Outward Bound

Outward Bound is an excellent science fiction book for either the science fiction fan or anyone looking for a good novel. The book is a short read that seems to go by rather quickly, which is a first for a slow reader like myself. The chapters are fairly short, but make the book easier to follow. I was definitely surprised that the book kept my attention, I could hardly set the novel down.

Linc Marani is a troubled teen who wants nothing more than to live the fast life. He runs into problems with the law and is turned to an alternative boot camp for youth. There he faces the adversity of his new and mysterious life. He interacts with many characters and problems, such as Angelo, the buddy, and Arvin, the bully. Tension rises when Arvin and Linc continue to butt heads and neither are willing to back down. The central theme is whether Linc will be able to turn his meaningless life around into something that is worth more than anything on this planet.

This is an uplifting story that gives hope that there are better things out there, showing that hard work and self control can get you somewhere in life. The technology is a little hard to follow but gets the point across. I was intrigued throughout the novel, this is the best science fiction book I have read, and I would rate it above the well known novels such as Blade Runner, Snow Crash, and Shockwave Rider. James P. Hogan's Outward Bound is just an entertaining, feel good novel.

Outward Bound is an excellent science fiction book for either the science fiction fan or anyone looking for a good novel. The book is a short read that seems to go by rather quickly, which is a first for a slow reader like myself. The chapters are fairly short, but make the book easier to follow. I was definitely surprised that the book kept my attention, I could hardly set the novel down.

Linc Marani is a troubled teen who wants nothing more than to live the fast life. He runs into problems with the law and is turned to an alternative boot camp for youth. There he faces the adversity of his new and mysterious life. He interacts with many characters and problems, such as Angelo, the buddy, and Arvin, the bully. Tension rises when Arvin and Linc continue to butt heads and neither are willing to back down. The central theme is whether Linc will be able to turn his meaningless life around into something that is worth more than anything on this planet.

This is an uplifting story that gives hope that there are better things out there, showing that hard work and self control can get you somewhere in life. The technology is a little hard to follow but gets the point across. I was intrigued throughout the novel, this is the best science fiction book I have read, and I would rate it above the well known novels such as Blade Runner, Snow Crash, and Shockwave Rider. James P. Hogan's Outward Bound is just an entertaining, feel good novel.

Hogan is one of my favorite hard-science sf writers. Here, he
attempts a Heinleinesque juvenile novel, and does a pretty good job of it. This short book is a quick, light, pleasant read. It's pretty formulaic--an angel-with-a-dirty face kid from the
wrong side of the tracks, right on the verge of going permanently bad, ends up in a tough-love bootcamp, which
straightens him out. Nothing great, and certainly not for adults, but preteens should enjoy it.

I heard Dr. Shannon speak at Wayzata Community Church on Nov. 3, and found that when I asked him questions about how the medical facts of the pill work, he was unable to discuss the matter, apparaently from a lack of knowledge. He supports birth control, but has no idea how the primary effect of the pill is to keep the fertilized egg from implanting on the uterus, which is an abortion that is usually unknown to the woman as it will not cause a disruption in her cycle.

Very confusing timeline. It is difficult to understand exactly what transpired in his mind, and how the whole story fits together.

I found this autobiography among the best 5% of books that I have ever read. The author has spent his life as a highly motivated, dedicated idealist. His insights are valuable to me in my own development. His unusual abilities and remarkable personal humility are an unusual combination. As a Roman Catholic, I found that he dealt with some of the Roman Catholics' most difficult problems with the church hierarchy in a charitable and inspiring fashion. His enthusiasm, courage, and optimism in the face of unexpected attacks on his work from his own church should lead us all to an enthusiasm and vision of the church which is positive for the world, the church, and ourselves.

Good book...but....too much social interaction on the space station....I prefer more techincal action type of book.

Don't get me wrong, I've been a fan of Hogan ever since I bought an old, battered paperback of "Inherit the Stars" at a street- market bookstore in 1989. However, "Endgame Enigma" is not "Inherit the Stars." The science in the book is well thought-out, as always, but the plot is far too simplistic, and the spy-story theme just doesn't stand up to the rest of the genre. I will give kudos for the surprise ending, though. To simplify, if you are a fan of both sci-fi and political fiction novels, don't buy the book. However, for fans of sci-fi only, or especially James P. Hogan fans, buy the book as an introduction to the world of political intrigue. Then go pick up some Clancy.

In the not to distant future Russia has built a space station that is totally unique and indescribable. However, prior to the final construction of the space station, American intelligence has gotten word that the space station is actually a battle platform that will totally wipe out the Americans in a nuclear war.

Since the Americans are still in a power struggle with the Russians, they decide to send in two covert spies in order to find a missing data that will show the space station is not what it seems. However, the two Americans are caught and forced into a jail that is located on the space station.

While in prison the Americans find a way to make contacts to the Americans, but the Russians are still publically claiming that the space station is just that....a space station. These two spies must determine the relevance of the space station or have American face politically humiliation by accusing the Soviets of potential nuclear battle platforms in space.

The novel is pretty simple to get through, and the plot can be intriguing at times. But, the novel can also drag at certain parts. Overall, the idea is interesting due to the similarities of the stress during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Overall, the book is average, but has an interesting political situation in it.

Has basic information and definitions about psych terms but once you get past the basics the book looses its value. Hasn't a clue about neuropsychology and info on theory is sparse.

To put it in a nut shell, this dictionary is an invaluable commodity acting as an authoritative and concise companion to aid the aspiring student and teacher to the forefront of psychology as we know it today. This dictionary is affordable, compact, easy to reference, and easy to carry. Some notable features include: new terms and up-dated research, the exclusion of pyschological jargon foriegn to the blossoming student, the many illustrations, graphs, diagrams, and formulae, ultimately complete this rewarding dictionary. Dr. Chaplin's work is highly commendable, and should be considered necessary for the shelves of all within the broad spectrum of the psychological world.

The only possible flaw in this book is that *a few* of the entries might be a little opaque to those who don't already know something about the given topic, but by far most of this book is extremely useful and understandable.

I bought this book as an undergraduate studying for the GRE in Psychology (and yes, I think it did help) and have continued to use it as a doctoral student. It's been helpful at all levels. I recommend it to undergrads who are just interested in psychology, to anyone wanting to brush up on any area of psychology, and to psychologists or psychologists-in-training who want a handy reference to look up new or unfamiliar terms. It contains clear illustrations -- for example, of the eye and of some optical illusions -- and includes a separate list of common statistical formulas, a list of Greek symbols found in psychology, and a list of abbreviations commonly found in psychology.

It has entries for everything from the most broad topics, e.g. "behaviorism", which gets a lengthy encyclopedic-like entry, to the most narrow, e.g. "phobophobia: fear of fearing", "bad trip", and "Barnum effect". It includes biographical entries. It includes many entries concerning statistial analyses used in psychology -- factor analysis, Latin square, rank order correlation, etc. Every aspect of psychology is included here -- the physiological, the psychoanalytic, the behavioral, you name it. All in a very small and concise package -- ordinary paperback size and probably less thick than the latest John Grisham novel.

Each entry leaves you with a good grasp of the basics of the term in question.

This is a good book for picking up and browsing if you're just trying to edify yourself, and it's a good book to have handy if you are surrounded by psychologists (or books) who occasionally hit you with a term you aren't quite sure of or would like to know more about.

Highly recommended.

Entoverse is the fourth novel following the Giant's Trilogy. Like the previous three, the same characters can be found throughtout. Also, there is a great deal of scientific research done by the main characters. But unlike the previous three novels, this novel fails to maintain interest and can be confusing.

First off, the novel takes you back to Jevlen, following the "Pseudowar" between the Thuriens and the Jevlenese. The supercomputer JEVEX has been shut down....or so all non-Jevelense think. In harsh reality, JEVEX is still running at a small rate, but there is a totally different world living in its system. The author has created a new world for us to explore, however it turns out that this world does not follow the laws of physics in our universe. To make it even more confusing, it seems that this world is merely just a computer generated pattern designed by the Jevlenese. To complicate things even more, the inhabitants of this "new" world, are taking over the bodies of our universe.

Now, don't get me wrong, I am one for all types of science fiction and new ideas. As a matter of fact, I think unique ideas make a science fiction novel. But this idea has gone too far. The novel becomes confusing because this world is run through a computer process. Yes, it is a new idea, but the idea has been taken to far. In fact, this novel does not have the quality writing and suspense as found in the previous three novels. It seems this novel was written just to be written, lacking purpose and further muddying the waters. I do not recommend this novel, as a matter of fact, if you read the previous three novels, you might want to stop there, because this one could leave you highly disappointed.

Hogan, as usual (Giants, Lifemaker, Thrice Upon a Time), does a magnificent job creating a gripping story based on plausible-sounding scientific principles. Hogan's writing is quite intricate, and he does a great job tying up seemingly unimportant loose ends. Some of the character development seemed a little artificial, though. I would strongle recommend having read the first three Giants books, although this story does stand mostly on its own.

I could not put this book down! It is a brilliant mystery book, with a fair amount of action thrown in for good measure. My only regret is that I have not read the previous three books in the series, so I was, so to speak, thrown in at the deep end, with no knowledge of the characters. All the same, I was able to pick up the story very quickly. I just wish that it had been longer!

I recently purchased this book for a class that I am taking at a junior college. There were two internet classes offered. However before selecting a class, I review the books first to see which are the most user friendly. To me this book fit my overall requirements. Although the print is small it is easy to read and understand. Instructions appear the be clearly written and objectives are outlined at the beginning of each tutorial. I'll write another review at the end of the semester once I see how it actually plays out.

Good foundational book for Internet and e-mail knowledge. However, do not rely solely on this book for all information revolving around the Net.

This book has a Blackboard course cartridge written to accompany it. That is what makes it an excellent book.

At last, a series for the Rifts universe. While many people critiqued the first book for having printing errors in it, the second does not appear to have any of these problems. If anything; the second book in this trilogy leaves me wanting to read more (which is good).......Our heros have been betrayed and now are getting ready to be sent out to the wilderness on a suicide mission again! Oh My! Hopefully the next book will have a bit more combat action in it (both magic and conventional). A good read so far if you like Rifts, but not necessarily a must have Sci-Fi set of material.

Deception's Web, the second part of Adam Chilson's Rifts triology vastly improves upon the first novel. For one, the editing has improved by a quatuam leap, and although it has a few problems, it's much better than the first.

The writing improves as well. The first part is almost a straight action story, and while interesting, it didn't do much to grab the reader's attention.

Deception's Web tones down the action and ignites the intrigue. As Lt. Sorenson's party returns to Chi-Town, they are met with court martial and deceit. A traitor is in their mists, and Sorenson's life hangs in the balance. Strange alliances begin to unravel the deception, but there's more to come.

The characters are also given a greater chance to develop, allowing for the strange friendship between Van and Darren to come to life, the tensions between other party members, and of course, Kramer, er, Kro-Mar, for the great comic relief.

I'm a sucker for identity-crisis books.

This book captured my attention because it had a man waking up without memory of several months of his life and every indication that he his someone else. But this book was disappointing. There were so many identity changes that it just got tedious. By the end, I really didn't care about the big revelation as to the whole identity problem. I just wanted to finish the book and move on.

Also I am almost never swift enough to guess the end before the author wants me to know, but in this book the "surprise" ending was painfully obvious very early on.

I did, however, think that the future presented in the book was interesting for those who like speculative futures. I wouldn't write the book off entirely just on the basis of the description of the future. There is also a lot of action, which may entice some into reading it.

As most of the other reviews have noted, James P. Hogan here presents a somewhat unevenly written story. However, that being said, there is a class of reader (such as I) that really appreciates clever sf and surprising plot twists.

Multiplex Man does have its moments of annoying polemics so frequent in Hogan's work. However, the incredible entertainment of this book easily makes reading it well worth while. Towards the end I couldn't put it down; the adventure was so exciting, the explanations so satisfying.

If you have difficulty finding this out-of-print book, a little Web searching can reward you with this gem.

What if you weren't . . . you?

(What if you were a writer _telling the story_ of someone in that situation? How would you organize it?)

If you're the protagonist in this fascinating SF novel, you're probably in for some interesting experiences. But will you get to keep them?

(If you're James P. Hogan, you tell the story in chunks, cycling through the various nonoverlapping personalities and telling the parts of the tale for which each is "present," as it were.)

Who do you turn out to be? Are you one person or several? Which hero saves the day, and which hero _gets_ saved? Are they the same person? Are you sure?

Hogan is in fine narrative form here. I've seen his writing described as "textbook-dry," but that's not likely to dissuade those of us who regard, say, Kernighan and Ritchie's _The C Programming Language_ as the pinnacle of expository prose style. Hogan writes like a _good_ engineer; his prose does the job he wants it to do, and the meat is in the story. (You don't need mannered digressions about the spelndid colors of the autumn leaves in a book whose theme is that the universe isn't what you think it is.)

In fact this is a fun book, full of Hogan's trademark mind-blowing coolness. The underlying technology is rendered plausible and the story is interesting from beginning to end. Even if you know what must be going on -- and you will, by midway through the second chapter, even if you hadn't figured it out from the title -- you'll still be kept guessing until the very end about (a) how and why it happened, and (b) how it will ultimately turn out.

Hogan is one of my two favorite living SF writers (the other is Spider Robinson, who doesn't write "hard" SF). If you like SF, you'll like him.

This book has at least 10 authors and is fun to read for the first few chapters. Then I really got annoyed to read the same things over and over again and at the same time I missed some more in depth explanations. A lot is done with the framework itself. This is probably due to the very early delivery date of the book. Though I really enjoyed the C# example (game of life) I think you be better served with Hollis, Lhotka "VB.Net Programming". Also there seem to be quite a few other books out by now.

This is a good introduction to .net, as the cover says, but me thinks it was just a ploy to make money. Not very useful at all, but if you are a beginner to .NET, then you might want to browse through it to get a general feel for the framework.

I have purchased several Dot Net books as of late. I thought the book was very thorough as an overview. This book was not intended to be a programmers guide to any single language in the Dot Net suite. But if you want a book to give you some insight as to what Dot Net is all about, this is a great place to start. I also purchased Wrox "Programming C# with the public Beta", although this book is being replaced with Professional C#, I still learned much from this title as well.

If you're looking for a useful guide to Turkey, don't waste your money on this book. Its authors obviously had no real feel for the country or understanding of its history and their suggestions are not of much help. The Lonely Planet guide is far and away the best available.

Just got back from a six week trek and island hop round Greece! I had a wonderful time and couldn't have met my budget and rigorous itinerary without Let's Go's extensive budget hotel and restaurant options. I though the writing style was witty and I knew I could trust the hip nightlife picks for my more debauched nights on the islands!

Let's Go excels in its detailed, sensitive coverage of the Greek isles. I couldn't have made it through without Let's Go's help finding the out-of-the way bargain hotels, connecting from island to island, and figuring out which ancient sites and Byzantine monasteries were worth seeing. Admittedly the Turkey section was a little bit weak, although I loved the Black Sea Coast coverage; the Sinop listings included a few cool bars where I met Turkish college kids, Austrian ski bumbs and American archaeologists. The book could stand to improve its coverage of the neighborhoods of Athens and of Eastern Anatolia, but in terms of budget options and nightlife coverage the other guides don't even compare.