I enjoyed using this book to teach my 3rd grader about thedifferent systems and functions of the human body. I especially likedthe moveable features of the display models, they worked remarkably well and gave better understanding to the lessons. The text, although a most of it is in very small print, is more than adequate for teaching. I even learned a LOT! A nice resource!

"Monday..." is part of a series of books about the Rabbi,which I have'nt read yet. I found this one in a used book store, and bought it mostly for the provcative religion-related title. It turned up to be a thrilling mystery. It was written in the mid-70s, and this is shown in the plot (Arab terrorists in Jerusalem, etc.), but that only means that you learn a bit about the way Israel was (at least, in American eyes) in the mid-70s, and about sections in the Jewish community in America at that time. On the other hand, I guess that you must have basical knowledge and interest in the Jewish Community/Judaism/Israel in order to enjoy this book.

I am not a big fan of detective novels, but I read Harry Kemelman's SATURDAY THE RABBI WENT HUNGRY with pleasure because in addition to a mystery/murder plot (which, OK, may not have been the trickiest I ever read)he surrounded the story with a lot of Jewish lore, cultural details of a synagogue's inner workings, and--for me--familiar local detail. It certainly helps to be from Marblehead when you read Kemelman stories because, for the most part, that is where they are set. Like any good author or cinematographer, Kemelman presents his characters and the locale as a pastiche of several individuals and locations, but as he lived in this town for close to 50 years, Marblehead is undoubtedly the fount of most of his inspiration; the source of his observations of human life in a small Yankee town suddenly settled by a considerable Jewish population.

The story moves along very well with asides to explain various Jewish traditions and customs. This may have been geared to a different time and generation, when the Jewish religion was still strange and foreign to many Americans on the East Coast. Certainly Kemelman's characters like to use phrases like "you people" and "your Yom Kippur", phrases that I have not heard in many, many years. Times have changed. But this story still stands as a monument to its times, to that period when New England Christians and Jews were still getting to know one another. If you know or want to know a New England town with its various characters, pressures, and patterns, if you want to read an enjoyable story with a Jewish background, then be sure to read this book.

This was a good book, I recomend it. If you like thrillers and mysteries this is a good book.

"Tuesday the Rabbi Saw Red" is one of the best mysteries out there. It takes place mainly on a Massachusetts college campus during the Vietnam era. Kemelman opens up with pieces of information that seem irrelevant, but everything falls into place. There is a clear plot, a defined theme, and the characters are real. This book will keep you wondering "whodunit" until the end.

The first "Bill" book was good. Not great, but decent, funny and satirically sharp. The rest of the series is barely-mitigated garbage. By this point, he's clearly not even writing the stuff at all, as one "co-author" after another takes over. Sadly, it's difficult to see how it would be any better if he had. Harrison can write great, lively, funny, inventive sci-fi: the early "Rat" books, "Deathworld". "Deathworld" works so well because he wrote three short books, one short story and then stopped (or converted its protagonist into the Rat, one could argue). But the Rat books decay into a muddle when it becomes clear that Harrison just thrives on the stock elements of the stories; the capers, gadgets and booze. Continuity and development can go hang. Who cares if English was the native language of Jim diGriz's homeworld in some books but has to learn it in others? Who cares that the man who has dealt with money in every form from coin to electronic transfer can suddenly be confused by a wallet and its contents? Stick with the ride and it'll all work out OK. The Rat character and the main ingredients are good enough. After a while, though, the contempt that Harrison exudes for his audience starts to get wearing. If Harrison doesn't care enough to keep consistent about basic details of his major character's history, why should we care about him at all?

But with "Bill", we reach this point after Book 1. The character is not as accessible, his lot in life not as enjoyable to read about, the reversals he suffers tiresome. Add in some often appallingly bad attempts at genre parody (the Cyberpunk and Orson Scott Card efforts in one of this series, in particular, were cringe-makingly horrible) and it's no surprise that in every used SF bookstore I've seen, a chunk of the Harry Harrison shelfspace is taken by barely-touched copies of "Bill the Galactic Hero And Something Or Other" by Harry Harrison And Some Guy. I've read them all once and will never touch any of them again. Harrison clearly doesn't care about Bill, and nor do I.

Harry Harrison has an ingenius talent when it comes to creating fundamentally likeable,amusing characters and scenarios.Similar to sleeeepery jeeeeem digriz(anti-hero of the stainless steel rat series)Bill is stuck in the TROOPERS and all his adventures revolve around trying to get out and back to his sepia-toned robomule.The final adventure is more topical than previous novels but is firmly rooted in the soil of mirth with running gags,polevaulting gags and gags on rocket powered rollerblades(both left footed,chuckle chuckle chuckle)ah bejesus,this was my 'bath book' for ages,like a fine wine in nearly no way at all except its funnier.buy this for a much needed laugh at the military mind.

Harris and Harrison have taken their Galactic Hero into the middle of a war for control of vital neutron mines. This book takes Bill back to satiric vision created by Harrison in the original book, Bill the Galatic Hero. Funny, occasionally moving, with an undercurrent of contemporary commentary on the nature of war--and people who like their jokes well-aged.

I'm not familiar with the other Rabbi Small books, which are apparently mysteries. Conversations With Rabbi Small provides a thorough examination of the Jewish religion. As the title suggests, most of the novel covers a series of conversations between Rabbi Small and a couple, Aaron and Joan. Aaron is Jewish; Joan is Christian, but is considering converting for the sake of her impending marriage. Aaron is not a religious Jew, but a scientist with an atheistic bent. Rabbi Small takes it upon himself to "convert" Aaron by explaining how Judaism is actually perfectly compatible with science and reason. As a non-Jew (and nonChristian actually) with an avid interest in history, philosophy and religion, I found Conversations to be a good source of information. One caveat --some non-Jews, especially religious Christians, may find some of the Rabbi's views objectionable. To paraphrase one passage, for example: "Christianity is a religion for dying, Judaism for living." He is similarly (and predictably) biased concerning the Arab-Israeli conflict. And if he is less than charitable towards Christianity, he (the author, that is, speaking as Rabbi Small) shows very little understanding of either Eastern religions or mysticism, both of which are simplistically equated with mere escapism. Rabbi Small represents a particular sect of Judaism, the conservative branch. He is critical of Jews who believe in life after death and any form of mysticism (thus dismissing virtually the entire Kabbalistic tradition). Yet, while all these points may be debated, they don't really detract from the book. Indeed, it wouldn't be realistic to have a devout conservative Rabbi give equal treatment to other traditions. History does, after all, give Jews good reason to be suspicious of Christians. And the biases that are present are openly admitted (e.g. Rabbi Small doesn't claim to speak for all Jews). Conversations is in the tradition of the Platonic dialogues, with Aaron and Joan playing, to some extent, shills for the wise Socratic Rabbi. The book is well written, with enough external distractions from the dialogue to remind the reader that these are real people, not merely disembodied intellects.

very educational and enlightening. Conversations wtih Rabbi Small opened my eyes about the jewish culture and religion.

enjoyed every little phrase. aheavy subject made very interestingfound lot of similarities to hinduism though no mention was ever madeaboutitanywhere in the whole book authorhas kept the interest and the line of thought of the reader tied tothe book throughout

Murasaki star system contains a duo of inhabitable planets that orbit each other: Genji - a high-gravity world with a dense, soupy atmosphere; and Chujo - an arid, wintry world of canyons and wind-swept plains. Neither is perfect for humans - on Genji they must wear pressure suits in addition to getting used to gravity levels half-again as high as on Earth; Chujo is more forgiving, though it can be intensely cold. Both planets serve home to sapient races: the Ihrdizu of Genji - low-tech amphibians that congregate in small villages; and the humanoids of Chujo - aloof, mysterious beings that ignore the humans entirely. It is here that the first manned interstellar expeditions will arrive, bearing humans of all frames of mind - Earthlings and off-worlders, atheists and philosophers, mystics and iconoclasts...

Instead of being a collaborative novel, "Murasaki" is a mixed bag of science fiction stories that share a setting, each written by a different award-winning author. Mind the fact that the only interesting part is the fairly in-depth world-creation notes (included as appendices), and that the stories are pathetically shallow and lead virtually nowhere...

...That is precisely what I though about this "science fiction novel in six parts" prior to reading the last two parts, which are so refreshingly, profoundly excellent that I almost wept with awe. A mystery of interplanetary proportions is suddenly built up and then revealed in flying colors.

It's really a pity that the rest of Murasaki doesn't follow suit.

I became interested in this book after reading Otherness by David Brin. One of the short stories in Otherness is actually a chapter in Murasaki. The book itself is has a very intruiging storyline and I enjoyed reading much of it. The only problam I had was the mental transition I had to make with each chapter of the book, as they are all written by different authors.

All in all, I would definitely recommend this book for anyone who likes the work of Brin, Bear, Anderson, Pohl, Kress etc etc etc.. They all wrote parts of it.

A good read.

Yoder's book provides a clear and useful account of a great many subjects dealing with SW listening that can be exceptionally useful for beginners without being at all patronizing. Nowhere else, for instance, have I seen as understandable a description of SSB (which I had never quite understood before), and the beginner or even devoted non-fanatical listener can learn about a large number of both essential and delightfully arcane topics (utility, number and pirate stations spring immediately to mind) that are either completely uncovered in the major guides or treated so cursorily that they are useless. On the other hand, much of Yoder's volume is devoted to a country-by-country survey of SW listening, and it is here that his guide is severely inadequate for nearly all users, for he fails to provide the detailed information about frequencies and programming that is essential for any SW listener. Much better is the superb Passport to World Band Radio and (if you can stomach it) the World Radio and TV Handbook (WRTH), both of which are far more up-to-date (since they're published annually) and significantly less expensive as well. Still, Yoder's volume contains info on a lot of topics that are either unexplained in the other volumes or explained so cursorily as to be useless. If you think of it as a book for people interested in learning about SW without having a radio nearby, then it has real merit, but if you're looking for a vade mecum to keep next to your radio, this isn't the book you want.

Andy Yoder has done a yeoman's job with this book, but calling it "far and away the #1 bestseller in the field" is beyond hyperbole. Just look at its Amazon ranking and compare it to, say, Passport to World Band Radio or other books in the field.

A solid introduction to short-wave Radios and much more (CB radio, Computers, Amateur radio, etc.). The writing is straight forward and very informative. Solid tips that include a small selection of viable radios to purchase. This book along with "Passport to World Band Radio" should be on every serious short-wave enthusiast's bookshelf. Worthy purchase 4 stars.

I have the third edition and the latest edition of this book. In my opinion, the later editions have been dumbed down considerably. In addition to developing the basics of vector analysis, the older editions included splendid discussions of curvilinear coordinates, tensor analysis and touched on differential forms (the wedge product being introduced). While the latest edition features appendices covering specific applications such as Maxwells and Navier-Stokes equations, the explanations are far too brief to be of much use. I suggest that interested parties attempt to get used older editions whose content were presumably under the control of Davis (not Snider) being much better written and probably less expensive. The older edition had few typos with very useful and entertaining problem sets. A better alternative book might be "Vectors and Tensors in Engineering and Physics" by Donald A. Danielson in paperback.

This book was used in my vector calculus class at UCSD. I think if I was in one of my upper division engineering classes it would be great to use as a reference to help me figure out problems. However, as a math book alone, this was not too helpful. Many of the explanations lack clarity and are from a mathmatician's point of view (in other words, very difficult for lower division students who are not math majors to understand). Also, a lot of the problems are practically impossible. The only reason I did alright in this class was because I had a great teacher. I would recommend this book for people who are in science or engineering classes and need a superficial introduction to vector calculus, but NOT for math classes that go into deep analysis of vectors.

This book provides a great reference for people studying the physical sciences. I'm a Ph.D. student in Physical Chemistry and have been using it extensively to help out with some other courses. It might not be as good for someone with a more puritanical or abstract interest, e.g. a mathematician, but it's great for anyone that needs a handy reference that explains the rudiments of vector analysis.