This book has a GREAT cover! And it is just a hint of what's in the pages and paragraphs inside this wonderful cover. The cover IS the essence of the book and you will not be disappointed. Jeremy's life during the year after he sees his father die is a compelling journey and you will not want to see it end. The writing is creative and original, real, true, accurate, touching, laughing, crying, 1960s, Jewish-culture-but-for-everybody type of story. And in the adventure are lessons, without being preachy, that may help folks who have lost loved ones too soon, or at all. Steinberg has crafted a story that captures the feelings and emotions of the 12 year old boy as his world suddenly must revolve on an entirely new axis.. A rare book, indeed.

Want to get an insight or just remember your youth then this is a great read. You will remember stuff you probably never remembered before as this exaims you youth thru the eyes of a 12 year old boy. The author is a sensitive and insightful guy who brings the story to life in very unique ways. You feel you must finish this book and will. Short shots and a lively mood brings this story around. You will remember this one.

I loved this fresh and witty story told by 12-year-old Jeremy. The mix of humor and tragedy was expertly woven together and kept me wanting more! (It felt like I was back in the sixties reliving seventh grade). My book club also loved it and hated to see it end. A worthy read, definitely five stars!

I met Flerlage a few years ago in Chicago when I was doing some research for a now-forgotten project and I went through his collection of fantastic photos with him in his apartment and loved every second of it. The composition and lighting in these pictures is beautiful, and he catches something of the energy of the performances that is pretty amazing. Flerlage isn't one of these precious blues prigs (e.g., Steve Calt) who spends all of his time trying to protect some pet thesis and trashing everyone else's work relentlessly, but is a real dude who lived jazz and blues on the South Side in a way that few other writers or photographers have. The result is what you see -- great photographs, on the ground, in the clubs with the people who made the scene as wild and energetic as it was. If you want to see pictures that give you a real taste of the power of jazz and blues in teh 50s and 60s, get this book and linger over these fantastic photographs. You won't regret it.

Electrifying images with intense feeling. Fine photography by Raeburn Flerlage and superb editing by Lisa Day. What a moving adventure to turn each page. I felt like I was in the audience and part of each photograph.

This is the best photo documentary of a music culture I have ever seen, the photos are so alive you feel you are there, you remember when you were there, even if you never were. The text is as beautiful and intimate and truthful as the photos. The scope is big and very complete. I spend hours, looking and looking again, reading and re-reading. I close the book and the music stops.

Joravsky's book is a thorough and honest portrait of the lives of two boys and their dreams of playing professional basketball. Unlike the original documentary film, the book explores each boy's family history, avoiding the cliches and staginess which render real life as caricature. Instead, we get an honest, direct and compelling account of growing up poor and black in Chicago and of having the chance to chase a dream. A fast read that captures the excitement of the game of basketball. Recommended for youths and adults alike; for classroom and recreational settings.

For two inner city kids from the west side of Chicago this is a chance of a lifetime. They get to get out of Chicago's west side for at least ten hours every weekday, to go to St. Josephs to play basketball. The book was excellent and I would rate it 5 stars. I could not put it down. It not only takes you through thier basketball lives, but through thier real lives. I liked it so much, because it was real, true to life, nothing in that book was fake, it was all real. I like reading books about athletics, but Hoop Dreams put each of them in, athletics and real life writing, which was a great combonation together. For these two young men, it was a struggle to try to fullfill thier own hoop dreams. Even with all of the adversity in thier life, they stuck with it thtrough thick and thin, and that was really enjoyable to read about. I would reccomend this book to any teenager who loves basketball. I would not reccomend this book to anyone younger than thirteen, because it does have some foul language in it. To anyone who has not read Hoop Dreams yet, go out and read it, it is one for the ages!

Hoop Dreams is a book everyone can relate to. Whether it be for the fact that it is for athletes or just for people who like real stories about people struggling for success. I personally liked the book because you got to know the kids and where they came from, not just about their basketball lives. You know it is a great movie when in the credits for He Got Game they have both the kids, one is one the brooklyn bridge and the other is in the gardens. Great book. I recommend it to all who love to read.

Larry Axelrood uses his years of experience in the criminal courtrooms of Chicago to give the reader a very realistic and exciting view into the criminal court system. His writing captures your attention through his ability to familiarize you with the characters. In an intense way, he places you into the minds of the main subjects.

There is an interesting twist at the end that caught this reader by surprise. I found the book a fast read as each particular segment of the story seemed to launch me into the next. There is excellent descriptive detail, for example, demonstrating how the slightest change in the facial expression of a juror can create havoc in an attorney's mind. There are the racing thoughts of a prosecutor versus a defense attorney that expose everything from pride to paranoia and the vicious extents an attorney will go to to defend his or her position.

I found the story quite interesting, while the use of the author's first hand experiences over time, his detailed observations, perhaps his own anxious moments, contribute greatly to the effectiveness of his ability to bring the reader directly into the story.

Absolutely fabulous! I found this book to be a classic drama. The author has created a gripping storyline containing interesting characters and a blockbuster finale.

Like most of the rest of us I have become somewhat of a courtroom junky. Do yourself a favor and take a trip to Chicago, Illinois with Attorney Larry Axelrood. Having worked on both sides of the criminal justice system he obviously posseses the insite to "Give us just the facts ma'am." However, his writing style is what creates a story that brings you deep inside the complex and intriguing Chicago legal system.

This book is exactly the type of story Hollywood makes movies about. I'm sure some savvy producer will snatch it up. Do what I did and read it before you see the movie.

Move over Mr. Turow, there's a new "writer" in town.

Having read and enjoyed all of Scott Turow's works, and being a native Chicagoan, attorney and avid reader, I thought that I'd give Larry Axelrood's book a quick read. My mistake!

I found this to be an incredibly gripping novel from start to finish. Axelrood's character development was impressive, descriptive and fixating; particularly between the the "Advocate", Darcy Cole, and the "Doe" boys. Their dialogue through out the book will leave the reader anxious to find out what they'll do next, with fabulous "one-liners" that could only have come from Axelrood's personal experiences.

The book reads quickly, flows well and has twists and turns that compel the next chapter. Anyone that has lived in or visited Chicago will appreciate the scenes, landmarks and other "local elements" that Axelrood incorporates in the storyline. The finish is fabulous, unpredictable and left this reader hanging for more.

This one goes on my holiday gift list!

THIS BOOK WAS GREAT!!!!!
John Kobler did an excelent job with this one. The title, The Life and World Of Al Capone, really sums it up. Not only was this an extremely accurate factual book, but also was greatly engaging. I am a big fan of Capone books and have read quite a few, but this was easily the best one that I've read. This book includes minute details on Capones life and "business" as well as the long list of dives, hot spots, and other gangsters all inhabiting Chicago.

I found no flaw in the writing of this book and thought it was marvelously written. I can't begin to tell you how great of a book this was. At different points it transformed me into a Chicago citizen reading the newspaper, to a young hoodlum in the gang, to an inmate at Alcatraz. The only thing I was disappointed with was that it went by to fast! You must read this book!

If you're looking for a complete picture of America's most notorious mobster, this is it. This is the definitive biography, a well-rounded study that brings Big Al into three-dimensional focus, something Schonberg only elaborated on and Bergreen failed completely at. The best book ever on the life, times and career of the father of syndicated crime.

This book is excellent! There aren't enough words in English to discribe this man! This book gives great insight into what really went on in Al Capone's life and his gang--RUTHLESS with TASTE! Just wish it were a lot longer.

The blurb on the back cover of this book has a slight understatement... It begins, "A landmark in jazz studies,"
Not since the advent of the long playing record and the publication of Leonard Feather's "Encyclopedia of Jazz" has anyone made such an enormous, substantive, light shedding contribution to Jazz (outside a recording studio.) This book is a must for everyone... and in fact, its divided into two parts... one which *is* for everyone, and goes into how musicians come up, hone their skills, learn to interact, develop and whatnot, and then the second half, which is more for musicians and features close to 400 pages of musical examples - - a text book in musical studies itself.

As a musician myself, I have long suspected that Jazz isn't just a bunch of patterns and scales. It is a culture, an attitude, an approach, and way of thinking... this book not only confirms it, but it substantively will take you into the mind of its foremost vetarans and practitioners. With its balance between information that's anecdotal as well as analytical, and Berliner's excellent writing style (despite the size of the book, he just draws you in the pages flow by one by one) - - this is must reading...

Almost a half a century ago Leonard Feather told us about the masters, now Berliner draws us into their minds. It is my hope that Jazz students (and fans) alike will begin taking up this book as they begin their journeys, and as a result, it invigorates and revitalizes the music as its never been before !

This is the single most comprehensive study that's been done of jazz improvisation, and perhaps of any kind of improvisation, period. Berliner interviewed over 50 working jazz musicians-including name players such as Gary Bartz, Lou Donaldson, Tommy Flanagan, Lee Konitz, Wynton Marsalis, Max Roach, and Red Rodney. He's also transcribed hundreds of musical examples, including rhythm section parts. Berliner discusses every fact of improvisation, learning the craft, influences, practice and rehearsal, riffs and patterns, repertoire, interplay, comping and soloing, emotional impact of performance, venues, the life of working musician, etc.

Requires the ability to read music if you want to follow all of the examples, though there is much you can follow otherwise.

Paul F Berliner is an ethnomusicologist at Northwestern (his previous book was _The Soul of Mbira_); here he turns his methods to the realm of jazz. His book is organized according to the learning process through which jazz improvisors proceed, from their first picking up an instrument to becoming masters of their art; rather in the mode of an ethnographer, Berliner learned a lot of this first-hand, picking up the trumpet again (he had been a classically-trained trumpeter when younger) to gain experience of how one goes about learning to play jazz. He also interviewed dozens of musicians, both famous players (Max Roach, Wynton Marsalis, Lee Konitz, Fred Hersch, Kenny Barron) & little-known journeymen (usefully, there's a lot of stress on bassists & drummers, who are often overlooked in writings on jazz in favour of charismatic soloists). These interview materials are quoted extensively in the book, & it'd be valuable enough just for that, but it's also a thoughtful, expansive account of how jazz, and jazz musicians, are created. My experience is that the uninitiated tend to either treat improvisation too casually (assuming that anyone with adequate instrumental technique & musical theory can automatically improvise), or with excessive awe: this book is useful for anyone curious about improvisation, & indeed even experienced players & teachers will find it interesting.

One nice feature of the book is the clarity of its organization. The main text is about 500pp long, written in clear, untechnical prose, with only a few illustrating diagrams or musical examples. The majority of the musicial examples are instead placed in a succeeding 250pp section: the high point of this is a series of four _full_ transcriptions of classic jazz recordings. By "full" I don't mean from end-to-end (indeed usually they're only a few choruses): rather, I mean that they are transcriptions of the entire band's activity, not just the soloist's line. The recordings transcribed are: Miles Davis's versions of "Bye Bye Blackbird", "I Thought About You" & "Blues by Five"; & Coltrane's version of "Softly, as in a Morning Sunrise".

As those names suggest, this book's aesthetic range is fairly narrow: basically bop & hard bop, whether filtered through the classicist bop aesthetic of Barry Harris, the pianist-pedagogue who is one of the book's touchstones; or through the neo-conservative aesthetic of Wynton Marsalis. (The book's other real touchstone, though not actually interviewed, is Betty Carter--a large percentage of the musicians interviewed were at one point Carter's sidemen.) The avantgarde, for instance, only gets a few peeks, notably in the figure of Ronald Shannon Jackson...though again, he's more often cited for his work with Betty Carter than with Cecil Taylor or Ornette Coleman! There is one engaging heart-on-sleeve affection here that upsets this neoclassism, though: Berliner is a big fan of Booker Little, & the text & musical examples frequently turn to his work. Nice to see Little get such sustained attention.

The book is written, as I've said, quite clearly: the downside is that it's a little bland & studiedly impersonal. The interviews are also evidently cleaned up a bit: no humming & hawing or grammatical errors, very little slang, no swear words. While jazz musicians are a very articulate bunch, I somehow doubt the original interviews were quite this smooth.

That's really the only criticism I have of the book. It does of course have its limits--one can imagine a very different book might have resulted if musicians like Charlie Haden, Paul Bley, Paul Motian, Bill Frisell or Sam Rivers were interviewed--but is nonetheless about as accurate an account of the informal, often very much heuristic educational process that leads an aspiring musician from his first efforts towards a mastery of the idiom.

... should make this book available again now that the movie HARDBALL has hit the screens. I read this book about three years ago or so when it first came out and thought it was a great read. I gave it to a fellow baseball fan, who is a supervising probation officer in our county. For those who feel that youth baseball (and youth sports) can often be more than just a game, this book is for you. Watching the movie last week brought back thoughts of this book. The movie does some Hollywood license on the story line (they win the title in the film) but essentially is well done and gives the essential message the author sought to convey.

This book and the film should be required viewing for suburban Little League teams which have as "must have" items the latest version $250 bats, batting gloves and all the new fangled gear that passes for "essential" baseball equipment these days.

In the film one of the kids is asked by the coach character as the kid returns to his housing project home full of problems and malingerers "What do you do for fun?" The kid responds: "I plaky baseball for you....." Ain't baseball great. This book plus the a little too sappy film shows us all why.

I enjoyed this excellent piece of writing to the utmost degree. The insight, intensity, and development of characters submerses one in the tragic surroundings of the inner city of Chicago and depicts the valiant efforts of indefatigueable volunteers to lift young boys from the throes of poverty. The writing style is almost poetic; this writer has a unique talent for making characters come alive --- he's one to keep an eye on in the future. I can't wait for his next book.

Quite a piece of work we have here. Anyone who appreciates a story about characters, whether they like baseball or hate it, will appreciate this book. It's terrific.

"The Outfit" is a well written, thoroughly comprehensive look at the post-Capone history of organized crime in the city of Chicago. Gus Russo does an excellent job of leaving no stone unturned as he chronicles the Outfit's activity from the jailing of Capone to its decline in the 90s. Along the way we meet the gangsters who made the Chicago mob rich and famous: Tony "Joe Batters" Accardo, Paul "the Waiter" Ricca, "Curly" Humphries, Johnny Roselli,Jake "Greasy Thumb" Guzik, and Sam "Mooney" Giancana. Russo discusses the role of each in making the Chicago Syndicate the power it was in the world of organized crime.

Russo's breezy style makes "The Outfit" an absolute joy to read, deftly mixing facts and ancedotes like a master chef. Read about the takeover of IATSE, the Hollywood union, and the infiltration of the mob into the world of the Hollywood studios; the Mob's entry and takeover of Las Vegas; the infiltration into the Teamsters and the scheming of the Outfit to fix the 1960 presidential election and what happened when they were doublecrossed. It was by no means a smooth ride - along the way Russo details the eforts of law enforcement to balance the books, so to speak, with the result that the Outfit always had to keep scheming, keep looking, for new rackets and businesses to infiltrate. Russo keeps the pages turning with a compelling style that makes the book's 550 pages seem like 100 when you hit the end.

Few books even attempt to cover the history of the Chicago Mob after Al Capone left the scene. Fewer still are this enjoyuable. A must for crime historians and those just interested in a good book.

This is the best and most informative book I've read on the Chicago Sydicate (aka, the Outfit). Mr. Russo really did his homework on this opus on one of the most successful criminal enterprises this country has ever seen. I was particularly interested in the role of Curly Humphreys. This shadowy figure was the backbone of the Outfit and was a brilliant strategist. He is not as widely known as Meyer Lansky, but was just as savvy. There was also much information on the rest of the Chicago bosses and bigwigs (Tony "Joe Batters" Accardo, Paul "The Waiter" Ricca, Sam Giancana, and Johnny Rosselli, among others). There was also some great information on Frank Sinatra and has involvement with various mob families across the country. If you want to read a definitive work on the Chicago Mafia and its far-reaching influence, then this book is it.

This is about as good as it gets in terms of criminal history. I agree with others that some of the secondary sources Russo cites are questionable (my eyes crossed when he cited the discredited "Last Testament of Lucky Luciano"), but Russo does an excellent job of placing the Outfit in historical context and telling their tale. Much previous writing on American organized crime has focused on the fractious and colorful New York families, but after you do a certain amount of reading, it begins to occur to you that the guys in Chicago seem to have a finger in every pie, but (after Capone) a knack for staying out of the papers. Russo makes the argument that the Outfit was actually much more powerful and cohesive than the New York families and had a much greater influence on American politics and culture. He convinced me.

I am also convinced by Russo's basic thesis -- that "upperworld crime" utterly dwarfs underworld crime, both in terms of dollar volume and its affect on society. For example, it would take a thousand Outfits a thousand years to steal as much money as Wall Street did during the dotcom bubble.

Thorough, well-organized, but never dry, this book will probably stand as the best work on the subject for many years to come.

Wonderful and authentic, a great collection for any Sandburg devotee or any patriotic Chicagoan. I was a little disappointed with the actual quality of the book, binding and covers, but it is not an expensive edition and the collection is priceless. A must read!

In my reading of poetry I have developed a peculiar habit. In the Table Of Contents I pencil in an asterisk before the titles of poems that I especially enjoyed. I find that this helps me to quickly relocate special poems later when I want to re-read them. In my copy of Sandburg's "Chicago Poems" there are many asterisks. I think that one of the things that appeal to me about these particular series of poems is their "urbanity". As the title suggests, these are often poems about "city"... about the "cosmopolis". Sandburg had a way of animating concrete and asphalt, and making us aware of the inner life of things that millions of us urbanites walk past each day. In one of my favorites entitled "Skyscraper" he says "It is the men and women, boys and girls so poured in and out all day that give the building a soul of dreams and thoughts and memories." And it ends beautifully with "By night the skyscraper looms in the smoke and the stars and has a soul." It is as though if any of Sandburg's Chicago Poems were to just remain silent for a moment, we would hear the faint night-time "humming and thrumming" of "a copper wire slung in the air." (cf. his Under A Telephone Pole).

He writes with a solemnity that avoids being morose, which is refreshing. But take note... "you will be thwarted every time, you try to catch a Sandburg rhyme." (they never rhyme). As for metre, his poems are in a free-verse very much reminiscent of Walt Whitman. The perfect poetry to read while feeding the pigeons, or otherwise commuting to and from the park.

A few weeks after September 11 2001, I came across the poem "Skyscraper" by Sandburg by chance in a huge volume of American poetry. In the millions of lines written about that horrible day, I found his words from 70 years ago to be the most moving. Here are some lines from that poem:

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BY day the skyscraper looms in the smoke and sun and has a soul.
Prairie and valley, streets of the city, pour people into it and they mingle among its twenty floors and are poured out again back to the streets, prairies and valleys.
It is the men and women, boys and girls so poured in and out all day that give the building a soul of dreams and thoughts and memories...

Hour by hour the caissons reach down to the rock of the earth and hold the building to a turning planet.
Hour by hour the girders play as ribs and reach out and hold together the stone walls and floors....

Men who sunk the pilings and mixed the mortar are laid in graves where the wind whistles a wild song without words
And so are men who strung the wires and fixed the pipes and tubes and those who saw it rise floor by floor.
Souls of them all are here, even the hod carrier begging at back doors hundreds of miles away and the brick-layer who went to state's prison for shooting another man while drunk...

Ten-dollar-a-week stenographers take letters from corporation officers, lawyers, efficiency engineers, and tons of letters go bundled from the building to all ends of the earth.
Smiles and tears of each office girl go into the soul of the building just the same as the master-men who rule the building.

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I have never studied Sandburg, but it seems to me he shares that same love of humanity and fairness that Walt Whitman was so famous for, along with the ability to craft lines as amazing as "hold the building to a turning planet". His love of his modern city seems like a remnant from another age, but his absolute belief in class equality is as relevant as any 2001 street protest.

There are some who think it's weird to tour cemeteries. They're missing the serene tribute to a city's history -- graveyards are neighborhoods and time capsules; art museums and in some cases the final repositories of enduring secrets.

Hucke and Bielski serve as knowledgeable and respectful tour guides for some of the most impressively landscaped, richly historical acres within and adjacent to the city's urban sprawl. It's a field trip through bold headlines and unsung achievements represented by a carved catalog of famous -- and infamous (at Mount Carmel Catholic Cemetery, mob boss Sam Giancana's mausoleum is padlocked) -- names.

The book follows Lake Claremont's practical design of dividing interesting sites by sections of the city map. I know from firsthand experience that you can spend the whole day in the Metro North area touring renowned Graceland Cemetery (Chicago's second oldest burial ground, final home to many whose surnames -- Field, Getty, Palmer, Kinzie, Kimball, Goodman, Sears, Armour, and Pullman to drop just a few -- are synonymous with Chicago's growth); or Rosehill, within whose 350 acres lie bicycle king Ignaz Schwinn, water magnates Otis Ward Hinkley and George Schmitt, shoe guru Milton Florsheim, "merchandising arch-enemies" Aaron Montgomery Ward and Richard Warren Sears, and 14-year old Bobby Franks, murdered in 1924 by University of Chicago students Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb.

Hucke and Bielski devote much-deserved attention to the artistic aspect of grave markers and cemetery architecture across a span of more than a century's worth of changing styles. Additional highlights: more unusual burials (attorney Clarence Darrow's ashes scattered in Jackson Park; musician Steve Goodman's cremains under home plate in his beloved Wrigley Field); a nod to necropolises in outlying areas, and a partial directory of Chicagoland cemeteries. This unusual guide is unusually enlightening on many levels fundamental to Chicago's identity.

This well-written and informative book is a must-have for anyone who is interested in Chicago history, cemeteries, or architecture. I read it cover to cover and often refer back to it for various reasons.
From the grave of Al Capone to the graves of lesser-known Chicagoans, this book seems to cover it all.
Great photos, fascinating stories!

Informative and to the point! I just wish they had the actually cemetery data included! Great for us "dark" people or anyone else interested in cemetery analysis!