There are now two editions of Boyle, the older version with an orange cover and the Barred Owl, and a newer version with a photo of a Hooded Warbler on the front. You'll want to make sure you get the latter, since many things have changed over the years.

It is one of the milder species of blasphemy, I suppose, to call any book one's "bible"; but since its appearance 17 years ago (!), Bill Boyle's NJBFG has served thousands of the birding faithful as ritual object and authoritative companion alike. My own copy of the first printing, with its ugly laminated binding in shreds and the bookblock bulging from tipped-in notes, photocopies, and clippings, is probably the single most used volume in my birding library: field guides come and go, but for nearly two decades now, Boyle has come and gone wherever I have.
Just how intensive my use of the book has been came clear to me with the arrival--"long-awaited," in the reviewer's cliche--of the second edition. As I read through the new treatments of areas long familiar to me, I discovered that (like many NJ birders) I'd actually memorized verbatim great chunks of the first edition, and that I noticed every new word and every new turn of phrase in the revised accounts. If it is true that every obsession is at its base religious, then this book truly is the birder's bible.
The birder's bible: divine in inspiration, certainly, but here and there the mortal nature of its human author peeks through. As anyone who has ever written anything knows, it is even more difficult to revise than to write, and this revised edition has some flaws that were not apparent in the first. There are far more copy-editing errors this time around, and the index--more important than ever, given the new book's rather breathless layout--is not an infallible help (just try to find the main entry for Merrill Creek!). Compared to the enjoyably expansive style of the first edition, the new entries strike me as occasionally a bit too concise, a problem that might have been eased by simply eliminating even more of the old sections treating sites that, like the Institute Woods, now offer (in Boyle's words) "the mere shadow" of their former glory; valuable space is also sacrificed to a number of new full-page illustrations.
These things having been said, the book is still an outstanding example of the bird-finding guide. The maps seem to be largely up to date and accurate (Sussex County birders: are Rockport and Blackdirt marshes really the same place?), the annotated species list is even more useful than in the first edition, and the binding isn't likely to crackle and peel. It will take only weeks, I am sure, for New Jersey birders to start quoting this new Boyle, chapter and verse.

This book is just as useful for seasoned birders as it is for the beginner, or the person new to New Jersey. Beginners will appreciate its review of New Jersey's best birding destinations; seasoned pros will enjoy the depth of the information and the amount of detail on nesting species and accounts of rarities.

For us locals, "Bird Finding" is great for those days when you want to hop in the car and travel to somewhere a little different, or if you want to explore a familiar destination a little more closely. The book offers detailed directions (although some of the exit numbers and streets have changed since its publication date), including which trail to follow, which tree to investigate, etc. Its accuracy is remarkable. It's clear Bill Boyle knows each location intimately and visits them often.

This is a must-have for any birder living in the state (and there are lots), and any vacationer planning to spend more than a weekend in New Jersey.

This book is truly incredible!Sometimes,I can`t believe my eyes. The original purpose of this book is to make people care about the ecosystems and why we should not destroy them.But I don`t know if this is a suitable purpose for a book like this one. The splendid photographs makes you forget that and just look at the true beauty of our planet. Over 200 locations and 250 illustrations makes a perfect view of world wildlife. Among my favourites are the mexican deserts,the Pantanal Rainforest and all of the underwater photographs. I am a lover of all kinds of animals,especially fishes. So that`s why the book is perfect for me. I recognize Frans Lanting and David Doubilet since earlier,and I got books by them both. Galen Rowell is new to me,but he seems to be very good too. And when these three photographs together,the results easily become the most beautifull nature photography book ever made!It is pretty expensive,but believe me,it`s worth the money. I highly recommend this to every lover of nature photographs or strong colours. It is truly inspiring.

It would be difficult indeed to over-estimate the sheer beauty of the photographs printed on the pages of Living Planet. Of course the three photographers were off to a great start as the subject matter they are presenting is riveting. There are so many truly exotic (and still unspoiled) locales explored here. And so many diverse, truly impressive plant and animal forms documented.

But these three gifted photographers are superbly inspired practioners and so they are able to elevate the naturally exalted to an entirely new level of organisation. This is accomplished specifically, at least in part, by the use of super-saturated color in combination with consistently fresh and geometrically complex composition. The results, printed with great care by Crown Publishers, are extraordinary!

The photography is so visually stunning that it is easy to forget the purpose of this book which was published by the World Wildlide Fund. Thus the text, which is teeming with information, emphasises not the beauty of what has been captured on film. Rather it focuses on the steadily progressing ecological nightmare as humans-induced species extinction of animal and plant life proceeds around the globe in an unchecked and relentless manner. To quote briefly from the introduction by Walter Cronkite, "Earth is losing one-hundred species of animals, plants, insects and fungi every day. Experts estimate that the world has lost one-third of its biological wealth over the last thirty years." Astonishing facts the sobriety of which contrasts mightily with the visual celebration of life as depicted in this wonderfully elegant volume.

It was interesting to note that this book is among several top 10's in science. It must result from good educational institutions: I saw this book courtesy of my daughter and was able to spend time with it over the holidays. There is an urgent message here, as everyone knows and WWF is able to get important people on board, not only with endorsements but with their explanations of the threat the world's ecology is facing. This book does a good job of framing out the larger picture already set by books this year which have given compelling narratives also illustrating the biodiversity crisis-- Goodall's Reason for Hope, Johnson and Coates' Nabokov's Blues, and other books like Quammen's Song of the Dodo. Its good to see all these books getting attention. It is going to take a mammoth awareness to really move the world, most of whom will never see amazon.com and this review away from the global destruction that today is most often the norm.

This is one of the best McDonald's collectibles books I've seen! This book includes detailed color pictures, very accurate descriptions, release dates, and an estimated value for a wide variety of McDonald's figures including premuims released in the United States and Internationally. A very thorough and informative guide to McDonald's fast food toys!

I love this book. I looked at this book in a bookstore. This books has all the toys from 1970 to 1997. I aslo love eating at McDonalds.

Good book, although they could devote a whole volume to Grimace

I was very impressed by the quality of the binding of this book, as well as the paper. It has been very difficult putting this little book down. Now I am enjoying reading this New Testament, and it really isn't difficult to understand, even with the original spelling. I highly recommend this book.

The worst thing that ever happened to the Bible was division into chapter and verse notation. When that happened it ceased to be so much a holy book as it became a law book. Prior to such notation one had to read the scriptures as a whole. One had to absorb the Spirit of the whole, instead of using a pick-and-choose study approach of those specific lines (usually taken out of context) that supported one's specific agenda. Indeed, text and verse division did not come into being until the 16th century- long after the end of high point of traditional Christiandom and the start of the age of the profane. The Tyndale is a wholistic work uncorrupted by artificial text and verse division. No doubt this was why the ruling class of the day considered it to be so dangerous.

Tyndale translated this work, alone, from the original Greek. This is not the work of a committee with an ax to grind. Actually, this is the translation that all English Bibles, including the King James, was based on until the 20th century. It seems no one else even attempted to translate the whole book from scratch into English from Greek until the modern age. Unless you can read Koine Greek yourself, it is still the best alternative.

I have heard various experts state that the King James version "eliminated" biases in the Tyndale. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The King James is in fact an edited and censored version of the Tyndale. If there was intensional bias involved it was in the minds of the rich and powerful who had Tyndale and his Bible consigned to the flames- and replaced with a "politically correct" substitute.

Tyndale's sole purpose was to get the undistorted, uncorrupted, word of God, as best he knew it, to the English people. He gave his life for that purpose. I prefer to trust his version for this reason.

The Word of God Preserved by God for the English speaking people by the promise of God. Psalms 12:6-7 The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever. Tyndale gave his life to get the Bible to the English people. Tyndale was caught: betrayed by an Englishman that he had befriended. Tyndale was incarcerated for 500 days before he was strangled and burned at the stake in 1536. His last words were, "Lord, open the eyes of the King of England". The start of the line of 7 English Bibles which ends with the crowning jewel the Authorized Version know as the King James Version. I must for Bible collectors. Best deal on the market. Other sites sale for $(...). I got mine used and it is brand new for $(...). Amazon is the way to go. Recommend the 1611 replica of the King James also. Also the 1560 Geneva Bible.

I really like this book, it brought out a great imagination of what it might have been like for Lehi and his family. I really recommend it!

Pillar of Fire is not only a good read but also an important fictionalization of a period all but lost to the Western world. There are scores of doctrinal and historical treatments of the Book of Mormon, but no other author has succeeded so well in characterizing the historical setting of the text. The historical elements of the story are instructional and the fictional elements provide the rich background so often missing when we remember those who sacrificed to preserve our sacred scriptures. The Promised Land series is great for LDS and non-LDS audiences and will become a classic in LDS literature.

Wonderful book. I could not put it down from the moment I started. It is the type of book that you feel like you are actually there. I Have wonder how it must of been like for these people and what kind of people they were and how they lived? I can't wait til the 2nd one is out. Can someone tell me when that will be out.

Thank you

I went to my library to check out "A Sight for Sore Eyes" as I was trying to describe it to a friend and wanted to re-read it for some details. Discovered "The Lake of Darkness" on the Ruth Rendell shelf.

What a great book! I could hardly put it down. I loved the ending where the bad guy forgets one very important detail and can't do anything about it. We assume that he will be caught, but don't know for sure.

What I like about this book was that the characters seem to be normal, but they are anything but. It makes one wonder what ones neighbors might really be doing.

I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to read a great story.

The woman never ceases to amaze me. I have read so many Rendell/Vine books and just can't stop. So few authors can look into the warped, secret side of someone the world perceives as normal in the acutely fascinating way she does. No skipping words or pages in her books.
'Darkness' ranks as one of the most perfectly crafted mysteries ever written. When all the pieces fit so beautifully--without stretching and reaching, without the reader thinking he's on a fictional ride--so perfectly, it is physically satisfying. The reader feels like one of the gods on Olympus looking down on these characters who stumble inexorably into what is to be their fate.
At the end of this book, I sat back and sighed with satisfaction. Yes, brilliant, Ruth. How do you do it?

Yes, she does put Grisham to shame. As well as Grafton and the rest. I would say she's on at least a par with Jeffrey Ashford. What is it about these British authors?

This story has become one of my favorite Rendell novels. It is definitely "a keeper." She really has a way with dissecting her characters---and they are so nefarious! Tim! Francesca! What a surprise! And did you notice how clever the author was in making it seem like it was Russell who met his demise? I had to flip back several times to be sure of the time sequence.

A great, suspenseful, well-told story. You won't be disappointed. Almost as good as "Sight for Sore Eyes."

This book is absolutely adorable!!! A very sweet valentine book with fun, colorful pop-ups and a sweet valentine poem!! Such a great book!!!

I bought this book years ago for my now 9 yr old,. Now my 3 yr old has rediscovered all of Carter's books & loves them. She is a girly girl & is usually afraid of bugs but these bugs are so cute, she loves them. Of course as with most pop-up books,it is short & fragile-not for the very young to play with on their own. But it is a must-have for anyone with kids.

The cutest valentine book ever! The pop ups are wonderfully designed and it is a real attention getter! My only complaint is that the book isn't longer!! I would love to see more!

Mac OS X Hints has to be one of the most popular sites among Mac geeks. Not only does it have a marvelous collection of hints it also has some great forums full of people more than willing to help. I've often found it useful for fixing a problem and have helped my fellow Mac users more than once.

Why would you buy a book with exactly the same name written by the site owner? If the book is the same quality as the site then that's got to be one reason.

The book is extremely well written with a wry sense of humour that appeals to me a great deal. The hints cover an extremely large range of subjects, not just the operating system and the iLife software but other commonly used packages such as Mozilla, Camino, Entourage and Word. They offer something new to everyone from the beginner to the advanced Mac user. Some are small and simple, others more complex. There is also a huge variation in the level of the hints, some are for the rank beginner, some could only be appreciated by a power user.

The structure, starting with a chapter called "Designing Your World" devoted to startup and basics such as windows and menus, does move from the simple through to the more complex in later chapters, chapters 15 and 16 are devoted to the Terminal and Unix. At first you may find the hints too simple but as you move through the book you will find your level and even in the early chapters you may pick up a trick or two.

There are a lot of good hints here, the cover says "more than 500" and elsewhere the book mentions 540, either number is realistic - sorry, I couldn't do the math. This is a book that will probably grow on you, at first I thought it wasn't worth the money but I picked it up and put it down several times, used a few hints (fixed Mozilla so it uses an external mail program, made a few cosmetic adjustments, added a couple of menulets), lost it for a couple of days in the desk clutter and picked it up again. It seems to fit into a strange niche in computer books, it's not a reference, it's not a teaching guide, it's more a book that should hang around and have a dozen or so pages read once a week so you can play with a hint or two and integrate them into your Mac use (or not, as you choose).

Finding the hints is no problem, the contents are long and detailed, the book is well indexed and the breakup of chapters is quite logical. There is some cross referencing of hints though this is perhaps one area that could improve.

So I think you'll get our money's worth if you're prepared to let this volume hang around your desk. If you're the sort of person who likes to read a computer book, learn the information then pass it along this book won't suit you.

Addressing the Obvious
The most immediate question I had when I heard that O'Reilly would be publishing a book containing hints from macosxhints.com was, of course, why I should get the book when the hints are already on the site for free. Both the author and the publisher also thought of this, understandably enough. Here's how Rob Griffiths answered the question in a post on the site, when the book was first announced: "The book isn't just a "cut and paste" job from the site to print form. Every hint was rewritten and retested from scratch, and hundreds of screenshots were added to help clarify and explain the hints. In addition, many of the scripts and programs posted here are included (the author of each program was contacted for approval to include their original work in the book - thanks to each of you for agreeing!)."

So the question then becomes: is this really the case? Are the differences between the hints as posted on the site and as printed in the book really significant enough to merit shelling out [money]?

The short answer would be that, in my opinion, the book is worth its price. The long answer is (predictably) a little more complicated. There are, of course, people who are more than willing to do the extra digging on the web to get the relevant content for free - they'd rather do without the little perks (increased readability, revision, testing, screenshots) than spend potential beer money for a glossy O'Reilly book. And that's fine - I'm more than sympathetic with this position, being frequently hard up for beer money, myself. But of course there are also people for whom the convenience is just as important as the cost, and who consider the price of the book well worth it in terms of the time saved. If you fall into the former category, don't bother buying the book - but then, you weren't going to buy it anyway, were you? As for the latter group, rest assured that your investment will not, in this case, be wasted.

What I Liked
I've read several other books on Mac OS X. The one I believe everyone should start with is still David Pogue's Mac OS X: The Missing Manual. If you've already read this book (and enjoyed it) or didn't read it but are confident you've already got the equivalent experience, then Mac OS X Hints is a good next step. Griffiths assumes you're comfortable using OS X for basic tasks - he doesn't tell you how to log in, or what the Dock is. If you're fuzzy on those kind of basics, you're not quite ready for this book (but you're positively crying out for a copy of the Missing Manual). Additionally, he pushes some not-entirely-obvious processes to the introduction, so you don't have to read the same instructions over and over in the meat of the book itself. After all, once you've been told the first time how to view the contents of a package, you're probably all set in that regard. This is one of the aspects of Mac OS X Hints that I found most appealing, actually - Griffiths just explains in the beginning that he's assuming certain things, and then doesn't bother dumbing anything else down.

I've been a fan of macosxhints.com since I first installed OS X, but it seems like Griffiths's style has really improved for the book - this may be a function of Pogue's role as editor, as the writing in Hints displays the same familiar, comfortable tone while not skimping on depth or details. Like other books Pogue has been involved in, this one is highly readable but not oversimplified.

What I Didn't Like
If I can be nitpicky for a moment, I was bothered by the frequency of purely typographical errors. Little things like "than" being used instead of "then", or the bottom edge of a line in a sidebar getting cut off. It didn't keep me from enjoying the book, and I'm sure it's the sort of thing that will get corrected in future printings, but this sort of error occured often enough that I noticed it, anyway.

Another little thing was that I wish URLS had been included whenever a third-party shareware program was mentioned. Of course I know I can Google for DragThing and find it immediately - but if I'm paying for a book, it seems to me that I shouldn't have to.

One final note: there's a lot of overlap between this book and Mac OS X Hacks, although each book has a significant amount of unique content. If you own one, you probably don't need to get the other, but it's difficult to say which I'd buy if I had to choose. Hacks contains only 100 articles, but they're more in-depth and the tasks they cover are often trickier or less obvious. Hints contains over 500 tidbits, but they're much shorter and often deal with things like key commands that allow you to increase your efficiency, and things of that ilk.

Mac OS X Hints is a fabulous book. Beginning, Intermediate, and even Expert users of both OS X and *nix will find this book a wonderful read.

The tips are well organized, and above all very useful--this isn't unnecessary stuff. He covers tips about general appearance all the way through some neat Terminal window tricks and even gives tips for third party applications as well.

Whether you're new to OS X or an old Unix geek, you'll find this book a great reference. I recommend it whole-heartedly.

--Michael Greifenkamp

Shows you how to create object models (analysis models) through indepth examples and guidance by presenting strategies and patterns as you need them as you work through the examples. The strategies tell you how to approach a task such as how to select objects. Strategies are short, focused. For example, a strategy may have three or four one-sentence things to do to accomplish a goal. The patterns present template objects and their typical interactions.

The examples are relevant to business analysts.

After working through even just one example, you will be able to create object models and using the strategies and patterns.

Includes reference section containing all of the strategies and patterns.

The book uses COAD notation to present the examples, so for people familiar with UML it takes a little getting used to.

The strategies and patterns mentioned in the book are really helpful. They improve the object think. The examples explain the author's point of view clearly. This book complements other books in OOAD and patterns by Craig Larmen, GoF, Martin Fowler etc.

One interesting point is that the author shows how same strategy or pattern helps in design in various problems. Most of the books do not show this. For beginners, it is often difficult to grasp a strategy or pattern with just one example.

One drawback is it uses UML notation very less. But Coad notation is simple and we can easily grasp to understand the diagrams in the book. If you want to learn from solid examples, this is a good choice. If you are very new to OOAD, this is NOT the one you can start with.

"This book makes a significant contribution to the world of business computing by providing familiar business application examples. The strategies and patterns make it easy to extend the practitioner's current knowledge and mental models. Working professionals in business who want to learn how to 'object think' will find concrete examples of applications development, along with practical 'how to' guidance. The result? Accelerated learning!" -- Peter Fingar, Dir. of Information Technology, U of Tampa,

I have been reading books on palms for the last 2 years. Many are extremely superficial treatments of appearances only. Others are extremely detailed and not very useful to the non-botanist/horticulturalist. This book has a satisfying combination of background on a variety of palms, basic palm information, and excellent photographs. I would have liked more horticultural information regarding seed propagation, light and soil requirements for the specific species. Overall, however, you need this book.

I use this wonderful book on a regular basis for identifing species on catalog lists. I consider this one of my primary palm books. Great for the novice or nurseryman. Easy to read. I would love to see more cultural information in the next edition. However, I would be lost without this book.
...John TexasGardenCenter.com

This book is great for those interested in learning about palms. It has great information and pictures on many types of palms. I look forward to any upcoming editions to this one.