerous themselves with more children to care for them, and the local economic activities were more functionally interdependent.

But McKnight's model for today's cure doesn't seem to fit today's conditions.  On the other hand, McKnights solutions may be the only ones available in a society where budget cuts and elimination of social services seem the prevailing trend.


Somebody Stop Me........
	........from reading Danielle Steel.  Here's the book:  three bachelors meet three women.  They all break up, they all end up happily ever after.  BORING, not one single exciting thing about this book.  I was happy when my lunch break ended so I could go back to work and stop reading.

Yes - we keep reading her because we feel obligated and hope for a better book someday, but I think I'm at the end of my rope with Danielle Steel.  My librarian told me last night they aren't even going to carry any new books of hers.  THAT'S sad


doesn't have it all
	While this book contains a ton of data, don't get it if you want calorie counts on anything homemade.  If you look up french toast, for example, it only gives information on name brand items.  Much of the information in the book is available on the packaging of the products.  I suppose that if you wanted to check it before shopping, or use it before eating out, it would be helpful.  But if you want to find out the caloric content of any homemade items, you are out of luck with this book


The Wrong Hostage
	While entertaining, I found several times that the story slowed down and got a little preachy about the politics of drug money. While probably true it distracted from the story by being repeated and heavy handed. I also found the timeline hard to believe. Maybe because I have lived in the area and understand the distances (and traffic) travelled in short periods of time. I am a big Elizabeth Lowell fan  (as well as Ann Maxwell) but this was not one of her better books


Eat Great, Lose Weight (Miniature Edition)
	I was very disappointed in this book even though it was a miniature.  Some of the pages were blank, having not even been printed.  I figure the book was a total loss of money spent


Voodoo Physics
	Gary Zukav states in his introduction "I had never studied physics. In fact I didn't like science and I had no mathematical aptitude.

On Opra (TV) he admitted that he does not have a TV which may explain his lack of contemporary physics let alone any depth.

I noticed that some reviewers refer to the "New Physics" is that like "New Age" or voodoo physics?

90% of the matter must be missing from this book. Or else how can he take physics out of context and make such fantastic leaps to religions parallels that he knows little of. He even twists the religion around to serve some unknown purpose.

Many people say they did not understand physics until this book; Surprises, you still do not. You now know what Zukav wished physics was. Take anti-mater for instants that does not mean the opposite of mater. And the relationship between particles has no correlation with the relationship of dogs and cats.

At least get it straight before mixing it up. Try reading some of these:
"The Ascent of Man by Jacob Bronowski". The book available everywhere the DVD's available from the UK.

"The Upanishads" by Eknath Easwaran (Editor), Michael N. Nagler (Photographer)

Or just about any mainstream material on physics and religion.

Then if you still want to mix worlds into one read someone saner:
"The Tao of Physics: An Exploration of the Parallels between Modern Physics and Eastern Mysticism" by Fritjof Capra.

Also on the fringe but not as radical as Zukav is a series called "What the Bleep." (both in books and on video)


A Light weight novel with little plot or character development
	I was disappointed with this novel which is set in my hometown of Chicago.  I had hoped that the author would have taken advantage of this setting, but it really seemed as if he had just read one of our gay newspapers and pulled out a few names to function as place names.  The plot is trite as are most of the characters.  Characters change their "stripes" at the drop of a hat.  The book has a certain fairy tale, and they lived happily ever after quality that I found really disconcerting.  I would have been more "satisfied" if Dean (the main character) had turned out to be an ax murderer!  Just kidding of course or am I?  If you can pick this book up used for a couple of bucks, okay but don't you pay a penny more


Little by Little !
	I ordered this book and read most of it in the hope that I would learn something about Familiars . In the interval between ordering and receiving my sixth sense made me begin to have doubts about Ms Little . Had she flown about the battlements of an old castle in the form of an Owl? Had she entertained A Hyrax or a Feral Cat as a house guest ? Had she ever had a pet Bat living behind a picture in the living room ? Was she acquainted with the properties of Henbane and twylight sleep and did she number Hecate among her close friends? The kindest thing , I thought was to suggest that Ms Little Knew as much about Familiars as I know about Conveyancing or Futures Trading , and let it go at that


NAMBLA Members Line up For Blocks to Get This!
	Now that Hannity has gone on the record as a pedofilia apologist and defender of child molestation.

"Thank God for Hannity!"
-Lee Krock, founder of NAMBL


BECOMING A MASTER MANAGER:  A BOOK REVIEW
	BECOMING A MASTER MANAGER, the textbook currently used in my Introduction to Management class, does not effectively convey the important fundamentals of business management.  The book is structured around eight 'roles' of an effective manager, and each role is further broken down into a number of competencies that are functions of that particular role.  While I appreciate the effort to organize a relatively broad subject, I do not feel that the book is necessarily easy to follow.  The reading is constantly being interrupted by assessments and applications for each competency, and while meant well, they are usually skipped over in an attempted to finish the reading and they seem to me to be a large waste of paper.  Furthermore, BECOMING A MASTER MANAGER stresses models and theories of management that I find useless without the necessary fundamentals of management, which are not adequately presented in the textbook.  Some of the models and theories have merit and should be discussed more in depth, but in a more advanced level of business management.  And while BECOMING A MASTER MANAGER is the official textbook for my management class, I have relied heavily on a different textbook for my information, and only the eve of a test do I bother to look over BECOMING A MASTER MANAGER, I do not recommend this textbook for an introductory class at all


Not the best
	I'm not a fan of mysteries to begin with.  However, my public library has a limited selection of audio books, so I take what I can get.  I am a voracious reader, and I listen to audios to get more "reading" in, as you can listen and do other things.  I much prefer the Lillian Jackson Braun "cat" books, at least there is some humor, and I like the "mystery" part of these books better than Deaver's.  Sorry to all the Deaver fan's out there...I HAVE enjoyed a few of his books, but I get tired of the "same ole-same ole"


Yawn. More stereotypical female masochists.
	I bought this book because it was listed with Ellen Miller's Like Being Killed, a brilliant and complex book about a woman's love affair with heroin, her best friend Susie, and her best friend's duplicitous HIV positive boyfriend. The protagonist herself was brilliant and complex. So naturally, I expected the same thing out of Swimming Sweet Arrow. Man, was I disappointed. This was yet another trashy tale about a pathetic woman's masochistic sex life, pathetic obsession with brutal men, and pathetic quest for attention. Her entire life is a meta-existence: rather than desiring, she desires to be desired. Rather than enjoying, she enjoys being enjoyed. The male characters and the female characters are written by someone who has never met a male or female who didn't exhibit the most common stereotypes; in her world, all men are sensation-craving brutes, and all women are attention-craving doormats. The men want drugs, fun, and sex, and the women whine and cry and enjoy nothing--not the drugs, not the sex, just being a victim due to the attention it provides. This book made me really miserable to be perceived as part of this gender.


a plus
	I have read all twelve of these books and hoping there will be more. The language is pretty graphic but they are so funny you can usually ignore those words. These books can cause you embaesment, since I read where ever I have to sit and wait and you burst out laughing people do stare and wonder if you are losing it. Please we would all like to see more of these


Interesting But Not Helpful
	On the plus side, this book is fairly easy to understand and contains sufficient pictures of the exercises.  I was very excited at first, but unfortunately none of the exercises, massages, meditations, etc I tried seemed to help any of my health problems, even after a month.  The book contains inspiring stories of people who have quickly recovered from serious illness or injury, yet leaves me crying in disappointment.  I will probably keep trying a few of the exercises and methods for awhile, but I don't hold any hope of them suddenly starting to work at this point


NOT the book you know and love!
	This is a nice enough board book, but be advised that it is NOT the full version of Dr. Seuss' book!  They've left out several (charming!) pages of text and illustrations for the Board Book...  What a disappointment to loyal fans, and how unfair to the newest generation of fans-to-be


Disappointing
	This book was suggested reading as if  quot; THE GREAT SECRET to PERSONAL FREEDOM quot; was going to be revealed. It spoke of a self-centered mindset that seemed to suggest that I was to live my life how I wanted and not consider how my actions would affect others around me. A very simplistic and selfish point of view


A Lame Blog in Hardback
	I read a good short story by Franzen in The New Yorker a couple years ago, but this book is lame, lame, lame.  The essays contain little to no humor or insight- they are just lengthy, boring opinions on various subjects.  Imagine if you can a duller, less-relavant Andy Rooney.  If I wanted to read some loser's uninspired musings, I would get on the internet and start reading weblogs.  I hereby declare this book Unreadable


This book lacks
	Sorry for the sarcastic title. I've read most of this book. I'm still reading the last chapter which is actually the most hopeful chapter.
I'll start with what I liked. Harris lays out some good suggestions on handling the pyhsical aspects of a dating relationship (or courtship if you get caught up in semantics)
However, Harris offers nothing else except a rudimentary courtship model that involves physical boundaries and guarding against things moving too quickly.
I think this is good wisdom, but the book completely lacks in many other apects of pursuing a relationship. He talks very little about communication skills. Also you won't find much on personality traits or compatibility.
When I began a relationship with my girlfriend I read this book. I don't regret reading it, but it lacks in a lot of areas. Part of this is due to the fact that I don't know what credentials Joshua Harris has to make his claims. He is not a Phd, or a relationship or family counselor. He had two substantial romantic relationships in his life. One with the girl who inspired him to write his first book, and the other with his current wife. When it comes to relationships, I would hardly call Joshua Harris and authority on the subject. He has no more experience or wisdom that the average person who would pick his book up off the shelf.
I support the crux of what Harris talks about. I respect the fact that him and his wife Shannon waited to their wedding day for their first kiss. The book is chivalrous and romantic. It is a hopeful book.
But it paints only a partial picture of how to persue a relationship. If you are into reading relationship books, just be sure this isn't your only resource.


Fully developed characters are in danger of extinction...
	This is my 3rd McDermid novel, I previously read 'Mermaids Singing' and 'Wire in the Blood.' McDermid writes good prose but in this 3rd novel I see dangerous repetitions in character types which, if repeated in the next Tony Hill/Carol Jordan book will make that one my last purchase. Generally McDermid paints female police officers as brighter, more diligent and more intuitive than their male counterparts, as well as more often homosexual. The men, with the exception of leading man Tony Hill, are mostly all egotistical, back-stabbing, power-hungry morons of the lowest order, while Hill is rendered impotent -- a redundant bit of emasculation since all the other males are castrated of their moral fiber. The slow mating dance between Hill and Jordan gets a lot of buildup and little payoff. And in this book, the serial killer and the surrounding hunt for him are as limply portrayed as Dr. Hill. The emotional connection between Hill and the killers in the two previous books is missing here, making the entire killer plot read like an afterthought. And the real villain -- not the serial killer but a drug-pushing / illegal-immigrant smuggler loses character focus as the reader is given reason to sympathize with him as well as with the killer. The climactic scenes involving the capture of one villain and the death of another are without any sense of thrill or danger. I was extremely disappointed with this book


souls of black folk
	was worthless...was not the correct match for my class book requirement.  Never used it...if someone wants it you can have it for free


Disappointing - still searching for answers
	I was looking for a book with practical advice on how to handle real-life situations.  I felt most of the book talked about how to parent, i.e. cosleeping, wearing baby, etc, but did not give advice on how to handle a specific situation.  What do i do when my child runs away from me toward the street and then hits and bites me when I pick him up?  I don't want to spank, but a 24-month old just doesn't take to "a talk" or timeout like Dr. Sears says he should.  The Sears Birth Book was amazing, I recommend it to anyone, but this book did not help me answer my questions


Breathtakingly bad
	I'm usually a sucker for just about any kooky theories backed up by barely-there evidence. Even trying very hard to be generous (hey, I'm a Christian and I think it would be fabulous if the stuff in this book were true), I think I could poke a hole in every page. And that's after perhaps 12 months of formal Mandarin study and a similar amount of Cantonese.

Don't buy it. It's embarrassing to Christians that this sort of thing gets passed around as scholarship. If they'd wrapped it up with a plot around it, it'd make a great work of fiction