Following seven weeks in a coma,AWAKE AGAIN is the story of one man's incredible journey from "total unconcsiousness" through fully conscious recovery to a position of elevated mental, physical, spiritual and emotional consciousness from which Martin Kreig currently lives and operates. The book is a celebration of the power of the human spirit to not only survive or overcome, but to excell. I totally love this book! I was immediately drawn in and could not put it down. Powerfully written, AWAKE AGAIN is honest, real, gutsy,poignant,tender,courageous,candid and inspired. It made me laugh. It made me cry. It changed the way I look at life forever. A must read for head injury survivors, those who love us and anyone who is mentally, physically, and/or emotionally challenged who truely believes in life without limitations, either self or other-imposed. AWAKE AGAIN will awaken you from the complacency of a " normal " existence and empower you to elevate your own consciousness on your personal journey to realizing your dreams. A powerful book. Thanks for you, Martin!!!

This engaging and inspiring book is about how to achieve the impossible. Martin Krieg shares his heartbreaking experience of waking up in a hospital to discover that he was paralyzed, unable to speak or perform even the most basic of tasks. Doctors predicted that the paralysis was permanant, but Krieg would not accept this prognisis.. He made the impossible happen. Readers will be impelled to examine their own perceived limitations and wonder if they acturally exist...... A GOOD book!.....Difficult to put down.

When I read "Awake Again", I was going through a divorce with two young children, had just moved to a new town, was returning to the workforce after nearly 10 years, and struggling financially. My whole world felt as though it had been turned upside-down. This book made me realize not only how grateful I should be for all that I did have, but also helped me with ways to deal with what I was going through. It is an incredible inspiration for anyone going through any kind of trauma in their life.

My thanks go to Martin for sharing such an extraordinary experience!

William Blake (whose poetry this book mirrors) runs an inn where we meet angels, rabbits, tigers, a host of interesting characters. It's a great introduction to poetry for the youngest of children. The illustrations are quaint and fit this book perfectly. I can see why it has won the awards it has.

A vsisit to William Blakes Inn is one of my favorite books ever. In a clever turn, nanct willard had turned the more famous characters from Blakes poetry into guest and attendents at his "Inn"" Angels make the bed, Dragons bake the bread,Tiger,tiger loses its strength,all adorned with gorgeous illustartions from alic and martin provensen. In the brief introduction,Ms willard explains how she became attracted to william Blake,then what led her to this book. My children even at a very young age have love this book. It's poetic scheme is simple yet elegant, which makes it also fun for the adult reading and challenging enough for a early grade reader.A wonderful, funfilled chidrens classic.And, Ms Willard is correct:poetry IS the best medicine.

When I was a child, I read A Visit to William Blake's Inn and it inspired the poet within myself. Now as an adult, I still find the imaginative poetry within this book to permeate my thoughts. The colorful imagery painted within its text matches perfectly to the book's charming illustrations. William Blake's Inn is a must for the collector of prized children's literature.

This book was a tremendous help to me when I came down with a bout of mastitus in my first month of motherhood. Not only did it help me diagnose my problem well enough to prompt me to call my doctor, but it offered advice for how to avoid mastitus in the future. Considering how many hours we devote to learning the ins and outs of pregancy, and the number of visits we make to the doc to prepare for birth, it is amazing how little information there is about the complications of and approaches to breastfeeding! The Nursing Mother's Problem-Solver is a must-read for every new mom--I only wish I had thought to read it before I had the baby when I had more time!

As a third-time nursing mom I found this book to be invaluable. Its format was logical and easy to use. The research was more extensive than any other book I have read on nursing. It answered pressing questions immediately and fully. Finally I enjoyed its humor and the light approach to common challenges! Jean Kirshner

Finally a book about nursing that doesn't waste time congratulating you on making the choice to nurse, but rather spends the time focusing on real questions and problems that face nursing moms! I found the book incredibly helpful even as a practiced nursing mom and wished that I had had it available when not-so-practiced. The format is easy to follow, and the content clear, concise, and REAL. I would highly recommend this book to anyone that is even considering nursing.

I really love this book. It is simple, like a cup of coffee in the morning and doesn't require that I apply each chapter to the raising of my children like a course in Parenting 101. I feel the author William Martin understood I was searching for an inner understanding, not more rules for parenting that can be so hard to obey because they only work once. It seems to be a real challenge to raise our children, keeping them safe, all the while being aware of the subtle difference between teaching and controlling. I have often found myself questioning my decision to become a parent, a job I cannot walk away from. After reading this book, I have started to understand where the real parent in me resides and she's a lot stronger, and frankly, a lot more fun than I had given her credit for.

This is the ONE book on parenting that everyone (parents, grandparents, caregivers, anyone at all who cares about children of all ages) should read and carry with them, always. It is especially helpful for those who have limited exposure to non-Western ideas, spiritual or otherwise. What is so special about Mr. Martin's book? It forces one to focus on the CHILD, and one's reactions to the child, and to stop worrying about classifying everything and overanalyzing the child. Parents these days get so worked up about raising the perfect child, and parenting perfectly, that no one winds up happy, and I for one think many of these current generations will suffer because of this. If only more parents would read Martin's book, they'd realize that children will grow up, with or without our interference. This book will guide those who choose to let the child become who THEY should be, rather than who we WANT them to be...wise words for us all.

William Martin's walk on the spiritual side of parenting is a path that few people are brave enough to travel. In a world full of how-to-do-it-in-five- easy-steps help books, The Parent's Tao Te Ching rises above, creating a place where parents can dig deeper into their own spiritual wisdom. Instead of following the guidlines of another "expert" who has never met the readers' children or lived a day in their lives, parents are encouraged to seek the knowledge that is inherant in everyone; mother, father, guardian and child. I love this book and have bought several copies for all of my friends who are weeks away from becoming parents for the first time.

Are you seeking a book with a panoramic sweep of American History? Do you wish to view it through the prism of perhaps the most tradition-bound institution in the United States? Do you want to witness the great battles that changed history and altered the map of the world? Do you want to see proud families clash? Behold Admirals' egos? Eavesdrop on the great personalities who have strutted history's stage? Then William Martin's sprawling ANNAPOLIS is for you! It's an almost 800 the page epic you'll be sorry to finish. A work, I think you'll agree, begging to be a mini-series.
William Martin is a wonderful storyteller and Historian who brings life and breath - and breadth - to the people and events that propel his story....our story! Most of the historical moments you'll recognize. Others will be new, and some will be revelations; but all of them are more interesting in his telling! From the battles waged by the U. S. S. Constitution to the sparring of the Monitor and Merrimack. From Midway to the rivers of Vietnam, Martin's U. S Navy - and his Stafford family - help shape and protect America. In light of recent dark days in our history, this story is more relevant than ever. It's a 5 star effort from a 5 star talent.
Pick up this book! Keep your 'eyes in the boat,' and before long you'll understand why what's good for the U. S. Navy is good for the United States of America!

Are you seeking a book with a panoramic sweep of American History? Do you wish to view it through the prism of perhaps the most tradition-bound institution in the United States? Do you want to witness the great battles that changed history and altered the map of the world? Do you want to see proud families clash? Behold Admirals' egos? Eavesdrop on the great personalities who have strutted history's stage? Then William Martin's sprawling ANNAPOLIS is for you! It's an almost 800 page epic you'll be sorry to finish. A work, I think you'll agree, begging to be a mini-series.
William Martin is a wonderful storyteller and Historian who brings life and breath - and breadth - to the people and events that propel his story - our story! Most of the historical moments you'll recognize. Others will be new and some will be revelations; but all of them are more interesting in his telling. From the battles waged by the U. S. S. Constitution to the sparring of the Monitor and the Merrimack....From Midway to the rivers of Vietnam, Martin's U. S. Navy - and his Stafford family - help shape and protect America. In light of recent dark days in our history, this story is more relevant than ever. It's a 5-Star effort from a 5-Star talent. It's unquestionably the best book of this type I have ever read.
Pick up this book! Keep your 'eyes in the boat,' and before long you'll understand why what's good for the U. S. Navy is good for the United States of America!

Annapolis was my first William Martin book. I have since read everything except the out of print "The Rising of the Moon". Growing up just miles from Annapolis, the title drew me in while I was looking for a casual read. Boy was I wrong. From the beginning I was enraptured with the history of the US Navy and the people who made it the greatest force afloat. His familiar style of telling a history now and then until the complete historical fabric is woven is an entertaining vehihcle that maintains the relevance of the material. For Martin, history is more than a collection of dates. It lives and he breathes life into it for his readers.

The sequence in the South Pacific haunts me even now two years after reading the novel. Martin ably carries on the traditon of historical story telling from Michener. He has demonstrated the ability to paint on the large canvas (Annapolis), the small canvas (Cape Cod) and the personal canvas (Citizen Washington).

I look forward to learning more about my country and its heroes great and small from Martin in the future.

I loved this book and recommend it as a must read. Books like this should be mandated in schools however the stark nature of reality would keep this book out of curricula. Instead, students will continue to learn fabled accounts of how America came to be. It would be so much better if children were taught that some fairly ordinary people with faults like us came together and became something extrordinary. This is what Martin does best.

Cape Cod, Engrossing..Entertaining..The perfect book to take to the beach-so says the Boston Sunday Hearld. A mixture of truth..and misleading fallacy.. Entertaining? Slightly..Engrossing? hardly. I had to force feed parts of it to my brain..other parts I simply skimmed, How much DESCRIPTION is a person expected to sustain? Annapolis was the first book I read by William Martin, I instantly feel in love, and mistakenly thought the seeming lack of depth to the "story" near the end of the book was a conscious effort to bring the reader down easily. In the reading of Cape Cod..I find the same shallow feel to the 20th century aspects of the book.
Cape Cod is a yoyo, sucking you down into the past, wrapping you in the arms of another time,engulfing you in the beauty of a well told tale, then jerking you up, ripping away the comfort of oblivion and rudely inserting you into the black embrace of..here and "now".
I enjoy Martins' tales of the past, I do not enjoy his depiction, or characters of the 20th century, he lacks..something in that area, and leaves me wondering if the same man mints both sides of the coin. One interesting thing about this book, which amused me greatly and had me applauding, is that there is not one single character amoung the many, that is even partially likable, which satisfys my misanthropic view of the world. Martin should stick to weaving words which draw A picture of the world behind us..and leave others to dwell in the present..
I think I'll try Nerve Endings next.. Who wants to send it to me? As it seems to be out of print.. *sigh*

At least not in William Martin's novel of the same name. In Martin's CAPE COD there are feuding families, long-held secrets, regional history and, tying it all together, a mystery - as well as those wondrous beaches and that natural essence of 'The Cape' (as we New Englanders know and love it) that he brings to life in this story.
From the first pages of this novel, in which whales inexplicably beach themselves, Native Americans and White men clash, and the Pilgrims, noble, flawed and human as they were, suffer the awful indignities of the relentless voyage to the New World, we're off on a William Martin-style adventure. As is his BACK BAY and ANNAPOLIS, the story unfolds through the eyes of (sometimes warring - always interesting) families, and jumps back and forth in time. This enables us to feel the historical events that are going to impact on the modern-day intrigue. I have always liked this about William Martin's stories. This sense of what it was like 'then,' how people felt, how they acted. We get to enjoy a well written tale and learn a thing or three along the way. Martin's respect for, and love of, history is evident throughout CAPE COD, as it is in ANNAPOLIS, BACK BAY and CITIZEN WASHINGTON. And his reverence for 'The Cape' will be evident to every reader, especially we Cape lovers! For us, that's a bonus. To read CAPE COD is to feel, in those pages, that essence of 'TheCape,'that infuses us as soon as we have crossed the Sagamore and the Bourne bridges....CAPE COD is a wonderful story, a lesson in our history, and the kind of enlightening adventure we have come to expect from William Martin. As usual, he delivers! Read this book...Perhaps sitting in a lounge chair on a sunny summer day at the edge of Old Silver Beach...You'll be glad you did....

Martin brings the plight of the Pilgrims to life. He also manages also to so us once again that these were people and not icons. While fiction, it is easy to visualize the petty argumnets and personality struggles within this group that most of us assume was a cohesive unit with a united purpose. Using his now familiar device of switching back and forth from now and then, Martin paints a living picture of the early history of the Cape. This was the last of Martin's books that I read prior to Citizen Washington. I hesitated because I thought the topic limited but I ended learning and enjoying a compelling history of a special niche in American history.

Martin demonstrates an uncanny ability to tell the great stories (Annapolis - US Navy) a the small (Cape Cod) and make them breathe.

I bought this book based on several 5-star evaluations here in Amazon, but I'm sorry to say that I was disappointed (which doesn't happen very often). I admit that the plot was interesting and I learned more about Boston than I knew before. However, many of the characters (especially the present-day ones) seemed very two-dimensional. It was hard to tell who was supposed to be driving the action -- it wasn't entirely third-person (which would have been logical in an historical novel) and it wasn't written through the eyes of only one or two characters. For example, a lot of space is given to Fallon the contemporary writer, and he seems to be the one that should draw our focus, but his intentions are all over the map. In fact, every time a new person is introduced, we get glimpses of that person's point-of-view too. I found it disconcerting to read the thoughts of a character in one paragraph, then have to guess what might have motivated their actions in the next one.
Maybe it's an older style of writing (the book was originally written in 1979), but I found the descriptions of relationships between people especially clumsy. I don't know if I'd have finished "Back Bay" if I hadn't been on a trip to a foreign country with no opportunity to find something else in English. I certainly appreciate Michener more than I did as a result of reading this attempt at his kind of storytelling.

I am not always much of a reader, but this book caught me from the first pages. It is a MUST for anyone who knows and/or loves the city of Boston and the history that goes along with it. I found myself visualizing the streets and areas of Boston as I read each chapter. My only disappointment was the ending...I could not believe that I was on the last page! I wanted it to end differently for the characters (thus, only 4 stars), but overall I was quite satisfied with the book. I am now going to dig into Cape Cod, but the same author.

a family saga told in parallel histories of the early 19th and the mid to late 20th centuries, spanning six generations. historic boston makes for a prominent backdrop for an elaborately plotted metropolitan treasure hunt doomed by a fatal curse. contrivances aside, an entertaining, nearly folkloric tale.

A reader's unfamiliarity with jazz does not detract from the value of this book. As a neophyte jazz listener I was introduced to Morton, Coltrane, Monk and Coleman from reading Williams' descriptions of their work and wondering "what does that SOUND like," then buying the records to hear (and decide) for myself. This is one of the most focused introductions to pre-1965 jazz you will find, because it is about the music, not sociology, biographical trivia, or amusing anecdotes.
Williams' preoccupation is with form, both in composition and improvisation. He shows how great jazz musicians demonstrate a strong sense of structure, (whether consciously or unconsciously), in their work, and how later musicians have built on the work of earlier players. In other words, these guys aren't just up there blowing a bunch of notes, they are creating art based on form and tradition in a similar and equal way to "classical" music.

Published in book form in 1970, Williams's study now seems critically unfashionable by arguing that jazz develops through the work of its composers (eg. Morton, Ellington, Monk) and its improvisers (Armstrong, Young. Parker, Coltrane, Coleman); it also concentrates on formal changes in the music rather than offering cultural, sociological or biographical analysis. But this is still the most intelligent, instructive, readable and stimulating book on jazz from New Orleans to free jazz to date. If you want to read superb, no-nonsense descriptions of individual jazz sides and get a meaningful sense of how musicians, individual tracks and the main movements of jazz inter-relate, this is the book for you.

I have found Williams to be a very perceptive guide to a wide range of composers and musicians. His judgments usually seem to be right on the money and his writing is quite clear and not at all aimed at some elite of jazz initiates (not that there's anything wrong with assuming your audience knows something - there's no imperative for authors to pitch every book at tyros, as much as certain readers seem to think that it's an outrage when they don't understand something they've read).

As a kid, I read this book over and over, soaking up the volumes of information. The reading is pretty dry, but the story covered is fascinating. Perhaps one thing that made it interesting was reading about the person who bought it for me - my grandfather. He was pleased with how he had been interviewed and, of course, thought they could have said more about his area of study!

There are countless books covering the PC revolution from about the 1970's and onwards, but not very many that carefully cover the saga of the 1800's and onward! This book does an excellent job at capturing what happened in the realm of computing from Babbage's work all the way up to what began the downfall of the mainframe to the minis.

I recently finished this book and "Engines of the Mind : The Evolution of the Computer from Mainframes to Microprocessors" by Joel N. Shurkin. Both are attempts at writing a detailed history of the development of the computer and the events surrounding it, and I must admit that I found "Computer" much more entertaining than Shurkin's text.

The difference between the two books is very slight, however, it is significant. "Computer" walks us through the work of Charles Babbage and carries us through the backrooms of large businesses at the turn of the 19th century. The authors discuss the work and lives of the people that were the first 'computers' working all day long to finish calculations that were used in business, and then for the calculation of artillery tables in the world wars. It was the replacement of these workers and their omissive errors and necessarily slow speed and development time that drove the development of the huge mainframes that would be developed by the military. The authors do a great job of walking through the history of the early computer companies, especially Hollerith's Tabulating Machine Co., now IBM, and National Cash Register. The role that these two companies played in increasing the public's reliance and trust in machines was a key enabler of the computer revolution. The authors then take us through to modern times and we follow the ultra-competitive computer industry through wave after wave of consolidation and rapid technological innovation. This book also shows us a slight glimpse of the business forces behind the development of the transistor, and how this invention would wind up changing the world.

I could not have enjoyed this book more. Of the two, it definitely did the best job of focusing on the industry and economic changes that have led us to the modern computer age. The annecdotes and writing style of the authors is well-suited to the material and I very highly recommend this book. I also recommend the other book as well - I believe that if read together (with some time to digest in between them) they do a great job of painting the picture of a fascinating development of one of the most important technological changes in the history of man.

Although there is no doubt in my mind that Patton is one of the most brilliant generals of 20th century USA, Blumenson seems to be a bit biased towards this controversial figure. He rationalizes all of the various controversies that surrounded Patton to put Patton in the best light. There is no controversy, or 'dirt' dug up on Patton here. Otherwise a fairly quick and very interesting examination of the life of Patton.

For readers who want a top-notch biography of Patton without committing to an 800-page or 1000-page tome, this is the book. Blumenson makes excellent use of Patton's personal letters, especially those to Patton's wife, to reveal the human side of his tough-as-nails persona. Patton with nervous indigestion? Patton feeling worthless and inferior? Who would have guessed! Highly recommended for those interested in historic figures and military history, but who don't want to get bogged down in minutae such as detailed battlefield tactics. This book focuses on the man, as it should, and not so much on the wars that made his career. That being said, my only complaint is that for the chapters about actual warfare the book could have used some basic large-scale maps of North Africa and Western Europe, especially France, showing the route of Patton's advances and major battles. I sometimes felt lost as Patton rolled through one village after another to attack the enemy.

I saw the movie with George C Scott, and was inspired to learn more about Patton, and this was the first book I picked up. It turns out that this was the right one, as it is fast reading, relatively short, and gives a good overview of the man behind the legend. I feel that the author is objective, and is not biased, which must be hard. He talks about Patton's weaknesses as well as his strengths. He even discussess Patton's later years when he became delusional and described the Jewish people as "lower than animals". I particularly liked the end, where it states that if Patton had lived, he would not be the legend that he is today. I have since read "The last days of Patton", an entire novel, which is only covered here in one short chapter. Of course, this is not a bad thing if you have not read a Patton book before. I HIGHLY recommend this one as a first Patton book to read or give as a gift to a friend.