I watched the Clinton second inaugural primarily to hear Miller Williams read the poem he had been asked to write. I was disappointed. The poem seemed self-consciously "occasional" and maybe even a desperation effort raked from the shallows as the prospect of a second Clinton term simply failed to inspire. There are several excellent efforts in "Points of Departure", however, that might have served well enough for the occasion. Although it is not one he could have read that day, I suggest that you will see Williams at his best in a small poem called "Deadsong for a Neighbor Child Who Ran away in the Woods." Sadly, it may say more about the soul of America than Williams' self-conscious effort to entertain the assembled Democrats last January

I wouldn't recommend this book to the beginning student of textual criticism, but it is a very well done work. Burgon died in the late 1800's, when people in general could read beyond a 5th-grade level, so the language and sentence structure used within do not yield an easy-to-read book for the modern reader. Not that that is a detriment, of course, but many readers might find reading it too much work. While not necessary, an ability to read Greek and even Latin would be helpful in getting maximimum benefit from this book.

That said, this work does an excellent job of discrediting the "revised text" that has in many circles replaced the Traditional Text of the New Testament (from whence came the King James Version of the Scriptures). The reader will also get a lesson in some of the methods scholars (and quasi-scholars) use to determine which of two variant readings is the one that the Holy Spirit insprired.

This is a story about a little girl how overcame obstacles by following her dreams and the advice of her mother.

This was my first book that I purchased for learning 3d studio max.. I also bought the fundamental book too.. I've only flip through couples of pages then I put it away to collect dust. The exercise are hard to follow, they gave complete instruction for teaching you a certain command. But you wouldn't find motivation to delve in to the 3d world by building something that's meaningless. The book is only good for advance user as it'll teaches you how to press certain short cut keys and stuff..

I found this book hard to comprehend.. even if I'm a immediate user, I wouldn't picked this book, as this is so boring.. It teaches you how to do certain things, but don't tell you much why you are doing it, or why is it necessary to take the steps..

there are few other good ones out there if you are a intermediate user...

This was my second 3D Studio max book. Buying it then was a mistake. There are many introductory books out there and this is one of the best but the problem is that the followup to this book; Inside 3DSMax vol 2, has everything vol 1 does and more. Get it if you are just starting out, and then I hope you are not scared of big books because this is where you start off, and start off well. If you already know your way around Max and just want to know advanced stuff like material manipulation and smoother models, get volume 2.

Many books on the market will give you step by step instructions how how to create a scene, or create certain effects. Although this is sometimes handy, it doesn't easially allow the user to incorperate the skills they learned into their own work.

Inside 3D Studio Max shows you the concepts behind how the program works, and allows you to apply these concepts, and skills to your own work, rather than a preformatted tutorial. It is this fact, however, that makes the book not extremely useful for modelers who are new to the program. This book often speaks of the manual which ships with 3DS Max, and the writer made it clear that this was not yet ANOTHER MANUAL. Inside 3D Studio Max explores how to expand your ability.

If you have no prior modeling practice, read the manual which ships with Max, then buy this book. If you do that, you will appreciate what is taught in this massive book.

This is an overall GREAT book, and it has really helped me to become a much better 3D artist.

This book gives only a few new insights into Laura Ingalls Wilders life. You learn she was a private person and she must have been because most of the information about her life seems to be from records of what organizations she belonged to. I did not like the way that the book seemed to turn into a bio about her daughter Rose Wilder Lane about halfway through. Not only did the author talk more about her than Laura he painted a picture in my opinion of a depressed unhappy woman who did not really care for her mother deep down. I also felt that since most of us "know" Lauras' family from the Little House books the author could have given the readers some more detailed information about how their lives turned out. That would have interested me more then hearing about Roses' depressed and seemingly unhappy life.

I read with interest the reader reviews on this book before I purchased it and saw mixed opinions and many comments, but the one that stood out the most was something to the effect of "this book might be too much for the casual Laura fan, but great for those who want to dig a little deeper." I heartily agree with that and think that needs to be stressed. If you've only ever read the "Little House" books, perhaps you should start with some of the lighter books and biographies about her. If you are like me, however, and can't get enough information about the true life of Laura, this book is fantastic. Its focus is a bit shaky at first, as it breezes through the first 20 or so years of her life in first third of the book. At that point it changes focus so much that it is almost like two books in one. Here is where we meet Laura the writer and witness her long path from town columnist to published national author. Throughout this section of the book her daughter, Rose, plays a pivotal part and has her own biography of sorts within these pages. While at first I was reluctant to read about the controversy over how much Rose actually helped her mother write the books, once I got into it I was fascinated and hooked. This book is a biography, a history book, the story of a young pioneer, and a look into a complex and conflicting mother/daughter relationship. And for those out there who simply can't get enough of Laura, curl up and dive in.

One other note: I learned a lot of new information about facts that were left out of the Little House books or changed to make the story flow better for children. John Miller even goes so far as to call her Little House books fiction. I don't completely agree with him on that point, but I did learn a lot and wanted to know more about the actual accurate early life of Laura. Miller makes reference in this book to Laura's first attempt at novel writing; an unpublished manuscript called "Pioneer Girl." I did a little research and found that copies are available from the Herbert Hoover Library in West Branch, Iowa. It is costly, but worth it for the biggest fan. It is definetly an adult read, though, don't plan on reading this to your children as a bedtime story.

Hope this review was helpful - enjoy!

Miller pretty well refutes the contention that Rose Wilder Lane ghostwrote the "Little House" books. There is no question that she edited her mother's manuscripts, and without her connections in the publishing industry there is a good chance the books might not have been published at all. However, the books were and are Laura's.

It's also important to remember that the "Little House" books only cover Laura's life up to her marriage, and that she in fact lived less than 15 years in DeSmet. She spent the remaining 63 years of her life in Missouri. I always thought that Missouri was an odd choice of destinations, but there in fact were compelling reasons, and Miller does explain them.

Some have criticized this book because they feel that it almost becomes a biography of Rose Wilder Lane about halfway through. A more careful reading gives an explanation for why this seems to be the case; Rose left massive amounts of personal archives, letters, and other documents when she died. On the other hand, Laura ("Mama Bess")left very little of this kind of information behind, and were it not for Rose's archives there would be even bigger gaps in the narrative. Miller does mention that a roomfull of possessions left behind in Laura's parents' home in DeSmet was discarded by the new owners of the house, and it's just possible that some of her letters were lost there.

If some people wish the book provided more in-depth detail about Laura's life in Missouri, then they should also wish for even more information about Almanzo. At the end of this book we know only a little more about him than we did at the end of "The First Four Years." He was apparently a man of few words, either spoken or written, so he largely remains an enigma. What little we do know about him comes from either Laura or Roses's writings.

One thing we do learn is that Laura never lost her pioneering spirit. In 1925 she, Rose, and a good friend of Rose's drove all the way to the West Coast from Missouri. A transcontinental auto trip in 1925 was sitll a major adventure, and even more remarkable when undertaken by three women. An account of this adventure surely would have made for good reading, but apparently neither Laura nor Rose thought of it.

This has been something of a rambling review, so I will conclude that Miller did very good work, and that any true fans of Laura Ingalls Wilder or her daughter would do well to read it.

I listened to an Audio CD version of the play and I regret to say that I found it unmoving. The Brooklyn accents of the characters seemed to fade in and out on occasion and they deep dark revelations about their personal lives seemed to be revealed without much emotion most of the time.

I really had high hopes for the drama but felt it was more gimmick than gripping.

I found Broken Glass interesting but disappointing. One expects the film to hold a much deeper secret and comes away from it thinking "This story has already been told." The three main actors, Margot Leicester, Mandy Patinkin and Henry Goodman, are all marvelous and far better than the script allows. I found Elizabeth McGovern a rather strange choice for the role of Dr.Hyman's wife. I own this film because I'm a huge Mandy Patinkin fan, but I wouldn't have spent the money otherwise.

The dimensions of healing placed in contradistinction to the tyranny of complaint.

This book provides a good basic reading material which would be useful to get a first sight of valuing a commercial bank. However, for practicioners, it seems that the book is not deep enough to answer "why" questions and not technical enough in providing enough "bullets" to be used in the real world. For me it's dissapointing, since my colleague recommends it highly.

As someone who has followed the bank merger game for quite some time I found this book to be an excellent read. It discusses in detail how to properly go about valuing the various peculiar assets of a bank such as deposits. It also goes in depth on how the various valuation methods differ from each other. It was a valuable guide to help me determine the fair value of merger candidates in the 90's bank merger boom. I suggest it to anyone who invests in bank stocks.

This book is overpriced and of poor quality. The paper and printing are well below current standards even though it was published in 2000. I really wasted my money on this. I did find his ranting about society in general somewhat interesting. Seems people complained about the same things in 1934 that they do now: Society is in a mess and the media is mainly at fault for this. What is the cure for all these ills? The Pilates Method.

If you are looking to get started with Pilates excercises don't buy this book. You can buy two or three of the others for the same price.

I am a Pilates instructor so I found the book immensely helpful in understanding the origins of the Method. I would, however, only recommend this book for an instructor or a serious student of Pilates as it is not an easy read. If someone is looking for a glossy, modern guide to Pilates, this is not the book. It amazed me that so many of the techniques he advocated so many years ago are so effective today. Both the vintage pictures and the text fascinated me! Again, this is an excellent book for people who really want to know and understand pure, unadultered Pilates.

I find this book very informative, not only historically but medically. As a nurse it's interesting to see what techniques are applicable to today and which we now know may not be safe. It's also interesting to see how Joe's original descriptions of his exercises have changed over the years, according to who is doing the teaching. I feel it was really overpriced for it's size, but for me worth it.

Like so many other books written by corporate presidents selling creative thinking, it is full of how I did this job at this prestigious company. A marketing exercise rather then a book to advice you how to do it.

I found that it had few ideas.

Kind of an ordinary treatment of creativity in the workplace. But has a value.

This is a how-to manual for inspiring and supporting creativity at the individual, group, and organizational level. It teaches you how to recognize your own innvate creative qualities. You will then be introduced to what Miller calls the "Creative Journey" -- a four stage process through which every type of creative endeavor passes. It offers a framework for identifying a challenge, focusing on priority issues, generating creative ideas, and implementing them. The gbook offers a variety of techniques for developing ideas and shows you the four "innovation styles" on which all idea-generation techniques are based. Also learn how to spark the motivation required for high level creativity by uniting people behind a shared purpose, a vision for thefuture, and aset of core values. It shos you how to ignite the internal drive and enthusiasm in yourself and others that launch creativity to its fullest potential. ...from Soundview Executive Book Summaries

Years ago, in the days of the starving artist, I guess, writers wrote whole books, sent the finished product to publishers who either published or didn't.

Unfortunately these days, writers send off a few chapters to the publishers and get a huge advance. After they get paid, they see the whole thing in an entirely different light to quote Groucho Marx in "Room Service". Often the end is NOT nearly as GOOD AS THE BEGINING! (Roger Zelazny was famous for starting books, getting advances and not finishing them).

Briefly, there IS a plot in Difference Engine! It's one of the most tantalizingly interesting (and frustrating) alternate history books I've ever read, as far as it goes.(did you know that 19th century English "dollymops" wore shoes with brass high-heels? presumeable to avoid round heels when walking the street??) BUT IT STOPS in the middle of the book, leaving plot lines and the ending completely unresolved. The authors just lost interest, introducing and blaming a shadowy character at the end who isn't really in the book at all.

Be forwarned.

After reading the opinions of other readers here, I wondered if we had all read the same book. I suspect that those who find this book a disappointment came to it hoping to read a work more in line with previous books by either of these two well-respected science fiction authors. Finding something different, they left unsatisfied. If one approaches this book with an open mind, I think they will be pleasantly suprised. The two authors paint a convincing, detailed alternative history that weaves several narratives into a cohesive whole that falters only slightly at the end. The characters are for the most part three-dimensional, and fit well within the world Gibson and Sterling have created. The atmosphere is dark and brooding, and the benifits and costs of an England dominated by steam-driven computers are well represented. The poltical climate and "world of the difference engine" are both plausible and entertaining. The only place in which the authors falter is in their attempt to move the narrative beyond entertainment into the philosophical and metaphysical. Then ending is somewhat reminiscent of the finale of Nueromancer, and is written in the sterotypical clipped Gibson style, which contrasts sharply with the rest of the novel. Had Gibson and Sterling left their work in the more mundane realm of (alternative) historical adventure, they would have had an unqualified success. Depsite that shortcoming, I recommend this book wholeheartedly. It is unlike any other work by these two authors, and thus you should expect something different. It is a rousing adventure set in a plausible alternative world, similar in tone and style to Frost's excellent "List of 7," only slightly hindered by some metaphysical trappings.

In contrast to most of the negative reviews, I thought the suprise ending was powerful and not entirely unexpected.Though this book is science fiction, its way of leading up to the suprise ending is similar to the stratigy used in the movie "Sixth Sense." Both start out slow,yet lead to powerfull endings which are foreshadowed with tantilizing clues.This last means that both stories should be seen more than once in order to be better understood.The Difference Engine is, thus, a complex story that requires an open mind and multiple readings in order to enjoy.