This book is very useful in designing realistic components of an in-basket evaluation. The in-basket evaluation attempts to produce a realistic sample of the activities that the candidate will encounter in the job he/she is being evaluated for. In order to produce a such a sample the individual elements used in the in-basket must be convincing. In this respect this book is very helpful. It draws together theoretical and practical considerations in a useful way. It provides a good range of well-considered suggestions. It is a helpful manual for those who wish to design in-basket exercises, or for those who want to refine existing material. The writing is clear and the ideas are practical. All in all, a good basic book for student, educator or human resource prfessional.

Philosophy commentator William Barrett has done great service... yet potential disservice...to students interested in History of Philosophy and Post-Modernist Existentialism in particular. Disservice is the grandiose title of the essay: WHAT IS EXISTENTIALISM? An introduction to nihilist ontology of Martin Heidegger is topic of the book (Barrett's source is Heidegger's magnum opus,BEING and TIME). Incipience of Existential philosophy in Western tradition is rooted in writings of St.Augustine.DECONSTRUCTIONIST philosophies of the West[beginning Post Modernism:the present anti-epoch, rejecting LOGOS as found in classical Greek and Christian metaphysics;as well as tenets of Western Enlightenment; and the Romantic Reaction(intially minus Occult themes and ramifications)]are nominally credited to writings of Kierkegaard and Nietzsche. Why Professor Barrett didn't entitled his book "HEIDEGGER:The Anti-Aristotle?" (or other "clever" formulation)is hardly Beyond Good & Evil. It may,however, be radically misguiding/misleading to novices seeking foundational background in existential thought. Heidegger's philosophy hardly comprises,in my estimate, fundamental Existential themes. His background as Nazi is certainly problematic "coloring"(as Phenomenologist-mentor Husserl might affect).

Having cautioned, the book is excellent explication of Heideggerian jargon and ideas on Being qua being. Barrett is thankfully clear discussing Dasein(man); es gibt(TIME concept/formulation);and Das Dasein de Seindes: Ereignis(the anti-Event/Being or NOTHING-NESS)from which existents...including human beings...emanate and Death consumed. Ideas such as SORGE, existential anxiety which Heidegger conceptualizes as "Care", are defined with clarity rarely found in scholarship which tends to be as obscurantist as Heidegger himself. Heidegger's notorious association with Nazism is almost ignored. In WHAT IS EXISTENTIALISM? I believe this lacuna/gap commendable and helpful because it permits a reader to acquaint himself with difficult terminology allowing informed pursuit into ideas and ideology of one of the most renowned and DANGEROUS thinkers of the 20th century. This is a good book...because of decisive lack of pretention...about a man who may be a very BAD(as in malus) philosopher.(4 & 1/2 stars)

Lord of the Flies is a story about an adventure which turns from an unexpected exciting episode to a bitter, sour dream come true. Although the scene focuses on children,it is a brilliant portrait of adult behavior too. The part about the Lord of the Flies still sends chills down my spine. Golding actually manages to confuse the reader just like the characters are supposed to be in the story. A must read for anyone who also likes stuff like Orwell, Greene and the like

Pincher Martin and Free Fall are good too but the Lord of the Flies walks away with all prizes, a simple story well-told.

I teach French for an American university and have just completed the first term using this text for a beginning French class. The students, who evaluate the text as well as the class and instructor, found this text to be awkward, virtually incomprehensible in places, poorly organized, and patronizingly "dumbed down" while simultaneously hitting them with passages and exercises that were too complicated or too vague. For example, the vocabulary in each chapter is presented without any sort of thematic approach--in other words, the new words are simply listed alphabetically, without categorization ("Foods," "Activities," "Places in a Town"--none of that here!). As an instructor, I found the CD sections to be virtually worthless--well over the level of beginners and under the interest level of advanced students. Supporting materials, when present, were similarly lacking. I ended up cutting and pasting from high school texts and supplementing the entire course, with only a nod to the "official" Paroles text! My adult students need the heavy supplementation; they found the Paroles text grossly insufficient for study outside of class. This text should be withdrawn from circulation.

I was very favorably impressed with the organization and variety of this book, as well as the fact that it accommodates the different styles of learning among students. French is my sixth language (counting English).

This text follows several parallel learning approaches. In each chapter, there is a section emphasizing conversation, there are notes directing the student to "discover" grammatical themes and irregularities, the usual snippets of history and culture, comments on usage, a brief vocabulary, an English discussion of the language lesson (like a plain-language discussion of what's going on from one English speaker to another). Each chapter closes with a condensed technical grammar for later reference and review.

Besides the diversity of learning approaches it supports, I especially like the fact that this book includes reading that is an uncomfortable stretch. These excerpts require deduction of the message from context. I'm sure students will complain loudly about the "unfairness" of having to guess the meaning of words that aren't formally defined anywhere, but face it -- intelligent guessing is the skill most required by someone who tries to use a language in real life. Why shouldn't it be taught?

As I say, I'm a bit of a language nut, and have several shelves of texts in various languages (Russian, German, Latin, Attic Greek). This is one of very few that actually teaches the skills needed for ordinary conversation, listening to the radio, and reading Le Monde.

I have taken many language classes, and they usually go something like this: teacher pulls out a puppet, the puppet says a few words, the students repeat them, and then at home we fill in a wroksheet for 10 minutes adn go back to whatever else we were doing, no more knowledgeable then before. This book is very refreshing- it is challenging but expalins the grammar step by step and directly so the students don't miss anything and can really understand. Also, the grammar pages make it easy to pre-read and review. The culture lessons make learning more exciting and make us use the French- which was my point for taking the class. To be able to use it in real situations! With this book I can learn French at a college level, the same way I learn math or econ or anything else. French doesn't have to be slow, easy and filled with puppet shows that leave you confused. I learned so much using Paroles (more than I did with HS Spanish) and I'm really glad that my university uses it. Merci!

William Martin's With God on Our Side is a good and detailed history of Conservative Christians' attempt to involve themselves in American politics. This is only one dimension of the movement, and his focus on this dimension leaves one feeling that the movement is primarily political. I also did not find the book as objective as other reviewers or as clear. While the depiction of events is objective, Martin's commentary is not. He does not believe that religious groups should involve themselves in politics. In many ways, the book is a warning to future generation of Conservative Christians. It provides many examples of how the attempt has blown up in Conservative Christians' faces. What is unclear in the book is the line between social conservatives and religious conservatives. While the line is fine, Martin's approach is at times simplistic. The groups often work together and share common causes, but they are ultimately different and have different views of America's future. To his credit, Martin usually makes this clear when discussing the involvement of radical groups like the KKK. If you keep the above in mind, the book can be rewarding!

This book is pretty solid in documenting the history of the religious right in America. Although much of the focus is on the last half of the 20th century, the introduction and the epilogue give some background on the interaction between Christianity and government in the previous period.

I haven't seen the PBS television series that this book accompanies, so some things in the book probably impact a little differently than seeing video or audio accounts, especially so in a movement that makes so much use of oral speeches and broadcasts. But at least in the written account, the balance is kept between fair treatment and criticism of the different elements of the movement. This is no easy feat, given the sometimes inflammatory rhetoric both by the Christian right and against it.

The chapters of the book appear to reflect an episode format, with varying types of focal points telling the story in a roughly chronological order. One chapter profiles a person (--Billy Graham) while other chapters highlight in depth a local conflict (such as the battle over sex education in Anaheim and the school book battle in West Virginia), while others talk primarily about the formation of the major activist groups (Moral Majority, and then later the Christian Coalition). One trend appears to be that as the Judeo-Christian culture lost its monopoly in the political process, the struggle has been for the Christian right (in whatever form it took at the time) to keep its place at the table while keeping to its core values. Even at the end of the book (which ends with mid-1996), this conflict was not resolved.

The book also focuses on personal profiles of the individuals in the involvement, which also provides some more depth about what many people might lump together as monolithic. The differences between Jerry Falwell's background (the rural son of an alcoholic father) and Pat Robertson (the son of a U.S. senator) are pointed out in light of the interaction (or lack thereof) at certain points when they would be considered natural allies on the surface. And at a time in the 1980s when most Christian preachers and conservative commentators were considering the possibility of quarantining or tatooing AIDS patients, one televangelist said:

"How sad that we as Christians, who ought to be the salt of the earth, and we, who are supposed to be able to love everyone, are afraid so of an AIDS patient that we will not go up and put our arm around them and tell them that we care."

The televangelist? Tammy Faye Bakker.

For those seeking to learn about the movement without the whitewash or the ridicule that accompanies most assessments of the Christian right, this book is the best place to start.

William Martin's With God on Our Side offers a sympathetic yet objective look at the evolution of Christian fundamentalism in America over the last 50 years, culminating in the rise of the Christian Coalition and the Religious Right. Written in conjunction with a PBS series of the same title, Martin's book contains both a detailed overview and plenty of first-hand accounts of events that have transformed what was once a politically non-existent group into one of the most important voting blocs in America. No matter which side of the fence you fall on, this book is a must for students of both religion and politics.

Verdun 1916: They Shall Not Pass is written in the standard Osprey manner and is an example of the linmitations of the series. The book is so full of information and troop movements that it is next to imppossible to follow without a map in front of you. The maps provided by the author are not a substitue. As a result the death and slaughter that was caused by the battle is completly lost on the reader.

When not caught up in the details the book is very good. The chapters on the background, leaders and the armies are good examples of why Osprey is so sucessful. That made the discussion of the battle all the more disappointing.

The latest Osprey Campaign Series, Verdun 1916, is a concise and useful summary of the battle of that name. The immensely popular 1960 book by Alistair Horne, The Price of Glory, heavily influences Verdun 1916. Indeed, this Osprey title reflects many of the same strengths and weaknesses of Horne's great book. Historians and those interested in visiting the Verdun battlefield will find this a useful adjunct to Horne, but probably insufficient to stand on its own merit.

This volume follows the standard Osprey campaign format, with sections on the origins of the campaign, the opposing armies, opposing commanders and opposing plans. There are three 3-D "bird's eye view" maps that depict Colonel Driant's Last Stand (22 February 1916), the French attack on Fort Douamont (22 May 1916) and the Battle for Fleury (11 July 1916). Although there are several excellent 2-D maps that depict the layout and action around Fort Douamont and Fort Vaux, there is only one 2-D maps that depicts the entire Verdun battle area. While the maps provided are interesting, they still do not depict the entire Verdun battle area (e.g. Mort Homme). In addition to many interesting photographs, there are three battle scenes: Colonel Driant's Last Stand, the "Sacred Way" and underground fighting in Fort Vaux. Overall, I would rate the graphic appeal of this volume as very high, which is one of the reasons to use this volume as a supplement to Horne.

The author, a retired British sailor, presents an adequate - if not original - summary of the Verdun campaign from February to October 1916. For those readers who have read Horne's Price of Glory, they will notice many similarities in this account, although the author does use some French sources to enhance the narrative. Essentially, the bulk of the narrative focuses on the initial German attack, the surprise capture of Fort Douamont, then the bitter struggle for Fort Vaux, followed by the German loss of initiative and the final French counterattacks. Although there is some discussion of the fighting on the west bank of the Meuse River, around Mort Homme and the surrounding hills, it is quick and has no supporting maps of photographs. This is probably the greatest weakness of this account: the author focused primarily on the area around the two forts because they are the nexus of the battle's mythology and also easy to visit. When I visited Verdun this year, I certainly found Vaux and Douamont much more accessible than other parts of the battlefield. However, the fighting on the west bank was very important to the overall campaign and this tends to be downplayed in favor of the more dramatic struggles for the forts.

A few minor glitches appear in the author's apparent lack of sufficient research on contemporary army tactics and doctrines. The author asserts that 1916 was a watershed year in military history and that armies had evolved into very different formations from 1914, which is a half-truth at best. After two years of bloody stalemate the armies of both sides were still in the process of seeking solutions to conducting a breakthrough attack against entrenched machineguns, but they had yet to arrive at the solution. Neither tanks, "Hutier" infiltration tactics or close air support were in evidence at Verdun in 1916. While the armies had indeed added more specialist troops like engineers and abandoned some of the sillier pre-war tactics, the bulk of the infantry fought using evolutionary, not revolutionary tactics. Infantry platoons were not "all arms formations" as the author asserts (nor are modern infantry platoons), and the handful of the new infantry support weapons were concentrated at company, battalion or regimental level. Certainly the dreaded German Minenwerfer was too heavy to be carried around by assault infantry platoons. Also, the author notes that the German 21st Infantry Division attacked with four full-strength regiments with a total of 12 battalions of infantry, but a "square" division only had 8 infantry battalions.

Nor does the author make any real effort to assess the battle or its aftermath, other than to recount the casualty estimates. Could the German strategy have worked? Were the French skillful or lucky? How did the Verdun Campaign influence combat in 1917-1918? No effort is made to address such questions, but the author does waste effort - as Horne did - in recounting the Second World War celebrities who fought at Verdun as junior officers. Is it really relevant that Wilhelm Keitel was a staff officer at Verdun (anymore than he was a staff officer in other First World campaigns)?

Verdun 1916 should be appreciated for the fact that there are so few English-language books on this subject and for its graphic value. The other main reason for buying this book is the excellent six pages of order of battle data, which lists all infantry units down to regiment or separate battalion level, as well as artillery and engineer units. The lack of order of battle data was one of the biggest weaknesses in Horne's otherwise excellent book, but Verdun 1916 redresses that omission.

This book was pretty good. But it spent way too much time talking about his movies. It did fill me on on a few of the facts that I did'nt know, like Dean's arrest for having a gun in his car. He was for sure the best entertainer that ever walked the earth because he did'nt really do anything but be himself and get paid for it. I bet everyone would like to be able to do that for a living. What a cool guy he was. The stars today or really lacking, and it is sad that there will never really be anymore superstars like Dean Martin, how can you top his act? It had everything! Wine, women, song, films, TV, and he did it all by just not giving a crap and doing what he wanted. I really loved the stories about how he got by in the lean years before he made it big. He really was just a normal blue collar guy at heart, and probibly would have been just as happy if he continued to deal blackjack in some backroom the rest of his life. We miss you Dean, I hope you are knocking them dean in that big La$ Vega$ in the sky .

This book is a nice, basic look at Dean Martin's life. I am a Frank Sinatra fan and of course became interested in Dean as well. I watched several biographies of Dean Martin and so I had a good overview of his life. This book helped with some details, mostly his movies. The author talks a lot about Dean's movies and I found this helpful, but had I already known all of Dean's film roles I probably would have found it tiresome after a while. However, I'm glad I read the book. It was helpful on dates and smaller details that are glossed over in television biographies. I recommend this book for new Dean Martin fans. If you are a diehard Dino fan, this stuff won't be news to you. Its an easy read.

As a big Dean Martin fan I found this book to be thoroughly enjoyable. It gives in-depth review of all of Dean's movies. The book also offers good insight on what was going on in Dean's personal life. The author denounces some frequently cited anecdotes and accusations about Dean and gives thoughtful explanations to support his statements. The author either interviewed people close to Dean or referenced interviews done by others. I wish he would have spent as much time detailing Dean's recording career as he did his films, but then the book would have been three times as big as it is. One thing I find odd about the discography that the author offers is that he doesn't consider "Everybody Loves Somebody" as one of Dean's "greatest songs". I found this book tremendously enjoyable and I think that any fan of Dean, Jerry, The Rat Pack or just someone who longs for the days before political correctness will enjoy.

I found this pocket sized book useless and full of gramatical mistakes (for example missing accent marks). It was hard to find what I was looking for as well.

The book has a lot of useful phrases for dealing with someone until you get a translator. It could really use a pronunciation guide. It is very basic. It is a little outdated and it does not cover any new medical terminolgy that has been in use since the 1980's. You will not find names for new technological instruments just the basic X ray and such. Also, you will not be able to find out how to ask questions that are problems for today. Example, the book tells you how to ask a parent if the child swallowed gasoline or bleach but not new questions for today like "did your child sniff glue?" However,for the price and for quick reference, the book served its purpose.

Booklet; format and content very good. No pronounciation guide. Accessible, sturdy, easy to handle, space for notes - a bargain.

It's amazing to think the author needed the services of a ghostwriter to write this badly. You'd think a reasonably intelligent twelve-year-old could have accomplished it by himself. Those who "[assume] the TRUTH [sic] will be 'good enough' [sic] entertainment for any sensible reader" may appreciate the Andy Warhol documentary in which the exterior of a building is filmed for twenty-four hours--the film itself lasts twenty-four hours. The art of the memoir is knowing what to leave out. McCartney's habitual trick is to damn John Lennon with faint praise. He loves to tell (and retell and retell again) how John Lennon contributed to his "It's Getting Better" the line "It can't get no worse", while completely ignoring the sophisticated and innovative harmony of "Julia" and "Because", etc. Rather a coincidence then that George Martin treats us to here to yet another rehearsal of this insipid story. (John Lennon was murdered December 1980. Interviews with John Lennon appeared in the December issues of "Playboy" and "Rolling Stone". In neither of these interviews does John Lennon attribute any bit of "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" to Paul McCartney. In 1965, on the other hand, the Beatles were still pretending that the attribution "Lennon-McCartney" necessarily implied a collaboration.) I can't help suspecting that in this case "research"--in contradistinction to believing your own eyes and ears--meant letting your book be edited by Paul McCartney's propensity for dissimulation and enormous ego.

While this book is ostensibly about the making of Sgt. Pepper, it's more revealing of George Martin and his view of The Beatles. The sections detailing album production (coupled with Martin's musical analyses) tend to be rather dry, and the divvying of songwriting credit provides little more than grist for the Lennon-McCartney argument mill. What turns out to be most interesting is Martin and Pearson's ability to communicate some of the feeling of the times, some of the extra-studio influences that brought the Beatles to the making of Sgt. Pepper, and subsequently led to the creation of the album.

With the huge number of books written about The Beatles, one could easily point to other volumes that cover some or all of this ground. But Martin had a unique position in the Beatles coterie, and though this volume is far from a tell-all, it does leverage his vantage point. It's not explosive in a way that radically redefines one's view of The Beatles or their times, but it does provide some first-hand perspective that adds shades to the ever aging picture. How much of this is accurate, and how much is shaded memory, is hard to say. Beatles fanatics may find the so-called McCartney-esque slant infuriating, but those who simply lived through times will find Martin's writing pleasantly evocative.

This fascinating, thorough, and accurate book about the making of the Sgt. Pepper album is the British edition of Martin's With A Little Help From My Friends. It's the same book: same text, same photos, different title. Martin did a tremendous job researching this book, combining his and others' enjoyable first-hand recollections about the making of the album with extensive research at the EMI studios, relistening to the session tapes (including the unreleased alternate takes), checking the detailed notes written on the original session sheets, and so on. (In contrast, for All You Need Is Ears all those years ago, he relied on his memory, and the results were much less complete.) Amazingly, this was the first Beatles book to reveal that Paul McCartney played lead guitar on the "Sgt. Pepper" title track (yes, he sure did), and also the first to thoroughly dispel the tired myth that "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" was "all John": it was a true cocomposition by John AND Paul (as John said himself in at least two interviews). It's refreshing to see a book like this that assumes the TRUTH will be "good enough" entertainment for any sensible reader. Martin, thankfully, simply ignores rock writers' relentless post-Lennon rewriting of Beatles history, which has magnified anything negative Lennon ever said about McCartney while ignoring anything positive (such as Lennon's praise of "When I'm Sixty-Four" to interviewer Anne Nightingale)... and has consistently seized on Lennon's MOST mistakenly exaggerated or misleading claims about his own role in the creation of songs, while "forgetting" about all the many times John happened to give Paul completely fair, due credit (such as his 1965 interview with Valerie Wilmer, in which he described "Ticket To Ride"'s melody as cowritten by McCartney). George Martin, who admired and liked both Lennon and McCartney, has no axe to grind about them, or the other two Beatles... and he finds the right balance of modesty and candor in describing his own important role in the creation of this album, too. The previously unseen session photos are a fine bonus. This book is a keeper.

William Diehl is a fine writer and has been for many years. I am a huge fan of Primal Fear, and its superior follow up Show of Evil. And because of that track record, I grabbed Reign in Hell as soon as it hit the selves.

Unfortunately, with a major change in tone and plot, Reign is a giant disappointment. Gone is the intense cat-and-mouse game that made Show so brilliant, nor the strong, unforgettable characters of Primal. Instead, we get a movie-of-the-week plot involving redneck militias with fantasies of armogeddon, with Martin Vail and Aaron Stampler thrown in for what seems to be the hell of it. These two characters do not fit into such a none-personal story, and their involvement is so convoluted that it makes almost every other event in the books seem unbelievable too.

But alas, too much legal speak and dumb-plot syndrome predominate the book, boring the first time reader and angering those who had read his works before. And that is a pity. Veil and Stampler were too of the most memorable characters to ever face each other. The way their story is resolved here makes the climax an anti-climax.

William Diehl's book is an absorbing thriller about a rogue militia group. The only problem is that he decided to graft a Martin Vail book onto it. The result is that you spend 3/4 of the book waiting for some sort of fascinating legal and/or action showdown with Martin in the middle and instead he's cut out of the climax. The Aaron Stampler character is completely out of place in this novel. He adds little except a familiar name and a selling point for the novel. Diehl could have cut him out and nothing would have been lost. Still, the plot threads together nicely and I was up until 1 A.M. reading in a white heat trying to see how these elements would fit together. The ending works, but is disappointing in its result.

REIGN IN HELL is the third book in a series about Martin Vail and his nemisis Aaron Stampler (serial killer and all around evil SOB). Reader's will remember that Martin Vail is a Chicago attorney: first -- defense, then DA, now Consitutional. Vail takes on a right-wing, religious militia (the Montana Patriots, not a professional sports team) for the Federal Government. Vail is called upon by the President to do this as a special favor. Vail intends to bring up the Montana Patriots on federal racketeering charges (RICO). The plot is beautifully conceived and executed; the story extremely well researched; the chracters are well drawn and developed, and the imagery is as good as any written (including that of Stephen King's). Aaron Stampler has become a "blind" religious nut-case -- Brother Transgression . In the first chapter, he uses poisonous snakes in his traveling tent show. He is approached by the Montana milita and is offered a paid "gig" on National radio. He takes the job. Aaron fumes, raves, blathers and spews hate over the air waves, all in the name of Jesus, the Bible, and everything else the right-wingers hold holy. I won't be giving away the plot by telling you Vail brings these militia bad guys and other nut cases to their respective knees before the final page. It is how Vail does it, that is beautiful. And Aaron Stampler (Brother T)? What happens to this evil spawn of the devil --does he die or not? Well, let's not spoil the for the reader. This is the best book Diehl has written (including his mega-hit SHARKEY'S MACHANE). While it is the third "franchise" book coming behind PRIMAL FEAR and SHOW OF EVIL, it is easily read as a stand-alone book. One doesn't need to read either of the previous tow books to enjoy this one. Of couse, it would be better if you were familar with the main characters. Martin Vail fans will be flocking to the stores (and the NET) to see what Diehl has him doing now. I hope you have a goodly supply of the book when it comes out (4 Oct. 1997