This is the premier history of the Outer Banks area, written by the region's premier historian. It begins in the 16th Century, when European explorers first touched the sandy barrier islands. It carefully traces the course of human and environmental events through the modern era, with special emphasis on the Revolutionary War and Civil War. This is a truly remarkable piece of work that will enlighten anyone interested in Carolina history.

David Stick has compiled a fascinating collection of stories, essays, letters and reports to bring to life many of the tales which have become near legend on the Outer Banks. From heroic rescues to the lives of everyday "Bankers" -- from the famous to the unhearalded -- from the first settlers to events in the 20th century -- the Outer Banks Reader paints a fascinating picture of the joys and sorrows, failures and triumphs and lives of the brave and hardy people who have lived and made their living on this ribbon of sand 23 miles out in the ocean. It is a richly woven tapestry of the stories that bind together those who love the Outer Banks. Each chapter contains a brief introduction which further places the persons or events in their proper perspective. This volume provides readers with some history and factual information about events on the Outer Banks in an easy-reading, anecdotal format which often quotes the original source. Whether you are a serious student of maritime history or just have a personal fascination with the region known as the Outer Banks, this is a must-read.

David Rabe brings us the story of David, a young man, blinded and driven to the point of insanity by the horrors he witnesses on the battlefield. No longer able to fight, he is sent back to his family. Only this is a world that is now foreign to him, as his family (who seem to be a darker version of Leave It To Beaver) are typical 1950's all-American patriotics, proud to have one of their own family members serve in the Korean war. Disgusted by the attitude his parents (Ozzie and Harriet) and his younger brother (Little Ricky) display, and tortured by a memories of a young Korean prostitute, he lashes out at them.

This play is as dark as they come. David is a complex character who does everything he can to make his family understand the terrible consequences of war. He represents the anger and hatred that many of us feel when confronted by images and stories of the casualties of battle. His family is the perfect foil for him. The ignorance and racism they exhibit when David tries to explain to them what he's been through is what finally pushes him over the edge. The end is a surprise that sends shivers down my back at the mere thought. All in all, this has everything that makes a play out to be truly great.

I was pleased to discover that this book has been reprinted. It is a well researched listing of shipwrecks along a particular secion of the U.S. Atlantic coast. Accounts are of varying length. In some cases the author gives extensive details, e.g., he devotes a chapter to the Steam Packet Pulaski, but in other cases the accounts are very brief, perhaps a long paragraph or a page. The author does provide a chronological listing at the end of the book, a detailed index, and descriptive drawings of the various types of ships along with a map of the area (which I hope was preserved in the latest edition).

I first picked up this book when I was 14 at a local bookstore in Wilmington, N.C. Ever since then I have been enchanted with stories of shipwrecks and the drama involved in them. This book describes the particularly dangerous coast of North Carolina where the warm gulf stream meets the cold artic currents, resulting in very dangerous sand bars and storms. This has resulted in hundreds of wrecks along this particular part of North America. The author describes some of the most climatic sinkings such as the USS Huron, the SS Metropolis, the steam packet Pulaski. He also chronicles the birth and growth of the US Life Saving Service and some of the most exciting rescues in history. Overall this is a fine and engrossing book, written by an author intimately connected with his topic

In this brief and useful history of lighthouses along the North Carolina coast, Stick shows he knows his subject and dots the seventy odd pages with a variety of interesting facts, including why each lighthouse along the Outer Banks is painted in a different pattern. I didn't know either that lighthouse development has been under Federal Government, rather than state, control since 1789. From the some things never change department: in one instance over two hundred years ago, Congress mandated construction of a lighthouse, but refused to appropriate the funds to carry out the construction. Stick's writing is workmanlike at best.

I'm glad not to be alone in seeing the Harry Potter books as only an empty marketing success and Zipes is acute when he comments on the banality of "Americanized" culture continued today by media giants like Disney. But Zipes is guilty of the same mamby pamby moralism that he criticizes in others, if you've read his Oxford Book of Fairy Tales you'll find that it's an unimaginative collection of innocuous speech codes and flaky feminist paranoia which is tedious and boring. Much of the "homogeneity" he complains about in popular culture comes from the dictates of "least objectionable programming" which advertisers like and is not unlike the political correctness found in elite Western institutions, where Zipes hails from obviously. J.K. Rowlings caricatures are embarrassingly "diverse" as if from a from a sensitivity training pogram which good leftists like Zipes should respect after all. Zipes reiterates all the liberal platitudes which have become suburban marketing clichés. Although he doesn't exactly advocate body piercing or tattoos. Not yet anyway. In short it's difficult to see where Zipes complaints lie since corporate progressives are pretty much dictating his own taste.

In this collection of essays based on speeches and lectures, the author - an admirer of Adorno - poses questions that should concern parents and teachers everywhere: Who decides what is "appropriate" literature for children? How are children introduced to this literature, and what do they make of it?

The first four chapters of the book, peppered with the somewhat off-putting jargon of literary theory, deplore the vertical integration of publishing empires, the marketing of books in association with toys, games, gadgets, T-shirts, etc., which results in "cultural homogenization" of the children. Adults decide "what's good for children" and use literature, among other tools, to manipulate and control them.

In chapters 5-9, the discussion gains momentum by using concrete examples of literature written for children. Changing attitudes toward Grimms' Fairy Tales and the "Struwwelpeter" stories of Heinrich Hoffmann have spawned multiple translations, bowdlerizations, dramatizations and parodies. The author shows how the "sexist" content of most fairy tales (the hero is almost always a male) has triggered feminist re-interpretations. Finally, there is no "authentic" version of fairy tales; all of them, including the ones collected by the Brothers Grimm, have been "contaminated", i.e. adapted and collated from multiple sources.

The final chapter on the phenomenal success of the Harry Potter books seems to be the one most American readers have focused on. It stresses the stereotypical aspects of the stories and the commercial hype that attended their release, and, again, their sexist nature - one of the author's pet peeves.

While some of these arguments seem excessively gloomy, all of them deserve our thoughtful consideration.

While I admire Zipes work in general, I think he's missed the point about Harry Potter. Zipes remarks that Harry is a classic boy scout, a straight arrow (...). He complains that the novels follow a tedious and grating fairy tale formula (...). The only difference between Harry and anyone else, according to Zipes, is that Harry has a lightning-shaped scar on his forehead (178).

Zipes misses the point on the importance of the scar - the scar is the central metaphor of the series and the importance of scars and wounding says something about our culture's adoption of this particular hero.