This book may give me an excuse to take a vacation.

The book provides the most detailed description of the islands I have seen. It provides a good balance between geological, historical and practical information that will appeal both to the occasional visitor and the fan of Boston and New England history. The writing style is simple and friendly. The only critic would be that the book is ageing and an update taking into account the most recent travel and National Park Service information would be welcome.

Although it seems unrealistic to expect complete objectivity from any biographer, Katherine Frank shows a level of bias toward her subject somewhat striking in the genre. Her descriptions of Emily Bronte are enthusiastic and warm, even when Emily's behavior (by her own description) warrants at least some kind of approbation, or at least evenhandedness. This unmitigated warmth is reserved for Emily alone, however; Charlotte, for example, is portrayed as living a constant struggle with conventionality which Emily gloriously escapes. Of particular interest is the expression of Emily and Charlotte's intense relationship. Charlotte consistently suffers in the comparisons with her sister -- at least by Frank's view. She doesn't seem interested in exploring Charlotte's suffering under Emily's emotional tyranny, even though she does describe it in detail. One gets the impression that Charlotte would do better in this biography if only she would care a little less about what others think. Their brother, Branwell, fares badly as well, and Frank's conclusion regarding one of Branwell's many pathetic attempts to be employed that he had been terminated due to a homosexual advance on his pupil seems strikingly unsubstantiated. Frank seems to come to this conclusion only because she can't think of any other. In the end, it's not that the reader can't see what Frank shows as part of Emily's character, it's that it's not the only thing to be seen.

Many of Frank's arguments were convincing to me--especially those regarding Emily's peculiar eating habits. All of her conclusions were backed up with sources, etc. Although I didn't believe this spin on the life of the Brontes word for word, I do think it was worthly of more than 1 star, hence my review. Check it out--you may disagree, but isn't that part of the fun?

The book reads a lot like an encyclopedia. It contains a lot of good information about social work administration, but is quite dry reading.

Recent (post-WWII) American history is a highly interesting and frequently-overlooked genre under the overall umbrella of American history study. Many tend to simply forget about it -- after all, it's hard to step back from the times in which one lives and analyze them objectively -- or shrug it off as not important. After all, we LIVED that, right? -- How can it possibly stand up as history? This overlooks the self-evident but rarely-ackwnoledged fact that merely living through something does not mean you understand it -- or, as with one aspect of contemporary American history covered in this book, the counterculture, if you remember it, the saying goes, you weren't there. Certainly, recent history is as interesting and vital as any other era to the objective historian -- and it is certainly the most applicable to our current social and political climate. One can read ancient Greek texts and see how that great society laid the foundation for what is going on at the moment -- but it is much more cognizable, not to mention jolting, when reading about something that happened much more recently, which we can clearly discern as sowing the seeds for the present day. What one often forgets when reading histories of the days of yore is that all histories are inherently prejudiced -- and even, as Oscar Wilde pointed out, autobiographical. When reading about events that one has actually lived through, this oft-forgotten fact becomes apparent.

Though individual parts of post-1945 American history have inspired volumes upon volumes, and even mini cottage industries, general, overarching texts of the period are not abundant. In Our Times is one of the most prevalent. Though this book is often used as a college textbook, it works better as a single reading than as a textbook or a reference. Certainly, it contains a wealth of good information -- but it is presented in the driest, most unimaginable way possible. Chapters are long, with little to no break in text: no captions, graphics, or eye-catching features whatsoever, and very few pictures (none in color) or graphs. Chapters are broken up only by bold typeheadings, and quite rarely at that, making it very difficult to look things up or search for something quickly; this renders the book almost useless as a reference and quite limited as a textbook. As a sit-through read, though, it is quite adequate. This book lends itself more to the historically-curious individual reader than to the student or scholar.

Murphy is a fat yellow lab whose human, Cheryl, purchases a treadmill and forces Murphy to use it. He does, loses weight, attracts a female dog, and becomes famous.
While Ziefert's intentions may be good, i.e. to encourage children to exercise and eat right, the less-than-subtle messages conveyed here are disturbing, to say the least. Is it alright to force someone to exercise, or to threaten them with punishment if they don't? Do we want to perpetuate this society's fascination with and reverence of appearance above all else? How many of us were humiliated by forced exercise or dieting as children, and how do we feel about it now? Did it improve our relationship to food or exercise? Were the results ultimately beneficial?
Though this reaction may seem strong, picture books are read and absorbed by impressionable young children, many of whom are already overly body conscious. We don't need to encourage this kind of coercion.

I just had to respond to the reader who panned this book: do you own a dog? This is a VERY funny book! And well done. Murphy, like many dogs and their humans had gotten into the habit of too many calories and too little exercise. To view the storyline as a case of "society's...reverence of appearance above all else" and to equate Cheryl's conduct with "humilia[ion] by forced exercise or dieting" is a major case of the reader projecting HER issues on Murphy! He's a dog: he lives to eat, sleep AND please his alpha dog, Cheryl. And Cheryl, like any good alpha dog (or parent, for that matter) is using positive discipline and proactive behavior to mold her protege into the best--and healthiest--dog he can be.
My kids love this book! And they don't see the negative messages that the CA reader does; they see a funny story about an owner's creative way to help her dog get healthier.

I will always be a Billy Ray fan no matter what Kari said about him! She went into the "relationship" with her eyes open and knew he was married. He continuously referred to her as a friend, so she is the one who put a more permanent position in the "friendship". As the old adage says, DON'T MIX BUSINESS WITH PLEASURE. These are her words only, so the other side hasn't been heard from yet!

I am a major Billy Ray Cyrus fan and bought this book the first day it went on sale. The problem I had with the book is that the author says the things are true and Billy Ray Cyrus says they are not. It would be a very good romantic fiction type novel but it's very hard to take what was said to heart since everything has been denied by Billy Ray himself.

The editor, Andrew Ross, describes this book as "an expanded edition" of a special issue of the journal "Social Text". Potential readers should be warned however that it is also an expurgated edition, from which Alan Sokal's celebrated parody of of recent socio-cultural jargon has been suppressed. One understands Professor Ross's chagrin at the cruel and unusual joke that Professor Sokal practised on him. However, the unadvertised deletion of Sokal's contribution is a hoax on the buyers of "Science Wars" who naturally expect to find in it the one item of the original publication that has received worldwide attention.

The subsequent reviewer found the current tome missing in scholarship, merely by not having reprinted Sokal's piece from the social text issue of the same name (science wars). If one cared to read through the book, however, one would notice a number of quite specific reasons for this: among these that the book is meant as a counter argument to Sokal, Levitt & Gross's readings of their fave foe: pomos and other dangerous 'leftists' (what does this mean?). It is no secret that these authors are fired by a profound hostility and unwillingness to engage with the material with which they are dealing. This has already been shown ad nauseam in the litterature (see for instance Callon's review in social studies of science). Nevertheless this book stands as a nice response to some of the worst nonsense that has come out of the sokal/gross tradition. Specifically one should not miss Hart's devastating analysis of Gross et al's 'scientific neutrality' and their analytical abilities in Higher Superstition. Other pieces such as Mike Lynch's are good too; some however, are merely perpetuating the current stand off in a nasty 'war' (among these both of Ross's pieces). So is this review, I presume. That said, I should stop. Read both sides before you judge, you might get to know a good bit about rhetorical wars from the putatively neutral and objective scientists (sokal, gross, koertge etc).

Walsh's account of the Todd-Dickinson affair is probably the most unbalanced work in the name of scholarship I have read so far. Unabashedly biased and judgemental, this book reeks of the author's personal issues with matters of adultery, while no effort is expended in trying to understand the complicated dynamic between all the adults involved in the affair.

Among other ludicrous and reductive explanantions for the behavior of Dickinson and Todd, Walsh asserts that Dickinson's participation in an almost fifteen-year affair was driven by a desire for "revenge against the fate" that had taken his son, who died as a young child. Walsh's grip on the psychology behind this stops here as does the supporting evidence. However, a great more effort is made to "justify" Austin's role in the affair while Todd, according to Walsh, is guilty of the deliberate "wrecking" of the reputation of Austin's wife, Susan, assuming that for her, malice toward others was the driving force behind her participation in the affair.

Apparently, Walsh is joining the ranks of a long line of historians and scholars who see fit to crucify their female subjects for deviant sexual behavior, while ignoring or justifying the same behavior in men. It is also interesting to note that Todd's sexual behavior is the just about the only aspect of her life mentioned in this book; her numerous accomplishments as a musician, author, painter, seasoned travelor and lecturer are dismissed or ignored. Once again, with Walsh's help, the historical representation of an ambitious, successful female is reduced to that of a conniving, malicious "hussy" whose sexual behavior exclusively defines her.

It seems odd that Walsh or any other investigator on this topic feels the need to "justify" or blame anyone's actions, well over a century after the fact. Susan and Austin Dickinson and Mabel and David Todd were all strong, creative personalities who created their own complex dynamic which in turn created the behaviors we have evidence of today. Understanding what happened between them as a group is nearly impossible, but reducing their individual motivations to a series of quick explanations is simply foolish and unrealistic. No individual is this easily explained through biography, historical research or other speculation. Even Walsh's attempts to portray Susan as the "victim" in the affair are reductive and insulting. That she should be viewed historically as a passive martyr, who "endured" the events around her, sacrificing her own accomplishments and reputation is ridiculous. Given her intelligence and social dexterity, it seems her role must be given a more complex motivation than this.

If nothing else, Walsh's account raises some important questions about just how much social attitudes toward women have changed over the years. Do we still consider successful, ambitious women who challenge the sexual status quo to be threats to society? Mabel Todd extended the notion of "ownership" in a nineteenth-century marriage to include more than one partner, and partners of her choosing. Mr. Walsh's aggressive condemnation of her suggests that if an educated woman were to suggest such a radical definition of multiple partner marriage today, she too would be considered deviant and perhaps malicious. Have attitudes toward women evolved to the degree where women might be able to criticize the accepted social dynamic of marriage without fear of castigation? Mr. Walsh's book suggests not, but I hope his view is an anomaly and that Mrs. Todd was not ahead of our time as well as her own.

John Evangelist Walsh's books explore murky literary corridors, sweeping aside rumor, innuendo, and distortion. In 'This Brief Tragedy', he examines the last days of Emily Dickinson, with particular emphasis upon the affair between her older brother Austin and the young wife of his colleague, Mabel Todd. Walsh brings a fresh and critical eye to this relationship, using their own letters and diaries to reveal the truth of this celebrated 'love affair'. Neither Austin or Mabel are well-served by their own words.

Walsh also argues for a new study of Austin's long-suffering wife, Susan. Susan was Emily's closest friend and supporter, but she has suffered through a century of bad press largely because of Mabel Todd's peculiar place in Dickinson scholarship. Todd was asked to type copies of Emily's poem for publication because the Dickinson family did not wish to risk mailing the original manuscripts. She did so, and from that humble beginning, managed to fashion herself into the authority on all things related to Emily Dickinson. In truth, the two women never met and Emily had a low opinion of the woman who willfully toyed with the emotions of both her nephew and brother.

But all lovers of great literature were desperate for information about the reclusive poet from Amherst. As various Dickinson relatives died in rapid succession, Mabel rewrote her own place in Emily's history. She found a receptive audience and few scholars have questioned her true motives. For this reason alone, Walsh's book is a necessary companion piece to Richard Sewall's celebrated two-volume biography of Emily. Sewall accepted Mabel's version of events so thoroughly that it mars his otherwise fine work. Neither Emily or Susan Dickinson left behind journals or diaries regarding the tumultuous events of the 1880s and '90s. But Mabel did. As a result, she has been given too much influence upon Dickinson scholarship. Read Sewall, but pick up this book immediately afterwards.

Not to sound trite, but this book was written by Dummies.... the examples are not true to life, there are too many mistakes and the explaination of JavaScript is too complicated and overblown.

I, as well was not too impressed with the book. Fortunately, I know some Java so that JS was not too difficult. But, if you are a total novice and know nothing about object-oriented or object-based programming, then you are going to be totally lost. I think that the author dives into functions and object methods way too early. There are some useful scripts in the book, especially for client-side form validation. But, if you are not familiar with Javascript you're going to be lost. My suggestion to the author is that she also have exercises to test the reader's knowledge - you can only learn this stuff by doing. If any novice is reading this review, my suggestion would be to first visit Joe Burns' javagoodies (http://www.javagoodies.com)site and go through the 30 javascript primers that are there. The best thing about them is that they're free! Also, if Joe's new book on Javascript (Javascript Goodies) is anything like his web tutorials or his HTML Goodies book, then I would save your money and wait for that one to come out.

"JavaScript for Dummies"

A beautifal oxymoron, but an oxymoron none the less. The thought of teaching an object oriented programming language to a "dummie" is laughable. However, JS for Dum-Dums certainly tries, but Ms.Vander Veer needs some help in the "dummies" part. Much of what the book is based on assumes that you understand programming terms (parse float, array, global variable, the purpose of curly bracees } ). I was so confused the first time I read it that I had to read it again. And again. And only now, now that I have Java, DHTML, Visual Basic and an over all better understanding of programming that I fully understand the book. It starts off good, but it just doesn't pull through. It introduces everything you'll need to write good JavaScripts. There's nothing really to say that hasn't been said in previous reviews. Despite what you may have heard, you need more than just HTML under your belt to get the full benefit from this book. Repeat, knowing HTML is not enough.

I guess the summary is don't buy this for someone who is just now starting programming. Start with a more concrete language like Java or Visual Basic, then hit back for JavaScript.

But I should also say that out of all the Programming books i have, this one is my best reference. The scripting style is perfect, just perfect scripting style. Very neat, and clean, the way programming should be, and well commented too.

Buy this for the fairly decent programmer, but not for the beginer.

The essays in this book are painful to read. They lack any sort of creativity and imagination. Reading them almost convinced me not to go to business school because it would mean sitting in classes with these unimaginative writers. Curry and Kasbar put together a terrific book for getting in to college but this one falls short. Buy The Princeton Review Guide to MBA programs instead. The sample essays in that book are much better.

This book is good in that it gives you a nice array of examples in the different categories of questions. However, it doesn't review any of them or give guidelines on what worked and what didn't about each particular essay. Some are extremely long which doesn't coincide with 300-500 word maximum that all the schools I applied to have. Basically, a this is a cheap way to go if you need help breaking out of terminal brain-lock when it comes to writing your essays. Otherwise, I'd shop around. There are much better aids out there.

Samples given are not representative of business students today. Desperately needs to be updated with a new edition. Comments from the admissions officers were off color.

And if you want to know... the main thing you need to get in the next game Banjo-Tooie, (supposedly to be released in Feb. from many web pages I've heard) will involve some very weird big eggs (about the size of Bango!!!!) with Question marks on it.

Picclo??? Who is that? Banjo's girlfreind? A giant? This book has completly gotten this game mixed up with some other game, (although whatever the game is, it sounds stupid...) but it doesn't have anything corect! I haven't ordered it or anything, but I was going to buy it ayt Wal-Mart, because I love the un-official because usually they have more codes and secrets... but as soon as this came out, I went to get it, but I always read the story and look through the book, everything is mixed up! Take it from me, I have the game, 1 day, I went to see if they would tell me how to get this one jiggy, I did everything they said, but this giude is completly screwy! Trust me, whenever I have even peeked in it for help, it didn't! I have the official one, and that makes so much more sense, I know it cost more, but at least you wouldn't spend your money on crap! And it is only $3 more, that is not much! Thanks for your time whoever reads this! P.S. I have all 100 jiggies and all 900 notes And Mumbo's pictures to the next game kick butt! So many new morphs... (remember how if you morph one creature enough Mumbo will finally say he will change into T-Rex then he said he was saving it for next game? He did not lie... but the cost of the Mumbo tokens... welll.. I don't want to blow your eyes out so I won't tell you...) so many new things to do in the worlds... It looks so AWESOME!! Remember, when Banjo-Tooie comes out, GET IT!! P.P.S. If you buy a strategy giude, you might want to buy the OFFICIAL...

This was a great book it helped me with things I could not figure out with other stategy guides. I think it is very cool.