This is a very good study of religious narratives in medieval China. While one might quibble with Gjertson's conclusions, the work does provide one of the few English-language analyses of a fascinating collection. This book belongs in any serious scholar of Buddhism's library.

Stress waves in solids are by now widely investigated
via numerical modeling. As the pertinent equations are
hyperbolic, it is evident that many of the concepts
and methods of computational fluid dynamics come into
play here as well. Consequently, many of items playing
a central role in fluid dynamics are also central in
this monograph: schemes based upon Riemann solvers,
various finite difference schemes, methods of
characteristics in 1D and 2D, TDV schemes, and domain

decomposition. Still, the many aspects where stress
wave modeling differs from CFD are clearly detailed:
the existence of single points and associated
challenges to numerics, the existence of various
constitutive relations, which may render different
numerical schemes most useful, etc. Those points are
amply discussed. --- Overall, the book is written in
such a way as to enable the engineer to grasp
mathematical concepts properly and, in turn, the
mathematician to grasp the physics at hand.

This book ties into the audio cassette and model trains of the Great Railway Adventure series. The two main characters are brother and sister Tuck and Billie who help a brave engineer when he is injured. The illustrations are in an older style that is very vivid and detailed. My 5 year old daughter, a train enthusiast, loves all three books in this series.

This is a very good book on advanced topics of Rough set theory. There are several good research papers which might help understand how to apply rough set theory in data mining. If you are rough set theory beginner - this book is not for you.

While I did find this a very detailed and HIGHLY useful book for signal transduction as a whole, I feel that there is a bias towards cell-to-matrix adhesion (integrins, what not) versus cell-to cell (cadherins, CAMs, etc). Overall a wonderful collection of the current data in the field, but the name is a bit of a misnomer. I would say this is a upper-undergrad/ lower-graduate level text, yet would be useful to someone who has been in the field for years.

Social Capital is a theory that, in part, describes the catalyst for human social systems and networking. It defines and explores methods humans employ to gain advantages. The book's application is sweeping; although, readers should have a background in the theory before tackling this particular work.

For educators, this book provides another angle for social contract theory, socio-economic systems, and synergy. For managers, this book provides a rationale for understanding and developing employee systems, including those in organized labor.

Anyone who is familiar with the ballad "Tam Lin" knows it's a story that is very much for grown-ups, or at least teenagers. Susan Cooper does a very good job here of adapting the old story so that it's suitable for any age. It requires changing a few plot elements, but the essential spirit of the story remains the same.

Margaret is tired of sewing and acting polite and talking about future husbands with the other girls at her father's castle, so she runs away to the woods of Carterhays to pick flowers. She has been expressly forbidden to go there, of course. There, she meets the handsome Tam Lin, and after arguing for a minute over who really owns the forest, they spend a pleasant afternoon talking and becoming friends in the woods. When Margaret gets back home, she's in big trouble--she has actually been gone a week! Her unlikely friendship with Tam Lin leads her to sneak out once again, to rescue him from the faeries during one of their processions. She has to hold on to him as he turns into all sorts of scary animals--and, well, you know the rest. Cooper does a wonderful job of depicting the feisty Margaret, and of adapting the story into something perfect for a little girl's shelf of fairy tale books.

I subtracted a star because I don't think the art really captures the magic of the story; it's too "cute" and too simple. But maybe I'm just spoiled by Kinuko Craft's cover for McKillip's _Winter Rose_. It just seems like the land of Faery requires absolutely lush artwork.

This book is very useful for a beginner in Visual Basic 6. This is a 950+ page book. The examples and code are easy to follow and topics get interesting after chapter 2. After that you get into topics like Error Handling, File Management, Graphics and Data and ADO controls. Over all the book is good and easy to follow plus it has reviews questions and a lot of labs after every section. The Disk included with the book is also helpful and it contains an electronic test. But the only down size to this book is that it contain a lot of junk. The book is 950+ and at least 100 pages are wasted in the first 2 chapters with the introduction to windows 95 which is not necesary. And it has a very lenthy chapter of definitions and more those definitions are repeated in the beginning of every chapter.

I read this book, when it was first published. I found it interesting and factual. Researched very good. The book includes personal experiences of the authors, who are teachers in the San Gabriel Valley of California. I found it especially interesting as I was taking folklore at the time in college. I found the New Year's Hoppin' John tradition delightful, as I had been invited to join a family from the South. I would recommend the book to anyone who is interested in the folklore and ways of America.

The Prince and the Pauper , first published in 1882, by Mark Twain is a literature classic and has been read by many generations. This book is hard to criticize because it is written by one of the greatest authors, has around for so long, and it is considered a classic. The story is about one prince (Edward Tudor) and one pauper (Tom Canty) who meet each other and end up trading places. At the time they don't realize the resemblance between them, so once they switch places and go off, no one will believe their true identity. This book shows the adventures of these two boys with the roles they end up in, one it the gutters and one in the palace. The main message and theme behind this book is about the natural human fault of judging people merely based on their outward appearance. My overall opinion was that this was a good book and it was fun to read. Yet there were some aspects that I think needed more improvement

One of the aspects that I think needed more developing was the characters At first I was a bit disappointed because, unlike all of the other Mark Twain books I have read, this one had very little character description. There is not much that you know about the two characters and you don't feel connected to them. There was nothing that you could relate to with Canty and Tudor and while reading the book the only image that you had of them was a very vague image. This was why it is pretty hard to get caught up in this book. I believed Mark Twain left a lot about the characters so that he could focus and develop more on the plot and adventure of the story than who they characters actually were.

In the book, Tudor is constantly being kidnapped by the pauper's father (John Canty) , who believes that Tudor is his son , and in return Tudor is always running away. After a while of this wild goose chase between Canty and Tudor it gets repetitive and tiresome to the reader. In this book Mark Twain focuses more on the situations of Tudor then those of Canty. He also wrote more about Tudor then Canty. I found the situations with Canty in the princes place were much more interesting and humorous then the situation of Tudor. I would have enjoyed this book more I think if there had been more scenarios and stories about Canty

This book is recommended for all ages yet I found parts of it hard and difficult to understand. The language that all the people in the book speak is old English. There are chapters in the book that is just conversation. I found this incredibly hard to understand by reading it through just once. The only reason that I understood the conversations is because I am familiar with the old English writing style (Shakespearean style) and have had past experience reading books in this style. To someone who would read this type of book for the first time, I think that they would hardly understand any of the conversations between people. Yet the author Mark Twain wrote this book in a great way. This is why it appealed to lots of audiences. For example, Mark Twain's description of the palace are not like usual boring ones, his descriptions are fun to read and you can almost exactly picture things that he is describing. Also his wording makes it easy to keep reading and reading as if each sentence flows perfectly to the next.

The book also had many strengths, in contrast to what I thought would happen, this book did not become predictable. Every chapter has a new twist or turn. The story was also very humorous. It was very amusing and hilarious what Canty did in the prince's position. For example at his first dinner he begins drinking the rose water, which is intended for washing his hands. He also says that all the ways of royalty are strange and annoying referring to when the official "food taster", tastes his food before he eats it and the long, grueling task of putting on clothes which involves a long chain of people who pass an article of clothing down one by one.

I would recommend this book mainly to people in high school or older. In my opinion it is too childish for an adult reader, and I think many adults would get bored. The adults that would enjoy this I think would be those who are "young at heart", and enjoy fictional fairytale like stories. The humor, marvel, and intrigue that this book contains is for a younger audience. Also the difficulty of the language in the book is too hard for children to understand (below 7th grade). I believe that if this book were to be rewritten in modern English it would be a perfect story for a child at any age.

The Prince and the Pauper written by Mark Twain is an adventurous, exciting book. The book takes place in London around the 1500's. Two boys were born on the same day, Tom Canty and Edward Tudor. Tom Canty was born unto a poor life, and as a boy growing up, "Tom's reading and dreaming about princely life wrought such a strong effect upon him that he began to act the prince." And just his luck, did he happen to some across the Prince of Wales, after suffering the hard blow of the soldier knocking him into the crowd. The Prince of Wales is Edward Tudor, the other boy born on the same day but born into a rich and wealthy family. As a result from the encounter, the two boys decide to switch places, as the Prince of Wales says to Tom Canty, "Doff thy rags and don these splendors."
The book describes the boys' adventures throughout the experience of living each other's lives. As the Prince of Wales lives as the pauper, he is introduced to and learns about many different people such as the Canty family, Miles Hendon, a troop of Vagabonds, Hugo, the peasants, the hermit, and others. And as Tom Canty acts as the Prince of Wales, he experiences living the higher life of royalty, being treated with respect and given so many opportunities and choices.
Through having the plot be that the characters switch places, the book is more exciting because the reader could act in the character's place and experience the lifestyles and adventures involved with each person's life. Other than being able to understand better each person's lifestyle with the type of writing, using dialogue in Old English adds a stronger effect to bringing everything back in time to understand the setting. Although at times, the Old English could get confusing.
Overall, I thought that this book was interesting because it explains the lifestyles of different people in London around the 1500's in a way that is fun and easy to understand. Although at times, I did feel as if it carried on too much about things that were insignificant. Other than that, the book was good and I would recommend that it be read, if you are interested in adventure.
Other adventure books written by Mark Twain, such as The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, were also interesting, but I enjoyed reading The Prince and the Pauper more because it contained more excitement for me.

Mark Twain's, The Prince and the Pauper is a classic look back into sixteenth-century English society. Tom Canty is a young boy who is born into poverty and is forced to beg in the streets of London by his father. Edward Tudor is the Prince of Wales, heir to the throne. Both of these boys were born on the same day but grew up in opposite ways of life. One day Tom is dreaming about being a prince and starts walking towards the royal palace. When he reaches the palace the guards try to stop him but Prince Edward sees Tom's condition and invites him to his quarters to hear what Tom has to say. While they sit there they begin to realize what strong resemblance there is between them and decide to switch clothes to fulfill Tom's dream of looking Princely. All of a sudden Edward storms out of the room to denounce the guards who did harm to Tom, only to be mistaken as the poor pauper and locked out of the royal palace. From here on out the two boys experience what life is like in the other's shoes. Mark Twain does an outstanding job of developing each character and showing how each must learn new ideas to deal with their latest way of life. Unfortunately I did find myself losing my concentration while reading this book. This easily could have been due to the fact that the way Twain wrote The Prince and the Pauper was actually on a very easy reading level, which would lead me to recommend this book to readers of middle school age who enjoy adventurous tales like The Boxcar Children or The Hardy Boys.