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Books to read if you're planning a vacation in "Island", sorted by average review score:
Nantucket: An Island Sketchbook
Published in Hardcover by Winter Harbor Press (May, 1996)
Author: Gretchen Jaeger
Average review score:

A lovely depiction of Nantucket, exquisitely illustrated.
This illustrated sketchbook is simply charming. Jaeger's magical talent and keen eye celebrate everyday yet rich Nantucket island scenes. The illustrations are a treat to behold, whimsical, fairy-like and colorful. The sketchbook brings reminiscences of youth and simpler times, capturing the essence of summer days long ago. It is a wonderful keepsake for those who have visited Nantucket, dream of visiting some day, or those who miss the beauty of the New England summer. This book is an especially thoughtful gift for a grandmother, sister or childhood friend. What a delightful treasure.

wonderful book
I grew up with Gretchen. She is a very talented person. I just sat poolside with her last Friday. She is an amazing talent.

Islands, Women, and God
Published in Hardcover by Browder Springs Press (May, 2001)
Author: Paul Ruffin
Average review score:

Fine stories of men's world
Fine stories of men's world
By ERIC MILES WILLIAMSON

ISLANDS, WOMEN, AND GOD.
By Paul Ruffin.
Browder Springs, $24.95 hardcover,
$16.95 paperback.

PAUL Ruffin, poet, short-story writer and professor at Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, writes about Texas and the Gulf Coast so well that his new story collection is likely to define the literary territory for many years to come.


The 17 stories in the collection are about common people, folks from Texas and Mississippi who live quiet and humble lives -- factory workers, farmers, fishermen, husbands and wives and youngsters and oldsters. Although the characters are common people, the book is not. These stories are masterful, every line honed and tight and true, the sentences spoken by the characters in phrases we've often before heard but never before seen on the page.

Ruffin's work has been compared with that of William Faulkner and Flannery O'Connor, but his stories are not derivative. Rather, they're part of the new wave of Southern fiction generally and Texas fiction specifically, a wave that includes Southerners such as Barry Hannah, Padgett Powell, Chris Offutt and Charlie Smith, and Texas writers such as Glenn Blake and Tracy Daugherty. Not insignificantly, Ruffin occasionally pays tribute to Cormac McCarthy, a Southerner-turned-Texan like Ruffin himself.

Islands, Women, and God is a man's book about the world of men. The stories center on the conflicts inherent in the stifled, brutal and often senseless world of masculinity.

Manhunt, the opening story, is about the apprehension of an escaped convict. The hunters of the convict are local men who normally spend their days selling cars and working for insurance companies, these otherwise calm men turned into bloodthirsty bigots and would-be killers, the manhunt a legal excuse to do what they would be doing were there not the constructs of "civil" society. Underpinning our culture is a violence that needs very little to turn supposedly peaceful family men into primordial beasts, Ruffin seems to say.

In Tattered Coat Upon a Stick, Ruffin writes of an aging man who, rather than live out his days in senility and helplessness, emasculated, chooses to return to the family property in the country and end his life properly and with dignity. His end is far from morbid or maudlin, but instead glorious and beautiful.

Interloper relates the tale of a family man who discovers a burglar in his house and takes care of him. Just before the protagonist of the story meets the burglar, Ruffin writes,

No, it is nothing that would warrant calling the police or awakening your wife, nothing to justify wrenching off a table leg and swinging it wildly through the dark. But it is more than simply nothing. So you must summon whatever resolve you are capable of and go down the stairs into the cold darkness of what a few hours earlier was your warm and well-lit den. You are in charge -- it is your house, your domain, and while your wife and children sleep you must stand watch if there is a threat. This is the law. A very old one.

When Ruffin's men pop, when their natures surface, he is there with some of the most perceptive and powerful observations in American literature, or any literature for that matter.

One of the best stories in the collection, The Sign, shows the brutality of father to son and son to father. At the beginning of the story we find a description of the father beating his son:

"I will beat your skin off, boy. You hold still." And the belt came down time and time again on his back, lapping around his protruding ribs like a devil's tongue, then curling about his legs, snapping until all the feeling went away and there was only sound, only sound -- and he could feel the warm of his blood trailing down from the welts, seeking its way, gathering and dripping. He stood like something carved of wax, not feeling the belt but feeling the blood. He would not cry. He clenched his eyes and teeth, but he would not cry.

The story centers on the father's wedding anniversary and a family reunion. The son returns home for only the second time in 40 years for the event. The father is dying of cancer, and the son exacts his revenge in spectacular and appropriate fashion, not by killing the father but by doing something far worse and more enduring.

The title and final story of the collection, Islands, Women, and God, is about a man named Ray who fakes his own death and deserts his wife and children to live on the barrier islands of the Gulf Coast. He is discovered by a former co-worker and friend, and the story gives occasion for Ruffin to present a sad and unfortunately viable solution to the condition of men: solitude and atavism, regression into an animal state in nature. Ray says, "I'm in harmony, man, with this island, with this Gulf. I got everything I need out here to live, and everything's in balance." Later he explains that every man is called to this state of being:

"It comes for every man. ... Every man. Only most don't know what they're seeing or feeling, or they don't know what to do about it. I'm telling you, Roger, an old man over there [in society] is, as Yeats says, just a scarecrow. Out here he's more. He's everything. He's a skull full of lightning. He's -- he's God, or he's soon going to be, because God is all of this."

We leave the book with Ray on his island and Roger back in civilization, longing to be living on an island of his own, afraid to do so yet wanting to do so.

Islands, Women, and God is an astonishing book. Every page is beautifully written, splendidly rendered and bold. Where weaker writers grow timid and shrivel, Ruffin burrows deep into truths we know but don't admit to knowing. In a time when American writers seem to strive to either shock or soothe, Ruffin instead gives us an honest vision of what lies beneath the veneer of manners and society. He is a master of language and a peerless teller of tales, and he will surely be known as one of the best writers of his generation.

Eric Miles Williamson is the author of the novel East Bay Grease and a graduate of the University of Houston's Creative Writing Program. He lives in Missouri and is at work on his second novel.

Review of Paul Ruffin's Islands, Women, and God
Islands, Women, and God. By Paul Ruffin. In Islands, Women, and God, Paul Ruffin returns to the Alabama, Mississippi and Texas regions he rendered so memorable in his 1993 critically acclaimed short story collection The Man Who Would Be God. They are tales of passion, suspense, violence, racial injustice, renewal, and the inexorable human quest for meaning and identity, laced with flashes of humor. Ruffin's ear for dialogue is impeccable, and his narratives are ripped, pulsing and breathing, from the unmistakable fabric of reality. The author wastes no time engaging the reader's attention. On page one of "Manhunt," the first story of section I, in searing prose pungent as the smell of burning flesh, Ruffin drops his reader deep into the pit of human violence. "The Pond" features Gerald Roper, an aging man who trespasses across Mr. Earl Palmer's pasture to fish in an artesian-fed fishpond. During his fishing expedition, Roper snags a great white thing rolling "like a dumpling in oil as the hook pulled loose and the bobber whistled past his head and clattered onto the gravel behind him, and two eyeless sockets in a white face, cradled by trembling reeds, looked right past him toward the ghostly moon." Next the reader finds Roper questioned by a deputy to whom he has gone to confess his shocking finding. Though the deputy, after viewing the "catch" and recognizing what it is, tries to convince Roper he's hooked a pig, Roper adamantly insists that what he snagged was the bloated body of his former mistress. Among the male protagonists of the other stories in section I are Mr. Turner of "Tattered Coat Upon a Stick," who, terminally ill, returns to his beloved Texas hill country to face his own death; Johnny of "The Sign," who, brutally physically abused during his childhood by his father, returns to his home after a lengthy absence and exacts his sweet revenge; the two graduate students of "Corn-Silver" who are hilariously duped by an illiterate, white-trash kid; and Buddy of "The Dog," a tragic figure who, in saving a dog caught up in a trotline, has his nose bitten off by the very beast whose life he saves, only to end up so monstrous in appearance he's abandoned even by his wife and kids, assuming a huge and dark presence "like some kind of old imagined or remembered sin." "The Dog," tragic though it is, is balanced with a moment of hilarity characteristic of Ruffin's brilliant humor. In section II, "woman" takes center stage: woman as "Nature," the mirror of mortality, the instrument of renewal, and seducer. Ruffin bares the hearts and minds of his female characters with a dispassionate clarity reminiscent of the late Eudora Welty. In "Peaches," one of the most sensual stories in the collection, a white woman misinterprets the remark of a black man who tells her that she has "nice peaches." She and her husband, Murle, are peach orchard keepers, and sell peaches in cardboard boxes by the road. Having packed his pistol and journeyed deep into the woods to the black man's cabin to address the presumed insult, he finds him on his porch steps fondling the exposed breasts of his lover. She sees Murle and rushes inside their shack, standing just inside the doorway. Upon repeated questioning by Murle as to what he meant when he said Sally had "nice peaches," Cliff insistently assures him he was only referring to the actual peaches they were selling. Meanwhile, Cliff's lover, realizing his trouble with the white man, seduces him and relieves Murle of his frustration. During the intimacy which ensues, Murle overhears an animal shrieking in the barn. She assures him that it's "just that mule," and that Cliff will stay in the barn until they're finished. Later, after Murle receives the sexual fulfillment he's so long desired, he changes his demeanor toward Cliff completely, feeling like they're friends or brothers. The "gods" revealed in the collection are as multifarious as the men and women who turn to them in their hours of darkness. There's the Great Spirit of the Kiowa in "Tattered Coat Upon a Stick;" the wrathful God of "The Sign;" the jealous God of "Peaches;" the comforting God Buddy turned to in his huge and dark loneliness; and the God of Nature of "The Drought," "April Treason" and "Islands, Women, and God." In many ways, "Islands, Women, and God," the final and title story of the collection, is a brilliant summation of the men and women who dominate the stories preceding it. Ray, the story's protagonist, fakes his death at sea to live out the rest of his life alone on a barrier island off the coast of Mississippi. Philosophizing with his friend, Roger, who "finds" him but swears to keep the find a secret between the two of them so Ray's wife can collect his life insurance, Ray says: "About women. I'm gon' tell you something else about women, some more gospel, long's I got your attention. Women are a hell of a lot closer to the center of things than men are or ever were. They're closer to the Godhead. Women are Nature. Like this island. Man, they got dark currents in them, deeper than ours run, and their bodies and minds are a great mystery, which is why men will never understand'm. They're in synch with the motion of the universe. Men are just dreams, or worse, just half dreams, but women are real. Men look for the reasons, but women are the Reason." With his second collection of stories, Ruffin makes another significant contribution to Southern and American letters. In spare, muscular prose seamless as a tendril of kudzu, Ruffin probes, with haunting insight, the light, darkness and yearning of the human heart. --Larry D. Thomas, author of Amazing Grace

Islands, Women, and God
Islands, Women, and God, Stories by Paul Ruffin. Browder Springs Press, 2001. 237 pp. These seventeen stories play themselves out in the Deep South, East Texas, and West Texas, three areas as dissimilar--in geography, social mores, and philosophy--as, say, Iceland, Bolivia, and Ethiopia. And while Paul Ruffin does employ his considerable skill to give vivid descriptions of these places, his poet's eye and voice and heart focuses tighter and truer on his characters, who, as credible characters must be, are spit-polished mirrors of people everywhere. And what a parade of individuals he sends forth. There's Sam, who undertakes, with a tunnel vision worthy of Ahab, to capture an enormous manta ray in "Devilfish". And Mitchell, in "Tattered Coat Upon a Stick", who wants nothing more than to have his ashes scattered among the mesquite bushes and rocks of the place where he grew up, rather than end up planted in the upscale, manicured cemetery that his children insist upon. And Loretta, perhaps the most haunting of the bunch, who uses the only tool at her disposal to save her husband in "Peaches." Loretta, who is black, has to make her unique sacrifice in the unrelenting era of racial inequality. A young insurance salesman, in "Manhunt", must make his among kudzu-draped backwoods. In "The Interloper", a husband and father must seek out something in the dark rather than lose his family to it, and characters in two of the tales choose to face their final darkness on their own terms. Sacrifice and reconciliation abound. Several of the stories chip away at the old, hard strata of established society in their various settings, and prejudice and cruelty and pomposity are served up in equal measure with love and trust and devotion. In "Corn Silver", a haughty graduate student is duped by an ignorant boy; in "The Sign," a middle aged man whose greatest accomplishment was to move permanently away from his harsh, Mississippi delta upbringing must go back to finally confront it. They were his people only in biological fact. From the eldest to the ones in diapers, they were an illiterate lot, mostly day laborers, fundamentalist in their worship and ultra-conservative in whatever politics they followed. If evolution had had a hand in improving the line over the decades, he could not imagine what they must have been like a century before - he doubted that the generations had witnessed much more than a gradual separation of forehead from cheekbones and thinning of hair from the backs and shoulders of the males. And on and on, in trailer parks, at fishing holes, on wide front porches of bourbon swilling lawyers, the themes of facing death, and, perhaps more importantly, facing life, weave their way through. And it is refreshing to read a writer who chooses not to veil his work in deep symbolism and puzzling time shifts. Every offering in Islands, Women, and God is told carefully and beautifully and forthrightly. Like the works of O'Conner and Welty, they don't have be worked at, but simply enjoyed. Whether the situations are humorous--especially when the author's letter perfect use of regional dialect runs rampant--or intense, or sad, the characters ring always true, and might just be the lady you find yourself standing behind in a grocery line. The man leaning over his bacon and eggs down the counter. The little boy not paying attention two pews up. There's a comfort level that comes with recognizing folks--be they lovable or detestable or anywhere in between--and it is as beneficial when reading good fiction as it is when stepping into a crowded room. Some reviewers have said that Ruffin is at his best when writing about fishing, a pursuit that he loves, and is good at. He's managed to work it into his poems and stories countless times and, I agree, it makes for fine reading. But I hold that he shines brightest when dealing with average people facing the daily dilemmas that life and fate just plop down in their paths. In "Drought", a couple of city dwellers have sunk all of their savings into a farm, only to be dealt a stunning setback by nature. In bed that night they listen as frogs and crickets drum and chirp around the ponds and down along the creek. The air is fresh smelling, almost cool. They lie across the bed with their heads at the open window. "I suppose," he says, "that we'll get over this." "Oh, yes, we always do." "Still, wouldn't it be good just once to get something without having to give something up?" "Somehow," she says, "it usually seems to work that way." And it usually does. In stories and in everyday life. Facing each day as it comes. Giving things up. Getting over something. And Ruffin chronicles the delicate dance nicely. In "The Pond", an old man has fallen hopelessly, headlong in love. There were times when but for the fact that he had not a dram of creative blood in him he would have gotten up and written her a poem, so deep was his passion for her. Such is the depth of Paul Ruffin's passion for the ongoing drama of living. And the reader benefits greatly from the fact that his creativity far surpasses a dram. --Ron Rozelle, author of Into That Good Night, The Windows of Heaven, and A Place Apart

Catch The Spirit
Published in Paperback by MFW COMMUNICATIONS (24 April, 1997)
Authors: Earl Handy and Molly F. Walter
Average review score:

Current, Entertaining, Exciting and Informative Reading!
I have finished reading this book and it was Great! A must read for anyone considering the rental or purchase of a new or preowned houseboat cruiser or any other boat for that matter. I could relate various aspects of my personality in each of the characters in this story. The adventure has inspired me to further my boating education by classes in the Power Squadron and Coast Guard Auxilary and becoming a member in each organization. A goal of of obtaining a Coast Guard Skipper's license within the next year is in place. Molly, thanks for sharing your adventure with us. I have caught the SPIRIT and redefined my own dreams.

Island Woman: A Novel
Published in Paperback by Arch Grove Pr (October, 1997)
Author: Richard Sessions
Average review score:

Wonderful!
Having Chumash blood in my veins from my paternal grandmother, coming across this book was just wonderful. The Chumash are a coastal tribe who lived in the Santa Barbara, Ca. area. This book was fun to read, and the historical content was helpful in answering some of my questions regarding a small part of my heritage. Thank you Richard Sessions! I have to also wonder if Richard Sessions is from Santa Barbara as I am (I currently reside in SLC, Utah). I am looking forward to his next story, and hope he writes and publishes another book very soon.

A well-written adventure that is hard to put down
This is a well-written page turner which combines philosophy, anthropology, history, and adventure in one volume. It reminds the reader of the best work Jean Auel, Robert Heinlein, Diana Gabaldon, and many others. But it is not only adventure. It is a thought-provoking examination of the modern human whose philosophies may not always agree with current reality, but finds that an opportunity to change that reality bears significant responsibilities and burdens. The author exhibits a talent for story-telling and captivating the reader. We will be hearing more from him in the future.

This book is fantastic!!!
I found this book to be very engaging and fast paced. I particularly liked the historical context and the weaving of modern day events with the past. A good, thought provoking read.

Dinotopia: A Land Apart from Time
Published in Hardcover by HarperCollins (August, 1998)
Author: James Gurney
Average review score:

Beautiful artwork...an adventure story with social messages
Dinotopia will appeal to different age groups for different reasons. Very young children (especially those interested in dinosaurs) will understand little of the story, but will appreciate the multitude of dinosaur pictures. You can 'read' this book to a very young child by simply commenting on each page's pictures.

Slightly older children will begin to be engaged by the story...an adventure tale, presented as if the book were a lost journal that has been recovered.

Youth and adults can appreciate the story's deeper messages about peace and simplicity of living, and the beautiful artwork...far beyond the typical illustrations in a children's book, both in quantity and quality.

Absolutely Breathtaking
This book is one of the most incredible books ever written. I thoroughly recommend it to everyone. Of all the books which deserve cult status, this book is the most breathtaking.

The artwork is amazing! The paintings simply take your breath away. Whenever I want to escape, I read this book. Whenever I want to immerse myself again in the land of Dinotopia, I just look at one of the fabulous paintings and i'm there.

The book is accessible to everyone - there are characters which connect with every person on this earth. The story is magical and deserves greater praise than I could ever give it.

I LOVE THIS BOOK! PLEASE BUY IT!!!!!

PLEASE!

Marvelous illustrations and content!
I found this book in on my brother's bookshelf thinking it would be a nice bedtime story. The cover looked interesting enough, but from the first page I was hooked. As an 18 year old, I was surprised at how this book captured my attention with its detailed illustrations and maps. It was an easy read, but I took longer than usual to finish it, because I lingered on each page, simply marveling at the pictures! In a fictional world of dinosaurs and humans, this book will touch your creative side like few others. I highly recommend Dinotopia, especially for reading aloud to a younger audience. I could just imagine myself in such a world and I'm certain you will too!

Anne of the Island
Published in Library Binding by Quiet Vision (19 January, 2001)
Author: Lucy Maud Montgomery
Average review score:

Absolutely wonderful!!
I love alll of the Anne of Green Gables series. They are so vividly written you find yourself wishing that you were born as Anne a hundered years ago on PE Island. I would have happily endured all her hardships for all the wonderful moments in her life, and the fact she married Gilbert Blythe! It's so well written that you actually feel that you know Gilbert and I actually found my self falling in love with him! I've read the series 2 times. The first time I couldn't stop thinking about Anne. I read Anne, I tried to live like Anne and I dreamt Anne. Anyway, although I love all 8 books almost equally Anne of the Island is just a little better. And although it's romantic it's definitely not just a romance. Anne of the island includes wit and humour that makes it an all-round perfect book. If you're an Anne fan you havvvvvve to read this. I could not describe how wonderful it is in 1000 words. Anne of the Island is truly a book you CANNOT put down. After reading this I recommend you read all the rest of the Anne of Green Gables series (there are 5 more book,) although you'll probably be rushing to buy them anyway.

Anne Of The Island
Anne Of The Island is a great book. It is about a girl with dark strawberry-blonde hair. She goes off to college with her friends: Charlie, Gilbert, and Diana. She makes some new friends and one of them, Priscila which is Pris for short, they meet in the graveyard across from the college. She meets many men she thinks she is in love with, including Gilbert, but when the propose to her she finds out she really doesn't love them that much. She even turns down the man of her dreams. So, it is partially a love story. She was adopted when she was young by Marilla. Now they have taken in twins when their mother died and their only relative can't take care of them. The younger one is Davy, who is always asking questions and getting in to mischief. He especially likes to bother his twin sister, Dora. She is always quiet and quite lady-like. They all live on Prince Edward Island in Canada. If you want to know the rest, you can read the book for yourself. Happy reading!

The Best there is!
If you like the Anne of Green Gables series this is the best one in the whole thing! Anne of the Island has something for everyone! Anne Shirley leaves the small town of Avonlea to attend Redmond collage.. There the novel introduces you to a character who is extremely funny named Pricella! (Hope I spelled her name right). In this novel Anne falls in love with a fellow school mate, while her long time friend Gilbert Blythe finds a love interest as well! Do they end up together at last? Read the book and find out! This book is definatly for people who liked the movie "Anne of Avonlea". They are without a doubt slightly similar, but the book is definatly better!

The Adventures of Tintin: The Broken Ear / The Black Island / King Ottokar's Sceptre (3 Complete Adventures in 1 Volume)
Published in Hardcover by Little Brown & Co (Juv Trd) (May, 1994)
Author: Herge
Average review score:

Why's Tintin so unique in the world of comic books ?
Of course we've all grown up with so many fiction characters from DC/Marvel comics, Disney, Archie's`etc., each of them with its own appeal and flavour ...

What sets Tintin apart from all the rest, I feel, the brilliant quality of the artwork. The level of detail, right from the wheels of flight 714 about to land on that tiny island (flight 714), to the shadow effects of walking in a hidden passage to the Inca empire (prisoners of the sun), to the shape of the waves on which Tintin in a coffin is floating (cigars of the pharaoh), or the jaguar in which Tintin chases the gangsters (the calculus affair), the details are just fantastic and the right amount, without creating too much noise and distraction - as is the case with many of the DC comics - iron man, the incredible hulk, etc.

The stories range from contemporary to looking ahead in the future - swing wing planes, rockets to the moon, hidden cameras/espionage. The subject matter is political, and in my opinion slightly controversial at times. Especially the way Herge stereotypes native people in India (Cigars of the Pharaoh, Tintin in Tibet), or in the jungles of Amazon (The Broken Ear). But even here, Herge is way above the shady and simplistic plots of the like of Phantom and Flash Gordon.

The collection is more readable towards the later comics, some of the earlier ones contains situations which are too improbable and rely far too much on luck for Tintin to get himself out of danger.

Great
I loved Tintin books when I was a kid, and I love them now at age 37. I know I'm not alone, because a Tintin store in San Francisco sells Tintin coffee cups and ties and key chains (grown-up's items!) I myself have a Tintin tie and key chain! THE LAND OF BLACK GOLD is my favorite Tintin book. It has all the best characters, humor, and an intriguing plot. (That's why adults can like them, because many of the books have reasonably sophisticated James-Bond type plots.) Tintin forever!

Great Books!
I am only 11, and I have only read some of the Tintin books, and the reason I'm at Amazon.com is to buy all the others. Out of the one's I've read so far, I think "Red Rackham's Treasure" was my favorite. I loved the way Herge made Calculus, and thought he was extremely funny, even when he did get annoying! I love the Tintin books, and look forward to reading every single one again! If I could go over 5 stars, I would, definatly!

The Mysterious Island
Published in Mass Market Paperback by New American Library (December, 1986)
Authors: Jules Verne and Isaac Asimov
Average review score:

Remember MacGyver?
How he used to make an engine run with duct tape and a shoe string, or make a bomb from bleach and a rusty nail?

He kept coming to mind as I was reading this incredible book, as the characters, stranded on an island with absolutely nothing, accomplished such amazing feats as draining a lake, making a home, building a ship, making an elevator, and a great many other things. There is excitement, suspense (what IS going on on this mysterious island??), and wonderful, likeable characters. Not a real well-known Verne book, but fortunately still in print, and one of his best and most entertaining.

(Incidentally, if you want a children's version of the same story, try to find "A Long Vacation" by Jules Verne, which is extremely similar in plot, but with younger characters and for a younger audience - very charming!)

By the way, please do read 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea first, if you have not already done so. Evidently, Verne assumed that everyone had when he wrote this novel.

Great reading!

Excellent
I think this is the best book Verne has ever written. It has adventure, mystery, suspense, survival, and science fiction all mixed up into one book. It is about Cyrus harding, the engineer, Neb, his loyal servant, Gidion Spilett, the reporter, Jack Pencroft, the spontaneous sailor, Herbert, a 13 year old boy, and the faithful dog Top, who get dropped in a hot air ballon on a remote island. The soon begin forming there own "mini-america" on the island. But strange things start happening - like when top is almost killed my a strange animal, but the animal suddenly dies from a knife wound, and when Pencroft finds a bullet in a wild pig. Who did these things appear on a uninhabited island? Hint- Read 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea first

Adventure Unlimited

Mention Jules Verne, and books that spring to mind are 20,000 Leagues, Around the World in 80 days, and Journey to the Center of the Earth. The Mysterious Island is one of his lesser known works, which is something of a mystery itself.

The book surpasses one's imagination and never fails to surprise. From the initial pages when Capt. Cyrus Harding and his friends decide to escape from a prison camp, the story seizes the complete attention of the reader, and unfolds at a pace and in a direction excelling Jules Verne's characteristic stories. The spirit and ingenuity of man is demonstrated in almost every page, as Cyrus and Co. find themselves marooned on a deserted island, and armed with only their wits, transform their desperate situation into a wonder world of science and technology. The reader is drawn into the adventure and finds himself trying to find solutions to the problems and obstacles that lie in plenty for the castaways, as Cyrus and his indomitable friends surmount myriad problems in their fight for survival. They are aided in their ventures by an uncanny and eerie source that remains a mystery until the very end.

This book cannot fail to fascinate and inspire awe in the mind of any reader. One begins to grasp the marvels and inventive genius behind the simple daily conveniences and devices that are normally taken for granted. The line between reality and fantasy is incredibly thin, and for sheer reading pleasure and boundless adventure, this book will never cease to please.

PS: The book has been adapted into a movie, which is one of the worst adaptations of any novel that I have ever had the misfortune of viewing. It is criminal to even mention the movie and the original work in the same breath.

Baby Island
Published in Paperback by Macmillan Publishing Company, Incorporated (01 August, 1973)
Author: Carol R. Brink
Average review score:

Just wonderful.
As a young girl between the ages of 9 - 12, I must have read this book a dozen times. It took the little girl in me and mixed it with the wonder and adventure of every imaginable dream of haveing babies to play with and care for without the need for adults or the reality of the hard world. For whatever reason, Baby Island, has remained in my memories for over 25 years as one of my most treasured books. With all the competition of best sellers and the proliferation of good reading material, the simplicity and entertainment value of Baby Island is unequalled. I want my daughter and neices to "dream" about "Baby Island"

Childhood favorite to be read with your kids.
I read this book over 20 years ago, and have remembered it vividly. As soon as I could find it, I began reading it to my 5-year-old. Although I have to explain some of the "old-fashioned" references to her, she is as enthralled as I was (and am). This book is just as much fun to read today as it was when I was a child. It is a grand adventure with genuine heros. Mary and Jean are brave and resourceful, and undaunted in their struggle to care for 4 babies on a desert island after a shipwreck. From the mixing of the twins to meeting a "savitch," this book is delightful

the most fascinating book I ever read
Baby Island by Carol Brinksis an adventure story that makes you want to read it to the end.In the middle of the night, the SS Orminta started to sink.A 12 year-old girl named Mary woke up. The first theing she thought of was the babies of the ship.She wole up her 10 year-old sister Jean to help her.When the two sisters and the four babies were loaded into a lifeboat, someone yelled"She's going down now!"Thier lifeboat was let out./they sailed for a few days then landed on a deserted island.Mary and Jean mmanaged to get enough food.The girls also figuured out hoe to build a home. They were having a fine life untill Jean found giant footprints while taking a walk. I enjoyed this book abundantly.i recommend this book because it is comical and exciting.

Golf in the Lowcountry: An Extraordinary Journey Through Hilton Head Island & Savannah
Published in Hardcover by Saron Pr Ltd (01 April, 2003)
Author: Joel Zuckerman
Average review score:

Low Country Treasure
Fabulous and funny essays about golf and golfers, coupled with insightful reviews of the area's courses. A must read for anyone planning to partake of the Low Country's golf course treasures.

Makes you want to head down South
Having never played golf in that neck of the country, I am sorely tempted to head down that way when I'm next on vacation. Zuckerman does a great job in making these courses come alive and his style of writing is breezy and fun --and with great insight into the sport of golf.

an entertaining look at the golf life in Hilton Head
I was given this book as a birthday gift, and thought it would just be a pretty picture book about the fine courses of Hilton Head Island and Savannah. That element is definitely present, but what surprised me were the funny essays about the game of golf the author intersperses with the course reviews and area personality profiles. It's really a nice read--entertaining and informative in the same breath.

Related Vacation Book Subjects: Washington
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