This trilogy very competently fills in much needed analysis and detail on the critical ACW battles of Stones River, Chickamauga and Chattanooga. Hard to believe, with the great volume of ACW material that has been generated and is still being generated, but there were really no standard, first rate treatments of these three great battles before Cozzens set to work (and there is still no standard available on the battle of Shiloh). The research, detail and accuracy are first rate (even more impressive since Mr. Cozzens is a foreign service officer and at times worked from sites as remote as Lima, Peru). The first installment - No Better Place to Die: The Battle of Stones River - is a slow start, somewhat confused and complacent (which is an odd impression, given that Stones River was equivalent to a two-day Antietam of the West). However, the next two volumes - especially the middle centerpiece - This Terrible Sound: The Battle of Chickamauga - are stellar. The right balance of commentary and description in tactics, troop movements and first person narrative is achieved to deliver great story telling and history. The incredible, depressing, star-crossed story of the Confederate Army of Tennessee is an amazing testament to the indomitable nature of the human spirit. Never were better soldiers under worse leadership. Where this work earns its Main Selection of the History Book Club and ACW classic status is in the unflinching, painfully honest portrayals of the individuals involved: Braxton Bragg is revealed to be the egotistical incompetent that he was (Bragg's only effective campaign was the offensive he launched against his own officers after his only victory); Sherman and Grant very competent but also capable of serious tactical errors; Rosecrans' collapse into despair; Longstreet's self-serving intrigues; Thomas' plodding but heroic style; all come to life in these pages. Above all, the simple hopes and desires, fears and dreams of the common soldier, moved to acts of cowardice and bravery, stupidity and inspiration, despair and hope, are documented for generations to ponder (this is where the primary research pays off - resulting in well-placed first person narrative descriptions throughout). Mr. Cozzens' has delivered a very valuable, enjoyable work deserving of attention. The art work by Keith Rocco is also a nice touch, effecting without sentimentality, historical art which contributes to the whole.

Jon Kraag, VP of Security at ADMS in Ravensburg, Illinois, is called in by his old army buddy who is now Ravensburg's mayor. Jon is a former FBI profiler with extensive experience; in fact, he's written a book on it, but he's never been called on to help with a case quite like this one. A man and a woman have been murdered in her bedroom, their posed and mutilated bodies discovered by her husband. The male victim is a local preacher and bachelor. The female victim has always, as far as her husband knows, been faithful. Within the past few months two other people have been murdered using the same M.O., although they were never connected by the local police. Now the mayor wants to hide the fact that these two are connected to the first two.

As Jon begins to profile and investigate these murders, he realizes the killer is moving more frequently, the mutilations are getting worse, and he knows the killer will soon strike again. Add to all of this an unsatisfactory love affair in Jon's life, the fact that he's a manic-depressive who has to fight himself to remember to take his pills, he has an obnoxious new female police detective running at odds with him almost all the time, and you have not just another serial killer novel. You have one of the most brilliantly conceived, fast-moving serial killer novels this reviewer has ever read. You're with Jon all the way, struggling with him through manic episodes that threaten to wreck his peace of mind, and racing against time with him as he tries to shake his own demons long enough to get inside the killer's mind and stop him before he kills again.

I loved everything about this book. The characters-especially Jon-the speed of the action, and the no-holds-barred investigation into a seemingly pristine small town which, underneath its slick veneer, is teeming with adulterous secrets, police departmental intrigue, and murder. I read this book without stopping; I literally could not put it down. I can't remember ever being this completely riveted by a murder mystery; my husband said the same thing. This book truly deserves all the accolades sure to be heaped upon it, and more. Watch for the name T. A. Stone. If anyone is destined for the NY Times bestseller list, this author is. B.A.

The reader is simultaneously illuminated by darkness and light when reading Cocktails with Brueghel at the Museum Cafe. With sobriety, irony, sarcasm, humor, and sorrow, Stone skillfully carries us through universal themes: love and its absence, the arts, family and solitude, mortality and the body, and the inexorability of the dark. Each poem is an intricate labyrinth of phrases and rhythms, which entice the reader who hangs over the edge of meaning. "A shadow elongates/ and slips through the gate, a foreigner/ with no meat on its bones." (p. 30)

Dissonant rhythms, irregular syntax, and unusual vocabulary awaken dormant places lying deep within us. Verbal contrasts and evocative rhythms mesmerize, unsettle, captivate, and hypnotize. Soft, gentle words, like "a shadow elongates" combined with abrupt, sharp-angled phrases like "febrile ruckus" show us that Stone is an accomplished master of juxtapositions. The author has complete control of her universe of words which aim towards a vanishing point of solitude. Magnetic phrases draw us towards each poem's center-centers which often lead us to life's edges. Each word, a prop on the poem's stage, is placed to release precise ambiguity of meaning. Her enigmatic titles, "Emissary Shadow," "Sun in an Empty Room," and "The Art of Crackage" are as mysterious as they are precise.

Stone constructs an exotic poetic scaffolding of elaborate phrases infused with darkness. Taking us to the boundaries of the human condition, to "the vacated events we make myths of" (p. 44), her language to describe the dark is paradoxically bright and invigorating. Her title poem, "Cocktails with Brueghel at the Museum Cafe" is a carnival of language dancing over darkness. Some 400 years ago, Flemish artist, Pieter Brueghel the Elder, whom Stone invokes, mastered such combinations of revelry and death in his apocalyptic paintings.

As vibrancy and laughter share center stage with solitude and darkness in Stone's poetry, words, at the edge of life's nothing, summon life's everything. Readers who enter this rich, textural cafe of poems will delight in the multiple layers of meaning that continue to resonate when the poetry ends.

This final installment of the Valhalla series brings into focus all the ramifications of what happened to Mongo and Garth in the Beasts of Valhalla. Further, it fleshes out Garth, raising him to a character in his own right instead of just being Mongo's brother. The book takes off immediately with Veil defending himself against the assassin sent in the previous book and doesn't stop. From there, it is a fast paced tale where Mongo tries to save his brother from himself and others while trying to figure out who his friends and enemies are. The Beasts of Valhalla trilogy is Chesbro's best work.

Kenneth Stone has the seal of approval, he "walks the talk". While not actually having been in retail (big black mark) he has been sufficiently close and "walked in their shoes" to have a credible list of suggestions and yes, big guy beater ideas.

The Congressional Minyan is a fantastic book. It combines an insiders knowledge of Capitol Hill with a political junkie's love of people, places, campaigns and issues. Stone has accomplished a lot in writing this book. Besides the 179 people profiled, there are asides on everyone from Orson Welles and Edith Wharton to Charlie Chaplin and Sam Goldwyn. Stone has an encyclopedic knowledge of American history, Congress and the people who have helped make it. Highly recommended!

This is that kind of books that tell us everything about a scientific topic that we need to learn with basic knowledge. The authors help us to understand the nature of stones and the better way to conserve its characteristics for the future, everywhere you need to apply it: museums, buildings and particular collections. Perhaps the most important contents are the necessary methods and materials that you must to apply in order to conserve and/or restore the original values of different kind of stone works. It is definitively a great help for architects, conservators and owners of stone collections.

*****Celia Winter-Irving writes that Zimbabwe's stone sculpture is unique, not only because of its individual form and content, which is highly valued and acclaimed in the art centers of the world, but because it springs from the indigenous talents that lay hidden until the 1960's. How could such creativity and craftsmanship suddenly flower? What is the inspiration that guides the Shona, Chewa, Yao and Mbunda artists who have produced it? Who are the actual individuals who fashion stone that is unlike anything produced anywhere else in the world? Her book answers these fascinating questions and has become the standard work on the subject. She believes that contemporary African stone sculpture from Zimbabwe is perhaps the most important new art form to emerge from Africa in the 20th century.
*****Although Zimbabwe stone sculpture is argued to be firmly located within a modernist discourse, its content and form are informed by traditional spiritual beliefs, myths, legends, oral history, customs, and rituals, which impart a new function and modernist aesthetic for creative expression in stone. Prestigious galleries around the world have been honored to exhibit the work of many of Zimbabwe's finest stone sculptors, such as the Paris Rodin Museum and the New York Museum of Modern Art. The larger pieces have been exhibited at the Kirstenbosch Gardens in Cape Town, the Kew Gardens in London, the Parlmengarten in Frankfurt, the Berlin and Hamburg Botanical Gardens, the Yorkshire Sculpture Park in Yorkshire, the Hannover Expo 2000, and the Missouri Botanical Gardens in St. Louis.
*****Celia Winter-Irving is the Writer and Documentalist in Residence at the Chapungu Sculpture Park. She is also the lead writer on art for the Zimbabwe Herald with her own column in the Herald 'Art and Leisure' each Saturday. At the park she writes books on sculptors, produces the newsletter, compiles and writes essay/biographies on sculptors represented by Chapungu, and organizes media relations. A listing of her more recent books includes Lazarus Takawira (Lazarus Takawira June 2000), Anderson Mukomberanwa (Anderson Mukomberanwa June 2000), Tengenenge Art Sculpture and Painting (World Art Foundation, Eerbeek, The Netherlands, April 2001), and Soottie the Cat at Tengenenge (Tengenenge Pvt Ltd, April 2001). In 2002, she finished a book concerning the successful Zimbabwe sculptor, Agnes Nyanhongo.

A fine reference volume, this book is perhaps less valuable in terms of instruction than Liebson's book, but Meilach picks up where Liebson leaves off. Liebson devotes his book entirely to technique -- to the craft of sculpting; only the first third of this book does the same, but with the help of over 350 photos, Meilach instead concentrates on the art of carving. Not so much art theory, but rather considerations of form, volume, and meaning, and how to impart those to your sculpture. Liebson will teach you how to carve; Meilach will help you figure out what to carve. Liebson's book is still #1, but Contemporary Stone Sculpture is its perfect complement.

This book is indeed your Cosmic Map Home. Even if you are not yet ready for Cosmic Ascension, it's fun to look ahead and see what's down the road for you. If you are serious about ascension and enjoy Dr. Stone's other books, you'll love this one too. I use the word "serious" with a smile, because when I got serious about ascension, I found out that it is more like fun than work. If you haven't read his *Encyclopedia of the Spiritual Path*, I recommend starting with "The Complete Ascension Manual: How to Achieve Ascension in This Lifetime" and "Soul Psychology." Once I got involved in the ascension process, I could not wait to read "Beyond Ascension" and "Cosmic Ascension," and each was encouraging and exciting. I now know what I have to look forward to.

If you are not familiar with Dr. Stone's work, you might be pleasantly surprised, as I was, that he seems like such a down-to-earth nice guy for someone with such a treasure trove of otherworldly wisdom to offer. All of this information was strange and foreign territory for me, but he presents it in a practical and accessible way. What a great "travel agent" the Universe has given us for our spiritual journey! This is a solitary road for some of us, but with Dr. Stone's introductions to the Ascended Masters, Angels and other Cosmic beings, it doesn't feel so lonely. If you work your way through his Encyclopedia and follow his techniques, you'll be too busy to be lonely :)