This attractive pocket-size guide is an ideal travel companion reliable and full of information despite its light weight and small format. It is easy to use even for non specialists : texts and photographs are clear and thumbnail color outlines of family group allow for a quick identification of birds. However this guide is not meant to be exhaustive : some species are left-out and you won't learn everything about the birds described. But unless you are a true bird specialist you probably won't mind since the 88 species descibed are the most typical of the 102 occuring in the vast region covered (12 countries south of a line running from Kenya and Uganda to Namibia) and you are not likely to meet the remaining 14 species. For each species described the guide provides clear color photographs selected to show the variations associated with age, sex and color form along with illustrations showing birds in flight, distribution maps and an authoritative text describing key identification features. The text also provides some basic background on the birds habitat range, feeding or breeding habits. Ideally this guide could be used in combination with another pocket-size guide dealing with birds in general such as Ian Sinclair's "Photographic guide to birds of southern Africa".

Hubbard's commentary is in-depth and accurate. He quotes the New King James Version but corrects mistakes such as Proverbs 30.1 where he correctly states that "Ithiel and Ucal" should be tranlated as phrases rather than names. Biblical archaelogy and scholarship has made significant progress in the last 10 years since this book was written (1989). For a more up-to-date in-depth commentary on Proverbs read THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO THE BOOK OF PROVERBS by Cody Jones. It features numerous drawings and photos which give the reader a sense of the culture of the time. Six translations in parallel aid understanding of more difficult passages. Jones reveals for the first time in any commentary the secret identity of the overall editor of King Solomon's wise and witty sayings.

There have been more well known academic studies of Poe's work (such as Daniel Hoffman's " Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe") but this is one of the best ones and deserves to be better known. Poe is still one of America's most avant garde writers and as Gore Vidal wittily wrote "the primal fount of American literature." Ketterer's book is not a complete success (his analysis of "The Fall of the House of Usher" and "Ligeia" is flawed); however his insights into Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado," "The Black Cat," and "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym," are excellent and never resort to pseudo-freudian criticism to explain the author's psyche. David Ketterer's book provides a firm understanding of Poe and his mysterious work. I recommend to all students or lovers of literature.

I used to loathe Poe's style, whose involutions seemed to drain his work of all their professed horror, while admiring the way he smuggled hugely complex ideas into popular modes - no wonder Hitchcock adored him. Now, as I grow older, I begin to value Poe more, recognise his obsessions and fears in myself, while marvelling at a style that manages to convey hothouse exoticism with remarkable, chilling precision.

Of the three stories I read recently in this volume, Morella is the least successful, a rehash of Leonora (a dead wife is reincarnated in her daughter), but there a brilliance in Poe's dramatising of an idea that is admirable.

The Facts in the Case of M. Valdemar is truly disgusting and horrifying. A hynotist experiments on a dying man to see if he can prolong life after death. The cool analytic style lead contemporaries to confuse it with a medical testcase (it was published in a scientific journal), but what is most memorable is the anguish of the dead man who cannot rest.

Best of all though is the immortal Black Cat. Violent and unconsionable, the brutalities in this story are among the most grotesque in literature, both to animals and to people. Poe's style is at his most poetically sustained as he describes the most vile barbarities with his character's objectionable self-pity. What is most sublime, though, is the note of black comedy that is laced throughout, which would be foregrounded in Roger Corman's hilarious version in Tales Of Terror.

Van Leer's introduction is informative enough, but there is a note of begrudgery and a refusal to take Poe altogether seriously, that is aggravating.

The stated intent of this book is to help both students and scholars of Biblical Hebrew with limited backgrounds in linguistics to understand important linguistic works hebrew such as Andersen's "The verbless clause in the pentateuch." Andersen's book, like many others, uses a complex coding system known as Tagmemics. Dawson explains in detail the use and usefulness of Tagmemics. I strongly recommend Dawson to anyone who has tried to study the advanced work of Andersen, Longacre, Muraoka etc. but emerged baffled. Dawson will help you understand those works. But be warned - Dawson is no easy read either! The evils he criticizes in other linguists -- such as unclear writing -- are present in Dawson's work as well. Dawson is surely to be thanked for the help he offers to the uninitiated. But I still am left wondering why linguistic writing seems so obscure even when the author is making a conscious effor to be clear. Is it some inherent limitation of language that makes it suitable to describe everything except itself?

Though this book had interesting moments, for the most part it was just a very detailed story of the life of a sports mogul. For people interested in going into the sports business or with a tremendous interest in knowing how the business works, this book could be valuable. I found it interesting to learn how major leage sports teams are started and all the work that goes on behind the scenes. However, since Colangelo is not a man who has had a great impact on the world, I found the many detailed accounts of his various experiences tedious at times and for the most part unnecessary to the story. Though not always engaging, the easy-flowing style of this book makes it an inviting read.

this book was pretty cool. Unlike the previous book I read on sports marketing, this book wasn't boring. This book was a pretty quick read. This book can be helpful to people who are looking to own a team or anyone who just wants to start their own business.

This book by Jerry Colangelo is very well written. It is a quick and interesting read and also teaches you many things about marketing a product. Jerry Colangelo is a very well respected person in the sports world and he is a real example of the American Dream. Colangelo began his life with nothing and slowly, using his intelligence in business, built himself a sports empire starting with the Bulls and continuing with the Suns, Diamondbacks, and Rattlers. This is a great book and I recommend it to everyone and anyone to read.

Good luck on finding mineral sites using this guide. While the minerals may be in the areas indicated, the maps are so crude that the likelihood of your finding the sites is very poor. I have tried using the guide for several years with almost no success.

Well worth what I paid for it. This book has lots of information and would make a good reference for the Geology of California.

The maps though, don't say what the major highways/roads are, so you'll need another map. I have the book Roadside Geology of North/Central California, and this book goes really well with it.

In some ways, Rocks and Minerals of California I think is more useful, despite the missing road ID. The book has sections of counties (not all but most) and minerals found in those areas. Also, quadrangle information, township/range locations of minerals is listed.

Gregory Hines and Joel Gray present horrible readings of two of Poe's best poems. Gregory Hines sounds like a used car salesman when reading "Annabel Lee," and Joel Gray sounds like a spastic nut when reading "The Bells." Did they ever listen to themselves? Christopher Cazenove represents the best reader and the savior of this otherwise fiasco. Although he left out the last stanza, his reading of "Ulalume-A Ballad" is by far the best reading I've heard of this powerful poem. Michael York's reading of "The Raven" is ok, but he lacks correct interpretation with the "wispered word, 'Lenore?'" The only other reader to read this phrase like a question is Edward Blake. For some reason many of the poems have background music. Did the producers of this collection really think that these poems lacked something? Perhaps this collection going out of print was an act of mercy.

Like the first reviewer, I thought Gregory Hines absolutely ruined "Annabel Lee" for me, which is--or now, was--also one of MY favorite Poe poems. What's next, "Gregory Hines Tapdances 'A Cask of Amontillado'"? Stick to you day-job, Greg! Michael York and David Warner are much beter readers than Hines, though when York reads "I shrieked..." it hardly sounds like a shriek. Their readings are good, but not great. By far the two less-famous (to me, anyway) readers on the tape, Roger Rees and Christopher Cazenove, are giants compatred to the other three. Rees' reading of "The Conqueror Worm" alone is worth the price of this tape. Obviously Rees and Cazenove are experienced Shakespeare-trained actors who love--and know how to utilize to startling results--the English language. I would pay almost anything for a new version of this tape read by Rees and Cazenove alone, or possibly by them and other accomplished Shakepearean actors (Patrick Stewart? Ralph Fiennes? Simon Russell Beale?). It's just not enough, to effectively read aloud poems or prose written by a master, to be famous (Hines) or even British and famous (York and Warner); you have to be GOOD! Anyway, overall this tape's worth buying.

If "Annabel Lee" is your favorite Poe poem, be warned that it is read by Gregory Hines, and the AudioFile review is being generous when it says that his readings lack drama and force. Though it is one of my favorite poems, or, more precisely, because it is one of my favorite poems, I fast forward through it everytime I listen to the tape, lest his reading impare my ability to enjoy the poem in the future.

This is somewhat compensated for by Michael York's exellent rendering of "The Raven" and David Warner's various readings which wonderfully capture Poe's mood and spirit.

Overall, still worth the price. I don't regret having purchased it and I'm still enjoying it a month later. If only "Annabel Lee" had been assigned to Mr. York or Mr. Warner!

I purchased this book per a recommendation and was extremely excited, after reading the cursory synopsis of the book. Upon receipt of the book I first looked at the CD's and found no mention of the Slackware Distribution, Only Redhat's and Caldera's, along with the Star Office. Now perhaps the Slackware distribution is included somewhere on the CD's but it is not immediately evident and will undoubtably lead to confusion. My initial foray into the contents started well, and I was pleased with the explanations of Linux, it history and use. Unfortunately, this is stopping point for, in my estimation, any attempt by the authors at making the subject matter the least bit interesting. It is in the 2nd chapter that the subject matter, while extremely important and manditory reading, as it is dealing with the set up and installation process, becomes painfully dry, an effort to read and definately not for the beginner or casual user. In the 3rd chapter much of the second chapter dealing with set up and installation is repeated verbatum, and again is technically difficult to read. At this point I should say that while not a total computer techniphobe, I do have 10 years of experience with computers, beginning in the days of DOS and continuing into the Windows amd Macintosh families of operating systems. I also over the years have accumulated a certain degree of experience with both hardware and software so I am what I would consider a fairly advanced computer user. I am currently starting into the 4th chapter and will attempt to get some understanding of the Linux OS. I would not however recommend this book to anyone just starting out with Linux, but would only recommend it to those whom already have linux up and running and require a reference book to fall back on. Great for the advanced user , but not for the beginner on thier initiation into Linux. I myself will probably purchase a much more user friendly reference to begin my experience with Linux.

I am new to Linux but have worked on Windows 95/NT for many years. After reading "Using Caldera OpenLinux 2.2," I was able to do just about everything in OpenLinux 2.2 that I currently do in Windows NT 4.0 Workstation. I was able to connect to the internet, create a WordPerfect document, customize the GUI, and install new applications. One downfall to the book is that it often used "print screens" from OpenLinux 1.3 (the previous version of OpenLinux). For my soundcard, the book recommended that I buy a commercial driver from 4Front technologies; I wish the book would have given me instructions on installing the free OSS sound driver.

The CD included with the book is superb. It includes Caldera OpenLinux 2.2 with WordPerfect 8.0 and hundreds of open source applications. KDE, the graphical user interface to OpenLinux 2.2, is better than the Microsoft Windows GUI. "Que Using Caldera OpenLinux 2.2" and the OpenLinux 2.2 distribution of Linux is a must for anyone new to the Linux community.

When I first installed Caldera OpenLinux on my PC, I was a newcomer to Linux and didn't really know my way around. Caldera does provide decent documentation for its product, but the installation and user's guide is a bit spare fora newbie to make much use of. This book is the one that took me from being a wet-eared newbie to a competent OpenLinux user. The book assumes that you know very little about Linux and gives you an introduction to the history of Linux, the open source philosophy, the distributions of Linux and a host of other pertinent information before taking through Star Office, the K Desktop Environment (using and manipualting), the command line, package management with RPM, the file system, configuring the X Server, configuring sound, the file system, networking (including using Samba and NetWare), connecting to the Internet, reading the XF86Config file, tweaking, programming languages, compiling source code, shell scripting, runlevels, troubleshooting, and a range of almost every possible problem that a home user or small office user will run into. This book can get quite in depth, and is suitable for those who want to get into Linux quite deeply, or for simple casual use as a reference guide. This is the one book that should ship with every version of Caldera. With this book, you'll find that Linux really can be quite fun to learn and quite easy as well.

Massie has written solid well researched historical novels that throw a clear light on the era being written about and his trilogy about Rome -Augustus,Tiberius ,and Caesar -had me going back to the history of the period seeking more information.
Sadly ,his book about King David has not evoked such a reaction and to be truthful I found the whole thing rather dull.
The story it tells is a familiar one to anybody whose education covered the Bible.
It is told in flashback with an ailing David reminiscing about his life.We are taken back through events familiar from the Biblical story-his anointing at the hands of the prophet Samuel,his first visit to the court of the stricken Saul to whom he brings comfort with his music,the clash with Goliath ,the rupture with Saul and his guerilla campaign against him culminating in his seizure of the throne and the personal and dynastic tragedies that arise from his adulterous relationship with Bathsheba
The book will not please the overly pious for the David that emerges from the book is a politician not above placing a religious spin on actions motivated by political and personal self interest,and the book is candid about his bisexuality .This is not a likeable man abut one whose vision for his people rendered him an effective leader but whose libido got in the way rather too often to render him truly dedicated or great
The opening half of the book is fine but it got a bit bogged down in political manipulation and dynastic complications and the last section dragged, not helped by rather flat and functional writing that never took wing
The real value -in my view -of the historical novel-is that it can make us more aware of the people and events of remote eras and send us back to the sources .This did neither and for this reason I rate it as average-no more