I descovered this book on a shelf in antique shop and have been very impressed with it. As well as being clear and concise; it is also alot of fun to go thrue. This book (puplished in 1961) has never heard of R.E.I, R.V's, or even a dome tent, but it will show you how to make one! I spent a whole afternoon just learning knot's.
The book was made during the (sort of) golden age of camping and is a no frill's, real deal guid. From trip planing to selecting chois spots, conoe handling to wilderness survivel or any thing else you can hope to imagin (except run on sentences)is all in there. Pick this book up and impress you're girl and/or buddies with your abillity to tie a horse hitch knot or tell the derections with your watch. I don't imagin any souls will seek this old book out but it deserves one good review...so dare to leave your house, see the light thrue the trees, here the traffic of a lapping lake shore and breath deep the air of your new found abilities...it worked for me.

St. Leonard's Way of the Cross is reflections by St. Leonard of Port Maurice on each station of the cross. The pamphlet includes a very short introduction regarding St. Leonard; an opening prayer; a line drawing of each station with a short reflection of the station by St. Leonard; a short history of the Stations of the Cross; and a handful of prayers appropriate for the Way of the Cross or prayers before a crucifix. This volume is intended for personal rather than group use; as such, it can be an excellent choice.

This book gives you real insight into Mae West's life and personality. While there are some errors in the captions under a few photographs, it is all well researched and very entertaining. I have read it more than twice...

Mae West: Empress of Sex by Maurice Leonard is a spirited account of the wild, serenely-brazen, sex-drenched life of Americas's foremost 1930's sex goddess Mae West. Saucy Miss West was born in 1893 in Brooklyn, New York , a gal with nerve to spare. Although in many ways still a product of the times, West was an autonomous, calculating cookie that knew the power of image and scandal in generating a stage career. Leonard shows West at the black clubs of 1920's New York City studying the outrageously sexy dances of the black crowd, doing her best to capture their moves, and then introducing those moves as her own to a properly shocked, white Broadway audience. West wrote her own stage and movie material; she felt she knew what was right for her better than anyone else. She wrote plays, books, and screenplays dealing with the forbidden topics of homosexuality(The Drag), and sex (The Constant Sinner). She had a taste for musclemen, handsome black studs and wayward lawless thugs. She generally never met a man she didn't like. Leonard's tome on West shows a woman who liked to be in control, control of her career, her men, and delusionally time itself. (She believed she looked twenty-six while in her eighties.) This book is a must read for all West's fans.

The book about Mae West was good. I enjoyed all of it. It was funny, touching and very entertaining. I recommend it highly.

Ursula seemed to know EVERYBODY. While this book is a fascinating look at some of the "big name" writers of children's literature, I really was hoping for more biographical data to accompany the letters. It was a frustrating reading experience at times. Ursula seemed to be "treading on ice" when she wrote letters to E. B. White and Laura Ingalls Wilder, but totally free and breezy (and perhaps bordering on rude at times) when writing to other authors. I was puzzled from time to time at the complete changes in Ursula's tone . . . and I am more curious than ever about Louise Fitzhugh, writer of "Harriet The Spy." Something went wrong in Louise's life after writing "Harriet," but there are few clues in this book to explain what happened. Ursula apparently took some of her most interesting knowledge to the grave; I wish I knew more.

She was cajoler, enabler, champion, critic, and friend. She was Ursula Nordstrom, Director of Harper's Department of Books for Boys and Girls from 1940 to 1973 - a one of-a-kind editor who took 20th century children's literature by the scruff of the neck and gave it a good shake.

Mentor to such luminaries as Maurice Sendak, Ruth Krauss, E. B. White, Shel Silverstein, and Garth Williams, she was a visionary who dared publish the antithesis of yesteryear's bland, sugary children's prose. Thanks to her discernment and determination youngsters found thrall in a myriad of now time-honored stories, including Charlotte's Web, Goodnight Moon, and Where The Wild Things Are.

Reading her collected letters titled Dear Genius (for she considered each of her authors and artists to be preternaturally gifted) is tantamount to having a lively, albeit too brief, one-on-one with the self-effacing, wry Ms. Nordstrom. You leave her presence reluctantly, knowing that such stimulating conversation is rare.

The only child of two beautiful people - "a gaslight-era matinee idol" and a pretty young actress, the editor would "forever regard herself as an ugly duckling born of swans." This lack of personal self-confidence didn't temper her considerable professional aplomb. When a doughty influential librarian challenged her by asking "what qualified her, a nonlibrarian, nonteacher, nonparent, and noncollege graduate to publish children's books," Ms. Nordstrom replied, "Well, I am a former child, and I haven't forgotten a thing."

Unmarried and childless, she nonetheless related companionably to youngsters, continually seeking to publish books that would make "any child feel warmed and attended to and considered." Belittlers of her choices were dismissed as "adults who sift their reactions to children's books through their own messy adult maladjustments."

Fearlessly confrontational in defense of her authors and artists, she was also psychological and practical support, shoring up a diffident young Sendak with, "You may not be Tolstoy, but Tolstoy wasn't Sendak, either." To Garth Williams, whom she feared financially strapped, she offered a monthly stipend.

A chatty, voluble correspondent Ms. Nordstrom's letters hold self-revelatory comments - a regard for Adlai Stevenson; an aversion to New York City - "a cement island;" and eclectic tastes: "Would Virginia Woolf be sickened to know that she is loved by one who also reads 'Confidential'?"

Her notes are punctuated with an engaging, self-deprecating wit, as when she admitted, "....I may have tried to impress you at one time with the beauty and general poetry of my existence....That is balderdash, dear.....I am a real mess...I can walk onto a lovely green plot of land, and tall strong trees turn brown..."

These letters, penned between 1937 and 1982 are a chronicle of the highlights in the children's publishing world, as well as affirmation of the editor's devotion to her craft and colleagues.

Ursula Nordstrom left no immediate heirs when she died in 1982 - generation upon generation of delighted "warmed and attended to" children are her beneficiaries.

A must read for any writer or lover of children's books, Dear Genius gives remarkable insight into the mind and career of Ursula Nordstrom, long-time director of Harper's children's literature department. Ursula poured her heart into many of her professional relationships, and her letters to authors, critics and fans are shrewd, witty, intelligent and sometimes sad--I didn't want it to end, but of course it had to, leaving me wanting more.

this is a wonderful story that touches all who reads it. It is amazing to think what one can accomplish. Beautifully written, and told.