This soft-cover book provides some of the most vivid color pictures of marine invertebrates that I have seen to date. However, do not expect involved explanations about each species listed. Scientific names are given for each species, but common names are not always included. Very little information given concerning how each species relates in the aquarium environment.

I only have positive thoughts about this great reference. It is simply the best book ever written on the invertebrates of the Indian Ocean and especially the Indonesian area. It is like an oversized version of Debelius` field guides,but this one truly rocks!It does not only include 1105 interesting invertebrate species,but also some great information about them. Some species are such new to science that they`ve not even been described. For example,there are 10 undescribed little octopi. If any animal are more strikingly colourfull than reef fishes,these are the ones. I love all animals but I especially like the chapters about flatworms,crustaceans,and molluscs,of which many species are new to me. I already have a great knowledge of animals for beeing such young,and this book gives me much more. When I take a trip to Thailand for the next winter,I`ll bring this book and see how many invertebrates I`ll recognize from it. Over all,this is a great book and would recommend it to any serious scientist,aquarium hobbyist,invertebrate lover,or the one that just likes strong colours. The price is high,but believe me,it`s definitly worth it!

The first approach anywhere that looks not only at scale of biodiversity loss and priorities for conservation for our often over-looked freshwater resources. This book is essential for anyone who truly cares about North America's diverse natural habitats.

The maps in the book are wonderful. They effectively convey areas which are spectacular and also the areas that are most threatened.

In the sphere of the social sciences, a long standing bias has existed against the so-called "natural sciences:" the lack of rhetorical power, and more simply, of terminological variability, has turned away sociologists, anthropologists, and historians from the literature of natural science. This bias is evident, but at base, irrational, at least by the uniform standards for scholarship that transcends disciplines. After all, the sociologist cannot simply write-off the work of the economist, just because of language.

This important work, although highly priced, must be read by social scientists as well as by natural scientists. Editor Robin Abell, with her talented staff at WWF-USA, have put together an inherently readable account of what "ecoregions" are threatened, while enumerating the attributes and possible threats to these areas. A reader, like myself, who knows little about such things , is sure to find themself surprisingly drawn to what otherwise seem like trivialities. For example, the consistent format of the volume, from section to section, provides the reader with a template, or general design, by which whole areas of geography can be understood.

And this understanding goes past the parochial association of one region with the "political unit" it is found in.

The title of this mini-review was not only meant to be teasing: it is my hope that more writers and editors adopt the style that Abell et al. have established. Perhaps then important subjects like this can climb closer to the center of the public conscience.

I was very dissapointed by David Suzuki and his biased view-points about killer whales and society. However the rest of the book, makes up for a sour start

I reckon it's the best i've ever seen, MAD

I have to say that I was disappointed with this book. It seems less about the legends about the selkie folk and more about what the author thinks he might feel about such legends---it feels removed, remote, uncommitted. If he was really on search for the truth behind the stories, he didn't seem to be searching very hard, and he didn't seem to share his results particularly successfully, and I never really felt touched by any sense of Celtic other-worldliness---and that's what I was hoping for and waiting for. The introduction by Seamus Heaney was, alas, the best part of the book...

I was fifteen when I first read this book, in 1967. I had never heard any of the Selchie legends, and I was completely enchanted by them, and by Thomson's writing. He doesn't just retell these tales; he finds those people who still tell them, and lets them speak for themselves. We hear about how they lived then, and how they live now, showing how beautiful some of the old ways were, and how sad their loss is. I have re-read it many times since and, as I get older, I find more in it that speaks to me. It should be impossible to feel nostalgia for something you have never experienced, but Thomson has managed to fill me with that emotion. I'm thrilled that it is back in print again (my copy is worn thin!) and that the celebrated poet Seamus Heaney has written the new foreword.

This is one of the most marvelous (in all senses of the word) reading experiences I've had in a long time. Thomson's book was originally published in the 1950's, but had fallen out of print and was resurrected through the efforts of Seamus Heaney, a friend of the author's who also provides a very helpful introduction. As a child, Thomson became fascinated by legends of seals who transform themselves into human beings (or vice versa), and in pursuit of this interest he traveled into remote areas of Scotland and Ireland where these legends were still part of the living folk tradition. But in the 1940's the tradition was dying out: the educational system pressured children to speak English rather than Gaelic, and listening to the radio had superseded traditional entertainments such as storytelling. Thomson's chapters depict a way of life that was already disappearing; he conveys not only the stories themselves but the entire "flavor" of the storytelling -- the people who tell them, the phraseology they use, their audiences, and the smoky cottages and fishy seaside shacks where the stories are told. His summary of the seal legends is fascinating, but the greatest pleasure of the book, for me, was its evocation of the world in which the legends arose. I can't recommend this book highly enough. (Suggested listening to accompany the final chapter: "The Song of the Seals" from Matt Molloy's album "Shadows on Stone.")

The 34th Fleet Initial Strike Team, Confederation Marine Corps, have been deployed again. This isn't a small unit assignment though, unfortunately things have gone wrong enough on Diamunde that the CMC is going to War. To provide the opening beachhead for the follow-up Army troops, against several armored battalions (read 'Tanks') that intel says aren't in the landing area. If you like the genre, this series is continuing excellently. If you're looking for the "Mobile Infantry" of Starship Troopers, don't look here. These Marines are... Marines with Blasters and better camouflage uniforms. They're still on foot, and still an elite force. If you can still find Book 1 and Book 2, they're worth reading too.

Semper Fi! Who else could have written such a compelling book except an ex-marine? The men of 3rd plantoon, Company L, 34th Fist are back and this time there fighting Tanks! Ya gotta love it. This book is filled with so much testosterone that you'll swagger when you walk. If you haven't read the previous two books you'll be able to feel your way through the book, but it's better if you read them in sequence. Nice tech in the book too, although some of it reminds me of tech from a few other books (ie. Rick Shelley's DMC series) But what are you going to do? An infantryman's wish list is probably pretty easy to guess. Buy it Now!

"Steel Gauntlet" (ISBN 0-345-42526-X) is David Sherman and Dan Cragg's third book chronicling the history of the Confederation Marine Corps' 34th Fleet Initial Strike Team (FIST) L Company Third Platoon, among the most deployed units in the Corps. The 34th FIST's mission to Wanderjahr was a success and for thwarting an attempt on the lives of one of Wanderjahr's leaders and the 34th FIST's General, Joe Dean and Rackman Claypoole were promoted to Lance Corporal. Diamunde, a resource-rich planet, has for the fourth time in Confederation history become a trouble spot requiring the use of military force to restore order. This time the Confederation gathers together a force consisting of six of the thirty-six Marine FISTs, the 34th is one the first units to land, two Army Corps, and a large Fleet to end the ambitions of the man who has taken control of Diamunde by force. The major problem that face the Marines, Army, and Navy units is having to relearn how to deal with Main Battle Tanks and other armored fighting vehicles, which have not been seen on the battlefield for 300 years. Before leaving Thorsfinni World to Diamunde, the 34th FIST's commanding officer makes sure that all his troops have been promoted and received all awards due them, including Charlie Bass who is once again promoted to Gunnery Sergeant. This mission will test the skills and bravery of not just the men of L Company Third Platoon, but to all the troops involved on both sides of the conflict. David Sherman and Dan Cragg do a great job in describing the fears and bravery of the infantry having to go against tanks on the battlefield. Further, this book does a good job in blending fact and the probable future of the infantry and of tanks in modern warfare.

This book is one of the best I've been able to find on sharks, and I could not put it down! I must have read it over three times already just to remember all the information it contains!

It has detailed pictures and information on shark anatomy, favored myths about sharks, factual accounts of shark attacks, some information on other animals such as crocs and killer whales, and xavier puts forth several facts and theories about shark behavior. In the back it also contains an encyclopedia of sharks.

This is not a book for those with weak stomachs, since the pictures are very graphic of those attacked by sharks, even though most of which were only 'investigative bites'(and people get struck by lightning more often than attacked by sharks).

Since it was originally copyrighten in 1991, there are one or two new shark facts that are missing in this book(as opposed to the many facts that are usually missing in other shark books), but this is still the best for its time, and one of the best informative books for the present.

I would suggest this book for anyone deeply interested in sharks. It answers alot of questions and asks many other thought-provoking ones, keeping the reader hooked from cover to cover.

Although known as the swimming death of the seas Xavier Maniguet ties to explain the truth about sharks. He also tries to close a gap between this perfect fitted animal and its status of a killer-machine. Especially by facing the reader with some horrifying photographs of human shark-attack victims. But the book also shows in a scientific and breathtaking way the other strange side of these misunderstood animals and let sharks not look like a man-eating machine but also as an important member in our ecosystem. For those who are really interested in sharks this paper is a MUST! And for me who faced a real Great White once in South Africa it is even more than that.

Maniguet covers just about every aspect of sharks, and from a perspective of human contact. One long chapter covers shark attacks on humans, while the rest of the book covers anatomy, behaviour, and human interface, with some attacks interspersed. The book is technical in parts, but not too much so. I was looking for a factual book on sharks and shark attacks, not sensational but not boring, and this was perfect.

I am a big California rivers environmental history buff, and I found this book to be too similar to his publication "Gold v. Grain" which debuted over 40 years ago. This book is essentially an extension of "Gold v. Grain" that covers the 1960s-1980s. Much of the earlier chapters are virtually cut and pasted verbatim from his previous book. Despite these criticisms, it remains (to my knowledge) the most comprehensive book written about the Sacramento River to date. Until a better book on the Sac comes along, this is probably the one to read for factual information, and for more conceptual/abstract stimulation, I recommend "Organic Machine" by Richard White.

If you've ever taken a guided factory tour, you know the difference between someone reciting memorized facts and someone who can call upon a deep reservoir of knowledge, accumulated over a lifetime, for information that will illuminate a particular subject. Mr. Kelley clearly belongs in the latter class. Reading his book, it is apparent that we are only scratching the surface of what this remarkable historian knows about the complex interplay of history, politics, personality and nature that conspired to produce the water system northern California has today.

The story of California water is fascinating, although perhaps only of real interest to Californians. Nevertheless, even if only for that audience, Mr. Kelley has written an entirely readable, yet simultaneously scholarly volume. Anyone interested in an introduction to the state of northern California's water situation should begin with this book.

In a general sense, however, this book is also about changing political and sociological trends in America beginning around 1850. The focus is on flooding in the Sacramento Valley, and its battles between gold miners and valley farmers, or between Republican engineers and Democratic populists, but parallels are probably found elsewhere in our country during the same period of history. I enjoyed this book tremendously.

For a native of the flood-prone Sacramento Valley, Battling The Inland Sea is the bible. Nowhere else is the history of a fitful battle against the annual floodwaters unleashed on the Sacramento Valley by the powerful Sierra Nevada watersheds captured so comprehensively. Kelley, however, informs us in a style that is relevant and entertaining. The valley resident treasures it for its history of the Big Fight. Political scientists enjoy it for its history and the lively way Kelley uses the fight over flooding in Northern California as a study in California and national politics.

I like this book because it has bright colors and great illustrations. It shows kids when you share with other kids that they will somehow repay you. It also hints to your children that you can be yourself, and don't change for other people. It's fairly easy. I would recommend it to this book to kids ages 3-9. It's a very cute book.

My grand daughter just loved this book. She is almost 5. I plan on getting more rainbow fish book for her.