Thanks to the urging of series editor Warren French, Twayne's United States Author Series includes this scholarly study of H.P. Lovecraft by Peter Cannon, and an excellent study of the neglected master of the macabre it is. I would not classify this as an introduction to Lovecraft and his body of work, although some of the blurbs on the back of the book itself deem this a great introduction that speaks to both loyal fans and skeptics. At least a rudimentary familiarity with Lovecraft's fiction, poems, and other writings is necessary in order to follow all of Cannon's arguments, and the Lovecraft neophyte will also find spoilers here for many of Lovecraft's most memorable works. This should not be considered a biography of Lovecraft, although it does contain much that is biographical in nature. This is as much literary criticism of an academic nature as it is biography, and Cannon manages to fuse the merits of both in an extremely instructive structural approach sure to enlighten even the most ardent of Lovecraft devotees.

Cannon's study begins with Lovecraft's childhood and early years, taking a look at the amateur journalism, travel pieces, and similarly obscure written pieces of those years. He then provides the reader with a most illuminating study of Lovecraft's early adult writings of the late 1910s and early 1920s; here, he is particularly interested in six prominent themes which speak quite clearly to the influences, both literary as well as physical and environmental, that came together to form Lovecraft's oddly personal worldview: the past, the sea, below (as in subterranean secrets and horrors), beyond (as in cosmic horrors), dreamland (making special note of the story ideas Lovecraft gleaned from his dreams), and decadence. By the mid-1920s, Lovecraft had come to see his beloved New England setting as the perfect environment for his horror stories, and this prominence on geography in the master horror writer's fiction leads Cannon to approach his mature output geographically. Here he examines each story of the given period in terms of geography and a number of other factors, making great use of the voluminous collection of personal correspondence reflecting Lovecraft's own thoughts on his work. The change evidenced in Lovecraft as well as his fiction from the move away from a stillborn marriage and unhappy abode in New York back home to the Providence he knew and loved is quite illuminating. Cannon's treatment of Lovecraft's ideas and slowly evolving opinion of mankind in general was of great interest to me, and there is much to be learned from Cannon's short but illuminating examinations of Lovecraft's individual stories and poems. Cannon points to a select number of the neglected revision stories Lovecraft basically ghost-wrote in "collaboration" with far less capable aspiring authors as holding great significance in the literary progression and legacy of the modern master of the macabre; Cannon's input here is invaluable because today's reader is hard pressed to determine just how strongly to associate Lovecraft with these revisions of other writers' amateurish fictional forays.

The book closes with a short look at Lovecraft's critical reputation, closing things out on a rather somber note. As a great admirer of Lovecraft, it does bother me that, despite important strides in recent years, his place in literature is still far from secure as many scholarly critics basically ignore the man and belittle his admirers as "juvenile" hero-worshippers of some kind of false god of fiction. Cannon's contribution to the Twayne's United States Authors Series is a step in the right direction, of course, but it does much to show just how long the journey to Lovecraft's critical acceptance by the academic community will be. Featuring a number of illustrative footnotes and a very useful bibliography of primary and secondary sources, Cannon's short but piercing examination of Lovecraft's place in American literature is something all Lovecraft fans will want to own, enjoy, and learn from.

A delightful book! Brings the insects to life. His tone is so entertaining you hardly realize how much you've learned. I heartily recommend it.

Nobody has described the venezuelan turttles better than trebbau in this book

This is an excellant book especially if you have no experience at all in dealing with emergancy first aid. It give clear, consice information on everything from simple to complete lacerations, emergancy child birth to what to have in a First Aid Kit. Extremely well written and easy to understand.

The Book of Lost Houses is a supplement for Changeling the Dreaming, one of White Wolfs roleplaying games.

Overall I found Book of Lost Houses an excellent read, it more than made up for the disappointment of War In Concordia (a book that I personally loathed). It is to the same high standards of the other Houses books, in fact more so since there wasn't any single house that I would not wish to play.

The gist of the book is the remaining Arcadian Sidhe Houses have returned to the Autumn realm, their motives for doing so and details on each house is included within the pages. Five houses in total, Beaumayn, (French) Aesin, (Scandanavian) Daireann, (Celtic) Varich (Russian) and Scathach (Celtic). There's new merits and flaws, details on the house birthrights and various oaths among the pages as well as a complete new fighting ability for the Scathach.

House Beaumayn are French in origin, and the one remaining seelie house (the other houses listed here save for the Scathach are unseelie) all members have gifts of prophecy, imprisoned in Arcadia for crimes by some of their house, finally they have been released. Dreadfully seelie at times (by no means assume seelie means 'good') some of the members have very interesting views on the use of cold iron. They were in the words of another changeling player, written the way House Liam should have been. They're undoubtedly the best house in the book.

Aesin are Scandinavian and being written by someone from that area of the world we can hope that the information has a few grains of truth to it. They're certainly not the looting Vikings I imagined we'd be getting (thankfully). Descended from the Nordic gods, with strong ties to nature, both genders have their own separate roles to play.

The Daireann are yet another group of celtic warriors (as if we needed anymore), they struck me as the most bland of the houses, save for small section that turn to poisoning instead of blades.

The Varich are Russian, have ties with the inanimae and seem rather upright and proper, with an interest in patterns of one sort or another, given enough time they can use this to their benefit, be it in combat or otherwise.

Scathach (as you might remember from Nobles: The Shining Host) have finally been made playable, further details given into their house flaw and boon, as well as (thankfully) a more detailed description between how the Scathach differ from other sidhe. Now they're the second best house in the book. For those unaware the Scathach are yet more Celtic warriors, the one Sidhe House to have remained behind and undergone the changeling way, no longer truly sidhe they share souls with mortals like the commoners do. Though, as the book reveals, not all of the Scathach remained behind after all. They were powered down a lot from their original incarnation I think and portrayed in such a way that I might actually play one, which is saying a lot because before they were my second least favourite house.

My one main criticism of the book is the art, which I personally did not like and I did not think did the sidhe any justice at all. A lot of it seemed like doodles in the margins and made me long for the days of coloured pages and where the true fantasy feel came through in the pictures. However we buy the book for the content not the pretty pictures I hope.

I also believe that the houses could have been given more space, and some of the text has been truncated from the Scathach section ...

If you've read the other house books and liked them then this one is definitely a must, ditto for if you're keeping up on the metaplot. If you plan to run a chronicle with Sidhe in it, I'd definitely recommend this book too. With houses from diverse cultures it's an enjoyable read and would make a great addition to any Changeling Collection.

Four stars; despite the bad art and the missing content I still feel there's a lot of good information in here. The merits and flaws, oaths, and house boons/frailties and the scathach combat techniques and treasures, are worth it alone and throw in all the background information and you've got a book that's one of the best Changeling releases ever.

At last, the juicy tidbits about what happened in Arcadia, the Exile and the very unseelie folks who come back to the Tellurian through in the second Resurgence. Not to be missed by St's wishing to spice things a bit for politically minded Changeling players...great book, and a reminder to WW... keep this level up and you'll keep us as loyal customers...

The consummate daydreamers... White Wolf's Changelings are complex creatures who exist in a world seemingly designed to destroy them. Their fragility makes them touching while their ferocity makes them intriguing. And The Book of Lost Houses only furthers the mystique of these complex creatures: Beautiful, sad, horrific, lascivious, mirthful, stunning, trapped. If the standard books just aren't enough for you - if questions keep bubbling to the surface the more you read and play these whimsical creatures - then The Book of Lost Houses might just be what you're looking for. Questions you may not even have had are answered herein, and it's all presented in such a way as to make it an enjoyable read. I cannot recommend beginning your Changeling experience with this book (try Changeling: The Dreaming, instead), but this is a must for those who are already familiar with The Dreaming.

This book is very useful. It is a definite help to graduate students trying to understand macroeconomics. It would probably not help undergraduates.

The challenge of explaining the major schools of thought, and explaining their strengths and weaknesses is a major one. The authors also go over some non-orthodox schools such as Post Keynesian and Austrian. However, some of the diagrams are poorly explained and the writing is a bit incomprehensible in a few chapters. Also, the book does not go over growth theory, which is probably a major part of any graduate macro class. On the whole though, it is one of the best macro books available.

The central purpose of this book is to make sense of the fierce issues and debates concerning modern macroeconomics.

The authors suggest that the text be used alongside a basic macroeconomics textbook or as a main text in itself.

It is an excellent introduction to what is recognised as a controversial area of economics. The analogy of climbing a mountain and not being able to see the landscape is a very pertinent one.

There may be disagreements about the content of this book. Indeed it is easy to adopt a position about exclusions but this is a side issue. The format of an historical perspective in the development of ideas coupled with a consideration of the major positions within the debate works well.

It is clear from reading the text that the authors are very familiar with the subject matter and that each has contributed to the individual chapters on the specialist areas in a way which carries along the general reader.

Two particular things stand out for me in this text. The first is the section within the first chapter devoted to methodological issues and the associated section on rhetoric in economics. This is a key to a comprehensive understanding of the nature of the debate and the competing schools of thought involved.

The other standout aspect of this book is the interviews with various protaganists of the differing schools. Some pretty big names here including that of Nobel Prize Winner, James Tobin who only died last week. And what interviews. Not for these authors the standard sort of awe-struck beholden interviews but foccussed on the central points of the debate, exploratory questions which give real insight into the people and the issues involved. An excellent approach and one which has proved to be very successfully applied.

The final chapter, Conclusions and Reflections provides an outstanding summation and is followed by a comprehensive bibliography.

This book manages to convey in written form the full extent and depth of the macroeconomic debate such that it is intelligible to the educated reader without resorting to more mathematics than are absolutely needed and for that the authors are to be applauded.

In summing up this is a very valuable text which will be an asset to every macroeconomics course reading list.

Snowdon et.al. present a thorough and concise summary of the competing schools of macroeconomic thought and the major scholarly contributions by their proponents. The book is organized in such a manner that one can follow the major ideas and models within the different schools as they emerged, and then follow how these ideas came to be critiqued by a proponent of a competing school. Snowdon et.al do this all by using intuitive interpretations of the literature and without the complex mathematical formulas or empirical test data. Very readable by intermediate standards with excellent information for understanding macro thought.

This book is a wonderful way to firm and tone your muscles while achieving a balletic grace. I usually hate workout books or even using exercise machines because the routine seems so pointless. This book, however, gives a purpose to the exercises. It won't make you a professional dancer, or even an amateur one, but you'll feel more graceful and become more flexible.

Before you even start the exercises, you're inspired by the excellent photographs of the beautiful dancers. If you're as out of shape as I am, at first the stretches and exercises seem almost impossible, but after only just a few days they become easier as you regain flexibility and muscle tone. Most importantly, you develop an awareness of your body that stays with you long after you've finished your workout.

This is the best workout program I've ever used. I recommend it especially as a post-partum routine for women who want to regain their pre-pregnancy muscle tone and flexibility.

What a wonderful book! I just bought it and I can't wait to get started. I've read it from cover to cover a few times, and I'm more than pleased with my purchase. The magnificent bodies are marvelous and breathtaking. It's true that the first few pages are bios and frou frou, but their stories are inspiring and motivating. Plus, they discuss why dancers' bodies are more agile and sculpted than most athletes, as well as tips on getting started, how to listen to your body and optimize your workout.

The workout is divided into six sections. Warm up and Stretch, followed by Abs (14-20 minutes), Floor barre (12-16 minutes), Ballet center (16-22 minutes) and Legs (16-22 minutes). Although they say you can do the entire workout as time permits, they offer suggestions for 10 or 20 minute workouts, as well as specialized workouts to correlate with specific sports for strength and flexibility or body parts of concentration. The instructions are clear-cut and detailed and along with the music selections they recommend, you'll feel like a prima ballerina. Personally, I have a lot of fat to lose so I plan on using this workout as a supplement to an aerobic regimen. I'm looking forward to using this workout every morning to get my day started.

What this book WILL do is guide you through an exercise routine that is as challenging and fun as you want to make it.

The exercises are divided into different sections: warm-up, stretches, abdominals, legs, floor barre, and ballet. There are also sample routines in the back of the book for emphasizing different aspects of fitness: endurance, strength, abs, etc.

Each movement is shown step-by-step with written instructions, and almost every one moves your body through motions it is probably not accustomed to doing. After just the 10-minute stretch, I am already feeling energetic and relaxed. The exercises are fun, often quite challenging, and they accomplish what they claim they will.

This book will not make you a ballet dancer ~ one-on-one classes are irreplaceable for that. But using the exercises contained in it will supplement your dancing (or any other activity you're involved with!) by making your body stronger and more graceful.

Regardless of one's feelings about the egomania of author Bogdanovich (and it certainly bleeds through every page), he provides the creative world a great service by sharing his many years of interviews with some of the masters of American Film.

Contained within these pages is a critical access to the creative process. Each director interviewed (obviously some more than others) provides invaluable insight into the nuts and bolts of film directing. Bogdanovich has compiled with this book, an indispensable historical document that does much to inspire, educate and guide any aspiring film director.

I particularly valued Alan Dwan's insights into the importance of communicating character relationships into the narrative. I have incorperated much of the late director's invaluable advice into my attempts at stage direction.

All in all a must have for anybody interested in directing or gaining insight into the creative process.

Peter Bogdanovich pioneered the director interview in English, and this wonderful collection will give endless pleasure to film buffs. The book-length interview with Allan Dwan alone is worth the price of admission. Bogdanovich always did vast amounts of study before sitting down to talk with his subjects, and his expertise and enthusiasm encouraged them to open up in a way they usually did not with other interviewers. Anyone writing about the careers of the directors Bogdanovich interviews has to start with his work on them. A fitting companion piece is Bogdanovich's encyclopedic interview book "This Is Orson Welles."

The title was suggested by Howard Hawks who once observed, "...I liked almost anybody that made you realize who in the devil was making the picture...Because the director's the storyteller and should have his own method of telling it." Hawks is one of the 16 "legendary film directors" represented in this volume. It is important to keep in mind that these are conversations rather than interviews such as those conducted by Robert J. Emery in The Directors: Take One and its sequel, The Directors Take Two, as well as interviews conducted by Richard Schickel in The Men Who Made the Movies. It is also worth noting that Bogdanovich is himself a distinguished director of films such as The Last Picture Show, What's Up, Doc?, They All Laughed (a personal favorite of mine), and Texasville. As a result of his own background, Bogdanovich's questions and comments reflect somewhat different interests and perspectives than do those of Emery and Schickel.

I rate all of these books Five Stars but probably enjoyed reading Bogdanovich's book the most because the conversations ramble along somewhat messily, as most of my own conversations tend to do, and also because Bogdanovich is more actively involved in the interaction than Emery and Schickel are. As a reader, I feel as if I were really an eavesdropper as 16 directors casually share their opinions, information about specific films and actors, gossip, "war stories," and overall evaluations of their careers' various successes and failures. At no time does Bogdanovich seem intrusive or manipulative. Moreover, perhaps to an extent he did not realize when writing this book, he also reveals a great deal about himself...much of it endearing and some of it admirable. His passion for film making and his appreciation of the great directors are almost palpable. Readers' interests about various directors and their respective films obviously vary. I include myself among those who are die-hard film buffs and so I enjoyed reading every chapter and every word in each chapter. Indeed, each conversation was for this amateur "gourmet" a feast to be consumed with delight and, yes, gratitude.

This is a well-written and useful book about leading edge enterprise business technology. I work in workflow systems development and I think this book provides a thorough yet practical vision of the next generation of business process systems. This book will likely launch a thousand ships with many winners among them. You do not have to be highly technical to get a lot from this book. In fact, it is written for business managers who have some sense of enterprise IT and its impact, both good and bad, in corporations. The authors rightly emphasize some of the current failings in IT and stress that much of the problem is the inflexibility of systems to adapt in the rapidly changing climate of business. Managers need to have control of the overall business processes to adjust quickly, but cannot because business processes are often "baked" into existing IT applications. The authors point to many examples in business history and in current pioneering efforts to show that managing business processes is a determinative factor of success. While this may sound obvious, the solution offered is potentially profound. Business Process Management Systems, or BPMS, are already being sold and deployed in real life environments and yielding benefits. While the authors admit that their full vision will only be realized in the decades to come, there is much that can begin today. Since the book is not highly technical, the authors do not address some of the hairier issues in systems integration (entity ontology for example) but they do outline their key assumptions such as the requirement for legacy integration (one time per system) and the pressing need for business process engineering/analysts. They also assume widespread adoption of a single process definition language. This will of course happen but probably not until after the various players try to sway the market towards their own standards. There are very good appendixes for the technical person and business manager alike. I love the book and recommend it highly. This book is short, insightful and packed with information from a variety of disciplines that are woven together to support the authors' primary assertions about IT for the coming decade(s). What is exotic today could well become a necessity tomorrow.

I first came across this book as an excerpt in Darwin Magazine. It immediately hit home. Business Process Management - the third wave" is NOT only aimed at experienced business leaders scouting the economic horizon, its for everyone as its themes are universal--in business and in IT.

The book is certainly NOT buzzword heavy, in fact the authors go to extreme lengths to make sure they dont talk down to non-technical readers. As they say, managing the processes of a company is about business AND technology (period). Smith and Fingar have made it UNDERSTANDABLE to BUSINESS PEOPLE for the first time (imho) WHY their IT systems often let them down and what they can do about it. Appendices are provided for people who want to geek out. But how Celia can say the book is abrasive beats me. It is so friendly, but at the same time focussed and inspirational. (Peter and Howard - I love the Zen stuff). Yes, they talk about "technology gods" and "cast in concrete" data stovepipes, but that's REALITY guys, that's WHY there is a business-IT divide today and why the third wave BPM could move us all forward, whether we are on the business side of the house or the IT side. I'm an obsessive process architect. These guys have hit the nail on the head.

Its true that Smith and Fingar lament the disruptive and "painful reengineering second wave advocated by their former colleague, James Champy." (Champy was CSC, Smith is CSC, for those who dont know). Well, as I said in my comments at Darwin, it looks like the industry is finally moving on and I am simply AMAZED at the clarity of the analysis in the Reengineering Chapter as to how modern BPM systems can now DO what the reengineering guys said they wanted to but gave no solution, other than to employ expensive consultants. Its just plain SILLY for Celia to say that what Smith and Fingar hope to achieve is to "cut IT entirely out of the business change loop". That's not what they say at all. They show how IT can provide BPM capabilities so that business people are EMPOWERED to manage their own affairs. The only thing that Celia says that IS correct is that "it behooves anyone who might be in a position to benefit from BPM -- or to get trampled by the BPM steamroller -- to familiarize themselves with the subject."

As I said at Darwin, its refreshing to see processes coming back center stage, but this time with TEETH. The books controversial elements may be missed by some readers, but will be understood by those that have REALLY worked at the intersection of business and IT. Clue, read the Epilog.

--- Yours truly, a frustrated (with data) business process analyst just starting to get some understanding of the potential of the third wave.

"Business Process Management - the third wave" is aimed at experienced business leaders scouting the economic horizon. The book is buzzword heavy and assumes a great deal of prior knowledge. Terms like lambda calculus, process calculi, PKI, six sigma and BPML are scattered throughout and not generally explained. The authors make a rather poor attempt at explaining Business Process Modeling Language (BPML), which lies at the heart of BPM (BPML is similar in format to XML and generates flowcharts), but otherwise you're on your own.

The overall tone of the book is abrasive. Smith and Fingar rail against "technology gods" and "cast in concrete" data stovepipes. They lament the disruptive and "painful reengineering" second wave advocated by their former colleague, James Champy. They see the main differentiator of BPM as being its ability to connect outwards to partner businesses.

What Smith and Fingar hope to achieve with business process engineering is to cut IT entirely out of the business change loop. They envisage being able to completely describe all business processes in BPML diagrams - down to the "Coke" machine's inputs (coins) and outputs (cans of soda). This way, business managers need never deal with IT folk again, and they can outsource entire processes by exposing the relevant sections of BPML to subcontractors.

It's truly hard to tell from the book how much of this is blue sky and how much is part of the trend already underway. Either way it behooves anyone who might be in a position to benefit from BPM -- or to get trampled by the BPM steamroller -- to familiarize themselves with the subject.

Karl von Clausewitz's (1780-1831) masterpiece On War has deservedly been translated into most major languages. The Everyman's Library Edition of the work - introduced by Peter Paret - is the perhaps most widely acclaimed English edition.

Long recognized as the classic the strategic principles of armed conflict, the book continue to influence military thinking. On War is an attempt to reach an understanding of the nature of war itself. The Prussian general defines war as violence intended to compel the opponent to fulfill the will of the proponent. Violence is the means; submission of the enemy is the object.

The ultimate goal of war is political - armed combat is the means to a political end, without which war becomes «pointless and devoid of sense». Another key thought is that the total defeat of the adversary is the essence of war. A critique often heard against this strain of thought is that Clausewitz's focus on decisive battle and over strategic maneuver invites bloodbath. This can also serve to illustrate why the book has carried relevance over the centuries. -It focuses on the -how's of war rather than considerations that are bound to be influenced by Zeitgeist.

The book is experiencing a renaissance in the post-Cold War era -reading it may well help to explain the phenomenon of war also in the years to come.

Karl von Clausewitz's (1780-1831) masterpiece On War, has deservedly been translated into most major languages. The Everyman's Library Edition of On War introduced by Peter Paret is the perhaps most widely acclaimed English edition.

Long recognized as the classic the strategic principles of armed conflict, the book continue to influence military thinking. On War is an attempt to reach an understanding of the nature of war itself. The Prussian general defines war as violence intended to compel the opponent to fulfill the will of the proponent. Violence is the means; submission of the enemy is the object.

The ultimate goal of war is political - armed combat is the means to a political end, without which war becomes «pointless and devoid of sense». Another key thought is that the total defeat of the adversary is the essence of war. A critique often heard against this strain of thought is that Clausewitz's focus on decisive battle and over strategic maneuver invites bloodbath.

The book is experiencing a renaissance in the post-Cold War era -reading it may well help to explain the phenomenon of war also in the years to com

I have the Regnery edition- "War, Politics, and Power," but this edition surmising Clausewitz's writings seems more widely available. So I offer my review on his writings and recommend this book. This book was widely disseminated in Red China, Nazi Germany, and the Soviet Union.

Essentially, this book contains the best writings of the German military theorist. Clauswitz, the Prussian Sun Tzu, effectively brought the concept of total war into acceptability. Gone our the days Antonie Henri Jomini's chilvarious code of conduct and honor- Civilians will not only be subject to attack - they'll bear the brunt of the battle in an age of total war. Several points are made- which are crucial to surmising Clausewitzian theory- 1) "War is the continuation of state policy by other means;" 2) "All war is based on the art of deception;" 3) "No one starts war... without first being clear in his mind what he intends to achieve by the war and how he intends to conduct it;" 4) War is "an act of force to compel our enemy to do our will." 5) "If the enemy is thrown off balance, he must not be given time to recover. Blow after blow must be struck in the same direction: the victor, in other words, must strike with all his strength... by daring to win all, will one really defeat the enemy."

To me this work is valuable in its historical context- and as an ardent student of military history.