I was expecting this to be a sequel to Eugene Ionesco's The Bald Soprano, but silly me, it's actually about being bald, which has nothing to do with the famous French playwright's play, despite its title. Nor does the play have anything to do with the recent popular cable TV drama, since it was written several decades before the show premiered, even though James Gandolfini looks like a pretty good "Bald Soprano" to me. But then Nietzsche's book, The Gay Science, has nothing to do with the Gay/Lesbian scene, either.

As someone who's hairline is receding even faster than his stock portfolio (which is saying something these days), or whose scalp is being denuded faster than the Brazilian rainforest at an industrial defoliants convention, I found this to be a valuable book on how to cope with baldness. You can't have too many books about balding in your library, I always say, and this one is chock full of valuable advice. Highly recommended.

This is the best book my husband has ever read. He finally realized the reason I love him has nothing to do with the hair on his head. In fact, his single brother finally shaved his head and he has more dates than when he was sporting the over-the-head sweep.After getting use to a shaved head, it seems, most men appear more confident, ie funny and confortable to be with. For any woman that needs to give their loved one a little boost give them this book!

This is a magnificent book. Even for readers like myself, with a luxuriant coif, it was an eye-opener. I have been getting in touch with my "inner coot" and going through the dynamics of "powerbalding" even though I am not myself a slaphead. First rate.

I first read Walt Disney's Epcot Center right after the park had first opened. It's Awesome! If your a Disney nut like I am, you will definately like this book. It gives all of the ideas Walt Disney had for the Experimental Prototype Community Of Tommorrow.(EPCOT)

This book offered me a great chance to see EPCOT Center as it was formed and created. It also looks deeply into each of the origanal rides including both Future World and World Showcase areas. The conceptual art work in this book is also increadible. This book also has many photos of the inside and outside of the rides. For the avad fan or for the first timer I suggest this book

This book is divided into two seperate and distinct sections, one covering all aspects of GMAW and the other the GTAW welding process. If your interest is purely in joining metals rather than weld specifications and metallurgy, this is the book for you. It covers everything from specific machine setup, gas pressures and welding techniques to the shade of eyeshield lens that should be used. There are also dedicated sections on weld defects and probable causes which assist in overcoming welding technique and equipment setup faults. I found the book to be excellent value for money and to contain most of the useful information found in other books available on this subject, presented in a format that does not require the reader to wade through pages of text to find the information required. If the GMAW and GTAW processes are new to you and you have previous Oxy-Acetylene and/or Arc welding experience, this book is a must.

This collection beautifully captures both the magic of letters and the exotic, turbulent China-Burma-India theater of World War II. The devotion this couple, Richard and Reva Beard, have for each other will renew your faith in steadfast love. Their daughter Elaine Pinkerton has added her intriguing, informative historical essays, enriching the reader's imagination and understanding of this little-recognized part of WWII.
You'll find yourself marking letters to re-read later - for their moving sentiment or marvelous wit. Whether you read "From Calcutta with Love" for literary or historical reasons, you'll be amply satisfied.

Having a loved older brother who fought in the European theater of World War II, I've always been fascinated by that time and events. But I'd never known anything about the China-Burma-India theater. So "From Calcutta with Love" was a fascinating story about two very real people. The commitment to their marriage, each other, and their future family was rather inspiring. The times weren't as the romantic movies often portray, but often very difficult even if not in combat. I really enjoyed getting to know about the people, places, and things even before getting to the letters. That helped to make it all so real and honest. By the time I finished I felt like I really knew Richard and Reva. What wonderful parents they must have been!

Elaine Pinkerton's "From Calcutta with Love" offers a unique way to look at World War II. I enjoyed learning about the China-Burma-India theater of operations and getting to know about Richard and Reva Beard through their daily letters. Their devotion was the old-fashioned kind, their relationship one that could serve as a model for today. The book is a powerful reminder of the way WWII tested values, built character and deepened love affairs. "From Calcutta with Love" stayed with me long after I read the epilogue. I was entertained, touched, and inspired!

An author's first novel will set the tone of his career. Therefore, the career of Richard Beard is one that I shall be following. In "X20", Beard involves the reader with a host of characters. He has shown the ability to give depth to his subjects, and allow them to grow throughout the novel.

This book does seem to start off with a noticeable lack of focus. The author tells the story from a several different points in time, jumping back and forth between periods in his life. Hearing the story from the start and the finish concurrently can be a little overwhelming at first, but that is soon remedied. By the end of the book, I was wishing that there were more cigarettes in a pack. This is a very worthy read for smokers and non-smokers alike.

More than a book about smoking, Beard's character finds himself addicted to memories, lust, love and companionship. Living in a world he can't really get into, but can't give up.

The book is written in the style of a man trying to give up smoking, writing entries to keep his hands busy and the length of the entries as well as thier content, show the withdraw. The main characters life unravels through these entries as well which give it a nice touch. At times witty, at times rather morbid, this book is a great read. Though I don't like this edition's cover art... cough, cough...

Preparing cow brains and eels might be simple for some, but most will find this a very impractical guide to French cooking. "Pretentious French Food," would be a more appropriate title.

Olney is acknowledged by the best in the food field (like Alice Waters of Chez Panisse in Berkeley) as an unimpeachable source of excellence in understanding, tasting, and (by the way) cooking French food. He is, I must acknowledge, opinionated, even arrogant -- he is also almost always right. This book should be read as well as cooked with; absorb it through the skin if you can. My favorites include roasted calf's liver -- absolutely sublime -- and lamb shanks with garlic (unforgettably good). As a european, I acknowledge his view of scrambled eggs as they should be -- soft and creamy, not the overcooked, dried-out buffet eggs of the american breakfast table. And his recipe for poached eggs is perfect -- boil water, turn off the flame, break in eggs, cover, leave.

Simple french food doesn't mean simple cooking; it actually takes real work. But this is the best overall treatise I have read (among hundreds). My second copy is falling apart, I have given it to many friends and I will go on buying it until they take me to the great restaurant in the sky. Don't be without it.

I am a true devotee of Olney's food and wine writing and place "Simple French Food" at the top of his list of books, even over "The French Menu Cookbook." No, the word "simple" in the title does not mean that the book contains recipes that are necessarily quick and easy, although there are some. Instead, "simple" refers to the food itself. It's the food (historically, at least) found in french country restaurant and home kitchens - soul satisfying food that has little if anything to do with showy "eye-candy" found in the famed three star establishments. Wonderful gratins, terrines, roasts, daubes ... that truly maximize the flavor of the ingredients listed in the recipes. Olney was an American artist who lived in France for decades and over the years became an expert on French food and wine. Indeed, he was widely respected by the French for his expertise (no mean accomplishment!). He is often cited by now famous American chefs for his influence on their careers (for example, Alice Waters, Mark Miller, James Peterson, Jeremiah Tower). While some might think his writing style verbose, I consider it to be uniquely informative and entertaining. I only wish he had written more books before his untimely death. (This review is based on the hardbound volume printed in 1974)

The conceit of this book is that it is always the same day--November 1, 1993. It traces the lives of a number of different characters but, even though they age as the book progresses, the day is the same. It is an interesting structure but I don't see that it adds a lot to the story.

Additionally, there are many things that are hard to pin down. Beard is constantly giving lists of possibilities. For example "somewhere in the Kingdom, in Quarndon or Northampton or Newry or York, in Kirkcaldy or Yeovil or Lincoln or Neath" runs part of the first sentence of the novel. A couple paragraphs later it's "somewhere in the Kingdom, in Harlow or Widnes or Swansea or Ayr, in Reading or Glentoran or Nantwich or Hull." This is followed by many more place-name lists. And he doesn't just do this with places. We're given possible advertisements, sporting events, magazines, TV shows, and on and on with the lists. I found this to be very irritating after awhile and started breezing through these lists to get to the meat of the story.

And Beard does have something interesting to say here. He is saying something about how people tend to look for a sign to help them know whether they are living right rather than making decisions for themselves. Everybody in this novel is looking for a conversion experience (like Paul's on the road to Damascus--hence, the title) to know with absolute certainty that what they've chosen is the perfect thing. Of course, this leads these characters to empty lives.

And herein lies the main problem with this novel for me--the characters. They are somewhat interesting but mostly unlikable and then, in the last few pages of the novel, they all change. They all somehow overcome their inhibitions and do the right thing for themselves. The potential serial killer realizes his problems, the boy and girl overcome their fears and get together, and the man trapped indoors by panic attacks can go outside. Perhaps they all had the conversion experience they needed but I couldn't buy it. They just didn't seem like real people.

Like Geoff Nicholson's Bleeding London, Damascus relies on a great deal of intersecting between characters, times and places. Beard uses this very interesting technique as well as a non-linear timeline to tell a compelling and often hilarious story. His characters are incredibly well developed and his writing is accomplished.

This is probably one of the most refreshing books I've read to date. It's rich form kept me interested, allowing me to finish it within a week between long hours at school and tons of homework. The parallel lives of the two main characters--meeting at certain points in their lives without ever knowing it--helped culminate a lovely, almost innocent love story. It's a novel about stepping out of your rut in life, taking chances and risks. I bet the next day was November 2, 1993 :-)

I bought this book with the intention of learning more in depth use of actionscript with all of its wonders...Instead, I was bombarded with too much game design stuff. The table of contents was misleading and the focus of the book was useless for true web design.

There are many books out there for actionscript, I suggest any of the others.

Friends of Ed has been publishing great books on Macromedia Flash consistently in the recent months, and this one actually has some fundamental coverage like concept design and project structure then moved on to advance topics such as XML integration, Generator, etc. Basically a little bit of everything starting from the intermediate level Flash developers can use. My only complaints is the black and white printing, and no CD-Roms, but all the source files can be download from Friends of Ed's web site. Keep up the good work FOE!

This book is, along with Moock's Actionscript book for O'Reilly, the first really solid book covering programming in Flash 5. That includes good stuff on planning projects, code structuring, OOP, design, and XML much more in depth than any other Flash book I've seen. It is definately advanced, perhaps not to the point of some of the hardcore OOP coders on the Flash lists, but quite complex and more than enough to challenge most readers, which is good.

The projects are good and varied, and it seems like Friends of Ed has at last gotten someone to insure that coding styles are reasonably consistant throughout the book--other of their Flash books have been essentially collections of inconsistant and often incompatible articles. The usual suspects do show up (spaceship games and rotating 3D cubes), but presented with a level of detail and thoroughness totally absent in other books (short tutorial in matrix math anyone?)

The great chapters on Sound and XML are almost worth the price alone, but the standout chapter is called "Creativity in Practice" and covers invaluable stuff like: working in teams, interaction planning, prototyping, information architecture, even some usability. In other words, the stuff that professional designers do the 80% of the time they're not messing around with software. It's exciting to see these topics appear in what could have been just another coding book.

I won't dock it a star, but one qualm is that it doesn't come with a CD (again contrary to Kevin's review below). You have to download about 80Megs of files from the publishers site. Come on guys, if there's no CD at least knock a few bucks off the price. And even at high-speeds, that 80Meg download is kind of a pain.