I came across this book on the recommendation of the author's mother. She was my grade school art teacher and mother of a long time classmate-Burton. I had not seen her since Burton's funeral, but when she mentioned Patrick's book I couldn't resist. I had been back in Walnut Grove for a weekend visit for a girlfriend's wedding. I had left for college a few years before and kept going. My family was not as deep rooted there as the Salisbury's were, but I grew up there and those roots run just as deep. Whenever school or life was getting stressful, the Delta was the first place I'd run to. It was a truly wonderful place to grow up, and the book depicts the eviroment beautifully. When I saw the pictures of the glass-like water, it made me want to be behind a ski boat once more. I knew Burton well, but Patrick was always the quiet older brother. I did know that they were total opposites personality wise. Burton was always the daredevil; class clown, as well as very gifted artistically like his mother and now as I see, Patrick also. My earliest memory of Burton I have is:him standing on a huge round table in our kindergarten classroom, which he then fell off of and cracked his head open for a few stitches. We grew apart after graduation, but he was part of many good memories I had while growing up in Walnut Grove...including one of my first crushes. I think about him often, though my life is far away from where I knew him last, and I miss him. Thank you Patrick for a little more closure:)

Through the medium of photography you watch the development of the personalities of two young men in a more personal and detailed way than words could ever express. Drew & Jimmy is a journey from adolescence to manhood for both the boys and the reader made all the more personal by the poignant story of the author and his brother. The growth and development of the author are also evident in the beautifully cropped works of art that make up this extraordinary book. I received this book for Christmas and it is one of my treasures.

Salisbury has created a wonderful jounal of growth and sensitivity. He has pulled at his heart to create this cronology of youth to adulthood. A somber passing, it would seem, for him.

I can only visit this beautiful, ineffable city once a year, but this wonderful volume of literary gems makes me feel like I live there all year around. There is SO much more to know about the Hostess City of the South than one finds in "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil."

I've been to Savannah I don't know how many times; have walked the streets and squares and read the historical markers; have devoured some local history and novels--such as MIDNIGHT IN THE GARDEN OF GOOD AND EVIL. But, now I don't feel like I knew Savannah at all. I learned so much more in LITERARY SAVANNAH. I highly recommend it for anyone who has visited (and loved, of course) or is planning a visit to Savannah.

This book is exceptionally well done and brings all the facets of a Southern Gem - Savannah - together in one book. For anyone who loves the old South, I would strongly suggest this book. The compilation of stories show a rich wonderful city that has had its own share of joy and sorrow. The editor did a wonderful job pulling literary tones together in a unique and complimentary fashion, sounding a true lyrical tribute. My favorite stories are by Conrad Aiken and Flannery O'Connor. The description of Savannah by James Ogelthorpe is astonishing. The piece that stole my heart , however, was written by Aberjhani entitled "Return to Savannah." The voice of the poet moves the words straight to the core of the reader.

The true life story of Bjorn Ortenheim has enough rich material to span several books and whilst some of the detail of his spiritual encounters with the 'Power of Light' were too far removed from my own beliefs, the message was as striking as it was stark. I can't recommend this book enough, it completely engrossed me and after finishing it in one sitting, I know I'll read it again. It hasn't changed my life, but it has made me sit up and take a good look around me at the world and my place in it. Utterly fascinating.

Readers of Ruth Montgomery's books on walk-ins were introduced to this Inventor-Scientist and his drive to create a polution free technology. Pattents for electric cars, hybrids, energy recovery devices and water purification are only a hint of his efforts to bring us into the 21st Century. This humanistic biography reads like an adventure novel- but its all true. A remarkable life! A necessary follow up to Ruth's final book, "The World To Come". Read and change!

Bjorn also wrote a novel, the Crystal City, just published, and has a children's book in the works. Use a search engine to find more!

A fantastic and very inspiring book that deals with the
underlying forces of nature. Bjorns guide "Power of Light"
gives us so many clues of why nature acts as it does and why
"the creator" probably will have to shake us up a bit in order
to get our priorities right.
As far as I can understand, we don't have very much time left
to change direction if mother earth is to survive.
-And of course the creator won't let the planet die, so guess
who will have to take the blow...

Obviously those who created the mess which we're in, we ourselves.

So maybe we should stop fighting for oil and gas, like now in
the middle east and focus our attention on alternative energy
solutions, as one example. Something Bjorn has spent many years
on with new inventions and good results. But with very poor
backup from the industry.

Albert Einstein once said something like that humankind won't
really gain anything from the modern western science until it
meets with the eastern spirituality and wisdom.

"POL" puts it very simply.
-Enter a dark room, light one small match, and the darkness
is gone.

-A must read for all interested in our very near future!!!

The authors have presented an analysis of gin rummy that serves as a critical reference tool, for anyone wishing to improve their game.

A concise introduction to the fundamentals of gin rummy are provided as background for even the novice. The author then gets into techniques for the experience player that wants to improve skills. Practical methods are provided for diagnosing the gin hand as well as the cards held by your opponent. For the serious player the author provides a section on how to remember cards played and how to use this information to analyze your opponents most likely melds and other cards held.

This book is excellent and I feel one of the best of its genre. It will help your game, and hence help you win lots and lots of money. The author must be a darned good card player, that's for sure!

This wonderful new collection of gay erotic stories is everything I have come to expect from John Patrick.It may not be the best in the series of similar anthologies(as "Come Again" and "Lover Boys")but certainly belongs in the top five of his books.The book contains a multitude of erotic tails from many known contributors,such as Thomas C.Humphrey,Peter Gilbert and Rick Jackson.As the title suggests the stories are mostly about sexually aggressive and insatiable young men,who get exactly what they want!Although all the stories were quite good,I particularly liked the story "Shakedown",by Corbin Chezner.It is about a hot blond correctional officer and his sexual encounters with his boss,a colleague and a prisoner.Very good were also the stories "C'mon Kid",by R.J Masters(about a rookie police officer and his partner) and "Dutch Treat",by Rudy Roberts(about two young men having a glorious time in Amsterdam).In addition the book includes a special section of stories about cowboys,focussing on the fetish of the cowboy attire(the hat,the boots,the works!).Finally at the end of the book there are two hot bonus novellas,elaborating on the theme of horny "Boys On The Prowl".Overall this is a very satisfying collection.John Patrick delivers!I definitely recommend it especially if someone does not own any other of his books!

Here's another large collection of gay erotic stories from John Patrick that's sure to keep you up late at night. There are so many wonderful, hot, sexy stories here it's hard to have just one favorite. The title says it all and these are hot guys just out there looking for sex. There are two bonus books included with this collection, plus lots of cowboys stories that are really hot & sexy & explicit fantasies. You can add to that a lot of hot photos on the cover & inside of young good-looking guys, especially of Emilio Sands. This book is a must for the collector of gay male erotic stories. John Patrick never disappoints in his collections of erotic tales. Enjoy!

This is a very short book (81 pages long, 111 if you include the prefaces and the frontispiece, big print, easily fitting in your jacket pocket) and includes Patrick's Lorica -- the hymn known as the Deer's Cry or Faeth Fiada as well as The Letter to the Soldiers of Coroticus (basically a public pillory of Coroticus) and St. Patrick's Confession.

If you are interested in buying The Confession because you want a straight-forward account of St. Patrick's life, you should be warned that it will not serve that purpose. If that is what you're looking for, I recommend you buy a biography instead. Given that the literary conventions for autobiographies had yet to be established, this work is much like St. Augustine's Confessions but more laconic and oblique. Apparently, it was written in defense of his character, having been recently defamed by his ecclesiastical competitors in England. As such, I think it would be best approached as an example of St. Patrick's theology. The editor has been very helpful in this regard by noting in the text every instance St. Patrick is quoting from the Bible. I'd estimate, on that basis, that quotes from, allusions to, the Bible account for around 40% of the text. Thus, if you want to understand the work, you probably want to read it with a Bible near so you can follow the thread of St. Patrick's argument/allusion. However, as you might imagine, this adds substantially to the amount of time required to digest the book.

I found A Letter to the Soldiers of Coroticus much more accessible, which makes sense given its intended audience - the faithful of Ireland. It comprises about a fifth of the book and was very interesting to me, at least, as an example of the power of ideas, how they can be used to bind together a community which can then be wielded as a tool, and why, in the competition between the old or pagan meme with the Christian one, the Christian meme more or less prevailed.

"Deer's Cry" is only a few pages long, and not more than nice to have. It clearly illustrates, however, the difficulties John Skinner (the translator) notes of translating these works, namely the loss of the chiastic structure and overall prosody. This is a problem of translation in general, but I would wager that these works are particularly difficult in that regard. I trust the translation is good, but I thought prospective buyers who, like me, are unfamiliar with St. Patrick and his times should be made aware of these difficulties.

With the above in mind, I would recommend this book as an interesting primary source for the thinking, life and times of St. Patrick which, in places, are both beautiful and disturbing.

This charming little book is a great guide for anyone who wants to know the man who is St. Patrick. In this work, O'Donohue doesn't discuss the legends that surround Patrick but translates Patrick's own writings and adds an insightful commentary. The author offers a new examination of Patrick as he suggests that Patrick's hard-to-decipher language is not the result of Patrick's lack of learning, as Patrick and many of his commentators claim, but the result of Patrick's own brilliant mind trying to bring the message of the Gospel to the Celts in their own language. This book will take you directly to the heart of a simple saint who's witness to Christ changed the fate of Ireland and, consequently, the fate of the world.

If you've ever wondered whether there's a book inside of you, then you should read "The Life Writing Class." I had the good fortune of beginning to read it when I was struggling to write my own book and finishing it after I had the opportunity to enroll in one of John Patrick Grace's Life Writing classes. So I have viewed the process from the inside and the outside, and it's a remarkable thing to behold. The book gives the reader a sampling of the stories waiting to be told by people from all walks of life. In the class, I have seen such people come in with ideas of the stories they want to tell and receive the direction they need to get those stories into print. That first Life Writing class, which produced this book, has led to the publication of five other books with more on the way. One member of the class I was in already has a book in the hands of a publisher and scheduled to be in print in a matter of months. The rest of us are working on ours with a new sense of purpose. Some of us still meet on our own on a weekly basis to give each other support. Not everyone will have a chance to be a member of a Life Writing class, but reading this book will give you a better idea of what's possible.

This book is incredibly inspiring, especially if you're considering writing your own life story. Each of these 26 short pieces takes a unique approach to the task: honoring a distant ancestor/poet, a Christmas Eve that holds the last perfect moment for a family soon torn apart, a funeral procession through the streets of Chicago that rekindles boyhood memories. We see a piece of ourselves in each tale and are stimulated by the different solutions to the puzzle of autobiography: where to start, how to proceed.

The Life Writing Class is also lovingly illustrated with black and white photographs of paintings held in the collection of The Huntington Museum of Art. Clearly reproduced, achingly beautiful, they are the perfect visual metaphor for a book of autobiographical prose: not the light itself, but a reflection of the light. The Life Writing Class is a class act in content, design, and impact. It makes you want to write.

"The Life Writing Class" is a must read for anyone passionate about personal histories and autobiographies. It would be particularly helpful for someone looking for a jump-start in writing a retrospective of their own. Edited by a masterful writing coach, the book left me feeling as though I'd made 20 new friends.

While the treatment of Weber's life and thoughts is quite useful and rather well written, the text contains over thirty (30)errors of German and Latin expressions. These are orthographical,
wrong gender endings, word distortions beyond recognition, etc.
Even historical names, like Leibknecht (for Karl Liebknecht) and Sombardt(for Werner Sombart) have been mangled.
For a work with "academic" pretensions -- the author is a professor at CCNY -- this is regrettable. One wonders what the numerous editors, proofreaders, and so on have done other than
base their "imprimatur" on self-attested expertise.

I certainly agree with the earlier reviewer from Portugal as to the high quality of Diggins' book. However, the reviewer is wrong about the term "iron cage." Weber very clearly refers to capitalism as an "iron cage" in the powerful concluding pages of his book "The Protestant Ethic and the Sprit of Capitalism." Weber both admired and feared the economic system that he saw as our fate. In a world in which values inevitably conflict and unintended consequences are the rule, every social system and every social initiative will be tinged with irony and tragedy. Capitalism is no exception; it is a mixed bag, both beneficial and costly. For Weber, only by both responsibly safeguarding ourselves from its more dehumanizing features and at the same time measuring up to its demands upon individual initiative can the human spirit survive and in some measure determine its future. We are suspended, with no relief other than our own individual and collective will to act, between these perennial and contradictory demands. Weber harbored both hopes and doubts that human beings were up to the task. Diggins' book brings out this message very well.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Max Weber was a modern thinker who defied categorization. Was he a philosopher, an historian, a political theorist or a sociologist? This leads to some confusion as to his message. For instance, contrary to what one of the reviews mentions, Weber didn't view Capitalism as an "iron cage", but it's modern derivative, bureaucracy as that cage. Few people will argue with that comment. Strangely enough too, as Professor Diggins indicates, the questions that Weber struggled with one hundred years ago are still very much with us today. Could that be because the situation of pre-World War I Germany burdened as it was with a dysfunctional political system and weak leaders, yet possessing a strong, vigorous economy and formidable military, is very similar to the that of America today? I found the author's discussion of Weber's problems of reconciling the "ethic of principled convictions" with the "ethic of responsibility" particularly timely. After finishing the book I found myself wanting to know more about Max Weber's insights into the modern condition.

This tape is well done. The sound effects create an atmosphere that draws in the listener. The actors are dramatic, but not overly so. The short stories themselves are well written, delivering edge-of-the-chair suspense (or knee-slapping comedy, as the case may be).

As most net surfers are aware the Sci-Fi Channel's web site has included a section devoted to science fiction radio drama...Seeing Ear Theatre. One aspect of which includes originally produced productions cerated especially for the site and which has featured performances by many well-known SF actors as Micheal O'Hare,Mark Hamill,Marina Sirtis,and others. With a few exceptions, a lot of the dramas are based on recent short stories by SF writers such as Terry Bisson, Allen Steele, John Kessel and Gergory Benford. With the release of this audiobook editon(which includes introductions by SF's resident angry young{sic}man Harlan Ellison)now one can listen to these stories anytime you want. The best stories(IMO)are the Three Odd Comedies and The Death of Captain Future (which despite the pulpish-sounding title is a darkly humorous tale set in the future history of Steele's previous works such as Orbital Decay and Clarke County,Space). If you like audio drama-- especially newly produced audio drama...you'll love this collection and you may also want to check out Vol. 2 which should be on sale soon(I know I can't wait).

WOW what a story! Brian Smith could sell this as a short story by itself it is so good IMO. I just wish they sold a hard copy of these writings--not just audio! I have been reading Sci Fi for a long time. This guy is great! Reminds me of 2001, a space odyssey a bit. Worth the price just for this one folks! I noticed there are no other books by Brian Smith for sale on Amazon. What's up with that? He needs to write books, and Amazon needs to sell them--geez, do I make myself clear?

James Patrick Kelly is a wonderful secret. If you polled a representative sampling of readers who call themselves SF fans, I would bet that not 50% are familiar with James Patrick Kelly. This is a shame because Mr. Kelly's work are of the very highest quality. This collection of short fiction shows off the very best of Kelly's stories and not one of them should be missed.

My favorite story of the collection is 'Mr. Boy', a wonderful novella about a 25-year-old who has re-engineered himself to remain in a 12-year-old body. This is Mr. Boy. Throughout the story Mr. Boy begins to mature, and he's not quite sure how to handle this. This 60+ page novella makes the entire collection worth purchasing, but there's so much more.

The wonderful stories "Rat", "Monsters", "Think Like a Dinosaur", and many more make this one of the most outstanding collections that I've had the good fortune to come across. Like all Golden Gryphon press books, this is an extraordinary collection from a very talented author. The Golden Gryphon imprint on a book is enough to make me open the wallet, even if it's an author that I am totally unfamiliar with. They put out excellent quality books filled with very good fiction. Highly recommended.

This volume contains fourteen of Kelly's best stories,including twoHugo nominees and four Nebula nominees. The title story is the best known, and the most discussed, of all of them, seen by many as a response or follow-up to Tom Godwin's classic, "The Cold Equations." The other stories represent the best of Kelley's work, and make it available in a permanent form. This is the first volume from a new publisher, Golden Gryphon, and is a very well-produced volume. (I hope someone is bringing single-author collections such as these to the attention of libraries, since they provide the only way for most libraries to get some of the best work of today's leading authors.)

Golden Gryphon Press has been publishing a long and wide range of single author short-story collections--and I must, obviously, admit that James Patrick Kelly's (author of WILDLIFE and LOOK INTO THE SUN) THINK LIKE A DINOSAUR AND OTHER STORIES has gained a special place in my heart. One of the leading SF stylists, Kelly's stories have a perfect blend of lyricism and sheer storytelling power; recently, he has earned well-deserved attention with his Hugo-winning stories, "Think Like a Dinosaur" and "10^16 to 1," respectively. Pick up this collection at all costs.