This book has given me the opportunity to try many new recipes as well as enjoy the historical tidbits depicting the life of James Madison and his entertaining wife, Dolley.

Unlike most restaurant-related cookbooks, the recipes in this book, although very gourmet in their presentation, can be easily followed by any home cook. Coupled with the beautiful table settings featuring rare antique china--beautiful portrayed in the magnificent color photos throughout the book--the writing brings forth many unique ideas for entertaining on any usual or special celebration.

Plantation Feasts and Festivals is a celebration, published on the occasion of the 250th birthday of President James Madison. Worthy of coffee table prominence, Plantation Feasts and Festivals is filled with beautiful photographs of Montpelier and neighboring estates of family and friends. A treasure trove of cultural and historical traditions, this volume's greatest value is in the kitchen. With recipes organized by seasonal occasions and celebrations, the sumptuous menus are connected with the land and its seasonal bounty, Southern tradition and hospitality. Edna Lewis, a native of Orange County and known throughout the country for her primers on Southern cuisine, shares her reminiscence of each season and many of the occasions. She says, "All recipes have been developed for special occasions, for those times when you want to indulge. Therefore we took no shortcut in preparation of ingredients."

Angela Mulloy's thirst for perfection must surely be quenched with the selections she included in this book celebrating Virginia heritage. Each menu is a beautiful balance of seasonal taste and tradition filled with ingredients that embrace the locale: shad roe, potted trout, quail, Chesapeake crab, country ham, fried chicken and venison; profoundly delicious uses of corn meal, greens, and fruits; and desserts made elegant in their simplicity and exquisite presentation.

Each occasion depicts a certain mood and a traditional style. The Hunt Breakfast, Afternoon Tea, Lawn Party, Wedding Dinner, Holiday Feast, and Twelfth Night Ball all bespeak the gentility of the time and place, and yet each recipe is on the leading edge of today's most sought after techniques and tastes.

Plantation Feasts and Festivities would make a grand addition to anyone's library and a wonderful gift for any celebration.

Plantation Feasts And Festivities: A Celebration Of The Grandes Dames Of Virginia Food And Hospitality combines a regional culinary and cultural history with delicious recipes carefully modified for today's kitchens and adjusted to serve from six to eight adults. Superbly enhanced with spectacular color photography, Plantation Feasts And Festivities is organized around the four seasons of Spring, Summer Autumn, and Winter. From Hand-Churned Honey Vanilla Ice Cream, Streusel Peach Pie, Savory Bread Pudding, and Bourbon-Grained Mustard, to Cornbread and Country Sausage Dressing, Caramel-Pumpkin Custard, Sweet Potato Gratin, and Scalloped Tomatoes, This inspired and inspiring collection is highly recommended for fine gourmet dining and a true reflection of Virginia's impressive culinary history.

This book is filled with valuable information about our relationship with nature--and, therefore, ourselves at a very deep level. I find it an incredible resource, citing research on community gardens, horticultural therapy, the deep and enduring relationship between people and plants. Gardeners, environmentalists, and anyone who loves plants will find reinforcement, information, and inspiration in these pages.

I really enjoyed this book. It's a book about our human interaction with green nature. Very informative, very well researched, with individual text and quotes annotated to a huge and diverse bibliography. From window boxes in the ghettos, up through the role of plants in prisons and hospitals, to the attraction of parks and great forests and botanical gardens of the world, Charles Lewis explores our need to experience and/or nurture those historically ancient green living beings that are sharing their planet with us. The tons of gardening books I have (you know, the ones with compost-smudged pages and mispelled Latin scribbled in the margins) will not share the same shelf with this book. They are cookbooks, this is a book on hunger.

Charles Lewis is the undisputed champion of people-plant relationships. A learned man, well-versed in all aspects of horticulture, Lewis is also an excellent writer. Lewis asks: "In what ways do plants enter our mental and spiritual lives?" What exactly is the importance of cultivating our own "inner garden." Gardens grow persons, not just plants. Lewis found that to pursue his interest in the human side of horticulture he had to look to other disciplines - psychology, sociology, geography, and medicine. Charles Lewis's Green Nature/ Human Nature is a must read for anyone who loves to garden. "Horticultural Therapy for the Soul" perhaps describes this book, but actually it is more. Check out this rare gem--you'll love it. Tom Ogren, author of Allergy-Free Gardening, Ten Speed Press.

This book sits rather oddly with others in the Institute of Economic Affairs Choice in Welfare Series. Whilst the sub-title 'Welfare before the Welfare State' suggests that this is an account of self-help swept away by the state the content is more contested arguing that the self-help which was available was confined to the skilled and semi-skilled working class rather than to all of the working classes at the time. This point of view is not particularly challenged, a fact which, given the genesis of the project, is surprising to say the least.

Before Beveridge is a welcome addition to the literature about welfare before the state intervened in Britain. Contrary to the establishment history books which used to argue that the benevolent state stepped into a welfare vacuum, a number of studies have challenged this claim with books and scholarly articles demonstrating that the working classes were more than capable of providing education and welfare for their families by themselves as individuals and in groups long before the administrative machine moved in.

In this slim volume it seems that the editor and the staff at the IEA Health and Welfare Unit have rather abdicated the case for individual enterprise in welfare provision to those authors who put forward the view that in reality this provision was available to a select number of the working classes and the unorganised and the poor were not able to avail themselves of the opportunity. The so-called liberals appear to stand aside in the face of the attack and do not attempt to join battle with those propositions. I find the papers of Whiteside, Harris, Vincent and Thane to be particularly well researched and argued as well as persuasive given the paucity of David Green's paper especially.

The weakness of the writers who suggest that there was indeed a need for the intervention of the state in bringing welfare provision to the neediest in British society is the determination to overlook the evidence that many of the disenfranchised working classes who did not belong to either friendly societies or trades unions were determined to provide education for their children regardless of their personal circumstances. The fact that individuals of limited means were capable of identifying, by themselves, often without any education of their own, options for the betterment of their children over the longer term and were prepared to forego current onsumption to pay for it speaks volumes which significantly undermines the position supporting the need for state involvement.

This is a very thought provoking book which adds substantially to the lierature and which colours the debate about welfare provision more vividly than before. I would heartily recommend the book to sixth form and college students of history and social policy as well as practitioners of the black arts of social policy and policy-makers in general.

This book sits rather oddly with others in the Institute of Economic Affairs Choice in Welfare Series. Whilst the sub-title 'Welfare before the Welfare State' suggests that this is an account of self-help swept away by the state the content is more contested arguing that the self-help which was available was confined to the skilled and semi-skilled working class rather than to all of the working classes at the time. This point of view is not particularly challenged, a fact which, given the genesis of the project, is surprising to say the least.

Before beveridge is a welcome addition to the literature about welfare before the state intervened in Britain. Contrary to the establishment history books which used to argue that the benevolent state stepped into a welfare vacuum, a number of studies have challenged this claim with books and scholarly articles demonstrating that the working classes were more than capable of providing education and welfare for their families by themselves as individuals and in groups long before the administrative machine moved in.

In this slim volume it seems that the editor and the staff at the IEA Health and Welfare Unit have rather abdicated the case for individual enterprise in welfare provision to those authors who put forward the view that in reality this provision was available to a select number of the working classes and the unorganised and the poor were not able to avail themselves of the opportunity. The so-called liberals appear to stand aside in the face of the attack and do not attempt to join battle with those propositions. I find the papers of Whiteside, Harris, Vincent and Thane to be particularly well researched and argued as well as persuasive given the paucity of David Green's paper especially.

The weakness of the writers who suggest that there was indeed a need for the intervention of the state in bringing welfare provision to the neediest in British society is the determination to overlook the evidence that many of the disenfranchised working classes who did not belong to either friendly societies or trades unions were determined to provide education for their children regardless of their personal circumstances. The fact that individuals of limited means were capable of identifying, by themselves, often without any education of their own, options for the betterment of their children over the longer term and were prepared to forego current onsumption to pay for it speaks volumes which significantly undermines the position supporting the need for state involvement.

This is a very thought provoking book which adds substantially to the lierature and which colours the debate about welfare provision more vividly than before. I would heartily recommend the book to sixth form and college students of history and social policy as well as practitioners of the black arts of social policy and policy-makers in general.

My eight-year-old is required to do three book reports each week and that can be overwhelming. But the Cul-de-Sac Kids series is a great way to overcome that. The books are entertaining to my child. They do a great service by bridging that gap between easy, babyish books with no real plot and longer, harder books, like Harry Potter. They are easy to understand and read without being simplistic and boring. We have really enjoyed them!

Discovering the Old Testament: Story and Faith is a colourful college textbook introducing the Old Testament. The layout is similar to Encountering the Old Testament (by Bill T. Arnold et al). Each chapter begins with learning objectives, questions to consider, and key words to understand. Coded side bars cover topics such as "The Apocrypha" and "Modern Translations of the Bible." Each side bar is coded as Interpretive, Theological, Historical, Cultural, or Archaeological. Chapters end with summary statements, questions for reflection, and resources for further study. Numerous photographs are included with a large number drawn from modern Judaism. There is a brief appendix on Jewish history from 331 to 63 B.C.

This 382 page book is very readable and probably appropriate in depth for a college textbook, although in this space cannot go as deep as, say, LaSor, Hubbard and Bush (Old Testament Survey). It is written from a conservative perspective but critical scholarship is presented in abbreviated form. For example, the standard dates for Second and Third Isaiah are presented in a paragraph. There is a general failure to engage such critical issues and the authors present "scholarly opinion" alongside "conservative evangelical" scholarship without always committing to a particular view. So on the authorship of Isaiah they write "There is no unanimous opinion on this issue among conservative evangelical scholars. Some prefer the multiple authorship view. Others view the entire book as the work of Isaiah of the eighth century B.C." (p 293).

Much of the content of the book summarizes the biblical content. New Testament interpretation is mentioned in theological sidebars where relevant and the reader is encouraged to apply theological insights to personal faith.

The majority of the book was written by Alex Varughese who also edited the work as a whole. Varughese and the other three authors are department heads of Christian liberal arts colleges (I do not know who Robert L. Lewis is [named in the ...description]. He is not listed on my copy).

This book will prove a colourful and readable introduction to the Old Testament, especially in terms of biblical content and life application. The numerous illustrations allow the reader to visualise Israel and modern Judaism.

This review is based on a galley proof.

I really liked this book because I think its really exciting. The way you don't know what's going to happen. I think this one was my favorite!

This book is among the best myhology books I have ever read. It is expanded to the best and most popular of Greek Myths. For example, The Labors of Hercules, The Quest for the Golden Fleece and more.

I read an Anne of Green Gables many, many years ago and immediatly fell in love. At once, I went out and bought the entire series, loving each book more than the one before. This is a line of books I would highly recommend to anyone, of any age. It is truly my favorite set of books. No matter how many times I have read it...and my first copy had fallen apart years ago...I laugh and cry just as hard as I did the first time. Anne of Green Gables 2, or Anne's House of Dreams, is a wonderful story of a couple just starting out in marriage. Moving from their friendly town of Avonlea, they started out anew, in a little cottage by the seashore. Gilbert, Anne's husband, is a young doctor, beginning his practice. They make many new friends, each more interesting than the last. There is even a mystery to unravel in their midst! Romance galore, love, friendship and dreams unfold before our eyes. Even when we read of their tragedies, we hurt along with them, feeling their pain. That is how well this book is written. Read it, enjoy it and buy the whole set. You will never regret it!

Anne of Green Gables is one of the first books to make me fall in love...with it. I mean, it was cute, it was lesson teaching (hehe, that sounds strange), and Anne was just such a good character. She sort of reminded me of me: bad temper (I've gotten much cooler now, haha), big words, amazing imagination, smart (haha, well, I was and am PRETTY SMART, at least, I think, haha). Gilbert reminded me of this guy at school...haha, well, I won't get into details there, but the book was charming, and I've already read it over four times in only like three years, which is sort of alot. I loved this book, and I believe that many other people will learn to appreciate its cuteness and truth and stuff over the years, hehe. Enjoy!

When I first read this book many years back, I loved it, and was sad for it to end when I finished reading it. I loved every single part of it...I simply couldn't put it down. Anne is such a character...you can't help liking her more and more, and wishing that she was your own "bosom friend" just as I did. While reading, I was transported back to that time, and I could just see Avonlea and Green Gables, the school which Anne studied in, and I could see Diana and Miss Stacy and Gilbert just as if they were my own friends.

I loved this book, and read it many times over again after I first picked it up, and it still delighted me. Lucy Maud Montgomery is a stunning writer, and I believe that she must have been like Anne, for no one could create such a realistic character and write everything that poured out of Anne's mouth...her made up stories, the things that she she thought of, her wild yet delightful imagination...all in all, Anne of Green Gables is one of the finest books I've ever read, and were ever written. I strongly recommend it to anyone, old or young. Everyone can relate to Anne and she could make you smile like she did for me.

The Green Guide to Herb Gardening is a very wonderful book that takes ten of the most popular herbs and explores them fully; from planting, care and nurturing of these plants to the harvesting, storage and culinary uses. There are some wonderful recipes for herbs here and I look forward to using some of them. This book covers it all. A must have primer for any beginner or anyone who who has never grown anything.
But what makes this book special is that it doesn't stop there. This book also covers the herb history, magic and folklore of these ten herbs, being basil, calendula, chamomile, chives, garlic, lemon balm, mint, oregano, parsley and thyme. Then Ms. Harding adds herbal teas, aromatic and ornamental uses and some simple magical uses. This now makes this book a very useful handbook worth owning by anyone.
Easy to read and follow, Ms. Harding explains everything fully and presents the material in a well organized and easy to follow format. This book is well researched, and a fountain of information on these herbs. I am hoping she plans to do another book on 10 more herbs, as I found this one a valuable aid to be used.

Author Deborah C Harding has written a winner in "The Green Guide to Herb Gardening." I can't decide what I like about this book the most, from picking the ten most Popular Herbs, Recipes, Remedies, Magickal Lore or even the format.

Ms Harding has taken the ten most popular herbs, and put together a sure fire way to propagate, prepare and to preserve. With the added history and lore, recipes and remedies, all together. For the first time we do not need 5 different books to learn of an herb. Its all in one. With easy step-by-step directions, wonderful mouth watering recipes, and over a hundred easy home remedies that can save the consumer a mint!

From the beginner gardener to the professional farmer, whether you only have room for two pots, or you have 100 acres. Whether you want to spice up a dish, decorate, beautify yourself or your home.This is the book for you(. . .)

Ms. Harding's book is clear, concise and easy to understand.She manages to present an informative and yet fascinating view intoten of the most common garden herbs--with all the information neededto get you started working with them. Ms. Harding is a multi-talentedauthor, and this book is worth every penny--I wholeheartedly recommendit...

I very much enjoyed this book because it was full of pure fun reading. Some books drag from the very beginning, but this children's story didn't. There were surprises from the start. This book is an all original example of using your imagination. Lewis Carrol was gifted enough to let his imagination go wild, and to write it down on paper. This book inspires me to write any sort of crazy thing that is worth writing. This book is about Alices adventures from the time she saw the peculiar White Rabbit with a waistcoat and watch. She meets thrilling but very arguementive creatures and charectors such as the caterpiller who smokes, the Duchess and her baby which turns into a pig, a Mock Turtle, a gryphon, and the most famous the Chesire cat and the Queen of Hearts. This book is a bit different than the Disney movie. There are other charecters in the book that are not mentioned in the animated movie. and I think the book is more bizarre.

I read the book "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and I really enjoyed reading it. Lewis Carroll is a magnificant author and the story he writes is wonderful. Alice is a little girl who journeys to a magical land where everything is full of non-sense. She incounters many people and creatures along the way. She is told many stories and riddles while she travels through wonderland. My favorite thing throughout the story, was when Alice kept saying that she would have to write a book about this place when she got home. Even though it was a dream, Alice still loves her world of non-sense.

Let me put it this way: I have yet to meet someone who does NOT like Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Some people have less affection for it than others, but it engages everyone, kids and adults alike.

While Carroll's work appears at first to be an eccentric and unfocused work of children's literature, closer study reveals a much more elaborate text, which is variously a satire on language, a political allegory, an attack on the flawed English educational standards of the time, a parody of children's literature, and much, much more. As Alice ventures into the world behind her mirror -- Wonderland -- she encounters some of the most remarkable figures in literary history: the Cheshire Cat, the White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter, Tweedledee and Tweedledum, and the Queen of Hearts, to name a few. (I have no proof of this, but I would bet that these characters continue to rank among the most popular and memorable of all time.)

But while the story is thoroughly enjoyable, I find the writing style even more significant. Alice is delivered in such a simple, honest, stream-of-consciousness manner that it does indeed work as children's literature. The absolute freedom with which Carroll lets his events twist and turn has been beneficial to me, particularly in my creative and personal writing, teaching me how to loosen up when attempting stream-of-consciousness, and how to let my writing go where it will. In terms of pure writing style, I think Carroll ranks among the most influential and invigorating of the authors I've read.

And, as a postscript, the original illustrations by John Tenniell are fantastic, and rank among my favorite illustrations ever. I cannot recommend this one too highly.