This book is based around fifty-odd letters written by Frederick Osborne from Salem, Massachusetts who served three years in Company F, 23rd Massachusetts Infantry. His brother Stephen also served in Company G and brother Nathan became a career soldier after securing a commission in the Regular Army. Marcotte tries to create a worthwhile book out of Osborne's rather mundane letters with some decent research. Osborne was only under fire at the battles of Roanoke, New Bern, and Whitehall, all in North Carolina in 1862. The 23rd did not see much active service in 1863 and Osborne was transferred to the Veteran Reserve Corps due to a non-combat leg injury sustained in a "scuffle" and missed seeing any action during 1864 before his muster out that fall. Taking Osborne's letters as a basis for the book, Marcotte first prints the letter then explains what you have just read in a text that goes on for 1-3 pages each. He also uses footnotes, but the redundant material of explaining what you have just read, plus information on everything from the lyceum, to Union war aims, to soldier life, could also have been placed in footnotes. If this book was meant for readers who know little about the Civil War, the very limited topic will find few takers. If meant for readers with an interest in the war, most of Marcotte's text is not necessary. This book will interest 1) readers who read accounts by New England soldiers, and, 2) those having an interest in the North Carolina campaign of 1862. Osborne's father was an officer of the Salem Lyceum along with Nathaniel Hawthorne. Unfortunately, there is no evidence why a sixteen year-old son of an educated family would be allowed to enlist in 1861. The book needed a careful proofreader. Major J. Lewis Stackpole is identified as Stockpile, Stackpole and Stockpile again all within a set of notes on page 267. Marcotte makes a game attempt to create a useful book, but given the very ordinary letters that have survived (and it seems many have not) about a campaign that few people in the Civil War community care about, this book has very limited usefulness.

Purple Dragon contains 15 stories drawn from A New Wonderland, Mother Goose in Prose, American Fairy Tales, and Animal Fairy Tales. The introductory comments before each group of stories show Baum's movement from a writer of witty and whimsical fantasies, to one whose views became more wordly and cynical. The stories were selected by David L. Greene, an editor-in-chief of The Baum Bugle and chairman of the English Department at Piedmont College, Deorest, Georgia. Illustrated by Tim Kirk who won the Hugo Award several times.

This is the seminal work in sci-fi by the man who's editing direction shaped the modern genre, Hugo Gernsback, the guy they named the Hugo Awards after.

A future where everyone wears electric roller skates, has a number instead of a last name and cities have moving side walks... One of theose travelogues of the future extrapolated by a writer from the very beginings of the pulp era. The gadgetry seems almost Victorian, the philosophy seems dated, yet somehow you'll never forget this book.

I read this book in the early 60's and it was already very quaint and dated even back then. But somehow I've never forgotten it and parts of this book come to mind even now almost 40 years later. If you've ever seen the 1930 film "Just Imagine," then this is the literary equivalant.

Yes, it's been awhile since I read this, but I clearly remember how much fun customizing the book with the stickers was. Not to mention that the story is very cute - about a kitten that shows up on Santa's doorstep. The elves fall in love with her in the end, but on Christmas Eve Santa must decide whether to give the kitten to a child for Christmas, or keep her himself.

This book is designed with the young student in mind, reaching for the ages that are starting their science in school and building a foundation for them to start with. It gives the basics of weighing and measurements, basic thermodyanmics (very basic, like evaporation in boiling), gravity, etc. A simplistic view of science for the beginner, not useful for adults or anyone who has the basics down. Suggested for grade school science teachers as an idea pool to convey how science can be demonstrated.

This is an essential book for Sci-Fi lovers like me. The only problem, though, is that it doesn't get updated.

God, what a badly written book. The ideas aren't bad, but didn't anybody edit this?

Well, at first the book is hard to get into but after the first five chapters it started to become more interesting. The book was about a man and his family that moved from the northeast part of the country to a small town in Colorado. The man and his family needed money, so Jack the father interviewed at a hotel to watch it for the long winter. Jack and his family were doing fine for a while but Jack started to go crazy being trapped in there for so long. He started drinking again and hurting his family. He was getting annoyed and tried to murder his wife and son. His son also became possessed. His son Danny was always saying redrum(murder) over and over again. One day he lost it and went after his son and wife. They bothed escaped and Jack died from freezing to death outside when he didnt find them. I think the book was very good and thrilling. I would recommend it to any one. It might be hard at first to get into it but it is worth it. I liked the book alot. Also i dont think its that scary, but i like scary books.

The Sino-Japanese War of 1937 to 1945, which led to the Pacific War of 1941-1945, should be of great historical interest. It is therefore astonishing to see how little has been written about it in the West.

For that reason alone, this book is important. It is a detailed military history of that conflict, giving a wealth of detail on units, commanders, and organization on both sides. This is not easy information to find.

Regrettably, the book has quite a few flaws. Dorn was once aide to "Vinegar Joe" Stilwell and it shows. He fairly drips with contempt for the Chinese on almost all levels, with the notable exception of a few of the bolder Chinese generals and, curiously, the Communists. To be sure, the Chinese Army did not exactly distinguish itself in this war; but Dorn's attitude gets rather tiresome after awhile.

A second fault with the book is that the maps that accompany it are beautifully rendered road and city maps of China -- with very poor depictions of the actual movements of troops. The latter are simply arrows showing the Japanese moves and Chines countermoves, without any dates or unit identification. This means the maps are not terribly informative, except perhaps to show relative locations of place names. The latter are all given in the obsolete Romanization of Chinese names used at the time and are difficult to match with the Romanization of Chinese names used on modern maps.

A third fault with the book is that it ends on December 7, 1941, as if nothing of interest happened between China and Japan after that date. SO you'll find nothing on the Ichi-Go offensive of 1944.

Finally, Dorn deluges the reader with data on units and movements without ever bringing any coherence to it. There are rather detailed orders of battle in the appendix, but since no unit locations are given with it, it's not nearly as useful as one might hope.

Still -- and this is the sad thing -- you can't find anything better out there. I've tried.