"It Happened in America-True Stories from the Fifty States" has caught the fancy of this mom and kids. Journeying alphabetically from state to state, we've discovered historical and biographical anecdotes that have kept up everyone's interest and helped us 'mentally reference' each state. The feature I like most about this book is that the author does not restrict her narratives to well-known people and facts, but has gone out of her way to find the lesser known, but nonetheless fascinating, people and events that contributed to the making of America. This is not a boring book filled with forgettable facts but just plain 'ole fun to read. Ever hear of the Camel Corps in Arizona or how Mississippi Mud Pie got its name? Well, you'll find that out in this book. Enjoy!

The story for each state is about five pages long. Some of the stories are well known, such as the tale of Rosa Parks for Alabama. Others are less well known, such as the Blue Hens of Delaware.

Each story is a fascinating snippet of history that your kids will actually enjoy and remember.

Lila wants to be in a music video as teh lead singer but she sings like a turkey, so she lets Johanna-the schools Celine-Dion-sing instead.Lila will lipsynch.

Hasn't anybody put down their reviews in here yet, or are they on the way?

Whatever the answer is, I relly liked this story, coz Lila finally made the right decision (not that she never did), and Johanna , Julie Porter's sister gets the chance to shine.

One question : do any boys like Sweet Valley Twins books?

D23H

If you like Lila this a great book to read

Although Lila Fowler is nothing more than a spoiled, rich snob, "Lila's Story" was one of my favorite Sweet Valley High books as a kid. It was also the first of three other Super Star books that spotlighted certain Sweet Valley characters, like Todd Wilkins, Olivia Davidson, and Bruce Patman.

In this one, Lila grows resentful over her father's new girlfriend, Joan Borden, and her 15-year-old daughter, Jacqueline. Lila thinks they're both gold diggers--which they are--but everyone--her father and friends included--seem oblivious to this. But not only are Joan and Jacqueline not what they appear to be, but Lila's new boyfriend (Evan Armstrong, a car racer she stole from his longtime girlfriend--with the help of Bruce Patman) has a surprise of his own for Lila, which involves Jacqueline.

As I mentioned before, Lila is certainly cold-hearted, but that's what I liked about her in this book. She was ruthless and punished anyone who took advantage of her, not that she would admit that they had, of course.

I did notice a minor goof in this book, though. Did anyone else notice that Jacqueline borrows Lila's car--but the girl is only 15 years old?

Excellent guide to checking your symptoms when you don't feel well. The book well help you figure out what's wrong. Not comprehensive, but what book on this topic can be? Also discusses dangerous symptoms that you cannot alleviate on your own.

This book is an excellent source of useful daily information. It should be included in everyone's reference library. It should be noted that it was only republished in 1997. The book is a reprint of the 1988 edition.

Lila is sure that her rich dad is now bankrupt and that she must learn to live as a pauper.So she recruits Melissa Mccormick ... to give her poor lessons ...

I thought this book was pretty good. It brought homelessness iin as a subject, and we learned more about Lila. It was also pretty funny. I think the author did a GRRRRRR-EAT! job.

Lila Fowler has always been rich. But when she suspects her father is having financial difficulties, Lila tries to live a more simple life, and learns that money can't buy everything. She stops buying everything she sees, and she starts treating people more nicely. The Sweet Valley Twins series is great--so try it out!

Lila doesn't want the new girl in town,snobby Rachel,to move into her old mansion so she chooses to make Rachel think it is haunted.

Lila can't believe it when she finds out that her father is selling the Fowler Mansion! They are moving to a six bedroom cottage on Secca Lake! It is no consolation when she finds out that,in her opinion,is the snobbiest, meaniest, and most terrible girl in the world! What will Lila do without the Fowler Crest?

I would reccomend this book to any girl of the ages 12-14.
Theres only two people living in the Fowlers Mansion, Lila, and her dad. The mansion has a olympic-sized pool, movie theater, volley-ball court, a bowling alley, and much more for only two people. Thats the reason Mr. Fowler wants to sell the mansion. It turns out a snobby girl named Rachel buys the mansion, and her and Lila are worst enemys. It turns out that Rachel isn't that bad. What happens next? Do they keep it, or sell it?

This book is very sad and emotional. The story of this couple is amazing. It makes you feel sorry for them, but at the same time happy because they share so much love.

This is a very short novel about a rural couple who have been married for more than forty years and the confusion and stress they face as the wife is hospitalized. It is a refreshing alternative to more popular and yet more sentimental stories that deal with spousal, parental, and sibling relationships and the conflicts associated with aging and mortality. Mason is a fine writer.

This was one of the most endearing love stories i've ever read. Spence and Lila are old and worn, but the love they have for each other is still pure and fresh, forty plus years after their marriage. That a love like this might exist, and the characters are so real that it is likely, gives me new hopes in life

When I was in junior college, Pirsig's "Zen And The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" was required reading for an intro to philosophy class. The professor informed us that Pirisig's ideas were simply a rehash of those of G.E. Moore's, but insisted that we read "Zen" anyway. After reading many of the literary classics, I found Pirsig's style unerringly pedestrian. After reading "Lila", I must say that he is indeed a one book author. Nothing is new here. He begins the novel with the protagonist making continual references to a disco song, and from there the author's use of plot is hastily scribbled so that he may continue to hammer his theme of quality, and what constitutes quality. Again, there is the continual rehashing of what constitutes right and wrong. As an author of ideas, he is never on par with Ayn Rand, Hermann Hesse, or Dostoievski. Pirsig would have done better to write as an essayist, because he shows little or no concern with plot, setting, or character development. I do not take issue with his philosophical ideas, but as an author, he should show some concern for the structure of the novel.

For those who think this book is better than the first one (Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance), I'd say please re-read it. Once, maybe twice. Lila's not a patch on Zen! There are several reasons for that:

1. Character development - Lila has absolutely no character development; even of the primary and critical character (Lila). She is reduced to being a cartoonish figure with no aspirations, dreams, or even strength.

2. Plot - We certainly do not expect anything by way of plot from Robert Pirsig - we know he is used to going where his Muse takes him, and that could be partly the reason for the cult following he commands. However, in writing a book such as this, one which involves Anthropology, culture, religion, philospophy, morals, ethics, science etc, one would need a common thread of a plot to be able to assimilate and consume and comprehend. Lila fails on that account. The thread, which was beautifully rendered in Zen, is sorely missing here.

3. Much like the way he has several slips noting details of things he's noted, the book progresses in the same fashion, with some random statements thrown in, without any dwelling on their consequence.

4. There are several repetitions of analogies and similarities, which, after some time, become a bit irritating and plain annoying.

The end is not at all satisfying; some explanations are thrown in, which make me wonder if the author was in a hurry to wrap things up, and if the only motivation or intention was to get rid of the book that seemed to be dragging on witout any concrete conclusion. Hence, if the alert reader notices, the absolutely abrupt way of the ending, in which everything is described as Good Is A Noun, is pretty disturbing, as is also his dismissal of Hinduism, which is characterized as being a low-grade imitation of what has been practised by American Indians! I was most unnerved by the illiterate and uneducated implication of the discourse that he gives after the Peyote meeting. Come on sir, we've seen better from you! Sorry to disappoint, and be disappointed.

I rate the book "10" because in a very human way it puts the computer into context with the human.

I first read LILA in 1992, after stumbling onto the title in the reference section of a computer history book. The Metaphysics of Quality is exemplified in the guy/girl interactions and in the mind-presentations of the author.

Read again in 1994, again in 1997, and 4th reading in early 1998. In 1995, read ZEN, THE ART OF MOTORCYCLE MAINTENANCE. Good philosophy, plot was not as interesting as LILA. Afterward on death of his son was chilling.

Your other reviews are superb so instead I will give some chapter events that grabbed my attention.

Chapter 1. Phaedrus meets Lila in a bar and begin their journey down the river.

Chapter 2. The card catalog, using slips of paper to record throughts. Organizing, reviewing, saving, discarding. The perfect tool for random access. I have used this system throughtout my life, and I was astounded to read an account of my system in a book.

Chapter 3. Americans are the amalgam of American-Indians and Europeans. This concept is expanded thoughout the book.

Chapter 6, 11. Does Lila have Quality? Expansion on Metaphysics of Quality.

Chapter 8. The Platypus does not fit anthropological structure. Platypus analogy is used throughout the book.

Chapter 11. The "...jungle of evolutionary patterns..." Patterns. Quantum theory.

Chapter 12. Patterns. I love the hardware and software analogies....the guy who designs the hardware is independent of the guy who designs the software.

Chapter 13. The world is full of static and dynamic patterns. The dynamic patterns build onto the static patterns and if accepted by a critical mass of people then the dynamic pattern becomes static, building on or replacing old static patterns. Phaedrus gives examples that are obvious to the reader.

Chapter 17. The giant moth and the light globe.

Chapter 19. You are reading along, enthralled with Lila and Phaedrus and MOQ, and all of a sudd! en Robert Redford walks into Phaedrus' motel room...

Chapter 20. Celebrity. Social pattern devours intellectual pattern. OJ and verdict comes to mind.

Chapter 24. Does Lila have quality? (Again.) The price of dynamic quality is instability. The Professor in the black neighborhood...a short lesson on racism.

Chapter 25. Insanity. Phaedrus reveals his earlier life in an insane asylum...hmmm. And discourses on the experience.

Chapter 26. Insanity. Language. Philosophology. More.

Chapter 32 (last chapter). "Good is a noun. That was it..." Well, the author concludes that the Metaphysics of Quality defies precise definition due to the lack of precision in language..."but if you had to reduce whole MOQ to a single sentence, that would be it."

The fact that Pirsig is not well-known, not LarryKing material, speaks volumes for public interest in philosphy. The internet, bless the Internet, is a forum for hidden treasures such as Pirsig. And this review is intended as a contribution to those who seach for such treasure.

review by Ash This is a book I finished reading within 3 hours. The subjects of the book are poverty, gangs, sex and love. Easy read to pass a few hours while waiting for someone or something. The front portion of the book concentrates on sexiness, middle bulk on longing for love and being poor, and it ends with a relatively surprising tragic climax. Do not read this book to feel good. Unlike Angela's Ash, this story does not end happily after all the suffering. The protagonist in the book is supposed to be the writer, and it's supposed to be true. Do judge for yourself. He is an Arab youth growing up in the slums outside Paris. A girl named Lila came and swept him off his feet. he longs for her but their impoverished lives kept them apart. The theme is love is impossible for the poor. This book makes you feel how lucky you are, if you are not living the lives of the characters in the book. And if it is make into a movie, I suspect it would look something like "Once were warriors".

I wouldn't really consider this erotica, but it has it's "ups" (if ya know what I mean). Now to be serious... this book is pretty good. It's kinda confusing how the authors sentences run on for long periods of time, but you'll mostly understand it. During some parts of the story, during one of the "naughty" seens, the author would begin to ramble on about something else once in a while, and then I think "Oh no... don't talk about that... get back to getting groovy". Ok, good and bad reasons why I rated the book 3 stars : Good language, run-on sentences, great depressing ending, well defined characters (or at least Lila), short story. One warning though, not only is it 128 pages, it can fit in my pocket. I finished the book in a few hours. But it's a great short read.

I was compelled to read on and on. Through the images of despair; the destructive frustration of the trap of poverty. Through the eyes of a prisoner in the dirty concrete other world, minutes away from Paris. The nameless ghetto estate is our exclusive setting. A story told through the eyes of a young Arabic lad, less hardened than his friends to the harshness of life, who finds a moment of liberation in his relationship with Lila.

Lila finds freedom in other ways. She reaches out for something tangible that penetrates the shell around her emotions. She finds it only in images. To feel sex is not enough that she needs to see it as well, herself in a mirror, or on a TV screen. She is able to describe her fantasies most lucidly to Chimo, her confidant, who duly transcribes them for our reading pleasure. It is the exciting, voyeuristic joy gained from reading these accounts; of loveless sexual hedonism from the mouth of a child, that disturbs me about this account most of all. It seems even at 16 years of age Lila is rendered incapable of love. Could she love Chimo?

Chimo describes Lila's beauty with such eloquence and emotion that it is clear that he loves her. But does such eloquence betray the book as ghost written by the publishers; the story of the anonymous manuscripts simply a publicity stunt? The naivety, simplicity and disorder of the work adds an air of authenticity. In a sense it does not matter who wrote it, the book will leave you breathless anyway.

Any book project that concerns itself with the challenging matters of philosophy is doomed if nearly all its contributors lack the proper background in philosophy or cannot translate thought to word with high fidelity. Such is the case with Lila's Child. Its writings were never intended to be published, and it shows. This is so plainly evident that Robert Pirsig himself makes a half-hearted attempt at damage control in his introduction, not exactly countering the notion that the book is awful, but to argue that it's more interesting that way.

Even if it were interesting, why someone would pay good money to read these postings as a book instead of for free over the internet...is hard to understand, unless the notes Pirsig adds makes them worth it. And quality annotations would be highly valued by anyone interested in the Metaphysics of Quality (MOQ) - Pirsig's muddled, re-packaged form of idealism that could dearly use some clarity. But Pirsig mostly misses this opportunity and manages only a scant clarification here and there, such as when he expresses his desire to reverse the impression left in Lila that all moral issues can be solved with his system, or when he categorically states that only people, and not animals, are social patterns of value under the MOQ.

A typical notation of Pirsig's consists of one or two clipped sentences that do little or nothing to further understanding, except perhaps in the overactive imagination of some readers, and on a couple of occasions he appears distressingly detached from his own ideas, such as when he makes a statement that is prefaced by the qualifier, 'If I understand the MOQ properly,...'.

The book does manage to capture some of the excitement of a crusading bunch who are under the illusion that Pirsig's ideas will change the world, although it becomes exasperatingly apparent that no two people can exactly agree to what those ideas are, or how they should be applied. One contributor, Doug Renselle, went on to invent Quantonics, an offshoot of the MOQ that is a worthy addition to the burgeoning field of psychoceramics.

Dan Glover does a serviceable job of rearranging the posts to make them more readable, and Struan Hellier makes some incisive comments, but beyond that the book is notable only for its confusions, illogic, and philosophical stabs in the dark.

This book is an excellent compilation of on-line discussions which occurred in the late 1990's regarding the Metaphysics of Quality. The discussions themselves are a joy to read, but Pirsig's annotations and comments make this an absolute must for anyone deeply interested in the philosophical system of thought called the Metaphysics of Quality. The contributors bring up and discuss many of the problems and difficulties lesser philosophers than Pirsig, such as myself, have had with the MOQ. Pirsig's clarifications and notes go a long way toward solving many of these problems.

This book is no Pirsig "lovefest." Dissenters abound in the discussions, many of whom are quite intelligent and learned. Pirsig's well-reasoned responses to the best dissenters provide some of the book's greatest insights.

By integrating the age-old wisdom of the most enlightened Buddhist and mystic philosophers into a rational, scientific, metaphysical framework, the Metaphysics of Quality may be the greatest intellectual achievement of the 20th century. Lila's Child, the third in the trilogy started by Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and Lila, is an important work to help integrate this achievement into our intellectual culture.

I read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig as an assignment in high school about five years ago but didn't really see what all the fuss was about. About 3 months ago I came across Lila in a bookstore and bought it out of curiousity. I fell in love with it. Afterwards I bought a copy of Zen and read it again. This time I got much more out of it. I searched the Internet for more on Pirsig and found this wonderful book. I heartily recommend it to anyone interested in Quality.