I loved this book. I especially liked the chapters about Rufus and Hughie running away from school and Joey dancing the Sailor's Hornpipe. Chet was my favorite character in the book, and also his brother Hughie. If they were based on real people the author knew, I'd like to read about who they really were. I love the Pudges!

this is about a family of 4 doing all these unusual things. like hopping on a boxcar during recces, dancing with a dog, or getting locked in a bread box! they love their house "the yellow house" but then it's for sale! will they have to move? read the book to find out.

The Moffats is an entertaining story about a poor family without a father that has many marvelous adventures. One of the adventures is when the Moffats help a man from the Salvation Army find his way.When the man moves to the back to get some rest he falls out and gets left behind.Read the book to find out what happens next. The Moffat family is a kind family. The book is a good family story. If you are interested in good book The Moffat's is the book for you.

Ernest Knobbs has created a piece of work that will pull you in and not let go! This heartrending story of a special relationship between parent and child will leave you breathless. Keep the tissue box close by! You cannot read this one without tears. Tears from hilarious antics to heart-twisting grief. This is a book for everyone, parent or not, because somewhere in those pages you will find yourself or someone you wish you could have been. Long after putting the book down, the characters will remain a part of your life. It will leave you with a resolve to live each moment as if it were your last. I will be anxiously awaiting the next part of the story in the lives of the Spaldings! Don't keep us waiting Ernest Knobbs!

Randy is a delightful book that speaks to the heart. It is an easy read and yet one that speaks of important matters of life and death, love and loss, grief and rebirth. The book draws you in, letting you experience extraordinary relationships under extraordinary circumstances. I recommend it for all ages.

I read randy in a 24 hour reading spree. And when I was done, I just wanted to read more about the Spalding family. If you love reading about "everyday families" and how they help each other through life- this book is for you. Down-to-earth with guarenteed laughs and tears. I highly recommend it!!!!!!

Mary was delighted to hear your raving reviews of her book. I am sad to tell you that she passed away August 18, 2001 at the age of 96. She was in the process of completing a sequal to "The Widow Down By The Brook". Had her body not given out, believe me, her mind would have finished it. I was fortunate to have spent the past year trying to keep up with her. The immediate personal connection you feel reading the words in her book are the same feelings you had meeting her. She found humor in every day. She was a delightful woman, a precious one that got away. She will be truely missed.

To the reviewer from Modesto - please email me, I know Mary would love to hear from you.

Mary's book read like a conversation between friends as she reminisced about the challenge of making a barn into a home and then adjusting to life as a single woman upon the death of her husband. Although for me it was reminiscent of similar experiences as I was her neighbor, living just over the hill, everyone will enjoy her style. In her telling of the love and support she found among neighbors, she reminds us all of a life and time many of us knew but now has been lost.

In this extremely well told tale, Captain Josiah Peabody, USN leads the frigate Delaware against British interests in the War of 1812. This story nearly has it all. The action crackles like a thunderous broadside, and the duel, the romance, and personal complexity of the captain are sure to satisfy even the most glutted reader. My only problem with this work was that it didn't continue to include a multi-volume series.
As a single book, it is an outstanding piece of naval fiction, certainly ranking as one of the best sea tales of all time. It is difficult not to come away from this work with a spring in your step, and the images evoked will sing in your memory with all the infectious brilliance of the Marine Band aboard the Delaware powering the fife and drum. Anchors Away!

This book takes place in the war of 1812 and is about the story of an intelligent, brave American captain who manages to break the Brittish blocade. He goes on a journey of harrassment of trade and of raiding and destruction. It is a very interesting book that shows what a life of an American Captain at that time must have been like and also shows us an interesting story with lots of action to keep you entertained as well as a believable plot.

This book has all the makings of a series that could have been created to parallel Hornblower but in the American Theatre and with an American captian.

The plot is tight, the book well written and the problems of neutrality and family that face Peabody and his foe are interesting and keep you reading further.

Peabody has a totally different set of bias, beliefs and weaknesses than Hornblower. They are played out very well throughout the entire book.

It is a shame that we haven't seen more of the captain, but then no author lives forever.

Before you buy however I would point out that first editions of this book are fairly easy to come by, at least here in NE. But whatever edition you buy, buy it.

My only complaint about this book is -- it is too SHORT!

I loved this book! Its alot like my begining in EMS and all the fears are real, the ups and downs true to life. A must read for all women in EMS.

Ever since I first stumbled across Jane Stern (ROADFOOD), I have devoured every title with glee, rejoycing in the wonders of Elvis, food, The Sixties, Pop Culture, Bad Taste and purebreed dogs. Naturally, the Sunday morning I saw AMBULANCE GIRL sitting on the new release table at my local mega-bookstore I snatched it up, raced for an oversize armchair and settled down to read before buying.

One day Jane sees a sign for volunteer EMTs at the local firehouse and plunges her fifty-something, sqeamish self into the world of EMTs enduring EMT-B boot camp. And once she's passed the exam, the real tests begin. From who truly holds the power in a county becoming over run with McMansions to the woman who the reading public doesn't get to see with each radio show and Gourmet column, Jane enthralls.

For anyone who thinks Jane Stern needs her hubby Michael to write a decent book, think again! The writing is crisp, clean and the story moves along at a steady speed.

A must have for even the casual Stern fan.

I was first drawn to this book by a haunting picture of two little girls on the book cover. I was impatient to learn their significance. I had to wait. In the opening of this story, the author relates his fear of the Not-sees (Nazi) as told to him throughout his youth by his mother who escaped Europe.

However, in an effort to come to grips with being Jewish and to learn the truth about what his family endured during World War II, an American divorced father and his two sons begin a quest to retrace the steps of an uncle who endured the Holocaust. Using a tattered journal's clues they searched for his hiding places and learned more than they expected about the war and its victims. Only after finding where and how the twins died did the author understand his great-uncles, other family members, and his mother. During the trip he also realizes what it means to be a father.

I could not appreciate the cover of this book until I learned the fate of the Jewish twin sisters and others who suffered.

Daniel Asa Rose has succeeded in writing a memoir that touches the reader in so many ways.He opens by inviting us to his childhood home of Rowyaton ,Connecticut ,and by sharing his memories, opens the flood gates of our own memory. But, Daniel's comforting small town life disguised the history of terror which his glamorous art dealer mother survived. This life is contrasted by that of his mother's family, the New York Orthodox Jewish diamond dealers,foreign and covered with diamond dust, who both embarrased and haunted the young Daniel.They were made more mysterious by the fact that that their Jewish traditions were in no way reflected in the home that Daniel's parents created.

Years later, after a wrenching divorce Daniel takes his two charming and intelligent sons ages seven and twelve, to Belguim,France and Spain to track the steps that led to his family's survival. The results are both delightful and harrowing, but conclude in an triumphant reconciliation with identity. The European chapters are interspersed with the author's boyhood adventures and conflicts. The device, though initially slightly disconcerting, help us understand the arc of Daniel Rose's life. The book deals with the issues of identity with which we all struggle.The reader will not want the story of the Rose family to conclude, but when it does you will have been greatly enriched by the journey.

Hiding Places by Daniel Asa Rose is many stories in one. It's the story of a young boy growing up and how he perceives his differences and ways he tries to blend in or hide. It's the story of a father and two sons trying to forge a relationship with each other after divorce, and it's about one family's experience of hiding to survive the horrors of the Holocaust.

The book is honest and forthright. Daniel Asa Rose has opened up a window into his feelings about growing up Jewish in a predominantly WASP Connecticut town. This reader was able to relate, not so much to the hiding borne out of cultural and religious differences, but to the hiding that kids do because they feel that no one else has the same thoughts. Daniel Asa Rose gives a voice to those childhood thoughts that most of us have kept silent.

The author reveals himself to be a caring father, one who misses his sons greatly after his divorce and seeks to find a way to create a whole family out of the three of them. He doesn't spend much time talking about how painful the divorce itself was to him, but this shows through in the writing. This is not something seen from a male perspective too often. There are sure to be other fathers out there who will resonate with this aspect of the book.

Lastly, Daniel Asa Rose creates a portrait of his relative, J.P. Morgan (not THE J.P. Morgan) and his particular experience of survival during the Holocaust. At times, it is painful to read, but because it is the story of a singular person, it takes on greater significance than observing the Holocaust as a whole. J.P.'s survival and the tracking of his hiding places by Rose and his sons is nothing short of miraculous. But wouldn't most of those who survived the Holocaust describe their experience as such?

It's tempting to condemn this father for exposing his sons to the horrors of the Holocaust at the tender ages of seven and twelve. Without debating the issue too much, the final verdict is really up to his sons, Alex and Marshall--after all, it's a family thing.

This is a very different take on the idea of just how far a mother would go to save her child from a certain death. Just what would you be willing to do? Would you "sell your soul" so to speak? Dinah is a woman who seems to have everything going for her, everything that is except a healthy child. During an endless hospital stay with her son she is "visited" by a ghost who claims to be the spirit of a long forgotten lover. The ghost taunts and teases forcing Dinah to revisit her past and cast doubt on her future. The ghost makes the ultimate offer, possession of Dinah for the saving of Elijah. This is a heart wrenching yet oddly funny tale about love, devotion, forgiveness and acceptance. It's well worth your time to read.

A thoroughly, enjoyable, can't-put-down kind of book. This story is so very different than anything I've ever read. The basic undertone of this story is a mother's love for her child. Elijah is deathly ill and knocking at death's door when his mother, Dinah, makes a "deal" with a ghost to save her son. This ghost is actually a demon and makes life difficult for Dinah, even unbearable at times. There are a lot of deep lessons in this book, and most of them are the type that none of us like to face; like the acceptance of the eventual death of a young son. Dinah fights that event and never has peace until she does accept that her son is not going to live a long, beneficial, and normally healthy life. The trauma of a fatal illness and the way it effects a marriage is another scene played out in this book. I highly recommend this book to anyone. This is definitely a page turner and one of the best books I've read.

This is a very different kind of story. I truely think it would be a great movie because of the story angles and because it is very unique and imaginative. Excellent!!

There's a depth and complexity to this electrifying tale that is extraordinary. Superficial stories about the death of a child are such a common clichéd surefire staple of movie-of-the week tear-jerkers that it is both remarkable and stunning to see someone explore loss on such deeper levels of sensitivity and insight. By the time you finish this work, you'll feel like you've been on an exhilarating journey-- it is that rare that you read something that makes you look at things in ways you didn't anticipate and go in directions you didn't expect to take. It is true that Elie Wiesel said that today literature is exhausted. That's why when you come across something so peerless and energizing as Saving Elijah, it is not just rare--it is an event.

In a compelling bit of story-telling, the book starts out exploring how the impending loss of a child strikes the protagonist Dinah Rosenberg Galligan in every core of her existence, and not just by the obvious overwhelming grief and sadness, as she flails about drowning in helplessness. Bit by bit, in fits and starts, it begins to wreck her marriage, her career, her friendships. For example, it's unusual that a book investigates how a child's illness can bring together and then push apart a husband and wife. It does this with such a beautifully raw honesty, you almost feel like you should look away, but you can't. That's what is so remarkable about this book; it keeps looking at things from angles you're not assuming. Still, it moves even beyond this onto a spiritual plane.

One of the things I liked about the book was that it was exquisitely written by the prose stylist Fran Dorf with a rhythm and cadence all its own, alternatively slowing down and then speeding up, but always building and building. The plot concerns the Faustian bargain Dinah makes with a demon from out of her past. He will intercede with death on behalf of her son if she will give herself to him. The fact that she agrees tells you more than you ever need to know about a mother's love and courage for her child. But don't for a minute think that this is a supernatural tale on the level of a Stephen King book or even those incredible otherworldly/sexual yarns of Isaac Bashevis Singer. More important than this actual demon, Dinah must boldly confront and take on the "ghosts" of her past which have long haunted her and weighed her down. Notably, this is not a depressing or pessimistic work. Saving Elijah is an optimistic meditation on the doggedness of the human spirit. It is ultimately a towering book about redemption and hope.

I am working my way through all of Ms's Allen's 37 books and this is my 15th. The one I like best so far is Matters of The Heart and I wish she would write another pithy one like that. It is hard to believe that a woman could be a recluse for 27 years in this day and time. I loved what I learned about ordering on the net everything one could want or need. Ms. Allen is currently writing a sequel to this and I will probably read it too.

"Fresh Air" is, of course, a realistic, contemporary novel, dealing with such issues as child abuse and spousal abuse (as do many of Charlotte Vale Allen's other novels). It vividly re-creates settings that range from Hollywood to suburban Connecticut to Harlem. It's even Internet-savvy. But the key to its appeal is something age-old and fundamental -- a fairy-tale quality -- that's hinted at by the nicknames of the heroine, Lucinda Hunter: "Ella" and "Cinders," which add up to "Cinderella." Lucinda, a movie star's daughter, is like an exiled princess, isolated and living in emotional poverty, when, if she only knew it, a world of love and connection, her true kingdom, is within easy reach. Katanya, the little African American girl who frees Lucinda from her self-imposed prison, is the classic facilitator, the fairy, the squire, the wizard, who breaks the spell and makes a new life possible.
This big-hearted story features a wide variety of voices and interesting characters. Some of its people, when "Fresh Air" ends, we may feel we're only beginning to know -- but a sequel, evidently, is on the way. It'll be worth the wait!

For the most part, Lucinda Hunter has not left her Connecticut home in twenty-seven years. Rarely she will leave to go into town, but that takes quite a struggle for her to achieve. Shockingly, Lucinda is the daughter of the late great actress Lily Hunter and a noted screenwriter in her own right. However, when her mother died, Lucinda learned that her father was a black man. Unable to cope with not knowing whether she belongs to the white or black race, both or neither, she became a hermit.

Lucinda looks out her window to see a young African-American female playing in her yard. The girl invites Lucinda outside. Surprisingly she goes and soon a bond forms between the nine-year-old Harlem resident Katanya Taylor, in town as part of the FRESH AIR program, and the recluse. As they become better acquainted, Kat helps Lucinda overcome her agoraphobia one step at a time.

FRESH AIR is an engaging contemporary tale that showcases how modern communication systems enable an individual to hide from society as everything can be ordered on line. The story line focuses on friendship, as everyone needs someone to care about. Lucinda is an incredible lead character and though Kat acts more like an adult than a preadolescent, readers will find her charming too. The support cast provides the audience deep insight into Lucinda as Charlotte Vale Allen gifts her fans with a deep psychological drama.

Harriet Klausner

This book has already caused a stir for all the wrong reasons. Various victims' rights groups have taken issue with this book for the following reasons: (a) that Wally Lamb would devote his time to, of all things, a group of criminals; and (b) that the stories in this book humanize their writers rather than focuses on the victims of their crimes. It is undisputed that the women who wrote these memoirs did a variety of illegal, immoral and awful things. However, if you read these stories, you will begin to wonder who the victims really are.

The women's stories are uniformly heartbreaking; nearly all the authors were victims of sexual abuse. Nearly all grew up poor. Nearly all had minimal or questionable parental support. And about half wrote about abusive romantic relationships. Several of the authors are in prison for killing their abusive spouse and/or significant other. While it was wrong for them to take their husband's lives, it is also understandable once you read their harrowing tales.

I was especially moved by Bonnie Foreshaw's "Faith, Power and Pants" and Diane Bartholomew's "Snapshots of my former life." Both went from unbearable childhoods to atrocious marriages. Both are clearly angry with a system that has failed them. Yet both write of finding hope despite all the indignities life has thrown at them. As a final indignity, Bartholomew developed cancer while writing her memoir. Only then was she paroled for the murder of her abusive husband. It is clear that she was only paroled because the State of Connecticutt did not want to pay her chemotherapy bills.

This book can be harrowing to read but it left me with a sense of hope. Beautiful women exist underneath the prison fatigues, who have survived despite the brutal conditions of the penitentiary system. Each story in this collection moved me in a different way. I can say that about very few books.

As a reader interested in women's issues I expected to like this book, but I did not expect to be completely captivated and overcome by it, which is what actually happened. It is presented in such a compelling way you become absorbed by each inmate's story and exeriences. It is at the same time heart wrenching and informative. Some common threads run through the individual stories yet each is so unique you feel the pain of each individual story. Photographs of each writer, both past and present, help to make you feel a connection. I gained insight into cultures and lifestyles I knew nothing about and saw a part of life so realistically described that I felt I had been there myself. Wally Lamb did an extraordinary job putting this project together and the result is a book that I feel will benefit everyone and should be read by all.

Sure, Wally Lamb has written two of the greatest books of all time and lent his expertise to the stories of the women in this book, but these women did a fine job on their own. The stories of these women are heart-wrenching, but at the same time inspiring. They are about as far away from victim-hood as one can possibly get. A great book leaves it's mark on the reader and this one has surely left a mark on me. This is a book I will remember forever. Yes, these women are all in prison, or have been in prison for doing terrible things, but they are not terrible people, they have all come to terms with their life and found peace through their writing. Get your hands on a copy of this book, read it and pass it along to your friends and family, you won't be disappointed!!

Superbly written by J.A. Louthain and illustrated by Andrea Eberbach, Tagger: Alone Along The Mystic River is an historical novel for young adults which is set in Connecticut in the early 1800s. Tagger is a young girl who is sold into servitude. She escapes to the Mystic River seeking to pursue an education and a new life. Tagger survives by catching and selling fish. Well researched, historically accurate, and with a strong message of independence and self-reliance, Tagger: Alone Along The Mystic River is engaging, rewarding, and highly recommended for young readers and enhanced with a charming, original music CD that comes packaged with the trade paperback book.

What a wonderful book, and such a great inspiration for young people. Through Taggers' adventures you will learn that honesty, hard work and sharing, builds lifetime rewards and friendships. There is a big emphasis on the importance of an education. Tagger's different relationships with all of the characters in this book are heartwarming, some happy and some sad; which is all a part of growing up. The book brings Mystic River villages to life with it's colorful descriptions. I bought this book for my 8 year old niece and she just loves it. She took it to her school and her teacher is reading small parts from a couple of the chapters to the class.

An adventurous and compelling story for people of all ages. The historical and geographical references were educational too. I highly recommend it; I read it in 1 sitting!