I bought this book at a race expo many years ago, and it is the most widely used running book I have. It is clearly written and easy to understand. The advice is practical and non technical--and it works! I have lent this book to many of my running buddies who have had aches and pains, and I have used the book a lot myself. In fact, I am ordering a second copy that I can keep for myself since more often than not, when I need it, someone has borrowed it. I strongly recommend this book for anyone who runs.

I love this book! Part first aid, part do it yourself podiatry. Learn to diagnose and treat running injuries. Shin splints, stress fractures, they cover it all. Then, learn to diagnose and treat the underlying problems.

Everything is clear and practical. Weak arches? Here's how to tape your feet to support them. Need heel cushioning? Use makeup sponges.

This is a must for anyone who runs hard. By learning to diagnose and treat yourself, you'll prevent injuries and improve as a runner.

--Pat / zippy@cs.brandeis.edu

I was first given this book as a gift when I was a teenager, and I found it to be an invaluable reference for understanding the physiology of various injuries as well as what contributed to the injuries. At times, the oft-repeated mantra of "rest, ice, compression, and elevation" gets old, but it really is on the mark.

This book belongs in every distance runner's library, together with Coe's Better Training for Distance Runners.

This is a mythical, mystical journey that deserves to be read and re-read for all time. A brilliant piece of genius which will bring many smiles, almost every paragraph demands re-reading to soak in the marvellous texture of the words.

Is Albert Murray the best living black author? Since Ralph Ellison (a friend of Murray's at Tuskeegee) died there has not a been a black author who has shown more insight, wit, and stylistic virtuosity than Murray. The Seven League boots is a fitting end to a trilogy of novels about Scooter, and again this book is a showcase for Murray's down-home mix of Joyce, Faulkner, and Duke Ellington poetics. In a book that warmly and humorously examines that ever-present rift between expectations and personal dreams, Murray never manages to drift into cliche. Much like the jazz music which forms the roots of both his style and his life, Murray confronts the demons of existance with the sound of surprise and wit. By an author who is far too overlooked, the Seven League Boots is a necessity for a lover of modern literature.

The Black Caucus of the American Library Association (BCALA) awarded author Albert Murray the 1997 Outstanding Contribution to African American Literature citation. The awards recognize excellence in adult fiction and nonfiction by African American authors. "It is said that Albert Murray has married American prose to American jazz."

This is a really good book to introduce SGML. Also, especially now that SoftQuad is out of the SGML web browser business, and no longer provides its Panorama SGML Netscape browser plug-in, the copy of Panorama Pro included on the CD that comes with the book is worth more than the price of the book.

Are you frustrated trying to get started learning about SGML, and how to do things with it? Do you feel like SGML is something out of a Kafka story? This book really can help you make that first big leap from helpless confusion, to being able to do things with SGML, and to be oriented so that you *can* become your own guide in going farther. Buy it: It works if you work it!

This book is an excellent introduction to SGML and XML. Its well written and covers the topic in a reasonable amount of detail. It includes an evaluation version of an SGML browser from Softquad that is worth the price of the book itself.

Pieper, in these three essays, describes what we have to learn from the works and life of Aquinas. The essays detail the scholastic arguements of the day and how Thomas, in the true spirit of open mindedness (his life and method are the definition of this oft abused term) brought some peace ond understanding to the various sides, a very serious matter in his day. The book explains how much of an Aristotilian Aquinas was, and more importantly how much he was not. Mainly by showing how the charactoristics of the Latin Averroists have been unjustly attributed to Aquinas by his detractors - the Latin Averoists (Averoes was an Arab) were whole hearted Aristotilians.

This book is an excellent addition to reading Etienne Gilson's "Unity of the Philosophical Experience" as Pieper gives further explanantions as to the behavior of the Augastinians and Latin Averroists. It could explain also why modern Muslims are so singularly textually dogmatic - it is in reaction to Averroist's attempting to rid religion of faith altogether - and thus the violent reaction in nixing reason and rationalism. It tells how Aquinas circumvented this problem. The last essay also compliments Gilson's book in that it shows what Existentialism has in common with Aquinas, some interesting things, despite some gapping fundimental differences at their very root and conclusion.

The first essay vividly descibes what an attitude of accademic pursuit and teaching should look like. Too many teachers are dogmatic and are only interested in pursuing and supporting an idea that is presently clear in their minds and propogating it, rather than treating the moment as an active pursuit of truth. Thomas was a model teacher and the book is an active discripition of his method.

The book also argues, with supporting evidence and reason, that Thomas' main work The "Summa Theologica" was intentionally left unfinished. Why it was left unfinished is at the root of what Aquinas was all about concerning philosophy and metaphysics - it is a process not a conclusion. Gilson's book describes what a conclusion is, as sometimes philosophers have rejected the idea that they have reached a conclusion, when in fact they have. Gilson effectively defines what a conclusion looks like.

Both are highly recommended books for Teachers, Historians, and Philosophers.

St. Thomas Aquinas, needless to say, is not easy to understand. In this little guide, which makes nice supplemental reading to get a look "behind the scenes" of the saint's philosophy, Josef Pieper first sketches a biographical outlines of Thomas' life and then delves into the negative element in his philosophy and concludes with the "timelessness" of Thomism, which makes it a perennial philosophy.

This book is primarily concerned with St. Thomas' epistemological assumptions (which were taken for granted, hence the "silence"), what knowledge meant for the saint, and how and to what extent it can be achieved. Pieper tackles Thomas' seemingly paradoxical stance on essences, and whether or not they can be known, for Thomas maintains both that we cannot know God in His essence and that God's essence is His existence.

Pieper shows St. Thomas' beautiful conviction that "it is part of the very nature of things that their knowability cannot be wholy exhausted by any finite intellect, because these things are creatures, which means that the very element which makes them capable of being known must necessarily be at the same time the reason why things are unfathomable" (p.60).

All in all, this book is a fine look at Thomas' profound epistemology, so rarely discussed in philosophical courses today. If you have an interest in the philosophy of St. Thomas, don't pass this one up!

The unifying theme of the three essays composing this book is the paradox that the intelligibilty of things and their incomprehensibility both derive from their being creatures, that is, from their possessing natures that are communications of the ideas in the mind of God. Things can be known only because they are created, but at the same time, things are unfathomable because they are created: "one and the same factor explains both why things cannot be entirely grasped and why they can be known" (pp.95-6). Why is this so? I'll not deprive the reader of the pleasure of reading Pieper's book to find out.

For me, this book ended a long struggle to discover what St. Thomas Aquinas really taught about our knowledge of things. Pieper succeeds in reconciling Thomas's frequent statements that we cannot know the essence of any created thing with his repeated claims elsewhere that our minds are receptive of the forms (i.e., essences) of things.

While my attitude toward Pieper's understanding of St. Thomas's thought is not uncritical, I must concede that he is one of the best and most original (the two are not the same) of twentieth century Thomist philosophers. Unfortunately, he is sometimes (unjustly) put down by scholars as a mere popularizer. Let them read this book and be disabused; Pieper has much to teach them.

My ratings of other books by Josef Pieper: Guide to Thomas Aquinas ****; Leisure the Basis of Culture *****; Scholasticism *****

What a breath of fresh air! Skimmin' Stones is light, adventurous and fun. It has a lilting quality that gives you the sense that you are there, in Ireland, laughing and exploring with these three boys. Three days of their lives was a tantilizing invitation to the style of the writer and his imaginative creativity. Definately a book to enjoy!

A wonderful glimpse into another life. Murrays style throws the reader into his world - one emerges from this story stirred not shaken. More please, Mr Murray.

I approached this book as somewhat of a requirement since the author is a close personal freind. I was hoping that Nick would do himself credit as he is a person of extreme wit. He has the ability to mesmerize those who listen to his truly outrageous stories. I was not at all dissapointed by his first book. Skimmin Stones is a multilayered book that at times shocks, saddens, envigorates and definately entertains. My only regret that Nick only covered only 3 days of his childhood. Knowing that these events really happened I only wish we could here more. Perhaps we could at some point revisit the lives of these three intresting boys. I wish the author the best of luck on his next project.

What is "Blues" ? Albert Murray says the Blues are those evil entities that attack our spirit, threatening to depress it. Blues music is the reaction - the means of which the blues is driven away. Actually it is the means African Americans have used to drive away the blues. There is no essential difference between Robert Johnson, Charly Patton, Louis Armstrong, Jelly Roll Morton, Count Basie or Charlie Parker - the all play the blues. Only their stylistic approach differs.
This book talks about the different ways the blues were being stomped - driven away. Murray objects to the "purists" who limit their definition of blues to those played by rural - unsophisticated musicians (such as Blind lemon Jefferson or Leadbelly). While Murray acknowledges their value, his personal taste leans much more to the Louis Armstrong - Charlie Parker lineage. He concentrates on Armstrong, Bessie Smith, Morton, Young, Ellington, Basie and Parker.
Murray seldom uses the word "Jazz" when relating to the music or the musicians. For him they are all "blues drivers", who provide their public with a stomping ritual that is totally functional. Their innovations are a result of the attempt to fulfill their role, to swing harder, and not necessarilly a result of a personal desire, detached from their public role.
Murray differs from most writers who have written on the subject. He comments on the mainstream critics - criticizing their glorification and condescending tendencies. He does not emphasize the inner divisions among the African Americans, as does Amiri Baraka in "Blues People".
This is a remarkable book, recommanded to all "Blues and Jazz" lovers.

do you ever get the feeling, when reading about jazz, that the writer is missing the point, or defending the music on terms inappropriate to it? albert murray never makes that mistake. what he describes is what you hear and see -- at least it was for me. for him, the blues is a great folk music, and jazz is what more sophisticated artists do with the blues -- an extension and elaboration of the blues that,at its best,brings together myth, storytelling, rhythm and improvisational grace.

he treats jazz as a classic art form, but an art form whose terms aren't the same as, say, european classical music's, or pop's. and he does a great job of spelling out what jazz's elements are. if you respond to his writing, you're likely to find the whole art form of jazz opening up before you, even if you dug it before.

bizarrely, albert murray is sometimes accused of having a "racial agenda" -- see other comments here. i don't understand why. i find his vision of race the most generous and noble i've ever run across, avoiding both antagonism and romanticism. (try his great collection of essays "the omni-americans," and see if it doesn't remind you of whitman in its breadth, humor and beauty.) in his vision, america is and always has been multiracial. that's its glory and strength, not its weakness. you'd be crazy not to dig duke ellington, and crazy not to dig thomas eakins. he's a great teacher, and can get you excited about art, performance, and ideas in the way only the great critics can -- pauline kael, for instance, or kenneth tynan, or matthew arnold.

the title "stomping the blues" refers to murray's contention that the blues -- and that african-american music generally -- isn't simply about moaning low or expressing your despair. it's about being honest about "what a low-down, dirty shame" life is -- and then setting that fact to a beat, moving to that beat, and shaking the blues off, if only for a while. that's the heroism of the blues and of jazz -- they aren't about giving in to the blues, they're about "stomping the blues." charlie parker? it's "dance music for the mind."

fyi, murray was a good friend of ralph ellison's, and fans of "invisible man" and of ellison's essays are almost certain to enjoy murray too. murray is often, and accurately, referred to as the intellectual godfather of the recent neotraditional movement in jazz. he has had a tremendous influence on stanley crouch and wynton marsalis, and his ideas are behind the founding of lincoln center's jazz program.

Albert Murray is the ultimate insider as far as jazz goes, and his knowledgeable observations here prove it. I sometimes wonder about his racial agenda, though.

... everyone eventually enjoys their 15 minutes of fame -- or infamy, in the case of football star (but not hero) Dash Carter, one of the main characters in Dennis Murray's "Sudden Death." As a former sportswriter, Murray gives an incisive account of how the appalling behavior of pro athletes and their "entourages" force those who depend on their performance on the field -- from owners to coaches to the guys and gals in the ticket office -- to sort through agonizing conflicts of interest. And his ending, while shocking, is actually all-too-predictable (in a good way) if you have any knowledge of European and South American sports.

While the details and flavor of the sports element of the book were excellent, DM has that dead on, what kept me glued to the book (it's very hard to put down) was the way he developed the different story lines and continually kept you on edge with where they were going. Very enjoyable.

Additionally, the plot elements weren't the same as most works that have a sports theme - which tend to be extremely predictable. DM continually surprised you and kept you guessing what was going to happen next.

One of the other reviewers questioned the ending. My first reaction was simply "wow", but then as I thought about it, the ending really fit - don't cheat and skip to the end, you'll kick yourself. The buildup makes the end even better.

I also agree with the other reviews on DM's character development, they were believable (which is so refreshing) and interesting - everyone seems to have their own "hero" after reading the book - the one character they were either rooting for or most interested in following.

A great read.

This book can only be found here, that fact alone shocks me!

My wife gave this book to me for Christmas. She stumbled accross it while searching for Lupica's new football book. Being a big sports fiction reader I was a little annoyed that my wife handed me something that; a-I never heard of the book and b-I've never heard of the author. I mean, I'm the expert! She makes her football picks based on who has the prettiest uniform(that technique, by the way, has made her some nice pocket change ;-)).

Well Mr. Murray is an extremely enjoyable read. His characters act like real people, all of them; the fans, the front office personal and of course, the athletes. The landscape, also, is well developed and the pace of the book flies at you. I was going to give it 4 stars because I wasn't sure how believable the ending was. But, that made me think about how very believable and enjoyable the book actually was. And after what has happened over the last couple of years: The ending may still be a little out there for some, others, like myself see it more as a something that will eventually happen.

Grab it and devour it!

I've been searching for a long time for a book that recaps all of the recipes that I grew up on and never thought to write them all down. It's like being at my grandmother's house all over again.

I AM CHILEAN, AND FOR YEARS MY MOTHER HAS BEEN FOLLOWING RECEIPES PASTED DOWN FROM MY GRANDMOTHER,THRU THIS VERY OLD COOKBOOK, THATS FALLING APART.I'M VERY EXCITED TO GIVE THIS TO HER AS A GIFT, AND FOR ME AS WELL..SINCE THE OLD COOKBOOK IS IN SPANISH AND WAS A LITTLE HARD FOR ME TO FOLLOW ALONG. THANKS AGAIN!

Im very happy that there is an american published book about chilean food Viva Chile!!! I got in to this page ,cause i was looking for dulce de leche info.Im chilean and live in Manhattan .I cant find it and i would love to know if anyone knows how to get the real thing, not the condensed milk one, the one like my grandmother would do, stirring milk and sugar for a long time.Im happy that more people beyond the Andes is going to be able to enjoy the delectibles from my country through this book.Thanks to the autor and please reply

This book is highly recommended. It has some great advise on how to get customers when business is slow. It gives very creative ideas that you can incorporate into your own business and make yourself stand out from your competitors.

This book has it all for the small all the way up to the biggest of companies. This book tells you how to take a person who is just a possible customer, and make that person not just a customer but someone who will sing the praises of your business, and according to the authors, that is what will make your business a big success. Lots of great stories of companies that put their (the authors) model into effect. If only all companies would buy and read this book and then put to practice it's advice. If you are like so many business owners today that STILL don't know that the customer is the key, please read this book and drink of it's wisdom. You and the rest of America and the world will be a better and friendlier place!

More and more businesses now realize that is far easier to keep your existing customers than to find new ones. This book shows you how to use different types of media including direct mail, newspaper, television and radio to attract new customers to your business. This book should be read by every business owner!

Few Christians today even grasp the concept of waiting: the true meaning of the aspects of the word. This book clearly delinates the concept of why we wait, what we wait for, what it means to wait, and the blessing of waiting. You absolutely have to read it.

In 1991 I read this book and was so impressed that I sought permission from the publisher to use it as a text book in our night school. EVERYONE who has taken this course has commented on the spiritual impact it has made in their lives. Mr. Murray, along with a number of other men of that age, may not have been "giants" in doctrinal materials, but they were way ahead of many today in their spiritual devotion to God and His Word. I HIGHLY recommend that every saint read and reread this book. One of the saints of the past said, every good book ought to be read over many times.

Andrew Murray is the master of devotional literature. In his devotional books he usually breaks a subject down into a month of daily lessons which require approximately 20-30 minutes of prayerful reading.

One of the most difficult lessons of the Christian life is how to patiently wait on God. In 1993 I devoted 30 minutes a day for one month to studying this book. This altered my life. Since then waiting on God has been one of the greatest joys in my life! It doesn't get any better than this!

Thank you, Andrew Murray and thank you, Jesus.