Salem, in charge of foreign affairs during the whole of Amin Gemayel's presidency and a distinguished professor of politics, provides a detailed insider's view of his country's politics during some of its most turbulent years. His candid and full account offers much new information on the May 17, 1983, agreement with Israel, the withdrawal of American troops from Beirut, the discussions to reform Lebanon's political system, and Gemayel's unsuccessful effort to appoint a successor.

But even more interesting are the many vignettes salted through Salem's personable memoir. In late 1987, at a time when Saddam Husayn and Hafiz al-Asad were aligned on opposite sides of the Iraq-Iran War, the two men met at an Arab League summit and "were seen walking together and joking." A mere fifteen minutes before his presidential term was about to expire, Gemayel invited Michel Aoun to form a government; to make matters stranger yet, Gemayel had previously been close to firing Aoun from his position as army commander.

Judging from Salem's anecdotes, jokes play an important role in diplomacy. In a get-acquainted breakfast with Ronald Reagan in the family quarters at the White House, the affable host's efforts at humor left a nervous Gemayel ever more tense. When Salem went to Damascus to lobby the Syrians to accept the May 17 agreement, Syria's foreign minister signaled his government's rejection of the accord by making a joke about it: "[H]umour was substance," Salem wryly comments.

Middle East Quarterly, September 1995

This book in my opinion is not the one to enjoy the beauty of the subject and mechanics in general. There is a vast amount of material amassed but the structure of the book is poor.
It seems being overburden with details and particulars and lacking unified clear consistent approach. In addition some mistakes are just plain annoying. If one wants to be serious about vibrations - do not sweat over this book. It can be just another somewhat usefull reference book to find some particular solution to for some particular problem.
Instead one can study mechanics with beautifully written classical L.Meirovitch, "Fundamentals of Vibrations" which is much more original, rigorous, clear, usefull and serious book to have.

I used this textbook for my Mechanical Vibrations course and was very displeased with it. My biggest gripe is the lack of examples in each chapter. There are an abundance of homework problems at the end of each chapter, but the vast majority of them are not illustrated at all in example problems. I noticed this immediately in Chapter 1 when attempting to solve several of the problems. The text also develops equations and formulas without detail and explanation. Luckily my teacher developed the eqations in class lecture and provided the majority of information for the course. While working out homework and test problems that were assigned, the book was of little use for me. I think the clarity of writing could be better, as well. By the way, I got an A in the course and still found the book to be poor.

I recently used this as a text to teach Vibrations to Mechanical Engineering seniors after Vibration Analysis by Vierck went out of print. I was attracted to Rao's book because much of the presentation is similar to Vierck. After using this text for one semester, I was not satisfied. I was particularly concerned by Chapter 2 where the fundamentals of damped single degree of freedom systems are covered. This Chapter is critical to building the foundation of Vibration Theory and I was disturbed to find that two critical plots, the time history comparison of responses with various damping levels and the phase plane plot for the same cases were seriously incorrect. While errors always can be found in texts, these plots were so obviously wrong at first glance that I wondered how a book with 29 reviewers (as listed in the Acknowledgements) has such glaring errors. As I progressed through the text I found a number of other errors including incorrect equations in some places. I also found that some material, emphasized in Vierck, that I consider important was buried in the worked examples rather than being emphasized as part of the book's text. While the book does present a lot of material and gives some interesting problems, I found that I was not comfortable with the text at the end of the course. I have since decided to drop this book from consideration as our text.

Rose Earhart's Dorcas Good, the Diary of a Salem Witch is on any scale the worst book I've ever read. The historical fiction is supposed to be in diary form, told from the perspective of four year old Dorcas Good. There are several problems with this. For one thing, I doubt that a four year old girl living now could read and write well enough to keep a diary, let alone a four year old girl in 1692. Even if she could, most diarists write about feelings and observations . . . not pages upon pages of dialogue. Also, a four year old would probably not be able to understand the political background of every one of her neighbors. Certainly a four year old girl would not refer to a nine year old as "little," but the narrator of this book repeatedly calls Betty Parris "little Betty Parris." The novel is unnecessarily and overwhelmingly perverse. One of the most ridiculous aspect of the novel is that it is written in modern language. I cannot, in two pages, possibly describe exactly how much I hate this 376-page waste of paper, but at least I will try.
The novel lacks structure. As if the author sat at her typewriter once a week, feverishly typing whatever meaningless phrase that popped in her head, the book lacks a comprehensible plot. There are no high points and low points; there is no climax.
By reading Dorcas Good, the Diary of a Salem Witch, one would think that every man is a child molester. Four year old Dorcas is violently raped, not only by her father, but by every man in town. Every reverend, every merchant, every sea-man and politician is a lecherous pedophile who wants nothing more than to stick his penis in a baby. William Good, Reverend Nicholas Noyes and Thomas Putnam are only a few of the innumerable child molesters in this trashy novel. After Dorcas is released from prison, her father dresses her in red velvet, takes her around the town and makes her a five year old whore. Given, child rape and incest is something that happens. It happens now; it's probably always happened. However, such perversity is a mental illness and I find it hard to believe that an entire village would have the same disease. I find it even harder to believe that such behavior would be tolerated under Puritan law.
With less class than a Harlequin Romance, uses every opportunity to graphically describe something sexually twisted. Any page that does not include a violent rape or molestation scene has an incest scene, or a lesbian eroticism or sado-masochism scene. For instance, Dorcas witnesses twelve year old Ann Putnam and seventeen year old Mary Walcott, cousins, perform oral sex on one another. Sex, throughout the novel, is always accompanied by beatings.
Earhart made a little notation, claiming that the book is written in modern language and narrated not really from a four year old point of view because "the words of Dorcas Good must be spoken in the clearest way possible so that her message will ring true and not be lost in the vagaries of a child's wandering speech."
I argue that the author merely lacks the imagination and initiative to take upon the challenge of constructing a diary from a four year old, seventeenth century Puritan's perspective. Rose Earhart holds degrees both in philosophy and psychology. My advice for her is to go back to grammar school and obtain some literacy, and perhaps use her psychological knowledge to work through her personal issues before attempting to write again. Earhart pathetically ended her novel with an extensive bibliography, as if such a list could convince readers that she actually incorporated research into her writing. If such a book as Dorcas Good, the Diary of a Salem Witch can actually get published, I am convinced there is hope for all amateur writers, even those who cannot spell.

Recently we have seen some fine novels that take as their protagonist some peripheral character from either history or a classic work of fiction. This is not one of those. Yes, it does describe fairly accurately the personal and political enmities abounding in Salem in the 1690s; its historical details of names and fates are true; and it quotes accurately from available documents. But its virtues end there. The narrator's voice is not that of the four-year-old she is supposed to be. The story is full of gratuitous ... violence, which in itself is tiresome, but when committed against a four-year-old should offend anyone with either feeling or literary taste. As noted by others, the typographical errors are egregious; I have never seen its equal in any professional publication. Basically, this book is a strange combination of scholarship and ..., with an emphasis on "...." If you want to read something worthwhile about the Salem witch trials, try "A Delusion of Satan," by Frances Hill (credited and even thanked with the author's name misspelled in "Dorcas Good").

Dorcas Good, The Diary of a Salem Witch, is an extrodinarily written book. If you read the professional reviews thatit received, you'll wonder, as I did, what the two negative reviews were all about. It's as though they were reading some other book. I'm surprised that one of them mentioned a young adult or adolescent book. I don't think Dorcas was meant to be read by children. It's a very well written adult book that tells what really happened in Salem of 1692. I't not a sugar coated version of the times. It's not afraid to "tell it like it was" back then. If detailed accounts of child abuse, spousal abuse and horrendous living conditiions make you uncomfortable, then maybe you shouldn't read it. However,if you like a well paced, well written NOVEL about the witch trials, not a history book, I highly recommend it.

I was extremely disappointed in this book. I could not find one credible statement to support the allegation that New Agers have a secret plan to take over the world. Also, it is offensive to many religions, countries and peoples. Inflammatory and sad.

For those who are new to the new age and conspriacies VS the bible and it's phrophcies this book is a perfect starting point. This book is fast and simple reading (about an eighth grade reading level) which claerly defines all aspects of the new age cults and false religions. Those who are already well informed with the bible, and it's new age counter parts will fnd little new or of interst however. In fact although the book was only written 10 years ago some of the information seems dated. For instance most no longer belive the 'Mark' will be a tatto, rather more likly a computer chip will be placed under the skin. This is an excellent book, however, for those who are less well informed of the various symbols and methods used by the "global Goverment" new age "new world order" crowd to contol the masses.

This book was long overdue and somewhat of a disappointment when it finally arrived. Much of the information in it is dated, but it remains important information that was long overdue to be in print. Congratulations Stanley for pulling it together. This book, albeit pricey, is a must for historical archaeologists.

I think this book was a buntch of gret humor and enjoyable for everyone. I thought the book was way to long, books should have a 50 page limit. Although too long for my enjoyment I would like everyone to read it. The main charecter was a great person. My friend Whitney says "this book was not good!" But i beg to differ it was bad.

This book came free in the mail to many high school physics teachers several years ago; I have just begun to read it. Kenneth Salem's book is a classic example of too little knowledge is dangerous, the book tries to bridge phsyics and philosophy when it is so obvious that Mr. Salem has not appearantly had any training in either one. (The biography is so boastfull that you would think he would list his credentials). The book is riddled with arguements so ridiculus and disproved daily in chemistry, physics and in common electronic devices (ect.) at the reader would have to assume the Mr. Salem is a CRANK. Please take some advice from a real Physics don't buy books like this. I you want to learn physics go to an acredited college and start taking classes.

Now that we know that President Clinton and Madeline Albright fought and succeeded to have the word "genocide" removed from all UN talk about Rwanda, this book reeks of opportunism. It is a way of Mrs. Clinton using the tragedy -- one her husband helped play itself out without aid to the slaughtered Rwandans -- to portray herself and perhaps her husbands administration as being caring. Truly disgusting. Of course this was not known at the date this book was first published, but in light of what we now know, this should stick in the throat of anyone who reads it. Sorry for politicizing this book and laying out more comment than review. I also apologize for giving this book a 1 star rating but the review will not be posted without one and there was no ) star rating.