Sigh. On page 190 the sidebar quote says: "Science is about knowing. It's not about believing". If only life were that simple. As the authors demonstrate quite well enviroscience is also about manipulation, halftruths, and outright lies. It is sad to see other reviewers fooled by these manipulations. The issues are too many to recite, but here is a sampling of the style in which the authors present "facts":

On page 27 they state: "In Germany, acid rain is destroying the forests" without a reference (not even to the otherwise heavily quoted bastion of scientific information the Sacramento Bee). Acid rain as the cause of large-scale forest destruction was shown to be erroneous fairly shortly after it was announced with doomsday headlines in the 1980s. But it is a good example of how at least $500 million was spent by the US alone to solve a problem before it was really demonstrated to be a problem.

Footnote 11 on page 41 relating to the book "Climate of fear" tells us "the book offers a one-sided optimistic outlook on the prospects of global warming" and that it "should be read cautiously". Sounds like daddy is telling me that I am not allowed to agree with any of it if I read it. It is also symptomatic of a real problem that the word "optimistic" is used as a negative! Wow, I must immediately learn to become more pessimistic.

Later they launch into lengthy chapters on supposed future energy sources. Among the information and gibberish we find things like this sidebar quote on page 218:"As a self-organization system with energy and matter exchanging externally, excess energy can be generated due to torsion coherent with zero-point energy in the vortex state on the tips of electrodes". I have a Ph.D. in Physics and I have absolutely no clue what this means. I doubt that any reader will have any clue what it means. As a matter of fact I doubt that the authors themselves have any clue what this means, because it is not the sort of thing anybody writes to clarify a topic. It is meant to intimidate readers into believing that lots of fancy words strung together will show how stupid they are and hence how smart the authors must be.

Environmental issues are important. There is enough misinformation out there. If you want a read by people clearly on the "left" side of the debate, here it is. Just don't believe for a second that the information is somehow balanced.

At last a book that responsibly tackles the issue of finding alternative energy sources. I require my students at San Jose State to use this well researched text to develop arguments for their debates on energy. Turning the Corner offers a balanced, no nonsense view of what we can do to alter the world's dependency on fossil fuels. My colleagues agree, this text does more to explain our current dilemma and ways to solve it than other books that only offer a one-sided view of the subject.

For the first time a book has been published on the subject of energy that honestly shows the public what really is available for the future. Section III is my favorite. It has a balanced review of cold fusion, zero point energy, electrogravitics and space propulsion, as well as new energy. This book also contains lots of annotated references at the end of each chapter for further information. It is a great book on a difficult subject with a fresh viewpoint unavailble elsewhere.

« The Oxford History of' » could suggest some grey bearded professors laboriously writing history nobody but them would understand, but far from it, Jonathan Riley-Smith has managed to edit the erudite contributions to this book into a pleasant and interesting format. Some pages, very few actually, are a little heavy going but most chapters are fascinating. They assume a reasonably smart reader ' nobody buys a history of the Crusades if he or she is exclusively into hard rock or soccer ' but for the average person with an interest in history and a probably bad recollection of the Crusades as they were taught to teenagers some decades ago, this a perfect book. It requires no more than a general idea of the who's who at the time and even that is made very clear chapter after chapter. I particularly enjoyed the sections describing the Crusades from the point of view of the people who were at the receiving end. Yet the book is balanced and does not fall into the stereotype of picturing the crusaders as greedy bad guys, turned loose on the local populace by manipulative popes and clerics promising them that past and future sins would be forgiven, although there was quite a bit of that. The chapters on the military orders are great and the final chapter describes the later perception of the Crusades throughout history with plenty of surprises: who knows that Voltaire was scathingly contemptuous of the crusaders? Think of it, though, it fits the great man's view of the world neatly. The illustrations are very good and abundant. Anyone with an interest in the Crusades should read this book.

Heavy historian buffs may rate this book as a 5, because it is packed with all kinds of information one might never imagine about the Crusades. It certainly deserves credit for all the research that had to go into compiling the essays in this book which cover such areas as the music, poetry, art, architecture of the times, as well as the prevailing thought of the times, both Christian and Muslim.

I gave it a 4 because it didn't meet my own personal expectations. I wanted to know more about the Crusades, but delineated in a different way to make it easier to digest, perhaps in more readable chapters explaining succeeding Crusades: their journeys, missions, and results. I did glean useful information and insight, primarily that the Crusades were much more involved than what we generally perceive today as a simple-minded holy war against the infidel Muslims. I was surprised that the Crusades were also against heretics within Europe, and that there were some critics of the time who opposed killing for the sake of God. However, this book was overwhelming in its details about people, places, dates, and yet I am still left wanting to know...what exactly happened?

This is a great general history of the Crusades, edited by one of the most prominent living crusading historians. It covers all the important battles, but is also heavy on social history, the "East meets West" aspect of the Crusades, and it's rather good on the Crusader kingdoms as well. If you crave the details of the Mamluks' machinations or the rise and fall of Shagarrat al-Durr, it might be best to eke out Riley-Smith's history with a book by a historian who knows the Arabic sources. This volume also contains a lot of lovely illustrations, some of which are actually helpful.

You will find that this book encompasses the traditional Crusading period, but doesn't stop there. This is because there is some debate when the Crusades actually ENDED. Are fifteenth-century pogroms against European 'infidels' to be considered Crusades? What about the Albigensian Crusade? There are two scholarly armed camps on this issue: Riley-Smith and his students on the one hand, and, well, nearly everyone else on the other. Just be aware that it's a contentious issue.

For that quasi-mythical animal, the interested layperson, I would also recommend Maalouf's The Crusades through Arab Eyes, and almost anything by Steven Runciman.

I am a great fan of Robert Swindells but I am sorry to say that this is one of the worst book he has ever written. Fliss is a young girl who starts having nightmares about this weird hotel and a room that has a number on it, 13. Anyway she tries to forget about it and tries to think about her school trip the next day. This place she is going to turns out to be a lot like her dream and when one of her class-mates falls ill with eerie marks on her neck it only leads to one place. Room 13. Very preditable and boring I would only suggest this book if you can't get to sleep at night.

It begins with a terrible nightmare Fliss had on the night before her school trip to Whitby. She dreamt about a house with deadly secret in room 13. When she arrives in Whitby, she realizes that the hotel is in her nightmare except that there is no room 13. LAter at midnight, she discovered that number 13 appeared on the numberless-during-daytime door. Strange noises can be heard coming out from inside the room. Her friend; Ellie-May's life was in danger and she, together with her other 3 friends were trying to save her. They are involved in a very thrilling adventures during the school trip! This book should be enjoyed by teenagers who love horror stories.

Fliss is a young girl who goes with her school class to stay in a hotel for the holidays. But there is a very strange cupboard in the hotel that at the stroke of midnight it turns into a room and inside is a.......VAMPIRE'S COFFIN.........But Fliss' friend Ellie May Suderland is bitten by the vampire.What happens next?Read this book to find out.(May be it will be a 2-1 story with Inside the Worm!

Reading this book was like being served up a meal of cream puffs -- impressive at first glance, but ultimately unsatisfying due to lack of substance. Like many books that attempt to present the reader with a cafeteria-style synopsis of a subject (a bit of this, a bit of that...) this work is a disappointingly superficial survey of a most difficult and elusive subject. I think John Ruskin said it best: "A great many people do not know green from red; and such kind of persons are apt to feel it their duty to write scientific treatises on color, edifying to the art-world..."

This excellently researched, enlightening book by Riley offers a useful overview of chromatic developments in a number of fields (the person who called this book "cream puffs" misses the point completely). The book offers numerous examples of innovations and commentary on various artists (pictorial and literary) and their colorific tendencies. Connections to theory--from Derrida to Barthes--accompany many of the book's observations. As there is little serious critical work on color, Riley's book offers a useful stepping stone to further research. I would strongly suggest this work to anyone interested in color theory and approach. Riley is a lucid, engaging writer who has made a major contribution to color theory.

Color Codes by Charles A. Riley II is an extraordinary example of inter-disciplinary thought, examining the fascinating topic of color through short essays on Modern and contemporary artists, architects, poets, novelists, psychologists, philosophers, composers and musical performers. Much of the most lively material in the book comes from direct encounters with artists in their studios and interviews. A passionate, ambitious book on a wonderful subject. Claudine Napoli

The book really adds nothing to what was already written in Ludwell Johnson's book from the 60's. It is well written but I was looking for more. Though admittedly the author did not intend for it to a detailed battle study, the book's battle descriptions are too general for the demanding student of the campaign. The maps are very disappointing,with the exception of the Savas map.The other battle maps are just copies of Ludwell Johnson's dull, spartan drawings that include no information other than troop positions. No terrain or battlefield features are illustrated. Also, many locations mentioned in the text are not on the maps provided, not exactly an uncommon occurrence in civil war books. Don't get me wrong, the book is a good overview but students of the Red River Camp.will want more than just a rehash of what has already been written. It is worth reading as there is little out there on this important campaign but if you have already read Johnson than it is probably not worth the time.

The Red River Campaign isn't one of those parts of the Civil War that the public knows much about. In 1864, when the south was losing, and the only question was whether they could string things out long enough to get a more favorable president in the White House, the Union embarked, at Lincoln's insistence, on a wild goose chase up the Red River in Louisiana. The objectives were several fold: conquering Louisiana and Texas would discourage the French, who were in the process of establishing a new world monarchy in Mexico; this part of the region was overflowing with cotton that couldn't be sold, and many Union soldiers and especially sailors (who could legally claim prize money from its sale) were eager to seize it and get some profits if they could; conquest of this region would strengthen the Union's hold on the state, and increase the number of voters participating in the elections of officials that Lincoln was trying to get Congress to accept as the new representatives of the State of Louisiana. With such diverse objectives, it's no wonder the campaign was a failure.

But there were other reasons for the failure. The Union plan was only vaguely mapped out before they left Union territory (basically where the Red flows into the Mississippi), with the Union army and navy proceeding up the river to Shreveport, and capturing and holding that city, with even more vague intentions of proceeding to Texas after. The fleet was commanded by David Dixon Porter, a skilled but somewhat responsibility-shy admiral with no love for the army in this operation. His army counterpart, as much as there was one, was Nathaniel P. Banks, a Massachusetts politician turned soldier who had managed to goof up several campaigns previously, and was one of those political generals (Benjamin Butler was another) who seemed able to get the least out of the professional soldiers under his command. Banks was the local department commander, but apparently no one thought to appoint someone to actually command the troops in the coming campaign, so Banks had to go along and exercise authority over the various troops.

His opponent was Richard Taylor, the son of President Zachary Taylor, and the son-in-law of President (of the Confederacy) Jefferson Davis. Taylor too was an amateur leading an army of professionals. Strangely, in this campaign the Confederates had all the foreign soldiers serving in their army, with a French prince (Polignac) serving as first a brigade and then a division commander, and a Prussian cavalryman leading a regiment of Texans of German extraction thoughout the campaign. Naturally, as a result, the campaign has some colorful characters. It also has the interesting aspect of being enough of a backwater that the soldiers who were driven from prominent positions in the war on the other side of the Mississippi wound up here, where it was hoped their incompetence wouldn't hurt too much if it continued. Charles P. Stone, the man blamed (almost certainly wrongly, for political reasons) for the Union debacle at Ball's Bluff early in the war, was Banks' chief of staff. William B. Franklin, a mediocre corps commander under McClellan in the Army of the Potomac, was fired after Fredericksburg because Ambrose Burnside accused him (with some reason) of failure to obey orders, leading to the failure of his attack. Theophilus Holmes, who proved uncertain in command during the Seven Days Campaign in 1862, was in command of troops at the beginning of the Red River campaign, and was finally removed when he refused to fight once too often for the Confederate authorities.

Author Brooksher (whose previous book, Bloody Hill, about Wilson's Creek, I didn't read) does a competent job of combining the strategy, tactics, personalities, and oral histories of the participants into one volume, which isn't overlong. He didn't have maps prepared for this book, instead choosing to use maps from other books: this works somewhat, but not perfectly by any means. They aren't, as one of the other reviewers noted, the best maps anyway. But maps aside, the author does a very good job of recreating the nature of the campaign, and shows little bias (which you could expect to be pro-Confederate, the author being from Arkansas) towards either side. He makes it clear that the Union army won all but one of the battles, and if they'd been competently led he thinks they would have won the campaign. He also thinks that their victory would have had little affect on the course of the war, just as their defeat didn't prolong the life of the Confederacy much at all. And he shows considerable skill with the thumbnail sketches of the various characters in the campaign. All in all a solid book.

Bill Brooksher follows up his studies in Civil War leadership, Boldly They Rode and Bloody Hill, the Battle of Wilson's Creek, with a masterful account of the Federal attempt to take Shreveport and ultimately Texas through the Red River Valley. This tale of war, cotton and politics adds a new dimension to understanding the war in the west. Written in the easy style that is typical of the author.

If you're fresh in C++ - this book is for you : it's easy and sharp but if you've got at least basic skills in C++ - save your money - skip this book .

I found this to be easily the best out of a handful of "beginners" C++ books that I bought. It cuts right to the point and unlike those big doorstop books this one keeps the reader progressing quickly.

It covers the basics (variables, functions etc.) very clearly and includes a lot of detail about pointers and OOP also in a very well organised manner.

There is a big chapter covering the standard library functions which I keep flicking back to as I write my own programs, even though I pretty much finished the book a while ago.

The only bad thing I can think is that if you already know a bit about programming then the first couple of chapters might not be useful. But its worth it for the later stuff on pointers etc.

Overall a great buy!

The authors give a good cursory background on knowledge representation within AI. Chapters 7 - 12, present CLIPS syntax and usage. The information in these chapters helped me to develop a simulation involving four intelligent agents, colloborating via a blackboard. The book provides no details with respect to CLIPS object-oriented capabilities (COOL), but this is something that can be learned through CLIP's accompanying documentation. I highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to know more about expert systems or CLIPS.

Provided good basic understanding of AI with example program, CLIPS, enclosed( floppy disk), well written with understandable examples

The author is an academic anthropologist. The book is a survey of a lot of information, but some emphases seem unusual. For example, there is quite a bit of speculation about what languages were spoken by prehistoric "pueblo" people but almost no information about the pueblo revolt of 1680. Details of that revolt are easily found in other books, but it was surprising to find so little about such an important event here. In contrast, there is a chapter on the Spanish conquest of Mexico. I found that material interesting, but it wasn't clear how that level of detail related to the author's main story. The author says almost nothing about the exploitation of the Pueblo people by the Church, government, and landowners before the revolt. He states that the Spanish were benevolent compared to the English in New England, but without any justification for this statement. There is an extensive list of references for readers who want to learn more. The book could also use some editing; some text is repeated in a later chapter.

"Rio Del Norte" is a very good summary and (partial) reinterpretation of the archeology and culture history of the US Southwest into the early historical period. "Southwest" is in quotation marks because during the early historical period it was Mexico's "Northwest;" but it has always belonged to the indigenous peoples who still live there. Apart from this misnomer, the perspective is not notably Anglocentric, and in fact, the work is exceptional in giving due consideration to the concerns of the Indians of the region. This is most noticeable in Riley's discussion of EL Turco ("The Turk"), a Plains Indian captive at Pecos Pueblo who led Coronado onto the Great Plains in the early 1540s. Typically portrayed as a lying traitor by the Spaniards, Riley shows him---convincingly, in my view---as an early exemplar of Pan-Indian consciousness who developed an (abortive) strategy to thwart the Spaniards' pursuit of wealth and power. In this way Riley restores historical and rational agency to this enigmatic figure, and also other indigenous historical actors from the region.

This book rates 4 stars because the level of specialized detail, especially on environment and economy, will deter some readers. But I have happily quarried it for lecture material, and both students and laypersons who appreciate clearly-written scholarship will benefit from reading it.

I bought this book while vacationing in New Mexico and found it an excellent companion to my visits to archaeological sites such as Quarai, Abo, and Gran Quivara. These former Pueblo Indian farming communities are located in the middle of nowhere and the fact they were able to exist -- and apparently thrive -- in a hostile, desert environment adds to their appeal and mystery. Riley has turned out a competent, readable survey of the Indians of the Rio Grande in pre- and early-historical times. In the first half of the book he gives a thorough account of all aspects of Pueblo Indian culture: history, language, agriculture, religion, technology, trade, etc. The second half is devoted to their contacts with Coronado and the other early Spanish explorers and settlers. He presents in brief form a lot of information, but most of what he says is jargon-free and comprehensible to non-archaeologists and non-specialists. I liked the book and it will stay on my shelves as a ready reference to the Pueblo Indians.

This is one romance definitely not bound for Blockbuster! The characters were so unbelievable and the dialouge so poorly written it was hard to make it from page to page. The plot in itself was corny and I actually groaned aloud when introduced to the character Aunt LOVE! REALLY we are romantic not ditsy. As usual, noone can deny Fabio's sex scenes were steamier than ever, but I'm not sure one can make it that far. Also, great sex scenes can hardly make up for bad plot. I love Fabio's pictures, I really do, but a reader worth their salt must agree that a great body on one page can't make up for 400 pages of a dull and flat book. For great historical romance try Virginia Henley and the almost impossible to get Roberta Gellis. For great contemporary romance keep in mind Susan Elizabeth Phillips.

I didn't think I would like Fabio's Rogue, I thought I would hate it but I was very pleasantly surprised, I wouldn't call it a masterpiece of classic literature but it was really good and I enjoyed it. I really liked the characters Natalie and Ryder and I enjoyed reading about their adventures and their romance.

The journey was heartracing, the chapter with the mirror over the bed... well, what can I say,to quote "Fabio's character, LET ME SHOW YOU". I wish more men had that kind of skill!!!!!

I have personally used this book in a class that was taught by paul riley. Although there are errors in this book, it probably is because some of the actual drawings in the book came from the students at King Philip High School where he teaches. Riley knows his stuff. I actually know the person who drew the giant old house which is used as a challenge drawing.

I have not used this book much yet, but my impression so far is good. Each lesson is presented clearly and thoroughly. Unfortunately, it does not cover orthographic projection, although isometric drawing is covered. It concentrates on mechanical drawing, and does not cover surveyor drawings, and only touches on architectural applications. Sample exercises at the end of each chapter are barely acceptable. It would be nice to have more, and better quality exercises.

I am a student in highschool and I have used Discovering AutoCAD 2000 and I learned so much from it. I thought I would learn only basic commands but I have learned very complicated commands. My only complaint is that some of the drawings have minor errors that should have been spotted by the editor. I hope to meet Paul Riley someday because he is my AutoCAD 2000 idle. If you have the money make sure you bye this book. The $45 seems like a hefty chunk of cash but this wonderful book is well worth the money.