The title said so. This is the guide for writing statement. Unlike other books, this book won't show the typical format. This book, however, shows the "real" statement of applicant who success. Many examples are interesting. Moreover, the guideline of recommend letter request is very good. It's not only for people who ask letter of recommendation, but also for the recommendation letter writter can see what they should said to thier students. I disagree with other reviewer that this book is not limited only Law, Business, and Medical school. It's true that the title said it and the examples are to Law, Business and Medical school. However, if you read it carefully, many examples and guidelines can be used in other school as well. This book is well written and organized. However, due to limited resource, example and guideline, this book is only in 3 stars.

I find the previous review disturbing. It is obviously the editor or author of the book giving themselves kudos.

I liked the book. It made me realize that the personal statement should not only be a self-marketting piece, but also be entertaining enough as to not get sorted into the circular file.

Every year, college students across the country prepare to enter the workforce or graduate school. One important part of this process is writing a personal statement that describes and applicant's goals, experiences, and future plans. Mark Alan Stewart is an expert on graduate level entrance exams. His book, Perfect Personal Statements, provides information and advice for college students seeking admission to graduate and professional schools.
Stewart's book is easy to read and understand. He answers the common questions like, "How will my essay be evaluated?" and "Should I discuss that glaring blemish in my past, or should I ignore it?" Stewart also provides students with minor details, like how to dress for an in-person interview. Finally, the advice from medical, law, and business school experts could prove to be helpful. The experts provide specific information about what they look for in an application. Each type of school has different standards and it is beneficial to know what admission offices across the country like to see.
College students applying to graduate schools tend to be very busy. They don't have time to read a long and confusing book. Mark Alan Stewart seems to have kept this in mind. He has packed a lot of information into only 114 pages. The book is also divided into sections that allow the reader to quickly find information on certain subjects. Stewart's book helps to simplify the application process and provides students with strategies to prevent them from feeling overwhelmed and frustrated.

Subtitled "Selected Lectures of Alan Watts," Out of the Trap is not so much a book as it is a transcript of recorded lectures Mr. Watts gave in the 1960s and early 1970s. Edited and published as it was in 1985 by its creator's son, Mark Watts, this printed version of spoken words might best be titled "Things Better Said Elsewhere."

This is not one of the better representation of Watts' extensive works for the simple reason that the presentation doesn't survive the translation from the spoken to the written word. There are passages here that go on and on ad nauseam only to make a minor point which was better explained in one of Watts' written works.

On top of this the editor, in preparing these lecture transcripts, let go some awkward wording and phrases in favor of preserving "the flavor and content" of the original talks. Unfortunately, all this accomplishes is to further engage the reader to reread some sections in an effort to try to recover the meaning in which they were originally spoken. This not only slows down the reading process but ads to the growing frustration the reader has in slogging through this material.

For the reader who is familiar with Watts' work, these transcripts cover little new ground, and in the end manage to restate, in a not altogether easily understandable colloquial language, favorite themes and topics Watts has covered elsewhere.

If you happen to come across this book in a library and you're wondering which of the seven lectures to dig into first, the last three are perhaps the best. These include "Historical Buddhism," "Philosophy of Nature," and "Tribute to Carl Jung."

For those of us who are Watts enthusiasts, we enjoy reading his works for his unusual ability to get to the essence of a point in an enlightening and sometimes entertaining way. Out of the Trap, however, provides few of these reading experiences.

These transcripts of Watts' talks would have been best left in their original form, as taped recordings, than to have been put on display in black and white where the flavor of the original presentation is missing as well as, perhaps, some of the fun.

I was told that "Out of the Trap" was not as good as some of the other books Watts wrote, but i found it totally enlightening. Watts had done more for me than any number of so called "gurus" (I dont think Alan liked being called a guru) but if the shoe fits (its probably ugly hahahaah)i would recommend the purchase of this book to fill out your watts library, if you have one going, like me..unfortunaley some of Alan's books are out of print and I just dont know why. Have fun with it..relish the phrases and immerse yourself into the philosophy of Alan Watts.. thank you and good day (Cleedy has left the building)

This book was very basic, but easy to follow. It was used in the classroom as an introduction to the life of Alexander the Great. The students were able to follow the story and wanted to learn more based on the brief discriptions of the places introduced in the story. I would recommend this book for a basic introduction to the life of Alexander the Great.

This books probably isn't the best place to start for someone just becoming interested in either Alan Watts or in Eastern thought in general. However, for osmeone who is interested in Alan Watts, it is invaluable. It shows him just coming into his own as a writer - most of them were written when he was in his late teens and early twneties, and shows him strruggling to devlop his style and the finer points of his philosophy. THe introductory material is especially helpful

Hubert a young boy wants to see the circus, buthe has no money and his father wont give him any.So he goes outside and kicks his soccer ball into the garden of Mrs.Pomfrey-Parkinson ,shes supposedly to be a bad temperated,loud,unreasonable woman,and she has told every kid in the neighborhood not to go into her garden for any reason.So he just goes into her garden anyways and tries to get his ball out of her garden, but unfortunately she sees him and he runs into his house and leaves his soccer ball behind.The next day he sees a help wanted add on the newspaper for the circus, and tells his friend Slider that he wants that job. So being made to he goes and makes a cannonball for him to fly out of just so he has some experience. but he falls into the roof of Mrs.Pomfrey-Parkinsons shed, the door is locked and he cant get out of there. He finds his ball and sees no garden tools

Talking Zen is not a book written by Alan Watts. It is a book which was pieced together out of lectures and talks Watts gave at various times in his life ranging from the age of eighteen to the age of fifty-six, a span of thirty-eight years. Therefore, dear prospective reader, do not expect it to be as disciplined and tightly woven as his written pieces.

As a writer, Watts can be devastatingly perceptive and magical. He can dazzle a reader out of his usual ruts of thinking and suggest a previously unimagined through virtually inspired way to look at a mundane fact of life. When he is writing at his best, he is writing with a passion - or as much passion as a transplanted Englishman can - and a fervor to communicate an insight he has discovered. And he writes in such a way as to attempt to communicate the same feeling of epiphany he had when he first realized the insight he's writing about. So that the reader can experience, in his own time, the same feeling of joyous discovery as Watts first did.

All this is by way of saying that if you are expecting the present book to dazzle you, you may be in for a big surprise. This is not to say that Talking Zen is without its moments. There some brilliant moments in it. But you have to be prepared to search them out and to wade through a lot of dross before finding them.

Talking Zen is not the same as writing Zen, and therein lies the difference. Because the medium of speech is different from the medium of the written word the element of discipline is sometimes discarded in favor of flowing with the moment. This is to say that in writing one can more fully focus on developing an idea to its fullest potential, whereas in speaking one is "playing to the crowd," and some of the development can be left by the wayside.

Of the nine pieces on display in the present book, the ones which come off the best in written form are the ones which were prepared ahead of time and were given as structured lectures rather than as extemporaneous talks. Of these there are three, which comprise the first three chapters of the book.

The first of these, entitled "Picture Without a Frame," was crafted by an eighteen year old Watts. When one reads it, it is difficult to imagine its author was only eighteen when it was composed because it reads like the composition of a much older, and wiser, person. Without going into too much detail, "Picture..." can be summed up by the following sentence: "To know the universe in terms of nothing but frames is almost exactly what Indian philosophy means by maya, the idea that all such knowledge is in some sense an illusion." There is more to be culled from this piece than just this sentence, and those who are interested will be certain to dig deeper in order to uncover the other nuggets of value which make up this essay.

The second piece, entitled "The Psychology of Acceptance: The Reconciliation of the Opposites in Eastern Thought and in Analytical Psychology," was composed in 1939 by a slightly more mature twenty-four year old Alan Watts, and was delivered before the Analytical Psychology Club in New York. Quite a daunting undertaking for a 24 year old, but Watts was up for the challenge. The piece is about creating a state of mind or attitude of acceptance regarding the darker side of reality, or rather those events which cause us psychological pain, and a method for conquering such pain in our lives. It is extremely insightful and, as with the previous piece, it also is a joy and a revelation to read.

The third piece, with the improbably title "Mythological Motifs in Modern Science," is another lecture text probably given in the early 1940s. In it Watts examines how science is "Western man's attempt to liberate himself from myth, from the so-called 'pathetic fallacy' of constructing the world in his own unconscious image." He spends the rest of the piece suggesting "that this attempt [at liberation from myth] is impossible and absurd." And ends up by demonstrating that "Western [scientists'] concern for the control of nature is slipping over into Eastern man's concern for controlling the mind. We are now beginning to attack maya in both directions, and for this reason books on the philosophy of science become more and more reminiscent of Indian metaphysics." There is more, but you'll just have to read it, and enjoy it, for yourselves.

For the reader who is discovering Watts for the first time I cannot recommend this book. You would be better served by picking up The Wisdom of Insecurity or The Way of Zen or Psychotherapy East & West or even The Meaning of Happiness. These are works which were composed and thought out as books in the first instance, and therefore are more fully explanatory of their subject matter as well as a better introduction to Watts' unique description of the indescribable.

On the other hand, if you, as a reader, have been around the block once or twice before with Watts and are familiar with his main thematical interests, Talking Zen may contain some additional insights not touched on in some of his more familiar published works. But be prepared to do some slogging through the muck - through his extamporaneous meanderings, expecially in the latter two thirds of the book - to get at these newly offered gems.

If you are struggling with the Logic Games section of the LSAT, as I am, you might want to stay away from this book. Perhaps it was designed for someone already scoring fairly well and was looking to add a few more points to their score, because it certainly does not cater to the individual trying to learn the basic techniques in solving logic games. I cannot imagine anyone diagramming in a timely manner using the methodology contained within. The structure of warm up exercises followed by mini-games eventually leading up to practice games should work but doesn't. I never grasped how the warm-ups tied into the overall scheme of the game. The explanations following each section were short, at times awkward, and narrow in scope. The sections and explanations just did not seem to build off of each other. Not a friendly environment for someone trying to learn. However, if you are looking for a source for all of the different types of logic games, this might be for you. It contains an incredible variety of game types. You just need to be fairly efficient with them before you get started on this book.

Are the logic puzzles your Achille's heel on the LSAT? Then this is the book for you.

Work through the problems in this book, and the actual questions on the test will seem much easier. The examples in this book are much more difficult than the actual test. I do not think you will ever learn all the catagories of questions and identify each one definitively, but that is not the point of your studies. This book will challenge you and make the process of thinking through the logic puzzles much easier.

The book only gets 4 stars because it surprisingly contains several typos and one wrong answer. I would expect a study guide to have no mistakes.

This book had a definite impact on my score. If you take the free LSAT practice exam and score less than 150, then this book is probably not for you; purchase a more generalized study guide. This book is for the people that want to get the highest scores and accepted at the best rated law schools.

I used this book as part of my preparation for the analytical section, which I felt was my weakest area. Some of the early "challenging" logic problems in the book are indeed just that -- MUCH harder than anything I saw on the actual GRE.

Kaplan and The Princeton Review also put out good books on the general GRE.

The key to acing this test is to read the logic questions very slowly before diving into the problems. This book provides ample practice for learning this skill.

Beware of errors (as another reader has mentioned), later on in the book. However, once you get to the point where you can catch errors in the explanation's logic, you should give yourself a pat on the back!

This is the worst java book I've ever read. The book is unorganized and the content is not suitable for the beginner at all.

The companion CD-ROM is useless.

If the authors would like to publish the new version for JDK 1.2, there will be a lot of works they need to get accomplished.

Simple words from me.... Don't buy this book.

Covers alot of fancy staff but has a great lack of contents. It seems like the author has rushed through the book just to fill it out with the Java 1.1 features and forgot to describe the import basics behind the language. There's now way you're gonna be a Java guru by reading this book!

It is very thorough. Almost everything important about java is in there including JDBC, JNI, Java Beans, Servlets, security management, even the specification of the virtual machine and most is explained well understandble. It is the best java book I ever saw!

I was looking for a book that would describe the HTML language and more importantly discuss writing CGI programs that interact with HTML. This book was not what I needed.

A simple search of the 16-page index shows the problems. There are no entries for 'cookies' or 'refresh' (as in client-side pull refresh), and the FORM HTML tag has a total of 3 pages referenced (hardly enough room to describe how to write forms). So if you're looking for detailed technical material, this isn't the book for you.

This book is useful as a broad-reaching primer about the internet, newsgroups, VMRL and many other obscure (and outdated) topics. But I think you would still do better elsewhere.

For a book that is supposed to be about HTML and CGI, this book spends most of the time talking about everythign BUT HTML and CGI. In fact, if you want to find a discussion of HTML and CGI in this book, you'll have to go lookiing for it.

I think the only reason this book sells is because people confuse this horrible book (HTML & CGI Unleashed) with a good book (HTML, Java, CGI, VRML, SGML Web Publishing Unleashed).

This book on the cover seems to say that it will help you learn more HTML and CGI. It does show you some good code but I think this book is more of a reading book then a reference. In the beginning it tells you everything about the web you can think of. There is a lot of information that I did not know, but this book takes you where you have never been. I would recommend this book to the accomplished HTML person with medium CGI experience.

While the title suggests a focus on the more challenging math facing those taking standardized tests, having read this book and several others cover-to-cover, I felt it missed the mark. It was less comprehensive and less exhaustive than similar books, particularly on the really tough questions/topics. For example, in the area of Combinations/Permutations the book fails to provide the general formula used for combination problems. Instead, it suggests the reader should make a list of all the possible combinations. Hardly a sound strategy for a 'smart test taker'. However, the greatest shortcoming of this book is the abundance of careless mistakes. In many cases these are obvious typos ( = in the place of a -) but other times terms are excluded from equations, and in some cases decimal points and digits are missing. Some pages are out of control, like page 195, where one can find no less than five glaring errors. These errors are a real frustration and will slow the readers progress. The bottom line this book does not go further than others on the tough math questions and sloppy editing waists the readers time!

I haven't read this book but I am familiar with their high school prep book for catholic students. There are at least 100 incorrect answers in the book. They even give an incorrect formula for the area of a circle. If a student really uses this book they will miss every math question that involves circles! I would have put this review under the title of that book but the new edition is not out yet, and its not taking reviews. Get any book but these!

This book is terrible. In addition to the many errors it is far too simplistic. I will be returning this book. Arco should be ashamed. I wish I had seen Eric's review before i bought this book.