St Therese was obviously not an accomplished writer and her prose become quite wearisome. She litters her writing with a combination saccharine-sweet sentiments and Victorian angst. Nevertheless hidden in the pages of this book are some deep spiritual truths and revelations given to this saint from Jesus himself. Her method of resisting the evil, her vision of all believers as flowers in the Lord's garden, some wild, some cultivated, all different. These are profound truths spoken simply "out of the mouths of babes and sucklings" as it were. Only there are not enough of them for my liking to compensate for dreary writing in between.

I first heard about St. Therese when reading Merton's Seven Storey Mountain. It seems Merton was simply overjoyed at discovering this saint, this little flower of God's love.

Two years later, I've finally managed to investigate what Merton thought so important. Having read this autobiography, I can say that Merton was no dummy. Have you ever read a story and just walked away from it happy and not knowing what about it made you so happy? That is the feeling I got when I read this the "Little Flower's" account of her own life.

In short, words cannot accurately reflect how I feel about this book. This girl, this saint of the Church, was just so loving, so joyful in being alive, so happy to be in love with God, that she will rub off on every person who reads this book.

This is the first book in a long time that, as soon as I finished reading it, I wanted to read it again. I hope it does the same for you. I have a sneaking suspicion that it will be even better the second time around.

And so, I take great joy in recommending this book. I can only hope that it impacts you as much as it did me.

The Story of a Soul is a magnificient insight into one of our most beautiful saints, St. Therese of Lisieux. Her story is an inspiration for all of us to find holiness in the 'little ways'. A pure delight written in easy to read language - a book for all ages.

Patrick Whalen, Out of the Night (Pocket, 1990)

Much of the geographic detail of Patrick Whalen's novels makes it seem as if this guy lives in the same California everyone else does. Everything else makes it sound like he lives on another planet. If half the things in California happened that Patrick Whalen write about, the state would be deserted. (Some would contend that the election of Sonny Bono is scarier than anything Patrick Whalen has ever written about, though.)

In this case, a public lynching during the nineteenth century is the focal point of the novel's beginning. A number of townsmen band together to hang six outsiders they believe to be responsible for a rash of deaths in the town outside which the strangers are camped. After the lynching, the town experiences a suspiciously high number of suicides, but no one (seems to) connect the dots.

The bulk of the novel takes place a hundred years later, when murders begin again in the same tradition as previously. A ragtag band of protagonists eventually come to the same basic conclusions-that the strangers who were lynched a hundred years previous are back. Not the stuff of good dreams.

A number of the problems that made Whalen's first novel just a touch under the par line are gone here. This book rolls along like a two-ton boulder on a smooth downhill slope. The foreshadowing is subtler, the characters more believable, the climax set up very well. There are a couple of places where predictability rears its ugly head, but such is the case with most horror novels; there are certain characters who always walk around with "kill me" tattooed on their foreheads, and some of those in Out of the Night are no exception. Still, the horror reader will find that an easy (and familiar) enough pill to swallow in the general scheme of things. Now, if only someone would make a movie of this with John Hurt and Denzel Washington.

In my recent kick of late-eighties out-of-print horror novels, this is one of the best I've come across. *** ½

ONCE AGAIN PATRICK WHALEN HAS WRITTEN A BOOK THAT IS HEAD AND SHOULDERS ABOVE THE TRIPE THAT IS PUT OUT BY THE CRITICS FAVORITES, "RICE, SAUL, ECT. TO BAD PUBLISHERS ARE SO DAMN SHORTSIGHTED. I HAVE A DOZEN FRIENDS WHO LOVE THIS GUYS STORIES. WELL READ THE OTHERS IF YOU CAN FIND THEM.

Patrick Whalen Kept me on the edge of my seat. I couldn't put it down. Unlike most authors he put vivid pictures of the whole book in my head. I wish I could find the rest of his books.

Hemingway's short stories were always a bit more finely crafted than his novels. The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway allows the reader to examine and even partake in the development of Hemingway as a writer; from his early Nick Adams stories, a few of which went on to become The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell To Arms, To Have And Have Not; to the mature Hemingway who wrote about his experiences as a reporter during the Spanish Civil War and later in Europe between the wars. This work contains some of the finest shorts of American literature. (Read The Short Happy Life Of Francis Macomber; The Snows of Kilimanjaro; A Clean Well Lighted Place; Big Two-Hearted River (parts I & II); Hills Like White Elephants--too many good ones to mention them all.) There are some poor stories as well but even these are well constructed. In short, the definitive volume of Hemingway--better than any single novel or other collection. A must have.... (I'm holding mine in my hand as I type with the other--) Little known fact: The Finca Vigia Edition contains an editorial change in the story A Clean Well Lighted Place--a moved line of dialogue--which was made by a silly editor after Hemingway's death and which renders the text incorrect with respect to his orignal published manuscript. In fact there are no correct versions of this short story presently in print. The accurate version, though, may be found in the Library of Congress.

Hemingway's writing is a grand example of stylistic dichotomy: His prose is as austere and utilitarian as a barn, yet his stories, unique and instantly recognizable as his own, pound with energy, drama, and almost excessive bravado. He wastes no time on literary pretension and gets right down to business; writing, drinking, and living life to the fullest are inextricably entwined, and nothing matters more than a well-worded and well-placed line of dialogue.

Hemingway's subject matter is easy to summarize: he writes about the things he actively enjoys. His short stories cover safaris, hunting, fishing, the outdoors ("Big Two-Hearted River"), boating, horse racing ("My Old Man"), bullfighting ("The Undefeated"), boxing ("Fifty Grand"), war, lowlife crime ("The Killers"), even a couple of fairy tales. Basically, Hemingway can turn anything adventurous and daring into reading material for the armchair weekend warrior. With a few exceptions, the stories take place either in the plains of Africa, throughout war-torn European countries, or in and around Michigan.

While some of the stories profess nothing more than pure narration, the recreational activities of the characters usually serve as a backdrop against which they face private conflicts or ethical dilemmas. Realism is emphasized, and only "Cat in the Rain" can be said to have a conventional happy ending, albeit one that glosses over the heroine's real problems. Hemingway is more interested in the seedy side of life, portraying people on the fringes of society: vagabonds, smugglers, expatriates. An important distinction about his war stories is that he tends to write not about soldiers, but about fighters -- individualistic rebels who are compelled by the strength of their political convictions and revel in the camaraderie on and off the battlefield, often with a bottle of fine wine.

The two stories that bookend this collection are indicative of the diversity of Hemingway's thematic repertoire. The title character of "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber" exposes his cowardice to his wife and loses the real trophy -- her love -- to their safari guide, even while regaining his dignity in a final effort that is too little, too late. Hemingway appears to reflect himself in "The Strange Country," in which an acclaimed cosmopolitan writer takes a cross-country road trip with a much younger girl in a series of vignettes that contrasts the comfort of American domesticity with the imminent dangers of pre-World War II Europe. This is the ultimate expression of Hemingway's restlessness: The world was too small to contain him; life was too slow to keep up with him.

Hemingway is one of the finest writers this country has every produced. In these politically correct times, he was fallen into disfavor, and that is a crying shame. His terse, lean lines are so easy to mock today, but what people forget is that he created that style, molded it and trimmed it down from the long-winded, more European style of writing that was so popular before his advent. As a short story writer, he is the master. Not a wasted word, and every word carved in its perfect place. When a Hemingway character plunges their arm into a cold stream, the reader can feel the ice cold numbing the fingers. His short story, "The Short, Happy Life of Francis Macomber" turned me onto reading as a teenager. So much came from him, and so much still comes from him. Raymond Carver, James Ellroy, Elmore Leonard and many others all walk a clear path that he cut through thick brush.

If you want to learn the basics of fly fishing there are other books that will teach you more. If you want to catch the allure of flyfishing this is a pretty good book.

The information that you will recieve in the "instruction" parts of the book are standard and can be found in any how-to book. The thing that I liked so much more about Shadowcasting are the Sidebars.

The Sidebars are essays about flyfishing and what it is about on a more personal or perhaps even spiritual level. I appreciated the insights offered in the sidebars.

For the absolute beginner, stick to the Curtis Creek Manifesto, for someone who has experienced flyfishing and has not given up, this is a book you should read. It looks good on a coffee table and has helped begin several conversations on the art of flyfishing.

Don't buy this to learn how to flyfish, buy it to learn why we flyfish.

I thought I'd lost my rod and reel and then by chance I found them.Then I found Shadowcasting and it definitely rekindled my interest in fishing.It's a little intimidating to start again, especially when I didn't have a clue anymore about how to tie a fly on a line.But Shadowcasting answered all my questions, and lit the fire again.Great fun!

My wife originally bought this book by John Dietsch and Gary Hubbell as a gift for her brother, who is struggling to get the hang of it; but she liked it so much that she decided to keep it for ourselves. It covers the basics in an easily digested way. It has also a section on ethics that I wish everyone would read. As either a point of departure for a neophyte or as a source of verification for a crusty old fisherman, this book is a keeper.

I am an advanced player who has been training everyday for several years. This is an excellent overview of tennis. It does not get very detailed into anything, but it covers everything. What do I mean? For example, when it talks about forehand, it shows you basically how to hit it but doesnt include much more information like about open stance, semi-open stance, hip rotation, etc. It does include the very basic information. It also gives you information about the pro tour, how the tournaments work, and grand slams. I also like a few creative pages of information like "a day in the life of a pro" and "mommy, where do pros come from?" I recommend it for any beginner to intermediate player and it could even add one or two tips to the knowledge of the advanced player (afterall, no one knows everything!).

I think it's a good and well-written book for a beginner. I wish it had more detailed pictures when authors are explaining techniques of the game . It has some, but the majority of techniques described in words rather then pictures. However, I wasn't able to find much better book with regard to visual explanations. On the other hand, when it comes to keeping in mind a novice, you can't beat the Dummies books.

This is a great book for people who know little or nothing about Tennis. It is complete and very explanable. I understand things, a lot more with the help of this book.

Colonel Carney and Ben Schemmer did an excellent job of describing the realities of U.S. contingencies in the last 40 years. As much as we try, the theory of the "purple suit" military and interoperability, i.e., all services working together, has not been achieved. The saving grace of this unfortunate situation is that our military forces usually demonstrate the flexibility to overcome these shortfalls and prevail. I commanded a rescue squadron which was tasked in an important support role for several of the operations that
Colonel Carney wrote of in this book and several that were not included. The Grenada mission was not the only one where we were unsure as to which command was really in charge. A well written book about a segment of the U.S.Air Force and our military forces which has not received the recognition and appreciation which they deserve. Colonel Carney is one of the Air Force's finest!

At first, this book seemed like one of those rah-rah "American soldiers make no mistakes and defeat every enemy" books, as the authors start their book by writing about the original development of special tactics forces.
But it soon developed that these authors offer a close-up and detailed, but relatively objective, perspective on a number of recent US military actions using special tactics units, including the Iranian hostage rescue attempt, Grenada, TWA 847 and the Achille Lauro, Panama/ Noriega, Desert Storm, Somalia, the planned Haiti invasion, and Afghanistan. The authors tell what went right, and what went wrong -- on the tactical, strategic, and political fronts. They don't pull the punches on how interservice rivalries, and poor planning and intelligence, caused a number of problems. A lot of depth is added to events that most of us are familiar with just from newspaper articles.
The authors also offer insight on the type of soldier who joins these units -- not Rambo types, or Tom Clancy "warrior" ethos heroes, but level-headed well-trained soldiers.
Anyone interested in recent history, politics, or military history would enjoy reading this well-written book.

Col. John T. Carney, USAF (ret.) takes the reader through his professional career and the history of U.S. Air Force special tactics units from the early 1980s through 2002.

Special Tactics, which has operated in most every American military action since Operation Eagle Claw (aka Desert One) in 1980, has its foundations in the Pathfinder units of WW2, and are often known as 'combat controllers.' They are often the first in and the last out.

In a frank and engaging manner, Carney lays out the history of special tactics and their operations, including Eagle Claw, Grenada, Panama, Achille Lauro, Desert Storm, and Somalia, through Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan. Given his firsthand involvement in the majority of these operations, Carney offers a unique perspective and pulls no punches in his assessment of Air Force and U.S. Special Operations. Nothing is glossed-over and the reader gets the sense that Carney bears more self-imposed crosses than he probably should.

If you are interested in a unique perspective of U.S. Special Operations and Air Force Special Tactics, this book should not be missed.

This is a great book for students...because it's not heavy! Seriously, the chapters are short and concise,heavenly stuff when you're cramming the night before exams.The writing is clear and focused...it doesn't meander off into extreme details. The illustrations are self explanatory...and the pictures are graphic and gross...like they should be in a infectious disease textbook. Too bad there aren't more of them!

This book covers every medical microbiology topic that is needed for class exams or the USLME. The book is intensely filled with very elaborated information that any medical student needs to pass his or her exams. My study group and I also used the following for class exams and the USLME and found it extremely helpful. I also purchased this book on amazon which is the following:
Microbiology Study Guide: Key Review Questions and Answers by Patrick Leonardi (ISBN: 0971999635)
The questions in this study guide were on target with my class exams and was an excellent reference for the USLME. Buy both books. Most definitely!!

The first thing to understand about this book is that it is a textbook and a difficult one. The difficulty for the beginning student or general reader is not a fault of the authors. Rather it is because medical microbiology itself is a daunting subject full of organisms that can only be seen fuzzily with an electron microscope, if at all, organisms involved in processes and behaviors that are foreign to our everyday experience. Add the fact that most of the material covered here is not part of a non-specialist curriculum either in high school or college, and effectively speaking the untrained reader is starting from scratch.

Well, why do that? First of all, because the material itself--how viruses, bacteria, fungi, and other infectious organisms enter the body, replicate, and cause disease--is fascinating and of immediate relevance to our lives. Second because (to my knowledge) there is little or nothing else available to the general reader that goes beyond a sketchy introduction to the subject. One is forced to read a text book. Fortunately this is a good one and it is thorough.

The text covers the range of infectious disease from viruses to tapeworms. The amount of technical information presented is daunting, and the sheer expanse of terminology a challenge (why is there no glossary?). The text is lavishly illustrated with photos and electron micrographs of the pathogens, as well as numerous schematic drawings showing how microorganisms cause disease, how they replicate, their chemical structure, their morphology, etc.

The instructional schematic drawings I found less valuable than the electron micrographs, but I suspect for the student of microbiology it might be the other way around.

What you'll get out of this handsome book depends on how much time and energy you are able to devote to it. I started reading this in the hope that I would, perhaps by osmosis, pick up some feel for life at the micron level, and I did. Obviously if I had been able to study the text with the help of an instructor, I would have learned a lot more.

Patrick Lynch's "Carriers" seduces with an unrelenting, chapter by chapter, cliff-hanging style. It kept me up an entire night, unable to sleep until finished. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the precarious relationship we have with our primitive ecosystems as well as to those who are fascinated with that voracious, world-class monster that is the virus. This truly frightening story brings home the personal nature of a pandemic event with just a hint of its terrible secret enticingly dangled in the moment of a brief encounter. Everyone I've shown this book to, asking them to read only a few pages, has immediately gone out and purchased the paperback for themselves. I eagerly await Lynch's next foray into the cardiac wild. DK

Patrick Lynch's "Carriers" seduces unrelentingly with its incredible chapter by chapter cliffhanging style. It kept me up all night, literally unable to sleep until I finished it. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the precarious relationship we have with our primitive ecosystems or who is fascinated with that voracious, unseen, world conquering monster that is the virus. This is a truly frightening book, that brings home the personal nature of a pandemic event with just a hint as to its secret carefully dangled in the context of a brief encounter. Everyone I've shown this book to, after reading only a few pages has gone out and bought the paperback for themselves. I eagerly await Lynch's next foray into the cardiac wild. Doug Kennedy

Before even reading Richard Preston's THE HOT ZONE, I just had to get a hold of Patrick Lynch's CARRIERS. This scientific thriller, weaving love, fear, worries and hatred into the plot, kept me in constant suspense which made it an exciting fast-paced read. With an airborne epidemic "one hundred more times more contagious than Ebola" (USA Today), breaking out in the Indonesian rain forests, only a team of American Microbiological experts are sent to investigate its source and try to keep it under control haphazardly, but only corpses and infected natives, who die in a matter of hours, are discovered with no answers to how the core of this mysterious plague is being spread. Overall, I would definitely recommend this book to anyone in search of a horrifying heart-racing, yet compelling read.

This is a *very* useful book. It explains the SQL language in a very clear and concise manner, covering the language in detail and offering excellent explanations. The book is also organized extremely well. The countless diagrams and screen shots are invaluable while working thru the examples.

Having come to a point where I needed to learn SQL (and understand it), and fast, I picked this book out of 4 I was considering. I whole-heartedly believe I made the right decision. Not only did I learn SQL, but I understood it too.

The book covers both MS Access and Oracle so if you're using either of those, and you need to learn the SQL language, this book is a great start! Heck, even if you won't be using Access or Oracle but have access to them for the purpose of the examples (I used Access for the examples but I needed to learn SQL for use with MySQL and MSSQL), this book should benefit you greatly.

This is a fine, fast introduction to SQL. The writing is clear and concise. The book is very well organized focusing on practical SQL and giving examples in SQL's two major dialects. The examples are well thought out; the sample code works. The diagrams showing how data is changed by a command are very helpful.

The book might have been a good reference - an Oracle-Access Rosetta stone - but the index suffers from the same careless editing as the rest of the book - e.g., the column or page containing references to the letter "J" is missing.

Why the author's preface thanks the publisher is beyond me. His book deserved better treatment than this. Nevertheless, I still recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn SQL in a hurry.

Choosing one particular SQL book out of the dozens available was not an easy task. Here are the reasons that made me choose this one over the others:

* Book organization - Chapters are very well structured with very descriptive sections, making it easy to find what you want. The first page of every chapter lists the contents by section

* Ease of reading - Everything is explained and described with tables or diagrams. Chapters are summarized at the end with the most important points covered. SQL code is explained in detail using numeric references that are explained separately from the code. Other books clutter the code with explanations making them hard to read and follow

* Oracle and Access code examples - Two of the most widely used DBs are covered, allowing the reader to see the slight, but nevertheless important differences in coding requirements for each platform. Command results are also presented for every example to allow the reader to compare them with their results

* Topics covered - From What is SQL to How to use Oracle and Access, the book is detailed and specific without being overkill

* CD - It contains all the examples in the book, plus all the tables and data. The CD is compatible with 98/ME/XP/2000 and NT. The Oracle code can be used with Unix and their flavors

Some examples could have been more realistic though, instead of using lunches, fruits and colors in many of them. But this is a very personal opinion that will not affect the evaluation.

I have no regrets in choosing this book, it has made me understand the SQL virtues and also its limitations. The book was definitely created with a wide audience in mind, written with no silly jokes and no fancy graphics or fonts to show off. This is a very straight, solid SQL foundation book for people with not much time for distractions.

I loved this book! The Net's everything! I do my papers, shopping, absolutely everything on it! I also adored Micheal Levin's Guerila PR: Wired. More Net!

John Patrick's book makes significant points about the rising expectations of consumers and the sometimes slow response of business to meet those Internet expectations. He provides a good review of current and upcoming Internet technology. Although much of this review may not be original, he exploits this review to push ahead companies' internal expectations. He harps on, and rightly so, on websites which lack integration of data and still offer "print and fax this form" customer service. If there is a weakness in his argument, it is a more complete discussion of the backend databases and infrastructures required to make the "fast, always on, everywhere, easy, Next Generation Internet" possible.

Patrick could have spent more time on technologies such as web services which industry has been slow to adopt. However, the technical details are more appropriate for other volumes. The strength of this book is its clear explanations of how Internet technologies are now available to meet the business strategies of pervasive, trusted, natural Internet. The book adequately addresses trust and secure technologies, yet the implementation of these technologies takes time. Once businesses and consumers are ready to accept and trust the technology and the people behind the technology, much of the Net Attitude can move forward.

One final limitation of the book: many of the examples are from the airline and financial services sector. More could have been said about healthcare, non-profit and government services, which need this attitude as much.

Overall, the book provides a current view which companies and consumers need to get. Whether the term "Next Generation Internet" will catch on remains to be seen but certainly the concepts need adoption now.

This is perhaps the best book I have read in a long time. Many tech-heads like myself will read it and say, "That is already happening. Why would anybody say this book is good?" Well, I have two things to say to answer that question. First is gimme a break. The book was published in 2001 and, obviously, there have been advancements in technology and some of the things Patrick mentions are already in place or are being put in place. That said, people should still read the book because a lot of what he writes about concerning the NGi (Next Generation Internet) is still not fulfilled yet.

Secondly, and more importantly, is that people should read the book for what it is really about: Net Attitude. One of the most important parts of net attitude Patrick presents is the concept of "outside-in thinking." Those of us in technology--whether we are code crunchers or CTO's--should be thinking about our customers and clients and what sorts of things they would want to be able to do over the Internet from our web sites. Read the book for more details. I am sure you will not be disappointed.