As a devoted fan of the "canon" of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's works, I thought "Sherlock Holmes in Dallas" was terrible. It might well be sub-titled "Holmes and Watson Read The Warren Report To Each Other.". The most ridiculous parts are the slanderous chapters about Dallas. Dallas isn't a perfect place, but it's certainly not a place "whose very atmosphere seemed to breathe some menace." It is obvious Mr.Ions was not acquainted with the Oak Cliff section of Dallas where Oswald's rooming house was located, for he mentions the "liquor stores" on the
"drab, suburban streets"......Oak Cliff has been "dry" forever !
I think the book is best summed up with Holmes statement.....
"I said at the outset that I would not be able to solve this, my last case, and I confess a sense of failure." There are a few good chapters, but not really in the best of the Holmes pastiches. Finally, Holmes remarks, "I feel old, Watson...."
No wonder.....if still alive, he would have been 109 years old in 1963. The best that can be said about the book is that it makes for amusing reading if one does not take it too seriously.However, in all fairness, you must credit Mr. Ions with a scholarly reading of the Warren Report and the book can be considered a very good "Reader's Digest" type report for quick reference without resorting to one's reading of all the 26 volumes of that report.

This book presents a scholarly analysis of the events surrounding the JFK assassination, in a readable format--while faithfully capturing the essence of interplay between Holmes and Watson as they might bring their analytical prowess to bear on this historical puzzle. After seeing the movie JFK, I had the distinct impression that someone within the Oliver Stone company had been influenced by this book. This is an ideal book to take to the beach or cottage on a short vacation.

This book is an effort by a noted Episcopalian educator and priest to describe his "understanding of what it means to be an Anglican." By "Anglican," Dean Holmes meant "nothing more than those Christians who worship according to some authorized edition of the Book of Common Prayer and who are in communion with the see of Canterbury." As an Anglican who is trying very hard to understand what is happening in the Anglican Communion today, I looked forward to reading this book. It is loosely organized into 12 chapters, each dealing with the author's assessment of the Anglican perspective on key issues in the church, such as authority, the Bible, the Liturgy, Episcopacy, and like topics. Each chapter could stand alone as an essay on the subject at issue, which makes reading the book less challenging than it might otherwise be. The author is articulate and his prose is generally understandable in a single reading. He delights in using vivid imagery to describe the theological topics he is examining; for example, Dean Holmes writes that "the Sacraments are to life in the church as sexual intercourse is to a marriage. They do not encompass it, they guarantee nothing, but out of them springs the possibility of lives changed by an intimacy with God at the deepest level." I was nevertheless very frustrated by the book. It is less a description of Anglicanism than its 20th century American incarnation; a better title would have been "What is Liturgical Liberalism?" The author neglects the Anglican tradition of the last five centuries as well as that evolving in the rest of the world in favor an "Anglican attitude" that is, as another writer has observed, "averse to the truth claims, disciplines, and passions that make for mission." It is also interesting that an author who repeatedly stresses the need for imaginative approaches to theology and "the penultimate nature of our answers to the character of God and his will for us" can speak so derisively of those who do not share his positions. Dean Holmes refers to the "simplemindedness of Pietism," characterizes the worship of Protestants as "homogenized," refers to those who think that the Gospel of Matthew could possibly support the infallibility of the Pope as "foolish," and labels as "absurd" the views of those who see in the book of Revelation prophecy about our present circumstances. So much for tolerance! The reader in search of an objective answer to the question of "What is Anglicanism" should, quite frankly, look elsewhere.

This is not an insubstantial book, in spite of its modest size of 95 pages. The author goes to some effort to dispel any notions and impressions that the Anglican Communion is socially and financially upper class. He also refrains from denominational triumphalism. There is a great deal of interesting reading on issues of missionary work, prophetic witness, the Sacrements, Bishopry and administration, and Biblical interpretation. The writing style is quite heavy but not overwhelmingly so, and is closely and coherently argued. Certain readers might find his exposition rather stiff and humorless, but very thoughtful and well researched.

This book was written I believe in 1982 and it reflects issues affecting the Anglican church at that time. It is due for an updated edition, in light of recent developments. Perhaps surprisingly, there is no commentary or opinion on the Anglican position - at least in Canada from my direct experience - on the issue of encouraging participation of Baptized but not Confirmed Christians in the Eucharist. The Anglicans have come in for some criticism on this matter, even from Pope John Paul II.

I enjoyed this book so much that I read it twice. For Anglicans and Episcopalians it is an excellent read, although it is not suited for novices to Christianity. Considering there is not a great deal of literature in this specific branch of worship, it is recommended.

This book while giving all the information nessary to build the gun is still a little patchy in its information and you realy need to know about firearms in the first place to fully understand it.If you have a basic knolage of the insides of firearms you should find this book infomative and enjoyable to read.

This collection presents more of the Mutual Broadcasting System's Holmes radio shows from a time after Rathbone and Bruce had left the show, as had writers Anthony Boucher and Dennis Green. Unlike the Simon & Schuster collections of tales from the Bruce/Rathbone era, this collection presents 12 consecutive tales in chronological order of presentation. Also, unlike the Simon & Schuster presentations, this collection dispenses with the pre- and post-story commentary. With the extra tape, they present three, rather than two, stories per cassette.

Every third story is an adaptation of a Conan Doyle story, so the quality of those stories is superb. When Meiser is left to her own devices in writing, she can produce very uneven work. "The Case of the Well Staged Murder" makes for satisfying listening, but "Professor Moriarty and the Diamond Jubilee" is quite contrived, and "New Years Eve in the Scilly Isles" is downright silly. A firebug is seen deserting a ship as it sails out of harbor. The Captain is radioed that the ship will probably go up in smoke at the stroke of twelve on New Years Eve. The lives of 2,000 passengers and crew hang in the balance. So does the Captain turn around and go back to port to unload the passengers and search for the time bombe? Nope. He sails on for 18 hours until he is far at sea and there is only an hour left until midnight. But Holmes arrives in a yacht just in the nick of time. This has my vote for the most contrived Holmes radio pastiche of all times.

John Stanley sounds more like Rathbone than Rathbone, and doesn't muff his lines as often. Alfred Shirley tries manfully, but he cannot quite convey the warmth of Bruce's Watson. The organ music is more subdued and not quite as annoying, but Meiser makes Holmes far too disagreeable. He is the rudest Holmes I have encountered, and very nearly the most conceited. I'm sure that on several occasions, the only thing that prevented Watson from inviting Holmes outside for fisticuffs was the fact that Holmes was an expert amateur boxer.

The 60 page booklet that comes with the collection is a gold mine of information for Holmes afficionados.

This edition contains 'The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes' short stories and the novel 'The Hound of the Baskervilles'. I actually stole this book from my High School library but I didn't want to read it until I had read the stories which preceded. Since I've already commented on 'Adventures' in another review I'll stick to discussing 'Hound'.

Written after Conan-Doyle's 'Final Problem' short story about Holmes' 'death' this book takes place before his confrontation with Moriarty at the Reichenbach Falls. Doctor Mortimer from Dartmoor comes to visit Holmes with the story of a beastly hound which has killed Charles Baskerville and will more than likely come after his heir Sir Henry.

Holmes promptly sends Watson off to Dartmoor to guard Sir Henry and report back with all developments. This is the point where Holmes disappears for almost half of the book. But he returns near the end to explain the mystery to all involved.

While it is better than Conan-Doyle's short stories in terms of a stronger narrative and a larger mystery 'Hound of the Baskervilles' still suffers from long, ludicrous and unrealistic monologues and superficial contrivances. As always the story is told from the point of view of Watson. But it simply isn't a unique enough point of view to make the first person narrative worth it. I can honestly say that if the story was told in the 3rd person perspective it would make hardly any difference.

I cannot for the life of me work out how this book is sometimes regarded as a horror. Nothing in it scared me at all. The hound doesn't even show up until the end. And even then Conan-Doyle's description doesn't paint a very vivid picture in your head.

There just isn't enough intrigue or reason to keep turning the pages. The human and reality-based side of the story comes thru too strongly to allow any sort of fantastical creativity. As a classic it's a disappointment but compared to the short stories it's definitely better than the norm.

This was the only book I could get my hands on before my trip. The plates are good but incomplete. Many birds I saw were not even covered in this book. It's organized taxonomically and the descriptions are pretty good, but I try to ID from a picture, then I read a detailed description. It is a small hardcover book, so it is easy to carry.

From the Introduction:
This book is designed to give the layman an introduction to each bird family, and by describing one or more birds from each, enable him to identify most of the birds that can be found readily in the various habitats of Java and Bali. There are colour illustrations of 112 birds, and text references to at least 120 more. A checklist at the back tabulates 433 species on the Java and Bali lists. Once the reader has developed sufficient interest to compare his own findings with this list, he will need to obtain a more detailed field guide. The list is not fully comprehensive, as there are some 50 additional species which reach the islands only rarely, as migrants off-course or as oceanic wanderers, and these are not included.

The "Field Guide to the Birds of Java and Bali" by John MacKinnon was recommended to me while I was there and is supposed to be the "most comprehensive" field guide of this area.

As prior reviews state, the text is well-selected from Powell's journal, and the photographs are superb. But how can the author publish the journal of an explorer without a map keyed to the dates of journal entries? The photographs are superb, but again, not keyed to a map, or even associated with the text. The identifying data for each photo is listed in the front of the book, but is not given on, or near the photograph. A potentially superb book, but, because of these defects and faults, one that is maddening to read.

I happened to purchase this novel and the author's previous Holmes effort, CHRONICLES OF THE MISSING YEARS, simultaneously. That was fortunate, because if I had purchased and read COTMY first, I would never have purchased another novel by this author, and so would have missed out on this one.

In short, this pastiche has everything that the first novel lacked: plot, vivid characters and characterizations, continual new developments and unexpected incidents. There's a good, scenery-chewing villain, Von Stein, and plenty of frantic action, as various secret agents practice the double- and triple-cross. As in any novel which mixes Holmes into WWI, there's not a lot of opportunity for Holmes to be Holmes--- instead, he's a rather elderly, but still spry action hero.

The novel's only liability is the return of a preposterous character from CHRONICLES, among whose many absurdly exaggerated abilities is that of being in two widely-separated locations at what is apparently the same instant, both timewise and plotwise. It is also a bit disappointing not to have Watson around, and further to be left at novel's end with no clear indication as to the current status of Mycroft Holmes.

If you don't mind some bending of the willow, you'll probably enjoy this adventure of Holmes in the middle East during the height of WWI.

I think this book is great for Spanish families who have seen the movie; or have read the myth, but hadn't seen the movie, or who just want to see the movie.