If you're Canadian, you really need to read this book. If you're American, you really need to read this book. James J. Blanchard has seen our Canadianisms and helped us to do the unthinkable, define ourselves. From coast to coast and beyond, the essence of what we are leaks out on these pages. It is fitting that an American should expose our mysteries and histories. Not that we are hidding them, we just seem to have a hard time accepting them. We remain the True North, Strong and Free. Thankyou James Blanchard.

...read this book. It is a decent primer for US residents who want to learn more about our oft-neglected neighbor. Warning: Mr. Blanchard is quite liberal, and liberal policies (US & Canadian) are treated matter-of-factly. His conservative successor as governor of Michigan (John Engler) has, in most people's opinions, done a better job. Interested conservatives will still enjoy the book--just keep a few grains of salt handy.

Canadians might get a kick out of a quintessential "American discovers Canada actually exists and is also pretty neato" story.

As the previous reviewers have said, Blanchard has written a key book for understanding US-Canadian relations. But this is also the most insightful book I have found about Clinton and the Clinton Administration in the areas in which Clinton was most successful, personal relations and trade policy.

I like the theme of this book, but the author relies on too many cliches to excite the readers interest. The story is basically evil and greedy politicians conspire with the liberal anti-gun media elite to do away with the constitution and bill of rights. Add into the mix the Fidelistas (Mexican invading army) and the Patriots (a group of, well, patriotic Americans wanting to fight the evil government and bring back America's greatness) And you have all the elements fo a great story. But, this particular story doesn't go anywhere, and the book ends without any resolution. I suppose that is left up to the imagination of the reader. Maybe the author intends to write a sequel? If so, I would buy it.

A book with a similar theme, but that is carried out with a lot more convincing detail is "Unintended Consequences" by John Ross. I highly recommend Unintended Consequences.

If you like Westerns, you'll like the action in this novel. If your politics are right of center, you'll enjoy the political intrigue. Even if your politics are left of center, you'll enjoy this portrayal of the US in the near future, when three political factions are fighting for control of all or part of the country and some good people have to make some hard choices about which side they're on.

When "Patriot Radio is on the air" my friends and I listen. We are still trying to stake out our own political philosophies and D. Michael Phillips does a great job in assisting us. I would recommend this book to any college- aged student wanting to strengthen their grasp on the American political economy.

The idea of a whole book about Funk is a thrill. But somehow, Vincent just seems to like EVERYTHING a little too much. He's so enthusiastic about everything that it's hard to get a good idea of which music I really need to hear and what I can do without. Still, you can't dock someone too hard for being positive...

I had recently been turned on to Parliment/Funkadelic(I'm 33). I was interested in someother bands to check out. I bought this book little did I know I was getting the history of the funk bomb. The section on James Brown was so cool to read about. I never realized just how much we owe to"Soul Brother Number 1". Fortunatly Ricky Vincent put it down for future generations of rump shakers to read about. If you got any shred of funk in you I highly recommend you read this book and check out some of the bands Mr. Vincent gives 5 stars to.

First, I propose a small title change for this book. It should be called "THE Funk". The word "funk" only refers to a musical genre. But THE Funk entails the whole lifestyle, attitude, and philosophy that go with the music. And that's what this book is about.

Rickey Vincent provides all the info you could possibly dig on the origins, artists, and influence behind the funk bomb that has been shaking the Earth since the 60's. You get the deep, ancient funk origins in jazz, soul, R&B, and even rockers like Hendrix and Santana. As should be expected, there's a ton of props for the musicians who invented funk, especially the Godfather, my main man James Brown; not to mention the old-school master, Sly Stone. Once the funk really took off in the 70's, Vincent provides top coverage of the entire phenomenon, with props for big men like the Isley Brothers, Ohio Players, Kool & the Gang, and Earth Wind & Fire; and unearths long-lost funkateeers like Slave and Zapp, who are ripe for rediscovery. But where would we be without P-Funk? No problem, as Vincent gives us an entire section on the most important and influential funk mob of all time, George Clinton's Parliament/Funkadelic thang. The story continues into the present with coverage of funk that survived underground in the 80's, and then rocked the world again in the 90's. Most interesting is Vincent's coverage of funk's humungous influence on the hip-hop nation, as well as a whole branch of rock-n-roll (populated by bands like Red Hot Chili Peppers and Primus).

When funk history gets ragged in the late 70's and early 80's, Vincent gets carried away in his endless condemnation of disco (you don't really need to say how much disco reeked), as well as the other new forms of dance music that temporarily buried the funk. But not to worry, because in the 90's the funk re-emerged triumphantly and in top booty-shakin' form. And get a load of the appendix, "Essential Funk Recordings," in which Vincent provides a gargantuan list of classic funk albums that will keep you on a buying spree for the rest of your life.

This is a short, enjoyable read that reprints a series of essays written by Ms. Barlow during the course of the Clinton presidency for a magazine called Chronicles. Each article is essentially another analysis of the character manque of Bubba and his First Lady Macbeth spouse, Hillary. Ideally these essays were better read at the time, because the political events that inspired each are only mentioned in passing. What compensates for this lack of context is the astonishing psychological insight into the personality of our worst First Couple that came as a revelation even to this long time observer of the Clinton years. This is the best description of the personality flaws and dynamics of Bill and Hillary that I have ever seen in print. Even if you think you understood these two, as I did, you will find nuances and hidden dimensions to their motivations and methods that you probably have never thought of or read elsewhere.<>
My only criticism of this book is that it is too much of an intimate character study, brilliant as it is. These essays beg to be rewritten and expanded, to take into account how the flaws in the Clintons' character (and marriage) translated into specific missed opportunities and lousy political decisions for our country. This is a story that has not yet been properly told, nor has the full damage of the Clintons to our political institutions and the respect for the rule of law been made clear to the public. If Ms. Barlow would connect her personality insights to what was actually done - and not done - at the time, this would have been a world class political book.<>
One example, on "gun control" will suffice. The Clintons ran the most antigun administration in our nation's history and even some gun owners have yet to realize how far they were willing to go to nullify the Second Amendment and defang the Bill of Rights. In 1995, Clinton signed the Safe and Drug Free Schools Act which outlawed the possession of a loaded firearm within 1000 feet of any public school receiving federal funds. Prior to this capstone of Sen. Diane Feinstein's legislative career, we had exactly two school shootings in our nations history or one every century or so. After turning our schools into gun-free zones, we had over a dozen schools shootings, of which the one at Columbine High in April 1999 became the most lethal. Was it possible for an avowed policy wonk like Clinton not to recognize that this law was producing the exact opposite of its intent, that it was making our schools less safe and more dangerous? Yet when Wayne LaPiere of the National Rifle Association tried to point out that Bill Clinton may have been willing to have people killed in order to further his antigun legislative agenda, he was vilified by the media. This kind of cold-blooded political ruthlessnes is possible only in a President who has something missing in his own humanity. This is only one example where Ms Barlow would have done her readers greater service by connecting the dots for them, particularly since the national television media scrupulously avoided any mention of the clear pattern of failure associated with the Safe and Drug Free Schools act or how an American President sat in the Oval Office while we had shooting after shooting in our schools and made no move to amend a clearly counterproductive law. And this is only one example on one topic; the Clintons' inaction during the breakup of Yugoslavia would have been a book in itself, resulting in a far greater loss of human life, all of it preventable by a President with the courage to act early on. It would be a great service to the public to have developed the pattern of how the Clinton Presidency took a pass on such missed opportunities and how the pattern is explainable only as a complete lack of character in the incumbent.
This is what Christopher Hitchens tried to do with his book, No One Left to Lie To, but I believe Ms. Barlow could do an even better job if she would concentrate more on the Clintons' policies and how these grew out of their mutually flawed personae. It is my hope that she will go back and turn these insights into a full fledged analysis of the Clinton admininstration and how these two sociopathic parvenues dragged the Presidency and the Federal Government down to the level of a small, failed Southern state, both ethically and politically. Now that would be a read.

I am a Clinton hater. At least that is what I have been labeled by the mainstream, Clinton worshiping media and the many people I know or have spoken with who seem to believe that if you disapprove of anything either Bill or Hillary have ever done, either professional or personal, then you are simply a narrow minded, judgmental, basically evil person who can't come to terms with the fact that the Clintons are brilliant, dynamic, and...cool. According to these people we should feel lucky that the Clintons have graced us with their wisdom, and if we're not, then we're simply out to bash them for no good reason. I mentioned the word judgmental earlier. This is a word that, in recent years, has become synonymous with evil. It seems like there used to be a time when it was okay, even expected, to disapprove of a man compulsively cheating on his wife with women young enough to be his daughter. The reason this is no longer accepted is because the Clintons have created the "everybody does it and if you say you don't then you're lying" mentality. In this book, Mrs. Barlow perfectly describes and disects this mentality, poking giant holes in the glowing media coverage of both Bill and Hillary, and yes, even weighing in with her own personal (some would even say judgmental) opinions. Eight years ago I knew quite a few people who were very supportive of Clinton. They were thrilled that he had been elected and were more than ready to defend his sleazy personality, which, if you think back, had already fully exposed itself even before he took office. As the years wore on and the scandals and lies piled up, these people stopped defending him on a personal level but remained firmly behind him from a professional standpoint. Now that we have reached the end and Bill has left office in a storm of pardon scandals that embarrass even his most dedicated supporters, these people have grown very quiet. They don't even talk about "moving on" as so many people are fond of doing when it comes to Bill and Hillary. They are simply quiet, too smart not to realize that this man is indeed a monumental phony. There were many arguments I had with these people in which I got confused and tongue tied, unable to fend off the creative wordplay that Clinton himself had perfected in his own defense. I only wish I had had this book then, so I could hand it to them and say "this is what I mean." The writing is quick, concise, and most of all, funny. All those thoughts you "Clinton haters" had (or have) swimming in your heads that you can't quite articulate are articulated here. This is not to say that Mrs. Barlow simply bashes away at her subject. She is analytical and intelligent, showing not only why Bill and Hillary are a uniquely awful cultural phenomenon, but also how the mainstream media essentially played the fool for these people. It is amazing to read some of the quotes from columnists that the author responds to. It is also amazing to read some of the quotes from Hillary's speeches. We have been told so many times that she is basically the most brilliant woman ever tht we are quick to accept it. This book very specifically takes these assumptions apart. My only complaint would be that the book is too short. I want more!

I don't pretend not to be a "Clinton hater". Almost everything they have done over the past eight years and beyond has disgusted me. Therefore I am predisposed to liking this book. That being said, the book is useful for anyone who is even the least bit skeptical about these people and what they stand for. It says exactly what I have been trying to say for eight years, and it says it calmly, precisely, with dignity and restraint. This book gets to the point. If some people think it is judgmental, I wouldn't call them wrong. Maybe it's just time we all realized that that isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Read this book.

Even as a life-long democrat, I always knew Bill Clinton was a phony, but I didn't think he was the low-life his critics claimed he was. So, I was reluctant to read this book. I'd heard enough Clinton-bashing. A friend of the author convinced me to read the last chapter, and I ended up reading the whole thing. Mrs. Barlow does her share of bashing here, and, as a collection of essays written over several years, the book seems a little uneven and disjointed in spots. But, having seen from Bill and Hillary what we've seen during the last several weeks, I think Janet Barlow has said something unique and accurate about these people. For all the good they have done, I believe they don't have any real concept of patriotism. Which isn't to say that they are unpatriotic, just nonpatriotic. It's all about them, in the end, no matter what wreckage they leave behind. It's kind of sad, really. Barlow's sense of humor keeps you chuckling along the way, however, and the book is a quick read. I recommend it to other Clinton supporters out there who are ready to take a fresh look at these two people we've defended so steadfastly since 1993. Not every observation in this book is original, but many are, and the author writes beautifully.

I read this book after reading Gerard Jones' _Killing Monsters_ and was disappointed. Much of the book is spent describing the intertwined homogeneous nature of mass media. However, this shouldn't be news to many people. We are supposed to be shocked and outraged that the people who are programming television "entertainment" are doing it to make money at the expense of our children. We are supposed to be surprised that shows like the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers are parts of extensive, pervasive campaigns to extend brands across television, movies, toys, cereals, etc. We are supposed to be outraged that the mass media has close ties to government. Does he think we've been living in a cave?

However, Steyer distorts a grim picture to make it appear even worse than it is. Yes, Colin Powell may be friends with the chairman of AOL Time Warner, and maybe that had something to do with his son being appointed to the head of the FCC, but Steyer neglects to point out that Michael Powell served as an FCC commissioner for years beforehand, and that his father was a board member of AOL/TW until he resigned to join the Bush administration.

Furthermore, Steyer's suggestions of what parents can do lacks the specifics that would lead to action. He advocates increasing "media awareness" in our children, but doesn't suggest many sample activities that might help our children control their media intake themselves. Our children will grow in an environment where they will not be isolated from the mass media no matter what we do in our own homes. They will see and hear about terrible things, like it our not. We need to provide them with the tools to cope which they will use the rest of their lives.

"If another adult spent five or six hours a day with your kids, regularly exposing them to sex, violence, and rampantly commercial values, you would probably forbid that person to have any further contact with them. Yet most of us passively allow the media to expose our kids routinely to these values...and do virtually nothing about it." - James P. Steyer in "The Other Parent"

James Steyer does a fabulous job examining how sex, violence, and commercialism in the media affect children; why the media is full of these things; and what can be done about it. Steyer, a parent, child advocate, and Stanford professor of constitutional law and civil liberties/head of a children's media company, is well qualified to address these issues. His data comes from studies, personal interviews with key media figures and politicians, personal experience in the media industry, and parenting 3 children.

Many of Steyer's points really made me think. Here are just a few:
* Over the past 30 years, more than 1,000 studies by reputable sources which Steyer names, have concluded that media violence impacts children in four ways, specified on p. 72.
* PG-13 rated movies have a lot of sexual content, foul language and violence, that would have been restricted to R rated movies prior to 1984. p. 57
* Children who play with media action figures "are bypassing their own imaginations, substituting prepackaged commercial characters and story lines for their own creative efforts." p. 105.

Steyer's solution to protecting children from harmful effects of media, begins at home with his 10 steps for parents, whom he calls the "first line of defense." Children I know, who are brought up in homes where parents follow most of these steps, are more engaged in activities other than TV and video games, and pester their parents less frequently for toys and junk food advertised to kids. An earlier review complains that one of these steps, "teach media literacy in school and at home" fails to provide specifics on how to do this. This is true, but Steyer explains that these techniques are well documented in other books which he names. He also provides 10 steps each for the media industry and citizen activists.

After reading this book, I feel a lot more knowledgeable about what goes on the other side of the TV and other media. I learned more about how to protect children from harmful media effects, and felt supported in what I do know. I highly recommend this book to all adults who have an influence in a child's life.

If you're a parent then you know the answer to be YES! Mr. Steyer reveals what's really behind the methodology of the media industry -money of course - however they just don't know when to stop and our kids are their biggest and easiest target for their big purse strings through their constant manipulation and exploitation of airwaves with commercialism, sex and violence. As a parent you need to take responsibility to ensure that your children are not over-exposed to the media and to really evaluate family priorities. Well worth the read and advice that Mr. Steyer gives.

Twenty years from now, when time has allowed for an author to look back on and write on the Clinton Presidency with some emotional detachment and real perspective, this book will be in the bibliography. Burns and Sorenson provide the most complete review of Clinton's legacy to date, superceding, as an academic source, Joe Klein's more recent, more opinionated and more reader-friendly "The Natural". That said this book has many flaws. It is denser than frozen cookie dough. Stuffed with the kinds of details that only poltical science professors and their students could stand to bear for even one page (for example, I came across the book while writing a senior thesis on the Post-modern presidency...if that excites you this book might be of interest)so it can be a sluggish read. It is also tilting to the left but that actually makes it's criticisms of Clinton stick more then say, a book written by Right-Wing Conspirators (and there are plenty of those if you are just into Clinton bashing for the love of it).

The book also suffers from the fact that it was published before Clinton actually left office so issues like his last minute pardons are not touched on. In contrast to The Natural, where Hillary comes off as a villain, here, for virtually the same reasons Klein criticizes her, she is the star of the Clinton Era. An oasis of ideolgical purity, striking in its contrast to the vacuous desert of the"the Third Way" centrism that enslaved Clinton and Gore. A bit hyperbolic, but that's the gist of the epilouge, incidentally written before Hillary's run for the Senate so perhaps Burns and Sorenson were on to something.

The book deserves kudos for focusing on substantive policy issues and evaluating Clinton on those rather than getting caught in the trap of focusing the many personal scandals and confusing them with his professional failings. Burns and Sorenson on one page offer one of the best retorts to the vicious, partisan and very often malicious attacks on Clinton. Yet,they aren't soft on him themselves and therefore one can not dismiss this book as propaganda. Rather, it is a truly substantive study that may be driven by the authors policy concerns but makes evaluations based on substance not smoke.

A good academic book. The Natural's conclusions, I think, will stand up as being more historically accurate than Dead Center's but for a really detailed look at the Clinton Presidency this book is indispensible.

This provocative yet thorough analysis of Bill Clinton's tenure in office provides an almost convincing argument against Centrism and its implementor. As a Bill Clinton fan, I must say that the author's arguments nearly swayed me to believe that Bill Clinton may have failed in what they called "transformational" and "principled" leadership of the country. They trace the beginnings of Clinton's presidency, from his inauguration speech of change and renewal, his failure of health care reform, his foreign policies to the Gingrich revolution and finally to impeachment. Within each, the authors argue that Clinton failed to bring any sweeping reform or decisive leadership but instead brought tactical politiking, dealing and governing from the vital Centre. The reader is left wondering whether Centrism is good at all. In fact, one gets the impression that Clinton's legacy lies in a tangled web of disjointed policies and no over-arching vision.

However, I think the authors miss the point that whilst Clinton did promise change and succeeded in some ( balancing the budget, welfare reform, NAFTA) and failed in others (health care reform,arguably race, campaign finance), the political environment he was in and also the post cold-war era constrained such sweeping changes. The Gingrich revolution forced Clinton to think more pragmatically and more tactically as re-election loomed. Impeachment (his own doing) poisoned Congress to a standstill in enacting any later reforms. In fact, whilst I agree that Clinton failed to deliver the high hopes he had promised from the start of his presidency, the situation changed to such a degree, that to survive politically, he had to govern from the centre ( see his triangulation). To a small degree, Clinton's presidency was a product of its times; there was no Cold War or major crisis to display "principled" leadership as with Reagan.

Not everthing is bad news of course. They outline Clinton's foreign policy successes in Ireland and the Middle East but also his hesitant meandering in Haiti and Bosnia.

The overall picture is one of a work in progress - a President learning on the job, trying to enact "bold change", later displaying tactical and political skill and subtly reforming the people's view of government. At the very least, this book strongly initiates the debate on the Clinton legacy and his leadership. It is by no means the end.

Historian James MacGregor Burns and Georgia Sorenson have written an interesting book about Bill Clinton's failed effort to be a success by becoming a "centerist" U.S. President. Their excellent book, title DEAD CENTER: CLIINTON-GORE LEADERSHIP AND THE PERILS OF MODERATION(1999), is worth reading.

The authors contend, rightfully, I think, that Bill Clinton tried to please everybody, and ended up pleasing no-one (well, almost no-one). Pulitzer prize winning historian James MacGregor Burns and his co-author Georgia Sorenson argue that the price of centrism is high. They state that in choosing a centrist strategy, Bill Clinton rejected the kind of leadership that might have placed hiim among the historic "greats."

They review Clinton's presidency (which they imply was a failed presidency), and state that Clinton lacked creativity in fashioning new policies, the courage to press for reforms and other changes despite popular apathy and opposition, the conviction to stick to grand principles no matter how long their realization might take (they imply Clinton was a notably mediocre President, and that he must really be grouped in the unprestigious ranks of Presidents who were fence sitters).

Most interestingly, Burns and Sorenson contend that Clinton (and by association, Albert Gore) was notable for his lack of commitment to the people to fight for their welfare at any personal cost. This is quite a charge considering that the main Gore Presidential candidacy battle cry was "I will fight for you!"

Burns/Sorenson review the disasterous faillure of Clinton's 1993-94 health bill and ascribe the failure of it to Clinton's centrism. They remind readers that Clinton rejected the highly intelligent Canadian health plan model, which has been successful for decades in attaining a liberal good, universal health care. Clinton tried to avoid alienating highly paid doctors and insurance companies. The result was that his health plan had no particular idology, pleased nobody, really, and failed miserably. The ironic thing was that Clinton's health bill was the most noble effort he made in his Presidency, which went downhill from that point.

Buy and read this excellent book. It's a good read, and great discussion of how not to be a U.S. President.

The praise of other reviewers is well met. Overall, this is a very good book and every CGI programmer and anyone else doing Internet programming should buy it.

My only complaint is that it doesn't group information based on servers and is missing some server-specific items that are important, although they are not part of the Spec.

This is a nearly perfect book both for learning HTTP and for an HTTP reference. HTTP is a small, simple protocol, and this is reflected in this book's small size. Great sequence diagrams illustrate the basic HTTP transaction which is detailed in less than ten small pages. And you will probably soon find yourself with several post-it bookmarks or dog-eared pages.

The book could use an explanation of HTTP proxies and gateways and a list of common user-agents. But any more and it would be too long.

If you develop your own web applications then this book is invaluable! You don't realise that you need it until you know what's in it. An overview of HTTP headers, client methods and server response codes along with URL character and media type tables makes for a great pocket reference!

The O'Reilly pocket references are so concise that they are not really meant for someone who is totally new to the subject. They can however be the ideal way to provide an overview to anyone who wants to know the basics of the topic.

This book is a must read for anyone who is involved with team building and developing leaders. I work in the field of Leadership Development and this is one of the key texts we continually refer back to on a regular basis. Clinton is an expert in this field and this book provides a guide for basic leadership development stages and how to do leadership development. Thanks to Clinton for an important work that every leader needs to read.

I met Bobby Clinton during a difficult time of transition. Over a cup of coffee, after asking a few questions, he was able to perfectly describe what was going on in my life and outline a practical plan to make the experience most profitable. It was if he had been reading my mail for the past two years.

When I told him how amazed I was at his ability he outlined for me the research that gave birth to this book. He and his students at Fuller Theological Seminary had studied the lives of over 400 leaders. The patterns of emergence they discovered are the basis of this book.

The book is a must read for anyone who is interested in the topic of leadership and leadership development.

So far, this is my absolute favorite book on the subject of leadership development. After 16 years of teaching and applying leadership development principles, this seems to me the definitive work on how the process works. Reading it was tantamount to stepping back from a connect-the-dots picture and clearly seeing what the picture is going to be--it finally makes sense. I believe Clinton did a great job of communicating how every part of our lives ties together to fulfill God's divine destiny for us(Acts 13:36). This is a must read for every one who aspires to maximize their leadership potential.

I have always thought a mountain climbing killing might be the perfect murder. Who is say how the "accident" occurred? Sometimes the body is never found. A misstep, a quirk of the weather, a piece of rotten rock---all or singly could happen in an instant and be given as the likely cause of death.

"The Edge of Justice," a debut novel, takes that premise and gives it quite a shake. Protagonist Anton Burns, Special Investigator for the State of Wyoming and climbing enthusiast, is sent to Laramie to investigate the accidental death of a girl who fell to her death from a ledge in the mighty Vedauwoo mountains. Anton is carrying a heavy load of baggage: he is under investigation for shooting and killing three men in a police raid, his beloved elder brother is in jail for manslaughter, and he has been exiled to the Cody office far from the action in Cheyenne. When he arrives in Laramie, the biggest trial in the history of the state is in progress, trying two lowlife brothers for the brutal rape/murder of a young girl. Anton and his faithful bear of a dog, Oso, after an idyllic afternoon rock climbing investigate the site of the climbing death. He quickly ascertains that the "accident" was murder. While investigating, he realizes a cover-up is in place and it is very likely the brothers on trial are innocent.

This is a fast paced novel that keeps our interest engaged. Mr. MacKinzie is obviously an expert climber and does well in describing the almost lyrical joys of high altitude climbing. One might say he devotes too many pages to the technical aspects of climbing, but I stayed involved all the way. The characters are mostly one-dimensional, either very good or very bad with no ambiguity. Also there are far too many subplots and needless diversions. However, the author has a good tale to tell, and he does it well. I look forward to further adventures with Anton; maybe the next time will be a little more streamlined.

I'm still not sure whether I'm more inpressed with the author or the novel!

Allegedly, this is the author's first novel. However, the enduring excitement McKinzie's story provides keeps the reader unable to close the book. Clinton McKinzie has a style most authors are lucky to perfect over a life-time.

I eagerly await the already planned prequel. McKinzie's career will be watched with great interest.

EDGE OF JUSTICE was slow getting started for me but once it picked up my interest, I was hooked. Anton Burns is a breath of fresh air. He's not a supercop, but a mountain climber/peace officer in exhile. I can't wait to read the prequel to find out why he is in exhile. I recommend this book, highly. It was more realistic in that Burns went through ALOT of trials and tribulations and I loved that he wasn't some supercop who could control each and every situation he was in. Often, the injustices that occured were very fustrating to read but realistic regardless. I think this book would appeal to those who are tired of the same ole thing. Characterizations were strong and memorable. Look forward to his next book.

Keishon

This was an excellent story which surprised me to a great extent. Mr Stacpoole is an excellent writer with an ability to convey what it would be like to live on a dream island in the south pacific with a girl of your dreams. Excellent characterizations and a tremendous flow of descriptive words. Almost lyrical in many respects. His writing sometimes approaches poetry. Other passages are worthy of great pathos. I particularly liked the kids discovering death, what pure love is like, thoughts on religion. Just an excellent story written in a style that is no longer seen. I wonder if Edgar Rice Burroughs read this story before he wrote Tarzan of the Apes. So many similar themes in the two stories. That would be a good research project for some motivated student of literary research. How can someone get the two sequels to this exact story in addition to Pools of Silence?

It highlights some of the things that occasionally happen to pop up in our minds as we explore the fantasy world and attempt to escape from the monotonous reality of daily life. I absolutely loved the story, and I recommend it whole-heartedly. I enjoyed it so much, I wouldn't hesitate to read it over again! =)

It was diffacult to obtain this book, but it was worth it. I though it was a wonderful story, though, it got hard to read at times because of the way Paddy talked. I have read one of the sequal to this book "The Gates of Morning" which was also very hard to get, and I still can't find it anywhere to buy. I have not been able to get"The Garden of God" I would love to read it, I haven't been able to find much information on it either, but If you know how I might be able to get it, please contact me