THE TAKING OF PLANET 5 just doesn't feel like a complete work. I must agree with other reviewers who have stated that the authors don't appear to be comfortable working with the ideas and themes developed by other writers. This is unfortunate because almost the entire story is nothing but ideas that have been pulled from previous books (most notably, Lawrence Miles' ALIEN BODIES). The concepts never evolve past the point of being Someone Else's Creation, and the result is that nothing feels as though it has any consequence at all.

There are a few good ideas contained in the book, but almost every one of them fails to yield anything of further interest after being stretched out to their full potential. I'll use an example from the very beginning of the book: the Museum of Things That Don't Exist. When this is first mentioned in the story, there's a certain air of mystery about the place. It certainly sounds like an idea brimming with creative potential and something that the Doctor Who format could do particularly well, especially in novel form. The problem with it is that when we actually get there, the museum turns out to be dead boring. Instead of surreal displays or books of magical and unexplained happenings we end up with nothing more than reconstructions of a few hoaxes and fictions that would only be significant to someone from Twentieth Century Earth. A nice idea ruined by poor execution, which is indicative of the majority of the flaws present in this book.

The plot is very complicated and there are several things going on at once. This results in the people involved in the story coming across as rather shallow. There simply isn't room inside the story for all of these characters. This is a pity as there are one or two there who seem like they could have been quite interesting, if only there had been room enough to flesh them out completely.

There are one or two bright points in the book. The Interludes are very strongly written and effectively convey some of the concepts that the main portion of the book had neglected. The Doctor is characterized well in the portions that he's in; it's a pity that those portions are so few and far between. The book seems far more concerned with relating more pieces of the future war between the Time Lords and the enemy than it does with telling a full story. This wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing except that it takes the Doctor out of the main thrust of the story right from the beginning, and the hints about the War (and the fate of the Celestis) simply aren't interesting enough to sustain the book purely on their own. But these hints and disclosures are all that we have here.

All in all, the presence of several big concepts and arc-related revelations don't prevent this book from ending up being extremely dull. It's not a poorly written book, just one that feels more like a vessel for bigger things to be put through it, never once standing up and existing on its own merits. It tries to be hard-SF by throwing around a lot of scientific gobbledygook, but it's never quite as clever as it thinks it is.

typically, i am not an avid reader of sci-fi. but since the BBC took the dr. who series back from virgin, the novels have typically been written with a very adult realism and a focus on tight storylines that was missing from many of the virgin books. there were some incredibly unique ideas that bucher-jones and clapman never allowed completely to be realized. their writing style was fast-paced, but many times they substituted huge scientific-sounding words and phrases (some real and some of their own creation) instead of focusing on important visual and conceptual descriptions. the basic plot was engaging and thought provoking, but more than once the action was brought to a screeching halt by some very odd description (compassion smelled musky? what was THAT about...) or an implausible plot turn. it is never fully explained who or what the original elder thing population infiltrated by the time lord soldiers truly is. the reader might assume they are mictlan, but too many aspects of this secret conflict are never clearly explained. And why have they chosen the fictional elder thing form? it is these details that become frustrating because they deserve a much better physical description and plot explanation. the authors have introduced one of the most original concepts of the series. the idea of the tardis as a bio-mechanoid lifeform was one of the most pleasant and exciting surprises of "The Taking of Planet Five". that, and the return of the fendahl, could have made this an incredible story. it is unfortunate that a completely ridiculous conclusion left this reader thinking....WHATEVE.

I really enjoyed this book. It is outstandingly well written, and keeps on the plot-line of the Eight Doctor, expanding the story bit by bit.

If you've been following the books, this is a wonderful addition to the storyline.

Also, it is great to see a Crossover story between the Cuthulu mythos and the Dr. Who world.

I highly recommend this book.

this text is required for my course on introductory topology. Not only does it omit entire branches of the subject, for example only giving cursory treatments of vector field topology, metric topolgy, and combinatorial techniques; but, the presentation is mostly unexplained. The author has concentrated on following a very dry quick example-theorem-proof technique instead of theorem-proof interspersed with discussion and example technique. I have yet to find a superb text, though for algebraic things i like massey

This is the book we used in my first undergraduate course in topology. I remember it as being one of the worst textbooks I ever came across in my undergraduate math studies. The explanations were too short and many definitions were buried into the text. I remember constantly having to flip through the pages of this book to find something I was looking for. Stay away from this book!

I'm surprised that several previous reviewers have given this book low ratings. This book is far superior to the standard introductions.

As someone who has studied topology for several years now, I have found that the greatest failing of many introductory texts is the inability to give a real 'feel' for the subject. By 'feel' I mean not only familiarity with the necessary tools and ways of thought needed to progress to higher levels of understanding but also experience with the kinds of problems that plague(excite?) topologists on a daily basis.

Several texts proceed in the logical progression from point set topology to algebraic topology. Munkres is among the best of this style. But the logical order is not always pedagogically best, especially in topology. To start one's topology career by spending one or more semesters on point set topology is utterly ridiculous, given that such point set subtleties are to a large degree not used to study the beginnings of geometric or algebraic topology. This is how these texts fail to give students the 'feel' for topology; the student has no idea what it is that most topologists do, and in fact will not get a good idea until much later.

Armstrong tries (and succeeds for the most part) in grounding concepts in real applications, the way the tools are actually used by research mathematicians. Perhaps this is part of why it may be confusing to the novice; introducing topological groups and group actions on spaces right after the section on quotient spaces may appear a bit much, but those concepts are a big part of *why* quotient spaces are so important! Incidentally, the material on quotient spaces is the most complete I've ever seen in an introductory book; Armstrong covers cones and also gluing/attaching maps.

The book is certainly fun. Imagine learning about space-filling curves right after the section on continuous functions. Armstrong keeps things spiced up throughout the book. He also goes at some length into triangulations, simplicial approximation, and simplicial homology. Then he *applies* this stuff to get results like Borsuk-Ulam, Lefschetz fixed-pt thm, and of course dimension invariance. Throw in less standard material like Seifert surfaces, and you have quite an interesting mix.

The exercises can be quite varied and hard, but are designed to give the reader a realistic view of the difficulties of the subject. The reader will get considerable insight from them, and loads of fun too. I say this, because as someone who already knows the stuff, I find more than a few of the problems enjoyable even now.

Having wrote all that, I should add that I did *not* learn out of this book! But I wish greatly that I had! I would have known sooner whether topology was the right subject for me to pursue and had some 'lead time' to absorb some very fundamental concepts early on. If you pass over this book, be warned that you are shorting yourself in the long run.

I have shelved this book at least three times in disgust and frustration. Each time I pull it from the shelf, I think: "There must be SOMETHING useful in there". Hours later, I re-shelve it again, wondering why I don't just throw this amazingly content-free book away. All the other comments about typos etc. are absolutely true. This book takes a confusing subject, adds 500-odd pages to it, and does absolutely nothing but leave the reader at the starting point, wishing for the hours of his/her life back.

I have just retured from a trip to the dumpster; after tearing my hair out for two hours over the example in Chapter 3, I have rediscovered why I rarely trust books from this publisher. The example, as written, does not work, and the publisher has not offered any sort of errata for this book. If anyone would like a free copy of this book, go comb the Rockland landfill.

Aside from the untested and unproofed examples, the text was rather disjointed, and provided a skimming the surface view of Zope that seems to offer precious little foundation in the system. The open source book, provided at [web address] has been far more helpful, and cheaper to boot.

I'm a newbie to this Zope, and would really like to see some working examples of this product, so I can at least compare what is correct to what is in this book. None of the examples I've come across so far work! What's worse; I cannot figure out what's wrong with them because I DO NOT KNOW ZOPE YET! I bought this for $., and I guess for examples, its ok. But man, if you want to come across as an authority in something, it wouild be helpful to make your books' examples workable.

I was reading Kelly Monachans book, not this one. Ignore my reviews.

I originally purchased this book with the idea of traveling from Chicago to Japan to visit my sister who is teaching English in Tokyo. Ten months later and I have done a total of four trips (Japan twice, London and San Paulo, Brazil). This is the best travel secret I have found to date. Although, it takes some planning and flexibility, if you want cheap travel, this is the way to do it.

I found the book was well produced and accurately researched. I have only skimmed through the other books on this subject, but I would have no problem recommending this book to anyone.

The first poster said:

"The 152 pages of large type, photos and unneeded banner separators created the impression of lot of fluff. The same text could be contained in 1/2 as many pages."

There is no photos in the whole book. The book is 200 pages not including glossery and index. And its normal type.

To set the record straight, this book gives me much more info than is available on the web. Some of it is common sense and fluff but even so you will only get a tenth of the info in this book on the web. The company resources in the book are outdated but this book is printed in 99, resources likely gathered in 98. Take it for what its worth. Go to the library and pay $0 for the book. If your in it for the money its better than $50 for a yearly website membership.

Nothing in the description of this book stated it was for gasoline engines only. Since my truck has a diesel engine I was quite unhappy when the book arrived and it stated Gasoline Engines on the front cover.

If you want to know where the gas filler is....Buy this book.
If you want info on a Bronco, buy allmost anything else.

Knowing little about auto mechanics I find this manual very informative. It's a great to use as a detailed extension of an owners manual. I use it thouroughly for basic maintenance and repair. As an amature mechanic it's a good resource for getting to know your truck better, with detailed descriptions on every part. I've tried to use this book as a trouble shooting guide with with little success. More often than not it led me down dead end paths and seemed to lack a lot of info in this department.

'Tooth Imprints on A Corndog' is great. This one is an unreadable collection of rambling nonsense.

Leyner is more often than not a solid 4-star writer (My Cousin, Et Tu, Tetherballs), but his first book offers little pleasure beyond the fun of its title. A number of years passed between this debut and the much more worthwhile "My Cousin" and it was a healthy period of artistic growth, evidently. There are a few flashes of cleverness here and there, but this is overall a soggy and underdeveloped effort that makes you realize how delicate and precise his unique style is: in later works, it's a marvel of pop culture satire, rapid fire wit, and intriguing arcania. Here, it's a sophomoric dud that too often reads like really bad Barthelme. Or really bad Leyner.

Don't misunderstand: everything Leyner's done after this first collection is brilliant writing and mandatory reading. But ESTHER WILLIAMS is the most godawful hodgepodge of literary conceits and pratfalls you may ever be unlucky enough to read. Obviously, some episode of satori marked the time between this and his next book, the now-classic MY COUSIN, MY GASTROENTEROLOGIST. I'm being harsher than I should be, perhaps, considering how great a satirist Leyner has become. But even he probably wishes this book would crawl off his resume. Take a pass on ESTHER and go straight to his other four collections.

Definitely not as good as the List of 7. Sparks's fall is very disappointing and, I think, unnecessary to the story. It takes away from his being the inspiration for Sherlock Holmes.

Not nearly as good as the List of 7. Sparks's fall is disappointing and, I think, unnecessary to the story. It really takes away from him being the inspiration for Sherlock Holmes.

I was not nearly as disappointed by this sequel to Mark Frost's The List of 7 as many of the other "customer-reviewers." In fact, although I understand the reasons for this disappointment, they are minor compared with the deeper treasure of this two-book story: it is a well-crafted tale of evil, redemption, love, and forgiveness, written with the clever, suspenseful build of the Victorian adventure novel. The addition of so many new characters may leave fans of the first novel feeling bereft of that book's tightly-woven play of Sparks-off-Doyle and vice versa, but the scenes where they communicate directly: darker, more mature, human, and alive than in the more light-hearted List - are a superb, deeply felt address to the question of the nature of evil as it exists in its most powerful tools: human beings. As for the ending: do not mistake "abruptness" for the power of brevity. Although many readers would love to see the story continue, it would meander and lose meaning if an Epilogue were provided within this novel. The last sentence of the book beautifully sums the whole of the two books: Sparks redeemed by his own choice, true friend Doyle waiting with open arms. Classic and well-worth the read. Thank you, Mr. Frost, for continuing the original story of us all. Any chance of a third book? After all, there's always life after redemption.

If your looking for insight or help in setting up or implementing the index server this book offers no help. I was highly disappointed in what this book has to offer.

Overall, the book contains (and looks like reprints) of details that are available via Microsoft's MSDN library. While this is useful for non-MSDN subscribers, neither source is comprehensive in describing the actual setup, use and practical examples. Actual syntax of commands and functionality is missing - appendices are unclear and effectively describe what the term means - not how it's used nor it's options. This is definitely NOT a step-by-step book. After reading, I found I had more knowledge about the product, but was still unable to effectively set it up. Am still seeking other sources. I do not recommend this book for anyone attempting a functional use.

I thought the book was a good one. There was plenty of information about the Microsoft Index Server. And since there are no other books (that I am aware of) on this subject... its even better. There is information about all areas of Index Server, from what the product is, to how to install it, and things like the registry keys that you can tweak to change performance of Index Server. It discusses how to use Index server on a multi-homed IIS server (although briefly) and describes how to use all the major parts of index server.

I think there needed to be more good examples, and then I would give the book a GREAT review.

I am looking forward to getting version of book for Index Server 2.0???

Thanks

I picked up a used set of Extreme Management (book and audio) at a flea market. I should have saved my dollar. The book was laborious reading, bordering on pontification, so I tried the tape. What a mistake. If the amateurish and combative writing style was bad in print, the voice used on the tape made things exponentially worse - a classic case of really bad writing getting worse.

Here's the quick scoop:
1. I checked with Harvard and they did NOT authorize this book.
2. The author did NOT attend the classes he wrote about.
3. The writing style is very reminiscent of pre-canned smoke-and-mirrors business-speak...much verbosity, little content.
4. The author sounds positively angry about something.
5. I was angry, too, only because I wasted a dollar on this junk.

I agree with the jist of almost every reviewer on this page, especially Publisher's Weekly and AudioFile. I should have read the reviews on this site first. Oh well, it was only a buck.

The title was a little over stated. As a business student myself, all of the enclosed information was positive reenforcemnet for what I had already learned and a little more! Some of the quotes in the text were reassuring to the reader of a point well explained. although some of the points explained in the text were over explained and it became "dry" reading after awhile. The author had good usage of business terms, but lacked other examples other then that from Harvard Business school.

The text was by far an ad for the Advanced Management Program and Harvard Business school. It also touched slightly on management from a global arena, when most would know that all businesses are likely to go global. So more information is needed for a non-AMP student to learn how to manage in a global market.

Overall the book was informational, but could not be used as the only form of education for potential managers. Not everyone can afford to go to Harvard, but any business school would be better then just reading this book. Because business school can explain these points better and with more content then the book did.

Poor ratings and skewed reviews by others prompted me to write this review to provide objective information for knowledge seekers.

In my view it is a good book considering the price i paid, reading time, breadth of topics, simplicity and few good examples of how high level concepts could be translated into actions. I felt like spending few hours in the company of professors and executives, what they shared made sense to me and made me collect their words as jewels. Where else could one find synthesized knowledge from people like Michael Porter, Fruhan and other renowned scholars within 190/200 pages? I liked the simple manner in which DuPont and other fundamental financial management concepts are explained. I wouldn't mind recommending it to anyone for casual reading during a 3hr flight. Indeed it is not a text book, should not be taken seriously and may not be permanent part of your collection. The book is NOT for technical person who likes to live in details, nor for one who tends to seek ready-made solutions, nor for one who is interested in structured learning or pursuing graduate degree in management. One finds elements of inspiration and motivation to act, hallmark of good books. The stuff about Harvard or text on cover is more of marketing gimmick but nowhere author claims school endorses his book. There is a clear statement to that fact so don't know what caused the confusion written in other reviews. What matters is that the interviews, wisdom and thought process shared by people is original and real.... writer did not make up those 7 OFP points or market competition strategies. Don't expect a book could make you good manager or reveal secrets of success - there is no formula book.

Bottomline, professors who are Harvard's brain and their executive students from Fortune500/Global2000, .....talk to you in this book. It does not matter whether the book is endorsed by the school or if the writer himself attended the AMP program.....knowledge shouldn't have strings attached to it.

The book was full of typos, just do a few problems and check the answers in the back if you don't believe me. I have never seen a seventh edition with so many mistakes. At times it was readable but more often it was not. I thought the last few chapters were very good, however. The flow of material seemed quite logical, but I thought some important things were not stressed enough. I just cannot justify giving this book less than two stars, or more than three.

Unless you're a physicist who has never seen thermodynamics before, don't use this book! The author's statement of the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics is flawed at best. They drop Gibb's Theorem into proofs without any discussion of the theorem itself. The authors call the concepts of 'fugacity' and 'activity' "topics beyond the scope of this book", and they spend A PAGE deriving mole fractions (didn't we all figure out this concept in high school). In conclusion, the 6th edition was far superior to the 7th edition. Perhaps if Zemansky was still alive...

The book is a decent first course on thermodynamics. My main issue with it was that most of the 'problems' were trivial exercises in algebra, although a few were worthwhile. Parts of the book were dull, but some sections were quite interesting. I found there to be fewer errors than some of the other reviews might lead you to believe.