I'm an adult but I collect children's books. Why? Because of books like this one. I love any collection of poetry of a theme, and this one is wonderful. I love poems, I love dragons, I love this book! I'm going to get several of them for Christmas gifts for both children and adults. The choice of poems is unbelievable. Who knew there were so many poems about dragons? And the illustrations are so cute, so funny, so amazing. The artist is some magical person who is a gift to our planet!

This is a meticulously researched, beautifully told, and exquisitely illustrated fairy tale. During a severe drought, a poverty-stricken boy discovers by accident a magic pearl that saves his, his mother's, and many of their fellow villagers' lives until some villains came with the intent to snatch the pearl away. In addition to the common theme of the struggle between good and evil, this tale expounds particularly well the Chinese concept of the benevolent dragon and filial piety.

The illustrations are worth noting. Paul Morin, an award-winning Canadian artist, spent months on location in China to research the scenery, architecture, costumes, and customs of the people. As in his previous book, The Orphan Boy, he incorporated real objects onto his canvas to enrich the texture of the paintings. If you are looking for a magnificent picture of the Chinese dragon, look no further.

A wonderful book for children 6 and up for reading, for adults interested in Chinese folklore, and for storytellers. Highly recommended.

My preteen daughter loves to draw but most of her work was cartoonish. I wanted something to help her learn the skills of realistic drawing, especially portaits. This book was exactly what I was looking for. It includes faces from babies to elderly people and discusses technique and perspective. We enjoyed the studies of faces expressing various emotions. The narrative helps a developing artist learn how to look at spacing and shading and discusses supplies. There are sections on mouths, ears, noses as well as complete studies. There is a lot of content for the money.

To anyone who admires and enjoys the informative images of Paul Hogarth this book is an absolute must ! I personally bought this book as a valuable guide for an aspiring illustrator such as myself. We all aware that this man is a genius when it comes to interpreting places around the world. This book allows us to follow his foot steps in achieveing his goals in a colourful exciting read.

The book includes images that Hogarth has created all around the world through his many visits abroad.

A bible for all his fans !

To the best of my knowledge, Paul Conrad is the only political cartoonist to win three Pulitzer Prizes. I would really be surprised if any other political cartoonist had first made Richard Nixon's "Enemies List," then, only four years later been named to the Richard M. Nixon Chair at Whittier College, Nixon's alma mater. Conrad, himself, found this rather ironic.

Conrad was chief editorial cartoonist for "The Los Angeles Times" from the early 60's to the early 90's. In that period he created some of the most memorable political cartoons ever published.

Unabashedly liberal, he still found something about every President; Republican or Democrat, Liberal, Moderate or Conservative, that he deemed worth targeting. This book contains about 200 examples of his work, and he never misses his mark.

There is an old expression that "one picture is worth a thousand words." This observation holds true here. I'm going to try to describe a few of these 200 cartoons, but you'd have to see them for yourself to really appreciate them.

An example of his non-partisan president skewering is the cover cartoon which, drawn during Clinton's term, has caricatures of Presidents Nixon, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton with quotes from each as follows:

Nixon: "I am not a crook." --- Reagan: "I don't recall any Iran-Contra connection." --- Bush (Sr.): "I was not in the loop." --- and Clinton: "I did not have sex with that woman."

A few on non-presidential subjects:

On a drawing of two ragged children picking through a garbage pile behind a tenement building, "Speaking of child pornography . . . ."

A picture of an unbalanced scale shows a bullet on one side of the scale outweighing a huge pile of paper on the other side of the scale, labeled "one and a half million primary votes for Kennedy."

On a drawing of J. Edgar Hoover at the gates to heaven being sent away by St. Peter: Hoover, with a file labeled "God" under his arm is saying, "You'd better look at what I've got on him."

Conrad took on everyone and just about every issue, and, depending on who or what you loved or hated, you either loved or hated Conrad. There was no middle ground.

This isn't a strict literary biography of any of the individual authors that gathered for a time in Morocco, rather its a portrait of the night life (mostly) that all the celebrities literary and otherwise took part in while there. Its better than you might think though. Coming to this book for its literary interest is not a waste of time. There is an interesting segment about Brion Gysin and his club where the mountain musicians performed(would love to have seen that). But there is an awful lot of socialites up to no good ... too. Who gives a ... about Barbara Hutton? The interesting aspect of that though is that it shows the decadent westerners living it up in the lap of poverty. Artists go to places for different reasons than Mick Jagger(no offense Mick) does after all. It is the artists that make a place hip for the work they do while there. This book is in a way perhaps unconsciously an example of how hip gathers parasites and then the parasites take over,and after that happens the place becomes too expensive and too congested and too self-consciously hip for the real artists and they move on. This is Vanity Fair,the magazine, both the good and the bad(they have on occasion done a good literary piece). It is an entertaining read at least and loaded with good glossy black and white pictures and we all like a little decadence now and then, the parties are kinda cool. A good photo album with snapshot portraits of all the players but for the deeper story(you know the stories about the ones that actually wrote a book or two) read the bios of the individual artists.

Another Native American tale I adore. The brillant rich drawings speak when the words do not. A story of two children who place their trust into a wolf who leads them back to their home and how the wolf is honored for doing so. It is still hopeful that someday we will capture that which has been lost to us. The love of the land and honoring the animals.

This charming book is presented as a children's book, but is suitable for all ages. The large, beautiful illustrations and reproductions coupled with the whimsical text make this imaginative book a delight to look at and read. Small children will appreciate the bright colors of the artworks, and the parents will appreciate the inventive way the author introduces an artist to children - without pretension or difficulty. Any parent wishing to raise culturally educated children should buy this book today! (PS: I say this with experience, both my 3 year old and my 10 year old love this book, but for very different reasons -- and I even catch my husband flipping through it at times)

A gift to my nearly 2-year old toddler, this is a sweetlynonsensical look at a dog named George learning to dress himself. Hisapproach to putting on his clothes matches that of a child, to whom putting his shorts on his head or his socks on his ears makes perfect sense. This is a great book for those little ones who are developing a sense of themselves and who understand that it's ok to act silly! I wish the book was longer, because the humor is infectious and I would like to spend more time with George. I hope the author produces equally inspired and humorous adventures with George in the near future.

This book is a usefull tool when calculations have to be done at the well site. It is easy to use for all kind of oilmen such as engineers, supervisors, toolpushers, etc. User frendly and complete data book. Highly recommended!!!