I was actually a bit annoyed to find this book, since I didn't know anyone had written Chapelle's biography, and I had thought of doing it myself. That said, Ostroff has written it much better than I could have. While what drove Dickey Chapelle to her achievements and disasters remains a bit hard to grasp, Ostroff has done an excellent job of tracing her cliffhanger career. There are nitpicks: Ostroff puts herself in Chapelle's head at times, as if she knows exactly what Dickie was thinking, and there is no mention of Chapelle's spiritual beliefs or lack thereof. Despite these slips, the book is an excellent tale, well told. I've recommended it widely.

Reviewed by Michael Gates, Parks Alaska, Dawson, Yukon Territory, Canada, for Alaska History, Vol. 13, Nos. 1 & 2 (Spring/Fall 1998): 73-74. Reverend R. M. Dickey made the first entry in his gold rush diary on August 31, 1897, and kept an account of his adventures as a gold rush missionary until his departure from the Yukon in August 1899. For years after, accompanied by lantern slides, he delivered lectures on gold rush exploits; he struggled also to bring his recollections to press. Upon the advice of his prospective publisher, he conveyed his story in the form of a fictionalized account rather than a documentary narrative. The work did not reach the publication stage during Dickey's life but sat neglected until recently when Art Petersen, a teacher of composition and literature at the University of Alaska Southeast, edited the manuscript for publication. The story begins in Seattle, from where protagonist, Timothy Shane, nicknamed Quebec, departs on an adventure to Skagway, Dyea, Dawson City, and the Klondike gold fields. Skeptical of missionaries and doctors, he finds himself befriended by and immersed in the missionary and medical crusade of those very people during the epic stampede. The story progresses, describing the various efforts of Quebec and his colleagues to build churches and hospitals and serve the spiritual needs of the Klondike gold seekers. Quebec weaves a narrative of events and people, based upon real events and personal experiences, of life and death, love and adventure, and heroic actions along the gold rush trail. I would have preferred a more historical treatment of Dickey's personal experiences. The story has considerable strength, however, since it derived from first-hand experience of the gold rush and thus gives the story a sense of veracity that it would not have if written by someone with only a second-hand knowledge of the places and events. The perspective, too, is that not of a gold seeker but a seeker of souls and thus dwells upon aspects of the gold rush not necessarily covered in other accounts. The story is footnoted by the editor to indicate parallels between Dickey's diary and the places and events depicted in the story. The story is also strengthened by the abundant photographs, many of them from Dickey's collection of lantern slides, which bring to life the places and events of the story. Though not as sharp and clear as one would wish, they nevertheless give visual strength to the story. Readers will have to jog themselves back to the realization that the story is not a historical narrative but a novel. Despite the editor's plea that the plot is clumsy and the characters are thinly developed, this still proves to be an interesting read.

Unfortunately, as a sports writer, he tends to soften what he has to say, which, in the case of Al Davis, renders it insipid and meaningless.

Want to read a good book on Al Davis? Try to find a copy of "Slick: The Silver-and-Black Life of Al Davis" by Mark Ribowsky. Supplemental reading" "The League" by David Harris.

This book is the bible of reinforced masonry design. It has a fantastic amount of information useful for architects and engineers. I was somewhat disappointed to find that the book for sale here is actually a reproduction of the original, and is a paperback.

An addiction to Ripperology and other infamous cases of true crime originally drew me to this book. A warning: THIS IS NOT AN ITEM FOR THE FAINT OF HEART. Even with the various Ripper related books I've read over the years, parts of the prose had me cringing in horror.

The most compelling prose in the various selections lies in the exploration of the six most common Ripper suspects (The Butcher, The Priest, The Poet, The Physician, The Psychic and The Prince). Even a casual reading can turn into a marathon reading session.

The language used is graphic and the images presented can be quite disturbing. Small details from the real Ripper case files such as the contents of victim Catherine Eddowes' pockets are woven in the narrative, adding that extra bit of realism to draw you into the insular world of Whitechapel during the murders.

Ripper! is not another volume in the endless flow of armchair detective volumes that litter the true crime section of your local bookseller. You will not come away with a definitive answer to who committed these crimes. Buchanan does not force his opinions or wild theories about the Ripper's true identity on the reader unlike most Ripperology selections. Instead the reader is offered a look into what visions may have filled the mind and compelled the person behind the Ripper murders.

While the publishers describe SAS for Forecasting Time Series as a manual, the authors have provided more than SAS statements and the resulting outputs. Theoretical explanations, equations, and matrix algebra forms of equations fill the book. This superb manual is the product of the Research and Development Director of Analytic Solutions at SAS and of the Professor of Statistics who was the co-inventor of the Dickey-Fuller test. In addition to the coverage of the essential univariate and multivariate time series analysis topics (e.g., ARIMA models), the authors included entire chapters or large portions of chapters on: Cointegration, State Space Modeling, Spectral Analysis, and Data Mining.
My only disappointment with this manual was the lack of an entire chapter on forecast accuracy. Four pages of references did not include a single reference to articles about forecasting competitions. The authors could have: (1) held back recent data in their examples (2) made forecasts with their best models (3) explained how to identify significant changes over time in error terms, standard errors, and in correlations (4) explained when and how to re-calculate model parameters (5) discussed the choice of unbiased forecast accuracy measures for comparing forecasts from ARIMA and regression models.

i did not like the book adventures of tom sawyer because i thought the book was to slow. they would carry on and on about things that were not that important. in my opinion i think that junior high kids should read this book. i thought that the book was like a roller coaster because one chapter you start getting to the climax and it just turns on you and goes to something differnt that is not even involved in thier adventure.

This is the first novel that I ever remember reading and thank the lord for Mark Twain and what he did for me. I was amazed, as a young boy of eight, that a book could bring me so much pleasure. I loved the adventure and romance of Twain's world and thirty years later remember the adventures he took me on and the charachters he introduced me to. True, this is not the depth of James Fenimore Cooper, the detail of Clancy, the clarity of thought of Dostoyevsky or even the shock of Steven King, but it is classic American literature and had it not been for Tom and Huck, I may have never learned to love to read as I do. This book should be read by every young person.

This book is descent but a poor substitute in light of better alternatives, namely Zar's Biostatistical Analysis or Sokal and Rohlf's Biometry. Zar's book is my favorite. I am not as familar with Sokal and Rohlf's but know enough that I prefer the organization and context of Zar. The limitations of Steel et al. is the needless use of matrix algebra, the lack of calculations in many cases (instead, the linear model is presented without decomposition into formulas), the brief discription for many of the analyses, lack of good examples, and difficult to follow writing. On the positive side, Steel et al. have a chapter on experimental design, which Zar and Sokal and Rohlf lack, although it is not an easy chapter to follow. My recommendation is to use Zar as your primary "go to" reference on biostatistics.

I found that Steel et al. covered a broad range of methodology needed for biological research, and that the scope of this text is comparable to any statistical manual available. It is very functional as a reference material for troubleshooting any design or analysis problems. As a professor of research methodology, I highly recommend consulting this text for improving the statistical analysis of biological research.

The book was little more than a list. The hand drawn maps were amaturish in this day and age. It was lacking in information. Maybe I was spoiled by the "100 Best And All The Rest" book I had just purchased on Colorado campgrounds. Camping Wyoming was a waste of money.

I was searching for a book that would tell me the information that would be most useful in searching for just the right camp site... This book has it... very informative and easy to understand without a lot of useless drivel... I wish it were available for Idaho!

This is definitely a picture book. The photographs are lovely and the write up for photographs are also great. However, I was not expecting a picture book. I was expecting a book listing or detailing dog friendly gardens. This book was not it, however the photos are appeasing.

"Dogs in the Gardens of the Rich and Famous" is probably a more descriptive title for this little book, but that's a minor distraction; the dogs are the stars of this book. The photos are without exception excellent and the accompanying text is good, especially when it focuses on the dogs. It was comforting to see the odd mutt featured in these pages, many adopted from Humane Societies. The passages about the pleasures of being with dogs while in the garden, particularly the ones pertaining to a dog named "May", make this book special. The book is printed on quality stock in a pleasing layout.