I have only one thing to say about this story...I thought it was plain STUPID! What is it with people's obsession's with Anne Frank anyway? Her diary is one of the most BORING stories I have ever read. There is nothing appealing about Anne's story. She focuses only on herself and barely explains any of the characters. Overall, this was an AWFUL book and Anne had no impact on me whatsoever.

I have read this book many times, and each time I do so, I am struck that Anne began writing this when she was only 13-years-old. It is as fresh today as it was when I read it the first time about 30 years ago.

I am always struck by those who use Anne's quote about people really being good at heart. . . According to Anne's friend, Lies Gosslar, Anne certainly didn't think people were good at heart after being imprisoned at Aushwitz and Bergen-Belsen. Trying to put a happy face on the Holocaust or give it a positive spin is really more than I can stomach.

This is one of the most depressing and yet uplifting stories of all time. I just finished a production of the play and I know that there wasn't a dry eye in the audience at curtain call. Anne's statement that "in spite of everything, people really are good at heart" shows that even close to death, love and hope survive. It's a story that everyone should read; it teaches a lot about life.

This review is for the second volume of the audiocassette edition. Volume 2 contains seven stories by a constellation of literary luminaries: Elmore Leonard, Eric Van Lustbader, Michael Malone, Ed McBaine, Joyce Carol Oates, Anne Perry, and Shel Silverstein.

"Sparks" details the smoldering particulars of an insurance investigator's inquiry into the burning of a beautiful woman's house. Three stars.

"Slow Burn" is a police procedural weighted down by the protagonist's Freudian baggage. It gives a disturbing look at child molestation, sexual exploitation, mental illness, and revenge. Two stars.

"Invitation to the Ball" presents a mystery in three parts. The protagonist, obsessed with a painting of a beautiful lady, seeks to determine whether she murdered her husband almost a century ago. He meets and woos a descendant of the lady. For all his interest in the ancestor, he shows remarkably little interest in the mystery presented by the descendant. The third mystery is a modern murder that ties in neatly with the other two. Five stars.

"Barking at Butterflies" tells the story of a man with a rival for his wife's affection. He fantasizes about taking murderous action towards the rival. Then . . . . Four stars.

"Heroes" began as a war story but resolved itself into quite a nice little mystery; not so much a who-done-it as a what-did-he-do. A good exploration of perception and reality as it relates to heroism. Five stars.

In "The Guilty Party," an eccentric judge applies the wisdom of Solomon to cases which come before him. Four stars.

Authors are: Kent Anderson, Edna Buchanan, Amanda Cross, James Crumley, Philip Friedman, Elizabeth George, James W. Hall, Dennis Lehane, Elmore Leonard, Eric Van Lustbader, Michael Malone, Ed McBain, Joyce Carol Oates, Anne Perry and Shel Silverstein.

As in any anthology, each writer has her or his own style. This anthology came across as hard-boiled and straightforward. The first story by Kent Anderson is about a cop uses drugs and loves to make bust. It's a harsh introduction and a touch of reality into this anthology. Anne Perry steps out of the Victorian age for a moment and writes one about an obsessive solider in W.W.I in her title Heroes. Edna Buchanan in The Red Shoes, writes about a man who trades his alcohol obsession for shoes, with a dangerous out come. These are definitely some stories you will remember.

If you like your stories strong and straightforward without mincing words, dirty or other wise, this is the mystery for you. Hardboiled fanatics will love this one.

I could not put this book down. Every story was good. The stories emphasize original twists on traditional obsession themes. Some are humorous. Others are shocking. Others are low-key and subservise. This is a well-written and intelligent collection.

When one picks up an anthology titled MURDER FOR REVENGE, you expect that all of the stories will have revenge murders as its theme. That is not the case with this collection.

Some of the stories, such as Lawrence Block's A BONE IN THE THROAT and Judith Kelman's ERADICUM HOMO HORIBILUS, involve characters seeking retribution after events of many years have passed. Other stories such as Joan Hess's CAVEAT EMPTOR, involve a woman who is taken advantage of and decides to get even in a deadly manner.

There are two stories that seemed misplaced in this book and they are Mary Higgins Clark's POWER PLAYS and Phillip Margolin's ANGIE'S DELIGHT. Granted they are two great authors but neither one of their stories could qualify as murder for revenge. The editor does treat us with a poem by Shel Silverstein titled THE ENEMY that talks about different ways of killing someone. Borrowing the title of Joan Hess's short story and buyer beware. The book's title is misleading and it might not be what you are looking for. Most of the stories are good but they just seem out of place in this collection.

If you like short stories, you won't want to miss this one. A great collection of today's most popular authors.

Skip the last story by Peter Straub -- makes no sense and was out of place with the short stories -- it was a novella.

The first thing that I saw was the cover. Then I flipped through the book, looking at the table of contents. The reason I bought the book is somewhat hazy--but it had something to do with Shel Silverstein.

Since I bought this book a few weeks before finals, I was trying so hard not to read it...I couldn't help it. I read it. All the way through. I thoroughly enjoyed it--I loved Shel Silverstein's poem, Mary Higgins Clark's story as well as many others.

Though the cover made me feel embarassed to be holding the book, it is worth being teased for reading something that looks like pulp fiction. If you like this book, read "Murder for Love" as well. It's just as good, and some of the same writers write stories/poems for it.

A nice little read of the diplomacy of Bismarck and Napoleon III prior to the Franco Prussian War. What is so apparrent by this book is how the French and the French government were so arrogant about their power. Most people subscribe to the fact of Bismarck causing the war. However this book shows how the inflamed opinion of the French and their government led to the war. Popular opinion blames the Prussians but it was the French who caused the war.
Wetzel shows the French interfering in the affairs of the Spain to place their candidate on the throne. The Spanish provisional government was not especially interested in their candidates, and ultimately decided on a Prussian prince. This was even more unacceptable to the French government. They then demanded the Prussian prince to renounce the throne. This the Prussians did. Then they demanded the Prussians apologize for their actions and completely renounce any interest. When this did not happen, they went to war against a German nation angered by the French actions. Subsequent actions paint the French as the victims when the opposite was the case. The French played into the hands of Bismarck.
A great read for those interested in the diplomacy prior to the war. Michael Howard's Franco-Prussian War is also a great read of the war itself.

Does a fine job explaining how the war happened. Recommend it to anyone curious about the issue.

The title of this detailed account of the origin of the FrancoPrussian war in 1870 refers to Louis Napoleon 3, nephew of Napoleon, and Otto Bismarck. The FrancoPrussian War ended the government of Emperor Louis Napoleon 3 and gave Bismarck the opportunity to unify Germany.

Wetzel begins his book by describing the characters. There is the French Emperor Louis Napoleon and his diplomats Ollivier, Gramont. Their Prussian opponents are chancellor Bismarck, and Kaiser William and their subordinates. Then Wetzel explains the background, the decline of French power and the rising strength of Prussia. We see how Ollivier, Gramont and Empress Eugenie let their passions and nationalist chauvinism blind them to the new weakness of the French army and the growing strength of Prussia

Wetzel explains the complicated succession struggle in Spain. No candidate could hope to win without total permission of France. Wetzel analyzes Bismarck's complex policy toward the succession and France and comes to some non traditional conclusions.
Wetzel follows the actions of Bismarck and Napoleon 3, as well as the actions and mistakes of their individual subordinates. We see the expertise of French diplomats such as Visconti-Venesto and Benedetti. Most of all we see the belligerence of Gramont, who left no mistake untried.

This book is not always easy to read, since Wetzel goes into great detail about the actions of all the diplomats involved. Wetzel bases his book on both primary and secondary sources and includes an informative bibliography with notes. This book ends right before the outbreak of the FrancoPrussian war, so there are no discussions of military strategy or tactics.

This is a good little book about Auschwitz. It is extremely thin and easy to read (128 pages). If you just want to know a little bit about Auschwitz and are not inclined to read one of the heavy books on the subject then this may be a good alternative. I found it easy to read and did not lack any of the intensity found in the bigger volumes on the subject. It is very detailed. It is also a great book to introduce yourself on the operations of the death camps. This book may spark your interest and you may want to read further on the subject. I finished it in only a few hours. Nice and easy reading.

a quick read for students, an objective attempt to chronologically illustrate the rise and decline of the Auschwitz extermination camp under Nazi German rule in which innocent victims, both Jew and Gentile were maliciously slaughtered.

"The Kingdom of Auschwitz" is an extract from Otto Friedrich's larger, sadly out-of-print "The End of the World: A History." In that book Friedrich examined several earth-shaking events in world history including the Black Death in Europe, the 1905 Russian revolution, and the fall of Rome. The book's climax is this long essay on Auschwitz (with an epilogue speculating on the effects of possible nuclear war circa 1982.)

Friedrich was a very talented journalist with a rich appreciation of history and a hypnotically readable prose style. Here he synthesizes the best available literature about the death camp to produce what is probably the best short history of that black hole at the heart of Western civilization. This is a good place to start if you are just beginning to read about the Holocaust. Expert readers will have their sense of the horror of the place renewed. Friedrich writes that Auschwitz does not disprove God: "Two men arguing about the existence of God is like two worker ants debating the existence of Mozart." A small masterpiece.

This is a well-written book with plenty of photographs, and thoroughly helpful information on raising these amazing little birds (I can attest to this since I have raised them for many years.) He gives good data on all the different canary types, how to feed and care for them, etc.

The only glitch I noticed was that he makes reference to color-fed birds being endangered by "synthetic color substances" without citing data/studies or naming chemicals. This is confusing to a beginner, especially since more than half the photos in his book are of color-fed birds! He doesn't discuss the crucial role the Venezualian red siskin in the formation of "red-factor" canaries, nor of the fact that beta-carotene is essential in both the siskin's diet in the wild and the red-factor's diet in captivity.

A more complete book would be Barron's "New Canary Handbook"; "Coloured,Type and Song Canaries," by Walker and Avon, and of course, Linda Hogan's classic "Canary Tales." The last is still in print and highly recommended.

This book was bought on a whim by a canary keeper of many years. It completely rethinks the canary as a pet, revolutionizes care, e.g. your canary will now be flying around your home and is insightful in all sorts of ways. Alas many of the suggested products are no longer readily available in the US where the canary has been falling out of popularity, first to the budgie and now the larger parrots. A strong and enthusiastic recommendation.

June Thomson is obviously a Sherlock Holmes fan. The story comes off as something written by a fan writing for other fans. However, that is not necessarily a good thing.

The mystery is rather slight. The appearance of Mycroft Holmes and his dire concerns about the case seem quite unwarranted. In fact when Holmes and Watson arrive on the scene, they are basically told who the culprit is and there is a very brief journey to uncover proof of this. The ending is rather anti-climactic.

However, Simon Jones does a superb reading of the story. He is able to give unique voices to his characters and quite brings the story and characters to life. Mr. Jones is now among one of the actors I will look for when choosing audio books, joining Time Curry and Michael York.

In the final analysis, this audiobook makes a decent distraction for a short commute. It is not gripping, but the performance is strong and worth the listen.

This audio presentation manages to combine an authentic sounding Sherlock Holmes story with the talents of Simon Jones to produce a genuinely enjoyable 2 hours of mystery.

As I settled down to read about a little known period of history--the Byzantine Empire and Otto II--I purred with anticipation. The characters are well rounded. The story plot is solid. But missing is the breath of focus, the width of historical sweep that we readers of historical fiction have come to expect from other historical authors likes Margaret George and Mary Stewart. There are good heavy doses of minute period detail, yet they lack the ricness we want to feel. It seems to be written for someone already familiar with the period and tale. Not bad, but not great.

Judith Tarr has written another brilliant book! This rich tapestry of a story covers the shaky Roman Empire in the West and the Bzyantine Empire in the East. Good storyline, setting, charactors. A book I highly recommend to anyone who adores historical fiction and shuge sweeping novels.

I bought the ninth edition (1956) for 200 yen, so I can't really complain! The book fascinates me because while it is very informative and a showcase of Jesperson's erudition, it also is flawed by his anglophilia and sexism. "Nevertheless, there is one expression that continually comes to my mind whenever I think of the English language and compare it with others : it seems to me positively and expressly masculine, it is the language of a grown-up man and has very little childish or feminine about it." p. 2 Other languages are weak and childish -- on the Hawaiian language: "Can any one be in doubt that even if such a language sound pleasantly and be full of music and harmony the total impression is childlike and effeminate? "(read on) p. 3

While researching for an essay on the Scandinavian influences on the English language, I found Jespersen's indepth and >clear< analysis to be of great use--especially when one considers the droll, dry, PC-speak of so-called 'modern' linguistic inquiry

-i.e. save yourself a lot of coffee and put Jespersen in the shopping cart (no book on English is a more enjoyable read).