I like the theme of this book, but the author relies on too many cliches to excite the readers interest. The story is basically evil and greedy politicians conspire with the liberal anti-gun media elite to do away with the constitution and bill of rights. Add into the mix the Fidelistas (Mexican invading army) and the Patriots (a group of, well, patriotic Americans wanting to fight the evil government and bring back America's greatness) And you have all the elements fo a great story. But, this particular story doesn't go anywhere, and the book ends without any resolution. I suppose that is left up to the imagination of the reader. Maybe the author intends to write a sequel? If so, I would buy it.

A book with a similar theme, but that is carried out with a lot more convincing detail is "Unintended Consequences" by John Ross. I highly recommend Unintended Consequences.

If you like Westerns, you'll like the action in this novel. If your politics are right of center, you'll enjoy the political intrigue. Even if your politics are left of center, you'll enjoy this portrayal of the US in the near future, when three political factions are fighting for control of all or part of the country and some good people have to make some hard choices about which side they're on.

When "Patriot Radio is on the air" my friends and I listen. We are still trying to stake out our own political philosophies and D. Michael Phillips does a great job in assisting us. I would recommend this book to any college- aged student wanting to strengthen their grasp on the American political economy.

Yes, this book does have good ideas on each page as others have stated; however, many are neither unique nor original. I got more out of Levinson's books.

This book is ostensibly about marketing, but much of the information is of general relevance to running your own business. I received my MBA from an Ivy school, and I have to admit that a substantial portion of the material in the book was stuff that we never covered in marketing classes. Overall, a very useful book about starting and operating your own small business. I highly recommend it.

I found it in the library, read it, returned it, bought it.

With each store example they use to describe an marketing idea, a bulb went off in my head because the stores are my favorites, but I could never have made the connection of using the same ideas for our own businesses. Now that I am attuned to the concepts, I can appreciate the things that the small businesses we've been patronizing for 10 years have been constantly doing.

There is a good deal to recommend this book. It is for the most part well-written, and the idea behind the book is outstanding. However I have quite a few problems with it. The opening tale by John Tynes is somewhat too short to overcome by backstory and characterization a rather ugly incident that takes place within it, equating experience with the Deep Ones to a version of combat syndrome, and that taints the rest of the book. Other tales fare somewhat better, and have some very thought-provoking concepts, adding a bit of science fiction to the world of the Mythos. One can become a ghoul, for instance, by reading a certain book, and a certain Great Old One can tear holes in the spacetime continuum in order to attract males for her followers (kind of silly, but effective within the tale). On the whole, I liked it, but for me that is the crux of the biscuit-I wanted to love it, and did not. Fell far short of the expectations that were engendered in me by the blurbs on the back cover and the front cover recommendation from Lucius Shepard. Can't give it a thumbs-up, but worth looking at if you have the money. Slim for the price.

I really enjoyed reading this book. As with any collection of short stories, I liked some more than others, but there were none in here that I didn't like. There were a couple that I consider to be real gems. My only real complaint is that it's not much book for 12 bucks. It's about half an inch thick, with eight stories in it. I guess maybe it's priced higher than most paperback books because of the cost involved for a small company to have smaller quantities of a book like this printed, but I must admit I was a bit disappointed with it in this respect.

I have always been a fan of way-out-there lunatic sci-fi/horror but unfortunatly most of the sci-fi and horror out there is just really insipid banal mainstream garbage. This book is different, the stories pull no punches and will blow you away. There is some violent violence and BIZZARE sexual stuff in this book so it is probably NOT for kids. Highly recommended and far better than the other Delta Green fiction "Rules of Engagement."

Getting Thru to Your Soul by Phillip and Jane Mountrose fills two gaps in the energy therapy field: it provides a common ground for professionals and beginners/teachers and students. It also builds a much-needed bridge linking the psychological to the spiritual through the introduction of the 7 spiritual activations, a kind of road map to enlightenment.
Getting thru to Your Soul is a brilliant segue from the standard psychological/physiological applications of energy therapy to a faster and more profound healing through the practice of Spiritual Kinesiology. Developed by the Mountrose team, SK helps us connect with and utilize our soul energy during the healing process. The process is simple and the results amazing. If you've studied ANY of the EFT/TFT/NLP/kinesiology processes, then this book is a must. If you are new to energy therapy, Getting Thru to Your Soul (and the Mountroses' previous book Getting Thru to Your Emotions) gently leads you through the steps. It is a very well-written book; the information is presented in a simple, clear format and is therefore easily assimilated. With the Mountroses, you know where you are going and what to do once you get there.
Along with their books, the authors also offer video tape and audio cassette accompaniments which will enhance and facilitate your understanding. (...) By the way, I speak from experience: after 20 years of study and participation in many forms of traditional and alternative psychological and spiritual healing, I was still a mess. Thanks to Phillip and Jane Mountrose, I am now pretty neat!

The processes presented in this book provide very clear and direct techniques for accessing your soul's energy. Contact with the soul provides a transformative experience where issues of separation are integrated in the light of the soul. I found the audio tapes with guided versions of the techniques to be particularily helpful in accessing issues that needed to be brought into conscious awareness and cleared.

Spiritual Kinesiology (SK) is one of the most exciting new
Spiritual Kinesiology (SK) is one of the most exciting new energy/spiritual approaches. It is thoroughly described and demonstrated in the excellent book "Getting Thru to Your Soul" by Phillip and Jane Mountrose and their accompanying videotapes. The book is uplifting, clearly written, very practical, heart centered and easy to understand. The three video tapes demonstrating the approach are defintely best buys in the field as well. The Mountroses' previous excellent book is called "Getting Thru to Your Emotions with EFT."

Getting Thru to Your Soul develops new ground not previously presented in the energy field to date. This book is filled with great spiritual wisdom and knowledge. It discusses the 4 Keys to Living Your Divine Purpose; the 7 Spiritual Activations; the 7 Energy Centers; the 7 Levels of Healing; the 7 Levels of the Energy Field; the 7 Levels of Care; the Illumination Process; the Soul Centering Process; Subpersonalites; Archetypes; Polarities and even gives a brief summary of EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques).

The wonderful book is filled with excellent checklists on many energy/spiritual topics related to the themes of the book. It also describes in detail how to use the various Spiritual Kinesiology techniques they developed that call in the light of the soul. Using visualizations of light energy, anchoring, reframing and muscle testing in a simple yet sophisticaled way, the SK approach rapidly activates change.

Personally I have tried these techniques on many clients clients and have had a high degree of success, at least as high, if not higher than almost all other energy techniques. Both the book and videos are highly recommended. They might transform your life or the life of your clients. Certainly they will elevate your work and understanding to a higher level of energy and spiritual growth and greatly enhance your skills. Don't wait; buy them now.. It is thoroughly described and demonstrated in the excellent book "Getting Thru to Your Soul" by Phillip and Jane Mountrose and their accompanying videotapes. The book is uplifting, clearly written, very practical, heart centered and easy to understand. The three video tapes demonstrating the approach are defintely best buys in the field as well. The Mountroses' previous excellent book is called "Getting Thru to Your Emotions with EFT."

Getting Thru to Your Soul develops new ground not previously presented in the energy field to date. This book is filled with great spiritual wisdom and knowledge. It discusses the 4 Keys to Living Your Divine Purpose; the 7 Spiritual Activations; the 7 Energy Centers; the 7 Levels of Healing; the 7 Levels of the Energy Field; the 7 Levels of Care; the Illumination Process; the Soul Centering Process; Subpersonalites; Archetypes; Polarities and even gives a brief summary of EFT (Emotional Freedom Techniques).

This wonderful book is filled with excellent checklists on many energy/spiritual topics related to the themes of the book. It also describes in detail how to use the various Spiritual Kinesiology techniques they developed that call in the light of the soul. Using visualizations of light energy, anchoring, reframing and muscle testing in a simple yet sophisticaled way, the SK approach rapidly activates change.

Personally I have tried these techniques on many clients and have had a high degree of success, at least as high, if not higher than almost all other energy and spiritual healing techniques. (I am very experienced using energy and spiritual healing techniques) Both the book and videos are highly recommended. They might transform your life or the life of your clients. Certainly they will elevate your work and understanding to a higher level of energy and spiritual growth and greatly enhance your skills. Don't wait; buy them now.

Sometimes unfairly glossed over and ignored, sometimes unfairly given more credit than he deserves, Howard Phillips (H.P.) Lovecraft's gothic horror novels and stories set a new standard for American horror literature and, most likely, influenced horror writers the world over. That he is the master of setting, scene, and utter creepiness there is no doubt, but many will debate the effectiveness of his "Out of Time" creatures as genuine fright-inducers versus just plain strange and weird... whatevers.

This book, however, is one of Lovecraft's rare pieces of nonfiction - a scholarly survey on the history of supernatural horror throughout literature. Obviously well-researched and excruciatingly well-written, it makes a fine resource for anyone interested in this subject, although its obvious fault is that it covers nothing beyond 1927 - and doesn't touch nearly enough on Lovecraft's own work. For a reference resource on post-1930s horror literature (and television, and film, which became important mediums after this volume was written), check out Stephen King's Danse Macabre.

This book makes a good investment for scholars interested in Lovecraft or horror, and is written in a way that makes it accessible for those who don't need a lot of scholarly language to entertain them. Beware - Lovecraft's well-documented anti-Semitism comes through at several points in this book, but it never presents a problem if you can appreciate his work as an entity separate from his abysmal beliefs about this subject (like you could, say, with T.S. Eliot.)

Bottom line: a worthwhile investment.

This essay was written by Lovecraft for a friend's magazine. According to the introduction, Lovecraft took three years to research his project, read numerous works, and write the paper. Also according to the introduction, Lovecraft was a very slow reader. If this is true, he must have devoted quite a bit of time to his research. It leads me to believe that all the books mentioned were all the books he read. What did he miss?

This essay is part explanation of what horror is and a reading list of the discerning horror reader. He gives a good definition and then shows you how other readers fit this definition. He arranges this piece to show you the progression of horror from its beginnings in folklore to modern times (which would have been the 1920s). He mentions quite a few, but not all get the coverage that the great ones get. For instance, Poe gets and whole chapter and Hawthorne and Bierce receive a good bit of coverage.

If you are not a reader of Lovecraft, it may take you a minute to acclimatize yourself with his style of writing. The fan of Cthulu will easily slip into the flow of words.

Lovecraft never really covers anyone he truly doesn't like. He does criticize some writers, but there is no in depth writing against someone. This work is primarily positive. I would recommend getting this for the reading list alone.

Yes, do not doubt it. In this thin booklet reprinted by Dover you will find a fine and most pleasant reading on the history of the most reknown and famed names that built up the literature of Horror, by the hand of the celebrated and controversial master of Cosmic or Materialist Terror, Howard Phillips Lovecraft, to whom some regard as the successor of Edgar A. Poe in North American horror-tales tradition. This short essay of his is one of his most commendable titles, even recommended by many of those who consider him a "second-rate" author. This booklet will make you to think otherwise. If you are interested in learning easily and pleasantly about this kind of literature-genre, do not doubt it, buy this one right now.

Although I am a veteran and successful lyricist and thought I had nothing more to learn about this form of my art, I was amazed at how many "tricks of the trade" she gave me that I'd never even thought about. Pamela Phillips Oland's new, revised edition of her first book is so chock full of tasty little details that I found myself inspired with new song ideas on almost every page - which is why it took me so long to finish it. By now, it is underlined and starred and filled with margin notes and tabbed with so many colors, it looks like a pocupine!
Everything from setting up my writing environment to setting up the deal with my collaborator UP FRONT, to helpful hints about my great starts that fill my journals, was useful. We all get into a sort of groove that can so easily become a rut that simply adopting a new approach - that Oland suggests many of - like reading the dictionary or seeing with new eyes a character trait in someone you know well, can cause one of those wonderful light-bulb ideas to pop up over your head!
I always love hearing other songwriters' anecdotes about how songs we've all heard on the radio came to be.
The book is so well laid out that when I sit down to write, I sometimes just open it at random, read a box or an example of one of her lyrics - and the process by which she completed it - and that gets me going.
It will be so helpful to the fledgling songwriter, too. I've given it to my 14-year-old, guitar-playing, songwriting nephew who says he loves it. And since I gave it to him, I can see a definite growth in his ability to express his feelings more clearly now in his lyrics. There is a craft to writing lyrics that takes years of devotion and attention to develop and perfect.
Thank you, Pamela, for acknowlwdging what REALLY goes into perfecting this craft and writing it all down in so arganized a way!
- Lisa-Catherine Cohen, double-platinum lyricist (ASCAP) Lisa-Catherine.com

I have been a songwriter "on the side" for a number of years, and this book gave me the confidence and information I needed to make the move to full-time. I now make a career of writing songs and, even better, I'm earning a living doing it!

The best thing about this book is that it's not a bunch of dry factoids about A&R pitches and recording demos. Sure, there's tons of useful info about all that, but it's so much more than that, too! I have heard this author speak, and she's AWESOME - she really knows her stuff, and she's absolutely inspiring. You'll totally get a kick out of her stories (check out the one about her first song - hilarious! not that mine was any better, mind you). And watch out all you poets masquerading as songwriters (you'll see what I mean if you read it!).

I don't want to ruin the book by talking about any more specifics, because it's a really fun read. I definitely recommend this book if you want to get into songwriting, and it's also helpful to established musicians who want to start writing their own songs. (One of my musician friends did just that, and her songs are fantastic now. She definitely needed the help, though.)

BUY THIS BOOK if you want to get into the music industry. Seriously.

Pamela Phillips Oland has taken the art of teaching lyric writing to a new level! As a new writer I needed not only guidelines for structure and content but also inspiration and her book gives it all. She helped me learn to define what I wanted to say and how I wanted to say it! The stories are amazingly cool and funny. Her talent as a songwriter might just be surpassed by her ability to teach and inspire other writers to believe in their dream to do the same. If you can't write a song after reading this book then you just can't write a song!! Loved it!!

This book was a disappointment. While the subject matter was very intriguing--the life and loves of a famous woman in Europe at the beginning of the century, I found Phillip Max writing unbearable. He does not manage to give any depth to his characters. We learn about Alma and her inconsistences and caprices, but we do not understand what drives her. The reader is left to his/her own trying to figure out why Alma and the people around her act the way they do. At points tedious, the story rushes through Alma's life and does not leave the reader with a real idea of time.

The only plus to this novel that I found is that it sparked my interest to look for Alma's autobiography--I would never think to rely on Max for even a fictional perspective on her.

"The Artist's Wife" is based on the life of Viennese beauty, Alma Schindler, an incredible woman with hair of (seemingly) spun gold, who married, believe it or not, the composer Gustav Mahler, Bauhaus architect Walter Gropius and the writer Franz Werfel. All of them, including Gustav Klimt, the most important painter of fin-de-siecle Europe, loved her to distraction and swore that a part, at least, of his most profound and greatest work was inspired, both by her and by his passion for her.

Alma, while being quite successful as a muse, was less successful as a mistress and a wife, and she was certainly no "good girl." She sometimes had more than one lover at a time and felt no shame in the situation. Instead, she called herself "a collector of geniuses." She was, by turns, a seductress, a flirt, a romantic and a real delight. She was also dreadfully anti-Semitic despite the fact that she had, not one, but two, Jewish husbands, Mahler and Werfel.

This book is called "fiction" but it is really based on Alma's own memoirs. Phillips writes the story from Alma's point of view, however, from beyond the grave, and he tosses in carefully chosen bits of imagined conversation, etc., causing the book to be classified as "fiction" rather than "fact."

Alma is not a character we can admire, but she is certainly interesting. She is a restless spirit in death and in life she was often selfish and downright mean. More than anything, she is vain, but she is not vain about everything. She does realize that she, too, has her faults. As she says about her voice, "I screeched all the Wagner roles until I ruined a good mezzo-soprano voice." And, as she once wrote in her diary, "I'm utterly vulgar, superficial, sybaritic, domineering and egoistic!"

If Alma was hard on herself, she was even harder on her husbands and lovers and even her potential lovers. She was a notorious flirt who often brought men to their knees only to spurn them in the most ungracious manner. One sometimes wonders why she bothered marrying at all; her opinion of the men in her life seems so very low. Gropius, who seems like an Adonis to Alma at first, sours as well, leaving Alma bored and lonely at only thirty-two and ready for an encounter with the wild, possessive and jealous painter, Oskar Kokoschka, who is six years her junior. Kokoschka, in the end, loses out to Gropius who, despite his boring qualities is more of a genius than is Kokoschka. Kokoschka doesn't take his humiliation at all well and what he does is pitiful, a little shocking and even a little funny. And, to be sure, the humor of the situation isn't lost on Alma.

Sadly, in some ways, Alma Schlinder, whose life so depended on her good looks and her vibrant wit, oulived almost everyone around her and lost both her looks and her wit at about the same time.

Although some readers have complained about the rather staccato prose in this book, it is prose that fits exactly the way Alma wrote in her own memoirs, so I think it is very fitting that Phillips adopted this style. And while some readers will no doubt see Alma as simply vain and mean-spirited, she was fascinating...there can be no doubt about that. I think Phillips has done a marvelous job in capturing the qualities and the vibrancy of Alma that made her so irresistible to so many men, despite the fact that she never really respected them, and perhaps, never really loved them.

I loved this book. I thought it was interesting, well-written and vivacious...just as vivacious as was Alma Schindler in her youth. And that is really saying a lot.

I approached this book with some trepidation, not quite "fear and loathing" perhaps, but close enough. My reason? Simple enough. My fondness for Gustav Mahler's music - irrespective of what warts the man may or may not have had - made me think twice before reading a fictionalized version of "the wild brat's story" and how it might have distorted my own version of reality concerning my favorite composer. I shouldn't have worried.

Some thirty-odd years ago, I had the opportunity to read an English translation of Alma Mahler Werfel's "Ein Leben mit Gustav Mahler" ("My Life with Gustav Mahler"). The book was not mine, and I regret not having my own copy to this day, if for no other reason than that Alma edited these reminiscences with a rather heavy hand, lest the reader get the idea that she was less than devoted to Mahler. Of course, even then, her legend preceded her. Those of a certain age (and I am one of them) well remember Tom Lehrer's send-up of her, sung to the melody of "Alma Mater." A tune as trenchant commentary, deservedly so.

Well, if there's nothing new under the sun from Tom Lehrer (and others) from then till now, why in the world should one read this "autobiographical" novel? For the simple reason that Max Phillips has fashioned an excellent tale about a fascinating woman whose greatest adventures occurred during a time when her fin-de-siècle Vienna and Hapsburg world was simultaneously both filled with intriguing characters and at the brink of chaos and collapse.

Despite her own heavy hand at personal "damage control," there is plenty of historical corroborating information (including those parts of her diaries and memoirs that she did indeed approve for publication) to state that Alma was clearly all of these: Self-absorbed, wilful, modestly talented, unafraid of her own sexuality, a flame to the moths of creative genius of the times, a sometime muse to these geniuses, and self-appointed - or perhaps self-anointed - champion and guardian of the arts of her times, with her "Sundays" (salons at which all the rich and famous of the arts of the period grovelled for her invitations and attention). She was also beautiful by the day's standards, and suffered from both deafness and alcoholism. Nevertheless, she outlived all but one of her husbands and lovers, living to the ripe old age of 84, by that time a barely-subdued doyenne. (Of her paramours, only Oskar Kokoschka outlived her, finally expiring at the very ripe old age of 94 in 1980.)

In an endnote, Phillips begins by stating "To put it mildly, this is not a work of scholarship." While perhaps true - because Phillips does take minor liberties with the timings and juxtaposition of events and (probably) major liberties with words placed in the mouths of his panoply of characters - he is being entirely too modest (perhaps with tongue implanted firmly in cheek) regarding these liberties. For, at the end of it all, one does come away with a clear sense of "what Alma was all about," and of an epoch and its end. The latter is detailed better in "Wittgenstein's Vienna" by Allan Janik and Stephen Toulmin, a true work of scholarship available elsewhere at Amazon.com. But, where Janik and Toulmin are factual - almost, but not quite, to the point of pedanticism - Phillips is downright trenchant in his observations on the epoch and in the words he puts in his characters' mouths.

At the end, the tale turned out to be both a hoot and a valuable backward glance at an artistic period and place which we in America regrettably understand not well at all. As I said at the outset, "I shouldn't have worried."

This book is only good for those people who wants to play the whole tune with the piano. If you have a vocalist, a guitarist, a bassist and you want to accompany on piano then this book is not recommended. It doesn't provide you much on the background piano as what you have heard from the album. Not even 20% of it. But you can use this book as a guideline to find the exact background piano played on the album.

Are you sick of playing the piano for your parents? Don't want to practice anymore? this book is the ultimate cure.. Get back to those days when playing the piano was FUN! with titles like November Rain, 14 Days, Don't Cry.. and more this book is EXCELLENT! As soon as I got it, I went to my friend's house, picked up the guitar, my friend came over, and we played songs from this book over an hour. Thank you Guns N Roses and Thank You Mark Phillips who made this book fun and easy to use.

Song List:

Knockin' On Heaven's Door
Live And Let Die
November Rain
Don't Cry (Original)
Yesterdays
Dust N' Bones
You Ain't The First
Civil War
14 Years
So Fine
Estranged

P.S guitar solos are arranged for the piano

This book is VERY good. Although not stricly what is played on the albums, it does have the solos transcribed for piano so you don't have to be playing with Slash! Also has that f@*king great piano solo that Axl plays in Estranged!!

If you play the piano you must buy this book, regardless of whether you like GN'R or not.

Are you a conscious consumer? Or do you passively accept every technology trend that comes your way, believing the promises you hope it delivers? This book covers several areas on how we are rapidly moving ahead with technology without much thought to the consequences it has on our humanity- whether it is violence on screens, quick health "solutions", or stressed out lifestyles with a half dozen different contact numbers.

After reading this book, I don't think I will ever be able to look at the media and technology the same ever again. While I think a few of the issues were oversimplified, this book was also well researched and most importantly- it makes you think. Whether you agree with some of the main points or not, you will be thinking about this book long after you have finished digesting it. Think of it as a bit of balance to your ideas, to counteract with all of those commercials you've been reading and hearing your whole life.

John Naisbitt is very high touch in person. When he told me his next book would be about high tech, high touch--the most popular and shortest chapter in Megatrends--I was hoping for examples of how to achieve that balance. Alas I was mistaken. I came away from the read very sensitized to the encroachment of the technologically intoxicated zone. I chuckled at realizing our two biggest markets are consumer technology and escape from consumer technology. These are valuable lessons and well documented. There are a few personable moments in the book that point towards turning off the TV. But the reader needs to look elsewhere and inward for the antidote.

Megatrends author John Naisbitt's new book (co-written by daughter Nana Naisbitt and artist Douglas Philips) is a fat book of ideas that touches upon genetics, art, media violence, time sensibilities and even South Park. Unlike most futurists, the authors make judgment calls about future timelines and inclinations. However, they agree with other futurists that full immersion virtual reality is coming, although they add that it's probably not a good thing, especially for your kids. Their compelling discussion of the genetic revolution is wide-ranging and fair-handed. Their interesting take on media violence and video games seems more controversial, evidencing a distaste that echoes the genre's most hostile opponents. Their view of modern art, which touts body part art (i.e. Piss Christ and sliced cows) but ignores the computer-driven fruition of amateur filmmaking, also seems odd. You may find yourself arguing and fighting with this very stylish, well-written book, but we [...] promise you won't be bored.

Keller tells the story of his search for God's presence in his life trough an engaging story about his working relationship with his first sheepdog Lass. Well written, it was a quick read that I finished in one evening. The parallels between Keller and Lass and Keller and God are well thought out. I also enjoyed this book from the view of a manager. Keller wrote the book about the working relationship between God and man through the story of his dog, but, I found most of the ideas translate directly to managing of people. Good read. I highly recommend this book.

Philip Keller does a wonderful job of drawing a connection between how a sheepdog relates to its owner and our relationship with God. EXCELLENT witnessing tool. I own 60 sheep and am actively involved in herding and training herding dogs. Philip's analogy's are right on the money. I have bought several of this book to give to herding friends.

This book should be read by anyone who has a animal. It is so heartwarming and loving. And the tie between God and nature is so strong. I loved it. All kids should read this book. Teeens too.