This book is pure joy. For those of us who have loved our dogs, the stories tug at your heart strings. Karen Derrico captures each dog's story with a peek into other dog owner's heart and how much they loved their special friend. Thank you for writing a book that has been so long in coming, and so beautifully written. This one is a must for dog lovers, pet lovers, and anyone who has ever had that special bond with their pet.

The Companion Animal Protection Society (CAPS) highly recommends Unforgettable Mutts: Pure of Heart Not of Breed. This touching tribute to mixed-breed dogs features a collection of more than one hundred photo-essays about remarkable mutts. Unforgettable Mutts is certain to make purebred lovers set aside their prejudices about those dogs who are less than "pure."

Around 75 percent of all dogs entering animal shelters in the U.S. are mixed-breed dogs. Sadly, one to two million of these mixed-breeds are euthanized each year. If you are thinking about adopting a shelter dog, CAPS strongly encourages you to give a home to a needy mutt. If you think you can't do without a purebred, read Unforgettable Mutts first. Karen Derrico's delightful book will convince you to change your mind.

Truly one of the best dog books I've seen in a long time! The photos are amazing, but combined with the inspiring, heartwarming, and incredible true stories, this book is definitely a winner. I wouldn't be surprised to see Unforgettable Mutts on the NY Times Bestsellers very soon! If you have even just a mild affinity for dogs, I guarantee you'll love this book!!

After 40 some years of living Alaska, I am well aware of the difficulty and seeming impossibility of capturing the great land on film and with words. The true essense and spitituality of this vast offering often eludes our cameras and pens. John has nailed it. His enduring patience and impecable eye for the finest of nature glows from image to image, mushroom ice stands, an otter enjoying a meal, volcanic clouds balloning over stands of towering spruce, an eaglets first moment broken from the shell, in your face bears, all these images and much more inspire me to look harder, go further, and wait longer for more of Alaska than I have ever experienced. The photos are sparkled by John's unique style of writing. After recieving the book as a gift I spent long nights, reading and re-reading his tales of adventure with delight. My work takes me far from home and John's book gives me opportunity to share the true flavors of Alaska with those I meet on the trail. Thank you John for sharing your God given talents, I so look forward to the next book.

I received a copy of John Pezzenti's book,A Photographic Journey Through The Last Wilderness,as a gift through my work. John Pezzenti's photographes portray such beauty and his words flow with spirituality. John Pezzenti's gift for writing matches his talent for capturing nature at it's finest. From the incredible photo's of the birth of an eagle,to the heart felt story of the Birthday Cake Bear. As I look through this magnificent book I feel his photo's and words drawing me in. It gives me the sense that I too am able to share what John Pezzenti must have felt being there. When I was young I went on a cruise to Alaska. I knew that one day I would move to this great land. John Pezzenti's book reinforce's why I kept this dream so close to my heart for all these years. I will always cherish this gift I received and feel blessed that John Pezzenti chose to share his God given talent with the rest of us. One could keep writing but there are no words that can truely describe this work of art. I highly recommend this book to anyone that has ever dreamt about Alaska. John Pezzenti truely opens his heart to the reader with his photographes and lets us share in the beauty he has captured over the past 25 years. I look forward to being able to share his work with my family and friends,as I also look forward to his next publishing.

If you want to experience the true Alaska as few have ever done, no need to make a pilgrimage to the far north. All you need to do is read this book about a photographer's solo odyssey into the wilderness of Alaska in search of getting the great shot. The shot, that transforms photography into emotionally evoking art. The shot , that exudes the magnificence of the photo into telling the full rich story around it. The shot, that envelops the viewer with both the tenderness and majaesty of nature. John Pezzenti's journeys not only allowed him to capture this "Holy Grail' shot but unbelievably a whole book of them. In my estimation his work is unparalleled in his field. John is truely one of the premier wildlife photographers of our time. Equally fascinating to the absolutely stunning photography, is the human story behind it. John chronicles his amazing adventures on his journeys. He details his harrowing survival struggles to awe inspiring revelations with candor and humor. John presents himself to the reader not as some superhero but as an everyday person with all our human fragility. While reading John's book it dawned on me that it is an antithesis to Conrads's "The Heart of Darkness". John and Marlow both, endure the brutalities of our world in their journeys, but while Marlow is left only with "bitterness and darkness", John is left with "wonderment and light". I would like to mention that though nature has thrown John some mighty barriers in his quest, the greatest hurdle lies within himself. John is classified 100% disabled with a rare and agressive form of rheumatoid arthritis, treatable only with a mild chemotherapy so he can walk. Experience this book! The reproduction of John's work is exquisite and the price surprisingly low.

In 1995 I fell in love with a strongly believing girl and she gave me several books to read. "Run, Baby, Run" was one of them (it was written in Czech) and one should admit that I enjoyed the book. Nicky Cruz's gang was really very violent, fighting with policemen often and many people there were drug addicts. But a preacher introduced Nicky to Jesus Christ one day and then everything changed...

I recommend this book to any reader and nonreader because i am sure they will all enjoy this book. I have just recently finshed reading it (I only wished I had read it earlier)and wanted to know more so next best thing was to read David Wilkerson's book's (the little skinny preacher) that did wonders for Nicky. It is just incredible how the Holy Spirit works wonders through someone else. I do hope Nicky will write another book, (or has he,I like to know)(as I am in Downunder and get second hand news)as I would like to know lots more.

A very compelling story: A Nicky Cruz autobiography of growing up without knowing the true meaning of the word "Love". Growing up in the streets of Brooklyn, struggling and battling to survive, his fiercest battle is with his innermost demons. He is able to discover with the help of a preacher that everyone is worthy of God's love no matter how much evil is in their past. I first read this book about 25 years ago at 13 years old and the book still to this day has a impact on me. I'm going to refer this book to my son of 15 years so that he can read this story of great inspiration.

I just wanted to tell everyone out there, who is going to or has read the book, its the best book ever. I know Aaron Carter, hes my really good friend,I love him. It was well written and put together very nicely. Everyone out there should read it. I love you Aaron!

Who knew you could do so much reading in one summer? This is the only book I have bought/read over the summer, and let me tell ya, its really good, I read it in a little under 2 days. This is probably the best Aaron Carter book you will ever read since it is a true life story written by the one who knows him best! Mom, Jane Carter, who is also the author of Nick Carter's book The Heart And Soul Of Nick Carter. I recomend this to Aaron fans and also the lonely hearted ones who have doubted Aaron's succsess may need to think twice about critisizing Aaron because of his young age, hey, he wont be this young 4 long! It tells his whole life story including how he was just a 6, going on 7 year old frontman headbanging and screaming covers of Greenday along with his teenage bandmates for a local rock school band, Dead End and what he thought of it. This will surely settle some rumors and untrue stuff you might have heard in the past.And answer some questions like Why soes Aaron want to attend regular school? Why is cotton candy a no-no? Whats it like to be a twin? and many, many more! It is also filled with a color photo insert and some black and white photos at each chapter! Enjoy!

Hi, i am Aaron's number:1 fan and ive LOVED him since he was 7 when his first little web-page came out...I have followed him growing up and untill this book came out I thought I knew every-thing a fan could know about him, but I was wrong this book takes you threw his wonderful life and growing up and family and being on the road...There are breath-taking picture that stole my heart, and a quiz at the end...This book is the best book I have EVER read and it stole my heart, Jane Carter you ROCK.... Aaron Carter you ROCK my world and youve stole my heart....

I think it was a great book. Ann M. Martin did a wonderful job of showing emotions, especially when Abby's father died. I could really picture Abby sitting in the principals office, and inisant 4th grader and hearing the shoking news that her father was gone. You feel like you become the charachter, which shows Ann M. Martin's wonderful writing talent. One of the bad things though, is that it doesn't seem very realistic for a person to write a biography in one weekend. I know from experience that a teacher always catches glitches and you have to write it at least twice. Other than that, it was a good book.

I think that this is one of the best Baby-sitters Club books.Abby has been through a rough time and it's really sad. I liked when Abby and her twin sister, Anna, were first graders, and they had to dress in certain colors so their teacher could tell them apart. I also liked when they were in Sanibel, but I won't spoil the book by telling you the whole story so, bye.

This book is the best, since Abby's the best baby-sitter! I really miss her in the new series, Friends Forever! I wish that there was a real person like Abby, so I could meet her! Please write some more regular BSC books, Ann, I really miss Abby!

This is an excellent study of what must be one of the most horrific among Civil War battles. Though one reviewer's comments about sloppy notation are well taken, Rhea's scholarship overall seems solid, and he uses quotes to great effect to make the fighting come alive.

Not only Spotsylvania but the tragic cavalry battle at Yellow Tavern are covered here. Relevant to this, no other study I have seen, not even bios of Stuart, brings out Stuart and his troopers' role in initially forming the crucial defensive line on Laurel Hill and then deploying the infantry in ideal positions. Little known, but perhaps one of Stuart's finest hours.

Rhea seems even-handed ideologically speaking, and his criticisms of Grant and Sheridan seem well supported by the facts. I would recommend this book not only to scholars but to amateurs who want to know why the Civil War was a horrible conflict. This is not light reading. It is a story of appalling human suffering, courage, and unbelievable sheer endurance.

With the year only four-and-a-half months young, it would still be a safe bet to put your money on Gordon C. Rhea's "The Battles for Spotsylvania Court House and the Road to Yellow Tavern-May 7-12, 1864" for "Best Civil War Book of 1997". Rhea, who gave us his "Battle of the Wilderness" in 1994, has only improved upon that award-winning volume with his latest effort. "The Battles for Spotsylvania" covers the vicious and nearly-disastrous engagement between Grant and Lee during the middle weeks of May, 1864. Here, near this sleepy little village southwest of Fredericksburg, Grant's bluecoats met Lee's butternuts in a mortal maelstrom of some of the most bloody fighting the Old Dominion had yet seen. Long neglected by Civil War writers, this pivotal and oft-confusing series of continuous combats was brought to the modern Civil War buff's attention by William Matter's fine "If It Takes All Summer" in 1988. Rhea, however, takes the torch from here and weaves a masterful narrative, both highly-detailed and smooth flowing at once, to give us, perhaps, the best coverage of this engagement we shall ever have. How so, one might ask? First, Rhea adds to the records and histories, a plethora of unpublished accounts from diaries, letters, memoirs, newspapers, and the like to give this book the comprehensive personal side of battle. Yet, the strategic and tactical concerns of the fighting do not suffer at all. To be sure, the author, once again, has found that special touch in blending the larger and smaller "pictures" into one without detracting from either. Nearly every imaginable aspect of the battle is covered in deft fashion, always maintaining the easy-reading flow in the text. Especially inviting to buffs and important to historians is Rhea's coverage of the concurrent cavalry operations between Phil Sheridan and JEB Stuart, including a riveting account of "Little Phil's" Richmond Raid and Stuart's subsequent death at Yellow Tavern. From the initial fighting at Laurel Hill, through Upton's heroic charge and the battering assaults against the "Bloody Angle", the reader will find and feel that they are seemingly in the midst of the battle itself. I just got my copy and read it in two days--you will find this one very hard to put down! Theodore C. Mahr Dayton, Ohio ------------------------------------------------ Former Seasonal Historian Fredericksburg-Spotsylvania Natl. Military Park Author: "The Battle of Cedar Creek: Showdown in the Shenandoah, October 1-30, 1864"[1992]

Gordon C. Rhea has done it again. Mr. Rhea wrote a compelling battle narrative on the desperate fighting in the Wilderness that appeared on the book shelves in 1994. After I read that history, I wondered to myself, how in the heck would he follow up on his excellent treatment on the Battle of the Wilderness. With his latest volume on the Battle of Spotsylvania, he has certainly done that. Rhea, with this latest book has established himself as one of the finest historians writing about the war today. He has brought all of the elements together...Bravery, tragedy, incompetence, and yes, humor in a narrative that truly describes the horrors Americans went through during those awful days in early May, 1864. Mr. Rhea's description of the events on May 12, 1864 are harrowing, unbelievable, and heartbreaking. The struggle for the Bloody Angle becomes all too real for the reader. The unbelievable, heroic combat for those earthworks on the hallowed ground of the Spotsylvania Battlefield makes me proud of both sides as they fought during that rainy day. Each side gave their all....and they showed what Americans are all about. Special thanks for the maps of George Skoch. Mr. Skoch's work really helps the reader understand the campaign. A must for all students of the Civil War....Rhea has written a classic!

The Cold War was a war of nerves. Like all war, it was costly and wasteful. And like most war, determining the key event or strategy that led to its particular end point may be subject to endless debate. Peter Schweizer's point is that but for the strategy developed by the Reagan team and adopted by President Reagan in 1981 to 1983, the particular ending resulting in the collapse of the Soviet Union would not have occurred. The story he tells is compelling. History may well confirm his analysis.

This is not an academic work. It is more a multiple memoir. Most of Mr. Schweizer's citations are of interviews he conducted of major figures in the Reagan Administration. It also reads like a cookbook with one recipe. The ingredients-military buildup, economic embargos, support of regional conflicts in Communist lands, and most important, adoption of the strategic defense initiative-are set up in the first part of the book. These ingredients were more or less in place by the end of 1983. The book then becomes repetitious, sort of like telling the cook to stir the pot and then stir the pot some more. In the end, Gorbachev comes on the scene, recognizes that the pot has boiled over and takes it off the stove.

Other authors have been critical of the Reagan team's efforts. Schweizer points out that some of the criticisms were expressed by team members (especially Haig and Schultz) at the time the secret decisions were made. As time passes and peace allows for a more expansive view of the events in the 1980s, criticism will likely increase. A book such as this one will be all the more important then, as a reminder of what was done and how and why it was done.

Tom Clancy dedicates Executive Orders "to Ronald Wilson Reagan -- The Man who won the War". Schweizer explains why Clancy is more correct than all the news media and intellectual elites who scorned Reagan when he was in office and have ignored his achievements ever since.

Much of the news media and liberal academia would have you believe that Gorbachev was the hero who modernized the Soviet Union and liberated it from the past. Schweizer outlines in detail the long strategic effort to defeat the Soviet Union through a multiplicity of specific strategies. From delaying and minimizing the natural gas pipeline to western Europe, to working with the Saudis to bring down the price of oil (the number one source of hard currency for the Soviet Union), to actively working to cut off technology from reaching the Soviet Union, to launching an arms race of high technology systems that would bloc obsolesce the old systems and force the Soviets into an exhausting effort to keep up, to financing opposition forces in Afghanistan, Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Central America.

Again and again Schweizer shows the methodical determined efforts of the Reagan team to undermine and roll back the Soviet Union. Trying to describe the end of the Soviet Empire without Reagan is like trying to describe the South losing the Civil War without mentioning Lincoln and Grant. This book should be read by every citizen interested in just how effective their country can be when it has a strategy and courageous disciplined leaders.

Once in awhile a book comes along that has that special quality of illuminating a real world mystery. Robert Caro's biography of Johnson and Albert Speer's memoir are two such works. Peter Schweizer's Victory is another.

For years I wondered, as I read news accounts and histories, why no one had a logical explanation for why oil prices had dropped so dramatically in 1985, when just a couple years earlier pundits were saying the sky was the limit for oil. And why, shortly thereafter, did the Eastern Bloc begin to crumble, soon to be followed by the Soviet Union itself? Then why did the Bush Administration see fit to conduct a war to liberate Kuwait and protect Saudi Arabia? And were all these momentous events related? The answer is yes. Victory describes clearly how they all were indeed closely related.

King Fahd of Saudi Arabia was worried that he would be overthrown as the Shah of Iran had been, either by Muslim extremists, or by Soviet backed revolutionaries. At the same time, the Reagan Administration was interested in the economic strangulation of the Soviet Union. The source of most of the USSR's hard currency was the sale of its oil on international markets. So a deal was struck.. The US would guarantee the security of the Saudi monarchy with AWACS jets and Stinger missiles and, ultimately, US armed forces. In return, Saudi Arabia would flood the market with oil, driving the price for a barrel of crude from $35 down to $10.

With its oil income cut by 70%, Moscow could no longer buy the technology it needed to keep pace in the arms race, let alone dole out largesse to Poland or East Germany. And when Iraq invaded Saudi Arabia's tiny neighbor Kuwait, it was time for the US to uphold its part of the bargain.

Victory aptly describes this and other maneuverings to win the Cold War, such as the support of the mujahedin in Afghanistan and of the Solidarity movement in Poland. It is based largely on interviews with such key players as Caspar Weinberger, Robert MacFarlane, George Schultz, Richard Pipes, Herb Meyer, and Richard Allen, so that it provides an almost palpable sense of being in the White House as the strategy was crafted. It effectively gives the lie to those facile commentators in the media who claim the Soviet Union fell of its own weight. It didn't. It was pushed.

Of all the adoption books I've read, this one has been the most informative. Although many the case studies may be a bit scary, one should know the types of hurt these children experience. It also explains all the behaviors a child may experience due to the many upsets in their life, and techniques a parent should explore to eliminate the ones that are destructive (mentally, physically or socially). The adoption terms are fully explained so no one every feels lost. I have recommended this book to several friends who are considering adopting.

This book should be a Bible for families adopting hurt children. Keck takes the adoption process step by step and uses case studies to back up each piece of information.

We see that there are reasons behind each phase the child goes through, the honeymoon period, the fall-out that follows, the need to drive away their parents before the parents drive them away. Through the children's actual words, we feel their pain.

Methods are suggested for dealing with attachment problems, sleep disorders, axieties, etc.

Though this book focuses mainly on domestic special needs adoptions, foreign adoptions are warranted their own chapter and, besides, many of the issues are the same.

This book was an excellent source for adoption of the older, hurt child. I couldn't wait for my husband to read it so we could discuss the topics covered. I feel this book took a very realistic approach to the issues hurt-adoptive children may have. They also clearly noted that people are individual, as well as children are individual. Working closely with knowledgable therapists is also noted many times as being necessary and helpful.

The single biggest reason to watch this movie is that the star himself was in fact the single most decorated war hero of World War Two, and he is convincing here playing himself with dignity, sincerity, and humility, which, of course, Audie Murphy always had in spades. The movie was adopted from his best-selling autobiography, which my Mom let me read after blackening out all of the four letter slang (as she called it). Perhaps it shows that he was my childhood hero, and I still have a personalized autographed photo somewhere reading "Thanks, Barry, for being my fan" that a friend's mom got for three or four of us ten year olds at the time this movie was released in the mid 1950s. It was the first movie I saw ten times. And I wasn't alone; Murphy was a national icon.

The movie truly is a classic; tightly directed, poignant, honest, accurate, and showing gripping combat without being gory or maudlin. It sometimes decends into travelogue movie-theater type newsreel moments, but these are thankfully rare and forgiveable. On the other hand, this is an interesting and absolutely true story of a common and uneducated boy from rural Texas who wanted more than anything to be a soldier and serve his country, and his subsequent deeds and patriotism above and beyond the call of duty inspired a whole generation of us who wanted to imitate his call to country. Unfortunately we walked into another time and the miasma of Vietnam. But that's another story for another time. Escape back to a time when the moral choices were clearer, and a real live hero was available to act his way memorably through an accurate recounting of his extraordinary if abbreviated military career. He may be gone too soon, the victim of a plane crash in the early 1970s, but his lifetime admirers remain. Enjoy!

When are you ever going to see a great hero playing himself in his greatest moments? If "Saving Private Ryan" was too gory for you, here's a movie that shows the glory and pain of WWII, but without the gore. If your grade-school kids want to know about the soldiers of WWII without them having nightmares, have them see this film. Audie Murphy is great in this role -- even though it is his story, it becomes the story of ALL the soldiers (although Audie does have the best moments). The fight scenes are gripping, and it really does feel 'real' rather than 'staged'. I would also recommend that you read Audie Murphy's book of the same name to get the whole story. Definitely Audie Murphy was the greatest U.S. soldier in the 20th Century!

I first read this book as a young man before entering high school. The book and Audie Murphy became a symbol of not only what one man can do, but what one man can stir in the friends and comrades around him.

Murphy's acts, thoughts, and efforts described in this book make him an absolute hero not only during the war, but should be displayed for generations to come as a man that believed in our country and the American Cause. It is the ideals that he fought for, and the American people that he believed in that make this book a must read for all types of people that would want to feel good about the United States of America and to be personaly uplifted and moved by the challenges that this soldier endured and overcame.

Pete Wright is the attorney who turned things around in special education by winning the famous "Shannon Carter" case holding that parents did not have to wait for lethargic or negligent school districts to help their children. Carter held that the parents could place the child at an out of district school and get reimbursment later, whether the school they chose was approved by state or local authorities or not.

I am an attorney who has handled literally hundreds of these special education matters.Be this book, I would have to carry an armful of materials to a hearing or an IEP meeting. Now its all in one paperback volume.

It is also in language the non-lawyer can understand. (and even lawyers). It is also laced with the Wright's wisdom from their many years as pioneers in this specialized field of law.

Don't go to a hearing or school IEP meeting without it.

Reviewed by William Laviano, Esq. Laviano Law Offices P.C. Ridgefield, Ct.

This is a great resource, putting all the laws, rules and regulations that are relevant to special education in one handy place. In addition to the actual copies of laws, notation of relevant case law is a really useful addition. Overviews of the laws/regulations and commentary are extremely helpful.

This book is a valuable resource for school psychologists, and it is required reading for my graduate course covering legal and ethical issues for school psychologists in training. Knowing the regulations and the law will help professionals plan programs that meet the needs of children and the requirements of the law.

I recommend it highly for parents, also. Parents are many times at a disadvantage because they do not know the law. With this book as a reference parents can be a fully participating member of the special education team.

As a parent of a child with autism, I have faced many struggles.
Working with the public school system to provide my son an appropriate education has been the hardest struggle by far. I have read Wrightslaw: Special Ed Law and From Emotions to Advocacy by Peter Wright and have found them to be an invaluable resource for parents of special needs children. As with any disability, parents must educate themselves in order to help their child. These books are loaded with information that is essential for parents who wants to be strong advocates. I recommend these books to every parent who has a child in the public school system.