Mr. Vacarro did a great job here, his pictures are telling and touching. Recommended for those who are into the occupation of Germany.

Tony Vacarro first entered Germany as an infantryman in December, 1944. Unlike other GI's, he carried a camera along with his rifle. He processed his film in army helmets and hung the wet negatives to dry on the branches of trees. Later, he worked as a photographer with the occupation forces. His stark and arresting black and white images follow the course from the liberation of Germany through the occupation, reconstruction and eventual return to a tentative peace in 1949. This book provides unexpected insight, through the eyes of a sensitive and individualistic observer, into a crucial period in 20th century history. Many of the pictures are truly unforgettable - especially the moving portrait of a dead GI in the snow of the Ardennes forest (p.4-5), the view of the mountains from Hitler's retreat at the Berghof (p. 68-69) and the quirky, humorous shot of the soldier with German children at Tempelhof Airport (p. 188-189) which sums up in a single image the magnitude of the rapprochement between Americans and Germans. "Entering Germany" is a very impressive achievement, and is strongly recommended.

Having lived in Germany in the late 70's, I saw the results of its "economic miracle." I often wondered though, as I drove down streets of Frankfurt or Berlin, what it looked like right after WWII. Well, this book delivers just that. It is a photo-journalistic treasure of post-war Germany and about what it endured (and one might say rightly so.) Each photo tells a story that can go on for hours. If this period of history interests you, you will not be disappointed. Interestingly, it was published in Germany.

A great reference book for history buffs and scale modelers. A must read

I have long been an admirer of Ms Dano - from Another World, to Attitudes on Lifetime, to One Life to Live, to QVC. She has a wonderful style about her that makes one take notice without being overpowering or too over the top.

This book is a really helpful guide of finding your own style and building your own wardrobe. She helps you thru the difficult parts and shows you how to build - one piece at a time. She gives so many helpful hints on accessorizing to keep your look fresh rather than faddish. And the very best of all, it can be attained affordably!

I took her advice to heart and have the beginnings of a wonderful wardrobe that will help me to keep stylish for years.
Heck, it even helped me to win an award for personal style.

Thanks, Ms. Dano, for a much needed book for the average woman.

Although I found it a little frustrating that she took a one size fits all attitude to what a woman needs in her wardrobe, I still think the book is invaluable. She helps you build a core wardrobe in a timeless manner. I bought this book after having a baby and finding that my body shape had changed, I found great advice that helped me discover the most flattering styles for me, and stop wasting money on clothes that weren't quite right. She is a gem.

When I graduated from college, I realized that all I had in my closet were jeans and T-shirts. I didn't have anything appropriate to wear to a job interview. I also had very little money to spend on new clothes. I knew of Linda Dano from her work on Another World and her columns in Soap Opera Digest, so I took a chance on this book. This book is a fabulous fountain of information for building a wonderful wardrobe. By knowing the items of clothing that I would get the most use out of, I managed to build a wardrobe that is versatile and will last for years. Between Linda Dano's great advice and witty style, this book is a winner all the way.

Every once in a while, one of the rapacious cretins inhabiting the brokerage houses of Wall Street has a twinge of conscience and a need to confess, and so he writes a mea culpa to cleanse his soul. The anonymous author, now a modest financial advisor in a small town, manages to look like a hero with a human heart while exposing the compromised nature of the securities business. If you have any illusions left about the goodness of humanity, don't read this book. You'll lose them. Part confessional, part cautionary tale, this first person narrative makes Wall Street brokers look like the dregs of humanity. If this sensational and rather novelistic tale is to be believed (and it is) then even lawyers and used car salesman tell fewer lies and steal less than Wall Street brokers.

License to Steal is the latest in a genre that goes back to at least the robber-baron days of the 19th century and probably to the earliest days of capitalism in renaissance Italy. One of my favorites is the very entertaining Where Are the Customers' Yachts? (1940) by Fred Schwed Jr. In that little book, studded with New Yorker cartoons, an innocent asks a broker the title question and is told, naive fool that he is, that the customers don't have any yachts. Only brokers and officers of the brokerage firm have yachts. According to the authors, today's breed of white collar crook doesn't spend his ill-gotten lucre on anything so romantic as a yacht, preferring German motor cars, cocaine and Cuban cigars, floozies, French champagne and blackjack. The degenerate get more degenerate it would appear.

I had a broker myself, back in the days of my naiveté, and I recall she told me one day that she was hoping the market would plunge a hundred points (that was in the days when a hundred-point swing meant something). I was momentarily stunned since I was a client with some serious money in those stocks that she was hoping would plunge. But she had forgotten herself for the moment and was talking to me as she would to one of her fellow brokers. THEY wanted a plunge so they could stir up some action and make some money on commissions. And therein lies what the authors of License to Steal call on page 265 the "basic conflict of interest" in "the securities business," namely that what is good for the broker is to move "clients in and out of positions to generate commissions" (and to take advantage of the spread), while what is good for clients is just the opposite, to pay a minimum for commissions and to get trimmed by the spread as seldom as possible. This conflict is still with us although, by trading over the Net without a broker, the commissions are much cheaper and the danger of getting trimmed by in-house spreads is lessen considerably. Nonetheless, the industry as a whole still has a vested interest in churning the accounts of investors. We see this in the frequent upgrades and downgrades issued by brokerage firms, recommendations that encourage a lot of buying and selling. The only way this conflict is going to be eliminated is for brokers to gain only when their clients gain. I wouldn't hold my breath for that reform however, since it would have the effect of sending the vast majority of brokers back to telemarketing or to selling aluminum sliding.

If you like License to Steal, and I think you will, since it is very hard to put down with the lurid picture of piggy greed and human stupidity it paints, you will also like F.I.A.S.C.O.: Blood in the Water on Wall Street (1997) by Frank Partnoy. Partnoy's book is about derivatives sales people who are as morally degenerate as the characters in License to Steal. The only substantive difference in the books is that Partnoy's book is not anonymous and neither are the firms he worked for.

Reading this book was captavating, especially since I am heavily in the market. Several of my friends have used brokers over the past five years, and without exception it was a negative (in hindsight) experience. This book shows why. Their stories struck me deeply, and I always warned others of the dangers of using these financial middle men. If you have a broker or are thinking of getting one read this book first! PLEASE! Very entertaining reading too. You won't want to put it down and can get through it in 2-3 days easy.

Reading this book was like taking a step back in time. I worked as a broker right out of college for a company that sold microcap stocks and is since defunct. I can say without a doubt that everything in this book is the absolute truth. From the hidden commissions to the trips to Atlantic City it is all true. Recently I was surfing the NASD regulatory website and found a lot of my old managers had been listed, fined and expunged from the NASD for life for the things that they did. From lying, to churning accounts, to buying stocks without authorization. Next time your phone rings and someone is pitching a stock to you beware. The only person that will make money is the person making the call. This was a fascinating real life account. If you want to be financially secure get a good financial planner and get rich the slow way. Compound interest over time.