This book was used by our study-group in Israel 3/00. It was part of a group of books recommended and I found it very illuminating. Lots of info available in easily readable writing style. I would strongly recommend this for anyone going to Middle-east/Israel and for those studying here for a more complete picture of the role of geography, etc in the development of the Bible. The impact of this facet becomes "alive" to the reader using this text.

Mr. Page came to our university (University of the Ozarks in Clarksville, Arkansas) to lecture and is going to be our tour guide on a trip to Israel that our Biblical Geography class is going on. He was very knowledgeable and the book is well written and will give you great insite to the lan.

This book helped introduce me to the many historical sites mentioned in the Bible. It is a valuable guide for people visiting the Middle East. Charles Page's book Jesus and the Land is also a wonderful and inspirational book about Jesus' life and times. This boook is a must for people who want to learn more about the ancient Biblical sites and an excellent companion for Biblical studies.

The reason why I like Carl Sagan's books is not only due to the fact that he has deep knowledge about the subjects I'm deeply interested in(astronomy and space), he is also one of the few scientists who can write so clearly, stylishly and inspiringly about science. Indeed, who is better qualified than him on such matters as UFO's, alien abductions, supernatural beliefs etc., for he was very much involved in the scientific investigations of such paranormal phenomena. Compared with the number of paranormal literature that exist worldwide, his book presents a refreshing counterbalance to all those spurious claims of the paranormal. However more importantly, his concern for mankind, the frailty of earth, his insights and knowledge on many aspects of life and the Universe, and the sheer breadth and depth of his interests is immediately apparent in this book. To quote Richard Dawkins,"... my candidate for planetary ambassacor can be none other than Carl Sagan himself. He is polymathic, witty, well read, and incapable of composing a dull sentence." I entirely agree. I strongly recommend everyone on earth to read this book.

Its hard to read this book and believe that this man is no longer alive. The lightness of his narration, the sharpens of his ideas and the open direct way that he had to open your brain and literally seed new ideas that up till then seemed incomprehensible, is unique. You really feel like a genius after reading this book, you feel that you can understand thermodynamics, organic chemistry, relativity is probably 15 minutes of casual reading away, quantum mechanics a walk in the park (and let Carl raving about how you need 15 years of disciplined hard education and study to come close to grasping the basics). And that's because he, like very few other in this century had the ability to take the hardest, the most complicated subject of modern science and present it in a way that even the mind of a brain-dead new-age follower would understand.

I wont waste time with his critics and the opposition, I just hope that they will understand and accept the superiority of science as a tool to open the little Pandora's box of mysteries we call universe. And I will envy them then because they will have the unique privilege to read his books for the first time. Because this book, and many more will still be around when all the bibles and holy scripts and new-age spiritual guides will disappear.

Is this the best of his work? Many, more informed and better trained, say no. I will have to agree with them. They also criticize his exclusion of great thinkers of science such as Kuhn, Popper, Feyerabent and others. But the aim of this book I guess is to approach not the people of science, but those who doubt it.

I handed this one over to a friend, a regular reader but not of scientific texts, and complained about "to much information that I can handle". Well yes it is like that and probably that's what makes it hard to put down. And once I will I know I'll read this again.

Carl Sagan started something with this book, and I have made it my job to help continue his work. If you hear someone profess to know something which you know is wrong, you do them no service by letting them stay ignorant. You owe them and yourself a debate on the matter. If you don't speak up, how can they move out of ignorance? Why chance it? We've all got a limited amount of time for everything. Look at Carl! He didn't wait to speak out for the Search For Truth. > God, here I am, a 40 year old "fan". I can't say that I'm embarrassed, though. I feel better as a fan of Carl Sagan's than a baseball or football fan, any day. > If you liked the book, tell a friend or acquaintance. Spread the word. If you didn't like the book, tell others NOT to read it. That may cause some of them to pick it up and decide for themselves. > The title of the book should have been "Science is Lighting a Candle for You, Look Around!". "Demon Haunted World" is a title that people might find while searching for "devil" and "haunted houses"... but you know, that may have been Carl's idea. This way, he may catch the ones that need to read his book the most!

For those of you trying to find information on UFO sightings, I would recommend UFO: The Complete Sightings. This book, which is good in its own right, delves deeply into the scientific basis behind UFO's, and some chapters involve some pretty heavy math. Of course, if you're into that sort of thing then by all means buy this book.

I have recently finished the book. He not only made me aware of the misuse of UFO reports but also on Project Bluebook.

We should all look to Mr. Page if we desire a lucid explication of historicism, and the threat it presents not only to philosophy, but to our lives in general.

Poorly designed, nothing more than reprints of selected pages from each issue. If Nest is going to do a book, I want to see a "Nest"-y type book featuring the same wit and creativity that characterizes the magazine, not some self-congratulatory, half-baked reprint. Buy the back issues instead, don't waste your money.

Holtzman is the John Waters of interior design: ironic, iconoclastic, an impresario of the outrageous. His publication is die-cut and drilled (I thought Grant Mudford was going to punch him out for piercing his images when the two met at an LA reception for nest) but never dull. This editor has progressed far beyond conventional notions of good taste, juxtaposing stately homes and prison cells, trailers and Carlo MollinoÕs Turin apartment in a surreal collision of styles. As a minimalist I put down this book with a shudderÑthe riotous excess brought on an attack of claustrophobiaÑbut others may love it. (Michael Webb is the book reviewer for LA Architect magazine.)

Nest has been a true godsend in the otherwise discouraging world of disposable-vehicle-for-consumption magazines. Not only does nest have more visual appeal than the slickest of fashion or design magazines, it also has content: articles ranging from the scholarly to the surreal, but always well-written; photography by the likes of nan goldin and richard barnes. Anyone who is interested in architecture, design, photography, or simply the peculiarities of human behavior- in fact, anyone who is interested in anything at all- would enjoy reading nest.
For those who don't know the magazine, this book is a great introduction to the first twelve issues. And for those who are already fans or even devotees, the book provides wonderful insights into the design and editorial process of the magazine's creators. It also contains material from the first issue, which is impossible to find used.
This book will inform, educate, entertain and astonish you. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

For developers involved with web-based projects, whether it be an online store for electronic commerce or an Intranet site for accessing and modifying company data, the powerful blend of JavaServer Pages (JSP) and Enterprise JavaBeans (EJB) technologies can really make life simple. Once you've mastered them, creating new components that encapsulate business logic, or new web interfaces to existing systems, is easy. The trick, for developers, is mastering the technologies.

Professional JSP is one way to get up to speed. Like many of the books published by Wrox Press, Professional JSP covers a specific technology in-depth, as well as the various ancillary topics relating to it such as databases, servlets, and XML. While not every developer will need every web technology covered by the book (and there are many), the book works both as a tutorial to cover the basics and a reference for technologies that you may encounter later.

Professional JSP starts by covering the basics of Java Server Pages, and how they relate to other web technologies. Embedded in HTML pages, JSP provides an easy mechanism for creating interactive web interfaces that draws on server-side components, known as Enterprise JavaBeans. While the presentation logic is written in JSP, the processing occurs within these JavaBean components. The book takes a balanced approach, covering both JSP and its syntax, as well as how to write and interact with JavaBeans to perform useful tasks, like accessing databases through JDBC and using other Java technologies. However, if you've read other Wrox titles, you may find there is some overlap in the topics covered.

One of the nice things about Professional JSP is that, in addition to covering theory, it goes further and examines practical applications of JSP, and issues for programmers like security and debugging. Like other titles in the Professional series, there are case studies of real projects using JSP and related technologies. My favorite would have to be the case study on porting Active Server Pages to JSP -- something that is extremely important for developers with "legacy" web systems. On the whole, Professional JSP is an excellent book for web developers wanting to get up to speed with Java Server Pages, web development, and Enterprise JavaBeans. However, developers with less of a web presentation focus and more of back-end server view may also want to consider the excellent Professional Java Server Programming title, which also covers JSP. -- David Reilly, reviewed for the Java Coffee Break

This book covers the chapters in a very structured way. It starts with a concise description of the JSP Basics with a detailed explanation of the concepts. It explains all the concepts in a very clear and simple words supported by an equally clear Comments and examples. Any body with a little of Java experience can become very familiar with the JSP syntax and concepts by reading first few chapters. It covers all the necessary JSP syntax for building a small web application to a very large distributed Application. It also explains about the way the JSP pages are processed by different web servers. For example it explains about the various methods available to maintain a persistence session and their merits and demerits. This is the first book in JSP series that explains not only the concepts of JSP and how effectively one can use them with the help of this book. It also covers various other topics like EJB, JNDI, JDBC, XML, XSLT and WML in very detailed way. Overall I feel this is the greatest JSP book ever published so far. I could build a simple and robust JSP Web application by reading the first few chapters in a short period of time.

This books lives up to its title in that it provides both real-world JSP techniques (through 7 very informative case studies chapters), as well as JSP background information that serves as a quick start guide. I rank it as one of the top 2 JSP books currently available (the other one is Web Development With JavaServer Pages by Messrs. Fields and Kolb).

After the JSP fundamentals are out of the way (which I am sure any JSP newcomer will appreciate and can benefit from), the book picks up pace with discussion on JDBC connection pooling, and the best practice for data access from JSP. Then comes the chapter on custom tags. My favorite chapters are the ones on debugging JSP's and implementing the MVC design pattern in JSP/servlets.

The case studies are very comprehensive and closely correlated to the earlier chapters. In one case study the design methodology is clearly explained with UML diagrams, which are very helpful to someone who is currently architecting an enterprise Java Web application. Other case studies cover such a wide area of topics such as JSP in combination with LDAP, EJB, XSL, and WAP.

For ASP developers, this books has two enormously useful chapters to get them started on JSP right away. One is a case study showing how to port an ASP app to JSP, and the other compares and contrasts the object model and syntax between ASP and JSP.

Having said all the above, this book does suffer from certain weaknesses. One is typical of any multi-author book, i.e., repeat of the same topic in different chapters. This is the case with JDBC, which shows up in both chapters 4 and 7. Another problem is the lack of the use of a standard servlet/JSP container, which will help new users to run all samples under the same software setting (although there is an appendix on setting up Tomcat server). Finally, a few chapters seem to be out of place in term of the logic flow of concept, such as the ones on dynamic GUI's and JNDI.

Finally, this book is still thin on heavy-duty J2EE topics, such as EJB, distributed transactions, message service, and interoperability with CORBA. This is why I consider it as an intermediate level book, not an advanced one. Hopefully we will see another Wrox book in the near future that addresses some of these issues.