This is a quite academic book about Buddhism in modern day Asia. It gives a brief introduction to several different approaches of modern application of Buddhism. It starts with the Ambedkarite Movement in India and ends with the Soka Gakkai in Japan. Well worth reading, especially if you think that Buddhism is a pessimistic religion

Published in England. Nicely done. Lots of illustrations. Text is very interesting. The only problem is: it is too short. You can read it completely in under 10 minutes. They should have included more kings and queens and more detail on the ones they did include. Its billed as being a children's book, but the names of some of the kings and queens were difficult for me and I have a master's degree.

When Billina, the talking hen, saves Dorothy, Princess Ozma, the their companions, from the wicket Nome King, they all think their problems are over--but their troubles have only just begun! For when the Nome King falls to pieces in fright, his shadow escapes and vows to avenge his master's honor. Shdy--as the Nome King's shadow names himself--sets out for the Emerald City to wreak his revenge on the people of Oz, and especially Billina.

The graceful, clever story has been well told, wonderfully illustrated (as always, in Claverie's case) and so badly designed. It's a shame that a perfect format, so right to the spirit of the story, fell into the hands of a designer who managed to put the worse ornaments next to the amazing illustrations, thus shadowing the whole achievment!

I bought this book because I was stunned by the perfection of "Good Behavior" which I expect to read again and again over the years. (I've read it at least 5 times over the past year alone.) "Queen Lear" isn't up to the standard Molly Keane set in "Good Behavior." Where does it fall down, exactly? The dominant characters are largely unappealing, but that doesn't explain it. They are equally unappealing in "Good Behavior" and still Ms. Keane made me care about Arun. In contrast, I can't care about the fate of Nicandra in "Queen Lear." Molly Keane seems to attempt a repeat of the magnificent knockout punch she delivered in "Good Behavior" (an ending which perfectly and shockingly fulfills and transforms the beginning, built logically and inevitably on everything in between). For me, "Queen Lear" just doesn't deliver. Why not? Some of the reason is technical, but there's also the unfortunate fact that the herione is a thorough pill with no redeeming qualities. By the time I reached the last pages of the book, I was heartily sick of Nicandra and her self-created, richly deserved misery. The final "revelation" from her childhood destroyed what little (very little) sympathy she might have earned. In "Good Behavior," Molly Keane made me sympathize with and finally, grudgingly admire a truly fascinating herione, Iris Arun. She's warped, stunted, horrifyingly self-deluded, and her unquestioning acceptance of the shallow values of her tormentors is rather disgusting. Still, there's the hidden audacity and sly creative stubborness with which she copes. (The cards are certainly stacked against her, emotionally speaking--she's got the "underdog" thing nailed!) Reading "Queen Lear," I cannot summon sympathy for Nicandra. Amply gifted with almost everything Arun lacks, she chooses a cruel, animalistic path that leaves her ripe for exploitation. Worse, she's not even interesting. There are some fairly good supporting characters in "Queen Lear," but they're not enough to carry the story and can't compare with the beautifully drawn, perfectly cast supporting roles in "Good Behavior." The psychological elements Keane introduces never quite gel into anything authentic or even definite. I highly recommend that you read "Good Behavior" if you appreciate brilliant writing and characterization. Read "Queen Lear" for scholarly or comparative purposes only.

This was a very amusing an enjoyable play. However, the quality of humor and style does not nearly match Payne's other works, such as Youth in Revolt. It also appears to have been written all in one sitting and not to have been edited: it reads somewhat like a skit written for a High School class. It is, however, worth reading because of the funny lines and its shortness. It can be read in about 30-60 minutes flat.

This book taught me a lot about my Hawaiian heritage. I learned tons of words and about the history of my people. The book was basically about 13-year-old Kaiuilani dreading to go to England, but went anyway, and the her life there and at home. It saddened me that she didn't have long to live, but this diary (I believe) shows how it felt like to be an ignored royal person. Although they don't show it in the story I think it's a tragic book. Hawaiians have much to mourn about for their royal family...

I thought this was a good story but there were some things about it I didn't like. For example, the godmother puts a spell on the princess at the begining of the book that prevents her from sleeping. However, in the middle of the book, the princess falls asleep after working with the peasants. I liked the begining of the book when the people were sleeping and the priness was awake. I was expecting the story to develop more around that theme but then it just jumped into different circumstances here and there. I liked the illustrations. The expressions on the characters' faces were done very well.

This book has reasonably valid information in it (checked against more reliable sources), but the author makes no attempt to differentiate the reliable from the unreliable, and far too much of it is unreliable. I suspect the author doesn't even keep his database in a computer genealogical program because there are many internal inconsistencies (I'm my own grandpa kinds of inconsistencies) that all the respectable genealogical software would catch.

No genealogical researcher should touch this book. All editions have been riddled with errors, and the latest is no exception. The spellings are frequently wrong, the lines are often inaccurate, mythical lines are not distinguished from historical ones, highly conjectural lines are not distinguished from proven ones, and most of the books and articles associated with many of the lines are completely unrelated to the material they allegedly cover. No statement in the book can be trusted at face value. Even if you want to use it just as a finding aid, double check everything.

Chris Bennett

This book is a great bargain for anyone interested in early and middle medieval history and genealogy. Accumulating this data by acquiring other books would cost at least 10 times as much. A caution: legendary, mythical and even fictional lineages are mixed in with the historical lineages, so care should be taken when using the book. Applicable references are given with most of the lineages, so the list of references can be checked for the known scholarly sources (Schwennicke etc), especially on anything before AD 1000. There are also silly errors (I'm my own grandpa type stuff), but most can be spotted by careful reading.