This book really got me the knowledge that I needed about my family since I am a descendant of Sam and Jane Livington. It was a part of me that I never knew was missing. Each year in August, there is a family reunion of the Livingstons and Howse's, held at Fort Victoria, just south of present day Smokey Lake, Alberta. I went last year and got the chance to meet more of my unknown relatives. Since, I have really gotten into my family genealogy and have found out alot of my family past that dates back to the early 1700 when the family came from England to Canada.

The main contents of the book,please

I like the various sample itineraries included in the books. The good thing is that the author goes into detail about the various stops and sights she has included in the itinerary. The author provides good and practical info on where to stay, how to get there and all the interesting things to do while you are there.

As a Tru64 UNIX professional, its hard to find books that meet my needs. This book does it and then some. The lay-out is logical it covers all the important topics so I don't waste time sifting through the docs to find what I need. If you work with Tru64 UNIX, you need this book.

...

Graham Hancock continues his pursuit of uncovering lost civilizations, this time under the sea. He takes us on a journey through the Mediterranean, the Arabian Sea, Persian Gulf, Bay of Bengal and the Pacific Ocean around Indonesia, Japan and Taiwan by looking at underwater structures that might be of human origin. I'm pleased to note that the government of India has recently authenticated two of his discoveries off the coast of India. In both cases, these structures are dated between 9000 and 11 000 years before the current era, which supports the hypothesis of a great flood that submerged vast areas of up-to-then habitable land. What I really like about Hancock as author is that he also provides the orthodox view at the same time as his own theories. I cannot but agree with his statement, "There's something wrong with the underpinning of history." Hancock has indicated the most likely places for pre-flood civilizations with the help of Dr. Glen Milne of Durham University who is an expert on glaciation-induced changes in the sea level, and taking into account the plethora of flood-myths found amongst all cultures on all continents. Underworld is lavishly illustrated and well served by a thorough index and extensive bibliography. This gripping text will amply reward the reader who enjoyed Hancock's earlier titles like Keepers of Genesis and Fingerprints of the Gods.

You probably need to be British to appreciate this book. You certainly need to be over forty to remember Tony Hancock. For years, Hancock drew huge television audiences (black and white pictures in those days) with his weekly 'Hancock's Half Hour. There, he became the nation's idol for his portrayal of 'your average man'. From the philosophical isolation of 'The Bedsitter' through the mayhem and confusion of 'The Radio Ham', and the misguided and self-centred 'Blood Donor', Hancock was finally fretting over his succession: "What have you achieved? What have you achieved? You lost your chance, me old son. You contributed absolutely nothing to this life. A waste of time you being here at all. No plaque for you in Westminster Abbey. The best you can expect is a few daffodils in a jam-jar, a rough-hewn stone bearing the legend 'he came and he went', and nothing in between - nothing!" And, unfortunately, his black humour was echoed in his real life. The more successful he became, the deeper he dove into the bottle until his eventual suicide in Australia.

Hancock was a British institution - a way of life even. A well-loved soul whose private life was little known by the public until his death. This book reveals that life from his grandparents through to his death in April 1968. For those of you who remember and loved Tony Hancock, this book is a must.

A 248-page treasure trove from this popular, peripatetic bundle of insatiable curiosity and wanderlust. It starts during her youth in Australia where she learned to get off the beaten tracks, and to travel on the cheap - tactics which served her well after branching out to Africa, Europe, the BC. Discovering the Northwest Territories, Nunavut and Yukon led to a continuing love affair with that enigmatic land, its people and wildlife. Hancock portrays the rigors and joys of traveling in a country where her unquenchable sense of adventure lands her in situations ranging from life-threatening (chased by a bear) to disgusting (eating rancid seal oil) to wildly funny (a grizzly and two cubs in the cab of her Datsun pickup). However, it is the people who highlight this account: the guides, trappers, prospectors, miners, homesteaders, biologists, stone carvers, truckers, hunters and bush pilots. A keen observer of human nature, Hancock describes their stoicism and humor; their love and reverence for the North; their concerns for the future. This is Hancock at her best, and illustrative of why she remains one of Canada's favorite authors. (Bob Jones in BC Outdoors)

An entertaining and easy read. Winging from the Mackenzie to the High Arctic via Hancock's fresh, crisp writing is to meet Northerners in person, to share their heritage, to enjoy wildlife and the clean, cool air of pristine landscapes, and to confirm what you knew all along: yes, you can get around red tape, and "no, it can't be done." Just do it. (George Diveky in Up Here)

The greatest thing I have ever read! I loved your descriptions of people and touches of humor. I will be forever in your debt (for writing it). (Ingrid via Ivy Pye, a reader)

Winging it in the North is a collection of anecdotes: some amazing, some funny, some scarcely believable, but all entertaining. It is a difficult thing to hold a reader's interest for over 200 pages with personal anecdotes. Boredom is not a factor here. This is about the unusual, unlikely and lucky things that have happened to her through serendipity. It is about the out-of-the-way places she has ended up through a chance meeting with a trapper or a carver or a hunter who has invited her along.

And she has ended up in some unusual places. She has been on seal hunts, fishing trips, soapstone carving expeditions, and trap lines. She has swum swollen rivers, bumped into bears and wolves, driven roads that hadn't been built yet, and flown to Canada's most northerly point to watch two men set off to walk to the pole. Through it all she has maintained a sense of humour and a sense of wonder at the places she has ended up, all of which has been greatly helped by the delightful people she has met. (John Wilson in Pier Magazine)

Lyn Hancock is a woman with more letters after her name than in her name yet she has never been trained to be a writer or a photographer, she just does it. The 15 books she's had published attest to the fact she does it fairly well. (Sandy Wiseman, Daily News, Kamloops).

Lyn Hancock's voice is light and readable, having been honed on thousands of magazine and newspaper articles and 15 books.

(A FEW SPOILERS CONTAINED HEREIN!)

My review is in part a response to the assertions of reviewer Robert Ryan Langer, who wrote: "The primary objective in telling a story is to entertain. Everything else is secondary, even teaching a lesson. When an author forgets this, a novel becomes at best a parable, and at worst a piece of propaganda."

If Karen Hancock--and other Christian writers--set out to convey a spiritual message to their readers, I see no problem with this. When Langer asserts that the "primary objective in telling a story is to entertain," I simply ask: Who says? Who made up that rule? And if it's just a man-made rule, then why can't others disagree with it? An important teaching tool of Jesus' was parables: obviously his overriding concern was not to entertain, but to teach--yet undoubtedly his stories were *also* entertaining.

In ARENA, one is left with no doubt that Hancock's objective was to make a point about how to live the Christian life. Her message is laudable: live by faith in God and His word, not by human wisdom. I appreciated the reminders she gave me on that theme--*and* I was entertained. Hancock has performed admirably in the technical areas of storytelling: plotting, wording, and (for the most part) characterizations; certainly for a first novel there's a lot here that is praiseworthy, and the book is worth buying.

Langer writes, "One harrowing escape where Pierce and others lay mortally wounded ground to a halt while Callie took ten pages to find the entrance to a safe haven. Uneven pacing prevented the story from being wholly captivating." I had no problem with the pacing; but I had somewhat of a problem with what seemed to me to be repetitiveness: cross-country trek / refreshment and instruction in a "Safehaven" / cross-country trek / refreshment and instruction in a "Safehaven" / cross-country trek / refreshment and instruction in a "Safehaven" . . . .

I have to take some exception with Pierce's (and also Callie's) sexuality. I'm not saying Hancock should necessarily have included sex scenes or even hinted at them, but she explicitly addresses the subject by portraying Pierce and Callie--in a literary context that never actually mentions God or a Higher Moral Standard--as people who won't have sex outside of marriage. Unless the characters are explicitly motivated by a Christian desire for purity, or by an unusual fear of unwanted pregnancies or STDs, or even just intimacy, I find it unrealistic that they would be virginal. It would have been better, in my opinion, to simply leave the subject unmentioned.

(An additional note re. characters' sexuality: I didn't need to be reminded half a dozen times how busty Rowena is. I kept thinking, "Okay, I get the point(s) already!" :-) )

The lack of an explicitly theological context for both the plot and the characterizations leads to my response to another of Langer's comments: "Knowing that a god will save the hero in every emergency greatly reduces the dramatic tension; the hero is no longer truly in any mortal danger. In Arena, the question was not whether Callie would survive, but merely when she would ask Elhanu for help."

He's half-right. It was made clear in ARENA that as long as characters didn't try to suicide their way out, if they died while traversing the Arena they would be returned to their lives on Earth. This lessened the tension of those scenes in which they were supposedly in physical danger; such danger was only superficial. That leaves spiritual development--which can itself make for an interesting story, and so that objective was legitimate on Hancock's part, but in my opinion her set-up lessened the forcefulness of this element as well.

Langer is mistaken when he speaks of a "god" saving the heroes. It's true that the characters are instructed to trust in Elhanu. But the thing is, Elhanu isn't a god--he's an alien. The only real differences between him and the Earthlings are that he's not human, and his technology is highly advanced.

There was no mistaking Hancock's attempt to fashion numerous analogues--Elhanu/God, manual/Bible, Aggillon/angels, Watchers/demons. The problem is that unless Elhanu is *literally* God--which in the story's own context, he is not--then he has absolutely *no moral right* to abduct people from Earth and force them to fight their way through his Arena for what amounts to merely his entertainment. He acted as if he was sovereign over their lives, but that is the province of God alone. This lack of justification in the story's set-up rendered likewise unjustified the portrayal of the Watchers as demons and the mutants as unspiritual or rebellious humans. They had every right to be upset with Elhanu, an arrogant alien acting *as if* he were the sovereign God.

I always knew what Hancock was trying to get across, and I completely agreed with her message, but I was constantly distracted by the fact that it just didn't work in her plot set-up. Hancock would have done better to take one of two alternative paths: (i) create an entirely allegorical world in which Elhanu literally *is* the God of that world who has the right to control characters' lives, because He created them (Kathy Tyers has done something along these lines, and done it well, in her FIREBIRD trilogy); or, (ii) have aliens interact with humans in the universe *we know*, with a mention of God as sovereign, and perhaps Elhanu as an alien who *represents* God. That way, the characters could be in *actual* physical danger, and would also need to learn to trust God, and Elhanu could serve as an instructor rather than a Saviour.

Callie Hayes is still at loose ends after graduating college, and doesn't have a serious relationship or any good prospects. Encouraged by her friend Meg she signs up as a volunteer for a "psychological experiment," and finds herself transported to a harsh alien world to carry out her assignment. Unfortunately she didn't pay much attention during the orientation and quickly finds herself lost, over-whelmed and in mortal danger.

The story quickly progresses as Callie struggles to survive and somehow get back home. In the course of her struggles she faces the limits of her own intellect, learns how much of her own effort is futile, and begins to understand faith in a much deeper way. And learns how to maintain contact with, well, God. And meets Pierce who is at first arrogant and obnoxious, but... well, you'll just have to read it. It's quite exciting and it will keep you turning pages.

Yes, it's an allegorical story about a Christian's spiritual journey; you can also read it as a plain old whiz-bang adventure story. It works either way.

Author Karen Hancock makes it clear from the beginning that this is a Christian book dedicated to Jesus Christ. For the most part she handles her material deftly and without preaching, but there are times when the theology becomes just a bit heavy-handed. And there are times when she offers too much explanation for all the strange happenings, rather than just showing the reader. Sometimes there is too much blood and gore, too much danger, too many impossible situations, but--hey! I still kept on reading, and so will you. This is not a perfect book, but a good one and an uplifting one as well. I recommend it. Reviewed by Louis N. Gruber

I loved this book. I hardly ever read fiction because I sometimes feel furthering my relationsihp with God is not going to happen by reading fictional stories. However, Arena has changed my mind! This book has made me see how much I was holding back from God, and gave me a big reality check. I came away from this book desiring deeper intimacy with God. I think it was the relationship that Callie had with Elhanue, and the way Hancock portrayed him as a friend and constant companion that made me see how I have been ignoring it.

I am a Christian, and quite a strong one, but it has been awhile since I have been unsatisfied with the level of intimacy I have with God.

I also thought the love story between Callie and Pierce was captivating. It was so well-written, and I love the fact that Callie only started to become attracted to Pierce after she got to know him. So many novels start with love at first sight. Their romance actually caught me by surprise (okay not entirely, but it was not obvious at the beginning that they would fall in love). I also thought Hancock did a great job of showing that Callie and Pierce struggled with passion and attraction to each other. People aren't perfect, even born-again spirit-filled Christians. I thought it made them seem human, and I was able to relate to them!

All I have to say is, this book has changed me and the way I see God. I highly recommend it!

This book contains an old treasure map which the mankind can't use until the authors have done their part, namely to write the next book(s) about this subject. It is absolutely incredible the way they are unravelling the mysteries of prehistoric Egypt. It makes you believe that some thousands of years BC there has been another high civilization with the knowledge and technology to plan and build this magnificient pyramids and especially "The Sphinx". The title of the book is "Keeper of Genesis:A Quest for the Hidden Legacy of Mankind". The Sphinx is still the Keeper of Genesis, and I look forward to the next book(s)!! If you haven't read this book, you have missed this years main event!

Here is a revolution in Egyptology. The reviews I've read of this book, the ones who have dismissed it only prove how narrow-minded people can be, after being spoon-fed a certain history for all their lives. Hancock and Bauval capture, in comprehensive detail many of the riddles of the origin of the Sphinx and solve many of them. From other recent books, we know that the pyramids mirror the exact position of the constellation Orion in the skies as it was in about 10,500 b.c.,that they are aligned exactly north, and we also know that the Sphinx and the pyramids show signs of water damage in an area that has been arid according to scientists for at least 8,000 years. The question is this, what if the pyramids, and the Sphinx, were built by a civilization far older than Egypt, not 2500 b.c., but in 10,500 b.c.? Egyptologists and the narrow minded scoff at this, of course, because it would mean a radical rewriting of Egyptology, not to mention human history, but consider this: even the best archeology is just guesswork, no matter how educated the academic, no matter how logical the theory sounds. The bottom line is no one really knows why or when the pyramids were truly built, carbon-dating is inaccurate, and the Pyramids of Giza were built with more advanced design methods than any other pyramids in Egypt, not only the ones that came before, but after. In fact, some that came after are mere piles of rubble now on the sands. None of the bodies of the three pharoahs the pyramids were supposedly built for were ever found in any of them and Khufe himself, supposedly the builder of the Great Pyramid, said in his records that he only did repair work on it, was not the one to build it. History attributes the Pyramids to Khufe and his descendents, the pharoahs themselves do not. The three smaller pyramids to the side of the monument were the tombs Khufe actually built for himself and his family. In fact, Egyptian myths themselves attribute the Great Pyramid, not to any of their Pharoahs, but to the more advanced methods of their "Gods of Old." No other pyramids in Egypt, before and after, were built with the same design methods and scale of these three,and Egyptologists have long been baffled as to why the pyramid progression happened as it did. Who built them then? Frankly, I don't think it was aliens, but I don't agree with the traditional historical assumption either. Egyptian chronologies attribute the Age of the Gods, to about 10,500 b.c., the same time frame that Plato places for Atlantis in his dialogues. Now, before critics harp on any mention of Atlantis, accept that humanity has been around as we know it, for at least one hundred thousand years, and that civilization has only risen to it's current status in the last five thousand, and you can see we are missing more than a little of our history. Humanity has risen and fallen many times throughout the ages, with little that the generations before us built remaining. Accept that, and also that the whole of Egyptian civilization, it's pyramids and it's gods, are simply a copy of an earlier civilization, one with far more advanced methods, and all the mysteries, the inconsistencies of the other pyramids, all seem to fall neatly in place. Hancock's and Bauval's theories are as good as any of the others that have been accepted over the last two thousand years. And actually, no one can even say that they are really right or wrong, mostly because none of us were really there, and no one can say for sure.

How old is the Sphinx? The question, and it's paradigm-busting potential for Egyptology, and history as a whole, is the subject of this compelling book. €Robert Bauval, a Belgian engineer, and Graham Hancock, former East Africa correspondent for the Observer, have authored previous bestsellers on archaeological mysteries of the ancient world. Here they combine forces to question the conventional wisdom regarding Ancient Egypt, and step bravely into the academic no-man's land that lies between history and prehistory. €It was Bauval who made the discovery that the Great Pyramids are exact likenesses, in position and scale, of the three stars in the belt of Orion. Hancock, for his part, claims that the precisely engineered structures of the Gizeh plateau are repositories of complex astronomical data. In The Message of The Sphinx the authors conclude that the Ancient Egyptians were heir to a civilization much greater and older than their own. €The most compelling evidence in this regard was announced in 1993, when evidence was presented at a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science that the Sphinx is thousands of years older than previously thought. €This haunting monument, the authors assert, with its refashioned, possibly once-leonine head, was created in 10,500 BC. The creators of the Sphinx were survivors of a primordial catastrophe that wiped out most of their civilization. € Hancock and Bauval point to the "followers of Horus" in ancient texts as dim memories of these survivors, and suggest the ancient Egyptians were inheritors -- not originators -- of their complex cosmology. The pyramids were completed at a later date than the Sphinx, and the authors present the extraordinary possibility that these enormous stuctures (particularly the great pyramid of Khufu, with its complex galleys and passages) were not meant as tombs at all, but as architectural maps of a region of the heavens known as the "duat", centered in Orion: the cosmogenic realm where souls are spawned and return upon death. The pyramids were used, they theorize, for ritualistic reenactments of astronomical events. €The author's labours have made for a mind-bending read, though Hancock and Bauval's ultimate vindication awaits the archaeologist's spade.

I read this book, and the accompanying volumes, several years ago. It held my attention and fascination in much the same way J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings series did.

I picked Greyfax Grimwald up at a used bookstore once, read it for a couple of hours, and fell in love with it. The book has an intriguing and adventurous plot. The story is about a dwarf, otter, and bear who are tempted to cross a river that transports them to a realm called Atlanton Earth where they are accompanied by the mystic wizards, Greyfax Grimwald and Faragon Fairingay. The dwarf, bear, and otter are instructed by the two wizards to protect a relic that holds power to destroy the darkness of queen Dorini. However, it's not that easy. The three companions will encounter Dorini's evil minions as well as human war and treachery along the way. This book had me staying up late many nights to read it and I can still remember much of it from when I read it over three years ago. I'm sorry to say that this book has become out of print overtime, though. Luckily, this book can be found in many used bookstores that stock science fiction and fantasy. A great book nonetheless, and better than many pieces of literature out there today.

This book and its sequels are a very nice series which every fantasy lover thats got time and dont rush-up to read each fulish book of a new author like Robert Jordan or Goodkind would love to read. It has 3 main companions which are a Dwarf, an Otter and a Bear, it may sound silly (it did to me) but when you read it you find out that it is written good and the story is great, so i would suggest you take your time and read those 4 books.