Although Buckley crafts his story well, this book serves only as a platform for him to express his inflated self importance. It is uninteresting and useless as a sailing narrative. The only reason I continued to read was in expectance of a point. Don't make the same mistake.

A delightful, real life, father/son saga about a months sail West across the South Pacific; Captained by William F Buckley with a crew comprising his son, Chrisopher Buckley and several other artistic and political luminaries of the 1980's.

On this voyage, WFB required each of the crew to keep (and relinquish at journeys end) a personal journal. WFB keeps the writing crisp and engaging by sharing only small portions of these apparently limited and hard won loggings.

All in all: A delightfully recounted adventure.

I've been looking for this book for years after reading an enchanting three part excerpt of it in the NewYorker:

After almost twenty years of continual Oz authorship, Ruth Plumly Thompson was clearly exhausted of ideas and energy by the time she completed 1938's The Silver Princess In Oz. Like John R. Neill's Lucky Bucky In Oz, this entry into the Oz chronicle reads more like a rough draft than a finished manuscript; portions of several chapters make no sense at all and are impossible to follow as published.

Coming well before the American science fiction boom of the fifties, with the Silver Princess In Oz, Thompson added ostensible extraterrestrials to the Oz landscape. In fairness, the extraterrestrials Thompson created for the book, Planetty and Thun the Thunder Colt, are creatures of fairytale convention and a far cry from the bug - eyed saucer men and glittering robots of the later age. The possibility of mixing the Oz fairyland with inhabitants of other planets is an interesting one, and one illustrator John R. Neill accomplished beautifully in his first authored Oz title, 1940's The Wonder City of Oz (though Neill's extraterrestrials were only warmongering mocha soldiers from a distant chocolate star).

In previous books Thompson had created vital, admirable, and multi-dimensional Oz heroines, such as Handy Mandy and Peg Amy, who made excellent role models for young readers. Thompson fails here not because Planetty, the Girl from Anuther Planet and her fire - breathing steed are creatures of fairytale romance, but simply because Planetty fails as a character and role model of any kind. Insipid, empty - headed, and oozing honeyed sweetness, Planetty, who is supposed to be a warrior, wins out over self - fascinated sky fairy Polychrome and the brain - poor Button-Bright as Oz's most tiresomely insensible character. Like Polychrome, Planetty is blissfully narcissistic; she spends the balance of the novel prancing, primping, and cheerfully speaking baby talk with a lisp. Illustrator Neill clearly understood the limitations of Thompson's text, for the book includes no less than 11 unelaborate illustrations of the silver - skinned Planetty striking empty poses for an audience in absentee. Planetty is first cousin to the vacuous lingerie model who glides through the fashion salon chanting 'Our new one piece lace foundation garment; zips up the back, and no bones,' in the 1939 film The Women: both exist solely on a catwalk in a parallel universe all of their own.

The story of the Silver Princess Of Oz is an empty retread of one of several already overused Oz blueprints. To escape dull court life and an unwanted marriage, young Gillikin King Randy of Regalia and Kabumpo the Elegant Elephant journey to Ev to visit mutual friend the Red Jinn. On the way, the two meet the space girl and her horse, who have unintentionally fallen to Oz down the back of a lightening bolt. Reaching the Jinn's castle, the foursome discover subversives have ousted the Jinn and taken over the realm. Briefly captured, Randy, Kabumpo, Planetty, and Thun escape to search of the missing magician.

Thun, who speaks by exhaling words of smoke, is no more interesting than Planetty, and King Randy is identical to all other young Thompson boy heroes. Creating new characters was Thompson's forte, but in the Silver Princess In Oz she failed completely, and none of classic members of the Oz royal family appear to add liveliness or spunk to the plodding, repetitive narrative.

The Silver Princess In Oz is also burdened with racial stereotypes, for the Red Jinn's subjects are 'blacks,' a color not usually associated with an Oz or Ev people or territory. As Neill's illustrations and Thompson's text make clear, the word 'black' is not an arbitrary distinction: the Jinn's turban-wearing people are Africans or African Americans, 'as black as the ace of spades,' who, when fleeing in fear, cry 'Yah, yah, mah ' Master!'

Less than a plum of an Oz book, the Silver Princess In Oz is one of the few titles which deserves the relative obscurity to which many of the later Oz books have fallen.

In Thompson's next-to-last book in the Famous Forty (she later wrote two more Oz books for the International Wizard of Oz Club), she presents us with one last romance between a young prince and princess, one last visit to the realm of the Red Jinn (who would reappear in the IWOC-published "Yankee in Oz"), and one last adventure for Kabumpo the Elegant Elephant. In many ways this is more of a summing-up of Thompson's style and the unique elements she brought to the Oz series than any of her three later Oz books. In fact, like "Captain Salt in Oz", this book features only Thompson's own characters and none of Baum's, although unlike "Captain Salt" parts of the story do take place in the Land of Oz. "Silver Princess" contains many beautiful and highly memorable moments and a unique and fascinating personality in its title character: Planetty, the Princess of Anuther (sic) Planet. Despite a major plot hole at the very end of the story--how do the characters cross the Deadly Desert on their return to Oz?--this book is highly enjoyable.

The important thing that I notice is that the book is too heavily based on the Open Card framework. I needed instead a book on java card first. Only found some tutorials on the net until now.

As a person who is concerning in developing javacards via OCF, found this one very useful due to contents that it has on framework. You could get and develop off-card apps, if it does make sense to you..

This solution manual only provides answers for every 4th problem. It does not elaborate much either. You're better off just asking your TA. Or hell, you can buy my copy - I'm sending it back.

this book is good, help student to solve the problem on the text book.

The book does start out with an interesting premise. An ordinary modern man is shot back to the past through mystical means and wakes up in the body of a young Viking man. Then it goes down hill from there. It is just too pat, too easy.

Immediately he is taken under the protection of a powerful master smith. It turns out that he has a modern fighting skill that beats all comers in the ancient world. He immediately finds friends and allies. There is not enough struggle to survive that you would find, if this happened to you. Even his adaptation to his new world is easy and quick.

But the last quarter of the book was very interesting. But you have to wade through bad fantasy to find it. I won't reveal it but I will say, it at least made the book not a total waste of time for me.

An intriguing premise ... Jerry Haskins is in a car accident and, as he dies, has his mind sent back in time by a Hindi mystic to inhabit the body of an ancestor -- Jar Haz the Viking.

An intriguing mix of Norse mythology comes across in this book. While parts are fun, and it's a fairly easy read, I can't say that it gripped me strongly. There isn't a real cohesive story being told here, but rather a series of strange events.

I just wanted to say that Catherine Coulter's The Maze is one of my all-time favorite books. I was very disappointed in this novel. The dialogue really got to me. It was a good plot, the characters weren't too deep, but entertaining. I hard a hard time getting through it, however, due to the extremely weak dialogue.

I have been a fan of Ms Coulter for many years so I was excited when I bought The Edge. She reintroduced previous characters from her other books "The Maze" (excellent 5 star book) and "the Target( an excellent 5 star book). I thought WOW I love these characters. But Ms Coulter tried a different style of writing this time. She wrote in the first person of Mac ( a man) So ok I can handle this. Ms. Coulter still showed the charming wit that made her so well liked. The story is going strong and then you have only 5 or 6 pages left and your wondering how is this going to end and tie up all the different stories. The problem it didn't address what happened to all the characters involved in the plot. You finish reading this book and the first thing I said was what about so and so. Maybe Ms. Coulter is writing a sequel to this book to answer all the questions....

I read The Edge out of sequence, that is, after I finished reading the other books in Catherine Coulter's FBI series. I found it an enjoyable read, but totally different than the others in the series.

The plot, based on a mind-altering and libido stimulating drug and missing persons, is fast-paced. There's even a touch of supernatural with the telepathic link between Mac and his sister Jilly. All these elements combine to keep you reading.

Coulter's descriptions of the different settings are vivid. You'll find yourself squirming at some of the encounters Mac and Laurie have with the native animal life in the Rain Forest.

The 1st person male viewpoint is unique and, as you can tell from the other reviews, troubling for most readers. Because The Edge is not 3rd person POV, the characters appear to lack depth. You only get to view what's happening from Mac's viewpoint. I think that's why most reader found it more difficult to become absorbed.

The Edge seemed to focus on suspense and leave out the hint of romance that you find in the other books of the series. The usual romance elements and sexual tension between Mac and Laurie weren't obvious. Even Dillon and Sherlock didn't come across as well in The Edge as they have in the other books.

Not what we are used to from Ms Coulter, but the plot and the unique writing style make it an entertaining and interesting read. Worth the read for Catherine Coulter fans!

In my opinion, this book is below average. According to the chapters it covers, this should be a book for beginners at programming. But by reading the book, only non-beginners would be able to follow all the examples. Rather than rely on the feedback of one person, I will give you the feedback of the students that I taught with this book. Most students beginning a programming class will have a hard time understanding this book that assumes that you already know a lot about math and logic. When I tried assigning homework from this book, most of my students had problems just understanding what the math and logic of the problem would require, and couldn't concentrate on the programming concepts. There are quite a number of inaccuracies in it as well, such as it's miscalling preprocessor directives a compiler directive. It also calls an array a data type which it is not, it is a data structure. It also calls the exponent of a scientific notation a characteristic. That term is only used in the natural science community. Even the IEEE standard for floating-point numbers calls it exponent and not characteristic. One of its first examples starts with a standard input statement without prompting the user with what input the program expects. These little annoying problems with this book have caused me to abandon it all together. I would much rather recommend Diane Zak's Fundamentals of Programming in C++ if you are a beginner to programming.

This book was required for the first semester programming class. Now I was able to understand 'cause I was in CS and had been programming for 10 years. But the history majors in my class were crying cause this book couldn't really explain the basic concepts. many of the intro to programming classes are core classes in Univs in US. So, a guy who's in CS, I assume wouldn't have any problem cause it's way too low level for him. Whereas those who really need this book..Art majors, or those who want to learn what programming in C++ is..will have a tough time..

I wouldn't recommend this book..cause it's too poor for a guy who knows C++ and too tough for those who don't.. They haven't been able to get that balance.

Another interesting point I was able to observe was that this text gives all source code example with Visual C++ in mind. Most of the Univs in US prefer to teach this course on Unix platforms, and so a book more relevent to Unix would be appropriate.

I give it 2 stars, cause it isn't all that bad a book that doesn't make sense. I still go back to it sometimes to look up the syntax and some basic stuff..But nothing more than that.

This book was required for a C++ course I attended at the local community college. I had been doing some minor programming in other languages but felt I needed at solid foundation in C++. This book would have been a difficult place to start. However, thanks to a talented and very patient instructor, the entire class did well. I would have given at least a four star rating but this Addison/Wesley paperback was very poorly published. Pages fell out daily throughout the semester. Have some tape and glue handy.

When I first heard about this book being published I couldn't believe it! This is a dream come true! I can finally stop searching and let this book do all the working for me. What I found instead was an author that was very opinionated, arrogant and, I'm sure, held several grudges. In the beginning of the book he lists several sources of where to order the listed tapes (many of which is either wrong contact information or the companies are now out of business) Did he verify and update his sources before this book was published? He also includes a brief description of each company, many of which he criticizes. It almost seems the author either is an ex-employee or somehow clashed with these companies, but what he says ranges from total praise to downright rude, even calling some of these companies "Greedy" or "They steal from some of the other public domain companies". He also states throughout the book many complaints about companies who refused to give out thier owner's name or "lend" him screener tapes. Unfortunatly just because someone is writing a book does not mean that these companies are obligated to either lend him tapes, or they will receive a bad review. That aside I found the reviews not too helpful, I put this book down MANY times because the opinion got in the way. There are several sources to find information on what's out there without the opinion (the internet is a HUGE palce) so I cannot suggest this book.

This book ultimately has to be had because it at least provides assistance to collectors in knowing what shows are on tape. Unfortunately the style of this book is atrocious. It is almost impossible to thumb through at random because something convenient like an alphabetical heading at the top of the page to key the reader as to where he is is not provided (this especially hurts when one flips through and finds a whole page spread and no sense of where one is at all!). And frankly, Mr. Frank's personal biases and assessments of various shows are just downright annoying and guaranteed to offend more people than inform them because he doesn't have the decency to offer a caveat at the beginning that others who don't share his politics, tastes in music etc. should take what he says about a lot of things with a grain of salt (I especially take umbrage to his characterization of Battlestar Galactica as a "bomb", saying not one word about Zeffirelli's "Jesus of Nazareth" one of the most important TV miniseries ever produced, and I wanted to scream shut up everytime he opened his mouth about Richard Nixon and blacklisting). A simple reference guide with equal comment for each show in a neutral manner in the tradition of Brooks/Marsh, McNeil etc. would have worked much better. Those books aren't popular because readers want to know what they think of those shows, they just want the facts. In the end, Frank comes across as a man talking down to the reader and that defeats the whole point of the project. Even on those points where I do agree with him (I too love "Our World" and the Goodson-Todman panel shows) I think it was for the most part out of place.

Since Mr. Frank (who I understand has since passed away) sees fit though to talk about the errors of other reference sources, I should feel compelled to correct a goodly number that I found in just one afternoon after I bought the book.

1-In his review of "The Late Shift" Frank reverses the actors who played David Letterman and Jay Leno respectively.

2-John Brown did not leave the Burns And Allen Show because he was blacklisted. This occurred long after he had left the show, and in fact Burns did make an on camera reference to his departure as being because of "other committments." Also, Frank is dead wrong in his description of the transition from Fred Clark to Larry Keating in the Harry Morton part. First, the episode is available in the Columbia House series, and second it took place entirely with Keating.

3-His summation of Burns And Allen shows on tape is woefully incomplete.

4-NBC did not "bring" Steve Allen from New York to Hollywood in 1960, Allen personally asked for the show to move there so he could spend more time with his children from a previous marriage.

While it is still several years before DVDs completely push "Buyer's Guide to Fifty Years of TV on Video" into obsolescence, it may be useful to note that the book, for all of its flaws, contains some extremely valuable information.

Yes, the late Sam Frank hammers away relentlessly at the mistakes of other TV historians, then makes numerous errors of his own; and certainly his editorial comments often seem like unwarranted intrusions, even though the premise of an opionated buyer's guide isn't inherently wrong (Leonard Maltin's annual Video Guide is clearly meant at least in part to be a consumer guide, to name one example; yet the Maltin guide is superior because it is seems far less capricious).

Nonetheless, there are things here that are difficult to find elsewhere. For example, it lists the episodes available from many of the series released by Columbia House Video Library through mid-1997 (and does so in chronological order, rather than the order of each volume). Even if you ask Columbia House for a list of every episode it offers of, say, "The Untouchables," you will get just a list of episodes, with no airdates, and no plot descriptions. Frank doesn't always give you plot descriptions, but generally he does, and with the airdates included, you can at least choose episodes from your favorite period of the show's development, if you're so inclined.

Frank's guide is particularly good for anyone interested in television's so-called "Golden Age." He was a Baby Boomer, and takes a great interest in playing up -- and simultaneously debunking myths about -- what made this era special.

It is here that his editorializing, particularly on things like picture and sound quality, is quite useful, as there are some horrible third-or later-generation public domain video dubs out there that should be avoided. The worst of these sometimes use kinescopes that are just overexposed or otherwise compromised to begin with. Yet, there are others that look and sound quite good, and it's good to have a reference point that helps to make the distinction. Listings are included for a lot of the "Playhouse 90," "Studio One," "Four Star Playhouse" and other early anthology shows released by Video Yesteryear and other public domain dealers, many of which are still available through retailers like Movies Unlimited. Inevitably there are listings for dealers in the book that no longer exist, or have since stopped selling videos, but in the age of the Web, a lot of this stuff can be found.

The book also includes exhaustive appendixes about the history of videotape and the development of color television, which seem to be squarely aimed at TV historians. In fact, throughout "Buyer's Guide," Frank's extreme interest in both innovations is underscored again and again. His main point seems to be that old television shows that can now only be seen on somewhat blurry black and white kinescopes looked crisp and bright in their original telecasts, and for that reason, among others, we shouldn't automatically judge these shows, and the audiences who appreciated them, harshly today. Whenever Frank does find a tape of something shot on video before the late '60s that actually looks close to pristine, he makes sure to draw our attention to it. How relevant this is to the typical reader is open to conjecture.

Numerous items from the MPI Home Video catalog are another welcome feature, including their "Nightline" tapes, "Hullabaloo," "The Missiles of October" and more. Frank's overview and descriptions of a number of episodes in the "Leonard Bernstein's Young People's Concerts" series are solid, and again represent something you don't see discussed very often today.

"Buyer's Guide" is a good supplementary reference if you've already got Tim Brooks and Earle Marsh's "The Complete Directory to Primetime Network and Cable Television Programming: 1946 to Present," or Alex McNeil's "Total Television." Frank's myopia keeps it from being anything like the definitive tome he apparently envisioned, but it's hardly a disaster.

I agree with a previous reviewer's observation that portions of the book are verbatim repeats (dare I say cut-&-paste?). I wonder what the ethical implications for such a practice might be (careful IDG, though the cover reads "Dummies," your readers are not).

There seemed to be a lot of twoddle in this book ("twoddle" is a Charlotte Mason term meaning, all fluff, little substance).

I appreciate IDG's attempt (through the Dummies series) to make technology accessible to the masses. I thought Lowe's Networking for Dummies was very good.

Unfortunately, the silly content becomes a liability, particularly as you progress through one of these books. Cutesy prose can be as obstructive as the ostentatious white-paper puffery the Dummies series attempts to avoid.

Until IDG does a revision, I recommend borrowing this one from the library, and read it with a mindset to skim.

IDG, take this one back to the drawing board (no disrespect intended toward the author).

This (like others have mentioned) was a low-point for the "Dummies" books. I am a web developer (ASP, javascript, etc) that is just getting into XML and bought this book for a simple intro to XML. This book is **NOT** easy reading, Ed Tittel is all over the place. THE BIGGEST PROBLEM WITH THE BOOK IS THAT HE REPEATS HIMSELF AD INFINITUM -- for example, he explains the rules of a proper XML tag at least 6 times through the book. I read it twice and concluded this -- you are better off with any 0ther XML Book or just surfing the various tutorials out there.

This book didn't ring my chimes.... the examples were not fully explained and there seemed to be gaps in the theory. Big thumbs down.