When I was a child I read Little Britches, Man of The Family, and Horse of a Different Color. These books/stories are timeless. Any parent who wants to give a good example to a child about resposibility should obtain these.

Ralph Moody again weaves an artful picture of true life in the real world of the early twentieth century. His easy going style and colorful portrayal of each character give a real livng account of day to day life with a constant optimism that many of us miss in our cynical world. A great read aloud family book aong with the rest in the series. Moody gives character qualities that are rarely found in the novels of today and are much needed especially for todays young men.

Put this one on your 10 - 14 year old's reading list but don't forget to read it along with them.

If Franz Kafka's Joseph K. had lived in the early 1940's and been ordered to wear a yellow star in Czechoslovakia, he would have resembled a character known only as E. S. in this story of wartime Hungary by Danilo Kis. The trial of an individual and his family at the hands of a vague and hidden totalitarian force are described with growing horror and gallows humor in ''Hourglass,'' a chilling novel in which time is running out for a marked man riding along the tracks of mortification.

One of the trains he takes eventually must lead to a concentration camp. But the journal of the final months of his life is told with such authority in this imaginatively constructed story that the doomed character appears to be in command of his own destiny. ''Hourglass,'' translated from the Serbo-Croatian by Ralph Manheim, is evidently rooted in firsthand family experiences. The reader is informed that a letter attributed to E. S. in the novel is based on an actual letter written by Kis's father two years before his death in Auschwitz. But the universal elements in the story - the attempt to carry on the everyday routine of life and the disbelief in an official policy of genocide - offer a parable about the extermination of the Jews by the Third Reich and its collaborative governments in occupied Europe. Trains were essential for the Third Reich to fulfill the quotas for the Holocaust, and trains play an essential part in the novel. At one point, the narrator sees himself, with trembling hands, gathering up his papers in his seat in the first-class carriage and stuffing them into his briefcase along with bottled beer and smoked-herring sandwiches. The author then transforms an ordinary train ride into an act of terror: ''Who was standing beside him at that moment? A young blond conductor, who was aiming his nickel-plated ticket punch like a revolver at the star on his chest.''

The interrogation of the narrator is bizarre. It shows the police mentality at work in a police state anywhere. The narrator is questioned about a piano in his home. The line of questioning goes: Can the piano be used to send signals? Where in the room is the piano? Can you describe what it looks like? Why was an open score on the music stand? How do you account for the fact that the piano was open and that someone had been practicing so early in the morning? Inevitably, the answers to dumb questions sound somehow suspicious and lead to more questions.

The nameless E. S. wonders how he can avenge himself against the armed police. He indulges in a small act of defiance for his own self-respect: ''Several times he had blown his nose into a newspaper with the Fuhrer's picture on it. Was he conscious of the danger he was courting? Definitely. He always folded the paper as small as possible before throwing it into dense brambles or the river, thus doing away with the corpus delicti of his insane and dangerous act.'' There are deliberate breaks in style as the author shifts back and forth in chapters that are labeled ''Travel Scenes,'' ''Notes of a Madman,'' ''Criminal Investigation'' and ''A Witness Interrogated.'' The year 1942 is a crazy time in the Danube Valley for the first-person narrator. He is trying to maintain a semblance of sanity while composing a letter to his sister that forms the spine of the story. If there is a theme in the novel, it is summed up in the last sentence of that letter:

''P. S. It is better to be among the persecuted than among the persecutors.''

''Hourglass'' owes a debt to ''The Trial'' by Kafka. In the narrator's musings, Kafka is cited: ''Everything that is possible happens; only what happens is possible.'' What distinguishes Kis's novel is its authorial independence. A conventional narrative structure is ignored; it is the author's musings and diversions that magically build suspense. Some paragraphs run on for pages, others suddenly break into short questions and answers between the omnipotent state and its helpless victims. Kis forces the reader to work for him, to pay attention. That he succeeds is a rare achievement...

Kis's novel is one of the most important in the entire Eastern-european literature. It gives an incradible picture of a desintegrating mind, following, in a way the steps of Youce and Woolf, but still making a step towards postmodernism

It was nice to finally find a book that high school juniors and senior want to read. The other books on the market dealing with the high school to college transition are too boring and preachy! I highly recommend this book for college prep counseling programs because I know how busy juniors and seniors are. It covers very serious topics in a very open, fresh manner. The books make great graduation gifts too!

Thoughtful advice on everything from selecting a major to partying to pop quizzes. I enjoyed the planning worksheets in the book - they helped me organize my thoughts and prioritize my game plan. Great illustrations!

What is it like to be a famous German novelist living in Switzerland during World War II? Innumerable Germans at their wits' end would write Hermann Hesse hoping that somehow he could help them. In this collection of short pieces, Hesse shows that the best way he knew to achieve peace was to use his pen.

It is worth getting your hands on this book just in order to read "The European," which reminds us that philosophy must above all be practical.

Hermann Hesse's "If the War Goes On" is different from many of his other books because rather than fiction, it is a book of short essays. The one which still stands out in my mind after 20-plus years is entitled, "The European". The book is worth reading. Hesse was, if I recall correctly, a pacificist whose nationality happened to be German, at a time when war was going on in Europe. The title of the book seems to reflect both the external political cirumstances of the time in which he was writing, but also, and perhaps mainly, conditions of conflict inside people. It is evident from biographies of Hesse that he struggled alot and documented this in his writing. It's time for me to re-read this incredible book.

The downside to technology is that you have to try and keep pace, expecially in CAD technology. This book helps to make the learning curve not quite so steep. It is laid out like the other "Quick Reference" books for ACAD, in alphabetical order, with numeric commands (usually 3d) after 'Z'

When you get to the command that you have a question about, there is a wealth of information. You not only have the command, but the icon also, if there is one for that command. You then get the command line reference, and a picture of the dialog box (again, if there is one with that command) In the command line feature, you also get the way to type the command, with a hyphen, to use the command in the command line only. You also get a brief description of options, related commands, system(s) variables, and quite a set of tips. They also tell you if a command has been renamed or is an undocumented, by AutoDesk, command.

All in all, you get very good information for a basic grasp of the command. This will make it easier for you when you go to more in depth resources for AutoCad.

Some other good features of the book are: 1) pictures of the function key and their functions on the inside cover, as well as some of the Control key combinations, 2) Command prefixes on the inside front cover, 3) 29 pages of system variables, 4) Commands that have been removed, and 5)some miscellaneous information on the inside back cover.

I would recommend this book to anyone that is now using AutoCad 2002. I would also suggest that anyone thinking of purchasing AutoCad 2002 to pick it up and see what it has to offer.

A perfect and user friendly book and its a must have reference book especially to whom practicing AutoCAD.

Even while flipping through it for the first time, I found at least a dozen things that I didn't know about AutoCAD, and I've been using AutoCAD for 10 years now! I can't decide what I like most about this book. Not only do you get commands listed alphabetically, but it includes tips, keyboard/mouse functions, a detailed section on system and dimension variables, and highlighting new options in R14 (including the new Bonus Tools) all of which is in a neat, well organized format. A book like this usually comes in the size of a phone book with a price tag close to $85, but this book is a convenient size for much-much less. If you only buy one AutoCAD [R14] book this year, get this one!

Clear, concise, and authoratative reference for AutoCAD R14. A must for all users of AutoCAD (including R12 and R13 users).

This new book is a home run for shareholders desiring greater accountability from the boards of directors they have hired as caretakers of their funds; and gives directors a handy reference book chock full of practical tools that practically every company will find useful.

After investing in public and private companies for over 30 years, serving on numerous public and private company boards, reading dozens of books and hundreds of articles on improving company boards and better corporate governance - this is the best I have come across. Companies should provide a copy of this book for each of their directors as a matter of policy, and investors should read it to discover valuable new insights into the crucial but often forgotten links between director quality, accountability, conflicts of interest and stock price performance.

One of the most frequent requests from readers of CorpGov.Net is for a book on how to improve their board. Finally I can recommend a book that doesn't read like a dry academic text and is built on real life examples. Finally, a clear guide to solving the most common problems facing boards. Each chapter provides a concise overview of a problem or focus area, several real life examples, internet resources, advice from various experts and a checklist summary. CalPERS should be sending Mr. Ward's book to each board member of the companies on its focus list.

At last! A book on relativity that the layman can understand with absolute clarity.

Authors Bruce Bassett et al deserve a literary medal for making such a rich topic so easy to digest.

They write with the consummate ease of travel writers.
Destination: space-time.
Mode of transport: Einstein's mind.

It's a complex task making relativity simple.
I'm really grateful someone finally did it!

Wow! This is an awesome little book. I love the "Introducing" series but sometimes I find their work a little too basic. Not this time. This is a graphic highway into the mind of Einstein - the 4th dimension, curved space and time...its all here but without the maths...just the ideas. The middle is the hardest, while the last third of the book covers current cosmology and all the latest advances in our understanding of the universe.

I usually don't review books I haven't finished yet, but I think it will take me years to figure out what I think about Invisible Man, and I'm so excited by it that I can't wait. I'm less than halfway through and it has become my favorite novel of all time, displacing Anna Karenina. I especially love how the events are often non-naturalistic as in modernist works like Ulysses (time stretches or speeds up, events that are just barely possible but more likely magical occur), but the style is clear and simple, not obscure like the works of Woolf or Joyce. An amazing book.

First let me say that this book changed my life and I love it so much I re-read it once a year. It's about a black man trying to find his place in the world and ending up in a lot of different situations because of it. At no point in time do you have the main character's name or any real description other than he's black which brings you into the story even more. You absorb the world in the same manner he does and the language is so wonderful. It is a wonderfully written book. I read Native Son the same year I read this book and this one had a much stronger impact on my life.

As author of this book, I am pleased to quote a review written by Beverly Allen, Professor of French and Italian at Stanford University: "Dr. Rosenbaum has done a marvellous thing: he has written a very smart, adult, thorough introductory Italian grammar which is full of infectious good humour and a finely honed sensitivity to the problems facing the native English speaker when confronted by Italian. In all of this, his own enthusiastic openness to the world of Italian shines through not only as constant encouragement to the student, but also as constant entertainment. A wonderful threshold not just to the Italian language, but to Italy as well! EVVIVA!"

This book is a gem for students of the Italian language. It presents many hints for learning and remembering Italian words, with chapters like "The Regularities of Irregular Verbs," "Cognates: Faithful and Quasi," "Faking out Irregular Past Participles," and "How to Recognize, Remember, and Even Make, Nouns from Verbs." It also covers hints on how to speak easily in certain domains, such as "Popular Italian Words and Phrases," "Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow: Expressions of Time," and "Hither, Thither, and Yon: Expressions of Place." All this is presented in an easy to read and entertaining manner, by an author who spent three years in Italy, and recorded those insights about the Italian language that were most helpful to him. It is truly, as the sub-title says, a "Shortcut to the Language."