I was there during the period of this book, at a lower level of Security Pacific. I found the book almost unbelievably exciting and scary. It explains much about what was happening to the "troops" that we could not understand. Smith did a good job of keeping the true problems away from all of us, including employees and the public, as he no doubt had to in order for the merger to succeed. All in all, anyone with any interest in banking and finance should find this an exciting and informative book.

I bought this book because it looked like a people-book about big deals and mergers and I was surprised by how gripping it was. It is also extremely funny. It is not like any other business book I have ever read. I came away with a sense of the participants as people. It is also well written. The first half of the book is about how Security Pacific got into trouble with banking regulators and some famous dealers like Trump and Peter Uebberoth. This part of the book is fast and hilarious and fascinating. The second half is about the merger of Security Pacific and Bank of America,and here the story really took focus and became quite intense. I can't remember getting so emotionally involved in a story about business. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in business and banking--especially if you are sick of books promoting companies that masquerade as business stories.

Dead Bank Walking gives a very candid and sobering insight into the merging of two banking bohemoths: Security Pacific and Bank of America. People who choose to purchase this book will be thrust into a world of high stakes finance, replete with sometimes brutally honest depictions of the people involved in one the biggest banking mergers in history. Mr. Smith holds nothing back and does a brilliant job of placing the reader directly in the line of fire...basically, in his shoes! His narrative is very descriptive and positively enthralling. Although armed with a seemingly unending supply of wacky characters (including downright white-collar criminals, pompous executives and bloated know-it-all middle managers), Smith avoids the easy way out of making this a diatribe of how unfairly he was treated, rather he takes great pains to illustrate the personal sacrifices others were forced to make in the best interest of the shareholders. Unfortunately, this places the author in an extremely difficult position and what transpires is nothing short of miraculous.
This book is an absolute nail-biter that will surprise you. You definitely would not expect this from a book about "some bank merger that happened 10 years ago out in California." If you work in the business world, especially in the banking industry, you must read this work of passionate dedication and self-sacrifice. The book's in-your-face comments and insight, peppered with self-depricating wit, will make you forget you're reading a book about "business," making it read more like a Oliver Stone screenplay.

With the recent Andrea Yates story being in the media, I couldn't help but think back on the Susan Smith story and recently read this book. It was an emotional book to read. I can remember so well watching Susan Smith on TV in 1994 and at first believing her story, but then I started doubting her. When she finally confessed, I was horrified for Michael and Alex Smith. The thought of two little ones dying in the cold water alone and crying for their mother, who put them there, is almost too much to bear. I feel such sympathy for David Smith. The story of his marriage is difficult to read at times ... the games that David and Susan played were just ridiculous, and both of them were unfaithful in their marriage. They were really two children playing at being married, I think ... they were very young when Susan got pregnant with Michael and had to get married. At Susan's trial, a lot about her life came out ... her father's suicide, abuse by her stepfather, a mother that didn't protect her, depression and earlier suicide attempts. The girl is clearly mentally ill. Now I've heard that two prison guards have been fired for having sex with her; the discovery was made when Susan visited the prison infirmary and was found to have a veneral disease. It is a very sad situation for both families of Michael and Alex Smith, and I know that both families miss those little boys every day. The other night I saw David Smith on CNN. He cried when he talked about Michael and Alex and said he will never forget them. He is happily remarried and has a new baby girl, and said that when she was born, he promised her he wouldn't be afraid to love her. I was very touched by that and hope he will find happiness and peace in his new life. I also hope that Susan Smith and her family will find forgiveness and peace, too.

Susan Smith is the cruellest person I have ever read about. She drove her car into a lake with her two infant sons strapped trustingly in the backseat, then stood on the shore and watched it sink to the murky bottom. She fabricated a story about an alleged carjacker to disguise her sole culpability in this crime. She shed crocodile tears for her estranged husband, her family, friends, the police, the media, and the world, while her murderous secret remained locked inside her noxious heart. She sentenced her boys to death and David to a life of grief. She sits today in prison. She will never on this earth suffer the consequences of what she did.

I started crying two pages into this book, and the tears flowed throughout every aching page. David's pain and suffering is so tragically transmitted to readers that we can almost touch it. But only almost. It is so agonising, so raw, so heartrending, and so horrific, that if Susan Smith were in a room with me I would scream "Why?" repeatedly while pounding her body with my fists!

As I write this, there is a lump in my throat, my jaw is clenched, and the tears are welling up. It is instinctive; I simply can't help myself. I will never forget this story, this book, David, or beautiful and innocent little Michael and Alex. Nor should anyone else. Forgetting them would be like forgetting what it means to be human.

This was such a sad bad. Like David Smith said, "Remember who are the true victims in all this, Miicheal and Alex, NOT Susan Smith! It was a good and fast reading and I a book is so much better when it's write by a person who the story concern them and not from a famous writer, is even better when the writer is not a writer, so from people who said this book is good but the editing is bad, I don't see what is bad, I thought the book was very good and it comming from the heart and soul to who that real story had happen, you can feel his pain! Everybody was saying how Susan was too good for David, my God it was the other way around, David was too good for Susan. Susan was picture as like a hot, sexy girl, sorry to me she look like a ordinary house wife and kinda chubby, she come from the South right? Yeah she do look like redneck, the way she dress and wear her hair are out of fashion even in 90th, well I am out of context here but can't help saying that to me see doesn't look hot stuff and one of the book with her glasses and her hair pine up she look like a geek! Like David Smith said, the two persons who love her the most, (their kids), she had killed them, how can a mother do this to her own children and said she love them? Why David Smith want so much the death penalty for Susan, if she got a soul she suffer much more in prison, well if she got one. She seem only to think for herself and feel pity for herself. Killing her children because she was in love with a guy that didn't want a family allready made, so she killed her kids and to have the pity of the man she love she make a a big lie that a man took over her car and push her out put kept the kids. Did she really think she could live with the rest of her life with that story and have back the man she love? She was stupid, he was also having other affair and like I said Susan is no hot thing, why he would go with her? Still a part of me pity her, if she really was having depression it can make you do stupid things, yeah maybe she was really insane!

This version (Workbook) of Modern Carpentry is a workbook. Its questions that you must fill in the blank (answer). It is NOT a book but more of a 'test' (I'm assuming) of the material in Modern Carpentry.

Full of information on every aspect of the carpentry field. In depth and up to date.

This is the best carpentry and overall construction book I've ever read. This should be at the center of all of your construction books. I do construction in the Navy and we have some great books to learn from but this gives book gives you more info on standard construction practices, load sizes for lumber and such detailed information with pictures that can't be beat. I've owned an older edition and that helped me out alot, but this book is truly modern and up to date with construction practices going on right now. This is a must have and you won't go wrong.

This book was very well researched, showing that there is indeed a divide between the white evangelical church and black congregations. It includes a good deal of statistical data as well as numerous interviews from individuals about the subject. The feeling I got from the book however, is that the tone was very dismissive towards the opinions of white Christians, and put a higher amount of weight on the opinions of black Christians. The author implied that the racial issue can be solved by policies of reconciliation, and that it is not an individual issue. However, for most of us that is all we have at our disposal. If we are not personally affected by racism we have no personal stake to push for social justice. After highlighting the fact that although there is racial inequality in America, to which most people can agree, the author admits that he can offer no solution to solve the problem. In addition, racisim doesn't simply exist between blacks and whites, people of all cultures face it as well, but the views of those smaller people groups are largely ignored. This book does more to fuel the fire of the differences that lead to racism than solve the problem. Anyone can complain, few can be constructive.

Michael Emerson and Christian Smith argue in their book Divided By Faith that the values and beliefs that are central to evangelical religion - freewill individualism, relationalism, and antistructuralism - actually help to increase the racial divide in America, even though they are the biggest supporters of racial reconciliation. The book is based a deep probing of evangelical Americans' feelings of race issues through an extensive nationwide survey of over 2000 people. The authors give rock-solid proof for their argument which is presented in a very concise and logical manner. The effective use of statistics and quotes from interviews help solidify the argument. In addition, they describe how the structure of American religious organizations is continually pushed towards internal similarity, leading to racially separate congregations. After reading the book, one will find it difficult to respect the views of evangelicals and their attitudes on race issues.

The book begins with a close look at just how racialized our society really is, citing mostly examples of economic disparity between whites and blacks. The problem also exists in the lack of interracial marriages, segregated communities, and in religious affiliation choices. Next the authors give a historical overview of how Christians, particularly evangelicals, have thought of race in the past, and what sorts of actions they have taken to address racial issues.

Racial reconciliation was started by blacks in the 1960s as a theology for reconciling the division between races. Its primary tenet is that individuals of different races must develop primary relationships with each other and recognizing social structures of inequality. Evangelicals have since popularized the idea and made it one of their top priorities for bringing and end to racial division. The original message was lost in the translation however, for evangelicals stress individual reconciliation as opposed to challenging social systems of injustice and inequality.

Evangelicals see the race problem of one of three types: prejudiced individuals, other groups trying to make race problems a group issue when it is only individual problems, and a fabrication of the self-interested. Emerson and Smith use the idea of a cultural tool kit - ideas and practices that shape one's perception of reality - to explain these views. They explain how accountable freewill individualism, relationalism, and antistructuralism are the racially important cultural tools for white evangelicals and how most do not think America is racialized because of their tools; in addition, most are racially isolated. White evangelicals see no race problem other than bad interpersonal relationships. These tools lead them to "minimize the race problem and racial inequality, and thus propose limited solutions." This strong evidence supports the claim that evangelicals perpetuate a racialized society without any intention to do so.

The authors asked people in the survey for their explanations on the reasons for blacks having worse jobs, income, and housing than whites. White evangelicals were significantly more likely to cite individual reasons than structural reasons; most felt that it was due to lack of motivation or will-power on the part of blacks. However, when black evangelicals were asked for their explanations, they overwhelmingly cited less individualistic and more structural reasons; most felt that it was due to discrimination. This shows that evangelical religion "intensifies the different values and experiences of each racial group, sharpening and increasing the divide between black and white Americans." Emerson and Smith also give anecdotal evidence that by not seeing how societal structures impact individual initiative, the racialization problem will continue.

The survey also asked people about how to solve the race problem. The results again show that evangelicals overwhelmingly felt that people should "try to get to know people of another race" and that almost none felt that racially integrated residential neighborhoods could solve the problem. What's more, white evangelicals were much more likely to respond this way than non-evangelical whites, further evidence of the cultural tool kit explanation.

The authors also give an in-depth examination of the structure of American religious organizations and the view that America has become a "religious marketplace." They explain why congregations are internally similar with the idea that "internally homogeneous congregations more often provide what draws people to religious groups for a lower cost than do internally diverse congregations" in addition to social psychological reasons. The book concludes with a look at how these internally similar congregations produce and maintain racialization.

This book is rock-solid evidence for the idea that evangelical religious teachings - although candidly supportive of racial reconciliation - actually do more to perpetuate a racialized society than they do to terminate it. Although the authors provide almost no suggestions for exactly how to end this racialized society, they definitely present a shocking argument along with rigorous proof of the contradiction that exists in American evangelical religion.

This is a powerful book that illuminates the reasons for the continued racial divide between black and white Christians. In engaging and accesible chapters,the authors meticulously show how white evangelicals look at the world, and how that makes it difficult for them to see racial injustice. The great hope of this book--winner of the 2001 Distinguished Book Award from the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion--is that by showing us what has been and what is, it provides the needed knowledge to spur our society to change. The review that follows assumes that the authors have left God out, but this is wrong. As a leader in a multi-ethnic congregation, I know that this book is critical for understanding how God views injustice and how this understanding is key to living in the kind of just and united relationships that God calls us to. This book is a must read for all thinking Christians.

WROX books used to be the only ones I'd buy; after having a grand ol' time with the ASP and ASP Databases series. The Professional series has been a real disappointment (and waste of money!). The books tend to be more wordy than necessary and spend too much time on the obvious and too little on the abstract. Cold Fusion is a fairly straight-forward programming language. WROX has somehow managed to make it much more. Perhaps too many cooks in the kitchen; looks like they had 18 authors put this beast together.
Look elsewhere...

Being a ColdFusion user group president, I give this book my seal of approval. This book is well written with easy to understand examples. It will help someone with no CF knowledge all the way to the experts. This book is well laid out and is enjoyable to read. I didn't know what to expect from Wrox on this. I have been a huge Ben Forta fan but this book is just as good as his (if not better)! If you want to learn CF, or just want to get better, buy this book. You will be very happy with it.

This is a very good book!
Vale a pena galera!

Attempt to slot this book to a a genre and it'll slither away - on speed. A coctail of dark fantasy, cyberpunk, sci-fi and a good old fashioned "whodunnit"; Spares takes you to a macabre world with no sugar on top, chillingly close to our own.

If you have the money, you can do anything - bash a few bones, burn off your face - no problem - because your "spare" is waiting to be utilised on a nearby farm. Jack Randall guards one of these farms run by SafetyNet, but in an uncharacteristic act of heroism - or insanity - he flees the Farm together with some spares.

This seemingly innocent start to the story leads the reader through a typically Marshall-Smith-esque maze of about-turns and stomach churning discoveries - all slipped to your subconcious while it was busy digesting the last few pages. This book isn't adrenaline packed. It's more like someone was slowly tickling your brain with a feather.

Must be read with an open mind. But it must be read.

"Spares" is Michael Marshall Smith's second novel, his first being the simply amazing "Only Forward". Like its predecessor, "Spares" is an unusual mix of Douglas Adams like humour, Gibson-esque science fiction, fantasy, action, philosophy, adventure, romance and horror that all combines to create something disturbingly familiar yet satisyingly unique. Set in a futuristic post-apocolypse America, "Spares" centers around the life of Jack Randall a down on his luck ex-cop who finds himself the guardian and protector of six spares; a group of cloned humans whos existance is due to a very sinister agenda by those in power. Having escaped The Farm with the spares in tow, Jack seeks refuge in New Richmond; an ex-flying shopping center made city, attempting to secure an escape vehicle for himself and his charges. But instead of salvation Jack finds himself confronted with his past and a frightening vista of reality known to Jack as The Gap. Stuck with no place to go Jack has no option but to fight the demons of years past. Starting off relatively light hearted and humorous "Spares" quickly darkens in tone until at last the horrors of The Gap along with the ravages of drug addiction are revealed to Jack. This novel is a much darker and disturbing work than "Only Forward" yet is just as satisfying as a peice of literature. The narrative is told by the central character himself and makes for an easier to read almost conversationalist tone. With this easily accessable style "Spares" can acurately be described as one of those book which is impossible to put down, despite its disturbing surreal overtones. "Spares", while lacking the commentary on the human condition shown in "Only Forward", still makes some very astute observations on the human psyche. With its crucible of concepts and styles "Spares" comes highly recomended and quite possibly will become the best book you have ever read, unless of course you have read "Only Forward" in which case it is a tie.

Michael Marshall Smith is a great new writer with a very unique and invividual voice. Coming on the heels of his debut, _Only Forward_, _Spares_ confirms that he is definitely someone to watch!

Some reviewers have faulted Smith for attempting to shoehorn too many diverse ideas into a single book, or for creating such an unlikeable person in his protagonist, Jack Randall. Depending on your point of view, this may be a valid criticism. For me, the mix worked and worked in a magical way I come across all too infrequently in my reading these days.

Jack is a drug-addicted former policeman in the surreal future world of New Richmond, Virginia, a grounded MegaMall which has been taken over as the basis for a city. On the run with a group of spares he's liberated from a Farm, Jack comes up against the same forces which necessitated his escape five years previously. Throw in the Gap, a strange, interdimensional reality, not quite analagous to cyberspace but similar, in which a war was fought 20 years ago, a war Jack and several of the other characters are veterans of, and the book is almost overflowing with ideas, originality, and an amazing level of energy.

If you're a fan of cross-genre mixes, hardboiled/sci-fi, this book is definitely worth your while. Based on his first two novels and a number of his short stories, including "More Tomorrow," an excellent Internet horror tale, Smith has quite a future ahead of him and, for now, a dedicated new fan in this critic.

Lots of tips, tricks etc. for end users trying to learn Discoverer.

Lacks best practices, installation/configuration options for Administrators. Unfortunately, this seems to be the only book available covering Oracle Discoverer. For Administrators, the only available resource is Oracle Documentation.

I have used Oracle Discoverer for years now (ie: v.3.0, etc.) and I wished many times to have a book that I could look through when I needed help. I've taught courses in Discoverer at numerous companies to hundreds of users and this book would be an excellent resource for end-users to have. For the more advanced users there's plenty of information included as well. Having this book on my bookshelf by my computer is good and bad. Good - because there's always something I have to look up (even if I already know it, it's good to know it's there); and bad - because when an end-user sees the book, they always want to borrow it.

I would give this book high marks as it's a good all round reference and learning book.

This is the only game in town as far as Oracle Discoverer goes. We use it on the job, and while most of the book doesn't work for us, since we use a specific pre-programmed EUL, the chapters on using functions are what makes money for us.

In this book, Ms. Gittleman suggests that excess copper is a common cause of fatigue and other chronic health problems, especially among women. Many popular foods, such as tea, nuts, beans, avocados and whole wheat, are high in copper. Even if we don't consume excess amounts, other factors (including stress and the Pill) can cause it to build up in our tissues instead of being excreted.

It's true that the author doesn't have a lot of evidence from peer-reviewed medical journals. Still, the idea makes sense, and her profile of the typical person with excess copper, especially the "physically tired/mentally overactive" part, describes me quite well. It also describes a good friend of mine to a 'T'. (She even has the characteristic orangish hair color.) I can't say I'm a true believer, but I figure it can't hurt, so I might as well try it. The suggested eating plan seems healthy and simple enough, and the optional supplements - B6, C, zinc, manganese - aren't expensive or dangerous.

I agree with some other reviewers that this book is a bit light on content: it's less than 150 pages, with a fair number of anecdotes and some repetition. Also, the useful material is scattered all over the book; an index would be greatly appreciated. But if it works, it will be well worth the price.

About a year ago, I noticed this book in a bookstore; being a fan of Ann Louise Gittleman, I glanced through it. Unfortunately I dismissed it as too speculative without buying it and reading it thoroughly. I have battled fatigue for many years. I take what I think is very good care of myself and am actually working toward a master's degree in nutrition. Yet, I still battle fatigue. Now, finally, after years of tired frustration, I am ready to try this approach.

This really isn't a new theory; she's simply putting the pieces of the puzzle together, producing a practical approach. The very well respected, late Carl Pfeiffer and others in his field have produced the evidence that copper overload in moderate and extreme amounts can be very detrimental to us both physically and emotionally.

I think think this book is worth at least picking up; it certainly provides food for thought. The bibliography also provides excellent resources for further analysis.

After suffering for many years from acne, dry skin, hair falling out, anxiety disorders, occasional insomnia and hormonal problems like bad pms, I have finally found what the causes of all these problems were; Copper toxicity! After reading Gittleman's book, I had a hair mineral analysis done and my copper levels were 5 times the normal limit! I have been following the advice in this book for 3 months and I feel like a totally new person. A very overlooked problem that could be the cause of many health problems especially for women. Go buy the book!

The spine of this book labels it as "suspense," and it certainly does share some aspects of that genre. It is also, however, a science fiction, mystery, fantasy, speculative religious thriller. This is both the joy of the book, and its curse. The joy is simply reading it for the excitement of not knowing what Smith is going to throw at you next. The curse is wanting it to coalesce into something besides the ephemeral pleasure of a roller coaster ride, and being disappointed when the coaster car simply comes gliding back into the station.

Hap Thompson is a petty con man who has fallen into the less-than-savory business of being a dream-washer and memory-holder. This would have likely been fine, except for his character flaw of being able to turn down wads of cash hovered virtually in front of him. He agrees to do a side memory job for a client so as to see all of the cash rather than just the skimmed bit given to him by his employer, REMtemps, and instead finds himself holding onto the memory of the murder, and if he doesn't get rid of it soon, LAPD will be on him. It doesn't matter that he didn't commit the murder--just having the memory is enough to set him up for life.

Smith hovers between writing like Raymond Chandler and William Gibson, and the result isn't as unpleasant as that match might seem (in fact, I've long thought Gibson's style of cyberpunk fit the early noir of Chandler, and only needed the psychological edge of James M. Cain to really perfect it). The book breaks down towards the end, however, when Smith starts trying to channel either Benny Hinn or Joseph Campbell. This is similar to the macguffin in Neal Stephenson's work, where he actually tries to make sense of all the fun and all it sounds like is pseudo-scientific claptrap.

Smith's an interesting enough writer to watch, however, and there are a number of science fiction/mystery novels that don't even come close to being as engrossing as One of Us. You could do much worse for pleasure reading, and there's not much better being published today.

I picked this one up on a whim. I had never heard of Mr. Smith, and I certainly hadn't read anything by him prior to this. Talking, walking alarm clocks? Roving bands of coffee makers? Is this book for real????? Luckily I continued reading despite my initial reaction to the story. I am so glad I gave this book a chance. It is bizarre, it is surreal, but somehow it all works.
Hap Thompson narrates this story about how he came to be employed as a dream and memory receiver, and how this line of work quickly puts him in danger. On the sly, Hap decides to accept a memory (which is illegal work) from a client who then refuses to take back the memory; Hap is in danger not only of going to prison for life but of being killed for this memory. He then sets out on a roller-coaster adventure that addresses ethical, philosophical and theological issues....but it's done in such a tongue-in-cheek, film noir style that it avoids being preachy.
The setting is sometime in the future in a world where humans share space with appliances that not only talk but have attitude. Surfing the internet takes on a literal meaning in this story, and computer hacking is central to the plot. This is a quick, funny, suspense story, and I enjoyed it immensely. Sometimes I'm totally surprised by a book....this one surprised me by how much I enjoyed it. I described it to a friend as Mickey Spillane meets Alice in Wonderland meets the X-Files meets Brave Little Toaster.

One Of Us is a very well crafted novel featuring modern-day humanity in a not-too distant future. I love Smith's knack for twists on technology - the talking appliances (also seen in Spares but less developed) add quite a bit of humor to the reading. Smith also has a fabulous way of describing the ordinary that will make you chuckle.

I found myself drawn in throughout the book in a similar way to the first two. I say one only must read it once as a comparison to Only Forward, and even Spares. With Only Forward, I immediately turned back to the first page and started reading the entire book again, having so many questions. What drew me in was Smith's ability to make you think - and though there are signs of it in One Of Us, it lacks some of the power in Only Forward. Still, it is a complete book and one I would highly recommend!!

It is almost like dream comes true when I saw the revised, new second edition out at the bookstore. The imrpoved edition not only has amended the errors or typo in its predecessor, but has graciously added new/updated materials in synthesis. You may see it as an equivalent to Jerry March's Advanced Organic Chemistry but a whole different approach. The sections on oxidations, reductions, and organoboranes are excellent. Since organic synthesis is a broad and infinitely growing field, not a single book covers all the principles and gadgets of organic chemistry. Use it as an encyclopedia or along with popular title like Nicholaou's Classics in Total Synthesis in order to enjoy the wonders of organic chemistry.

It's amazing to me that Smith is able to gather so many resources and consolidate them into one place. Everything is there. Reagents. Cross references to books that deal only in reagents, and so on and so on.

Often, one sees textbooks that give reactions and simply assume that they will work without citing a reference where someone has actually gone through the trouble to see if the reaction really will work. (This, I have found, is the quickest way to waste time in the lab. The easier it is to locate a protocol, the higher your lab productivity is.)

It's also good to see that he's taken the time and trouble to whittle away some of the pretty colors that a lot of books put in in order to try to draw the reader's attention away from the glaring lack of substance.

This book may, in the next few years, supercede the March text because a good number of his references are from within the past 5 years (50%, I believe), and it is such that if you are working in the lab and need to find *that* particular reference, then you can easily go and look it up.

The 2/e is a comprehensive look at modern methods in organic synthesis.

Smith avoids the trend, common in many books, of using too many colors and myriad worthless illustrations. He instead provides a clean, easy to read volume for the advanced undergraduate or graduate organic student.

The references at the end of each chapter are outstanding. There are often in excess of 75 citations per chapter, readily allowing further study.

I would like to respond to the criticism of some reviewers regarding typographical errors. The 2/e does seem to be much better than the 1/e in this regard. Also the author maintains a well documented list of typos on his website.

All in all, this book is easily the rival of Carey & Sundberg's Part B and well worth the investment for any organic/pharm chemists out there.