A really interesting overview and analysis of the "baad man" as a central figure in African-American literature, tracing the origins from his earliest appearances in myth and folklore. Lively, literate without being pedantic, and full of interesting and surprising examples. Real insights into such major figures as Richard Wright and Toni Morrison, along with a fascinating section on the sources and achievements of Ice-T and the contemporary rappers that I, never a rap fan, found really eye-opening..

Jerry Bryant has written a most compelling study of the African-American male using history, poetry, song, literature, along with myth and fact. This is a must read for anyone interested in, deeply or just superficially, the ways and the cultural whys and wherefors of the black man in american...yesterday and today. It is done with sensitivity and thoughtfulness and worth anyone's time...and it is damned readable!

This is a book about African American "badmen" like Stagolee, John Hardy, Railroad Bill, and Devil Winston and how this archetypal figure gets taken up by black novelists, convict "toasters" and gangsta rappers. It tells the story of the defiance of this black folk hero and how middle class novelists and commercial rap artists soften and exploit an originally spontaneous figure of freedom that first emerges at the end of the nineteenth century. Jerry Bryant is professor emeritus of English, California State University, Hayward. By the way, the 5-star rating isn't vanity, it's just that some rating is required by Amazon and I figured it would be counter-productive to give my book anything less. JB

For a recent trip we bought quite a few sticker books for our toddler, and I thought this one was very good. Over forty stickers augment a variety of activities including tracing, matching, recognizing patterns, coloring, sequencing, series completion, comparing, categorizing and even a little maze. Illustrations are very colorful and show Caillou in a wide variety of situations with Rosie and others from the television show familiar to kids. Notes to parents detail the skills involved on each page. It's not that easy to find activity books geared to preschoolers, and these are exceptionally well done. They really helped make our trip a pleasant one, and we will definitely get more in this series for our next outing!

Simply the best activity book I have seen. My advanced 4 yr old consumed the 4 caillou activity books in the Merry go round series in a few days.

Three decades have passed since Claude McCutcheon and Jesse Hamilton served together in Nam. Though they were best friends while serving in the jungle, it has been almost that long since they last talked. That is why San Francisco Bay resident Claude is stunned to hear a small child crying in his living room. Jesse has disappeared, leaving his son with Claude to protect him.

Soon the security chief of Sentinel Microsystems, Barton Jones, arrives, demanding Claude reveal Jesse's whereabouts. The FBI, making the same demand follows Barton's aggressive visit. When danger hits home, Claude begins to search for his missing friend. Claude learns that Jesse went underground because he uncovered the dark secrets of what his Silicon Valley company was really doing and has a disk to prove it.

CAUSES OF ACTION is an action-packed thriller that highlights the ambience and excitement of the Bay area. Claude is an interesting character and the support cast, especially the San Franciscans, add warmth and depth to a well-designed tale. The story line occasionally slows down, but John A. Miller continues to provide insight into the various mindsets of Viet Nam Veterans as he successfully did with CUTDOWN. An engrossing novel that will bring accolades to the author.

Harriet Klausner

I got my hands on an Advance Readers Copy of this book-which I understand will be available in December. Protagonist Claude McCutcheon is a very modern and yet traditional hard-boiled hero. A practicing lawyer and Vietnam veteran with deep shadows in his past that make the fast-moving action parts of the book highly believable. The action scenes read like verbal lightning. There is also a sense of ideas played out in real life, choices made and prices paid that is genuine in a way not every mystery novel attains. Speaking as a cat lover, I also have to say that in CAUSES OF ACTION, as in CUTDOWN (the first Claude McCutcheon), there is a very fully-realized cat, who plays an important role in the story. CUTDOWN introduced McCutcheon, his law practice in Albany, California, his network of friends in low places-some of them old Army buddies. Like Marlowe with his chess and Travis McGee with his crusades, Claude McCutcheon is true to a code older than Gunsmoke.

CAUSES OF ACTION begins when Claude awakes in the pre-dawn hours to find a 4 year old child in his bedroom with a note pinned to his jacket. The little boy, Earl, is the son of Jesse Hamilton from Claude's old platoon. Although Claude has not seen him since the day 30 years earlier that Jesse was wounded on a battlefield in Vietnam, he feels an obligation to take care of the boy for a few days. Clearly Jesse is in trouble and Claude cannot help attempting to dig him out. This tortuous journey then takes Claude into the minefields of the Silicon Valley business wars, close encounters with a beautiful FBI agent who may or may not be an ally, and a confrontation with old enemies and deep-rooted corruption that threatens his carefully balanced existence and his very life. Miller's first book sparked some controversy among a few people I know who disagreed with the hero's less than politically correct ideas. Having known a few Vietnam veterans, I found McCutcheon's views to be an accurate portrayal of the opinions of many from that particular "lost generation." I personally found both CUTDOWN and CAUSES OF ACTION well worth reading for the story and reading again for the writing.

An intelligent and funny coffee-table book for those who understand cats, or who are trying to understand cats.

I adore Claude, especially as I have one of my own.

Although this is a small book, it is worth its weight in gold. The photos are the best I have ever seen of a cat. The expressions on Claude's face (the cat) are just irresistible, and the text is just as charming. I am eagerly awaiting a second Claude book. As I said, the remarkable photos are precious - any cat-lover will appreciate this book and go back to it again and again for a mood pick-me-up and to share parts of this cat's life. Claude obviously has a wonderful personality and it is a great credit to Randy Moravec that he was able to capture this on film. I highly recommend it!

The IEEE Information Society releases (IEEE Press) releases yet another priceless book which is both historical in nature; yet every bit as current as when Shannon first started published some of his more famous works in the 1940's. This book is unquestionably a "must have" reference book for either communication engineers or mathemeticians who have either a serious, or newly found interest in the topic of "information theory." Shannon's theorems of Channel Capacity and Channel

Coding are studied by EE students worldwide. However, this book is much-much-more. The books 924 pages contain a wide assortment of articles written by this rare genius. Elementary cryptography and analysis of the Entropy of the written language; "communications secrecy" (which is quite honestly outdated by todays standards; but taken into context, the papers were valuable at the time.) Also obscure articles on "game theory" as it applies to the field of "artificial

intelligence" which at the time, he was a pioneer (along with other great minds including Turing, Minsky, etc..) Also, his articles on early computers and automata, and optimizing circuits so as to use less relays, etc.. are also quite interesting... Yes, the man was mortal, and to show that he wasn't all mathemetician, Shannon writes a fascinating article on the physics of JUGGLING.. The book comes with an introductory chapter which contains a somewhat adequate biography, and an interview with OMNI Magazine which was published in 1987.

This is definately a book which should be on the shelf of anyone serious about the subject. Yes, there are much more technical books on the subject. If you have a PhD in EE or mathematics, you might not be impressed... but Shannon's "easy writing style" which differs from some of the "dry" IEEE writings of today makes for an interesting read; if only for remembering history. -S.A. Hoffman, NY-

It's a great book if you need to know what's driving todays information technology w.r.t. bandwidth and how it can revolutionize the economy.

i thought that this was a great book. it was wonderfully written, giving you a new understanding of the life of a great artist. not only was the book well writen but it was also full of hundreds of great recreations of monets best work.

This book gives a very good over view of his life and work. What he went through to get to where he became well known. This books is well illustrated with work that is not well known and several of his more well known work.

Another great biography from John Soister. Mr. Soister wrote the definitive book on Universal horror films from the 1930's a year ago, now he publishes the definitive biography of one of filmdon's acting giants, Claude Rains. A book on this wonderful actor was way overdue. Soister proves it was well worth the wait! Each of Rains' films is recounted in detail, with Soister's well informed opinion on each film, and Mr. Rains' performance. If you are a fan of Claude Rains, or Hollywood's Golden Era, THIS is a must book for you! He may have been short in physical stature, but Claude Rains was a towering giant when it came to talent, style, and film presence. You won't be disappointed in buying this great work!

Claude Rains, A Comprehensive Illustrated Reference is the book Claude Rains fans have been waiting for for years. It starts off with a wonderful mini bio from his daughter, Jessica. Especially nice, is a charming story about them going to see 'The Invisible Man' together. The reader gets a sense of Claude Rains, the man as well as Claude Rains, the actor. Both are well worth reading about. There is a detailed synopsis for each movie with lots of little backround tidbits and loads of great photos. Also discussed, in less detail, is his stage, tv and radio career. The author says that the book is a 'labor of love' and it shows. If your a Claude Rains fan, and who isn't,buy the book... you'll love every minute of it.

If nothing else can be said for Warren Lehrer you can say that he is excellent at capturing people. I love this book. I've read all the portrait series books (I had to for class) and Claude was my second favorite. Brother Blue was my first. Claude is a captivating guy. I can see why women love him. If you're looking for a book that truly reveals and captures an honestly interesting character, buy this book. Heck, it's worth it just to read Claude's advice for having great relationships.

If nothing else can be said for Warren Lehrer you can say that he is excellent at capturing people. I love this book. I've read all the portrait series books (I had to for class) and Claude was my second favorite. Brother Blue was my first. Claude is a captivating guy. I can see why women love him. If you're looking for a book that truly reveals and captures an honestly interesting character, buy this book. Heck, it's worth it just to read Claude's advice for having great relationships.

With the Nutshell series, it's hit and miss. Some are excellent, others mediocre, and some downright duds. The Contracts installment falls in the first category. Concepts are introduced and explained succinctly and coherently. The book also includes questions for each section and suggested answers. I found it very useful for reinforcing concepts discussed in class. Farnsworth's treatise was also helpful.

I bought this book during my first year of law school and was grateful for its clear, concise explanations and numerous examples. Since then, I have referred to Contracts in a Nutshell many times in the context of both academic and professional research. At present, I find that many excerpts are even suitable for teaching basic principles of contract law to students in non-law-related fields. But of course, its primary purpose remains dispelling the mysteries of contract law for 1st years and sweeping the cobwebs from the bar-taker's storeroom of legal knowledge.

Convex Analysis and Minimisation Algorithms by Urruty and Lemarechal is a gentle but comprehensive introduction to finite dimensional convex analysis. This book is part of Springer's series on Comprehensive studies in Mathematics.

Volume I deals with convex analysis (convex sets, convex functions, sublinearity and support functions, subdifferentials of convex functions and minimization algorithms for smooth convex functions) and the companion volume II deals more with nonsmooth optimization and bundle algorithms to solve such problems. The theory is developed rigorously with many intriguing examples and figures to illustrate important concepts. As the authors mention in their introduction the minimisation algorithm suggested by Einstein "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler". The two volumes are fairly comprehensive (and as a disclaimer the contents are by no means elementary, and will require a sustained effort on the part of the reader).

One can then take on the likes of Rockafellar and Wets' "Variational Analysis" and Borwein and Lewis' "Convex Analysis and Nonlinear optimization, two other recent works in convex analysis and optimization.

Este libro de Hiriart-Urruty y Claude Lemarechal, es el paso obligado de quién desee aprender este tema. Los autores han realizado un gran esfuerzo para lograr un libro claro, del cual se puede aprender. Hay mucha información, muchos ejemplos, muchas gráficas. Este libro, junto con el Convex Analysis de Rockafellar no deben faltar en el escritorio de toda persona que se dedique al análisis convexo o a la optimización. Es un texto largo, se necesita al menos un año para estudiarlo, pero vale la pena.