This book has helped me so much with honors high school chemistry and explains everything so clearly and the convenience of having 40 practice questions per chapter really helps me truly understand the concepts of each chapter. I recommend this book to anyone taking chemistry!!

This book has helped me so much with honors high school chemistry and explains everything so clearly and the convenience of having 40 practice questions per chapter really helps me truly understand the concepts of each chapter. I recommend this book to anyone taking chemistry!!

I have used this review book since its first edition both for h.s. chem. and as a review in my AP chem classes. I don't think there is a more thorough or clearly written review book than this one on the market. For students preparing for the SAT II in chem, the book needs be supplemented with additional questions of the type used on that exam.

Dr.A.N.Lefkowitz

It's very obvious which side of the fence the author stands on in the debate over animal intelligence, but Linden never gets preachy about his theories. Instead he presents a collection of fascinating anecdotes and lets the evidence speak for itself. That's not to say he doesn't provide any scientific insight into the stories he's telling; he does, and from both sides of the argument. But this book is not about proselytizing, it merely wants to spin some tales about animals that are at times humorous (I laughed out loud several times), at times sweet and touching, and always thought-provoking. It succeeds in its goal. I couldn't help but feel for the killer whale who grieved after giving his pregnant mate a "sonogram" and discovering she'd miscarried, or laugh at the parrot who invited a wild bird inside for dinner, or secretly cheer on the orangutan escape artists who foiled their keepers at every turn. Mostly I couldn't help but marvel at the awareness and intellect that can be seen in all of these stories. Even being an animal lover to begin with, my next visit to a zoo will carry with it a whole new respect for the animals within.

I loved this book from start to finish. Eugene Linden's individual essays on the intelligence of different species are insightful glimpses into the sentience of animals. From the extraordinary and intelligent efforts of a female gorilla to escape her solitary enclosure to rejoin her friends and family in an adjacent enclosure (she succeeded twice in overcoming electric fences and a moat by using non-conductive and sturdy logs and branches) to a parrot saying, upon seeing her owner's dinner of a Cornish game hen, "Oh, no! Paco!", referring to her male companion kept in another cage, these stories delight with each new page. Linden is careful not to attribute too much intelligence to these animals unless the evidence supports it. He discusses possible ways these moments could be misinterpreted as well as why he believes they are proof that animals have more going on in their brains that some scientists are willing to admit.

Read this book if you are willing to expand your view of what constitutes animal intelligence. Even if you are not persuaded by Linden's arguments (which are indeed compelling), you will find much to consider here. And you'll enjoy every word.

I enjoyed this book of anecdotes about animals behaving in smart, original, creative, and sometimes heroic ways. It was written in a very accessible style, and I enjoyed the author's sense of humor. The book was well-divided into sections: games and humor; trade and barter; deception; mind reading and mental chess; cooperation in work, conflict and healing; tools and intelligence; escapes; empathy and heroism; and a place where humans are the novelty. I would've liked to have read more about the last section, about animals who have no fear of humans in a virtually untouched jungle in Africa. The only thing that puzzled me about the book was the rather apologetic tone regarding animal intelligence. The tone tries to pacify scientists and other people who aren't convinced that animals possess intelligence. I have never doubted that they do. I'm sure most people who have pets or work around animals feel the same way. It's too bad that we have to be apologetic about believing that the important life forms that share our planet have the capacity to think and feel. As the author points out in the last chapter, based on what we're doing to the planet, it's sometimes questionable which species is really the one without intelligence.

you can't complain when you're set in the world of the three laws of robotics with a beautiful young woman and a man without a memory--first rate pastiche by the two authors in the book. I loved it!

The saga of Robot is continued in this novel, which can only be described as exellent, with a dose of brilliant, and a side of superlative. The story of Robot City is expressed through the further development of the characters Derec, a man who crash landed in the aptly named Robot City, a city run and inhabited entirely by robots. Having lost his memory in the crash landing, he takes the name of Derec, which is the manufacturer of his jump suit. Throughout his journey, he meets the mysterios Katherine. After a bout of being captured by extraterrestrials, and such other madcap antics, Derec and Katherine are deposited in Robot City together. It is here that the plot begins to thicken, and the character development becomes signifigant. This volume of the series is a perfect book for any science fiction fan, and perfectly expresses the three laws of Robotics and their applications in the real world.

Many years ago, I read this series of books when they came out in paperback, while Asimov was still alive. I had forgotten how entertaining they were. All the classic elements, including continuity between different authors in the series exist. A must read for people who like a substantial, yet easy to read book. Definately not for those with a short attention span or someone who would rather see the movie then read the book.

This book picks up where "Planetfall" left off, with main character Homer B. Hunter commandeering the ship inhabited by his faithful robot companion Oliver, tough but pretty warrior Reina, gorgeous Lieutenant Coryban, and the inept and argumentative Ensign Blather. I must say right off that this book cannot really be understood very well without first reading "Planetfall." Other than that, however...this book is just as hilariously ridiculous as its predecessor. Homer B. Hunter leaves the others and crashes his ship on the very mysterious and very advanced civilized planet of Aurelia, where he teams up with a head-shrunken rock star Spaceside, the ancient but heroic Agent Double-Oh-Pi (in the book it uses all numeric characters!) and the agent's beautiful, initially naked daughter Yangtze. Battling a mysterious phenomena in the universe known only as "The Farce," Homer must use all his wits to locate the spirit of his other once-dead-but-no-less-faithful robot Floyd. The written gags are as ridiculous as those in the first book, such as the cybernetic sexual member replaced on Homer after he is injured in an explosion, the alternate egos of the goddess Marie (one who rides the soul of Yangtze and another who chews gum and tries to look cool), and Oliver's annoying habit of taking all of Homer's sarcasm seriously. This book reads quickly and I highly recommend it. I only give it 4 stars instead of five because:

1) In some places, particularly the last chapters, the author gets so lengthy with event description that I found myself skimming just to see where the next character action occurred.

2) The story would be hard to understand without having read "Planetfall" first, and

3)The next sequel promised at the end of the book, supposedly called "Futurefall", was never written. Therefore, you are left permanently hanging after you finish this book...although thankfully the "hanging" is the start of a new story with the same characters, rather than cutting you off in the middle of the old story.

I hope the author takes another, longer tour of the US. Most of her conclusions about the "harems" of "Western men" are only applicable to European men, far better educated and more culturally refined than us guys here. We surely do have or desire our harems today--a man's "stable" of pretty women who will let him get away with making the rounds as often as time and money allows. A huge issue she raises is control: how do guys keep their women? And how do those women, who at some level consent to being kept, fight back and control their man? What role does beauty play, what role intelligence, what about economic empowerment, and what about religious values? How does jealousy impact the decisions made by both the women and the man? And perhaps most importantly, is the US truly making progress toward women and men treating each other as equals? Or have we just found more sophisticated ways of manipulating each other? The author suggests Westerners should be much slower to criticize Islam, because we have our own problems that are as bad or worse. Very thought-provoking.

After reading a few other critiques on this title, a few reviewers may need to reconsider the intent of the text. Mernissi is hardly deliniating a definitive narrative on the sexual mentality of men/women or East/West; however, she provides a series of impressions that can create a complex, intriguing innerdialogue as well as spark useful discussion among adults interested in the related topic dynamics. Overall a wonderfully written book intermingling Mernissi's personal experiences, history, literature, and art. I highly endorse this book.

Fatima Mernissi's book, Scheherazade Goes West, is one of those rare books that you start reading and simply can not put down, not wanting it to end.
It is witty and delightfull book but more important, it touches upon some fundemental questions about the meeting of East and West, in art, fiction, as well as in every day life, questions that have never been addressed like this before.
Mernissi does something which is both rare and refreshing: she dares ask questions and her quest for answers takes her (and the reader) to a journey which ultimatly touches upon the universal questions concerninig not only the complicated, mystifaying relations between East and West, but also, and far more intersting, between Men and Women, and how they see each other from both sides of the geographical, cultural distance.

The thing that makes Buffy the Vampire Slayer such a great television shows is that it is able to combine action, comedy and drama in such a seemless manner. Once you get past the idea that all that martial arts stuff is needed to drive a steak through the heart of a vamp, the action routines are the best on television. The comedy is character driven to such an extent that a priceless funny moment can be a double-take or a raised eyebrow as much as a quick quip or arcane pop-culture reference. But the heart of the series is the dramatic undertones, always implicit in the fact that Slayers die young and reaching its operatic heights with Buffy's tragic relationship with Angel. All of the Buffy the Vampire Slayer books, whether original stories or adapted from various episodes, automatically lose the action elements. Break down the fight sequence from the second part of "Becoming" and it is going to lose something on the printed page. So losing one part of the Buffy triad is an automatic given. The problem with "Night of the Living Rerun" is that the story overloads the comedy and comes up way short of the drama. Arthur Byron Cover is not alone in this regard as this my standard complaint with the vast majority of Buffy novels.

Forget about the cute title, the heart of this story is a compelling tale: the story of Samantha Kane, the Slayer during the title of the Salem Witch Trials. How does this fit into the Buffy mythos? This happened to be when the Master was accidentally trapped in the other dimension. Buffy keeps dreaming about the past, and when the same thing starts happening to Giles and Xander the set up is for a symbolic replay of the past. The Buffy novels keep resisting the idea of having tales of the earlier Slayers without including Buffy and the gang, but this particular story idea would have worked much better either as a bookend to the final demise of the Master or as some sort of parallel story. Adding these extra layers took away from a fascinating story idea. Given the final episode of Season Four and the promise that we will learn more about the First Slayer and Buffy ancestors, hopefully we will get to the point where the Slayer mythos can sustain its own fiction without this particular cast of characters, but so far all we are getting hints and brief glimpses. There have been intriguing graphic novels that have "retold" the Batman and Superman stories in different times and places, and I have to believe that the idea of the Slayer would work just as well (but not like in the movie where they all end up looking like Buffy).
"Night of the Living Reun" is not one of the first Buffy e-Books you should download.

Perhaps you remember the Infocom game, its delightful humor, its mystery-filled world. If you happen to see this book at a used bookstore, your fond memories of the game may deceive you into picking it up.

Please, save yourself from pain and suffering.

As to humor, there is none. As to juvenile and crude references, there are plenty. If this sort of thing is your cup of tea, save yourself the money and hang out on an elementary school playground during recess. This book has the distinction of being one of the two books I've actually stopped reading before the end, and I've suffered through a lot of horrid literature.

At that used bookstore, I might advise you to run and run fast, but on consideration perhaps it might be best to hide it between the bookshelf and the wall to help your fellow man.

For a book based on a computer game, this is actually a decent book. But, it is not what I was hoping for. When I read the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, I found a terrific and unexpected escape from reality. And this book touted itself as the Next Hitchhiker's Guide. It was far from that. Instead, it was a rather self-conscious immitation of Douglas Adams. It was rather flat, with few actual belly-laughs, and just one or two giggles throughout.

Still, it is a light, quick read, and it is a good book for a rainy, lazy Saturday when you have nothing else to do.

But read Douglas Adams first.