Robert Carlsen: The War for the Heart and Soul of a Highland Maya Town, Austin: University of Texas Press, 1997.

E. Michael Mendelson writes: The subject of this extremely well written and readable book is Santiago Atitlan, the largest town of the Tzutujil Indians on one of the world's most beautiful volcanic lakes: Lake Atitlan in Guatemala. The town has long been famous with tourists and with anthropologists who have been studying it since at least the Nineteen Twenties. One of the principal deities in the Maya-Christian religious syncretism of Atitlan-the Maximon or Mam-even made Time Magazine coverage when it was attacked by Catholic clergy in the 1950s.

In a sense, the attempted conquest of the Maya and Maya resistance to it have continued from the 16th century Spanish Conquest down to the 20th century Civil War (in most ways a war against the Maya Indians) and Carlsen does a brilliant job of investigating four centuries of both continuity and change. In the last half century, a major crisis has been developing on the lake due to increased population and shortage of land. The move of so many local Maya from agriculture to commerce may be the reason why, Carlsen argues, traditional native religion-agriculture based-is having a hard time surviving against Orthodox and Charismatic Catholicism, militant Evangelical Protestantism, and contemporary media-driven culture. Commerce is not doing sufficiently well to save the town when set in the context of Guatemalan capitalism, itself vulnerable to increasing globalization. Further undermining the situation has been the Civil War, culminating in the December 2nd 1990 massacre of civilians by the Army-though local pride in forcing the Army out the town as a result of the massacre remains strong.

While this is Carlsen's main concern here (one is sure there will be further books), he manages to include a great deal of fresh and resonant information on Atiteco traditions. There is, among much else, a wonderful chapter on the central Tzutujil concept of "Flowering Mountain Earth," linking Sun, Corn, and Humans in an ideology descended straight from the great pre-Spanish classic text Popol Vuh, as well as a condensed but most insightful essay on the continuing cult of Sacred Bundles in Atitlan. Like all good anthropologists, Carlsen achieves a delicate balance between empathetic participation and objective study. His long dedication to the town is evident in the depth and warmth of his vision. The book is blessedly free of jargon and is illustrated with a wealth of excellent photographs. It cannot be too highly recommended.

Little monkey, who lives in Africa, is pursued by several animals that also live there and one who doesn't. In his attempts to get away from his pursuers, Little Monkey has to run up, down, over, under, in, and out. He finally gets a rest when he realizes that his last pursuer, the tiger, doesn't live in Africa. This book introduces children to the concept that there are other places in the world and that different things live in different places. It also teaches them about opposites. This book is very charming and engaging. My two-year daughter loved it immediately and had me read it again and again. She now loves to read it on her own--to turn the pages to see "who is coming" to get Little Monkey and to tell the monkey to run. The illustrations are also engaging. A new classic for our house!

TWAOAP is quite a fine piece of work. It has every government agency, official, and congressmen and their addresses. I would not know, but I guess this is an assassin's dreamhouse!

I've just finished reading this book and i feel this new edition is even better than it's predecessor, which is already not far from perfect. This well-known textbook is a comprehensive overview of what we have known about molecular cell biology, and what's more important is - every material here are treated very clearly and carefully, and this is where this book really shines - I even believe a layman with some elementary knowledge about chemistry and biology could not only read this book from cover to cover but also actually *understand* them.

Both the material and the references are quite up-to-date (not surprising), so don't hesitate to buy if you have the third edition.

I give it five stars because:
1) the authority is doubtless;
2) it's comprehensive, wide in scope;
3) the text is written in plain english, thus won't confuse students in the non-english speaking countries;
4) the figures are *really* excellent, IMHO better than any others that I have seen in other books;
5) the index is nice;

and some minor flaws:
The typesetting of "List of Topics" is somewhat... odd. There are no page numbers associate with the individual topics in that list too. Also I think the reference sections could be better.

So... let it be 4.5 stars.

This is latest update for the most revered text in the field of cell and molecular biology. I used this book as an undergraduate even though this was not the required text for the course. I still turn to it often as a graduate student. As someone who has read the book cover to cover I can vouch for its extensive coverage of the most important concepts and the abandance of information on the most frequntly encountered concepts. It is a must have for any serious student of cell, molecular and developmental biology. I recommend that you buy this book in addition to any required texts for your course. The book is so comprehensive that even topics that gained prominance in 2002 such as RNA interference are wonderfully presented. Even if you are new to this subject area this book if properly used can increase you understanding immensely of even the most difficult of concepts. You would never regret buying this.

Molecular Biology of the Cell is one of the best surveys available on the status of current information about cellular biology. The authors skillfully accomplish the difficult task of combining detail with readability while conveying the excitement of this dynamic field. Clear, concise, and colorful illustrations assist in this task and the book is a fine collection of splendidly dramatic photos of "molecular biology of the cell" in action. They covered an enormous amount of material with a style that is simple enough for a college-level biology student to follow with enough detail and references to be of use to an experienced research scientist. Bravo for a job well-done!

This book is the Bible of Internal Medicine. Anyone considering a career in medicine should have this book in their library. Comprehensive and well written, it is the gold standard of medical textbooks.

This book is the Bible of Internal Medicine. Anyone considering a career in medicine should have this book in their library. Comprehensive and well written, it is the gold standard of medical textbooks.

I have been using the 14th Edition of the main textbook for over two years now. The sheer size [and weight] of the book does not allow for easy carriage, especially when you have limited space. Moreover, I often had to leaf through reams of pages or read through several paragraphs when looking for information on specific topics. The companion handbook makes all these unnecessary. It is easy to carry around unnoticed in a small bag and, when there is need to double-check that elusive info, it is right there. Of course it is not as detailed as the parent text, but as a companion text, it fulfils its role very well.

Refactoring is another must have book for any OO developer. As with other books like the Gang of Four "Design Patterns", Mr. Fowler has compiled, structured, and systematize a set of common practices that any OO developer does in his/her day-to-day work.

Refactoring consist roughly in reshaping and evolving your code without changing its interfaces in order to improve its internal structure and functionality as well as other attributes. Every developer knows that is very difficult to hit the bull's eye at the first attempt and the code once written must be changed a number of times to accomodate new functionality or requirements or to allow the reuse.

Mr. Fowler starts explaining what refactoring is using a pretty well documented and complete example, next he describes when, why, how, and where you must refactor your code and how to locate those pieces of your code that are suitable for refactoring and how to test those changes. Finally, the bulk of the book is devoted to a catalog that identifies and classifies the different refactorings.

The book id full of code examples in Java, easy to read and right into target. From my point of view is a good investment for any developer.

I would have to give 2 thumbs up to Martin Fowler's book on Refactoring. He has addressed so many common refactorings in such a simple and elegant way that many will benefit from his work (as well as the others that helped write this book).

Martin's writing style is very relaxed and sincere. He's entertaining and doesn't complicate things as you can easily find what you need. You can tell he simply wants to make programming teams' lives easier and he has accomplished tenfold. He's not going to tell you that your an innately bad programmer or that he is a better one - he truely captivates that quality code is important and refactoring is that one big step that each organization and programmer must take to improve the quality of code.

Some of the patterns that he identifies are very common - but for completeness' sake, he includes them. Others are very insightful such as Introducing Null objects, which I've used 5 times in a single application now since I've read this book.

This is also an excellent book to accompany Design Patterns, as many of these refactorings will help you achieve design patterns in your code - it's like working them in your code in a different, systematic way.

All in all, this is a fantastic contribution to improving code and developing quality programmers in the software development industry. I would recommend this to any software professional and especially university students (where quality code is not touched on at all). It's the will of the programmer to improve their code and this is one of those books to read if you want to do that. If you want to just be an average programmer, a following in your organization and not take responsibility - then don't read this book. If you want to truely be effective in your job or entrapreneural projects, add this book to your bookshelf and read it, use it and live it.

I spent seven years in the Smalltalk environment figuring (parts) of this stuff out for myself. You don't have to - buy Martin's book and shave at least a few years off the learning curve. Refactoring is an indispensable part of software development. Like it or not, whatever you write today will be "wrong" sometime in the future. You need to have techniques for transitioning to the "right" stuff. Refactoring provides you with a wealth of small tools that can make the transition easier.

Not only that, having confidence that you can refactor your code later (supported by relentless testing) actually relieves some of the pressure you feel when you write the code the first time. Get it working, then get it right. Don't panic. Don't sweat. Enjoy your work like you did when you started (remember?). Let Refactoring guide the way.

A practical guide for any OO developer, no matter what language you are working in, though you need enough familiarity with Java to read the examples.

Molecular Biology of the Cell is written in a straightforward easy-to-read manner. The book is especially well up-to-date on many ascpects and, to my delight, connective tissue components are given enough space. This is your book if you're interested in molecular biology. A drawback from the point of view of a medical student is the lack of integration of metabolism to the organ level, let alone human body. Molecular Biology of the Cell sticks to its header by consistently leaving out topics such as - insulin regulation of blood glucose - ketone bodies - fasting (and ketone bodies) - CYP enzyme family (cytochrome P450) - pentose phosphate pathway/hexose monophosphate shunt/glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase - purine catabolism/xanthine oxidase/uric acid/gout

Clearly, if backed up with a texbook of biochemistry or physiology covering metabolism on a higher level, Molecular Biology of the Cell is an excellent choice, even for medical students.

This text covers every important aspect in the field, from experimental techniques and basic concepts to reviews of immunology, cancer, and developmental biology. I used it as a reference in four different undergraduate classes, and have prepared for several job interviews by reviewing the relevant information in this book. The illustrations are all relevant, the organization is excellent, and the prose is so well written that I take the book off the shelf and read it for fun. A new edition would be useful - some of the more speculative information is outdated - but this is still the best textbook I own.

Most people, when commenting about this book, tend to compare it to Lodish's Molecular Cell Biology. I own both, and I must say that they are quite similar in their content but different in the way of explaining concepts. Although Lodish's book is a little more up-to-date, it's just a matter of time until a new edition of MBoC is published. In fact, a great number of concepts are clearer in Molecular Biology of the Cell... and vice-versa. About the book, it is the authoritative text of molecular biology for beginners and a reference guide to all fields of cell biology. The chapters concerning the structure of the cell and of the organelles are amazing and include in-depth explanations. It also comprehends the best revision chapters on macromolecules compared to Lodish's. The team of authors was accurate to compose one of the best books in molecular biology for students of all biological and biomedical sciences.

I didn't know Ruin Mist six months ago, and now I can't stop reading Stanek's books. 'The Kingdoms and the elves of the Reaches' is a fantastic mix of action, adventure and mystery! I had no idea that a book could be so captivating. As soon as you start reading, you realize it is not going to be just an ordinary kind of plot, that strange things can happen at any moment, and that our world pales in comparison to the wonder of Ruin Mist. As we read we learn the value of true friendship, the pain of loss, the joy of life. Adrina misses his mother. Vilmos has to leave his family to keep them safe. The elves must leave their home to go on a perilous journey across the sea. They all set set on a journey, on a quest, looking for something, and that something they find will surprise and delight. It's not all good characters either. Some are mysterious and dark like Xith. Some are [bad] like Erravane. I've just finished book 3 and am going back to start over! I already miss Adrina and her friends!

I just finished reading The Kingdom's books for the second time! Mr. Stanek's Ruin Mist is has its own creatures, history, and magic. We meet new friends like Vilmos, Seth and Emel and a few we aren't too sure about.

It's got elves, gnomes, shapechanging wolmerrelle, watchers, wizards and men. Stanek very subtly points to dark forces at work, Sathar who has survived the dark journey, war in the elven kingdoms but that's not the focus. Those things are looming on the horizon. A dark "change" is coming to the lands of men as well but again its not the focus. This first book is the start of a great adventure. Lots of unexpected twists and turns.

After an opening with a series of strange events, the journey stars. I have never read a series that has kept me turning pages so far. Mr. Stanek's characters are so believable. You can relate to them. I like Vilmos most.

It's a fantasy series that is like no other I've read. It centers on things that make this novel more enjoyable than the most other fantasies. I recommend reading the entire series. It does get better and better as others have claimed. Stanek is a great new voice in the genre for sure. This book sets the stage. Things really take off in the next 2 books.

I will not bore you more details. I will say that no matter what your age you should give it a try.... It is a very entertaining, well written and easy to enjoy book. It is a great change of pace. My best suggestion is to quit reading this and read the book. Remember 2 and 3 is where things get going best. I highly recommend this book to everyone.

Incredible. These have got to be some of the best fiction novels on the planet and have really helped inspire me. I've read each Kingdoms book nearly straight through the first time and the only reasons I stopped were for little things like sleeping, eating and school. I've also read them all at least five times. They're that good.

The books follow the story of Vilmos, a twelve year old boy, Adrina, a girl coming of age, Seth and Galan, the mysterious elves, and their friends. Vilmos, a boy who's spent his whole life living a lie. Until one day he finds out that his dark power can't be gotten rid of. He's a wizard, and not just any wizard, the first human mage in a thousand years. Adrina, a girl who longs for change from her dull and boring life. Until one day the change comes and it isn't at all that she hoped for.

The characters, writing, and story in these books in superb and the entire series will leave you shocked, surprised, and eager for more. If you haven't yet read The Kingdoms this is a great time to start.

This is certainly a very good reading about building enterprise applications. I like that the author gives samples for the most currently used software platforms, such as Java and .NET. Anyway, the author treats more the specifics of Java than those of .NET, and that shows the patterns he discusses don't always have such a general applicability. A certain thing not well covered is related to the table module. I have a compelling question about it and if any readers of the book are willing to help me with that, please let me know. I suppose questions aren't to be posted in a book review.
To conclude, I liked reading the book and I'm sure it's worth the money.

This is the best book I've found on J2EE and .Net patterns. I think it's destined to become a classic. I found the discussions on when to distrbute ('sell your favorite grandmother first'), Unit Of Work, Domain Model and Data Mapper patterns extremely useful. It has changed the way I think about enterprise applications.

I think it fits somewhere between the original 'Design Patterns' book, by Gamma, et al, and a book like 'J2EE Patterns' in terms of its scope. 'Design Patterns' describes existing patterns that are applicable to any kind of application. 'J2EE Patterns' describes patterns in terms of one platform (although many of them apply to other platforms as well.) Fowler's book describes a set of patterns that work with a certain kind of application, business apps, but that are applicable to more than one platform.

It's better than the 'J2EE Patterns' book, which doesn't do a good job explaining which parts of J2EE to avoid, and which 'patterns' are in fact workarounds for problems in the platform itself. (For example, the 'Composite Entity' pattern.)

I have to strongly disagree with the first reviewer. Fowler does explain which patterns work best on which platform. The first section of the book gives a good road map for deciding which set of patterns to use for your app. He mentions explicitly that .Net pulls you in the direction of Table Module, but that with J2EE you would be less likely to use that pattern.

As far as the patterns being available in frameworks, I still find it useful to know about the patterns the framework implements. That way you know which framework to select. We recently went through an O/R mapping tool selection process. Reading the Unit Of Work, Data Mapper, Repository, Lazy Load and Identity Map chapters helped *immensely* in that process. Likewise reading the Front Controller pattern gave me some new ideas on how best to utilize the Struts framework. I totally disagree with the notion that "learning about the patterns that are associated with these frameworks will provide little value". Ignorance is definitely not bliss here.

Finally, the idea that because the book 'just' collects and names patterns that already exist somehow decreases its value is hogwash. These are tried and true patterns that many developers have found useful. Naming and clearly describing common patterns is very helpful. This is exactly what the original 'Design Patterns' book did. By this logic, I guess the original reviewer would have given 'Design Patterns' only 3 stars.

It's a great book.

This book gives a catalog of patterns for enterprise solutions based on layered architecture(he has not covered the filter/pipe pattern). It provides multiple probable solutions(In C# and Java) for many enterprise related issues/problems. Most of these issues are shared by J2EE/.NET/CORBA framework based applications. If the user has already read J2EE Design Patterns, Design Patterns(Gang of Four) books and worked on 3-4 Enterprise multi-layer applications, then this book makes a lot of sense. The solutions can be put to practice fairly easily , atleast in the J2EE app server based solution space.

BTW, this books is out of stock at Amazon, I ordered my copy from Barnes and Noble and got a good discount too.

The book was on the net for a while on martinfowler.com site and only after it was published at OOPSLA 02, was it removed. Going through the June 02 snapshot of this book provided for interested reading. The final version has been edited for easy reading and comes out pretty well.

CONS :
1) Does not come with a CD :-)
2) Does not use all(advanced) language facilities (to make it readable)