First, let me say a big God bless you to Kenneth Copeland Ministries. They're the publishers of this book.

Basically there are three main collections of Lake's sermons out there, all three classics in their own right. First and foremost, there's Robers Liardons 1000+ page collection entitled "John G. Lake: The Complete Collection of His Life Teachings" (ISBN:1577780752). I strongly recommend that everyone get this collection! It's chock full of the most wonderfull messages you could ever want to read.

Then there's "John G. Lake Sermons on Dominion over Demons, Disease & Death" by Gordon Lindsay (ISBN:0899850286), a brief but well-done collection at under 100 pages.

And in the middle we have the Copelands' collection at about 250 pages. Again, very well done, but what I'm getting at is, if you're anything like me, you'll fall head over heals reading Lake's sermons. The Copelands' or Lindsay's books will only serve as appetizers for Liardon's collection.

Save money and time. Go straight for Liardon's. You'll be glad you did.

This book is nothing short of amazing. Why? Because John G. Lake was such an amazing man of faith and action. I can't recommend this book enough. It has it all. Amazing powerful testimonies of faith for healing, boldness to stand up against unbelief, honesty to admit when wrong, a desire to walk in integrity, and sermons that encourage the reader to take bigger and bigger steps of faith. I could feel faith rising up within me. Page after page of the miraculous. It will challenge the reader to approach his faith in an entirely new way. This book has helped me redefine my approach to christianity. I'll truly never be the same. Never again will I allow my unbelief to limit what God can do. Personally, this book is an answer to prayer. I am reading the Bible with an entirely new outlook and level of faith. What happened in the New Testament can happen today!!! I truly believe this book is annointed. Read it!! You'll never be the same.

The life of John G. Lake shows that God is willing and able to reveal himself in every man through his tangible presence, love and peace. It also shows his ability to heal from every sickness. A BOOK THAT CAN CHANGE YOUR LIFE FOREVER!

I know no other language other than English, however the New Testament was written in the Greek text. Therefore the question I have; "Has the English translation carried over the complete thoughts, feeling, revelation and wonder of God's word for my understanding? In other words, if Paul, Mark, Luke, and other writers of the New Testament were writing to me, has the language barriers been removed in order that I know that I have accurately understood what each have written?

Kenneth S. Wuest translation has fulfilled my translation desire. Knowing the true feelings, thoughts, and intent of each writer of the New Testament.

For example, the King James renders Hebrews 13:5,6

5 Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
6 So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.

Now if the writer of Hebrews was writing to you who spoke only United States English in the year 2000 he would instead write the following in order to transfer the impact of his words.

Hebrews 13:5,6

Let your manner of life be without love of money, being satisfied with your present circumstances. For He himself has said, and the statement is on record, I will not, I will not cease to sustain and uphold you. I will not, I will not, I will not let you down. So that, being of good courage, we are saying, The Lord is my helper, I will not fear. What shall man do to me?

This translation makes an impact! It speaks God's words clearly to me and it may do the same for you as well.

I know no other language other than English, however the New Testament was written in the Greek text. Therefore the question I have; "Has the English translation carried over the complete thoughts, feeling, revelation and wonder of God's word for my understanding? In other words, if Paul, Mark, Luke, and other writers of the New Testament were writing to me, has the language barriers been removed in order that I know that I have accurately understood what each have written?

Kenneth S. Wuest translation has fulfilled my translation desire. Knowing the true feelings, thoughts, and intent of each author of the New Testament.

For example, the King James renders Hebrews 13:5,6

5 Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.
6 So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.

Now if the writer of Hebrews was writing to you who spoke only United States English in the year 2000 he would instead write the following in order to transfer the impact of his words.

Hebrews 13:5,6

Let your manner of life be without love of money, being satisfied with your present circumstances. For He himself has said, and the statement is on record, I will not, I will not cease to sustain and uphold you. I will not, I will not, I will not let you down. So that, being of good courage, we are saying, The Lord is my helper, I will not fear. What shall man do to me?

Therefore this translation speaks God's words clearly to me and I believe it will bring salvation, understanding and great comfort to those who read it as well.

I owned a copy of this for a good long while - the old blue-bordered edition - and had given up hope finding it again. I am very grateful that I found it here at Amazon.
Wuest's isn't the sort of thing you would wish to use for devotional reading, but for study it often adds useful insight for those of us who just haven't got time for Greek lessons.
Used in conjunction with my NASB, my NKJV and my NESB, this is often the only "commentary" I find that I need. The last chapter of John's Gospel alone is worth the money. Highly recommended, and a great gift for a new Christian.

After a seven year absence, tough guy Detroit private detective Amos Walker returned in 1997 with "Never Street." I'm a huge fan of P.I. fiction, and Walker is one of the best around. He doesn't work the streets of Detroit so much as he INHABITS them. "Never Street" is longer and more complex than any Walker story up until that time as Amos tries to find a missing video producer and noir film buff who appears to be acting out his fantasy of sisappearing into one of his movies. For any fan of classic film noir, this is a MUST read. As a mystery, it reads reasonably well, although is not nearly as good as the best of the Walker series (novels such as "Sugartown" and "The Glass Highway"). Walker novels suffer a bit from too little reliance on supporting characters. Reappearing cops John Alderdyce and Mary Ann Thaler make a brief turn here, but only in the background of the story. Walker does have a rare romance this time out, and that helps give the story a bit of a lift.

Overall, fans of Amos Walker should enjoy this entry in the series. His is a welcome return.

If, for some reason, you must read books that are well written, with tough talking, wise-cracking, good intentioned, interesting, likeable private eyes who live in the atmospheric pages of a master crime writer, then you must read this book. Great fun for lovers of the hard-boiled genre. Read all of Estelman's Amos Walker series and you'll be have something to measure all the rest by.

I just finished Never Street. I had to. It nagged me when I put it down. Like the late show movie, I was hooked when I first put eyes on it, wanting to know what happened next. Amos Walker is the genuine article, a renaissance man to the bygone era of street wise 'private dicks' who often find out more than they wanted to. Walker is the real gem. He's involved in a track down of a nut case hooked on film noir by the worried movie widow during a Detriot heatwave. A conniving partner, a crooked shrink, an ex-con, a bumbling P.I. competitor, and a sultry mistress later, produces a couple of bodies and more than one headache the kind a couple of aspirin can't help. Walker's wisecracks alone are worth the cover price. It's no wonder Estleman is one of the most decorated mystery writers in the business.

Ken Iverson has truly earned the right to be called a "Business Maverick". In this book he explains how the culture he created at Nucor became "60% of their competative advantage". He explains how breaking down hierarchy and opening the lines of true communication in all directions can propel a business to success.

His unique, but successful, techniques at time agree with, and at times flies in the face of, McGregor, classical management theorists, and others who have studied management, communications and human resources.

In chapters entitled, "A Higher Cause", "Trust Your Instincts", "Destroy the Hierarchy", "A Simple Stake in the Business", "The Virtues of Smallness", "Ethic Over Politics", and others Mr. Iverson relates how you too, if you are willing to work hard enough at it, can "turn a confused, tired old company on the brink of bankruptcy into a star player...", while learning that "many of the so-called 'necessary evils' of life in corporate America are, in fact, not necessary".

This is a fantastic and priceless book, by a man who turned an almost bankrupt company around, to a company doing over $4 billion a year in business, with much profit. It's an inspiring book, that gives you faith in human nature...all you have to do is appeal to peoples' best impulses to get them to perform well and enthusiastically (the MANAGERS had to rescue a union organizer from the WORKERS, who wanted nothing to do with unions. Imagine that! WORKERS being hostile to the union representative, and MANAGERS, rescuing him from a hostile group!) This may be the greatest business book ever written, frankly!! I'm almost loath to recommend it, God forbid my competitors should read it!....

Ken details the mechanics of a simple, effective, decentralized framework that aligns the goals of the employees, management, and customers. Base salaries are below industry median. The bonus of a manager depends on the return on equity (capital + equipment + human) that s/he generates. Each team's bonus is tied directly to what they produce.

The higher up the manager (there are four layers including CEO), the higher the proportion of of paycut during down times.

Has simple effective metrics to monitor the health of each decentralized unit (half a dozen including sales, productivity, expenses).

A good mechanism to set goal and measure performance for a business generating tangible goods. Not sure how this could be applied to more intangible value added activities such as IT and software engineering

This collection of poetry has me breathless! The depth of emotion in these poems is endless. So much beauty is presented here it is virtually indescribable. I can only say that any poetry lover needs this book, and anyone interested in beautiful writing should truly consider investing in this book. You do not have to be a fan of poetry to fall for this poet, his words are like stories that engulf you in its tale, never letting go! Many nights I have found myself still immersed in a world of his creation long after I had closed the book.

To put it simply: Kenneth Wood is an amazing poet, a timeless visionary, and most importantly, an epic storyteller!

Buy this book.

-Tara

I'm almost at a loss for words when I try to find a way to review this book! Epic, grandiose, Mesmerizing...three simple yet powerful words that could easily accompany this book.

It goes without saying that indeterminate amounts of heart, mind, soul, and integrity went into the creation of this book, from cover to cover. While reading this book the most predominate emotion I feel is sheer amazement. Simply put, this man writes intense, amazing heartfelt poetry! And more than that, he has the ability to create stories and new worlds' for the readers, creating a vivid, welcoming escape to the dreary, monotonous drone of everyday life.

This book will stay at my bedside when sleep eludes me, and when the nighttime birds do not sing me to sleep, these words will guide me to a place of deep peace. This is a guarantee.

Again, I am trying to find words to explain something virtually beyond words of praise. This is an ocean of thought, in which you'll gladly drown.

Pen on, my friend, pen on...

This book reminds me of one of my favorite authors'...Stephen Crane! He is most notably known for his "Red Badge of Courage" book, but he wrote some wonderful, alluring poetry.

There are about 200 pages in this book and every page is a wonderful read. He is mainly a free verse poet, straying from the typical rhyming scheme we see in a lot of poetry these days, but he is not above writing this kind of poetry. Most of the rhyming poems are short with a lot of punch, or they come in free form style without structure and a fast flow, and it's great. It reminds me of rap style, which is rare in poetry. I could see a lot of these poems going over well in poetry slams.

Another great thing about the book is it is broken up into sections and each section ends with a long epic-style poem at least 3 pages long. The first sections seems to be the lighthearted section where he seems to touch upon love and hope, and other things of that nature.

The second section is the darker section, with poems written in a manner to express sadness and despair, even psychosis!

The third section reads like a story and I believe this is what the author intended it to do. There are two sub-sections aptly name "The End" (section 1) and "The Beginning" (section 2). It starts with a foreword type statement, a prelude if you will, and into the first poem which is a haunting plea written to himself called "A Letter From Prison" and that sets a sad tone of despair. Still, as the reader progresses through the pages you find yourself intrigued as to where he is going, and when your reach the end you can actually feel the hope and love withing his words! You will strain to hold tears back after reading the final poem!

All in all, I could not find one thing wrong with this book! Fans of poetry will LOVE this book, and I cannot stress that more. For those who do not like poetry may want to give this a try, you've never read poetry like this! Kenneth is a great poet and I hope he gets the recognition he deserves!

Blue Guitar is a sweet tribute to Jimmy D'Aquisto as a guitar maker and to Scott Chinery as a collector of fine instruments. The impeccable workmanship of the instruments in this book is a small oasis of patience and craftsmanship in a fast-food culture. It provides an insight into the type of people that create these wonderful pieces, as well as the zeal of one person whose passion was acquiring the best of examples of this art form. You don't have to be a guitar junkie to enjoy this book. It's fun to read and real easy to look at.

The book is an execellent reference to anyone interested in the making of guitars, and to know who presently, are among the "elite of luthiers".

Scott Chinnery, an avid collector of guitars, was instrumental in re-igniting a passion for the revival of the arch top, semi-acoustic guitar. It was Chinnery, that approached twenty two of the finest luthiers, and inspired them to the task of creating an eighteen inche (wide) semi-acoustic guitar. Chinnery also requested the guitars be made "blue" - all luthiers used the same color, yet were free to formulate and apply the color as they indivudally desired. The results and finding of this work becomes the topic of the book.

The text presents a challenge to continue the work initiated by these craftpersons. It is "inspirational", and very informative.

What does the ultimate blue archtop guitar look like? 22 master craftsmen were posed with this challenge: "make an 18 inch wide acoustic archtop guitar...make it any way you want, as long as you make it blue."

A virtual competition ensues as the top 'luthiers' get down to business creating their personal vision of the finest blue archtop. Scott Chinery, a collector of fine guitars had amassed a collection numbering over a thousand pieces when he had the notion to commission the best craftsman to make a blue archtop. You don't even have to love guitars to appreciate the wonderfully varied interpretations that came about as a result. The pride of craftsmanship shines through on each and every meticulously crafted piece. This is a handsome book richly filled with photographs of these masterpieces in blue, and the talented men and women behind them. This book is a gem for the price.

Even though it is already the year 2000, you can still get a lot of great information out of this book. I'm trying to catch up with the guy who has read "dozens" of Y2K books. See below... If nothing else, it is good for a laugh.

Whew! I am working my way through BTP's works like Sherman marched to the sea, and he keeps getting better. (See my other BTP reviews!)

Why would I heartily recommend a Y2K book when we all know Y2K was a complete farce, because this book is absolutely not limited to, and really not applicable anyway, to some kind of post-Y2K Def Con 4 meltdown scenario. This, however, is a book first and foremost about the how-to's of living independantly and being disaster proof. It is also a shopping manual. It is also a ground up survival manual. In detail:

the how to of independant living is Boston's breakdown of just want it would take to keep human beings alive and flourishing if the supermarkets stopped stocking the shelves. You obviously need food and water, but the intricacies of providing those commodities for yourself in ample supply so as to not make yourself a refugee are covered by Boston and a farming friend of Boston in chapters covering planting of some crops, and the raising of animals for food. The best animals and crops are discussed by Boston, along with what the animals need, fencing, pens, animal feed, butchering, and tractors and water supply and even the desireable and undesirable traits of different animals. Unless you the reader are a farmer and butcher combined you know nothing about these topics. I am a city kid, and I never realized what it would really take to supply a family of 4 with food and water on your own. This book gives you a distilled roadmap of how to go about setting this up for yourself. From tractors, equipment, etc., all of it is covered. Although this book cant tell you everything, it is more than enough for you to sketch out most of what you would need to do for yourself.

The chapter on energy generation, the generators and real efficient appliances is worth double the price of the book alone. This is an area I have studied on my own to some extent and frankly, I never really learned anything about it until I read Boston's book chapter on the topic. I know what different currents are, and Boston rated various gas and diesel generators in terms of cost and efficiency. Boston even goes into the storage of gasoline and diesel. Solar and wind power is covered. It runs the whole gamut and will cover the type of climate and conditions in your area.

Boston covers RV'ing, and living in those types of arrangements. It really is amazing how creative people can be, and how guys 'think outside of the box' and come up with all types of ways to beat the power company, the water company, the rotten corporations, high cost of hotels, etc!

Then all these aspects are drawn together and placed into the context of plausible scenarios for disasters and civil disruptions. Tips like, crafts and skills to have if society is forced to go simpler for a time, why and how you should mask the fact that you have generators, and other nice tidy setups when your neighbors stuff is all 'out' and various chapters on problems one faces in disasters.

All in all, this is another bang up Boston book, but I think it suffers from having Y2K in the title. Frankly, Boston should expand all the topics in the book, add a few more, and then retitle the work "Boston on Independant living". Hope to see it soon!

I already went through Y2K bug type disaster in Armenia, when USSR crushed, borders were blocked by Turkish and Azerbaijan started war with us. We got no energy, no food, no water, no gas and no money for long 5 years ( 1990 - 1995 ), so I drive from experience in this review... Although, this book mostly US oriented, but may and should be used anywhere since it points you to strategic and vital info for your survival. Just gold mine of Y2K bug info.

I had this book on my shelf for two years before taking a serious look at it, and only wish I had read it much earlier in life. Christos Papadimitriou has written quite a gem! On one hand this book serves as a good introduction to combinatorial optimization algorithms, in that it provides a flawless introduction to the simplex algorithm, linear and integer programming, and search techniques such as Branch-and-Bound and dynamic programming. On another, it serves as a good reference for many graph-theoretic algorithms. But most importantly Papadimitriou and Steiglitz seem to be on a quest to understand why some problems, such as Minimum Path or Matching, have efficient solutions, while others, such as Traveling Salesman, do not. And in doing so they end up providing the reader with a big picture behind algorithms and complexity, and the connection between optimization problems and complexity.

After reading this and Papadimitriou's "Introduction to Computational Complexity" (which I also highly recommend), I now consider him one of the best at conveying complex ideas in a way that rarely confuses the reader. I also had the priviledge of attending one of his talks on complexity, and he seems just as effusive and transparent as a lecturer as he does a writer. Ah, for once I bought a Dover book that did not disappoint.

One could buy this book for different reasons: interests in combinatorial optimization, of course; interests in what Papadimitriou has to say, since his thoughts on this subject are definitely invaluable; perhaps the price is a good reason alone.
Whatever the reason, however, I think that would be a rare event to remain duped.

I was preparing my exam in Computability and Complexity when I first used it. I've been wonderfully surprised by the amount of definitions, algorithms, concepts I've found in this book. I think one could use this book for a simple course on Algorithms, on Computability and/or Complexity, on the whole Combinatorial Optimization, and the book would be always and costantly useful.

The chapters on algorithms and complexity, or those on NP completeness have proved to be gems. The chapters on Approximation and Local Search are great, and they feature a bunch of detailed and excellent quality stuff (e.g. there is a detailed treatment of Christofides' algorithm to approximate the TSP, that is quite an idiosyncratic topic).

All in all, a very great book, with a value exponentially greater than the very insignificant price.

As a computer science graduate student I carried Papadimitriou and Steiglitz with me almost every day. Its target subject is combinatorial optimization, but going through this book, you might think that graph theory and computational complexity are just subfields of combinatorial optimization. It builds a beautiful theory that brings these and other fields together, and with a fraction of the page count of, say, Cormen, Rivest Leiserson. Now that it's a Dover book, it's a fraction of the price I paid, and I was gladly willing to pay that.

It's welcome recognition of the rich body of American noir writing that the Library of America has decided to gather these novels and include them in it's collection. This volume, along with it's companion, "Crime Novels: American Noir of the '50s", is perhaps the definitive collection of this genre. While this volume is not as strong as the second volume collecting hard boiled writing from the '50s, it more than makes up for it with the inclusion of two seminal novels from the genre: "The Postman Always Rings Twice" and "They Shoot Horses Don't They?" The themes that would be later expanded on by Jim Thompson, Charles Willeford, et al. are here: the uncertainty of reality, the indifference of fate, the allegories on the disfunction of mercantilist capitalism, the femme fatale as deus ex machina, the erosion of moral standards...themes that are that much more relevant today.

It's comforting in a way that these novels, which were considered (and still considered by some) as trash, disposable items of consumption, are collected along with the novels of Melville, James and Hawthorne...."elevated" to high brow lit.

Perhaps the original authors of these masterworks would disagree on the modern critical re-assessment, but to readers like myself, it's just confirmation of something we've known ever since we first discovered them.

The Library of America is a first-class organization. The LOA is consistently reprinting volumes of literary achievement by the most notable authors in American history. They have reprinted everything from political speeches to poetry to historical works. This volume is the first in a two volume set dedicated to American noir stories. The stories in this book were written in the 1930's and 1940's in what seems to be the golden age of the genre.

The first story is from James Cain, and it's a whiz-bang of a tale. I had heard of "The Postman Always Rings Twice" before, mainly in reference to the two film versions of the story. This is one dark read. Adultery and murder never seem to mix, and it sure doesn't here, either. Told in first person narration, a drifter gets himself mixed up with a washed up beauty queen who is tired of her Greek husband. The result is classic noir: a conspiracy to murder the poor schmuck and run off together. As usual, the murder brings about tragic consequences. This story has more twists and turns than you can imagine. The ending is especially atmospheric. This is certainly one of the best stories in the book. I always like to see a story where the blackmailer gets a good beating.

Horace McCoy's "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?" is next in line. This is another great tale that was made into a film in the 1960's starring Hanoi Jane Fonda and Gig Young. The movie is soul shattering, with depictions of dehumanization in the neighborhood of "Schindler's List." The story is not quite as good, but it still packs a heck of a punch. The story is set in Depression-era America and depicts the horrors of a dance marathon. These marathons were apparently quite popular during the 1930's, until they were ultimately outlawed. Contestants were required to dance for hundreds of hours with only ten minute breaks every two hours. The couple that lasted the longest won a thousand or so dollars. The public would come and pay admission to watch this sorry spectacle. It's like poking sticks at animals in a cage. This story is loaded with dark depression and sexual innuendo. The conclusion is suitably depressing to merit a noir award.

"Thieves Like Us" was pretty substandard when compared to the other stories in this book. This one really didn't seem to have those noir elements that I like so much. Actually, it's more of a Bonnie and Clyde type story. A penitentiary break leads to a crime spree across Texas. Banks are robbed and cops are killed while the gang lives on the lam. A relationship between Bowie, the main character, and a girl named Keechie really doesn't add much interest to the story. There is some good dialogue and a bit of desolate atmosphere, but not enough to lift this to the level of noir. I don't know why this story is included here. Try and guess how the story ends (the clue is "Bonnie and Clyde"). I hope that Edward Anderson's other stories are better.

Kenneth Fearing's "The Big Clock" is excellent, and brings the level of the book back up to where it should be. Set in a magazine publishing house, this tale is sleek and smart. The story is told in first person narration, but Fearing shifts the narration to various characters in the story. These constantly changing viewpoints turn the story into a roller coaster ride of epic proportions. An editor at the company makes the mistake of sleeping with the boss's woman. When this lady turns up dead at the hands of same boss, all heck breaks loose. This story is riveting and has a great ending that is all suspense. A must read.

William Lindsay Gresham wrote "Nightmare Alley" after some discussions he had with some carnival workers. This story is the longest one in the book and is a decent addition to the volume. Full of unpleasant images of murder, swindle, cynicism and downright perversion, you won't be disappointed when this one comes to an end. A scheming magician decides to take his con to the big time by posing as a Spiritualist minister, and as usual, the end result is tragedy all around. This story is downright depressing, and if you don't feel sorry for Gyp, you have got a problem. I didn't really care too much for the (...) addition of the black Communist towards the end of the book. Gresham had a flirtation with the Redski movement, so this apparent insertion makes some sense in that context. It goes nowhere in the story, however. There are some other holes in the plot but overall this is an entertaining story.

The final tale comes from the sumptuous pen of Cornell Woolrich. "I Married a Dead Man" becomes instantly familiar within a few pages, mostly due to the numerous films that have copped the plot. The writing here is far superior to any of the other stories in the book. I'd say it's far superior to most writing in general. The metaphors are extraordinary. Look for the description of Bill lighting his cigarette in the doorway. Wow! The story centers on a case of mistaken identity with a strong dose of blackmail thrown in for good measure. Of course, there's also a murder. This story is outstanding.

Overall, if you are just starting to read noir, start with these two volumes. It is good to see some of the best noir has to offer, and you will find some of it in these pages. The book clocks in at 990 pages, but it reads really fast. There is also a nice summary concerning the careers of each author at the back of the book. Recommended.

I was surprised at how modern the themes and writing of this compendium were. I read "Thieves Like Us" just when the Texas 7 episode was happening and was amazed at how little the views of crime and punishment, justice and desperation have changed since that writing, especially in Texas where the story takes place.

"They Shoot Horses..." was my favorite of the bunch for it's depiction of deperate people doing desperate things to survive in the form of a Dance Marathon. But are they doing this out of deperation (even the winner of the prize money, after months of physical torment , will end up having made less than a dollar a day)? Or becuase there is nothing else to do? What is futile and what is meaningfull, the story seems to be asking.

"Nightmare Alley" brought the Tyrone Power movie back home, only the ending seems more poignant. The author organzies each chapter along the 22 minor arcana of the Tarot, a device used by later authors like Robert Anton Wilson and Umberto Eco.

"The big clock", filmed at least twice with variations on themes, uses a unique writing style of shifting narratives from the main characters' points of view and has an awfully modern motive for the murder (probably a little too modern for that period).

"The Postman.." and "I Married a Dead Man" story were also very dood. The Noir theme of "Crime Does Not Pay" runs through most of theses stories, but when you read them, you realize that it's not as simple as that. In the end, who really wins and loses and does it matter?

I don't think one can do better for reading the greats of American Literature than through the Library of America seri

I have always liked Kenneth Patchen poetry. This novel has a wonderful title. I would almost have to read it solely on the basis of the title. It is not the greatest prose I ever read but it was a very engaging tale. I have to admit that the whole time I was reading it I kept thinking to myself I bet Bob Dylan read this book. A lot of the names and imagery was reminiscent of the lyrics of Dylan. Since Patchen came first it stands to reason that he bore an influence on Bob Dylan. It is a very enjoyable read for anyone that likes surrealic prose. Patchen was always an outstanding poet and this book more than reveals his gift for writing prose.

This book has two plots reflecting themes that run throughout much of Patchen's work: the absurdity of the "profane" civilized world and the importance of focusing on the "sacred" or natural world to bring meaning, order, and purpose to human existence. The device Patchen chose for the first theme is that of censorship of erotic content in literature. It is from this that the book derives its title. When this book was written in 1945, books were often published in the US with ellipses substituting for erotic content. The beginning of the book tells the story of a first novel of innocent love, called The Spool of Destiny, written by Albert Budd of Bivalve, New Jersey. An unscrupulous editor changes the book's name to The Spill of Desire and substitutes **** and . . . . for Albert's innocent words throughout the text in such quantity that the book must be published overseas. Albert becomes a best-selling pornographer who everyone wants to meet and make love to.

About half-way through the work Albert meets and falls in love with another innocent, Priscilla, and the story moves from the profane life of New York society to a sacred love that works miracles and heals all wrongs. This is the most moving part of the book and Patchen's best portrayal of this mystical, transformational love that inspires so many of his poems. I think many readers might give up this book in the first half and miss this gem of prose writing embedded in the second half.

If you like Patchen's poetry, you must read this book. If you haven't read Patchen before, stop whatever you are doing and either read this book or a book of his poetry. He is truly a great American author and this is his most approachable novel. This review is dedicated to Miriam, Kenneth Patchen's wife and inspiration, who died in 2001.

Maybe a bit arcane (1945 issues for 1999) but I've never read a sweeter or more charming book.