This book is fabulous! For sailors, the story alone is worth the read, but it is much more than just a story about sailing. Bertrand's description of the final race against "the red boat" (Dennis Connor) is so powerful that I felt what he and his crew felt, even before I had read what they felt! Any reader interested in the nature of sport and competition will find this book valuable.

Fantastic book. It is an instructive lesson in how to prepare for what you overwhelmingly want to achieve. Being set in the context of one of the most famous sporting events in history, the attempt to wrest the America's Cup from the US after 132 years, makes it that much more exciting. Sailors will love it, but anyone interested in the psychology of winning will gain from this book.

Even if I hadn't written the profile pages for this tpb I'd still go out of my way to tell people that it rocks. The introduction by Johns alone is worth the price of admission. Hawkman has been given a new lease on his four-color life and has never flown straighter nor looked better (with art by RAGS MORALES predominantly, the listing up there for Patrick notwithstanding). This is a trade collection that you'll go back to time and again for adventure and mystery.

Geoff Johns is perhaps the best comic book talent to surface in a looooong time. His passion for characters and story telling are never more apparent than in this collected edition of Hawkman. Following the Winged Wonder on his newly reincarnated adventures, these stories will entrance you with mystery and enthrall you with a unique romance. If you missed out on these books, pick up this trade. You will enjoy the flight!

I personally think this must be one of the best books i have ever read! i am 11yrs old and own 'Hacker' and 'Pig-heart boy', but i have yet to read the other book of hers. both of the books i have read are EXELLENT and i would HIGHLY RECCOMEND them both to anyone. i rated them both top! if anyone is looking for a book to read this would be an IDEAL CHOICE!! READ IT - YOU CANT STOP UNTIL YOU'VE READ THE LAST PAGE AND EVEN THEN YOU READ IT AGAIN!!! i recomend you buy it INSTANTLY!

In this book Admiral Woodward has provided the reader with an informative and candid view of a task force commander at war. His myriad of concerns; logistics, weather, technology, numbers, and the interference of politics and the modern media in the campaign are presented in a very readable format. It was interesting to read his asessments that Argentina could have won the war by concentrating their air attacks on the 2 British carriers (fortunately the Brits hadn't sold them) or the amphibs. As a naval officer, and a student of military history, it was refreshing to see a modern commander admit that such things as acceptable losses and expendable commands really do exist in the conduct of warfare. His humor and leadership style, warts and all, are a primer in command and control under fire. The book presents dramatic descriptions of many tragic episodes, such as the sinkings of the HMS Coventry and the Atlantic Conveyor. Unfortunately, since the book was written from a naval officer's point of view, the land campaign was given rather short notice therefore leaving out an important portion of the fight. I highly recommend the book for professionals and buffs alike.

This fine naval autobiography takes us behind the scenes of the Falklands sea/air (not ground) war and modern battle management in general. Admiral Woodward didn't exactly know what he was sailing into back in 1982, and makes no attempt to hide his personal sense of vulnerability as Britain's first fighting admiral in high-tech warfare. In fact, the entire book is refreshingly down-to-earth. Woodward is quick to note that he was tapped for the job because he happened to be the navy's closest flotilla commander at the time (in Gibraltar)--and confides that his superiors almost replaced him with a higher-ranking officer even as he led the task force into danger. This is no stuffed-shirt memoir.

Woodward and co-author Patrick Robinson weave accounts of grand strategy and military politics through a genuinely absorbing narrative of men and machines in heavy weather, incessant tactical maneuvering, and flashes of terrifying combat. Along the way, there are plenty of 'what-if's to chew on. We learn that Woodward had to manipulate London to get HMS Conqueror to sink the Argentine cruiser General Belgrano (British subs weren't under his tactical command). He explains why the sinking was both necessary and tragic, and how Conqueror watched but spared Argentine ships coming to Belgrano's aid. He also reveals that his ships almost shot down a Brazilian airliner mistaken for a pesky Argentine recon jet; he personally gave the order to withhold fire. And Woodward's character shines through his account of ordering HMS Alacrity on a potential suicide mission to scout mines--in an exceptionally gracious mea culpa of command, he praises the captain's sterling courage while faulting his own mundane direction.

Also fascinating are the individual stories of the high number of British ships damaged or sunk, and Woodward's frustration with underperforming anti-aircraft and anti-missile systems. This was more of a close call than the world knew at the time, as he makes abundantly clear. Ultimately, his modest approach on paper belies the fact that he and his task force pulled off a truly impressive naval feat. And it's a credit to Woodward the author-analyst that 'One Hundred Days' transcends the Falklands War to give an illuminating, first-person view of campaign and tactical battle coordination. It could find a home on bookshelves of Fortune 500 executives as well as students of naval and air operations. The style is also breezy (and occasionally humorous) enough for the casual reader. I've never seen it in a U.S. store, so thanks, Amazon.

A superior autobiography. Although the focus is plainly on the Falklands, the author provides a fascinating account of the RN's submarine training program -- which reminds one of why the British military, though tiny in size, still maintains some of the best trained warriors in the world.

The meat of the book retells the story of PM Thatcher's courageous decision to retake the Falklands. The author provides a fine defense of the UK's controversial decision to sink the Argentine crusier Belgrano and a compelling account of the terror visited upon his task force by (French-made) exocet anti-ship missles. Unlike many commanders' post-mortems, this book contains little of the standard blame shifting usually found in such works. The Admiral takes you through his decision-making process step-by-step never letting the reader forget that the decisions he made often were made on the basis on VERY incomplete information under intense time-pressure (from the US, the UN and the coming South Atlantic winter) and, often, under fire.

Overall, one comes away thinking the author would have done a bang-up job at Trafalger or Jutland . . . or even taking on the Soviet Navy in the North Atlantic. A must have for those interested in finding out what -- to paraphrase the Iron Duke -- a damn near run thing the Falklands campaign really was.

I am puzzled that this book seems to have been taken out of circulation sometime in the last two years. It is now impossible to find it in any bookstore, and virtually impossible to find a new copy for sale anywhere online. I feel fortunate that I had bought my copy before the publishers froze their presses. Perhaps, it is deemed too sensitive in the Boat Race world to merit further propagation.

The book is written from the viewpoint of the Oxford Boat Club coach, Dan Topolski, who's had to deal with the tumultuous mutiny staged by the American rowers on his crew. His only ally was the club president, Donald MacDonald. The book paints the Americans as villains and prima donnas who could neither adapt to nor accept the harsh training practices and traditions of the Oxford Boat Club. Obviously, this book is highly partisan in its viewpoint, and has the agenda of attributing blame and responsibility for the mutiny amongst the American rowers, most of whom are still living and active in the rowing world.

Beneath the politics and the purpose of the book, however, it is still a worthwhile read. Topolski and his co-writer Robinson, do not write with a light trivial style. Topolski takes his statements seriously, substantiating them with systematic arguments that appeal by turns to logic, common sense, and the rugged traditions of elite rowing. He explains the psychology of rowing, of pain, of excellence, of teamwork, of self-sacrifice, with a passion and detailed understanding that can be quite exhilarating to read. When I was still active as a rower, I liked to underline key phrases in his book which I found to be extraordinarily motivating. Unlike "Assault on Lake Casitas" which is a macho book about a macho rower overcoming the odds, the prose of "True Blue" is very deliberate, very British, slightly ironic, sometimes moralistic, shorn of excessive testosterone, but always impactful. The Topolski-Robinson team is quite a remarkable marriage of sports wisdom/passion and writing sophistication.

I am sorry that the book is now almost extinct. I have a feeling that the American rowers indicted in the story may have rallied against it -- it is obviously biased but it is also quite convincing, making a devastating case against the American oarsmen. I do not know if the dispute is settled with any consensus in the rowing world, or whether the rowing world is still divided about whether the Americans were the cause of the unhappiness and scandal in the Blue boat. Apart from the political ramifications of the book and the agenda it advances, I have plenty of praise for its insights into the spirit of sport and rowing.

and I got thoroughly personally embroiled in this tale of incredible determination on the Thames, which is the most fantastic place to row. As a rower I would recommend this especially to anyone who wouldn't mind a bit of extra motivation! Topolski man, you F---ING RULE!

Fantastic I would recommend this book to anyone and everyone

I especially like this book because it gives the IT shop and the security professionals lots of ammunition for getting funding and support from the "business" side of the business. Too often, the business executives don't understand the technology in question, and therefore do not comprehend the extent of the threat to the enterprise. Because this book is written for a "high level" business audience, among others, it presents issues like risk assessment and extent of the threat in ways the average businessman can understand. It even has sections like "Gaining Support" meant to help IT get management and funding on its side, without which the most carefully thought out plan isn't going anywhere, given that it's the executives who have the clout to make things happen in an organization!

Any manager who lets his technical people build a security program without the rational kind of road map this book offers is asking to be "owned", that is, to be hacked, his Web site defaced, his firm's data trashed. Never, never wade into the muddy waters of cybersecurity without a good plan.

This book is that plan: risk formulas, the nature of the threats, key tenets of a security program, key steps in constructing one, important policies to have, key steps in formulating a policy, key goals in information security, kinds of architecture to consider, kinds of infrastructure that underlie the program, steps in the life cycle for developing a secure system.

Talk about comprehensive. A great way to introduce yourself to security from a high level view or to start building security for your organization.

Just what the doctor ordered. Finally a clear road map for setting up computer security at a corporation.

Lots of organizations are clueless about what is needed to set up an effective defense against hackers. This book provides the clues, in a clear, jargon-free, and easy-to-understand manner. It lays it all out step by step.

It sketches the nature of the threat hackers pose. Then it tells you, phase by phase, how to put together a security program. It lays out a so-called Policy Framework on which to hang you secure password policy, incident response policy, asset management, vulnerability assessment policy, you name it, along with the technical procedures - tightening up UNIX, getting software patches for Windows XP, etc. - that flesh out the policies. A formula for figuring out risk is offered. There's lots of useful stuff on how computer architecture fits in with security, and how life cycle development should incorporate security into it.

There actually can be a rhyme and a reason to formulating security policies, and this book lays it out.

After first reading Kilo Class, then Nimitz Class, I had high hopes for HMS Unseen. My brother-in-law felt the same way. He only got through the first chapter, and gave up, calling it extremely boring. I decided to give it a try. It was a very slow read. I appreciate the fact that writers carry over characters from previous books. It makes for interesting character development. However, the hero of this story, Admiral Morgan is way too one dimensional not to mention extremely rascist, and unlikeable. The villainous super-terrorist, Ben Adnam, is too perfect, never making any mistakes. While it was interesting to delve into the mind of a terrorist, the Adnam character was a little too sympathetic to be a real villain. Robinson also goes too far with very detailed descriptions of irrelevant things such as meals, and incidental scenery descriptions at the expense of plot, technical explanations, and character development. I'm always searching for a good techno thriller author, and after having read some good ones like Clancy, Brown, Coonts, Herman, Coyle, etc., I have to say that I will stop reading Robinson after this book. The book cover has the nerve to mention Mr. Robinson in the same category as Clancy. I don't think so! There is simply no comparison.

Thanks for reading.

First the good points:
- an exciting story involving high intrigue and the world's most wanted terrorist
- confrontation between the USA and England on one side and Iraq and Iran on the other side - how topical can you get?
- a techno-thriller about an undetectable submarine and lots of other modern military hardware

With all that going for it, H.M.S. Unseen should have been a great read. But what did we get? A book that makes the exciting moments (stealing the submarine, the shooting down of the Concorde, etc.) sound dull, and makes the in-between parts positively sleep-inducing.

On top of that, the ending is really poor. (Spoiler alert - don't read any more if you want to avoid learning how the book ends.)

The President of the United States decrees that the government of Iraq (i.e., Saddam Hussein) is to be punished. The President's national security advisor implements an attack which results in a major portion of Iraq becoming flooded. The national security advisor proudly reports to the President that Iraq's economy has been dealt a major blow from which it will take them 10 years to recover.

So it's apparently considered legitimate to cause major suffering to the entire population of a country just to "punish" the dictator at the top. In reality, Saddam is presumably totally unconcerned with his people's suffering and will probably find himself in a strengthened position, since he and his people now have proof that they have a common enemy with no moral scruples.

Of course, reality has now bypassed this portion of the book. So although the story is supposedly set in the near future, it must now be considered a total fiction which isn't even remotely possible.

This book starts off brilliantly. Ben Adnam, the terrorist bad guy in PR's NIMITZ CLASS, is betrayed by his home country of Iraq when Saddam orders him assassinated. So he journeys to Iran, in a well-researched voyage. Zap forward to 2005 and Adname had infiltrated the Iranian Navy. With aid of the Russians, he purchases a surface-to-air missile system, and hijacks the British Royal Navy's most modern diesel sub, HMS Unseen. With this feasible capability, he knocks three high profile flights from the skies, including Concorde! As Adnam hides, weaves and ducks, and ends up in Scotland, it is up to Admiral Arnold Morgan, a foul-mouthedly entertaining character, to search him out! And the ending, and Adnam's evasions of the authorities in a journey across Scotland, Britain and Ireland is surprising. Action comes thick and fast, the locations are well-researched, particularly the UK scenes, having been to Scotland many times it was easy to relate to them. However, I have one criticism to make. Did we really need to know in exact detail what every character had to eat? Or what movie they loved? It did interfere with the fast narrative, but HMS Unseen still gets a five star rating for a great story(which could come true one day) and an entertaining set of characters. Well done Pat!

Oxford University Press has published a visually spectacular and comprehensive astronomy encyclopedia for the lay-person. They have made liberal use of recent Hubble Space Telescope images to produce a truly beautiful book. However, the number of errors ranging from mistaken numbers, to misattributed photographs, to confused sentences is surprising. Perhaps a second edition will clean up these problems.

This book is state of the art in information. It can answer any possible question you can ask about astronomy. It is a thick heavy hard covered book. I spent two hours just reading the captions of over 500 pictures and learned things I never thought about. Get it.

In Kilo Class, Patrick Robinson did some good writing. I enjoyed reading the book during the escapades of Hurricane Floyd and it kept my on the edge on my seat. He did have some technical flaws in the book suck as a Super Cobra being used as a transport helicopter. Also, I'm not one to believe that a Tiawanese naval vessal would kill more than half the people onboard a research base just for showing up at an island. It makes for a good plotline, but it's not quite believeable. Also, the ending could have been MUCH better than leaving off where it did. He ended the story way to quickly and I, plainly put, was not satisfied with the way the book ended compared to how Robinson built up the book. It was, however, a nice book to read and I enjoy his style of writing in this book. I plan to read Nimitz Class soon and hope that it can get up there with this book and have a hopefully better ending. But one last thing. I greatly enjoyed the antics of NSA Admiral Morgan. He was a riot and a good comic relief in the book in my opinion. Poor ol' Charlie...

Patrick Robinson has written another winner! For a start, those that gave this book, and also NIMITZ CLASS(Mind candy reading? Sounds fine to me!) one star made me want to read this more. I loved KILO CLASS from beginning to end, it was awesome! The story concerns a group of Kilo Class subs on sale from Russia to China, which must be stopped at all costs before the balance of power shifts in Asia to China's favour. So the US President approves a set of covert strikes against the subs en route - including some very unusual methods involving Navy SEALS on a tourist cruise in Russia! Also, what is the secret of a sub base on a remote island off the coast of Antarctica? Read this brilliant book now! The characters were entertaining, the prose was simple to understand without getting bogged down in too much technobabble, and Robinson proves he had done good research into his subject matter. I look forward eagerly to HMS UNSEEN.

Tom Clancy, watch out, Patrick Robinson is on the rise. This is his second book in the series, the first being "Nimitz Class", and the following installments being "HMS Unseen", "USS Seawolf" and "The Shark Mutiny". Honestly, I can say it is one of the best, most entertaining novels I have ever read. Packed full of military goodness, but not enough to make you go damn bonkers (Clancy?), pure action-adventure adrenaline, and excellent characters and narrative, everybody should give "Kilo Class" a read-through. You quickly begin to love National Security Advisor Admiral Morgan for his spirit and vigorous way of handling things. He doesn't take any [stuff] is putting it mildly. However he's not all extreme, and actually had depth and character, most of which is explored in later books. The story involves the Chinese purchasing ultra-quiet Kilo Class submarines from the Russians. Admiral Morgan could not let this happen since they couldn't afford to be blocked out of the Taiwan Strait. It brings an issue brought forth time and time again in the news - the fact the China wants Taiwan as its own. Without saying too much, the effort involves a pulsepounding race underneath the Arctic Circle by the American submarine Captain Dunning, and a riviting undercover operation by a group of Navy SEALs deep in the heart of Russia. I have talked with people who are actually in the Navy who have read this book and they tell me it's as close to real-life global operations as it comes. (The next book in the series, "HMS Unseen", however is a little far fetched.) Apparently stuff like this actually happens. Of course we, the public, don't know about it. I enjoyed this book a lot better than any Tom Clancy novel just for the reason that it was a novel more based on story and not a behemoth textbook on military hardware with a story thrown in. "Kilo Class" is the perfect sit-down-and-read-straight-through novel. It makes you want to keep reading because it's so exciting and thorough. Great praise is due to Patrick Robinson.