The Enchanted Rocking Horse is a book that will be read and reread every Christmas. Several of the stories are excellent for reading to children. The others are suberbly entertaining, thought provoking, and heart-warming for us bigger kids. I loved every story and read it twice this Christmas. I have stored it with my Christmas things to be brought out with anticipation again next year. It sincerely is the best Christmas book I've read in a long time.

This wonderful book contains alphabetical and bibliographical entries for topics associated with Victorian England. WHile it truly does cover the broadest of ranges for various topics like Charles Dickens, Disraeli,and Peterloo, it omits various "secondary" figures like Forster and other less literary but nonetheless notable characters of the time. Over all, it is a great browsing book full of interesting data for the general reader. If it does not cover all it could have done then it does at least offer a wide number of bibliographical entries for additional reading.

A good first hand account of what it takes to create a training program for budding entrepreneurs. Written by someone who obviously knows her topic.

The Example School Portfolio brings the School Portfolio alive. Now I know how our School Portfolio should look.

The Example School Portfolio clearly shows the benefit of using data in school improvement. It is a wonderful tool to have as we improve our school system.

Only five of the 1800 photos from which these were selected had been printed before. The photographer had put them away, after spending a summer in Mississippi, with a Whitney grant. As an artist, the time had never been ripe to look at them again. This is the only record of a single town in the midst of the Civil Rights revolution in America. It is the record of the largest project in Mississippi, which was overlooked and unpublicised at the time, probably for reasons of personal conflict & sexism. It is also a moment in the civil rights revolution preserved with the sensibilities of a participant, who is African-American & American Indian. It is a loving but never sentimental look at the people of the town in the midst of change, and of the young white college students & middle-aged, middle class African-American professionals who volunteered their services in aid of that revolutionary movement. One bookseller has called the introduction to the photographs "the best I have ever read." It is a good introductory history for the majority of this country who were born after that time. And it is a very beautiful book.

This is a lovely publication on hand fans. It gives a concise and accurate history of fans - including some new information. It concentrates on European fans up to the early 20th century and is beautifully illustrated with examples from the Victoria and Albert musuem in London. If you are interested in fans either as a costume accessory, or because you collect them this book is worth adding to your collection.

Are cooperatives for farmers like labor unions? Are they like corporate monopolies? Are they another sort of entity? These questions were directly relevant for the raisin growers of California in the early 1900's and for the federal government. Saker Woeste provides detailed analysis of legislation and federal court decisions about the thorny status of the cooperatives--a debate in which the involved parties were creating their own precedents.

Saker Woeste's book has a liveliness beyond what the legal topic might lead us to think. Mixed with these discussions of the law are colorful episodes that few of us outside California realized before. The book features violent night riders, tales of ethnic pressures and prejudices (especially regarding the Armenian- American community), eccentricity and idealism in the characters of the Cooperative's leaders, and the marketing story of how Sun-Maid got lots of Americans to gobble their raisins.

So the book features lots of law with lots of social history, marketing, even violence. And a wealth of pictures helps the reading. Especially interesting are the early Sun-Maid advertisements. Fans of the histories of California, of agriculture, or of American law would enjoy the book.

For Easterners, good comparison/contrasts are studies of Kentucky's Black Patch War--Night Riders among the tobacco farmers.

This is a great book- so great, we named our boat 'The Frisky Dog'- a fun way to introduce adventure tales and poetry. A great gift for boy or girl- We have been reading it to our girls since they were 2-

It is most surprising to me that a book which has been on the market for such a length of time has yet to receive a review in this location. When one of the Church's premier theologians writes as profoundly as this concerning a source of great confusion among Catholics today, we should surely pay attention.

Cardinal Ratzinger returns us to something that is very basic where the Mass is concerned. It is first and foremost a sacrifice which expresses a reality with which Catholics are required to come to grips for as the Cardinal, himself says, "Its price was the death of Christ himself."

If there is confusion in the Eucharistic Liturgy today, and I believe that the now "famous poll" bears this out, then this little tome is the perfect antidote to begin to set things aright. The author combines theological expertise and a profound depth of spirituality before which one can only stand in awe.

This should be madatory reading for every liturgist and musician in the Church today.

I dissolved into giggles when I stumbled across this alphabet book. The drawings are delightfully silly, showing fruits, vegetables and other foodstuffs coming to their untimely ends or in other fraught situations. Rex Barron, an illustrator new to me, creates amazing personalities for these items of produce. This is definitely a keeper. Fair warning - if you are prone to anthropomorphizing, you may find yourself reluctant to bite into that crisp shiny apple after reading this!