Half Moon Bay Exploring is just what a travel guide should be: clear acturate information, well organized and fun to read. We not only use it when we go to Half Moon Bay and the coast, we give it to visitors who exchange homes with us from other countries. We think it is great-- and we use their Montery Guide too.

Anyone coming to the beautiful California coast, or even for someone who lives here like I do, will find a wealth of great info in this book that will make your trip even more enjoyable.

It would be difficult to overstate the significance of Apollo 9 in the final push to land men on the moon. As editor Godwin points out, this mission easily gets lost in the breathtaking excitement of the surrounding missions that actually went to the moon. But Apollo 9 may be the single most ambitious, "pushing-the-envelope" mission ever undertaken by NASA. The almost ludicrously intense flight plan called for a complete checkout of the lunar module in just a few days. Not unreasonably dubbed "the world's first true spacecraft" for its inability to fly anywhere other than space, the LM was and is a unique machine. And Apollo 9 was, in stage parlance, a full technical rehearsal for a lunar landing. It's also easy to forget that this would be only the second time that two manned vehicles are in space at the same time. Gemini 6 and 7 were the first, but at least in that case there had been considerable experience with the necessary ground support for the Gemini capsules, not to mention that all one of the Gemini craft had to do was provide a target while the other did all the work.

Apollo 9, not surprisingly, had one of the strongest crews of any mission: Commander Jim McDivitt, who on Gemini 4 became the first rookie ever to command a multi-man space flight, went on to succeed the illustrious George Low as Apollo Spacecraft Program Manager. Command Module Pilot Dave Scott stayed in the astronaut corps and became commander of the first J-class mission, the scientifically ambitious Apollo 15. Rusty Schweickart, unfortunately, was grounded after this mission for his demonstrated propensity for space sickness, which almost caused the mission to fail.

Instead, he recovered enough to go on with the flight plan, and Apollo 9 was a stunning and extraordinary success, making a lunar landing possible on President Kennedy's ambitious timeframe. There are those, in fact, who think that it would have been possible to go straight from Apollo 9 to Apollo 11 without the "dress rehearsal" provided by Apollo 10.

That being said, I found this collection to be the most disappointing of the series so far. It contains the usual press kit, pre-mission report, and post-mission report, but the first two overlap greatly, and the latter is a mere 11 pages long. There is no transcript of the crew debriefing, which I've found to be the most interesting item in these collections. It seems an appalling absence considering the importance of the crew's evaluation of the capabilities and performance of the lunar module. The CD-ROM, too, simply contains the standard NASA film on the flight along with the usual photographs: no inflight videos, interviews, or supplemental documentation.

Godwin should also know better than to spell the possessive "its" with an apostrophe, as he does several times.

Now, what's here is good, but it just doesn't seem like enough. Apogee Books should consider putting out a second volume (as it did with Apollo 11), with the crew debriefing and other supporting documentation. But perhaps this mission just isn't glamorous enough for them, or perhaps they think it won't sell (which I think is underestimating their loyal audience).

This book shows the interoir of Apollo, the systems and the people like no other book or WWW site. The CD is very useful and, although the book is mostly black and white there are diograms almost everypage, most of which are clearly readable (some have been compressed to fit the page, in which cases any keys or labals are printed else where). There are about 1400 images taken of earth and of the other spacecraft along whith recent pictures of the inside of the spacecraft taken a few years ago.

The APOLLO MISSION REPORTS published by Apogee Books, are an excellent source for Space History buffs. The book includes a press kit from the flight, pre and post mission summaries, and a fabulous bonus CDROM which has the official NASA mission report movie lasting about 17. The CD also has some GREAT color and black and white photographs. In particular, the APOLLO 9 Mission Report has a wonderful set of interior photographs of the command module. There's some excellent detail for all us model makers out there.

All in all, these books are a must. I recently got the mission reports for Apollo 8,9 and 10 (10 has TWO movies and some stunning moon photography). I just found out that the Apollo 11 Mission report has just been released and is a TWO volume set (with Volume 2 released next week).

I recommend them as a great resource. They can be purchased at any bookstore or amazon.com

Ok, first off...no where on the front of the book did it indicate that these were short stories, rather than a full mystery. That is my major complaint. I grabbed the book thinking that since it was Reginald Hill, it was a full mystery. After I read the first story, then I read the back! If the reader prefers a full mystery, then don't get this book!!!

Other than that, and the fact that short stories do not have the time to well develop a mystery plot (my own opinion), I enjoyed Hill's writing. He may not have the plot time in here, but he does develop the characters. Pascoe and Dalziel are a hilarious couple in many ways. Dalziel is an old British curmudgeon, who never ceases to surprise the reader and Pascoe.

The first three stories were pretty good, the last with a mystery based on the moon wasn't as well done. Part of it is trying to write what we expect the future to be like, and that is hard to do. If you base your expectations on science fiction writers like Wells, Verne, Orwell, etc. we are already behind on some things and ahead on others (establishment of space travel versus communications and information retrieval). I am not crazy about mixing the two genres (mystery and science fiction).

But Hill is a good writer. For those who run out of other stuff to read, this book is good enough for a glance...
Karen Sadler

this is a great collection of short stories from one of britain's leading writers.

It is more laden with humour than many of the novels, but that is mainly due to the capacity for some hilarious in-jokes which Hill includes.

"The Last National Service Man" is a more a comedy than a crime story. There are elements of crime, but imagining Dalziel (pronounced "Dee-ell") jogging up and down on the spot in army regalia is just side-splitting! It's a taut, well written story, and does have some great suspense in it at times. The solution is also quite clever, but a bit of a cop out, i feel.

"Pascoes ghost" is another good story, it is well plotted, with more than it's fair share of well drawn characters with interesting and varied motives. Here, the mystery is first class, enough, really, to support an almost full-length novel. The solution is satisfying, in typical Hill style. The climax is also very exciting.

"Dalziel's Ghost" is not so much a crime story, as just a story. It's very much a ponderance upon the characters of Dalziel and Pascoe (but to a lesser extent). There is little real mystery to it at all, but it is still intensely interesting, cleverly plotted, and has another great and somewhat amusing twist at the end!

"One Small Step" is perhaps the best in this collection, offering us a Hill's-eye look at what he thinks life may be like on the future, and the events which have caused the first murder on the moon. (As a crime-fiction concept, it is so original as to deserve a standing ovation.) Again, there are loads of in-jokes, but this time we are treated to a first class mystery story. This is another one which could well support a really cracking full-length novel. The solution is satisfyingly convoluted and multi-faceted, until you really realise what's going on (God forbid taht anyone should underestimate Dalziel! Pascoe should have known better!) Excellent.

All in all, if you like good short stories, give this a go. If you are a Dalziel and Pascoe fan, give this a go. (especially as it catalogues their first meeting.) If you like a good yarn, of any kind, give this a go. If you like good writing with great characters, give this a go.

The other short stories are fine but the moon visit is laugh-out-loud terrific. Andy D. never fails the reader.

The novel, based on the life of the French painter Paul Gauguin, is a very absorbing and easy read. Maugham's style has such fluidity that you can read the entire book with great interest in a single day. The main character, Charles Strickland, gives up a comfortable life of a financier to pursue his passsion for painting. Strickland is a man possessed, who is willing to sacrifice his well being and that of his family to fulfill the call of his inner voice to paint his vision of the world.

I like the novel and highly recommend it, but I do have a few criticisms. First, Strickland is portrayed as too inhuman, which makes the character unrealistic. Many artists are driven and single-minded, but Maugham is so concerned in making his Strickland appear a hard and uncompromising creator that he makes him crude. Strickland is taciturn, though he occasionally spouts Nietzshean phrases and tries to project Nietzschean haughty indifference to everything except his art. Not surprisingly, Strickland is condescending toward women and does not hesitate to let us know about it in his rare but obnoxious commentary. If the real Gauguin, or any artitst of significance, were as incensitive as Strickland, he would not be able to feel and to paint what he did. And this, in a nutshell, is the problem with Maugham's novel. He started from a stereotype and ended with the main character who was not particularly compelling.

Obviously the book tells a story based on the life of the famous painter Paul Gauguin but it is also a projection of Maugham's thoughts and desires. In fact his main character, Charles Strickland, is exactly like Maugham would like to be because he sacrifies everyone and everything just to follow his inner vision, which is to paint. He doesn't care about society he doesn't care about material things, he just lives for ideas and is indifferent to everything else. That's according to some philosophers, the true and only way to be an artist and I think that it is also Maugham's opinion about it. Therefore he created a figure who is nothing but his ideal picture of himself, as he did not have the courage and the force to live it in reality, probably due to his constant fear of losing all social relations. It's a really good book which could give you, the reader, the force to realize yourself and to do only what you really like and give up everything else to reach your aim.

It has been noted many times that artists are usually not the most pleasant human beings to be around; Maugham's novel is, among other things, a compelling examination of why this is so. The obsessed artist who dominates this book, Charles Strickland (based on the notorious Paul Gauguin), walks away from his cushy middle-class existence in England to pursue his dream to paint, amid frightful poverty, in France. Strickland is an unforgettable character, an inarticulate, brutishly sensual creature, callously indifferent to his fellow man and even his own health, who lives only to record his private visions on canvas.

It would be a mistake to read this novel as an inspiring tale of the triumph of the spirit. Strickland is an appalling human being--but the world itself, Maugham seems to say, is a cruel, forbidding place. The author toys with the (strongly Nietzschean) idea that men like Charles Strickland may somehow be closer to the mad pulse of life, and cannot therefore be dismissed as mere egotists. The moralists among us, the book suggests, are simply shrinking violets if not outright hypocrites. It is not a very cheery conception of humanity (and arguably not an accurate one), but the questions Maugham raises are fascinating. Aside from that, he's a wonderful storyteller. This book is a real page turner.

I wanted to like this book and I probably would have liked it more if it had been about 1/3 as long. The technique weighs down the images and I could only take small doses. Not that it's a bad technique, it's just too redundant for my taste when presented in this quantity.

The previous reviews cover the quality of the images in this book. I cannot say it any better. So, I'll touch on one little pet peeve I have.

I'm puzzled that Arena Editions would release this book with such an inferior cover. The compressed, uncoated cardboard cover just invites disaster! Not only is it prone to staining, it is also VERY susceptible to moisture and denting... much more than the average hardcover

I know, I know... "you should be careful when handling books... blah blah blah" That doesn't do away with the fact that this book demands to be handled! The images are too good to let this simply be a "coffee table" book. This is a sure fire page turner that must be protected in some way.

Before purchasing this book, I STRONGLY suggest you also purchase some soft cotton gloves and a book cover of some sort; and most of all, don't out it on the coffee table!!!

Sarah Moon creates enchanting visual poetry in an exquisitely produced book.

Not what I expected. This book is more philosophical, than literal. I like it, but it's like reading a lot of proverbs, you cannot absorb it all, only the few that strike you at that moment.

If you want a step by step, how to make film book, you're better off browsing the bookstore at your local film school.

If you are a novice filmmaker, and you want to make art with film or video, and you want a guidebook on how to THINK and FEEL about your chosen art form, this is a must.

Bresson inspired the French New Wave filmmakers, and in my opinion was one of the few directors this world has seen who actually considered the particular reality of the moving image and created a set of principles to guide his choices as a director based on the medium itself, and not on any inherited traditional technique. One of the primary divisions in film theory is whether you believe film to be an extension of theatre or something entirely different.

For Bresson theatre is a more intellectual, mind based experience, whereas film is an EXPERIENTIAL art form. Bresson was highly interest in TRUTH over the APPEARANCE of truth. For Bresson the camera and audio recorder capture the essence of a thing, and therefore he cautions against using actors, and sets, and instead suggests people being themselves and shooting on actual locations.

This book is actually a collection of notes that Bresson wrote to himself over the course of his career. It is a wonderful look into the mind of an artist. In this book I have found a kindred spirit, whose insights into the nature of film and film production are distilled down to their essential forms. What kind of Truth does the camera capture, what elements go in the mise-en-scene which add or distort that truth, how do you illicit the inner truth of the actor (model) while still maintaining the requirements of the plot and script?

There are two books which have, for me, opened up the truest possibilities of film as an artform. These books are: "Notes on the Cinematographer" by Bresson, and "Sculpting in Time" by Tarkovsky. These books are a must read for anyone interested in exploring the true potential of film as an art form.

Also, this book goes in and out of print fairly regularly, so you should buy it whenever you see it being sold. Its relatively inexpensive, but contains a wealth of knowledge. It makes a great gift for someone interested in film or video as an art form.

"Notes on the Cinematographer" is a tidy, Zen-like summation of the special aesthetic Bresson brought to film. 'Cinema' to him was simply filmed theater. He wanted movies to do something more, to create a new language of images that could express a character's inner states and moods (I think this goal, more than anything, explains why he's so often labeled a 'spiritual' director). Bresson wanted faces, not actors; events, not scenes; "BEING instead of SEEMING." To this end he insisted on amateurs over trained actors, noises over music, slowness and close-ups over speed and pans. Cinematography as Bresson explains it here is a unique form of writing. His efforts to make an essentially mechanical & visual medium parallel the inwardness of the written word has to be one of the strangest and most fascinating projects in the history of film. Not surprisingly, he writes beautifully, and these aphoristic koans, surrounded by all that empty white space, are as haunting as anything he captured on film. A tiny masterpiece.

I have not read any other books by Nora Roberts. Reaching for a book to read while I was trapped in a car on a roadtrip, I remembered a favorable blurb in the newspaper and grabbed Carolina Moon. Soon I was engrosed in the story of Tory Bodeen and her quest to return to her hometown to confront the ghosts from her past. The white trash Bodeens had been tenents of the Lavelle family and young Tory's friendship with Hope Lavelle was a source of joy for both children. a brutal act cuts short the life of Hope and sends Tory into hiding from her self and her feelings. Eventually, Tory realizes that she must confront the past in order to heal. She returns to Progress, the town of her childhood to delve out the secrets of the past. Once there she renews contact with the remaining Lavelle family and family members who still live in Progress. She also begins to trust and rely on a special gift that has always been a part of her. In the process of setting out to start a new life, she discovers love and a very real danger from her past which can destroy her. As the story caomes to an end,it almost seems too pat...be prepared. This was a really well paced book and I plan to look into other books by this writer.

I have read Nora Robert's books for the past 8 years or so, and am happy to report that I loved this book. Her characters were well developed, the plot very interesting and the ending was a little out of left field, I mean it kept me guessing. I really enjoyed the characters of Tory, Cade, Wade, Faith, and Iris. Hannibal was really scary as Tory's father. Those of you who haven't read it yet, please stop here. I thought the end was anticlimatic at first but then the real ending was a bit of a surprise. This book reminds me of Nora's earlier masterpieces such as Carnal Innocence, Divine Evil and True Lies. Of her series romances I enjoyed the "Born in..." series. However, I haven't had the urge to read the others. I tend to enjoy her novels that stand alone rather than those in a series. Overall this book was quite engaging and I really enjoyed it. Neither diehard Nora fans nor new readers will be disappointed in this book.

I've always been able to depend on Nora Roberts for an entertaining story, but her latest works have been top of the line storytelling at it's best. Carolina Moon is a bit more gritty and earthy than some of her prior novels. It's a well rounded read, filled with complex characters and intense plot lines. Tory, the heroine, is quite engaging, not a simpering southern belle, but a deep individual coming to terms with her past as well as looking towards her future. Cade, as the understanding hero of the book, is not just a spoiled rich boy, but a man who tries his best to be a fair person in a climate where right isn't always the most popular course to follow. With supporting characters that are just as interesting as the leads, this book is a can't-put-down kind of story, with nail-biting intensity. It's Nora Roberts at her best!

The good point about this book is the technical detail. For example, a big cut-away diagram of the first stage rocket showing fuel delivery system and nozzles. Also, complete launch sequence. The biggest disappointment was the fact that the whole book consists of pre-mission reports, and only the very briefest post-mission report. Where are the post-mission reports? Also disappointing is the fact that one report is almost identical to another! Some of the reports were scanned in, and so contain frequent spelling errors. Overall, worth it for the detailed technical stuff.

This is the original book in the series, now revised and including the crew debriefing (my favorite part, as I keep saying) and other materials, including a Jim Lovell interview on the accompanying CD. I don't know what I can say about this volume that I haven't said about others in this series. Apollo 8 was a key step on the way to the moon and probably the riskiest mission in NASA history. This provides a valuable technical background to the mission and a useful accompaniment to more human-oriented books such as Jim Lovell's Lost Moon or Andrew Chaikin's A Man on the Moon.

Reading these Apogee books is like leafing through a thick stack of mimeographs. Robert Godwin's decision to leave the documents essentially "as-is" (leaving spelling and punctuation errors, for example) and to publish as much relevant material as he could find in the archives (similar, but not identical reports) allows you, the reader, to process the information yourself, as if you had gone to the archives to do research. If as a reader you are uncomfortable with the idea of developing the narrative on your own out of this raw material, these books may not be for you.

Just about every American alive in 1968 must remember sitting before the television set on Christmas Eve, watching an eerie wedge of the lunar surface slip past as the Apollo 8 astronauts read the first few verses of Genesis.

Apollo 8 may be the riskiest but most dramatic space flight ever undertaken. The first manned flight of a Saturn V, it would go to the moon without the backup of a lunar module and count on flight hardware tested only once before returning to earth and entering the atmosphere at an unprecedented 25,000 miles per hour.

Zimmerman expands the story of Apollo 8 to book length by providing an extensive background to the mission, focusing on the politics and current events of the time and the stories of the astronauts. He appears to have a fascination with the depredations of the Soviet Union, particularly the Berlin Wall. He also spends a surprising amount of verbage discussing the astronauts' religious beliefs and choice of churches. This perhaps provides background to the choice of reading matter on that historic Christmas Eve, which he also goes into significant detail on, explaining how the astronauts decided what to do.

There's some annoying sloppiness in the book, phrases which are more impressive than accurate: The Saturn V would in fact fit inside a football stadium since even though it's slightly taller than a regulation football field is long; most stadiums I've seen have extra space beyond the end zones. And it's an overstatement to say that "To everyone on earth, ... [the] Apollo command module had now been reduced to three trebly voices on the radio," since the spacecraft could still be tracked both visually or with a radio telescope. He also seems to claim that Apollo 8 was the climax of the space program and that interest waned thereafter, somehow forgetting the billions who watched and listened to Apollo 11.

He relates the controversy (led by Madalyn Murray O'Hare) over the reading of Genesis and comes squarely down on the side of the astronauts, to the point of expressing irritation about Aldrin's subsequent inability to mention giving himself communion after landing on the moon on Apollo 11.

He settles a few arguments, including who took the classic "Earthrise" picture. (It had to be Anders, who had the color camera. Borman took a similar one and claims he took the famous one but apparently didn't realize he had the black-and-white camera at the time.)

Overall, it's a good if not great book, best when it's expanding on the mission, less significant when it's trying to interpret history.

This was a very well written book. Personally, I've always been interested in astronomy and space flight whether they were American or Soviet space missions. The 60's were a time of tension and revolutionary fervor. Many aspects of life all around the world underwent profound change; the effects of which can still be felt today. It was upon this backdrop that Robert Zimmerman explained the story of Apollo 8. In 1961, President Kennedy called upon the science community to devise the necessary methods to "land a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth before this decade is out." From that moment onward, the space race began in earnest. Zimmerman did a fabulous job explaining the technical achievements that made Apollo 8 possible while keeping the reader glued to the pages by providing detailed accounts of the political climate of the time. With each progression of the story, the personal lives of the major players are revealed as well as the circumstances of the day. Premier Khrushchev led a vigorous space campaign to outdo the Americans in the race to the moon. The story is interspersed with detailed descriptions of the erection of the Berlin Wall, the Cuban Missile Crisis, The Vietnam War and the social upheaval in the cities of America as a result. All the while, there was a segment of American society that was dedicated to fulfilling President Kennedy's dream of a moon landing. Apollo 8 was the first major step toward that goal. This was the first time that a manned mission left the influence of the Earth to enter the Lunar environment while traveling at tremendous speeds. The "Earthrise" photograph still enjoys popularity today as it was originally captured by Bill Anders onboard the spacecraft. This was a very well written book and is highly recommended. Of course the very title of the book places its primary focus on the mission of Apollo 8 to orbit the moon; it also provides insight into other pertinent areas of interest. The currently unfoding story of the international space station and the space probes visiting the celestial bodies of the solar system owe, in large part, their existence to the success of the Apollo 8 mission which is described in very interesting detail.

If 'Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8' wasn't a true story, it could well pass for a fine novel. Using a minimun of technical language, Zimmerman tells the story of a mission which was intended to be a test of the Lunar Module, but because the module wasn't ready, was changed to become the first manned mission to orbit the moon. With one slight problem... that Lunar Module was supposed to be a back-up vehicle in case they could not get out of the moon's atmosphere, meaning everyone involved knew there was a real possibility that the astronauts would die trapped in lunar orbit. Rather than telling the story chronologically, Zimmerman uses the blastoff as a starting point and skips back and forth to chapters describing the astronauts' family lives and chapters telling of the political atmosphere throughout the 60s as it relates to the space program. It's a great read that moves swiftly and gives a real human side to the space program.

I'm in Gumi, Korea on business, so I needed a guide book for occasional weekend travel only. This book is generally good at describing most sites to visit, and even gave some bus routes to take for those daring enough to try, especially since Korean city buses generally have no English. However, the book is a bit thick so it wasn't so convenient to carry, thus I end up carrying the Lonely Planet book most of the time. Below are a few complaints about the book:

1. In year 2000, the Korean government adopted a new Romanized spelling for Korean language. If you can't read Hangul (Korean alphabet), you may have difficulty matching up names of places. For example, the ancient Silla capital city is now officially spelled Gyeongju but this book spells it the old way Kyonchu. If you can read Hangul which takes a few hours to learn, that may not be a problem since the book does give location names in Hangul. This book also teaches Hangul for those who wants to learn.

2. For the Korean phrases that they teach at the end of the book, they left out many simple phrases like "I don't speak Korean" or "I want to check-out". They taught complex useless phrases like "I speak little Korean" and didn't teach much on checking in and out of hotels. In small motels, the front desk speaks no English at all so that is important.

I've lived for Korea for the past five years. I've looked at all the guides and books about Korea. Well, most of them. This is the best book I've encountered about Korea. I always use. It's much more thorough than the competions (you know who's) guide book. If you're going to Korea, this is the book you need.

Last year, I lived in Korea for 10 months. I took two guidebooks with me, Lonely Planet and Moon Handbooks. Moon handbooks was by far the superior book. It has everything in it. The first two hundred pages give an introduction to the history, culture, and important travel tips. This was very useful if you're going to the country to learn about the culture as well as see the sights. This book gives a lot of history and even myths and stories about the sites around Korea. Lonely Planet didn't give much information on the cities and sites(Kyoungju, one of the cultural sites of the world, had only a couple of pages on it, whereas the Moon guide had 50); many of the places I went weren't even in Lonely Planet. It tended to focus on hotels and places to eat. I didn't stay in a lot of hotels while I was there, but the ones I did stay at were in the Moon Handbook and were everything they said they'd be. If you're going to Korea and want to learn about the places you're going to, take the Moon Handbook. I never used my Lonely Planet handbook, and left it there when I came home. I still have my Moon Handbook and hope to use it if I get the chance to return.