When the book reviews the wildlife that appear in the Full House series they claim Full House went off the air in 1994. It was actually '95 it went off the air. And the Mr. Ed series went off the air in 1966 not 1965.

Doggone it! Call this one a howling (and oinking, meowing and neighing) success. Here,
in one compact book, is the history of the lives and career of TV's greatest stars --- the
furry (and usually) four-footed kind. The big stars are here --- Rin Tin Tin, Lassie, Clarence the Cross-Eyed Lion, Trigger, Mr. Ed and Arnold Ziffel --- as well as those you might have forgotten about --- Barkley, Spike the Seeing-Eye Dog, Sam the Chimp and Spooks. The journey takes place in alphabetical order, with concise histories of the shows, lots of nifty photos (including Jackie O visiting Elsa the lioness on the set of the ill-fated TV series "Born Free") and great insights into the lives of the non-human small-screen stars. (Who knew the seeing-eye dogs who guided criminal insurance investigator Mike Longstreet were played by three German Shepherds --- Blanco, Snow and Blizzard?) It's a jungle out there. Get ready to grin and bear it. That's "bear" as in "Gentle Ben."

Great book! Well researched and the information on Lassie was right on target. Even other animals trained by the Weatherwax family are interspersed throughout this book. Ken must have interviewed the world for this!...

I hesitate to review this book because, by doing so, I'm forced to give it at least one star. I would far rather have given it zero. This book is applicable to nothing in the B5 universe. The characters and setting appear only as a backdrop for an endless diatribe about capital punishment and xenophobia (which, for Mortimore, seems to indicate anyone who disagrees with anyone else about anything.) He presents his political opinions with all the subtlety of a MOAB bomb, and responds to any potential criticisms (how could any be lacking?) with an exceedingly arrogant comment at the end of the "book". Insult to injury. No, the first injury was to me for having bought the book in the first place.

As one can see looking at all the other reviews ranging from several one star rankings to several five star rankings this book is not easy to review. I see several reasons for this difference in views:

If this novel would not take place in the Babylon 5 universe but in a universe of its own, it would make a fine novel I would rank at about 3-4 stars. This book is mainly about death penalty and the "right to kill" and sheds light on many aspects of this theme, e.g. using death penalty as a political instrument to get more votes for your re-election (like president Clark does in this book through the law referred to in the book's title). Both sides, pro and contra, are given room for their arguments.

The problem with the novel is that it takes place in the B5 universe in a way I cannot accept as consistent with the TV series. While the story is fitting into the main facts of the series, to me especially the characters of Garibaldi and Sheridan are different from those of the TV series. While the book really enhances our background knowledge about events on the station prior to B5 getting independent from Earth, to me Sheridan has lost some of his authority, charisma and his moral standards in the book, he is too much of a puppet directed by Earth, and Garibaldi has become somewhat of a cynic who makes jokes about everything and everyone, trying to be "cool".

On the other hand, characters like Franklin and Vir are described according to the TV series and there are some interesting story developments around their characters.

The alien civilisation of the Tuchanq, which is introduced for this book, is interesting, but it, like the whole novel, centers around a lot of bloody rituals, which to me are somewhat untypical of B5 in this intensity. The state "kills" (through Sheridan as executioner) an alien who has killed a human (who likes to have paid sex with all sorts of aliens) and 40 Narns in a prison. G'Kar nearly kills Londo, who had ordered the assination of G'Kar, and G'Kar even tries to kill himself. During riots Narn, Tuchanq, Centauri and all sorts of peoples kill each other and you learn about a lot of killings in the past. Sometimes I really wondered that so many people are still alive in the end.

Why only two stars and not three? The basically good storyline is overshadowed (no pun intended, considering the titles of the three parts of the book) by several scenes in which the main characters and their interactions in my eyes do not stay true to their depiction on television.

Still, I would advise this book to fans of Babylon 5, they will find a lot of interesting background material interwoven into the storyline.

This book, one of the best in the series, has a great plot. The weird rituals of other cultures, the conflict between aliens, and the conflict between duty and personal feelings. And also, the philosophical questions: Should there be a death penalty? If there is, where do you draw the line?

The autor shows the feelings of the crew about the execution almost perfectly. You can feel the pain of Dr. Franklin, with the stems and with his sorrow over the innocent brain damaged Tuchanq. The captain's feelings are felt very strongly. You can almost see the expressions on the characters' faces, and there great pain.

The end of the book is very smart, and makes everybody happy. It definitely is something the Captain or one of the crew would think of doing.

A flaw about the book is that people that are not familiar with Babylon 5 might not understand parts of it. This might not be a big flaw, since most of the people reading the book already know Babylon 5.

To sum things up: this book is highly recommended for B5 fans.

On the first few pages, it becomes evident that the author of this book never met Howard. This work is by the ranch-hand that tended some of his massive holdings in Nevada. Part of the book is about the procedures to build fences and handle animals.

If you're a serious collector, the most interesting part of this is how the disposition of the land was handled after Howard died, and how the many purchases tie in with the scams covered quite thorougly in other books -- that Howard's cronys bought land under Howard's name without his knowledge at vastly inflated prices. The agents supposedly split the price inflation with the cronys.

Really, Really, weak otherwise.