As far as Nobel Prize winners go, Mr. Feynman surely must be the most interesting of the lot. This autobiography is a remarkable journey from Feynman's youth through to his golden years. He mostly covers his professional life but does touch upon personal incidents (disease and death of his first wife).

Throughout his storied life, Mr. Feynman had worked on the Manhattan Project, lectured students on physics at premier universities, traveled and taught in Brazil and Japan, played the bongos and drums, frequented strip clubs, won a Nobel Prize, chased women, deciphered Mayan hieroglyphics and solved a space shuttle disaster mystery to name just a few adventures.

The books consists of individual stories that cover major sections of his life (college years, Manhattan Project years, etc.) Throughout these stories, Feynman presents himself as a fellow who effortlessly found himself in odd and amazing situations. For instance, while playing a tambourine-like instrument in Rio de Janeiro, Feynman ended up in the Carnival festivities partying through the streets. With other such incidents, Feynman is one who has lived a full life. I would have loved to have met such a unique individual. As such, this book is a wonderful starting point.

Well, what can I say about this book? The truth is, it left me in such laughing fits I looked utterly and totally maniacal while reading it in public. Who would have thought that a brain that he was (mind you he was a Nobel prize winner who worked with some of the greatest minds known to date, was involved in the making of the atomic bomb, lectured in Cornell, etc etc) was as warped as he?! I mean, this guy went through life playing pranks on people, doing the most weirdest experiments (such as ferrying ants to determine if they left trails and if they had a sense of geometry, and persisted in controlling his dreams to the point where he could navigate himself in full colour), tried to prove a point by peeing while doing a head-stand and hung out six times a week in a topless bar even while still a professor in Caltech! Feynman was a real character to say the least. I thoroughly enjoyed the book, and truly don't remember the last time I loved a book this much for its style, its seeminly identifiable everyday-like experiences but with a hilarious Feynman twist to it, and most of all Feynman's life, pranks and adventures. Interestingly, he also tried to explain some (few) physics laws in humourous ways (probably for the scientifically impaired such as myself) and highlights the problem of rote-learning, which most encouragingly, he says is also practiced by MIT students. Finally, his insight into MIT and Princeton makes some of the best stories in this must-read book. A very enlightening and inspirational man. Very very very highly recommended

A friend recommended this book once, but after reading a few paragraphs, I did not find it very interesting and I moved on to something else. After a while he brought it up again and finally convinced me by reading me one whole chapter that made me laugh a lot. I am glad I finally gave in to this delightful and fascinating book.
It's been a long time since I have read a book which combines so perfectly humour, curiosity, intelligence, a very vivid language, and nice adventures of discovering the world.

Basically, the book speaks about the exploits of the Nobel Prize winner in Physics, Richard Feynman, an incredibly brilliant mind who was part of the research team that made the atomic bomb, but who doesn't know that if you put milk in your tea, you should not have lemon at the same time. Nor is he very good at socializing with women, yet he is a successful visiting professor at the most important universities in the US where he gives very challenging lectures.

These contrasting features make Richard Feynman a very appealing and lively character, and his book is a series of hilarious events that make you laugh out loud. He is so smart that he can break a safe in less than 15 minutes and so he made a habit of playing tricks on his colleagues by breaking the secret codes for their safes.

A multilateral personality, he studied also biology, art (he took art lessons and sold a few paintings), music. He was a scientist but not the stiff type; on the contrary, he was a very funny personality, full of sense of humour, with a childlike curiosity who tells his story with an incredible sincerity, a free spirit and enjoyable character.

It is a book I highly recommend for different reasons: readers will have the chance to meet a rare and admirable personality in a narrative marked with good quality humour.

I have read and re-read my copy of this book so many times the pages are all dog eared and the spine is on the verge of coming apart. In short this book is an absolute masterpiece. I don't think that there is any other book that will completely hold you in it's grip from the first to the last line in the way that this book will.

This book and it's author have became cultural icons ever since it went to print in the early seventies. Plenty of other reviewers have gone into great detail about many of the notable qualities of this book: the hilarious dark humor of the two's drug induced antics and the razor sharp wit it is written with, the clarity in descriptions of the drug state, the spot on observations of the 'American way of life' as well as the counterculture of the '60s, the brutal honesty in which the author deals with negative and reckless acts commited by him and especially his attorny (which some find disturbing) and of course the shear genius in every page of this by all means flawless novel.

After reading this book too many times to keep count, although I still find it totally laugh out loud funny, I generally must say that Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas is ultimately a sad novel. Sure it's a road trip to cover a story in Las Vegas on hallucinogens, but I feel that overall it is the cronicle of a 'failed seeker'. I mean the search for the American Dream is unsuccessfull and you get the feeling from this book that it will always be an unfruitfull search as the American dream doesn't exist. The passages on how the energy of the '60s dissappeared are particularly moving in this way.

I cannot recomend reading this book enough, it is funny, witty, paranoid, dreamy yet crystal clear and written impecably well.

"Buy the ticket, take the ride"

Thompson's most famous work, and for good reason. "Dr. Raoul Duke" proves himself to be the Mark Twain of our time: indulgent, biting, and hysterically critical of society just like good ol' Sam Clemens...so why don't we read "fear and loathing" in school? Kids can learn a lot more about the nature of drugs from seeing the hysterical adventures at the Circus Circus casino and the horrifying moment in the hotel bathroom after Thompson's cohort digested an entire sheet of blotter acid...this book is truly brilliant, on par with Jack Kerouac's work, only Thompson doesn't take himself as seriously as Kerouac, which of course makes him all the more fun.

Those that love to read about people's adventures during the 60's and 70's will love Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. This is a story of a journalist who travels to Vegas to cover a race called "The Mint 400". The only problem is he is a doctor of journalism and an event like this has to be covered is all of the correct preportions. To do this he and his attorny get numerous amounts of drugs and alcohol. They arrive at Vegas just in time to cover the story, but that is the last thing that they want to do. The real purpose of their journey is to find the American Dream. They found it alright but when they saw what it really was they said forget it. They go around breaking all kinds of laws and create all sorts of rukkus. It was all in good fun though and nobody really got hurt. Through out this journey they learn many things including never to give a 16 year old girl that you don't know acid. This book is a very deeply descriptive book and it really puts you in the mind of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. I enjoyed this book so much that I have read several other of his books and I have seen the movies.

Ken Follet actually wanted to write this book years before it was published. But his agent told him to build up his base of fans by writing several more thrillers. His EYE OF THE NEEDLE pushed him up to the best seller list.

At a later point, after writing those novels and studying medieval cathedral architecture, Follet got to write his 900 page novel centering around the British dispute of the crown between Queen Maude and King Stephen; these were the contestants who preceded Henry II, who is best known for his colorful History with Eleanor of Aquitaine, Richard the Lion Hearted and the gray King John.

Story centers around several commoner types, with a few exceptions, whose lives intertwine in the eventual struggle to build a glorious cathedral. Without revealing too much and generalizing this story has: lurid scenes of lust, violence, intrigue, political disputes, wars, loves gained, loves lost, main characters dying, a child abandoned at birth and much more. And, to Historian lovers, it even teaches readers of the period.

Highly advised reading, even if the dialogue is a bit informal and the structure sometimes isn't as focused as it could be. If those two points don't bother you, this is a great book.

Ken Follet actually wanted to write this book years before it was published. But his agent told him to build up his base of fans by writing several more thrillers. His EYE OF THE NEEDLE pushed him up to the best seller list.
At a later point, after writing those novels and studying medieval cathedral architecture, Follet got to write his 900 page novel centering around the British dispute of the crown between Queen Maude and King Stephen; these were the contestants who preceded Henry II, who is best known for his colorful History with Eleanor of Aquitaine, Richard the Lion Hearted and the gray King John.
Story centers around several commoner types, with a few exceptions, whose lives intertwine in the eventual struggle to build a glorious cathedral. Without revealing too much and generalizing this story has: lurid scenes of lust, violence, intrigue, political disputes, wars, loves gained, loves lost, main characters dying, a child abandoned at birth and much more. And, to Historian lovers, it even teaches readers of the period.
Highly advised reading, even if the dialogue is a bit informal and the structure sometimes isn't as focused as it could be. If those two points don't bother you, this is a great book.

I've never been a fan of Follett, and picked this book up with some misgivings - anyone these days can try to do an "historical" novel with some quick sex, some fake archaic new-speak, and a TV-movie-miniseries concept of history. While there are some minor flaws in this book, its sweep, characterization, tensions, and love of its subject are simply riveting. I could not put the darned thing down and have lost sleep for a week compulsively page-turning. Follett, unbelievably, seems to have made little splash with this book when it first came out - more shame to the critics who missed a "Gone With the Wind" from a conventional thriller author.

His primary strength in the book is his magnificent characters. By the end, Prior Phillip, Aliena, Jack, Richard, "Witch" Ellen, William of Hamleigh, Waleran Bigod, and a host of supporting characters are as real as people you know. Their strengths and weaknesses feel as sound as earth. I've just reached the part where the Cathedral is finished, and its magnificent image, built in love, hardship, and devotion, colors the whole book like light through stained glass. And I suspect the ending will be as immensely "right" as the entire rest of the book in its proportion in spinning out complicated human lives and emotions.

Follett manages to write of an age of religious devotion without tumbling into the two pits - making fun of medieval Christian faith, or uncritically adopting it. An IMMENSELY satisfying read.

I could quibble with what I feel is some gratuitous sex, some slightly contrived plot twists, but that's like complaining about some flotsam in the river as you're going over Niagara.

DO NOT MISS THIS BOOK if you love wonderful story-spinning and history.

Well done, Mr. Follett!

These Russians really know how to tackle the big issues in literature. I started with Solzenitsyn's Day in the Life, then did War and Peace, then Crime and Punishment, and most recently, The Brothers Karamazov, and I have to say that I am much the better for reading these books.

Phew, I thought War and Peace was good (and it was), but the Brothers Karamazov locks horns with the problems we face as human beings, wrestles them to the ground, exposes us for the weak, sinful things that we are, then gives us hope.

Principally (to me, anyhow), the novel was about the problem of overthrown authority. God and the church were starting to be questioned as the ultimate authority, and the air in Russia at the time was begining to move towards reform, begining to become modern. Its themes are just as relevant today as they were for Dostoyevsky's time, and there are several passages in "The Russian Monk" chapter that were profoundly prophetic of the problems of modern society- if you replace some words with modern equivelents you have a very good picture of the USA today. Isolation of the individual, invented needs, the problem of freedom- these are some of the things Dostoyevsky tries to tackle.

Several chapters are masterpieces enclosed within the work itself, 'Pro and Contra,' 'A Little Demon,' 'The Russian Monk' the chapter where Mrs Kholaklova (spelling) professes her lack of faith to the Elder Zosima, the chapter that focuses on the relationship between Snegiyrov and Illyushin, his son, showing how children lose their innocence and become indoctrinated into this harsh adult world- with bad consequences when violence is present. And of course, there is the 'Grand Inquisitor' chapter. Wow. WOW. Had to read that three times before I think I got everything in it, but I think if every human being on Earth read 'The Grand Inquisitor' 'The Russian Monk' and then 'The Speech at the Stone' we would all be very much the better for it. eh, just read the whole thing while you're at it.

Dostoyevsky's conclusion seems to be that faith will be the ultimate healing salve for all humanity- once everybody realizes the stupidity of everything other then selfless, active love, we shall all move forward and life shall be paradise. We've had 120 years or so more progress towards it since Dostoyevsky wrote it, but it looks like we're still not doing very well (thank you very much Ms Ayn Rand). Dostoyevsky provides enough sustenence for people with less ardent faith to continue on- one of the characters, Rakitin, says 'Man kind will find the strength to live for virtue wether or not he believes in the immortality of the soul.' The Devil, in the chapter where he has a conversational duel with Ivan, mocks this idea as 'most charming.'

Each of the primary characters- Alyosha, Ivan, Dmitry, and Fyodor Pavlovich, is a guide to a certain way of living. Alyosha the christ-man, Ivan the intellectual skeptic (Raskolnikov mk II), Dmitry the noble savage, and Fyodor Pavlovich as the great sinner. Each character has his own climax in the book, and everybody should be able to identify with at least one of the characters, or find that they may be 10% Dmitry, 50% Ivan, and 40% Alyosha.

This should be an exceptional book for any young person trying to figure out what the heck life is all about. There's some good stuff between those covers- Dostoyevsky has a very deep understanding of human nature.

So in closing, whatever your beliefs are, don't eat the pineapple compote, and don't take the earthly loaves.

The Brothers Karamazov becomes more ironic and comedic with multiple readings and age, i.e. mine. It is also, for me, the novel of the Russian soul/landscape, the ungovernable, mystic and irrational. Traces of Rasputin can be gleaned in Fyodor Karamazov, the patriarch whose decadent life and death is the magnetic core of this masterpiece. Dostoevsky, in his last novel spares few but least of all the lesser landowners, moneylenders and petitbourgoise whose treachery and self-absorption is the essence of the drunken Karamazov. From 3 women, come the brothers and the bastard and it is within their various souls, the archetypal Russian nature and its conflict, comes the plot. In all, the span of the story is but 4 days.

Karamazov is the comedy as well as the nature of the murderous avenging of devils that lightens and lifts, to the degree that is possible in this notoriously dense read. In one scene glaring with "a broad, drunken half-witted leer." he manages to speak some of the author's tormented inner debates about religion, God and the progressive, radical elements that would choose violent change and destruction. Despite his tyranny to servants, children and women, Karamazov is a yellow bellied coward. Confronted by Dmitri, his son, Fyodor squeals and runs around the table, "He's going to hurt me, stop him stop him" grabbing desperately to another son's coattails.

Dostoyevsky's final work of the obsessions that consumed him as well as his age is no where more labrynthine than in his depiction of the Russian church. He indicts the overly powerful clergy of the Holy Mother Church of the Tsar- while remaining fanatically Christian. He has contempt for the court system and the repressive penal codes, but a greater contempt for the radicals and assassins who assert that blood is the path to reform and the end of crime. Here, he enlarged on the theme of Crime and Punishment where destabilization and rampant appetites and excess were condemned. Karamazov is less a sermon or a catharsis for its delightful comedy, the burlesque of dreamers, rebels, the pious and the rogues who are part of the great folly, the foolishness and perhaps unredeemable condition of mankind. Dostoevsky was a Christian who could only love a suffering Christ- Ivan, his son intellectualizes religion yet it does nothing but infect his mind and bring nightmares, one of which is the famous chapter of "The Grand Inquisitor." There is an attack upon the deification of the uneducated Russian countrymen when after a verdict came through someone yelled, "Hooray, Trust our Russian peasants, Trust the peasants." Yet they had just convicted an innocent man.

Dostoeyvski speaks in the preface as author and creator, in particular in regard to his hero, tells us in the preface that the Aleksi, (Aloysha). The Christlike youngest brother is superior in thought alone, but in his action, he fails to inspire.

In no area is Dostoeyevski's own uncertainty more brilliantly depicted than in the question of the nature of the holy man on earth- the monks, the starets and the saintly. Fyodor insults the monks where Aloysha has gone to prepare for the priesthood. He shouts in a mad frenzy to the monks, "why shouldn't I act the fool? ....every single one of you is worse than me. That's why I'm a buffoon- a buffon of shame..Master (falling to knees) what must I do to earn eternal life?" Was he in jest?
It has been said that all the characters are insane, and then rebuffed with, we are just seeing them, in so much vivid light, but they are, like ourselves, just ordinary. This is an event, a necessary ingredient to any reading life.

THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOV may indeed be the greatest novel yet written. The Russian master's tumultuous epic concerning ultimate questions of good and evil; faith and rationalism; love and passion, are profoundly dramatized in a murder mystery that astonishes and disturbs by its refusal to stereotype any of its characters or trivialize any of its themes. Hence the book...like a well-lived life...is a struggle that requires much of the reader. However, if the effort is made in good faith, one never forgets the experience of journey and the lessons taught. The Constance Garnett translation is to The Karamazov as the King James Version is to the Bible. At the center of the story is "The Legend of the Grand Inquisitor". Some readers may observe that its inclusion in the novel is a "mechanical" contrivance and a technical flaw that does not naturally flow into the narrative. This may be true; but Ivan Karamazov's "poem" (as Dostoyevsky's proud, intellectual nihilist proposes) is...in effect...a spiritual history of humanity and its battle for dignity under the weight of its own Sins. When the Inquisitor/anti- Christ figure of the tale asserts that man's greatest curse is his own freedom and that he will "worship" anyone who takes this burden from him (from Supreme Court Justices who declare abortion is not murder...to talk show hosts who celebrate divorce and homosexuality)most readers suddenly realize that they are not merely reading a book but...like The Brothers Karamazov themselves... are on trial for their beliefs. Or lack of them. It is a novel which rivals parts of The Bible itself in wisdom and startling insights. Yet Dostoyevsky was "only" a man and this book... perhaps the greatest novel ever written...is a wonderful testimony to great literature's affirmation of life and the "adventure" of living.

"You will be haunted by Three Spirits." So forewarns Jacob Marley's ghost to Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge, a miser of stingy, unfavorable traits. And so begins the enduring Christmas classic distinguished by almost everyone. Come along on an erratic journey with the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future, all of whom attempt to point Scrooge onto a virtuous path. Meet the most notable characters ever introduced in literature: Bob Cratchit, angelic Tiny Tim, and good-natured Fred. With vivid descriptions of Victorian England and enlightening dialogue, 'A Christmas Carol' will enrapture both the young and old throughout the year with a vital lesson on hope and benevolence for humanity. This, I find, is treasured most of all in this brief story marvelously crafted by the creative Charles Dickens. No matter how many adaptations of the book one has seen on television or as films, the real source is highly recommended and should not be missed. For if you do pass the book up, you are being just a Scrooge (metamorphically speaking, of course!).

It's hard to think of a literary work that has been filmed and staged in more imaginative variations than Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol"--there's the excellent George C. Scott version, the delightful Muppet version, the charming Mr. Magoo version, etc., etc. But ultimately true "Carol" lovers should go back to Dickens' original text, which remains a great read.

"Carol" tells the story of cold-hearted miser Ebenezer Scrooge, who despises the Christmas holiday and scorns all who celebrate it. But a visit from a series of supernatural beings forces him to reevaluate his attitude--and his life.

With this simple plot Dickens has created one of the enduring triumphs of world literature. It's a robust mix of humor, horror, and (most of all) hope, all leavened with a healthy dash of progressive social criticism. One thing I love about this book is that while it has a focus on a Christian holiday, Dickens puts forth a message that is truly universal; I can imagine this story resonating with people of any religious background, and also with more secular-oriented people.

This is a tale of greed, selfishness, regret, redemption, family, and community, and is enlivened by some of the most memorable characters ever created for English literature. Even if Dickens had never written another word, "A Christmas Carol" would still have, I believe, secured his place as one of the great figures of world literature.

Well, I finally read it (instead of just watching it on the TV screen).

This is what you can call a simple idea, well told. A lonely, bitter old gaffer needs redemption, and thus is visited by three spirits who wish to give him a push in the right direction. You have then a ghost story, a timeslip adventure, and the slow defrosting of old Scrooge's soul. There are certain additions in the more famous filmed versions that help tweak the bare essentials as laid down by Dickens, but really, all the emotional impact and plot development necessary to make it believable that Scrooge is redeemable--and worth redeeming--is brilliantly cozied into place by the great novelist.

The scenes that choke me up the most are in the book; they may not be your favourites. I react very strongly to our very first look at the young Scrooge, sitting alone at school, emotionally abandoned by his father, waiting for his sister to come tell him there may be a happy Christmas. Then there are the various Cratchit scenes, but it is not so much Tiny Tim's appearances or absence that get to me--it's Bob Cratchit's dedication to his ailing son, and his various bits of small talk that either reveal how much he really listens to Tim, or else hide the pain Cratchit is feeling after we witness the family coming to grips with an empty place at the table. Scrooge as Tim's saviour is grandly set up, if only Scrooge can remember the little boy he once was, and start empathizing with the world once again. I especially like all Scrooge's minor epiphanies along his mystical journey; he stops a few times and realizes when he has said the wrong thing to Cratchit, having belittled Bob's low wages and position in life, and only later realizing that he is the miser with his bootheel on Cratchit's back. Plus, he must confront his opposite in business, Fezziwig, who treated his workers so wonderfully, and he watches as true love slips through his fingers again.

It all makes up the perfect Christmas tale, and if anyone can find happiness after having true love slip through his fingers many years ago, surprisingly, it's Scrooge. With the help of several supporting players borrowed from the horror arena, and put to splendid use here.

It might not be easy to really make the transition from imperative to object oriented programming, but if you are trying to do this, plan to try to do this, or for whatever are forced to try and do this, you *must* own and have read this book. That's my simple opinion.

For a lot of people this book take as a whole might be a bit to much. After all, its basically an introduction of the concept(s) involved and then 'just' a kind of catalog of OOP design patterns that have proven themselves in multiple practical projects before. The book does not actually take you by the hand and try to teach you something per se. But if OOP is important to you, and even if this book is too much for you at this point in time, I think it best to at least come in contact with it as soon as possible (=now) and keep coming back to it. You will feel the whole concept clicking into place soon enough, especially getting you hands dirty on some practical examples and actually seeing them work and seeing what benefits the use of the design patterns can bring you.

(If you're a VisualBasic programmer, you might benefit a lot from 'Microsoft Visual Basic Design Patterns (Microsoft Professional Series)' by William Stamatakis as well...)

This book is a clear elucidation of a complex sub topic within the Object Oriented Design methodology; namely the application of a set of 23 design templates to common design problems. It has a strong academic base, with only one chapter, (no. 2), giving a well worked example. The book is broken up into 6 chapters, with chapters 3, 4 and 5 each describing a different category of pattern template. All 23 patterns fall into one of these chapters. Chapter 6 acts like a summary of the design pattern community and current research directions. Highly recommended reading for software engineers dabbling in OOD at the intermediate to advanced level. Would form a basis for graduate level study course in OOD. Suffers from only having one well worked example. Would benefit from a supplementary book with detailed applications of all the design patterns

I've been a software developer in C++ for some time. I would have to agree with the reviews that mention that most C++ textbooks rarely show the full scope and power of what this language is capable of, until you look at modern OO languages like Java and how they have been put to use. After all, those are language textbooks, not OO design/philosophy books.

This book, on the other hand, made clear the "why" behind many software library architectures I've used, from the basic Java classes and AWT to things done in MFC, COM and the Stingray MFC extension libraries. Not only did it give an explanation, but it explicitly set out the "how-tos" on using these patterns yourself (complete with diagrams illustrating the structures and interactions), and more importantly when and when not to use particular patterns.

For me at least, the most difficult part of designing an application is not coming up with good algorithms or efficient routines, but is constructing a sensible, easy-to-maintain architecture that will hand the demands placed on it...without writing excessively convoluted code. This seems more all the more difficult the larger the application gets. The patterns in this book clarified many things which I wish I had known earlier. A few patterns that I had "discovered" through much trial-and-error and observation were set out, often in a much cleaner form than I had come up with myself. Several of the patterns in the book were immediately applicable to a project I was working on, helping to speed through what likely would have been another messy and slow design phase.

I would recommend ths book for any OO designer. At the very least, it will enable you to understand why various libraries were implemented in certain ways. At best, it will provide a useful toolkit of proven solutions enabling one to get the most out of an OO language such as C++ or Java, a toolkit that can be drawn on to solve your own architectural issues without reinventing the wheel.

The only warning I would give about this book is to reiterate the warning in the preface's very first paragraph: "This book assumes you are reasonably proficient in at least one object-oriented programming language, and you should have some experience in object-oriented design as well. You definitely shouldn't have to rush to the nearest dictionary the moment we mention 'types' and 'polymorphism', or 'interface' as opposed to 'implementation' inheritance."

I very much enjoyed this book because it was full of pure fun reading. Some books drag from the very beginning, but this children's story didn't. There were surprises from the start. This book is an all original example of using your imagination. Lewis Carrol was gifted enough to let his imagination go wild, and to write it down on paper. This book inspires me to write any sort of crazy thing that is worth writing. This book is about Alices adventures from the time she saw the peculiar White Rabbit with a waistcoat and watch. She meets thrilling but very arguementive creatures and charectors such as the caterpiller who smokes, the Duchess and her baby which turns into a pig, a Mock Turtle, a gryphon, and the most famous the Chesire cat and the Queen of Hearts. This book is a bit different than the Disney movie. There are other charecters in the book that are not mentioned in the animated movie. and I think the book is more bizarre.

'Alice in Wonderland', by Lewis Carroll, is an excellent book for both adults and children. It details a little girl's wild adventure through a make believe world. The writing was clever. And so were the characters and situations created by Carroll. Everyone is familiar with the principal idea of the book, but reading the book forces you to remember all the particulars. It it clear why children love this book, which it's fantastic situations.

Being a software developer and a computer science major, it was also interesting to pick up on concepts such as reasoning and logic skattered within the book (Carroll was a mathematician). Of course these concepts are skewed in Wonderland.

If you've never read this book before, put it on your "must read" list. It's a short book and a fast read. If you you're read it already, why not read it again?

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is one of the most clever and entertaining books yet written. The author's use of language is extremely appealing to the younger readers. These young readers are attracted to this book because of the author's use of many songs. For instance the lullaby sung by the duchess to her child. The Mock Turtle also sang to Alice and the Gryphon a song about the Lobster Quadrille. The author also uses poems that are entertaining and fun to listen to. "You are Old Father William" is one of the many poems. Not only does the author use poems but she also uses commonly known poems and changes the words to fit the character saying them. For instance the Mad-Hatter sings Twinkle Twinkle Little Star in different words saying "Up above the world you fly, Like a tea-tray in the sky." If this isn't a unique way of writing I dont know what is. Another style of her writingthat is appealing is when she creates a picture, using words in a poem, about the poem. Yhis is used on page 37. The words in the book are nbot hard so the book can be enjoyable when it is being read, not stressful. The author brings animals to life which is an interesting style of writing. This is Lewis Carroll's style of writing. The main character in this book is a little girl with blonde hair named Alice. This child is full of fantasies and dreams, which is what the book is about. Alice is very curious and likes to know every little detail. She thinks she is very smart. For example, when Alice is listening to the Dormouse's story she asks questions like "What did they live on," and makes smart comments such as "They could'nt have done that you know, they'd have been ill." She is also a little bit bratty, especially to the Dormouse when she says: "Nobody asked your opinion." These characteristics pull together to make an interesting main character and to create a fabulous story. The theme of the story is sometimes you need to take a break out of every day life and dream of fantasize. This makes your life more interesting even if you dream about things that will never come true. Alice does this when she dreams about changing sizes and listening to talking animals. Dreaming doesn't hurt anyone except the people who don't do it. If nobody ever had dreams life would be extremely stressful and boring. The plot of the story is all about Alice trying to find the white rabbit, which of course is in her dream. Following the white rabbit takes ALice to interesting places, such as the Courtroom filled with animals, and the Duchess' house, along with meeting interestingpeople such as the Cheshire-Cat and the Queen. This amazing cat hes the ability to disappear whenever it wants to and it always smiles. In the end Alice finds the white rabbit and then wakes up from her dream. This is the plot of the story. The story is effective to the reader. This is so because after listening to such acreative dream and fantasy, it inspires people to take a little time out of the day and be creative and dream once in a while. All the parts of this five star story; the writer's style, the main character, the theme, and the plot; come together to create the overall effectiveness of the story. This is why I rated this book five stars.

Patrick Delaney is an unlikely hero. He finds himself at 81 contemplating his past and suffering the indignities of the present. WWI has become as fresh in his mind as if it happened yesterday. Patrick revisits his past; mourning his friend Daniel and his lost love Julia.

Set in three time frames this book reaches the heart of what it is like to have loved and lost and to wonder about the might have been. You can't help but shed a tear for Patrick and Julia. Their chance meeting 10 years after the Great War ended altered the course of both their lives leaving Patrick to regret the choices he made 60 years later.

This is also a story of triumph. Triumph of spirit and the will to chose despite impending death.

I can't help but feel anyone reading this book will be touched by the beautiful story of Patrick and Julia. I look forward to reading more by Jonathan Hull.

Jonathan Hull's beautifully crafted novel about love and war is superb. The story is told through Patrick Delany's eyes as a 19-year-old foot soldier in the trenches of WWI, as a 29-year-old WWI veteran looking for answers to the never-ending questions of life, and as an 81-year-old great-grandfather in a nursing home. Hull does a wonderful job weaving the narrative through the different phases of Patrick's life; he understands and knows the characters of Patrick, Daniel, and Julia the way any writer should---like he/she knows himself/herself. There are no surprises or unusual twists...the reader knows that Daniel dies, but the manner of his death is still shocking. I literally gasped and had to close the book to adjust to the vivid scene that Hull described. In our quest to honor the veterans of WWII, I think Americans may have forgotten the greater horrors (if possible) of WWI. And it comes as no surprise that Patrick loses Julia, Daniel's lover. But the manner in which the characters get from Point A to Point B and the choices each character makes makes this is one of the best crafted novels to be published in the last five years. It takes a lot of skill to interweave such three timeframes so that the reader is neither lost nor bored. It would have been easy for Hull to descend into the ghastly and ubiquous, but his ability to tell the tale rises well above the ordinary. I plan to use this novel in my Basic Fiction Writing classes as illustrations of the amount and type of descrption, character development and plotting. There is not an unnecessary word or scene in this entire novel. It's a page-turner that will live in my heart for many, many years.

This is easily one of the best books I've read. First attracted to it by the title, then the cover picture, in the bookstore where I work part-time, never in my wildest imagaination did I know what I was in for when I started reading it.
As a war book it is amazing in describing what life was like in the trenches during WWI. The term "No Man's Land" now has new meaning for me. After reading this book, as a mother, I can't imagine any mother ever wanting their sons, or daughters, to go off to war and serve as cannon fodder. The cheapness of human life was revealed to me, as thousands died to gain a few inches of groumd, only to lose it. Interspersed through the book Hull included diary entries from real soldiers that serve as a grim reminder of what it was really like.
As a love story, which is only a small part of the book, Patrick reflects on choices he's made. A loving father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, he realizes early on in his marriage that he made the wrong choice, but when faced with the possiblity of having Julia as his own, his courage falters.
Though he had a good life and a successful one, looking back he can see the mistakes, the lost opportunities. Told with humor, his life in the retirement home is both funny and heartbreaking as he faces his impending death from stomach cancer.
Hull makes the characters seem larger than life and so real it isn't hard to find yourself mourning for young Daniel, whose life was full of such promise. His death will stay with me for a long time. Please take the time to read this book. You won't be disappointed.

One day...is that all it was? Even reading the novel, you feel the exact sameness of the days, how they all blend together in a Soviet workcamp, and how it had to be difficult to keep track of how many days have passed.

This book had a profound impact on me. These types of books make me look at myself a little differently. They make me wonder just how I define what's important in my life, and they make me awe at how easy it would be to redefine "important." For Ivan, what's important is an extra bowl of food, dry gloves, and a little tobacco. But we know, when we read this, that it wasn't what was always important--once upon a time, he had a life.
Simply by becoming a prisoner of war, he's become an enemy of the State; and a prisoner of a much larger war (Stalin's war on his people).

This book is about more than Stalin and more than a workcamp. It's about much more than a day in the life of a single prisoner. It's about humanity, about questioning who we are and what it would take to make us radically different, and yes, about communism and another world.

Read it yourself--and find out.

_Ivan Denisovich_ is by no means light reading, nor is it particularly notable for its entertainment value. Solzhenitsyn's detailed descriptions of the horrors of life in the Gulag, though, give the reader a glimpse into an otherwise unknown life, a life filled with desperation, starvation, frozen tundra, and injustice. Although I did not particularly enjoy the book as I read it, I am glad that I did--Solzhenitsyn's story is worth being heard, and the novel's ultimate value surpassed my initially negative feelings about the book. It is truly amazing and thought-provoking to realize what sort of a day is good in the eyes of Ivan Denisovich and his fellow prisoners.

One Day is based on the real life experience of A. Solzhenitsyn, who was imprisoned for the better part of ten years (may have been more, can't remember) in a Russian hard labor camp. One of the ironies of this is that A.S. was not an outspoken dissident or a rabble rouser, he mostly held to the party line, or didn't give much thought to politics. He was imprisoned for an offhand comment after years of loyalty. After finally being released, and writing this novel, the book was banned in Russia and he was eventually forced into exile from his beloved/hated mother country. He went on to win the Nobel Prize for this and his subsequent works about Russia during his lifetime.

The character Ivan mirrors A.S. in some respects, most notably in the fact that he doesn't care at all about any of the ideology behind the camp. Some of the other characters debate politics or sociology and mostly get thrown into solitary confinement. But not Ivan. He thinks about food and how he's going to get more of it. He thinks about keeping his foot wrappings dry and leaves the political proselytizing to the fools who will soon be dead.

Ironically, this is where the book finds its true literary achievement. At the heart of this character is a total disillusion, not the smallest spark of hope or faith in ideals or humanity, and yet the experience of watching this character carefully manuever his way to an extra bowl of soup, a pinch of fresh tobbacco, an old crust of bread -- it's magical somehow. The scene of the prisoners laying bricks is practically transcendental. Here there is dignity, pride, a sense of accomplishment, community, even a small amount of pleasure. Did we forget we were reading about a communist forced labor camp? Yes, for a moment, we did.

There's a powerful statement about the nature of a human being in that. This is A.S.'s achievement, the puzzling complexity of this book -- it is precisely out of his hopelessness and disillusion that Ivan Denisovich's humanity and strength arise.

You can still feel the author's conflicted sorrow, the unquenched bitterness and the utter frustration with a communist system that was completely irrational and blindly destructive. Yet the source of that frustration is the love he had for his country that nearly destroyed him. This confusion and melding of opposite poles is only appropriate for literature about Soviet communism -- a system based on such high utopian ideals, yet responsible for some of civilization's most massive atrocities.

All in all a quick read and honestly not as depressing as it may sound. An incredible novel as well as an incredible piece of literary history. Besides, when was the last time you got off so easy reading a Nobel Prize winner?

PS. I happened to pick up All Quiet On the Western Front at the same time as this book. They turned out to be quite similar in a number of ways. If you like one of these books, you will certainly like the other. Both fascinating and oddly beautiful accounts of the misuse of the population by those in power.

In Invisible Man Ralph Ellison narrates a story through the eyes of a southern black man who is forgotten and abused by people in the worlds around him, conveying to the reader his belief in the necessity of self-realization and self-reliance through the narrator's insights at the same time. Ellison develops his own personal convictions within the unnamed protagonist, giving his character depth of understanding imparted by the experiences he encounters. This anonymous narrator learns not only of racial prejudice during his childhood in the South but also of social ignorance in the North even among other blacks. Upon first arriving north in New York City, the narrator feels as if he has left behind prejudice social classes and unfair bias, but slowly he begins to realize that in New York or any other place there is no such thing as egalitarian rights and communal respect because of the self-serving minds of other people. In many characters such as Mr. Norton, Dr. Bledsoe and Brother Jack, Ellison embodies this attitude of ignorance and personal ambition. In the book Mr. Norton plays a minor role as a university benefactor who only wishes to see the narrator succeed in order to add to his own legacy. Dr. Bledsoe is the head of the narrator's old college who fears allowing the narrator to stay at the university may bring ill repute to his university. He only desires to see the narrator fail and even attempts to catalyze this hope by giving him letters denouncing the narrator's qualifications which he claims to be letters of recommendation. Shortly after arriving in New York, the narrator meets Brother Jack, who is the head of a civil rights movement. At the end of the book the narrator learns that Brother Jack has been using him as a speaker to incite citizens for his own alterior motives. Ellison states through the narrator that his invisibility arises from the negligence of others who are striving toward their goal, too busy to think about him on their way. In the end of the book the narrator fully grasps and learns that his insignificance in others' eyes is insignificant itself, that his peace and contentment must come from within himself. Ellison shows ubiquity and timelessness in his philosophy on man and his intrinsic nature, intricately developing Invisible Man to reflect aspects of his own take on life.

I read Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison independently, while reading and analyzing To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee in my 8th grade class. Both books offer different points of view on the horrible racism of America in the 1930s. Invisible Man is told through the main character's point of view, so the author's views on racism are fully expressed. This is similar to To Kill a Mockingbird because the story is told from a first person in that book as well. The major difference between the point of view from which the two stories are told is that in TKM, the story is told through the eyes of a young white girl, and in Invisible Man it is told from a black man's point of view. The writing is somewhat similar to To Kill a Mockingbird but Invisible Man is darker and more cynical, which makes sense considering that the author of TKM is a white woman, while the author of Invisible Man is a black man. A person's views on racism would be more pessimistic and negative if they had been oppressed and were subjected to racism, and more optimistic and positive if they hadn't. Ralph Ellison must have been discriminated against, up to the point that Invisible Man is somewhat of an autobiography of his struggles with racism. His book is very pessimistic towards the idea of racism ending, as the main character is betrayed again and again by white people. Harper Lee, on the other hand, wasn't oppressed due to her race and therefore her book is optimistic that, over time, racism will go away. A person's beliefs on a subject are greatly affected if that person has been harmed by the problem. I gained a better understanding of the horrible conditions black people suffered not that long ago while reading this book, and that alone is worth the price of admission. Two thumbs up.

Ellison's African-American hero (appropriately, we never learn his name) wanders through life suffering from people who expect him to be someone he's not. Every time he tries to assert himself, people punish him for failing to conform to their expectations, and since no two people seem to expect the same thing from him - and since he meets so many different people - he suffers a lot. He calls himself the invisible man, then, because no one sees him for himself. The novel tells how he comes to this realization and how he concludes that forcing people to conform is wrong and that diversity is a strength. Surprisingly for a black novel set in the 1950s, only about half of his troubles come from racism, and he seems to have little or no internalized racism. Also, although the novel can be read just on the surface, it has a rich allegorical subtext that rewards careful examination. (E.g. the Liberty Paint Company secretly adds a few drops of black graduate to each bucket of their award-winning white paint.) Finally, the book is almost completely free of modern notions of political correctness, so it should be readable and enjoyable for everyone.