. . .that I've ever read -- and I've read quite a few.

Professor Jared Lobdell, the editor of "A Tolkien Compass" (see my review) has, in this volume, contributed several original critical essays on Tolkien and his creation. In emphasizing his Edwardian English background and his academic life as a philolgist, Lobdell covers important ground. But it is in his third essay "The Timeless Momement" where Lobdell demonstrates his insightfulness and creativity. It is in this essay that the Catholic Christianity of Tolkien is analyzed in light of his created world of Middle-Earth. It is one of very few essays to ever address the theological or philosophical background in Tolkien's work -- and one of the very best.

If the reader truly wishes to understand the man behind Middle-Earth, this book is a "must-read".

. . .amid all the "hyperfandom" surrounding the Professor and his work, comes a collection of essays written by Professor Jared Lobdell which are clear, coherent, well-reasoned -- and, in the opinion of this hobbit, right on target. Through the pages of this book, the REAL JRR Tolkien comes to life in a new way.

If hobbits reading this review own only one book of Tolkien criticism, this should be the one. I hope that it returns to print.

Jared Lobdell argues that Tolkien's influences are: 1) his Edwardian upbringing 2) his expertise in philology and 3) his Catholicism. He supports these contentions eloquently. I am very tempted to offer an excerpt in support, but the book is so tightly integrated, such a cohesive whole, that to excise any part of it is to do an injustice to the thought expressed. But I will quote from the backcover: "Lobell's explanations for the appeal of the Lord of the Rings are original and convincing...The reader soon discovers this is not the ordinary scholarly mongraph, but an essay, written with charm and quiet authority, in which bigger game than literary criticism is being stalked." The author of the quote is Charles A. Huttar, then a Professor of English at Hope College. Can't say it any better than that.

This is a superb book for any practitioner working in primary care. It covers all important subjects completely and concisely. I used it to review for my boards with the review book that goes with it and I was very prepared. I highly recommend this text.

I found this review book an excellent source of knowledge and simple to understand. This book by passes all the intricate biochemical details and present the meat and potatoes so to speak. The wisdom of the pearls make this book unique. I recommend this book to any professional in a primary care setting.

This is the most comprehensive and concise medical text that I have ever used....so reader friendly. It has over 70 contributors from all over the country.

In "Sauron Defeated", Christopher Tolkien brings to a close "The History of The Lord of the Rings", a subset within his "The History of Middle Earth". Like the previous three volumes in this series, Christopher traces the development of his father's thought as the final chapters of The Lord of the Rings are written. Of special interest are the early conceptions of "The Scouring of the Shire" and the two versions of the never-published "Epilogue". The Epilogue was, to me, particularly touching, as it involved Sam, now a middle-aged hobbit with a houseful of kids, reading to his family and keeping the Story alive.

HOWEVER, the above material, while unable to fit into the previous volume (The War of the Ring), was not enough to warrent a volume all by itself. So Christopher has also included "The Notion Club Papers" -- a space/time/dream travel story, written at the same time as The Lord of the Rings was being developed. The story itself involves Numenor -- Tolkien's telling of the Atlantis saga. Of particular interest to CS Lewis fans, "The Notion Club Papers" purports to be a discussion of (among other things) Lewis' own space travel fiction, penned in the late 30's and early 40's. It's a shame that this story was never brought to completion -- I'm finding the ideas it expresses to be quite interesting.

Again, 5 stars, both for the Master, and for the tireless work of Christopher.

In the ninth volume of The History of Middle Earth and the last dealing with LOTR Christopher Tolkien gives us not only the original ending to Tolien's epic trilogy, but also an essay called the Notion Club Papers, an edition of the Drowning Of Anadune, and information on Adunaic which was one of Tolkien's invented languages. I liked this book very much even though the Notion Club was hard to read at times. Thankfully, this is the last edition dealing with LOTR and Tolkien soon turns again to his father's greatest work, The Silmarillion. I recommend this book to any Tolkien fan.

The title of this book should say it all. Certainly a book designed for die-hard Tolkien fans, 'Sauron Defeated' hardly represents interesting reading for people unfamiliar with the Lord of the Rings series. That said, the thick volume is still essential for anyone who has read the previous three chapters of the History. Although some parts of 'Sauron Defeated' are better off left out in its next edition, it presents enough interesting information in its 482 pages to make it a worthwhile (not to mention impressive) presence in your Tolkien library.

Bullying? Every school has kids who tease, taunt, shove up and beat other kids for no reason at all. Ignored, exulted sort of indirect bullying is worst than a physical assault too that kids face at School or just about anywhere! Bullying has just become of the most underrated but enduring problems in schools today. The cases rise to shoot up and as the survey speaks, it has been a challenging task for the mentors to instill the values of human relationships.Its sometimes the attitude of parents/teachers/adult that fail to instill moral values to the kids.Recognizing degrees of teasing and learning to cope with hurtful teasing are important life skills a child needs to learn. Often bullies become more unhappy and aggressive with age. When a bully attacks kids, they often feel ashamed and refrain from talking about it. Bullying Prevention Handbook offer resources tested and proven creating safe environments for students. The main topics presented by the author are the characteristics of a bully, individual and group interventions at home and at school. Discipline, creating life skills and safe environment at schools is necessary for child development. The Handbook is indeed a good 'guide'

This book is the product of the National Educational Service, whose stated goal is to offer resources that have been tested and proven helpful in creating safe environments for young people. In addition to creating safe schools, their areas of expertise include: working in culturally diverse environments, containing crises, anger management, building life skills in young people, handling the threat of youth suicide, and discipline with dignity.

The Bullying Prevention Handbook contains a great deal of information, but the style of writing is clear and easy to read. Though there is no index, the table of contents is very clear, and the book is well laid out. The three main topics presented are: the characteristics of a bully, individual and group interventions at home and at school, and a specific anti-bullying education program. The authors provide references, an extensive bibliography, and many appendices containing multiple evaluation checklists and screening forms.

Though this book is billed in its subtitle as "a guide for principals, teachers and counselors," I recommend it highly to parents, as well. It is frequently only through the intervention of concerned, informed parents that excellent violence-prevention programs such as the one outlined in this book are implemented. Preventing violence in the schools is not a simple, overnight process. It requires the commitment and cooperation of the school staff, parents and the community at large.

Both victim and bully are helped to avoid usual traps of demeaning bullies and reinforcing habitual victims. New alliances are built with bullies, with clear steps towards genuine empowerment as well as protection of other children. Family guidelines useful for therapists, perhaps not always for schools.

This prayer book is the best all around prayer book for daily personal (or even family)use. The Scriptures are addressed back to God and arranged by category (with direction to add certain categories of requests inbetween the sections). This adds structure to ones prayer life and breaks the monotony of "grocery list" praying. This one is a little longer than, "Praying the Scriptures for Spiritual Growth" or the "Simple Prayers" books; in my own personal devotions, it takes me about 7 minutes per daily prayer segment.

Boa has written several prayer books, all great, all solid. This is my favorite to date.

Many times when we pray we don't know where to get started, what to do, many times we just want a deeper prayer life.

This book will scripturally guide you through praying...not only the scriptures, but will guide you in praying for your world around you. It begins with praise and worship of Almighty God, leads you in a confession of Who He is, then guides you through personal renewal, petitions, intercession, and then a prayer of thanksgiving.

One of the things I liked best about this book was that it started out with each section, declaring the Word of God, then it guides you (differently each day) to pray for your leaders one day, your family the next, that you will be a faithful steward of your time and money, for God's wisdom...the list goes on and on.

Both this book and "Praying the Scriptures for Spiritual Growth" are two of the best prayer/devotional books I have ever used. If I could only keep two, these would be the two I would keep. Not only are they easy to follow, they are taken directly from the Word of God.

Face to Face is a wonderful tool to help you pray. Boa has assembled scripture into eight sections for each day. You pray through scripture for Adoration, Confession, Renewal, Petition, Intercession, Affirmation, Thanksgiving and Closing. It helps you focus and it gives a marvelous sense of the completeness of God's word. I do not recommend very many books but this is one that I would recommend to anyone. I have already given away 20 copies.

Finally, a compilation of Howe's fantasy, and 144 pages, at that! I admit that this review is premature, but I am totally excited to snag this new arrival...

John Howe and Alan Lee are the indisputed masters of "Lord of the Rings" artwork. And this fantastic compilation of Howe's artwork, of all kinds, is a wonderful collection of artwork by an immensely talented artist. (And a cute part at the end has photographs of Howe in armor)

A great deal of the book is devoted to Middle-Earth and J.R.R. Tolkien's works. There are the creepily reptilian dragons, spiders chasing hobbits, the majestic Elves, several different incarnations of the Balrog and its battle with Gandalf, the black-armored and evil Morgoth, the dwarves dining in Bilbo Baggins' hole, a misty Treebeard, Smaug asleep on his glowing gold, the Dark Tower of Mordor with a hissing Fell Beast in front of it... all sorts of goodies. The pictures come from book covers, book illustrations, game boxes, and so forth.

But Howe's artwork is not just for "Rings" and Middle-Earth. Oh no. There are sketches (uncolored) and previously unpublished artwork. There are illustrations from picture books like "Jack and the Beanstalk," "Rip Van Winkle," Howe's fascination with armor and Arthuriana, which includes lots of solid horses, armor, and sword-wielding knights; his illustrations for books by Anne McCaffrey, Robin Hobb, Charles de Lint, Guy Gavriel Kay, Jan Siegel, Margaret Weis, a compilation of Merlin-related stories, and much more.

Howe's artwork has a lot of variety, and many of them look almost like photographs. While you can tell that they're paintings, they're frozen in one second, often in the middle of an action scene. So you almost expect them to start moving. He uses light and shadow expertly, such as in the pic where we see Smaug on his gold -- under his wings, the golden reflection of his treasure is lighting up his face and scales. Or when he is shown attacking Laketown, where everything is dark and shadowy except the fire.

When the "Lord of the Rings" movie trilogy was given the go-ahead, Howe (along with Alan Lee, ) was hired by filmmaker Peter Jackson to help with the sets and landscaping and other designs. Now Jackson has written a foreword to this book, in which he talks about what a fan he is of Howe's artwork (and was, even before the movies!), and how his artwork served as a guide of sorts to how certain things should look. (Such as Ian McKellen's "Gandalf" look, which was based on Howe's famed picture of the wise old wiz) And the afterword was by fellow artist and friend Alan Lee, who describes how they met in New Zealand in 1998, starting work on the movies, and praises Howe for his energy and skill.

This is a fantastic read for fans of J.R.R. Tolkien's works, not to mention people who enjoy good artwork and fantasy/SF pictures. A lush, fantastical book of dragons, halflings, Elves and suits of armor. Marvelous.

I shall just get right to the point: if you are fascinated by the world of Tolkien or just like to read books with some extraordinary fantastic art, this is the book for you.

This book shows you a collection of the art of John Howe, a well-known artist of fantasy art, and someone who designed a lot of visual aspects in the Lord of the rings movies. It contains lots of artwork that has to do with the work of J.R.R. Tolkien, but also some of Howes other work with various subjects.

I can really recommend this almost everybody,because it's just fun to have this for the pretty pictures. The impressive things are not only the detail, the design and the colorscheme, but also the fact that the work really seem to show a certain greatness and movement. They make you believe that those moments were keymoments in the history of some other world.

This a MUST-HAVE.

Cato's Letters are a must have for any lover of liberty. They are filled with enough passion, wisdom, and wit to make them shining gems on any bookshelf. The philosophy expounded in these letters is that of radical liberty according to the laws of nature. It is made clear throughout that governments are the servants of people, not there masters. The only just role of government is to protect the life, liberty, and property of the governed, any other role being usurped and explicitly tyrannical. It was this radical philosophy that made Cato's Letters such a huge influence in America throughout the 18th century. Their influence on the Revolutionary generation is rivaled only by John Locke and his Second Treatise of Government. Above all, these letters are classics of reason and resistance. In my opinion, they are the best exposition of libertarian principles ever written.

Anyone who adocates capitalism, liberty, freedom, etc. should read these letters. They inspired the American Revolutionaries. They inspired me. I'm willing to bet that they'll inspire you.

This book is an excellent description of the extensive renge of issues dealing with changing the appearance of a patient's smile. The book is clear about its objectives and is very easy for anyone to read and follow.After reading this book, patients can easily decide whether they are candidates for cosmetic dentistry and get a reasonably good idea of the procedures involved. The author has discussed several treatment options for every situation, and he has included self-evaluations for patients to use in making informed decisions. An introductory chapter of relating the smile to the entire face presents a unique perspective. Dr. Goldstein discusses contemporary interdisciplinary approaches in creating different aesthetic effects. The explanations are accompanied by excellent illustrations that demonstrate the changes possible by procedures in modern dentistry and medicine. Often the patient and the doctors are not on the same page as far as the patient's chief complaint is concerned. This may lead to a situation in which the treatment provided may be superior; however, the treatment did not address the patient's chief complaint, leading to the patient's being dissatisfied. This book may provide the critical link to complete the communication circuit between the doctor and the patient. After reading it, patients can have a better understanding of their problems, the steps required to address these problems, and the advantages and disadvantages of each procedure.Further, details of expenses provide the consumer with an idea of the financial commitment involved. In summary, this 324-page hardcover book with 575 high quality illustrations is the most comprehensive and clear presentation of an important self-assessment tool used in cosmetic dentistry. A must-read for patients, students, and clinicians involved with cosmetic dentistry.......reviewed for the Journal of the American Dental Association by Dr. Pramod K. Sinha, Assistant Professor, Univ. of Oklahoma College of Dentistry, April l99

This book lets you analyze your smile and come up with the most practical solutions for whatever smile problem you have. There doesn't seem to be anything left out of the cosmetic problems and solutions to a better smile.....and a more attractive face as well. This is because there are chapters that involve the role of facial plastic surgery, orthognathic(done by the oral surgeon) surgery, and cosmetology. It contains a simple smile analysis in the first chapter and logically helps you understand what your problem or problems are. It is easy to comprehend what your choices are because both the patient photographs and illustrations are so easy to understand. In each treatment summary the author describes not only what the result can look like but more importantly, the maintenance required with each restoration as well as a realistic range of fees and life expectancy. Too often people fail to get what they want mostly because they really don't know what they want,and they don't know how to get it. The best way is to take this book with you to your dentist!!!

If you are a pastor of a big or small church you must read this book. Very sound biblicaly.

The authors of this book say that while in some ways seminary trained them for pastoring small-town churches, in other ways it did not. Why not? Because their seminaries assumed a suburban model of doing church. Those models, when transplanted to the small-town environment, just don't work.

The authors both gave into the temptation to treat the small-town church as a smaller version of the suburban church before figuring out that the small-town church isn't just a miniature version of the suburban church. It has its own characteristics and will thrive only when it focuses on being itself, on doing what it does best--intimacy and involvement.

I like the way the authors learned to approach pastoring in the small town as cross-cultural ministry, realizing they had to become students of the local culture, just as missionaries to other countries do. An eye-opener for me was the challenge of pastoring in the "rurban" community, a traditional farm community that is now becoming a bedroom community for commuting professionals. How can a church reach out to include these professionals while also remaining relevant to the farm community? It's a challenge, but a doable challenge. This book also has a good chapter on how to lead the decision-making process in the small-town church. (It's a lot different from in the larger church.) There's plenty of practical wisdom in this one to make it worth a read. As a church consultant, whenever I do a consultation with a small-town church, I almost always give the pastor a copy of this one.

Quite good in reviewing the basic pathophysiology of endocrine disorders.
This book is becoming the standard for fellows in endocrinology.

This textbook is very user friendly. I prefer this text over the William's textbook of Endocrinology. Very well organized with many good illustrations and tables. Has appendix of endocrine testing as well as common drugs used in endocrinology. Highly reccomended.