Whether or not you are a Christian, this book will touch your soul. Samuel Lamb spent over 20 years in Chinese prisons for sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ. As a Christian, it has challenged me in my walk with Christ.

I felt strongly enough about this book to go out of my way to write a review (!). I learned a lot about how the Chinese government deals with the Church. I would love to meet Pastor Lamb someday.

In 1996, a friend loaned me their copy of Bold as a Lamb just one month prior to our trip to China. This book gave me a stronger understanding of the real presecution that takes place everyday in this fallen world that desperately needs Jesus Christ. This book recounts the story of one Christian man's life within the wallls of China. How he spent over 20 years of his life in prison because of his faith in Jesus Christ. I would strongly recommend this book to anyone Christian or not. Also, to those who teach High School or College students this would be an excellent book for classroom reading and discusion. While in China, I personally met Pastor Samual Lamb and worshiped with his home church.

Somehow Holmes produces scholarly biographies that make compulsive reading. He never fictionalizes or puts thoughts in his subjects' heads that he has no authority for - and yet he keeps us turning those pages. Is it the subjects he choses? Shelley and Coleridge both had strongly "plotted" lives. Coleridge married the sister of Southey's wife and fell in love with the sister of Wordsworth's wife. I liked his comment on Coleridge's father's predecessor in the the benefice of St Mary's Ottery.

The general reader and the scholar should enjoy this book. Holmes does set Coleridge talking.

Don't miss Owen Barfield's WHAT COLERIDGE THOUGHT if you want to explore the matephysician.

If you think Coleridge was finished by 1804, think again. True, all his great poems had been written but an astonishing life of triumph and tragi-comedy lay ahead. "Coleridge, Darker Reflections" is the long-awaited second half of this award-winning biography of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. It covers the period 1804-1834 - a time when, according to popular belief, Coleridge's fertile imagination had dried up and he faced a slippery slide to an opium-induced decline. But not according to the author Richard Holmes, described as "Our best post-war biographer". He is a superb story teller and unlike so many biographers before him, deeply in touch with his subject. His first volume, "Coleridge Early Visions" introduced the poet to a new generation of admirers (including myself who was fired into writing a play for children about the poet's early magical years). This wonderful book will surely establish STC as a troubled but gigantic genius of the 19th century. Holme's own genius is to show us Coleridge the man. "Always on the knife edge between tragedy and comedy" said Holmes at the London book launch this week (21st October 1998) Holmes has worked assiduously through STC's vast notebooks. Like his namesake, Sherlock, the author clearly enjoys the detection element of biography. His is a personal search for the man, his millieu and his place. Holmes retraces STC's footsteps around England - echoing the desperate perambulations of the wandering poet. Holmes tells this astonishing story at a cracking pace - he has the thriller-writer's gift for making you turn the page. We follow STC through his Malta years - a wonderful evocation of Coleridge's chaotic life. The years of tragic opium decline in London are brought to life (I challenge you not to cry) - and yet there are so many triumphs - the marvellous late poems that Holmes has championed in an earlier collection, the seminal lectures on Shakespeare, Coleridge the thinker and radical, Coleridge the father (not a very good one), the years of relative happiness in Highgate where we find Coleridge the guru. Above all is Coleridge the man. Holmes as only the greatest biographers can, brings his subject completely to life and shows us why Coleridge was such a tour de force in the Romantic movement and why Byron called Wordsworth "a fixed star" but Coleridge "a meteor". There is so much to love in this book - it is hard to know what to recommend. If you have never read a biography before, make this your first. If you think you are familiar with the life of STC, this book, so full of new discoveries and insights, will make you reassess the poet. Holmes is clearly enamoured of his subject. It is a book that will make you laugh out loud in places. You will see exactly why Charles Lamb said of his great friend "He is an archangel, damaged."

I wish I had this book when my father died. Even now, eight years later, it's a Godsend

Creative Grieving signals a turning point in the literature dealing with loss. Psychiatrist Art Samuels joins his 40 years of experience with age old techiniques from the East to create an effective healing process. It helps the reader transcend the fear of impermanence and teaches how to turn major losses into an ever available source of strength and joy. Separate sections in the book address losses due to death, divorce, money, status and moving to a new location.This book is strongly endorsed by eminent scholars in Buddhism and psychoanalysis.

I felt lost and abandonded until I read this book. The person I loved the most was gone. I was unable to love myself or anyone else and was sinking in despair.The book enabled me to get back in touch with the loving part of myself. It helped me nurture myself through the pain of my loss. What is most awesome about the book is that it helped me to identify what I was most missing about that person and use that quality to strengthen myself and share with others. It was a Godsend in helping me through the death of my mother and my divorce.

I have used telling the criminal who he is and how he thinks often in my work. This alone gets their attention. To be so accurate about their thinking and reasoning has won hands down their interest and willingness to participate in the change process. They can't imagine you know already what really happens in their day to day thinking. To me this is the reference work I go back to time and again especially with difficult clients that have failed all other attempts at change. This book gave me the tools to work with the most hardened cases. If you don't understand the change process how can you guide them through it. Its most useful feature is the cases that are presented and the methods used to create change in thinking and action. If I had to choose which to buy it would be this one as it has taught me not only about the criminal mind but how it can be changed.

This is a great book! The author breaks the criminal down into parts such as what a criminal thinks about people, in general, what needs to take place within the criminal in order to change, and how they view the world. I was somewhat surprised the author views criminal behavor as a choice, not due to poverty, a fatherless home, or any of the usual reasons cited for a child becoming a criminal later in life. The author is a psychologist, but communicates logical concepts in language that is easy to understand by the layperson.

This is a great book! The author breaks the criminal down into parts such as what a criminal thinks about people, in general, what needs to take place within the criminal in order to change, and how they view the world. I was somewhat surprised the author views criminal behavor as a choice, not due to poverty, a fatherless home, or any of the usual reasons cited for a child becoming a criminal later in life. The author is a psychologist, but communicates logical concepts in language that is easy to understand by the layperson.

I supervise and teach psychological assessment and use this book to help students learn how to integrate different psychological tests in their reports. The worksheets provide useful guidelines for integrating data. Overall this reference helps one create reports that are useful and appropriate for both teachers and parents, as well as physicians an therapists. Jerome Sattler's Assessment of Children books are probably the backbone of my work, but this little paperback is handy when a quick overview is all that's needed or I want to present material to individuals who do not have a theoretical background in assessment and psychometry.

Again, the authors have given a blueprint of test interpretation using Gf-Gc theory. They also provided worksheets to ease the interpretation process. This book is an excellent companion to the "Wechsler Intelligence Scales and Gf-Gc Theory". I highly recommend this book.

I have used Cross-Battery Assessments for over two years, and this is THE book to have in your library! Easy to read, it provides an excellent method to evaluate cognitive functioning! In school psychology, I am asked to evaluate students and then apply the results to their educational programming. Never before has it been so clear, and it has changed the way I do my job. ANYONE who does intellectual testing should have this book!

Very nicely done and useful for those in crisis. Perfectly combines the classic Psalms with modern research on mind-body medicine in a pastoral, readable volume.

"For Thou Art With Me" appears to be a book about dealing with pain and suffering, but it is really a book about the human condition. In a series of poignant examples, the authors connect the experiences of hospital patients and their families with the ancient outlook of the writers of the Book of Psalms. The Psalmists' questions about the presence or absence of God in the human confrontation with suffering and evil are as relevant today as they were 2,500 years ago. These issues and the universalist message of the authors - that God is present and available - are very effectively laid out in this inspiring book.

While "For Thou Art With Me" is not specifically about Judaism, it communicates in a unique way the essence of Jewish theology. I have read many books on Judaism and this is by far the best in expressing, from a Jewish point of view, the ways of a loving, ever-present God. I would recommend it on that basis alone for all readers.

I loved this beautiful, healing book. It's has the perfect words and tone for people faced with grief, fear, illness, pain and suffering.

You know how you don't know what to say to people who are really suffering? How helpless you can feel? Well, I've just ordered 11 copies of this book, because that's how many people I know (this week) who could really use it.

I'm an old time fan of Henry Dreher, who's a wonderful and brilliant health writer and now I'm a new fan of Rabbi Chiel, who, I'm told is the absolute best as far as rabbi's go - a great orator and a kind and compassionate human being, all in one. Anyway, that much is obvious from these pages.

I'm very glad this book got written. It will help a lot of people who need to lean into their judeo-christian roots to get a divine assist.

I am a high school student who competes in extracurricular mathematics contests. I've found many great books for trigonometry, algebra, precalculus, calculus, and any other field of math except geometry, i.e. until I found this book. A thorough knowledge of geometry beyond what you learn in high school in necessary needed to be competitive, and the place to get it is Geometry Revisited. This book covers any geometry you could need and is by far the best, if not the only, book out there with what you need to know. This book was also very interesting and thought provoking. The selection and arrangement of topics couldn't be any better. Each lesson even contains exercises (with answers and hints) to show you how to apply what the book teaches you. I would recommend this book to any high school student competing in any contests, to any person interested in extending their knowledge of geometry, or to anyone who with any interest in math. I can tell you that you will learn multitudes and enjoy the book too.

This is 'the book' the typical high school student in America needs to read in order to see what Geometry is really all about. Geometry can be fun and engaging. Unfortunately it has taken a back seat in the high school curriculum. This is unfortunate considering the beauty that the subject has to offer. Many topics are covered in this book: The extended law of cosines, Ptolemy's theorem, transformational geometry, conics, and many, many, many more. This is also a book that is essential for mathematical problem solvers-- particularly for those interested in competing. All that is needed to follow along is the basic geometry learned at the high school level. This book is a must have for any mathematical library.

A++ Highly recommended.

Geometry Revisited should be used as a textbook for every geometry class in high school. It offers comprehensive proofs and theorems that every undergrad should know by the time he/she gets through basic geometry. The last sections of this book also offers a slight touch on comcepts such as non-Eucledian and projective geometry, serving as a launchpad to higher levels of education. I highly recommend this book to any high school or undergrad teachers and students.

What a story! A remarkably easy to read account of Sam Goldwyn's rags-to-riches life. Did you know "Goldwyn" was not his real name? Did you know he was thrown out of the MGM company after a few years?! Goldwyn worked at some stage or other with just about every famous name in the business, and also fell out with just about everybody he ever met. A cantankerous and perverse character who loved contradicting people. When people quit because he made their lives intolerable, he sometimes felt personally attacked and betrayed. The book is full of colourful characters, and Scott Berg has done a wonderful job of using quotations and dialogues to really bring these people alive: Gary Cooper, Marlon Brando, Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Lillian Hellman, William Wyler, Billy Wilder, and the remarkable Hilda Berl. It reads like a movie! By tracing Goldwyn's history, the book also covers the story of many of the other famous movie companies that are still famous today: United Artists, Universal, Paramount, Warner Brothers, RKO and of course MGM. Goldwyn also came across many young actors and actresses before they were stars: Vivien Leigh, Laurence Olivier, David Niven, Marlon Brando, John Wayne, etc. And of course the famous Goldwyn malapropisms are here, though limited to the ones actually traceable (as far as possible) to Goldwyn himself: "Anyone who sees a psychiatrist should have their head examined! Include me out! A verbal agreement isn't worth the paper it's written on," to pick just a few.

A remarkably well-written and well-researched biography that brings this vigorous, infuriating, yet oddly attractive ugly duckling to vibrant life. This must rank amongst the best biographies, up there with Ron Chernow's book about the Morgans. Anyone at all interested in movies and movie history will enjoy this.

Great book! I enjoyed reading about a man who literally came from poverty to be on of Hollywood's pioneer filmmakers. He was a rough man to work with no doubt, but knew what worked and lasted in an industry that is hard to last in! A. Scott Berg did a wonderful job of writing a respectful book about this man!

A most compelling, intricate, mesmerizing, passionate, heartfelt and respectful account of Goldwyn's life! A. Scott Berg has created a profound work as equal an opus to any of Goldwyn's best stuff. The neat thing is that you feel as if you were there - the birth, growing pains and maturity of Hollywood - brutally recreated for our pleasure. Bravo!!

I prefer this to fiction. If you are interested in true life stories, this is the place to find it. Phyllis Crawford, New Paltz, NY. I am an historic interpreter and researcher for Ulster County, NY Historic Societies.

GIMH,BKII is a series of stories based on patient/doctor interactions. These stories, spiced/sliced with humor, ranging from the indelicate/steamy to the heart-gripping and tragic, provide entertaining reading and a window on the great variety of human behavior.

This book is a compelling collection of human stories; great reading for messages and for fun. Dr. Alicia Bertone, a scientific author, Professor at Ohio State University who recently has won a $500,000 Truman Endowment to set up and continue research

Although I've been known to grumble at Kramer's dullness, the present book, far from being dull, ought to be of real interest to many. Professor Samuel Noah Kramer was the world's leading Sumerologist, but in this book he seems to have risen above the dry academic persona we find in some of his other books and allowed his love and enthusiasm for things Sumerian to show.

Basically the book sets out to explain and describe, using extensive quotations from Sumerian Literature, what Kramer took to be thirty-nine civilizational firsts of the Sumerians. Many new archaeological discoveries have been made since the 3rd revised edition of 'History Begins at Sumer' was published in 1981, and current thinking seems to be leaning towards the view that, far from beginning in Sumer, civilization first arose further East in India.

But whether it first began in Sumer or in India, since the Indus script hasn't yet been deciphered, and the Indians didn't write on imperishable clay tablets anyway, we have as yet no thirty-nine Vedic Indian firsts, and perhaps should give Kramer the benefit of the doubt and enjoy his splendid book.

After a brief Introduction, the thirty-nine firsts follow. Mutterings have been heard about the 'pop' overtones of the term 'firsts,' but it seems to me an interesting way of treating Sumer's history, and the book, in my opinion, is far more successful at capturing and holding one's attention than Kramer's later and more conventional study, 'The Sumerians.'

Most of the chapters are centered on a Sumerian text, some quite brief and others fairly long, which Kramer envelopes with his full and interesting commentary. Often we are given a line drawing of the actual cuneiform tablet from which the text was taken, and these have a special fascination all of their own. Besides the 28 line drawings, the book is further enriched with 34 halftones - sculptures, cuneiform tablets, stelae, artefacts, archaeological sites - which greatly add to the interest of the book.

Among the firsts covered are such things as: The First Schools, The First Case of Juvenile Delinquency, The First "War of Nerves," The First Bicameral Congress, First Historian, The First Case of Tax Reduction, The First Legal Precedent, The First Pharmacopoeia, The First Moral Ideals, The First Animal Fables, The First Literary Debates, The First Love Song, The First Library Catalogue, The First "Sick" Society, The First Long-Distance Champion, The First Sex Symbolism, Labor's First Victory, and so on.

Many of these and other chapters are memorable, and once having read them you'll never forget them. You'll never forget them because, in fact, they are about yourself. What I mean is that one of the more important things we learn from Kramer's fascinating book is that, whether we realize it or not, we are all, in a sense, Sumerians.

The patterns that were perhaps first laid down in Sumer - urbanization, monumental architecture, kingship, writing system, distinct social classes, laws, lawyers, lawcourts, taxes, formal education, libraries, a regular army, organized warfare, labor disputes, etc. - are still very much with us today. We usually refer to the whole package as 'Civilization,' without realizing how indebted to the Sumerians we all are. Or are we?

I say this because the second important thing I think we have to learn from Sumer, though it seems to have escaped most, including Kramer, is the simple fact that Civilization doesn't work. It doesn't work because 'Civilization' is a euphemism for exploitation. Sumer, after a relatively brief efflorescence, crashed in ruins.

Here are a few lines from Kramer's 'Sumerian History, Culture and Literature': "In the course of centuries Sumer became a "sick society" ... it yearned for peace and was constantly at war; it professed such ideals as justice, equity and compassion, but abounded in injustice, inequality and oppression; materialistic and shortsighted, it unbalanced the ecology essential to its economy.... And so Sumer came to a cruel, tragic end" (in Diane Wolkstein and S. N. Kramer, 'Inanna - Queen of Heaven and Earth,' page 126).

Perhaps the third and most important thing we can learn from 'History Begins at Sumer' is that, rather than persisting in this obviously unworkable and unjust and outmoded Sumerian pattern, we should be thinking about replacing it with a true civilization, one based not on the exploitation of one's fellow humans but devoted to realizing the full human potential of all men and women and children - a Civilization that would be about humans as humans, and not about humans as 'owners' and 'units of production.'

But perhaps you'd better read Professor Kramer's fascinating and thought-provoking book, and then you can make up your own mind about all this. It's a book you won't easily forget.

Our views of history have barely caught up with the archaeological revolution of the twentieth century. The sources of our traditions in Classical antiquity always had a murky prelude, the world of the Assyrians, a late Mesopotamia with an unknown provenance. And yet the sources of all this remained obscure, as if we had forgotten the Greeks behind the Romans. Now the full scope of the complete historical cycle of civilizations beginning in Sumer (and Egypt) has come into view throwing the whole of world history into its real pattern. For we see that the Sumerians were the real creators laying the foundations for what was to come. Our perceptions of the evolution of civilization have yet to catch up.

We owe much of our knowledge on Ancient Sumerian civilization to Mr Samuel Kramer. As one of the specialists on Sumerian cuneiform and written culture, he traced the clay tablets of Ancient Mesopotamia in various places and brought together the parts of puzzles that belonged to very early Sumerian myths. In this legendary work, Mr Kramer presents us the "39 firsts" of history, including "The First Farmers Almanac", "The First Law Codes", "The First Noah", "The First Resurrection" and so on. The book does not follow a chronological order but presents the achievements of the Ancient Sumerians in an "item-by-item" basis. You not only learn the historical basics on Ancient Mesopotamia in various chapters of this brilliant work, but have fun by reading the fascinating original Sumerian myths, including "Inanna's voyage to the land of the dead". If you're into ancient history, this book should be on your "Top 10" list. If you need further reading from Mr Kramer, "Sumerian Mythology" may well follow the suit.