An extremely informative & detailed read! Stevens iterates a tragic event in Marine Corps history with a direct, thought provoking style. As the current Commanding Officer of the Recruit Training Regiment at Parris Island, I am encouraging my officers & drill instructors to read this book in order to better understand how close we, the Marine Corps, as an organization, came to being disestablished because of the actions of just one man. Another book of interest on the same subject matter is Keith Fleming's, "The U.S. Marine Corps in Crisis: Ribbon Creek & Recruit Training." Another important book in helping to understand how the recruit training process has evolved.

I want to begin my comments by saying this is an excellent balanced book and that Stevens deserves a lot of credit. I would further recommend it to any Marine or others interested in Marine Corps history.

I will also state it is my opinion that S.Sgt. Matthew McKeon was a good man who made a tragic mistake. The factors leading up to the events of the evening of April 8, 1956 are manifold and can only be fully understood by reading Stevens' book.

My personal perspective comes from having served in the USMCR and the USMC from October 1956 until August 1962 when I was Honorably discharged as a Corporal E-4. I went to Parris Island in early February of 1957 and my recruit training virtually overlaps the events of a year earlier, putting me at the rifle range at about the same time of year.

Like all of us who went though boot training, I too pulled butts at the range. The discipline and control there was far different than back at main side so on several days I took the opportunity to spend my entire lunch break walking all over the Ribbon Creek area. I wanted to understand this incident.

Definitions from Webster...

Marine: Of or relating to the sea.

Amphibious: Able to live on both land and in water.

Swim: To propel oneself in water...To float on a liquid...

DI Motto: Let's be damn sure that no man's ghost will ever say "If your training program had only done its job."

And from Chesty Puller we learn the mission of Marine Corps training! "...success in battle..."

When I got to Parris Island, I was shocked to see recruits who could not swim had joined a service called the Marine Corps. I also thought it strange the USMC would accept anyone who could not swim, but I guess the Navy does too. How much W.W.II footage have you seen with Marines wading ashore under heavy fire when the Peter and Mike boats could not make it to the beach? Or, in jungles up to their chests and necks in water at Guadalcanal and then all over the south Pacific and Vietnam as well.

HELLO! This is the mission!

In training "...the nonswimmers had been taught how to float, tread water, and dog paddle. All recruits in the platoon had received ten hours of swimming instruction before April 8."

Platoon 71 got themselves into trouble by not following McKeon and by "joking, kidding, and slapping others with twigs while yelling "Snake" or "Shark! Suddenly there was a cry for help and panic broke out..."

I had looked closely at Ribbon Creek while at the rifle range and my "vivid" reaction then was someone would need to be retarded or radically incompetent to drown in that area! Several in platoon 71 fit this description.

"About three-fourths of the platoon was squared away. But the remainder were foul balls." "For example, eight of the men in Platoon 71 were either illiterate or had General Classification Test scores - approximately equivalent to an IQ test - below 70."

McKeon's colorful assessment that 25 percent of the platoon were "foul balls", may not have been far off the mark based on the testimony of several members of the platoon at the trial and in later interviews"

"The quality of some of the men under McKeon's tutelage may also be measured by their behavior after completing boot camp. At the time of the court-martial, two men were AWOL from Parris Island, one was AWOL from Camp Lejeune, one had deserted, one was in the brig, and one was awaiting punishment by his commanding officer." Remember these men did not complete their recruit training under McKeon, so other DI's also had a chance to make these guys good Marines.

SDI Staff Sergeant Huff had basically washed his hands of the young men under him...Stevens states "McKeon was failing, and he knew it." I think it was SDI Huff who was failing.

As far as the charges of being drunk the testimony is flawed and inconclusive. "Not until the court-martial nearly four months later would Dr. Atcheson admit that there was no clinical evidence of intoxication."

His own recruits "...testified that there was no evidence that Mckeon was drunk or impaired by drinking". Of all the recruits in the platoon who had made statements "...not one...had anything negative or critical to say about Sergeant McKeon".

McKeon was victim of being a nice guy by helping Scarborough with his bottle, allowing him to leave it in the barracks, driving Scarborough to the NCO club and accepting congratulattory drinks he never finished. Granted, McKeon used bad judgement but he was certainly not a bad guy.

S.Sgt. McKeon was the first person in the water and he was the last one out. He was leading, not just ordering recruits into an unknown situation. It is empirically obvious that if they had just followed him, as instructed, they all would have gotten back safely. Basic for military training!

Bottom line, McKeon was a new junior DI carrying virtually the whole burden of squaring away this platoon. When I got there a year later there was a "Motivation Platoon". I don't know if this approach existed in 1956 but what I saw of the "Motivation Platoon" regimen would have straightened out these "foul balls".

Although busted to Private, McKeon was allowed to stay in the Marine Corps. He attempted to rebuild his career, capitalizing on his W.W.II carrier experience. He worked with an all-weather fighter squadron and supplemented his private's pay by working nights in the kitchen of the EM club. Remember he had a wife and kids!

Earlier that year he had earned his squadrons "Marine of the Month" award.

"With one exception, all of the men interviewed forty years later spoke as highly of their former drill instructor as they had at the trial."

Enough said!

I am so glad to have found this book. I am the illegitimate daughter of Charles Reilly whom I knew nothing about since he died one month before I was born. This book not only took me through the trial but also gave me incite to the person he was. Through the years I have only had a home town newspaper article of the incident and was never recognized by his family.
I am sure McKeon did not march the whole platoon into the marsh with the intent that some would surely die and do feel that he has been justly punished for his bad judgement on that fateful night. I could almost feel like I was at the trial by the way Stevens writes. As a former wife of a Marine who spent four years living the "life", I, too, would like to see this depicted on film. I would also like to locate some of the surviving members of Platoon 71 who might have more information of any kind about my father.

This pocket companion serves as a concise overview of the most important facts & concepts from the parent textbook (Guyton's Textbook of Medical Physiology). However, it does not contain all the details or some clinical relevances, that's why you have to go back to the parent textbok for furthur info.

Good figures. Text is easy to read. Guyton's text is especially good in explaining cardiovascular material. It complements the larger text well, and is recommended as a good, shorter version of the main text.

'The tyranny of the majority' - a brilliant phrase coined by the author of 'Democracy In America' and a brilliant chink in the armour of Rousseau's societal vision. An individual who owes everything to the state cannot conceivably be called an 'individual.' They are, rather, reduced to being an automated cog in the wheel of human motion. Their very individuality is subsumed to serve the will of the collective. This cannot be right. Minorities must be protected. If not, they will find a way. However, I agree, as Orwell did, that there must be a rejection of 'every form of man's dominion over man.' We are equal but different. This paradox resists neat hyperbole.

Rousseau's treatise on the nature of people and their government has left a lasting imprint on political discourse. Though at times passionate and persuasive, most of the short book was simply too vague for Rousseau's semantic games to be indisputable, and sometimes even comprehensible. Some of his ideas are simply wrong, such as the "noble savage", while others quite clearly debatable, such as the social contract itself. I, for one, would fear to live in Rousseau's ideal world, where every right I have is only mine so long as the majority (who never can be wrong) wills it.

Whether you agree with him or not, plowing through Rousseau's 150 pages is a necessity for anyone who wants to carry on high-level political discourse.

Deeply influential book, "The Social Contract" is a "must read" for anybody interested in the history of political ideas, or even in history. It had a big influence on the French Revolution, and in many movements after it that considered that the individual owes everything to the state.

After reading this book you will be astounded by the insight that Rousseau (1712-1778) showed. He explains us, among other things, the reason for the formation of political society, and the origin of the social contract.

I believe this is a good book to start a study on political ideas. It is simple and well written, it has had an important political impact and can make you curious enough to know more. If you are interested, read also a book about the history of political ideas (for example the one written by George Sabine), because it can guide you to other interesting books, and can give you a deeper insight into the ideas, circumstances and life of Rousseau.

Dr. Arthur Guyton and Dr. John Hall fail in offering a comprehensive molecular understanding of physiology. Although the general presentation of subjects is decent, it does not offer a thorough understanding of molecular events that occur to create what is observed macroscopically. The diagrams are weak utilizing ancient graphs that do not serve to clarify difficult points, and the book is in desparate need of some schematics and flow charts. Tip to Guyton and Hall: today's medical students need more than just a cursory glance at the molecular basis of physiology. And I would suggest to those reading to check out Berne and Levy and Ganong, the latter of which offers up much more detail than Guyton despite being a review text.

As a general practitioner, I don't recommend this book for professionals who want to improve in advanced knowledge in physiology. It is a STARTER book on the theme, for medical students only, not for practicising doctors. I've got frustrated.

This book states clearly in the preface it is NOT meant to be an advanced molecular physiology text. I am neither a doctor nor a scientist, just an interested mature student of biology, and this book is exactly what I was looking for. Physiology texts seem to be either sophmoric, very basic overviews or dense comprehensive surveys used as reference by researchers / professionals. This book, to me, is unique in providing depth and detail missing from basic texts, without being overwhelmed by minutia only selectively interesting. Highly recommended for the curious who feel their intelligence is being insulted by most introductory physiology texts.

Kidd, the hero of Devil's Code is a likable computer hacker/criminal and a fairly good artist. He must be a good artist because he does not have another source of income. The plot involving two seemingly unrelated murders is interesting enough. St. John Corbiel as head of a company called AmMath has come up with a software program that will intercept intelligence satalites, and he is selling photos and information to foriegn buyers. The two murder victims got to close to what he was doing and Corbiel's people killed them. The sister of Jack Morrison, one of the victims looks to Kidd to find out why her brother was murdered.

There is not a great deal of mystery throughout the book. The plot is fairly simple, the characters are predictable, and the ending is not really a surprise. Kidd is interesting enough to carry the reader through to the end of the book, but not enough to make me log on to find the other Kidd books. I like Lucas Davenport better and hope there will be another "Prey" book soon.

John Sandford's Prey Series has been becoming more and more stale with each book. Easy Prey which was released earlier this year was by far the worst book yet. That is why I was amazed to hear that Sandford was releasing another book so soon. I was expecting the worst. However, I was pleasently surprised to learn that The Devil's Code was actually the third Kidd and Luellen book. I grant you that this one was not as good as the first two(The Fool's Run and The Empress File) but it was still enjoyable. This kind of book is exactly the kind of change of pace that all authors who write a series should write. I agree with some of the other reviews that Lucas Davenport is a better character, but let's be honest have any of the recent Prey novels come even close to some of the earliest books like Rules Of Prey and Eyes of Prey? Take this book for what it is, a very good departure form a great author. The plot drags at some points but overall it is an interesting suspense story. Now let's hope Sandford breaths some life into that other series or we all be hoping for more Kidd novels instead.

I decided to give The Devil's Code a whirl because I am a big fan of John Sandford's Prey series. I'm glad I did. If you enjoy a light hearted romp through intrigue, mystery, suspense, sex and high tech complexity, you would be well advised to do the same.

Granted, The Devil's Code doesn't have the intensity of the Prey series. This is the story of a part time artist, part time criminal and part time computer hacker who gets dragged into a high level political investigation that involves the FBI, CIA and other law enforcement agencies. Although he is completely innocent of any involvement, Kidd -- the book's main character - needs to find the real criminals before the investigation leads to him. His mysterious and talented sometimes partner, LuEllen, shows up to help him and add spice to the narrative.

While the Prey books deal in realism, The Devil's Code is pure escapism. One of Kidd's hacker friends is murdered and his (the friend's) sister asks Kidd to help her find the murderer. This sets off an action-packed chain of events involving espionage, conspiracy, violence and suspense. But it's all fairly superficial. From virtually any phone booth or motel room, Kidd is able to access a complex network of computer hackers to get the information he needs. No dial-up problems, no slow network speeds, no disconnects - just instant response with the answers Kidd needs. For a heavy Internet user this seems a bit fictional, but that is what this is, fiction.

And the criminal plot that slowly unfolds before us is truly ingenious. The bad guys have devised a way to access highly sensitive government information for great monetary gain. But I won't reveal what this is because it would ruin the story. Read it, and have fun!

I really had to force myself to finish this book. It is only the second in the Prey series that I have read, but after reading Certain Prey, it is a disappointment. I listened to it on audiobook and had a terrible time trying to keep up with the characters. I wasn't able to go back and look up the names again, so struggled a bit that way. Sandford didn't really take the time to develop the characters, which made it hard to feel much empathy towards them. Plus the fact that all he could seem to think about was which woman would he sleep with. He had the friend ( a fellow policewoman who was shot), the model (who he did sleep with), the Dr. (who he thought he might marry if she asked him) and his old girlfriend from his college days. I, like other reviewers, just really didn't care much about the people in the story and the action just didn't interest me. It sounds like the previous Prey books are more worth my time and I'll have to go back and try them.

Lucas Davenport is called in to head the investigation into the strangulation death of supermodel Aliiee'e Maison at a society party following a photoshoot; the investigation soon uncovers the body of Sandy Lansing stuffed in a closet and the complications begin. As the story unfolds, these deaths are followed by evidence of drug use, lesbian sex, incest, and further murders interspersed with the complicated family and personal relationships of the people involved. Given all the interrelated aspects of the plot, the narrative jumped around a great deal and was further complicated by the influence of Lucas' personal relationships on the plot.

Readers of this series know that Lucas has been estranged from his former fiancee Weather Karkinnen since the horrific hospital shootout in SUDDEN PREY; this is the story that allows Lucas and Weather to have a chance to begin to reconnect. Meanwhile, his former girlfriend and fellow cop Marcy Sherrill plays a crucial role in the story, and Lucas is fascinated by and attracted to Alie'e girlfriend, the former model (who has taken up pottery) Joel Corbeau. And just to add a further complication he is distracted by a chance meeting with a college girlfriend who rekindles old memories (and perhaps more). Another female integral to the plot is Rose Marie Roux, who is still the chief of police and very worried about the political complications and widespread media attention. Finally Lucas needs to call on his old friend Ellie Kruger (Sister Mary Joseph) for advice once again.With the added backdrop of Lucas' personal relationships, at times Lucas and old friend Del Capslock seem even more confused than the reader and not at the top of their game.

I enjoyed the book, and found it a very fast and engaging read. But I read it as a Lucas Davenport fan rather than a devotee of the PREY series; I have just recently started the series and have been reading the books out of sequence and thus did not have the disappointment of some of the long time readers that this represented a break in style from the earlier works. This is about Lucas and how this case causes him to reevaluate his life and his relationships, the murders are clearly a means to that end for the author. Thus, the case was confusing, and some of the elements seem quite contrived relative to most of Sandford's books. Finally, the solution to the last of the unsolved murders and the ending of the book were not as at all foreshadowed as they are in most police procedurals and classic detective stories.

Thus, if your goal is to get to know Lucas, this book does a good job of character development and is four stars on that basis; it includes the usual supporting cast and the expected clever exchanges between Del and Lucas. You will be disappointed if you are expecting a book that follows the model of the previous books in the PREY series, as the many one and two star reviews indicate. While I definitely felt it was a wothwhile read and recommend EASY PREY, be prepared for what it is - a book which transitions the series from straight police procedurals to stories involving more character development and more complex storylines with interrelated subplots.

This was a great Lucas Davenport book.fast and somewhat confusing....It took a long time to sort out all the characters that Sandford gave us. And I even liked when he started to recall past events from the other Prey books, but it took a lot to keep up with this one. I was not prepared for the "villian" at the end. I kept thinking I had it figured out and then ...Wham! ...my suspect is murdered too. I couldn't make the connections and the ending was not as well prepared as some of the other books he's written. But that doesn't mean I won't be waiting for the next one out..I WILL. The ending here is a cliff hanger for sure, and I will refrain from giving my opinion on that...don't want to give away everything. Others have mentioned poor editing and I did see evidence of that too. I can't give an exact example right now, but I know there were instances that were repeated within one or two pages of each other. That happens to all writers I'm sure. All in all, this is a recommendation for anyone that like police procedural/mystery/suspense type books...get it now.

A person who pays $60 for a paperback volume on natural history might naturally expect to receive a fairly hefty tome. This book, however, is a mere 200 quarto pages cobbled together mainly from a series of technical papers. The language and style are classically dull, dry sciencespeak. Although said by its editors to be designed to appeal to a broad audience, it's strictly for bear bionerds. The clothbound version is even more outrageouly overpriced at $120! This thing is obviously aimed at people who have government grant money to throw around. And disregard the star at the head of this review; the software won't allow less than a one-star rating.

The authors did a wonderful job of compiling years of scientific research into a natural history book. This is definately a book for the more scientifically-oriented community. It is nice to see the technical aspects included, rather than oversimplifying the material into a "storybook." The missing star is for the price...but this is probably a matter related to the publisher rather than the authors.