Having waded through the detailed accounts, opinions and viewpoints of the German generals, I was stunned -- and lost; lost because I, just a loader in a German 150 mm Assauly Howitzer Panzer, never knew the Big Picture. Truly eye-opening in may ways and fascinating to the lowly Gefreite.

Having been at the receiving end of a T-34's 76 mm gun, I am missing out on many a thing; as I said, the Big Picture never was mine. What astounds me is the rather poor editing when it comes to the German titles or names: the 1st WSSD, the "Leibstandarte der SS Adolf Hitler" is constantly misspelled (Liebstandarte sounds rather weird in German and could well be misunderstood by persons who are intimately knowledgable in German).

This book is more for scholars accustomed to slogging their way through dry-as-dust recollections that, after all, are sixty years old by now. For those, it is a most valuable addition to accounts by the lower ranking officers and enlisted men. Buy it and treasure it if you are a historian, read it from the public library if you are interested. Forget it if you expect the dirty, muddy, and high-pucker-factor experience of the Landser,

Author Steve Newton, who is well known to many Civil War students for his books like "Lost for the Cause: The Confederate Army in 1864," and "Seven Pines," is also a scholar of high merit when it comes to German and Soviet WWII operations. I believe he speaks/reads both languages, and is a firm believer in writing history from the manuscript sources. "Kursk: The German View," is the result of this high standard of excellence he has set for himself.

Students of Operation Barbarossa will find this collection of German material on Kursk indispensable to their study of the campaign. While Glantz and others have carved out a large niche describing the entire action, Newton has opted for a more limited approach, pulling together various high-ranking primary German sources rarely if ever used in their original form.

After a detailed and thoughtful Introduction, Newton presents the edited "papers," adding priceless footnotes and commentary from his deep well of knowledge on the subject. Every German perspective is corps level or close to it. The last 30% or so of the book is a collection of valuable chapters on a wide variety of subjects, all penned by Newton. He is clearly less enamored with German apologists who claim that a few more days would have scored a major tactical and strategic victory. The battle was completely avoidable and should never have been fought. (His insightful chapter on Hoth's orders/intent is worth the price of the book.)

The book's quality of production, editing, etc. is very high. This is a book to buy, read, and put on your shelf. It is definitely a keeper.

Beware: The book is not for neophytes. The detail is deep and the going is often tedious. The maps at the back of the book help wade through the chapters. Stick with it. When you close the book, you will feel a real sense of accomplishment--and know a lot more about Kursk then you knew going in. And the battle will never look quite the same.

Kursk: The German View by Steven H. Newton (Associate Professor of History, Delaware State University) is an annotated study of the battle of Kursk, fought in the summer of 1943, a crucial struggle and the largest tank battle of World War II. Translating the post-war reports written by German commanders themselves, Kursk: The German View is uniquely insightful and a welcome addition to military history shelves. Also very highly recommended is Professor Newton's German Battle Tactics On The Russian Front 1941-1945 (Schiffer Publishing, Ltd., 0887405827, $24.95) and Retreat From Leningrad: Army Group North 1944-1945 (Schiffer Publishing, Ltd., 0887408060, $24.95).

When I picked this book up, I thought it was a great find. I read a great deal of non-fiction of this type, and the opening pages were very promising. But I ultimately found it disappointing, even offensive. Trienens sinks the book in legalistic detail, focusing so much on the civil suit that he loses sight of the fascinating larger story. Worse, he seems to regard the Goodmans -- descendants of the owner who died in the Holocaust -- as little more than opportunists, and displays little sympathy or respect for their family's tragedy. And while he claims to be taking an objective view, over and over he interprets facts in a light most favorable to the defendant in the suit -- his client. This book is a badly missed opportunity. I would love to see someone else do it again.

Truth is found in the details. By logically organizing the paper trail scattered through several countries, written in at least four different languages, and held by a variety of individuals, Trienens establishes the facts of the case. Whether or not readers agree with his interpretation of these facts is another issue. I don't believe anyone withholds their sympathy from the Gutmann family or anyone who suffered from the events of World War II. However, sympathy should not blind readers to the facts of the case, including the 1967 signed statement that upon payment from the German government, the Gutmanns would not pursue any further compensation. While the attention to detail can at times interfere with the narrative, in the end the author sheds light on the complicated process of Nazi-era provenance research and reparation -- and the role of the press in shaping America's ideas about this sensitive issue.

"Landscape with Smokestacks" is a beautiful "monotype" created by Edgar Degas around 1890 and currently on view at the Art Institute of Chicago. Degas smeared oil colors on a metal plate in large diagonal strokes with a rag, then placed a paper on the plate and used a press to transfer the image to the paper. As Degas described it, "The result is a picture on paper more luminous than if the artist had worked directly on the paper." He used fingerprints for texture at the horizon of the scene, and then dabbed on pastel colors in little dots of yellow or pink. Green striations of monotype ink were matched with green pastel. Prussian blue pastel was smeared into the sky to suggest smoke coming from the nearly eradicated monotype chimney.

The family that owned the work of art perished in the holocaust. They had sent the art to a dealer in Paris, either for safekeeping or on consignment to be sold. If it was sent for safekeeping, it may have been stolen by the Nazis (especially Goering) who were looting art throughout the occupied countries of Europe during the Second World War. If it was sold on consignment, however, then the heirs of the family (who brought suit in the United States to recover the painting) would be out of luck. Their only recourse would be to find the Parisian art dealer and sue him for the proceeds. But maybe the painting was stolen, in which case the heirs might have a claim to get it back. After the painting left the art dealer in Paris, it wound up in Switzerland, and went through the hands of various purchasers, finally winding up in a private art collection in Chicago. The owner donated it to the Art Institute, and the real legal battle began -- between the heirs who claimed the painting had been stolen, and the Art Institute, which of course wanted to keep it (though the Institute would have returned it to the heirs if the Institute had been convinced that the painting indeed had been stolen).

Although the author, Howard Trienens, represented the defendant art collector in Chicago, I found his book exceptionally fair in its meticulous treatment of the provenance (sales history) of the Degas painting and in describing the negotiations that ensued between the heirs and the Art Institute. Like the Degas painting itself, the book is a little gem.

I expected this to be a walkthrough for people like myself who have a knowledge of physics but are far from being experts and are interested in reading the classics of science. This is a guide for the modern Professor of Physics, not a guide for the common reader as it says. If I had known that I wouldn't have bought it. I get the impression that there is certainly a demand for such a walkthrough. I thought this would be it.
A BIG disapointment!

I have not read this book, but would love too. But the price is just too high for a book that is intended for the common reader. It is unaffordable for the common reader.

(NOTE: My stars rating is meaningless because I have not read the book.)

Chandra translated Newton's Principia from the geometric language that Newton was forced to use into language that is immediately familiar to a modern audience. As such *every* physicist should be forced to read this book from cover to cover, or else face the *shame* that they have not. This is truly a piece that every physicist will enjoy and find thought provoking at the deepest level.

Despite the hip, appealing jacket and auspicious credentials of the author, this book disappoints. It feels like an academic toss-off, designed for the layperson with a fleeting interest, who will leaf through it like a magazine. To swim through the author's disjointed and often autobiographical slough to arrive at the occasional chunks of interesting stuff is simply not worthwhile. On page 9, the author describes his attitude toward his doctoral thesis (...I stayed up, slept late, frequented cafes in the long afternoons, wrote and unpublished novel and an unperformable play, watched far too many old movies, and diligently avoided my supervisor...) Replace 'supervisor' with 'lit agent', and we may have discovered Newton's approach to book writing as well.

It's a wonder that a writer could take such a fascinating subject matter and make it so annoying.

There are many myths about abandoned children who become heroes, like Moses and Oedipus. These had the good fortune to be found by humans and raised by humans. But there are other myths, some as modern as Tarzan, about abandoned children who are taken up by animals. Romulus and Remus were raised by wolves, and Semiramis, who founded Babylon, was raised by birds. Such stories seem to be of intense interest to humans, and when a real "wild child" is produced, it can cause curiosity, sympathy, and sensation. The stories of six such wild children are recounted in _Savage Girls and Wild Boys: A History of Feral Children_ (Thomas Dunne Books) by Michael Newton. The individual stories, full of contradiction and wonder, are all intriguing, and the responses to the children and their fate have something to tell us not so much about feral children, but about ourselves. These poor children lacked human contact when they should have been learning how to talk, eat, and behave; the result of such deprivation brings up profound questions about what language means, and what it is to be human.

Peter, the "Wild Boy" came naked out of the forests of Hanover, and became an attraction at the court of George I. He lived on for sixty years, described in 1751 as "more of the Ouran Outang species than of the human." He could say only three words, "Peter" and "King George." Memmie le Blanc was lured out of a tree in France in Champagne in 1731 when she was about ten; she seems to have been a Native American dropped for some reason by the slave trade. She could run and swim well, used a club to kill prey, and lived on roots and raw meat. She eventually learned some French, and made artificial flowers for her living. Victor, the Wild Boy of Aveyron was captured in the woods and lost twice over the years before being finally taken in 1800. His development is among the best documented, as a young doctor set out to make the wild boy social. Victor learned to say the French word for milk. Kamala was about eight years old, suckled by wolves in the Indian jungle, until she was captured in 1920. She lived nine further years, and learned a few words. The famous Kaspar Hauser had a strange tale of being kept prisoner in a cellar for sixteen years. He is the one feral child here that might be fraudulent. The most modern example, the sad Genie who was tied to a chair in Los Angeles until she was about thirteen, acquired lots of words but no grammar. What was going on in the minds of these children?

Probably no one knows with any confidence, but that does not stop curiosity or speculation. One of Genie's caretakers found her "unsocialized, primitive, hardly human." By the time we get to her case, we can see that the same thing was said of all these wild children, and that their suffering struck cords in those around them. But like Victor, Hauser, and Le Blanc, Genie was rescued, received intense caring attention, became a celebrity, and then was consigned to oblivion. The pattern happened over and over to the wild children who lived long enough, and seems to indicate that bringing such creatures happily into human society is almost impossible. Those who thought about these children, and they thought long and hard, were eager to examine humanity uncorrupted, as completely blank slates, but no one came close enough to understanding the children to make them social. We fantasize that we can reclaim such lost humans, or that they have the intellectual power to reclaim themselves; look at Mowgli or Tarzan. It must not be forgotten that these poor children survived under appalling conditions, and that can inspire some admiration. But humans need each other, and Newton's serious and earnest book is best at showing this simple truth in a new way.

A wonderfully interesting read that poses some crucial questions about language, trust, and human identity. What separates us from animals, and from each other as humans? Perhaps it's much less, and much more, than we think. These case histories, fascinating in their glimpses into children's abilities to survive in the wild, are just as intriguing when the author describes their various attempts at re-entering human society. Beautifully written, with sparkling wit and literary savoir-faire at every turn, this reads like fiction and offers sadness, triumph, and mystery as it tickles the imagination.

I read these short stories in a haphazard fashion rather than sequentially and unknowingly saved the worst two for last. A few days ago I was ready to give the collection five stars but the egregiously macabre "Ethan Brand" and "The Old White Maid" caused it a few points. These two tales are out of place among Hawthorne's other gems; they seem more suitable to Edgar Allen Poe on a night when he was feeling exceedingly gruesome.

Among the highlights is "Feathertop" an eccentric piece about a witch whose magic pipe gives life to her scarecrow. "The Prophetic Pictures," allegedly based on a true incident, is an intriguing yarn of a painter whose portrait accurately predicted his subject's forthcoming madness. "The Gray Champion," a patriotic tale, must have been a hit with Hawthorne's good friends President and Mrs. Franklin Pierce. A recurring theme through Hawthorne's works is the individual's perpetual battle with character flaws-a motif that makes them suitable to our modern age and indeed timeless. Many of the allegorical elements including the notorious "A," Hawthorne immortalized in "The Scarlet Letter" are scattered throughout these works.

The proem by Newton Arvin offers an interesting biographical summary of the author's life. Much has been written about Nathaniel Hawthorne-unquestionably one of America's finest and most beloved authors, and there is little I can add to voluminous evaluations. However, to anyone interested in building his or her vocabulary, Hawthorne's writing offers a cyclopean lagniappe to dulcify sesquipedalian pursuits. For me that aspect was as beneficial as the enjoyable vignettes.

It's easy for our contemporaries to accuse Hawthorne of being formulaic or using timeworn themes. It must be remembered that in Hawthorne's own day, the many of the "timeworn" ideas represented a truly novel vision, and it was appropriate to use many different stories to convey its fullness. Just remember, if you think it's a "cliche," it's probably because you've read a lot of post-Hawthorne "wannabes"!

In your face, obvious, and heavy-handedly allegorical, still Hawthorne manages to pique my interest and hammer home his point. Switching from historically based stories ("The Gray Champion" and "Endicott and the Red Cross") to spiritual allegories ("The Bosom Serpent" and "The Celestial Railroad"), Hawthorne continually chips away at the danger of isolation. Although he clearly believed in the fallibility and evil of the human heart--particularly pointing out the religious hypocrites--he also believed that one must continue to risk and be a part of the community. In stories such as "Young Goodman Brown" and "Wakefield", we see the gloom that comes over certain men who pull away.

Hawthorne, like Poe, uses graphic and surreal imagery, sometimes repetitively, to set a mood and draw a picture. His characters and scenes are alive and psychological consistent with his tales, and he manages to wring a moral out of nearly every page.

Heavy-handed? Yes, but he aims to state a message, and he states it clearly: The moral nature must never be sacrificed for intellectual pursuits (Ethan Brand). In a world of cheap commercialism and mindless brain fodder, at least Hawthorne has something to say.

This realtively short book is a good place to review accounting principles and terminology with excellent examples provided covering Balance sheets, income statements, cash flow reports, etc. This was used as a supplementary text in a course I just completed that was sponsered by a Society of Financial Analysts and used in conjunction with the other material provided by the instructor this book was quite helpful. I will continue to use it as reference. However if you are looking for detailed training in accounting this is NOT the book to choose.

While not a good source for those who have never taken an accounting course, this text is great for those who have taken an introductory course but need a concise refresher. As appropriately stated in the title, it is a review of the essentials of accounting.

I am a software engineer who needed to learn the basics of accounting in a hurry. If you know nothing about accounting, this book is for you. It is a small, thin (150pp) book that gives you 'just the facts' with simple real world examples (i.e. why is 7up an asset but Coca Cola is not?)

Save your money: there are much better (and more accurate) sources for the same information available for free on the Internet to anyone who knows how to use a search engine. Not recommended.

As one of only a few females i know who are interested in the serial killer, i found this book hard to quit reading, i was enthralled in many cases, only to find myself wanting to read a book several hundred pages long on the murderess. Some cases left me feeling like he was fluffing up his book. However, some other entries left me cringing and in awe. I have wondered where all the female murderers were kept.... Michael Newton unlocked that door for me can't wait to read Hunting Humans

Learn about Elizabeth Bathory, Carpathian countess who bathed in blood to stay young! Or about Mary Bell, 11 year old murderess! Read the unbelievable exploits of Martha Beck, who went from washing corpses to making them! If you're at all interested in this kind of stuff (my cotton candy) then this is surely the book for you. Very thorough and entertaining.

This is a very tiny (145x190mm) paperback with 112 pages containing essential plates by Mr. Newton. ("Newton for dummies".....?)

The format brings to mind the TASCHEN postcard paperbacks except that the pages in this petite book are bound, so it'll survive normal use.

It starts with some pondering text by Mr. Marshall Blonsky. On page 17, Mr. Philippe Garner reveals that the original "Private Property" work contains three suites of portfolios each containing 15 original selenium toned signed prints, with a total of 45. The monochrome images date from between 1972 and 1983. I can not even imagine what such a set would cost if it would be for sale....

The price for this paperback is so slight (10.95 USD printed on the back of my paperback) that it is well worth the purchase if only to glance trough it for a while...and then end up in giving it away and investing in a real book by Mr. Helmut Newton.

This small pocket volume of Helmut Newton's work features one of the best essays I have read on his fashion photographs. The softcover version shows 45 small images from 3 large-sized portfolios of his photographs. Few of the images reproduce well in this work due to their extremely small size, even though Mr. Newton directed the printing. To his credit (and that of the printer), the details are unusually well dilineated for small images.

This book would earn an R rating if it were a motion picture.

To me, Mr. Newton's fashion work is most often about sexual fantasies involving women where the women are eager participants in the frolicing. The fantasies are often rather extreme and of a hard-edge variety. They are not for those who look for purity and spirituality in sexual relations.

Some of the quotes in this book capture the feeling of Mr. Newton's work here very well. "Newton is an erotic powder keg, a vicious knife, in the midst of the 16th arrondissement salon." This refers to his focusing on upper class women in his fantasies. Mr. Newton himself said, "I don't deserve to be called King of Kink." That title was given to him by others for his tendency to invoke what are considered by many to be symbols of bondage. As Matthew Klein said (and most would agree), "His fantasies are extraordinary." "He puts into play strange forces of domination, of the exploitive . . . ." To a large extent, his photographs deal with his own sexual language and imagination. Within this, his women are shown as being strong people.

As reproduced here, these are my favorite images:

Jenny Kapitan, Berlin, 1977 (She is unclothed, encased in a leg cast and a neck brace, while leaning on a cane, but maintains a dignified beauty and strength.)

Hotel Room, Paris, 1976

Tied up Torso, Ramatuelle, 1980

Self-Portrait with wife and model, Paris, 1981 (This is perhaps his most famous self-portrait, and is a signature work to many.)

David Bowie, Monte Carlo, 1982

Sylvia in my studio, Paris, 1981

Woman examining man, Saint Tropez, 1975 (A confident, well-dressed woman appraises a passing man while sitting in a male-dominant posture -- an interesting role reversal as a social commentary.)

Sie Kommen, Paris, 1981 (A group of undraped runway models march forward confidently and boldly as though they are "modeling their own skin." This image is often shown with the clothed version next to it, but not in this book.)

Andy Warhol, Paris, 1976

Personally, I think that Mr. Newton is a better portrait artist than a fashion artist. This volume suffers for being light on portraits.

After viewing these images, I encourage you to think about how fantasies can be inspiring rather than salacious. What is the line between the two? What does an image have to look like to inspire both women and men in a sexual situation? In any other situation?

Be open to seeing the world for its best potential, always!

a good postcard-type size book of beautiful photographs

I do not recommend reading this book to any parent or concerned adult of a child who may or may not have a drug addiction. The Author's opinions (in my opinion) tends to manipulate the fears and worries of the parent in order to benefit his own cause! The author of this book has run Recovery Programs for Children that have led to major lawsuits, one in which awarded millions of dollars to a client under his "care." The Author of this book has been involved with rehabilitation programs that had been under investigation for abuse of children, human rights violations and insurance fraud. The Facts are the Facts but my opinion once again is this book is not helpful, it's harmful.

I met the author of this book back in November 1981 just as I became a Client of Straight, Inc. This book goes over all aspects of Chemical Dependency in a clear and easy to understand manner. Although this book is out of print, the material will never be out of date.

Don Smith Cincinnati Straight, Inc. 1982

I wish I had read this book at the time I was taking my 14 year old son to therapists, tutors, and psychiatrists. The anti-depressants he was prescribed only served to mask the volume of alcohol and drugs he was consuming every day, unknown to me. This book showed me that my son's behavior was not something he could control the way I treid to make him do. He had a disease by then which was not mental illness; it was not depression; it was not learning disabilities. It was Drug Addiction, and that disease has its own treatment separate and distinct from the symptoms such as depression and anti-social behavior which present while a teenager slips farther and farther into drug abuse. Every parent who sees his or her child's choices of friends, grades, clothing, and attitude become more and more foreign owes it to the child and to the family to read this book. It is short, concise, compelling, and eye-opening. I never dreamed it was drug use when I saw the symptoms; this book may save a parent from the years of suffering I permitted my son and me to live through out of ignorance.

A simplistic presentation that presents some powerful ideas. A useful tool for Masonic leaders and teachers. Definitely not aimed at the general public.

Waite was once widely read by freemasons who were fascinated by his personal reflections on Christianity and stonemasons. This book provides a valuable insight into the ideas and value systems of a forgotten world.

Indeed, this is a good book. But to get even more out of it, read The Illuminati Manifesto.