This book is like a hard punch in the gut. With its rough pictures and raw interviews, it is quite a tour-de-force by a great photographer. The people profiled really open their hearts up to Barbara Seyda. There is nothing on earth quite like this powerful book.

Barbara Seyda has eptomized the words, "...in the end only kindness matters..." a real look at homeless not only in Tucson, but everywhere...thanks Barbara Jo

What a wonderful,innovative hiking guidebook! As a hiker andPalm Springs resident, it is a joy to read Linda's prose that soappropriately captures our beautiful desert trails.

I amparticularly impressed with Linda's description of the IndianCanyons. Each year, HIKE FOR HOPE is held in these beautiful canyons,offering 7 different guided hikes to raise money to fund women'scancer research at The City of Hope. Linda understands the magic ofthose canyons and the wonderful spirit that exists there. Linda hasbeen a terrific supporter of this event... we met her because of herbook and our admiration of it...

During our drive out to Palm Springs, I skimmed through the book and map to find hikes that would be near our hotel. I read about six different hikes/chapters and then chose two that I thought would be close and not too long since I would be hiking by myself.

Not familiar with the area at all, the first thing I did after arriving at the hotel was ask the concierge where the nearest hiking trails were. I was told there were none.(The concierge could use a copy of your book.)

Back at my room, armed with your book I found one three blocks away. Perfect! I set out the next morning, found the trail easily and started up. What I enjoyed most while hiking was remembering what you had written about your experience and it was like sharing my trek with an invisible friend. I noticed the canyon below that you had mentioned and wondered if I would have admired it as much if it hadn't been pointed out in your book. When I reached the top with that incredible view of the Coachella Valley, I sat for a long time.I was looking forward to telling you that I had 'made it', it was worth the uphill climb and to say thanks because if I hadn't read about this trail, I would never have known it existed!

I had originally planned to run up the trail--that lasted about one third of the way up. But I did run all the way down on the way back. Yahoo!!!

I finished the rest of the book and intended to do a second hike but ran out of time. We did check out the famous homes listed in your book while driving around.

This is a very beautiful book..its worth much more than it costs...splendid collection of sufi wisdom.

This book contains some of the finest poetry from the literature of sufism; It is an awesome gift to the world; The photographs have something that reminds me of the young Ansel Addams;The best book on sufism i've read in years!

Written and illustrated by Irene Brady, The Redrock Canyon Explorer: A Virtual Visit To An Imaginary Canyon is a highly enjoyable and strongly recommended companion to exploring redrock canyons of the Southwest. Packed from cover to cover with black-and-white illustrations, The Redrock Canyon Explorer showcases amazing facts about canyon history and wildlife, from how lizards run, to the life cycles of ravens, to the Ancestral Pueblo Native American culture that once called the redrock canyons home. The Redrock Canyon Explorer is a truly amazing, fact-filled and exciting guide for nature lovers of all ages and backgrounds.

This beautiful book is a stunning breakthrough in nature writing. "The Redrock Canyon Explorer" by Irene Brady combines the best in scientific accuracy with high adventure as she describes and illustrates the hidden life of the Colorado Plateau. For research or for recreational reading, children and adults alike will delight in the exquisite drawings and lyrical narrative of the creatures who live in the high desert Southwest. Curl up in front of a cozy fire with this lovely and informative book, or take it with you as a guide in your Southwest travels. This is a book to cherish for a lifetime and to give to the most discriminating friend. I recommend it without reservation.

I brought this book under the highest scrutiny - and it passed with flying colors. I would reccommend this book to any female I know, whether they lead retreats for a living or are women just seeking to know Jesus more fully. I know the author personally and she is a women of fine character and wonderful personality. A River in the Desert is a five star book, and one that is truly inspirational.

Whether planning a spiritual retreat for one (yourself!) or a group of 100, Ellen Shepard has provided all the necessary information for organizing a meaningful withdrawal from the everyday world. With her wide experience in ministry and leading women's retreats, Rev. Shepard understands what women of all ages need for faith formation and spiritual growth.

The twelve themes of the retreats, from "Seeking Growth" to "Joyful Heart-Dancing Spirit," cover a wide range of important topics for Christian women. Well-written, easy to follow plans include everything from "ice breakers" to closing worship ideas, with suggested time allowances for each activity.

"A River in the Desert" will help individuals and women's groups leaders as they seek to provide opportunities for community and significant spiritual introspection.

A very quick and surprisingly engrossing book. ROMMEL is just as good if not better than its predecessor, Adolf hitler: My Part in His downfall. Milligan does a fantastic job of juggling the humor and the tragedy without overwhelming the reader with the events of the times. His sad nostalgia isn't as pronounced as it is in DOWNFALL, but it is there, as he does take time out from reminiscing to hammer out a paragraph about how he longs for the old days. His writing makes those who never experienced it long for it as well.

This book written by a comedy genius was both marvellously funny and desperately sad at times. I thoroughly enjoyed the bit about the gun going over the edge

Kristin Joy Pratt-Serafini began writing her fabulous books at age 14. In her fifth book, Kristin has taken her journaling habits and transformed them into interesting and educational masterpiece.

Saguaro Moon takes you on a journey through the Sonoran desert (and through the seasons) while educating you about deserts, the plant life, insects, birds, reptiles and other animals. Obscure facts are included along with references to other books, web references, and an invitation to become a Planet Scout. This is a great book for any child, teacher or home educator!

This is a fun book that is interesting for anyone to read. It is well designed because there are journal entries as well as informative articles written by the author on every page. The illustrations are full of color and I enjoy the attention to detail that fills this book.

Kristin Joy Pratt-Serafini has a talent in writing books that are fun and informative. This book details the changing of the seasons (month to month) in the desert environment as seen by a young girl and her friend.

I found this book by accident and read it in one sitting... I have read many times since then. I recommend it.

I would like to commend this book to all readers, whether you like poetry or not. The author, Billy Marshall-Stoneking, is one of Australia's greatest living poets, and here, in his book, Singing the Snake, he has offered poems of genuine feeling and insight. There is real knowledge here, and humour, and voices... one can almost smell the smoke of campfires... and the aroma is entrancing. In these wonderful poems (illustrated by the Pintupi elder, Tutama Tjapangarti) Marshall-Stoneking recounts his time among the Aborigines of Central Australia. This book is destined to be one of the great classics of Australian literature and I have no doubt of the world. It certainly deserves international recognition. His poem, The Seasons of Fire, which is included in this collection was awarded the Bill Harney Poetry Prize. I am pleased to recommend this book.

Les Murray, Poet

This is a stunning book of photography, with about 120 color plates of the Sonoran desert, taken by photographer Jack W. Dykinga. Besides Arizona, locations include Mexico, Baja California, the shoreline of the Sea of Cortez, and Anza-Borrego and Joshua Tree National Monument in southern California.

There's no mistaking that it's a dry, hot region, but it's also clear that there is plant life almost everywhere. There are photographs of landscapes of sand, rock and sky, with saguaro, barrel cactus, ocotillo, and many desert flowers. There is not a sign of human life (until you reach the last half dozen pages where the editor has included several shots of blight: graffiti, a junkyard, a concrete water channel). Many photos are taken at sunrise or sundown, capturing glowing colors and shadows. A few are taken after snowfall.

The text, by Charles Bowden, is personal and impressionistic, with a Sierra Club point of view. He emphasizes the desert's resistance to any but the Native populations, who lived here in harmony with the landscape for millennia before the exploitation of European explorers. To these, in their crudest manifestations, are compared the more reckless schemes of modern-day developers. The closing chapter is an appreciation of wilderness advocate Edward Abbey. In my opinion, an error on the part of the book designer was to set these long essays as full pages of italic type, which makes them difficult to read.

As a companion volume, I recommend Joseph Wood Krutch's "Desert Year," an account of a year spent in the Sonoran desert near Tucson. Although a different desert, there's also Abbey's "Desert Solitaire."

Having grown up with Arizona Highways magazine, I had, over the years, lost interest in the same old lovely-but-humdrum Meunch brothers photography and lackluster text commonly given to the Sonoran desert. Then I saw the cover of "The Sonoran Desert" and everything changed as I leafed through it. Bowden's text is intensely thought-provoking; the text is spare and rich at the same time, like his subject matter, and Dykinga's photographs show the Sonoran desert in the only way it should EVER be photographed. The photos capture a depth of the desert I've never seen in print before. Dykinga shows like nobody else the juxtaposition of textures and colors, the whole feel of the Sonoran desert in all its glory- and there's a whole lot of glory there if you take the time to look for it. Dykinga clearly does.

If you think of the deserts as places of emptiness and boredom, have a look at this superb book! The subject was not easy but Jack Dykinga is mastering the art of using the light and the shapes to make us enter a new dimension. His breathtaking large format photographs plead in favor of preserving the wilderness in it's original state and presents us to it's amazing vegetal hosts. After seeing this book, you will never ever think of the Sonoran Desert as an "uninhabited place".

This is the first collection of talks by Sant Ajaib Singh Ji that was published by Sant Bani Ashram. Later ones include _The Palace of Love_ (on the Vars of Guru Nanak, 1st Guru of the Sikhs), _The Jewel of happiness_ (on the "Sukhmani" of Guru Arjan, the 5th Guru), _The Two Ways_ (on the "Gauri vars" of Guru Ramdas, the 4th Guru). The great Saint and poet was a man of practice. He used to pick some verse from the Guru Granth Sahib, the Sikh Scripture, and rather than just comment it, He would explain it and make it fresh and actual, with lots of examples and stories, so that this treasure of spirituality may be put into practice by truth seekers everywhere and anywhere. This is priceless devotional poetry.

A simple man attains greatness.

To read about the truth is one thing, but to see with your own Eye is another.