The "ultimate" book on dollmaking! If I could rate this book higher, it definitely deserves a 10! Highly informative with a wealth of information and photos that take you from the very beginning of making a doll right up to dressing the completed doll. Lots of "how to" photos with in depth instructions that even us beginners can follow with ease. A definite "must have" if you're into dollmaking!

I had this same book when I was a little girl. I was enchanted by Eloise Wilkin's illustrations, which are alone reason to buy this book! Her style is evocative of I. Hummel. The children depicted in her drawings are so adorable! As for the prayers themselves, they are short enough for very small children to learn. You will see alot of traditional language, though. This may be difficult for a small child to understand (i.e. Thee and Thou). However, I feel this book is well worth buying!

Being Christian is not an easy life. When a child of God finally makes their confession of faith, Satans workload gets larger, but the believer is his prime target for all his powerlessness. His work consists of extinguishing the believer and all that he or she can effect for God through whatever weaknesses he can find. This short book helps the reader realize why things have or have not been so smooth in their transition from unbeliever to believer. It will wake you up! When God opens doors we're supposed to walk through them; walk through this book and you'll never regret that you were reading instead of mowing the lawn or checking your email. God bless!

I was pleased with my purchase. I was hesitant on purchasing a
used book,but now I will definitely not think twice.

In his book Punishment, Crime, and Market Forces, Leslie Wilkins attempts to explain why western democracies that appear so similar differ so greatly in their incarceration rates. One motivation for the study is the belief, held by Wilkins, that arbitrary variation in the level of punishment across countries is incompatible with the concept of justice. Wilkins rejects the commonly held view that incarceration rates can be explained by crime rates. Rather, "it is the use of punishment which must be studied in its own right" (Wilkins, pp. 13). In particular, in responding to variations in public demands for punishment, a society's criminal justice system largely determines the incarceration rate. Wilkins argues that popular ideas about crime are so overly simplified that they result in an unacceptable (and sometimes hazardous) distortion of reality. In particular, he holds that the concept of just desserts (because of its false simplicity) ought to be reconsidered and rejected. For if it were true that "the punishment could fit the crime" then we ought not to see such drastic variation in the incarceration rates of western countries. In explaining the reasons for the variation in incarceration rates, Wilkins rejects any sort of a conspiracy theory, instead examining the public demand (or attitudes) for punishment. The demand for punishment, he argues, is a moral attitude which hangs together in "value packages" (ibid., pp. 108). Wilkins holds that moral attitudes are learned from other people, especially organized social and religious groups. For example, he asserts that the demand for the death penalty, is packaged together with preferences for certain economic policies, views on human rights, and religious fundamentalism (ibid., pp. 109). Given these observations, Wilkins attempts to explain the demand for punishment as the expression of a "syntax of personal values"-or a "grammar of values." In particular, he connects the current demands for punishment with a country's verbal and written language-which he concludes "is embedded in social experiences" (ibid., pp. 132). Countries with disproportionately high rates of incarceration thus may be said to have a similar "grammar of values." This "pro-incarceration" (also called "individual blame allocation") grammar is characterized by an anti-intellectual tendency to impose micro models on macro level problems. Another typical characteristic is the belief that if a right decision is made, "there is no need to speculate about its consequences" (ibid., pp. 144). However, Wilkins finds that the major characteristic of public opinion supporting high rates of incarceration is the separation of morality into dichotomous categories-right & wrong, true & false, and black & white. Wilkins calls this sort of simplification "extremism." And since this sort of thinking helps maintain the status quo, it is often supported by politicians who may be aware of the true complexity of social problems. Incarceration, Wilkins argues, has to be justified in moral terms. In searching for potential justifications, political leaders most often turn to religion. For "the fundamentalists' claim that 'simple is true' provides a convenient strategy for avoiding the true complexity of crime & punishment" (ibid., pp. 155). Yet since this dualistic logic cannot accommodate the complexity of the real world, Wilkins asserts that it will always provide unsatisfactory conclusions and poor penal policy. Given these overall findings and conclusions, Wilkins believes that no progress can be made in penology "without a far better informed environment of public opinion" (ibid., pp. 164). All criminal justice policy, he argues, must be based upon an assessment of future outcomes. In particular, he asserts that the public must rely more on scientific language, thinking, and logic in understanding crime and punishment. If this were done, individual blame allocation could no longer be continued. For individual level blame allocation serves to reinforce the status quo by assuring us that there is nothing wrong with our (macro) social system (ibid., pp. 69). Consequently, Wilkins contends that our system of punishment will never be reformed until we consider it on a macro level.

a cliff notes version of radiology no fluff, all pearls. besides, my son wrote it!

This book is a great motivational tool for anyone who believes that life is too tough or difficult. Witness firsthand how Skip defeated all the odds and continues to this day to demonstrate the ideology and the perseverance of a true winner.

An ealier edition of this book was given to my wife when her father passed away in November 1993 by a priest at the private school where she still works. She was very close to her father, and even though he died at the age of 91, it was hard for her (and me) to reconcile with the fact, implications, and inevitabilty of death.

The priest told her to read this book and said that she might find some answers or understanding of the helplessness of human beings with death and how we could cope with it.

She read a few chapters or pages, got some solace and went on to accept this event that she had dreaded all her life. She was surprised with the objectivity with which the author has handled each major and some minor religions of the world, and the extent to which he goes to explain the origin, basic principles, growth and maturity of each religion. The book also provides, in simple language, the evolution of the world religions and their interlocking relationships. The religions have, I understand now, much more in common than in contrast.

I know all this because I have read the book myself a few times, and was so excited, educated and impressed by it that we have since purchased many copies of the book and gave it as a gift to family and friends. And, every time, we had to special order it through the school! My humble thanks and gratitude to Mr. Wilkins about whom I'd like to know more!! I hope that the book is updated periodically.

I highly recommend this book to everyone, especially to the peoples in and from South Asia where many world religions flourish in the same community, most times in tolerance of each other, but frequently in conflict.

Even though I have read many books and short stories by great authors and is dazed, and full of admiration of their work, it happens once in a while, that a book or a story, that one has never heard mentioned goes right in to your heart and won't let go. That is what Mary Wilkins Freeman's stories did to me. I felt as if I had found a friend. There is such a pleasure to be found in her stories, the fluent and smooth style, easily understood by all, as well as a lesson in living your life at your own pace. She is so unaffected and natural in her storytelling, that these stories, which easily could have taken place, are sweet, tender, bitter and then full of resistence. Her character do not always behave. The stories are mostly about New England country women, for whom Freeman has obviouly a great sympathy for and she writes about them with respect and affection

Dealing with fragments is like walking in a minefield: you can never be too cautious. There is only one methodology: keep your speculations "tame". The more ingenious a speculation may sound, the more aberrant may prove to be. If even the great T.B.L. Webster could not avoid this pitfall (his "Studies in Menander" ended up a major embarrassment), then nobody is immune. This volume brings together a number of major studies on the fragments of Old Comedy. The volume is comprehensive, welledited and well printed, representative of a variety of authors, subjects and approaches. As a rule the essays followed the cautious road, as pinpointed by Kenneth Dover's introductory note. One should not look here for a resurrection effect: what is lost is lost. But this is as close as we can get towards recovering at least the gist of the Old Comedy experience beyond the great master. A worthy investment.