HIV and AIDS is what we hear about in the news and read about in the paper, but Ryan White delievers his true story of being a young adolescent living and dying with the virus. This couragous young man shared his gut wrentching riticules, his painful treatments, and how he showed the world he would survive as long as he was alive.

Ryan describes in his own words what it was like to live with HIV and the ignorance of others about his virus. His story is heart breaking, informative and tear drenching. I sat motionless on the couch for hours in tears while I read and the tears didn't stop when I finished the book.

Ryan's story if a wonderful book for all readers, both young and old. I strongly recommend you take a look into Ryan's life to expand your knowledge and heart of the the AIDS virus.

If you don't know anyone who has died of AIDS, you will feel like you did when you finish reading, Ryan White: My Own Story.

Ryan White: My Own Story by Ryan White and Ann Marie Cunningham is one of the most heart-warming and touching books I have ever read. This work of nonfiction is a biography of one of the most courageous young men in the world.
Ever since he was born, Ryan had been in and out of hospitals. He had a horrible disease, Hemophilia, which causes the blood not to clot. Ironically, the treatment he takes to help with his Hemophilia ends up giving Ryan Aids. Throughout the story, Ryan tells us of his struggle with the pain of the incurable diseases and the continuous harassment from his fellow schoolmates and citizens. He faces all the challenges of a normal teen and on top of that, has to face the cruel reality of an imminent death. This book is a great source of an amazing story and a very informant book on the affects of AIDS.
To me, Ryan is one of the bravest kids to ever live. When so much was against him, he always found a way around it. He is truly an inspiration to me and probably to everyone who has read this moving book. I would recommend this book to anyone, and I think that anyone who ever thought they had it bad needs to read this truly wonderful book!!!

Dear Teens of the World , The Book I read was Ryan White my own story. Ryan white is an excellant book for kids to read. The book is about a young boy named Ryan White. Who is living with AIDs. Ryan was given tainted blood to treat his severe case of hemophilia. Once I read this book I felt changed. The book was hopeful ,heartbreking , and spirited all at the same time. The book makes you think about aids and what you would do if you knew you had aids. Ryan White lead a long and miserable life life because the people of his home town didn't approve of his disease. Ryan loved school : he was an all American Kid and an honors student. He loved school so much that he went to court to stay in school and won the right he was to return immediately. The students parents were against the ruling , however, and took their kids out of school and started their own. It was not that the parents were mean , it was that they were scared.

Ryan had it so hard in Kokomo , kid at school vandalized his locker with words like fag , bit*h and other slurs. Ryan 's house was repeatedly vandalized too from peole shooting at the house and throwing rocks and whisky bottles and trashing the yard while no one was home to scare them . Well it worked : the Whites moved out of Kokomo to Cicero , Indianapolis not only because of the people but he didn't want ot die in Kokomo ,Ryan wasn't afraid to die he just didn't like the thought of being buried in Kokomo's cemetery.

Although Ryan had AIDS he meet some very popular people like Elton John , Micheal Jackson , Lukas Haas , Rev. Jesse Jackson , John Cougar Melloncamp , Paul Newman ,etc.... Ryan was on of Elton johns 1# fans and Elton felt the same about ryan . Ryan went to many campaigns , meeting and conventions to represent kids with aids. He went to Washington D.C. to meet the president. Ryan also went o an AMfar convention that is held in NewYork . Elizabeth Taylor often helped AMfar out with donations.

Ryan's last and final trip before he died was to Washington D.C. to take picture with president reagan and his wife but to very first thing he did in D.C. was go on the Home Show with Howie Long. Then wentto the white houseto tke picture after that they went to the oscar party. Ryan spent the next day asleep while his mom tried to reach ad octor in LA but had no luck , so they took a plane back to Cicero to see ryans doctor. Ryan was admited to the hospital and put on oxygen because he was having trouble. Ryans mom steped out of the room to greet vistors. Once back doctors were huddled around him and his bed. Ryan was being rushed to the intensive care unit .His grandmother flew in right away. Ryan's doctor laid out the situation for ryan and his mother. Ryan Knew that once knocked out that he might not wake up but went on with the plans. Ryan told his mom that he was tired of fighting aids , then the drugs took hold ,and Ryan White never woke up again.

This true and powerful story of ryan white will make you think about life twice because this just proves that you can be their one day and be gone the next. This book just shows you how fragile life is. This story is heartbreaking ,hopeful , sprited , all at the same time. This book is great for all ages.

Deacons Kill is a town that I would not like to visit. It seems to have more than its share of creepy events going on in this small town in the Catskills. While the term "kill" refers to a stream or river, the other meaning would be quite appropriate in the case of Dead White.

Anyone who has ever been snowed in knows the sense of clautrophobia that can accompany such an event. Sound is muffled, individuals cling to their home, the entire face of the world is changed. Cabin fever refers to the anxiety that can happen during such an event.

Now, into this alien white world in Deacons Kill comes an antique circus train on rusted, unused tracks. And the horror begins.

Highly recommended for those who enjoy a compact dose of grue-- especially recommended if the reader happens to be snowed in at the time!

This book is very much worth reading, if only as a diversion. It is a fun well paced read that doesn't aim to be anything but that. If you happen to run across this book, read it. After all, who can resist killer clowns with floppy feet?

On a cold winter's night, the citizens of Deacon's Kill find themselves at the mercy of a snow storm. The few who are not snowed in come together in the town hall to draft a disaster plan and create a temporary shelter. But something else has arrived in their town. Something more ominous than any blizzard. An old circus train rolls in on railroad tracks that haven't been used in nearly a century. And inside the train are vengeful phantoms that want the town to pay in blood for a forgotten sin. Ryan's novel has all the elements of a classic horror novel. In a simple, but compelling writing style, he delivers one of the creepiest and most entertaining horror novels I've ever had the pleasure of reading. Highly recommended...especially for a cold winter's night!

Obvious agenda here by a shallow author looking to capitalize on a recently re-elevated subject. The entire book fails to make any positive remarks about the most popular and elected politician in the history of the state of South Carolina. Most of the research by this "author" is conveniently taken from anti-Tillman press while bypassing all of the many contributions to the state and to the U.S. Senate. Tillman was honored and revelled by many fellow U.S. Senators from opposing parties (and from Northern States). He established Clemson University, Winthrop College and the Charleston Naval Shipyard. There were two U.S. Navy Ships named after him. None of these accomplishments and honors are worthy of mention by this spin artist. He conveniently chose to omit, and obviously failed to research, Tillman's admirable private and personal life as it would destroy the credibility of the subject and agenda.

Kantrowitz fails miserably in the area of accurate and balanced historical journalism. The slant is conspicuous and offensive and breaks the golden rule of interpreting sources and historic events in the context of the times they were written.

Don't waste your time or money.

Professor Kantrowitz, a professional historian, has written a book that is revealing of the man and the times but too long and detailed for the nonprofessional reader of history. He has mined old newspapers from South Carolina and other documents energetically--and it would appear that every one of his index cards, so to speak, has been carried over into the text. Consequently, there is more detail than this reader needed or could possibly absorb. This failing is compounded by the author's inadequate treatment of Tillman's life. Milestone personal and family events are mentioned in a sentence, with no indication that the author is interested in Tillman the person--although, to his credit, he does on several occasions remind us that Tillman was devoted to his wife and wrote her loving, and playful, letters. But Tillman's relations with his children are not covered adequately. Nor do we learn much about his nonpolitical relationships with friends, relatives and neighbors. In other words, Professor Kantrowitz has scanted the biographical aspects of his book in favor of doctrinal analsyis. He has given his readers too many excerpts from Tillman's speeches, letters and interviews--primarily on how he felt about the place of Negroes in a white-dominated society. Kantrowitz shows that Tillman took a hostile view towards Negroes, as African Americans were called (and worse) in the 19th Century, and yet he and other farmers needed them as low-wage laborers. His racism and support of violence, part of his calculated appeal to white "producers," are well established early on. But the point is made over and over. Tip to readers: Kantrowitz, a disciplined writer in some respects, introduces paragraphs with topic sentences. Very often the supporting detail that follows can be skimmed or skipped because the general point already has been made.

The reader from Washington says the book is too long, but he wants more personal detail! How would that happen? Fact is, for a major figure in American political history, Tillman has found biographer whose economy of language is commendable; Kantrowitz only uses 309 pages to do a magnificent job of storytelling and analysis. And it is a great read, especially given the deep and subtle insights that Kantrowitz squeezes from this Dixie demogogue's pernicious but important career. And he does so without turning Tillman into a demon, but rather by revealing that the Senator was not so much a tribute but a trickster of the people, and far from being a populist, served the richest and most powerful of his constituents as he poured salt into the worst of the nation's wounds--the scar of white supremacy. This book is eloquent and profound, and could scarely have been better crafted.

This book is useful for both the studious geneologist and casual peruser, containing comprehensive, in-depth geneological information as well as a wealth of photos and anecdotes.

Let me preface this review by saying I have read most of the Blackie Ryan series and have loved them all, despite a few irritations. Let me also disclose that I am a moderate Republican and practicing Roman Catholic. If that shoots my credibility in the foot for you, move on to the next review.

I found the story line in Bishop in the West Wing to be very thin. The central problem of the poltergeists in the White House is brought up from time to time to string it all together, but it seems an afterthought. The true purpose of this novel seems to be to recount Father Greeley's visits to the White House during the Clinton administration, with Blackie playing the part of Greeley and President McGurn as President Clinton. While I would be interested in reading about that subject, I would prefer it in a nonfiction text, as opposed to under the guide of fiction. Having Republicans as a group stereotyped as hate-spewing elists, as they are in this book, is no more fair than stereotyping all Catholic priests as pedophiles, which they are most certainly not. Also, there is a real Rasputin-ish quality to the part that Blackie plays in the White House in this novel. Am I the only one who noticed this?

I was bothered by Father Greeley's characterizations of teenage girls in this novel, as I have been in his past novels. It seems especially evident in Bishop in the West Wing. He portrays them as modern-day "Valley Girls", with ditzy personalities and brainless slang used in every sentence. When one conducts a conversation with most teenage girls and young women, I believe one will find that most of them, especially those of the type Father Greeley is representing in his novels, speak much like the rest of us. I won't even get started on the "ebonics" he imposed on a high-level African-American White House aide in the book.

I am hoping that this novel is an abberation in the Blackie Ryan series, and not a sign of things to come in future novels. Despite the negative tone of this review, I would still nonetheless recommend this novel to Blackie fans such as myself (hence the two stars instead of one). Blackie is a fun, clever character, and spending some time in his world is always an escape from our own. Just hold your nose in parts and pray that Father Greeley will juice things up in the next Blackie novel.

Andrew Greeley's newest well-paced mystery will capture the reader's interest, as Blackie Ryan visits the White House to investigate a possible poltergeist. He's invited by President Jack McGrath, a Chicagoan of Irish descent, a widower whose enemies have tried to paint him as a womanizer. (See a previous reviewer's characterization of a possible "Clinton done right". I also wondered if that were Greeley's intent.)

McGrath is innocent of these allegations, as he is numb, locked into celibacy by grief over his wife's untimely death in a plane crash while campaigning. His two lively adolescent daughters connive to interest him in a brainy, attractive aide, but he hasn't the heart to pursue.

Greeley's usual blend of suspense, nuanced characterization, humor, and insight into the Irish and the church, provides the reader with another enjoyable tale. Recommended.

United States President John Patrick McGurn has enough to deal with between the eastern established media and the Republicans. However, the Irish-American from Chicago, dubbed rancorously by the press as "Machine Gun Jack" and want to tie him with the Irish Mafia, has a poltergeist wrecking havoc in his new home, The White House. Jack asks long time friend and successful amateur sleuth Father Blackie Ryan to exorcise the spirit by discovering who is really behind the shake, rattle, and roll in the Oval Office, West Wing, and Lincoln Room, etc.

Unable to mount more than a weak argument to remain in the Windy city, Blackie travels to Washington DC upon the orders of his superior Cardinal Cronin. Blackie quickly concludes that the ghost is more likely a young female suffering from unrequited love or vengeance against a President detested by his enemies as he begins eliminating the candidates one at a time.

THE BISHOP IN THE WEST WING is the best Blackie Ryan novel in several years as Andrew M. Greeley provides insight into the White House from a guest's perspective while satirizing the seemingly endless attacks on Bill Clinton, obviously Jack's model. The story line is fun for everyone except right wing Republicans and the so-called liberal "muckraking" press as Blackie looks for a more mundane solution to the poltergeist question. Father Greeley makes no bones about his feelings towards the previous president with an engaging amateur sleuth tale that Mr. Clinton and many other fans will enjoy.

Harriet Klausner