In Blowout, Bob Orrell recounts the dramas of life on board "Hewett A", a North Sea oil and gas drilling rig. Life on an oil rig is arduous, brutal, highly dangerous. But the men who work there persevere with humor and camaraderie despite the appalling accidents, atrocious weather, and occasional clashes of temper. In Blowout, Orrell's rig suffered a disastrous bowout and he gives a vivid, harrowing account of how rescue boats and helicopters battled gale-force winds and raging seas to evacuate men from the gas-filled platform. There was a tremendous loss of life and Orrell found himself abandoned with only one colleague on the gas and oil spewing rig. When Red Adair (the legendary Texan oil rig firefighter) returned to the rig to cap the well, Orrell was there to man the communications equipment. Blowout is a riveting true story, the stuff of which legends are made.

This book offers an excellent guide for students starting out on their university writing careers. It covers everything from getting started, to voice, to structuring essays of different genres. If you want to know how to write an evocative descriptive essay, or a clear process essay, or how to go about preparing your research paper, this book will help you with its clear, friendly advice. It also covers such issues as writing effective sentences, how to document your work, and choosing the right words for your essay. Its many TIP! sections scattered throughout the book provide small bites of practical advice that you can take in at a glance.

Overall, "Here's How To Write Well" is short enough to be accessible--and to make an excellent writing guide for its price.

This book easily and clearly illustrates the concept of pulley, screw and lever. Simple machines have never been so easy to explain. The cute animals and the banana party they have help the students in my 3rd grade class to understand force and work. Bravo!

THIS IS AN EXCELLANT BOOK WITH MANY WAYS TO MAKE CHEAP DISPOSABLE SILENCERS. I HAVE TRIED MANY OF THE DESIGNS DESCRIBED AND HAVE BEEN VERY HAPPY WITH THE RESULTS.

With Homer, you can still appreciate the Iliad and the Odyssey in English -- indeed, the recent translations of Robert Fagles capture the movement and energy of Homeric verse quite well. With Theocritus, however, a translation is a wretched substitute for the Greek, since the exquisitely refined beauty and charm of his poems simply cannot be reproduced in English. What makes Theocritus such an enjoyable experience in Greek is the Doric dialectic in which he writes, his manipulation of the hexameter verse (the same 6 beat verse used by Homer), the echoes of Homer and other authors, and similar curiosities.

Theocritus wrote in the 3d century BC, during the so-called Hellenistic period which arose after the demise of the classical Greek city-state. This era was, in many respects, the first "modern" world. Theocritus was a Sicilian who wrote around 270 BC. He was highly original -- he invented pastoral or "bucolic" poetry, a genre which had a very long and distinguished run in subsequent Latin and European literature. Appearing in the works of this poet for the first time are the cowherds, goatherds, and shepherds playing the pan pipes under the shade of spreading trees, bantering with each other as they sing their rustic songs. If you wish to appreciate Vergil's Eclogues, Spenser's Shepheard's Calendar, or Milton's Lycidas, to name a few of the more well known examples of the form in later literature, you must at least have a taste of the master who invented this important genre.

In this Penguin paperback edition, Robert Wells offers up straightforward, readable translations of the 22 "Idylls" (meaning "short sketches") which are commonly attributed by scholars to Theocritus. Accompanying the translations is an excellent 52 page Introduction which provides the general reader with important background information about the poet, his art, his era, and his compositional techniques.

WARNING!!! The poems of Theocritus are not intended for poorly educated or unsophisticated readers. Do not attempt to read these poems if you lack imagination, curiosity, and an appreciation for the delicate craftsmanship of a sensitive and learned poet

Except for the title story, which reads more like a long outline for the TV movie he wrote of the same name, almost every story in this book is awesome and mindblowing.

Check out the crazy throwaway story Sheckley wrote to pad this collection called REDFERN'S LABYRINTH, a tale of a man who receives two letters in the mail, one a description of the state of mind he must have as he reads the letter, the other advertising the experience he must go through reading the two letters, describing the effect of the first letter and the second, which describes them both. And which has the faint odor of kelp. Does this make sense? Not really. But in a weird way it does, and it's high intellectual fun watching Sheckley making it up as he goes along, and surprising you with exponential inventiveness at every turn.

Sheckey is the wittiest storyteller of his generation, and one of the classic fantasy writers of all time. Sheckley and Bradbury are like the Lennonn and McCartney of SF short story writers.

Once you get past the opening title story, you are in for a treat of high satire, bold and paradoxical plotting and concise craftmanship.

This collection, along with IS THAT WHAT PEOPLE DO?, THE ROBOT WHO LOOKED LIKE ME,...CITIZEN IN SPACE and UNTOUCHED BY HUMAN HANDS, are his best and highly recommended for anyone who enjoys satire, wit and fantasy short story writing at its best.

That book is the best one I found in Hong Kong bookstore for the Pharmacy staff or the student in the Pharmacy. The information is update and very clear. GOOD

Well Said, Well Spoken is a collection of 736 quotable quotes directly relating to the teaching profession. Timeless quotes such as "Normal adolescence is sometimes very abnormal." and "Short-term goals are refueling stations along the journey." fill the pages of Well Said, Well Spoken from cover to cover. An excellent gift book for anyone who works in the area of education, and highly enjoyable to simply browse through again and again.

Robert E. Wells writes about speed in a book that is fun and easy for younger elementary school kids to understand. The book compares the fastest living things such as the ostrich and cheetah, then moves on to rocket ships and meteoroids and the speed of sound and light. A chart in the back compares how long it would take each of these to reach the moon from earth! I also recommend Wells' other books: "Is a Blue Whale the Biggest Thing There Is?" and "What's Smaller than a Pygmy Shrew?" I wish more kids' books were as fun and educational as these.

very good, very informative, and written in plain english. it is a good book because it focuses on small independent retailing, not service or production like most "start your own business" books.