Georges Herbert-Germain does a wonderful job finding the equilibrium between Céline's public stage-life and her emotional private-life. The book's chapter pattern of singer to woman to singer shows that there's more to Céline Dion than being a diva and an international pop icon. Despite being followed by the media since she was 12, Céline appears to have remained grounded in the stories of her past, present, and what she plans to do in the future. There's more behind this diva besides Titanic and pipes of platinum.

I have read this book umpteen times now! It was a great gift I recieved 2 Christmases ago. Celine's book enchants me with her story of family values, right from the start. This young woman's career has been what you'd call an "amazing triumph". Celine's author writes of the Dion family's pride for their sibling. The most touching part of the book has to be the 1st. This is where the Dion clan forms. We read about how Celine's mom & dad meet, and how they never fail to support their huge family.

Each section of the book has a bunch of great, moving photos, following Celine down her long road to success. Each photo tells her story in chronological order. It makes me think of a blossoming flower, going from stage to stage.

There is also a story of what Celine has done, in preparation of her "Falling into you" tour. Georges Hebert tells the every stress Celine has felt on given days. I was amazed about how she is so loved in foreign countries. The book has skyrocketed into great success, either in french or english. I am looking forward to buying her latest book. My likes for her are not finished, even though she is on her sabbatical.

Buy the book and read it carefully. It's the type of book you won't put down! Did my review help you?

No word can truly discribe Celine's wonderful voice, dreams and spirit, but I believe this book has managed to do the best it could. Of course, you cannot feel Celine's passion by simply read a book. However, I can ensure you that after reading this book, you must at least start to like this real-life model of human being -- Celine Dion.

There are many papers and review articles about the quantum well intermixing and its applications to photonics. This great book selects the most important articles in this field. It covers the milestone work in the early stage of quantum well intermixing as well as advances in later stages. The editor is a highly respected scientist in this field, he chose the most relevant articles which are useful for both beginners and experts in this field. This books includes articles on materials, physics, and devices aspects of quantum well intermixing for photonics. This is a "must" for anyone who is interested in quantum well intermixing.

This is a very useful and helpful book for a beginner and an expert.

As a beginner I found this book a very useful introductory material. The author made a carefull selection of the most important papers in the field of QWI.

McLuhan's most enduring work and certainly his most accessible. A history of western society from a media perspective. McLuhan concentrates on the larger patterns in history by providing a snapshot of each period with a rich bibliography to fill in the details. A mosaic of the works of other writers arranged to get at more abstract ideas. The book is filled with great understanding and insight, often packaged as gnomic utterances but rarely without substantial scholarly support behind them. He stole from the best and without shame and put ideas together like no one else. Not so much an original thinker (for which we can be grateful given some of his crackpot ideas) but a chemist experimenting with the works of others to great effect. Misunderstood and disliked in his own time, idolized in the present for all the wrong reasons. We will not see his likes again.

One can almost think of "The Gutenberg Galaxy" as the "prequel" to Marshall McLuhan's much better known "Understanding Media," because "Galaxy" does for print techology what "Media" does for electronic technology. Basically McLuhan assesses how European civilization went from an ear-touch (listening) oriented mode of receving information to an eye-oriented (that is, reading) mode of receiving information. Recalling that for McLuhan, the medium IS the message, so the invention and dissemination of printing-press technology and the sharp rise in literacy it occasioned therefore brought about a major seismic shift in Western thought and all that goes with it--language, mores, dress, politics, etc.

Another way of looking at this is to say that in McLuhan's view, history is not determined by politics or economics or weather or science per se so much as by our media--the "extensions of man." This book is a must-read followup to anyone who liked "Understanding Media"; it's also a great book to cut one's teeth on before reading "Understanding Media" because it's a more traditional (i.e., formal and linear) type of academic work. And undeniably brilliant. For what it's worth, I was a communications major at the University of Virginia in the mid-1970s when reading McLuhan's work was rougher than it is now; many of his concepts like "global village" have since filtered thru society. But I read all of McLuhan's media-oriented writings, wrote term papers on him, and feel as though I benefited as a result--he's the main reason I'm a writer today.

Allen; charless@ync.net

The Gutenberg Galaxy is an intriguing account of the drastic alterations and implications or the transiton from the audile-tactile culture to the visual stressed culture of the print epoch. The printed word allowed for individuals to egress their present oral culture and advance to a realm of elvated messages and meaning.

There are few authors I feel everyone should read but no matter who you are Herbert Huncke should be read. He is one of the best storytellers/writers I have had the privilege of reading. His stories of sex, streets, drugs, life and friends bring a humanity to what may be considered by many obscure, degenerate, or just plain disgusting, but Huncke's stories I believe are non of these. They are filled with love, beauty, pain and always truth. He takes the reader into a world they don't always want to enter but when the story is finished we are glad we made the journey and had someone like Huncke by our side as a companion.

Herbert Huncke was the true beat. As WS Burroughs wrote, in The Herbert Huncke Reader, "Huncke had adventures and misadventures that were not available to middle-class, comparatively wealthy college people like...me....Huncke had extraordinary experiences that were quite genuine." The sad true is that Huncke was the type that Burroughs wrote about, but didn't like much. He was real. Burroughs was living on trust-fund money for decades (remember that the $200 a month WSB received from family in the 1950s was equal to thousands of dollars a month now-not a bad way to live). Huncke lived the life that others wrote about, but never live. While Burroughs ate steak and drank fine booze, Huncke was still wandering around Times Square. Read the original beat. He makes the other 'beat' writers seem like the middle-class dilatants that many of them were. Huncke never fought for the fame, the fortune, and the boys. He was just a "junkie on the prow." This book is truly hip.

Previously known for using the word "beat" to the fullest, thus inspiring Kerouac for an appropriation of a very hip literary movement, there was more to Huncke than just a "jive" talker. As we know, Huncke was a full time junky (what a rhyme!) who had more of an affect on Burroughs than any other beat writer. Likewise, Huncke spent most of his life helping out on the Burroughs' cannabis farm and taking care of Bill's wife Joan who harnessed a difficult benny habit. In Huncke's early years, growing up in Massachusetts and NYC, he used to entertain the boys at local cafeterias with his succinct yet street jargon-fulled stories; clearly he had a talent for story telling. This story-telling is pretty much what makes up the Herbert Huncke Reader. Starting with Huncke's journal, Herbert gets his feet wet with short-story writing, particularly focusing on introspective work-outs and clever anecdotes. Then the books moves to The Evening Sun Turned Crimson, another introspective composition altho mainly concentrating on structural pieces depicting street life, hanging with the beats, and drugs. Next to Reader introduces Guilty of Everything, a comprehensive series of interviews plus outtakes from other journals. Finally the book closes with Previously Uncollected Material, the chapter says it all. Sometimes moving other times raw and scatological, Huncke writes with a unique style that is easy to comprehend and is inspiring. Although not as transcendent as his contempoaries (Burroughs, Ginsberg, Corso), Huncke's writing should not overlooked as "writings of a drug addict," or "a subordinate Beatnik." Huncke did have talent (most notably with recitations) and has definitely worked to the fullest by publishing what he could, despite his painful heroin addiction and ostracization. In my opinion he's a second Neal Cassady (more of a inspiring icon) and definitely had a major affect on the foremost Beat's writings despite his own sparse collection; that's why I think this Reader is important.

I love this story but my son is only 16 months and it doesn't hold his attention as well as some of the other books we bought ("I'm a Big Brother," "The New Baby") to prepare him for becoming a big brother. The story is just beautiful and it reads very well; he's just not interested in it. I think if he was a little older, he might like it better.

This book tells the story of a little boy who, while curled on his Mother's lap, wants to bring all sorts of other objects up with him... until the baby wants to be included. Of course, there's "always room on Mother's lap" which the little boy finds is not only true but a pleasant experience for him as well.

I love the restful illustrations and the ethnic items the young boy wants to have with him on mom's lap. The overall story is one of sweet acceptance and a perfect read for a young older sibling.

This adorable book tells the simple story of a little boy who not only wants to be on Mother's lap (but not little brother!), he wants to pile all his favorite things on her, too. It happens to be set in an Alaskan village, and some items in the room are of interest for those children learning about Alaska. The Mother in the book is very patient and wise, and lets her boy know that "There's always room on Mother's lap." A very sweet and loving book.

This was a clever book starring bureaucrats whose job is to intentionally derail governmental productivity and a sweet giant supernova named Caliban who just needs a little love. Together they must stop a wealthy & aristocratic S/M Mistress from destroying interstellar transportation. Reading this book will cause you to giggle like a madwoman.

I find the book so deep that only after the 5th reading I understood Herbert was trying to conjure a new way to look onto the creation of our universe from a VERY uncustom perspective. OK, so I read it 5 times, and I'm venturing into my 6th now. Willing to sell me your herbert collection, don;t hesitate to contact. :)

One of the best short stories I have read, Whipping Star is most memorable for Fanny-May, an extra-dimentional Caleban whose death will mean the end of life. I definitely recomend it for any lover of fiction

"The year of the hare", by finnish writer Arto Paasilinna, is a finger-licking good book, period! It's about a journalist who unintentionally runs over a young hare while being on an assignment. He gets out of the car to help the wounded animal, venturing into the surrounding forest and... well, doesn't come back. While attending the animal something happens in his mind and he suddenly realizes that he can't cope anymore with his life, his wife, the rhythms of modern society, his boss and everything. He therefore forswears everything in favour of a new life, with the hare as his sole companion through the small adventures he's about to experience. From a certain point of view he becomes a revolutionary because he proves that one can live happily outside society, in fact happier than ever before...
I don't necessairly share his point of view but the tale is so imbued with happy feelings and lightness that one can's help but feel touched! As for the writing, Arto Paasilinna's is extremely minimalistic, without many frills and that adds to the impression that what you're reading is in fact a modern fable :-)

The worst sides of the western society have been revealed. And, what makes it even more ovbious: almost 20 years before the stressful and hypercommercial way of life really took off! The Year Of The Hare is a story about escape. It is allso a very truthful description of Finland, and it's people. Being one of the politically most "incorrect" books, it plays around with the posibility of revolution, wich made it forbidden in some socialist countries ( as far as I know...). Ther it is, the western way of life, summed up, pretty completely.

This book is so hilarious and I recomend this book to everybody, who wants to have a good laughs and likes good literature

Herb Gravitz' book on OCD, New Help for the Family is a wonderful contribution to the mental health field. His writing and perspective lend compassion, clarity and understanding for all people involved in this anxiety disorder. Diagnosed, 6 months after starting a serious relationship, my Significant Other and I were able to glean new understanding and boundary setting with Dr. Gravitz help. I would like to see more medical professionals encouraging family members to read this book and get the assistance and recovery they need. I would recommend this book highly (and do!) to anyone who loves someone with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.

Following up on his previous successes with nationallly well-regarded books on children of alcoholics and survivors of trauma, my California psychologist colleague has written a meaningful and from the heart book on a pervasive disorder and its impact on family and dear ones. He writes very well and knowledgeably. I have recommended it to my patients, and they have found it most helpful.

Garvitz writes from both the heart and the head. If you care for OCD and its impact on the family, you must (underline that) read this book.

I thought the war of the worlds was an ok book the thing's i didnt like about it was that in alot of parts in the book it dragged on and on like they just kept on running and running from the martians from mar's.Thing's i enjoyed about the book were it was cool about them breathing fire on the people at where the cylinder first fell.I also liked the times when the martians started destroying everything but it dragged on alot.
Ialso enjoyed when the army came and tried to shoot down the martians but nothing happend.

I am an Old Time Radio fanatic. I love War or the Worlds and this book is the definte history of this imfamous radio broadcast. The Mercury Theater on The Air was such a great crew and this book tells a great deal about them.

War of the Worlds enthusiasts continue to love, emulate and draw new stories from this, the original outer-space invasion novel. The story has been filmed twice--once as a television series and once as a 1950's sci-fi epic--but it's been copied and re-told many times in other films, INDEPENDENCE DAY included. What would Hollywood do without this original, one-of-a-kind horror story? This new book has everything, including a CD and excerpts from a recorded discussion between H.G. Wells and Orson Welles, as well as the original 1938 Welles broadcast, and two press conferences with Welles. What's missing is the fascinating story of how and why Wells wrote this story (it's truly a horror tale--our hero has to sit in an abandoned house for days, listening to the Martians eating live humans, for instance), which contains many of the same suspenseful elements you'll find in other classics that will not die--such as FRANKENSTEIN, DRACULA and SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES. When I traveled to England to attend a meeting of the H.G. Wells Society in 1998 (the centenary of War of the Worlds' publication), I was treated to a walking tour of the actual Martian landing site, the sand pits of Woking. Then, we followed the same path that the Martians traversed during their campaign against the world. A small, polished pebble lifted from the sandpits sits before my writing desk, a relic of a fictitious war for which, like the recent attacks on New York, Washington and Pennsylvania, no-one was prepared. Wells was living in a time of unrest, when anarchists (terrorists?) might strike at any time at the powerful and arrogant British Empire, and the portent of war was everywhere. War of the Worlds was a wake-up call! Ray Bradbury's foreword is worth the price of the book. He is truly Wells' successor--a behavioral optimist who in every way is the kind of writer Wells tried to be. Incidentally, Bradbury once told me that he missed his chance to meet H.G. Wells when he lectured in L.A. Bradbury was a high school student and didn't have the price of admission. Besides, he told me, "I was afraid I'd die of a heart attack if I met him!" Wells dominated the first half of the 20th Century, Bradbury the second half. Both were believers in the potential and unrealized greatness of humankind. Both are worth reading. --Jim Reed, author of DAD'S TWEED COAT: SMALL WISDOMS, HIDDEN COMFORTS, UNEXPECTED JOYS

I recently got this book and have read 100 pages so far. It's full of fascinating tales of Karajan. For instance, I did not know he was a devotee of the "rehearsal-free" concert, that he believed in "spontaneous" music-making. I also didn't know he was actually a very shy person who preferred solitude and not the "jet-set" life-style. Also interesting that he sometimes suffered a sort of speech impediment -- stammering. Seems his words couldn't keep up with his mind.

Though I'm eager to finish this book and view it as a terrific addition to my library, I have some qualms with the writer's style. On the cover flap it's said how Mr. Osborne's writing is lauded for its "readability" to both musicians and non-musicians. And being a NON-musician myself I was hoping to see clear, clean English. Yet, Mr. Osborne never fails to use a lot of pretentious lingo such as Latin and French ("annus mirabilis" and "anuus horribilis"?), as well as highfalutan words like "ratiocination" and many others (be sure to have a Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary on hand!). He also uses many arcane musical terms like "re'pe'titeur" yet fails to translate them for the non-musician. Terms like "legato" and "cadenza" -- albeit not as arcane -- also remain untranslated.

Perhaps a truly "readable" book on music is impossible? Given the gigantic ego of so many writers of music?
Still, all in all, this remains a magnificently researched and put together book.

This is probably the ultimate biography of a complex and controversial personality in recent musical history. The book is conventionally structured: it is based on a detailed chronology supported by a rich factual database on Karajan's accomplishments as an orchestra builder and manager, recording artist and film maker. Stretching to more than 700 pages, the rich detail of Osborne's account certainly is one of the main attractions of this book. We learn a tremendous amount about Karajan's working methods, contract negotiations, concert tours, recording schedules, casting policy, press reviews, etc. As the story progresses Osborne branches out in all kinds of directions, gradually weaving more and more threads into the basic narrative. Given the quality of Osborne's prose this never becomes tedious. And it really does learn us something substantial about the breathtaking speed, economy, tenacity and versatility of the Karajanesque genius. There is no doubt that the book as a whole transcends the merely anecdotal. What emerges is a rich, multifaceted, holographic image of a great artist. What is even more impressive about Osborne's book is that it gives us an idea of what constitutes the essence of great conductorship. Instead of being confronted with woolly and simplistic generalizations about a certain 'Factor X' that allows an individual to coax exactly the right sound from a full symphony orchestra, we see the conceptual foundations of this most elusive of disciplines emerge in all its technical, psychological and somatic richness. Therefore, this book is definitely a must-read for any classical music lover, irrespective of personal predilections with respect to the man himself.

This book is the most fascinating description of the stunning life of the mythical Herbert von Karajan. It gave me a more "real" feeling of a person I admired for so long. Richard Osborne's book helped me with the demystification of one of the persons I admire most - artistically speaking - aftera all, he was only human and with many flaws... The book is really a wonderful synthesis of the life of this incredible conductor. Is without doubts the best Karajan biography I ever read. And the little writings of Karajan ("die probe", as an example) are lovely little pieces of history. Wonderful!