In America we are in an era when we willingly hand over our wills, intelligence and spirit to the guru du jour. Self-inflated pompous snake oil salesmen who proclaim they have all the answers to the problems that confound us all. They are usually odd numbered (the 7 habits, the 5 learnings, the only one that was even numbered was the ten commmandments) repackaging of recycled obvious knowledge. Stephen Michael Peter Thomas (cleverly borrowing the first names of all the leading gurus) mimics their posturings in this enormously witty satire. The best send up of business I've ever read. You'll never be able to sit through a motivational conference with a straight face again.

If you are a CEO or a business consultant or just an ordinary working schlumpf, you can read this book and find something USEFUL in it. Particularly if someone accidently leaves a winning lottery ticket in it as a bookmark. For instance, you could apply any of Stephen Michael Peter Thomas's Learnings or Teachings to your business situation and before you know it, you will be named in a major class action litigation or you will drive your business directly into bankruptcy. What this business genius has to say is that EFFECTIVE! I can honestly say that, by applying what I learned from this book, I have accumulated enough good time points that my sentence for malfeasance, fraud and impersonating a business person has been reduced by almost THREE WEEKS! Thank you, thank you, thank you Stephen Michael Peter Thomas

It's fun reading this collection of digressive informal anecdotes about famous (and some obscure) Englishmen. If you enjoyed "An Instance of the Fingerpost" (where some of thc characters appear) you'd like this. As a primary source for information it gets less reliable the further back it goes. Aubrey was born in 1626 so his accounts of Shakespeare and Elizathans are a generation removed, but he had met Harvey and Penn and had been through the Civil War and the rule of Cromwell.

Because its author never completed most of the entries for this biographical work, and never published it, what he did set down about his varied noble and ignoble subjects is uncensored, gossipy, perhaps unsubstantiated, and delightful. If you like browsing in Pepys' diary, or are fascinated by English life in the 17th century, this is the book to leave about for the occasional free moment.

If you're a civil engineer looking to make a move these days, it will pay you to know how to use the software tools built by Haestad. This company is the standard in water modeling. I used this book in college and recently acquired the latest edition to bone up for a water resources position that was being offered in California. This book dispenses with all the deep theory and gets right down to the practical business of modeling. Since, it includes academic versions of all the standard models, it was easy to get a refresher course, and I held my own during the interview.

I like the fact that Haestad Methods has added more software and coverage. Highly recommended.

For those of you sick of engineering texts filled with a bunch of theoretical junk, this is the book for you. It very nicely blends a little bit of theory with some real-world practical applications and the software in the back really brings hydraulic engineering into the 21st century.

I was supposed to read this book for a class called "Meet the Authors" about a year ago at the University of New Mexico, but finally got around to reading it a couple of weeks ago. As someone who grew up in eastern New Mexico, this book is a perfect description of life in one of those small towns. It had me laughing the whole time. If anyone happens to read this review...go ahead and buy this book. You won't regret it.

Interesting, entertaining book about a young man's escapades as he struggles to control his inappropriate responses in stressful situations and win back his wife.

I appreciate the direct, pertinent, and efficient information presented in this book. It is easy to read and understand and provides forms and examples for the reader's benefit. The information presented is timely for people who have worked hard to amass money, holdings, property , etc. to pass on to their heirs, therefore, preventing the government in the form of probate court, from taking your heirs' inheritance.

Mike Monji's father died leaving an estate valued at $285,000. After the courts, the lawyers, the accountants and the system grabbed their parts, Mike received a check for $211.77. Yes, one-tenth of one percent of what his father wanted him to have. This travesty could have been avoided with a Living Trust.

Does it Pay to Die? is a financial wake-up call. The workbook format makes the process easy. By doing it yourself, you will save money and understand the structure of the trust. If you want an attorney to draft your living trust, the cost should be less than $1,000; money well spent.

Mike Monji's advice worked for me and it will work for you. Hold on to your money, protect your family and avoid probate. ...

Review of Michael Hudgens' Donald Barthleme: Postmodernist American Writer
By Roger E. Dendinger, Ph.D.
Comparing writers to visual artists, William S. Burroughs once said that writing is fifty years behind painting. From a Burroughsian perspective, painters successfully deal with technological change and resulting cultural stresses because they work outside the straightjacket of language. With mere words as the base material of their art, writers face constraints of linear narrative and logical representation unknown to painters. (Tom Wolfe's The Painted Word describes the dilemma of abstract and conceptual artists who rely on textual explanation and commentary.) As Michael Hudgens makes clear in Donald Barthleme: Postmodernist American Writer, Barthelme's achievement in overcoming the "backwardness" of writing was won in the aesthetic battleground over the nature of narrative and representation. Hudgens explicates two of Barthelme's best known novels, The Dead Father and Snow White, and the short story, "Paraguay," a work considered emblematic of literary postmodernism by both sides in this debate - by critics who scorn postmodernism as chaotic or willfully difficult and by those sympathetic to the need for exploring heterogeneous forms of expression. The nature of cultural postmodernism is a significant sub-theme of the study, and here Hudgens makes a valuable contribution to the theoretical standoff between postmodernism and its critics. He identifies elements of Barthelme's work that contrast starkly with tenets of high modernist criticism, explicating them in the context of Barthelme's stated goals as a writer. In a key chapter, he traces Barthelme's development of the technical innovations of Joyce and makes a convincing case for viewing Joyce's experimental works as a Rosetta stone for deciphering Barthelme and, by extension, other postmodernists.
Rather than diving into the theoretical debate over postmodernism (a profitless undertaking at best), Hudgens uses the outlines of the debate as a frame for explication. He avoids the semantic hairsplitting of language philosophy and the willful obscurantism of much post-structural cultural criticism, focusing instead on the bedrock material of traditional literary scholarship - the artist's own words and works. An example of Hudgens' method is his reference to Barthelme's interest in architectural theory, where the debate between modernists and postmodernists has produced manifestos on both sides. Barthleme's interest in architecture was both personal - his father was an architect - and philosophical. He found a corollary to his own linguistic pioneering in the contemporary theoretical struggle within architecture, a struggle pitting practitioners of established formal approaches against innovators seeking new expressive possibilities. Much as "po-mo architects" seek alternatives to the inherited language of 20th century architecture, Barthelme sought new ways of expressing his own brand of literary realism. As in other manifestations of post-modernism, the defining feature of postmodern architecture is, in the words of Fredrick Jameson, the "effacement of the frontier between high culture and so-called mass or commercial culture." High modernism in architecture is associated with Utopianism, elitistism, and authoritarianism and is credited with destroying the urban fabric of traditional neighborhoods by transplanting Utopian structures and plans into the context of pre-modern cities. Le Corbusier's statement that "architecture has for its first duty...bringing about a revision of values" may be seen as the ultimate expression of high modernist values in the realms of architecture and city planning. This magisterial view is countered by one of Bartheleme's artistic touchstones, the architect and critic, Robert Venturi, whose postmodernism presents itself as a brand of architectural populism. Venturi's Learning from Las Vegas is widely regarded as one of postmodernism's most lucid declarations. In it, he celebrates eclectic diversity and scorns the unidirectional methodology of modern architects and planners. Is a particular work a "magisterial pronouncement," a "master-narrative" in the tradition of high modernism? Is it the product of a literature of inclusion, of healthy populism, heterogeneity? Is it, that is, Venturi-like? Or, as critics such as Frederick Jameson contend, is post-modernism a faux populism with a deeply disguised political agenda? The literary critic's task is to untangle these and other issues. By combining pertinent details of Barthelme's biography with a New Critic's view of literature as an internally unified structure of meaning, Hudgens avoids theoretical campaigning and illuminates the tension in Barthleme's work between tradition and Ezra's Pound's old directive - make it new.

Review of Donald Barthelme, Postmodern American Writer By John J. Dunn, Ph.D.

Dr. Michael Hudgens has written a scholarly and provocative book on Donald Barthelme and his position in the cultural phenomenon called Postmodernism. He has succeeded very well in analyzing Barthelme's often difficult fiction and relating it to other significant examples of Postmodernism in literature and art.

For example, his analysis of the innovative story "On Angels" is unusually perceptive. It reveals how Barthelme tries to come to terms with traditional theology in an age which often questions the existence of God. Obviously, Barthelme has been strongly influenced by his Catholic background, particularly Thomism (the five "proofs" for the existence of God, etc.). Hudgens comments cogently on both the wit and the experimental technique of this startling story. Calling The Dead Father Barthelme's best novel, he provides a detailed exegesis of this brilliant, complex work-a haunting fictional examination of the ambiguities which drive family relationships. In this chapter, Hudgens authenticates the accuracy of the author's assertion that he sought "a meditation upon external reality" in his fiction.

Besides providing clear and explicit analyses of Barthelme's novels and short stories, Hudgens traces the similarities between this fiction and other works associated with Modernism and Postmodernism. He reveals, for instance, a deep understanding of James Joyce and his many-faceted contributions to Twentieth Century literature. His tudy of "The Dead" constitutes perhaps the most powerful and insightful segment of his book. He is also obviously a member of that distinguished minority of literary scholars who actually understand Finnegans Wake. . . .

Hudgens expertly refutes many of the broader criticisms of Postmodernism contained in John Gardner's On Moral Fiction (1978). He is fair-minded and judicious in his response to this controversial work, but he makes a convincing case that Gardner grossly underestimates the seriousness and substantiality of much Postmodernist literature and art.

Aside from its honest and meticulous scholarship, Donald Barthelme: Postmodernist American Writer is unusually readable for a scholarly tom of this sort. Quotations are carefully selected and are integrated smoothly into the text. Hudgens' style is lucid, often even elegant and witty. He manages to avoid the tortured syntax and overly cerebral vocabulary of many learned works of criticism. Furthermore, he is never afraid to use humor or irony when a lighter note is appropriate.

Donald Barthelme: Postmodernism American Writer is a major critical study of an increasingly respected fiction writer. It will be a valued addition to the growing body of scholarship surrounding Barthelme's writing and its position in the Postmodernist movement.

This book will definately assist those of us who practice medicine in third world environments. Well laid out and laden with useful tips for coping with the conditions encountered in the field. Thank you!

This is more than a reference, it is a handbook and diagnostic guide good for the EMT to doctor. My only complaint is that it should have been a hard cover for the price.

This book describes a new and interesting approach to some well-known web development problems. Though not all of the technologies described are mature (yet), they are largely standards-based and likely to grow in popularity in the coming years. The author does a good job of showing how several different technologies (SQL, XML, XSLT, HTML and others) can be focused into a coherent whole. Probably not for beginners, but anyone with web development experience should be able to learn a lot from this book.

The author has done a excellent job. It describes about the important pieces in a dedicated chapter - XSQL architecture. After that he delves into SQL, PLSQL, XSQL , XSLT. The best part is chapter 14 on Building XSQL web applications. This explains how all the above pieces are put into a working model. The material is written keeping oracle 9i in mind. As a whole, I felt very comfortable reading the whole book.

Especially for database developers who come from sql, plsql background and are trying to get into web development world ( without the hassle of learning Java Servlets, Jsp etc ... ), I would definitely recommend it.

I found this book very helpful in deepening my prayer time with God. The prayers can also be used as devotionals as they reference specific scriptures throughout. A variety of topics are covered including prayers for worshiping God, dealing with sin, sickness and disease, relationships, and praying to bring in the Kingdom of God. I was challenged by this book to pursue God in a deeper way and inspired by His greatness.

As an evangelical pastor who collects prayer books for use in personal devotions and for use from the pulpit, I have found "Prayers to Move Mountains" to be the best I have seen thus far.

The prayers are written simply, in plain English, but are nonetheless beautiful. They have substance, are anchored to Scripture, and though written for personal prayer times, are easily adapted for groups. The prayers are pretty much mainstream evangelical/fundamental with a slight charismatic twist in a few of them, and the few prayers which may reflect a variation from the readers point of view may be easily adjusted. I am a non-charismatic and only feel I need to slightly adjust a handful of the prayers.

The book contains 108 practical and reverential prayers divided into 11 categories, each prayer about 2 short pages long. The categories are: Worshiping God for Who He is, Thanking God for What He Has Done, Becoming More Like Jesus, Sin, Stress, Marriage and Family, The Lives of Your Children, Relationships, Job and Career, Sickness and Disease, and Bringing in the Kingdom of God.

If you are a Bible-oriented Christian, you will appreciate this prayer book. Go for it.