L. David Mech (NOT David L.) achieved something that most biologists could only dream about: he gained the trust of a wild pack of wolves on Ellesmere Island, in the high Arctic. You may have read the National Geographic article he wrote about it.
The book is more or less a filled-out version of the NG article. It's simply laid out and nicely presented with lots of photographs.
Most of the book concerns the pack's everyday activities and behaviour - socialising, hunting, feeding pups, and so on. There's some information on wolves in general, for people who are completely new to the subject. Mech also tries to describe the almost overwhelming emotion of making contact with the pack.

Mech has a scientist's style. His first priority is to make the text totally truthful, and his second is to make it clear and readable. He does very well on both points.
This scientific approach has a drawback: it's very difficult to write a 'hard' scientific book that still has the spark of delight in it. Like most people, Mech doesn't really have the knack. The main let-down is the way Mech sometimes explains the hard facts, gives a tiny, tantalising glimpse of the wolves' nature or personalities - and then changes the subject. I got the impression that he was leaving out some of the most fascinating insights, maybe because he couldn't back them up scientifically.

Still, it's a first-class introduction to the Arctic wolf. I recommend it.
And by the way, the photography is great. And Arctic wolf pups are very, very cute.

David Mech is probably the world's foremost authority on wolves. He began publishing in the early 1960s and hasn't stopped since. This is one of his best general-readership books; it contains one-of-a-kind pictures and an easy, engaging account of the team's summer stay, literally among the wolves. Reminiscent of Farley Mowatt's "Never Cry Wolf," except that Mech came prepared, and didn't need to eat mice!

Well worth tracking down, "Living with the Wolves" is out-of-print, but happily, Mech has just published a ten-year followup! Look for "The arctic wolf: ten years with the pack", ISBN 0896583538, which Amazon now has.

This guy's been at it so long that there's even a book ABOUT him: "Wolfman: exploring the world of wolves", by Laurence Pringle, ISBN 068417832X. And for an excellent accompaniement to the book, view the National Geographic video "White Wolf", where you can see many of the same wolves you met in this book.

Over 200 beautiful color photographs.. stunning. Cloth Emerald green cover is beautiful, too.

A look at the pacific NW from unusual angles.

Purchasing a first class photographer's books, when well printed, is a unique opportunity to own fine art at bargain prices and makes an outstanding gift. Morton Beebe's Cascadia is an opportunity to acquire world class photography and an outstanding visual essay on one of the most dynamic areas in North America at an incredibly reasonable price. The first class Japanese printing contracted by Harry Abrams illustrates some of Mr. Beebe's fine pieces with an exceptionally high quality. Among the photographs which are highlights of the book include a stunning skyline of view of Seattle at sunset, an exceptional graphic image of the Washington Mutual Tower, unique photographs of Orca whales, an beautiful view of Echo Bay in British Columbia, portraits of the logs floating outside of a Washington mill in winter waiting to be cut up with seagulls overhead and on the logs and numerous other exceptional photographs. If you have a friend or member of your family who's interested in the Pacific Northwest, Cascadia is an excellent candidate gift.

This audiobook is an excellent addition to the U.S. history-buff's glove compartment. There are basically four tapes of interviews by Roger Mudd done for the History Channel. Mudd asks questions to the featured historians and they respond with stories and factoids to keep you thinking. I can listen to them many times and still learn things that I didn't catch the last time around. This is also a great way to brush up on your U.S. history while enriching what you already know.

This is the very best audio tape I've ever listened to. While some interviews are better (Stephen Ambrose) than others (Richard White), each one offers important insight and perspective on the most important events of our time. Through the eyes of these men, our nation's history is told so clearly and succinctly, and with such passion, that you can't help but be changed and moved by the experience. I guarantee you'll come away with a better grasp of who we are and where we're headed as a nation.

Roger Williams is mining the degrees of separation between two comparatively unknown British authors, Norman Douglas and Elizabeth David. Williams' strategy is to mix a roman a clef and a dash of mystery-book plotting. Douglas, best known for the cult favorite "South Wind," and David, for cook books/good-eating sensibility before that was a genre unto itself, met before WWII and had a brief friendship. Williams supposes a charming connection between the two that evolves into a fictional contemporary link. This is especially compelling for fans of either of these two writers.

I had read a few of her cook books, and decided to read a biography of Elizabeth David's life (WRITING AT THE KITCHEN TABLE by Artemis Cooper), before I read LUNCH WITH ELIZABETH DAVID. I'm glad I did. Roger Williams probably provides the reader with enough information to make the necessary connections to David's life, but I know my prior reading enhanced my experience. I think I would have profited a bit more if I had read some of Norman Douglas' books before reading LUNCH-at the least "Old Calabria." Fortunately, I had read other authors who'd written about Italy in the "old days" before WWII.

Williams' writing is reminiscent of Nabokov, Durrell-and Elizabeth David. I think his book is very literary in tone and substance, and as is often the case with "classical" works, some of the content is distasteful, although this interpretation is subjective on my part, and not perhaps how Williams sees it. Norman Douglas more frequently than not went about with young boys in tow, and was described by more than one court as a pedophile. I find pedophilia disgusting, but I'm glad I did not follow my first impulse which was to throw the book in the trash bin because it contains more than allusions to this topic.

The main focus of the book is not Douglas, as the book jacket suggests, but the effect he had on other lives. The protagonist in the first section of the book, which takes place mostly before WWI and includes Douglas as a character, is a 12-year old boy from the East End of London named Eric. The main character in the second part of the book, which takes place in 1990s England, is a woman named Cherry whose mother served as maid for Elizabeth David for a short while during WWII. Cherry marries John, Eric's grandson, and a London fish shop owner. Cherry sometimes helps John deliver fish, and eventually develops her own catering business. Food associations lead Cherry to discover Elizabeth David and Norman Douglas. Her discoveries have a profound effect on her life.

LUNCH WITH ELIZABETH DAVID is a hauting book about the long-lasting effects of other people's lives.

Eddie Cantor is truly a great comedian! The two new autobiographies that were just released; you hear Eddie's story about how he got in to show business, his sucess's and also failures. This is a wonderful book and I would advise it to any Cantor fan.

Eddie Cantor was a larger-than-life musical comedian in the first half of the twentieth century who made a splash on Broadway and in the Goldwyn Musicals of the 1930's. If you want to hear about old-time showbiz straight from the mouth of someone who lived it, seasoned with intimate memoirs, you've got to check these books out. What's more, you get two for the price of one!

This is collection of short stories that offers a wide mix of speculative genres. Fantasy, SF, horror, and just plain weird. The stories run the gambit and most are good. "Jeo Defined" and "Moon Warrior" were excellent stories and well worth purchasing the book. Even just the so-so stories were enjoyable and all the authors are names to keep a look out for. In the end, this is a book of up and coming writers and a few of them will no doubt be big names someday.

I didn't know what to expect from this collection of short stories but I was happily surprised. The stories cover a wide range from fantasy, science fiction, and horror to those hard to classify strange stories. Each one is worth reading. My favorites were the one about a radio personality who was singing the Siren's song and the one about a criminal who is forced to undergo "augmentation" to control him. Some wild stuff for a great read.

This book is for the serious graphics programmer who wants to learn the techniques and how to apply them. I don't promise "easy": I do say necessary! With block diagrams for algorithms you can make code in any language from the discussion in this book!

The new edition of the book is written in the same manner as the first. New techniques have been added and the old material have been rewritten in a more educational way.This combination makes this book a perfect choise for a good start for beginners and a beauty to study for non.

A Tale of Troy is the easy way of reading Homer's Iliad. It's the same story, but under 300 pages and is more user friendly. A Tale of Troy describes the beginning and end of the Trojan War. It retells from the Iliad the stories of Achilles, Hector, Odysseus and his later adventures home, and many other fascinating stories. The only downside to this book is that since it is a simplified version of The Iliad, to fully understand some of the dialoue and references a reader mus know some backround of Greeks and Roman mythology(You can still enjoy the book without even heard of Zeus before, but the story goes better when you know about The Olympian War etc.)This book is great for any young teen between 13-15 who likes adventure and action.

In this fantastic, beautifully-crafted story, mythology expert Roger Lancelyn Green weaves the tale of the last big "Hoorah" of the Heroic age. Green's colorfully-written portrayal of the fantastic battles fought by Greece against the wicked Troy is a must-have for any avid reader! He describes in vivid detail the bravest heroes of the age, from clever and cunning Odysseus to brave and strong Achilles, who fight zealously to win back the tender Helen, told to be the most beautiful woman in the world, but stolen by the evil city of Troy. Sit back and marvel as you witness the ongoing struggle between cities, each fight sequence written to put you right in the action in this absolutely fabulous book that will keep you on the edge of your seat!

I remember reading this book when I was 12, my english teacher gave us it to read, to understand what it was like to survive as a child and as a war victim. My son is 12, and told his mom and I that he is not that bad off in this world with 2 loving parents. He explained that his teacher gave him a book to read about a young boy who was mistreated as a child. I then remembered the book my english teacher told me to read, so I gave my son the same book. He could not put it down. After reading it, he re-emphasised how lucky we are to live in this day and age.

This book is a bestseller, and if you read it you will know why. It is a story of a young boy who discovers the world, and I mean really discovers it, any more and i'll be telling you the story. It's a childrens story but i loved it even though

This book was read to me in grade 7 class. I enjoyed it a lot and always wanted to know what would happen next! The plot sounds weak but it is not. The only thing I can critisize is that some of the coincidences are not easy to believe but the beautiful writing style makes up for it. My advice is, READ THIS BOOK!

I've bought numerous books on Flash and the Dynamic Scripting that can be intermingled with Flash.... Flash 5 ActionScript F/X and Design, Flash 4 Creative Web Animation, and different Wrox books on ASP, ASP databases, and ADO. This book ties ALL of them together. It explains motion scripting for beginners, and then it shows how to import variables from ASP, PHP, Perl, and Cold Fusion. These 1000+ pages contain EVERYTHING you want to know about Flash, it it with out a doubt, THE BEST FLASH BOOK EVER CREATED!!!! It even branches out Flash to other programs like Dreamweaver UltraDev and Generator, it explains how to display information from databases using Flash Turbine. If you read this book, you will be a master at Flash.

An excellent book! Well worth the investment! It transitions well from more basic concepts to more complex topics -- With lots of substance for people at all levels of experience. Even those with more expertise can learn a thing or two from the different conceptual approaches presented. The book is not just about "here's how to do the same old boring X, Y & Z, just in the updated version of Flash", it also says "here's some different ways of thinking about solutions that takes greater advantage of new features of Flash". I also really enjoyed the mini math and geometry lessons... it's good to know that years of high school algebra and geometry could be put to some use!

The interface design chapters were particularly outstanding; judging by how awful so many Flash sites are at integrating interactivity, PLEASE!! I BEG YOU!!! everybody read the chapters on designing interfaces! They are a "must read" for anyone who wants to improve their site's interactivity.

The game design chapters are also incredibly helpful as well, and I think are some of the first useful explanations of game design I've ever seen for Flash. Even if you're not designing games in Flash, using a familiar game like Asteroids as a vehicle for explaining some pretty clever design elements works very well. Not to mention, it's very cool to be able to make your own video games! Flash isn't just for dull corporate websites anymore!

I'll be incorporating the lessons learned from those chapters into all the stuff I do... even though I only get to do very boring stuff for a corporate site. And if I use what this book teaches, maybe someday I can get hired to make games and do cool interfaces!!! :)

If you are a newbie,......their are other alternatives that will get your feet wet, but if you are a practicing Flash developer and have a firm understanding of ActionScript...this book will inspire you to build real dynamic Flash apps. It touches on Flash Javascript methods, Flash and textfiles and goes into server side middleware solutions like, CGI,Perl and PHP. It also introduces you to database integration. This book gives you real world solutions, which maybe a bit elementary, but overall it lays the foundation for you. I found this book to be inspiring and to be the book which pushed me to learn CGI,PERL,PHP and MySQL. If your looking to build real dynamic/interactive Flash applications or websites this is the book.