this is an unusual book and a very compelling read. the translation is superb. although originally written in french, it is mercifully lacking in froggy aspects. there is plenty of action and excellent characterisation.
i bought this book in paperback in switzerland, and observe that paperback editions are available there many months before they come out in the usa or england, which is odd.
the occult and the exotic are mingled without descent into the unconvincing. an astonishing scope of geography and ethnology is encompassed.
the only fault in the plot is the ridiculous notion that the bad guy would fix up an elaborate car crash to kill the little boy, when that task could have been done much more simply. also the author seems to believe, perhaps a french notion, that there are five states of matter instead of the classical three.
nonetheless these are minor criticisms in a truly imaginative thriller that is wonderfully engaging and very well written, though one wonders how much that is due to the translator's skills.

When a women named Hally walks into an antique dealer and buys the doll the dealer wants to get rid of all hell breaks loose. The doll is strange enough to begin with: It is chained to a board as if it were into weird sexual stuff, not to mention the antique dealer doesn't like the way the doll looks at her. When Hally looks closer, she notices a weird inscription nailed to the dolls' board. Everything seems fine, when Hally takes the doll home until she starts having dreams about doing bad things to her friends. Except they aren't just dreams they really have happened she learns later that day when she watches the news. Something bad happens in her own life, and she is just sure that the doll is connected to it. Although, her fiance thinks that she is nuts and locks the doll up in the cabinet. Soon she learns from an friend what kind of doll it is, and the friend warns her that she must kill it to get rid of it. At one point in the book she meets and old man, that is somehow connected to the doll but he isn't much help to her. This book was excellent! It is one of the best doll horror books that I have ever read in my life. There was never a boring/ cheesey part in the book. This book is way better than Chucky even. If you like doll horror books you'll love this one! The cover is so creepy, you just know it's going to be scary. This story could be something out of the Twlight Zone, especially the ending.

Well, this one is one of the best sources for Knowlegde. Nicely designed, very helpful pictures, with Rashi commentaries, and of others. I have noticed several differences in commentaries between '94 and '01 editions. They are basically the same, but one has broader explanations, the other has more recent translations. Very nice to have both. You can visit ArtScroll [publisher] for more info and other books.

A really fascinating meditation on race in America and internationally. Set in France, an African American struggles to grasp the source,meaning, and implication of racism. Focuses primarily on the question of "Can a racial minority be just as racist as his oppressor?"

I read a lot of fiction and, quite frankly, loved this book as much as anything I've read lately. Stough has written an unpretentious chronicle of Panama from the Spanish conquest to the present--and beyond. The story is told through people connected by blood and also by Panama's rich, varied culture. There are enough heroic, doomed, quixotic characters--spread over 350 years--to shame the Bard, a collection of natives, Spanish conquistadors, English pirates, opportunists of every ilk and, of course, French and American canal builders.

"To Mamma with Love" it is dedicated, and this is a love story, of growing up well loved at Pinedale. Mrs. Graham has put on paper most thoughtfully her story of growing up in a big family with an artist father in the wonderful north Georgia hills. Her mother, Mamma, was surely little short of an angel, raising almost a dozen kids on a most uncertain income, teaching the children at home in addition to canning and cooking, keeping them all in well-mended togs, and catering to the needs of her husband who had the temperament said to be typical of artists, up in the clouds to down very, very low. The milk cow, the dogs and cats were all pets. If a baby bird died there was a funeral planned and carried out by Brenda and little sister Suzanne. The seasons of the year come to life under Brenda's deft pen. Some problems have solutions and some mysteries are solved. There are some good laughs and some good cries, too! And a big dose of faith in God when death strikes the busy Knight family.

Brooks'new novel is a poetic tour de force, a literary exploration of the old west as only the most playful and -- simultaneously -- the most poignant imagination could bring to it. I was captured from the first sentences: a dead Billy the Kid -- or perhaps not-dead Billy the Kid -- denies all, recalls all. This is not your father's Western. It has little likeness to the traditional genre, but it has everything to do with contemporary literature, that kind of delightful exploration of truth which is always multiple and never quite certain of itself. Brooks is able to make Billy the Kid a vulnerable, wistful poet of sorts, one who reads Shakespeare and Voltaire, and who kills villains only when forced to. This Billy the Kid is sometimes lonely, sometimes stupid, sometimes conflicted, but always full of a wistful reflection on the human condition, and always full of sad dreams, "like a bird whose wings are boken," as Brooks puts it. In the end, a dying Billy recognizes in his journal that "All the words in the world cannot tell the true story of even a single life." The only problem with this novel was that it had to end.

one of the most unsung children's writers working today (and the ghostwriter behind many of your favorites), standiford scores again with the stone giant. the book makes an american legend accesible to young readers without diminishing its mystery. as with her classic balto, standiford takes the raw stuff of real life and turns it into liquid gold. what we're left with is nothing short of a new subgenre in american literature: the phantasmagoric children's period piece.

Stone Houses is a splendid survey which focuses exclusively on residential architecture in the USA. The book begins with several breathtaking photographs of historical sites in the Southwest where the Anasazi built beguiling settlements out of local stone over one thousand years ago. It then proceeds to document numerous stone structures of interest from colonial times right through to the present. Moreover, in addition to his commentary on the buildings presented within the pages of this beautifully realized volume, Lee Goff provides a thoughtful discussion of the qualities of stone itself which makes for such a superb, durable building material in the first instance as well as an inspirational source for imaginative residential design. To quote briefly from the introduction: "Stone has different moods. It can be warm or cold, protective or inhospitable. Before all else, however, stone evokes an image of power, strength, impregnability and endurance. Even more subliminally it conveys a sense of the primordial...Instinctively, we feel the millions of years ago the stones were formed. Thus, the materials of nature become the material of shelter, and the form the shelter takes in turn reflects the origin of the stone and the house's setting, connecting the dwelling and its inhabitants to the most permanent world of all-the natural world."

Stone was the first material used for shelter. It can be (and has been) assembled in any number of creative, aesthetically pleasing ways. Stone Houses takes us on a wondrous tour of many of the possibilities inherent to this medium of construction. "Whether cottage or château, cabin or castle, stone houses embody feelings of romance and the picturesque. Their walls speak of permanence and history; their stones give whispered accounts of their prehistoric creation. They are an ongoing part of what Tennyson referred to as 'the eternal landscape of the past.' "

Very few books exist on this topic. The books that do exist are either decades old or are relatively simplistic. This book is technical and concisely covers a broad range of topics not covered elsewhere. It is the best single source that I have seen on the topic. If the reader has a geologic background, the book is quite readable.