Jasper's intimate expose of family lifeand history of the mysterious Tacho Drom..the Way...is music to my ears andeyes. I truly was enchanted and couldfeel the people in their journey fromIndia and the thousands of miles andyears that led them to North Wales. For me this book was healing and beingwhat he calls the diddiker, one quarterGypsy, made sense. The courage it tookto go public, and make a book availablethat the Gypsies and Gaujo world canparticipate with the fairy tales of ourIndo-European childhoods...is a greatconnecting link in a pluralistic society, here racism is a political wayof creating hatred and fear. Jasperdeals kindly with all aspects of religion and spiritual practices of theindigenous tribal people. There areeleven million gypsies of the Rom whobelong to the Romany Union, worldwide.I wish they knew about this book.Suzette Lynn Price...aka Sophia Mubarak

Fascinating, warts-and-all first-person account of Gypsy life and traditions. His experiences are rich and his meditation suggestions make the Otherworld far more accessible than most books related to "magickal" studies. In this respect, it's a breakthrough book for shamanic explorations. However, even if you're simply interested in the context of Gypsy life, this can be a tremendously insightful book.

The Romani drom (path) calls individuals to believe in themselves and their imaginations. Not a book of initiations or techniques or an anthropological report of a tribe's practices, "We Borrow the Earth" vividly depicts key concepts and experiences in the development of an indigenous Romani Chovihano (shaman) as well as many examples from his students' own journeys to self-discovery. Through a gradual, grounded, earth-based process students of this path face challenges with the aid of fairy tale characters and structures familiar from childhood. Sleeping Beauty, Jack, ogres, castles - the characters and places which populate these journeys resonate with the ancient blood memory of those with Indo-European roots. Through these journeys, exercising our wits and senses, the students can find within what was always there - the courage, honesty, trust, and confidence to deal with the problems and opportunities in their everyday lives. We can learn to believe in ourselves again, as we did when we were children. If you read this book and if your heart is open, I believe you will find a magic key, an ancient memory. And you will find yourself longing to return to your 'wild,' natural and joyous self.

Writing and publishing this book required courage, honesty, and trust in the guidance of his Ancestors for Jasper Lee faced opposition and obstacles to sharing the Romani inner world. Having found the book even more enriching on a second reading, I thank him for facing these obstacles and not allowing his culture to be lost.

I have just read this remarkable book for the first time--for I plan to go back and read it again, slowly. It is sorely needed refreshment for the struggling Christian writer. It's also practical, easy to read, supportive and yet challenging. The book consists of thirty-three short chapters, with a supporting structure of Scriptural references, simple homework assignments, and plentiful examples from the author's own struggles. Just reading it is refreshing and soothing--thre is something remarkably restorative about the author's plain-spoken style. Some of the subjects she covers include dealing with rejection; doubt and despair; maintaining balance; and keeping up one's physical health. In short, this is a powerful book about the spirituality of Christian writing. I recommend it most highly.

I just received Marlene Bagnull's book, Write His Answer, and can't seem to put it down! Although I am certain about my call to be a Christian writer in my life, I also struggle with feelings of inadequacy. As a striving young Christian writer, the sound advice and tips from this book along with the sound Scripture references have truly been an answer to prayers. God used "Write His Answer" to provide a nudge in my own life to take a more active role as a Christian writer. I recommend this book to any Christian writer.

When I first started reading this book, I could not believe how practical it was. The biblical principles shared works and I would recommend this book to anyone who believes God has called them to write. It will basically answer most of your questions.

This book was excellent! Lee Varon provides a wealth of information in a clear, well-organized format. She guides the reader through a thoughtful decision-making process that helps you examine your own thoughts, needs, questions, readiness to be a single parent, etc., to determine whether adoption is right for you, and if so, how to go about starting the process. I found it to be just the right balance of practical detailed information, questions and issues to consider, brief stories and examples, and lots of ideas about how to gather further information and follow the path that's right for you. Highly recommended.

Lee Varon competently covers the vast emotional and practical realm of prospective single parent adoption. In a warm, experientiallly-based manner, this adoptive parent offers opportunities for readers to examine areas like "hopes, fears and realities", the positive aspects of single-parenting as well as predictable issues occuring within this kind of family structure. Sections like "The Needs of Adopted Children" allow us to visualize a future in which the parent and child/children find the best of what creating family and love can offer us. As a single parent of two internationally adopted children, I highly recommend this book as essential reading for prospective parents as well as others involved in this important field.

Varon's book is invaluable for anyone who plans to adopt a child. As the single parent of an adopted child, I wish this book had been available to me when I was going through the process of adoption. The book will help you to make an informed decision on whether or not adopting a child is right for you. As a single parent herself, Varon gives a warm, heartfelt, and practical approach to the ups and downs of single parenting.

In one lavishly illustrated and well-written volume, Gerald Durrell takes readers on a pocket tour of the infinite variety of the creatures that inhabit planet Earth and at the same time provides a brief tutorial on the methods and importance of simple, hands-on biological research. This is a gift of the first rank for any scientifically-inclined child, and great for adults too.

As readers of 'My Family and Other Animals' will be aware, Gerald Durrell's passion for animals was a constant throughout his life, and his legacy survives in the form of the Jersey Zoo, an institution devoted to the preservation of endangered species. Durrell was also a writer of tremendous charisma and charm, recounting his adventures around the world in a prose that is often unmatched in nature writing.

In 'The Amateur Naturalist', Gerald and wife Lee set out to create the sort of guide for which the much younger Durrell, loose among the wildlife of Corfu, would likely have killed (humanely, though). Broken down by habitats, with coloured illustrations and thoughtful, enjoyable text descriptions, 'The Amateur Naturalist' is a treasure trove for anyone interested in studying the world around them, no matter the part of the world in which they might live. Although you needn't be an actual collector in order to enjoy this book, there is also information on how to begin collecting wild flora and fauna (there is no recommendation, however, on the keeping of snakes in the bath or spiders in matchboxes).

For anyone that knows and loves nature, or would like to know more, this is definitely the book to have.

I found this in my local library and loved it. Now I'm trying to get a copy and I hope this works. I you find nature/biology at all interesting, this is the book for you. If Durrell wasn't my favorite author anyways this would make him my favorite for sure.

an electric dazzle of color light all infuse these poems, a terrific joy to read. it's on my nighht stand right now... a true talent!

This volume contains poems and prose-poems that are autobiographical (I assume), biographic and mythical. In the biographical series of interned Japanese, the poets' confidence that the story itself is sufficient creates very effective poems - simple language, well chosen details - and a person is drawn. In the mythic poems she uses more "poetic" language and imagery while retaining a highly effective simplicity. In the biographic poems, the segment that includes prose poems, there is a different sensibility, one drawn from hunting, from social isolation as the child of a war bride - a bride who married the enemy.

The most impressive feature of this volume is the confidence of the poet - the trusting of her skill, the power of story, the power of words. While much of the message of the poetry regards the policy of internment, the destruction of Hiroshima/Nagasaki, racial prejudice, childhood embarrassment of parents that are "other" etc., there is no trace of the diadactic in the poems. The poems simply sing.

A large passion guides these poems from the first line to the last. From tragedy to simple pleasures, an entire range of human emotions is chronicled in this unique collection of poems. Beyond Heart Mountain is a moving experience; a great addition to your library and life.

Ms. Malcolm nicely lays out the history of the tension between English rulers and subjects over the control of weapons. She made me realize that the current dispute in this country over access to firearms has a long pedigree. Her depiction of the circumstances under which England, in 1689, declared the right to bear arms "true, ancient, and indubitable," when in fact it was none of those is particularly interesting. (See p. 115.) She provides evidence for her view that "it is particularly ironic that some modern American lawyers have misread the English right to have arms as merely a 'collective' right inextricably tied to the need for a militia" (p. 119) when by 1689 the opposite was true. I'm not a historian or a gun enthusiast, but I find all of this quite fascinating.

When the book turns to the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution, however, its energy seems to flag. I am sympathetic to the argument that the Second Amendment confers a right on "the people" respectively, i.e. as individuals, "to keep and bear Arms." But Malcolm's argument is undermined, however slightly, when she urges that "[s]ome" i.e., more than one, nascent American state constitutions "included a specific right for an individual to have firearms for his own defence" (p. 150), but quotes and cites, as best I can discern, only the Pennsylvania bill of rights in support (pp. 148, 149). Is there more than one, or not? Another apparent example of waning energy toward the end is the treatment of an argument that "like the Convention Parliament in 1689, the senators [debating drafts of the Second Amendment] rejected a motion to add 'for the common defense' after 'to keep and bear arms.' " (P. 161.) To me, that point seems crucial, but Malcolm does not explore it further, beyond providing a footnoted reference to another source.

Finally, some minor quibbles. Noting the author's regular use of English spelling, I thought she was English until I realized, on reading the penultimate page, that she is an American (p. 176). Perhaps Malcolm was reared and educated in England, but nevertheless her anglicizations are distracting and seem affected. It also seems affected to spell "dissension" archaically as "dissention" (p. 153), and to print "u" as "v" in quoted material, as in "Vs" (Us) (p. 41) or "vpon" (upon) (p. 59). If one is going to do that, why not also ask the typesetter to print quotations with the long "s" that looks similar to the lower-case "f"? (Actually, I wouldn't so much object to that, though it would also come across as affected: at least the long "s" is still an "s," though of archaic form, whereas a "v" is not a "u" at all.) These are, of course, trivial items, but when I encounter them, I think, "Come on, Harvard University Press copy-editors, get with it!"

After all the foregoing griping, it may appear that (1) I am a detail-obsessed curmudgeon of uncommon degree, and (2) I disliked the book. The first point may be true, but the second is not. I look forward to seeing how others eventually build on Malcolm's scholarship.

From T. Markus Funk, "Is the Second Amendment Really Such a Riddle? Tracing the Historical "Origins of an Anglo-American Right" 39 Howard Law Journal 411 (1995):

Few topics of contemporary social, moral, and political debate can provoke as much raw emotion and open hostility as the Second Amendment, particularly in relation to the topic of gun prohibition. This subject routinely causes many well-intentioned people of whatever view to give up all pretense of courtesy and reason in favor of ad hominem attacks on those with whom they disagree. Readers of history professor Joyce Lee Malcolm's To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an Anglo-American Right will find these ugly by-products of the contemporary conflict refreshingly absent. Malcolm clearly keeps her distance from any broad normative judgments about the social utilities or costs of civilian firearms possession, offering instead a sober, scholarly, historical discussion of the Amendment's origins. Meticulously tracing the British history of regulations on firearms ownership from the Middle Ages on, she provides a detailed and illuminating history that includes the English Bill of Rights and, a century later, the American one. Because it is only in this historical context that the Second Amendment's meaning can be fully understood and appreciated, Malcolm's book is essential reading for anyone interested in this complex and controversial subject.

I like how the author explained exactly what he wanted to

This book surely deserves a 5 STAR. Certainly I am glad that there is a reference to the ART. I find this book "Universals Of Kenpo" to be a compass as I personally jouney through this Art. Thank you Mr. Bachman for such a great contribution.

This book gives us here in Ireland the information we need to continue our Kenpo studies in the absence of regular instruction. It gives us the answers and the hunger for more knowledge. Thank you Mr. Bachman from. Ward Kenpo Schools Ireland

I would have to say this is one of Mr. Bachman's best books. It took me a little longer to read because it's 150+ pgs long. It's a good mix of textual and graphic explanations of Kenpo concepts and principles. I really enjoyed several areas of discussion in this book. I thought the "qualities of an instructor" was very good. Mr. Bachman not only covers more advanced topics, he also takes the time to break down the basics of etiquette, including: bowing, tying your belt, class behavior, etc...It's a very good area to look at for newer martial artists. Under the section of Physiology and Kinesiology, he covers conditioning and has an area called "Muscle Facts". This lists the major muscle groups and what they are responsible for (i.e. their type of motion). Which I took to mean if I attack that muscle the right way then it can no longer do that job. There are also some basic stretching drills.

One of my favorite chapters is Psychology and Practice. He covers meditation, practice and practicing for control. The topic, "Practice: Patterns for Progress" is excellent. He breaks down practicing into imitating, internalizing, personalizing and visualizing. It's a great topic of discussion. He also suggests way to keep training interesting, the learning stages of Kenpo, mental progress (great discussion) and motivation.

He covers weapons concepts that are very interesting. Diagram of an attack with a weapon and the diagram of a weapon really eye opening. Also the fundamentals of control with a weapon was a good topic. Two topics in this chapter, Window of Opportunity and Keys to Accomplishment could be used for weapons or empty hands and represent a person that has taken time to study and develop a theory behind the actual process of being confronted and the way to successfully respond.

The other chapter that was also one of my favorites was the one on Principles. In this chapter Mr. Bachman talks about memorization, personal weapons: progression to conversion (making a simple strike sophisticated) and commitment. Two very good areas of discussion in this chapter are the scientific method of Kenpo and Selecting and Creating Opportunity.

His conclusion is a list of Kenpo sayings that he as come up with over the years and a story of one of his Black Belts. I would have to say that this is definitely one of Mr. Bachman's best books. It has something for everyone. From basic to advanced concepts, empty hands to weapons. In my review I only touched on the things that I found most interesting. There is actually a lot of good information that I didn't mention. So I would suggest this Kenpo book to any martial artist that is looking to advanced their studies. As Mr. Bachman says, "An intelligent person answers questions, the wise person asks them". I think Mr. Bachman shows in this book that he is both intelligent by freely sharing his information (I say freely because the cost is so reasonable) and wise by asking you, the practitioner, if your willing to expand your thought process in the many different aspects of the martial arts.

I teach root cause analysis and have been a practicing failure analyst for nearly 15 years. I've had the priviledge of working with some very expert people in this field. Dean Gano does a great job taking what can be a very confusing and intimidating task and making it clear and understandable.

Dean Gano has been honing his craft for many years and is well respected in the failure analysis community. The only criticism I have is that the process is more geared to providing supporting evidence for possible causes of events. There needs to be more discussion of the need for refuting evidence.

Cause analysis at its best is a structured application of scientific principles (referred to as the scientific method). What the scientific method requires is that you pose a hypothesis (a possible explanation for what has happened) and then gather evidence to support or refute the hypothesis.

I recommend that anyone interested in a better understanding of how refuting evidence is used read "The Rational Manager" by Chuck Kepner and Ben Tregoe. It's the foundational work that provides a complete solution for resolving concerns (problems, decisions, etc). The "Rational Manager" has you break things down and deal with them separately. Dean Gano's book helps you see the larger picture. The other book I use as required reading for our root cause analysts is "Managing the Risks of Organizational Accidents" by James Reason. Together, these three references will help you to significantly improve your ability to resolve problems and will be the three books you will refer to over and over again.

After several years of pumping equipment failure analysis engineering, this is by far the best book I've read about the failure analysis and problem solving process. Dean Gano's approach covers the full spectrum of associated issues in a very efficient and flexible manner. He challenges a lot of failure analysis "conventional wisdom" in a very convincing manner, truly creating "a new way of thinking" that should greatly improve failure solutions.

Read several books and this seems to get to the heart of the matter in the least amount of time. Book is well written, to the point and will get you going within 24 hours.

This is an original and satisfying ghastly yarn about serial killers who are human part of the time...they turn into werewolves. A star detective gets on the case and ends up...well, that would be telling! The offbeat characters of the identical twins -of the Havasupai Indian tribe- add to the mystery. The author knows her Indian ways, and comes up with some wild twists and turns under Sister Moon. Eeeek!!
Author Arthur Myers

I thought this book was excellent!! It had a great pace and kept you wanting to read. The character(all of them) had good backround information, just enough about them to let you know where they where coming from and why they were who they were. If you like to be kept on edge, read this book! I can't wait for the next one!

"Beasts" takes an unusual look at werewolves, and pulls no punches with the grisly details. While not for the squeamish, anyone who enjoys a good scare will love this book. There isn't a dull moment, and the characters are carefully developed so that the reader cares about them. The dialog is excellent. More importantly, there are unexpected twists and turns that make it impossible to figure out the ending without cheating. In particular, the Native American lore is fascinating and makes sense, which contributes to the goosebumps and the reader's tendency to jump at shadows! This isn't a thick book, which is just as well, as it is impossible to put it down once it is started! The ending is totally unexpected, and leaves the reader hoping for a sequel. This is an excellent first novel by a very promising writer.

I enjoyed the idea that we are the bad guys. I think that writing a whole 300 something page novel is a pretty fantastic feat in itself. Also the thought provoking philosophical aspects really were great.

My dear god, this book was fantastic. This is a rare display of complete and utter mastery of English literature. Such dramatic and beautiful images, crystal clear, this is a famtasical. This book is a must. You won't be sorry you bought it, the only thing you will be sorry about is the last page. I could have read for decades in this book. WOW! It's a must.

a surprisingly, moving well writen novel. It kept me interested from the first page to the last.you have a great imagination and are on toa great career in writing ,Can,t wait for your next book. stephen king watch out!!!