This book is a must-read for teenagers and for their parents and teachers! Teens' voices are heard as they are - unedited, uninterpreted. And what they have to say is more profound and more interesting than you would think! I also love the art and the poetry - it can speak louder than words. The author's information is real and down-to-earth and truly helpful. And the book is not just anecdotes and theory, but it also contains exercises so that it can be used as a workbook (also great for adults dealing with stress and anger!). Easy to read and very worth-it!

This is a totaly awesome book it has so many cool insights of so many different teens. This is a good book to read if you need advise or just to realize that your not alone in the world when it becomes different and unknown. I hope that all teenagers read this book, because everyone will get something out of it!

This book gives insight to the real teenager and thoughts they may not normally share in a verbal manner. It is honest and expressive in a way that kids can relate to. What a wonderful reading for both adults and kids.

I am impressed with the Stonehenge and Valley of the Kings books for a variety of reasons:
-crisp, clear, appealing layout
-inclusion of maps with modern cities and related sites
-timeline, glossary and index
-photos and drawings have clear informational captions
-interesting aspects of the topic are explained on full-page "asides"
-use of words like "probably" and "one theory" to explore how our understanding of these ancient sites changes as archeologists discover more
-the mixture of the historical and legendary with the technical and physical information
-interviews with the archeologists, which personalizes the subject and makes it real and possible for students

This is the best book on Stonehenge. The text is concise and extremely well written and documented. The photos of the sites, stones and artifacts are beautiful. I especially liked the anciet time-line.
Ms. Bernard answers the Who, Why and When about the constuction of Stonehenge. Anyone interested in archeolgy and problem-solving will devour this book.
I am looking foward to more Digging in the Past Serries.

Stonehenge is a comprehensive and intelligible book that delves into the past explaining facts plus the fallacious legends that have always surrounded this archeological phenomena. It helped me further understand what present day discoveries have been made' and how the legends grew up around Stonehenge. The interview at the end of the book with Ms. Malone was educational and informative. The thorough glossary was also very helpful. I would highly recommend this book to any novice or person already interested in archeology.

Dear Amazon.com Our teacher just read to us the Voygers Stone.We thought the book was great!!!It takes you into the story and tells you a lot of real life facts. We liked the way the author put a lot of adventure and detail into the story. It tells you everywhere that Voyager goes. We liked the way you put a map once in a while, so we would not get lost during the story. It really leaves you hanging. We really recommend this book to all readers.

Our teacher just finished reading us the Voyager Stone. We live in Hawaii and are studying the ocean. We really like the Voyager Stone. It's a really great bbok. We liked that the author told information in the book. It was very exciting. It makes us never want to stop reading it. At the end of the book we felt wanted to read it again. We liked the non-fiction and fiction parts put together. We really recommend this book for everyone in the whole world. It's great!

There are many opinions and contradicting 'first hand accounts' about Brian Jones life and death. The only choice a serious fan has is to compare and contrast a good sample of the books available. While Bill Wyman's book may be more detailed, 'Golden Stone' is many steps above the average teeny-bopper fare available on Jones, and is a necessary additon for any real B.J. enthusiast.

The book is a brief history of medieval Ireland. It covers the times from the prehistoric times to the fifteenth century. However, brief does not mean superficial. The author chooses some subjects he is interested in and discusses them trying to be impartial - from many different points of view. He does not try to describe the past in detail, but rather to point out the most important moments, problems and aspects in Irish history. Richter also poses some questions significant from the point of view of a contemporary person some of which remain open.
The book is suitable for beginners as it is quite short and written in a comprehensible way as well as for people truly interested in the matter thanks to reliable bibliography record and references. It helps to understand the unusual political organization and the complicated and quite uncommon social structure of the Island in the middle ages. Obviously, history of medieval Ireland was greatly determined by the history of church, that is why the book deals mainly with the church's history, which was not less interesting in Ireland than political history. It is a very good book for a great start.

Understanding Stone Tools and Archaeological Sites balances a hands-on analysis of North American stone tools and prehistoric stone tool manufacturing with facts based on fieldwork, providing students of archaeology with a primer for understanding stone tools and site analysis proceedings. Essential for any student of American archaeological studies.

Chicken Soup for the Gardener's Soul is a collection of 101 short stories and vignettes. Each piece is about three pages long, a format that is convenient for those of us who's free-time comes in little snippets. The stories share a common theme: Despair + a Garden + God's Grace = Wisdom and Peace.

Chicken Soup books seem to really polarize readers. A reader either really likes them and buy copies for all their friends, or dislikes them and would not buy one on a bet.

Let me assure the first type of reader that Chicken Soup for the Gardener's Soul is just as good the other Chicken Soup books. One of my concerns was that the quality of the writing would be inferior to the earlier books, that all the good material had already been skimmed. That concern was baseless. Evil is newsworthy because it is rare. Dignity, humanity, honesty and sacrifice ARE the human condition. There is no shortage of inspirational stories, just a shortage of publishers who think they are worthy of the readers' attention. Chicken Soup is still skimming the cream.

Book reviews are supposed to help the reader decide "Do I buy this book?" That is not much of an issue with this book. Chicken Soup addicts will buy this book. The question on the table is: "Do I buy this book for the cynical friend who thinks they are 'sappy', or 'maudlin'?" I think the answer is a qualified "Yes."

These stories do not strike a quick resonance with cynics. It is not because cynics have never felt despair. Rather, it is because cynics are afraid of the pain of revisiting those times. Cynics need to ease into these stories the way you might ease into a hot-tub. So buy them a copy and highlight a few stories like:

*A Veteran's Garden, page 25 "The Marines sent me overseas. But it took gardening to bring me home."

*Girls like Roses, page 109, "...twenty-four bucks! That's a lot of money. Even for a girl named Michelle."

*Brian, page 192, "Brian is seven. He's a dreamer and drives his teacher crazy. She is as stiff as taffy in December."

Thanks to Cliff Hunter for his great review of "Chicken Soup for the Gardener's Soul". Please note, however, that the story "A Son's Harvest" was written by Lee May, not Henry Boye, as Cliff states. (It's a wonderful story, no matter who wrote it, but Lee should get the credit!) Thanks--Carol Sturgulewski, coauthor, Chicken Soup for the Gardener's Soul

Gardener's Soul is my first read in the Chicken Soup series. Had I an inkling that the series could evoke that cozy-fuzzy feeling, like a purring kitten warming your lap, I would have been reading them all.

Paula Silici's Nona's Garden stands as a fine example. I could smell the beef, garlic and tomatoes simmering in the kitchens of my childhood as I read of the life's lessions learned from her grandmother. I have more hope for the future after reading Beth Pollack's Planting Day,especially considering that such words of wisdom came from a 16-year-old. Good job,young lady! And A Bedside Story by Pat Stone reassured me that I'm not the only gardener who talks to plants.

No wonder the publisher has the name Health Communications. When the mind is calm, the body is better able to heal. This book is a fabulous choice for anyone feeling blue or for just anyone!

This book was just what the doctor ordered for my 15 year old to help her understand the events of September 11th. It was very inspiring and helped put things in perspective. Brian Vaszily writes about fictious characters and what they might have gone through during this tragic event. It is not morbid, but more of a reflection on what life is and what it means to people. It is a quick read that will leave you feeling ready for the future. Thank you Mr. Vaszily for a wonderful release! Hope to see more soon!

Once in a great while a book comes along that makes you stop and think about what the really important things in life are. Do we just drone through life day-to-day on auto-pilot, or do we step aside and ask the hard questions - where am I going, what am I doing here, what's my purpose in life. Mr Vaszily, through "Beyond Stone and Steel," has created a book that will make you think about just these kinds of questions. This book is a very deep, emotional and uplifting book, a book that will stay in your mind well after you've read the last page.

Where were you when the World Trade Center collapsed? We as a nation are deeply scarred by the events of that day. Yet in the hands of author Brian Vaszily, we also have the opportunity to revaluate those lost lives as a gift of life affirmations. Indeed, Vaszily creates an intensely personal work that will touch all American hearts in BEYOND STONE AND STEEL.

Vignettes capture the intensity of the moments before death. A man on the stairs in the World Trade Center turns back to help a fallen woman, only to realize the tower is about to collapse. We've heard the stories of the heroes who brought down Flight 93, but there were others on that flight and others paralyzed by fear, by the realization of impending death who are equally missed. Each voice combines with the rising chorus of loss, reminding those of us left behind of the beauty in living.

I felt myself identifying with Vaszily's personal narrative as he describes how his horror and shock over such a monumental event as September 11th displaced the personal crises he faced in his life. Suddenly unemployment, bankruptcy and other mundane matters took a backseat to the appreciation of life, love and family. The voices of these fictional victims bring about the profound realization of the beauty in living, and the goodness and tremendous potential in the people around us.

I agree with many of the reviewers below that this book was helpful and often interesting. It gives a readable orientation to one of the most important movements in the software industry today, and the editors have been fortunate to gather together so many contributors who obviously know whereof they speak. In particular, the editors' Introduction, Eric Raymond's "Brief History of Hackerdom," Richard Stallman's account of GNU and FSF, Bruce Perens's discussion of Open Source, and Tim O'Reilly's essay on "Infoware" were informative and thought-provoking.

That said, it should be noted that the Amazon reviewer above gets it wrong when she writes that the book gives a "fascinating look at the raging debate." In fact, *nothing* about Open Source is debated in this book, which is a major disappointment. As the reviewer from Princeton below notes, the goodness of everything Open Source and the badness of everything Microsoft seems to be a given for many of the writers. At the risk of criticizing the book for not being something its creators didn't intend, I think it would be greatly improved with the addition of a wider range of viewpoints and even a dissenting voice or two. (There are a number of essays that could give place to some alternate content: Eric Raymond's second essay, "The Revenge of the Hackers," leans heavily toward the self-congratulatory, as does the Netscape cheerleaders' "Story of Mozilla." And Larry Wall's "Diligence, Patience, and Humility" seems to have been included not on its own merits but on the author's reputation as the Perl Deity.)

A final wish is for the book to address a broader range of readers. As a longtime computer user but a relatively new programmer, with no formal business training, I found many of the essays to rely heavily on the jargon of hackers and MBAs. More editorial control here, in addition to a broader range of content, would make this book seem less like preaching to the choir and more effective at spreading the Open Source gospel.

This is a good idea on O'Reilly's part to try to document the history and goals of the Open Source movement, which had roots in several college campuses and research labs in the '70s and '80s, and became news in the late '90s with the popularity of Linux, Apache, and the decision of Netscape to open its browser source. The best introductory piece, however, is probably Eric Raymond's "Cathedral and the Bazaar" which is not in this book(O'Reilly publishes it separately, but it's available free on the Web and short enough to be read in one sitting). As for this collection, I liked Robert Young's business case for distributing open source - his story of how Red Hat was launched reminds me of the Compaq tale of "three guys in a restaurant". The Apache article is also quite good, and Linus Torvalds offers a brief but interesting (and characteristically opinionated) article about how Linux evolved technically. There's also a good article discussing the various open source licenses (BSD, GPL, Netscape, etc) and what they do and don't restrict.

Others I was less impressed with. Stallman's article is predictable and self-serving. He explains how he evolved his software-as-gift philosophy but doesn't come close to terms with how the software industry can support substantial employment if all source is given away. There's yet another history of the different branches of BSD Unix. There's a breathtaking inside account of the launch of Mozilla which ends with the fancy Silicon Valley party when development has finally gotten underway. The low point is Larry Wall's "essay", which is a frankly ridiculous waste of time and print.

Although this is a mixed bag, there's enough reference material and interesting points of view to keep the book around.

First of all, take a look at the list of authors. It reads as a "Who's Who" guide for the software and tools I'm running on my current system. (Kernel by Torvalds, GNU/Free Software by Stallman, Open Source Software by a number of individuals/companies (esr, Perens), development tools by Cygnus (Tiemann), DNS by Vixie, web server by Apache (Behlendorf), CGI programming in Perl by Wall, browser by Netscape (Hamerly, Paquin), Linux Distribution by RedHat (Young), and references by O'Reilly. (Of course, there should be an "et al." behind every one of these names.)

This is a great book for achieving basic literacy in the (generically-termed) Open Source movement.

By reading this book, you'll get rms' view of why software must be free. (And indeed, why it eventually will be free.) You'll also find out how some companies (like the newly-merged RedHat/Cygnus conglomerate) can thrive in a market where the product is free.

If you read *all* of the essays, you'll even find out why the Free Software Foundation's GPL does not work in some cases, and how "Open Source Software" is similar to and differs from "Free Software". (The below reviewer should be slapped with his Clue Stick for not taking the time to read and understand this important difference. ;-)

And you'll also find out why Perl (like Larry Wall himself) is so strange and brilliant at the same time.

The reason this book only gets 4 stars is due to the lack of proofing. One of Wall's diagrams is completely missing, and there are numerous typos. This is the first O'Reilly book I've seen with a lot of stupid mistakes. (And I've seen a lot of them. =)

PKG

If you're looking for a tabloid expose on Brian Jones, there are other books on the subject. Good Night, Sweet Prince is a wonderful story of a young girl who dared to enter the magical woods she called home and the mysterious new neighbor she encountered there. Deborah Parrish was a teenager of the 60's who, like so many girls, was trapped between the imagination and spirit of a child and the desires of a woman. Her daydreams took her to America and an adventurous place called California. We watch her grow up amidst unrequited love, a rival's taunting, betrayal by a loved one and the loss of a friendship not yet found. This book was thoroughly enjoyed by my 15-year-old daughter, who is clueless about Brian Jones, and myself, who remembers him well. This story is for you Brian, no headlines, just a simple good night, sweet prince.

As a life-long fan of Brian Jones and the Rolling Stones, I approached this book with caution. It turned out to be an excellent novel, with a strong story line and sympathetic main character. Brian Jones is not the main character, as the story is told from the perspective of a young English girl. The book, however, evokes the sense of loss and tragedy that many of us felt when Brian Jones died. There is a sense of innocence about the book that is quite touching. Incidentally, I am an adult male, and this book is not just for the female fans. I quite enjoyed it and highly recommend it. I look forward to the author's next work.

The nice thing about this story is it will {also} appeal to people who do not know who Brian {Jones} is. This way maybe more people can find out about him and learn something positive from such a sad ending to a young life which had so much potential...I found this book to be a thoroughly easy and enjoyable read. And I am sure many people will interpret the story in different ways and this is part of its appeal.