Aves sin nido is not a perfect book, its importance in the Latin American literature lies in the fact that it was the first novel to attempt to give a realistic portrait of the Indians and to call attention to their miserable situation. This soon created a fashion in the beginning of the twentieth century when the novels were usually about the oppression the Indians live under or the rich culture of these oppressed Indians that infiltrates in the Latin American culture. The novel by Clarinda Matto de Turner offers an utterly pleasurable story about a nice young white couple who helps a nice young Indian couple, but many essays were written about the imperfections in the characterisation, the errors in the style and the failure of the author to keep the tension throughout the story. Still, it is an easy read, with an easily decipherable message. Of course, it often falls in the trap of exoticism, frequently alluding to the richness of the Indian culture, many of them now part of our minimal notion about Andean Indians (the llamas, the alpaca, etc.) It also falls in the trap of constantly trying to show us that Indians are also nice people, thus drawing a rather one-dimensional portrait of the characters. But considering that she was a pioneer in this matter this propagandistic details can be forgiven. And considering realism, in some ways the novel is far more realistic and less corny than say Uncle Tom's Cabin.

At first glance, this is an ordinary baby name book. At second glance, however, you start to find a wealth of unusual, beautiful, distinct, and commonplace names, in a refreshingly new format. If you're a parent looking for a name you might not have seen before, this is one of the best books; if you're an author looking for a treasure chest of great names, I highly recommend this book.

Turner's book is a good, straightforward guide for walking inthe city. It doesn't offer much in the way of photos, but it givesyou the information you need to tour Barcelona in a coherent way. The material is organized geographically, and some of the areas overlap. Each tour has its own focus and is clearly described in its introduction, so you can easily pick the tours and the sights that interest you. The book was written several years ago and of course things keep changing in the city, but it remains a useful guide.

The heroire marries by proxy to a cruel hard man that she finds revolting to say the least. The Countess Christiane Bouchard is fleeing the French revolution and she finds herself on Saint Domingue married to a stranger. Upon arriving she witnesses her husband (Eitenne) brutally beating one of his slaves. She also finds herself attracted to her husbands plantation overseer. The overseer is a man by the name of Reid and he was on his way to a penal colony for the murder. However he is innocent of the crime. During a revolt on the plantation Eitenne is killed. Reid escapes and takes Christiane with him. They go to New Orleans and pretend to be a married couple. Of course during their time together they fall deeply in love. However a surprise is in store for them and a nasty one at that. I do not want to give away the entire plot but it appears the Eitenne is still very much alive and very angry with his wife, but Reid has no intention of losing Christiane and he will fight to keep her. You will have to read the book to find out what is in store for the lovers. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

I imagine readers will be wandering toward this intriguing book by way of some very different roots. Some, although not I, may be drawn to the implicit neo-political message in its subtitle, "The Value of Values." Perhaps having read your William Bennett you seek a more austere, academically flavored approach to moral absolutism. I don't think you'll find it here, but I wouldn't be surprised if the complexity (or is it ambiguity) of Turner's message didn't allow ideologues of the moralist right to snatch up this book to wave in the other free hand.

I came to this book after having discovered a very unusual book-length work of epic poetry. A rare enough form in itself these days, but this epic takes the further genre-bending leap of representing its story in the future, as "sci-fi." The epic poem is "The New World" and, as you might have surmised, the author is Frederick Turner. I guess it figures. Consider the readership problem. An epic poem may capture about 10% of the already small poetry-reading cohort, then one has to slice away another 90% of that often rather snooty crew as disdaining the sci-fi genre. A writer would have to have some sort of "big idea" fuel to drive such a thankless and relatively readerless endeavor. Turner has (many) such ideas!

Turner believes there are cross-cultural, cross-temporal universals, one of which is that which he shamelessly calls "beauty." You might note your own reaction to that title (or the thought of reading the book openly on a bus ? better a Danielle Steele). In choosing the more vernacular term, Turner purposely steps around the academic doo-doo that has become "aesthetics" while pursuing a rather academic task - defining beauty and bolstering the claim for absolutes in the process.

I'm not sure if he succeeds.

One intriguing link he makes, drawn rather extensively, is that between beauty and shame - notice another word one rarely sees in discussions outside the psych department. Beauty, he suggests, lies at a boundary between the dark and the light - shame energizes that interface for humans, fueling a historically tumultuous dynamic.

Casting a sidereal light on recent events he suggests:

"We can tell ideological pity from true pity by the killing.
Once the killing starts, another feedback mechanism springs into being; our shame at our crimes is denied, and transformed into further hatred, which must be slaked by further crime... This is the essential mechanism of the phenomenon of Terror."

Wow... "where's did beauty go?", you might ask. Well I can only say that the power of Turner's argument probably stems from his walking the sharp edge between dark and light and that one chosen quote represents the style and the energy of his approach if not its breadth.

Turner's discussion, I must add, are not a-political. He is certainly aware of the political content that lies within a head-on challenge to "modernism" and relativism. He also goes ahead and steps into the busy and dangerous highway of intellectual discourse by claiming that the development of the notion of left-right political dichotomy itself is at the core of the shames which have driven our culture away from the beautiful. Once again, the Bennett-ites will leap in to place a heavy hand around Turner's shoulders, but I think he would shrug it off. (Not being a student of cultural history I wonder that this 1991 book must already have had its reaction within intellectual circles and for all I know Turner is co-authoring books about what your 2nd grader needs to know... don't think so, though).

He is careful to develop the notion that his idea of beauty-lost is not necessarily a toga-party; not just a revival of a Greco-Roman canonical corpse. His references, such as they are, are smattered with non-western elements which build a broader base for that-which-is-lost than Bennett and the gang.

But its in the references department that I found the book wanting. As a lengthy essay it is very thought-provoking. But Turner suggests throughout that his notion of the "absolute" part of the argument is built upon recent discoveries about human brains and consciousness. Perhaps it is - but he drops nary a single footnote or reference (or even a slender bibliography) for the inquiring mind; and thus leaves, in the end, a certain doubt about the grounding of his ideas. If, like me, you have rooted some of your own thinking and reading about human existence around writers like Daniel Dennett (or even Morris Berman), you will feel cheated knowing that such scientific grounding doubtless exists and could have been bundled into this bouquet.

Ah well, you can't have everything (or five stars). This is an intriguing book.

This 500 page book is a good reference book for plant lovers and gardeners alike. It is divided into sections to make specific plants (or type of plant) easy to locate. The first section covers the basics: garden design, maintenance, fertilizing, etc. This section is good for those with no gardening experience. The best part of the book are the subsequent sections on plants including annuals and perennials, shrubs, trees, bulbs, lawns, vegetables and herbs, fruit and nut trees, indoor plants, cacti, orchids, ferns, and climbers. This layout is perfect for someone who knows what they want to plant (ie trees, annuals) but doesn't know which one. They can peruse through the thousands of full color photographs to find the one they want. Next to the photographs are basic information about the plants: the zones it can grow in, light requirements, etc. The photographs are good, numerous, and in full color. I gave it four stars rather than five because I would like more specific information on how to grow the plants rather than an overview. For the price, though, you can not beat it. It is a great addition to a gardening book reference library.

The first starship returns from a 40-year voyage to find Earth's society completely changed. The commander, a kind of genetic superman (but not telepathic, as the Amazon capsule summary has it), hopes to seize power. It's a society at once saner and more dangerous than our own--one where private autos are banned, but a person can be enslaved instantly through the use of drugs that can be applied to any paper or other surface that comes into contact with the skin. This is a remarkable and original book from a stylish, talented author. I've just finished Samuel Delany's "Triton," and "Beloved Son" is reminiscent of Delany's style, though perhaps not quite so difficult--Turner conveys ideas in shorthand, and makes the reader do a lot of thinking. Why only 4 stars? A little too much shorthand for me, plus a tendency to shift the story's viewpoint around among several characters, none of whom are particularly likable. But this was a pleasant surprise, as I had never heard of the book or author.

Here Frederick Turner advances a spiritual and religious thesis for the destruction of nature by Western civilization. What sets the West apart from almost everyone else in the world is a lack of connection with nature, which has lead to vast environmental destruction and the extermination of entire peoples. With great historical insight Turner traces this tendency way back to the very earliest cultures of the Near East such as Sumer and Mesopotamia, which were besieged by hostile nomads who resisted their attempts at the settled life. This influence continued into the Roman Empire which was constantly on the verge of collapse from barbarians at the gates, and Western culture developed an innate fear of unstructured and unknown nature. Meanwhile, as Christianity became the world's most bureaucratic religion, God was removed from the world and confined to the church, and stifling dogma prevented followers from attaining new revelations and awareness. In turn the outside natural world became the realm of Satan and had to be conquered and controlled. Turner extends these dire trends into the eras of exploration and expansion into the new world, with the stipulation that the inherent Western disconnection from nature led that culture to destroy it out of hatred and repressed desires.

This is a very strong thesis and Turner's research and insights are sound, especially for the time he wrote the book (1980), though he does tend to do a lot of stretching. An example is the implication that Westerners were so likely to slaughter other peoples because Christianity did not allow ritual sacrifices. Another problem is the inconsistent writing in this book, as Turner's distinct history and anthropology often drift into sentimentality and repetitive complaining about the West's evil deeds. Early in the book he condemns the doctrine of the "noble savage" as a patronizing effect of hypocritical Western culture (which it is), but in the final two chapters Turner is dangerously close to this attitude himself. Despite some inconsistencies, Turner has delivered a very insightful look into the culture that destroyed much of the natural world and the deep historical influences that prevented remorse and guilt, except in the subconscious of every nature-deprived Western person.

What a pleasurable introduction to the Bible as a storybook for all denominations. Written in plain, but not childish language, I found this book to be a good review for me. It's not preachy or full of contrived messages, just presents the Old and New Testament as a series of short stories. It reads aloud very well, but my first grader can read it and understand it himself. To top it off, the illustrations are wonderful; colorful and intricate, something you could spend forever looking at. I am buying copies to have as gifts as my nieces and nephews start celebrating special occasions.

The Blackwell text is an excellent companion or primary text of social thoery. Topics include the areas of classical to postmodern theory as well as current theoritical debates. A few of the main theorists include Marx, Blumber, Giddens, and Bourdieu. A must have for sociological students and professionals!