This book is the third in the author's arsenal, and it is just as useful as the other two. The author is a wonderful photographer, just the images in the book would be worth the price, but the reader gets a lot more:
Detailed descriptions of where to go for the best shots, and the best times to go there. For some of the areas, you get a mile-by-mile log, and even some compositional suggestions. Even if one has been to these places previously, this book contains extremely valuable information for the serious photographer.

He was bound determined not to paint people reading and women knitting, but instead to show people who breathed emotions into his darkly suggestive prints. "Death in the sickroom" showed family members at the ages when they were painted, not when his sister Sophie died; it expressed unity in grief as one of death's longlasting effects by seemingly overlapping planes flowing together across bleakly empty areas, starkly B&W contrasts, and stiffly posed mourners frozen in misery. "The mirror" heads of a disembodied man and woman was his first woodcut to give up the Japanese method of printing each color with a separate woodblock; instead, he jigsawed blocks into pieces according to compositional design, linked each piece with a different color, and put everything back together into a multicolored print. He considered his "Sick child II" his most important print: his first color lithograph, it focused on the diseased upper chest and the head in profile facing right against a large pillow in order to gaze with tragically meditative resignation into the flatly patterned looming void on the far right. However, his "Scream" became the most compelling image for the late twentieth century: it expressed terror before the universe by powerfully decorative lines reverberating through the starkly opposed black lines and bleakly white voids of pulsing land and sky. Elizabeth Prelinger and Michael Parke-Taylor have applied reader-friendly illustrations and text to their catalog of the Vivian and David Campbell exhibition. Their SYMBOLIST PRINTS OF EDVARD MUNCH goes down good with PROGRESSIVE PRINTMAKERS by Warrington Colescott and Arthur Hove, PRINTS AND PRINTMAKING by Antony Griffiths, EDVARD MUNCH by Josef Paul Hodin, and THE PRINT IN THE WESTERN WORLD by Linda C Hults.

The field guide was very handy in learning the specific animals and plants I encountered in Arizona.

It is handy to go back and look up an plant or animal in the field guide after a trip - ie. many of my travels were difficult backpack trips and the field guide was left in the car to save weight!!

this is the one to take! Like carrying a park ranger in your backpack to help you know what you are looking at. Trees and wildflowers, animals of the land, sky and water, minerals, stars of the night sky. Increase your knowledge and understanding of the beautiful places you visit and your own backyard. Check out the Audubon Field Guides to Florida and other regions as well. Well worth the money. Lots of color photographs and well organized for easy use.

This is a delight to come home to after a walk or a trip to the river. I try to bring a wildflower home to check out in the book, and am never let down.

While it seems almost an impossible undertaking to include four very large states in one book, in fact the Range guide helps focus the book quite a bit.

As an artifact, the book is well made and should last some time.

I live out of this book. A must for anyone going outdoors in the South. I continue to impress my friends with the knowledge I retain from this book. If you are packing on the trail this is the book for you. Don't carry 10 different books. This is the only one you need.

This field guid is really easy to extract information from. My sister-inlaw, who lives on a boat traveling all around the southeastern states, absconded with mine and I was left in the dark. I own many audubon field guides but I truely like the format of this one because all aspects are under one cover. It makes my pack much lighter! Alden and Nelson do a wonderful job for introducing the newcomer to the southern states. Thank you, JE Rifkin

This book is a good introductory field guide to the region. As expected from an Audobon Society book, the photographs are top-notch. Sections on topography, habitats, the night sky, and area parks and preserves are particularly helpful. The flora and fauna identification sections don't go into a lot of detail, but will allow you to identify most common plants and animals. I can see where this would be helpful to scouts and young adults in particular.

However, I was disappointed that the book wasn't a bit more comprehensive. Obviously, as a portable field guide, it can't cover every single species. But in our area (northern Virginia) we have so many more butterflies and other insects that this book simply does not include. In some cases, I had to refer to the Audobon Field Guide for *Florida* to find a particular species. And with crayfish all over the creekbeds of this area, their omission under the crustacean section just seems strange.

That said, I would still recommend this book as a basic field guide. It does provide good background information on the area, and the photos are spectacular. Just don't expect to identify everything you see with it -- you'll need to do further research on your own.

I bought this book to take on family hikes. Whether your interests are as general as that, or whether you are inclined toward serious plant/animal identification, this book should be helpful.

It is oriented toward quick identification. The pictures are clear, colorful, and though small, should enable many matches out in the field. Although the write-ups are brief, and don't go much further beyond identification and some basic facts like location, there are occasionally some additional helpful information. For example, the section on mushrooms clearly identifies which ones are poisonous and deadly poisonous.

The book has some additional chapters on parks in the region. It is well organized. I would imagine that for weekend walkers, this field guide might be the only one you'll ever need.

This series has answered a long outstanding need ... an one volume field guide that you can actually carry into the field. As a birder, I still carry a more detailed bird guide such as National Geographic or Peterson's. But I'm always running across a flower or tree or animal I'm curious about. This guide is the ideal second volume carry with you since it explains the the most common things you'll run across in areas other than your primary interest. Another valuable use is for leaders of youth groups, such as Scout leaders. As a Scout leader myself, I'm always being asked by the boys to help them identify a salamander or other animal. This guide allows you to do this in the field wihhout having to carry a whole library of field guides in your pack. In addition, by being regional guides they eliminate the things you won't find in an area, such as saguarro cactus in New Jersey. In sum, the appropriate book from this series is a good reference to carry with you as you explore the outdoors in your part of the USA.

A nice collection of information but for what I was looking for the web had as much information on what was where and how much it cost. This book is not worth as much as others becuase it lacks the reader input and real experience of going and being there. Most info can be picked up from travel guides and brochures.

This is a wonderful resource with loads of candid opinions on what's great and not so great in the Alps. It is an overview and does not go into tremendous detail on any one resort, but if you are trying to pick from the overwhelming range of choices, this book will definitely help. Be aware, the book is written from a decidedly British point of view so it places much value on some criteria that American skiers may not value quite as highly (i.e. whether on-mountain dining is of a high enough quality). Also, don't rely on the section covering US resorts for anything other than a humerous glimpse at how the Brits size up places like Vail and Lake Tahoe (both criticized for "lack of non-skiing activities"). There are no photos and the mountain maps give only the broadest idea of the mountains and terrain offer, but the individual writeups are worth their weight in gold.

by far the best way to review and select resorts for your purpose. very easy to use, accurate and INDEPENDANT.
money well spent to ensure you go to the best place for you.

This book has been over-rated. Promoted as the "summer of 1977" this picture book is apparently the result of one or two afternoons (a Cleveland day game). Don't expect any pictures of baseball or the White Sox (there are 2-3), even though 1977 was one of the most exciting years in their history. While the pictures capture some of the parks' essence, they are very depressing. 90% are shots of forlorn fans that look like they are watching a last place team, when in fact this was a first place team. Old comisky had a lot of beauty that was missed here. I was there that summer and it didn't look like that.

This book has nothing to do with baseball and everything to do with people and community and one unique little corner of the world as it looked 24 years ago. I enjoyed it and I wasn't there. Looking at it with someone who was is even more fun.

As a lifelong Sox fan it was a real treat to open this book and be swept back in time to old Comiskey Park. Looking at the pictures gave me a chance to appreciate and enjoy what I never had paid much attention to at the the time- other fans around me. The place was a dump and we all loved it anyway. With such great detail in the photos I felt right away like my godfather and I were watching one more game together. Thanks for the book Mr. Elliott, for me it's a memory album.

hall and castells examine numerous attempts to successfully create techo-cities like silicon valley around the world. they judge success to be the creation of an innovative milieu, an environment so mentally attractive that firms locate there regardless of cost. a.k.a. a Marshallian or Neo-Marshallian node.

Contains several examples of models of industrial and high-tech parks around the world. Discusses the strengths, weaknesses and future prospects of each park.

I'll be honest. I work for a large online retailer named after a South American river, and ordered this because the ASIN (0000000868) is so ... distinctive ... and, frankly, I wondered what the hell a "reader turntable" was, particularly one with both an editor and an illustrator.

A friend suggested that the title was really the result of a very poor translation; that "Reader" was supposed to be "Tales", "Turntable" was supposed to be "Lyrics" and this was really a book entitled "Korea's Favorite Tales and Lyrics". Oddly enough, there is such a book, apparently edited by Mr. Hyun and illustrated by Mr. Park.

Well, as it turns out, "Reader Turntable SE-14" is not a book. It is, well, a reader turntable: a black rectangular piece of 1/2" particleboard, about 13x16 inches, mounted on a bearing so it can rotate easily. It's a lot like a "Lazy Susan".

It's useful for reading rooms, libraries, etc. Place it on table, put a dictionary or other big heavy reference book on it, and now folks sitting on either side of the table can share the reference, simply turning it towards them when they need to look something up.

Construction is sturdy. I (175 lbs) stood on it and it rotated: a bit roughly but it didn't collapse. Bearing quality is modest but serviceable. Black matte finish is tasteful.

Like all devoted lovers of Jane Austen, I have long pondered why she chose to write this, of all books, at time she was experiencing the intoxicating success of Pride and Prejudice.

The protagonist is a loathesome little priss. Austen herself says so in her letters. Fanny Price is neurotic and oversensitive where Austen's other heroines are brash and healthy. Even Austen's own family found the ending as odd and disappointing as do subsequent generations of readers.

So there's a puzzle to be solved here. The answer may lie in the fact that this book was written when, after a lifetime of obscurity, Austen found herself, briefly, a huge success. As is so often the case with writers, the success of her earlier book may have given her the courage to decided write about something that REALLY mattered to her--and what that was was her own very complex feelings about the intensely sexual appeal of a morally unworthy person.

This topic, the charm of the scoundrel, is one that flirts through all her other books, usually in a side plot. However, the constraints of Austen's day made it impossible for her to write the story of a woman who falls for a scoundrel with a sympathetic viewpoint character.

So what I think Austen may have decided to do was to write this story using Edmund--a male--as the sympathetic character who experiences the devastating sexual love of someone unworthy. Then, through a strange slight of hand, she gives us a decoy protagonist--Fanny Price, who if she is anything, is really the judgemental, punishing Joy Defeating inner voice--the inner voice that probably kept Jane from indulging her own very obvious interest in scoundrels in real life!

In defense of this theory, consider these points:

1. Jane herself loved family theatricals. Fanny's horror of them and of the flirting that took place is the sort of thing she made fun of in others. Jane also loved her cousin, Eliza, a married woman of the scoundrelly type, who flirted outrageously with Jane's brother Henry when Jane was young--very much like Mary Crawford. The fact is, and this bleeds through the book continuously, Austen doesn't at all like Fanny Price!

To make it more complex, Fanny's relationship with Henry Crawford is an echo of the Edmund-Mary theme, but Austen makes Henry so appealing that few readers have forgiven Austen for not letting Fanny liven up a little and marry him! No. Austen is trying to make a case for resisting temptation, but in this book she most egregiously fails.

2. Austen is famous for never showing us a scene or dialogue which she hadn't personally observed in real life, hence the off-stage proposals in her other books.

Does this not make it all the more curious that the final scene between Edmund and Mary Crawford in which he suffers his final disillusionment and realizes the depths of her moral decay comes to us with some very convincing dialogue? Is it possible that Jane lived out just such a scene herself? That she too was forced by her inner knowlege of what was right to turn away from a sexually appealing scoundrel of her own?

3. Fanny gets Edmund in the end, but it is a joyless ending for most readers because it is so clear that he is in love with Mary. Can it be that Austen here was suggesting the grim fate that awaits those who do turn away from temptations--a lifetime of listening to that dull, upstanding, morally correct but oh so joyless voice of reason?

We'll never know. Cassandra Austen burnt several years' worth of her sister's letters--letters written in the years before she prematurely donned her spinster's cap and gave up all thoughts of finding love herself. Her secrets whatever they were, were kept within the family.

But one has to wonder about what was really going on inside the curious teenaged girl who loved Samual Richardson's rape saga and wrote the sexually explicit oddity that comes to us as Lady Susan. Perhaps in Mansfield Park we get a dim echo of the trauma that turned the joyous outrageous rebel who penned Pride and Prejudice in her late teens into the staid, sad woman when she was dying wrote Persuasion--a novel about a recaptured young love.

So with that in mind, why not go and have another look at Mansfield Park!

this book was interesting enough. i love jane austen. my two personal faves were pride and prejudice and emma. this was interesting, the plot was intriguing and everything. i just thought that way too much was going on throughout the book. it was event after event after event. it was definitely suspenseful. the end was satisfying enough. fanny is not the best of jane austen's heroines. my favorite character was sir thomas. he was cool. i enjoy reading books of this sort generally. fanny could have been more interesting. i don't get why she was so totally in love with edmund the whole time that he was in love with mary crawford. it is a good read if you have time. it took me a month or so to read it because i had to read in the few spare moments i have aside from school reading and other work. i do recommend it to people who enjoy jane austen and those who are willing to take a good chunk of time out of their day to read.

As Jane Austen's most controversial novel, Mansfield Park continues to occupy an inveterate place in literature for its dark charm, its slow yet steady rhythm, its dry yet sharp and ironic humor, and of course fabulous charaterization built on extensive description all within a country challenged by progress.

Readers become acquainted with Fanny Price, a victorian era Cinderella so it appeared--plucked from her family in destitude to be allowed to blossom at her wealthy uncle's house, Mansfield Park. Of course being passive, steadfast, timid...certainlly lacking the very fierce which makes Emma and Marrianne among other Austen heroine memorable. Yet withstanding the seductive charm of fortune and of consequence, Fanny Price resists the wooing of a stranger Mr. CRawford who puzzles everyone with his light gallantry and dark desires. A soulmate since childhood, Fanny's cousin Edmund yields in to Miss Crawford, who is all but a nonessential part of Mr. Crawford's scheme of stolen pleasure. Henry Crawford, certainlly one of the darknest characters ever portrayed, more so then Willoughbe (excuse the sp.) is too caught up in the sensual delights of his incessant conquests (including Fanny's 2 pretty cousins) that even though he ackowledges the good influence Fanny's purity has on his heart, he is too deeply sunken in his web of "play" to rise and face truth of love. Yes, Henry Crawford did love Fanny with his heart, at least the pure part of it, unlike Edmund who loves Fanny only out of brotherly affection. But Fanny, whose steady character makes her an unlikely candidate to Crawford's actual reformation, refuses Crawford's sincerity and thus almost pushes him back into his bottomless hold of scheme. The storm thus takes place in the heart of London's upper society, casting its shadow on the peaceful Mansfield Park community and shattering everything Sir Thomas has persevered in building up--with fortune, and with consequence...a mention of slave trade as well.

Mary Crawford is a complex player, tainted by a society blindly wooing money and status, that even Edmund is not able to save the good side of her. Apart from Henry's scheme, Edmund is forced to refocus and, voila, there is Fanny (no matter how distasteful cousin-courtship is to many).

The movie adaptation of this tale certainlly emphasizes the fighting nature of Fanny which is rarely detected on pages. Yet what IS acknowledged and admired in the quiet little herione, is the perseverance so rare in a world on the verge of revolution.