One River was one of the best books I have read in quite some time. As a Ph.D student in Botany, I was inspired by the accounts of Shultes, Plowman and Davis' journeys to the Amazon seeking tropical plants and learning from the people who have been using them for generations.. Davis has a rare ability to mix technical science writing with a deep knowledge of history, culture, and politics and make it flow into a coherent narrative. Any student of ecology, evolution, (especially of plants) will love this book as will people with an interest in the cultures and history of the Amazon basin.

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Take one vast, timeless rain forest. Season with sacred plants. Add thousands of Indians and one intrepid explorer. Cook at tropical temperature for 12 years. The astonishing and tasty result is Wade Davis' ONE RIVER.

In the late 1930's, Harvard ethnobotanist Richard Evans Schultes was responsible for major scientific breakthroughs regarding plant hallucinogens in Mexico. His next field assignment, to identify botanical sources of the deadly arrow poison, curare, immersed Schultes in the savage beauty of the Colombian rain forest and its indigenous Indian cultures. Totally captivated, Schultes remained there for the next 12 years.

This true story of Schultes' explorations is compelling, and he's a guide we gladly follow. Quietly heroic, Schultes thinks nothing of paddling thousands of miles down uncharted rivers, navigating white-water rapids that bend his boat in half, stepping on poisonous snakes, and contracting near-fatal tropical diseases. All the Indians he encounters accept him with alacrity, and within a few hours he is often half-naked, painted and feathered, ingesting sacred plants, singing and dancing with his new friends until the dawn. Not exactly what one expects from a politically ultra-conservative Harvard academician.

Like lianas in the jungle, ONE RIVER's many stories intertwine: the travels of Schultes' predecessor, Richard Spruce, whose spirit infused his own; the rise and fall of the ancient Inca Empire; Schultes' crucial impact on the development of wild rubber during the rubber crisis of World War II; adventurous field research on coca, the "divine leaf of immortality," by Schultes' students, author Wade Davis and Timothy Plowman; and the historic role Schultes played in launching the psychedelic revolution of the 60's.

As we wade deeper and deeper into the Amazon, magical efflorescences delight us: a legendary Blue Orchid; "river dolphins"; an ancient Inca city shaped like a puma; the Kogi tribe, who believe the sun weaves existence, like a cloth, on the loom of the earth. And in the shadows we confront the atrocities committed against the Indians on the rubber plantations of El Encanto ("the Enchantment").

Rich and vibrant, meticulously researched, ONE RIVER is a brilliant amalgam of natural science, history, anthropology, and one hell of an adventure story.

In the same way the Indians trace their lineage from the original Anaconda, or from the Son of the Sun, Wade Davis traces the ethnobotanical lineage of the teacher he reveres and the irreplaceable friend he has lost -- from Richard Spruce to Richard Evans Schultes to Timothy Plowman. Although, modestly, he fails to acknowledge his own position in the sacred lineage, we know better. Thousands of years ago an Inca ruler created a city embodying a puma. And Wade Davis wrote a book that's an Amazonian rain forest.

This is one of the best natural history and history of science an culture books I have ever read. I started this after reading another scintillating science book by David Quammen "Song of the Dodo" which I have since read again with great pleasure but "One River" forms a link between science and culture that was untouched in Quammen's tale of A.R. Wallace. The curious link is that Wallace started his journey's as a collector in the Amazon and covered some of the ground that Davis retraced.

Davis does a marvelous job of melding his and Schultes adventures in interlocking chapters. The tale of the mission to secure a supply of rubber during the war and the subsequent loss of the incredible genetic library that Schultes founded and was subsequently destroyed by bureaucratic bumbling is classic and tragic.

A wonderful read, highly recommended.

In My Hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer by Irene Gut Opdyke is a remarkable autobiography about the life of a Polish woman who risked her life in order to save her Jewish friends. When World War II began, Irene was only seventeen years old; she was a devoted nursing student and an innocent Catholic girl. As Germany took over her country Poland, Irene volunteered to accompany the Polish army as part of the Red Cross. Separated from her family, she was forced to endure harsh living conditions while aiding hundreds of wounded soldiers. A few weeks later, she was seized and raped by Russian soldiers who then left her for dead in the snow. Irene would have frozen to death if a kind woman named Dr. Miriam had not found her and nursed her back to health. When Irene had finally regained her strength, she was allowed to return to Poland, now a part of Germany, to be reunited with her family. It was a joyful reunion, but Irene was stunned by the changes in her hometown, Radom. The Jews had been forced to move into ghettos while the Poles had to live by strict rules. Only one week had passed since Irene had come to Poland when she and her sister were captured and transported to Germany to work for the Reich. She became a domestic worker in a Nazi hotel; there, she witnessed the cruel, monstrous acts that were being committed against the Jews in the nearby ghetto. Overwhelmed with horror, Irene began sneaking food and blankets to the ghetto, as well as transporting runaway Jews in a wagon to a nearby forest. She had also befriended the ten Jewish workers she supervised at the hotel. When she was released from her hotel duties to work in a German major's villa as a live-in housekeeper, she found a way to smuggle and hide her Jewish friends in the basement of the villa. When he discovered them, Irene became his mistress in cooperation for his silence; later, she and her friends managed to escape from him during the Germans' retreat. In 1949, through the acquaintance of an old rabbi, Irene was interviewed by a delegate from the United Nations, and she was accepted to be a citizen of the United States, which is where she lives to this day. Irene Gut Opdyke is the courageous hero of this amazing autobiography. She had started out as a seemingly ordinary nursing student, but she had been separated from her family at 17 and forced to work for her enemies. She was determined to do all that she could to help the Jews after she had witnessed the abominable suffering inflicted on the local Jews. Being sensitive to her Jewish friends' needs, she always put their safety ahead of her well being. She demonstrated extraordinary bravery and heroism throughout her life.

In reading class, we were required to read a book about the Holocaust. I had read a few before, but I thought that they were boring and uninteresting. I thought that I would have to read another boring, uninteresting book.
This book totally surprised me. It was the first Holocaust book I had read that actually had me feeling the emotions of the main character. This book kept me turning pages until the very last word. This person's true emotions were brought to life throughout this book by colorful language and interesting similes and metaphors.
In My Hands is the story of Irene Gutowna, a Polish, Gentile girl, 17 years of age, who starts to work for a restaurant, which is run by Nazis. She never thought of becoming a resistance fighter. But she started small. The restaurant was located right next to the ghetto. Irene began to hide food under a hole in the fence.
Then she eventually did bigger things, leading up to hiding 10 Jews in the basement of a German sergeant's house. He finds out, but keeps quiet. In return, Irene must be his mistress.
This book was very good, and even made me cry. I think that everyone should read it.

This is probably one of the most remarkable stories that I've ever encountered and I don't understand why it hasn't received more attention. My husband and I listened to the audio tape which was beautifully read by Hope David.

IN MY HANDS is the autobiography of Irene Gut, a 17 year old Polish Catholic girl. The book begins with lovely recollections that Irene had of her early life in Czestochowa, Poland, where she was surrounded by her four sisters and loving parents. When the Nazi's invaded Poland in 1939, Irene was living away from her family in Radom where she was studying to become a nurse. When Radom was bombed, the Polish Army had to retreat and asked that some of the medical staff come with them to help take care of the wounded. Irene volunteered to go, and eventually ended up on the other side of Poland which was under Russian rule. Many miles away from her family, and eventually separated from the other hospital staff, Irene faced life alone, and saw the country that she loved controlled by brutes and killers.

At first this young woman saw the worst in the Russian soldiers and later she also met the German invaders who showed her another side of brutality. Despite the threat to her own life, Irene risked everything so that many others had the chance to live. This very inspiring memoir compares to HIDING PLACE the story of Corrie Ten Boom and her family.

In preparing our list of Christmas books to share with others, we had to search far and wide on amazon to find this particular book, a paperback edition of the classic Night Before Christmas.

This is the book I've used for years when reading this story to my own children, passing on Tasha Tudor and other illustrators. Why?

Although we can find the same poem and pay a lot more, with award winning illustrators, the illustrations provided by Douglas Gorsline are surely the best. They are quite colorful, and offer details little children love looking into...cats lie sleepily on the window sill, we see an overview of the town, the presents spilling from the open sack are intriguing and plentiful, and Jolly St. Nick is -- well, quite Jolly (as you can see by looking at the cover!)

The story is an "abridged version" - I'm not sure about other parents, but we read this on Christmas Eve, and we only have so much time and energy. Everything we remember from the classic poem by Clement Clarke Moore is in this version.

(From "'Twas the Night Before Christmas, and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse" to "He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle, And away they all flew like the down of a thistle. But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,"HAPPY CHRISTMAS TO ALL, AND TO ALL A GOOD-NIGHT!" In between we have everything, from the names of the eight tiny reindeer, to a belly that shakes like a bowl full of jelly, including dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly, when they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky".

In other words, don't be scared off by 'abridged'!)

Perhaps a hardcover edition might be more appropriate if you're giving a gift (unless you're giving to more than one child), but this book is one of the best offers we've found!

A classic done simply and inexpensively!

We have an inexpensive paperback version (see our reviews) of this classic poem, and we said that's enough for us. That was before we looked through this beautifully illustrated (by Bruce Whatley) edition of The Night Before Christmas.

The lyrics are the same, from book to book, but the fanciful illustrations in this one are enough to engage adults and children as they read this book together.

The perfect gift for any family whose Christmas tradition includes reading this classic!

This beautiful book was in my family as a hard cover edition for many years and was a Christmas Eve tradition for my four sons when they were growing up. It's poor battered body disappeared some time after the last of my little ones went off into the adult world. I am so delighted to see it back again, though this time as a nicely affordable soft cover. Clement C. Moore's enchanting story poem already provides an atmosphere filled with warmth and joyful expectation and with the addition of Tasha Tudor's quaint, nostalgic water-colors from an antique New England the Christmas magic is complete!
The winter landscapes fill our senses and Tasha's own gray tabby cat and Welsh Corgi welcome us into this charming world.
Tasha's Santa that you will meet in this book has been portrayed as the poem describes him...a right jolly old elf. He's not that much larger than the corgi and his team really consists of eight "tiny" reindeer. His pointy ears and his Eskimo mukluks add to the delightful ambiance of the book. He dances with the toys and with the happy animals and we can truly believe it will be a happy Christmas for all.
I hope this book becomes a Christmas Eve tradition for many, many more families.

I read this edition along with the Hobbes translation (Green, ed.) and despite having read through Thucydides several times before, Thucydides, despite claiming to write a completely objective history, the composition of the work shows through quite a bit. The narrative is not linear, with digressions, flashbacks, and other tropes which makes the book hard to follow at times. In any case, the events of the war are so complex, covering such a long time, and in so many theaters of operation, that there is no single way to give a coherent recounting of the events.

All the maps are very clean, freshly rendered and easy to read. In addition to a few omnibus maps in the back matter, there are many smaller maps throughout the book, each having only as many landmarks as are necessary to illuminate the particular passage. This turns out to be particularly helpful. One can find a place like Naupactus, (not obscured by too many dots and words and unclear print) and understand why it was so important for Athens to hold onto. The other editorial matter are also very helpful. Using the index and the notes, the reader can follow the stories of the people, places, and themes invovled.

If you are at all concerned about Ancient Greece, or history, this book is worth it, for the maps alone even if for nothing else.

I bought the Landmark Thucydides because it was the only hardback edition I could find. I was pleasantly surprised because it happens to be the best modern edition available. The editor, Robert Strasser, set out to make the most authoritative book on Thucydides's History of the Peloponnesian War, and I believe he has succeeded brilliantly.

Strasser uses Richard Crawley's translation, apparently revised and updated. In any case the text is very good, though Thucydides syntax is sometimes complex and even a bit confusing. Strasser uses marginal notes besides each paragraph to summarize the events described in the text. The most valuable additions are the maps- there are maps every few pages, illustrating the geography described in the text as needed. Other welcome additions are a timeline, breaking down the events of the book according to date, appendices covering topics such as Athenian and Spartan government, trireme construction, land and naval warfare in ancient times, and even an essay on the monetary units and religious festivals used in the ancient world. There is also an introduction, discussing both the text and the author in detail and in the context of their time. There is also a full and complete index. If you want Thucydides, this is the book to buy!

This book presents a wonderful way to read Thucydides. While the introduction and appendices can be quite helpful to the non-specialist, the edition's greatest strengths are its translation and its maps. Crawley's is truly the definitive English translation, doing justice to Thucydides' majestic, albeit sometimes dense, prose. At the same time the maps make reading it a real pleasure. The Peloponnesian War ranged all across the Greek world, and most editions force you to constantly flip back to a few small and confusing maps in a feeble attempt to follow it. This volume entirely relieves you of that burden, removing all obstacles to the enjoyment and appreciation of this classic.

For those further interested in Thucydides and the war he recounts, I highly recommend Donald Kagan's four-volume analysis of the Peloponnesian War. An up-to-date, thoroughly scholarly work, it is also very accessible to the non-expert and well-written to boot. For expanded views and interpretations of the war, as well as an evaluation of Thucydides himself, pick up any one of his volumes.

My aunt suprised me one day with the LOVE COMES SOFTLY series she had had for a couple years. I put off reading them for a couple years because I was only eight! I started the first book when I was 11 and just could not put it down! I read the whole series and it had a very big impact on me. I've read the first three books at least ten times each, never getting bored with them and the rest of the series at least three. Please consider these books. They are the bomb!

This is a wonderful story about family life at a time when people did not possess much material things but instead loved and cared for one another unconditionally. The story begins with Clark and Marty and goes on to include the lives of their children. What drew me to read and reread this series of books is the way it is written with so much love and understanding. There are many moral issues dealing with the Christian God and how the righteous man would behave. It is therefore also a book of learning. I would highly recommend this series. This is one of the few series of books that I would consider to be worth spending money on. I know that I will reread it many more times. Janette Oke is an excellent storyteller.

Imagine you1re living in the midst of the 19th century. You1re 19, far from friends and family, and to top it all off, your husband dies and you are two months pregnant with his child.........

Love Comes Softly is an eight book series written by Christian author Jannette Oke. I thought when my mother-in-law tried to get me to read her books, that I was in for another mushy Harlequin Romance novel, filled with people involved with three, four or five men, and definitely no sign of God in their lives. Boy, was I in for a VERY pleasant surprise. Mrs. Oke leads us through the life of a very young Marty Davis, who has just left her family in the east, to travel west with her new husband , Clem. Clem and Marty had been living out of their wagon, eating pancakes and drinking coffee EVERY day, because that1s all that Marty knew how to make. Unexpectedly, though, Clem dies, and Marty is left alone with child and no home, no money, and just what she has in her wagon.

The Love Comes Softly series then begins to take us through the struggles Marty has to overcome and Mrs. Oke guides us so beautifully, that we feel like we are right there with Marty. The eight books lead us through 40 years in Marty and her family1s lives. I enjoyed every minute of the readings. Never has a book so captured me like Mrs. Oke1s did.

I try to count my blessings every day, but after reading this group of books, I found more to be thankful for. I never stopped to realize what the generations before us went through. With Marty, I learned what is was like to bear a child with no husband and no doctor around--just a local lady that had delivered many babies. I learned what it was like to leave family behind, knowing that you will probably never see them again--or even hear from them again.

The funniest part of the series was in the very first book. Marty decides she will try to make her new husband a chicken and dumpling meal. Well........she goes to the chicken pen to try and catch one. After tearing apart then pen, she finally catches one of only two roosters (she didn1t know she was supposed to only kill the female). Once she gets him, she has no idea as to how to kill him, so she decides to tie him up and kill him--that didn1t work, and she wound up cutting off the beak of the prize rooster. When her husband, Clark comes home, he finds the pen in disarray, and sees his rooster with no beak and he comes to find out that Marty was just trying to cook him his first real meal. This part cracked me up, along with the part where she tries to fix biscuits and they turn out as hard as rocks.

You have to read the books in order. They just keep continuing with this saga. The best book in the series was book four. I can1t tell you why, for it would give the ending for the rest of the series, but it was the book that kept me the most fascinated. The hardest part about the series was the way she wrote it. She wrote it with the accents as they would have said things. It was hard at first, but I got used to it by the second book. I highly recommend her books, and am looking forward to the next series I am about to read. The new series is from the Canadian West. It involves new characters, and therefore new lives.

I would really appreciate hearing from others who have read her books--especially the Love Comes Softly series. It would be enjoyable to talk with others about Jannette Oke1s books. You can find her work at any Christian bookstore or even the library. They are expensive, between $9-13.00, but they are worth their price. I found twelve of her books at the library, though. I hope you enjoy it as much as I have. It is definitely a series I would read again and again, and I look forward to my two daughters growing up and wanting to read them as well. They are written in the same manner as the Little House on the Prairie series by Laura Ingalls Wilder. ENJOY!!!!!!

As a child, I was encouraged to read, but was warned by my third grade teacher to "stay away from that science fiction." It was not a difficult task; most books in our elementary library were NOT science fiction...if they were, they consisted of green, slimy creatures disguised as humans by day and terrorizing student by night. Naturally, science fiction did not appeal to me at all.

Until I ran across The Girl with the Silver Eyes. To my third grade mind, it was painfully long, kind of hard to follow, but extremely interesting. It is the sole thing that piqued my interest in all things scifi.

Now, as a high school senior and avid science fiction fan, I reread The Girl with the Silver Eyes. For a child's book, it is extremely intriguing. It's science fiction and a suspenseful mystery all in one. It can most easily be compared to a junior version of The X-Files: weird, eerie, yet disturbingly accurate. However, when I was younger, I found the plot boring in many spots, not enough action. At the time, I merely blamed this on my youthful impatience. But even today, I still find the storyline a bit thick in parts, and nearly impossible to continue to the next page. For me to say that reading this book was an intellectual chore is not an exaggeration.

Any child reading this book will quickly lose patience with it, it has so many slow sections. Its surreal plot and wonderful scifi appeal is for the extremely patient only.

This book was definitely different from other books I have read in a good way. The main character is Katie Welker. She has silver eyes and telekinetic powers. She is used to being alone in an apartment all day long. She would rather be alone than being with other kids her own age. When she tries to make friends they don't accept her. They are too threatened by her appearance and her powers. Even her own family feels threatened by her! Can you imagine what that must feel like? On top of not being able to make friends another horrible thing happens. Katie overhears a neighbor saying that they might have caused her very own grandmother's death. You have to read the book and see of they catch her listening and find out if she can find more people with silver eyes! I feel that this book was well written. If you do not have patience I don't suggest this book for you. You have to wait for all of the action to begin. But it is worth the wait! I would mostly recommend for girls ages 8 to 12. If you would just like a good book to read this is the one for you.

Katie is a little girl who is a bit unusual to say the least. Born with silver eyes and an uncanny ability to make strange things happen, Katie has been a loner for most of her short life. After the death of her grandmother whom she has lived with for several years she goes to live with her divorced mother and this is when her problems really start. Digging into the past Katie finds out that she isn't the only child who is, well a bit strange. Friends of her mother who all at one time worked for the same medical company also have strange children. Children with silver eyes and strange powers like telekinesis and mind reading. As Katie tries to find her fellow "silver eyes" she is watched from afar by a man who could be a friend or a foe. This is a well-written children's science/mystery fiction book for the younger reader but it can also be enjoyed by older kids and adults alike. A quality book that makes reading fun and exciting.

There are times that I think my life was or still is hard. Well, I'm a black female who grew up in a middle-class home with two teachers as parents. College was as automatic as sleeping and eating. But, for these young men in the book "The Pact", college was as uncertain as winning the lottery. I always knew that our young black boys growing up in the inner-city had it super hard, but this book allowed me to see another side of our young brothas. They all have dreams as little kids, even though they don't see anyone in their neighborhood to emulate. Somehow, someway, Sampson Davis, Rameck Hunt and George Jenkins all found the determination to succeed and become doctors. Their positive story is proof that just one person can make a difference in a kid's life. Everyone needs someone to look up to; someone to follow.

We all have gifts we can share. Read this book and feel blessed that someone in your life took the time to mentor you and be there for you; not everyone has that in their lives. I am so proud of these young men! Not only are they smart and positive, but they are cute too! What a great combination! God has truly blessed them and their family.

What a refreshing book. Thanks to Tavis Smiley for recommending it on the Tom Joyner Show.

who are in grade school and face difficulties living in the inner city or ghetto. This book has the capacity to be very inspirational to young, minority men who have a bright future and wish to fulfill dreams that their peers may not. However, if you have no children and are older than, maybe 19 or 20 years of age, this book is just "okay." Regardless, I am very proud of these young, successful men.

"The Pact" is an incredible book! I just finished reading the remarkable journey completed by Drs. Sam Davis, George Jenkins, and Rameck Hunt. It's an easy, quick read ~250 pages.

If you're not familiar with their story, they are 3 young, African-American men from Newark that establish a pact at 17-years old to become doctors. Over the years, they run into many obstacles (peer pressure, arrest, finances, and family issues) that tend to dissuade so many young people from pursuing their dream. With the "I got your back" support of each other, mentors they encountered throughout their journey, and God they become doctors despite how many people had presumed their future would turn out.

Dr. George Jenkins, probably the most focused in the group, knew at a very young age that he wanted to be a dentist. In high school, the three friends attend a college presentation offering full scholarships to minority students interested in the medical field. Knowing that neither he nor his friends could afford college THIS OFFER would be their ONLY way to attend college...the formation of the pact.

Surprisingly, after completing college and med school, Sam and Rameck were still unsure if they wanted to be doctors. Sam saw business/management as his future and Rameck wanted to be an actor (he'll settle on being a rapper). (If I didn't know the outcome, I would have been in suspense until the bitter end waiting to learn if they became doctors.) The death of an important person in each of their lives confirmed that medically helping others is what they were meant to do in life.

If you're in the education field or work closely with children in your community this is an excellent book to pick up when you...

- feel like what can I do to get through to this person
- need a testimony that success is not by luck but achieved through faith, perseverance, and support from others
- need a roadmap to better mentor a person in need

"The Pact" is an amazing story of inspiration and motivation to get (primarily) black teens to see beyond their environment, current situation, and look ahead with a plan for tomorrow. "The Pact" also displays the need for adults to begin mentoring children before they reach their teens. The book concludes with the doctors providing the "how-to's" to make a pact work.

I lost my ten-year old golden 1 1/2 years ago. She was not only my friend, but a part of my family. I miss her every day. If you feel you had a connection to your pet, this book will reconfirm those feelings. It gave me comfort and left me with a warm feeling in my heart about my lost friend. This book will make you smile and cry about the loss of your pet. The book is about the connection you have with your dog, and that not only do dogs have guardian angels, but they are our guardian angels. It is not a religious book, yet it will touch you deeply. I believe my friend is still with me, and now I know that I am not alone in that feeling. It made me smile, brought a tear to my eye, and comfort to my heart. A beautiful book.

I have never lived without a pet in my life since the day I was born. For the first 18 years of my life I had only owned dogs. From then on I have had dogs and cats, but I had one special dog who was and always will be my "forever dog". Reading that book gave me hope that we will be together again someday. He has been in heaven 15 years now and I pick up and read that book at least once or twice a month. It has helped me to deal with the loss of my best friend and I know he is always watching over me.

A friend whose little dog 'Max' was killed by a car was the recipient of this book after I ordered it and read it myself. It is beautifully illustrated and very profound. My friend wrote, "losing my precious Max was like losing my child. I felt like I would never have a dog again but after reading "For Every Dog an Angel" I know now that I need another. She went to the pound the next day and adopted a dog. I will order more just to have on hand for my pet-loving friends.

Although I am an avid reader of American military history, I read few first-person accounts of war because I tend to prefer books about geopolitics, grand strategy, and decisive weapons systems. Nevertheless, I enjoyed this book about a marine officer's experience during the Korean War. It was easy reading, its narrative was straightforward, informative, and, I believe, honest, and it provided some valuable insights into the harsh realities of the first of the Cold War's regional conflicts.

The United States' "forgotten war" began on June 25, 1950, when the People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) invaded the Republic of Korea (South Korea). At the time, Author Joseph Owen was a Marine Corps lieutenant stationed in North Carolina, living with his wife and their two young children. According to Owen: "Nobody at Camp Lejeune had expected a shooting war. Nor were we ready for one." A captain who had been an adviser to the South Korean Marine Corps predicted Korea would be "[o]ne lousy place to fight a war. Too hot in summer, too cold in winter, and straight up and down mountain terrains all year round. Except for those stinking rice paddies down in the valleys. Human manure they use. Worst stink in the world." Nevertheless, according to Owen: "The possibility of American Marines in a combat role excited us." Owen writes: "The North Koreans continued to overpower the meager resistance offered by the South Korean soldiers....Seoul, the South Korean capital, fell with hardly a fight, and the Red blitzkrieg rolled southward. In response, President Truman escalated American involvement in the war. He ordered General MacArthur, America's supreme commander in the Far East, to use U.S. Army troops stationed in Japan to stem the invaders." And: "General MacArthur called for a full division of Marines to help him turn back the North Koreans. According to Owen: "The Marine Corps welcomed the call, but we did not have a full division to put in the field;" and "More than seven thousand of us at Camp Lejeune received orders to proceed by rail to Camp Pendleton. There they would form into companies and embark for Korea." Owen's unit, "Baker-One-Seven became one of three rifle companies if the 1st Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment....Our ranks were filled by 215 men and 7 officers who had never before served together....Many of [the privates] were beardless teenagers with little training beyond the basics of shouldering a rifle and marching in step." While training, there was much concern about the readiness of the Marines for combat. At one point, after a sergeant remarks that the troops need more training in boot camp, Owen succinctly invokes reality: "They are not going to boot camp. They are going aboard ship. And they are going to fight." On September 1, the company boarded a Navy transport for the three-week voyage to east Asia. According to Owen: "Ready or not, we were on the way to war." And, according to Owen, the 1st Marine Division's orders were "to go for the Yalu River," North Korea's border with China. At one point, a veteran officer provides this paraphrase of William Tecumseh Sherman's famous dictum: "War is hell, but you never know what particular kind of hell it's going to be." The Korean War hell was cold and barren. Owen writes: "We were chilled through and bone tired as we slogged our way back to battalion....The bivouac was lumpy with rocks and boulders;" "The cold weather was as formidable an enemy as the Chinese;" and "Rarely did the [daily action] reports exceed zero degrees, and there were lows of twenty below."

By the time Owen's outfit arrived in Korea, he writes, "we were making bets that the war would be over before we got into it." Owen's Marines could not have been more wrong. While Owen is inspecting his men's weapons, a private asks: "Think we'll get shot at today, Lieutenant?" Owen replies: "We're taking the point for the regiment. If the gooks are there, they'll be shooting at us." A few pages later, after the outfit's first experience in combat, Owen comments: "We were fortunate that the enemy had not chosen a "fight-to-the-death" defense of this hill, as they would when we advanced farther north." But some fighting was hand-to-hand. At one point, Owen writes: "Judging from the noise they were making, and the direction of their grenades, the North Koreans were preparing to attack, not more than thirty yards away." The Captain tells Owen and the other subordinate officers: "The Chinese have committed themselves to this war....The people we will fight are the 124th Division of the Regular Chinese Army....They're tough, well-trained soldiers, ten thousand of them. And all of their officers are combat experienced, their very best....A few hours from now we'll have the Chinese army in our gunsights. We'll be in their gunsights. You damn well better have our people ready for some serious fighting." The combat was, indeed, brutal. According to Owen: "The Chinese attacked in massive numbers, an overwhelming weight, but they also endured terrible casualties." Owen recalls that, while waiting for one Chinese attack, the "men stacked Chinese bodies in front of the holes for greater protection." And the fighting around the frozen Chosin Reservoir may have been the most brutal of the war. Owen ultimately suffered wounds requiring 17 months of treatment, and he never regained full use of one arm.

A few months ago, I reviewed James Brady's wonderful The Coldest War: A Memoir of Korea here. This book has different charms. Whereas Brady is a gifted professional writer, there is no elegant prose here. But Owen provides an equally vivid account of this ugly war. Big, sophisticated studies of military history focusing on geopolitical principles and grand strategy rarely offer narrative moments like the ones in this book. Reader are unlikely to forget the Korean War after reading Joseph Owen's Colder than Hell.

Colder than Hell: A Marine Rifle Company at Chosin Reservoir. By Joseph R. Owen. Reviewed by Mike Davino

Army Korean War expert Lieutenant Colonel Roy Appleman has called the 1st Marine Division of the Chosin Reservoir campaign "one of the most magnificent fighting organizations that ever served in the United States Armed Forces." The remarkable and inspiring story of the division at the Chosin Reservoir has been the subject of numerous books and several films. During their fighting withdrawal, the Marines decimated several divisions of the Chinese People's Liberation Army while at the same time fighting an exceptionally harsh winter environment.

Joseph Owen's new book on the subject tells the story from the cutting edge perspective of a rifle company. The author served as a mortar section leader and rifle platoon commander in Baker Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Marines from its activation in August 1950 through the Inchon-Seoul and Chosin fighting where he was severely wounded.

There are many reasons given for the outstanding performance of the Marines in northeast Korea during the winter of 1950. It is clear from this book that a large measure of the credit goes to the Marines and their leaders at the small unit and rifle company level.

Owen's narrative covers the hasty activation and training of the company, its brief participation in the fighting north of Seoul after the amphibious assault at Inchon and the details of its intense fighting at Chosin. He candidly discusses the mistakes made by the leaders and Marines of Baker Company, to include his own. More importantly, Owen covers what they learned from these mistakes and how they used that knowledge to defeat the Chinese in a series of intense actions.

Although focused at the company level, the author frames his story with the overall conduct of the campaign. Refreshingly, unlike many books about the Chosin campaign, it is free of partisan sniping about the contributions made by the various services involved. Owen gives credit to the Army units that fought at Chosin as well as the contributions of naval and air forces and our British allies.

This book is rich in lessons about small unit leadership, training and combat operations. It is an excellent addition to the personal narratives on the Korea War.

When preparing to travel to an Asian country on business, I seek context by reading of the wars the U.S. has fought there. When I look in those Japanese, Chinese and Korean eyes, I see the children of old enemies and old friends. While plowing through Fehrenbach's canonical Korean War history, "This Kind of War", I took a break and lost a weekend of yard work to "Colder Than Hell" which I ordered based on the praise given by my fellow Amazon reviewers. My thanks to the other reviewers, for this is a superb first person account of a Marine company fighting it's way up and then back down the Korean peninsula in 1950. Marines of Baker one-seven fought and froze to the death too often, but their sacrifice has let 47 million Koreans in the South build a democracy and learn the meaning of freedom. The price of freedom was huge for Baker one-seven, but the esprit de corps so crisply described by ex-Second Lt. Owen carried his Marines from hill to hill. This is an excellent book and a must read for fans of first person stories of war and sacrifice.

Burke Davis did a spectacular job with this book and I highly recommend it. Not having served in the Marine Corps, this book gave me a pungent taste and deep admiration for this elite fighting brotherhood of which Puller is a legend. What came through to me most about Puller was his incredible humanity and compassion for his men. Puller would never eat until his men ate first, and in the midst of the frostbitten epic Marine engagement at the Chosin Resevoir in the Korean War, Davis writes that Puller took his own jacket off to give to a grunt who didn't have one. This to me is what made Puller special and puts a gold plate on the heroic bust that Davis has crafted - fearsome pugnacity, steely toughness, and unparalleled leadership were qualities he possessed in uncommon quantities, but his heart of gold was what makes him and this book stand out. It's a sad commentary on modern day America that a man like Chesty Puller would probably be mocked, scorned and marginalized. A good read.

Marine! The life of Chesty Puller is one of the best books I've read of Marine Corps history. Chesty played a major part of that history and this book tells it like no other. You'll read it over and over again

Read any non-fiction book written about American warfare from WWII to Vietnam and they mention Chesty Puller. He was with the 1st Marines on Peleliu, fought in the awful frozen mountains of North Korea and commands Marines in Vietnam. Truly a man's man. His courage beyond question. Highly decorated including the Navy Cross. His career is unparalleled in the Corps and his life is a shining example of American Warriordom. He is certainly due his own story in the annals of military history. This book will be a find addition to any personal library. I highly recommend it.