This is the first boring swimsuit calendar I have ever seen. I would only rate one girl a 9. About 4 girls would be 7s. The rest of the girls look like they have nice personalities. The photos have almost no imagination. I was going to give this as a gift, But I now have to go buy something else.

This is one of the coolest calendars I've seen...12 girls from KU and they're all hot! I wish I would have gone to KU. I have purchased the last 3 calendars and can't wait for the next one!

This book was a good read, but there were also disappointments. Myself, living in Kansas, I felt the reader was some how putting Kansas down, from the boy's point of view. I suppose I don't really like what it was like back then, but, as a Kansas citizen, I am proud to live here in the vast prairies, and flat lands. To me, it seemed like Thomas' father only wanted him to come live with him, because he needed another farm hand around the place. In this short story, two young children also die. Thomas' half baby brother, from whooping cough, and a neighbor girl, who was only three, and got lost on the prairie. I guess in this day and age, we don't like to think about the bad things in life, and are not use to it when it comes to reading stories.
Otherwise, it was a good book, and you do learn a lot about the Kansas prairie.

The information in the book is pretty good, but I found it very difficult to read. Being a descendant of the Spears family, I had hoped to learn a little about the LIFE of my relations, most of the text was a re-hash of dates and places. It was horribly difficult to navigate through different chapters.

I bought the cookbook being a big fan of coffeehouses and of Kansas City but this book did not do either justice. I tried several of the recipes, following exactly, and they simply were nothing that a coffeehouse could serve and retain customers! Some good information and references, but disappointing recipes and/or editing of the recipes.

If you are interested in the general history and sociological setting of the Kansas City Monarchs, this piece of research is for you. If you are looking for a book of hopping stories and personal Monarch players, you should look eleswhere.

This book is an obvious academic study (perhaps written as part of a master's or doctorate program) and has the feel of a textbook. Not a lot of thrilling baseball information for the fan, but if you are interested in understanding the business side of the the Negro Leagues and what the social effects of baseball on the community were, this is an invaluable resource. Well researched and detailed, this book will be used as a great secondary source for those who are interested in the Negro Leagues and in particularly the Monarchs.

Deputy marshal Custis Long (Longarm) is the toughest, fastest and smartest of lawmen back in the old west, able to puzzle out the most convoluted scheme, shoot it out withthe fastest gunmen and bed the most beautiful women.

In this story, Longarms mentor is in jail. As soon as he finds out he drops everything and races to his assistance because Longarm knows the old lawman is innocent. When he gets there the whole story keeps getting more and more convoluted as people and events start piling up, there are murder attempts and arson but none of it makes any sense.

The Longarm series has had its ups and downs, back in the high 100's the stories were not terribly good, but by the mid 200's things are much better and they are fun to read again. This is a good example, the story has you guessing and trying to figure out who the bad guys are and why they are doing what they are doing. Its a bit slow moving for a Longarm story, with an occasional murder attempt thrown in to try and keep it exciting but its mostly a whodunnit with lots of sex!

The reason I gave the audio version only 3 stars is not because of the narrator. Kit Cameron does a fine job, different voices for the characters and inflections reflecting the tone of the person speaking, he also handles the description of the sex scenes without any hesitation or embarassment.

My biggest complaint is with the audio adaptation, obviously things must be cut out to abridge the story for audio but it seems that the sex scenes were left in at the expense of the storyline. Perhaps whoever makes the decision was trying to punch up the "adult appeal" and I have nothing against sex scenes, however at the end when the big finale happens and the motives and whodunnit are all revealed, its almost all cut out! The audio version doesn't explain why Dinky tried to shoot Longarm, who set the fire in the courthouse or to Normans house and why. The basci motivation was established, but I remember a lot of loose ends tied up in the paperback that you were left guessing about in the audio version. I think the story would have been better with a bit less sex scenes to leave more room at the end for wrapping up the story.

I can only comment on the Kansas section of this book, but that leaves a little to be desired. It seems that Knapp found the most popular trails but didn't dig too deep. Another problem is his tendency to list utterly boring rides on semi-maintained doubletrack. If someone buys a mountain biking guide book, it means they are looking for the real thing, not some flat access roads. Unfortunately, there are not a lot of alternatives to this book for cyclists in the midwest so I still have to recommend it as part of your collection, if for nothing else but the states you do not live in.

I love Kansas. That is really the story of Kansas

I grew up in Lawrence, Kansas in the '60s, and attended the University of Kansas during the time of the political protests, riots, violence, and police shootings that are among the most important events recounted in this book. So it's possible that I cannot really be fair to this author. His book is a decent history of the '60s in Lawrence, and the author employs an impressive array of primary research such as letters to the newspapers, letters to congressmen, and some interviews with residents.

But something is missing. The author's contentions are that that the community was polarized, that the fundamentally conservative and "cold war" attitudes of the town were opposed to the radical outlook of the university. He is no doubt correct on that, but he offers little in the way of supporting evidence, especially about the university. I was looking for more discussion of some of the radical tendencies of the university faculty and staff--things that I remember from the time.

Lawrence, even for a midwest college town, is one of the most liberal cities in the nation, and has been for some time, arguably since its founding. The author does explore some of that history, but I found his social history lacking in detail, for exammple in delineating the differences between the local businesspeople and the university faculty, who often came from other parts of the country. Perhaps some more research into the background of the KU faculty would have made the argument more convincing.

Even the central events of the book, the police shootings of 1970, are not handled with the kind of detail I would like to have seen. I wanted some detailed analysis of what really happened--was Rick Dowdell, a kid I went to junior high school with, armed when he was shot by police? Did anyone investigate this? How did the "investigation" whatever it was, compare to what we would expect to see now in such an incident?

Another point he makes is that the threat of violence and disruption of community tranquility seems to have been effective, in accomplishing, for example, the successful opening of a municipal pool in 1969, and the creation of womens' studies and womens' services at The University of Kansas in the early '70s. Both these accomplishments followed group action tending to be unlawful or even threatening violence, but that mobilized support and opposition, eventually resulting in compromise.

I would have liked to see some more social history, including for example, the community reaction to the JFK assasination and the RFK and MLK assasinations. In other words, more general observations of the decade.

Also, since I note that there was recently a reunion of '60s radicals in Lawrence, I wonder that the author was apparently not plugged into that so as to get more information.

Incidental thoughts are that the book's index is sketchy. Photos are okay, but the local paper would have had many more that perhaps could have been used. I would liked also to have seen some information on the local draft board, and the local drug scene. One of the points that the author makes is that the "Street People" who were part of the conflicts of the 1970 acute crisis were viewed as "outsiders". I recall that many were not KU students, and were in fact part of a large drug culture, but the author seems to miss this point.

Wilson was the junior Kansas Assistant Attorney General who, largely through happenstance, wound up arguing Brown v. Board of Education before the Supreme Court -- on what we would call the wrong side. Wilson admits that he was essentially along for the ride, but provides an honest account of why he believed at the time that his position was correct: Kansas law authorized but did not require segregated schools, thus it allowed local school boards to meet local needs.

This book adds little to the history of this landmark case. Most of Wilson's history is covered in Richard Kluger's Simple Justice, which is far more thorough. Much of Wilson's own story is of minor relevance -- filling out the paperwork to be admitted to the Supreme Court bar, his train ride to Washington, how it felt to watch Thurgood Marshall argue the case, etc. However, Wilson does provide some local details to round out the historical record, such as an account of how local Topeka politics almost caused Kansas to default before the Supreme Court.

Wilson doesn't offer much reflection on the experience of being "wrong." Part of the reason is that Wilson's position was not based on racial views, but on his support for local control over schools. He doesn't seem to appreciate how that support for localism, or federalism, could be used to advance malevolent ends (because, to be fair to Wilson, he thought Kansas schools offered equal facilities to blacks and whites). Because Wilson had little moral or personal investment in his position, his loss does not have much of a sting to it. As a result, the book is more of an ant's view of a battle between giants than an effort to confront the ethical dilemma of being a lawyer who represents the "wrong" side.