With terrorism being the current excuse to freeze accounts of people who later turn out to be innocent, offshore asset protection becomes important to everyone - and perhaps more so if you are an immigrant with significant assets and living in the U.S.

What I really liked about this book was that it was direct and practical - and the publisher even provided a free offshore trust with an offshore brokerage account included. I didn't have to spend lots of time trying to pursue generic advice.

The developed countries continue to chip away at the individual's privacy. Using the usual guise of "money laundering," the OECD and FATF have attempted to blackmail foreign banks and tax havens into cooperating with their tax collecting agenda. At the expense of personal privacy, they will implement the one world society. Their initiative has been launched and will continue in the months ahead.

Adam Starchild's book is one of the best ways to personally escape rather than fight this trend.

Many people who elect to become structured offshore do so because they feel persecuted by government, claim-minded litigants, and even investigative journalists. Often it is less an election than a matter of simple survival. In spite of assurances of fair trials and opportunities to be heard, assets are at risk if they remain in your home country or if you remain within the range of the agencies or individuals that would attack you. The natural law of envy provides that the greater your success, the greater the likelihood that you will become a target for several character types, each with a different agenda but all proximately motivated by the natural law. That is, the means and immediate goals of attackers may take different forms but at root, each is driven by the natural law of envy.

Unfortunately, it is impossible for anyone, including us, to live in this world without confronting such ugliness in some form or another. Cloaked in a thousand forms of self-righteous crusading and victim restitution, all efforts share a common goal of taking away your assets. For example, armies of IRS bureaucrats, working 40 hours a week in positions with little hope of advancement, are paid to audit you and simply cannot help but enjoy the prospect of acquainting you with financial adversity. They may not personally realize economic benefit from their work, but their gratification derives from knowing that at least you will not enjoy your former wealth.

Well, there wasn't really much of a problem I had with this book, I just...couldn't stay interested. Maybe its because I'm a fan of realisticness, but I doubt it. This book was just...boring. Adam Rapp is a great author, which he proved in "The Buffalo Tree," but this one just couldn't do it for me.

If there was on good thing though, it HAD to be Oakley Brownhouse. He was hilarious, imagining him as a little nine year old in the stuff he goes through. Its really quite funny.

I just wish the whole book was as interesting.

The world is well done and detailed, the characters are interesting, but forgive me Mr. Rapp I couldn't find much point or plot to the book! Perhaps a wiser reader could, or perhaps there will be a sequel that'll get more done. I'd certainly buy a sequel.

On a post appocolyptic Earth of the future, ruled by a dictator, eleven-year-old Whensday fights a daily battle for survival. She escapes slave labor in a mine after being rescued by a merchant. Impoverished, he decides to sell her to a childless woman. Whensday things she is being sold back into slavery, so she escapes into the devestated landscape, where acid rain falls daily. She joins up with two other children, but things grow steadily worse, and Whensday ends up being raped, while the friend who tried to save her is put to death. This book is not for the faint of heart, but if you do read it, it gives you a look at a decimated future, and a young girl so determined to survive that she never gives up, in spite of all the horrors she goes through.

This is not a book for the casual reader. Oh no, he who picks up this book had better have his thinking cap firmly in place. The book is split into four sections, each distinctly different from the others yet related in their relevance to the studies of two men: Darwin and Freud.

Expecting to find a biological study on Darwin's fascination with worms, I foolishly picked this book up. I was dismayed to discover that about ten pages of the first chapter is actually dedicated to the study of worms and their importance. Even this one section deals with worms more from a psychological standpoint than in a biological sense. This book, although interesting as it delves into complex theories, was slightly misleading to me with its cover and title.

This book consists of four somewhat related essays on what Darwin and Freud have to say about how to live a life in the face of the transient nature of existence. Disappointingly, the essays fail to address this interesting question effectively. Instead, Darwin's Worms is a collection of brief, descriptive essays on a few elements of Darwin and Freud's thinking.

The first essay sets out the question. Darwin and Freud are two thinkers who are probably most central to the "existential" worldview, the view that there is no greater "being" responsible for or looking over our actions. As a result, each of these writers was keenly aware of the relevance of "transience" as an element of living a life. Darwin saw that transience was a natural element of his theory of evolution, and Freud saw mourning and loss as a critical component in the dynamic of the psyche. So the interesting question arises: what did each of these thinkers have to say about how to live a life in this new world into which they thrust us. This question is particularly intriguing since both viewed themselves as scientists for whom direct speculation on these issues would be inappropriate. The answer to the question needs to be carefully teased from their writings. Unfortunately, the author does not carry through this exercise.

The second essay focuses on Darwin and what can be learned from his interest in the productivity of worms. The writer provides a light pastel portrait of Darwin and considers the broader implications of Darwin's interest in worms. But for me the review was too cursory and I had no sense from this of Darwin's answer as to how to live an "existential" life. At best, this was a teaser to read the more detailed work done by Darwin's biographers.

The third essay, on Freud, is surprisingly confused, given that Phillips is a psychoanalyst. It appears that what happened is that Phillips had previously written an essay on Freud's feeling toward his own biographers. Phillips then tried to fit that essay into this book and somehow make it address the larger questions this book was to address. The result is an essay that moves unconvincingly from Freud's feeling about his own biographers to his thoughts about the death instinct.

The final chapter tries to summarize what we've learned, but again the rigor is lacking. If you are looking for a cursory treatment of Freud, Darwin and the question of how to deal with the "transience" implied by their work, this book is fine. For this reader, I found the lack of disciplined reasoning frustrating, and made the book not worth the purchase price.

Adam Phillips is one of the few genuinely exciting contemporary psychoanalytic writers today, and this, along with Houdini's Box, is one of his finest works.

Somewhat,had a hard time reading and understanding it,but think what is going on today with DNA,what is it geomom???????,being able to clone life, with ginsburgh story,i say they did not have to breed with what he say were humans, i say they were a species of there own,similer to species here on earth, by god i think he is on to something here. there should be more study into this..and we are near to space travel, it could bbbeee! thonk about it....

I read this book at the suggestion of a good friend. That was 20+ years ago, and I am still captivated by it's suggestions. I would love to read it again, but alas, it is out of print, and my friend has given it away long ago. If anyone has one or knows where I might pick up a copy, please email me at lrywin@earthlink.net. -Lori

Either a whimsical and entertaining fantasy, or a serious and realistic attempt to reconcile science and religion, FIRST, MAN. THEN. ADAM! puts forth the daring idea that Adam and Eve were members of an advanced species from far off outer space who crash-landed their spaceship, effectively stranding themselves, here on a very primative earth occupied by early Homo Sapiens.

Skilled in genetic science, they were able to breed with these early peoples, to produce a long-lived (900 years!), durable and intelligent species from which present mankind is descended!

Dr. Ginsburgh, a Physicist, maintains that the Biblical Genesis story is a true though transformed history of this and following events (with the spaceship as the Garden of Eden and the ship's central computer as the Tree of Knowledge, for example). The shorter lifetimes and growing subsceptibility to disease of each suceeding generation of these early space/earth men and women is stated to be due to continual dilution of the space people's genetic heritage by interbreeding with native earth people.

A large number of occurrances described in Genesis are shown to be consistant with this space origin theory. The description of the origin of the universe given in Genesis, can, according to Dr. Ginsburgh, by giving modern interpretations to some of the terms used in the description, be shown to be entirely consistant with the current Big Bang Theory!

Altogether, this is a stimulating and challenging attempt to reconcile religion and science, and can be read as a serious theoretical proposal, or if this is too hard to accept, as, at least, a very entertaining speculation. Unfortunately, the book is not easy to find...

I enjoyed my 2nd reading of Mahoney..interesting story involving the Hero, Brian McKenna...his good relations with his department, NYPD..his dealings with the Brits, Iceland and the IRA..the interesting story of the cop gone bad(not McKenna)..the involvement of family of the victims and McKennas too...good informative stuff and easy to follow..The presentation of the Det from Iceland, Thor, was rather neat as well..the ending seemed kind of rushed but i liked it all things considered..i look forward to Mr. Mahoneys other work..

If you are a Brian McKenna fan, this is a must read, but be prepared to learn a lot about the Irish fighting in Belfast, Ireland. To me, while some of this information was important to the story, the excessive amount of information about Ireland did not move the book forward. I was beginning to feel he was being paid by the word for Ireland experiences.

Fortunately, this book is also set in New York and Iceland. To me this would have been a 5-star police procedural if it had taken place only in New York & Iceland.

Iceland's criminal justice system and its Chief Investigator are priceless. This information (scattered throughout) alone is worth reading the book.

Overall, I recommend you read this book if you like Police Procedurals or Dan Mahoney (McKenna) Books.

This book grabs your attention and doesn't let go for a week after you finish it. As a former Police Officer and someone who has been to Iceland and Northern Ireland I found this book to be very realistic in every sense. Brian McKenna is the type of guy you want to be your partner, your friend , and the cop who comes when you dial 911. He is Dan Mahoney's main character in all of his books, a NYPD Detective who in spite of past problems rises to the task of solving the toughest cases that come along. In this book he travels to Iceland to find a missing girl and ends up in a personal battle with the IRA's best bomb man. If you want a safe, predictable story then DO NOT buy this book. But if you want a gripping, realistic story of intrigue, with heartstopping action thrown in. Then get off your chair and go buy this book !

Cochran's book takes a hard look at current physics. The book pokes holes in common theories and experiments. The author also suggests routes that future researchers may want to follow. I will admit, I was a bit skeptical about purchasing this book, but was pleasantly surprised. Before I purchased it, I read a review on it in which a letter from Arthur C. Clarke (inventor of the communications satellite) is quoted. I am paraphrasing here, but Arthur C. Clarke said that he agreed with about 50% of the book. This may not sound like a lot, but when you consider the fact that almost everything in Cochran's book is considered blasphemous to modern science, having Clarke agree with 50% of your ideas is pretty huge. As for me, I don't know if I could come up with an exact percentage, but I would have to agree with many of Cochran's points. There most definitely needs to be a new direction taken in modern science.

I bought this book because I too have my doubts about accepted science. I must say, the book was quite interesting and covered many different areas. There were many ideas that I had never even thought of before. My only complaint is that the book was too short. I wish it would have gone into more depth. But I guess leaving me wanting more is the sign of a good book. Great purchase.

Anyone who comes up with a new way of looking at the universe will face criticism. Reading this book is like seeing the sun shine from a new and strange angle. In that respect alone it was more than worth the price to me. It will keep me thinking for a long time.

Horrible printing of Adams' most obscure photos. Fuzzy images with none of the range of tones normally produced by his incomparable application of the "zone technique." The poor images even make it impossible to appreciate the words of John Muir.

This book is flawed by the images selected to be in it. The other main weakness is that the book is clearly overpriced.

The good news, however, is that the image sizes are large enough to capture the power and majesty of Adams' work. The reproduction quality is superb, as well!

The essay by William Turnage is an excellent discussion of the roles of Thoreau, Muir, and Adams in creating the awareness that has helped us to save and cherish some of what remains of our American wilderness. The artist-turned-conservation leader, Adams' role, is a particularly important function in our society. The artist helps us to experience what we have never seen while the conservation leader takes actions that galvanize the emotions that are evoked by nature and the artist into helpful improvements. When the artist and conservation leader are the same person, there is a combined power and continuity of vision that is irresistible. Thank goodness!

Adams is someone we should all admire for another reason. His nature photography and conservation efforts were hobbies, labors of love. Photography of nature is a field that offered meaningful remuneration only in recent years.

His day job was doing commercial photography. He took pictures of dead people in the Los Angeles morgue as well as of open pit copper mines in Utah.

What we admire about him was what he did on weekends, before and after work, and on vacations. Because he wanted the most remarkable images, this often meant hiking before dawn in difficult winter conditions to remote peaks to get just the right perspective.

Andrea Stillman did a good job of selecting Adams' quotes for her opening remarks. "Photography is a way of telling what you feel about what you see." " . . . [T]he turning out to the light the inner folds of the awareness of the spirit . . ." is what his work is about.

Throughout the book, you will find other quotes about Adams' reflections on the wilderness. They are well selected and add much to your consideration of what his images mean.

Here are some of my favorite photographs as reproduced in this book:

Santa Elena Canyon, Big Bend National Park, Texas, 1947

Monument Valley, Arizona, 1942

Canyon de Chelly National Monument, 1942

Sand Dunes, Sunrise, Death Valley, 1948

Sand Dune, White Sands National Monument, 1942

The White Stump, Sierra Nevada City, 1936

Terraya Creek, Dogwood Rain, Yosemite, 1948

Clearing Winter Storm, Yosemite, 1944

Half Dome, Winter, from Glacier Point, Yosemite, 1940

Leaves, Mills College, Oakland, California, 1931

Maroon Bells, Near Aspen, Colorado, 1951

Old Faithful (4), Yellowstone, 1942

Mount McKinley and . . . Lake, Denali National Park, Alaska, 1947

After you have finished being refreshed and rejuvenated by these inspiring images, I suggest that you contemplate what the wilderness meant to your grandparents and parents, what it meant to you as a child, what it means to you now, and what it means to your children. If you are like me, you will see that wilderness is rapidly receding as a concept as well as a reality. What are we losing? How can we reverse that loss?

Understand all of Nature's message for us by living in harmony with her!

... because you can put four legs on it and use it for a coffee table. If you're going to have a single Ansel Adams book, this is the one. His images just don't work in any smaller format.

I really didn't know what sort of theme this book would have. Turns out it was pretty much a diary of the "first married couple" It would be a good book for a first anniversary gift. It's not bad, definitely well written. It wouldn't be offensive to anyone who actually read it.

It's impressive how well Mark Twain describes difference between a man and woman. It's sometimes funny and often sentimental to love....

This abridged version has been a very good gift for newly married couples who would like something short and sentimental and a little thought-provoking to read while honeymooning. It provides the literary and emotional essentials of the longer edition. The editing, while at times abrupt, is smooth enough to make the story easy to follow.

This little book manages to evoke more passionate emotions, word for word, than anything else you'll find. You'll be confused, frustrated, awed, elated, broken, and hopeful as Adam and Eve (and Twain) pull you into their thoughts and interpretations of life. This is a great little valentine for your sweetheart or yourself, and has been appreciated by each of the several couples to whom I've given it, and treasured by some. One couple read it to one another as they drove across the country on their honeymoon. Another read it on a sunny tropical beach.

I recommend this version over the unabridged version for most gift recipients, as it's more likely to be read completely. ...And if you buy this wonderful book for wonderful friends, you don't want them to miss the end!

I just started playing paintball and this gave me all the info I needed. It was clear and clever and now I have what it takes to wipe put the opposition! I would reccomend this to anyone that has an interset in paintball.

The first thing that you'll notice when you get this book is that all the printing is double-spaced so the book could easily have taken up half the number of pages. The second thing is that there are a lot of quotations from "The Art of War". I guess the author figures by defining some martial art terms and by quoting from a famous book that paintball could be tied to martial arts. It is an interesting twist but this book falls very short. The book does cover some paintball tactics but they are elementary and probably only useful for "white belt" paintballers. By far the best thing about this book is the cool looking front and back cover illustrations. At [$$], about the cost of two hoppers full of balls, the book might be considered useful to those beginning paintball...just don't take the martial arts part too serious.

I happened upon "Gun-Fu - The Martial Art of Paintball" and of course I ordered the book next day and it arrived by the end of the week. I read it in 4 days, lent it out a few times and recommended to my friends and teammates. If paintball is your game this might be your book.

Gun-Fu by Terry Adams is a perfect book for those entering tournament play or for those just wanting to step up their game. Mr. Adams does a fine job of translating the complicated world of strategy and self-awareness into this useful guide. I think this is a definite must for the "paint in the veins" enthusiast. I will say that I particularly enjoyed the analogies between paintball and Martial Arts. The first chapters were absolutely inspiring. I think any level player will find something in its pages. Even someone that has never played can find the knowledge they need to start. For the more advanced player you will find great perspective. The pictures are useful and the lessons are complete. For me, some of the book was more useful than the other parts but I did find golden words that did motivate me.

This book pushes technique and training methods that are proven in many other disciplines. The author draws on many similarities of paintball and other competitive sports and introduces training routines that can be incorporated into a successful paintball practice. Mental preparation is a repeated skill that is echoed throughout the pages. The science of competition is illustrated in ways that will challenge you to review your own thought processes when you are on the field and when you prepare for a game.

From a disciplined art perspective this book makes for a nice comparison between Martial Arts and Paintball. I realize that this book may find its critics as well. Especially from the Art of War quotes and Martial Art associations. Competition is a negative in many people's eyes as I have witnessed in the last 10 years. I have played in softball, chess, boxing, swordplay, fencing, all on a highly competitive level (some times it even paid my bills) and all of them have their critics. These same people that draw negative opinion don't like us as a sport anyways. Unfortunately to take the game to a competitive level you must draw on learned confrontation. And this is true, not just of paintball but as in any sport that requires strategy and team work. To attack and to defend is the tools by which we wage war that is the nature of competition. But I do think Terry's work was a book about competitive play much more so than it was about paintball. A definite must read for the bunker bound folks.