It's interesting to see how the book is dedicated to "Coutney,Nana and the boys at the Bohemian Club". Little did Hank know in 1980 that his daughter Courtney would wind up with Mr.Cobain, who would give the Gratful Dead a big thumbs down. Funny how life is, although the Dead and Cobain both 'blew thier brains out', Cobain did it litteraly. Maybe if Kurt read the Chapter "Encountering Neal" he might have understood what Cassady meant when he told everybody to "always keep that light lit,your candle can snuff itself,man....you can lose the wick and f*** over the candle so it can't work." Anyway,when I first read the book,I got this sense Mr.Harrison was under the care of Dr. Feelgood while he wrote. It gave me a sense of 'You Had To Be There......',that's why I read it so many times until it finally set in. It's a book for real purists. It made one out of me.

This is a good book for people who enjoy Stephen King books and Romance books. I never read books more than once and this book was a re-read. The book is well written and keeps you guessing. If you had not read the description above you would not realize that the guy pursuing the heroine was dead. And how the heroine and the dead man are connected is intriguing. This book has led me to seek out Allie Harrison's other books.

I first read this book in 1977. I had been interested in the case since the late 60's. Mr. Pollack takes a somewhat sympathetic view of Dr. Sheppard but only after the case had been well over and there had been time for much reflection. Although sympathetic (Dr. Sheppard definitely did not receive a fair trial), Mr. Pollack is able to step back and say that the defendant's past did not help in his defense (infidelity). Excellent chronology and simplification of the legal matters of the case. My only criticism is that the book does not explore enough of the character of Dr. Sheppard, his background, his strengths and weaknesses. The book depicts that this is truly one of America's great human and legal tragedies.

When a crow steals a hen's (Ethel) egg and drops it in an eagle's nest, a chick (Dylan) is hatched to an eagle alongside two eagle chicks. Named E-awk, Dylan, like a vegetarian born to a carnivorous family, eats corn while his siblings eat fish, bugs, and snakes. Dylan proves his mettle by saving his mother, like a chicken-hawk-eagle, from the clutches of a fox, proving that not all chickens are chicken. The illustrations are clear and enjoyable, but the text has peculiar asides, such as twice mentioning that the mother eagle's name is too hard to pronounce (is this some sort of hip inside joke?)

This book is a very learned overview of the macro-economic factors affecting the WWII war economies of major combatants. A certain degree of acquaintance with economic monetary theory is advisable. The fact that it includes all the major players is valuable (any article on Italy's war efforts is always welcome!), but the emphasis some of the articles give to econometric treatment is, frankly, irrelevant to understanding most of the war effort, especially when one is talking of survival. The book also tries to analyse how wartime experience helped shape the post war economy, a field in which it it quite successful. It is worth noting, by the way, that generally speaking all the authors seem to agree that wartime investment in capital formation and technical training schemes paid off for the vanquished, whilst in the case of the USSR, the amount of war destruction and the political predominance of the "industrial-military complex" led, ultimately, to economic stagnation.

Advisable for anyone with a serious interest in wartime economics.

Is there something large and unknown in Loch Ness? I really don't know and I may never get an answer. I do like to read about such things though and this book is as handy as a shirt pocket. Harrison's work is not a book to sit down and read nor was it intended to be. It is a reference guide and will be of help to anyone reading any study of Nessie. Harrison makes no claim that there is a plesiosaur in the loch but leaves an opinion up to his readers. He is firm in his opinion however that in the minds of many people in the area Nessie is very real and gives us stories to back up his thesis.

To make this book even more complete Harrison goes out of his way in the bibliography to point out the better books on the subject and the point of view these writers take. Even better, he has a page devoted to The Loch Ness Monster Research Society. On this page Harrison tells about the aims of the Society and even gives the address of the Membership Secretary in case the reader wants to join up.

I only took one star from this book because of what I don't know. I assume all the information that one would need is here but this is the only book I have looked at about the subject so I really don't know. Thanks to Harrison however, I now know what books to look for.

Living on the east coast, I guess I always assumed that lighthouses were only built along the ocean coasts. This book corrected that impression as it featured lighthouses throughout the United States in places such as Michigan, Ohio, and the Hudson River area.

The authors/photographers showed endangered lighthouses, ruined ones, and some that have been restored. Time, tide, and erosion have wreaked terrible damage upon these buildings.

I found the concise history of each of the featured lighthouses to be very interesting and informative. The photos were wonderful, especially the ones of the moving of the Hatteras Light in North Carolina.

This book provides a good reminder of how important these structures were to the American way of life, and for this reason, why they should be preserved or rescued.

It has been 16 years since the publication of vol.1, 'Ratime to Swing' in 1984. At long last we can read the vol.2 . I obtained a copy in the Ginza, Tokyo. It cost me ..........! This was the case in Japan before the ............' in Japan.

During these 16 years the co-writer Charles fox regrettably deceased,to whom this volume is dedicated. The writing by three writers (the leader is Max Harrison) is as highbrow as in the previous one and they frequently mention classical music, which sometimes made me bored. However, rarely have I ever come across such high-grade criticism. The works equal to this brilliance of the two volumes are, arguably, Humphrey Lyttleton's 'The Best of Jazz' 2 vols.(the volume of modern jazz is unpublished), Gunther Schuller's 2 vols (the same as the former), Martin William's 'The Jazz Tradition', and the Japanese critic Masaaki Awamura's 'The History of Modern Jazz'(only in the Japanese language.

In the vol. 1, 250 records were analyzed and criticized, this time also 250 from Charlie Christian's Minton House Session to Peter Apfelbaum and the Hieroglyphic Ensemble's 'Sign of Life.' We can listen to our own records/CDs afresh from various new points of view and reexperience the process of jazz trend, if not development, from modern to postmodern age. I am sure the meaning/significance of our record collection will become manifold.

The first volume of the Essential Jazz Records (I'm not sure if the second volume ever appeared) is a very strong guide to early jazz on a number of accounts. Perhaps the most important reason for its succes is the fact that the three authors are sufficiently alike in their predilections for the book to be cohesive, but are sufficiently particular in their passions for their to be a wide net as they attempt to gather in "the essential jazz recordings." There are enough recordings here to support the title, and they are spread over a wide enough stylistic range (from African music, to field recordings of African American performers, to blues to the earliest jazz through swing to Charlie Parker's earliest recordings) so that no one will find any gaping holes. These three reviewers together probably present a better feel for the breadth and beauty of early jazz than any of the dozens of guides I have read. Anyone possessing all of these records would certainly feel satisfied they had captured the essence of early jazz. Another fine thing about this collection of reviews is the keen insights they offer into the recodings themselves. I have often found myself returning to recordings on my shelf and listening to them with new ears in response to something written in this book. I do not always share the views of these British jazz experts, but they do certainly inspire reevaluation. The fault that many will find with the book is that the particular recordings listed here are all long-since-disappeared LPs. Many of the major label recordings have reappeared in pretty much the same form on CD, but some have not. Nevertheless, almost all the music here is available somewhere. By using this book as a guide to the music one should be looking for, and another guide to help decide which reissue might have the best remastering, etc., the explorer of early jazz won't go wrong.