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Book reviews for "Hein,_Leonard_William" sorted by average review score:

Garth Williams Treasury of Best-Loved Golden Books
Published in Hardcover by Golden Books Pub Co Inc (2001)
Authors: Garth Williams, Leonard S. Marcus, and Margaret Wise Brown
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This stunning book rights old wrongs!
Garth Williams is a genius illustrator of the very best in children's books. You simply can't do better.

...But you can do worse. If you only know the GB editions of GW's books from the *1970's*, you'll be in for a wonderful shock from this book.

The image quality is 3X as good! So bright, sharp, distinctive and subtle in coloring. These are basically fine art plates. Lucky us! Part of it is probably due to the very high quality paper, but most of it has to be due to the LOVE OF THE ART on behalf of those who published this tribute Treasury.

But there's more. (And this is where it gets a bit nasty.) For some reason, in the *1970's* GB editions of these books, the publisher often DELETED PAGES! Several of the books featured in their ENTIRETY here have many pages that never appeared in the 1970's editions. And many of these pages feature the VERY BEST ART! It was so wonderful to finally find them here. ...Dismaying as well. What a crime! I can only imagine that the publisher was trying to save paper costs: they always killed pages in groups of 4. Can you imagine the low, venal insult to art and children in doing such a thing? Here's a real example of an artist pouring his heart out, but being thwarted by chiselers. Well, maybe there's another explanation: I hope so for the sakes of GB.

Thank heavens, wrongs are gloriously righted in this gorgeous new volume.

I daresay you will cherish it as one of your most favorite story books, if not your #1. Thanks!

Excellent book
"A Garth Williams Treasury of Best-Loved Books" is a must have, right up there with "The Golden Books Treasury of Elves and Fairies". Williams is one of the best children's illustrators. His drawings have such magic that anyone who sees them can remember them well after childhood is long gone, and leaves them with a hunger to see them again. This book is pleasingly large, appx. 12" x 10.5" and the drawings are nice and big. The stories featured in the collection are: A Tale of Tails; Baby Farm Animals; Three Bedtime Stories: The Three Little Kittens, The Three Little Pigs, The Three Bears; Animal Friends; The Golden Sleepy Book featuring: The Whispering Rabbit, Close Your Eyes, Going to Sleep; The Friendly Book; Home for a Bunny; The Sailor Dog; The Kitten Who Thought He Was a Mouse; and Mister Dog. The book is 149 pages long.


Inches
Published in Paperback by Warner Books (1995)
Author: William Leonard Marshall
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A bank, a bum, and a baseball bat
This is William Marshall at the top of his form, writing once again about the police officers of Yellowthread Street in British Hong Kong. Chief Inspector Pfeiffer, Inspector O'Yee, and Auden and Spencer are challenged this time by a locked room mystery, a mysterious assignment for O'Yee "from Headquarters", and by a congenial set of brothers who are into fantasy fulfillment as psychotherapy. Marshall skilfully weaves the three stories together; all 3 denouements are superbly done.
I can regularly be seen on the D.C. Metro, when reading a Marshall book, with my eyebrows way up my forehead, as Marshall either turns the tension up yet another notch, or describes some of the most bizarre scenes in crime fiction. This time, my facial muscles hurt from the scene with Spencer and the seagulls. Not to be missed!
Marshall is one part Ed McBain's 87th Street police procedurals, one part Janwillem van de Wetering's Gripstra/De Gijr existential police procedures in Holland and elsewhere, and one part Frederick Forsyth, in terms of the suspense involved. With ingredients like that, how can you miss?

Terrific Off-Beat Humor and Whodunnit
If you have not read any of Marshall's Hong Kong Police stories you have missed a real treat. Hard to find, but worth the effort. Makes you want to put Hong Kong back in the hand of the Brits today just to ensure the continuation of these characters. Wow!


Leadership: A Treasury of Great Quotations for Those Who Aspire to Lead
Published in Hardcover by Galahad Books (2000)
Authors: William Safire and Leonard Safir
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This is a treasure!
One of the aspects of a good leader is the ability to articulate powerful ideas through powerful words. As a college speech instructor, I am always looking for books which collect memorable and inspirational quotations --- and this book does just that. I was impressed with the emphasis on contemporary leaders and the fact that this book is not a just a re-hash of the quotations we all have from other books. It is easy to read and truly a bargain!

A Great Bathroom Reader
I enjoyed this book, but then I also enjoy great quotes. This is a perfect companion when you just have a few minutes to read. You can pick it up, turn to almost any page, and find something of use. I write a couple quotes down and stick them on my computer for the week. I find I often remember them long after they have been in the trash.


Original Intent and the Framers' Constitution
Published in Paperback by Ivan R. Dee, Publisher (01 September, 2000)
Authors: Leonard Levy and Leonard Williams Levy
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Lays waste to the jurisprudence of "original intent"
Without a doubt, Leonard William Levy has produced the finest argument against the doctrine of original intent that I have ever read. As a liberal working in Washington, DC, I have long been bothered by conservative criticism that our judiciary has been over-run by "judicial activists." In my attempts to understand the issue, I have read many accounts of what is supposedly wrong with the idea of an "evolutionary constitution," and found them interesting and compelling and was beginning to think that I had made a terrible mistke in terms of my political outlook.

Granted, much of that can be accounted for by the fact that the only things I was able to find about "original intent" were written by the likes of Robert Bork and Antonin Scalia, both of whom subscribe to this theory. But then I discovered Levy's book and found that the theories of Bork et al. were not all they were cracked up to be.

Levy is a Pulitizer Prize winning historian who examines the birth of our Consititution in amazing detail, citing the Constitutional Convention, the Federalist Papers, Anti-Federalist pamphlets, state constitutions and ratifying conventions and presents a clear view of the state of our nation even as if was being formed. His insight is so far beyond the pseudo-history offered up by Bork and his ilk that it is almost embarrassing to think that men of such intellects could be so sorrily mistaken. With chapters on the main areas of debate within the Constitution iteself, and others covering the Frist, Fourth, Fifth and Ninth Amendments, Levy gives us a very clear picture of just what has happening at the time the Constitution was being debated and ratified.

The three final chapters are, by far, the most impressive deconstruction of the theory of "original intent" I have ever encountered. In fact, I would recommend that the reading of these final chapters alone offers up more insight and better arguments than anything else ever written.

While at times the reader can get bogged down in details, it is the fact that Levy knows and includes them all that makes this work so extremely valuable. The writing is clear and entertaining and Levy has no problem telling those who subscribe to the doctrine of "original inent" that they have "the historical imagination of a toad."

In all, Levy has crafted a solid, insightful and entertaining book that I can not recommend highly enough.

Recommended for college-level political science students
Debates keep raging and struggles re-surfacing over the original intentions of the Founding Fathers when they drafted the Constitution: this provides an argument by constitutional scholar Levy, who rejects the views of both left and right sides in examining sources of constitutional law and cases supporting original intent. Recommended for college-level political science students.


Phaedrus
Published in Paperback by MacMillan Pub Co (01 January, 1956)
Authors: Plato, W.C. Helmbold, W.G. Rabinowitz, Perry Miller, and Leonard Williams Levy
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Division and Gathering: The Cycle Within the Life
'Phaedrus' is the first work ever to provide an explanation to how we organise our ideas, speeches and use our knowledge in a general sense. It explains the basics of an arguing and convincing, within the context of Greek politics and society.

As I said, it's division and gathering that is evident in all of our arguments. We make our claims based upon the similarities and differences in things, and this is the core of argumentation.

In his dialogue style, Plato talks about many other things, that range from what makes a good writing a good one, to the heritance of knowledge. How should knowledge be attained from others? How should we present our knowledge for new generations to understand us? These are some of the questions that come up in Phaedrus.

Plato, one of the clearest writers in philosophy, wrote yet another beautiful work. I've started reading Plato when I was thirteen, and I really enjoy reading his works, which just flow.

I recommend not only this book, but almost any book of Plato's, for all philosophy lovers out there, and all those that would like to make their first attempt in understanding some philosophical issues, which build the base of our living.

Phaedrus
In Phaedrus, Plato records the conversation of love and rhetoric between Socrates and Phaedrus. Socrates uses love as a metaphor for rhetoric by categorizing the differences between love and lust, as well as the differences between a philosopher who pursues divine truth, and a poet who forgoes truth for ostentations. Then Socrates and Phaedrus eventually conclude the requirements for being a dialectician. In the course of defending proper love and truth, Socrates pointes out that beauty and truth are divine. Whoever pursues reality would worship beauty and truth with reverence, and his admirations of divinities yield pleasures. Then in order to receive the blessing from gods, the proper lover and the philosopher must overcome desires with reasoning. Conversely, those commoners who are tempted by earthy imitations of the reality would be trapped by carnal or linguistic pleasures, as the improper lover and the poet, who lack reasoning would drown in the momentary enjoyments of their own wantonness.


Principles and Practice of Endocrinology and Metabolism
Published in Hardcover by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins Publishers (15 April, 2001)
Authors: Kenneth L. Becker, John P. Bilezikian, William J. Bremner, Wellington Hung, C. Ronald Kahn, D. Lynn Loriaux, Eric S. Nylen, Robert W. Rebar, Gary L. Robertson, and Richard H., Jr Snider
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Becker's Endo
Quite good in reviewing the basic pathophysiology of endocrine disorders.
This book is becoming the standard for fellows in endocrinology.

Concise Endocrinology Textbook
This textbook is very user friendly. I prefer this text over the William's textbook of Endocrinology. Very well organized with many good illustrations and tables. Has appendix of endocrine testing as well as common drugs used in endocrinology. Highly reccomended.


Sci-Fi: A Yellowthread Street Mystery (Rinehart Suspense Novel)
Published in Hardcover by Henry Holt & Company, Inc. (1981)
Author: William Leonard Marshall
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A Hong Kong Mardi Gras
This is another superlative police procedural mystery, set in the fictional Hong Bay section of Hong Kong, starring those inimitable Hong Kong police officers, Harry Fieffer (the boss), Christoper O'Yee (Amerasian), and Detectives Auden and Spencer, playing once again their combination of Marx Brothers and NYC's finest. Anyway, in this outing, the boys are challenged by the arrival of a science-fiction convention, with the usual fans dressed up as their favorite aliens, parades, and general mayhem. O'Yee is hunting for...well, we won't spoil it...something REALLY hard to find, while Audena and Spencer are looking for a mugger in a multi-story parking garage. Feiffer is looking for the fiend who is incinerating citizens for no apparent reason.
Marshall once again combines the zany with the suspenseful, and once again my eyebrows are sore from raising them at all the hair-raising (pun intended) hold-your-breath scenes. If you're looking for a great police procedural series, and one that doesn't take itself too seriously, you are in the right place in Hong Bay with Marhall's band of loonies. Long may they reign!

This book should NOT be out of print
Oh man, this is the funniest book in the whole series. Yes, it's part of a series, and the whole series is funny. It takes place in "Hong Bay" precinct in Hong Kong, pre-Chinese-takeover. (The introduction to each book in the series points out that the Chinese could have taken over Hong Kong years ago just by turning off the water tap.) Let's mention here, in case it is not obvious, that nothing in this book actually IS science fiction; it's murder mystery/police procedural.

The characters in the Hong Bay precinct station are a mixed lot of mostly Europeans and Asian-Europeans, or European-Asians, the inhabitants of the precinct are a complete cross section of would-be capitalist Chinese. There is a little bit of stereotyping, with the wily Chinese frequently outwitting the Europeans. Everyone, cop and civilian alike, is just a tad greedy and eager to get ahead or to get something someone else has.

In this particular book, an all-Asia science fiction convention is taking place. Like any science fiction convention, there are people who insist on attending in costume, and there are people who indulge a bit too much in recreational substances. In the opening chapters, we have a wonderful scene where the police station is trying to figure out where to put yet another costumed arrestee; various cells are already holding The Swarm - all of it - and other familiar sci-fi characters. As the new one is a midget, our lieutenant suggests stuffing him in the fire extinguisher closet, since that's the only space left.

I won't give away too much of the plot; let me just say that in addition to the murders, the side plot involving the little old lady piano player in the hotel is definitely worth following.

For fans of police procedurals, and of any murder mysteries, who have also ever been to any convention in a big hotel with a costume party, this is MUST reading- definitely worth doing an out-of-print search on. We have two copies, ha ha, so I can loan one out to friends without the risk of losing our only copy, because there are scenes I like to re-read when I need a good chuckle. The offbeat world of Hong Bay is reliably funny.


Applied Strategic Planning
Published in Paperback by John Wiley & Sons (1992)
Authors: Timothy M. Nolan, Leonard D. Goodstein, and J. William Pfeiffer
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A sea of knowledge, one centimeter deep
This book widely specifies WHAT to do in strategic planning but it hardly explains HOW to do it. What I expect when reading this kind of topics is not the concept but rather the application procedures and practical techniques for implementing those concepts in an effective and innovative way. In consequence, I found this book repetitive and non productive for planning specialists. However it may serve a lot to beginners and students.

Very good, plus...
This is a very good book. In addition to this, I recommend "Strategic Organizational Change" by Michael Beitler.

Very useful and comprehensive book
I loved the organization of this book. It's like you are the CEO and are really organizing a new business from the scratch. The author uses a structured approach of applying strategic planning that makes a complex subject like this extremely simple to understand.


Origins of the Bill of Rights
Published in Paperback by Yale Univ Pr (01 March, 2001)
Author: Leonard Williams Levy
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Strong Historical Analysis
Where did our constitutional rights come from? Why are they written the way they are? Were they original, or did our Founding Fathers get the ideas elsewhere? These questions and more will be answered in Levy's Origins of the Bill of Rights.

I'll begin with the weaknesses and get them out of the way. I'm not a constitutional historian, nor am I a lawyer. Although I think I'm somewhat knowledgeable, Levy could have introduced his terms better, particularly when he devotes a chapter to them. Habeas Corpus, for instance. The lawyers out there are now laughing at my ignorance, but I had to think and carefully recall exactly what that means. Law is precise, so history of law might consider being equally precise. Also, when citing cases, Levy sometimes left it unclear what the case was about.

References. Somehow, despite almost forty pages of documents in the appendix, Levy manages to not quite every actually list the amendments in their final form, despite reproducing the English Bill of Rights, the Virginia Bill of Rights, and the various House and Senate versions. All right, this is easy information to find, but would it have hurt for the book to be self-contained?

For those who care, the third and tenth amendments are barely mentioned.

Style. I'm transitioning into the good points, since one person's good style is another's bad. The middle of the book heavily emphasizes case histories, both in America and in England. Sometimes this is to the detriment of readability. If you're just reading this book out of curiosity, some philosophical discussion might be nice. If you're looking for names and dates of trials, then this is useful of course. It doesn't completely dry the book out, but it does make it drag a bit, at least for my tastes.

So what's good about it?

What's good is that Levy points out, thoroughly and conscientiously that we have rights. We, the people. Me. You. The neighbor down the street. These rights come from somewhere, and they go back a long way. To those who want to know what the original intents were of the authors of the constitution, this is a place to look. Do you think that the second amendment only arms the National Guard? Wrong! Do you think that the government can give religions all sorts of special treatment as long as it doesn't pick a favorite? Wrong! Do you think that a right doesn't exist unless it is specified exactly, spelled out in intricate detail? Wrong! To liberals who cover their ears when the second amendment is discussed, and conservatives who are in open revolt against many of the others, read this book. Or read another one, but this one is the subject of the review. Frankly, you may be surprised at what they thought back in the olden days.

Wonderful historical reference for the Bill of Rights
Well written and interesting. This book gives a wonderful historical perspective of the laws, practices, and history that led up to the framing of the Bill of Rights. With careful study, Levy has built a window into the politics, thoughts, and fears that led to the inclusion of the BOR and includes many examples of the reasons that they were included. Well written and entertaining, this lesson in American history reads like series of short stories.

Origins of the Bill of Rights
The upset with politicians today is nothing new. "Origins.." puts a human history face on the Bill of Rights. Amazing that our country has retained the original hopes of our founders. Levy is excellent in his description and inspiration.


Exodus: The Egyptian Evidence
Published in Hardcover by Eisenbrauns (1997)
Authors: Ernest S. Frerichs, Leonard H. Lesko, William G. Dever, and Brown University
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A Multi-scholar review with controlling biases
This collection of 5 papers was compiled from a conference considering if Egyptian evidence for the biblical exodus exists. Immediately in the intro it is stated "the traditional approach has given large weight to the assertions of the biblical narrative even when it provided acknowledged ambiguities and even seeming contradictions". Unfortunately no examples are given. While there is no doubt truth in the statement that "those who continue to affirm the historicity of the Exodus will lean heavily on a presumed positive relation between the artifact/graphic Egyptian evidence and the bible text," it likewise true that a predisposed attitude that the exodus story can never be anything more than folktale or myth, despite any evidence which may lend to the contrary, will also never allow arrival at what is reality. An example is found in statements such as "the Egyptian material may serve as analogy to the biblical account and in part even as indirect proof" or "we do possess several significant indirect sources, a sort of circumstantial evidence that lends greater authority to the biblical account" and such evidence is amply reviewed, yet the papers usually conclude with such statements as "there is not a word in a text or an archaeological artifact that lends credence to the biblical narrative. From the Egyptian view, the O.T. narrative records a series of earth shaking episodes that never happened." Such conclusions stand in stark contradiction to other statements made in the papers such as why a biblical editor would mention the city of Ramesses when it no longer existed and had not for centuries if the exodus was entirely a folktale fabricated in a post-exilic period. Thus as I read it, all the reviews, although some more than others, reflected a bias against the bible account being supported in any way by the Egyptian evidence as even possibly being a historic event in their conclusions despite statements in their context to the contrary.

A Balanced Account of Exodus Evidence
This is an excellent book. A number of scholars discuss the evidence (archaeological and historical) for the exodus. There is little or nothing in the direct records for this event, but that is not surprising. The ancient Egyptians did not record their defeats, and the exodus would have represented a setback.

The evidence is indirect, for example, mention in the Bible of the names of two towns (Ramses and Pithom) that actually existed, or the inscription on the "Israel stela" which mentions the Israelites without adding the symbol for a settlement, which is added to the names of the peoples conquered by Pharaoh Merneptah (successor to Ramses II), suggesting that the Israelites at that time were a (wandering) people, not a place.

However, it is impossible that the Israelites numbered 600,000 men (not counting families), which is the Biblical figure. The total population of Egypt at that time was unlikely to have exceeded 2-3 million. Probably the tale of the exodus lost nothing in the (re)telling, and if it did occur, in the sense of the Israelites being freed to leave Egypt, it involved a very, very much smaller number of persons. This would square with its not being remarked upon in Egyptian records or in the documents of other kingdoms in the region.

Pros and Cons for an Exodus
The book consists of a number of papers read by professional scholars at a symposium to discuss what evidence exists for an Exodus from an Egyptian perspective. Some scholars are Bible Scholars, others are Egyptologists. All are well versed in the various arguments for and against the Exodus. Some thought the Exodus did occur, others not, each presented their arguments in support of their views. It was helpful to see how each interpreted the Egyptian data, e.g., ancient annals or records and archaeological data in support of, or in denial of, an Exodus. The reader is left to decide for himself, the merits of the Pros and Cons brought out in the papers. Those desiring to pursue in greater depth the "pros" and "cons" for the Exodus are invited to visit my website,...and navigating to the OT menu, peruse my articles on the Exodus utilizing archaeological evidence assembled by scholars like Israel Finkelstein and Burton MacDonald, who are published on the subject.


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