Ellis' fine work demonstrates that, unlike Jefferson, John Adams' vision of government still has much to teach us today. While Adams was blessed with a long and productive life, the author's focus on his retirement years deprives us of some insights and perspective on Adams' presidency and his days as an ambivalent leader of the revolutionary movement.

I would recommend this book highly; however, if you are only going to read one book on Adams, read John Ferlings' biography, which is broader in scope and just as well written.

Ellis' work focuses on the latter part of Adams' life. While it makes no claim to be a complete biography, the book serves as an excellent foundation for those seeking to learn more about our most underappreciated founding father. Through detailed comparisons with Jefferson - Adams' rival and close friend who has been treated more kindly by America's collective consciousness - Ellis begins to illuminate many levels of the New Englander's character. In doing so, he helps us understand why Adams was not, and probably never will be, adored by the nation he helped to create

I searched this book out after first reading Professor Ellis's outstanding character analysis of Thomas Jefferson in "American Sphinx". "Passionate Sage" was written before the Jefferson book (which won a National Book Award) and, as a critical analysis of John Adam's character , should be regarded as a companion piece to American Sphinx. The two books tell a similar story, but from the very different perspectives of Jefferson and Adams. With a fluent, gripping and readable style uncommon among professional historians, Professor Ellis makes a compelling case that the eccentric and volatile Adams is seriously underappreciated both for his towering contributions to this nation and for his unconventional yet oddly endearing personality. Anyone who likes American history should not miss this book.

I absolutely could not stop reading The Wisdom of Shepherds once I started reading it. The story held my attention more firmly than any book I've read in the past few years, and it moved my emotions in a strange way. The Wisdom of Shepherds is full of wisdom, suspense, good humor, and everything else one would expect from a good novel, and it was a delight to read. While the book addresses hard subjects and at times sad subjects, it manages to remain positive and hopeful throughout. The ending left me with a very happy, satisfied feeling.

The plot is not predictable, and it contains many hooks-- many questions for the reader to attempt to answer, many mysteries for the reader to attempt to solve. What strange thing had the old shepherd buried beneath his cottage when he was a young man? Who was the young woman's strange husband? For that matter, who was the strange young woman? Will the old shepherd work out his internal struggles? Will everyone find true love in the end? For that matter, will they find friendship?

The story begins one evening when an old shepherd makes his annual return to his crumbling little cottage, his shelter during the cold months. He is shocked to find that a strange young woman has moved into the cottage. He is also afraid that the thing he had buried beneath the cottage has been unearthed. We get all this in the first three or four pages. By the end of the first chapter, I was totally hooked.

Anyway, The Wisdom of Shepherds is now one of my favorite books of all time. Well worth reading.

The Wisdom of Shepherds is absolutely loaded with wisdom for insightful readers. The story line is pretty simple-- something anyone could enjoy regardless of age, but the depth of the wisdom is profound.

The story is about Old Caleb the Shepherd who spends part of his year in a crumbling old cottage on the outskirts of a small town. One year he returns to his cottage and finds a stranger living in it. At first he is worried that the stranger has or will discover the object he buried beneath the cottage-- and object which was to have remained secret forever.

Many strange things beging to happen in the old man's life, and he has to find ways of dealing with them. Change does not come easy for Old Caleb, but he manages it through the tough but tender Wisdom of Shepherds. The Wisdom of Shepherds is an amazing book-- truly one of the best I've ever read! It spoke to me on several levels.

The Wisdom of Shepherds is an excellent wisdom-story. I enjoyed the way it made its deep points, and the plot held my attention very well from beginning to end-- very exciting and spellbinding.

We are never told exactly when or where the story takes place-- it happens in a very timeless place, and the characters have a timeless quality about them. The setting has the feel of "once upon a time" though it is a book that can and should be enjoyed by adults (as well as intelligent children).

A wise old shepherd confronts a life changing situation when he discovers that a strange woman and her daughter have moved into his cottage. He tries very hard to understand and do the right thing and the best thing, but he confronts many challenges. He is very afraid that the object he buried beneath the cottage will be discovered.

I cannot tell you about the ending other than to say that I felt surprised and very happy. This book was so gripping that I could barely breathe for the last fifty pages or so.

There is some Christian content in the story, but I am absolutely certain that ANYONE who reads it will enjoy it as the religious aspect of the story is never forceful or pushy-- friends of several faiths have said they enjoyed the book.

There are many wonderful lessons in The Wisdom of Shepherds, and I am encouraging all my friends who have not done so yet to read it soon. Otherwise they risk not getting to collect some very important treasures of wisdom.

...After reading 'Literature Lost', I have found fresh ammunition for logically debating and disseminating the host of anti-intellectual literary "theories" and critiques concerning contemporary studies of the Humanities. Ellis book lays in conjunction a host of well-balanced perspectives and rebuttals into a systematic outline for understanding what exactly the problem pertains to.
The Amazon review already discusses the example of Tacitus, setting the tone for the mentality of the Race-Gender-Class critics and how their viewpoints are nothing new or original. As a complementary point to this, Ellis explains that questioning the Enlightenment and Western Culture by it's critics is a unique trait of the Enlightenment itself, since previous cultures never questioned the validity of the social, cultural, religious or class status in their own cultures. So the irony behind what the Race-Gender-Class critics think they are doing as unique is in fact a part of Western Civilization and the Enlightenment.
The same goes for the next point concerning the supposed "racism" that Race critics cry as isolated to Western Culture. This is true in the respect that "racism" was never questioned until the Enlightenment came along to challenge the notion of racial tribalism that historically pitted members of one racial community against another. When the Enlightenment came along it stressed the virtue of getting along with others for their ideas and achievements, and the result created the ideas that "racism" is itself immoral. The "Race" chapter also throws a little venom at the Post-colonial extremist Edward Said, targeting his hypocrisy of pretending to be a champion for values against racism but spits at the originators of the notion for supposed infractions of "Orientalism" and hegemony; a bogus notion undoubtedly.
Ellis reserves the bulk of the personal critique on Frederic Jameson-a lover of Marxism (this will come as no surprise as we will see later) who blindly and continuously espouses Marxist theory as a viable perception of literature and economics. Jameson deserves particular wrath by espousing these views in the face of the mounting evidence of against Marxism and the evils resulted, which Ellis expounds upon in detail.
'Literature Lost' doesn't preserve itself solely to de-bunking illegitimate literary theories but also to more effective methods of assessing literary studies; his utilization of quasi-scientific reasoning and logic for uncovering the meanings behind a literary work seem particularly intriguing, as well as the endorsement of Leo Spitzer's work "Linguistics and Literary History".
The second to last chapter "Is theory to Blame?" discusses yet another problem reaching both in and out of literary studies: revisionist history. Ellis provides the factors behind the recent trends of revisionist history, trends pertaining to either careless documentation (or lack thereof) of the facts, or the malicious manipulation and changing of the facts by the critics with both overt and covert political agendas. The perspectives offered here are causes for concern considering people like Said and Jameson have thousands of followers in academic departments spewing these theories of race and class oppression...

DR. ELLIS HAS DONE A GREAT SERVICE TO ACADEMIA BY WRITING THIS BOOK.HE EXPOSES THE VARIOUS FLAKES THAT SIT IN TENURED POSITIONS MAKING DISGRACEFULLY HYPER-EMOTIONAL CLAIMS/DENIGRATIONS AGAINST THE VALUE OF WESTERN SOCIETY/CULTURE, ALL WHILE "SUFFERING" UNDER THE "OPPRESSIVE" YOKE OF THE CAPITALIST/DEMOCRATIC SYSTEM .THEY BIDE THEIR TIME BY SPEAKING OUT AT WELL PAID SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS WHERE THEY CAN VENT THE FULL EXTENT OF THEIR SORROW FOR THE "PROLETERIAT",WHILE FIGHTING "THE SYSTEM" AT THEIR LEISURE OF COURSE. ELLIS' EXPLANATION IN CHAP.1 ON THE ORIGINS OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS ARE AS USUAL FOR HIM WRITTEN IN A CLEAR,"DIRECT" LANGUAGE.I THOUGHT SO HIGHLY OF THIS BOOK,THAT I LENT IT TO A PHD CANDIDATE I KNOW,WHO AFTER READING THIS,QUERIED THE OTHER 9 CANDIDATES AT HER COLLEGE AND FOUND THAT EXCEPT FOR HER EVERY OTHER STUDENT WAS DOING RACE/GENDER/CLASS SUBJECTS(another topic Ellis tackles).HIS "DE-STRUCTION" OF THE PERVERSE RAMBLINGS OF FREDRIC JAMESON ARE WORTH THE PURCHASE PRICE ALONE.ANYONE WHO HAS THE IDEA OR BELIEF IN THE PEACEFUL EXISTENCE AMONG AND BETWEEN PRIMITIVE SOCIETIES SHOULD READ THE BOOK BY ROBERT EDGERTON CALLED"SICK SOCIETIES-THE MYTH OF PRIMITIVE HARMONY" ALONG WITH THIS BOOK,AND YOU JUST MAY APPRECIATE HOW WELL WE LIVE IN THE WEST,NOT PERFECT,BUT BETTER.

This is an excellent book, but ultimately a very sad one. The shortcomings of contemporary 'literary' fads and fashions are identified and effectively countered, but that is likely to make very little difference in practice.

Issues of Race, Class, and Gender are of enormous importance in our society and they should be addressed using the most sophisticated professional means at our disposal. Literature departments, however, do not utilize the methods of analysis of the social and natural sciences and these issues are significantly elucidated through such methods. Instead, we have something much more akin to passionate advocacy than dispassionate analysis.

For example, the fact that Ellis successfully demonstrates such things as palpable errors in logic will make no difference to advocates. They will respond by claiming that logic is a tool of oppression rather than an independent check on sloppy thinking. They have, in effect, so structured the 'debate' that objections to their positions will not be met with counter arguments or counter evidence, but by ad hominem attacks and allegations of racism, sexism, and so on.

Rather than bring the full strengths of the academy to bear on issues of great importance, the discussion is politicized in ways that are quite familiar. What could be a reasoned discussion of an important issue becomes a shouting match between a James Carville and an Ann Coulter. Meetings which might be convened for the exchange of scholarly information become support sessions in which prejudices are confirmed and dissenting voices silenced. Rather than marshalling intellectual support, advocates marshal political support.

This is very sad, not just because it undercuts the position and purposes of the academy, but because it precludes any analysis of important issues that might challenge prevailing orthodoxy. It is also sad because the viable alternatives to such practices (outliving the proponents, waiting for or even attempting to hasten the eventual exodus of students, deploring this state of affairs before the general public and funding sources) do damage to an enterprise that is inherently good and worthy.

In reading any novel you bring a certain amount of yourself and your experiences with others to the table, which helps you to understand the characters you meet. For me it was difficult to comprehend the relationship between Paul and his mother; it is unlike anything I've experienced before, and I can't imagine the feelings he had or how they affected his relationships with his lovers.

Paul and Miriam were a trifle difficult, as well, though I was closer to getting it with them. One fo my problems was that I kept projecting personality characteristics onto Miriam as I grew to know her (sometimes verging on stereotypes), only to understand later that that wasn't who she was, that she too was unlike anyone I had met before, though similar in some respects. I would like to read Lawrence's account of the real person whom Miriam was based on.

The characters in Sons and Lovers are people that will ultimately expand your understanding of human nature, but for me, their motivations were so foreign that I didn't entirely grasp them the first time around. The best I could do was recognize that Lawrence was depicting very real people in a very detailed and compassionate way. I, however, remained out of the loop for most of the book.

The most I gained from Sons and Lovers was a detailed sketch of life in early 20th centurey England. It was interesting to note that, despite the stereotype of the proletariat during the industrial revolution, being a coal miners family did not automatically relegate you to a lifetime of poverty. Not only did the miners make decent enough wages to afford a house, furniture, good food and several pints of beer a week, but for a man (at least) of other talents, the sky was the limit as to how far he could go.

Sons and Lovers is intense, exciting, intriguing: cleverly sculpted scenes with double entenders indicate the sexual tensions that exist between Paul and his mother and with Miriam. This book is also a study in the shifting narrative technique; he is a pioneer and the bridge between the conventional pre-20th century omniscient narrative and authors such as Joyce and Woolf, where the very storyline consists of jumps between the personal emotions and opinions of the various characters of a novel. DH Lawrence is proof that quality literature with a distinct sexual edge CAN be produced. Bravo!

A tour de force! Bravo. It is story of Paul Morel who loves his mother more than himself. Mrs. Morel who is married to a ignorant, illiterate coal miner tries to find comfort, solace and love in her sons, first with Walter and when Walter dies unexpectedly, with Paul, the second son. She lives for him, he for her. She is so possessive of him that she objects his involvement with his first love, Miriam. He then goes after, Clara, a married woman. The book revolves around Paul and these three desperate women, who comfort him, torture him and
he scornfully resiprocates. But he is always faithful to his mother , who he adores. I guess we are all like Paul, in some
ways. Miriam is a haunting character who reverberates in the entire book, so innocent, pure, religious, pious and madly in love with Paul. Clara, on the other hand, very rigid, calculating, demanding and yet very vulnerable. In Paul we see callousness, sacrifice, piety, haughtiness, repentance, a bit of Roskolnikov, a young man whose life is torn between a adoring mother and two lovers. In the end his high spirits and intellegence prevail and he conquers his demons.

I am an e-commerce architect mainly dealing with technical part of the e-commerce rather than the business side of it. I heard good things about the authors' class (I belive it is a lot more technical) that is being taught at the SMU in Dallas so I decided to pick up the book thinking it will save me from attending a $5,000 class.

Well, this book is not for those people with technical backgrounds but for those management/business people who doesn't understand the basic concept of what it needs to run succesful e-commerce web sites. If you fit in that category it should be a worthwhile reading I belive. It will give you a good general background info.

I would say this is still better than the most e-commerce books I've read but still not good enough. If you are an engineer/programmer/analyst, then don't bother too much with this book.

As an IT professional, I was a bit (just a bit) disappointed with the content of book. The authors have done a very good job in including almost all points that need to be looked into in an e-commerce environment, but as in all "all-in-one" books, some areas, especially those that fall into the realm of business strategy, are left weak. Even in the first four chapters, where e-commerce strategies and approaches are set out, I felt an inclination towards the technical side of e-commerce. However, the book is very successful in conveying different architectures, together with the pros and cons, to the reader who has the basic knowledge about internet technology. I believe that this is not enough to "build the e-empire", but the book has enough potential to act as an infrastructural guide and a reference for e-commerce deployment projects, especially for project managers and executives.

This book provides an introduction to the various technical and business aspects of e-commerce for the small to medium business owner or manager. The authors begin by stressing the importance of e-commerce and tremendous growth potential for companies that do it right. After a few brief case studies, they delve into some of the more technical aspects, such as how a company can connect its databases to off-the-shelf e-commerce software. They describe what a server does and give an overview of the features of the top-selling server software. They also summarize the possibilities for electronic payments and how they work, as well as the kinds of security that are needed in various parts of an e-commerce network and why. The final chapters in the book provide an in-depth look at online auctions, project deployment, and their own e-commerce program of study.

All in all, the book sticks to the surface of many of the technical issues, so readers without a great deal of technical expertise should have no trouble understanding it. On the other hand, if you are looking for technical details, you may want to go beyond the level of this book.

Okay, I realize I might be over-emphatic on exactly how much I love this book but I LOVE THIS BOOK. If you ever feel the need to read a novel depicting life in a certain lifestyle,(especially if that craving reaches to college kids in the mood), then this is the book for you. I've now read it at least twenty times, and each time I can't help but get sucked into the characters and their lifestyle. The author uses a unique method of "showing the world through their eyes" to develop the characters and allow the reader to fully understand exactly what each character is thinking at any particular time. The description provided of the plot does not do it justice. This is more than just a book about three college kids, it's about a whole generation, and how anything can be different if you look at it from the right angle. No surface characters here, this novel brings you to the heart of the matter, and once there, you never want it to end. If you like Irvine Welsh, you'll love Bret Easton Ellis.

After seeing the film version of "American Psycho" I was compelled to read the book. I became almost obsessed with AP--a funny, frightening, daring book. Since then I've been meaning to get my hands on more of Ellis's work. I was trying to decide between this and anotehr Ellis book, and since I'm in college myself decided to go with Rules of Attraction. A great, fun, interesting, thought provoking book. Now, I believe AP was probably Ellis's masterpiece, but Rules was very much the college, early 20's version of the world Patrick Bateman lived in.
The character I felt most for was Paul, who seemed the most genuine of the three main characters. Sean was frustrating and entertaining. Lauren was an interesting character, but her obsession with Victor became somewhat tedious at times.
However, the book was great, and oddly enough I hadnt' realized that Sean was the infamous Patrick's brother till the end. Sean was so different from Patrick (well, for one he wasn't psychotic) it never occured to me until he mentioned Patrick. And I did get a quick smile out of the brief appearance by Patrick--acting sane, oddly enough. I may have to go back and read Sean's appearance in AP.
A good book I read in 2 days! Not as "funny" as AP, but very good nonetheless!

IT'S 1985, FALL, NEW HAMPSHIRE.

Lauren's a pretty, virgin-type, yet she's not as chaste as she seems. Born with good looks and great money, Lauren is focused on what major she should choose and why the heck her boyfriend, Victor, won't call her--even if he's in Europe. Lauren's ex Paul's bi--sensitive, lovable, and sensible getting over his lost love, Mitchell--while looking at Sean. Semi-junkie and alcholic Sean's no one's ex, but sure would love to be with Lauren, who's like an angel to Sean, even though he does everyone he basically wants--which is almost half the school.

I found this book so funny and so interesting and so realistic. It's like something I would love to read. I read Bret Easton Ellis's first book, Less Than Zero, and fell in love with it. Then I picked up The Rules of Attraction, 'cause I heard it was an OK movie and I hadn't seen it, so I decided to read it. It's amazing how someone can make a love triangle at an unconvential college seem so tasty and real. I wonder what his secret is.

Anyway, get this book! It's amazing, raw, different, smart, realistic, fresh, and edgy.

There is some legitimacy for questioning Joseph Ellis' scholarship of Jefferson independently of his personal veracity. Does his analysis itself hold up to scrutiny?

In at least one significant sense, no, it doesn't. The genetic connection between Jefferson and Sally Hemings of which Ellis is assured is anything but, which Professor Ellis surely knows himself since one of his co-authors on the inflammatory 1998 report "Jefferson Fathered Slave's Last Child" was the author of the DNA study itself, and who publicly stated as much himself.

Eugene Foster told the journal Nature that his study found only that Thomas Jefferson *could* have been the father of Eston Hemings, not that he was. He pointed out that in fact the type of testing done was incapable of proving such a thing. All the DNA analysis revealed was that *some* Jefferson male very likely fathered a child by Sally Hemings. Since DNA comparisons were made with regard to Jefferson's uncle, not Jefferson himself, over two dozen Jefferson males living at the time were possible candidates, several of whom were present at Monticello during the time Hemings conceived her last son.

Contemporary evidence points strongly to Randolph Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson's brother, who had such a close acquaintance with the slave community at Monticello that they referred to him as "Uncle Randolph." Some of the same evidence can be seen to point to Thomas Jefferson as the father, but such an interpretation requires one to believe that the forty-four-year-old U.S. ambassador to France chose to have an affair with the teenaged slave half-sister of his wife who by more than one account was incapable of taking herself, much less the ambassador's daughters to whom she was charged. You be the judge.

So what does this say about Joseph Ellis' scholarship? Clearly for him to declare as he has that "Now we know," concerning the truth of the Jefferson/Hemings relationship, is irresponsible and injudicious at best, since such an assertion is factually incorrect. When combined with his own personal prevarications and embellishments, such a willingness to bend facts to support a purely subjective opinion makes trusting his judgement in accurately reporting and adjudging history and historical figures much more difficult. I, for one, am now deeply skeptical of his work, and believe others should be, too. That he writes well isn't in question. That he's right, is.

Joseph Ellis deserves the Pulitzer Prize! As a Jefferson researcher who has been through everything written about, and more important, by Thomas Jefferson, I don't always agree with the author's subjective opinions on topics for which I believe objective conclusions must be found, as I did in my book "WEST POINT" about Thomas Jefferson & West Point. Nevertheless, that is always debatable. Not debatable is the fact that the author and his editors have done a stellar job.

I enjoyed reading "American Sphinx" by Joseph J. Ellis. It's a well written description of Thomas Jefferson as an enigmatic, sphinx-like figure of American history. I recommend it. I also recommend "West Point: Character, .... Thomas Jefferson" by Norman Thomas Remick. It brings Thomas Jefferson into clear focus.

Sarina. Nicole. Bitty Jack. If you read this book, these are three names you will not soon forget. All meet at different times, their lives intertwineing to create one of the most devilishly funny novels I have read in a long time. Let's start with Sarina who is outstandingly beautiful-and know's it. Ever since she was a child she would stop at nothing to get her way,eventually using sex as her most handy tool. She carefully follows every instruction that her mother gives her to ensure her high southern social standing, and marriage to wealthy man, as soon as the right one is found. But do her looks get her everything that she wants? ...Next we have Nicole. The self mutalator, who is obsessed with Sarina, who would do anything for "Ree", but she is also the one who Sarina abandens, and this takes a serious tole on the already deranged girl. Being seen as a failure to her mother probably didn't help either. When she finally mentally breaks down, the results are unbelievable... Sweet, sweet Bitty Jack is the last main character in this book. The dorky one, the one with glasses and acne whose parents are campsground keepers. She means well, and is works hard for what she has. Unfortunatly, Sarina keeps her from getting what she deserves, and more. This is a book about competition, betrayal, and perhaps most importantly revenge. When all of the girls are in one way or another reunited all at once, you can't help but keep the pages turning to find out what crazy stunt has just been pulled, each one will leave you wide-eyed in shock. Ending in a blood bath, this book is truely an original in every way.

Sugar and spice and everything nice is not necessarily what the three girls from Alabama this book centers on are made of. Under the pretty smiles and perfectly groomed facade of Sarina Summers lies a calculating, often cruel girl who will stop at nothing to get her way. Her friend Nicole Hicks a is truly disturbed girl who is obsessed with Sarina. The third in this trio of young girls is poor plain looking Bitty Jack Carlson who it seems would have nothing in common with the other two, and in fact, she doesn't. The intertwining of these three lives and the lives of their parents set amid the social climbing south is a delicious, though sometimes shocking, journey to see who is better than who & who is keeping up with the Joneses. I read it in one sitting and was really, pleasantly surprised by the ending.

I have lived in Alabama my entire life, and I graduated from Auburn University. I have many friends who went to Bama, and I have visited there many times. There was always a strange feeling there. And Helen Ellis, even though it is fiction, brought that feeling to the pages. It is a fresh bold bloody first novel. I respect her for consistantly raising the stakes higher and higher each page. The book leaves you wanting more, sort of like most of Sarina's boyfriend's. It left me unable to sleep. I kept thinking about it all night. She is brave for dragging out those girls that many of us have inside, or know someone like. It is disturbing to know that the greek system was portrayed not so very far from the truth. It is Southern Gothic. It is fiction. But there is enough truth involved for you to suspend everything you know for a few hours, and believe Helen Ellis. Go down into the rabbit hole. I bet this will upset our states sorority girls. Well, come to think of it-I bet they don't read much anyway. Sorry, I had to say that.

As someone just beginning to read books about finance and investment, I found this book interesting but repetitive. Perhaps it is important to keep drumming in the same messages: (1) the odds of beating the market by timing purchases of individual stocks are very low; (2) the asset allocation of your portfolio has more impact on your ultimate success than which stocks (mutual funds, whatever) you choose. While I did find the arguments compelling, I also heard them the first time and didn't need to see them again on every page. Fortunately, the book is short (certainly price per page quite high), therefore the repetition comes to an end before too long.

I was attracted by both the title "winning the loser's game" and the big names who wrote the recommendations - Abby Cohen, Peter Drucker, Bryon Wien...You seldom find them placed together on the same back cover. After I read thru it, I do agree with their praise, but not more.

This book is an extension and a modification of Mr. Ellis's ground breaking paper in 1975, a piece of the early groundwork of contemporary investment philosophy - The Portfolio Theory, that investors can never beat the market in the long run by market timing, and that return is always proportional to the amount of market risk one takes, (the Capital Asset Pricing Model stuff). Investors therefore should consider their own conditions well to determine the level of risk to be taken and to choose the right type/span of investment or investment fund or fund managers, blah blah blah, things you should have heard of if you are a frequent attendant in mutual/index fund sales events or investment seminars.

As a CFA charterholder, I have no problem in knowing what the core message is all about. (Mr. Ellis had chaired AIMR, the parent association of CFA. I found that on the bottom flip of the book cover) However, I doubt it very much whether a normal investor can appreciate that or not. The dilemma being that if you understand the book well (which I do), you might find the book a little bit boring (137 pages of one major message and mediocre writing skill). If you cant understand it that well, you will have little impetus to read on. In either case, you are playing the loser's game.

This book is based on a famous article written by Mr. Ellis in 1975, "The Loser's Game," that showed why professional money managers are unable to beat the market averages in 90 percent of the cases. In fact, the harder they try, the more likely they are to lose by increasing trading costs and mistiming their trades. The first two editions of this book were aimed at providing solutions to that dilemma for professional money managers. Mr. Ellis provides consulting advice to such professional money managers, and is in a good position to know what he is talking about. This edition is aimed at the needs of the neophyte individual investor. It is especially timely as we near the end of 2 decades of almost continual bull markets for equities.

The beauty of this book is that it is simple and easy to understand. Ellis designed it for anyone who has a genuine interest in getting good investment results, is willing to develop an appreciation for market fundamental, and has the discipline to pick an approach and stick to it.

In various chapters, the book describes why professionals do so poorly, and how the individual can have the same problems if not careful.

The key points of the book are that you need to establish your long-term investment objectives in writing, and with the expert advice of professionals, determine a well-reasoned and realistic set of investment plans that can help you achieve your objectives. You should set your asset mix at the highest ratio of equities you can afford financially and emotionally for the long-term. However you do this, don't try to beat the market. That's a loser's game. He emphasizes not making mistakes, not losing money relative to the market, staying in the market, and realizing that your real problem is beating inflation rather than the market. In general, doing less will be doing more. Avoid speculations, shifting funds continuously, and paying too much attention to near-term performance.

A good companion book for this one is John Bogle's recent one, Common Sense on Mutual Funds, that articulates many of Ellis' points in more detail and more graphically. As a historical note, Bogle writes in his preface to Ellis' book that he was inspired by Ellis' original article to make Vanguard's first indexed mutual fund in 1975.

In thinking about the advice here, I'm not sure that everyone needs professional advice to come out in the right direction. If you decide that you primarily want to pursue indexed mutual funds, there is little need for advice, for example. But if you do opt for advice, be sure you watch out for vested interests in the person giving the advice.

Also, the book doesn't do enough to address the conflicted feelings that people have about money. If you don't address those, you won't carry through on your discipline. I suggest that you read any of the excellent books on that subject and do the exercises in them.

I also suggest you find the calmest, sanest person you know who is good with investments (but is not an investment professional) and ask them to review how you are doing annually. This will help you keep your discipline. A parent, spouse, or good friend could be an appropriate choice for this role. Share this book with them first, so they will know what you are trying to do. Then explains your ideas, and spell them out on paper. Chances are you will outdo what you would otherwise accomplish.

Good luck in outperforming inflation!

Donald Mitchell

Coauthor of The Irresistible Growth Enterprise and The 2,000 Percent Solution

(donmitch@fastforward400.com)

Let me start by saying that as a diehard fan of superhero comics, I found the Authority to be a wonderful read. The characters, especially Jenny Sparks, are interesting and the variety of powers in the group is good.

However, that said, let me turn to what I didn't like. As intriguing as the characters are, they suffer from a lack of depth. Apart from a few tantalizing scenes, we get almost nothing of their personal lives. The Doctor in particular is a total enigma. Each of the two story arcs in this collection present the team with a massive threat to defeat, which they of course do. But what else if there? Warren Ellis is a fine writer, but here I think he allows the concept to take precedence over the characters.

I would suggest to anyone who buys this volume that they continue with the ongoing series. Even though Ellis left four issues after the stories presented here, it continues to develop and even improve on what you get in Relentless.

In conclusion, if you can only buy one collection, pick up Ellis' Planetary: Around the World instead and then start getting the ongoing monthly Authority series.

The Authority is a secret global-protection group ('superheroes') who protects the earth from things 'normal' human agencies can't handle. Things that aren't known to the general public. With a wide variety of superpowered 'humans' they are pretty well equiped in every situation.
Although this series spawned off the earlier 'Stormwatch' title, you needn't be too familiair with it. Knowledge about what happened in Stormwatch is a pre, not a must. It's not like you'll miss out on anytthing vital in here if you haven't read it, only you'll know some more on the back-ground of SOME characters if you have (not all).
This first collection collects #1-8 of the series, which are basically divided in two four-part sub-plots (the complete Warren Ellis run/storyline goes on for another four issues in the second volume, along with the first four Mark Millar-written issues).

Storywise intro:
The first sub-arc is called "The Circle". A dictator/tyrant ruler of the island called 'Gamorra' is trying to put his mark on the rest of the world in a rather brutal, unconventional way. It's up to the top-secret global defensive group "Authority" to put him to a stop. In this arc the group is forming and deciding who it's members are gonna be. It's mostly used as an explanation to the reader who the characters, led by Jenny Sparks, are and what they are about (powers, a little background and such).
The second story-arc is called "Shiftships". Earth is under attack by creatures from an alternative earth. Jenny Sparks knows these creatures (half humans) from her past, but she was convinced they were long dead. The question is how to stop them, but luckily Jenny has an ace up her sleeve which should give her group a fair chance. The intentions of the invaders get revealed to be even worse than first pressumed though.
In here you learn more about the ways of the Authority. It's wise to pay good attention here on subjects as 'the bleed' (in which they travel) because it is pretty vague at first but important in the long haul.

Overall my conclussion is that this is a pretty nice title. It's not ALL that but it's certainly above average and won't be a waste of your money (which is a good thing in this day and age of comicdom). Compared to the other Warren Ellis Wildstorm title (Planetary) this one is artwise a little better. Having said that I'll be quick to add that storywise Planetary is better by far. The biggest problem with Authority is lack of debt character-wise. These people do the things they do but miss an explained motivation. Were Planetary is very slow in revealing it's characters fully, it has a certain thing that makes you curious about them, making every revelation anticipated and welcome. It keeps you wanting to read on. That doesn't happen at all here and curiousness isn't sparked. That's a shame because otherwise it could have been great I think. But still, worthy of 4 outta 5 stars.

In the '70's comic book writers began to add greater depth of characterization and take on adult themes, and for the most part this was a welcome change. Books like Alan Moore's Miracleman and V for Vendetta; Los Bros Hernandez' Love & Rockets; Garth Ennis work on Hellblazer and Preacher; (and so many others) did more than entertain, they actually enriched my life. It was (and still is) a great time to be reading comics.

Yet the attempt to add meaning can become portentious or simply pretentious. Over-complex characterization can result in intermindable soap operas that go nowhere. And sometimes, you just want to "kick it" (in both senses of the phrase). In this sense, Warren Ellis & Bryan Hitch's twelve issue run on The Authority (the first 8 of which are reprinted here) represents a breath of fresh air. Yes, it helps to have read Stormwatch, but then it helps to have read Batman before reading JLA. Ellis does introduce interesting ideas & character development; but he does so in a piecemeal fashion the better to keep the emphasis on the action. And for once it's worth it.

People called The Authority, "the JLA (or the Avengers) finally done right," and I have to agree. Ellis & Hitch do it so well! Realistic cinematic art with a touch of grandeur, incredible world-shattering threats, Jenny Sparks "appallingly bad attitude," and a group willing and able to force change on a global scale, not just to neutralize the enemy but to build "a finer world" whatever the vested interests arrayed against them. It's been a wild ride and great fun to boot: the comic book equivalent of a really well made summer blockbuster action movie. Turn off your brain and give it a try. (Again) for once, it's worth it.