Great book for everybody who is new to the field of geology. It provides a lot of background information which even goes beyond the subject, but which is not less interesting. Everybody beginning to study earth sciences should have a copy of it on his/her bookshelf.

THIS BOOK WAS SOOOOOOOOO BORING. IT HAD ABSOLUTELY NOTHING I WAS LOOKING FOR. THE WHOLE POINT WAS TO LEARN ABOUT AMUSEMENT PARKS BUT IT HAD NOTHING OF VALUE. I HOPE FOR YOUR SAKE THAT YOU TAKE THIS BOOK OFF THE MARKET AND BURN EVERY COPY!!!!!

This is the best guide to amusement parks ever written. The author has included every bit of information I would want before deciding to visit a park, not the least of which is a comprehensive list of every major ride in each park. Driving directions to the parks in question are the most painstakingly accurate I've ever had the priviledge to read. While Tim O'Brien, Jeff Ulmer and others have written good books on the same subject, Reed's was by far the best. His untimely death precluded any updates of this master work in the genre, so it is a bit dated, but if I ever write my own book on the subject, it will be based more strongly on this one than any other. The format is simply amazing and needs to be revisited sooner rather than later...I only hope that I am fortunate enough to be the one who does so. Highest recommendations.

James Reed Campbell takes the term "gifted" and applies it to the characteristics of high achieving students. Although Campbell's repeated point throughout the book is communication between parents, children, and teachers is useful, he ignores the characteristics and academic and emotional needs of gifted children. He recommends strategies to parents that will inevitably set students up for debilitating perfectionism, disappointment, and failure - as he recommends the parents setting their children's life goals and directing their children to reach them. He recommends pressuring children into achieving these goals and doesn't take into account circumstances under which gifted children do not achieve to their potential. Campbell considers giftedness a condition that can be reached through hard work as opposed to it being a natural ability. As a school district gifted specialist, this would not ever be a book I would recommend to parents of gifted children.

This book should be required reading for all parents. Although children are born with inherently different talents, this book teaches you how to work with and maximize your child's potential. There are wonderful summaries of each chapters and concrete suggestions to enrich your child's education--things that don't take a lot of time, just persistent effort on a DAILY basis. Anyone can do it. I have the most important pages copied and posted on my refrigerator at home and in my briefcase at work so that I can review. Rather than a book to be borrowed from the library to read once, this book is one that I review on an annual basis just before the start of the school year. Buy your copy today. You won't be disappointed. The things in this book are best applied after reading Mary Sheedy Kurchinka's Raising Your Spirited Child so that you understand how your child's personality affects learning and behavior.

It takes a ... what? It takes more than this book recognizes to improve education. The rhetoric here implies that the so-called "reform" movement is the way to cure school ills. To most teachers, however, this is simply another year's bureaucratic fad to morph educators into paper pushers. Although I found several insights here, and detailed information on six inner-city school districts, I was somewhat amazed by two important omissions: teachers and students. Teacher unions were trivialized by the suggestion that each little school decide, on their own, if they want to unionize.The writer recommends "hiring halls" for teachers, putting us on a level with farm workers and factory hands. This writing shows absolutely no understanding about why teachers need unions or how such organizations originated.

This writer clearly identifies a target audience -- mayors, civic leaders and school board members. By decision, it excludes teachers and students. It's sad to think -- and I've seen this happen -- that ivory tower bureaucrarts actually make decisions based on this type of dubious theory rather than getting down in the trenches with the reality of the classroom.

Content here is peppered with educratic jargon which twists other terminology into bastardized educational theories. School "incubators" make me think of premature babies."Real dollar budgets" make me wonder if bureaucrats are playing Monopoly with our taxes. "CEO Strong Schools strategy" pretends that a principal, who is middle management, is a CEO. Get real. The only CEO in the school district is the superintendent who is hired by an elected school board.

This book, to it's credit, recognizes the inability of reform to reform anything (last paragraph, page 84). Any good book offers new insights and "policy churn" gets my prize here. Teachers are jaded by bandwagon bureaucrats who recycle new versions of old ideas, one after another, never saying, "stop this" or "drop that."

Hillary Clinton quotes the African proverb, "It Takes a Village." This book spins the idea into, "a city." I'm waiting for the next trendy realization for someone to discover that, "It takes a teacher."

As a amateur historian specializing in ancient cultures such as the Romans, I found this book to be nothing but pure fiction. While the authors do make it seem as though these events could be true, a little common sense tells the intelligent reader that they are not. What I found even more incredulous was that the authors give absolutely no sources for their information. On the other hand, this piece does work as a pornographic salute to the Romans. Hilarious but not true at all would best describe this book. If you are a fan of murder, sodomy, beastiality, and lurid female conduct then buy this book. If you are more interested in the facts of the ancient Romans, then avoid it like a Lybian lion going for the anus of a young slave.

Caligula: Divine Carnage capitalizes on our enduring fascination with the excesses and perversities of the "bad" Roman emperors. The Foreword promises that this book "eschews the mind-numbing minutiae of politico-military history and instead brings the glorious, often shocking decadence of Ancient Rome to bloody, pulsating life." Indeed, drawing from the usual contemporary sources and biographies as well as from "newly-excavated documents," authors Stephan Barber and Jeremy Reed attempt to reconstruct the lives of a few of the more notorious Caesars in a graphic and direct manner.

The fundamental problem with Caligula: Divine Carnage is that it doesn't seem to fit into any useful literary category. The book never makes its intentions clear; it is neither pure history nor straight entertainment, and as such, it is difficult to identify an audience that it will fully satisfy.

As history, it certainly presents some interesting facts, but since it lacks footnotes or even a bibliography, it is impossible to follow up on most of its novel claims or even to verify whether they are true. The book definitely poses as a work of non-fiction, but some of the claims are so outrageous, that even to readers who are not especially well versed in Roman history might seem suspect. If any of the "facts" are indeed unfounded, then this book does the supreme disservice of misleading naive readers in the guise of a credible history. At the very least, the authors should explain themselves when they venture far from the consensus of the standard sources.

As entertainment, the book is actually quite successful. Barber's vivid treatment of Caligula and the arena would make enthralling fiction and the thought that it is true makes it all the more fascinating. With the possible exception of the final chapter, there is never a dull moment in the text. Some of the qualities that make the book fail as history are actually beneficial to its entertainment value. Dates and detailed historical background are included only when necessary to the context of the book's theme. It is definitely an easy read.

One aspect of the text that limits its appeal to either serious historians or casual readers is its excruciatingly colorful language. There are many examples, which I will not repeat here, of language that borders on offensive and which definitely disqualifies the text from being used in the classroom setting. Sensitive readers are advised to stay away. Especially problematic is the fact that the book is neither marketed nor jacketed in a way that indicates the rawness if its language. There are many readers who are interested in learning about the subject matter promised by the cover, but it is not until a few pages into the text that the reality of the portrayal is revealed. On a scale of offensiveness, I would place this publication near the un-edited Caligula of the Bob Guccione variety.

Another weakness of the book is the dramatic shift in tone that occurs in the last chapter. Jeremy Reed, who authors this single chapter, discards the abrasive language found in the rest of the book. Instead, he descends into indecipherable psychobabble in search of the true motivations for the young emperor Heliogabalus's ridiculous behavior. This chapter really would be best published elsewhere, for readers who appreciate it will probably not enjoy the others and vice versa.

In summary, I would most recommend this book only to casual enthusiasts of Roman history who have a healthy sense of skepticism and a strong stomach, and for whom Seutonius is too restrained. Even for these readers, there are doubtlessly more reputable sources to visit first, and doing so would probably be prudent. Caligula: Divine Carnage is an interesting and thoroughly entertaining work, but suffers some substantial weaknesses that limit its usefulness in most conventional categories.

THIS BOOK IS HILARIOUS!!!

Especially if you know anything about the subject, because it is so tragically inacurate. This is thinly disguised pornography written by two [individuals] whose only resources were an encyclopedia article and a copy of the Bob Guccione movie. This book is also Exhibit A in the case against ever allowing an Englishman anywhere near a word processor.

So much of this book is brazen [material] ' ... ' but in a sick way that's part of the charm.

This book HAS to be a joke ' just check out the description of how to capture a lion on p. 78: 'Armies of slaves were expended to capture those majestic beasts ' they were impervious to tranquilizer arrows, and the only way to subdue them was for a particularly handsome slave to present his [body] to the lion's mighty sexual apparatus; then, once the act of copulation (which invariably proved terminal for the unfortunate slave, due to unsustainable blood loss) reached its critical point and the lion was momentarily distracted, a gang of a hundred or more whooping slaves would wrestle the lion to the ground and throw a net over it.'

Whew!

I'll be generous and say that 5% of this book is historically accurate. But sometimes the guys weren't even trying to be real. We are presented with page upon page describing Caligula at various Coluseum events, but unfortunately in their 5 minutes of research the authors missed the fact that Caligula died in 41 and the Coluseum wasn't built until 80!

To an extent, that is what is so purplexing about this: given the vast wealth of dirt and absurdity that are amply documented about Rome's nuttiest Emperor, it is a mystery why these two buffoons would chose to go into uncharted territory and brazenly make up lurid fiction. The only solution I can fathom is that this is a straight-faced joke.

If you know nothing about Caligula and actually want to learn, avoid this book like the plague and get a *real* book. But for a good laugh, check it out.

I have also discovered it is possible to make a drinking game out of it. Get a case of beer, and a copy of this book. Take a sip every time some historical 'fact' is presented that is obviously wrong. Take a swig every time a sex act is referenced, and pound the rest of the can upon the use of the term 'plebeian scum.'

You'll be wasted before you finish a chapter.