This is a straight reprint of the original...they actually photographed the pages instead of having it re-typeset, thank god...and all the David Stone Martin illustrations are intact.

This is THE classic on jazz music and writing. Crazy stories, crazy times, with the unbelievable spinner of tales Jelly Roll holding the floor. Lomax could have just printed Jelly's comments verbatim and this would've been great, but he went to the trouble of tracking down a bunch of people who knew Jelly or were otherwise around New Orleans in the early daze, and this added detail spices the pot considerably. Alan Lomax's own commentary and observations are witty, charming, and spot on.

This edition is made definitive by a scholarly afterword bringing the reader fully up-to-date on modern Jelly Roll research. Quite a few pertinent details are now known that weren't when Lomax was writing this.

Up there with Mezz Mezzrow's "Really the Blues" as essential an text in the American music pantheon.

This is one of the rare books for it can be enjoyed by just about anyone who picks it up. Its the amazing account of the life of Jelly Roll Morton, one of the best jazz pianists of all time. Though a braggart and troubled man, he created some of the very best pieces of jazz. The book goes into his life from his childhood and his time working at Storyville to the very troubled end in the early forties. You learn about his family, his troubled relationships with Anita and Mabel and how he went from being wildly successful to dying virtually forgotten. Voodoo, New Orleans, jazz and Creole culture, its all here.

Written with flair and never boring, Mr. Jelly Roll is a book that you will read more than once. Its a look at a legend and a glimpse into a world we can only know of through books and music. Get this if you want a good read and a look at Mr. Morton's life. A true classic.

Alan Lomax interviewed Jelly Roll while doing an extensive set of recordings shortly before Morton's death. He followed up with a number of interviews with people who knew Jelly Roll. Lomax did a fabulous job of keeping himself out of the way while letting the often colorful information from the interviews tell the story of Jelly's part in the birth of jazz, a story with triumphs, massive ego and ultimate decline. I read a library copy and am buying a copy for a present.

this is an excellent compilation of stories about hippies and their adventures. i highly recommend it.

What was it like in the sixties? Have you ever wondered this? Even if you lived through the sixties. A collection of stories, some sad, some weird, some gross, and some crazy. This book will take you back. The stories are anywhere from a few lines long to a few pages. A truly amazing book, that not only will you enjoy, but will force on your friends to enjoy

I was given the opportunity to catalog Dr. Gentry's herbarium collection at the Desert Botanical Garden in 1987-88. I haven't seen the new edition mentioned here, but read the original work at the time I was cataloging his herbarium specimens. Through it, I was able to share his experience as an explorer in the spirit of John Wesley Powell, someone who knew that the American southwest is best delineated by watersheds, not along false lat/long lines. I met Dr. Gentry a couple of times, and remember the occasions well. Last time I saw him, when I was cataloging his collection, I overheard a conversation between him and a consultant for the Fort McDowell Indian Community. The consultant was asking about desert-adapted crop plants. Dr. Gentry went into great detail describing many desert plants suited to agriculture - tepary beans, jojoba, Lippia (Mexican oregano), agave, chiltepines, gum arabic, etc. I learned a lot just by eavesdropping. The consultant listened, but did not hear the words. He recommended that the Fort McDowell people plant cotton. Not because it was best suited to desert agriculture - far from that. They planted cotton because it needs vast quantities of water. They did not want the best desert-adapted crops. What they wanted, instead, was the best crop for wasting water, so that they could establish valid rights to the water. Worse, I watched them clear off vast acreages of mesquite forests to make room for the water-wasting cotton crop. The Hopi call this koyaanisqatsi. This book should help folks in southwestern north America realize that we have a bounteous resource, if we can only learn to use it.

Located in a transition zone between the Sonoran Desert and the tropics,this region is well known for its biodiversity, thanks to a 1942 study by botanist Howard Scott Gentry. Revision of his classic work began before his death in 1993. For researchers, this is a must-read book. It provides a clear overview of botanical studies of the Rio Mayo, a contemporary view of the vegatation, excerpts from the original text and an annotated list of plants.

This edition of the Holocaust by Bea Stadtler is an amazing book. It is great for young adults and children. It really opens their eyes to the horrific and horrendous time in our history and at the same time, makes you proud to know that books like this are being written by amazing authors such as Bea Stadtler!

What a wonderful and enthrilling book. Doc Martin really managed to let the reader feel like he'd be part of the whole story. From the beginning of the book the reader feels like standing right next to Stonewall Jackson, the tactical genius who rewrote military history during the Civil War. It is an absolute pleasure to feel and see the numerous photographs in the book become alive with the words of the author. The fact that beside Stonewall Jackson the book offers an exclusive view on all the other important personalities behind the scenes of the war and around the map-table makes the reader finish the book with an exhausted - because of the many details shown - but satisfied impression about this time period and it's heroes. I highly enjoyed analyzing the movements of the opposing forces on the charts and maps and I can only recommend Mr. Martin's other campaign books 'The Peninsula Campaign', 'The Chancellorville Campaign', and 'The Philadelphia Campaign', as well as 'Confederate Monuments at Gettysburg' and 'Gettysburg July 1'.

Laura C. Martin's book about Southern Garden's is published on a fine high quality paper with wonderful color photographs. All of the South's wonderful public gardens are included. The book does a fabulous job of educating the reader about the gardens but is so complete it truly serves as a travel guide for the must see gardens of the South.

This book is top quality. It is mostly a pictorial but really gives an insight as to the tone of the civil rights era. I would recommend this book highly and I bought several copies for friends. The author is well respected and is the founder of the National Civil Rights Museum.

Robert Carlsen: The War for the Heart and Soul of a Highland Maya Town, Austin: University of Texas Press, 1997.

E. Michael Mendelson writes: The subject of this extremely well written and readable book is Santiago Atitlan, the largest town of the Tzutujil Indians on one of the world's most beautiful volcanic lakes: Lake Atitlan in Guatemala. The town has long been famous with tourists and with anthropologists who have been studying it since at least the Nineteen Twenties. One of the principal deities in the Maya-Christian religious syncretism of Atitlan-the Maximon or Mam-even made Time Magazine coverage when it was attacked by Catholic clergy in the 1950s.

In a sense, the attempted conquest of the Maya and Maya resistance to it have continued from the 16th century Spanish Conquest down to the 20th century Civil War (in most ways a war against the Maya Indians) and Carlsen does a brilliant job of investigating four centuries of both continuity and change. In the last half century, a major crisis has been developing on the lake due to increased population and shortage of land. The move of so many local Maya from agriculture to commerce may be the reason why, Carlsen argues, traditional native religion-agriculture based-is having a hard time surviving against Orthodox and Charismatic Catholicism, militant Evangelical Protestantism, and contemporary media-driven culture. Commerce is not doing sufficiently well to save the town when set in the context of Guatemalan capitalism, itself vulnerable to increasing globalization. Further undermining the situation has been the Civil War, culminating in the December 2nd 1990 massacre of civilians by the Army-though local pride in forcing the Army out the town as a result of the massacre remains strong.

While this is Carlsen's main concern here (one is sure there will be further books), he manages to include a great deal of fresh and resonant information on Atiteco traditions. There is, among much else, a wonderful chapter on the central Tzutujil concept of "Flowering Mountain Earth," linking Sun, Corn, and Humans in an ideology descended straight from the great pre-Spanish classic text Popol Vuh, as well as a condensed but most insightful essay on the continuing cult of Sacred Bundles in Atitlan. Like all good anthropologists, Carlsen achieves a delicate balance between empathetic participation and objective study. His long dedication to the town is evident in the depth and warmth of his vision. The book is blessedly free of jargon and is illustrated with a wealth of excellent photographs. It cannot be too highly recommended.

This book goes a long way toward explaining CIA's intellectual and operational constipation in the 1950's through the 1970's. It follows James Jesus Angleton, who tied the Agency in knots and went so far as to privately tell the French that the CIA Station Chief in Paris was a Soviet spy, and William King Harvey, who literally carried two six-guns both in the US and overseas "because you never know when you might need them." Included in this book are some serious details about the operations against Cuba, a chapter appropriated titled "Murder Corrupts", and a good account of how Harvey, in perhaps his most important achievement, smelled out the fact that Kim Philby was indeed a Soviet spy. The concluding thought of the book is exceptional: "Immersed in duplicity and insulated by secrecy, they (Angleton and Harvey) developed survival mechanisms and behavior patterns that by any rational standard were bizarre. The forced inbreeding of secrecy spawned mutant deeds and thoughts. Loyalty demanded dishonesty, and duty was a thieves' game. The game attracted strange men and slowly twisted them until something snapped. There were no winners or losers in this game, only victims."

I knew very little about MLK and the civil rights movement before reading this book. It was a very detailed account of MLK's involvement in civil rights and his personal life. From the late 50's to his death the author tells you practically everything about his life. Though it would be easy for an author to be bias toward or against King, I felt that Garrow did a good job of just telling the story and leaving conclusions to the reader.

Although not completed I already have the idea that it should be required reading for Seniors in High School and/or a Freshman College requirement. After all it is a most significant event of modern day history along with the civil war and both world wars. David Garrow simultaneously celebrates and condemns human nature by revealing the courage and strength of Dr. King and his followers even as his wife and daughter are attacked with fire bombs by the hateful white mobs. A very compelling beginning story of Rosa Parks... the injustices and inhumane treatment she suffered at the hands of a hate filled people...sets the stage for a work that could begin a lesson in tolerance and unity for our next generations. I unfortunately believe we are still condemned to live our hateful existence in America and the world until works like this can get the attention they deserve.

First of all, this isn't a biography for the weak-hearted. It's around 1,000 pages on long. Rather than bouncing from Montgomery to Birmingham to Selma, as if the Southern Civil Rights Movement carried itself entirely on momentum, this book explores the details and compromises that went into King's political maneuverings.

Garrow is also unafraid to discuss King's frailties, implicitly positing (and answering) the question: don't a persons public actions and deeds outweigh their private shortcomings? (yes)

This is not only the best book on King that exists, it may very well be the best book on the Southern Civil Rights Movement of the 60's that exists.