Anyone who has been hiking the White Mountains of New England since the 1970s, is likely to have kept their orange hardcover AMC "White Mounain Guide," like a family heirloom. Since its inception, the Guide has provided detailed, largely editorial-free, descriptions of all the many trails of the white mountains. For novice hikers, it is absoulutely indispensable for its advice on practical hiking pleasures and perils - it should not leave the pack. For experienced hikers, the Guide provides all information needed to plan White Mountain excursions ranging from half-day beginner hikes to multi-day backpacks. The trail descriptions should be viewed as overviews, not all-telling. At times, a trail seemingly modest from the book description, will be rocky and arduously steep. Other times, an innocuous-sounding trial will provide breathtaking views. Some curse this as a short-coming, while others, this reviewer included, appreciate the fact that reading the book does not diminish the surprises of the trail. The directions to the trailheads are remarkably accurate, as are the essential descriptions of major trail junctions, as well as trails and peaks on which extra care should be taken. The maps, while not minute topographical maps, are extremely useful, more so with compass skills, but quite practical even without them. The organization is improved over the 26th version - especially the recommended easy and moderate hikes at the end of each mountain region's trail descriptions. Worthwhile to complete one's White Mountain hiking library, are the AMC Southern New Hampshire Trail Guide and AMC Maine Mountain Guide.

I wanted to learn more about the forgotten WWI. I wanted to know why and how Gen. Pershing earned 6 stars! This book is really not a good read. Perhaps it is because I had just finished reading Robert Asprey's Napoleon, volumes I & II, that Gene Smith's book did not compare in quality, research and information, in my eyes. It is a quick read, but it miserably fails to live up to a great beginning chapter and a wonderful title.

Many factoids are told all over the book, seemingly out of place, when they would have been most appropriately placed at the time of the event. For example, we learn in a parenthetical sidebar to a later period in his life, that Pershing had two bouts of a venerial disease while he was in the Phillipenes earlier. Given that there were controversial news stories at that time, about his having kept a Filipeno woman or having kids who called him 'father,' that factoid was appropriate at the earlier time when he arrived in the Phillipenes with his new wife and that particular controversy exploded, not years afterwards.

I am especially vexed at the air-brushing of his time as commander of the all Black 10th Cavalry. The 'norm' of racist thought that pervaded white males of Pershing's era and social/economic class is well-documented. Yet, we read very little direct writings of Pershing's opinions on race. We read about one of his friends who wrote racist things alluding to the usual put-downs about blacks and their capabilities as soldiers and human beings. We also get a feel for the social put-down of Pershing being set as commander of the Black cavalry troops; the 'N_ _ _ _ _ Jack Pershing' nickname as case-in-point. But, what about himself? Where are in his letters during that time? We hear that he physically abused a Black soldier (with no apparent punishment forthcoming)in a temporary fit of anger, demonstrating his obsession about strict military form, order and dress rather than his feelings about Blacks. In later chapters of the book, we read more about some fiance of one of Pershings'grandsons, than about the 10th Cav and Pershings' role!!! What about the historically brave, courageous performance of the 10th Cav in the Spanish American War? What was Pershings' leadership role? His feelings? Nada. Once again a page in Black history, brushed aside. Could it be because no one wants to admit the 'great' general disdained his black command? It seems to me, that just like only a few want to talk about Thomas Jefferson's decades-long love affair with a slave woman, this yet another written historical text that wants to ignore something that in modern times would be perceived as negative concerning an American Historical figure. Mr. Smith is this so?

Basically, I see Pershings' rise to 6 stars as an adventure in the men's club of back-slapping buddies, rather than exceptional military achievement. OK.. he subjegated the people of the Phillipenes and became the great white father to many. OK.. he chased a Mexican bandit across the country (never caught him) and ended cross-border raids. OK... he withstood French and British pressure to use American bodies as cannon fodder in that bloody 'great' war. But America came to that War late and Pershing's role was limited in the overall picture. But, compared to the great Civil War Generals, George Washington, the exceptional WWII Generals like MacArthur, Patton or Eisenhower.. how in heavens' name did Pershing earn 6 stars? The first star was given because he was a buddy of Teddy Roosevelt. His battle commission in the Spanish American war was granted because he 'knew somebody' to give him a waver out of his West Point teaching post where everyone seemed to loathe him anyway. The command in WWI was under a pacifist Secretary of War and a peace-desiring academic Commander-in-Chief that knew nothing of war.

For me, this book is a sub-standard written text, too short, without more analysis of major historical issues -- coupled with a subject matter that cannot be apologized for (the man didn't seem to have earned 6 stars in my view).. Still, it made an interesting read in very few parts (the stories of his family's Civil War past, his historic/artistic friends, the sadness of the fire at the Presidio) and silly reading in other parts (the exploits of some Pershing off-spring as rich, alcoholic jet-setters with a famous name.) Generally, the book was a disapointment all around.

Until the Last Trumpet Sounds is a fine book. Gene Smith has written an interesting, fast-paced narrative of the life of John J. Pershing. This reader, however, upon finishing the book, was left a bit unfulfilled. At 337 pages, a full 50 of which are devoted exclusively to the lives of Pershing's grandsons, Smith simply cannot do full justice to the highest ranking military officer in US history. Smith merely alights upon a peak of Pershing's career and then sets off for another before the meat of the story is told. What results, nevertheless, is a highly interesting read, but not half of what it could be.

Pershing, born in 1860, rose from obscurity to the General of US Armies garnering an unprecedented sixth star. He went from fighting Indians of the American West on horseback to leading mechanized battles of World War I. Gene Smith's Until the Last Trumpet Sounds has only scratched the surface of a truly remarkable life and, therefore, leaves the reader feeling he could have done quite a bit more. Even so, what he has completed merits a solid 4 stars.

Overall, Smith does a pretty good job of bringing Pershing to life. Prior to reading this book, I knew very little about Pershing. This book got me past that, and a good deal more.

The details about Pershing's early life are a little sketchy. As the story moves along, Smith includes more and more info (presumably because more source material exists). I never got a sense of what Pershing's life was like growing up, but I got a lot (bordering on too much) about his relationship with his son and sisters.

I wholeheartedly disagree with the very negative review below. This book stays VERY focused on Pershing and, in my opinion, does not give too much detail about other people involved in the story. And, while Pershing may not have been as colorful (or as politically active) as Grant, MacArthur, Eisenhower, etc., he sure as heck earned six stars (which he never wore). With very little support from home, and against a great deal of pressure from the French and British, he trained and formed a US Army out of practically nothing, beat the Germans (don't argue that the French and British could have done it alone), and was the ONLY major voice calling for Germany's unconditional surrender (would WWII have happened if Wilson & the others had listened?).

The greatness of Pershing's acheivement comes through clearly in Smith's book. Sometimes, it's a little harder to get a feel for the greatness of the man.

as good as GENE VI by Lewis

I make specific what book this is a review of, because if you look at the user reviews for Shelly Taylor & D. Sears' social psychology textbook, you will find the exact same 5 reviews as are below mine. Either Amazon or some user are up to something sneaky.

Despite the comments below, which may or may not reflect someone who has actually read or used the book, my comments are based on using this book when I took the course and ordering it for a course I am teaching this summer.

Regarding the infractions cited below, I have not found this text any worse than others. It covers a wide range of an exciting subfield of psychology, and it does so in a way accessible to an initiate to the field. Allyn and Bacon provide excellent support for the text, as well.

Finally, I wish to note that while I am currently working in the same Psychology department as Donn Byrne, the second author, we are not affiliated in any way.

I highly recommend "Social Psychology" to practically any adult who can read. We are social beings and understanding each other helps us to create better relations. A better world. This book is excellent to examine and understand not only others' behavior but also ours.

Here is an excerpt that caught my attention: "how we interpret, analyze, remember, and use information about the social world-suggests that we are far from perfect in our ability to think clearly about other persons and reach accurate decisions or judgments about them."

"Social Psychology" covers many branches of psychology but the chapters give you enough information to learn just the basics. I think that this is great for lay people or new students in Psychology. I found that the personal stories that both authors used, helped me to better understand the topic of the chapters; however the, I met this psychologist and have been friends with since, led me to believe that this reaction was due to a schema. Perhaps our society has created a schema in which others' names define who we are. I particularly don't sympathize much with this.

The colorful pictures and cartoons in the book, I enjoyed greatly. I tend to be very visual in many occasions. In fact, I feel that many of the pictures were more thought provoking than the text. I found them very helpful to understand the subject. I also sensed that the targeted audience was mainly young students since many of the studies were conducted or focused on young students. I just wished that the authors had not forgotten that there are older people (like this book reviewer) who go back to school or who want to learn about social psychology. Once again, I highly recommend this book to anyone. You'll learn to view the world under a new perspective.

I read several chapters from this book before I took a social psychology course, and saw that it was indeed very helpful. The author uses a lot of examples, which makes the concepts understandable. Also, the narrative text of the book is very high in quality according to me. It's pure, understandable, friendly and in harmony. (Look at the Franzoi's 1st edition: You will understand what I mean by no-harmony). I strongly believe that to write such a good book should have taken much time for the author. In addition, the author most probably had had an empathetic approach to understand the needs of the student and write accordingly. I don't mean to harm or criticize in any way those that made negative comments on this book. Nevertheless, let me convey you my opinion. According to me, using "I", the author only intended to provide a warm atmosphere to the student sharing his experiences and understandings. But, this is a way to encourage the student think of his/her own experiences in real life, which causes the assimilation of the knowledge more effectively. It's not to advertise himself(author), as far as I perceived from the book. Another thing is that, in psychology, phenomena that seem not logical to a human eye may be significant in a statistical sense. Very small differences, after the elimination of the error margin, may still be significant and therefore, meaningful. In the book, there are graphs not starting from the 0 point, and thus the difference may appear larger when looking superficially. Nonetheless, when looking carefully, undoing the illusory magnification, still the difference is observed, and I believe that the author made focus on the significant part of the graph to draw the attention of the reader and to make him understand better and easier. According to me, this is a good feature of the book and intention of the author.

Although I certainly enjoy most books and articles by Maynard Smith, this book was a tremendous disappointment. He argues against self-organization in biology in a very bad way. Instead of a good argument, one finds a subjective, totally biased and unscientific argument (what a splash pattern has to do with morphogenesis? no idea, really ... that's a funny picture but nothing to do with development). Still worse, Maynard Smith tries to "put down" previous and current work on development from the point of view of complexity by claiming that it has to do with some obscure disappointment with Marxism and with some feminist-like reasoning (? ). I find this strategy really unfair and not appropiate for a great scientist and writer such as Maynard Smith. I think that it is clear that selforganization is, **together with information and adaptation** a fundamental part of the understanding of life. In trying to ridiculize complexity and selforganization, the author is (perhaps uncounsciously) acting in a way not far from "scientific creationists".

I picked this tiny book up hoping to get a decent introduction to contemporary theories of development. To an extent, that's what this book imparts; Smith compares and attempts to compromise the theories of self-organization and genetic instruction. The "compromise," however, is stilted, and despite my lack of in-depth biology knowledge I could clearly tell that Smith's lip service to the self-organization theory was quite lacking. The last section, an examination of the theories' political relevance, was utterly catastrophic and could probably have contained a more meaningful synthesis of the book's ideas.

I was prompted to write this after reading the review below from the New Mexico reader. He misses the point, not Maynard-Smith. This little book (45 pages)is based on a lecture given by Smith at the London School of Economics. The central theme of his lecture was to make the point that the two views in developmental biology i.e. dynamic-holistic view and the local-reductionist view are both important. But, he extends this thinking by suggesting that this dichotomy in biology is a pattern that exists in all aspects/spheres/disciplines in life. This is what I found so revealing. Gore Vs Bush could not be a better (current) example that comes to mind when reading the final chapter 5 - Reductionists to the right, Holists to the left.

This book is a popular retelling of the lives of four major figures, all of whom were marked by the horror of the Great World War I. Gene Smith, a well-known author, puts these lives in the dramatic context of the First and, for Petain and Eden, Second World War. There is little that ties these four lives together, and the book is strong on atmosphere but weak on analysis and interpretation. Smith's thesis centers around his proposed study of the reason for demise of such great men. He cites this reason as being WWI, which pulled these men from the history in which they were so great, and placed them in a 'new' world that would require new men with new minds to develop. A strong point thus is made, though Smith does little to give any fresh perspectives whatsoever in his analysis.

One of my favorite episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation was "The Big Goodbye". This was the one that introduced Picard's alter ego Dixon Hill, Private Eye. This book as a follow up or continuation of the story was not very good at all. Instead of mystery that is built with clues and leads, about 90% of the plot is spent making a wrong turn. Not very entertaining. No payoff at the end. Very little imagination. By the time you reach the end of the book you will just want to scream, "Give me a break!" I would love see more Dixon Hill tie ins but this one can sleep with the fishes. Do not waste your time.