I'm so tired of seeing famous romance writers passing their old books off as new in romance anthologies put out by publishers who fool us readers into believing that new formats mean fresh new stories.
First Night, An Anthology of Romance Novellas, is the real thing.
The four stories in First Night are original novellas by four new writers. Each of the stories is brilliant. Honey Clover by Pauline Shannon is exceptional in every way. I've recommended it to all of my friends and now I'm recommending it to anyone who likes to read romance fiction that is sharp, sexy, passionate, interesting and polished.
Jen Safrey's Fate and Firecrackers is a sharp little ditty that reads very quickly. I like that the lead female character is a drummer and the lead male character is your typical hot Latin lover.
Bobbi Lerman's Providence is a coolly thoughtful story with a nice air of mystery and magic about it. It is a time-travel, and I enjoyed that it didn't get bogged down by ridiculous excuses for how the time-travel occurred, it instead focuses on building the relationship between the two lead characters.
MaryAnn Mangini's Renaissance was the most serious of the four stories. The detail in the story about Venice is rapturous. I very much enjoyed the characters.
Overall, First Night is the best anthology I've read in a long time.

First Night is a thoroughly enjoyable and wonderful collection of four romance novellas, each of which represents a season of the year. These stories are mystical, yet grounded in a reality I wish was mine!

Honey Clover by Pauline Shannon and Providence by Bobbi Lerman are opposites in season (spring and winter) and in content (Providence is a time travel; Honey Clover is set firmly in reality with science as a supporting character.) Both stories share lovely writing styles and the authors have created heroines that are smart, alluring and complicated enough to be extremely interesting.

Fate and Firecrackers by Jen Safrey (summer) and Renaissance by Mary Ann Mangini (fall) are also opposites. Fate and Firecrackers is a fast, scintillating read that heats up quickly and explodes at the end. Renaissance is a longer, lanquid story that touches every sense.

The heros are fantastic, the heroines are cool, and the stories are unique. I sincerely enjoyed this book.

There are four novellas in First Night and each of them is great. I particularly liked Renaissance. The writing is just beautiful and Delia's story of renewal is strong and realistic. Honey Clover is very good, very original and had me laughing, scared, crying and celebrating with Vivienne and Brian by the end. Providence was mysterious and effective as a time travel. By the end I felt everything falling into place for Amy, even though a lot is left up to the reader to figure out. Fate and Firecrackers was a nice quick read that sizzled and sparkled. I highly recommend this book to anyone that likes romance with edge and originality.

I am a senior in high school. I read this book under reccomendation from both my father and sister. Precious Bane truly was a breathtaking story. It's a shame it's out of regular print; I think if more people knew about this book, it would be much more widely read. I reccomended it to all my friends in school, and we together convinced our English teacher to use it as material for the course. Unfortunatly we all might have to pay the hefty $14 price if the school won't pay for it! I was hoping to find some used or paperback editions but alas my search has been to no avail!

I watched the last five minutes of the "PBS version" in '89 or '90, and it was so beautiful that it haunted me for years. Once I had found the book, I had little patience with the text's "accent", and I couldn't read it. A couple of years later, I was determined to conquer the book. I finally came to the realization that it's a love story. The dialect became easy, and I couldn't put the book down. Although the subject matter can be heavy at times, it's a must read for true romantics. Jane Eyre, eat your heart out!

I inherited a 1920's hardcover copy of this book when my Grandmother died- it had always been one of her favorite books. When I read it, I begin to see why. My Grandmother was a person whose spirituality was unconventional, and this is a theme that strongly runs through this book. Traditional Christianity is there, but so is ecstatic spirituality inspired and manifested by nature. She sees God in nature. There are many many beautiful passages where the heroine is literally transported spiritually by the slight of flowers, or the songs of birds. Traditional beliefs and local magic are explored in detail and with an amazing lack of Judgement ( folklorists take note), and the Wizard, though he is not expected to go to Heaven, is a friend to a poor disabled girl and teaches her many good things. Her struggle for a "normal" life with her disability, a hare-lip, is very touching and inspiring. The author also deals with bigotry, persecution and rejection of those who are different, and the difficult question of what truly manefests Goodness- is Goodness something people truly strive for, or do most people simply go through life follow social pressures? Is the Wizard, who reached out to Prue and helped her with and open heart, a "better" person then the hard hearted comformity driven Churchgoes who would not even allow the Wizard's ( staunchly Christian) wife to enter their homes, condeming her to a lonely life?
There is Magic here, and unearthly beauty seen though the eyes of a sensative young girl, and what must have been a very different exploration of true human nature in those rigid times. A thoughtful, highly recommended book.

By Fire, By Moonlight is an amazing book filled with adventure and suspense. This book has all the qualities of a fantasy with all the action of an marvelous adventure. This is the most recent book I have read from the Unicorns of Balinor Series. It is a great book and I would recommend it to anyone with a side that loves adventure...

I absolutly love this book. It is the best. I HIGHLY recomend this book to any horse/unicorn lover. If you love fantasy books,you'll definetly love this whole series. I also think it deserves more than five stars. It need about twenty million stars. I really hope you like this book if you read it.

This book was GREAT! I don't know how she does it, but Mary Stanton has written the best books ever! This was one of my favorites, because of the challenges Ari has to go through, and how she over came them. My favorite one was the race over fire pits. And if you buy this book, you will have to buy the rest. They are too good to sleep on, or wait for. I have read up to seven, and wait to buy eight, and then nine when it comes out. These books are too good to miss!

This is simply the best book anywhere for campus leaders.

I admit that I'm one of the co-authors. But keep this in mind-- as editor of Student Leader magazine, I don't lend my name and reputation to just any project.

I was, and am, proud to be associated with this uplifting and inpsiriational book. It's written similiar in style to the Chicken Soup series, including lots of heartwarming stories written by campus leaders themselves nationwide.

This book is perfect for leadership retreats, workshops, and seminars. It would be the perfect addition to any leadership classes as well.

If you're the parent, friend, or relative of a student government leader, resident assistant, Greek leader, or other campus leader, this book would be the perfect easy gift!

As soon as a student becomes involved with leadership positions and experiences on campus, his or her "roller coaster ride" begins. These student leaders are constantly juggling meetings, deadlines and activities with their academic responsibilities. Most student leaders need some motivation and inspiration in order to alleviate the overwhelming stress. Inspiration for Student Leaders offers the encouragement and support student leaders are seeking so desperately to find. This paperback is a collection of stories about leadership that will undoubtedly bring new insights to all readers in search of a little inspiration. The stories are diverse in their approach, reflecting the broad range of interests and talents of the people who wrote them. Some stories are humorous while others take a more serious tone, but each is compelling in its own right. Most importantly, this is a book by college students for college students.

The book also serves as useful resource for student affair professionals as they engage in efforts to guide and mentor promising undergraduates. The stories in this collection can be used during meetings, retreats and group activities. This is just another valuable tool for student affair professionals and students' "leadership tool bag!"

Above all, these stories clearly demonstrate that "leadership is about having a passion, not a position." I hope you enjoy the book as much as I have enjoyed being part of this exceptional co-author team!

OK, I admit that I'm one of the co-authors. But I don't lend my name as editor of Student Leader magazine to just any project.

Inspiration is simply the best book ever for its audience: campus leaders of all types nationwide.

Similar in style to the Chicken Soup series, this book features dozens of inspirational, uplifting, and heart-warming stories written by campus leaders themselves nationwide.

The book would be perfect for leadership training classes, workshops, or seminiars. I could see schools ordering in bulk to give as gifts to participants in their off-campus leadership and planning retreats.

I'm proud to be a small part of this book and humbly suggest that it's well worth your investment.

This is a great book for children. It teaches sharing and how to make friends. I like this book becuase Oliver learns about how to treat others. He doesn't know what life is like, becuase he has always lived by himself and never talks to any of the people in his town. He has one of everything in his house. He doesn't know that his house was only made for one person until he makes a friend and invites her to his home. Peggoty Small tells Oliver that his home was made for one person and she couldn't live with him.
My favorite character was Peggoty Small. I like her becuase she told Oliver Toliver what she tought. She wasn't afriad to tell him about her feelings, she just told him flat out what she thought. Even though she hurt Oliver's feelings, she old him anyways because she thought he should know the truth. This book teaches kids how to make friends, and how to share what you have with others.

This is a wonderful book with captivating pictures and excellent text. The rhymes are intelligent, making it a pleasure to read out loud. The words roll of the page. My children, 2 and 3 years old, love the pictures of Oliver Tolliver and his house. I will definitaly purchase other books by Mary Ann Hoberman. A Delight!

After stumbling upon this book in the bookstore, I've found myself buying it for all the kids in my life. It is a fantastic, engaging story about sharing with vibrant illustrations. It is a MUST for all children. Kids ask to read it over and over again.

Im a fifth grader.This was a very good book. The best thing about this book is when the monkey started throwing big fruits at Annie and Jack who were stranded in a canoe on the Amazon River. It was humorous to imagin this. One thing I did not like is how the author had keept describing how often they saw green when they first climed out of the tree house. I would recommend this book to is a first grader through fifth grade because its easy to read. Have a fast fun adventure.

The book was exciting and fun to read [I read it over lunch at Tatnuck Booksellers].
Jack and Annie travel to lots of cool places but this was the best because of all of the bugs. Jack and Annie are very lucky to have found the magic tree house.
This is the tenth Magic Tree House book I have read and I can hardly wait to read the next one.

I like this book because it is an adventure book. I believe it is a good book for kids that like adventure. The book is about two kids named Jack and Annie. They go on a trip to the amazon rain forest. When they get to the tree house they find a mouse. The mouse helps them through the rain forest. So they find a canoe on the river side and get in it. When they get down the river a monkey starts throwing red fruits at them. After it stops doing that piranhas started to eat the boat. Then after that Jack grabs a snake. So after that they back on the river side. When they get on the side, a army of ants come after them. When they get away from the army of ants they can not find the tree house , so they put the mouse on the ground and it finds the tree house. But the jaguar finds them and starts running after them. Now you need to read the book to see if they find what they are looking for.

I am now an adult, and have kept my copies of My Friend Flicka and Thunderhead. By some horrible oversight, it appears I never purchased the final book in the trilogy, Green Grass of Wyoming, and thought I might buy it now. I now find it's out of print. What is the logic of keeping the first two parts of a trilogy in print and not the third?

It's been years since I read this one, but if memory serves the book is more for adults than children. It focuses a great deal on Nell and her relationship with her husband now that her children are grown. It is a horse story in the loosest sense of the term, in that a horse ranch provides the background for what goes on. I definitely recommend it, and maybe if enough people ask the publisher will bring it back.

"Green Grass of Wyoming" is the necessary culmination of "My Friend Flicka" and "Thunderhead." Like those others, it is by no means a childrens' book. It can be read on one level by children, and on another by adults. Ken has finally grown up, and his long-time faith in Thunderhead has been justified. How I loved the MacLaughlins when I was a child and wished they were my family! I love them still, and Mary O'Hara's trilogy has an honored place on my bookshelf. I return to them again and again, and am enchanted all over again when these enchanted pages take me back to my childhood and the "green grass of Wyoming."

To whatever powers that be that decide whether a book stays in print or not, please NEVER stop printing this absolute classic. "Green Grass of Wyoming", the sequel to "My Friend Flicka" and "Thunderhead", is not only a wonderful book about human relationships but it is one of the best horse books ever written. In fact the whole series are incredible horse books. Mary O'Hara knew more about horse behaviour than Monty Roberts and 99% of the so-called horse whisperers out there today do. The book I purchased from Amazon is actually the third copy of "Green Grass of Wyoming" I have owned because I have literally worn my other copies out re-reading them and I wanted to make sure I had a copy for posterity. I can't recommend the books highly enough, especially to any horse-lovers out there.

This is an acceptable story if you can take it on its own merits. It doesn't stand up well to my other favorite about the Indian Mutiny, Zemindar. That is history for grownups. This is romance novel fantasy. However, if exotic escapism is what you are after, this does provide.

The plot is full of incredible romantic conceits, from Winter, the European heroine, having a background that will allow her to pass flawlessly as Indian (convenient during a mutiny); Winter's parents, beautiful, highborn, perfect lovers who die young, leaving her with a Spanish title and lots of money; the series of coincidences that lead to her voluntarily marrying a real "rotter" (although given the total innocence in which Victorial girls were kept, not totally unbelievable).

Then there is Alex, superior to Winter's husband in every way. He has a way of being present at historic moments, or running across historic figures, and like Winter can blend at will into the Indian landscape. He is the perfect English soldier-gentleman. His conflict over protecting Winter vs the greater good, though, is a believable one with which the reader can sympthize.

My worst criticism of the love story is that, even though Winter is pregnant before it's all over, there are no good love scenes. From a strictly romantic POV, that leaves the story lacking.

For the rest, there are the usual stock characters: Young Englishwoman, Innocent Victim; Loose Woman with a Heart of Gold; Native Mistress with a Heart of Stone; Villain Motivated By Lust, etc. To give her credit, they are real enough while you are reading. It's good, historical-romance escapism for the right mood.

If you liked M.M. Kaye's "Far Pavilions" of TV miniseries fame, you may find this earlier work by the author even more enjoyable. A romance novel to be sure, but non-fans of the genre (I am usually amongst their number) will find it a very pleasant surprise, especially if you can get a copy of the early editions, which were considerably shorter than those that came out after the success of the "Far Pavilions". Ms. Kaye's outstanding attention to Indian historical and cultural detail surrounding the Great Sepoy Mutiny supplements the central love story wonderfully. Actually, the reader soon becomes aware that "Shadow of the Moon" is a tale of two love stories - one between Alex and Winter and one between Ms. Kaye and the people, culture and land of India. If you like a good love story, lots of action, many interesting secondary characters, and a generous dose of education about a fascinating and pivotal time in Indian and British history, this book is a must read.

I first discovered this book (the earlier 1956 edition) when I was a young teenager. I grew up in a house filled with books and was always an avid reader. One rainy day I was browsing through my parents' bookshelves looking for something to read, and found Shadow of the Moon. The title caught my eye, so I took it out, and after the first page I was hooked. I could not put the book down until I had finished! I read it many times over my teenage years, and my young 20's.

Then, after the success of Kaye's The far Pavillions, they reissued this book in an expanded version. I had to buy my own copy and loved it even more than the original. I've never been a fan of "romance" as a genre, preferring mysteries and SciFi, and historical fiction, but I do enjoy a touch of romance in my novels, as long as that is not the total purpose of the book. And this one just fits the bill. An interesting romance but set against the background of the Indian Sepoy Rebellion of 1857. The history really takes center stage, and I loved that part of it.

This book was that one that triggered a lifetime fascination with India, and also led me to read many other books on the subject, as well as all the other books by author M.M. Kaye. I've enjoyed all of them, but this one remains my favorite.

"Will you walk into my parlor?" said the Spider to the Fly... So begins Mary Howitt's 1829, cautionary timeless classic. But this age-old masterpiece has been elevated to new heights by the stunning, black and white, "silent screen" artwork of Tony DiTerlizzi. Mr DiTerlizzi has created a clever and captivating feast for the eyes, and filled his illustrations with spooky humor and wit, intricate, eye-catching details, marvelous facial expressions, and pure magic. Young and old alike will be entranced as they linger and explore each page, finding something new and enticing each and every time they open the book. Perfect for "youngsters" of all ages, The Spider And The Fly begs to be read aloud and shared with friends and family now, and future generations in the years to come. "And now, dear little children, who may this story read,/To idle, silly, flattering words I pray you ne'er give heed:/Unto an evil counselor,/close heart and ear and eye,/And take a lesson from this tale,/of the Spider and the Fly."

The main reason why I like this story is the Illustrations by Tony Di'Terlizzi. They are what attracted me to this book. It is a classic story of The Spider and The Fly. The spider is able to lure the fly into his "parlor" by flattering her. She eats up his kind words and gets tricked into going with him. The common meaning to this story is to not eat up all the kind words people tell you, it may not be what they are really thinking.

I have always been fasinated by this warning tale of the evils that can befall those who are too trusting and do not reguard strangers or those of brief aquaintance with proper waryness,(Especially young women... this is after all a Victorian tale!) but, never before have I been charmed amused and enchanted by it!
Mary B. Howett's tale is perfectly illustrated by Tony DiTerlizzi.
Entirely done in black and white Tony has set the story in a charmingly Gothic Victorian doll house that carries the shadowy overtones of all evil dwellings.
The Spider is an Edwardian looking gentleman from his tiny moustache down to his spats. His home is the epitome of Victorian (pardon the pun)good taste. The fly is a wide eyed flapper who is as cute as a ..er bug.
A good deal of the charm of this book lies in the subtleties of Tony's wonderful illustrations. The wallpaper with a pattern of bees, the stuffed bug footstool, the cookbook bearing the title THE JOY OF COOKING BUGS, all are amusing additions to the larger tale the pictures tell . Just as the sad little daisy parasol of the fly sitting with her hat on the spiders plate speaks volumes.
This is not only a wonderful childrens book but one any adult who appreciates the work of Edward Gorey or the writing of Lemony Snickett will appriciate!
It is a surprisingly relevant tale for our time as it was for little children about a century ago.

This was the best Unicorn book I ever read! I hope Mary Stanton makes more of Unicorns of Balinor!!

Unicorn & Horse Lover Tammy

The Unicorns of Balinor is a very good example of protagonist/antagonist books. Foreshadowing is also displayed very well. I remember when I read it for the first time two years ago, I was kept on the edge of my seat because the story line is very addicting and suspenseful. It's hard not to imagine your self in a woodland watching the old mare of the mountian appear or carefully making your way across the fiery feild (in order to recliam the royal septer from the evil shifter).

True, the book ends very abruptly, but that is why it is in a series. This is not; however, a series you can read out of order. Trust me, I have tried to do that. It doesn't work.

Valley of Fear was a great book! Dang!Mary Stanton can sure bring to life her characters. Unicorns of Balinor is my favorite book no doubt! This book brings to life a vivid image in your head! Hint to all readers-MUST READ ALL BOOKS IN THIS SERIES IN ORDER! I love this book!