This book is concise and informative, with an overview of basic facts about the Hope Diamond, it's history and owners. Anyone with an unreasonable fear of the Hope Diamond will be particularly interested in the fact that Cartier manufactured the "curse" to sell the diamond based on a novel, "The Moonstone." "Blue Mystery" is an excellent precursor to "Queen of Diamonds", a fascinating autobiography of Evalyn Walsh McLean, the last private owner of the Hope Diamond.

The book intresed me in many ways! Just think all of the owners and some family members died in a horrible way. I've always had a special intrest in mysteries like this one. And probaly like others I want to get a chance to see it. Now that I've read the book I'm to scared!

I bought this book to help me learn more about the amazona genus that I was considering as a pet. But what I found was a book written before 1992 which was around the time importation was banned and hand raising and breeding birds within the United States had became more common. This resulted in very little information about todays common amazons. Also, this book described all the the precautions one must take to ensure the saftey of your wild caught bird, precautions that are now just plain useless! Though if what you are looking for is a picture book about amazons, this is almost a good book for you.

As a new Amazon owner I was looking for a species-specific book that would give me detailed information about my blue-front. Unfortunately this book seemed superficial, simplistic, and somewhat out-dated (with some information actually contrary to what is widely recommended now). It has some wonderful pictures, and fragments of useful species information, but overall I think there are better general care books available (certainly more detailed), and this book's Amazon-specific information was sketchy.

After purchasing just about every Amazon Parrot book out there and being disappointed, I found this one. Instead of pretty photos and general narrative fluff, this book has good solid information for anyone interested in the species. Thank you.

To begin with, academically speaking, I totally agree with the lengthy review from Alberta, Canada. Anyone wanting to read this book should first read and digest that review. It's hard for most academics to write across disciplinary lines, and a lone historian just isn't qualified to tackle a subject that encompasses sociology, gender studies, gay studies, queer theory, cultural anthropology, psychology, et al. At least in my humble opinion...

What I'd like to comment on isn't the validity of Hitler's homo or hetero-sexuality. The idea that Hitler might have been homosexual or bisexual is not new, and while nothing in this book convinces me, I don't dispute the possibility that Hitler was homosexual, certainly not for fear of what it "says" about gay folks today. (With the heterosexuality of such monsters as Stalin, Idi Amin, Pol Pot, Pinochet, Hussein, and bin Laden well documented, anyone who equates evil with gayness based on this book needs to go back to the third grade and retrieve their critical thinking skills.)

The issue I would like to raise is this -- simply, "the gaze." Did the author of this book consider the environment he released this book into? Did he stop to think about the audience, and how his words might be perceived, interpreted, and used? Some would say it isn't the job of a historian to be concerned about such matters. Just tell the story and let the chips fall where they may. So why doesn't he tell the whole story?

One can read "Hidden Hitler" cover to cover and gain virtually no understanding of the Nazi persecution of homosexuals, nor any understanding of homophobia in Nazi/Germanic culture. Without this context, the book comes across at times as superficial and sensationalistic. And sometimes I just had to wonder if these glaring omissions didn't indicate the presence of a hidden agenda operating somewhere in the author's mind.

Admittedly some aspects of Machtan's thesis are tentative and in need of verification. But it's a subject that hitherto has received little treatment and that only in a sensationalistic manner. Machtan brings to his study a serious and dispassionate tone. The homosexual aspect of Nazism, especially in the Stormtroops, is well known, but little else has been said of it in regards to the party as a whole. Having read about Hitler and Nazism for two decades I can say that Machtan's study fills in a lot of gaps. The Roehm putsch and Night of the Long Knives makes much more sense. Liberals will not be happy with the fact that Machtan reveals that the Nazis did not target homosexuals per se (as many high ranking party members were homosexual so long as they were discrete). Rather the Nazi's anti-homosexual campaign was a hypocritical excuse to further clamp down on political opponents rather than combat immorality. Even if Machtan's argument for Hitler's homosexuality is not absolutely conclusive (he was certainly dysfunctional and a misogynist ), there can be little doubt that the future German fuehrer came from a bohemian background, and that ideologically the Nazis grew out of the pro-homosexual Wandervogel movement which emulated the Spartan ideal in more ways than one. Many of Hitler's close friends and mentors were undoubtedly homosexual. It is a very readable and thought-provoking study.

With the literally thousands of books and articles about Hitler that have appeared over the last half century, it is nothing short of remarkable that no one has ever thought to examine the wealth of documentary evidence suggesting that Hitler was homosexual, or to analyze the impact his sexuality may have had on some of his actions. Machtan's well-researched book should open a whole arena in the Hitler studies.
Obviously this book has upset many. It's thesis seems particularly offensive to many gay people, afraid that the revelation of Hitler's possible homosexuality will lead to a simple equation that Hitler was evil because he was gay.
But Machtan is careful not only to avoid such simplistic reductionism, but to point out instead the immense damage Hitler did to gay people in Germany in his apparent attempts to cover up his history of homosexuality and destroy those who knew about it. As a result, Machtan throws a whole new light on the homophobia of the Nazis, the destruction of the SA, the persecution of Magnus Hirschfeld and the roundup of gay Germans.
This book is a bit dry at times, and loaded with footnotes. But that's no vice in a work of such a potentially sensational nature. Machten avoids prurient sensationalism and outrageous or unsubstantiated claims, preferring to quietly focus on the conclusions that can be culled from the admittedly murky sources.
All told, a major contribution, well researched and thoughtfully rendered.

The Bride of the Wind, while scrupulously researched, fails to bring its subject to life. Alma Mahler must have been possessed of much charisma and fire to attract the geniuses that she did, but Keegan's dry account of Alma's self-absorption and reputed beauty left me wondering what she had missed, since the portrait does not accord with the events of the subject's life. (The movie of the same title, by the way, has the same flaw, though it at least paints an atmospheric picture of turn-of-the-century Viennese society, which the book also fails to do.) The book also bogs down with information about Austrian history and classical music that is far too inside-baseball to be interesting to a general reader.

The Bride of the Wind by Susanne Keegan is the perfect biography for anyone wanting to avoid a stale representation of the illustrious Austro-German arts community in late nineteeth-century and early twentieth century. Written by a woman about a woman, this account contains insights and even some facts that a male biographer would have left out, yet these are the very facts which bring out the qualities of an historical figure which can affect his or her resurrection to the modern world.
Most interesting for anyone intrigued in the enigmatic character of Gustav Mahler are the accounts of Alma's 12 years with him. Keegan sheds light on a side of Mahler most biographers gloss over for fear of blurring the importance of his music. However, one might find that after reading about Mahler from Alma's point of view (and with the help of Keegan's many intuitive insights), that one can dig deeper into the emotional maze that is his music than ever before.
Susanne Keegan has made an accurate and insightful chronicle of a life that affected so many men of importance around her, a life which hitherto has, before this book, been left largely to mere speculation. She has done for Alma what Henri de la Grange has done for Mahler.
Look for the movie based on this book which will hopefully be coming out soon.

The people who made this should be shot! It is JUNK! JUNK! JUNK

I loved this book! The photography is a quirky and eclectic mix of imagery that has absolutely no flow from one image to the next. It's like Mardi Gras on mushrooms: weird, reckless, and a tasteful, funloving disaster.

Lots of people won't get this book - too bad for them.

This is a good book, but the title doesn't indicate that its for grades k-6.

Alex Smith is the new CEO of Haydon-Smith Communications. Before he resumes his new position, he has a few days vacation to enjoy himself. He dresses like a vagabond, unshaved, with long hair and feels carefree just wandering around. He meets Cassidy Romanelli at the City Hall Park and rescues her by pounding on her back when she chokes on her food. Cassidy is scared and turns away because of Alex's appearance. But she comes around a moment later and feels guilty and ashamed of her own behaviour. She approaches Alex and invites him to lunch for helping her. Alex agrees gladly and they have a good time together. They agree to meet for lunch again the next day and then dinner after work. Unfortunately, Cassidy has an urgent project that needs to be done and she has to work overtime the next day. She still goes to see Alex and they agrees to meet for dinner on the coming Monday. What they don't know is Cassidy works in Alex's company as a HR specialist. And they are surprised when meeting face to face in the CEO's office on Monday afternoon.

Alex is a super sexy hunk with self-assurance and confidence. Women always chase him and never choose work over him. His ego is a little hurt when Cassidy has to work overtime and reschedules their dinner. It is also why he finds Cassidy a special woman.

Cassidy has lost faith in men after her divorce seven months ago. Finding out that Alex is her new boss makes her feels deceived and angry. However, Alex's tender sentiments for his staff touches her deeply and lest her see the other side of him.

LOVE AT THE TOP is a simple plotted, light-hearted, romantic story that you could read within one day. A nice tale of "Millionaire Marries Working Girl" and somehow a fairy tale comes true. However, like most short stories, there is not enough room for characters developing. An average read for a contemporary romance.

Quite a nice story, didn't get you too involved that you couldn't put it down, but plesant enough. I read this based on a review that likened it to Easy Connections by Liz Berry - It didn't have nearly as much depth as Easy Connections and I found it was not a book that drew you into the stroy.

All photographs of this book have a tendency to the high key and looks a little flat. The models are thiny, Fred Aufray says that the models are ordinary people but they look similary to his professional models, not too pretty of course, I give to this book 3 starts because is cheap and the price is right.

"On Mood Swings: the psychobiology of elation and depression," by Suzanne Schad-Somers, 1990. When reviewing a book about "psychological and medical complications which can ensue when extreme reactions and feelings become physically and emotionally problematic and often warrant active intervention," a specific frame of reference is required: educated, uneducated, or perhaps doctoral elite. Or from an editorial standpoint, when trying to uncomplicated vague statements such as the aforementioned jacket copy description. Instead, why not say, "See your doctor when you go off the deep end." The author did not write this book for the general public; in fact, a reader may not even guess who the book is written for, based on a sometimes confused sentence structure. This book covers ten chapters over 284 pages as such; that is, unnecessarily complicated. On page 187, for example, we read such generalities as, "In a multiple personality the different persona [sic] have different personalities, memories, handwritings, talents, knowledge of foreign languages and right-or left-handedness. Isn't this more than obvious, if not an outright repetition?

The jacket description continues: "...coupling case histories with the latest findings in the field of psychopharmacology and psychobiology..." But on page 191 this assertion is contradicted: "Obviously, none of what has been reported so far is meant to suggest that there is a brave new world of psychotherapy right around the corner where we can simply optimistic new pathways into patients' heads via electrical stimulation or other utopian methods. What? Translation: "We really don't have anything new to report." So why the book? What we really have is an admission of unoriginality. "On Mood Swings" is also highly presumptuous. Further on page 191, we read "'Getting it' is not stress-induced divine revelation." What does that mean, exactly? All we have are annoying statements of the obvious which was not even prefaced, such as one on page 131: "Genetically we are programmed to mate, and most of us, to procreate." Duh! I also looked for "...particular attention to the relative merits of the 'talking cure',..." Okay, if it is meritable, why are there no entries in the index for "talking cure"? The word "elation" is part of the subtitle, and again, there is no index entry. We know what elation means, we want to know what the author is implying. The author lost the art of explaining simply, perhaps out of fear of looking uneducated to her colleagues--clearly not how the public would perceive clear, concise writing. I found many occurrences of the phrase, "In other words..." Why not say it in these "other" words in the first place? Stating simply and oversimplifying are not the same. Our author even admits to not even knowing her conclusion on page 257, or even why she wrote the book: "...the treatment of mood disorders is purely speculative on my part, my admittedly unsystematic survey among colleagues working in these specialties, asking them as to whether or not these speculations are biologically possible or impossible, has not yielded a single definitive answer..." Translation: "After informally checking with my peers, I cannot prove or disprove anything." Really? Then why even bother writing it?

Sorry, author, that's not good enough. The critical mistake of admission by the author not knowing her subject was made, and it comes off the pages as a lack of enthusiasm and specifics. It is even more unacceptable when coming from someone with a Ph.D. At least Dr. Schad-Somers, however, listed her references and I appreciate that--a saving grace. Perhaps when the book came out (1990) it seemed more orignal. This book would shine if it were rewritten and reedited; that is, when the author clearly knows what she wants to say, and also when she DOES have more confidence in her subject. Readers are more savvy than ever, and authors always need to be one step ahead. But because the author TRIED, and also had the only title specifically on mood swings, I can't give her less than three stars. I hope to see a follow-up, either for the same book or the same subject.