This is exactly the type of reference book I was looking for. Not only does the book breakdown the phonetics of Burmese in a step-by-step manner, it also is very easy to place in my pocketbook. I have used the book to help me communicate with my nanny and that in itself is a blessing. While I use the book to freshen up on my Burmese, my nanny loves perusing through it to freshen up on her English.

I have visited Myanmar three times (and plan a fourth) since purchasing this phrasebook. I would not even consider traveling to Myanmar without it. It won't teach you Burmese, but it will do what it is for -- provide you with phrases. At first you will feel like you have to be able to read the author's mind to know where in the book to find the right phrase. The best approach: just remember where you are, hotel, restaurant, etc. It works.

This book is the best of the countless George W. Bush biographies that are appearing all over the place. Minutaglio does a great job providing a well-balanced book about the ups and downs of our President's life and how his family has played apart. It clearly shows Dubya's attempts to move away from his father's shadow in order for him to make a name for himself. It is a great book, full of interesting stories and minimal political jargon that you will find in so many of the other books being written about Bush. If you want to read about our President, I suggest this book.

What an enjoyable, informative read. I didn't know much about George W. Bush other than he's raised a lot of campaign money as a Republican presidential candidate. But like Richard Ben Cramer's classic WHAT IT TAKES, or David Maraniss's FIRST IN HIS CLASS about Bill Clinton's early years, this is a terrific, broad look at the man and where he came from, his family, his personality, his accomplishments and failures. I feel like I know "George W" after reading this book. The author of FIRST SON deserves a tip of the hat, not only for putting together a biography that provides great background on this politician, but also for writing a very entertaining book.

If you are looking for tabloid like Bush Bashing, don't look here (you might try The Father's Son, that one is quite good at trying to instill some what outdated class war fare dribble). This particular book is extremely well balanced. If you love the Bush clan, or hate them, you will find something within. Personally, I found it an insightful and interesting tale of one of our nations most powerful pollitical families. Is George W qualified to be President? Well that is a question that only time will answer. My thoughts are he is as qualified as the guy we have recently given the nod to twice, except, maybe George will actually care more for the country than himself. He does seem to learn and grow. Now that would be a pleasant change. However one thing is for certain, the Bush family is a political dynasty (now more impressive than the Kennedys) and the people of Texas sincerely love both of their Georges.

This book is divided into 2 parts: Part 1 deals with The Clinical Approach, and Part 2 deals with the Essential Background Information.

The Clinical Aproach is the best part and includes 10 chapters (CNS, Eyes, Limbs, Head & Neck, Abdomen, Respiratory system, CVS, Hematology, Diabetes, and Skin). It focuses on the physical examination, and on the symptomatology.

The second part contains a summary of basic clinical facts about the diseases which you can read in any standard textbook. In addition, there're many important subjects which are not covered properly in this section (e.g. dermatology).

This book is not intended to be a complete textbook, and I think it should be supplemented by further reading. The margins of the pages are large so that you can add your additional notes. It contains few diagrams (no photographic pictures) and many tables.

Dr. Bradley starts on May 29, 1946 as Navy ships leave San Francisco for the mid-Pacific. "Operation Crossroads" was a test of nuclear weapons occurring on Bikini Atoll in 1946. The 1948-edition jacket reads, "...Convinced published reports available to the average man have given him an incomplete and therefore distorted view, have even perhaps lulled him into a false sense of security, Dr. Bradley has interpreted the real truth for everyone to read." Bradley reports events in a log format by date. The flavor of the trip is accurately described along with technical remarks. Bradley comments, "Sailors can be the most profane and uncouth men on earth... It would be impossible to record the language they use. It is so degenerate, so monotonously vile, that even the most blasphemous expressions become meaningless." The trip is described like some bizarre Rick Steves video with a medical flavor. Bradley details events of the days prior to the tests, Able Day test, and Baker Day test. He describes observations and complex physics in terms the lay person can appreciate. For example, "...the damage seems to be so haphazard and occasionally so violent as to suggest the action of some primordial force beyond one's comprehension. The energy released in the explosion of an atomic bomb is that mysterious energy which holds the nuclei of atoms together. The unstable uranium or plutonium nucleus requires a vast amount of energy to hold it together, whereas the binding energy required to hold together a smaller more stable atom like barium is proportionally much less.It is the excess of nuclear energy which is given off (since it is no longer needed) when fission takes place and the heavy, unstable atom breaks down into several smaller, stable units." He gives a medical perspective, laced with reality, describing the events of the test: "...[conditions] are still far better than one could hope for in time of atomic war. It is indeed hard to imagine that a population or an army exposed to a similar rain of radioactive material could ever afford the luxury of urinalysis. From a medical as well as a military point of view, urinalysis, blood counts, and other such protective measures would be about as useful to a fellow in such a catastrophe as Metropolitan Life Insurance." The final entry in the book describes October 9 & 10. An appendix details basic nuclear physics and radioactivity. While this work may have been forgotten by many it is an important firsthand accountof a nuclear detonation: an event (hopefully) few of us will ever witness.

This book is one of the best of the whole West Point series. The authors have found a way to describe an analyse historical events in detail and in a very serious way, yet the book is never boring nor exceedingly academic. The readers feels like a junior officer in a staff HQ and witnesses key decisions being made. A brilliant and innovative book, maybe a little too centered on the role of the United States. The Atlas is a useful complement, and reading the two in parallel is invaluable. Probably one of the best tools to understand WWII ever designed.

I was in India earlier this year and as it was my first trip out of my own country I made the mistake of presuming that the Lonely Planet guide would be the best as it is the best known. After struggling with it for a few weeks, I pretty much stopped using it. My criticisms of it would include - poor maps and outdated information on things such as banks and costs. These are not things that particulaly bothered me after I had worked out that The Lonely Planet wasn't actually a bible, but just a tool for travel. I think the Lonely Planets biggist problem is that everyone has a copy and is out there doing exactly the same thing as everyone else. In parts of India such as Calcutta, Darjeeling and Sikkim, this wasn't such an issue because there were'nt so many tourists. The hotels I stayed at were generally how they were described in "The Book" , the prices were right and the people unaffected and friendly. Sometimes I was the only westerner staying in a hotel. But the places that were unaffected were few and far between. Most places I would go the Indians were all obsessed with the power the Lonely Planet had over travellers. For example, In Agra, there has been a sceme going where a resturant will purposely poison a tourist and then get a cut from the hospital from the unfortunate victims travel insurance. This is good advice and I must admit that I didn't risk eating at any other place other than that recommended, but the Indians had taken full advantage of this and all the resturants were incredibly expensive as a result. While this is not a direct fault of Lonely Planets I would definately suggest getting a lesser known guide, such as The Rough Guide, so that you don't spend your whole trip surrounded by Lonely Planet readers.

This edition of "Lonely Planet India" is better than the previous one, which was very very good itself. Despite the immensity of India and the numberless topics and regions that therefore have to be covered, the authors have done an excellent job indeed. Some weaknesses are inevitable, and this is perhaps why this is not one of LP's masterpieces, but it is indeed inevitable for travel guidebooks to be the better, the smaller the region they cover - this is why this book should perhaps be complemented with the individual LP guides to different Indian regions. But in itself, this book does cover most of what a visitor will need or want to know. And in a place that is chaotic and tough for foreigners like India, this may indeed be an essential tool for the less experienced travellers. The coverage of places to stay and eat is absolutely excellent, not just for the major cities but also for minor towns and sites (the authors would indeed seem to have been on every single square foot of land in India !). The section on permits and other legal matters is of immense value to anyone, and well up-to-date. And of course, the sections and special chapters on history, culture, religion, are extremely well written, great for the traveller and the armchair reader alike. Even though the best discoveries are those a traveller will make herself / himself, this guidebook is surely a great tool and help in anyone's discovery of this wonderful land. All in all, a masterpiece despite its limitations. A weakness is of course that things being as they are in India, information is subject to change, and some may have become out-of-date by the time this book was printed. But this is of course inevitable, and it simply means that - as in any country - a traveller should not rely on only a guidebook, but make a considerable effort to grasp as much as possible of current circumstances on her / his own.

This is the second time to visit India.Both time I took the same Lonely Planet. Always I choose hotel from it and felt not bad. In some small city, hight rank hotel means good servie and the price was not so high as you image it. First all the price listed in the book is as same as in the hotel, so try to cut off nearly 30% off is the very important thing to do during the trip.
Also I visited Jaisalmer on May, but if you following the book you will never go there in such cray summer. In fact, the summer was high enough, but still interesting. No more tourist means you can enjoy alone, and only myself in the hotel you can get nearly 50% discountdown for low season. If you read you can find a lot of things from the book, but on the trip everything is changed, you never image the book can guide you everything. Try to ask person around you, and get the most reasonable price.
I will plan to go to india again, by the guide of Lonely Planet, but I think I need a new version.

Any large 2 volume reference text certainly looks impressive. But, unfortunately, NICP is only superficially attractive. I have used this as a reference many times and have closed the book without gaining any satisfactory answers. Considering it's size and price, NICP is a huge letdown. The online subscription service is costly, but at least it gets continuously updated and has videos to boot.

...
Last year I read pretty much the whole 3rd edition cover to cover, so I feel qualified to comment. When I started, the appeal of this book for me was: (1) it looked fairly comprehensive, (2) it was well written, and (3) a lot of time was devoted to teaching ways of thinking and defining what, say, a neuro-urologist does, in addition to facts about diseases.

In regards to (1), I still think it is one of the most comprehensive books out there. But it is also the most verbose. The editors should mandate that contributors are not allowed to say anything that is self-evident, especially anything along the lines of "a multi-disciplinary approach is best" or "the likelihood ranges from 0-70%" or "starts with a thorough history and physical examination". Whole sections, even whole chapters are devoted to this kind of blather.

I agree ... that volume 1 is much better than volume 2. Volume 2 has some really really long and tedious chapters that could easily be (mediocre) textbooks unto themselves. Overall a book like Merritt's looks better for the neurological diseases than volume 2 at this point. I hope the editors take this to heart in the next edition and radically revise this volume.

In regards to (2) it is very well written and you'd be surprised what a difference that makes in terms of how enjoyable it is to read. Kudos to the editors on this.

In regards to (3) I continue to think the "more than just facts" approach make this an attractive book for residents looking for an introduction to the discipline. But as I said before, there are better books when it comes to concise and usable presentation of the neurological diseases.

There a few outright errors, but some serious omissions particuarly in the area of treatment, ...

A couple of other points are worth mentioning: (1) The question book is excellent. The questions are intelligent, and there are only a few mistakes in the entire book. Hats of to Misulis on this one. (2) The website is not as useful as you might think. It isn't updated all that much, and it is structured to thwart would-be copyright violators more than to facilitate easy use. Count on not being able to read more than a few paragraphs without jumping to a new link. In the next edition, I hope you can opt out of web access in exchange for a discount. ...

All in all I don't regret reading this book. I don't think there's another book out there that offers all that this book does, and if they can continue to improve it, it will become the standard text of neurology.

This book is too highly priced, and fails to live up to expectations. A book this expensive should be a superb reference, with a comprehensiveness second to none. Nothing of the sort may be said about NICP. Diagnosis and treatment sections need serious expanding.

The best part of the book is Volume I. First rate chapters on the clinical approach, some of the best written, save the book from publishing purgatory.

I bought this book to learn MRI, but the work is more of an encylopedia than a readable textbook. It contains too much useless information, while the important material is not particularly well written, presented, or organized; for example, the first 300 pages of physics is too often impenetrable and consistently overly theoretical, esp. the parts written by PhD's as opposed to MD's. The chapters are inconsistent in quality, varying from poor to very good. Although the book was supposedly printed in 1999, most of the references are 7-8 years old, the most recent being around 1995; this book is hardly state-of-the-art in its field. It is hard to believe that a book this expensive and in its 3rd edition could have so many typographical errors; did anyone proofread this book? The print is very small, the smallest I've ever seen in a top-of-the-line radiology reference work. On the plus side, it is well illustrated and an outline precedes each chapter.

I ONLY WANT TO BUY VOL NO.3. I WANT TO GIVE IT TO SOMEONE FOR A PRESENT. IF IT'S POSSIBLE HOW MUCH DOES IT COST?

A Good Book to explore the culture and history of the pain that they went through. The struggle which we don't see or realize.

Spiritual Quests offers some terrific pearls of wisdom from various writers whose works contain religious themes. If you want to learn about writing inspirational literature, this may not be the best choice for you, but if you are interested in hearing a variety of perspeictives from people of different faiths and backgrounds, you may enjoy this book.

I particularly enjoyed that each writer shared specific instances from his or her writing. Fredrick Buechner's essay was my personal favorite with David Bradley's a close second. The book may be more enjoyable for those who have read something by these writers, but I found food for thought even though I haven't read their works.

Spiritual Quests is not a quick read, and some parts do drag. At other times, the "spiritual" aspect of writing was not clear, and some authors seemd to be more interested in sharing the spiritual dimensions of writing (ie. letting your characters guide you) rather than how spirituality can affect a writers' work. But it was still interesting, even if not what I expected.