This is a meticulously researched and well written book about one of the most celebrated astronomers of the turn of the last century, who is unfortunately almost forgotten today. As was the case with many well known scientists of the 19th century, Barnard started life inauspiciously and came to science as a result of his considerable amateur achievements. Poor and virtually uneducated as a child in Nashville, he distinguished himself as a photographer's assistant, and developed a lifelong interest in the night sky. After becoming fairly well known as an amateur astronomer, he attracted the attention of the officials of what would eventually become Vanderbilt University. The regents were persuaded to build an observatory, and installed the young Barnard as its director, even though he had no college education (not even high school!). Barnard was aware of his limitations, particularly in mathematics, and began to audit courses at Vanderbilt in math, astronomy, and physics. When he finally left several years later to take a position at the new Lick Observatory in California, he had the equivalent of a bachelor's degree, though a degree was never officially conferred.

Barnard's life in astronomy is marked by greatness. Comets were his early passion and he discovered many, but he was equally please to make detailed observations of any comet, regardless if it was "his" or not. He was also a passionate observer of the planets. His discovery of Jupiter's fifth moon was the event for which posterity usually remembers him, but he also made ground breaking observations of Mars and Saturn. Though he never publicly said so, he was one of the earliest skeptics of his good friend Percival Lowell's "canal" observations of Mars. Barnard's sketches in the early 1890's revealed details of what would later be called Valles Marineris and the volcano calderas of Olympus Mons, Arsia Mons, and Ascraeus Mons, but showed no evidence of canals. Later, Barnard pioneered the use of wide field photography and made some of the earliest and best photographic studies of the Milky Way, and eventually authored the catalog of dark nebulae that bears his name. He also did considerable photographic work with comets and put forth some controversial (and mostly correct) theories about the nature of the mysterious coma and tails. His pioneering work in stereoscopic photography was done with comets as well, where a special viewer allowed the viewing of two sequential shots of a comet, making the comet stand out in relief against the background stars. Barnard's penchant for closely studying his photos was rewarded by his discovery of the great looping nebula in the constellation Orion that bears his name, as well as the faint star of fast proper motion in Ophiuchus (Barnard's star).

Sheehan's writing is marvelously clear and interesting, and his documentation is thorough. He lays bare Barnard's decade long quarrels with Lick director Edward S. Holden, and follows Barnard to Yerkes in Wisconsin where he spent over 20 years and eventually ended his career. Sheehan is a psychiatrist by training and makes an occasional conjecture regarding the psychology of various characters. I found this distracting at first but he never went overboard with it. By the end of the book, I found myself wishing he would be even more adventurous with his psychohistoriagraphy in the case of George Hale's well known struggles with mental illness, but Sheehan didn't take the bait beyond a few general comments.

Overall, I found this book virtually impossible to put down, and was almost depressed that it had to end. Dozens of wonderful pictures of Barnard and his companions, astrophotos, and sketches litter its pages. A detailed index is supplied making cross-referencing the many names and places easy.

E.E. Barnard was a pivotal figure in the history of astronomy, straddling the breach between observational work of the 19th century, and the "new" astronomy (astrophysics) of the 20th. Barnard never ceased being an observer to the end of his life, and in many ways it is his spirit that lives on in the form of amateur astronomy at the beginning of the 21st century.

This book is good practice for the past tense.

The text is written in a metric pattern. The author suggests the melody of "The Wheels on Bus," but you can also use the melody of "Mary Had a Little Lamb."

This book contains a small number of stories. In fact some of them could be more correctly called novellas than short stories. The link between them all is that they are all extemely well written, and their main characters have been involved in war in some way. Most of these are not new, but put together like this they make an outstanding collection. Included is one Miles Vorkosigan story (not new) if you are looking up this book because of that author's series.

This book contains the following stories:

"Call him Lord" by Gordon R. Dickson
"pilots of the twilight" by Edward Bryant
"Sepulcher" by Ben Bova
"The high test" by Frederik Pohl
"When Johnny comes marching home" by Timothy Zahn
"Labyrinth" by Lois McMaster Bujold

Read, and enjoy:)

I have used this text for approximately a year and found that the students are able to comprehend geography better with a systematic approach than a regional one. One of the things that sold me on this text was the auxillary material, particularly the webpage. The book is very easy to read and has excellent illustrations and photos. Needless to say, I highly recommend this text.

I am a student of Dr. McGoldrick and reading this book was a requirement of his class. It was a rather enlightening book which gave a brief overall picture of the history of the Bible. It starts with pre-Tyndale times and factors in Robert Barnes and Martin Luther and then follows through with Myles Coverdale acquiring permission from King Henry VIII to publish a version of Tyndale's Bible. It is a matter-of-fact book which helps to view the struggles of those early translators of the Bible.

I read the local library's copy and its so good I am going to buy one for myself.

Why? Because Andrea Gabor has researched the topic of Quality well. More to the point, Andrea has given insight to the men who showed how to achieve continual improvement (Quality).

Its more than a good read, there are valuable lessons to be learnt from reading case histories mentioned. Note how successful companies can become!

Reading "The Man Who Discovered Quality" will encourage you to change your attitude towards work. Directors and managers should especially read this insightful reseach, because its within your hands to change business mindset.

You may even want to extend the attitude of Quality into your personal life.

Read it and make up your own mind.

Peter Sammartino writes an eloquent, concise view of the Shakespearean authorship question and the case for Edward DeVere, the 17th Earl of Oxford. I began my investigation into the authorship question here and I have now read virtually every book on the subject. This is a must read for all those interested in obtaining deeper meaning from the plays and the Sonnets. Highly recommended.

This is probably Kienzle's best book yet. From the very start, you're engrossed in the novel, trying to guess whodunit. The ending is surprising, and as always, I enjoy Kienzle's references to the Detroit area of which I'm familiar.

This parasitology textbook is the highlight of my second year in medical school. Most of my classmates do not rely on this book as their study tool, but to me, it is everything that will help me get through my parasitology course. The details regarding pathological symptoms, treatment and diagnostic methods are very clear and easy-to-read. A must for medical students taking parasitology!

I consider this to be the book of choice for starting on this topic for either children or adults who wants a quick read. In fact, I would recommend this to anyone planning to read a more extensive biography or history as a helpful overview that will give them a good grounding from which to weigh other authors' theses. The author seems to lean toward Richard's guilt, but does an admirably fair job of laying out the various arguments. The text is lavishly illustrated with black-and-white pictures that make it more appealing, but the reader might want to be warned that most appear to 19th century and are inauthentic and sometimes wildly inaccurate. Fun, though. After this, one might want to move on to A.J. Pollard's Richard III and the Princes in the Tower, written for adults, but similarly informative and even-handed. I would avoid Alison Weir's erratic The Princes in the Tower until and unless the reader has a fairly good knowledge of the topic.

On April 9, 1483, following the death of the English king, Edward IV, preparations were made to crown his 13-year-old son, Edward V. However, seventy-seven days later, when Richard III seized the throne, Edward V and his younger brother, Richard, were placed in the Tower of London, never to be seen again. This is the story of those two "little princes in the Tower."

In a short but succinct narrative, the author goes through the events surrounding the disappearance of the princes, laying the blame for their deaths squarely on Richard III. Then, alternate theories for who were responsible for the princes' deaths are examined. And finally, the book closes with three family trees of those involved, followed by a chronology of the events covered in the book.

This book is short (101 pages counting the chronology), but highly informative. The author takes great pains to give the reader an in-depth understand of what happened and why. Admittedly, the alternate theories are dismissed with little discussion, but nonetheless I do consider this a wonderful resource on the subject. Therefore, if you are interested in this tragic piece of history, then I highly recommend this book to you.