I appreciate a good horse as much as the next guy. Looking at horses through Keith's eyes makes me love them. I'm not going to run out and buy tight pants and a helmet because of this book, but you get the idea. The images are well made and seen. Not all of the pictures have the tilt-shift look which has been overdone so that's good. The layout is great. A square book for a square image. Keith's little ditty about Ezekiel's Horse is a warm piece of writing. If you're a Keith Carter fan, buy the book. If you like horses, buy the book. If your interested in photography, buy the book. If your name is Mr. Ed, look for your portrait on page 29, then call your lawyer.

Whoa! No one can begin to describe Keith Carter's style and vision. You have to experience it. It's not just what he sees, it's how he renders it, making it new and timeless too. This is a book you'll want to open often.

i admit i was skeptic when i first heard about this book, and i had no intentions of buying it. i'm not that crazy about horses. but i got a look at an advanced copy, and i saw the the work was just beautiful and i had to have it. be sure to look at orange tree and nude and arabian, which are my two favorite pictures.

keith carter's new book of photographs is a beautifully put together book. the publishers did an excellent job, they made a book that just looks beautiful, though i do see where keeping it in good condition might get to be a problem. the images are beautiful images, but after a while you do get a little tired of seeing the same thing over and over again. it's not as good as 25 Years, but i'd still recommend this book as an excellent purchase.

I like this selective focus images so much!
It's like a dream!

I was browsing through the bookstore one day when I spotted this book. I have never seen prints (OK, reproductions of prints) so beautiful in all my life, and as a photo student I'm addicted to looking at every kind of photograph imaginable. Carter uses the Hasselblad arc-flex, a sort of bellows for the medium format camera, to get dream-like images where part of the image is in sharp focus and other parts drift off into softness. He has an extraordinary sense of light, capturing so many subtle nuances, and he tones his prints beautiful shades of brown and purple. Carter seems to tell stories with his photos - it's like you "read" his pictures, instead of simply looking at them. His passion for life and for what he calls visual "opera" are evident in every shot. Looking at his book, one is transported to a whole other universe, and dwells there happily.

This book is a fascinating way to help children connect with the natural world while teaching important environmental concepts. It comes with a guide to use the book effectively, and is divided into sections of special topics. Each section contains a Native American story, discussion ideas, interesting questions, and related indoor and outdoor activities. These activities can be accomplished without expensive materials, often in or near the home or school. Oh, by the way, adults will learn from this book also!

I am a homeschooling mom and I bought this book to use with my kindergartener. This is an amazing book that combines social studies and science wonderfully. It contains alot about american indian beliefs and practices, distinguishing between the many tribal groups and traditions instead of lumping them all into one large culture. It uses indian legends as a jumping off point to study the environment, how it affects us and how we affect it.

This is a useful, well-documented book for those interested in studying the different ways mathematics may have developed in our history. It is interesting to compare the book, which traces how our ancestors may have developed algorithms (mostly empirical) to calculate astronomical events, with others covering historical approaches in different areas in the World. For example, the one "The Exact Sciences in Antiquity" was written to trace the development of different mathematical methods (more conceptual and theoretical) to solve the same problem in Southwest Asia (Assryria, Babylonia) and the Middle East. There is one by Professor Van der Waerden which treats the history of mathematics in Greece and Egypt particularly well. And, there are others dealing with the development of mathematics and numbers in Egypt. I consider this book as a valuable historical resource to use for this type of study.

A fairly laid-back analysis of the current information without the hype and bombast usually ascribed to these works. Wood isn't writing to debunk or pander, just to state the facts. It's a blessed relief.

This is a clear and thorough an expose of the fraud perpetrated by Bruno Grosjean Dossekker, who falsely claimed, in Fragments, to be one Binjamin Wilkomirski, a child survivor of the Holocaust. Stefan Maechler proves beyond any doubt that Wilkomirski is no such person and that Fragments is a fiction.

The author pursued every possible lead. He compared each minute detail in Dossekker's narration of "events" with historical records from such leading Holocaust scholars as Raul Hilberg and Lawrence Langer, accounts of other child survivors, interviews with members of the Dossekker and Grosjean families and more.

The most damning evidence Maechler unearthed is the fact that in 1981, Dossekker/Wilkomirski contested the will of Yvonne Grosjean, whom, in a letter to officials in Bern Siwtzerland, he called "my birth mother." Dossekker/Wilkomirski received a third of her estate.

Other damning evidence includes Dossekker/Wilkomirski's use of Laura Grabowski to "corroborate" his story. Grabowski claims to have known him in a children's home in Krakow. In fact, Grabowski is an American citizen of Christian faith who has since her youth fabricated stories about her victimhood, the most well-publicized being a book called Satan's Underground. The Social Security number of said Lauren Stratford is the same as that of Grabowski, who subsequently used it to make a false survivor's claim. Furthermore, Satan's Underground and Dossekker/Wilkomirski's book contain startling similarities.

The one problem with Maechler's work concerns his questions about how such a fraud could be perpetrated. He concludes that the volume of Holocaust material made the fraud possible. Unfortunately, this amounts to blaming the victim. There is something tawdry in blaming the commemoration and documentation of the worst crime in history for the appearance of a single fraud, or two. Holocaust historians must guard against even the unintentional falsification of the record. But documenting the history is not a problem. The problem is that any evil of the Holocaust's enormity ever needed to be documented. Alyssa A. Lappen

This is the account of the real life detective work carried by the swiss historian Stefan Maechler about the authenticity
of Fragments, the (as it turned out, invented) childhood memoirs of a swiss musician claiming to be a survivor of the Nazi's
concentration camps. The "memoirs", which constituted a literary event in Europe and the US in 1995 and brought its author fame and
recognition, were first accused of being false three years later, and this report, based on interviews and official documents, definitely
settles the matter. But on top of this, it is also a really delight to read. It is organized in roughly three parts: a first one where the history of
Wilkomirski (real name: Grosjean) early years is presented, together with Wilkomirski own version, and the events leading to the writting
and publishing of Fragments, its reception, and its denunciation as fraud. A second one describing the author's historical research. And a
third part with a very perceptive and fair analysis of the whole affair. A discussion of important issues related with the instrumentalization
of the Holocaust, and references to recent works about this matter (Cole, Novick, etc) ends the book. A serious book on a real life event
that can be read and enjoyed as an excellent detective novel, with not a few surprising discoveries in the end. This english translation of
the german original Der Fall Wilkomirski also includes, after the main text, a complete text of Fragments.

This first book of fiction (33 short stories) by an ex-East German (an Ossi) has won several prizes in Germany. This is not necessarily praise - it tells you this is the kind of literature that gets prizes. The translation appears excellent.

The preface and one of the stories tell the same tale from two points of view - that the book itself is the edited version of some weekly letters written home by a German businessman working in St. Petersburg. At first, the businessman wrote of St. Petersburg life. Then, lacking material, he began building the letters around fictional tales, and this is the part of his output from which the present book was compiled. Many stories are indeed in the first person, and the first person is a German working on a Russian weekly in St. Petersburg. Put the two pictures together and you have a good idea of the general style. The missing elements are a) that many tales are fantastic and b) that quite a few are inspired by previous tales in literature.

To my eyes, the "reportorial" details are faithful and revealing, and they have the appreciable virtue of not falling for "that unique St. Petersburg spirit", though almost all the stories are set in the region. What is revealed is more often urban or village life in West Russia generally, and this is as it should be.

If you take the fiction as presented above, then it's a nice framework into which to post these observations. But if you take it as fiction, then the framework betrays a serious literary failure. In all stories, third- or first-person, the tone is that of the external reporter, and this simply doesn't bring to the prose the color it needs to carry the fantasy, and especially to breathe life into the cultural and spiritual themes that are the motive force behind it. We have fantastic themes, yes, but only the usual insights of the most ploddingly realistic fiction.

Said another way - if rich prose is prose that holds within its sentences gripping detail, deep color and complex cultural connotations and evocations, then 33 Moments is an example of poor literary prose. It's the kind of prose you would find in a long New York Times article, treating one thing at a time and always in the same tone.

The closest ambitious writer I could think of to compare Schulze with is Michael Moorcock (in his Mother London/Cornelius Quartet mode) and if you like Moorcock (who influenced comics, cyberpunk the whole noir revival in the US) you'll go with Schulze's flow just as easily. I am a fan of both writers, though not of Moorcock's fantasy, which I liked as a kid, and I've been looking for years for a writer as good. This and Simple Stories are really outstanding. Schulze is a definite heavy weight on his way up. It's been a while since Germany showed us a writer as good and as ambitious as this. Wonderful work.

each of the 33 stories in this book prvided me with vivid places and deleicate people. the stories made me cry and laugh. this is one of the greatest collections of short stories i have read and it provided me with a true sense of beauty and honesty, about peole and life and the value of moments.

Tired of buying your kid another mindless, souless piece of useless plastic? Then try John Nelson's book about American folk toys. Not only does Nelson delve into the history of toys in America, he also provides blueprints and step-by-step instructions on how to build them. The book should appeal to anyone interested in toys, anyone looking for gift ideas, anyone who is handy with tools, and anyone who wants to learn!

Nelson has done a splendid job of integrating the readability of a coffee table book and the ruggedness of a functional shop-guide. His smooth writing style and clever wit led me to read the book cover to cover in the first night it was in my possesion. The illustrations are of the utmost quality. Truly a first rate book. Thank you John, for a book that will hopefully lead to homemade toys for my grandchildren this christmas!

Wow! What a terrific book! My daughter came across it when we were Mother's Day shopping. We fell in love with it because of the beautiful pictures and clear illustrations.

The way the book is designed and written makes it very easy-to-use. The writing is so engaging that my daughter asked me to read the Climbing Bear section over and over! The clearly written instructions and sharp illustrations get even me, not a woodworker, ready to go ahead and give it a try.

I especially like the introductory material presented for each toy or game. The author gives interesting anecdotes on the toy's origin, history, and often how he stumbled upon it. The author, in addition to being a careful writer, clearly has first-hand knowledge of how children love and use toys and games. He also has a penchant for beautiful simplicity.

I've just been travelling for 2 months and decided to pack a ratty second copy of The Magic Mountain with me. A long 'didactic' novel, certainly enough sustenance for any journey. I managed to skim through most of the last half on a 10 hour train trip, so my impressions will be that of a tourist. A friend of mine who read it said it was a powerful work of philosophy. Having studied a certain amount of philosophy, I found certainly a whole wealth of philosophical, sociological and historical musings. But to my annoyance, none of the issues could really be developed into a strongly structured argument. Rather, I feel, Mann was trying to conjure up the intellectual milieu of the time. If anything, Mann, as artist was trying to describe the philosophy of the age from a point above philosophy, weaving a narrative of contradictory thoughts, if you will. I found the characters beautifully drawn and they rebounded off each perfectly. From the indolent, dreamy Hans to the intensely funny Settembri, as he pontificated what was basically an inarticulate philosophical position. The book was at its best in the heated discussions which cemented the foible and nuaced details of the characters. But...between these conversations, I found the prose rather lacklustre and pedestrian. Pages and pages of static descriptions of the sanitarium put me very close to catatonia, until I got woken up by the arrival of some characters. Perhaps I've been spoiled by the writings of some more contemporary writings, but couldn't the passage of time be evoked by ways other than the physical passing of time in the reading process itself? But let it be said, the coherence of the novel is staggering. The tightness of the structure is sustained over the course of this weighty novel. Now that is a feat to be admired.

I grabbed hold of this novel after I read that Susan Sontag read this aloud when she was an adolescent. Harold Bloom, the literar critic from Yale, said that this book requires considerable learning to read and understand. Having read all of it and understood most of it I feel pretty well.

The thrilling part of this novel is when Hans Castrop is educated into the ways of an intellectual life by his mentor Herr Settembrini. In the rarefied air of the mountain sanatorium the two debate art and literature. For an air-chair intellectual like myself it was fun to learn more about the humanities from the discourse of Herr Settembrini.

Like all of Mann's novels and short stories the prose is beautifully written. And as Susan Sontag points out "The Magic Mountain" includes it's own built in literary criticism to help you understand the plot and theme.

For a homosexual, Thomas Mann knows the heterosexual skill of seducing a female. When Hans Castorp was wooing Madame Chucat I had to look over my shoulder and see if anyone spied my embarrassment as I am sure I was blushing. This was such a beautiful narrative that I wanted to subject it to memory so I could use it in the future. (I have the same goal for some of Shakespeare's sonnets and soliloquoys.)

I am still a little confused by the ending. I won't ruin it for you but suffice it to say it is not clear to me which character was the subject of the final few paragraphs. Maybe someone can recommend an Edmund Wilson, Irving Howe, or other informed criticism that I can read.

Nominally, the Magic Mountain is the story of Hans Castorp, a young German man who has just finished school and is about to start on a career in shipbuilding. First, he goes for three weeks to a Swiss sanatorium to visit his cousin, partly for a vacation before he starts his job and partly to convince his cousin, a soldier, that he should rejoin the real world rather than stay in the sanatorium. Castorp gets a check-up from the doctor, learns that he is ill and remains for seven years.

Mann originally started this book as a novella parody of sanatoriums and medicine in the early 20th Century, when doctors were first saying that disease was created by organisms and were enamored with the power of the newly discovered x-rays. However, Mann stopped the novella at the beginning of World War I, and came back to it at after the war, realizing that he had a lot to say and that this story might be a good vehicle through which to say it.

After all, the sanatorium's clientele were the new rich and the old upper class of all the different countries of Europe who began the war. The doctors acted both as the leaders who led them through the insanity and the scientists who made the mechanized, horrible war possible. And Hans Castorp was the age of the soldiers, following the leaders, the aristocracy, the scientists and the intellectuals into battle.

You can read all this into the book, if you wish. The doctors are firm in their belief that they are helping their patients, but are not above shenanigans like "proving" with little evidence that patients should stay year-round, rather than leave for the summer in order to line their wallets. Herr Settembrini and later Herr Nafta are the intellectuals filling Castorp with ideas that seem sometimes benign and sometimes diabolical. Castorp is a young, impressionable man who falls madly in love for a fellow patient, Clavdia, but has no outlet for his emotion, except during Carnival--a truly amazing scene, which alone is enough to make the book worthwhile. No wonder this continent was plunged into a tragic war that left Mann with the need to write this beautiful, tragic book.

I, however, was more interested in Mann's thoughts about of life in general that permeate this book. My favorite example is the way Mann talks about the concept of "getting used to getting used." He describes it in the sense of Castorp who never gets used to the thin air in the Alps and therefore always winds up redfaced and short of breath. However, Castorp does get used to always being redfaced and short of breath. Therefore, he gets used to getting used to the Alps.

This is what part of life is. We are unhappy with many parts of our life (maybe a job, maybe family, maybe friends or lack of friends, or financial resources) and we never get used to that. It leaves us with an empty feeling somewhere in our soul and no way to get rid of it. We never get used to this problem and thus the empty feeling never goes away. But we get used to the empty place in our soul and think of it only occasionally. But it is there crying out.

What a sad thought about life. The solution, of course, is to listen to the part that is crying out rather than squelching it and to try to do something about it. But it is often easier to get used to getting used to a situation than it is to fix the situation. It is easier for Castorp to stay in the mountains rather than breathing normally.

Overall, an excellent book, with ideas that I had never even come close to thinking of before.

The story is a little sad, but it is very interesting. There are a lot of animals in it, and anyone who likes animals would enjoy reading this book. It takes place in a forest and a meadow. The author uses lots of exotic names of animals such as sedgehens and yellow birds. The main enemy is man and He comes into the story a bit too much. The story is very detailed and does have lots of hard words, but it's worth reading. I liked it much better than the Disney movie.

I first read Bambi 30 years ago and was lucky enough to find a 1929 copy that I will hold dear to my heart forever. The author takes you deep into the forest where you become one of the animals. You can feel the cold and smell the fear among them when the two-legged animal called "Man" arrives. It allows readers to immerse themselves in the world, seeing it from an animal's point of view.

It's a great book to share with kids and a valuable learning experience about the ways of nature. At times it is cruel and very true to life. It teaches respect for our elders, and love of family. We stand back and watch Bambi grow stronger until he has a sense of wisdom that only experience can bring. This is truly a book to share with your kids. It is so much more than a Disney cartoon.

The only reason I read Bambi by Felix Salten was because I thought the Disney movie was kind of "cute."

THE BOOK IS SOOOOOOOO MUCH BETTER.

This isn't exactly what you would call a children's book. Salten has written what some would almost call a satire about survival in the woods and the dangers of manpower. This book (along with Salten's other book, Fifteen Rabbits) has been the only book that has moved me to tears. This is a must-read for ANYONE. You won't be able to put it down. But, beware, there are some pretty moving and powerful scenes in this story, so have some kleenexes ready! (In the end, EVERY major character, including Faline, his father, etc., is killed except for Bambi and his two young children.)

P.S.--If you liked this book, be sure to go out and read Salten's other book about forest life, except this time from a rabbit's point of view: Fifteen Rabbits. You'll love it!

Being a lyricist (ck. home.earthlink.net/~paulkruger), I've been using Wood's Unabridged Rhyming Dictionary for so many years the book has begun to fall aprt. (Never realized till a few weeks ago, the edition I have was published in 1943.) It was time to replace it. Or so I thought.
Clement Wood's genius was to divide each section so that you could see at a glance words which have the same sound (e.g., approved, improved, reproved, etc.) and, therefore, were not true rhymes. So what does this appallingly dreadful edition do? They list all words alphabetically regardless of sound!
No wonder one of the editors is named Bogus.

For pedants and poets. Songwriters should skip it and look for something a little more intuitive and easier to understand.

Most people can come up with several words that rhyme with any given other word. This book gives you the words you thought of, plus ALL THE OTHERS! Not only does this rhyming dictionary list all of the rhyming sounds and sylables imaginable, but there are phonetic rules (rhyme and reason!) stated, which make the entire matter completely logical. -- This publication is a fantastic tool for song writers. I've used this book for years, it has a prominent eye-level place on my shelf. Highly recommended!