LOVE AND POWER If you feel a little lost in this land of hopelessness, LOVE AND POWER, is the book for you. I found it to be a guide to a lost heart. Of course, the Holy Bible is the best in my opinion for a wounded soul. But, LOVE AND POWER is still a wonderful book, one of the best I ever read.

I am new to Lynn Andrews's work but have been told of her for several years. Frankly, to my surprise, I was enthralled with her style and insight. She is very unique and this is a wonderful book. I will definitely start at the beginning of her journey with Medicine Woman.I truly did not know what it was I needed or wanted to make me happy and to have "balance" in my life. The man with everything materially- but nothing spiritually or in love.I can honestly say that this book helped guide me to see what was attainable and now, blissful. Thank you.

Ms. Andews has done it again, but with even more clarity and insight this time! Fabulous, I'm giving a copy of this wonderful book to everyone I know for the Holidays!

I've been working exclusively on the Mac for nearly seven years, yet each chapter of this book unlocked another great time saver or just plain fun secret! It also demystifies technically cryptic computer jargon. It's a logically structured, easy read. Chapters cover the basics to the advanced. Macintosh unraveled from memory to modem! The included CD-ROM contains very useful items such as ResEdit and File Buddy, that allow you to roll up your sleeves and dig around inside your programs. A true treat from beginning to end! I can't wait to read their next edition

This book, written by two of Macworld magazine's top authors,is extremely informative. It is written not only for thefirst-time user of Macintosh computers, but also for the Mac guru. Everything it talks of finishes with at least 2 or 3 pages of extremely useful tips. The only flaw found in this book was the fact that by the time the book is on the shelf, some information is out of date. Also, some users of outdated technology will find the tips to be only for the newer systems. Of course, the CD-ROM included has much of the info for the older user.

As the owner of a Mac computer company this is one book I love to have on hand. It just doesn't get any better! Never again will someone come into my store thinking they know something I don't. It's the best book for computers I've bought in years

A true blessing! Reading this book has given me hope and has made a significant change in my lifes journey. I highly recommend this book. There IS a "magic child" in us all. Let her bring the magic child out in you. I recommend the CD "magic Child" also. A great compaion to the book.

"Magic Child" is by far the most powerful book I've ever read. Ms. Meyers is able to present issues related to God, Truth, Love, Happiness, Self-fullfillment, responsibility and conscious living with just the right mix of wonder, magic and logic so that it is not only spiritually inspiring but makes perfect real world sense as well.

I recommend this book to anyone interested in living a happy, conscious, magic life.

This book should required reading as early as highschool. It is the perfect gift to any friend, as we all can benefit greatly from what Jane is sharing with us. After reading only three chapters, my life immediatley improved. REVELATIONAL! I realize that I am in control of my life and it is exciting to think of what I will be able to do. Very empowering, buy this book! You will not be disappointed, and it is an easy read. It addresses serious but not unsurmountable issues, and even makes you laugh out loud!

For anyone interested in world peace, Mary King's book, Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr: The Power of Nonviolent Action, is a must read.

In the post cold war era, the battling forces of conflict - war and negotiation - peace have changed. From 1945 to 1990, the United States/Soviet Union standoff shaped public policy. The absence of the super power conflict has created a void and the opportunity for regional controversies has emerged. The essence of Mary King's theme is to utilize the people-based non-violent practices of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. as the major new forces for peace and conciliation.

Mary King's whole background and international experience makes her a unique voice. She cut her teeth in the 1960's in Mississippi, active in America's civil rights batles, working with Julian Bond and Martin Luther King, Jr. From there she has been one of the world's leading spokespersons and activists working on the international scene on behalf of women's rights, civil rights and peace. Her first book on civil rights in Mississippi won the Robert F. Kennedy Award for Journalism.

Mary King has woven together photos, quotes and her own reflections in a manner reminiscent of the popular GANDHI THE MAN by Sri Eknath Easwaran. Her subject is broader, however, in that she gives us not only Gandhi and King but some of the more dramatic leaders of nonviolence in the modern world. The need for information and understanding about this subject and these people cannot be overstated. Mary King was superbly qualified to respond to that need, and she has done so beautifully in this volume. I agree with previous reviewers that it should be in the library of every school and college.

There are not nearly enough books published in English on the extremely important topic of nonviolent social action. I am a member of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, and realize how very many publications there are that examine all aspects of the use of violence/force in international and inter-group relations. But sadly, few of those books give much sober assessment of the huge limitations there are on the effectiveness of coercion-based actions (e.g. in Kosovo, Bosnia, etc.) This book helps to provide an antidote to that. In addition to giving full descriptions of Gandhi's and Dr. MLK's thinking on the power of nonviolence, the author, Mary King, also provides some fascinating material about the effectiveness of nonviolent acts in more recent struggles.

I have written a regular column on global issues for 'The Christian Science Monitor' for nearly a decade now. In the past couple of years, I have also been blessed by the opportunity to work as a writer with an extremely inspiring group of Nobel Peace laureates, including the Dalai Lama, Archbishop Tutu, Rigoberta Menchu Tum, and others. (Based on that work, I wrote a book called "The Moral Architecture of World Peace: Nobel Laureates Discuss our Global Future".) It was significant that nearly all the laureates I worked with mentioned both Gandhi and Dr. MLK--who was also himself a Nobel Peace Laureate--as prime inspirations in their own work and thinking. So I was looking for one reference book that I could use myself, and to which I could refer readers, that would provide a broad overview of the thinking of those two men. I was delighted to find it in Mary King's book, which ideally should be placed as a source-book in every high-school and community library in the country!

This is a set of case study information out of a highly competitive commercial industry that has seen both public outlook and technology change dramatically over the last four decades. While told in story form, the lessons are real and translatable to other industries rather readily. It suggest that management (upper) should take a close look and the non-conforming individuals to find the results of their actions, and potentially give them some more rope to succeed with.

I had a great surprise when a friend from work lent me this book and said, "You have to read this." The book reads effortlessly, like a good friend telling you a great story. When I finished reading it I found the author had put a lot of things into perspective for me. I have a much greater insight into the maverick and how mavericks can benefit a business organization. For anyone in business this is required reading. For everyone else it is enlightenment and entertainment.

Cheverton's been-there-done-that business sense combines with a novelists knack for entertainment makes The Maverick Way a star in the crowded field of business books. Instead of charted, statisitically oriented information on climbing the corporate ladder, Cheverton takes us on a wild ride as the corporate Maverick is identified, makes waves, gets things done, leads when necessary, follows when he must and works his way through the system with a vision that can't be confined. The Maverick Way made me want to get to work, rethink my strategies and be a maverick too. When I was finished with this book I wasn't left with a list of things to do but with the true spirit of what makes business great, risky and so satisfying. A must read for anyone who is serious about making a mark.

Eileen Power's Medieval People sets out to study the Middle Ages not from the viewpoint of an Historical abstraction, but rather from that of the people who lived during the age. It is an account of six individuals who lived during the MA's; Bodo, a Frankish Peasant; Marco Polo, the famous Venetian merchant; Madame Eglentyne, prioress of Chaucer; an anonymous middle-class Parisian housewife; and two English merchants, one engaged in the wool trade and the other a clothier in Essex. The author has illustrated various aspects of social life of the era by drawing on such sources as account books, diaries, letters, records, and wills. She starts the work with a previously unpublished essay entitled "The Precursors," which describes the barbarian conquest of Rome. In this, she describes the lives of three men, Ausonius, Sidonius and Fortunatus and uses them to foreshadow the life that would re-emerge in the Middle Ages.
She starts by imagining a day in the life of the Peasant Bodo, in the time of Charlemagne. From her study of primarily economic documents from the Middle Ages of this time, she not only extrapolates but truly brings to life Bodo and his wife Ermentrude. From there, she goes on to the better documented life of Marco Polo, and also describes how he served as an inspiration for Columbus. Madam Eglentyne is next. Here, Power humorously details the inner workings of a gossipy nunnery and how Eglentyne would have gone about her life as an aristocratic women of God. She next details the life of a middle class Parisian housewife by studying the contents of the Menagier's Wife and validating many of it's points by citing other documents. She concludes by detailing the lives of the two Thomases; Betson and Paycocke of Coggeshall. Both are merchants and provide a chance for Power to really show off her grasp of medieval economics as well as an ability to compile disparate correspondences into a story of a life. This is a rare scholarly work that truly entertains while being read. One of the best books I've ever read.

Wonderful scholarship in a most readable written style. Goes beyond institutions to discover real people of the "middle" ages.

Eileen Power studies the Middle Ages, not from an abstract historical point of view but from simple and real people and what we can know about them. I particularly like her study of Marco Polo, from his notes and diaries, which gives us a materialistic and realistic vision of what they saw of the world, and not what we want to see of what they saw. I also loved Madame Eglentyne, a prioress taken from Chaucer but at once identified to one particular prioress through real life archives and descriptions. A very interesting and useful book to enable us to capture the density of everyday life in the Middle Ages.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU

The reader need only be well grounded in the theory and practice of DC-DC converter design. If so, this grand survey course opens the way to the much larger world of AC power conversion. The impressive breadth of scope is attained within a reasonably modest length (<700 pages) due to the use of telling figures and diagrams, and the author's gift for getting right to the point: what does it do; how does it do it; and what are the advantages/disadvantages versus competing topologies. The presentation seems to include just sufficient detail to enable rapid evaluation of each approach for a given purpose, but never so much detail as to bog down the pace.

Unlike many academics, the author appreciates both elegance of approach and practicality of implementation given available technology and devices. Thus, some topologies are included "for completeness", some are described as "widely used" in large-power industrial applications, and yet another might be described as having "an extensive literature" but few or no commercial products, etc. This will be a valuable up-to-the-minute reference for working power electronic engineers as well as students.

Excellent Book in Power Electronics and Motor Drives, May 4, 2002
Reviewer: Prof. Cong Wang from China Univ. of Mining and Tech., Beijing, China
Prof. Bose, author of the book, is well-known in the world in the field of power electronics, and it is an honor to review his book. The book is a masterpiece contribution in power electronics and drives area. I was teaching his previous book "Power Electronics and AC Drives" (1986) for more than 10 years in my undergraduate and graduate classes. In 1999 our University published the Chinese Version of his another book "Power Electronics and Variable frequency Drives"(1996), I was one of the translators. I was delighted to see this updated, expanded and technologically enhanced book. It will now easily replace his previous book. It is difficult to imagine that anybody else other than Prof. Bose can write such an authoritative book. The writing style is superb, and difficult things have been expressed in clear language.

The book covers almost everything in power electronics and motor drives. It starts with power semiconductor devices, and then covers different classes of converters. The induction and synchronous motor drives (with control and estimation) have been discussed in detail. Finally, the special feature of the book is coverage on artificial intelligence applications in power electronics which have not been treated in any other book on power electronics. There is a separate Problems Manual of the book. I should recommend the book in undergraduate (Senior) and graduate courses in all universities.

Power electronics evolved, taking root and growing into a blossomed tree, inch by inch, from thyristors to transistors to DC drives to microprocessors to advanced converters to AC drives to sensorless control and estimation to AI (artificial intelligence) based control with much more to still come.
Power electronics and variable frequency drives are multidisciplinary fields in electrical engineering. Therefore, a book that encompasses such comprehensive knowledge has to be written by an author who has a visionary engineering knowledge. Prof. Bose is a celebrity, he has been investigating and contributing for this field for more than 40 years and have been contributing widely with more than 150 papers, 21 U.S. patents, 6 books, tutorials and keynote addresses throughout the world. His comprehensive understanding of such field is unique; this book is really recommended if you want to learn what is modern power electronics and ac drives!

Ann Brighton reluctantly goes to England with her millionaire father and serves as his hostess in exchange for the money to start her own horse farm back in post-Civil War Virginia. She can't forgive him for deserting her family to run blockades. She's adamant about returning to the States until she meets Rhys Kendall, a man on a mission of vengeance against her father. Their liking and respect for each other blaze into a passion neither can deny, which endangers both his plans and hers. But when a mysterious blackmailer threatens not only Ann's father's life, but Ann's as well, Rhys and Ann both have to decide what path they want to follow and what they're willing to do to follow it ... The heroine is beautiful from the inside out, generous to her friends and devoted to family, with a gutsy, bold, "American" brashness I admired and chuckled at from the start. The hero is one to live for ... intelligent and sensitive, sexy and bullheaded, in fact, all through the book I wished he was locking horns with me! I haven't read an historical romance in a long time but I couldn't resist this one, from page one on. I highly recommend it and can't WAIT to read the others in the three-part series! Bravo, Jo-Ann Power!

I took it with me everywhere. From the beauty salon to my son's track meet. I couldn't let it out of my sight until I finished it. Now I can hardly wait till the next book. It has all the elements of a fantastic book: romance, mystery, and rich historical detail. Ann is a true delight!!! I even bought extra copies to give to my friends!

It started out a little slow for me because our first American Beauty Ann was getting on my nerves but as the story continued she began to grow on me and I came to enjoy her very much. She definitely had a mind of her own and I like that type of character.

I save my reviews for books that deserve it. And this is definitely one of them.

Though it is tempting to take a star out of the rating because of a few punctuation and typographical errors throughout the book, I won't (someone at the editor's office should check page 163, though, it is missing a paragraph or two); this book is just too darned good to not give 5 stars.

Not only does she bring an open and creative mind to the work, and encourage her readers to do so as well, but Ms. Drayer also makes numerology fun. Throughout the text, she is gentle, and continually urges the reader to figure it out for themself; they are, after all, the final authority on the subject.

Good for both experienced numerologists, and the absolute beginner, put this book high on your "To Read" list if you are at all interested in learning numerology, or wanting a little breeze to set you sailing on the journey of self-discovery

Numerology: The Power in Numbers, A Right & Left Brain Approach, Ruth Abrams Drayer's 3rd Edition, is a remarkable book that clearly explains the principles, clarifies the process and provides enlightening spiritual keys to our own personal past, present and future. A positive, uplifting book that unlocks the significance of our names and birthdates in a way that validates each and all of us. Well worth buying and reading!!

I am so pleased to have a copy of Ruth Drayer's Revised book (3rd Edition)of this most informative and enlightening book on Numerology. I first came across Ruth's work 30 years ago and have used her books in workshops and private counseling over the
years. This book is SIMPLY THE BEST for those who are just beginning their study of Numerology or long time practitioners as myself. With this Edition, I find the new diagrams and instructions helpful to my workshop students as they learn how
to chart their own life and those of family and friends. The
expanded information on the ATTAINMENT Number is inspired as
well as the expanded information on relationship comparisons.
If you are looking for spiritual insight as well as practical guidance for your every-day life, I highly recommend this book.

THE PARABLE OF THE TRIBES is an awesome achievement that will completely restore your faith in human nature. The book presents a stunning theory of social evolution every bit as revolutionary as Einstein's theory of general relativity or Darwin's theory of natural selection. Like those two previous theories, the PARABLE represents a paradigm-shift in thinking. (My jaw hung open the whole time I was reading.) The book provides a path beyond guilt, shame, and hostility toward love, compassion, and wholeness within the human condition. Ranging over the subjects of psychology, anthropology, religion, and sociology, the book's implications could not be more sweeping and profound. It presents a breathtaking critique of civilization that shows us how humankind is more the victim and less the instigator of history's violence and oppression. It disproves the erroneous commonsense view that civilization is merely human nature and human choice writ large. It leads us to understand fully our predicament so that we might solve our problems intelligently. For a couple million years, humanity lived within a fairly circumscribed biological niche. Culture evolved slowly and was in step with biological evolution. Suddenly with the agricultural revolution 10,000 years ago, social evolution began to outstrip biological evolution. In an unprecedented way, our genetic inheritance came to be out of joint with our environment. Schmookler's book shows that with the advent of large-scale agriculture, suddenly anarchy came to characterize the inter-societal system. Societies began to compete using the vast new possibilities offered by civilization. A process of selection began, continuing to this day, which favored the ways of power--a process that is utterly indifferent to natural human needs. Ways of being that had been inherently more humane and more sustainable were slowly but surely swept away in favor of cultures and societies wielding ever greater power. Schmookler reveals how Power is a contagion that leaves destruction, despoliation, and misery in its wake. The book also presents possible solutions to this problem of power. The PARABLE will definitely be one of the greatest, most liberating books you'll ever read.

If I were to list the top ten books of the century, this book would be one of them. Why? Because it dares to answer a question that few others have attempted, a question that is fundamental and vital to our future. It is the question: "What determines the direction in which civilization evolves?" Or, "What explains the overall thrust of history?" Or, "Are we shaping our own destiny, and if not, what is?" Not only does Schmookler dare to address the question, but the answer he comes up with is equal to the dimensions of the task.

If you think that the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden is adequate for explaining the history of civilization, this book is not for you. If you think that everything is made crystal clear by the Marxian analysis of the "material conditions" of life, this book is not for you. If you believe that spirit-beings elsewhere in the universe are guiding us toward some wonderful end, this book is not for you. But if you think big, and are ready for a magnificent, breathtaking, and sobering view of humanity's course, based on best-science research into prehistory and panoramic interdisciplinary insights, you will come to cherish this book. I, for one, am glad that it has a poetic title, The Parable of the Tribes, and not just an academic title such as its subtitle, The Problem of Power in Social Evolution, because the sweep of the book includes but encompasses more than straight intellectual analysis. It tells the human story, our story, with all the poignant, tragic, and hopeful implications.

The stroke of genius that powers this book is Schmookler's insight into the broader applicability of Darwin's categories of "diversity" and "selection." In effect, Schmookler has shown that these are categories from the discipline of logic. Darwin's genius was to take these purely logical categories and show how they could be applied to, and did apply to, the natural world, resulting in biological evolution. Schmookler's genius is to free these categories from their usual ties with biology, and to show us how they have operated in human history as the fundamental underlying forces shaping our destiny, for good or ill.

Just one of the many themes in this book is that there is a commonsense view that human creativity is what accounts for the diversity in variations of forms of civilization, and that human choice accounts for which of these variations get selected. Hence the idea of simple progress. But we live in a disenchanted era that knows better. Schmookler reminds us that "For a story of improvement, the history of civilization makes rather dismal reading, and as the culmination of ten thousand years of progress the twentieth century is deeply disappointing." (p. 7) Similarly, the "invisible hand" of the free market, where human choice is supposed to reign sovereign, has led to only pockets of prosperity in the world (granted that some are big pockets), and even that prosperity is itself rent with stress. What is it that is systematically distorting our cultures, our civilizations, in directions that we are not deliberately choosing? If we don't gain comprehension of it, how can we ever alter it toward selection of more humane, more intelligent, more loving, more fun variations?

The "parable" is that once some human tribe becomes habitually aggressive toward other tribes, all others are eventually forced to adopt the "ways of power." "Eventually" can mean a long time, but the systematic distortion is there. The ways of power seep into every aspect of human life, from relations between men and women to harsh upbringing of children to weapons development to forms of economic exchange. It is part of the wondrousness of this book to make your way through section after section, discovering how yet another broad area of human life is illuminated by the quiet or not-so-quiet struggle for power.

In the end, it is a noble vision that is offered by The Parable of the Tribes. It simultaneously engenders compassion for the human race (trapped in the struggle for power), and clears away the confusion and the obfuscation that is part of the problem. The ability to see the human race in its last ten-thousand-year development has only recently become possible, and Schmookler has made it actual. His book gives me hope that we humans can understand our own long history and begin to shape our own destiny for good.

Parable of the Tribes

Gripping in its fascinating subject matter, Andrew Bard Schmookler's The Parable of the Tribes flows with the elegance of language rarely seen in writing today. This important work highlights the essence of human existence, that which makes the complicated and messy business of civilization work: Power. The evolution of biological systems discounts the idea that organisms are slowly giving way to more perfect descendents, and the same holds true for civilization. Civilization doesn't get "better," it gets "different" depending on the interface between power and the environment. Like the blood coursing through our bodies, power flows through each and every one of us, an invisible force between minds and souls. Tapped into this power, each man, woman and child since the beginning of human existence has contributed its share to the super-organism called civilization. Power drives the vast majority of our individual decision-making process. Individual freedom in the true sense of the concept never existed in the first place. We, it turns out, are less in control of our destinies than once thought. It is the constantly changing invisible nexus of power that determines how, when and why we respond the way we do to the world around us. It is important to know that power is a child of the merging of many intellects, and not some brutish club wielded against the weak, as is so often described in texts on politics and war. It is a unified human force that can be described on a relative scale of both good and bad, with shades in between. I can honestly say that few pieces of literature have moved me in a profoundly thought-provoking way like this work. After reading The Parable of the Tribes, human events both tragic and beautiful that characterize our civilization suddenly make sense. One begins to understand why and how wars are fought and peace is forged. The beauty of this work is that it describes in wonderful detail the bond we share with each other, that we are literally linked together to form a single, very impressive experience called civilization. Leaders would do well to read this book, and learn the true ways of power. Many believe that power is a thing sprouting from the few, and that some, indeed most do not have this supposed talent. The reality is that power is in all of us, like the current pulsing through our nerves, its dendritic connectors tapped into our fellows around us. Scmookler, it must be said, does not believe even remotely that we are puppets floating about in a river of power, forever subject to its unknowable flow. Schmookler's point is that while we may make decisions based on what we believe is best, it is power, manifesting itself in the millions of human interactions which occur every millisecond, that long ago set events in motion forcing you to make a decision in the first place. We, one realizes, are the power.