I also found the author's practice of using bold font for emphasis overused, preachy and distracting.

You don't want to make all the mistakes yourself, learn from others and avoid the pitfalls...

I hope Ed continues to write more funny stuff though, like Daugher of Darkness. Can we get more satirically hilarious old Hollywood kiss-and-tell quiche please? Love those faded actors. Maybe Gorman can do something about Bradbury versus Mr. Barrymore. He should work closely with Matheson, Jr. or David Schow and get back on the old saddle with hilarious faded cowboy actors and so on. Maybe he can freshen the read with faded scifi actors too (ala Galaxy Quest). Hey Ed, time to imagine a really satirical SF novel, with Hollywood in it. Whaddaya say, hey?

I

However "Rapid" is NOT a substitute for deep work with an qualified, experienced and insightful therapist. Instead it's an execellent source of day to day coping stratgies. For eight bucks, that's quite a deal.

Dr. Cramer exhibits unbridled optimism grounded by realism, and expects the same from those following her advice. The constant themes of creativity, resilience, and constructive growth over reactivity, despair, and corrective discipline make a lot of sense.

My only reason for not giving this 5 stars is I would have preferred a shorter book... though I am hard-pressed to recommend what should be cut. On that note, the book is very well-organized, and you can quickly find the main points and exercises if you wish.

I heartily recommend this to anyone facing insurmountable obstacles and not enough resources, especially someone in an organizational setting.

These days we use our Palm Pilots and Day Planners and cell phones and multi-tasking skills to squeeze more productivity out of each day. And with each precious minute we save, we do...exactly the same things.

Now Dr. Cramer has come along to wake us up. Faster, harder, and smarter sometimes works in the short term, but for the long haul we need to rethink our whole agenda. Tackling the world's largest "to do" list is not really a life plan. Using Dr. Cramer's six steps, we can shape a compelling vision of what we want to achieve, so that everything we do fuels - and is fueled by - this greater purpose. Instead of faster, harder, and smarter, we learn to live richer, deeper, and wiser.

Dr. Cramer shows us how to recognize our deepest desires and how to tap into our greatest capabilities. By infusing our lives with meaning, we can let go of frustration and irrelevant tasks, and intead focus on what we need to do to achieve a future that will bring us joy and satisfaction.

Dr. Cramer instead suggests that you step back and find a new solution that does not rely on working faster, harder and smarter. For example, ask yourself whether the task needs to be done at all. Often, the overwhelming task is a waste of time. A good example would be marketing programs that primarily bring in unprofitable customers.

In this interesting book, Dr. Cramer emphasizes ways to manage your psychological state that will help you step outside the day-to-day tasks to establish an effective strategy for accomplishing what you really want. When Faster, Harder, Smarter Is Not Enough is intended to be your coach and personal guide to "enlarge our capacity to be creative under fire." As a result, you will turn "stress into success" and be "energized rather than drained."

Her advice is supported by case histories from her executive coaching practice over 20 years, and exercises to help you build awareness and skills for being more creative. One of the most interesting ones is building a life map to see your patterns for getting into and out of overload situations. The book contains a continuing case history of a CEO who got out of touch with his real goals, and wanted to change. This example also shows the many ways that these methods can be employed throughout an organization.

She emphasizes 6 elements:

(1) " . . . see the big picture (externally) and . . . be aware of your emotional landscape (internally)." To do this, she encourages you to be curious and committed, while being intuitive and aware.

(2) " . . . imagine the best possible outcome and . . . become energized by how excellent it is."

(3) " . . . concrete yet flexible plan for achieving your goal, and . . . give up any counterproductive ideas or habits that might sabotage your efforts." This requires being imaginative, visionary, observant, and innovative.

(4) " . . . involve in your game plan those you love and those you need." Here you need to be influential and collaborative, articulate and persuasive.

(5) " . . . implant your plan, watch your progress, overcome the obstacles that present themselves, and learn to capitalize on conflict." Here, you are trying to be resilient and resourceful, fearless and authentic in your actions.

(6) "Enjoy your achievements . . . and do it all over again!" To do this, be passionate, proactive, inspired and confident.

You start with developing a list of long-term personal and professional goals, " . . . then connect the dots." You will do this by becoming richer in mental and emotional resources, deeper in your thinking, and wiser in your choices. You will also become better at avoiding your deepest habits of harmful blind reaction.

Having co-authored a book on developing better decision-making and action habits, I found this approach to creating the right psychological environment for such changes to be very interesting. I thought that points two and four above are important, and are often forgotten in the rush to accomplish. I suspect that the best use of this book is in combination with any of the many excellent books about how to become more creative, to add more focus into the psychological space that this book creates. Without more specific content on the technology of creating these solutions, those who employ this book will create better solutions . . . but ones that I suspect are much less than their full potential to achieve through their organizations.

After you finish exploring these more resourceful states, I encourage you to think about how you allocate your time. Breaking patterns of where you spend too much time that is not supportive of your real intentions is a great way to get started!

Always spend time to think through the questions of whether the work needs to be done, how it can be done vastly better, and how you can get enormously greater results from the same effort. The more overwhelming the situation seems, the more important it is to do this!

Manuel Vexler
VP Marketing
MotorWiz Inc

And it's a good thing that Johnson wrote a funny book, because Isaac Asimov this is not. The plot--alien Greys are abducting humans for experimentation and eventual extinction, with a few embellishments--covers no new ground. Rod Serling was doing this stuff fifty years ago.

The tale starts out strong. Lewis is a UFO skeptic who likes to have fun debunking believers--at the expense of his ufologist ex-wife. But then he himself is abducted, incised, and later visited by the ubiquitous Men in Black, who warn him to keep his mouth shut. Nothing new, but so far so good. Unfortunately, suspension of disbelief collapses as the MIB conspiracy expands to include virtually everyone in British and American government and military. Then, oddly, the protagonist and his now-friendly-again ex-wife get all sentimental and decide to help some captured aliens (who've vowed to destroy Earth) escape. This nice gesture alone seems to change the minds of the Greys who have traversed millions of light years of space in their black triangles to carry out God's will: destroy their errant genetic experiment, mankind. This is "Can't we all just get along?" on a galactic scale.

If you can get past the lukewarm plot and any expectations of mind-bending conspiracies, Mercury Rapids is a fun and worthwhile read. Steven Johnson is a writer with tons of potential. --Christopher Bonn Jonnes, author of Wake Up Dead

Mercury Rapids is my first novel and, hopefully, not my last! If you like action plots that zip along at breakneck speed, then I suggest you give Mercury Rapids a try.

Now for the blurb:

"Mercury Rapids is the story of Bill Lewis. An astronomer by profession, he has made a career of debunking UFO sightings... until he encounters a UFO himself.

"As he struggles with his own beliefs, he finds himself becoming embroiled in a war between the alien Greys and the secretive Orion Committee; Britain's version of Majestic Twelve. Now he must fight not only for his own live, but for the lives of those around him.

"Mercury Rapids is a chilling, fast paced sci-fi conspiracy thriller that will leave you asking yourself.... Are we really alone?"

Mass transit security changed forever in March 1995 when the Aum Shinrikyo sect
placed five canisters of diluted sarin gas into the Tokyo subway system, killing 12
people and sickening thousands. That single incident gave the world a taste of the
potential for mass destruction within the mass transit system.

Mass transit security has become a specialty in and of itself, and Kurt R. Nelson has
given this emerging field a treatise of its own. Nelson explores the goals and
elements of transit policing, examines tactical considerations and approaches to
transit issues, and delves into special issues of modern life that affect mass transit
safety, such as terrorism, youth behavior, and disabled passengers.

The book also contains three valuable appendices: a customer security survey,
transit laws, and the Tri-Met (Portland, Oregon) security system plan and program.
The latter, at 76 pages, outlines the process that the transit authority used in 1998 to
develop security programs and incorporate security into its business philosophy. It
includes sections on security roles and responsibilities, security plan management,
and threats and vulnerabilities, among others. This appendix, like the book as a
whole, is of value to police officers, transit security officers, and directors of security
involved in mass transit.

The first section of the book has three chapters devoted to the theory of discussion of creating a management system for a safe and secure transit system. That theoretical discussion allows the reader to then appreciate the actual security plan developed by one transit agency, which is contained in one of the appendices. It is probably the best feature of book that allows both students and profeessionals within the field to use the book to improve their understanding of policing a public transportation system.

Following the theoretical basis for creating a community oriented security system, the book then looks at all parts of modern transit systems: buses, trains and fixed locations. It is in this section of the book that each of the parts of a typical system are fiven individual attention with practical suggestions of improving the policing of any public transportation system.

The third and final section deals with special considerations every transit manager must understand. Of particular interest to me is the section on the potential of mass transit being a target of terrorism.

While greater attention could have been given to some of the topics in the last section, overall I found the book a very good combination of theory and practice. It will be of use to both those already within the profession and as a text book for those studying mass transit, law enforcement and planning.

Policing Mass Transit is an asset to communities and local governments; transit planners; port, rail, and bus authorities; police policy/procedures developers; and training designers. It proves essential reading for trainers, transit construction and subcontractor vendors, and specific members of the criminal justice system who may have a direct or inderict interest in policing transit modes and bringing criminals to justice.

Read carefully the book description in the Editorial Reviews: "This book helps people to quickly master the fundamental techniques of graphic art and design using felt-tip pens and plain paper." If you're looking for technical tips to improve your drawing, by all means, buy this book.

Bottom-line, I found it more oriented toward illustrators or artists than toward thinkers who want to doodle.

I would always use Mr. Hanks' suggestion in visualizing ideas when taking lecture notes- even the most boring university lectures become the funniest.

Every page is filled with humorously illustrated cartoons that brilliantly capture the essence of each thought. The ideas themselves are concisely presented as well- quick to the point.

Thanks Mr. Hanks, for sharing your creative ideas to the world. I surely can't wait to read your future new books.