"Dear General MacArthur" is a wonderful and very illuminating compilation of letters written by the Japanese to Gen. MacArthur during the American Occupation (1945-1952). Sodei's running commentary alongside the letters is full of powerful insight and helpful explanations which allow the reader to genuinely understand how, and why the Japanese wrote the General with their praise, adoration, pleas, and criticism regarding him and the occupation. It is a "must" read for any who are interested in, or are students of Japanese culture. The letters are moving, incredible, sad, and hilarious. Never in world history did a country ever "love" MacArthur as much as the Japanese did after WWII. As the Pulitzer Prize-winning and illustrious historian of Japan, John W. Dower notes in his foreword, "This is a rare gem of a book. We have nothing else like it concerning Japan." Compiled and expounded by the foremost authority on, and biographer of MacArthur, it is a book that all should enjoy.

My neice and I read this a-page-at-a-time while on vacation. Now I'm buying it for her birthday. We enjoyed a daily chuckle and an occasional laugh out loud as we considered the musings of these insightful children. I have three babies of my own and my niece is a pre-med pediatric student. She and I identified with these letters and we wondered how God might answer. Our favorite: "Dear God; Maybe people in this world wouldn't kill each other so much if they had their own rooms. It works for my brother and me." If you have children under 10 and woder just what is going on in their busy minds, you HAVE to have a copy of this. If you don't have children and enjoy hearing the voice of innocence, you'll like this book too.

There are several published books of letters and diaries written by American Civil War (ACW) soldiers --from both sides of the conflict.

Enriching our understanding of the human heart in impossible circumstances is "Dear Sarah: Letters Home from a Soldier of the Iron Brigade," edited with loving care by the soldier's descendant Coralou Peel Lassen.

In my opinion it goes without saying that this recent contribution is refreshing, of great value to not only the modern reader but to posterity, too, to those who want to know more about the men --and women; the real human beings, who lived through and endured the American Civil War. This volume also illuminates the nature of not only the American Civil War but all war.

The Iron Brigade Soldier who wrote to Sarah was a young Union soldier named John Henry Pardington. The intense personal nature of his letters, what he writes about and how, is more than touching. The letters left by John Pardington offer a glimpse into the mind and soul of a man in the midst of a terrible situation and how he copes with it, how it defines him, shapes him, and how he continues to triumph over adversity.

After reading several pages I already felt like I was becoming familiar with the people "back home" that this soldier wrote about 140 years ago. I began to feel the pain of his separation from his wife and daughter, the pain of every aching joint and privation he endured. The more I opened up to John Pardington and the realities of his life at war, the more psychologically invested I became --and the more I read. Knowing the inevitable outcome made some letters particularly poignant. And painful. Often, I found the book emotionally overwhelming and put it down, reflecting. Sometimes I re-read passages with a fresh insight --from John's point of view. It isn't too much to say the book is, at turns and by its nature, not only a body blow but also eye-opening. Reading firsthand accounts of how soldiers of the Iron Brigade's 24th Michigan Infantry lived and died day by day in 1862-63 can leave one feeling "beat" inside, symptomatic of the tremendous impact the reality of John Pardington's life.

I think Ms. Lassen has really done an excellent job editing John's letters. One would think any student of history (or humanity) would want to read this book because John's words are universal. He was a Union soldier of the American Civil War, but his triumphs and failures, needs and wants, yearnings and hopes, etc., are an insight into the psyche of men away at war of all times. Her triumph is bringing John's words to the modern reader and to posterity. If one wanted to know how a soldier might be feeling or what he/she might be thinking, from Marathon to the Persian Gulf, one can find the essence of the human spirit, a soldier's dilemma, distilled and evolving in the letters of John Pardington.

John Pardington's human face on a large historical event; his evident love and longing; his deeply human and often tender observations made me again wonder why there must be conflict, wars that kill far too many John Pardingtons and leave the world a poorer place. Is there such a thing as a tragic triumph? If so, John Pardington's triumph in expressing himself, in his very being, is all the more tragic because of his death at Gettysburg. He probably never imagined his words would one-day reach out across the years to so many people. He would probably be surprised. Rather than flustered or embarrassed to have his innermost thoughts laid bare, I like to think he would ultimately see how his own life matters today, and always.

Ms. Lassen has helped John Pardington speak after all these years and still we hear him. And will hear him.

common sense advice from a thoughtful man. sias has a common sense approach to life which he applies in dear son to topics like money management, relationships, and the value of dogs in our lives. this book is unique because it is a product of sias' love for his now adopted son and his desire for him to live a happy life. dear son will be a road-map to a happy life for some people and a casual reference for others, but it will definitely be important in some way to everyone who picks it up. a most enthusiastic 5 stars!

This is a must read for all educators. This book tells the stories of many children that may be sitting in classrooms all over the world. Listen to their stories and pay attention to the children in your life. I wish someone would have asked me what was wrong when I was growing up.

John McCaslin captures the personal side of WW II and the effects it had on families that remained behind and the views from the front.

John Dear is a youngish Jesuit priest who's the clear successor to the Berrigan brothers when it comes to peace activism. Past director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation, author, speaker, agitator, Dear is also a graceful and sensitive author. His *Peace Behind Bars*, the journal he kept in prison, is my favorite. It's an utterly honest, utterly human, document.

Dear spent 8 months in a North Carolina jail after his conviction for a Plowshare action. His journal is a record of the time there, which he shared with Phil Berrigan. The journal doesn't whitewash how trapped and hopeless Dear at times feels. He's honest enough with us and himself not to try to play the hero. Reading the book at times gives one an uncomfortable sense of sympathetic claustrophobia. But the journal also attests to Dear's discovery that the suffering God he serves is also found in prison--and, indeed, perhaps best found in prison. Here, for example, is what Dear writes on Christmas Day, 1993: "Being in jail on Christmas is not just counter-cultural, but anti-cultural. The culture has no sense of Christ's spirit. People spend billions of dollars in an orgy of consumerism, exchanging presents while ignoring the plight of the poor and the demands of discipleship." Imprisonment gives one the distance from that culture to remember that Christmas is about this: "God has become human, and it follows that all human life is sanctified." (p. 44)

I can think of few spiritual memoirs that are up to the high standard of stuff written by Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, or Henri Nouwen. This is one of them, even though it hasn't received the attention it deserves. Highly, enthusiastically, recommended.

We were forced to read this book in school, but it was allright. I liked it! But the ennoying thing is, we have to make a book review about it..better start write..

I picked this book up last night just before I was about to go to bed and I didn't put it down until I'd read every page. Even when I'd finished I couldn't stop thinking about it, I'm still thinking about it now. It may me cry so hard because I felt like I was in the book and my whole world had been flipped upside down when it finished. Many aspects of the book and the characters related so much to my own life, it was the most gripping and real teenage book I'd ever read. John Marsden isn't afraid to write things that other authors are and it makes his work so alive. Dear Miffy keeps you guessing until the very end and it makes you feel like you're living through the experiences with Tony. This is just such an amazing book because you get something from it, it leaves a mark and adds to your way of thinking. Aboslutely unforgetable, read it.

If you like the type of story with a twist in the end, you are in for a treat. Dear miffy was one of the most powerful books I had ever read in my life. What I love most about it was how real it made me feel while I was reading it, while lots books for teenagers had fabricated the reality into anything but real, John Marsden had always kept it raw and true. Although the language could be a bit offensive to some readers, but I think that's what this book is all about- showing you the not-so-nice part of life and the darker side of the world. I deeply felt for Tony- the main character in the book, this book was so very powerful, I couldn't sleep that night when I finished the book. One advise though, don't go and read the ending before you should, it will ruin the story.