I like the fact that the book shows that children are individuals, and that a one size fits all approach to parenting tends not to work. The book could really give a parent insight into a child who is vey different from the way the parent is (say, a very extroverted mom or dad who can't quite understand why his/her child would rather read a book or play with a chemistry set than go play with a group of kids). It can also help the parent understand why some discipline techniques that work really well with one child completely fail with another. The book talks about all these sorts of issues - school, discipline, overall behaviour, etc.

The problem I have with the book is that I think is difficult to identify some children's preferences, particularly in the more complex areas of a person's type. It's rather easy to tell if someone is an extravert vs. an introvert. Other things, like sensing vs intuitive, or judging vs. perceiving are more difficult to assess in a child. I found it hard to determine the type of the child I was thinking of. Where the book is more useful is knowing your own type, and looking at how your child might respond to it.

Although I'm not convinced that the Myers-Briggs Type Indictor is a valid instrument to use with children, I do believe this book can still give parents and other adults who interact with kids a good broad base of understanding of how temperment is displayed in children. For that alone, the book is worth looking at. I would reccommend getting the book out of the library and skimming a few chapters to see if you like the book and think it will be useful to you before you spend the money to purchase it outright.

As a prime example, I learned things I previously thought were problems, were in fact how my ENFJ child is supposed to act. When I changed my behavior to match her personality *her* problem diminished. Another cool ascpect of this book is learning how to understand how your children are similar or different than yourself.

A final thing to note: although this book is long, only about 25-30 general pages and another 20 or so specific pages will apply to your child. So, you will be able go through it rapidly. ...

Paul Theroux was in the Peace Corps in Africa in the early 1960s until he was ejected from the Corps for giving a member of an opposition political party a ride to neighboring Uganda. That same friend--who later became Malawi's ambassador to the United Nations--got Theroux a job at the college where he had become headmaster. Theroux stayed there as a professor until leaving Africa in the late '60's.

Having left so much of Africa hopefully poised for independence and rebirth, he returns to travel through one ravaged kleptocracy after the next; countries where the most common greeting to foreigners has become "give me money." And why shouldn't they expect another handout? Aid programs abound, pouring billions of dollars, or francs, or marks into countries where the people seem unable to life a finger to help themselves. Everything, everywhere, is filthy. Foreign doctors work in hospitals for low salaries that African doctors refuse to accept. Theroux is approaching 60 years old on this trip, a milestone that so few Africans reach that many people cannot conceive of the number being connected with age. What happened here?

The saddest chapter in "Dark Star Safari" is when he visits the college where he taught in Malawi. Once a beautiful place that educated many of the country's shining lights it is now broken-down and filthy. The books in the library that was once a pride of the nation have been stolen or torn apart. The old students Theroux meets admit that it a tragedy, but none of them have done anything to change it.

And that is his revelation on this trip--only Africans can help Africa. Why they are not is fodder for another book altogether.

This book is hard-hitting good reading. And as always with Theroux, you will find yourself hitchhiking and hanging off the side of the bus in his excellent, tough-minded company.

This is one embittered globetrotter who should win the Nobel.

Repairman Jack is so believable and down-to-earth that the supernatural angle of the story took me by surprise. Yes, I had read the back cover, but the story was so enthralling that I was blindsided by the horror part. There I was, racing along, totally drawn into Jack's world when...oh my gosh...he's...she's...that's a ...wow! What a story!

Without giving away any of the surprises, suffice it to say that this was another one of those books that will keep you up all night to finish. Very well done, and I look forward to reading more Repairman Jack stories.

I have just bought all of the Repairman Jack novels in one order and will read the other three instalments in the coming weeks. "The Tomb" was a very promising start to a supposedly unforgettable series.

In any case, it has great interviews of the crew, especially the screenwriters and producers. But the "interview" with Ridley Scott, is completely anti-climactic since it is a patchwork of interviews over the years. It does however, reveal the "practical genius" of the man, especially, when the actors, crew, and producers hated him during the film.

It definitely makes you realize how artistic vision and mass appeal are polar opposites in the film industry. Fun read.

The book reads easily and well, Sammon's style informal. He writes as one BR fan to another, a great approach. The production details are thorough, insightful, and wonderful to read, 441 pages in 18 chapters, with nine appendices containing interviews, production details, the cast list, etc. Sammon is a total BR devotee, I compliment and commend him on his achievement and the recognition of those who worked so hard to make BR.

There is vast information throughout from all members of the cast and crew, all of them supportive of Sammon's effort to tell their story. There is surprisingly liberal information from the movie's principals, Ridley Scott, Harrison Ford, Sean Young, Michael Deeley, Syd Mead, Hampton Fancher and David Peoples. One disappointment is the absence of direct input and comment from the soundtrack maestro, Vangelis. Sammon nevertheless gives him thorough justice.

Wonderful esoteric tidbits abound through the book, such as the revelation that the original lead was not Harrison Ford, but Dustin Hoffman. Edward James Olmos provides great background on his preparation for his role as Gaff and his detailed construction of his Cityspeak dialog (most of it sadly unused). We learn of fantastic special effects scenes never realized, and that in the background in one of the aerial city shots is a painted Millennium Falcon model. We learn that the process of creating this movie was a years-long, highly personal effort, first by Hampton Fancher to secure rights and create a screenplay, then later by Ridley Scott and other members of the team who continued to craft the film even after they were fired by the production company. It is a story of dedication to craft and art from a group of artists looking to raise diverse artistic, social, moral, and ethical issues with this genre-transcending film. I often was reminded of the documentary Hearts of Darkness, the story of Francis Ford Coppola's unending dedication to and struggles with the making of Apocalypse Now.

Highlighted superbly in the book is the true key to BR's success, Ridley Scott's intense attention to detail, his relentless questioning of the larger context and physical placement of the story. For example, Scott insisted on instructions painted on the futuristic parking meters in the street scenes. Absolutely illegible in the finished film, this sort of detail nonetheless set a compelling, even subconscious tone for the set and those who worked within it.

Particularly entertaining is Chapter 8, the scene by scene account of the shoot, with comment from the actors, producers, specialists, crew, and Scott. Also very useful for the true BR fanatic are the appendices listing all of the various BR versions, their formats, availability, and catalog information. Sammon does the same for the various soundtracks and musical compositions heard throughout the film, even the music and lyrics from the advertisements sported on the ad-blimps. Especially enjoyable is Appendix C's detailed list of "blunders," a compendium of the film's both obvious and subtle continuity errors, dubbing flaws, and inserted footage.

There are dozens of illustrations throughout the book, and Sammon gives due credit to BR's still photographer for the hundreds of stills that BR fans know and collect. The main problem is that the ONLY color photos in the entire book are on the front and back covers. The B/W photos in the book are small, grainy, poorly reproduced, and do not reflect Sammon's praise. These sorry photos do not allow the reader, who hasn't seen many of these never-before-published stills and production drawings, to revel in the details.

Sammon is overly obsessed with cataloging ALL of the different versions of the film, and detailing the most minute differences. We have chapter after repetitive chapter discussing the differences between the Workprint, the pre-release revisions, the theatrical release, the various video, broadcast, and satellite releases, as well as the competing director's cuts. The fascinating core tale of the political, economic, and artistic fights over all of these versions of the film is lost as Sammon loses track and focuses too closely on the details of the different versions, obsessing to the point of irrelevance on miniscule details. For the BR fanatic this is invaluable, but for most readers this makes the narrative tedious and repetitive, given this technical information is available also in Appendix B.

Sammon's promised discussion of BR's influence on sci-fi film is absent. His subtitle, "The Fascinating Story Behind the . . . Most Influential SF Film Ever Made" promises a discussion of BR's influence on filmdom. His discussion is poorly introduced, disorganized, and sorrowfully weak on supporting facts and testimonials, leading ultimately to the conclusion that BR simply is NOT the most influential sci-fi film of all time. In fact, the paltry six-page discussion of BR's influence is one of the shallowest, most poorly researched and organized parts of the entire book. Sammon's strength and enthusiasm clearly lie in the film's production details. Nowhere in the book does he cite any filmmaker, actor, editor, producer, or special effects artist describing BR as an influence.

This book is an invaluable acquisition for any die-hard BR fan, and a great memoir for any student of filmmaking. It's not for the casual BR or film fan; it's a cult book, just as Blade Runner is a cult film. Disappointingly, Sammon fails to deliver a crucial element of his work, a thorough and convincing discussion of BR's influence on cinema and its place in greater filmdom.

Written by Paul M. Sammon, the book takes us through the making of the film, the initial screenings and subsequent release, interviews with the cast and crew, the special effects, mistakes and problems with the film, the question of "Is Deckard a replicant?" and much, much more. This book is very much a reference book so it can be read in almost any order and referred to when you have questions that need answering.

The book provides some very interesting little insights into the film. One example, revealed during an interview with M. Emmet Walsh, is that Ridley Scott said that Walsh's character, Harry Bryant, had a stomach problem. This is the reason why he pours two shots for Deckard in his office and none for himself. He likes to see other people drinking since he can not.

The book is quite long and goes into a lot of detail, particularly in the section dealing with special effects. If you're not interested in such things it can be skipped over, however I am happy that it was included. It is better to have too much information than not enough. One thing that bothers me a bit is the fact that shortly before the book was to be published the publisher cut almost 300 pages of material from the book. This left Sammon scrambling to figure out what to cut and where to put important information from those deleted chapters in the book. There is talk of republishing the book in an expanded, more heavily illustrated version in 2002, to coincide with the 20th anniversary of Blade Runner's original release, but whether this will happen is not yet clear. A deleted chapter from the book about the BR crew has been made available online on the website 2019: Off World. Do a search on Yahoo! for 'Blade Runner' and you'll find it.

The book also contains appendices outlining the many versions of the film, the soundtracks and many other useful tidbits of information.

To sum up, this is a great book. It is a must for die-hard BR fans and for anyone who is interested in delving a little deeper into the mythology of Blade Runner.

The setting for this novel (which is really a loosely connected string of short stories) is the wild Caucasian mountains, to which Lermontov himself had been "exiled" to fight against the fierce Chechens. After the death of Pushkin, Lermontov took it upon himself to keep the great poet's legacy alive. The authorities did not take kindly to Lermontov's endeavour, and transferred the young officer to the war zone.

To 19th centrury Russian writers, the experience of the Caucasus and of 'Asiatics' in general was of tremendous value as a gauge of the value of Russian civilization. Juxtaposing Russian high society with the people of the steppes and the mountains became a familiar device in Russian literature, just like American Indians were used to symbolize the natural/unadulterated or the uncivilized/savage in American literature.

However, in "A Hero of Our Time" the officer Pechorin transcends the boundaries between culture and nature. In the early chapters of the book, Pechorin's adventures are described from outside, and seem extraordinary, bizzare, yet captivating. Later on, other stories are recounted in Pechorin's diary, and they draw a different picture of the modern hero: disillusioned, hateful, and profoundly unhappy. Life is a game which he has long mastered, he knows exactly how to play into people's pride, vanity and passion. Yet, at unlikely moments, a stir of long-forgotten emotion briefly produces a vulnerable, human hero with whom we, despite ourselves, are forced to identify...

The novel presents the misadventures of a Tsarist officer through the account of his early friend and through Pechorin's own diary. Pechorin is an immoral man, personifying the corruption of the early nineteenth century military classes in Russia.

For the concentration of the evils of Pechorin, for his treachery and seduction, this is a surprisingly 'modern' book, though written in the 1840s.

I recommend it for its economy and the strength of its portrayal of Pechorin. By his early death, Russian literature was robbed of a writer who may have joined the pantheon of the great Tsarist novelists.

Now, a book for the 21st Century, Ray and Anderson's The Cultural Creatives, is poised to have the greatest impact on Americans' understanding of themselves - and shaping of their future - since Megatrends. "The Cultural Creatives" is already joining the national lexicon as the name of the substantial American sub-culture - 50 million adults - that the authors identified after more than 100,000 questionnaires, 500 focus groups and scores of personal interviews.

The Cultural Creatives, who transcend normal demographic boundaries, are characterized by their values. They tend to: love nature and are concerned about its destruction; hold a holistic perspective; value relationships, psychological and spiritual development; support women's and children's issues; be optimistic about the future; be unhappy with both the left and right in politics and seek a new way that's not the "mushy middle." The authors present 18 "values statements" that tend to define the population.

The Cultural Creatives is not only an immensely important work on American culture at this critical time -- with implications for marketing, politics and most aspects of American life -- it is also a fascinating, easy and accessible read. The authors present complete profiles of America's three sub-cultures -- The Cultural Creatives, The Moderns and The Traditionals -- along with historical context for all the groups and a collection of personal stories of cultural creatives from all walks of life ... and how they found their way into this group that's intent on generating "a future that works for everyone."

Not to be missed by anyone interested in the personal and social transformation emerging worldwide.

As soon as I bought and read this book I sent it to a daughter in Tucson, who was beseiged by her colleagues for information, copies of the graphs, etc, so I never got the book back. I consider it not lost but joyfully seeding its miraculous message in another environment. I will buy another copy and probably give it away, too. Thanks to the authors. I heard Ray interviewed this morning on Jefferson Public Radio in Southern Oregon and hope he and his fellow author will continue their work, encouraging all of us who are Cultural Creatives and now know that we're not alone! In light, Nancy M. Davison.

Psychologists Paul Ray and Sherry Anderson have written a handbook for people who are working to make this world a better place. Their book, THE CULTURAL CREATIVES - HOW 50 MILLION PEOPLE ARE CHANGING THE WORLD - is a guidebook for those who are interested in saving the planet, nurturing their personal relationships, and being sensitive without being stomped on.

You might be a Cultural Creative if you're into: books and music; arts and culture; stories; social causes, especially issues dealing with women and children; and authenticity. The authors have created an interesting test to gauge where you stand in the mix and use a lot of graphs throughout the book to identify cultural creatives and their issues.

If you're from the '60s and you've ever wondered what to do with all the energy created during that period of our lives, this book will open your eyes. If you've sometimes felt like an alien in your own family, the authors will offer you comfort because you're not alone. Even if you're just wondering why cultural creatives are so passionate about their lives, this planet, and their causes, this book will help you put it all together.

Cultural Creatives include such personalities as: Pope John Paul XXIII; Martin Luther King, Jr.; The Dalai Lama; Annie Dillard; Georgia O'Keeffe; Marc Chagall; Yo-Yo Ma; Robert Redford; Katharine Hepburn; and Bill Moyers. Pretty good company, don't you think?

While the book represents a lot of research on the part of the authors, the data is never presented in a dry, boring format. I found it hard to put the book down. The information resonated with me -- I'm from the 60's -- and it gave me hope for the future of our species and our planet.

Enjoy!

As Wilson mentions in the book's introduction, Legacies marks the second 'Repairman Jack' novel in roughly 15 years. Those who read and loved Jack in 'The Tomb' will find 'Legacies' no disappointment, although not quite as tightly written as his first novel. While 'The Tomb' relied on the occult as a backdrop, the mysteries in 'Legacies' are somewhat more mundane in nature. Who are the secret organizations after Jack's clients' house? Why do those powers find the house so important? What happened in the house to cause Jack's client to refuse to step foot inside even decades later?

As enjoyable as 'Legacies' was for the R.J. fan, I would imagine that readers new to the character would find him a little too 2-dimensional for comfort. Although Wilson attempts to walk a fine line between repeating character development covered in the first book and keeping the current plot moving forward, I think he tended to short-change rea! ders new to the character. While he makes an admirable effort at recapping points from 'The Tomb', a more subtle-yet-detailed approach may have proved more effective. The element most notably lacking for readers new to Repairman Jack is motive. Although we get a small taste of why RJ is the way he is, it's not enough to help the reader appreciate the character the same way we did in the first book. A stronger explaination of Jack's background and motives could have made a good book even better. In short, although this book is highly enjoyable on its own merits, readers unfamiliar with the Repairman Jack character will get much more from 'Legacies' if they read 'The Tomb' first.

The plot in LEGACIES is more along the lines of a mystery than THE TOMB, and it kept me guessing all the way. The heroine, Alicia, is a real tough cookie, but you eventually come to know why, and you really feel for her. (As a bonus, I think I found a link to SIBS, one of Wilson's other novels.)

If I have a quibble, I'd say I would have preferred a supernatural element in the story, but that's just a personal thing. All in all, I haven't enjoyed a novel this much in a long time. Highly recommended.