A nice collection of quotations as befits the title, though some strange choices. Tennis is heavily represented, perhaps as the most successful women's sport as far as catching the public eye. I still don't think Anna Kournikova merits the dozen or so quotes that she's given, and Jay seems to have an obsession about the Bobby Riggs-Billy Jean King match. I never thought it was that big a deal, though I could be wrong.

There are a handful of soccer quotes, though the ones from Mia are not her best. Still an interesting collection, though.

Perhaps my favorite: "We're women who like to knock people's heads off and then put on a skirt and go dancing." - Brandi Chastain.

You can tell the author/compilor has a good sense of humor. At least, she does for intelligent readers. Who else would give Anna Kournekova so much space? She covers the lesser-knowns pretty well and tosses in just enough of the big wigs. I like this one. Definitely some zingers in here to counterbalance the "jocks are stupid" theory.

This entry into the world of women athletes, painstakingly compiled by the indefatigable Molly Jay, is the first book that made me laugh out loud, choked me up, and incensed me - all on the same page! This is a roller-coaster of a book, a trip to Funland, and at the price, you should buy one for your car and one for your home.

But seriously, this book has been compiled with a level of care and craft unusual for a book of this kind - or any compilation, be it of an editor's favorite cummings or hooks poems, or of Woolf or Stein's prose. Ms. Jay cannot possibly have been sufficiently compensated for the labor (albeit, clearly, of love) she has put into this work of hers. I only hope that the next time we see her work, she is more clearly reflected by it.

I needed to get my resume straightened out for applying for jobs as a science educator at a college level or as a disability/deaf rights activist, or maybe going back into Neuroscience which my MS from med school is in. I found this book was okay for people with high school, work experience, and a first degree from college, but not for someone like me who has 3 degrees and numerous experience in speaking to groups and writing for a variety of mediums. This resume definitely is not for those who need to write something closer to a curriculum vitae, but is adequate for everyone else. Needless to say I was somewhat disappointed because it came highly recommended. Karen Sadler, Science Education, University of Pittsburgh

I found this book very helpful. I am director of sales, and found a good balance of examples and tips. Most of the resumes are geared toward business professionals, with an emphasis on how to develop your resume with the hiring company in mind. This is important in our industry from a sales perspective, and they teach you the same approach in presenting yourself to the customer, meaning the hiring manager/company.

I found this book to be very helpful, and include more variety than others on the market. The online section was good - brief and to the point. I think this is a book for the future on getting your foot in the door.

I agree with the reviewer below who compared this book with John Sandford's "Prey" series. Blackbird Singing's hero, Tom Hopkins, is very similar to the Lucas Davenport hero of the Prey series. The only reason I gave this book 4 instead of 5 stars is because you need a scorecard to keep track of who's who and who does what for whom. Otherwise I really enjoyed this book and hope to see more stories involving Tom "Hoop" Hopkins.

Jay Amberg's "Blackbird Singing" is a sensational thriller, that one only hopes is the first of many. Tom Hopkins, the lead detective in a much publicized kidnapping, is very likeable and believable. As a reader you will want to become better acquainted with him. What we do learn is that he is able to match wits with the cunning, delusional, computer-genius kidnapper who has captured the daughter of the famous Chicagoland basketball hero, Robert "Sky" Walker. We also learn that he is as vunerable as the rest of us. If you are a fan of John Sandford's "Prey" books or Robert Tannenbaum's many thrillers, you will enjoy Jay Amberg's "Blackbird Singing".

I love a good detective thriller and this one certainly fills the bill. Likeable, hard-working Commander Tom "Hoop" Hopkins faces seemingly unsurmountable odds in trying to catch the cyber-kidnapper of Tanya Walker, 9-year-old budding-gymnast daughter of the Chicago Bulls' superstar player, Sky Walker, and his glamourous anchor-woman wife. Lots of characters get involved in this fast-paced story and I'm still having trouble figuring out what to do with Pit Bull, the sleazy t.v. reporter...but that's okay. The story twists and turns and kept me on the edge of my chair. I had started to bed and finally gave up and just got a cup of tea and finsihed the book! I hope there are more books forthcoming about this group of dedicated law enforcers...Hoop, Carl Henderson of the FBI and others. We gotta catch that brutal Saville. Surely he can't get away to Europe never to be heard from again. This book is truly a "thriller" in every sense of the word. A really good read!

Surely, we can't talk and think enough
about the state of mankind!
But these are hazardous waters! Where should we begin
and where do we want to go from there? So, Having
Gould and Eco as guides seems like a clever start!

According to the book, the hebrew language has
no exact present tense?? The infinitely brief, the
very essense of the present, is not to be found - it
can be neither fixed, nor measured. It is therefore
completely justifiable, grammaticale speaking,
to leave out the present?

Yet, obviously, it is from the present we look at the
past and towards the future.
Stephen Jay Gould is always a pleasure to listen to -
and the right one to put time into perspective.
For a palaeontologist, like Gould, 7000 years
(timespand of human culture) is really no more than
the twinkling of an eye. So all we know is really in
the present - which hardly exist!

From this position we look out into concepts like
the eternity - which we obviously really can't grasp.
And into ourselfes were e.g. DNA was discovered as recently
as 1953. Mystery upon mystery.
So, we struggle to discover instances of regularity and
to fit them together with the help of stories. We throw
in a little religion "were religions do not
ask questions, they answer them". Still we are far
removed from any real "understanding".

And that is what these conversations are about.
With Umberto Eco and Stephen Jay Gould - it is
of course an ok read. But only an appetizer.

-Simon

Conversations About the End of Time is a a discussion of questions and answers given by four thinkers. Stephen Jay Gould, Umberto Eco, Jean-Claude Carriere and Jean Delumeau all answer questions and are given a chapter in this book to espouse their respective answers.

Just think of a coffee table discussion, of a one on one discussion and you get to read the answers on questions of import. Each answering these questions with their respective insights and down-to-earth style. Each having their respective life experiences to draw from to unravel perplexing questions.

With fascination you read the thought-provoking answers. The answers will suprise some, others may be right inline with what you'd expect, but nerver boring... challenging, educational, lucid and erudite are more what you'd expect and you are not dissapointed.

This book reads fast and the questions are cogent with the general topic. Each respective thinker answers in a style of their own and the reader does not feel irrelevant. This is an interesting book in that questions asked make the reader think as well.

I found the book to be highly interesting and it has a fascination woven throughout the text captivating the reader.

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I'm talking about that Darwinian theory of Natural Selection you keep telling as if it were true. It is "differential reproductive success". So then that means I need at least 2 different things to call some event NS. So then I ask myself what do these 2 different things have to do with each other? So then I say well either they influence each other's reproduction some way, or they could as well be in different environments. So they must influence each other's reproduction some way. So then I ask, what ways can the one influence the reproduction of the other?

+/- increase reproduction at cost of the other +/+ mutual increase of each other's reproduction -/- mutual decrease of each other's reproduction +/0 and so on -/0 0/0

but what you do, is pretend like there are only +/- relationships. You ignore all other type of relationships with NS. Your natural selection theory is false, for being unsystematic in describing the relationships between living beings. You make teachers into liars by it.

This is a thin hardbound volume, a collection of photographs and short
discourses about various aspects of dice, gambling, and fraud. Each
chapter is very short (just a few pages) and the entire book can be
read in less than thirty minutes. Both the photographs and the text
are fascinating, and left this reader wanting more. I hope that Mr.
Jay will be writing more books to share his voluminous and interesting
knowledge of magic, gaming, and cons with the world. (Jay's other
books: Learned Pigs and Fireproof Women and Jay's
Journal of Anomalies are also highly recommended.)

Associeted with "good luck", dice have long had their solid place in the line of objects revered by people captivated by supersticions as well as by "die" hard gamblers. -- Lucky to those whose fortunes have been increased by the magical cubes, unlucky to those who have been destroyed by the overwhelming losses derived from their addiction to tempt Lady Luck. Then of course there is the chapter on "loaded" dice, the term familar even to the most respectable of gamblers.

For most, a pair of dice is associated with friendly parlour games (Monopoly, Sorry! et al), while others see "money" and flashy Las Vegas neon signs when shown these magically dotted cubes. The scientific roots of the magic behind the cubed die, as ingenious as it appears is purely mathematical. First grade students learn the "rule" regarding where exactly to place the respective "numbers" on the cube (top and bottom always adding to 7). The countless symbolic and logical aspects of dice are outlined in this engaging text. A fierce opponent of gambling, I nonetheless respect the research and well explained findings in Ricky Jay's book. An intriguing scientific read!

Though they may have passed the peak of their fad, fuzzy dice can still be seen hanging from the rear view mirrors of favored cars. They are an amusing bit of American folk surrealism, recalling the more official artworks of the fur-lined cup and saucer or the lobster telephone. The furry dice don't clack the way real dice do, and they are too huge and too rotund ever to be useful as mechanisms in games of chance. Yet they look strange enough that many people fancy them, and assembly lines somewhere are tuned up to produce them for enthusiasts. Conversely, there are real dice depicted in _Dice: Deception, Fate, & Rotten Luck_ (Quantuck Lane Press) by Ricky Jay, with photographs by Rosamond Purcell. But some of them are startlingly furry, and all of them are dying.

Ricky Jay is a magician, and a historian of magic, in addition to being a stage and movie actor. He has produced a couple of large books having to do with the history of magic and showmanship, but this is a small book, square like a face of a die, as are the color close-ups of the afflicted dice. "In the attempt to acquire empirical knowledge, I have accumulated thousands of dice over a period of decades," Jay explains. They are of all sorts of colors and patterns, but most of them are made of celluloid, the same celluloid whose decay has robbed us of countless early movies. Rosamond Purcell specializes in photographing the entropy that overcomes inanimate objects, like a book eaten by termites or rusting objects from the junkyard. Most of the large photographs here show the dice larger than life. The styles of their degeneration are diverse. The transparent ones show cracks through their mass, as if they have been dropped from a height. Some of the faces have crystallized, so that they look as if they have been sugared. Greenish mold seems to grow on some of them, while others seem to be bubbling from inside. Some of them have become as floppy as Dali's pocket watches, while others cleave crisply, leaving cubic fracture lines. Sometimes the spots are preserved, and sometimes it is the spots that have been attacked by time. They are certainly more interesting and more photogenic than they would have been when they were first manufactured.

It is to be expected that the text, in twelve small chapters numbered by pips on the dice, reflects Jay's wit and erudition. Here you can learn a lot of dice history, tales of loaded dice found in Pompeii, or of the conjuring dwarf who had no arms or legs, but manipulated dice in subtle ways. You can read about how God has struck down sacrilegious gamesters. Here is the legend of the Scandinavian kings throwing dice for territory, each throwing repeated boxcars until a surprising stroke (consistent with these pictures) gives a throw that beats a twelve. These are all good stories of the importance which many have felt for dice and their outcomes, and they are made poignant by the handsome photographs of just how chance and time have overtaken these humble cubes.

It used to be that I couldn't put this book down. It was on point and insightful and really helped me start my business. But that was before a friend handed me Guerrilla PR Wired by Michael Levine. It was brilliant and current and the methods were spot on. Theories such as the Magoo Theory helped me to really zone in on why certain techniques work and why others don't. I couldn't go back to Guerrilla Marketing Excellence after that.

This is one of my all time favorite marketing books. I often refer to it time and time again. A MUST read for every business owner, manager and entrepreneur!...

This book as well as the other Geurrilla marketing books by Levinson adjusted my entire concept of thinking as a businessman and I made miracle happen as a result. Levinson really sifts out a lot of nonsense of marketing tactics, and gives you one atomic weapon after another to really launch an effective attack on the marketplace and hold a position. It was a book of continuous eureka's for me as I read. I suggest keeping a notepad handy as you read because your bright ideas will begin to explode one after the other and you will want to record them for later use. This book is entirely loaded with data. I recommend it for everyone with a desire to be successful in business.

This book is good but it isn't good enough. While the techniques and methods are relevant and work, they just aren't agressive enough for today's competitve market. Times are a-changin. Guerilla PR Wired is the book to read nowadays. Check it out; it's well worth the thirty dollars.

In other reviews I've classified this book as the "Greatest Hits" collection. Although this is the lowest cost book in the series, it condenses most (if not all) of the suggestions that have made the Guerrilla Series so popular. Since this book has been written primarily for small and medium sized business owners, much of what it contains may be basic for experienced advertising and marketing professionals. However, for the rest of us (business owners), the Series is a welcomed business partner. Highly recommended.

As a small business owner, I have read dozens of books on advertising and marketing. Most deal with theory and few with real world solutions. This book gives you 100 ideas that you can use to improve sales. Many with low cost. Truly an amazing work!!

Reading "In Search of Donna Reed" literally took me back to Iowa. In 1996, I traveled there from my home in Pennsylvania to learn more about the woman's whose (adopted) name I shared. Growing up Donna Reed in the 1960s was no treat and the name caused me much embarrassment. But as I grew older and learned more about the woman, I felt better about it. I decided to go to Iowa much as I had decided to seek out my family's ancestral town in Germany. Though I was certainly not related to Donna Reed, I felt a kinship to her born out of the shared name. As a young reporter, I vowed I would one day try to interview her. Instead I waited too long and saw her name flash across my computer screen with the word "obit" behind it. A strange sensation, to say the least. I decided I needed to learn about her first-hand. In Iowa, I got the chance to meet and/or interview her widower, children, friends in Denison and co-stars. Certainly, the woman I got to know through their eyes is indeed reflected in Jay Fultz's writings. I regret that in life she did not get the acclaim she should have been accorded not just as an actress, but as an activist and businesswoman. "In Search of Donna Reed" is a solid read and a fine way to learn more about her essentially wonderful life.

...

Ever since I saw the movie "It's a wonderful life" 9 years ago, I have been captivated by this truly amazing woman! Since then I have purchase many items about Donna Reed Mullenger, her biography (In seach of Donna Reed, which was truly a work of art, and I sure can relate to the feeling Mr.Fultz has for her!) also many movies staring this wonderful creature. I only wish I would have known her personnally...
Anyway, I sure would like to see more DVD movies available to the public, staring the beautiful Miss Reed.

In this long-awaited biography of Hollywood's consummate lady, this 1998 volume reads like the proverbial breath of fresh air. Author Jay Fultz recreates an era and a family that at once reminds the reader that it is indeed those examples of grass roots beginnings that oftentimes begets greatness and achievement. In addition to relating the tale of Donna Reed's film and television career, Mr. Fultz also shows clearly the making of a devoted American citizen, spawned by a classic example of the American family, i.e., practitioners of hard work, faith, and patriotism. The book shows that Miss Reed infused her work in Hollywood with elegance, grace and charm, but never forgetting that she was a person of intellect and ideas and strong beliefs about the world around her. More hosannas should be aimed at the legendary lady that was Donna Reed, and Jay Fultz's biography makes a great beginning.

A friend suggested that I take a look at this book. Different than the many books on ecommerce. The last chapter really brings the ideas together.

This book is an encyclopedia of metrics that business process owners care about, and a compendium of advice for measuring them. Don't let the title fool you - this book is as applicable to bricks and mortar businesses as it is to e-commerce sites. I can assure you that reading this book will give you insights into the minds of the business process owners for whom you exist to serve, and will impart a good appreciation of business imperatives.

What I like about this book, aside from what I've said above, is the way the authors analyze the technical and business factors. They start in Chapter 2 with a five-layer e-commerce model, then proceed in subsequent chapters to thoroughly dissect the model and how it applies to business types. This book only addresses technology as it relates to business issues. Chapter 3 illustrates this approach wherein the internet platform is placed into the context of cost/benefit issues. As such you'll get the technical details necessary to understand e-commerce infrastructure, but you'll never lose sight of the business imperatives. This is a refreshing approach, in my opinion, and the rest of the book is consistent with this.

Specific chapters that I particularly like include: (Ch 8) Customer Acquisition models, and (Ch 9) Application of Business models. These two chapters capture the essence of e-commerce. Another valuable part of the book is the appendix, which provides in tabular format real companies, their major and minor categories and revenue models. This is excellent research material that has been pre-compiled and will save you untold hours of research and classification as you benchmark your model against competitors and other business models.

Although I was unfamiliar with the authors and uncertain of the quality of theories/research, I was splendidly suprised and found this book to be a wonderful read. Not only were the theories challenging and stimulating, the author provided fascinating examples of the underlying principles of the book. I think that not only is this book a must read for internet professionals but for the avid business reader as well. The theories can be applied to all disciplines and the concise manner of this book makes it easy for all to understand.

I abandoned this book after encountering over 40 typographical errors in the first 200 pages. This kind of error rate is simply unacceptable. Was this book not edited? If you're going to give the title of Gauss' dissertation in Latin, get it right. You can leave that out if you want to. Quite a few of the errata appear in mathematical statements, so the careful reader should be prepared to make the corrections rather than wondering in vain how some statement is true when it isn't. The writing style is generally agreeable and enthusiastic, but sometimes that gets to be too much. I do agree that learning mathematics along with its history is the best way to get a broad view. It is really a shame that the pressure to get people in and out of graduate school and the pressure subsequently to publish esoteric articles in hopes of getting tenure leave little opportunity to gain a broader, longer view. I admire the author's intentions but find too many annoying problems in this book, problems that could and should have been avoided.

The Queen Of Mathematics: A Historically Motivated Guide To Number Theory by Jay R. Goldman (School of Mathematics, University of Minnesota) is a college-level mathematical text that scrutinizes number theory as it was developed through the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. The notable contributions of Fermat, Euler, Lagrange, Legendre, Hilbert are meticulously examined are studied and dissected in a pedagogical manner, along with an especial emphasis on the work by Gauss. A superb combination historical narrative and introductory mathematic text, The Queen Of Mathematics is a superbly presented work of impressive scholarship as well as a seminal contribution to the history of the Science of Mathematics academic reference collections and reading lists.

I would agree with everything the first reviewer has written. This book is very readable, and it introduces a large number of important general concepts in number theory. What separates this book from other "introduction" books is (1) it is pitched at a much higher level than most introductory number theory books, which often assume that proofs and induction are unfamiliar, and so there are many superfluous chapters at the beginning which are just a rehash of basic set theory, how to write proofs, and modular arithmetic. This book starts from the beginning with Fermat and assumes some mathematical maturity -- ability to read proofs, knowledge of calculus, linear algebra, basic definitions of groups, rings, and fields, about advanced undergraduate, roughly. But the difference in sophistication is more obvious towards the middle and end of the book, where more general concepts from algebra, geometry, and analysis start to appear. This allows the author to talk about a variety of topics that are rarely mentioned in "introductory" books. Put another way -- if you want to see what some of these topics are about, you either have THIS book, or else some rather technical graduate textbooks to start with. Where else is complex multiplication, transcendental number theory, quadratic forms, and p-adic numbers all discussed at an undergraduate level? The other aspect which is different is (2) everything is historically motivated, and this is more than a phrase -- passages of original historical text, problems originally studied, historical commentary, and other folklore are nicely put together with mathematics. The result is that the reader gets a very broad picture of number theory, the "big picture", seeing how number theory isn't some static piece of knowledge sitting somewhere in space, but a body of concepts, ideas, and techniques which naturally developed over the past 400 years. For an advanced undergraduate or graduate student who wants a simple answer to the question, "What is number theory?", I would just refer them to this book.