"The Best of Pif Magazine Off-Line" offers a refreshing assortment of new stories and new voices. A standout among them is Mimi Carmen's "Love Birds". Ms. Carmen's tale of an aging mother and conflicted daughter resonates with idiosyncratic vision and gritty passion. The bird imagery is breathtaking. I also very much enjoyed "23 Johnson Avenue, 1985" by Diann Blakely. If writers were race horses, and I had money, I'd bet my wad on these two.

A wonderful collection - refreshingly different, but solid. My favorite is "Love Birds" by Mimi Carmen. I'd like to read more of her work.

I am bored with many print magazines nowadays. The same things, the same things. Ho-hum. I've been following this zine for a while now, open it every month with relish. They've definitely picked a lot of their best, and Camille Renshaw's intro says a lot about WHY I don't like other magazines. Here is something worth a read, something that will make you want to get everything the magazine has put out since the beginning. There's even a rationale for professional wrestling, something that wants me to buy a tape of the event with the Undertaker/Mankind Hell in the Cell match, and I NEVER watch that stuff! You should definitely have this on your shelf--impress your friends with how in the know you are.

This is the first book I have seen on the use of herbs as bonsai material. It is great book. It is informative and very descriptive with many black and white illustrations used to help explain text. Having only one-hundred pages, it is packed full of information on selecting herbs (including author recommended choices) suitable for use as bonsai. Training, developing, potting, shaping, caring for, and displaying herbal bonsai are all covered in detail. References and resources include mail-order nurseries. Terrific for beginners who don't want to invest a lot of money, but would like to try their hand at this hobby.

Before i took my ACT last june, i studied with this book, it was awfully inaccurate, with the practice tests, my average scores ranged from 17-21 and on the real test my scores came out 25-26! This October I am taking my ACT again and obtained a real ACT sample test - which i scored very high on ranging f rom 25-34. With this book, my scores are still around 17-21.... i wonder about that! The sample tests are extremely inaccurate, they do not portray the ACT accurately or even resemble the test. Plus, i've found many mistakes in every section. It's nonsense and not worth buying!

I used 4 ACT Preps and this one was by far my favorite! It did lack in some capacities as compared to the other texts but it definitely filled a lot of holes that other test preps didn't even approach which is what I think ultimately led me to score a 35!

The book and CD were very great but the ACT is too hyped up. You can receive a great score without ever buying a book to help you study.

The editors have tried to add value to this rather unexciting collection of letters and brief diary by interspersing their own comments among the letters. This is all very well when they stick to facts, but too often they inflict their own 20th-century political beliefs upon the readers. That's particularly annoying considering the lip service paid to "objectivity" in the foreword.

The letters themselves are not exactly thrilling. The soldier in question saw little action and his letters (typically of Civil War letters) concern themselves mostly with relatives he's met and what he wants to have sent from home. His prison diary is interesting mostly in that its tone differs markedly from that of the letters; it's emotional and romantic, whereas the letters are downright dull. Still, the diary offers little factual information -- though he does undermine his editors' hoopla by stating that he was actually treated reasonably well. Whether he was "unreconstructed", as the editors claim, is unknown, because no post-war writings of his own are included.

I'd skip this. The editing is annoying and the primary material adds nothing new or entertaining to the wealth of Civil War primary sources already in print.

Sojourns of a Patriot is a compelling read. It esentially follows the life a Confederate infantryman, Corporal A.P. Adamson, throughout his tenure of the War Between the States. The book is composed primarily of his letters home and a journal he kept for the last year of the war. Secondarily, the editors provide comment and explanation to some of the entries. Most revealing were the roles that camp gossip played in his thoughts on the morale of the Southern troops. Also quite interesting were the false or incomplete pieces of "news" that reached Southern camps. This aspect of the book provides the reader with an insight that is often not present in regimental or campaign histories. Often, readers know the outcome of the battle, the makeup of the casualty list, or the result of a particular election. The letters in this book permit the reader an escape from that biased knowledge and to live through the life of the writer. The love of the writer for his home, his yearning for a return to his previous life, and his concern for the future are poignantly brought to the fore through his letters to various family members. However, some of the best writing is not included in these letters, but is in his later journal. These entries are poetry disguised as prose. The images brought forth by his writings are disturbing, comforting, melancholic, and often heart-wrenching. Brief though they are, they are some of the most powerful writings of the War this reader has encountered. The only detractor to the book is in the commentaries by the editors. They focussed a little more than was perhaps necessary on the personal histories of peripheral protagonists. Some of the information was repititious. However, in their defence, the editors do warn the reader of this in the beginning and they do have personal bias to this information. Additionally, the other commentaries they provide would be useful to readers who may not be as familiar with the conflict (in fact, these could have been expanded somewhat, but there is a conscious effort by the editors to provide suggested readings which are appropriate for each entry). Overall, I highly recommend this book to any person interested in the War Between the States. It will be especially appealling to readers with interest in the personal experiences of the war and an informative diversion to those readers who generally limit themselves to straight histories.