The Growing Edge is a magazine designed and published for readers with an interest in gardening, horticulture, and hydroponics. The Best of Growing Edge II: Popular Hydroponics and Gardening for Small-Commercial Growers and Hobbyists is a compilation of the best of the magazine's articles originally published between 1994 and 1999. The various articles are grouped into chapters: Introduction to Hydroponics; The Basic Elements of Hydroponics; Building Your Own System; Plants You Can Grow Hydroponically; Breeding and Propagation; Pest & Disease Control; Greenhouse Management; Organics and Hydroponics; Beyond the Basics; Small Commercial Growers; Hydroponics in Education and Public Service. The Best of Growing Edge II is an essential title for personal, professional, academic, and public library hydroponic gardening and horticultural reference collections.

The Best of Growing EDGE is a collection of the best articles, by twenty four different authors, from the first five years of Growing EDGE magazine. It covers hydroponics, greenhouses, nutrients, lighting, and other new and innovative techniques to use in high tech gardening and horticulture. Since the articles are from the first five years of Growing EDGE magazine, each chapter is a comprehensive compendium of cutting edge horticulture without going over the edge! New and innovative seems to be the keyword here. The mainstream gardening magazines and books cover the tried and true techniques of gardening; The Best of Growing EDGE covers the new and innovative. The information can be used by both hobby home gardeners and large commercial growers. The techinques are the same, it is just the scale of the operation that is different. Gardening is possible year round with the information contained in this book

Of scholars in the field who have published extended studies of Beckett's early prose (Dream of Fair to middling Women, More Pricks Than Kicks, Murphy, and Watt) three stand above the others and are required reading on the subject for scholars. Anthony Farrow's Art and Allusion ... is one. It is hampered by the lack of an index and extraordinarily poor proofreading. Lawrence Harvey's Samuel Beckett: Poet and Critic is another. Published in 1970, it is out of print, a big shame. Harvey's is the only serious study of Beckett's poetry. The style of both Farrow and Harvey is discursive. Rubin Rabinovitz's The Development of Samuel Beckett's Fiction is the third, written in a more concise scholarly style that makes it the most entertaining of the three for the non-specialist. Rabinovitz is likely to be the most useful to the specialist as well, though of course this depends on what you're after. I have not read John Pilling's new book Beckett Before Godot, and there are, as one would expect, numerous article-length studies of the early prose that are required reading for the specialist.

When I saw the page I recognized the cover of the book, but I could not believe what people were actually writing about it.

First I want to say that I am an undergraduate biotechnology student. I have a very strong background in biochemistry, cell biology, molecular biology, tissue culture techniques, and immunology; but I have not had any classes dealing with anatomy or physiology since Bio 101 way back when. I have read and am quite comfortable with Alberts Molecular Biology of the Cell and Stryers Biochemistry, and even a handful of primary journal articles, so I do know how to read a textbook.

Now with that out of the way, let me say that this book is completely incomprehensible. It is so full of anatomy and Latin derived words (which it does a poor job at explaining BTW) that I can only assume that it was meant for medical students, and to have physiology an a prerequisite for it, but it doesn't even have an introduction describing the recommended background or whom it is supposed to be for. In fact, most of the book is devoted to the physiology of sensation and movement, not neurobiology. Now if you have the background for it and thats what you are looking for then it is a very thorough text that goes into a lot of depth.

If you are looking to understand the biochemistry or molecular aspects of neurobiology, find another book!

As an undergraduate Psychobiology student, this text served me well in my Neuroscience course. In all honesty I never went. I just read this book. I got excellent marks in the class. As a serious slacker and bibliophile, I recommend this textbook for any like-minded student.

As an undergraduate Neuroscience major I found this textbook to be highly informative and well-written. It was used to a Freshman-level course, and was easy to understand, yet thorough and interesting. The graphics are well done, and the format is better than most textbooks I'm used to. Anyone, even with minimal science experience could dive right in and learn a great deal. It may not be advanced enough, however, for grad or medical students. As a reference it does okay, but there are more-advanced texts which would probably do better. All-in-all it is an excellent book. In-fact, I liked it so much that I didn't sell it back at the end of the semester and keep it on my bookshelf for future reference (and future classes!)

I am certain that Mark Twain would be highly amused to read your descriptive title of this collection -- "The Unabridged Mark Twain (Abridged)"

Keep 'em guessing, eh?

Samuel Clemens is one of the greatest American writers ever, and this collection contains most of his best work. It is better than volume II of the collection. I am working my way through the book again for the third time in 15 years. It is worth every penny you will pay for it.

I've been reading Mark Twain for thirty years and always enjoy his sharp, acerbic wit and profound observations. The Unabridged Mark Twain is a collection of some of his best stories and essays dealing with life on the Mississippi River, travels, political commentary and general good fiction. I think one of the hallmarks of a good author is that their writings become timeless and issues pertinent then can be found today. Highly recommended reading.

Lipking has written a "writer's life," examining Johnson not from the viewpoint of celebrity, but as a history of his writing, and "career development" as an author. Lipking's thesis is that the transformations Johnson underwent in his career went a long way in shaping what we think of authors, and in that interest spends the bulk of his time examining Johnson's written words. While one may initially think this approach is redundant with Kernan's ("Samuel Johnson and the Impact of Print"), in fact Lipking is far less concerned with the publishing industry and more concerned with Johnson's writings themselves. A more direct comparison might be made to DeMaria's "Samuel Johnson," but even there the comparison is weak. Like Lipking, DeMaria analyzes Johnson's writings, but Lipking is less concerned about context, and concentrates far more on the writings.

Because you wait and wait, and then three don't turn up at once.

I just received this book and haven't read it yet. It looks quite good.

HOWEVER! because I read the description too quickly, and because I was misled by the other reader reviews, I thought that the actual text of the play was here, in both languages, in addition to a critical apparatus. Not so!

All of the other reader reviews are about Beckett's play itself, which is not part of this book!

I discovered 'Waiting for Godot' when I was 15 and it is still my favourite play 15 years later. It deals with human frailty, and shouts out all the big questions like, 'Why are we here'? Beckett asks us to confront one the the bigest concerns ever faced by human kind and that is 'Is there such a thing as eternity, and if there is what is it's purpose'? Every culture has myths and mechanisms which seek to understand the eternal. The Egyptians tried to conquer eternity with their pryamids and I belive that 'Waiting For Godot' is the modern equivalent. Waiting for Godot is touching and humerous at times, but also filled with bitter irony. It is a play that speaks for human kind and it lets us know that we are not alone with our frailty. I can not reccomend this play enough. Samuel Beckett certainly deserved to win the Nobel Prize for literature.

The main premise of this book is, as far as I can tell, obviously true: a group's cultural values can make a difference in that group's success, prosperity and competitiveness. Is it really controversial to claim that cultural features of Western Civ have contributed to its success? It seems clear to me, e.g., that values associated with scientific rationality contribute to progress in technology, medicine, etc., and while not everyone has to admit that these are desirable things, the majority of the world thinks that they are. I mean, we couldn't have discovered a polio vaccine without the scientific method, and the scientific method is a cultural practice, so to the extent that everyone can agree that a polio vaccine is "progress," then it seems impossible to claim that culture doesn't matter.

Critics, including one of the volume's contribuers (Shweder) often say "but there's no such thing as objective progress." And they are correct in a sense - but so what? If you're determined to think that the polio vaccine is an awful thing, then ultimately no one can prove that you shouldn't feel this way - you can believe what you want. But the point of this book is NOT to arrive at some universal consensus about how to define "progress." That would be a waste of time, not just because it would be impossible, but because the authors are already assuming that many people in the world already agree about what progress is. This book is simply about how people can apply knowledge in order to achieve their ideas of progress. The message is: "if you decide that vaccines are good things, here's what you have to do to in order to discover more of them."

It may be politically incorrect to say that culture matters, but it may also be true. And if it is true, the costs of denying this could be high. It's not just a matter of political posturing to deny that culture matters - the more disadvantaged countries deny this, the more they will fall behind and the more their people will suffer. And the more advantaged countries deny this, the more their own cultures (and advantages) will decay.

This is an important book because it admits that culture matters and it begins the task of adressing how and why it matters. This is no easy task - every group's culture is a tangled bundle of traits, some "adaptive," some non-adaptive, some relevant to progress, some irrelevant, some detrimental. Discovering which traits are important to success is not easy - it requires careful thought and analysis, and explicit hypothesis testing whenever possible (this book is short, unfortunately, on hypothesis-testing). But just because the task is daunting, difficult, and, as one contributer (Glazer) fears, politically "dangerous," that does not make it less crucial or unavoidable.

Culture Matters consists on a series of essays written by well-known scientists and journalists from all over the world. Each of them describes the causes of underdevelopment based on many theories, but mainly through sociological explanations, like culture, values and attitudes.
As a Latin American I can say I finally found a book that brings light into such a controversial issue as the failure of our contries. I was particularly impressed by Carlos Montaner's account of the role of the elites in our societies, and how their corrupt practices have destroyed our economies.
The book fortunately goes beyond the common and naif conclussions of the so called anti-imperialists and intellectuals from the left by succeeding in showing the real factors that bring prosperity and progress into communities. It also enriches Weber's work by adding new and interesting aspects that positively contribute to create wealth and welfare for people.
I highly recommend this book for everyone who is interested in finding explanations for the underachievment of countries instead of blaming "the forces of evil" and economics.

It certainly seems to matter. Why, after all, should Japan have been be rich while Taiwan was poor, if culture did not matter? Or Denmark been a nation of farmers while Holland held dominion over the trade routes of the world? And why, as is asked in one of the most frustratingly tentative essays in this very variable volume, do different immigrant groups to the United States have such very different careers? Of course, it is unfashionable to ask such questions lest someone believe that to say culture matters is to imply that race matters: ie that members of wealthy races are inherently superior to members of poor races. Perhaps that is why the most compelling essays in this book are by an African development economist and a Latin American journalist who exclaim impatiently that of course culture matters and insist that the thing their nations need is to discover the cultural components of economic success and import some. Even more refreshing is the essay by Ronald Inglehardt who brings - gasp - actual measurable data to this debate. Not that anything is quite settled. We are still left with the big questions, like: Why Europe? Why not China? and What was so special about eighteenth century England? On those questions, permit me to recommend two other new books. Nathan Pomeranz's THE GREAT DIVERGENCE, which bends over backwards to prove that China could equally well have given us the industrial revolution, but for a few chance occurances that have nothing to do with culture. And BULLOUGH'S POND by Diana Muir, which, in the course of discussing a number of other things, does lead one to wonder if there may have been something about those Calvinists after all.