Our son has always been afraid of snakes - until he read SNAKE CAMP. Now, while he's not exactly a snake charmer yet, he is interested in overcoming his fear of snakes. This is a funny, very clever book that also has a very important message.

This book is about a girl's hockey team that goes to Miss WestMisent's Fine School for Girls. It starts out when they are on the bus and Miss Westmisent is taking the hockey team to the game in Buffalo. When they get to the airport they get on the wrong plane and go to Moscow, Russia. They meet a Princess named Anastasia. She has a Ukranian Egg with her. The story goes on from there.

It is a really good book for kids. I read it in the fifth grade and liked it a lot. I would recommend it to all my friends.

This is a really great book for kids who love horses - and our kids do! Now, our kids want to save all the wild horses in the world. They've read this book over and over.

My favorite Christmas gift -- the cover is Red, the stock feels great to the touch, and there's plenty of white space. It's a book and an exhibition in one. It's filled with people who love their work. Work, Life, Tools qualifies as great design. (Hats off Milton Glaser, and to Steelecase for being enlightened enough to fund the exhibition.) This book cum exhibition guide ranks high on the visual, aesthetic and conceptual pleasure scale. My favorite aspect: the way the bios portray the multiple talents and the "I don't just do one thing" truth about their subjects. It's filled with lots of practical ah-has. You get to peek into people's work spaces. It represents a fascinating spectrum of thinking about work. And, it's amazing to me how loyal people are to their fountain pens (as one who's committed to Deluxe Uni-balls.) I loved it!

Four stars for what has been carried over from the 1980 version, zero stars for what has been appended to it. We can't entirely blame the dictionary for the poor quality of most of these additions. The dictionary depends on a large pool of contributors, most of whom hold academic positions, and our academies are beset with insufficiently acknowledged problems.

One problem is the graduate-school analogue of what in secondary schools has been called "grade inflation". We might call it "degree inflation". Unqualified candidates are routinely pushed through graduate school; mediocre minds are awarded doctorates and assume faculty positions. This is partly the result of a misguided egalitarianism and partly the result of a quid-pro-quo cronyism. In any case, it is self-perpetuating and self-proliferating. It manifests itself here most obviously in rambling pseudo-intellectual essays on such empty buzzwords as "postmodernism".

Another problem is commercialization. It manifests itself here most obviously in vacuous and clumsily written (and randomly strewn with rock journalism cliches) extended accounts of various pop music figures, such as, for example, Bob Dylan and David Bowie. (Both Bob Dylan and David Bowie have composed interesting song lyrics and are worthy subjects for popular culture historians, but neither have any particular MUSICAL significance.)

One could never hope for a 'compleat' dictionary of music and musicians any more than one could hope for hope for a 'compleat'library of knowledge in one publication. But, just as the Encycopeadia Britannica has come to be seen the most comprehensive summary available of knowledge generally, so has Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians come to be seen as the ultimate summary of information available about music and musicians.

The question now is: when will 'Grove' follow the Encyclopaedia Britannica and reach out to a wider audience via CD-ROM and Internet on-line services? For this reviewer: the sooner the better

Ian Bowie

Discursive and authoritative, the one failing is the lack of convenient text search. When available on CD-ROM with that capability, it will be an ideal reference.

I would give this book three stars because it isn't the best and isn't the worst.It also wasn't my favorite because the mystery was very un exciting.I would recommend this book to my friends because
they would like the story.

I bought this book hoping to end the "electronic gameitis" my son was displaying. I was not disappointed, first the book introduces a third grade classroom which my son relates to because he's in the third grade. Then it show how to write and decode a secret message. I'm still decoding secret messages sent TOP SECRET. Because it involves a mystery that is simple and somewhat common, it keeps the kids thinking "hey, this could happen to me!" This book is the solution to show kids that they have an imagination, no need to rely on t.v, etc... My only complaint is that's its too short.

The THIRD GRADE DETECTIVES is a wonderful series for budding detectives - like my kids are! It's also great for teaching science - something my kids weren't really interested in until they found out that the police use science to solve crimes!

This childrens book is a thin veneer of fiction wrapped around some worked examples of cryptanalyzing some simple ciphers (your basic pre-twentieth century ciphers).

The writing is a bit formulaic (but no worse than the Encyclopedia Brown books), the situations implausible, but my nine-year-old son liked it, and it's a painless introduction to an interesting hobby.

i thoght this book the code breaker kids was an excellent childrens book.it showed that if you really want to do something you can with all your minds combined .it showed good friendship because the kids never broke up and stayed as a team.

The book There's a Shark in the Swimming pool is an okay book. I would recommend this book for 3-4 graders. The reason why I gave it a four is because it is really farfetched, I mean, how many pools are there with sharks in them? Do not buy this book without checking it out from a library and reading it first.

This book ,is a good book for kids in 4th grade. The book isreally farfetched. Not many people would believe it.

The book is very interesting for a genealogist. I found only two names that relate to my family tree. I purchased this book because the title indicates that it covered the most years. The title is actually 'Death Records from Missouri Newspapers January 1854-December 1860'not 1960.It only covers seven years. I would have bought a different book of death records if I had known.

This book provides a nice insight on old New Orleans and the impact its bars and barteneders had on the devlopment of some of America's classic cocktails. Most recipes are accopmanied by a bit of history of New Orleans and the orgin of each drink. It does a wonderful job of giving background and insight on the Sazerac, Mint Julep, and Ramos Gin Fizz...all of which are standard cocktails in the Big Easy and have earned their place as "classic cocktails". Imbibers who prefer some of the more modern drinks of our time may be a little confused or diaaspointed with the recipes in this book since they are truly "old school'..many dating back to the turn of the century and pre-prohibition. Nonetheless, the history and colorful stories in this book will surely please anyone who is in love with the "Old South" and the Crescent City!