After their parents die of illness on the journey west, sixteen-year-old Betsy Monroe and her older sister Willa are left all alone on the Oregon Trail. Betsy is determined to fulfill their parents' last dream and complete the journey, and Willa, never the stronger one, agrees to go along with Betsy's decision. The sisters are found by Charlie Freeman, a handsome young trail guide. He wants them to turn back, convinced two young women on their own have no chance of making the journey. He reluctantly guides them to the nearest fort, where Betsy and Willa are able to join up with the very wagon train Charlie will be guiding to Oregon. Betsy begins to fall in love with Charlie, but a misunderstanding leads him to believe that she led him on, and has no feelings at all for him. I highly recommend this book to teenagers who enjoy reading historical romances. It's really a shame that it's out of print.

This is one of the most well written teen romances I have read. I first read this book 14 years ago when I was just 16...In rereading this book as an adult, I found that it still has it's same magic. This story is great for any teen and I think it will awaken a thirst to learn more about our country's history.

I first read this novel when I was 16 years old. I instantly wanted to learn all I could about the Oregon Trail. This novel is great at sparking curiosity about educational stuff in kids' minds! I recommend it for any middle school to high school reading selection.

This is a very touching, yet realistic story for its time. Ms. Michaels does a very good job of mixing historical fact with fiction and/or likely occurrences. She obviously put heavy research into her writing, as confirmed by the bibliography in the back of the book.

This book deserves to be read and cherished!

I gave copies of this book to a 6 year-old and a 12 -year old. Both loved it. It is a really well-researched and cleverly put together book, a great idea done well.

I bought this book largely because of its gorgeous, highly reflective cover. A true whim, particularly as I do not have children. However, as soon as I started to turn this highly engaging volume's pages, I found myself riveted. Hainey is a master at fascinating minutiae. He takes a simple topic--the color blue--and relates it to myriad topics ranging from animals to music to history. Kids will devour it. And this adult loves it.

Ciencin has a way of bringing the reader into the story. A wonderful book. If you liked any of the other Dinotopia books, this would make a great addition to your collection.

This book was agreat addition to my Dinotopia collection. It's added size only made it as the story that was told by Scott Ciencin could not have been made any shorter. If your a fan of Dinotopia you should buy this book.

I guess I'm old fashioned when it comes to using a telescope, but I prefer a paper atlas to laptops and software star atlases. And I also prefer star-hopping to using GOTO or setting circles. If you're like me, you already know you're buying this massive work. Yes it's expensive. Yes it weighs about twenty pounds. But it's the ultimate paper atlas for the star-hopper. The three volumes (each covering eight hours of RA) together have over one million stars plotted on their pages!

The binding and paper are of superb quality, sufficient for this atlas to actually be used out in the field! Unfortunately, after you see how pretty it is (and remember how much it cost), you'll probably be content to let it sit safely on the shelf to be used as a reference. Personally, I use an 8" Dob and hence generally observe objects bright enough for Tirion's Sky Atlas 2000.0 to be an adequate atlas. I have taken the MSA out a couple times but it was overkill.

For owners of larger scopes who wish to go after the fainter DSOs, a Mag 11 atlas like the MSA is a bare minimum. A computer atlas going down to Mag 13 or so would be even better, but if you like paper then the MSA is the way to go. I eventually do plan to make heavy use of the MSA out in the field, but probably not until I get a larger scope.

The closest competition to the MSA is Tirion's Uranometria 2000.0 2nd Edition. Note that although it doesn't plot anywhere near the number of stars the MSA does, Uranometria plots three times the number of deep sky objects (30,000). Therefore, owners of very large telescopes may be better served with Uranometria since it plots the very faint DSOs that MSA skips.

The best description is a Massive Three Volume Set. This is a great Atlas - The organization is much better than Uranometria and the print and sizing of the stars is much better. This may not be the most practical at the telescope atlas but it is printed on high quality paper and the books do open and lay flat. I find this atlas very useful for going after the small faint stuff where you have to know the star patterns to ID the fields.

Seeds has a deep understanding of science and a refined writing style that is rarely found among textbook writers. Aside from hard astronomy details, he strives to train his student readers to think like real scientists, which includes the necessary skill to distinguish true science from pseudoscience. Sometimes the tone of the author subtly reminds of Carl Sagan; If you like Carl Sagan, you'll love this book.

The beautiful graphics and the student's edition of TheSky CD further enhances the value of this product. Seeds is a strong force indeed.

"Rebirthing" is an artform that many aspire to and few attain. Michael's book captures both the spiritual as well as the practical aspects of many facets of the breath and breathing. He is quite poetic as well. A must buy for anyone interested in transformational breathwork and the study of the breath.

Fabulous! Mark Breen's new book helps kids and grown-ups understand how the weather works. He gives great instructions on how to build weather instruments. He gives lots of hints for predicting the weather, including looking out the window. The Weather Man's Song is a hit!

Truly fascinating. Smith captivated me from the first page on. Stayed up all Friday night reading it. #1 Recommendation.

David and Deborah find love, adventure and horror but you won't want to put the book down once you have picked it up. The ending will suprise you. You will be glad to have spent the time

This is the best book if you want to read something touching, made by a mixture of romance and action. Suggested to those of you who like aircrafts, aivation and similars. You'll find yourself slowing down in reading, just to make is last longer!! READ IT!

Mike Gregory's book is, simply about the challenges of command, both in the tactical and human spheres. Based on his experience as an Attack Helicopter Company Commander in the liberation of Kuwait, it covers the array of challenges faced by all yound commanders, and the particular challenges faced by commanders in the US Army.

A great insight into helicopter operations, and the command environment in the US Army.

'Desert Skies' is a great novel. Highly readable and thought provoking, Michael Gregory has captured the essence of what it is to be a military professional.

Ostensibly about attack helicopter tactics in the Gulf War, 'Desert Skies' quickly proves that it is about more than this. With a focus that is squarely on the trials and tribulations of a junior army officer in a position of great responsibility, the reader is given a rare insight into the 'human' face of leadership. The challenges that the central character and his family face, and the impact of his leadership decisions upon himself, his troop and his family, faithfully portrays the dilemma that it is command. Importantly, it shows that command and the responsibility that goes with it doesn't stop once the uniform is taken off and that the answers are rarely textbook in nature.

This is a book well worth reading, and when you have finished with it, hand it to your spouse.

Fiction based on fact is a very clever way for an author to get across their story without falling into the clutches of either the hierarchy or the trainspotters who wish to take exception with the insignificant things. With Desert Skies the author has managed to capture the full range of emotions felt by military leaders at all levels, from pure disgust and hatred through to absolute fear, without naming names (although I'm sure those in the "Champions" could put faces to the situations).

What really surprised me about the book is that it not a story of helicopter warfare ... instead it is a story of devoted leadership set within an attack helicopter unit.
It tells of the fine line between being one of the boys or being in "command", demanding respect or earning respect and most importantly that fear of failing subordinates is (and should be) the driving factor behind day-to-day decisions.
Desert Skies is a timely reminder that the military is about people and getting the absolute most out of them in any circumstance... something that gets quickly forgotten in times of peace. It is an absolute shame that it takes a war for us to treat our soldiers (at all levels) with the respect and loyalty they deserve.
I thoroughly recommend this book to military leaders of all levels ... despite it being written by a company commander even section commanders will get something out of it (in fact I think that junior leaders will get the most from the book). I also recommend those very same people work hard on convincing their partners to read it. The author puts into words the range of emotions and conflicting priorities felt by commanders with families far more eloquently and understandably than I ever seem to be able to do in the heat of the moment.

This book is a trek into memory and is one that is held together by two riveting and story-unifying scenes. It's scenes like these that keep the book still haunting my own memory two weeks after finishing it. The book, just like real life, is merely a cycle - a repetition of connected events.

Both scenes involve the author's dead friend, Jonathan Wright, once a professional photographer and mountaineer who was tragically killed by an unpredicted avalanche.

The author, Rick Ridgeway, is asked by Wright's daughter to take her back to the grave site of her father on the flanks of Minya Konka in "wild Tibet." While hiking the well-worn trail to Tengbocke Monastery, Ridgeway describes himself identifying the white-capped river chat on the banks of the Dudh Kosi. He is perhaps a few hundred yards of Asia Wright, the dead climber's daughter. Ridgeway is suddenly reminded of doing the same identification some twenty years earlier when Jonathan came upon Ridgeway at the river's edge. Back then, they together thumbed through the bird book until they indentified it as the same one they were looking at. Now years later, in almost the exact same spot, Asia Wright comes up the trail, and seeing Ridgeway squatting next to the river, stoops and says, "What are you looking at?" Dizzying deja-vu.

The second motif occurs at the end (don't read this if you don't want to know the surprise). Here, Ridgeway has found the grave site where twenty years before he had buried Jonathan after the fatal avalanche. He approaches the tumbled stones that still partially cover the body. He shifts a rock and sees the hair of his friend. Ridgeway reaches down and holds the strands between his fingers, rubbing them slowly and gently. Years before, Ridgeway had done the same right before Jonathan had died. Ridgeway held Jonathan in his arms. He remembers when he moved his fingers through his hair while Jonathan's lips changed color and suddenly his face paled and something "went out of him," and he died.

These scenes are lasting memories for Ridgeway. I connect with the author as he connects with his past. Below Another Sky is a touching account of an aging mountaineer with a rich heritage and valuable advice to those of us too timid to climb mountains and risk our lives.

I bought this book after reading Seven Summits which recounted Rick Ridgeway's involvement with Dick Bass's and Frank Well's attempt to be the first to bag the "seven summits".
This is a moving story of not only the loss of Rick Ridgeway's friend and climbing buddy in an avalanche in the himalayas where he also almost died but an account of his return voyage with the friend's twenty year old daughter to where the avalanche had occurred some 18 years before. It is a travel narrative, mountaineering book, great insights on Nepal and Tibet with interesting sidetrips through his memories, trips to Patagonia, being in a Panamanian jail when he was but twenty and what it taught him...etc. You have got to like this guy! A perfect read for the introspective armchair adventure traveller who loves Asia; which is the name of the twenty year old girl who finds her father's grave and her way in life on this trip.

This is the recounting of a trip Rick Ridgeway made with Asia Wright through the Himalayas enroute to searching for her father's grave. Her father was Jonathon Wright, who was killed in an avalanche on Minya Konka when she was an infant. Throughout the journey he tells her of her father's life as well as of his own past as a mountaineer and adventurer. This was a difficult book for me to get through, and it was some time before I could pick it up without my hands shaking. I didn't think it would have such an emotional impact on me, and I'm bemused to think that Jonathon can still affect people when he's been dead for twenty years. We knew Jonathon, and I remember vividly the shock of returning from a trip and receiving a telegram saying he'd been killed. Certainly we were familiar with death's capaciousness, but it was a classic case of, "Why him, of all people? Where's the meaning in this?" It's a curious experience to read a book twenty years later where someone asks those questions about the same person, but we've all known someone who died too soon.

They're difficult questions and Ridgeway does as credible a job of the philosophical answers as anyone can, with his acceptance of life and death, and change. However, his denouement at the end, that we should live each day as if it were our only one, felt flat. We've heard it before and it's been boiled done to a kitchen plaque cliché that I've always found irritating when it's not further explained. I don't think I'd plan on spending my only day on earth wondering if the roof should be redone this year or next and booking dental cleanings, as I'm doing today. My grudge with the cliché is that it seems to imply that we should regret whatever it is we've been doing up to now, rather than accepting that some days are simply going to be filled with the mundane details of living. It also holds an inherent suggestion that we should seek pleasure. But the kind of pleasure that makes life worth living is an elusive phantom and comes only after we've sought experience. Pain or regret may also result, regardless of our intentions. We have to embrace the experience regardless of outcome; if it's pleasurable, it's a bonus and we've earned it. Jonathon tried to focus on the experience rather than the goal or glory at the end, and I think that's what was meant in the book, but perhaps each of us sees it differently.

But Jonathon's effect on people was the result of more than what he did, it was the result of his personality, and Jonathon simply being Jonathon. We all affect the people we contact each day. Whether it's for good or ill is up to us. Partly because of his own innate goodness and partly because of his efforts, Jonathon had a positive effect on the people who know him. The lesson I would take from his life is that we could all have a similar impact if we made the effort to be nice - and I apologize for the lackluster word, but there it is - nice. The circumstances in which I first met him was one where egos could become inflated, inflamed, or deflated in an instant, and the silly posturing and puffy tempers certainly were a contrast to Jonathon's calmness. It's an odd thing, given that I didn't know him that well and it's been a long time, but I am still influenced by him and try (not always successfully!) to behave in difficult situations as he would have. Our lives do indeed affect others.

The book focuses on personalities, and that gives it a heart and poignancy which are often lacking in adventure stories. As for his journey with Asia Wright, it begins in Nepal, continues on to Mount Kailas, across the Chang Tang Plateau in Tibet, and ends at Asia's father's grave. The book is nicely-written and over-all the description is strong enough, although there were places where it lacked the vitality that would really bring an area to life for me. I will say (and this truly is surprising, since he recounts a fair number of disasters, not to mention numerous other assorted miseries) that Rick Ridgeway managed the impossible - he made mountain-climbing sound appealing even to me.