This book was simply a pleasure to read. While it was well documented, the documentation did not grind the book to a halt. I would consider this more as an anecdotal history rather than a military history. The author puts a human face on a serious topic. I have now read all of the books in print on the Iron Brigade and the Nineteenth Indiana Volunteers and this one is the best.

As an ardent student of history I found this book to be wonderfully documented and accurate. I have read all of the books about the 19th Indiana and the Iron Brigade and found this one to be the best by far. I was so intrigued with the book that I visited the critical archives and libraries cited in Mr. Dunn's book to verify their accuracy. Each entry which I checked was quoted exactly as I found them. I have heard through some Civil War circles that there has been an attempt to impugn this book in an attempt to increase sales of the other 19th Indiana books. If so, this is sad. I have recommended this book to all of my friends.

What a great book on the Nineteenth Indiana Volunteers of the Iron Brigade. The book was maticulously researched and documented. The best part about the book was that the documentation did not detract from the enjoyable reading. The pictures and roster were very helpful. I have personally read over 200 Civil War regimental histories and this one was my favorite. I have read two other books on the Nineteenth Indiana and found them to be lacking in documentation and in ease of reading. This book is the best.

An interesting fact of American politics - that many of our Presidents came from the "upper class" of American society - is the central premise of "The Three Roosevelts: Patrician Leaders Who Transformed America." In this book, co-authors James MacGregor Burns and Susan Dunn examine the role played in American history by arguably the most influential "patrician" family of the twentieth century - the Roosevelts of New York.

"The Three Roosevelts" is essentially a book containing short political biographies of Theodore, Franklin, and Eleanor Roosevelt. Theodore Roosevelt (TR) became one of our greatest Presidents. Early in life, his sense of "noblesse oblige" caused him to choose a career in politics rather than a life as a member of the wealthy elite. He was elected, in turn, state representative; then governor of New York, as a Republican. He was appointed Assistant Secretary of the Navy in the McKinley Administration. Three years later, he was elected Vice President of the United States, and succeeded to the Presidency when President William McKinley was assassinated on September 14, 1901. His seven years as Chief Executive were some of the most successful of any Chief Executive up to then.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) was a young man who appeared to have little of his cousin Theodore's intellectual acumen, driving ambition, or ideological bent. Franklin followed his famous cousin into politics, but unlike his cousin, Franklin became a Democrat. Like Theodore, Franklin's political career advanced steadily. In rapid succession, he was elected State Assemblyman, then State Senator. By age 31, he had been appointed Assistant Secretary of the Navy by President Woodrow Wilson.

In 1921, FDR was stricken with polio, which paralyzed him from the waist down. In 1928, after a seven-year hiatus from politics, FDR was elected Governor of New York. His two two-year terms were highly successful, but by then FDR already had his eyes on the biggest prize of them all: the Presidency.

From 1929 to 1932, during the early years of the Great Depression, FDR proved himself a capable governor of New York. By 1932, after three years mired in the Depression, Americans were ready for a change. They elected FDR - the man promising Americans a "New Deal" - as President of the United States.

The vast majority of "The Three Roosevelts" is taken up with an account of FDR's "transformation of America" during the Great Depression. Here, Burns and Dunn portray Roosevelt as a man employing a pragmatic approach to governance... try whatever works! Congress passed a body of legislation that was tremendous in scope. For the first time, the Federal government actively intervened in American life in an effort to make life better for all. The modern welfare state was born.

The third of the "three Roosevelts" - Eleanor (ER) - was an integral part of her husband's political success. After her marriage to FDR, Eleanor remained indifferent toward politics, although she steadfastly supported her husband's political ambitions. As FDR's political career progressed, so did Eleanor's interest in politics. In fact, she was much more of an ideologue than Franklin. Burns and Dunn imply that Eleanor grew to have a tremendous influence on Franklin, possibly pulling him more and more to the left of center during his Presidency.

On April 12, 1945, after thirteen years as President, years which saw the United States struggle out of Depression and stumble into a world war, Franklin D. Roosevelt died. He had helped build the modern welfare state, and had guided the United States to a position of victory in the Second World War.

In the years following FDR's death, Eleanor Roosevelt continued to be a major influence on American politics. Through her nationally syndicated newspaper column "My Day," ER continually interjected her ideas and opinions into the national debate. She was appointed as an American delegate to the first organizational meeting of the United Nations General Assembly. Later she would serve on a UN commission that authored the Universal Declaration on Human Rights. She championed the cause of equal rights for all Americans, and was vocal in her support of the new nation of Israel.

When "The Three Roosevelts" appeared in bookstores in the spring of 2001, I eagerly bought a copy. This was the first book I'd seen in over twenty years that was written by James MacGregor Burns, the historian best known for his two volume biography of the 32nd President - "Roosevelt: The Lion and the Fox" and "Roosevelt: The Soldier of Freedom."

My hope was that Burns and co-author Susan Dunn would provide a penetrating examination of what caused this trio of extraordinary individuals to leave behind the values and traditions of their 19th century "patrician" class, in favor of a progressive and at times socialistic political agenda. It is a question left largely unanswered. "The Three Roosevelts" remains a book very long on biographical information and very short on historical analysis.

The authors show an almost complete lack of objectivity toward their subjects. Burns is well known as a liberal "New Deal" Democrat, and his political bias shows on practically every page. He is ably abetted by Dunn. The result: "The Three Roosevelts" is practically a paean of praise to TR, ER, and especially FDR. Criticisms of the "three Roosevelts" are few, and even those are largely muted. Burns and Dunn's unabashed, gushing admiration of the "three Roosevelts" is annoying, and limits the usefulness of the book as an objective study of these fascinating characters in American history.

James MacGregor Burns and Susan Dunn, Democrats by conviction, give an unequal account of the life of three Roosevelts by dedicating most of their biography to Franklin Delano Roosevelt. MacGregor Burns and Dunn show their audience how these three patricians left behind a relatively easy life to descend into the arena of politics. Theodore, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt had to overcome their prejudices about other classes, religions, ethnicities and races to get an understanding of the issues at hand and, at times make, painful compromises to get things done. MacGregor Burns and Dunn explain to their readers that the three Roosevelts have ultimately left an indelible imprint on the psyche of the nation by each setting an example of transformational leadership. On the domestic front, the country has been working on the best possible reconciliation of the respective interests of business, labor and consumers as well as the rights and duties of its respective races and ethnicities. Abroad, the country has weighed the pros and cons of an interventionist policy on a case-by-case basis to safeguard its vital interests, and to advance the cause of a world that espouses the values of responsible democracy and capitalism.

This novel was immensely informative and entertaining. I am an English teacher who reads a lot, and I could not put it down. I loved the descriptions of leaders such as Huey Long and Gerald Smith and the isolationist movement. It was also impressive that it was so well-balanced and avoided sensationalism and cheap shots. The authors did not take sides or make quick judgments. You must read this book. My two favorite sections were the descriptions of the New Deal and the class struggle in New York during TR's time.

I have the first edition of this book, and when I first moved to the LA area, it was great to have...but, I find it lacking a lot now that I know more about the area. It doesn't mention the Huntington Gardens, or the Rose Bowl, or Descanso Gardens (cool tiny train that runs on weekends)or other kid friendly venues. I found the restaurant listings useless...rest's are everywhere, and I tend not to make one a special destination when I'm on a daytrip!

I recommend getting an up-to-date California guidebook (Lonely Planet or some such) and decide where to go based on your child's and your inclinations, and ignore the ubiquitous malls that you can find anywhere in country.

Good Points: Give good descriptions of attractions, including an estimate of how long you'll want to spend, and practical issues like availablity of food/strollers/etc.
Good descriptions of natural sights (beaches, parks) as well as man-made attractions.

Bad Points: Seems to take a very narrow view of what kids are going to enjoy. Why assume that no child is capable of enjoying an art museum? Or, as the authors states flatly, that kids hate scenery, and that your teen would much rather stay home with his friends than actually travel with his family? (Author suggests spending time at the local malls if you are travelling with teens!) Or that kids won't eat anything but hamburger-based kid's menus?
Given that the book is covering a large geographic area, and given the author's abovementioned narrow view of 'kid-friendliness', many important attractions aren't mentioned at all.
Only a few accomodations recommendations are given, and most are very expensive.

(This review, incidently, applies to all the books in this series; California, Florida, and Washington DC).

I live in southern California, and this book has inspired countless Saturday family outings. I had no idea what was in my own backyard! It is fabulous to have someone's advice on what is worth spending the time, with kids, in traffic for. We have loved this book-and hope to find a similar one when we move to Philadelphia!

Nice materials (physically), do not expect a lot of details of the herbs. The color and pictures pleased me good for your coffee table.

Beautiful pictures; not much garden advice, hence not for the beginning gardener. But herbs here I had never even heard of, and the pictures are so beguiling. Those pictures and the huge range of plants are the reason to buy this book. I intend to work my way thru alphabetically and just grow herbs. They need no fertilizer, which is purely wonderful.

This book is full of information and very good pictures. If you are wanting to learn about herbs, this is a good book.

As a work of entertainment literature, this book is dry, boring, slow, and not worth reading. All of the characters are hateful, and unrealistic. Now, I'm not going to lie to you, it has many interesting philisophical concepts. Some of which are love, the supernatural, and human nature, however, the book was so uninteresting, and depressing, I would have rather read it out of a textbook. Bottom line - Hopefully I'm just a shallow uncultured reader, and you will find much more enjoyment in it than me.

OK, it's still one of the best editions available (the 3rd edition, I mean), especially if you don't need non-dialectal notes (there are almost none). A very useful selection of early critical reviews, an intelligent anthology of Emily's verse (and that's very important), and a good selection of good, modern critical essays. Who may want more? I, for one, want notes.

As far as the text itself is concerned, it WAS a rather good edition that looks very much as if one takes the second, Charlotte's 1850 "improved" edition and drops it into a 1847 paragraphing and -to a certain extent- punctuation mould. It's not at all -as one reviewer says- Emily's words, but these with almost one third of the Charlotte's and other improvements, as is clearly stated in the Textual Commentary by Sale Jr. So far, this is not a big problem in itself, although we get 'door' instead of 'floor' at the beginning of Chapter 2.

Fourth edition comes with an improved anthology of reviews and of Emily's poetry, and much improved notes (although still on the scarce side). The text -claims let aside- is the same of the 3rd ed (eclectic, as scholars say), but the Textual Commentary has by now disappeared, and that's a pity. Perhaps it doesn't matter that much, but it isn't -as wrongly stated- the 1847 text.

Wuthering Heights baffles me. It's the most curious novel in 19th Century Literature, and the only novel I read each year regardless. I just bought this edition, for Emily Jane's words, unedited by her sister and others. It also contains some poems from Gondal, some diary entries, and a few criticisms, which are always lacking in my opinion. I learned nothing new from them, but the text is beautiful and worth the money, and the edition of her poems and how they play into Emily Jane's Gondal world offer a few new insights. I often think this novel is part fairy tale, part dream, part nightmare, part history. But it defies definition. Like Gormenghast by Mervyn Peake, it creates confusion and muddle for the scholar. The amazing sum of its mystery is that Emily Jane Bronte wrote it at all, this lonely, isolated, and ill woman from the moors of England. Read it. Think about it. Wuthering Heights is truly a mystical experience. If only the author had lived to write another complete novel, we might really understand her mythologies. I'll keep reading till I do.

This book is a conversation starter for those who trying to sort out the appropriate role of religion in American public life. It should provide a stimulating start for a reading journey at the center of contemporary American history. For those who come away concerned, or indeed, not very concerned about the errosion of religious freedom and separation of church and state in the U.S., the logical next reads are Why the Religious Right is Wrong about Separation of Church and State, by Robert Boston...

The founding fathers were horrified by witch hangings conducted by Christian Puritans, and by atrocities committed by state-enforced Christian churches in Europe. The founding fathers were attracted to a deistic concept of God, a kinder, more humanitarian God than the jealous, cruel, vindictive God of the Bible. The founding fathers were well-read and had studied many religions. Washington was acquainted with Buddhists and with "Mohammetans", as he spelled it. In 1778 James Madison said to the Virginia Convention on Ratifying the Constitution: "Freedom arises from the multiplicity of sects, which pervades America and which is the best and only security for religious liberty in any society. For where there is such a variety of sects, there cannot be a majority of any one sect to oppress and persecute the rest." Deists valued reason, science, knowledge, not religious superstitions.

George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin, James Madison were not Christians but were rationalists and deists. Jefferson hoped that America would be a tolerant land of religious diversity; he was a Unitarian. Madison wrote in 1774: "Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind." They believed in reason, not mythology.

My first problem with this book was trying to keep the characters straight. (They all seemed interchangeable.) But that problem was soon solved, because I didn't care about any of them enough to try to keep track of them. Which left the setting (the best part of the book) and the plot (not exactly spell-binding). I don't plan to read any others in this series.

Set in 1923 England, this series follows the adventures of the Honorable Daisy Dalrymple, a young woman who has defied convention by choosing to make her own living (as a journalist) rather than let her aristocratic family support her.

In this, the sixth of the series (preceded by "Damsel in Distress" and followed by "Styx and Stones"), Daisy visits relatives at Henley-on-Thames while researching her latest writing assignment, an article on the Henley Royal Regatta. Daisy's relatives' house is packed to the gills with people in town for the Regatta, including the rowing team from Oxford's Ambrose College, who will compete. Needless to say, there is lots of friction between all these people for a variety of reasons, and eventually, one of the rowing team turns up dead just in time to spoil Daisy's weekend plans with her fiance, Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher of Scotland Yard.

This book is not quite up to the high standards of the others in this series because the suspects all blur together so easily. The individual members of the rowing team all seem more or less the same and are, as far as the reader is concerned, easily dismissed as true suspects. There are only four or so characters truly depicted in-depth, so it becomes very clear that one of them must be the murderer. This is not how a mystery reader likes to solve the mystery.

The recurring characters, however, are as well done and enjoyable as ever, and the little jealousies between the newly engaged Alec and Daisy are fun. Once again, Dunn has created a clever and realistic "set-up" for the mystery, and her depiction of time and place cannot be beat.

Daisy and Alec are to be the guests of Daisy's aunt Lady Cherington for the Thames Cup boat races. Daisy's cousin Tish's beau, and his teammates, including Tish's cousin Cherry. There is some discord in the team. The Hon Basil DeLancy, an out an out cad, is baiting the cox, a Mr. Bott for not being as well borne or socially apt as the rest of them. Harold Bott has a huge chip on his shoulder and responds just as DeLancey wants him to. This all cumulates in DeLancey pushing Bott in the river after he disgraces himself by being sick during the race. Since DeLancey got him drunk the night before it really was his fault. Then, DeLancey dies after becoming sick during a four man race. Bott is naturally a suspect, and Alec takes over the case. He and Daisy seek the murderer.

These golden age mysteries are alot of fun. The murderer was fairly obvious, but getting to the conclusion was still worth reading. The author has a real gift for describing England in the 1920's.

This is my favorite author for gumpaste flowers by far! The flowers are very beautiful and life-like, and the instructions are detailed with step-by-step photos, unlike some other books I've seen. It would be a wonderful resource for beginners and experienced sugar artists alike. His arrangements are a bit too big for my personal taste, but are easily scaled down, and of course the cakes themselves are English style rather than American, but the focus and value is the information on the flowers themselves anyway. A must-have if you are interested in gumpaste flowers!

Sorry to see the review saying that the cakes and flowers in this book are not acceptable.

Alan Dunn is a very talented sugar flower designer and his books are sold around the world. If the reader was expecting fresh flowers then this book was not the one to buy -- that being said it just goes to show that Alan's ability to create stunning lifelike sugar flowers fooled the most discerning critic.

Please remember this designer resides in England and the cake styles are somewhat different to those seen in the United States. His cake design is normal fare in the UK and probably seen at 80% of weddings. The use of rolled fondant in the United States is currently gaining in popularity (evidenced in all of the cake layouts in bridal magazines) and it is my opinion that it will continue to do so in the future.

Wow, Alan Dunn does it again! The gumpaste flowers in this book are so lifelike and the instructions so clear, that he makes learning new flowers an enjoyable experience. A must have book for the professional decorator or for the cake show enthusiast.

For the money, I did not feel that this book offered as much information/detail as I would have liked. A considerable amount of the content is regulations/documents that are readily available on the web from a number of sites. Why pay this much for what you can print from the web in five minutes?

Check it out before you buy it!

Does a good job of outlining the basics in an easy to digest format. We've made it part of new IRB staff and member training.

"Protecting Study Volunteers in Clinical Research" provides a very comprehensive overview of the federal regulations which govern clinical research in a very concise and accurate manner. It is very easy to read. It makes for an excellent educational tool for investigators, coordinators, administrative personnel, and IRB members. I would recommend this book to anyone who is involved in clinical research.

I was pretty disappointed with #2 in the Daisy Dalrymple series. The mystery doesn't start to unfold until about half way through the novel-- the rest is just set-up. When things finally do get rolling, I wasn't very engrossed by the mystery, and found the final resolution anticlimactic.

The Honorable Daisy Dalrymple is working on her second article for Town and Country Magazine. This time, she's been invited to profile Occles Hall by a friend from school. Lady Valeria isn't completely happy about Daisy's presence, but agrees to let her continue. While touring the winter garden, the discovery of a dead bush leads to the discovery of a body. Grace Moss, the parlor maid, was presumed to have run away two months ago. When Lady Valeria pressures the local police into arresting one of the estate gardeners, Daisy's observations convince her that an innocent man has been arrested. She calls her friend Detective Chief Inspector Alec Fletcher to come help, but can they solve a murder that's two months old?

This is the second book in the Daisy Dalrymple series, set in 1923 England. It's a cozy with an emphasis on character and interviewing the suspects over tons of action. But don't misunderstand; it's a great read. Lady Valeria is a strong character, and watching the other characters try to work around her is lots of fun. The pace of the story doesn't lag, with lots of new information and complications coming on a regular basis. Daisy and Alec's relationship is also very fun to watch, as they are not willing to admit to any feelings between them.

If you're looking for a book with lots of shoot-outs and close calls, look elsewhere. However, if you are looking for a good mystery with great characters and an intriguing plot, this is the series for you.

This mystery, set in 1920's London is a great mystery novel that is not cluttered with gore and sexual innuendos. It's interesting and fun. I especially enjoyed the endearing flirtations between Daisy and Alec. Their interactions are a nice change from the often crassness of today's t.v. You won't find much to stress you out here, everything fits into a neat package by the end of the book. It's a great way to relax and be taken away from daily life. And Daisy's such a great gal! I really loved it! Check out Carola Dunn's other Daisy Dalrymple mysteries. They're all great!