This is an excellent work. Practically everything you ever wanted to know about Edson's vaunted Raider Battalion can be found here. The book is jammed packed with facinating anecdotes and the maps and illustrations are first rate.

The book does have flaws, though. Serious errors on the Japanese OB are littered throughout the text. For instance, the 4th Infantry didn't fight in the 2nd Matanikau, only the 124th. And Col. Alexander's narrative doesn't flow smoothly in places.

Minor quibbles aside, though, this a superb work--the most detailed book you'll find on the Raiders, even better than Peatross' Bless 'Em All. Get this book!!

Edson's Raiders, the 1st Marine Raider Battalion, engaged the Japanese in seven battles, five of them on Guadalcanal. This well researched and footnoted work by retired Marine Colonel Joseph Alexander tells the story of this remarkable group of men. Trained and conditioned by the founding commander, Merritt Edson, their baptism of fire was on Tulagi against the Japanese Special Naval Landing Forces, the rikusentai. This landing occurred simultaneous with the invasion of Guadalcanal twenty miles to the south. Completing the removal of enemy forces at Tulagi, Edson and his men were quickly moved to Guadalcanal. Glorious pages of their history were written there along Edson's Ridge, a three day-two night struggle, often hand-to-hand, against an enemy force under General Kawaguchi, which out numbered them by a factor of at least five on the second night. The enemy attacked remnants of the Raiders and the 1st Paratroops, a total of less than eight hundred men, without let up. Forced to fall back to a second line of defense, "...grossly outnumbered, back-to-back, nearly out of ammo...Edson could count less than three hundred men defending Hill 120." Their action in that engagement and subsequent battles along the Matanikau secured their place in the proud history of the Marines. The US Navy named twenty-four ships after raiders in recognition of their valor. The need for highly trained volunteers in special, lightly armed commando units were soon deemed unnecessary with the advent of the fast fleet carriers of the Essex-class along with new fast battleships. But not before the successes of the 1st Raider Battalion carved for themselves a monument in Military history. This is an excellent telling of their too brief story.

Col. Alexander's work bring to life one of the Corps less talked about, and somewhat enigmatic, yet truly heroic figures - Red "Mike" Edson. He was a visionary with the good sense to not let his vision be clouded. A focused officer and combat leader without whom the war in the Pacific might have turned out a little different.

This man deserves his place in our nation's memory with those of Patton, Bradley, Nimitz, Halsey and a thousand others.

Let's hope that Col. Alexander is busy on a book about General O.P. Smith, USMC now!

I reread *The Ends of Power* for two reasons. First, Sidney Blumenthal's recent *The Clinton Wars* recreates the White House when President Clinton was impeached. Richard Nixon was threatened with impeachment for more serious actions and resigned to avoid it--a neat contrast. Second, Professor William Gaines and his journalism class at the University of Illinois announced in May 2003 that Deep Throat, Bob Woodward's mysterious informant in *All the President's Men,* was John Dean's assistant Fred Fielding. In two tidy pages (136-137), H. R. Haldeman reaches the same conclusion. His brief is necessarily sketchier than that of the Gaines group, but his thinking is similar. On this topic, Haldeman is less sentimental, more objective and more briskly intelligent than Leonard Garment and John Dean, who ride hobby horses.

How does the rest of *The Ends of Power* hold up? The prose, probably Joseph DiMona's, is serviceable but slick. Most of the text is an explanation or defense of Watergate. The most insightful idea is Haldeman's linkage of Viet Nam to Watergate; however, as its title indicates, the book does not pretend to be a full account of Nixon's presidency. As Haldeman presents them, the facts are not apparently self-serving. They may thus be more subtly self-exculpatory.

Haldeman exhibits little moral feeling. There is no sense here of the country's having been done a great wrong or of the fact that Nixon's abilities--which the text names--were wasted by this ethical void. Watergate was surely a more consequential breach of behavior than oval office trysts, though the anguished evasions of Nixon and Clinton may appear eerily alike.

On the positive side, one feels that Haldeman succeeds, with a compression equal to his argument about the identity of Deep Throat, in making Nixon humanly understandable, even likeable. Longer and more balanced accounts of Nixon's administration do this task less effectively, and at greater length.

There is no index in *The Ends of Power.* That is outrageous and unforgivable!

This is HRH's memoir of his years in the Nixon White House, and the overwhelming failure known as Watergate. HRH was not a lawyer or politician; he was in advertising when he first became a volunteer for Nixon in 1956 (p.49). HRH was not alarmed by the Watergate break-in. Nixon used wiretapping in his first term, and it was also used by LBJ and JFK; it was widespread in business (p.5). HRH blames Watergate on John Mitchell's neglect of his duties at CRP (p.10), which left Magruder in charge. Nixon told HRH it was "unimportant", when in reality Nixon blew up in a towering rage; HRH was being deceived by Nixon (p.13)!

HRH sealed Nixon's doom by meeting him on June 23, 1972 to discuss getting the CIA to stop the FBI's search into CRP money. Tell the CIA "this will open up the whole Bay of Pigs thing again", said Nixon. Helms and Walter denied any CIA connection with Watergate (p.34). But at least one of the burglars was still on the CIA payroll, and was reporting about the proposed break-in even before it happened; the first lawyer for the burglars was reportedly CIA-connected. When the CIA at first refused to tell the FBI to back off, HRH played Nixon's trump: "this entire affair may be connected to the Bay of Pigs". Turmoil followed; HRH was absolutely shocked by Helms' violent reaction. And so the CIA asked the FBI to not investigate the Mexican bank and the CRP money. Years later the mystery of the "Bay of Pigs" connection was cleared up by reading Daniel Schorr's "Clearing the Air"; it was a code word for the assassination of JFK (pp. 37-39).

HRH said he protected Nixon by not following "petty vindictive orders" (p.58). But Charles Colson encouraged Nixon's dark impulses, and acted on them. ...In retrospect, there were many indications along the way that could have caused him to wonder what was really going on. His responsibility was the operation of the office of the President; he chose not to know anything else at the time.

"The Hidden Story of Watergate" mentioned that Nixon planned a reorganization of the government that aimed to give him unprecedented control. This must have scared the Ruling Class much more than members of the Federal Bureaucracy! Nixon was only the President, not the absolute ruler of America. HRH gives a rationale for Nixon's termination, but doesn't seem to realize it!

Page 226 tells how Nixon would "have Buckley write a column" to push a policy. I always suspected Buckley was a hired voice who echoed opinions. I wonder who has this job today?

The "Conclusion" sums up his views on "Watergate". "Most of us would have been willing to sacrifice ourselves, if necessary, to save the Presidency that we believed in. But we couldn't even do that because we didn't know the real situation." "I can see that my loyalty to President Nixon and my assumption that I knew all that I needed to know led me to some serious errors of judgment." Yet if he had the chance to do it all over again, he would! Like the Bourbons, he remembered everything but learned nothing.

I must second the review of the reader from Malibu...a must read! Haldeman shows again (like in the "Haldeman Diaries") his human side and not the rigid company man that he's always made out to be. The break-in and subsequent cover-up (or as Haldeman says "containment") are explained with an insiders perspective and in what I must say, the best and most clarifying way that I've read (there's still a lot on Watergate that I haven't read though...). The only critique that I might make is I wonder how much of this was J.Dimona? S. Ambrose's "Ruin and Recovery" explains that Haldeman, in later years, refuted this book and it's conclusions and, if true, that would be a shame as the conclusions drawn from this book make the most sense given the advantage of over 20 years perspective. Even though this was published in 1979, many copies are still available and can be gotten for very reasonable prices ... so I'd again recommend this book highly.

If Francis Ford Coppola's Vietnam was born of Conrad's Heart of Darkness, than Ferrandino's telling is Lord of the Flies. The book grabbed me by the head and pulled me face first into the story until I came up at the last page, breathless and wanting more. Don't let the title fool you. This isn't some Don Pendleton macho yarn. This is as real as it gets...told by a man who lived it. Track this one down and read it.

Mr. Ferrandino's book is worth reading. He is not only a great teacher but also a great writer. I had the honor of meeting him when the book first had come out in the early 90's and he was very nice in answering any and all the question's that the students of HCCC asked of him about his expiernces over there, about the book itself and what made him decide to write a story based on it. I bought it for my father since he is a vetern of Vietnam. I happened borrowed it to read myself and was blown away with the story and couldn't put it down. If you want to read a book by someone that was really there, this is a must read.

Ferrandino's oracular insight and prophetic knowledge of Vietnam almost outweigh his estimable literary talents. The author is amazing!

I felt that the first three writers were the strongest. Mintzberg promotes an idea that leader is just a role in his advocated all mighty manager. Zaleznik brings this down with his idea that managers and leaders are different kind of people and talk about managerial mystique. But maybe best advice how to solve present leadership dilemma comes from Kotter, who says that companies should pick up talented individuals and then put them to grow into leaders through tough challenges.

Gives an insightful view of a manager's job. It enunciates traits and behaviors of leaders and managers very well, and explains how it is important for a manager to have both traits. The material triggers a manager to look within to understand one's leadership and managerial styles. If one wishes to change or develop leadership and managerial skills this material is a great beginning.
It also points out that organizations and academic institutions are good at developing organizational specialists but not at training managers. The author thinks that these institutions should provide management programs that also focus on developing leadership and managerial skills. But to do that it's important to understand what managers and leaders really do.
Overall a very good read for a traditional manager to be introspective and effective.

Excellent book with eight fantastically different views on Leadership. Describes fundamental differences between leadership and Management and brings forth thought process which can help professionals in all fields. Contents are 1) The managers Job (folclore and fact), 2) What leaders really do, 3)managers and leaders (are they different), 4) The discipline of building Character, 5) the ways CEO's lead (5 different ways gathered from study of 160 CEO's),6)The human side of management, 7) the work of leadership, 8) whatever happened to the take-charge manager, also contains brief background about the contributors. Each chapter is from a different contributor

If you have read The Essential Drucker, Balanced scorecard etc. , the book essentially has the same information repeated under a different title. Recommend Essential Drucker, Balanced Score card which is more comprehensive than this title.

This collection of eight articles from the HBR is a must IF AND ONLY IF you want the only highlights of some of the new management tools and theories out there. If you've ever wondered what Activity-Based Costing (ABC) is or what Kaplan's "Balanced Scorecard" is all about, this may be just the introductory text for you. I mention these two tools first since 2 out of 8 articles deal with ABC, either in whole or in part, while another 3 deal specifically with the balanced scorecard. So, if you've got ABC and the balanced scorecard already firmly laid out in your head, this may be a bit redundant.

The remaining three articles are still worth a quick read though. I found in one article, "How the Right Measures Help Teams Excel," ideas that I hadn't seen anywhere else (for example, the team "dashboard"). And, the "How High is Your Return on Management?" article might give managers a moment of reflection on whether or not they have a good ROM and what they can do to improve it.

As I stated before, much of this is merely highlights though. Do not expect to be able to use this book as a primary source to implement any of the measures. It's a tease that gets you excited (at least it did me), but doesn't provide much of a game plan for bringing it all about.

Still, if what you want is a quick overview and a few case studies where these principles and tools have been applied, by all means, read this. It's worth at least that much.

Looking for some informative, original and clear thinking about measuring performance? This book is a great choice! This is a collection of eight outstanding articles selected from past editions of the HBR. The articles cover such subjects as activity-based costing, the use of nonfinancial criteria, and tools executives require to generate the information needed. Each article begins with an executive summary which, for the fast-forward crowd, is a big plus.

So many books are merely ONE GOOD ARTICLE embedded in a thicket of verbiage. Chopping away through such a jungle of verbosity for the gist-of-it-all often proves tedious and disappointing. (Blessed are the laconic!) This book, on the other hand, just serves up a bunch of 'gists' -the pure meat and potatoes of ideas. Happily, the HBSP has published several other collections of this sort on such topics as knowledge management, change, and strategies for growth. Each of these is collection of first-rate 'gists'. Reviewed by Gerry Stern, founder, Stern & Associates, author of Stern's Sourcefinder The Master Directory to HR and Business Management Information & Resources, Stern's CyberSpace SourceFinder, and the Compensation and Benefits SourceFinder.

Lisa Fortini-Campbell is a professor at the prestigious Integrated Marketing Communications graduate program at Northwestern University. Her book gives sound advice about getting to know consumers, and gives superb, real life examples for each of her major points. She describes various tools used to both understand consumers and to convey the knowledge learned to others, such as "attribute mapping," "benefit mapping," "creative briefs," and "laddering." HITTING THE SWEET SPOT should be required reading for anyone working in Marketing or Advertising.

Who would have thought that a book that tells us how to
market something we may not need to people who may
not want to buy it could be bright, interesting and worth
the price?

"Hitting the Sweet Spot" is written to teach students and
professional marketers, and advertisers and others how
to stay in touch and truly understand their target
audiences. That's not necessarily a bad thing, even for
those who think we're too busy buying and selling
already.

I read this from a consumer's perspective and found it educational. Not once, after I opened the pages, was I tempted to sneer at the point of the book--teaching people how to sell. Why? Because the book strikes me as honest.

Yes, it's teaching kids and others to persuade someone else to do something, perhaps something they don't want. But at no time is there a hint of deception or arm twisting. It's simply a guide to knowing your market.

That's something anyone who works with potential customers in any
venue--and that's a lot of us, folks--needs to understand.

This book will teach you some terminology--early adopters vs. laggards, account planning, laddering and more--that is creeping into ordinary vocabulary, has applications well beyond plain old advertising and therefore must be understood. For those of us who live in this intensely consumer society, I recommend this book because it's really, after all, about us.

The book is written in a comfortably breezy manner, easily read by high school students and up, by Lisa Fortini-Campbell, a top-ranking woman in the advertising/marketing field. She offers us both theory and practical help, in sections ranging from defining the reason for understanding consumers to working with others to achieve goals.

Hitting the Sweet Spot is a classic in the field of marketing literature. Fortini-Campbell's insights came before the dot.com revolution and they have even greater application with the marekting evolution that has come with the web and permission marketing. She combines theory with practical exercises. The Sweet Spot provides a highway from Data to Information to Insight to Inspiration and leads you to becoming an urban anthropolgist and savvy marketing strategist. Whether reading it for the first time or the fifteenth, you will find it indispensable. If you are a marketeer who wants to be continue learning and getting better, sharper, and smarter consumer insights, this is one great road to take.

In purchasing this book I hoped of achieving manipulation of my subconscious mind through a scientific approach. "How to use the laws of mind" seemed my best shot of catapulting my inner strength to externally bring an overwhelming abundance of wealth and vitality into my life. Unfortunately the depth into the subconscious matter is extremely shallow and will leave a lot to be desired if this is what the basis of your purchase will depend on.

Mr Joseph Murphy gallivants into a vast selection of one to one cases he has come across throughout his professional career all of which tell the tale of ravishing and miraculous results in arduous and cumbersome situations. The majority of the entailed stories proclaim nothing more than a little common sense, which makes irritating reading when quotes from the bible and other religious means are stressed with great importance. The author claims that affirming the 91st Psalm (whatever that may be) and understanding its inner meaning would prevent anyone using malicious or negative actions against you. Affirming every night the words: - "Vengeance is mind; I will repay, saith the Lord" will prevent hypertension. If you are been wrongly accused by someone either for a criminal or civil case, just read Psalm 56:4 and everything will be okay. I beg to differ.

The majority of content demonstrates how pray is always the answer. Maybe I am not praying hard enough. Millions in Africa pray for rain, but to no avail, unfortunately for them they do not have access to any written form of Psalms, nor can they read.

Despite my sceptical approach, the overall teachings of the book contains a vital and very important connotation; "Words are very powerful." If you say a statement repeatedly and believe in what you are saying to be true, it can have a strong impact on your mind and others around you.

If you insist on the purchase of this book I can only suggest you also purchase a book of psalms to supplement your reading. For others who see my sceptical analysis, a good recommendation would be "The Instant Millionaire" by Mark Fisher.

I love this author and am pleased to report that this is one of his best books, on a par with his classic 'Power of your Subconscious Mind.' It explains the difference between the conscious and subconscious mind and how the two work together to create the reality of the individual. As in Murphy's other books, examples are given of how people overcame problems or manifested their desires by changing their minds through belief, affirmation and visualization. The chapters deal with healing, prayer, becoming spiritual-minded, the creativity of thought, the meaning of evil, the meaning of life, controlling one's fears, the power of suggestion and marriage, sex and divorce. In his very readable and engaging style, the author teaches us how to use both phases of the mind synchronously, harmoniously and peacefully in order to bring harmony, health and abundance into our lives. He also explains that Biblical statements are parables, allegories, metaphors, similes and cryptic statements, and are thus not to be taken literally. The main message is that we are all children of the infinite, born to win, and to live in the joyous expectancy of the best. In Murphy's own words 'Begin to see tongues in trees, sermons in stones, songs in running brooks, and God in everything.'

RTERTERTERTGRBERTERTGERT

Many English-speakers are distraught when they realise that the beautiful language of Italy will forever remain a secret to the rest of the world. The native Italians refuse to speak an ounce of their language to foreigners for fear that we should butcher their romantic language. It is quite a loss for those of us who are actually willing to give much time and training to learning Italian. This course "Italian, Made Simple" is probably the most comphrehensive courses ever written, and I have much of my Italian vocabulary obtained from this book!

The book itself has been around for quite some time. It was written in 1960 for the "Made Simple" series. It has been a popular staple of Italian courses in high schools and colleges ever since, and is now one of the better self-teaching courses. The book consists of fourty-one comprehensive chapters, each building on vocabulary, verbs, common expressions, and pronunciation and grammer. About every six chapters, there is a "revisione" - review chapter. These are like unit tests that one should do in full, at one sitting. At the end of the book, there is an Italian-English/English-Italian dictionary section, and contains all words learned throughout the course. (However, you might want to buy a complete Italian-English dictionary after completing the course, so you have a reference for words you did not learn. I suggest the wonderful "New World" dictionary, also available on Amazon.com.)

With each chapter drilling you to the maximum, and such a comprehensive voabulary agenda, "Italian, Made Simple" is not exactly the most simple of methods. It takes quite a lot of time. Each chapter may take from thirty minutes to an hour-and-a-half, and you may only have time to do three or less chapters in a single week. I suggest trying to do one lesson a day, but even I could not do this. The entire course took me three-and-a-half months to complete. However, by the end of this period, you will have learned enough Italian to get you through Carlo Collodi's complete "Pinnochio", and speaking with many Italians. Being an opera fan, I was able to comprehend large amounts of the texts of Italian operas without having to look at the supertitles! (Although, as Italian has changed quite a bit since the time of Puccini and Verdi, it is not always so easy.) I learned more from this course than anything else.

A problem with using this course is with the text, as it was written in 1960, and Doubleday has neglected to update the work, some of the text is considerably out-of-date. This is the Italian of the 1960's Italy - not current Italy. For example, the currently Italian pronouns used for "he" is not "egli" - but "lui" (pronounced "looey"). The current Italian pronoun used for "she" is not "essa" - but "lei". (This is also the same as the Italian word for "you", but one word capitalize it when using it in that sense.) Also, the phrase "per piacere" ("please" in English) is less common these days in Italy. Today, one would more likely hear "per favore". These can be cleared up, however, by watching Italian telision shows or listening to Italian music. (In Washington, D.C. we even get Italian music videos!) These will help to bring you a bit more up-to-date on Italian today.

I would suggest using this course along with the Pimsleur Italian audio courses. Although they are expensive, they help GREATLY with pronunciation, and are extremely easy. They are not as comprehensive as this course, but when used together, you will become quite fluent! (Also, the Pimsleur courses are actually up-to-date, so if you cannot get an Italian telivision show or radio program, they are quite a help! One little error on the course, however. Italy no longer uses the lyra as their monetary systems. It is now the Euro - easier to use and pronounce!)

This is the most comprehensive course I know of. It you learn to deal with the innacuracies due to dating (and I have pointed out the most prominent, already!) and have perseverence, you will be able to converse in fluent Italian, and read and write in the language (I even begin to THINK in Italian sometimes!), it is nessesary. A friend in Italy went through this course, and said to me: "If anyone can get through this course, they truly deserve to be treated as an Italian in Italy!" You should not fear about butchering the language after having done this course! It is a great secret to many who are looking for a great course!

This book is an excellent introduction to the Italian language. Its pronunciation guide is the most thorough I have seen, and pronunciations next to words indicate which syllable to stress, which is not done in the other popular italian books I have used. This is crucial to pronouncing the language correctly. The book is well layed out, pedagogically, if a tad ambitious. It keeps a fairly rapid pace in introducing new grammar rules, and can be overwhelming as a first text. Heavy use of drills really does get the language to "sink" in, however. The reason this book gets four stars, is that the italian it teaches is a bit outdated. Some of the vocabulary it teaches is straight out of 1960, and the pronouns it teaches for "he" and "she", among other words, are not in common current usage in Italy. My friend from Italy explained to me that those works anly used by her grandparents' generation.

By buying this book it really helped me understand the basic-intermediate status of Italian. It does everything in the best way I thought possible, and helped me learn my new language quickly and easily. It takes you step by step so that you don't get confused. Every six chapters there is a brief Quiz to see what you have learned and what you still need to spend some more time on. In the end, you won't be speaking fluently, but very very close to it. I reccommend buying "Living Language: Italian" that will give you an advanced-intermediate status. and finally, buy an advanced book or get a tudor...(TUDORS WORK REALLY WELL!)

HAVE FUN!!!

I read Joey a year ago and I will never forget it. I will read it again and again and give it to anyone who hasn't read it. It touches home, and I have never cried so hard as I did when I finished this book. Fr. Joe Girzone is the greatest author, and if you have never read any of his books, I suggest you start.

This book is the best book I read so far from Amazon.com This book made me think hard about how God love me.

Having never read Mr. Girzone prior to this book,I would have to say he is my favorite author to date. Anyone with a child and a belief in God will have a hard time not being able to relate to it's content.A book I found impossible to put down.

This isn't a review. This is to say how much I enjoyed this extremely well-written book. Unlike most fiction, it's not a book quickly forgotten. Is it ok if I say "there's more to it than meets the eye". Last time I enjoyed a book of fiction this much was Bonfire of the Vanities.

This is one book I couldn't put down. I read it straight through. The characters are so real that I felt like they were part of my life (and I hope I have a Joseph in my life somewhere). The plot and the switch from present to past was done with great expertise. When is his next book coming out?

This debut novel by Newton, while seemingly a paranormal story, has significant subplots revolving around the ongoing lessons of one man's life. The plots are interwoven in a manner that allows the reader to have the "aha" about the connections between two time periods and one supportive black man. The main characters are engaging and much can be said about the symbolism each brings to the story. This novel exemplifies the need for humankind to resolve their spiritual issues in the midst of whatever situations occur. An entertaining, action-packed, and thought provoking read.