Of the many literary biographies I've read, only Peter Ackroyd's "Dickens" seems to me as "definitive" as Ms. Lee's terrifically compelling book. One finishes it with the sense, however illusory (see Janet Malcolm's extraordinary "The Silent Woman" for a convincing argument that it must be), that the Virginia Woolf found in its pages is essentially identical to the actual woman who lived and wrote and died. Anyone with even a slight interest in her must consider this book essential reading. I found it a real page-turner throughout its considerable length despite being unconvinced of Woolf's literary eminence (except for her sparkling correspondence) and finding her character unattractive (i.e. snobbish, frigid, a false friend, etc.) even by the usual standard for writers.

Probably the best bio of Woolf we are likely to see for some time. Lee has succeeded brilliantly and gracefully in that most elusive and troublesome task of capturing the "spirit" of another human being and then conveying that without simplification or reduction. What is most moving is that Lee allows Woolf her complexity and contradictions, her courage and cowardice, her generosity and meaness, without indulging in a sort of inconoclastic glee in smashing received images of Woolf as victim or feminist icon (or any other of the several and various "Woolfs" to be found these days.) Lee's bio is a stunning feat of sympathetic imagination and rational scholarship which ranks with the other "best" bio of the last 20 years or so, Deirdre Bair's marvelous and beautiful "Simone de Beauvoir." I am grateful to both of these writers.

I am taking this book slowly and am nearing the end. It is terrific and I find, on the days I take off from reading it, that I miss Virginia Woolf and want to go back to the "place" that is her life. I thank Ms. Lee for giving me a closer intimacy with Virginia Woolf.

This box is about life, one life in particular, the author's life. It covers the time from the time he tries to give his three week old sister popcorn until his daughter is killed in a car accident; he retires in Europe, and has a stroke. It descries 21 days in a hospital. The hospital in on the Grand Canary Island. I believe you will be surprised by the hospital and the care he received.

In between the popcorn incident with his baby sister and his stroke 60 years later he covered a good part of the world and got an education at the same time. His father died when he was 8 and his mother raised him on a West Virginia hill farm until he was 18. His mother then managed the farm and made a good living for Roger and his sister and brother. He worked on the farm along with his sister and brother until the Korean War started when he enlisted in the US Air Force.

He stayed in the Air Force for 8 years, 4 of which he spent in Japan. When he was honorable discharged from the US Air Force he went to work for Bendix as a tech rep.

With Bendix he was working in communications, radar, lasers, and computers in hardware and software. His work took him from Europe, to Libya, and Saudi Arabia to Alaska by way of Australia. When he was working in Europe he spent time in Turkey and on the Azores Islands. During his stay he married a Spanish Lady he later to went to Maryland, right outside of Washington D. C. where his daughter was borne. In Maryland he was a tech writer. Several years (12) of his working life was with NASA (as a contractor). He was manning a console on the Manned Space Flight Station in Canary Island when Armstrong landed on the moon.

You will find Roger's life interesting. But the book is really about growing up, developing a philosophy of life and finally becoming a man.

Autobiography of a Good Life by Roger L. Lee

Roger Lee led a varied and vigorous life on which he wrote an autobiography. He wrote the story of his life after he lost his daughter in a car accident and had a debilitating stroke. He wrote it as part of his self planned and determined recovery effort in the Canary Islands. He relearned his English, which was his mother tongue and touch-typing on a laptop computer using Microsoft Word.

He grew up on a West Virginia hill farm where most of his friends' grandest ambition was to get into the military service for the Korean War. They saw this as a way to get away from the farm and see some of the world.

When Roger was six years old he started his formal education in a one-room country school. The school was a two-mile walk one way. The highest grade in the school was the eighth. He didn't know that there were higher grades available when you got out of the hills.

His father died when he was eight years old. His mother raised him and his younger sister and brother with the aid of the hill farm. His uncle came and gave his mother a hand by moving into a small house on the farm and sharecropping the first three years after his father's death.

Roger Lee enlisted in the US Air Force when he was eligible at 18 years old and went to Texas for basic training. This was the beginning of his education. He went from basic training to radio school in Illinois. Then back to Texas and from there to Japan back to the US for a tour at Washington D. C. From there he went back to Japan again. He came back to Texas after two years. All this time he kept working on a correspondence course in radio and radar and received his First Class Radio License.

He received an honorable discharge from the US Air Force and went to work in the field he knew best, electronics. Later he was sent to Europe and saw a great deal of the western world while working on US contracts. He was always curious about the people he met in the countries where he worked, their food, the way they lived, how they earned a living and their language.

When Roger came back to the US he went to work as a technical writer in electronics and started college at the University of Maryland to improve his writing. He was soon bored by the US and went back to Canary Islands in Spain where he was employed at the Spacecraft Tracking Station.

He stayed at the Canaries Spacecraft Tracking Station until he became the Operations Manager and Armstrong Landed on the moon. Then a good friend took the job of managing the Spacecraft Tracking Station on Ascension Island and asked him to come down with him for a few months. Roger had a family by this time, but he left his wife and daughter, a new car, an apartment, and a yacht that he had acquired in the Canaries and went to Ascension for four months.

Back in the Canaries after four months he was 'sort of at loose ends.' A telephone by another friend gave him something to do. The friend offered him a position at the Alaska Spacecraft Tracking Station. He thought about it, sold his car and yacht and took his wife and daughter to Alaska.

Roger spent a year and a half in Alaska and bought another house. He got itchy feet again, took wife and daughter and took off around the world. He was lucky there was plenty of electronics work and interesting people where he stopped in Hawaii and Australia. He dropped off his wife and daughter in the Canaries and continued on back to Alaska. This completed the trip around the world. He was scheduled for two months in Alaska this time and sold his house there.

Lasers were something he had never worked with so when he was offered a job in the NASA laser network he jumped at it. This meant that he took his wife and daughter back to Maryland and bought another house. From a year there he went on a contract with the Royal Saudi Navy in Saudi Arabia. From there he back to Texas to help write a proposal on the shuttle contract. Then he went back to Europe to work with the European Space Agency.

Later he lost his daughter in a car accident in Texas while he was still working for the European Space Agency, quite work, and went back to the Canaries where he had a stroke that resulted in this book. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did.

It's in print! The life of Roger Lee. I meet Roger's daughter Monica while trying to learn Arabic in Saudia Arabia. I became great friends of the Lee's and ended up marrying Monica. Roger lead a very exciting life. He grew up as a dirt poor farmer in West Virginia during the depression. He got into the Electronics business early in life which opened the world up to him. He lived and worked all around the world from Alaska to Austrailia to Saudi Arabia. He spent many years helping the US Space program get started. After a long stay in the Cannary Islands working on the Apollo tracking station they decieded to maintain a home there while they continued there travels around the world. Roger speaks many laguages, English, German, Spanish, and Arabic to name a few. This is a true life adventure story! Can't wait to see the movie!

It should be obvious to anyone who reads this book that Mr. Power is a skilled researcher and writer. His narrative is well documented and clearly organized. But I found it a bit short in analysis and narrow in coverage. Basically, this book traces the changes in morale among the Army of Northern Vigrinia's rank and file soldiers, something Power attributes to their own battlefield performance and results. He largely neglects to address other key contributors to morale (or lack of morale) in sufficient detail, for instance, the significance of religious revivals among the troops. In addition, most of Power's conclusions are not original. He basically reenforces--effectively, of course--earlier scholars' opinions regarding the ANV during the late months of the conflict. Still, this one is worth adding to your shelf.

Superb account of the soldiers who made up Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. Tracy Power brings them to life for us as he digests their hopes, fears, and passions in this wonderful account of "Lee's Miserables" in the final year of the Civil War in Virginia. Covering a period during which Lee must continue to hold the Union armies at bay even though he has been deprived of his most talented subordinates, the author provides us with marvelous insights into what kept Lee's soldiers in uniform and willing to follow their commander despite the shadows lengthening over the Confederacy in 1864-65.

I recommend this book to all of my students in a Civil War history course that I teach. Every student who has read it has thanked me for the suggestion. Well organized, highly readable, and thoroughly balanced, this is "must" reading for anyone who wishes to understand the 19th Century southerners who fought on even when hope had all but disappeared. Great work by a fine historian and talented author!

By ancestry and upbringing I am a Connecticut Yankee and, while for many years I have been a keen student of the American Civil War, my interests and sympathies are definitely pointed towards the Union (my relatives wore the blue). Thus, it is comparatively rare for me to enthusiastically read a book which is about a distinctly Confederate subject. I happily made an exception for J. Tracy Power's "Lee's Miserables". As it happens, a special focus of mine has long been on the Virginia campaigns of 1864-65, perhaps due to the early influence of Bruce Catton's wonderful "A Stillness at Appomattox". Mr. Power describes his book as a "hybrid of social and military history" and that is indeed an apt desciption. Although the reader can follow the course of the campaigns well enough through Power's narrative, the primary focus of the book is firmly upon how the men and officers of the Army of Northern Virginia perceived their situation and viewed the future, as told in their letters, journals, and other first-hand accounts. Although some soldiers in Lee's army remained confident to very end that they would ultimately achieve victory, "Lee's Miserables" chronicles a broad decline in morale over the winter of 1864-65. An army which could still defend its ground in September and October had become vulnerable by March and April.

I strongly recommend this book for anyone interested in Civil War realities and who are ready to reject the hagiographic myths which have far too often dominated books about the Army of Northern Virginia. And I hope that someday there will be a comparable social/military history published about the Army of the Potomac during these same campaigns.

I am five and I can read. I love transportation books. I have books by Virginia Lee Burton- Katy, Mike Mulligan and The Little House. I got Maybelle for Xmas. I like the cable car and the Golden Gate Bridge. I like the artwork. I looked up San Francisco on my map and on the internet. If you like transportation, this is a great story!

I just bought this book for my 4-year-old son (and myself!). He loves it. The book is about cable cars in San Francisco and is practically a history lesson. It's also fun!

One of my favorite books one I was a kid, and enjoyable for grown-ups, as well. Some wonderful art illustrating the workings of a cable car, San Francisco scenery, hilly hills with loads of cable car track, and a sweet story giving a simplified history of the train with a cable, and some contemporary settings(contemporary for when this book was originally released)chronicling the rise and popularity of the bus. But not to worry, Maybelle and her sisters win an election to stay in the city by the bay. Extremely enjoyable and under-rated.

Although many seem to think that this is a delightful book, it is full of stereotyped information about people with Down syndrome that is outdated and offensive. Portraying Eddie as not caring that the children make fun of him, gives readers the idea that people with Down syndrome aren't bright enough to know when they are being made fun of. Always happy, always laughing--certainly not the real picture of people who have feelings, hopes and dreams just like you and I do. The illustrations, although lovely, exaggerate the physical characteristics some people with Down syndrome have in common. Instead of pointing out that people are more alike than different, this book points out differences. If you are looking for a book to educate readers about disability issues or Down syndrome, there are many better choices.

This is a great book on teaching kids about differences. Everyone is different in their own ways, some people just show their differences more. Eddie Lee is treated wrongfully in this book becuase of his appearance. We hav eot learn to except people for who they are, not what they look like. Eddie Lee just wants to be the same as everyone else and fit in. Sometimes people get fed up with him though, and do not want to hang out with him. These are the tiems we have to be there for these people.

My favorite character in this book is Eddie. He just wants to be like everyone else and fit in. It is hard for him to make friends because sometimes people jsut don't want to hang out with him. It is hard for people to understand him, and he just wants to make friends. Thsi is one of my favorite childrens books. IT teaches a lot about children and how they think.

Be Good to Eddie Lee is a great book for children. I appreciate this book because most people treat Eddie Lee the way JimBob treats him. Eddie is special in his own ways. No one realizes that he is a good person at heart because they get the wrong impression. People these days just need to respect everyone. We are all different in our own ways, and we all have our unique qualities.

This a book that shows how certian people are treated. Eddie Lee is a great person at heart yet no one notices it. No matter what, everyone in life si different. We just need to realiize that. This story shows how great some people really are. We just have to look a little deeper to realize the simularities. People have difficult lives yet, we can all be friends in some way or another.

This is the incredible story of the decade of labour unrest(1912-1922) known as 'The Mine wars". And real wars they were, in which hunreds and sometime thousands of armed man opposed each other in the vallies of West Virginia. The author is not a great writer or stilist, but he witnessed much of the events in a variety of capacities (State Attorney General, among others) and he has the good sense to let the facts speak for themselves. This part of American history is as shocking as it is fascinating and richly deserves the attention Lee has given to it.

In plain, unvarnished style, Lee relates the history of greed and evil by the outside capital interests who came into West Virginia to rape and pillage. The miners wouldn't stand for it, and war broke out.

The president had to declare martial law - twice.

While Lee doesn't exactly have a beautiful, rolling style, he tells it like it was; he was there.

If you want to know about the true character of the Appalachian people, read this book.

This is the most unbiased telling of the struggles in West Virginia between the coal operators and the union. Mr. Lee offers an impartial insider's view of the birth (and or death) of the real West Virginia.

Longacre is very impressed with the "style" of Stuart. This has caused him to ignore his short commings as a commander. The book is less a study of the actions and TO&E that went into the war, than a isn't J.E.B. great book. His short commings are glossed, the 7 Days, over or not covered at all, Ox Hill.

He falls into the trap of the early CSA were just better and ignores the problems the Union had with building a Cavalry. He did an excellent job of covering this in his last book. Then, he falls into the better equipment trap w/o looking at how the war shifted tatics and the why ANoV failed to adapt.

This is not a bad book but a disapointment after his excellent "Lincoln's Cavalrymen".

Lee's Cavalrymen: A History Of The Mounted Forces Of The Army Of Northern Virginia is an exhaustively researched, superbly presented, "reader friendly" study of the southern calvary troops active in the American Civil War, as well as a welcome and complementary volume to Lincoln's Cavalrymen which presented an intense scrutiny of the cavalry units of the North. Drawing upon the results of an extensive study of newspaper archives, calvary-specific dispatches, letters, diaries, and memoirs of cavalrymen, and more, civil war historian Edward G. Longacre effectively utilizes these core source materials to produce his erudite and fascinating discourse, which is very highly recommended reading for Civil War buffs, students, and researchers.

An excellent overall study of the cavalry of the Army of Northern Virginia. Told generally in a narrative style, the book provides a solid discussion of and evidence for Confederate cavalry dominance in the earlier part of the war. Specific actions are covered--just about all of them, in fact, which means there isn't necessarily room for a lot of detail about every event. Longacre also includes material on the training and daily life of the cavalry. Disadvantages in weaponry and materiel, as compared to the Federals, also get plenty of time.

Longacre gives a balanced picture of Stuart; it's hard to see how a historian of ANV cavalry could avoid writing about their commander for most of their existence, and Longacre offers both praise and criticism, as well as a couple of insightful points. He's not at all a Stuart partisan; in fact, one gets the feeling he would probably rank Hampton first in tactics.

This book offers a sensible account of the Confederate cavalry at (and not at) Gettysburg, and represents a modification of Longacre's view in his earlier book on the subject. In the earlier book Longacre seemed to accept the viewpoint that Stuart "should have" been present, whereas now, perhaps influenced by *Saber and Scapegoat* (which appears in his bibliography), he takes a more positive view.

Longacre is more original, and perhaps more questionable, when he analyzes the tactics of mounted charges. He claims that ANV troopers wanted to fight mounted, but with revolvers and other firearms rather than sabers, and I wish he had provided more supporting quotes, because I've read plenty of primary sources (Gilmor) where sabers are used with glee. His assertion that sabers were really more effective than firearms at close quarters is interesting, and he goes on to state that mounted charges really were of little use, being more or less outdated and causing high casualties. But did mounted fighting, which took place until the end of the war, actually result in more casualties than attrition, disease among horses and men, or the kind of dismounted fighting cavalrymen sometimes did in the West, where they were ordered to charge breastworks? (history of the 7th TN Cav). I wanted to see more analysis, more numbers and more quotes.

Certainly a complete and interesting account, as far as I know the only such work, and required reading for anyone interested in the topic.

I agree that JACOB'S LADDER is a TV miniseries waiting for production; as I read it, I kept thinking "LONESOME DOVE in the Civil War." The characterizations tend to cardboard, although sometimes they're well-painted. On the other hand, at several crucial points, somebody does something because author McCaig needs to advance the plot, not because it's what that character would do under the circumstances. The book comes nowhere near generating the power of THE KILLER ANGELS or Thomas Keneally's CONFEDERATES. The latter in particular covers much the same historical ground but produces a near-overwhelming sense of the moral horror of slavery and the war, a thunderous undercurrent that JACOB'S LADDER doesn't match. THE KILLER ANGELS imagines its way into the mindset of its characters and reproduces Gettysburg as if it were happening for the first time. JACOB'S LADDER misses this kind of immediacy. If you've already read CONFEDERATES and THE KILLER ANGELS, read JACOB'S LADDER; otherwise, save your money.

If Margaret Mitchell had been as sensitive to the Black characters as to the white ones, she might have written this engrossing novel. That is, if she had had Donald McCaig's courage in taking the reader into the fire-belly of war. The scope of this book is huge, yet its focus is at the same time fine. The variety of the characters is remarkable. And there is an effortless continuum between the mythical and the factual. Donald McCaig is an author of deep intelligence and great heart. He has written the War and Peace of the Civil War.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Jacob's Ladder. The characters are very real and engaging, and the historical references - battles and home life - make you feel as if you are right there as they take place.

If you like this book, you may also like Stonewall Jackson's Gold (sort of a Civil War Treasure Island, but a true story) and On the Occasion of My Last Afternoon (a postwar fictional memoir of a woman who lived a very interesting life during the war).

A marvelous, if brief look at four military institutions in the South before and during the War for Southern Independence. At times bittersweet, Conrad does an excellent job of telling this tale. A nice side-bar addition to anyone's Civil War library, particularly those of interest in the Confederacy.

excellent book! I would have liked to have seen the author delve into several more of the cadets' lives, but what's there is great.

Excellent book. Conrad did his homework before putting pen to paper in writing this book. His knowledge of the subject, and his passion for telling the story of the confederate cadets at war, comes through loud and clear.

Finally a book on breast cancer that explains the REAL causes: (1)environmental exposure to toxic chemicals like pesticides and petroleum products that mimic our own natural hormones, estrogen specifically; (2) nutritional deficiencies from eating junk food that allow these toxic chemicals to inhibit normal detoxification mechanisims that take place in the Liver and Gastrointestinal tract; (3) taking prescription drugs which amount to synthetic derivations of our natural hormones, which inhibit normal cellular communication and can damage our DNA, resulting in formation of hormone-driven tumors; (4) chronic emotional stress which uses up our B-vitamins, essential fatty acids and other essential nutrients needed to maintain our immune and detoxification systems, as mentioned above.
Dr. Lee is a hero and a mentor. I highly recommend that ANYONE interested in the REAL causes of breast, ovarian, uterine and prostate cancers, AND how to prevent them, should read this book, and the two previous books by Dr. Lee, on Menopause and Premenopause, both available on this website!
More and more people are waking up....and beginning to understand the horrible mistake we made by trusting large corporations (drug companies)that place profits before people. Reading books by Dr. Lee will educate us and show us how with a little time reading, we can learn how to take care of ourselves while living in a world that is run by corporations trying their hardest to destroy us!
Read and share this book with those you love!

I found this book to be a very timely breath of fresh air.

While reading the introduction I experienced a sense of clarity and relief that someone is telling the truth! Thank you!

As I delved more deeply into the book and began to recognize defininte symptoms of hormone imbalance in my body, I decided to take a clearer look at my lifestyle - diet, exercise, and long-held attitudes and beliefs about breast cancer, the medical establishment,
and the impact of the individual and collective physical, emotional, and spiritual environment on health.

In following some of the practical advice found within these pages and implementing some simple changes in diet and nutritional supplementation, as well as using a pure natural progesterone cream, I am experiencing higher quality of life.

This well researched and clearly written book made a powerful and positive impact on me. I highly recommend it for all women who want a consciousness raising experience (!) and encourage them to share it with their primary healthcare providers.

Thank you, Dr. Lee, Virginia, and David Zava, for your good work.

Dr. John Lee Tells the Truth about Hormone Replacement
After all the hoopla recently about the dangers of HRT, this well-written book is a refreshing look at what's really going on in medicine with hormone treatments, and what's really causing breast cancer. Obviously written with great care for scientific accuracy, yet within the grasp of the "lay" person, Lee, Zava and Hopkins have carefully laid out the politics of breast cancer, the psychology of it, and the biochemistry. When you put this book down you'll probably have a better grasp of breast cancer than your typical doctor. This classic is a life-saver and should be on every woman's bookshelf.