Martin Stone, a survivor of WW3, finds himself in boot camp with the New American Army led by Gen. George Patton III. After a few missions with the army, Stone finds that the general has plans to make himself dictator of a revived America. This is an exciting adventure in a Postwar world that is not inhabited by mutant monsters or genetic freaks. Craig Sargeant's series offers a chillingly realistice America after the ultimate disaster.

This was the first Shadowrun novel I ever picked up, and was the first thing to welcome me to the Shadowrun world, although it's not the first book by Mr.'s Sargent and Gascoigne. In their first book, Streets of Blood, you meet Serrin Shamander, an elf mage who gets tied up in solving a mass murder plot. In this great novel, Serrin is at it again with a few new friends and a lost love to try to keep himself from getting captured by an evil with some slightly strange tastes... the taste for blood, especially.

Sargent and Gascoigne are two of the best writers in the Shadowrun universe. Their characters are interesting to read about, and just human enough to relate to. Anyone interested in Shadowrun shouldn't miss this book. A great read!

"Poppyseed has a magical way of changing the lives of those around her - even the lives of monsters determined to be fierce. Her good will is contagious. Her smile is irresistible. Bright-eyed and sunshiny, she is Poppyseed, and this is her story." The description of the story on the back cover tells it all.

The story is about a band of children who found their way to a lonely old woman's home. They would have crossed the river to get to town, but a horrible, scary monster lives in the river. Poppyseed and her band of friends learn lessons about love and making friends. A delightful, fanciful story for children.

Scanlon's memoir gives the stateside reader a glimpse of what life as a Peace Corps volunteer in Chile was like in the early 1960s. His entertaining experiences, such as learning a new language and adapting to a different culture, were shared by many Peace Corps volunteers. His insightful commentary and poetic writing style made me believe I was there in the Andes with him, working with the farmers and their families. Read Scanlon's letter to President Kennedy and imagine what it was like for JFK to receive an on-the-spot report on the program he had just created. This book shows us, too, that volunteer service provides great personal satisfaction. This book will appeal to young and old alike, whether they ever served in the PC or just wish they had

This story revolves around a young flutest who takes ip an after school job at a neighbors house. It turns out to be more than expected when she finds out the job includs awakening an huge old bat.The story has a surprise twist. A good book to curl up with.

As a quasi student of art history, one my favortie modern paintings has to be Madame X. It is captivating and a fine example of art's ower of the human race. So it was with great joy that I cracked open the spine of the book to read about the painting. However, much to my disappointment the actual painting doesn't show up until Chapter 8. By then the author is losing steam, her chapters are getting shorter as are her descritptions, and dialogue. Although "Madame X" led a very interesting life, the most memorable part of her life was the painting! This is barely covered in the book, as if it were just written to get it out of the way.

The book does have some good aspects though. It has some interesting people and events that are visited again and again. But, overall these are seconday in importance. Its funny because in the Authors Note, she mentions some historical factoids that are far more interesting than what she wrote, which even concerned some major characters. Odd, I would think that basing a historical fiction in as much fact as possible would be the way to go!If you want to know more about this painting pick up a book on art history, and just skip fictional this one.

I read Ms. Diliberto's article in The New York Times this weekend about the mystery behind the portrait of Virginie Gautreau and was instantly enthralled and had to buy the book! I read it in one sitting and was delighted by Ms. Diliberto's imaginings for the elusive Madame X and her life. I'm glad she turned her hand from biography to fiction! I Am Madame X is a fun romp in Belle Epoque Paris!

I read this book with very few pauses. I have been interested in the art piece 'Madame X' but the book made it come alive. Of course, it is fiction, but I want it to be real. I know that the story is based on facts and bits and pieces of documentation that are available to the author, but the story that she has woven around this tangible evidence is so otherworldly that I was lost for a full two days as I read. I was wishing to be Madame X and wanting for the tale to be true and yet not at the same time due to the tragic romanticism. It was truly a great read.

I was extremely disappointed with the illustrations in this book. The artwork is amaturish at best. If you are interested in reading about heroines in sci-fi/fantasy then pick it up, but if you are looking for a good fantasy ART book then don't bother with this one.

This book is an interesting read on the changing roles of women in Sci Fi and fantasy, but the artwork really lets it down. It looks as though Ron Miller was in one hell of a hurry to produce enough pictures for the book and the quality really isn`t up to much. OK so I`m being critical and I freely admit I could`t do better, but that isn`t the point, there are those that can. Save your money get "Transluminal" or "Chiaroscuro" Jim Burns & Tim White show how it should have been done.

Having read so many positive reviews I gave the book another chance, was I wrong ? Sorry but no, it isn't that I was expecting Boris type archetypes of perfection. I just prefer paintings where perspective and proportion have not been sacrificed in order to achieve quantity. I stand by my original rating one star only.

While some of the other reviewers have trashed the art in this book, I simply found it uneven. It's certainly nowhere near as bad as some people have suggested. Some of the paintings are, I think, excellent--many are the best portrayals of the characters that I have ever seen. The artist has obviously made some considerable effort to make the characters seem more like real people than the idealized caricatures seen on most SF covers. Outstanding are the portraits of Jirel of Joiry, the Little Mermaid, Rima, Sharane and Susan Calvin, among others. It's true that some of the paintings were obviously rushed, but these are in the minority and the book is well worth getting for the art that is successful. It may be that Miller's efforts to make his women seem like real people may have backfired on him, since most readers will be expecting the kind of glitzy, over-the-top depictions found in books by Chris Achilleos or Boris, which these are not.

I own both the Ratcliffe book on Sargent and Sargent Abroad, and I find this book to be a fine addition to my library of Sargent books. Frankly, the criticisms here regarding the reproductions are greatly overstated, in my opinion. I have no quarrel with the reprductions in my copy, except that I would welcome more detail shots and a larger format for the book in general. The abundance of notes and the photos of Sargent and his studio (etc.) have to be appreciated by any serious student of Sargent.

I have no idea what the others are complaining about. I compared this Sargent book side by side at a book store with other published Sargent books, and this one had the best reproduction by far. It is even better than "John Singer Sargent : The Early Portraits (The Complete Paintings , Vol 1)", which is by the same author and editor as this one. Make no mistake, this is the best book so far I've seen on Sargent. I'm not concerned about the writing since I'm a fan of Sargent because I'm a painter, and he's one of the best there ever was. Sure I'd read the text, but it's not nearly as important as the reproductions of his paintings. It's all about the paintings, and he is an artist. That's all that matters.

I found a battered and bruised copy of this collection in a bookstore and had ample time to compare the quality of the pictures with many of the highly rated, thicker Sargent compendiums. While the Carter book documents the technique and career of this master of light admirably, this publication stands as the one where Sargent's work seems most marvelously luminous. Though not an expert, I believe through comparison and quick makeshift measuring that the pictures are not only rendered most accuarately, but in some cases in better aspect ratios compared to the original sizes than many of the more expensive hardbacks. What a bargain!

This author is extremely "down to earth" & his target audience seems to be the Western mind. Most traditional I Ching users don't consider a natal hexagram to be valid, but don't let that discourage you. If nothing else, the book gets you into some basic I Ching background, personal character traits, etc that seem pretty "on the mark" for the people I have looked up. There IS an error in the Trigram Key Number Chart (pp 17, 18) The author e-mailed me saying that #1 and #9 should be reversed when I contacted him about a discrepancy between his calculation result and an online calculator I found (both use Dadaji Mahendranath's method). He refers the reader to the Wilhelm/Baynes, the Ritsema/Karcher, or the R.L. Wing translations.

This book was really very informative. I am new to the topic, and found the explanations to be extremely straightforward (but not simplistic). It is also genuinely interesting and entertaining.

I have been using the I Ching for 31 years with great effect and it has helped me quite a bit. This book opened a whole new view of the system to me, one based on personality types- it was AMAZINGLY accurate! Typing myself & my family has helped us all get along better and figuring out the natal hexagrams of my coworkers has really decreased tensions.
There are great exercises in the back of the book and I think he is one of the few Westerners to understand TEH!

As with most modern Star Trek writers I always worry when they decide to write a sequel to one of the original stories. This is because they rarely capture the style or fun of the show that started the Star Trek legend. These two authors to my mind have an erratic history with Star Trek as their first novel together, "Heart of the Sun", was a boring go nowhere story with no action whereas their second, "Across the Universe", was an exciting fast paced little adventure. Unfortunately this book is an uneven mix of the two. While there is a bit of excitement in it, the plot is an absurdly constructed mess, full of situational and logical errors. The dialogue is painfully bad at times and the mistakes and disjointed nature of the dream sequence at the beginning of the novel makes you question just how closely the two authors were in contact when they wrote it. As others readers have pointed out the authors can't seem to figure out if the adversaries are Romulans or Klingons !!! Though as every real Star Trek fan knows for the timeline to be consistent (*not that modern writers seem to give a damn about that sort of thing these days !!!), it would have to be the Klingons engaged in the battle. The other big problem with this story is again the rather dubious idea that it was inspired by an original series character who was so interesting the authors felt we should hear more about him. Well I completely disagree with the statement that "Captain Garth was only rivalled by Khan Noonien Singh as Kirk's greatest adversary". In fact he was just one of a long line of interesting characters who Kirk met during his career, a number of which have featured in various other novels, and personally I don't think that Garth was anywhere near the top of the list. I suspect that these two authors sat down one day and said ... "Hmm, who can we write about to give us a link back to Star Trek that hasn't already been covered" ... and thus this novel was born. Certainly I don't believe they captured the feel of the character, or delivered a particularly credible adventure with this novel. However once again the most disturbing thing about this book, and indeed the current generation of writers, is the lack of credit they give to past writers. As with Greg Cox, who wrote the atrociously bad novels about "Khan Noonien Singh" in 2001 and 2002, these two authors are full of praise for the actor who breathed life into the central character of their novel, who they claim was their inspiration, but give absolutely no recognition what so ever to to his creator. For the record, while Steve Ihnat played the character of "Garth of Izar", it was Lee Erwin and Jerry Sohl who conceived him and without them he simply wouldn't exist. This lack of respect for the original series writers is both disappointing and I suspect indicative of why so much modern Star Trek is weaker than its' predecessor. Current writers don't understand the in and outs of how the original stories were constructed and subsequently often fail to reproduce the sense of style and entertainment that they had. As for this novel it is a barely adequate excuse for yet another mediocre adventure.

The beginning of this novel consists of a disjointed dream by James Kirk in which the villan switches between Romulans and Klingons in midstream, although I have to say in defense of the writers that dreams often do not make much sense, so this can be explained in that way. This novel is based on a character in the earlier original series, the authors state that this character rivals Khan in interest; I like at least one previous reviewer disagree. Overall, my impression of this novel was one of slight boredom as I read it, it just did'nt have that spark that the top Star Trek novels have, this is just pulp science fiction, average and run-of-the-mill. Pamela Sargent and George Zebrowski are veteran Star Trek writers, and perhaps when two talented writers work together it kind of muddies the waters, with the result being a work that seems to be a result of tedious labor and not much inspiration. My favorite Star Trek novel is SPOCK'S WORLD, this novel is not nearly as good. However, if you are like me and partial to the original series it is nevertheless well worth reading.

Star Trek-The Original Series: Garth of Izar written by Pamela Sargent and George Zebrowski is a novel that continues the television episode "Whom Gods Destroy."

The legend of Captain Garth is known Federation-wide and his exploites are taught at Starfleet Academy and read by Captain James T. Kirk. Garth sustained some rather extensive injuries while on Antos IV. Antos IV is a planet of shape-shifters and after Garth sustained his injuries the tried to bring Garth back to his former health, but now he has shape-shifting abilites and the cure has proved to be worse than his injuries driving Garth to insanity.

Captain Garth is sent to Elba II due to the madness that the Antosians inadvertinatly passed to Garth while being treated. Now, Captain Garth has been "returned" to service after being treated for mental illness... and Garth has returned to mediate a crisis on Antos IV as Captain James T. Kirk and the Enterprise crew come to Garth's aid.

The book was well-written and I found it to be better than this duo of writers did on "Heart of the Son" TOS #83 and "Across the Universe" TOS #88. I found the storyline to be captivating and the reintroduction of Garth to be a strong character to balance the character of Kirk.

I enjoyed the book as it was a very quick read at 263 pages with a larger print made this book easy to read. This book is, so far, the best work by this pair of authors as found in the genre of TREK. I have always wanted to know of what became of Captain Garth from the television series and this book fills in that gap. We get a good fleshing ourt of the character of Garth.