A wonderfull source of information for the "o" and 027 gauge operator.Explains how to set up accessories from Lionel.I found an excellent track plan,for an 027 layout,with a trestle,in a limited space. Highly recomended!

Buy this book for the pictures. The text is awful--it is poorly translated from another language (Italian, I suppose), and it's badly laid out, with the text split by photos and running to the far edges of the pages.

However, the text really doesn't matter. The photos are wonderful and cover every decade of Valentino's glorious career. Bows, polka dots, flowers; Sharon Stone, Marisa Berenson, Brooke Shields; lace, satin, chiffon... This is a beautiful book.

A wonderful book for the baseball enthusiast. I was fascinated by the outlook he had towards the game and how difficult it was for him to make it into the Major Leagues.

His love for playing the game was equal to Ty Cobb's and Pete Rose's and he played with the same dedication and determination.

The determination he showed during the days of "colored only" hotels, stores, and sections in the ballpark, when Jackie Robinson was just opening the door was "eye opening." His innovative way of thinking, and refusal to accept things for what they are just because "it's always been that way" changed the game of baseball forever and made this an excellent reading experience!

He also shows his vulnerable side and how his addiction to coccaine cost him his career, his fortune, and almost cost him his life.

A very interesting man, and a story worth telling.

Yes, you will find lots of stats and an inside look at the game of baseball. Maury will tell you how he stole the 104 bases, sized up the pitchers and what drove him to be the best. He will even give you insights into other players of his era. If the book had stopped here, It would have been a great sports biography. Lucky for You (the reader) there's more. It is one of the most touchingly human true stories you'll find. Maury recounts his life from his childhood in The Projects, in Washington, D.C., through 1988. He will let you feel how racism, romances and the sports media affected his life on and off the field, The payoff begins, however, in what happened to his life after he was fired, as a manager, from the Seattle Mariners. Yes, this gifted athlete, this deeply moral person who didn't even believe in smoking in front of his young fans became an alcoholic/addict. This book, then, was not written to be a simple sports autobiography. It was written to give hope to the addict who still suffers, it was meant to be of service. Maury wants to let you know that it can happen to anyone but also wants you to know that you can recover. He tells you what was true for him in each of these situations. Maury Wills speaks with courage, truth and conviction from a very tender heart. Mike Celizic writes the story with honesty, compassion and a style that makes it a great read.

Maury Allen didn't so much write "Where Have You Gone, Joe Dimaggio?" as he did typed it. A New York sportswriter, Allen simply pastes together rambling, unedited interviews of those who knew Joe D. best, never separating the wheat from the chaff. Subsequently, the book consists mostly of lengthy, word-for-word accounts -- some of them five pages or more -- of long-retired ballplayers. Now old men, the subjects begin talking about Dimaggio but end up meandering into their own less substantial careers and lives. The only insight Allen elicits from his reporting is that the Great Dimaggio was one of baseball's best-ever players. But that's not the true Dimaggio story. Lots of great ballplayers preceded and succeeded the Yankee Clipper. But no one has transcended the sport like Dimaggio to become an American hero and a cultural icon. He maintained a powerful and emotional stronghold on the country's consciousness for nearly 50 years after quitting the game. And that's despite his obsessive demands for privacy. Neither the interviewees nor Allen ever shed any light on why that is. Anyone wanting to know more about Dimaggio, the man and the legend, would be better advised to check out Richard Ben Cramer's forthcoming biography "Joe Dimaggio: A Hero's Life," due in September 1999. A five-page article in "Newsweek" magazine on the occasion of Dimaggio's death offered more depth and insight than Allen's 179-page book.

I loved this book! From the first chapter, where Lefty Gomez is talking about pitching against Joe D when he was only a kid with the San Francisco Seals. and this "amateur" gets two doubles off him, to the parts about Marilyn Monroe, which I think everybody on earth is interested in, this book had me hooked. I couldn't help but wonder how Mr. Allen got such personal and intimate information on the courtship of Marilyn Monroe by Joe. The part about her coming home from a party sad, because it's Christmas time and it's always been a horrible time of year for her, and she opens the door to see a small Christmas tree on her table, with a card from him, and he's sitting in a chair in the corner waiting for her. I found that very touching and emotional. As a reader, it was the most intimate view I've ever had of the two of them, and I will probably always wonder how Mr. Allen was able to get stuff like that, when I KNOW DiMaggio refused to talk about her, ever. All of Joe's teammates, from Lefty Gomez and Bill Dickey to Whitey Ford and Mickey Mantle told the most revealing stories about Joe and his life on the field and off the field with the Yankees. That was great reading. The clubhouse man, Pete Sheehy, told one of the funniest stories about DiMaggio when he described the day the Clipper showed him a bruise on his backside and asked Mr. Sheehy where he thought the bruise originated from. "Joe," Mr. Sheehy said, "That's from all the guys kissing your backside." What a great read!

This review reproduced here with the permission of the authorand the Executive Editor of the Journal of Environment &Development

It was not until the beginning of this decade thatenvironmentalists truly began to discover the environmental relevance of trade issues. The singular event of the GATT decision on the Tuna/Dolphin case ensured the battle between trade proponents and environmentalists would be joined. Since then, it has been an "Us" versus "Them" attitude, from both trade liberalization proponents and environmentalists. The free trade advocates, having been around for many years, did not welcome the environmentalist's intervention. The debate is still framed by two questions "How does trade liberalization harm the environment?" and "How do environmental protection measures interfere with trade liberalization?" It is within this context that Agriculture, Trade, & The Environment must be reviewed.

OVERVIEW Agriculture, Trade, & The Environment has a promising title. Trade versus environment debates have more often than not neglected agricultural issues. A book that "discovers linkages" between trade and the environment, without neglecting agriculture, has the potential to advance long-standing traditional view-points. Unfortunately, the reader will be disappointed. While the book does a good job of presenting the traditional free market argument that increasing public wealth will increase the public's desire for environmental protection, it does not seriously address agricultural aspects of the trade versus environment debate.

Part of the book consists of papers presented at a symposium titled "Agriculture, Trade and the Environment: Understanding and Measuring the Critical Linkages" sponsored by the International Agricultural Trade Research Consortium, an organization made up of 160 economists from 16 countries. The other chapters were invited contributions. Almost all of the authors are economists.

The book includes a few good chapters and an excellent introduction to the pro-trade liberalization perspective. It does not deal well with agricultural issues and is mostly a rehash of economic models and arguments in favor of trade liberalization. In particular, the book emphasizes the theory that free trade, like a rising tide, lifts all boats, thus protecting also the environment. In the final chapter, it is admitted that "though the conference was intended to be agriculturally oriented, the larger issues related to the general environment quickly emerged as the focus" (p. 301). Agriculture, Trade and the Environment provides further proof that purist economics is an inadequate tool kit for environmental policy-making. Yet another glaring over-sight, the editors did not include any chapters on environmental economics theory such as those from University College London, the London School of Economics, or even the World Bank.

The editors have organized the papers and the invited contributions into four parts. The first few chapters deal with the linkages of trade and the environment to international institutions. Second, the linkages between trade, renewable resources, and international environmental goods are explored. The third part discusses ways to measure these linkages. The fourth section deals with the identification of future research needed.

DISCOVERING THE CRITICAL LINKAGES: TRADE, INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTIONS AND THE ENVIRONMENT The ever-present Jagdish Bhagwati repeats the assertion that there is a positive correlation between income growth and the demand for environmental protection. Howard Gruenspecht looks at whether the suggested trade/environment linkages are valid, and whether there are other more cynical motivations for the environmentalists to interfere in trade talks. Ambassador Michael Smith, who identifies himself as a major player in trade and environment negotiations, reveals that he conducts his work on two principles "(1) that traders are, at heart, environmentalists ...; and (2) that carried to an extreme, the international crusade of environmentalists can end up hurting everyone" (p. 42). This clearly is a biased view that does not suggest one who is seeking balance.

Steve Charnovitz once again proposes his Global Environmental Organization that should operate along side of the World Trade Organization just like the International Labor Organization. In so doing, he fails to acknowledge the need for reform of the international trade regime which has been at the forefront of the trade and environment debate since Our Common Future was published in 1987. A chapter by Ballenger and Krissoff provides an adequate summary of one of the NAFTA environmental side agreements but devolves into a shallow and unconvincing account of interviews of environmental groups' and farm groups' positions on NAFTA related environmental provisions.

DISCOVERING THE CRITICAL LINKAGES: TRADE, RENEWABLE RESOURCES AND INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL GOODS G.M. Heal leads off with a chapter on the management of international environmental goods. This is followed by Graciela Chichilnisky's discussion of property rights and the search for an equilibrium model for North-South trade. She concludes with the simplistic notion that the "South overproduces, but primarily because the North overconsumes" (p.107) and that "all in all, property rights improvements in the South could check the main economic source of overuse: prices which are below social costs" (p. 106). Therefore, Chichilnisky ignores the fact that natural resource prices in the North are also well below social costs.

Diao and Roe also try to tackle the North-South general equilibrium model. This section of the book ends with a chapter by John Walley on how to quantify trade and environment linkages. He points out that standard environmental regulation that supposedly interferes with trade actually has little effect. However, if instead a carbon tax were adopted, global production and trade patterns would be strongly impacted.

MEASURING THE CRITICAL LINKAGES This part of the book, which includes six competent chapters, finally begins to deal with the issues related to agriculture. The authors discuss the economic effects of environmental policies on the agriculture sectors in the United States and Europe. Unfortunately, the chapters perpetuate the one-sided perspective of the book by continuing to suggest that environmental issues have no place in trade liberalization talks (remember the rising tide).

KEY QUESTIONS AND RESEARCH NEEDS The lead sentence in this section says almost all that needs to be said: "Most of the research that has already been done on the relationship between expanded agricultural trade and environmental protection is theoretical, incomplete, and lacks sufficient empirical content" (p. 281).

JED V5N4

On the plus side, much of the information presented is from interesting sources (about half of them I've read and will be looking for most of the rest), the author pulls together information over a longer time frame than most of the similar subject books I've read, and the overall content really encourages you to stretch the limits of your imagination and test your willingness to begin to believe that we don't know as much as we think we do about our own history and accomplishments. I might actually even recommend this book as a "primer" on the subject - a significant amount of information to tickle the imagination but not much depth. On the minus side, the book reads more like a collection of research notes rather than a narrative - often confusing and poorly organized, with contradicting information and random statements that don't have anything to do with the subject at hand (and if I had found the word paradigm one more time I had promised myself I would throw the book away - luckily it didn't appear again until a few pages from the end so I finished the book anyway). From time to time I had the feeling that the author didn't know much about the subject himself - but I thought he should get points for tackling a difficult and non-main-stream subject. Bottom line - I don't think the author fulfilled his stated purpose but there was something strangely fulfilling about the book anyway. I have the second book, which I am looking forward to reading, and I'm looking for the third book of the series.

Rabid Yankee fan that I am, I bought this book expecting a fascinating overview of the Steinbrenner era with some new insights and perspectives. I got neither.

Maury Allen was without question a talented sportswriter in his prime, but this ranks as the worst written sports history book I have ever read. It soon becomes clear that Allen's book isn't the product of extensive research but merely personal reminiscences and meanderings that offer very little sense of depth or substance about this period at all. Allen's most gripping chapter is his first one concerning his eyewitness perspective on the Fritz Peterson-Mike Kekich "wife swap". After that, it's all downhill with skimpy warmed over rehashings of things I've read about in so many better written books.

Along the way, when Allen skimps over the seasons and games of the period he's supposedly writing about he wanders off into annoying digressions about players of the 50s Brooklyn Dodgers, or the early 60s Mets, or Richie Ashburn, or being rude to Richard Nixon in 1969, none of which has anything to do with the Steinbrenner era. And on top of that, he gets so many basic facts wrong that after awhile it really gets annoying. There's trouble in the opening when he has the Mets beating Houston instead of Arizona in last year's postseason! On another occasion he describes Dave Righetti's 1983 no-hitter as the first at Yankee Stadium since 1951 (uh Maury, what about Don Larsen?) Don Mattingly is described as the first Yankee captain since Thurman Munson (Graig Nettles, Willie Randolph and Ron Guidry held the position after Munson and before Mattingly). Tony Horton is described as playing for Boston and being victimized by Steve Hamilton's "Folly Floater" in Fenway Park (Horton played for Cleveland and the incident happened at Yankee Stadium). Don Mattingly's eight game HR streak is described as happening at a time when the Yankees were "going nowhere" in 1987 (They were in first place at the time).

This book is for completists only. As a comprehensive overview of the Steinbrenner era it is neither comprehensive, nor is it much of an overview.

A good read if you remember the 1970s thru 2000 Yankees. Maury Allen is a bit full of himself (he refused to vote for Thurman Munson for the Hall of Fame because HE did not like him as a person) and repeats some lines thought the book. It's well worth the basement price of 5.00 (new) you find around town.

I enjoy reading baseball books that contain stories and anecdotes that don't usually appear in the papers. Allen has amassed a wealth of these stories, and as a baseball fan who is not privy to the "inside story," I found the book extremely interesting and fascinating. Allen rambles through Steinbrenner's 25 years as owner of the Yankees, and, in the process, he relates many wonderful stories about baseball and the people in it. Some of his tales aren't complimentary, but he's never nasty or spiteful, and I find that refreshing. I recommend the book to anyone who likes baseball and likes to read the stuff that isn't covered by the print and broadcast media. The book was written as an anecdotal anthology, and it succeeds.

I bought this book thinking it would cover some of the technical issues of Group 3 fax and IP-based fax (e.g. T.37/T.38). Instead what I got was a collection of product reviews on various obscure fax service providers. It's almost as if the author just copied magazine reviews (or worse yet, press releases) on various fax-related companies. The level of technical content in this book is virtually nil.

This book would be more accurately titled "Buyers Guide to New Fax Services". It might be useful for the business owner or marketing person, but is pretty much worthless as a technical book. Given the real shortage of technical books on fax (other than McConnel and some of Douskalis), this is a real shame.

This book was a tremendous help! Several weeks ago, I was tasked with researching replacement products for our existing desktop faxing package. Being new to the Telephony/faxing field, I was somewhat unfamiliar with the "faxtalk"...ie faxing terminology, the telephony relationship, protocol, etc. After reading this book, I now have a much better understanding of how faxing actually works.....from dialing to routing. The book also has an overview of each major faxserver product. (This was very helpful, since I was tasked to research several the vendors!)

This is by no means a sole technical reference source, but if you are looking for an all-purpose faxing book that explains faxing/faxserver concepts and how faxing works in the enterprise, this is a good one.

Bottom line: for a journalist, Allen understands nothing about baseball. His selections are ludicrous. Rube Marquard over Frank Robinson? Mark Belanger in the top 100 of all time? No way. This book is terrible. I'm very upset I wasted a cent of my money on this. Don't buy it.