Yes, this is a peak into the mind of Ginsberg. It may be more of a peak into his persona at the time the work was written, whether poet,bluesman, hippie,scholar, political activist etc. What makes it worthwhile are little nuggets found throughout the work which probably were unnoticed by most of us when originally published. I do wish this book had a complete table of contents (pagination) rather than just page numbers listed for the major sections. But, maybe it nudges us to search "on our own."

A peek into the creation of Allen's psyche.

The totality of this book results in a Ginsberg manifesto, delivered in his own unique prose style, and bursting forth with great honesty and impassioned integrity. Invaluable as a document of the times (roughly late 40s thru early 90s), as a sourcebook for things Beat, as a reference source to Ginsbergian Mind Speak, this book is a major addition to Ginsberg's published work. My only criticism is that it is presented topically, not chronologically as nearly all Ginsberg's published work is, but that is a minor point. This book stands with his best and is certainly his most important publication since 'The Fall of America' in 1972, maybe even since 'Kaddish' in the very early 60s.

The Morgan-Greer tarot deck is full of bright, yellow colour that is almost sickening. The paintings are quite nice themselves apart from the intense colours on many cards, but they are so plastic they slide all over the place and feel too smooth to the touch. The corners of the cards are too curved so that they get damaged from shuffling very easily. The dark blue cover of the deck looks quite appealing but I was unpleasantly surprised when I took out the cards.

I reckon the Morgan-Greer is the best Rider-Waite clone ever published; even surpassing the latter in several respects. For starters, the cards are borderless which imparts a feeling of expansiveness, and of nothing being wasted. (Contrast this with the big, wasteful borders of the New Palladini deck!) Also, its people look like real people: the men are down-to-earth attractive, and the women - buxomly curvaceous. None of that pathetic waifish, pixie-ish, anorexic visages which plague many modern Tarot decks. The pip scenes are also very well done: several of them actually improve on their original Waite-predecessors; and the cards' lack of borders assist in this achievement.

Some readers may complain that this deck looks "ugly", but they should re-evaluate it in the right context. not only does the Morgan-Greer capture the epoch of the 70s era succinctly, but also, its color schemes conform to a carefully-thought-out, esoteric plan. It is a nicely-executed memoir of a bygone Golden Era.

You have to see this tarot deck to truly enjoy it. It's colors are rich and the drawings are very expressive. The meaning of the cards are well expressed in the pictures.

Truly one of a kind. Most tarot decks have blaise borders and pale colors. Not this one. Each picture is artfully done. On top of that the picture dominates the entire card, there is no border, so the card really stands out.

The only negative is the plain blue with white stars back. With such a beautiful face the backing is somewhat of a dissappointment.

When one first approaches this book, one can't help but be drawn in by Ginsberg's knowing smile. His life experiences, loves, and tragedies can all be summed up within this book. However, the many monumental poems in this book("Things I Will Not Do", etc.) are spaced apart with lymerics, catchy tunes, and mostly toilet humor. When both reading about Ginsberg, and reviewing his earlier work, a person feels a sense of awe and wonder. A person begins to look upon the world with new eyes. However, I felt a little let down after reading this one. I just felt most of the poems to be far too juvenile, and this really detracts from the over all concept, and sentimentality of the book. I'd really consider this a "half-n'-half" book. Half was good, and half was not. If anyone is looking into this book for a first look into Ginsberg, I strongly advise you read his earlier stuff first.

Ginsberg happens to be the father of the beat generation, a generation that many dismiss. Ginsberg comes to understand death in the pages of political tongue lashing's and calling them out like a showdown at the "OK". Buy this book and understand a dying man's dream of innocent fame.
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I recommend this title to anyone who enjoys good poetry. There is something extremely "real" about Ginsberg, always has been, and he shows that realness in these last few poems before he died. "Things I Will Not Do," which was the last poem he wrote before dying, brings a tear to my eye almost every time I think about it. We could all hope to approach our ends with the kind of dignity that Ginsberg seems to have.

This book has many wonderful photos but it seems sometimes that the focus is more on human celebrities rather than their magnificent equine counterparts. There is also no information on any of the horses whatsoever except name and what race it was. Interesting book to skim through, but not something you could spend hours on, or even one hour.

Fans of racing will learn something new by looking at the images in this book. A racing fan myself, I saw great horses, jockeys, trainers, and owners in a new light. We read so much about War Admiral and Whirlaway, "Sunny Jim" and Eddie Arcaro, but images, especially good ones, are difficult to come by. This book opens up that world of racing's golden age of Triple Crown winners and celebrity owners. I think the book is an excellent companion to the Seabiscuit book. The images capture on film much of the world that Seabiscuit lived in. A worthy addition to any racing library.

While the book had extensive coverage of using ODBC in VB, it had very little actual code for C. Most often it just had the function prototypes and hardly more, barely explaining what the parameters meant and very rarely giving a code example. The examples given were muddled with MFC code, and it even had a section simply walking you through an appwizard project. I ended up getting better information using online help, which covers the topics much for extensively. I had previously been trying to work from docs at the MS site, and found this to be somewhat easier, but not much. Overall, it has some good points. I mainly use it for the error codes, etc it has listed.

+ This book gives genaral description about working of ODBC. Good for VB programmers who heard that ODBC is fast but used jet and always wondered why it is so slow with big databases. - A floppy containg samples is much desirable.

I have used this book for two or three years now in my VB consulting business. I find almost all the answers I need in it. These folks explain how ODBC works from the ground up. Once you get past the theory there are nicely organized chapters covering everything from how to connect to what you do once you're connected. There are lots of C and VisualBasic examples, and as far as I can remember, they all worked -- a real plus. I found the writing style to be as entertaining as any nerdy book is likely to be. Lots of detail, lots of context, lots of perspective. If you don't find your answer in this book, chances are good the authors will point you in the right direction. And don't miss their discussion on ODBC tools. If your VB clients insist that you use ODBC then put this book in your bag and carry it with you every day.