In the hands of a writer like Stephen King or Ramsey Campbell this material might have worked. When I bought this book I hoped that I might have discovered another greater horror writer - but after reading only a couples of pages I knew that Campbell/King/Barker etc. can rest easy in their beds. Morris's writing style is atrocious, the use of similes and the conversation being particularly dire. I gave up reading after the first 20 or so pages and flicked ahead to see if anything scarey happened. It didn't ...

I was disappointed in this book. It tells you more about diabetes, and hypertension than Syndrome X, and very little on how to manage it. Any thing in here you can find out on WEBMD.COM, so save your money!

This book is a looseleaf collection that does not teach anything at all about proofreading. I had hoped to see some pages of marked text. Nothing! The papers have an abundance of errors for you to proofread for yourself, but not a word about how to do it. The collection was designed for use with an instructor who would tell you what to do, leaving you to practice on the sheets that comprise the book. The material is for test purposes only; there is no instruction. I urge the writer to issue a new addition with the ANSWERS, i.e., with the same sheets MARKED, rather than left for the reader to mark.

Poetry lovers beware!!! The author of this book is NOT Mark Strand the poet, but one Mark Strand, a fisherman, with a big mustache and lots of fishes on his mind

This book is one of the most extensive critiques of Roosevelt's foreign policy ever penned. It criticizes him for appeasing Germany, while taking an unfairly harsh line towards Italy and Japan. Marks criticizes Roosevelt for insularity, ignorance and dogmatism. His officials are unreliable, while FDR mistakingly believes you can buy respect and supports misguided pacifism when a strong show of force is required. He seeks to sabatoge Chiang Kai-Shek and is far too indulgent towards Stalin. His first months in office encourage isolationism and his attitude towards Latin America only encourages the contempt that continent feels towards a weak master. Footnotes makes up a quarter of a book, the bibliography is long and extensive, and Marks has engaged in multi archival research from Taiwan to Canada, as well as from Britain and France. Were Marks' view accepted it would lead to a major decrease in Franklin Roosevelt's reputation.

As it happens, Marks' revisionism will not succeed because despite the effort involved, it is seriously flawed. Marks shows a strong, unrelenting prejudice against FDR at every turn (his books on Teddy Roosevelt and John Foster Dulles show the opposite problem). There are two major flaws to this work. First, there is the biased selection of evidence. In order to make Italy and Japan look more reasonable Marks cities Italian and Japanese propoganda on the Ethiopian war and the Manchurian crisis respectively. There is no mention of the Rape of Nanking. Admiral Horthy, ruler of Axis Hungary, says FDR was insufficiently anti-communist, a view that is seconded by Franco's pro-Axis foreign minister. Hitler's slippery dishonest finance minister Schacht is quoted as saying that FDR thought that Hitler was good for Germany. Hitler's disreputable vice-chancellor, von Papen is quoted to contrast Winston Churchill's supposed mercy in comparison to FDR's bloodthirstiness on the Nuremberg trials. (Actually it was American officials who took the lead on the matter.) Whether they are pro-Japanese appeasers, propagandists for the China lobby, or sentimental frenchmen who unfairly blame Roosevelt for the demise of the French colonial empire, Marks blandly praises their genius while ignoring compelling counter-evidence.

Likewise, there is a lack of balance in the book. More space is given on the 1937 Brussells conference on Asian problems than on the Breton Woods Conference that set up the post-war economic order. One suspects this has much to do with the fact that France and England blamed FDR for its failure. Much of the archival evidence from Britain and France consists in complaints from the less than brilliant Halifax and Bonnett. Much is made of the gaucheries and mistakes of Roosevelt's diplomats, while statesman like General Marshall and Henry Stimson are almost ignored. So, for that matter, is much of the conduct of the war. Chaing's regime is blatantly whitewashed while the opposing case is never countered or, as in the case of Lloyd Eastman's Seeds of Destruction, read. Flaws that apply equally to Dulles and TR, such as bigotry and ignorance, are applied to FDR alone. There is something tendentious and questionable on every page. On no account should anyone consider anything mentioned here as definitive.

I never felt fully prepared to take exams or any sort of related activity upon reading the book . I often felt lost and out of place when viewing the book and feel that it should be made more clear. I don;t know exactly what your objectives should be, however, let me make it clear to you that there are individuals struggling to keep up in class because they are confused by the combination of your book and the actual text.

The fact that this was in the Wayside Gardens series mislead me. When the book arrived I discovered that it was written by a Britisher for the British gardener and that 3/4 of the plant material was not useable in the mid-Atlantic region.

The pictures are sumptuous, but the content is just not relevant for the American gardener - unless, of course, you are on the Pacific Coast!