History can be used to tell some smashing stories. Cormac McCarthy used the real Glanton gang for the plot lines and characters for "Blood Meridian." Larry McMurtry used the real Charles Goodnight/Oliver Loving story for "Lonesome Dove." But both authors honored the facts of their stories, and they brought imagination and empathy to the retelling.

Mr. Huebner brings only blood and gore, written in a thick style that turns oddly funny about halfway. How many times can you describe generals drinking whiskey by a fire? Four, maybe five, in this book. It's "Copy and Paste" run amuck. Every time a soldier fires a gun you're ankle deep in teeth, brains, blood, and bone. I can take a large dose of gore, but here it is just description. How many times can you shoot an Indian in the chest with a single-shot carbine before he falls down? Three, maybe four, in this book.

If you don't mind strings of cliches, history thrown into a corn popper, Indian skirmishes that turn into Vietnam-style assaults, zero character depth, then maybe you won't mind "American by Blood." But the book is just a bad cavalry movie from the 1950s updated with blood and gore in the name of realism, with a 1980s PC overlay.

I did like the title and the cover.

Beware, this book is written in stilted and somewhat disontinuous prose and is not too easy to read.

It is very desciptive particularly of the environment and the blood and gore of war in this period. It does not portray this period of American history and the destruction of the ethnic indians as in any way glamorous,unlike most American westerns.

The descriptions of war and human injuries are far closer to reality than potrayed in western movies. The weapons and bullets used in that period caused significant injury which the author is not afraid to detail. To remove or tone down the blood and gore would detract from the objectives of the work in my opinion.

The author is able to give life to the charaters such that you can imagine them as having lived in that period.

I did not find the book easy to read because of the prose style: some sections required reading twice to fully understand the authors intent.

This is a specialist piece of work and I believe would only really be enjoyed by some one who has an interest in this period.

I enjoyed this book on so many levels...the rich historical figures, the prose and style, the social context (was the aftermath of Little Big Horn America's Balkan-like "Final Solution")and most importantly as a view to man's struggles with himself. Huebner investigates what the days following Little Big Horn were like for the people on both sides of the struggle for the American west, and what that life and death struggle did to the "little people" involved. Huebner's work juxtaposes the beauty of the American West with a clear view of the carnage accompanying battle. I think he gets it right, as he loses me in page after page of beautiful and at times confrontational prose. I literally couldn't put it down, and look forward to more from this fresh voice.

I read 'Wrack' for my final year at High School in Australia and upon first reading it found it to be uninteresting and dreaded spending a year studing 'Wrack'. After re-reading it and discussing it with my teacher and classmates I discoved the many layers of this very deep and suprising novel. Bradley explores so many issues in this book and examines the characters relationships on many levels that I finished my school days feeling that I had read a great novel by a very talented writer.

So give 'Wrack' a chance - it's a great book!

This story of intersecting love triangles is a thoroughly absorbing but ultimately unsatisfying read. The opening pages promise a depth of emotion that is never fully realized as the book prgresses. Still the skillfull writing and a powerful grasp of history show that Bradley is capable of great things. I expect to see truly extraordinary work as his writing matures.

This book was a surprise to me...I thought it was merely a mystery from all the reviews I had read, and even from the cover of the book itself. Yet the mystery turned out not to be as compelling as the historical story and the story of dual obsessions. The intelligent narration of the story within a story proved to be confusing sometimes, yet overall the writing was spectacular. This young author has a definite way with words and descriptions of the possible discovery of Australia by the Portuguese proved to be one of the most compelling historical fiction I have read in years. The research and incorporation of the cartographic science involved, and also the tale of scientific obsession which leads to jealousy, bitterness, and rivalry is all too credible. I personally am not crazy about the use of objectional language, especially if it serves no purpose to move the story along (which I felt was the case here). However, Bradley's impressive language use and insights into the links between the past, present, and future made for an exquisite book.

This book is a definite must for readers who enjoy mysteries with plausible historical context and for those who enjoy writers who are masterful practitioners of the English language. Karen Sadler, Science Education, University of Pittsburgh

I agree with both of my fellow reviewers to some degree in that Mr. Bradley's potential would benefit greatly from a bit guidance on the the part of an editor and that the speculative fiction aspect of the book was provocative. (I'm sure if I had an editor I wouln't have written such a ridiculously long sentence) Anyway I enjoyed Bradley's use of language and bright vivd images to explain where the main charcter was in her life. I however didn't see any evidence of this being a thriller just because the brother is missing. All in all I would say it is more a story of a young woman's life and her struggle to reclaim it as such.

The Deep Field tells the story of a young woman, Anna Frazier, a gifted photographer who resides in Australia, the home of author James Bradley as well. Although it doesn't really pick up until 100 pages into the book, Bradley has created an interesting bunch of characters and he begins to draw you into his tale of woe at this point by backtracking through the last couple years of Anna's life, revealing what has brought her to this point. A few facts seem unrealistic like that Anna never once has a job of any sort or that everyone in the novel is easily excitable, asserting themselves constantly without much agitation. There are also long passages that give too much technical information about shells, photography and other topics. Although they are relevant to the characters and their passtimes, they tend to bore a person not involved in similar interests half to death. I finished this book out of respect for Bradley who I consider to be an author with a great deal of potential who simply needs an editor to organize his work.

Bradley's The Deep Field is a multi-faceted and multi-layered novel. Although set in the future, starting somewhere aound 2010 and going well beyond the next couple of centuries, the speculative fiction aspect of the book is an intriguing but not the most important aspect. It is part thriller, based around the disappearance of a soul-mate brother in the polical unrest in Hongkong, part social critique of the situation of street people and other outcasts in the near future. Finally, it is part romance and exploration of time, relationships and art. The most fascinating layer of this fully engrossing book is the evolving main character, a woman photograher, who step by step learns to see in completely new ways thanks to the growing influence over her by a blind paleontologist who sees with his hands and feels the history of life in ammonite fossils.

The author has no idea how to express his thoughts in writing, and I would not recommend this book to anyone. It is horrible to read. There are many better books on this topic and the research presented in this book is all redundant information that has been around for years. There are numerous errors throughout the book which seriously detract from its readability. DONT BUY THIS BOOK.

Albert Einstein once wrote that you should never despise simple books.

This is certainly an example of a simple book, about the ideas and principles behind risk, which the author explains thoroughly. It is full of insights too, and will probably never go out of date. It gives you a clear understanding of risk in any context, financial or otherwise.

A new, easy to understand risk measure, the author's invention, is central to the book. He uses it effectively to explain the well known but hard to understand standard deviation measure of risk. He also uses it to derive a new version of the risk equation that makes risk elimination and reduction possibilities almost obvious. The original risk equation, over which the author's version is a clear improvement, was first proposed by William Sharpe.

But be warned. This is a book for ideas people only. The author is clearly only interested in principles. (The front cover does state that the book is about practical principles, and means it.) All of the author's examples, many of them almost trivial, are geared to getting the reader to understand a unified set of principles represented by a few basic equations. Nowhere will you find a detailed method for carrying out some specific complex operation, either in finance or everyday systems. The author obviously assumes that if you have understood the principles, you will be able to figure out what to do in any situation, even an entirely new one.

Some people are not very comfortable with ideas, concepts and principles, however, especially application of principles to new situations. They are more comfortable dealing with complex specifics and standard procedures. Such readers may react negatively to this book, since it lacks specific information about any specific situation. With that caveat, I rate it five stars. I found one obvious typographic error near the end, inside an arithmetic expression that came out right.

This book was chosen as the textbook for the AP Computer Science C++ class at my school. Having programmed in C++ for quite a while, I must say I was disappointed. Most all of the basics are covered, and I believe a beginner would, after reading this book, "know" C++. However, the style of teaching isn't that great, and the order in which things are taught isn't the best either. Also, much of the code appears untested, and contains errors. The code also does not conform to the ANSI/ISO standard. I've read much worse, but I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone who asked me about C++, and I definately would not use it to teach a CS class.

-Alan Johnson

This book is intended to be a textbook for an introductory programming course for students who have never programmed before. You may agree or disagree with the premise (I disagree), but you have to admire the authors for trying.

What's in the book is pretty decent. The writing is clear. The examples are simple and clear enough to read without straining your brain. The authors do cover some fairly advanced topics, such as multiple inheritance and templates, but they concentrate on explaining the basics and make little attempt to cover the weird stuff and pitfalls of the language. You need a more advanced book for that.

Because the organization, writing, and index are better than average, I find that I am continuing to use this book. (I don't usually keep tutorial-type books after the first reading.)

I would recommend this book to undergrad students and beginning programmers who want to learn C++ or to anyone who wants an easy-to-read overview of the language. For advanced programmers who know C, Bruce Eckel's book "Thinking in C++" is a better choice.

Gavin, I love the man, but the book is a biased (albeit the author acknowledges his bias) and under-researched account of a complex leader. Gavin was an orphan raised in Pennsylvania who earned an appointment to West Point after enlisting in the Army. He rose to become the Division Commander of the 82nd Airborne Division (the youngest Brigadier General since Custer)during WWII and amassed an incredible war record. Following the war, he rose to the rank of 3 stars before retiring amid a controversy over his testimony before the senate. As the division commander, he fully integrated black airborne soldiers into the 82nd. He would later become JFK's ambassador to France. He protested the war in Vietnam and wrote several books.

If you want a more thorough account of this truly exceptional and interesting leader, read Paratrooper: the Life of James M. Gavin by T. Michael Booth, Duncan Spencer. It is well researched and gives a more thorough representation of Gavin's life, although Mrs. Gavin claims the book gives short shrift to Gavin's time at Arthur D. Little as the CEO.

If you are more interested in a cursory review of Gavin's life, then Bigg's rendition is for you. You can read it in an evening.

Airborne!

Don't waste your money (and time) on that ancient book.

It's shame to offer a 70's book for regular sale! Although it reprinted again in 94, its content remain.

It is a very usefull book for an computer engineer.If you are in a first class of computer engineer you can have some difficulties about using the mathematical formulas in computer.This book makes you learn yery easy.It is for a starter.