I am being charitable to have given this book a 1 rating. If you want a reliable book, try to find BACKGROUND OF A BANDIT: THE ANCESTRY OF JESSE JAMES by Joan M. Beamis and William E. Pullen. Otherwise this will have to do. Steele's book has a chapter on the "Tennessee James Family" that should be taken with a barrel of salt. There are plenty of James families scattered across the country, but it's a subject of question as to whether there is any relationship with Jesse James of Missouri. I have heard that the errata in this particular book would be substantial.

This is an execellent resource book for James family researchers. All background information appears in order. Very detailed and full of family knowledge. A book worth investing in for any James Family historian.

I love stories about supertitions and myths but this book really falls short. The stories are mostly dull and lack details that could have been used to make them interesting. The section about outlaws was very boring and pitiful. The (very short) pages about supertitions was entirely without merit. All that was written was a list of superstitions and the author gave NO detail about how they came about. I also found the book to be very short and I read it in less than one hour. For the price, it was ... not worth the money ...

WOW This book was great. I am into the superstitions and I really enjoyed this book.. I live in Baxter Springs Kansas which is only 10 miles from the "ozarks" and I enjoy hearing about all of the awesome tales. I highly recomend this book to anyone who is superstitious

"Tracks of Deceit" is the first mystery story in a series about the 19th century American detective Katy Steele. After her father is murdered, Katy's determination to find her father's killer brings her to the construction site of the transcontinental railroad. With her partner Sam Bronte, Katy uncovers a ruthless plot to sabotage the railroad project, and finds herself faced with murderous and money hungry villains who will stop at nothing to achieve their aims, even if it means Katy and her companions need to be "eliminated."

"Imperial Intrigue" is the second volume in the series, and describes Katy and Sam's new assignment in protecting an Austrian prince and princess who are settling down on a ranch in the American West. Katy soon shares in the struggles faced by the foreign royal party: adjusting to ranch life, befriending the ranch family, facing the murderous attempts of a greedy neighbouring rancher to take over the property, and avoiding death at the hands of a skilled assassin.

What NOT to expect:

1. Solid theology and a thought provoking message.
Typical of much evangelical thinking, this book offers only shallow theology. Typical are the ideas that heaven will be "enriched" by a wonderful Christian ("Tracks of Deceit" p.45), a false contrast between an Old Testament God of justice and the New Testament God of love (p.129), the idea that it is entirely wrong to judge someone even from their lifestyle (p.195), the pop-psychology assessment that an evil self-centred life is not really sin but rather indicative of being "seriously sick...insane." (p.216), the secular notion that Christians must learn to love themselves more ("Imperial Intrigue" p.178), and that it is possible for an unbeliever to be "basically a good person." Despite the fall into sin, the authors have rather too much faith in human nature, which is probably not surprising considering their Arminian theology (p.50,142). Such shallow thinking is evident throughout, and results in a grinding down of the gospel of Christ into a super-sweet sugar coating and sprinkling it over the story-line. Also of concern is the Biblical thinking that is missing from these books. Instead of focussing on the "unseen" heavenly promises, the authors focus with nauseating regularity on the "seen" qualities of physical beauty and physical attraction ("Tracks of Deceit" p.76,164, "Imperial Intrigue" p.32,47). When this secular focus was combined with a liberal dose of sappy romance ("Tracks of Deceit" p.125, "Imperial Intrigue" p.81) where characters habitually wind up kissing at their first meeting or soon afterwards, at times I could hardly believe I was reading a Christian book.

2. Strong characterization.
Katy herself is rather one-dimensional. While barely shedding a tear over her father's death, she immediately goes off to play detective and find his murderer. Although the characterization does improve in "Imperial Intrigue" (especially the attention devoted to the internal relationships of the ranch family), on the whole the characterization leaves much to be desired. Even the unbelieving "good guys" are surprisingly unselfish or else become Christian at the tip of a hat, whereas the "bad guys" have no redeeming qualities whatsoever, and are nearly always presented as "human monsters" that are always evil all the time.

3. A surprising and unpredictable plot.
The authors left so many clues that one of the surprising plot twists at the end of "Tracks of Deceit" came as no surprise whatsoever, but was instead entirely expected. When there are surprises, in both books they are frequently the result of most remarkable coincidences that are hardly credible, and thus hardly satisfying. Although "Imperial Intrigue" was certainly more credible and convincing than "Tracks of Deceit", weaknesses are still evident - among them an incident where the authors resort to having one of the characters have an unexplained urge to visit a grave in the middle of the night (p.195) in order to get three of the characters out of the house. Oh please!

What to expect:

1. Lots of action, intrigue and murder.
There is constant riveting action and intrigue, as Katy tumbles from one hair-raising situation to another. There is action aplenty, and by the end of the "Tracks of Deceit" there are several corpses, gun battles, kidnappings and sabotage. "Imperial Intrigue" also features constant action and intrigue, and probably even surpasses the effort of the first book. Despite the lack of realism at times, it is really the story-line that gives these books any measure of success.

2. An informative historical picture.
Despite the presence of a few questionable anachronisms (such as Katy's strong anti-discrimination and pro-feminist sentiments, as well as the frequent portrayal of minority groups as Christian), both books give interesting historical information without being tedious. "Tracks of Deceit" passes on many interesting and accurate historical details about the construction of the transcontinental railroad project - without allowing the novel to degenerate into a history lecture. Especially the conflict between two rival railway construction companies and the conflict between the Irish and the Chinese laborers is finely portrayed. Similarly, "Imperial Intrigue" gives a fascinating portrait of the prairie setting, and the trials and triumphs of ranch life.

In short, if you are willing to overlook the over-sweetened sugar-coating of shallow soap opera theology, you can enjoy these books as mediocre mysteries. But at best, these books offer little more than a so-so story-line, shoddily dressed in a rather poor-quality garment of thin Christian content.

This book is really great. It is a great action book with alot of turns and thrills with a slight love story as well. I recommend this book to those who want a great book to read.

I found the text of this book to be too simple with very basic information but the photographs are great. It is suitable for those in grades 3-5. The simplicity of this book is compensated with the 60 step-by-step projects it includes which are a learning experience in themselves, quite easy to do and great for school projects. To list a few models one can make: Pyramid,Harpoon,Axe,Bow drill,Parthenon, Wooden Henge,Temple,Canoe and Boat. Other interesting projects include ancient food recipes,dyeing cloth,tiles mosaics,masks and clothing

This is the second book in the series. But, if you read the first one than you should know that this one follows the same pattern as the story unfolds. Fennia finds herself thrown together with the very powerful and rich Jeger Urquart. Jeger is now responsible for his two year old niece, while her parents are recovering from a bad car accident. Jeger doesn't know anything about kids so Fennia decides to help, she is familiar with Nikki since she works at the daycare that Nikki attends. Fennia finds Jeger to be a jerk, but is still attracted to him.

I have all three books in the series and they are all the same. The women come off as sassy and the men rich and powerful. The story is one sided. The entire story is told from Fennias perspective and we never know what Jeger is feeling until the very end. The story was good, but it could have been better.

When Merren was mugged Jarad helped to get her back on her feet even offered to replace the money that was stolen. Merren did not want to take the money, but she knew that she did not have a choice. Merren had every intention of paying Jarad back his money, but he offered her a job instead.

For the next year, Merren had to pretend to be Jarad's girlfriend. Jarad explains that its to keep his mother and sister from parading women in front of him. Merren agrees to this odd proposal, but she never realized how guilty she would feel for lying to his family. Merren also never expected to fall in love with Jarad. Somewhere along the way the line gets crossed between reality and a lie.

This was an interesting story, but a bit slow. Merren stands up to Jarad, who has done nothing but help her, but she lets her family walk all over her. I had a hard time feeling sorry for Merren when she let her family treat her like crap time and time again.

Entertaining novel for leisure time reading.A book not to be passed up.

I am giving it three stars because I have a 1988 Izusu Trooper. This book contains more information on the Isuzu cars and doesn't give enough info on the trucks. I have ordered the Chilton's Isuzu Amigo/Pick-Ups/Rodeo/Trooper Repair Manual. Hopefully that will be better. If you have an Isuzu car. You might find this more usefull.

The only reason that I gave this book only 3 stars is because it didn't meet my specific needs as well as I hoped. However I am not a "roughing it" kind of gal. We camp in a motorhome. For the person who is an avid hiker or backpacker-type camper, this book is marvelous. There aren't a lot of pages, so it is easy and lightweight to pack along and it offers many helpful suggestions on both food and drink. It could be a definite boon to the backpacker, so I would recommend it for this use. There are about 25 recipes (two or more per page) and several pages of suggested "easy to prepare" foods that can be purchased in the supermarket and are economical to carry. There is a section on drinking water safety and information about cookstoves, how to prepare coffee, etc. This is a book very well suited for a primitive camper, not necessarily an rv-er. An rv-er may find the few recipes helpful, though, if they enjoy cooking over the campfire.

Colonel Steele, a strict military man, as well as a man of his word, writes his memoirs in much the same way as he lived. His courage and bravery, as well as his honesty, come through just as history has recorded. He did not give praise lightly, nor did he speak ill of anyone without just cause. His word was his bond and not to be broken. A definite insight into the history of that period, as well as into the man himself.