I saw a review in the USA Today for this book and could not resist picking up a copy:

"Most college seniors are trying desperately to not think about what comes next: the big belly-flop into REAL LIFE. And, speaking from experience, 99% of their parents are biting their tongues trying to find a non-verbal but effective way to get their near-graduates off their dime.

Enter Rebecca Knight with her almost platitude-free guide for the Class of 2003 (and their parents), A Car, Some Cash and a Place to Crash."

This book strikes a wonderful balance between funny, anecdotal stories and practical, expert advice. It's fun for the 'not-so-recent' graduate and it's invaluable for the new entrants to the real world. I highly recommend it.

I just bought 4 copies of this book for my brother and his roommates who are graduating in 3 weeks. It's tough to enter the "real world" and recent grads don't always want to take advice from parents or older siblings. (I know I didn't - thought I knew everything!) I read a review for this book in USA Today and then looked through a copy that someone in my office had ordered and thought it would be a great gift.

This book has a ton of useful advice and you can tell that it is written by someone who really wants to pass on the information. A family friend gave me a book about life after graduation a few years ago and despite the book's boring approach I did find it to be useful. Rebecca Knight's book blows that one away and I would really suggest buying this for any college student or recent grad that you know.

There's college, and then there is the real world. College is great, very important and fun. The real world, particularly the months after graduation, can be less so. Reality can smack you in the face.

This book, which I'm buying for twin cousins who are graduating next spring, is a real world guide. There were so many things that we need to address once officially off on our own. Many I thought I had covered, only to realize that I could have at the time (and still today) been a beneficiary of author Knight's advice (read 401k). I also like the advice on taking some risks. Though many of us are a little timid just out of college, don't we all look back and say "if I only took that chance"?

There are many how-to books. This one is fundamentally important as the course we chart post-college can determine what we do many years thereafter. A smart, real world, how-to guide that I could have used a decade ago.

This is the book we Aggies deserve. It's got all the school's history, traditions and spirit. And lots of football. Tons of color photos. Lots of games and great seasons and stats. And bonfire, red white and blue out, and just about everything else. Written by an Aggie. It's fantastic!

After reading TIGANA, I decided to read the first book in this acclaimed series. I did manage to read the whole book, which is one good thing, because the really bad books I stop reading as soon as they get boring. In short, the book does keep your attention. I think most of this is due to the book's originality. Sure, the OTHER WORLD apart from OUR WORLD may not be so original--Zelazny's Chronicles of Amber comes to mind--but there are other parts that ARE original. The hunter in the wild fields. The overall storyline about five young ones going to a world they don't understand. The summer tree itself. One thing that I noticed was that Kay used FAR too many commas in this book. Some sentences, sorta look, like this. In the end, this is only a mediocre fantasy novel, especially when compared to the works being cranked out by such heavy-hitters as Robert Jordan, Terry Goodkind, and George R. R. Martin.

The Summer Tree is the first book in The Fionavar Tapestry series (continuing with The Wandering Fire and The Darkest Road).

At Loren Silvercloak the mage's bidding, Kevin, Kim, Jennifer, Paul and Dave, five University students from Toronto, 'cross' into the Kingdom of Fionavar, the First of all Worlds, to help him in an oncoming war against Rakoth the Unraveller, and thus fulfil their destinies.

Like the five heroes, the reader is teleported into a land of magic and fantasy which the author only describes little by little. Although certainly used as a stylistic device, this sometimes makes it hard to understand the ins and outs of certain characters' actions. In the same vein, I also found the few sex scenes somewhat a bit out of place and unpoetic. Anyway, looking back upon it, I realize these were just details.

And indeed, as you turn the pages and learn more about the people and history of Fionavar and about the role the heroes have to play in it, the book really turns out to be enthralling and hard to put down. I particularly enjoyed the third part, where Dave is taken in by a tribe of hunters called the Dalrei, and learns about their customs and rites, to finally risk his own life for them.

Although at first I was a bit sceptical about the mixing of today's world with fantasy, in the end I really liked this book a lot and I'm looking forward to reading the next two. So don't let the first 150 pages or so get you down and read on, it's definitely worth it!

I've read many - at least a thousand, certainly - fantasy books, and The Summer Tree (and the entire trilogy) is simply one of the very best. The 'Fionavar Tapestry' is so painstakingly crafted that it must have been a labor of love (and probably a first book), and I can never understand why I don't hear far more about it.

The language is frequently lyrical, far above the usual standard for fantasy writing; "words more strung with fire", to use one of Kay's own phrases, than any but the likes of, say, Bradbury's. The whole really IS a tapestry; a complex and intricate interweaving of different characters, plot strands, and fantasy elements. And so tightly and carefully woven that it's unbelievable - half a sentence in one book can subtly foreshadow a major event in another book three hundred pages later - yet it's never slow, as I'd expect given all the connections and resonances. You just don't normally find this level of plaited storytelling, even in the endless 300 pound series.

Obviously I was blown away by this trilogy - will probably read it every few years for life - but many of the Amazon reviews were negative and I'd like to address some of the comments. First, a number of the reviewers seemed to be giving Kay low marks mostly because he hadn't written some other book. For instance, some would have preferred a book in which all the characters came from the one world, not some from Fionavar and some from earth. Or some would have preferred a book that was more like Tolkien, or less like Tolkien, etc. I'd say that these are simply valid alternate choices as to the form, and he should be judged on the job he did, not downgraded because he didn't write another book entirely.

A few reviewers thought the plot cliche or even PREDICTABLE. I'll just flat-out claim that noone could have predicted his plot; it was simply too complex and detailed. It could only be honestly considered cliche or predictable if you simplify it to the level of Good vs. Evil; who's going to win? If that's the criterion then many, if not most, fantasy books just fail.

I do agree with some reviewers that it seemed like the 'earthlings' adapted amazingly well to an entirely new existence on another world and seemed to cut loose of their pasts with almost no remorse. Though I'd almost bet that Kay had that all worked out in his mind, not enough justification made it into the pages of the books. He did give us a few reasons(and hints)to think that some of the 'earthlings' had no strong personal ties back home, and that the one who did frequently thought about that tie, (his father), but I too think that he could have fleshed that out more.

And I agree that the two female main characters weren't
delineated well enough at the beginning. At first it was hard to really tell them apart, (though after a critical event in one of their lives that problem was taken care of).

There are some smaller imperfections as well, but compared to the vast majority of fantasy books out there...!

This book was a bit disappointing. After all, Laurie King's Mary Russell series is a humdinger. Those are real page-turners. This one was not. OK, OK, there were places where the pages couldn't turn fast enough, but really very few. The main character was very well drawn, but it kind of slumped into the realm of romance novel, which it really needn't have done. I suppose it's my own fault for having read so much about cults -- this one just didn't have the ring of truth. And it didn't seem scary enough for all the concern. The ending seemed implausible. Ah, well, it won't keep me from reading the others in my Laurie King library. But try it out for yourself: This one came highly recommended, so obviously somebody out there loved it.

.

Having read all of Laurie King's other books, I continue to appreciate the way she weaves details and character development into her stories. Buuuut...she does have a bit of a tendency to overly describe physical settings, while leaving some important details too sketchy. In this book, her complicated feelings about Glen and her guilt and present life were well-examined, but, for example, I waited for even an inkling as to why she and her husband and daughter had ever been in a cult in the first place. We're not given enough information to begin to understand Joseph. And the story line with Steven in Arizona was a red herring. Was he supposed to be a good guy? All that time spent in that commune, come to naught. And I guess I just didn't "get" the whole alchemy thing --metaphor or the physical process. Was Steven supposed to believe it? Joseph? Or was it just a ruse? Unlike many of the other reviewers, I didn't come away with a feeling of insight to cults at all. We don't come to *really* know anyone in either place other than the leaders (sort of) and Jason/Dulcie, who are not even there by choice.

And then the ending....excuse me, but...huh?

The reason I even give this 3 stars is because Laurie King's sheer effort is very apparent here. I think she had some wonderful story ideas, all of which were lovingly and deeply researched and thought out (par for the course for her), but when brought together just didn't quite _fit_ each other. Like a quilt of gorgeous patches that gape at the seams.

But all said, I sure hope she writes a sequel and resolves the fates of Anne and the children. I did love those characters.

My first exposure to Laurie King's writing was with Kate Martinelli, and then I picked up Mary Russell and Holmes. I've read all her books to date. But The Darker Place has to be her best book yet. I couldn't put the book down, yet I didn't want to get to the end of it. I wanted it to go on and on. Anne Waverly became like a friend I was reading about. I surely hope Ms. King is going to do more books about her.

First off, what a waste of money. I bought this book looking for an essential manual for High-School Theater Directors and what did I find? Crap. I have never read a book with such a condescending tone in all my life. This review can't even begin to tell how terrible this book was. After reading 2 pages I threw it in the fire, put the ashes in a glass jar and dropped it into a well...never to be seen again.
DO NOT BUY THIS BOOK!!!!

Joy Varley's Essential Manual For High-school Theater Directors provides students and theater leaders with a handy outline of tasks, roles, and responsibilities for creating a successful production. From audition schedules and evaluations to student volunteers and wardrobe assessment charts, this is packed with fine tips essential to staging a production.

Mack Samples -- Dust on the Fiddle

(Book Review by John Wehrle; copyright 1995 by Graffiti Magazine)

From the exquisite cover by Bill Pitzer -- a dusty violin rendered against a mellow peach background -- we move several pages over to the opening scene of this novel. Corley Malone is driving up the Vandalia River at 85 mph in his V8 Ford, a Falls City between his knees, with a state cop in hot pursuit. We may not be in Kansas anymore, Toto, but we're sure as hell in West Virginia.

Samples' second book picks up Malone's story in 1961, four years after the events in "Doodle Bug." After a year of bumming around the country and three years in the army, Corley figures he ought to settle down and make something of himself, so he enrolls as a freshman at "Mountain View State College." But things never stay settled for long when Corley Malone is around. A staunch conservative steeped in the mysteries of the John Birch Society Blue Book, he quickly becomes radicalized when an article he writes for the college newspaper is censored, and he discovers, just beneath the serene surface of the idyllic rural campus, a murky world of power politics presided over by Mountain View State's autocratic president, Dr. Simon Luger.

Corley takes up with Caleb McClanahan, Mountain View's irreverent Registrar and Director of Admissions, who also happens to be a talented folk musician. Caleb convinces Corley to "blow the dust off his fiddle" and join him for some weekend gigs; the two of them link up just in time to cash in on the burgeoning folk revival of the early '60s. When McClanahan is fired during one of Simon Luger's purges, Corley decides to raise some hell as only he can. He and his friends on the Mountain Echo start up a down-and-dirty underground paper, and a full-tilt campus revolt gets underway.

It's no secret, of course, that this book was inspired by recent events at a "small rural college" in WV. If it has a fault, it's that Samples sometimes seems a little too eager to get his licks in about the controversy that cost him his job. If it doesn't have a "real" ending, it's because that controversy is still raging, judging from recent news reports. Just the same, "Simon Luger" is a villain you will love to hate, and when Samples turns his wicked sense of humor loose on the assorted bureaucrats, ass-kissers and moral cowards that are his natural enemies, he'll have you laughing out loud again.

"I had a lot of fun writing this one," he told me recently. You'll have a lot of fun reading it.

I expected much more of this book. There are MANY cities and towns in the U.S. having 4-year colleges .... and this book perhaps looks at 0.5% of the total number .... Perhaps I should have looked at the book's page count before I bought it. That would have been a clue to the low number of cities and towns covered. Look at the low prices being asked for used copies of this book. That gives a telling clue to the low values that buyers of the new book place on their used books. I personally do not recommend this book.