The New Zealand Prayer Book is one of the easiest to use prayer books in my library. It has marks of creativity that open up prayer. Out of the 3 or 4 prayer books I have, this one is the most flexible and useful. I combine it with daily scripture reading from The Chalice Hymnal and the Revised Common Lectionary. This prayer book keeps me balanced and regular - more so than others I have.

If you're an Anglican who loves liturgy (or even if you're not Anglican), this is a must for your library. It's the standard prayer book with all the services you know and love, but with a wonderful new twist of language. In the translation for today's church, the feeling has come back to all the words we say without thinking. For example, in the Lord's prayer "our Father" becomes "Eternal Spirit, Earth-maker, Pain-bearer, Life-giver, Source of all that is and thiat shall be, Father and Mother of us all..." What could more inclusively capture a glimpse of the Living God?

A New Zealand Prayer Book beautifully combines the lofty Anglican tradition with a directness and simplicity that reflects native culture. Many of the prayers are almost childlike in their simplicity, but directly speak to the heart and soul. I find myself coming back to certain prayers, especially an evening medititation that reminds, "What has been done has been done; what has not been done has not been done; let it be." Accessible and reflecting the complexity, and simplicity, of the soul.

Why is this book going out of print? It is the most down-to-earth dictionary of English that I have ever seen, with numerous excellent examples to illustrate usage. It is perfect for English language learners. I teach college English and writing, and every student who has seen this has been excited by it. The entries include information necessary for ESL students, such as countable and uncountable nouns, subtle differences in meaning, and idiomatic expressions. I keep it near my desk at all times, and prefer it over the standard Webster's or Random House dictionaries when working with students.

I bought this dictionary in May 1990 in Singapore.

The way the content presented is the best I had ever seen. This dictionary is written in ordinary, everyday English that is easy to understand. It has an excellent Guide to the Use of the Dictionary. Every explanation comes with at least one example that is taken from actual texts wherever possible. The extra column in the dictionary, right beside the explanation of a word, creates a visual attraction to the reader. This extra column is used to give two different types of information: grammar notes and semantic relationships (similar or opposite) for the word that is being explained. I love it.

CoBuild is the appreviation of Collins Birmingham University International Language Database. This dictionary was developed and compiled in the English Department at the University of Birmingham as part of a language research project commissioned by Collins Publishers.

Currently, I am looking for its enriched and/or, if any, CD-ROM version. Unfortunately, it seems that the publisher stopped publishing this great dictionary.

This book is a treasure. I take it with me everywhere I go, packing it in my bags no matter how light I am traveling. The book is the size of a very small pocket dictionary, yet it contains maps of every country in the world, as well as an index with thousands of entries to help locate even small unknown localities. True, larger atlases show greater detail and may be more accurate, but this one you can actually carry in your pocket. It's helped me out many a time on my travels in trying to communicate where I'm from and where I am going when I share no common language with the people around me. Yeah, it's a little outdated now since it was printed before the demise of the Soviet Union, but I don't know what I would do if I ever lost it.

One of the smallest "atlases" of the world you can possibly get. It's a few inches tall by a few inches wide, about 1000 pages thick. Maps are detailed enough and cover very small sections (Britain, for example, takes up two pages alone). I keep this in my desk all the time and refer to it often. All the major cities in the world are available for look-up in the index reference.

The book has alot of information. I own one of the old Machetes and it was quite interesting to read about it. I would highly recommend this bood to anyone owning a Collins Machete.

Since I appear many times in the text of this book as an observor, as a facilitator, and as a source, it may be considered presumptuous for me to review it. But since I am competent to do so, here goes. Ed and I knew each other from 1971 when we first met. Since I am in MD and he was in CA our face time was limited but we kept in close touch by snail mail and phone. He made many trips to the source at Collinsville and I dug a large amount of materials out of the National Archives, Smithsonian, and the Library of Congress. Since Ed focused strictly on Collins products and only on the sub lines of machetes and I am interested in all military edged tools and cutlery as well as axe work in general, we overlapped our interests. Is this the book I have written or would have? Certainly not, but I know for certain that it is all in focus and, unless there is a new vast discovery of documents, if there is anything more to be known about Collins machetes you can put in a very small pot. By focusing as he did Ed was able to find things that I never did nor even thought to look for. The ultimate test of this kind of book is is it interesting, and is it useful? I think it is so, and I wll be able to chop out all the corporate history which was in my original work and refer the reader to this one. Carter Rila

I have had my copy of the Eastern edition of this book for over 6 years. I own many field guides, but this is the one I turn to time and time again. Great pictures, logical layout, comprehensive coverage. I'm finding more opportunities to travel West, so now I'm looking for the companion. It's a treasure.

I purchased my copy of this book over 10 years ago. Being an amature Ethologist and ardent back packer, I have continously found this field guide very complete and easy to use. Each section gives overviews of general species charactoristics. Specific data is direct, to the point, and covers a broad spectrum of information. Excellent color plates can easily be used to quickly narrow down cassification. This handy book is far superior to any other Field Guide on the market for meeting the challenge of identification of any wildlife encountered localy or on the trail. Why carry a pack full of books and manuals when you can have everything in this great book. Our only mis-fortune is that it is currently not in print, But if you get your hands on a copy, KEEP IT! I am sure you will treasure it as much as I treasure my copy.

Extraordinarily handy little booklet. While in the beginning-intermediate stages of learning Spanish, I carried it in my breastpocket at all times. At the start, I went through the discussion and examples--that's the best part of the book, the to-the-point examples--not really understanding everything, but getting a good overview. As I worked through other sources and got better, the book became indispensable for its clear treatment of, first, the basic grammatical structure, and, second, irregularities and idioms that commonly arise.

If you're serious about learning Spanish, this book will make the experience much more productive and quick. If you already know some, you can go from "understandable" to "correct and almost fluent" by reviewing with this book.

Really, a must-have.

Like packing a laptop, this 650-page book covers every creature an East Coast nature lover could encounter, from starfish and sharks to rabbits and walruses. Very easy to identify your sighting with numerous color plates and vivid descriptions. Author, Collins, offers own observations and challenges the reader with unexpected wit and wisdom seldom found in nature books. 40 years old and shamefully out-of-print, if you find a copy, hold on to it!

As a French high school teacher, I have the opportunity to compare French-English dictionaries with my students - and the Harper Collins softcover version is better every time. More accurate, complete with full expressions and all the synonyms you could hope for. Any time that I go to this dictionary, I always come away with the feeling that I got EXACTLY the word or expression I was looking for - and I never got that from any other dictionary I've used! I use it on a daily basis, and it's so well-thumbed that I may need a new one! I heartily recommend it to serious students of French.

Marguerite Henry loved horses, and she wrote a number of the most memorable horse stories every written. This book tells about her life, from birth in Milwaukee to her death in 1997 in California. What I liked was learning how she wrote MISTY, KING OF THE WIND and all the other books about horses. There are lots of good tips for writers in this book too. If you want to know about a great author, fun horses and how to write better, read this book.

This is definately the best modern Italian dictionary on the market today. Not a travelling book. It is HUGE. I used this book for a big translation project and did not need anything else for the Italian portion. A definate must for the professional translator or student of Italian.

Has tons of words! Many Italian idiomatic expressions and past, present, and future tenses with examples. I bought and returned several others prior to this one. The only downside, it's a little on the expensive side but for the quality, in retrospect, it's worth it!