This book deals with a series of very little-known murders in country Western Australia in around 1929. Arthur Upfield, who was to become famous for his fictional detective, Detective-Inspector Napolean Bonaparte, was discussing his latest murder plots. Snowy Rowles, who was present, later put the same plot into effect, and three men disappeared. Rowles later hung for the crimes.

Terry Walker has VERY thoroughly researched his topic, and though some very small parts of the book might make for dull reading, this is so only because he has left nothing out. It must be regarded as the definitive account of the case, and for anybody who is interested it is invaluable.

Arthur Bloch's books make great reading, and are quite simply hilarious. There are hundreds of brilliantly insightful and laugh-out-loud genius sayings and observations that I remember and laugh about for years... the fact that this guy comes up with hundreds of these little sayings and "laws" blows my mind. He truly has an Einsteinian sense of humor---I really love the way this guy's mind works. Some of these are pretty sharp wit and cleverness too.

To be honest, I don't get why these books aren't #1 bestsellers, because I can read them over and over and be in stitches. I always love reading his stuff.

One of my favorite books of this genre... Everyone should have a copy.

This book is legendary. With humor and wit it explains in "layman's terms" the laws which govern the mishaps and mayhem in our lives! For example, did you know that the probability of a piece of toast falling butter side DOWN onto the floor is in direct proportion to the value of the rug which it lands on? The "laws" are too funny and all too true. You'll find yourself quoting from this book!

Imagine that the chief executive of a major record company died of a heart attack. His staff strangle all the members of the in-house orchestra, say the Vienna Philharmonic, chief conductor to the fore, laying them carefully in performance layout in an underground concert hall. The executive himself is placed with attendants (also strangled) in a fully-equipped recording room to one side. Next to each player was his (or, occasionally, her) instrument on which the murderer had first inscribed its tuning. Beside the bodies were illustrations of the musicians in performance, though sadly no scores. Then a roof was put up and the whole tomb encased in earth for a little over two-thousand four-hundred years.
This scenario may sound fantastic, it may even sound curiously tempting to some. It is also exactly what happened in central China. In the Winter of 1977 a unit of the Chinese People's Liberation Army was called in to level a small hill, such that a factory could be built near the town of Suizhou, which lies to the north of the city of Wuhan in Hubei Province. Breaking into a hitherto unknown burial pit of obvious antiquity, the soldiers quickly called in the archaeologists. The discovery that followed was the most remarkable in Chinese musical history to date, and one unparalleled among any of the other ancient cultures, whether in Asia, Africa, Europe or the Americas.
Laid out according to the model of a classical Chinese palace, the stone-lined tomb contained everything the Bronze Age despot would need for a successful, upwardly mobile after-life: an ornately lacquered wooden double coffin to shield both his bones and his dignity; several thousand weapons, pieces of armour and bronze chariot fittings; the bodies of twenty-one women (each strangled-presumably to keep her body pure) and a dog (method of death sadly unrecorded); and, best of all, a full set of ritual musical instruments, including a sixty-five-piece ensemble of studded bronze bells and thirty-two tuned chime stones. Inscriptions on the bronze implements identified the tomb's incumbent as Marquis Yi of Zeng, a minor and long-defunct state in central China. They also recorded that the bell set was presented to Marquis Yi by his powerful neighbour the King of Chu in the King's fifty-sixth year (i.e. 433 B.C.).
Superbly well-preserved in the central "ceremonial courtyard" of the subterranean palace, each bell produced two distinct pitches, depending on where it was struck. The set as a whole had a range of over five octaves, much of it fully chromatic in semitones. Drums, stringed instruments and wind instruments, as well as the above-mentioned lithophones, completed the ensemble. Some of the instruments or other ritual materials found in the tomb bore scenes depicting the making of music. The bells themselves were decorated with both the names of their two pitches in absolute terms and the identification of these in terms of relative pitch, a duplication that means we can today measure both their respective pitches and establish the tonal systems within which the set as a whole was played. The inclusion of five sets of beaters even gives a fairly strong hint as to how many musicians were required to perform the bells.
Discovered at the very beginning of the period of reconstruction following the Cultural Revolution, these instruments, most especially the bell set, have already attracted major attention in China. Recordings of a replica ensemble are available at many tourist sites across the country (though sadly the music chosen is less interesting). By the mid-1990s, enterprising Hubei peasants had taken to buying replica bells from Shanghai's Jiaotong University. These bells are then buried in the paddy fields for a year or two to age them and then sold on to unsuspecting foreign tourists, who are warned not to tell Chinese Customs-antiquities not being legally exportable). Whatever the moral issues of this exchange, the bells are extremely good-looking objects, and they deserve to be better known overseas.
Music in the Age of Confucius (or, actually, a century or so later) is exactly the book to carry out this process. Drawing together the widely scattered fruits of twenty years of research, it talks the reader through the various unprecedented discoveries, and was published on the occasion of the exhibition of instruments from the tomb of Marquis Yi at the Smithsonian Institution, Washington in 2000. Lavishly illustrated with photographs, many of them in colour, it is expertly written by a team of contributors who have kept in mind the intelligent, lay public likely to attend the exhibition. Five chapters examine, in turn, music at the time of Marquis Yi, percussion instruments, strings, winds and the importance of the instruments for our understanding of Chinese music history as a whole. In each case, the material from Marquis Yi's tomb is used as the focal point in a review of discoveries from other sites and references in the surviving literature and relics of the period. Supporting material in the book includes a chronology, map, glossary of characters, reference list, scale diagrams of instruments and an index. This adds up to a fascinating and engaging read, eminently open to the reader new to Chinese music.

Perhaps the most detailed musicological study of all of the compositons - not just the operettas - of Sir Arthur Sullivan. This is a relatively slim book, but it is packed with musical examples, analysis and commentary. This is definately a book for those with a musical education, a music theory book and dictionary or perhaps simply a Ph.D. in Musicology, is a good companion for reading Hughes' book.

The book analyzes Arthur Sullivans style, breaking it down into chapters dealing with musical forms such as melody, harmony, word setting, orchestration, etc. Copious examples in musical notation and snippets from scores, many from very obscure non-Savoy operas. (E.g. quotes from "The Zoo" which was still officially lost at the time of the original edition).

Hughes takes a very objective style, unusual for a books on Sullivan which tend be limited to the more prosaic descriptions of his operettas. He takes Sullivan to task for some of his failings (e.g. harmon! y) and praises him where appropriate (e.g. melody and word setting).

A unique and very detailed tome!

Ord-Hume presents an exhaustive work on the subject of music box collecting. This book has almost everything you need to know including identification of tune-sheets, manufacturers, music box styles and types. He includes a guide to values which is probably already out-dated, but it gives a good idea of what different boxes are worth.

If you want to know what a rigid formation box is, it's in there. If you want to know the difference between a mandoline box and a organeoclide, you'll learn it there. It's an excellent reference book, and I even read it as I would a novel, it's that well presented.

I enjoyed this book very much. It is a story of a family's shared love for nature. The author tells the story of his relationship with his father and how they were brought together by fishing on the Oyster River on Vancouver Island, British Columbia. A variety of personal stories interweave the outdoor experiences with the aging of the father and the maturation of the son. The story is completed with a section written by Arthur Mayse's own daughter after his death.

My Legal Warrior: Arthur Petersen, My "Spate Liebe" is the touching and sensitive account of an American attorney who use his legal skills against two unique evils of the twentieth century: Nazi war criminals and culpable asbestos companies. It is the story of how as a young man in his 20s, Petersen was brought to Europe in 1948 to try Nazi war crime cases in Nuremberg. Esther Genal was a 17 year old German girl attending school in a building that abutted the Nuremberg courthouse. Almost fifty years later the two met after beginning a telephone friendship from Esther's home in Bamberg Germany, with Arthur who owned homes in Saginaw, Michigan and Sanibel Island, Florida. She married Arthur in 1995 despite his being confined to a wheelchair, being diabetic, and weighing more than 300 pounds. My Legal Warrior is the story of Esther's life. Her father Josef Genal worked at various jobs and moved from town-to-town voicing his opposition views against Adolph Hitler and the Nazis. After the war Esther married and had a family with Eduard Sandner. My Legal Warrior will have special appeal to readers who enjoy autobiographies and memoirs of people caught up in unusual times, who live there lives as best they can, confront the evils of their times, and continue to seek happiness for themselves and their loved ones into their "twilight years".

Arthur Marx has written a wonderful narrative of his life as the son of Groucho Marx. In this book, you will find out about Groucho's likes and dislikes... what drove his wives to divorce, and a great deal of "the real Groucho" from someone very close to him. What was most interesting to me was the sad ending to this comedic genius' life and how his estate was ultimately resolved. A wonderful insight into Groucho's personal life.

Not only is this a collection of some lesser know works by Levi, but it is edited by A.E. Waite, one of the more important occultists of last century,and designer of the most influential and popular tarot deck this century. Waites knowledge turns this into an extraordinary buy.