It is human nature to know about the inevitable, but not to do anything about it. For example, I live in California and I KNOW that there is substantial evidence that there will be an earthquake, but still, I am unprepared.

The September 11th events tore our lives apart. They made us feel unsafe in our very own homeland. Most of us lived with the idea that these kinds of things didn't happen in our country...but now we know they do.

This book has helped me to get proactive and begin to prepare for the future. It contains a plethora of information, from what we can expect in a future situation, to how to prepare and survive under harsh conditions. There is always a possibility of more terrorism, and this book is going to help me be more equipped for that.

The Collected Poems of Alexander Scott, ed. David S. Robb, The Mercat Press, Edinburgh, 1994, 260pp.

Alexander Scott (1920-89) was a pioneering teacher of Scottish literature at the University of Glasgow, and a poet and dramatist of genius. This collection, edited by David S. Robb, contains the greater part of Scott's verse, written between 1940 and 1987, and incorporates work from his first collection 'The Latest in Elegies' (1949), right through to his 'Selected Poems (1943 - 1974)'; Scott was preparing a final selection of his poetry for publication as 'Incantations: Poems and Diversions' at the time of his death in 1989.
The poet was a leading figure in the late second wave of MacDiarmid's Scottish Renaissance, along with others such as Sidney Goodsir Smith, Robert Garioch (Sutherland), Norman MacCaig and fellow Glasgow University academic Edwin Morgan, all friends and contemporaries of Scott. Although not all of his poetry is in Scots, certainly the best of it is, and readers will of course find here all of Scott's most famous works in this medium, notably, his long, heavily rhetorical poem on his native Aberdeen 'Heart of Stone' (Robb No. 91, or R.91), the life-affirming love poem 'Continent o Venus' (R. 49) and the much anthologised satirical reflection 'Calvinist Sang' (R.10), which contains a memorably bleak testimony to the short-comings of our modern age: 'The day ye need a hert and harns / As dour as the diamant, cauld as the starns'.
Literary readers will also be familiar with the popular 'Scotched' series of satirical squibs, in which Scott offers terse penetrating insights into the pretensions, flaws and foibles of his native people. Favourites include 'Scotch Passion' (R. 203): 'Forgot / Mysel', 'Scotch Poets' (R. 212): 'Wha's the / T'ither?' (Burns and who else, presumably? ... there cannot possibly be more than two!), and 'Scotch Education (R. 148): 'I tellt ye / I tellt ye', the perennial cry of the frustrated Scottish teacher.
For the first time in too many years, general readers can at last have easy access to exquisite, intensely musical lyrics such as 'Great Eneuch' (R.80) or to the sorrowful, sympathetic and harrowing war poems 'Coronach' (R. 22), 'The Sodgers' (R. 46), 'Stravaiger's Sang' (R. 41) and 'Twa Images' (R. 58). Scott was a resolutely modern poet, as his subject matter often shows (consider 'To Mourn Jayne Mansfield' (R.98) or 'A Gey Flash Gordon' (R. 290)), but he was also a traditionalist, whose consummate command of verse forms and Scottish literary traditions (look at 'Truth and True Thomas' (R. 278) or 'Sir Patrick Spens: The True Tale' (R. 20)), should be an inspiration to the younger Scottish poets of today.
The present reviewer's own favourites among Scott's poems must include the beautiful song 'Love is a Garth' (R. 60) with its reverent re-working of the 'seize-the-day' motif, 'Mouth Music' (R. 73), which contains a wonderful celebration of dance: 'Dance it, dance it, skirl it, birl it, swing / Wi a tipperan tae, wi a sway, wi a flourish, a fling', or 'Problems' (R. 217), with its audacious act of association between the plight of astronauts adrift in space, and the massacred peasants of Vietnam. Those whose taste runs to more substantial fare will find much to satisfy them in the major long poems, such as 'Deathsang for An Auld Man Young' (R. 51), 'Seaman's Sang' (R. 14), from the Anglo-Saxon', 'Deir Deid Dancer' (R.96) and 'Grace Ungraced' (R. 313). Notable English poems include 'From You, My Love' (R. 83), 'Landfall' (R. 105) and 'Greek Summer '74' (R. 276). But, at the end of the day, Scott's greatest poetic achievement must be 'Heart of Stone', not least because of its magnificent introductory image of the desolately circling sea-gull:

The sea-maw spires i the stane-gray lift
Owre sworlan swaws o the stane-gray sea,
Flaffers her wings - a flash o faem-white feathers -
And warssles awa i the wake o the trauchled trawler
That hirples hame hauf-drouned wi the weicht o herrin.

Robb's edition contains an introductory essay on Scott which is particularly informative about the poet's earliest attempts at writing verse, and gives us a fascinating textual insight into Scott's compositional process. There are two Appendices which contain an early version of 'Scotched' and list the contents of his individual collections such as 'Cantrips' (1968) and 'Double Agent' (1972). There is also a substantial glossary of Scots vocabulary which is essential for predominantly English-speaking readers. The book itself is simply but attractively designed, with a startling photographic image of Scott by Angela Catlin, set against a stark black background. A close-up of the poet's penetrating eyes is featured on the back cover and reminds us pointedly of one of Scott's most haunting lines (from 'Dreams', (R. 267)): 'There's een that only makars hae / To look on wae'.
David S. Robb and Edinburgh's The Mercat Press are to be heartily congratulated for bringing out this sterling collection of work by one of the 20th century's greatest Scots makars; would that we had similar one-volume editions of Scott's plays and other miscellaneous writings

This coverage of an aspect of early American history and culture will delight readers researching this era. Kenneth Scott's Counterfeiting In Colonial America reviews the law enforcement system of the times, liberal attitudes toward counterfeiters, and the prevalence of counterfeiting during the times. From individuals who made a high art of the practice to how counterfeiting transcended social and political boundaries, this provides an intriguing coverage.

This is one of those books crammed with little and not so little facts about Judaism...all done in an entertaining way. It's a great read and sure to please everyone.

Imagine assembling over 300 missionaries, mission leaders and professors of missions to ask them any question you wanted. Now imagine that they addressed over 1400 topics. This new encyclopedic dictionary has done just that. With 700 topical articles, almost 500 short biographical articles, and hundreds of country profiles, the Evangelical Dictionary of World Missions is a veritable goldmine of up-to-date information on missions.

The authors include people from East and West, North and South; practioners and teachers. All have written in non-technical vocabulary and evaluate their assigned topic(s) in light of evangelical thought. The book is decidedly Christian and missiological in tone.

There are short bibliographical notes at the end of many articles and a good indexing system.

Dive in anywhere and enjoy the learning experience.

There are thousands of mutual funds on the market. The question is where to start? How can I select a mutual fund that is right for me? How can I select a mutual fund that is easy to follow, without having to devoting numerous hours in the financial pages of the newspaper to determine daily status. How do I select a mutual funds low in expenses whose performance will at least equal the market as viewed on the evening news. This book has the answers and ensures that you will be able to get the maximum return on your investment without spending hours doing research and daily tracking. Time that can be spent with the family. This is a book that can give you piece of mind as you invest in the market.

A lighthearted look at higher education - A must read for anyone who works at a university.

I'm a studenf of the author at University of Hong Kong, although he's an American , his book tell me more about HK than anything else ever did. I began to have a fresh look at the things that's been around me for so long. This book is a must read for those Americans who know nothing but to raise the "free Tibet"sign whenever a Chinese official arrive and those who keep saying how Hong Kong will be a ruin after the handover.

My 3rd grade son used this book as his main source for an American Indian home project for school. It was incredible how much information was packed into the book. I totally disagree with the editorial regarding this book. It is not over cluttered and the title is not offensive when you consider the book is telling a child how he or she would have lived as an American Indian from the climate, to what you'd eat, to what was inside the teepee and exactly how it was made. Also included how and when the American Indians migrated to North America from Asia, why and how they moved to survive, what a buffalo hunt was like and even their arts and crafts. It should be noted that the book concentrates on the Plains Indians. I spent about an hour researching childrens books at the bookstores and this was by far the most informative and best presented. My son was not at all interested in the American Indians, but after studying this book wanted to go back in time and live as they were when they roamed freely. Our family is proud of its American Indian ancestry, and this book did it justice. EXCELLENT! We'll be buying more books in the series.

This is the best edition of 1 Henry IV on the market today; and probably the most impressive of the new Arden series. The intro is energetically written and always interesting; the glosses are lucid and helpful; the text beautifully presented. This is the wonderful Arden Shakespeare at its very best!