There were two reasons why I picked up this book: the first being that it was illustrated by Lisbeth Zwerger, whose art I greatly admire, and the second because "Swan Lake" is one of my favorite ballets. Unfortunately, this book turned out to be a real disappointment for me. Those familiar with the ballet know of its unhappy conclusion. However, originally the ballet was written with a happy ending which was preserved in this edition. I am not against happy endings, but the way it was presented was too bare bones---no meat at all. Boy meets girl, boy loses girl, girl quickly forgives boy and they live happily ever after, the end. Both the narration and characters were flat and left me indifferent. Even Zwerger's illustrations lacked a certain something. I would recommend treating a child to Tchaikovsky's music than this work. For those wishing to enjoy Zwerger's superb art, as well as a captivating story should check out "Dwarf Nose", "The Wizard of Oz", "Alice in Wonderland", and if you are able to obtain them in an out-of-print shop, "The Deliverers of Their Country" and "The Nutcracker".

"With a flash, the lake was bathed in a shimmering light, and before him stood the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. 'I am the Swan Queen,' she said. `I am the swan that you tried to kill.'" The somber but beautiful drama of Tchaikovsky's brilliant ballet. "Swan Lake," has been transformed into an elegant picture book for children retold and illustrated by Lisbeth Zwerger, and translated by Marianne Martens. Zwerger - a Hans Chrisitan Andersen Medal-winner for lifetime achievement - is in glorious form here. Her mysterious paintings are filled with emotion, urgency, light and shadow, while her formal, dramatic text is as radiantly ethereal as the Swan Queen herself. Few contemporary princess tales can come close to providing the grace and majesty contained in the breathless passages here. It's a thing of beauty to be cherished. Next to "The Nutcracker," "Swan Lake" is the most popular ballet for young children, so the natural appeal of this book is great, particularly for budding ballerina's in training prone to their own flights of fancy.

"Once upon a time, all you needed was the right mix of enough evil and a good spell to transform a person into a tree, a rock, or even an animal. In those days, there lived a prince..." So begins award winning author and illustrator, Lisbeth Zwerger's, captivating retelling of Tchaikovsky's, Swan Lake. Her eloquent prose is filled with imagery and magic, and enhanced by evocative illustrations in soft, dreamy hues. Together word and art dazzle, and bring the beautiful story of love found and lost, to life on the page. Unlike the beloved and familiar ballet, Ms Zwerger gives her adaptation an upbeat, happily-ever-after ending. As she explains in her Author's Note, Tchaikovsky wrote the original fairy tale dance in 1871 as a gift to his sister's children. It retained the "love conquers all" happy ending when he premiered his full length ballet six years later. It wasn't until after his death, sixteen years later, that the story was reworked by his brother and given the now famous tragic ending. Perfect for youngsters 7 and older, Swan Lake is both an engaging, read aloud fairy tale, and a marvelous introduction to the wonders of ballet, that should whet the appetite and send you looking for a recording and performance.

I was compelled to buy this book because my Dad grew up reading the original Tom Swift books and I grew up reading the Tom Swift, Jr. books in the 50's and 60's. I had never had a chance to read any of the original stories until I found this website and when I did, well, nostalgia took over.

This book is fun to read both for the story, which for Tom Swift fans from the 60's is in keeping with those stories, and for the flavor of the early 1900's. This book was written in about 1910 and the grammar and "dialogue" are of that era. Anyone who has read a book by a modern day writer trying to write as if he was in 1910 will be able to feel the difference. Tom's adventures are what you would expect in a book aimed at pre-teens, but the "Science" he uses is 1910 and presents the reader with a wonderfull picture of ordinary life in that era.

I highly recommend this book for anyone who wishes to get a view of 1910 regardless of whether or not the reader is a former Tom Swift Jr., Hardy Boys, or Nancy Drew fan.

In this sequel to Tom Swift and His Motor-Cycle, Tom purchases the motorboat used by the gang in their nefarious activities. In the midst of his competition with Andy Foger, Tom discovers that someone is tampering with his boat. Who is tampering with the boat, and what are they up to? As usual, Tom combines his love of things mechanical with his boyish energy and big heart to help his friends and bring the villains to justice.

Once again, this book is also a wonderful window on the United States of 1910. While reading, you can see the comparative simplicity of mechanical devices back then, and the simplicity of life. Tom Swift presents a good role model, which is a definite plus, and the story is quite fascinating.

Eradicate Sampson, the African-American character is back, but this time the racial epithets are missing, which goes a long way towards making the story acceptable. This book begins with a synopsis of the first one, so let me suggest that this book may actually be a better starting point for reading the series. Overall this was a great book, and I highly recommend it.

This fine facsimile of a classic 1910 boys' adventure book would make a beautiful gift. Young people up to about age 14 would love it. Tom discovers a secret tunnel dug by criminals to access Swift Enterprises grounds and steal his secrets. He soups up a motorboat to get double the original speed. At one point, he fights for his life as he tries to outrace a boat full of gunmen from a criminal gang. Tom is kidnapped and imprisoned, but escapes. The style is lucid, simple, and clean for young readers. The setting of 1910 adds an exotic quality to today's readers. These were the best-selling boys books of all time, with possible exception of Hardy Boys. Your son or grandson would love it. In a beautiful reprint of the original edition.

This book introduces heroine Peggy O'Neill, a campus cop at a large university. Professor Adam Warren has called to report loud music coming from neighboring fraternity houses. By the time Peggy shows up at the professor's office, he is dead. Peggy is supposed to turn the case over to local law enforcement officers, but she decides to carry on a parallel investigation of her own. Her investigation almost causes her to lose her job, and then her life, but she is able to sift through the list of suspects and finally to discover the killer. O'Neill is a feisty and likeable heroine and this is a promising beginning to a mystery series.

This book has good character development and good story. The entire series has shown a character with flaws and fears while providing a great story.

This is the second of a two-volume set, which includes some of the writings of the Early Church. Every work in this two-volume set was (almost certainly, to my knowledge) written before the year 200.

As with the other volume in the series, the format is great, with Greek on the left and the English translation on the right, with references to any relevant scriptural passages. It also includes footnotes and textual variants in most cases. There's an introduction to each author briefly sketching the history of each text, manuscripts used, etc - thoroughly academic, but just as easily ignored if you really don't care. The size of the book is great, I can easily throw it in almost any coat pocket.

"The Shepherd (Pastor) of Hermas" was written just prior to the year 150. It's the largest work in the series, it runs about 150 pages (300 if you count the Greek), and is broken up into three sections: Visions, Mandates, and Similitudes. It was seriously considered as a candidate for canonization during the years when the canon of scripture was in flux. For that reason alone, it should be read carefully, and it's contents honestly considered. If many Christians in the second century considered it that seriously for canonization, then the contents of Hermas must have enough similarity with the content of the Apostolic proclamation to offer us _some_ insight into it's original nature. The only drawback to this translation of Hermas (and I don't know that it's the same case for any other translations) is that for a moderate chunk of the work - somewhere after p.87 - there is only one textual witness which the translators had to work from.

The Martyrdom of Polycarp is just what the title claims it to be. Polycarp was the bishop of the Church of Smyrna, and according to early witnesses was instructed in the faith by the Apostle John himself. He may very well be the "angel of the Church at Smyrna" referenced in The Revelation of John. His venerable dignity and uprightness are evident in the delightful narrative account.

The Epistle to Diognetius has some sections that are wonderful to read (if you're a Christian, otherwise you'll either fall deeply in love with them as well, or you'll find the whole thing far too rhetorical and nearly nauseating). It's a letter, in which the author is trying to persuade someone by the name of Diognetius towards embracing the Christian faith, by arguing against non-Christian ideas and commending the poetry and nobility of the Christian life. I will quote one line that appears towards the end of the Epistle, which I'm rather fond of:

"He was from the beginning, and appeared new, and was proved to be old, and is ever young, as he is born in the hearts of the saints."

I really like the format of this book. The original languages (Greek and/or Latin) on the left and English on the right. The translation, while trying to be accurate, is hard to read at times.

The writings themselves are classics. I especially enjoy the Martyrdom of Polycarp. You see the faith and strength of an old bishop as he glorifies God in martyrdom.

Brinkerhoff's little guide is just the right size for stuffing into the pocket of your cargo shorts or daypack, and it covers a fair sampling of short and easy South Salt Lake City and American Fork area hikes especially suited for hikers with limited abilities or families with small children. Also, the brief hike descriptions, with trailhead info, trail notes, distance and hiking time estimates, are generally helpful and reliable. But this book falls short of its potential, for it could easily have been greatly improved without sacrificing its convenient size or adding much to its cost simply by adding a few more details to some of the hike descriptions, extending the coverage a bit to include a few more popular and spectacular local hikes, and especially, by improving the trail maps.

Having hiked every trail in the book, many with this text (and others) in hand, I routinely found myself correcting or supplementing Brinkerhoff's cursory trail descriptions and hand-drawn maps (which are currently little more than wiggly dotted lines with a few essential features like paved roads, trailheads and lakes) with such things as as elevation, distance, topography and terrain notes, maps of converging trails, and occasionally, minor corrections. Admittedly, some of the trails covered in the book don't actually require anything more than instructions to the trailhead, but most of them connect with other trails the reader might want either to follow or avoid, and in such cases better descriptions and maps would be a genuine help. And since the book is so small (and admirably so, for it is by far the most portable of the many Utah trail books available), it could easily have been expanded to cover a greater number of short and popular local trails--like Ensign Peak, Provo's Rock Canyon, and a host of candidates from Sandy and Millcreek Canyon. As it is, despite the title, the text really only covers Big and Little Cottonwood Canyons and American Fork Canyon (with the inclusion of a single trail in Pleasant Grove under the American Fork Canyon section).

In my opinion, improvements of the kind I have mentioned would have made the book a much more serviceable text without adding significantly to either its bulk or price, and thus, should have been included. As it stands, I recommend "Best Easy Day Hikes SLC" as the best available short and cheap guide to easy Wasatch area trails, but a serious hiker will prefer something like David Day's "Utah's Favorite Hiking Trails," Steve Mann's "100 Hikes in Utah," or John Veranth's "Hiking the Wasatch," all of which are infinitely more informative and helpful--but also bigger and pricier. Or buy this for it's convenient size, and then supplement the applicable entries before your trip with important details from the bigger and better books. Hopefully, a reworked edition will soon save you the trouble.

This book is a must have if you're a hiker near the Salt Lake City area. It's great for the novice hiker, families with smaller children, or nine-to-fivers like myself trying to pick up a quick hike on weekdays before or after work. All of the routes in this book have two conveniences in common. None of the trailheads are more than an hours drive from the bottom of the canyon, and none of the hikes are more than a few miles round trip. This makes it really easy to knock of several hikes a season. Most of them average about one hour of hiking time. Brian Brinkerhoff also does a great job of describing what kind of terrain to expect. Some of the included hikes are paved for easy wheelchair and stroller access, or for the ease of beginning trail runners worried about their ankles. Several on Brinkerhoff's list includes highlights such as waterfalls, alpine lakes, and even some mining ruins, concentrating on the little and big cottonwood canyon areas.

After reading the first two books in this series and reading some of this one, I didn't quite recognize the writing as from the same author. Even after delving more into it, I had a
difficult time following it as closely as the others. I was considering reading it a second time to see if I could pick up on some of the things I didn't quite understand. I don't know a thing about boats or the different types talked of throughout (ie...waverunner).

Bray certainly does have a messed up family and we don't find out what goes on, on the island until late in the story. There are a lot of new characters in this book and it helps a lot if you at least know some of them from reading the previous books in this series before attempting this one.

This book was good too with a lot of action, however again, the main characters escape from harm a little too easily. There's a lot of jumping from scene to scene which isn't really a problem as long as you can remember what happened previously.

There is some predictibility but not in a boring way.

Thanks, Mr. Kritlow, for such a great series! I am really enjoying it. When's the next one coming out? For those possible readers out there, these are a delightful Christian, love story, comedy, mystery series - how's that for everything in 1(or should I say 3 so far?) - They are great!

Bob Stepto, a professo at Yale University, recalls his early youth growing up in Chicago and spending summers at a nearby lake community. He weaves his stories of the lake, school, his family and his African American community into a seamless tapestry filled with humor and warmth. Stepto is a great story teller. Don't miss it.

When I began the book, I knew the author was a sophisticated man, a professor at Yale. As I read, I discovered the depth of his observations of his life. I was awed by his understanding of what was going on around him and his wonderful way of expressing it.

What could have been just another light little book became both easy reading and deep. It exposed something of the author's soul without being maudlin or trying to find meaning that was not there.

I enjoyed the book so much, I read it again immediately to find the parts I missed the first time.

As a CA-2 Anesthesia Resident, I have found this book to be comprehensive and convenient as I have passed from Cardiac to Thoracic to Vascular experiences. It has offered me a large knowledge base and more adaptability as inter-staff variability tries my patients. This Book is a happy medium between painfully extensive texts and abreviated/incomplete handbooks. It offers deepth to all aspects of pathophysiology and monitoring. Its weakness is in clinical applications such as CPB weaning, which is similar to other books of its kind. Regardless, this book is one of my favorites, one I have read from cover to cover and use as a reference frequently.

... I personally think this book is the right choice for all the cardiovascular anesthesiologists and students who want basic to update knowledge for 3 areas(cardiac, pulmonary&thoracic and vascular anesthesiology) as rapidly as possible within a single book. This book let us see the point among the wide and complicated area, and also let us review our knowledge from perioperative assessment(Chap. 1) to postoperative ventilatory support(Chap. 40). Nicely arranged, easily understandable tables and figures(adapted or maden) will help you to study, lecture and practice.

This book is okay but very wordy. Perhaps it's just me and my Jack Webb attitude, "Just the facts, ma'am."...

This is meant as a companion for his other book on ponds but does a very nice job by itself.

I like most peterson books, however this one is just as knowledgable, but I bought the book hopeing to see color plates of corals, which it did not have. It had mostly color plates of starfish, sponges, sea buscuits, other animal life. I was disappointed in that, but as most of their books have, a nice description on how to identify it. It does seperate out the different types of corals, such as brain coral, then different subspecies (depressed, common, sharp hilled) but NO good pictures. It tells depth circumferance and valley, color, nice descriptions. It does have some black & white photos of coral, but it really does not help much.

I would feel confident recommending any of Peterson's field guides including "Coral Reefs." Many field guides simply discuss a single group of animals or plants. However Kaplan has succeeded in producing a pocket book explaining the most diverse habitats on earth. He writes from a broad knowledge base covering many topics important to coral reef watchers or biologists. Frequently he injects wit and humor into what might have been a dry text. He manages to hit on most groups of animals and uses many types of illustrations to allow the reader to identify and sort out the great number and types of animals that they will see on any coral reef within the area discussed.

I am new to this book but have used quite a few field guides in my day. Now I can't wait to visit the reefs again, armed with my new education.