Being in the throws of the emptying nest for some time now I have scoured the market for good information to guide me through. I have read many books on the empty nest and didn't realize how insulting they were until I read Shelley Bovey's excellent book. Most writers give the emotional impact of this important trasition a tiny corner in their books and at that not very supportive to say the least. I always felt like they were minimizing my grief and trying to push me out the door without honoring where I really was at. What they are missing is that for many of us all the rest of what they have to say doesn't matter and we can't get there by choosing to - we must grieve our loss first. Like Shelley says, we must look back before we can look ahead. It relieved my anxiety to know that other women had tried this "rush out and explore yourself" advice only to find it all dull and lacking. Now I know that I don't need to rush into all that - I can stay home and sob - releasing the tears as long as I need to knowing that the process will take me where I need to go. I have a whole new life ahead but now it's time to grieve and to feel my emptiness. I'm so comforted. Thank you to Shelley for writing this important book and to all the women who shared themselves within it so honestly. One more thing - the author has done some very interesting work on how this current loss can trigger old losses that haven't been healed. So in grieving this loss we open up and heal old losses that have needed resolution. I find this very strengthening and hopeful.

I bought this book about two years ago and I've come back to it again and again. Every time I pick it up I'm struck with a new piece of wisom it offers.
I thought I would never suffer from empty nest syndrome -- I'm a college professor with a Ph.D. -- I thought only pathetic women with no life beyond their kids had problems with this. But empty nest syndrome hit me hard when my older daughter was in high school, while the nest was still very full! I searched for information to help me through, but the vast majority was silly ("now the frig stays full longer"), or simplistic ("take up gardening"). I'm so thankful that I finally found Shelley's book. Her book is written with great sensitivity and compassion, and offers much insight from women who have experienced empty nest syndrome, as well as from psychologists who have dealt with it professionally. A primary thesis of the book is that, for many women (and some men too), children leaving home constitutes a major loss in life, and needs to be grieved, just like any other life altering loss.
This book must have taken Ms. Bovey years to research, but in doing so she has given us a priceless gift. This is one of the few books I will always keep.

My third and last child left home 6 months ago. I was utterly devastated, totally unprepared for the sense of loss and emptiness I felt. Shelley's book so dramatically changed my life that I can't thank her enough for writing it. In those pages I founds dozens of women, from all different walks of life, who felt exactly as I did. I felt so validated and normal again. I wasn't going crazy after all. What I was going through, the pain I experienced at the loss of that particular phase of motherhood was very normal. Her book is very well written, researched and full of wisdom and practical advice. This book is a must for any woman or man experiencing a sense of sadness or loss over children leaving home, whether in the past, present or future. I certainly wish I had a book such as this when my first child left home almost 10 years ago. It would have saved me years of doubt and uneasiness that I was maybe over-reacting or being too sensitive about "losing" my children. Shelley's book enabled me to look at the situation, face it and move on with my life. Thanks again Shelley.

I have known Don Bovey for about 40 years, and know firsthand that he is a true man of God. I waited about 7 years for him to finish the book, but it was worth the wait. And, it certanly caused me to spend more time in the Bible than usual.
Thanks Don.

...

Don Bovey's book "In Touch with Eternity" is an excellent resource book for studying the Ten Commandments. Details about the origins of the Ten Commandments are clearly explained. And linkage between the Prophets and Kings of the Old Testament describe true case studies on how the Ten Commandments reveal guidance for these special people.

Knowing Don personally, he writes just as he speaks. I enjoyed his book immensley. "Two Thumbs Up" to Don. The beginning and the end, the Ten Commandments are as Don would say "Timeless".

The beautiful photos of lichens and mosses are the best feature of this book. Even many of the harder to identify crustose lichens are included and equally well photographed in this handsome guide. It is difficult to get a handle on lichen identification without some formal training, but this book will enable you to at least make identifications for some of the easier foliose and fruticose ones, such as parmelia or usnea, for example, and perhaps the more difficult ones too as you become more knowlegeable and experienced. The crustose lichen, rhizocarpon geographicum, for example, isn't that hard to identify from the tile-like pattern it makes on rocks and the lime-green color and black apothecia on the plant thallus.

Along with the photos, there are good descriptions and range maps showing plant distributions.

I had the opportunity to take supposedly the only full-semester lichenology class being taught that year in the entire U.S. by the late, great Harry Thiers, back in the mid-80's at San Francisco State University, a graduate botany course in which I'm proud to say I got an A. So I have some formal training in the area, and feel I can judge a good book on the subject when I see it, and this beautifully illustrated field guide is definitely worth the relatively modest price.

Focused on the moist parts of western North America, this guide uses photos, range maps, and keys to identify and describe the primitive plants that are everywhere around us, but poorly understood. Great for plant exploration in the cool parts of the year. If you've ever wondered about those beautiful green carpeted forest floors, the delicate life growing on trees and rocks, or the lacey ferns in the fields and woods, this book is for you.

Some of the monsters that medieval artists drew along the edges of manuscript pages were based on real animals, such as lions and whales. But many were made up from reading ancient and biblical writings. Respected writers, such as Aristotle, Ctesias, Herodotus and Homer in Greek, and Pliny the Elder and Solinus in Latin, saw foreign lands, forests and wildernesses as dangerous places. They thought of people, in such faraway lands as Ethiopia and India, either as deformed creatures looking somewhat human or as monsters.

Christianity spread by letting be whatever parts of other cultures didn't get in the way of what Christians believed. So St Augustine of Hippo accepted these stories. But he saw these monsters as having souls in need of being saved.

But it didn't matter if it was monks or, later on, professionals outside the church who copied and did the artwork. Artists and writers, particularly in medieval England, France and the Netherlands, were just as accepting as those who had gone before. The Universal History and The Wonders of the East on the one hand, and the Byzantine and Tiberius psalters on the other, were all known for monsters.

And monstrously ugly on the outside meant bad on the inside. For the final battle in the biblical book of the Apocalypse was between St Michael's good army of beautiful angels and Satan's bad of ugly dragons and monsters. Readers and viewers in the Middle Ages felt that they had to take sides in this fight. So they often scratched, slashed or smudged the faces of those drawn as doing evil in medieval manuscripts.

Joining monsters at the end of the 15th century were grotesques, as having parts from animals, humans and plants. They were based on cave drawings of mythical monsters. This art was in a palace of Emperor Nero that was rediscovered in 1488. So, for example, grotesques showed up on the edges of pages in the Book of Hours for Bonaparte Ghislieri, a wealthy resident of Bologna.

Author Alixe Bovey is an excellent starting point. Her user-friendly writing gives perfect examples of the MONSTERS AND GROTESQUES IN MEDIEVAL MANUSCRIPTS. Her book works well with Janetta Rebold Benton's HOLY TERRORS and Jennifer Dussling's GARGOYLES. She paves the way for John Block Friedman's THE MONSTROUS RACES IN MEDIEVAL ART AND THOUGHT and A G Smith's GARGOYLES AND MEDIEVAL MONSTERS, both harder to start with first.

I am an IT consultant with limited programming exposure, but good Excel knowledge. I had a sudden Excel VBA work requirement that meant I had to get going fast. Had heard this was not a book to get started on, but not true, and wouldn't have wanted to learn any other way. No messing around - get stuck in with real world business examples and numerous tips on things to watch out for. Had to focus hard as there is so much information but now 5 weeks later have finished it and feel confident to have a crack at any Excel VBA project. Also now got a good library of code to use.

In fact I enjoyed learning with these guys so much I have ordered a book on programming VB 6.0 to expand my knowledge.

Can't recommend it enough.

The reader of this book must have programming knowledge and be a proficient Excel user. This was not written for absolute beginners. The book is best where it covers advanced feature's such as Add ins, programming the VBE, Windows API,Class Modules and writing international applications. However If you buy this book I would recommend WalkenBach's "Excel Power Programming..." which offers a better coverage of Userforms, Charts, Toolbars and Menu's.
The book is very lean althogh it is about 1000 pages, it does not offer plenty of examples but the code that is given is very useful. Although could not grasp the chapter's about com add ins and programming the Smarttags I would classify this book as one written in a very clear and approachable way.

I'm a beginner in VBA and I bough this book one week ago and I find it excellent. I have tried to learn VBA with other books before with no success. This book is easy to follow and gives lots of easy examples. Personally I learn best working with examples. No problem recommending this book for other beginners.
Ok it doesn't come with a CD, but it's no problem downloading what you need from the home page.

Good luck!

As someone who has struggled with eating disorders for over ten years and has been both severely underweight and overweight within the space of 18 months, I thought this book might in some way be helpful. Some of it was, but the major flaws it also contains ruined my reading of it. Bovey is angry - fair enough, but she lets her anger cloud her vision and goes much too far with many poorly-researched, aggressive arguments. In particular the points she tries to make about anorexia are extremely offensive. She narrows her focus to see only a world in which compassion is finite and the apparently selfish anorexic has stolen all of the sympathy owed to the overweight woman. That just simply isn't the way things are and anorexics are in many ways treated far worse than the overweight - force-fed and locked in isolated rooms without light or conversation until a certain weight is gained is what I remember. But this isn't the point, anyhow. It's not a competition. There is no need to try to prove your own suffering is more worthy than someone else's. The points you make should be able to stand alone. Bovey's viewpoint is extreme. She has no distance from what she is writing about, which can make for a passionate book, but also a very black-and-white attitude. Surely there is space for a middle ground of acceptance, where larger people do not have to vie for respect at the expense of others? In a truly fair world, one in which no one is discriminated against because of size, I would like to think criticizing the very thin would also be unacceptable. In many ways, Bovey's aggression reaffirms her perceived "outsider" status and allows little room for reconciliation.

Bovey writes a convincing piece using a mix of scientific research, personal experience, and letters from her readers. The author presents dozens of pieces of evidence to support her argument that being fat does not necessarily mean being unhealthy. Bovey is angry, and it shows through her use of strong words and the occasional shard of sarcasm. The only failing of Bovey's work of non-fiction is a relative lack of organization. This disorder does not overly detract from the effect of the book, however.

Bovey's work has helped this reviewer to see fat and fat prejudice for what it is and is not. This book is recommended reading for any fat person and is directed at women specifically. It dispells taboos regarding weight and reveals that all the worry about weight is silly and utterly useless.

I don't say this about many books, but this one changed my life. It made me feel ten times better and destroyed the myths about dieting & the "dangers" of being fat. You know you're living in an insane world when you're told that your respiratory problem is due to being overweight (mine is actually due to an allergy) - a trivial misdiagnosis but in some cases it could be fatal. Read this book, even if you're a stick insect. You are free to be who and what you are, not what is prescribed by the media.

I Moved Your Cheese, a satire on self-help books, written by Darrel Bristow-Bovey. This book has 96 pages (including last 3 pages BLANK to make the book look thicker) and has been published by New Holland Publishers (UK) Ltd (2002) and is distributed in India by Dolphin Publications.

The author, using humour, expresses his utter contempt for self-help books and those who read them and adds that the problem with the self-help books that litter the shelves of the bookstores and bedside tables of the nation, besides the fact that they are poorly written by unattractive authors, is that they expect you to do all the work. You are required to read them, remember key words, and perhaps even put their teachings into practice in everyday life.

The title I Moved Your Cheese implies a direct attack on the similarly named 'Who Moved My Cheese?' by Dr. Spencer Johnson, a self-help book about dealing with change. But Darrel Bristow-Bovey has not limited himself to ridiculing just this; he makes disdainful references to Deepak Chopra and other self-proclaimed 'gurus'.

I Moved Your Cheese is a total laugh riot. Darrel Bristow-Bovey, with his absurdly funny anecdotes and instances, will not disappoint readers seeking ridiculous humour. His chapter about the mango-throwing wise guy guru is hysterically funny and his take on Oprah and feng shui will have you sniggering smugly in your couch. His other stories about the Xam, his neighbour Bill, and his friend Chunko are sidesplitting. Instead of writing words of wisdom in cheese, like his forerunner, the author is found sardonically writing in the sand. Across the book, he is yelling, "Who moved my keys?" "I moved your geese" and other deliberately mocking lines.

And of course the process of "Osmatix", which the author himself has patented. The process where the reader not need read this book but should simply buy this book and keep it in a prominent position will make him/her a brighter, happier and more desirable person. Since, the pages have been treated with a revolutionary new formula that allows wisdom to pass directly from the page into the atmosphere, where it can be easily inhaled from any position.

With hilarity oozing from cover to cover, this book is a must-read for those who enjoy humour at it's mirthful best.

The author, who won the Annual Readers Choice for this book, makes a reccount on every type of self-help book, saying this is not a self-help bool.
In fact, it is, with it's story of a young boy who carries an egg, his inner egg, and gains respect from his people.
This book is about our inner egg, our hidden secrets, and it reads fast and delightfully.
For a light and funny lecture, this book has 4 stars.

An excellent honest anthology written by strong, sucessful women showing that that is not a barrier to acieving whatever you desire. These pieces are poignant, truthful and humorous. I recommend this book to anyone interested in size issues.

This title has an excellent overview of the fundamental physical principles of NMR with many of the formulae and facts essential for understanding this topic at an introductory level. However, the applications section of this title is out of date. The book maybe useful for the organic and inorganic chemist interested in structure determination research. It is not aimed for the biomedical scientist interested in protein and enzyme or whole tissue analysis. References are adequately listed.