This book is about a middle-aged woman who has an affair with a teenaged boy. My middle aged English teacher gave it to me to read "on the side" when I was fifteen. I enjoyed it.

This is a pretty ok book, if you like whips and chains, submissive women, and very peculiar sex. The main star of the book is a women named Samora, who manages to talk herself into marriage to a very perverted prince. On the way to her wedding she meet this soldier and falls in love with him in just a couple of hours, vowing to marry him a spend the rest of her life with him. Unfortunately, it does not work out that way and she marries the prince who likes to keep her tied up in dark rooms. The prince lets just about anyone you can imagine do anything and everything to his wife Samora. Some parts of this book are very disgusting other than that it was ok.

This book is very interesting if you like biographies, and is perfect for all ages. She talks about her childhood of writing and making up stories. She says that at first she didn't understand how to read and she thought all of the kids were just making up a story that went with a picture. She also talks about eating her sister's chocolate bunny and having to wear awful boy's clothes! She later on discussed the steps she took to become the marvelous writer she is. When I read this book, I found out that she wrote a series of humorous books on "Alice". The "Alice" books are now among my favorite. I would suggest this book to anyone who loves to read and write.

I heard of Willie Sutton. The name was mentioned here and there as I grew up, but only spoken in hushed, almost reverent tones. Upon reaching adulthood I found out why. Willie Sutton was a bank robber, like my father. It is alleged he taught my father everything he knew about how to rob a bank. Of course, in adulthood my interest was piqued, so I got the book, more because of research than anything else. Well, I didn't find out anything about my father but ended up finding an extremely interesting, easy-to-read book about a very intelligent man who used his talents in the wrong way. Unfortunately for him, his life didn't amount to much; however you have to admire the fact that in the end he finally came to that realization and wrote the book to try to sway the next generation of potential hoodlums in the way of the straight and narrow. A smart man.. who finally put his intellect to good use. I would definitely put this book on my "things to read" list.

Barbara Reynolds caught hell when she published this book. It was the first to expose several "facts" about the Jesse Jackson myth as false. The assasination story, the growing up in a shack story, the curious finances of Operation Breadbasket and Jackson's personal life were all exposed. Reynolds eventually had to leave Chicago and the book although widely read was rarely mentioned in public. Today Keith Timmerman's book Shakedown is on the bestseller lists. It turns out that Barbara was right all along.

Josie has gotten into trouble. As she tries to help her new best friend Sarah practice piano, they tip over the bench and brake one of its legs. The girls must find a way to pay for the repair of the bench. When troubles such as a lost cat ... occur. What will happen? I enjoyed this book, and its focus on friendship gives it a specil touch. Read it!

Marcia Vaughan is one of our favorite children's writers, and here she has written a pleasant folk-tale about how a slow, but crafty, sloth avoids becoming crocodile lunch. Unfortunately the illustrations are are overly busy and a bit too cute, and do not bring out the simple strengths of the story...

This is a typical Osprey book. A great introduction to a specific topic. It has many color illustrations and maps. Not many books written about the Picts. This is a good introduction to the style of warfare in Great Britain toward the end of the Roman Empire. I like these books because they give you a general background and then suggestions for further reading. The book is only 64 pages so it will only take an afternoon to read it. Very little detail, but enough info to get you started and give you the ability to talk about the subject. The following is an "About This Book" quote from the Osprey website which is not included on the Amazon.com site. It is helpful. "First mentioned by name in AD 297, the Picts inhabited Northern Britain from the end of the 3rd century AD to the 9th. They rose to power in the devastation following Emperor Septimus Severus's repression of the Caledonians in AD 208, and dominated Northern Britain for over 500 years, before vanishing mysteriously. The Picts represent a high point of Celtic civilisation, remaining free and unconquered beyond the borders of the Roman world, and rising to become the first barbarians to form a recognisable 'nation'. This title takes a detailed look at their origins, and examines Pictish heroic and warrior society, covering education and training, appearance and equipment, the status of women, and the experience of battle."

This is not, as the reviewer below suggests, a book for "die-hard fans". Rather, it is a book for Tolkien *scholars*. Most Tolkien scholars, of course, are fans-- and a good number of fans are also scholars-- but the two sets are not identical.
Essentially, this book consists of the proceedings of (i.e. the papers presented at) the 1992 Conference on Tolkien that took place at Oxford on the 100th anniversary of his birth. It comprises several dozen short papers on a variety of Tolkien related subjects. The papers are divided into ten major sections: 1. Recollection and Remembrance, 2. Sources and Influence, 3. The Lord of the Rings, 4. The Silmarillion, 5. Linguistics and Lexicography, 6. Response and Reaction, 7. Tolkien Studies, 8. Middle-Earth Studies, 9. The Inklings, 10. Flights of Fancy. Some sections are much longer than others, and a few papers that were presented are not included because no written copy was submitted.

Of the various papers, a few are by renknowned scholars of Tolkien-- philologist Tom Shippey, bibliographer Wayne Hammond, literary scholar Verlyn Flieger, etc. There are also a few other 'surprises' by folks who are clearly among the up-and-coming crop of new Tolkien scholars. There is, however, some non-scholarly material mixed in here. Most of really kooky stuff is in the last section, butto be honest, quite a few of the purportedly scholarly articles in the other sections have an amateurish character to them-- both in style and substance (And, of course, the reminscences in part 1 aren't especially scholarly themselves... although they are still valuable to the Tolkien scholar for their anecdotal/historical value)
Of the various papers here, the most successful are those in the sections on Sources and Influences and on Linguistics. Of these, the most insightful are Chris Seeman's article on Tolkien's relation to, and reconceptualization of Romantic literary theory (a very astute piece of intellectual history) and T.A. Shippey's discussion of Tolkien and the Gawain-poet (i.e. the author of "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight"). Sadly, those works which address Tolkien's fiction directly-- i.e. those in the sections on the Lord of the Rings and Silmarillion sections-- tend to be on the weaker side., while those in the rather vaguely defined sections (i.e. "Tolkien Studies" & "Middle-Earth Studies")are very weak indeed. The two exceptions to this are Hammond's "Tolkien and the Critics" (which perhaps ought to be called "Tolkien and the Reviewers" since he's really speaking about reviews that appeared in newspapers), and Anders Stenstrom's "A Mythology? For England?" (a careful piece of analysis that shows that Tolkien never appears to have really used the phrase 'mythology for England' to describe his fiction, but rather indicates that this overused catchphrase seems to be the result of Humprey Carpenter's conflation of some other references). A big disappointment here, though, is Shippey's paper on "Tolkien as Post-War Author", which just seems somewhat thin and vague-- a real surprise considering the strength of his other article here and his book _The Road to Middle-Earth_.

This conference took place nearly ten years before the time I write this review-- but it does reveal several things about the state of Tolkien studies then and now. The first of these is that Tolkien scholarship is still strongly rooted (peraps too strongly?) in a biographical approach. As one looks at the footnotes in this volume, one discovers reference after reference to Tolkien's letters, to Carpenter's biography, and to works like "On Fairy Stories", in which Tolkien outlines his theories of literature. There are very few footnotes for references to The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion. (Also, I think it is no accident that those sections on LotR and the Silmarillion happen to be the shortest and the weakest ones in the book-- or that there is no section devoted to _The Hobbit_ at all!_) This seems to me to be a bit of a shame-- as Tolkien's literary legacy is far more important and profound than his thoughts on philology or his theories of authorship, or his trip to Holland... and it also seems to me that more effort ought to be spend discussing Tolkien's fiction on its own terms, as works that can stand on their own, without such an overwhelming focus on matters of authorial intent and self-interpretation.
When all's said and done, this is certainly a worthwhile book for the Tolkien scholar-- or a research library-- to acquire. Not everything in it will be equally useful, but it's certainly better than a lot of other collections of Tolkien scholarship.

to me, they seem a bit contrived because he insists on having an english rhyme scheme and meter which makes me think he probably gave away something in translation.
The introduction is a good basic introduction to the biographical data and accuracy available about the poet, some of his influences, and subject matter.
I usually shy away from rhyming translations, but this is pretty good, and there are some excellent poems and stories in here...