Recently, I read The Glass Cage by Judy Levering-Duff. It is a wonderful book for the young reader. The main character, Princess Isabella, a ten year old girl has many adventures and they transform her in a positive way. The book held my interest till the end and Isabella stole my heart.

I recieved this book as a b-day present from a friend. Fabulous book! I could not put it down and ended up finishing it in one night! I loved the main character, Princess Isabella and her trials and tribulations throughout the book. I am anxiously awaiting Mrs. Duff's next book of Princess Isabella's adventures!

I recieved the GLASS CAGE as a present from a friend. I finished the book in one night because I couldn't put it down (IT'S A GREAT READ!!!)! Where to begin, where to begin...hmm how about the main character, Princess Isabella of Grom? She was the perfect heroine for the book...she had beauty, brains, and 'brawn' to boot! I loved everything about her character, especially how even though she was a princess she didn't act like one, and could survive without being pampered. I also enjoyed the setting of the book, way back when...with all those mythological creatures and everything! All-in-all it was a fabulous book, and I await Mrs. Duff's next book on Princess Isabella's adventures!

Utilizing their fascination for traditional rural fashions, the designing dream team of Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana has captured the fashion world by storm. Since their company's inception in 1982 to the present, Dolce & Gabbana has made Italian fashion look so wearable.

This book, which celebrates their first 10 years in business, is a collection of past ad campaigns and a plethora of celebrities that normally would make a coffee-table book about fashion appealing. With a foreword by Isabella Rossellini, and appearances by many top name fashion models, Dolce & Gabbana's vision of incorporating Sicilian (Dolce is orginally from Palermo, Sicily) & rural styles is genius. Their tribute to Madonna, who gave them the brand-name notoriety they deserve, is great (Dolce & Gabbana got big press for designing the outfits for Madonna's "Girlie Show" tour). Their recent work with Whitney Houston on her world tour was also spectaclar as these gentleman know how to make a woman look and feel like one.

I am so happy that Dolce & Gabanna, wo are my all-time favorite designers have been in the fashion business for over a decade already. I hope to see a followup of this book very soon, whenever they reach their 20th anniversary. An excellent tribute to a talented duo.

Great pictures of famous people in their D&G clothes. Advertisements with Linda Evangelista (great!) and Madonna, Demi Moore and many others. A must have!

I consider Dolce & Gabbana to be among the very best designers of our time- very much in the same class as the late Gianni Versace, a fellow Italian designer.

The photography in this book is very, very good most of the time. My favorite pictures are from a Fall 1995 ad campaign that featured my favorite, Linda Evangelista. Here she is, with her trademark Sassoon angled bob, one of her best looks ever. Another favorite set are of Nadja Auermann and Kate Moss, from a 1992 campaign. So over the top!

Also included are some celebrities, like Demi Moore and Madonna, who had D&G design her Girlie Show costumes.

You don't have to be a fashionista to appreciate this folio. I think this book would look great on ANYONE's coffee table.

This is one of the most fun read on time travel I've ever read. The author's other book, "After The Storm", another time travel tale, is just as wonderful, only much hotter!

The hero and heroin in this book are delightful characters. The heroin, Kane, coming from the 25th century, makes amusing blunders in her way of speech when she travels back in time to 18th century England. The funniest scene in the book was the conversation she has with her maid regarding where and what to use to take care of some "personal business." This scene was priceless and was laugh out loud, roll-down on the floor funny!

The hero, George, was a delightful character as he fumbles around trying to understand Kane, and inspite of it, still falls hopelessly in love with her. They are well matched and one of the best romantic and delightful couples I've ever read.

The secondary characters in the book plays a strong role as well, especially the character of George's mother. She's funny, adventuress, and just fun to know. I wish more mothers-in-law were like her!

A very heart warming book with tender and sexy love scenes. After reading it, you'll wish the story was longer!

This author is a pseudonym of erotica writer, Jaid Black. If you are expecting this book to be as hot and erotic as her writing in Jaid Black, then you'll be disappointed. However, if you want to read a story that is delightful and heart warming, with memorable, funny and lovable characters, then please buy this book. You'll be glad you did!

Whew! It's been a long time since I've read so original a book. This book takes us on a fantastic journey through time fraught with perils and unexpected adventures. The main characters Kane and George have intense chemistry and understand each other on a realistic and loving level. You won't believe they're really a work of fiction. The time travel aspect of the story is handled well and realisticly and the plot is very original.

In future Earth the population is diying from a brain plague that makes AIDS look like the sniffles. There is plant that has properties that could cure this devastating disease...there's just one problem. This plant has been extinct for hundreds of years. So Kane, a warrior woman/biologist must travel back in time to obtain samples of this plant in order to save her world.

In past Earth George Wyndom the Earl of Blackmore is stuck between a rock and a hard place. He must find a wife to beget his heirs. He must find a suitable wife soon or his mother will foist an insipid nightmare into his marriage bed. While riding through his property and brooding over his problem he stumbles upon an incredible...naked beauty. He falls instantly in love/lust and his life turns upside down. Little does he know that the woman of his dreams is also from the future! Will he be able to help her fulfill her quest...even though it will mean losing her to the future?

Be ready to laugh until you cry this book is full of hilarious surprises and wonderful characters. You'll hate it when the book comes to an end.

I also recommend Before the Storm also by Tia Isabella and any and all books by Jaid Black.

I loved Tia Isabella's After the Storm. I did not think she could do any better but I was wrong. Maybe it's because I like historicals a tad bit better than conteporaries but Before the Fire stays vivid in my mind and heart even though that was many books ago. ...

Before the Fire is a sensual love story about Kane and George. If you think Kane is an unusal name for a female heroine, you have no idea how truly unique she really is. Kane is a scientist from the future who has to travel back in time to find a cure for a deadly disease that threatens to wipe out their entire population.

She meets George in his time. He's the Earl of Blackmore but she calls him her lordling. He's amused by this and everything about her. His body parts also have an amazing lustful reaction to her nearness too. He offers to take her home and she refers to it as his pad. Yup, the future may be advanced but due to a big fire that destroyed most of their old records of the past, her information of the past "BEFORE THE FIRE" is all lumped into one jumble. She mixes her 20th century terms with the 18th century terms often to the amusement of George and all.

My favorite thing about Ms Isabella's writing is that she doesn't try to insult our intelligence by feeding us the tired mainstream romance formulas. My choice example of this is George's mother. You'd think the mother of an Earl would hate the fact that George is smitten by Kane. That she would do everything she could to try to sabotage their relationship. Sigh, it was SO refreshing to read a book written by someone who dares to do better than mainstream and succeeds so convincingly. I loved George’s mother and so did Kane.

But my favorite part of the book was the seductive writing that describes the love that blossom between Kane and George. The way they feel about each other gives passion a whole new meaning. Sparks fly from the beginning and the sultry heat they generate is enough to burn a thousand books. Good thing this is an e-book.

This book of romance/erotica will keep you warm (more like red-hot!) on those nights when a cold loveless book of erotica won’t. I wonder if Ms Isabella is related to Chef Emeril Lagasse because she sure knows how to take a love story and “take it up a notch” by spicing up and shaking up the mainstream romance formula with HER special “essence”. I can’t wait to devour her next book.

A Wish For Miguel was cool! In this book, Miguel, a worker on Isabella's rancho is called to work in the mines! Things are terrible in the mines! Workers often die and get hurt in rock slides, poisonous gasses soffocate the workers and many of them die of terrible diseases! Isabella must reach the Viceroy to tell him Miguel must be exused from the mines! To do that, she must play the guitar. Mama played the guitar and died last year. Isabella must find the courage to play the guitar.

Meet Isabella, the newest Girlhood Journeys character! Isabella is from Peru, in South America, in 1820. Her mother is no longer alive. She doesn't want to play music anymore since that's what her mother did. But now she found out her servant Miguel will have to go to a mine! The living conditions are horrible there! Isabella must never give up and go to the capital herself! And she does what she truly loves.

This was a great book. It is about Isabella, a young girl living on a rancho in 1820s Peru with her Papa. Mama died last year, and life hasn't been the same. Isabella can no longer play the guitar now that Mama has died. But now one of her father's employees, Miguel, is going to be sent to work in the mines, and Isabella must find the courage to play the guitar - for Miguel's life depends upon it.

There are few things that inspire me more than a true story of a child of God who is faithful in the face of success and apparent failure. I see the reality of this woman's walk with God to be the challenge and encouragement. The accounts of her passion, travels, and encounters challenge my perspective on missions. I don't believe I had a real grasp on missions until I read this book. The quotations of her own journals and other writings bring a special feeling of knowing Lilias by the end of the book. This is a book I highly encourage all believers to read.

I am a voracious reader of non-fiction (particularly Christian non-fiction), but out of thousands of books I have read, this biography captivated me like no other. Perhaps because I am a writer and artist, I could identify with Lilias and her passions. Ultimately, however, this is a story of adventure, sacrifice, surrender and uncompromising dedication to Jesus Christ, all set against the exotic backdrop of Algeria. I can't wait to meet Lilias in heaven and tell her how she inspired me. Of course, I also look forward to meeting the authors someday because they brought Lilias to life. The narrative is as lovely as Lilias' art!

This book does indeed weave a challenging and interesting tale of a pioneeer missionary, who for the sake of the gospel left a comfortable and gracious victorian life for a life of sacrifice in the northern deserts of Africa, among Muslim tribemen.It is carefully crafted and includes some prints of Lilias' own artwork, which from what can be seen, is lovely.I wish a book could be devoted to more prints and more about Lilias' travels!

Every book by Isabella is an adventure. This book is wonderful to read during and after a trip to the islands. It makes great bedtime reading and is a book that you can stretch out for a long time and read again and again.

The steamer Nevada left Auckland New Zealand in January of 1873. Onboard are a number of travelers including Isabella Bird, who is traveling for her health. When another passenger takes ill, his Mother asks Isabella to disembark with them at Honolulu so they are not in a foreign land all alone. Thinking she will be there a short while, she actually begins a six-month journey, which she chronicles in a series of unabridged letters to her Sister back home. For those who have visited Hawaii or those who wonder what the islands were like before being annexed to the United States, these writings are pure joy.

Isabella arrives as a foreigner, but in a short time learns of the beauty of the various islands and begins to understand the diverse culture of the people.

She travels as an unescorted woman in a country, which has recently converted from aboriginal customs and inter-island wars, to the relatively peaceful paradise known in modern times. From simple observations of looking down at clouds on Maui at sunrise, to the unexpected earthquakes while standing next to a bubbling caldron of creation itself, you follow her adventures in well-written communications, which inform and entertain.

As she stood in snow, gazing down at the crater 800 feet below her, she wrote "The mystery was solved, for at one end of the crater, in a deep gorge of its own, above the level of the rest of the area, there was the lonely fire, the reflection of which, for six weeks, has been seen for 100 miles."

What she witnessed upon King Lunalilo's arrival in Hilo, brought tears to my eyes. Although they were beginning life under a form of government, the natives treated their king to a touching procession unlike anywhere else in the world. Many of the citizens had little or no money for clothes and wore what they had to meet him.

Some also brought gifts as Isabella writes: "One woman, sorely afflicted with quaking palsy, dragged herself slowly along. One hand hung by her side helpless, and the other grasped a live fowl so tightly that she could not loosen it to shake hands, whereupon the king raised the helpless arm, which called forth much cheering." A poor cripple who had only the use of his arms, drug himself two miles to lie for a moment at his kings feet. He too carried a gift.

Reading Isabella Birds' letters allows you to see first hand the magic the islands has on a visitor's soul and how easy it is to fall under the spell of the Hawaiian people.

I highly recommend the book with only one useful hint. That is to find a detailed map and refer to it during the travels. Unfortunately, the maps in the book are not clear enough to use for this purpose.

A beautifully written first hand description of the hawaii of the 18th. century. The book is a series of letters written by a 40 year old english women to her sister in england. During her stay in the islands, she had the opportunity to travel to all of the main islands, and the stories of her experiences are most vividly described. For those of us who love the islands, it's people and their culture this is the book for you.

"Your Affectionate Daughter, Isabella" is a very entertaining book - the kind of book I always slow down on reading, towards the end, because I don't want it to be over - but also a fascinating look into the world of the Antebellum South. Most of us have a picture of plantation owners as Clark Gables and Scarlett O'Haras in silks and brocades; the Torrances' plantation in North Carolina is a reasonably prosperous but serious working plantation, whose owners do care about their slaves - apparently the only information we now have about them comes from annual summaries James Torrance writes up - and who would probably free their slaves, except that "Then, where would we get workers for the Plantation?" A good summary of much of the prewar Southern situation.
The basis of the book is an extensive collection of letters written by Isabella and various other family members, all interwoven with just enough history and background so that it all makes an absorbing story. The Torrance plantation - in western North Carolina - prospers and exemplifies the good life, sure enough; various sons and daughters, including Isabella, go off elsewhere to find their fortunes, mostly with indifferent success, and often as not drift back to the old homestead. This is life as it was lived by a group of attractive but fairly ordinary people, in a world in which the vagaries of the weather, the agonizingly high rate of infant and adult mortality and the price of cotton, year by year, were far more important than far-off Abolitionists and Fire-eaters.
As a part-time Civil-War buff, I found this a fascinating insight into the people on the Other Side, who are of course now Us. It's part of the magic of Your Affectionate Daughter that you really want to know how they all came out - the book tells us all the letters know, but I found myself wanting more. And, if making you really care about the characters isn't a measure of a book's narrative power, what is?

p.s. Well, yes, I am a brother-in-law of the Author. But it's still a really good book.

"Your Affectionate Daughter, Isabella" is particularly noteworthy as Ms. Williams has avoided the trap that most authors who base their work on a collection of letters fall into... her narrative carries the story, using the letters only to support the text.. rather than the reverse.

She accomplishes this with an impressive working knowledge of the post 1800 south and plantation lifestyles, presented to us with both a flair for writing and a skillful turn of phrase that, when combined, turn this work into a charming story that will find favor with anyone who enjoys well written and educational history. I hope we'll see more of Ms. William's work.

What a wonderful book! A good read, a touching story, and accurate history. Isabella Torrance was a strong woman who suffered much, and accomplished much, growing up in North Carolina and Mississippi in the early part of the 19th Century.

This story is set in the early 1800s in the American South and is totally based on existing letters from the period. The Torrance family of North Carolina must have kept every piece of paper they ever got. It follows Isabella from the age of 7 when she was sent off to boarding school (Salem College, North Carolina), to coming home at the age of nine to a new mother and growing up on a large farm which was turning into a plantation. She married early and pioneered with her husband and baby in Mississippi - the edge of the wilderness at that time. After much suffering on the frontier, and the death of her husband, she returned to North Carolina to more adventures and a full life.

The story is told through family letters, using the actual letters and other family records, plus enough imagined dialog to keep the story moving along. Ms. Williams seems to have done her research well and all of the details, from the largest to the most minute, ring true. I really enjoyed reading the book as a story, plus the added value of finding out what life was really like in the American South and on the frontier in the period just before the Civil War.

This is a story of a pair of female anthropologists that are studying the relics from an ancient castle in Scotland. Maya finds that the painting of the Lady MacGregor is very similiar to her in eye color and hair color. She and her friend Sara are intrigued by the Clan MacGregor.

While walking on the beach during a hurricane the two girls are swept bak in time to meet this Clan. Maya and Thomas, the laird of the clan, antagonize each other. both being strong willed and independent. Maya just wants to get home, until she realizes that she has fallen in love with Thomas.

Thomas has been taught that women are faithless and untrustworthy. He is unprepared for the force of his attraction to Maya. I will say he is open minded when Maya explains her origins.

This is a great story and although not as steamy as some of Jaid Black's other stories it is very enjoyable.

What an amazing book! If you're tired of the same old formula when it comes to historical romance then you'll love yourself for getting a copy of After the Storm. This story has everything! From time travel, to humor, to intense emotion and erotic sensuality this book is a definite keeper.

In the present day Maya Jones is one of the worlds leading anthropologists. After unearthing some amazing artifacts from an ancient scottish castle, Maya finds herself drawn inexplicably to the story of the Laird of the castle. Thinking of taking a small vacation Maya and a friend find themselves participating in a hurricane party on the coast of Florida where *poof!* she and her best friend are swallowed up by the storm and transported through a wormhole into ancient Scotland! Using her understanding of ancient peoples Maya and her friend become part of an ancient and fearsome clan the MacGregors!

Most amazing is that Maya finds herself as drawn to Laird MacGregor in the flesh as her historical view of the Laird. She's never known a more virile or exasperatingly stubborn man. Hilarious hijinks ensue as Maya and the Laird take turns pursuing each other, forging an earth shattering love that spans through the ages and gives birth to a dynasty.

I also recommend Before the Fire also by Tia Isabella and any and all books by Jaid Black.

The blend of history, the development of his characters, and the attention to details. The Heretic,remind's me Umberto Eco " The name of the Rose". BRAVISSIMO! Mr. Weinstein

The Heretic is well written, entertaining and historically reminds us of a dark period in the history of Spain. The characters were real to me and I found that I was compelled to keep reading and finished the 370 pages in about 2 and a half days. I thoroughly enjoyed it and wished the story could have continued.

Just finished Lew Weinstein's book - The Heretic. I was very touched by the characters - they truly came alive. It held my attention throughout the book. It also filled me with a greater understanding of Judaism and enlightened me as to the dominance of Catholicism over Judaism during this period. It was well written and the research for this book left nothing to be desired. Congratulations to Lewis Weinstein on The Heretic.

Isabella Bird was an astounding woman. Adventurous, courageous and full of good humor, she traveled by horse through the Rocky Mountains when it was still virgin territory. Although she lived under difficult circumstances, especially during the winter months, and met a number of rough customers along the way, she never lost her nerve or her good nature. This is an excellent book to get a feel for Colorado in the late 19th Century and to admire a woman way ahead of her time.

A must for the reader who is searching for a first hand description of life in the Rocky's in the 1800's. It includes wonderful sketches by the author and great descriptions of characters and adventures in the untamed West. A great book for bedtime and rainy day reading.

This is a wonderful book to bring on your vacation to the Rockies. Miss Bird travels to what are now popular tourist destinations, only she does it before the convenience of a SUVs, Motels, or even plumbing. She meets overworked settlers, fascinating (and surprisingly polite) desperados, and English dandies. She revels in the mountain vistas, sunrises, sunsets and orange moonlight. Her many mile treks on horseback over frozen landscapes, alone in the wild west are an inspiration.