The Florence City Pack did a great job of giving the top 25 sites to visit in Florence. The picutres were good as were the highlights of each cite. We also found the general city information to be helpful, for example, public restrooms and getting around.

Unfortunately, we found the hours of operation for each site were extremely unreliable, causing us to miss museums and try to build them into our schedule the next day. It seemed that this was the norm for most of the sites they listed. We ended up calling the places to get the visiting hours.

Overall, the book was helpful and easy to carry around because it fits into a pocket. The map was up to date and came in handy. I would reccommend the book as quick reference, but suggest getting a more comprehensive guide for detailed descriptions of the region and sites.

I found that this book gives lots of great ideas but i would have preferred to have them arranged in some type of age ranges. The book claims it intentionally arranged it without age ranges since each child is different. As a first time mom of an 11 mo. old. , many of the activities are for older kids. We can obviously do them later... but would like to be able to easily find those activities appropriate for his age.

Please tell me How can I buy that book.

Mr. Woolcott's first foray into science fiction is a commendable effort. In this short novel, he moves at break-neck speed thru a beautifully surprisin plot. Unfortunately, this leaves his characters somewhat underdeveloped. The story Mr. Woolcott tells is quite compelling and the hero is a fancinating young lady. This book is well structured and a good lead into the next book of the series that the title implies. I look forward to reading it!

Okay, I bought this book because I'm a punk and I thought that this would be highly entertaining to me...wrong. The only story I even like din here was the one by Poppy Z. Brite and it's a gothic story. The stories aren't bad at all they're just not what they say they are. xXx

Being a big fan of Perry's "Matador" series, I recently picked up a used copy of "Hellstar". While I enjoyed reading it, I can't really recommend it all that highly.

The book is set on a ship about halfway through a 50+-year journey from earth to Alpha Centauri. The ship is coasting at this point, and weight is provided by a rotating toroid. There are several subcultures specializing in things like working at the hub where there's no gravity, or working outside the ship, but there aren't any radical differences between groups. Most of the first generation crew members are still alive, so the ship still runs reasonably well, and the journey seems to be going pretty smoothly.

Then, of course, strange things start happening. There are weird temporary failures of basic laws of physics, escalating from subatomic particle experiments misbehaving, through failures in coriolis effects and eventually, far more serious things. The reasons for these failures are never really satisfactorily explained. There is some pseduo-physics mumbo-jumbo about macroscopic quantum effects and massless singularites, but it contains more than the usual proportion of handwavium[1].

The "science fiction" aspects of this story are, as a result, somewhat unsatisfactory. The description of the ship itself is good, but the "universe gone mad" eastern philosophy fusion bits really don't quite work. I've seen similar themes handled far better in many other works.

The real strength of the book is when it focuses on martial arts sequences or delves into Zen and the martial arts. There are major subplots involving a serial killer and political intrigue that are really the book's saving graces. Steve Perry has handled both far better in other works, however. You really can't beat his "Matador" series on that score.

I think Michael Reaves may be the weak point here. He was also a collaborator on "The Omega Cage", and that book also has some relatively weak science that detracts from the action. It could also be that this book was written fairly early in both authors' careers, and represents a time when they were still forming their respective styles.

I'd recommend this one only if you've already ready everything in the "Matador" series and are looking for something else by Steve Perry.

--
[1] Handwavium: n. 1. Any fictional substance or element used to explain how speculative technology might work. Example: "Dilithium crystals are made of pure handwavium." 2. Any argument known to be in contravention of one or more scientific principles, used to explain a technological plot device in a work of fiction.

Perry described the game of backgammon well and made it easy for even the newest player.

This book contains many inspiring examples, as well as do-it-yourself instructions, for designing landscapes in Florida. The landscape designs that are presented, photographed and discussed in this book provide nearly everything a Floridian needs to design and plant a landscape of their liking.

However, the treatment of native plants is very limited, and discussion of non-native nuisance plants is almost non-existent. We live in a state with so many beautiful, low-maintenance natives, as well as such an abundance of non-native nuisance plants, that I could not help but be disappointed by this aspect of the book. The one list of native landscape plants is extremely short and includes a few plants that are not native. Also, some of the recommended non-native plants in this book, most notably punk (melaleuca), are plants that are forbidden in several counties due to their tendency to escape cultivation and invade natural areas, crowding out the native plants that our wildlife need to survive.

Use this book to design your landscape and to get a general idea of which plants will do well in Florida. However, when selecting your plants, I recommend purchasing a good book on landscaping with native plants, such as Rufino Osorio's or Bob Haehle's, which are also available on amazon.com. This will insure that your landscape will not only look beautiful but will also require little water, pesticides or fertilizers and will be compatible with our wonderful natural environment.

Mints: A family of Herbs and Ornamentals
Barbara Perry Lawton

I would never have believed that you could write a whole book about mint. But then, I never knew the mint family (Lamiaceae or Labiatae) was such a huge one. It includes 67 genera, of which the commonest are lavender, oregano, nettle, thyme, bugle and rosemary.

Barbara Perry Lawton is a well-known garden writer in the US whose concise, factual style helps her pack a ton of information into each page. Much of her extensive research was done at the Missouri Botanical Garden, which reminded me what a huge asset a good botanical garden is in any community. I also learned that the Missouri Botanical Garden has a world-class collection of early (pre-Linnaean) botanical books. Some of the illustrations in this book are reproduced from drawings made over 400 years ago and they are what helps to make this book unique.

The writer has organized her material well, starting with the history of the mint family and moving on to discuss herbal mints, ornamental mints, weedy mints. After short sections on pests and the botany of mints the writer moves to "Catalogue of Mints" which takes up about half of the book. This contains useful descriptions of most of the genera and many of the species within them, nicely illustrated with line drawings.

There is a brief glossary, three pages of suggestions for durther reading and an index of plant names.

This is a professionally written and well-researched book, and deserves a place on the book shelf of anyone interested in herbs or botany.

Murder on the Aisle Four mystery stories entitled "It Was Bad Enough", narrated by Ron Goulart, "Snookered", narrated by Gerald Tomlinson, "The Waste Pile at Apple Bow", narrated by Joan Richter, and "A Slip of the Lip" narrated by Lawrence Treat. We listen to audio tapes in the car on vacations, and this is a very good one for that purpose because each is short enough to keep your interest yet long enough to make the miles go by quickly.