Once again, Charles Swindoll has brought a biblical character to life. I felt as if I was going "through" with Joseph! Mr. Swindoll makes it easy to relate what happen to Joseph with his family relations to today's family. If you're having difficulty relating to the trials and tribulations your family faces, read this book and get a revelation from God!

This is only the second book by Swindoll that I have read. The first was "Intimacy with the Almighty". I liked this one much better. Swindoll did a fantastic job with the life of Joseph. He included a lot of details and perspective on issues, Jacob's poor parenting, geographic locations, etc. that really put you in Joseph's shoes. The book was an engaging page-turner, which I devoured and greatly enjoyed. I am looking forward to reading some of the other books in the series. (Moses, Daniel, etc.)

Much like with the first novel in this series, "David", this book is not only wonderfully written and explained, but inspires great strength in the reader. Also like "David", "Joseph" should be read with the intent of learning, of bettering one's self, not for strict entertainment value alone (although the book is highly entertaining). Another tool for the modern day Christian, and another wonderful book from Swindoll though the power of God.

No one interested in American politics could fail to find this an interesting and informative volume. The essays are perceptive, tho some are repetitous. The listing of all the Jewish Senators, Representatives, Federal judges, and governors is valuable. I found it amazing that apparently there was no Jew appointed a Federal judge till Wilson appointed Brandeis to the Supreme Court in 1916 and then there was no Jew appointed to the Federal judiciary till Hoover appointed Cardozo to the Supreme Court in 1931, and not till FDR was any Jew appointed a lesser Federal judge! An excellent reference book.

The editors are to be commended for creating a useful reference work that will be used for years by students of US politics. Their study begins with 14 thematic chapters that explore such topics as the presence of Jews in the three branches of the federal government, the role of Jewish political party leaders, the historical voting patterns of Jews, the political role of Jewish women, and Jewish contributions to foreign policy. This section is followed by a ten-page list of sources for additional reading in each of the thematic subject areas. Other sections, just as important, provide biographical profiles of about 400 Jewish participants in American politics, past and present, and rosters of Jews who have served in the cabinet, in Congress, and in the federal court system, and as ambassadors, governors, or mayors of major cities. This section also includes a chart of concentration of Jewish population in selected major US cities from 1800 until 2000. This book will be a welcome addition to reference desks and general collections in libraries across the country. All levels.

This book does something extraordinary. It presents a vast array of information while at the same time including a number general essays on Jews in American politics. No person seriously interested in ethnic politics and Jews particularly should be without this book.Clearly edited and turned by the press. There is no political slant--all positions represented.

Words don't do justice to the work & imagination of Ray & Charles Eames! This is a beautiful book covering the creative minds of two of the best modern furniture designers. Filled with great pictures, & very complete text of their design & the many other things they created besides furniture.The Eames' are my biased favorite, if you love modern 50's furniture,fabric, & art you must have this book.They worked for the infamous Herman Miller company, who has reissued many of the Eames furniture pieces available again today.As creator of the modern molded fiberglass chair, & molded plywood, the Museaum Of Modern Art has Charles' chairs as Art, which they are & comfortable too!More than comparable to their Danish counterparts,this couple brought us sleek,smooth lined furniture that will take us into the space age for at least another fifty years!(check out A.I.-incredible backgrounds of modern furniture!)

This is a wonderful addition to any coffee table! I learned so much about this creative couple that I never knew before. The pictures are A+ & very well done. If you are a fan of Eames furniture, you cannot live without this book!!

The Eamses were innovators in many fields such as Architecture, furniture design, film, etc. But to my mind their gretest acheivement was the definition of a new profession, 'Graphic Design', or as I beleive they called it, a 'Design Office'.

Up till then, there was 'Commercial Art', and 'Art Departments', and whatever styling was applied to an industrial product was done as an afterthought, and usually by an amateur.

After The Eamses, a new recognition that the design of appearances was a craft and a profession, and not just an art, was born.

This book demonstrates in many ways, how Ray and Charles Eames applied this and many other insights to the various fields of endeavor that they entered and changed forever.

This book is very thrilling, and keeps you in suspense. You feel like you are really there, watching history unfold right before your own eyes. If you find it is hard to stay into this great book, press on! You will really love this adventurous book.

I read this book with my daughter who is 10 and we had a hard time putting it down. She is studying the Middle Ages this year in school and this story brought that time period to life. Not only did we learn about the historical events of the time of King Alfred and the Vikings, but we enjoyed reading about the culture of the 9th century. We have read other books by Henty and we were not disappointed with this one. There is something here for everyone, adventure, battles, romance, friendship, etc.

Henty is a wonderful author. I have read this book dozens of times and it is always fresh. The scenes are vivid, the plot is involving, and the characters are marvellous!

Between Two Rivers has the ability to intermingle the characters with the reader. His writing allowed me as the reader to get involved with the lives of the characters, to cry when they cried, to laugh when they laughed, and to rejoice when they rejoiced.

Mr. Joseph has done a superb job of writing a novel that is a struggle to put down. I highly recommend Between Two Rivers. I too look forward to his next book!!!

Between Two Rivers has the ability to intermingle the characters with the reader. His writing allowed me as the reader to get involved with the lives of the characters, to cry when they cried, to laugh when they laughed, and to rejoice when they rejoiced.

Mr. Joseph has done a superb job of writing a novel that is a struggle to put down. I highly recommend Between Two Rivers. I too look forward to his next book!!!!!!

Between Two Rivers joins the reader with a group making its way through wild, dangerous territory. Their goal - a place of peace and happiness. Mr. Joseph deftly blends the essentials of a true "page-turner". The well-paced narrative makes this book difficult to put down once started. Struggles to survive against villains and nature, friendship and personal sacrifice, honor and heroism, humor and sadness, adventure and surprises - all abound. And, a touch of romance. The characters, good and evil, are developed in sufficient detail to make them quite interesting as individuals. Descriptions of the physical surroundings absorb the reader into the scene. Although fiction, the characters, events, and the surroundings are realistically portrayed and the reader quickly comes to believe this could be a true story. I highly recommend Between Two Rivers to all who enjoy well-written, attention-grabbing novels with real bite! I look forward to Mr. Joseph's next offering with great anticipation!

I went to the library to screen for authors and bought this book along with some others. I work in the Chemical Process Industries
and found it gave me tips on how to apply the standard in my situation. It seemed like the reasonably lengthed prose had depth. Reading the whole thing tipped us off to weakeness that sure-n-nuff the audit pointed out. It the books I've handed to my employees.

Quality managers, people considering implementing a Quality Management System and those who simply want to learn what ISO is and what it means, will find this book invaluable. It contains the newly adopted ISO 9001:2000 standard text and clear explanations of the requirements of each clause in practical terms. The authors provide examples of the application of the clauses for manufacturing, hardware, software and service organizations. They also clarify where additional requirements have been added or requirements deleted.

The audit checklists that follow the explanation of each clause will be useful to everyone: to those implementing a new system and to those with a system certified to the 1994 standard who may want to get a quick read of what they will need to do to transition to the 2000 standard.

In his book, Swindoll shows in a concise, vivid and entertaining manner the things that Joseph had to undergo and adequately explains that the only way he survived them and came out on top was due to his extreme devotion to and faith in God. He uses the method of displaying a passage of scripture and then analyzing it piece by piece. What would you have done in Joseph's position? How did Joseph do what he did? This book is extremely superb, whether you want to take an in depth look at your favorite patriarch, or if you are struggling with integrity and forgiveness in your own life.

Chuck Swindoll has done it again! If you read only one book this year, you owe it to yourself to read "Joseph: A Man of Integrity and Forgiveness."

After reading a number of Swindoll's books, booklets, and articles, I firmly believe "Joseph" to be his finest work concerning personal integrity! It challenged me to reach for new levels of personal, Christ-like character.

Be prepared to laugh, shed a some tears, and have your life challenged by the book's insightful observations, masterful commentary and penetrating questions for application. It delivers the goods in a life changing way!

This book is unquestionably a classic. My first introduction to the Arabian nights(this is much easier to type than the title of the book)was as a kid when my mother would recite these stories during mealtimes. Being an Indian, I was not new to the world of Jinnh's, magic carpets and other such wonders. Everyone enjoys the popular stories such as Alladin and Ali Baba(thanks/no thanks to Disney). However, this book is one way of getting to the real Arabian nights that have not been adultrated by Disney. Sorry Disney fans, but the truth is often bitter. The thousand nights and one night is a perfect source of transporting oneself to the ancient middle east. The land of the Caliphs ,where women were immensely beautiful and heros truly heroic. Each story in this volume is a wonder. There is much to be learnt from these stories since they reveal age old wisdom in addition to pure joy to the heart. The stories themselves go beyond plain narration and successfully give the reader an insight into the life in the ancient middle east. Oh! I know that the thought of people flying around in magic carpets sounds preposterous. It is the cultural background that I am talking about. The book reveals middle eastern charm, something that is to be found in traces even today if you were to visit the middle east.The book begins with the disillusionment of King Shahriyar by his wife, something that makes him an absolute tyrant. He kills her and then decides to marry every night and put the bride to death in the morning. The vizier's daughter who marries him decides to change his distressing behaviour for good. She starts the practice of reciting captivating stories every night that are left unfinished in the morning, thus extending her own life. This is the birth of the thousand nights and one nights. When I read this book, I spent several sleepless nights trying to finish it. I believe that it is a true classic just like the Iliad, Odessey, The Poetic Edda, Mahabharata and the Ramayana. A piece of the old world that we are lucky to retain.
However, I MUST add a note on the content. This book is definitely NOT for kids. There are plenty of adult language and situations that would definitely not do for a child. One must make allowances here since this book is probably a direct translation of the original text. In addition, there is a strong bias regarding non islamic communities. Since this book is but one for a four book series, the bias may not necessarily be a part of this book. While reading the entire series, I had to make allowances for racial and religious discrimination. Remember the age in which these stories were written and then try to forgive the original authors for their attitude and mentality.
On the whole, a wonderful read for people interested in old folk/fairy tales.

Almost nothing can be said about the Thousand Nights and One Night, except what is obvious to anyone who understands its substance. It is one of the truly essential pieces of world culture, and probably the most extensive universe of stories in history.

Something must be said, however, for those who are NOT aware of the extent of this work. This is not the simple batch of a dozen or so stories -- Aladdin, Ali Baba, Sinbad, and the like -- that most people think it is. This is over 2400 pages of narrative, comprising close on 100 stories -- some of which are themselves as long as novels, and many of which contain smaller stories within themselves. The stories range from the profoundly epic to the delightfully whimsical, and there is variation in mood and length throughout the series that it not only serves as a collection of discrete stories but functions as a unified whole.

As such, the attempt to read the Thousand Nights and One Night in its entirety can not be a halfhearted one. The reader must be prepared to invest considerable time in the reading. The rewards, however, are incalculable. The complete experience has few parallels in fiction, because few works of such volume possess such unity. Reading moves from the hasty and immediate to the comfortable and regular. The difference is akin to that between listening to a 3-minute pop song and listening to a 30-minute symphony. The individual stories fade into memory, retaining their own identities but also falling into place within the whole.

I will not attempt to address the individual stories themselves in any detail. Suffice it to say that they narrate love, lust, sex, war, peace, contemplation, action, commerce, politics, art, science, and many other things, in the spheres of the supernatural and the mundane. The Thousand Nights and One Night is a virtually complete panorama of human existence, with each story a component scene.

I will, though, address the issue of translation. I have perused other editions of the tales in varying degrees (although this is the only one I have read completely). In the first place, any translation which omits some stories is not worth consideration. Although there is some controversy over whether Richard Burton (the first to translate the tales into English) corrupted the original text and inserted spurious parts, there is nothing to be gained by being persnickety in this regard. This edition contains more tales than most others I have seen, and therefore is more likely to contain the "right" tales somewhere inside. On a less abstract level, this text is simply more fun to read than most others, and, as mentioned, there is more of that fun text to be read.

Also, it can be plausibly speculated that this translation is particularly likely to have fewer Burton-induced inaccuracies, since it is not in fact a direct translation from Arabic to English. This 4-volume edition is a translation into English, by Powys Mathers, of a French translation, by J. C. Mardrus, of the original Arabic. It is somewhat surprising that an indirect translation such as this should be of such high quality, but I have found it to be so. In particular, this Mardrus & Mathers version includes substantial verse passages (which in other translations are often rendered as prose) and is refreshingly frank in its translation of the more ribald passages (which are numerous).

The Thousand Nights and One Night is not merely a book that can be read; it is a world which can be experienced, and the memories of that experience can mingle almost indistinguishably with memories of reality. Only a work of this size can work on large and small levels, with many intricate details but also many large thematic components. As an added benefit, by the time you have finished reading the fourth volume, your memories of the first will be fading, so you can begin a new reading immediately, and experience the joys of the Thousand Nights and One Night all over again.

The stories contained within are truly wonderful. They oftentimes read with such beauty and vividness that I almost believed I was there! If there's such a thing as a darn-near perfect translation, these books are it imho. Why not introduce your children to the tales of the Arabian nights via these books? I'm no historian, but these tales have a much more authentic feel than others that I encountered as a child. Read a few stories each night, and enjoy the whole series over a period of time! Or dive in and don't surface until you're done!

As an owner of the second edition, I looked forward to the revised update. The quality of the information is high. However, I was disappointed in the quality of the publication. Some of the graphs and charts seemed "muddy" with hard to read notations. Also, the binding and paper quality seemed to have slipped a little. This seems to be a trend. I own a number of texts from the 1950's. Their binding and paper quality is much better than that used today.

Handbook is a term which implies comprehensive coverage of a given subject, so often a term which is misapplied. Not so in this case however, this book is without a doubt one of the best sources of information on pumps and related system components currently in print. For anyone requiring a comprehensive pump resource, this is it. I would definitely recommend this one for the engineering library.

I am one of the four editors of this handbook. Please note the correct number of pages is 1765. The 2nd edition has the 1280 pages presently described. After the name Charles Heald add that he is an editor also. The 2nd and 3rd reviewers are referring to the 2nd edition of the handbook as they are dated before the 3rd edition was printed.

This is a beautifully written and illustrated book on a noble subject. On the basis of that rarity alone it deserves five stars.

This book stimulated my interest in trying to figure out how music works more than anything else I have ever read. Sure, it is not the latest word, the most comprehensive or closely argued, but to get the interested amatuer started down the path of analysis of musical forms, why it sounds good, and what the big three Classical Era composers did to create a large chunk of our western musical heritage, this is the place to start. Rosen steered me toward many, many other books, cited in his bibliography and notes, on related topics, such as sonata form, how it works and does not. Sure, scholars can quibble and somebody else could and should write a followup to answer the complaints, but until then, Rosen is the place to start. His other books are just as good, but not as enjoyable. Dense, you bet, but worth it.

As a music lover with a superficial knowledge of the technical aspects of music-making, I found this book to be a real challenge. It took me several attempts over the course of a couple of years to get through it. But having expended that effort, I can say that every minute was worth it. I now have a good understanding of what "classical" music (in the stricter definition of "classical") is about, and why its three great Viennese exponents were such masters. I now can listen classical music -- indeed, to any common-practice period music -- with much more insight, understanding, and enjoyment than I could heretofore.