"Brothers, I wish that God would give me and entire forest of these Junipers." Brother Juniper is one of the eleven monks, Little Brothers, living frugally in the Little Portion of Assissi with St. Francis. Given the nickname "God's Joculator" by St. Clare, Brother Juniper's only weakness was giving everything away to anyone in need. This weakness, compounded by Brother Juniper's kindness and devotion, lead him to adventures, including giving away the silver altar bells to a poor old woman to giving away his own robe to a poor man. The monks of the Little Portion learn to leave few things lying around, lest Brother Juniper give them away. So great is his kindness and devotion that the Devil conspired to have Brother Juniper executed. Again, Brother Juniper's reputation manages to save him from that sentence. The religious nature of this book should not deter anyone from enjoying the adventures of Brother Juniper, who exemplifies the precious qualities of heart-felt compassion and innocent simplicity. I thought it was a lovely book when I first read it at age 10. Reading it again as an adult, I can see how different and better the world could be with a "forest of these Junipers".

"What use is a life like this?" asks her mother as she lies in a nursing home connected to a feeding tube, unable to get out of bed or use one of her arms. Gerber responds to her mother, "Maybe because you have to have this experience (and I am having it, in my way, too), we are both making something valuable from it." Gerber not only shares the experience of watching her mother deteriorate, but she also shares life affirmations in the guise of a tiny kitten who brings joy in the midst of sorrow.

Busily planning her day, Gerber stands at her back door when she hears a small, desperate cry. Following the sound, she finds a kitten beneath the crawl space of her house. Luring the kitten out with food takes days, but brings a renewed energy and purpose to the act of living. The kitten touches the lives of each of her family members, even her mother who names it Maximilian because it's the closest any of the them will ever come to having a million.

In parallel stories, OLD MOTHER, LITTLE CAT describes the antics of a young life and the fading purpose of an old one. Despite the bleakness of the landscape of a death without dignity, Maxie, the kitten, becomes a shimmering ray of hope in the midst of desolation. Acknowledging the inevitability of old age and the battles that age brings, at times humorous, at times pathetic, Gerber's book remains cheerfully optimistic in its life affirming message.

Writing with stately grace and beauty, Gerber reveals the pain that our seniors and their families must endure. Despite the pain, Maxie becomes a metaphor for living life in the moment, for appreciating the immediate gifts offered by each day. OLD MOTHER, LITTLE CAT is a powerful, touching book. In fact, it's one of the remarkable novels I remember months after reading it, even though I review around 40 books a month. I heartily recommend it.

For cat lovers it is a must read book! But really anyone would surely love this book. I told my son I wanted him to read it but only the parts about Maxie the kitten not the old mother parts they are too sad and what we all may have to face somday either as the old mother or the caregiver. It made me wish for a kitten even though I have three adult cats who would not appreciate an interloper of a kitten

This engaging little memoir charts the ascent of psychoanalysis as seen through the eyes of its world-famous originator. Beginning with the youthful Freud's days with pioneer Josef Breuer in late 19th Century Vienna, it charts the burgeoning movement through the psychoanalysis organization that Freud founded in 1908--and which nearly went to pieces a few years later due to some nasty internecine battles. These were obviously trying times for Freud, and the book sometimes lapses into an acrimonious tone (he calls one detractor an "evil genius"); he also shoots a few poisoned arrows at former colleagues Jung and Adler. For the most part, though, it's a very readable, revealing look back at the days when psychoanalysis was young and had far more enemies than allies: "Occasionally a colleague would make some reference to me in one of his publications; it would be very short and not at all flattering--words such as 'eccentric', 'extreme', or 'very peculiar' would be used."

Extraordinary visuals accompanied by brief, but very meaningful
meditations.
They may be,'meditations for awakening the source,'but it's a wonderful book to page through before drifting into your dreams.

este libro me parecio interesantisimo ya que posibilita herramientas pedagogicas a los educadores de niños para enseñar de una manera amena ,agradable y creativa la literatura. las estrategias que propone de verdad ayudan a los niños a construir el esquema narrativo esencial para escribir historias.

A moving critical study on those silences that confronted women artists in the West, focusing on professional, non-professional, and traditional women artists' struggles to find voices and to cope with markets for their work. Jensen discusses several artists whose careers were shadowed or distorted by husbands, some of whom were themselves artists or collectors. She also treats extensively the history of a Native American basket maker's struggles with market forces, traditional cultural artmaking and art-using practices, discrimination, and family forces. Covering late pioneer days through the rise of Hollywood and spanning painting, photography, literature, dance, and crafts, the book surprised me with its concise and compelling portrayals of many societies and art worlds. Jensen communicates immediate and personal interpretations of the "lifeways" of silenced and near silenced women artists, as well as some who succeeded--at their great cost--in finding a voice.

In a time when kids are exposed only to stories from poorly written television shows and movies, this book arrives. The stories are timeless, and well written. They are worth reading, even if you don't have children to read aloud to.

The collaboration of Joan C. Durrance (Professor, University of Michigan School of Information) and Karen E. Pettigrew (Assistant Professor, Information School of the University of Washington), Online Community Information: Creating A Nexus At Your Library is dedicated to helping librarians better serve the needs of their patrons in the 21st century. Individual chapters clearly spell out effective methods for setting up and managing an Internet community network that is useful, functional and practical. Online Community Information is especially recommended for librarians who want to their academic, community, corporate, or governmental library to be the best it can be in this modern information age of cyberspace, computerized data banks, and the World Wide Web.