I was very pleased with this book. I think the authors did a great job with the overall history of the camp. More importantly, I think I was able to get a good idea of what life was like for the prisoners held there. There are many good footnotes that will allow me further research into documents and holdings I didn't know about. There are only a few photos (all period), but very nice. It is well indexed (very few personal names mentioned..if any), but I was dismayed that there was no bibliography. A good value.

I love to read history - especially biographies, and more especially about French history. I found Bergin's book very readable, containing interesting incites into the age, not only economically but also giving me legal facts I had not known before. The main obstacle in the book is that the author assumes that his reader can read 17th century French! I read French, but sometimes the old spellings make it difficult for me to understand. If he had translated the passages in his footnotes, it would have given me a choice - decipher it myself, or read the footnote. This would have improved the book with little effort

The first year of law school was very difficult. It was refreshing to use this casebook that so clearly outlined the law of contracts.

The best part about the book is the problems after every section of cases. These problems allowed me to realize whether I understood that type of contract.

The worse part about the book is that the hornbook is a newer edition. So, although Calamari does an excellent job laying out the law, the labels (that tell you which sections in the hornbook to read) do not always correspond.

I use Cases in Contemporary Strategy Analysis in my Capstone course (final course) for my MBA graduate students. It provides them with excellent insight into corporate decision making and strategic planning processes. The case studies are interesting and rich for discussion. My only criticism is the world of business is so fast paced. I would have like to see an internet site or CD ROM with more current information on the companies. Many of the organizational case studies were dated 1998. A myriad of financial, economic, marketing, and strategic changes occurred since the printing of the text. Overall, I recommend the book for textbook use.

I am studing this book nowadays. But I believe there should be an answer book for the cases that shall accompany the book itself. We need to judge our understanding to the subjects by cross checking our answers with the key answer book. So, please advise on availability of such answer book! Ayman

REVIEWED BY MARTIN RUBIN
That arch British Imperialist pioneer-buccaneer-millionaire Cecil Rhodes famously observed - wrongly as it turned out - that he had achieved true immortality because the central African nation of Rhodesia had taken its name from his. "They can't change a country's name, can they?" he boastfully but plaintively observed, never dreaming that within 100 years "his" country would dissolve into "Zimbabwe" and " "Zambia."
A truly apt expression, however, is likely to endure, for who is going to change a catchphrase which shines a spotlight on a circumstance which formerly took a mess of words to describe? Which brings us to Joseph Heller, who does seem to have achieved immortality for as long as spoken English contains the phrase Catch-22.
The New Oxford American Dictionary gives it a remarkably concise definition, "catch-22: a dilemma or difficult circumstance from which there is no escape because of mutually conflicting or dependent circumstances," but even so, it takes 18 words to describe what Heller achieved in one and a half. And certainly this dictionary gives him his due, going on to say: "ORIGIN 1970s: title of a novel by Joseph Heller (1961), in which the main character feigns madness in order to avoid dangerous combat missions, but his desire to avoid them is taken to prove his sanity." So Heller has made a contribution to the language, has perhaps identified as well as named a troublesome conundrum, but what of his contribution to literature?
Insofar as he has made one, it has to rest on "Catch-22," certainly Heller's magnum opus, and light years ahead of any of his other novels, let alone the odds and ends contained in this depressing little collection, "Catch As Catch Can: The Collected Stories and Other Writings." Even the title of this posthumous volume is a blatant effort to ride on the wings of the one thing he wrote which has any vestige of literary merit. Yet, how much does even "Catch-22" possess?
That master of satirical war fiction, Evelyn Waugh, certainly did not think much of it. In what must have been one of the most misguided literary publicity efforts of all time, Heller's publishers sought a blurb from the author of "Sword of Honour," the crowning achievement of World War II fiction. The middle-aged curmudgeon's reply was not merely a crushing blow to the publicist's enterprise, but is also a devastating judgment upon the book:
"[Catch-22] suffers not only from indelicacy but from prolixity. It should be cut by about a half. In particular the activities of 'Milo' should be eliminated or greatly reduced.
"You are mistaken in calling it a novel. It is a collection of sketches - often repetitious - totally without structure.
"Much of the dialogue is funny.
"You may quote me as saying: 'This exposure of corruption, cowardice and incivility of American officers will outrage all friends of your country (such as myself) and greatly comfort your enemies.'"
Waugh's critique goes to the heart of what is wrong with the novel. Heller is not alone in emerging from World War II with stories to tell about snafus and incompetence. Waugh himself did it - who can forget his indelible portrait of the unsuccessful assault upon Dakar, as well as scores of incidents large and small, rife with tragicomedy? And Heller's contemporaries, from Norman Mailer to James Jones and Leon Uris, showed the confusion of military life in that great war of liberation. But Heller lacks not only literary skills but also real passion, which even a writer like Uris was capable of harnessing in a novel like "Battle Cry."
The smallness of Heller's vision, his determination to visit his hero's (and one suspects his own) inadequacies on the whole enterprise upon which he is engaged, his lack of any gravitas - all these contribute to a profoundly dispiriting credo.
It's one thing not feel you have to trumpet the "greatest generation," but to lose sight entirely of the essence of the conflict is to miss the opportunity to put his personal kvetch into some sort of context.
People will continue to read Ivan Turgenev's great novel of the generation gap, "Fathers and Sons," for its literary qualities and for what it has to say about human nature and not merely because it is the book where the term "nihilist" was coined. In the end, all that is of value about "Catch-22" is the catchphrase: The book itself is dispensable.
But the novel was not only an instant phenomenon, it continued to burgeon, a legend in its own time. And what a time it was, that other low, dishonest decade, the Sixties. In "Reeling in Catch-22," one of the essays which the editors of "Catch as Catch Can" saw fit to add to the pieces of fiction that make up the bulk of the volume, Heller comments on the serendipitous confluence of "Catch-22" and its time:
"'Catch-22' came to the attention of college students at about the same time that the moral corruption of the Vietnam War became evident. The treatment of the military as corrupt, ridiculous and asinine could be applied literally to that war. Vietnam was a lucky coincidence - lucky for me, not for the people. Between the mid- and late-Sixties, the paperback of 'Catch-22' went from 12 printings to close to 30.
"There was change in spirit, a new spirit of healthy irreverence. There was a general feeling that the platitudes of Americanism were horse sxxt. Number one, they didn't work. Number two, they weren't true. Number three, the people giving voice to them didn't believe them either. The phrase 'Catch-22' began appearing more and more frequently in a wide range of contexts. I began hearing from people who believed I'd named the book after the phrase."
The author seems very pleased with his good fortune, but what if it wasn't entirely accidental? Art, after all, can influence life, for better or worse. It is a little scary to contemplate the role this self-indulgent, whiny novel might have played in making its era something of a mirror to its destructive, corrosive qualities.
And what of Heller's later career? There are novels such as "Good as Gold," which make me wince as I remember their crude caricature combined with an air of monumental self-satisfaction. Having sat through his play "We Bombed in New Haven" (still another version of the "Catch-22" story), when it was appropriately enough given its premiere in the eponymous city at the Yale Drama School, I can testify that his skills as a dramatist were not noticeably superior to those as a novelist.
The phrase heard most often about the play that evening in the late Sixties was that It had indeed bombed in New Haven, a quip for which this hubristic and more than usually self-deluded playwright seemed to be asking. As for the stories collected in "Catch as Catch Can," they are banal beyond belief, some of them rising almost to the level of competence but none of them having anything original to contribute to the reader's understanding of either ideas or the human condition.
Indeed, some are so generic that I felt that I had read them before even though to the best of my recollection I had not.
Given the artistic level of both the published and heretofore unpublished short stories, it is unfortunate that the editors should have chosen to make such extravagant claims for Heller: "Heller set out to become a professional writer and became a literary genius."
Not even close. Say a quiet thank you to Joseph Heller for inventing catch-22 if you are so inclined, read the novel - if you are very curious as to the phrase's etiology and if you prefer satire that employs a blunt instrument rather than a rapier -- but do not waste your time on the scraps of an undistinguished literary career contained in this overblown book.

Since 1927, for a whole generation now, Rev. Joseph Malloy's "A Catechism for Inquirers" has sold millions of copies and has served as a basic instruction manual for inquirers seeking to begin learning the elementary concepts of Catholic faith and practice. This revised edition, by Rev. Edward H. Peters, retains the same basic structure as the original except, of course, in reference to the decrees promulgated at Vatican II. An appendix, also, containing several Catholic prayers, rites and precepts, has been added to this edition, making this one a step above the others. Overall, this concise manual is clear, orderly and set up so that individuals, once finished with this, may then move on to the large Catechism with significant background information. This is great for CCE and RCIA

While all six essays in this slender volume will prove of interest to the reader seeking more background on J.R.R. Tolkien's epic story, I found the essay by Janet Blumberg, "The Literary Background of The Lord of the Rings" especially valuable. Prof. Blumberg not only explains the influences of Anglo-Saxon literature such as "Beowulf" and High Medieval literature such as "Sir Gawain and the Green knight" on elements in LOTR, but also offers a credible explanation for one of the most remarked about elements in the books: the absence of any overt religious practice or worship. This essay alone makes this slender volume a valuable addition to the library of any Tolkien fan.

An insightful and in-depth look into the psychological scars that war leaves on people, especially children. The battery of personality and other psychological test were conducted (1948) only 4 years after the Battle of Saipan (June 1944).

As eyewitnesses to one of the most bitterly hard fought battles in WWII, the Chamorro and Carolinians of Saipan suffered tremendous psychological trauma. Years after the actual battle, the children's mental health showed signs of on-going trauma. Images of the bodies of family and friends, of American and Japanese soldiers dead and dismembered, rotting on the ground as the Battle of Saipan raged on still hunt many of them today.

Confronted with starvation and death, caught between the American forces and the Japanese forces, Chamorro and Carolinian civilians were subjected to the most horrible sights of war.

There are numerous publications on the Battle of Saipan (and the Marianas). However, Alice Joseph and Veronica Murray's book shed some light on a different type of casualty of war - the minds of the civilian population of the island of Saipan.

There are many books on the Battle of Saipan and the Chamorro and Carolinians of the Marianas, some of the book titles are offered on Amazon.com such as:

Saipan: The Beginning of the End by Carl W. Hoffman, Oba: The Last Samurai, Saipan 1944-1945 by Don Jones, Ancient Chamorro Society by Lawrence J. Cunningham.

This a very informative book on pewter, of course. As usual it doesn't have as many marks as I would have liked. That was not a big surprize as none of the books do. When will someone write a book that contains all of the marks in a easy to read and understand format? Question of the century?