History Books

I bought this book as a gift for someone else, but after seeing it in person I'm thinking of buying it for myself! It is a beautiful book!

When relying on a computer all day, this book lets you return to how it all began. Get creative! Draw, doodle, color, cut, create and interpret this into your latest computer-aided design.

If you love handmade and mixed media this book is for you. It is an inspirational collection of graphic design with a handmade look, very creative.

This is such a lovely book! Nice layout, easy to follow. Full of fantastic examples.

This is a fantastic resource filled with great examples of handmade design masterpieces. There are a few sections of illustrations that are already starting to look very dated, but a lot of the featured designs are timeless in their inginuity and beauty.

Whether you are already using hand-made techniques in your work, or you are searching for some inspiration on how you can get a more hands-on tactile feel with your designs in this age of InDesign, Photoshop and stock graphics, this book is great.

This is the best history curriculum I have ever used. I love the way it is laid out from creation through history. I wish I would have found this sooner. My kids also love the activities that go along with each lesson and are remembering what they are learning. I add in extras if my kids are interested in learning more about a certain topic. I would highly recommend this curriculum to anyone looking for a hands on Christian curriculum.

This unit study incorporates all of the "best" elements of learning and would be fabulous for non-home-schooling families to integrate into their children's reading program at home...as well as for home schooling families. Much praise for this product!

Great curriculum with good activities at the end of each lesson. Better for middle school or younger but can be used with supplemental material for older students.

We are using this along with Story of the World Volume 1. It's been a great history program for our family. It gives our 5th grade just a bit more to chew own. If you google Paula's Archives you will get a list that correlates the two programs together. We use the Story of the World Activity pages and suggestions.

I just received my copy of Mystery of History Vol. I. I am excited to start this with my daughter in the fall (5th grade). I looked for a long time at the Tapestry of Grace curriculum, but I couldn't justify spending the money with our small family. I was so glad to find MOH! It is an affordable alternative to Tapestry with a similar scope and sequence, and seems to be a little more user-friendly. It's definitely more kid-friendly. It is written so that kids can read the lessons for themselves. It seems that it is not as labor-intensive for the parent.

I especially love the 'What do you know?' pretests that encourage them to see what they already know and makes them curious, and the 'take another look' or 'what did you miss' reviews & activities - then there are quizes every 2 weeks, too, which test their knowledge. All of this is in small bites so the information isn't overwhelming. There are many activities to do. Each lesson lists assignments for 'younger', 'middle' and 'older' students. There are 36 weeks of lessons in this volume. The author lists several examples of how organize your week.

You will need to inlcude real books from a library (or you can buy some) to flesh out the lessons - but the same goes for TOG. I plan on making a time line as well.

The only negative I can find so far is that the 5th (last) volume will not be published in time (planned for release in 2014 or 2015 ?), but we can find a substitute curriculum for that last little bit of history - no problem. The 3rd and 4th volumes should be released in time for us. (3rd this spring and 4th in 2011.) For more info you can go to the MOH website, but don't buy there. The prices are better elsewhere.

i agree with all the previous reviews, this book is a must be and worth every penny you spend on it. the chronicle order of this book make it easy to understand and to be used as a reference... i recommend it for my students in the comparative class...

This book arrived on time and in perfect condition. I was pleased with the service and would order again.

At first I thought the book would be too dry and encyclopedia like, but when I started reading the chapters, I was taken by the text. It moved along nicely, and though there is a lot of information, it is presented in a way that makes sense, and in a way that helps one navigate through the `big pictures' of history. The maps are nice but they sometimes could have more information on them. The book is a challenge to those who think linearly or for those who think that the history of architecture "begins" with the Egyptians and Greeks and then "ends" in US postmodernism; the purpose of the book is to keep the globe turning. Sometimes the authors go east to west and sometimes west to east. It takes a little getting used to, but I think people will appreciate the idea that history is a moving target. It makes for some interesting contrasts. Each chapter has its own particular logic, however, and tries to emphasize a particular theme, having to do with religion or politics. On page 511, there is an imaginary architecture tour that begins in Japan and ends in England; it was an eye opener for me. At that particular time, as the authors point out, though Europe was in the middle of the Renaissance, there was a lot of good stuff also happening in China, India, and Turkey, that cannot be simply ignored as part of some `other' tradition.' It was all interconnected. I also discovered the free Google Earth download from Wiley Press web site where all the buildings in the book are flagged! That has been a great help in lectures.

I pre-ordered Ching's new book months ago based just on his outstanding work in his previous books. I wasn't disapponted. The timeline organization gives a much-needed new comparative perspective on architecture around the globe and across time. Ching's illustrations and choice of photos are just enough to illustrate the excellent text. This is yet another example of Ching's talent as an architectural illustrator and teacher of arxchitecture.

This book is a sorely needed alternative to current textbooks. It is written in crisp and unsentimental style that conveys big themes but with an attention to details. The book is organized as a series of timelines beginning with 3500 BC and ending with a chapter on recent architecture. But instead of each chapter beginning at the same place in the world, each chapter begins somewhere differently.3500 BCE starts in China, 25 BCE in India, 1500 BCE in Egypt and 800 BCE with the Olmecs in Mexico. This constant turning and spinning of the globe is, in my view, quite exiting, as it gets students to learn how to be comparative in their thinking and simultaneously mobile in their intellectual understanding of history. Each chapter is introduced by a one page "take" on the architecture of each time section. These introductions, which serve as a text with a text, point out the themes of each chapter. Naturally in a work like this, one can talk about what is and is not included, but one has to give credit to the fact that book provokes that type of question in a positive way.

A fascinating argument that the authors make is that from early on architecture was changing and adapting, and, in essence, `modern.' In other words, it is not that WE are modern and everything before us was linear and stable. The book in that sense not only wants us to get a sense of the global horizon of architecture, but also a sense that architecture is very much IN history, reflecting in very real and dramatic way the changes that take place not only in technology and economy, but also in religion and power, those being four identifiable subtexts of the author's approach to the material.

I especially liked the chapter 1600 and its companion chapter "Architecture of Eurasian Power Block" which starts in Japan and works its way through Eurasia to England, not once but twice to emphasize the significance worldwide of the period 1500 to 1700 in the history of architecture. The drawings, sections, plans and photos work well with a text that is as densely packaged as this. And finally, it is worth noting that the book also serves to give the students fundamentals in the various global architectural vocabularies, Greek, Chinese, Hindu

This is our second purchase of the Story of the World series. All three of my school age kids (6,8,10 yrs.) just love to listen to these tapes. It is giving all of us (mom included) a much more comprehensive picture of all the parts of history we have learned with other books. We highly recommend this product for your family as a history program or just for listening to in the car for fun. The acitvity book is also full of great ideas for making this as involved or as simple as you would like it to be.

My children (ages 6 and 14) studied through volumes 1 and 2 last year for our homeschool social studies curriculum. Volume 3 is everything we hoped for to extend our knowledge! The activity guides have proven to be a vital resource to cut some preparation time for lessons. In Volume 3 each chapter covers a slightly broader time frame, making it even more important to follow up the lesson with additional activities. We recommend Story of the World to all our homeschool friends.

I really love the Books. I have them all and they are so brilliantly written and engaging for my son. Makes planning activities for Social Studies so easy for me.
Thanks!

Coupled with the Story of the World text, the Activity Book has been the cornerstone of our somewhat reluctant venture into homeschooling. (We had a sudden overseas move and had to jump into homeschooling with little preparation.) Studying history has proven essentially effortless because the book and activities are so interesting that my 8-year-old begs to do her work. As non-religious academic types ourselves, we were wary of religious biases in the texts we chose for our kids; we've been very happy with the author's balanced treatment.

For the teaching parent, the lists of supplementary materials are invaluable -- exceptionally well-organized and researched, and the editors have been sure to include reading materials for different levels, which we have appreciated since it means we can easily include the 4-year-old in our stories. Every chapter includes review questions to test comprehension orally, then several worksheets which may include maps, coloring pages, and other activities. Many include recipes from the place and time being studied -- always a hit with the kids. All have worked well so far. The map work is a great follow-up as well, walking the student step-by-step through visual representations of different topics covered in the text (coloring the Triangular Trade route used by slave traders, for example). Although there's no way any student could complete all the suggested activities in a school year, I love the freedom of picking and choosing the activities that best suit and interest my daughter.

As suggested by the Activity Book, we're assembling all this work into a history notebook, a 3-ring binder full of my daughter's work. This serves the dual purpose of reminding her how much she's learned and giving us tangible proof of the homeschooling process. In short, this book has transformed us into homeschoolers and history buffs. Very useful.

I really loved this book in the series. I was disappointed with Fiery Cross and was hoping that this one would redeem. It did! It was a treat to read it! Can't wait for the next one!!!

I'm finally done! Whew! I read the whole series and I thought the last, A Breath of Snow and Ashes, was just as good as the others. I do wish that it wasn't as quickly tied up at the end, jumping around, without the final word on what happened to Claire and Jamie, but on the whole I really enjoyed every word.
I suggest you start from the beginning of the series and make sure you have lots of time to devour all 6. I stayed up way to late for a month or so :-)

After reading the first five Voyager series books, I was thrilled with this book. It tied up so many loose ends from the other books and gave an even more intimate look at the characters. This is one of the better books in an excellent series of books. Diana Gabaldon's books are entertaining, engrossing and even educational. I find them hard to put down once I start reading.

Loved this one! I am a big fan of revolution-era fiction, and I just love Claire and Jamie!

Gabaldon paints her books with thick color. Her characters are so well-developed that I feel I know them all very well. A Breath of Snow and Ashes closes some questions left from earlier volumes, and rounds out some character detail. I don't want to give anything away here, but it was a thoroughly satisfying read. Happily, it also leaves an opening for further Jamie/Clair volumes.
After reading this 6th book in the series, I started with Outlander and am re-reading them all. They're giving me as much pleasure the second time around.

The book certainly had some interesting points, but overall, even for a military buff like me, could get quite boring. It seemed to drone on, almost like reading an actual military handbook. In all honesty I haven't even completed the entire book, I've come close to the end to what I assume is going to be an interesting part, but I just can't quite force myself to read it yet

Anyone who is remotely considering a career in SF needs to read this book. It really put it all in perspective

Great book a must read if your looking into a future in SF or just interested in what they go through.

This is an excellent, no b.s. account by Dick Couch, himself a SEAL and fmr CIA Operative who writes without any ego driven agenda. He has been given excellent access by the Army. This clearly isn't written from a warm, dry desk. He goes into the cold, heat, and rain to get it right. Starting before training, Couch follows (runs alongside) the Special Forces "training process", which is more accurately an art, not a science. With attention to ample personalities, Couch brings the reader close to the fire. You sense "the big picture", but Couch keeps you close to the guys who are sweating and bleeding to succeed. This isn't a book only for those with a military interest. In fact, it's probably a far more educational and IMPORTANT read for people who have absolutely no clue about Special Forces. These elite professionals are our Nations ambassadors in places many Americans can't even find on a map. Their objectives and how they fulfill their missions have potentially deep impact not merely on military affairs, but on US Foreign Policy itself.

This book is very focused, and is made all the better because of that. The authors choice of focusing solely on the training of Green Berets, except for the first chapter, rather then on the whole history of the outfit and it's long list of achievements.

As a former SEAL, he clearly knows about special forces, and is able to translate that into detailed explanation. He gives enough background detail of the people he is talking to to be interesting without giving us page after page of soldiers that come and go (a problem with some history books).

He clearly recounts conversations, but only the parts that are applicaple to what he is discussing. Throughout the book, while you meet the soldiers in training, the only character you really feel like you get to know is the training itself.

The pace of the book is also noteworthy. Many history books are a little tough to read. Having to record so much information and so many facts can leave a book a little dry. Couch has a great writing style and the book really flows.

There are a few problems, such as going into detail about the same thing nearly verbatim in two different chapters. Not to often, but it was distracting. Also his insistence on calling the Green Berets special forces and naming all the other SFOR by name. In the beginning he even indicates that the Green Berets are the only real special forces. Something surprising coming from a former SEAL.

None of this detracts from the book. It is a well paced, informative read that anyone with interest in the military or history would be glad to read.

If you'd like to see more of where Taylor is coming from in this book, check out his interview over at The Other Journal. It's a great read and is specifically relating to this book.

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I'd love to review this item, but I've not yet received it, though Amazon promised it by now. What's the holdup?

Robin

A work for those interested in pondering precedents that seem to now demand a second look, a more psychological reflection. There is however a slight lack of objectivity and a very slight nostagia comes through.

This is a wonderful 200 page book. The problem is that it takes Taylor many more hundreds of pages of repetition to finish it. I normally read a couple of books each week, but i had to put this down many times over several months to get to the end. There are some brilliant observations in this haystack, like needles, but you are so exhausted in reading the same observations so many times that it becomes a tiresome book.
I can see why there was no editor for this book since a real editor would have spent years getting him to realize that a compendium of lectures (which is what this book is according to Taylor) does not lend itself to a good book.
If you want to spend a lot of time getting to how we live in a "Secular Age" which of course we do not if looking at the world as a whole, you may find a few nuggets in here, but you won't find a vein of gold that makes the effort worthwhile. Sadly this book could have been great. Sadly, it is an example of what a poor writer can do with an interesting topic.
I pity any of his students who had to suffer through these lectures without the benefit of lots of caffeine. I am sure Taylor is a very smart and engaging man, as long as you don't have to spend more time with him than the usual checkout line takes at the grocery store.

An exhaustive, very learned string of reviews on Taylor's study can be found at "The Immanent Frame" ([...]), a blog maintained by the Social Science Research Council (SSRC).

After all that has been said, I will only add that Taylor's book is work of synthetic and imaginative genius. It offers very comprehensive insight into the condition and history of modernity without subscribing to a unilinear, "subtractionist" notion of secularization. This book will be permanently useful in many disciplines. It is worthy of comparison with Blumenberg's The Legitimacy of the Modern Age and John Milbank's Theology and Social Theory: Beyond Secular Reason, but with the huge added advantage that it canvases popular experience as well as the experience of the intellectual elite.

Thomas recounts in vivid detail all the injustices and hardship suffered by his grandparents, parents and himself over the last century and how all of that attracted him to Republican conservativism, which embraced the ideals of racial equality, eradicating poverty and affirmative action - ideals which helped Thomas reach the heights of success.

He seems keenly aware of the fact that he did not possess the legal expertise or the intellectual depth to sit on the highest court in the land. But after spending time with the other underqualified and highly over-rated justices on the court such as Scalia and Rehnquist, Thomas came to realize that he had nothing to feel bad about. The one regret he has is the advent of C-SPAN, which provides an unwelcome measure of public exposure to the court. He worries that the blind reverence and assumption of supreme intelligence which the public held for the judges for over 200 years has come to an end. Instead, the public now has C-SPAN to show them that the court is really nothing more than a collection of simple-mided political suck-ups with giant egos who do strange things with soda cans and who will approve the torture and dismemberment of their own mothers and children at Guantanamo Bay if it will get them appointed to the court.

Although he still harbors a great deal of anger over his historic and divisive confirmation hearings, he hopes to find the infamous coke can, which he dreams of selling one day for a certain fortune at e-bay.

As a general rule I take what I read in a memoir with a grain of salt. It is only natural for people to put their best forward when writing about themselves for public consumption. In this case however I found myself accepting Thomas' words at face value. Whether it was his writing style or the way he spoke so openly about his human failings I did not question the honesty of his accounts or the sincerity of his emotions.

His life growing up in poverty was a compelling story. His angry youth was unsettling, but understandable and the struggles of his adult life make him all the more admirable. I always had difficulty reconciling the quiet humble man of the senate hearings with the accusations leveled against him, and though his views reflected my own conservative values I knew that the reality was that only he and Anita Hill knew the truth. After reading this book I no longer have any doubt that Clarence Thomas, with all of his human failings, is an honorable man and was an outstanding choice for The Supreme Court of The United States of America.

Readers looking for a defense of Mr. Thomas's legal theories or time on the bench will have to look elsewhere. The book is the simple, straightforward story of a man's rise from shocking poverty to one of the most prestigious positions in the United States, and those he views shaped him throughout his life. In that sense, it is a useful companion piece to Mr. Thomas's personal friend Thomas Sowell's own autobiography, which the reviewer recommends even more highly.

Where to begin with all the good things that I'd like to say about this book?

1. The prose is very clear, concise, easy-to-read and unpretentious. The entire book comes in at under 300 pages and there are no wasted words. (For a VERY LONG and VERY BLOATED autobiography of a politician, see Bill Clinton's "My Life.")

2. He fills in the missing gaps from Anita Hill's account of what happened. (It was fairly easy to surmise from her writing style in "Speaking Truth To Power" that Anita Hill was/ is a drama queen.) The type of antics that Thomas described (without going too far into detail) were not at all unexpected based on the personality type that I perceived from Hill's writing. The snippets are neither bitter nor abusive. Only discussed in a matter of fact way.

3. There is some interesting discussion of the dynamics of a government bureaucracy and how it starts off to solve some problem but eventually "hardens" into something completely different. There is no long, philosophical discussion of *why* this situation materializes (as you might find by reading the works of Hayek or Milton Friedman), but just observations that it does happen.

4. The thinking is very clear and straightforward. Thomas is not a mindless ideologue, but rather someone who has thought out his positions based on actual *life experience.*

5. He made observations that racism is not a uniquely Southern phenomenon (for example, noting that the first time that he was called a "nigger" happened when he moved up North and not in the South--where the blacks and whites there came to some sort of modus vivendi).

Bad points (only one):

1. The book had no index. That might have been nice when going back over fine points after finishing the book.

All in all, this book was well worth the purchase price of a new hardcover book.

I bought this book out of boredom. I had nothing else, at the time, to read. I thought that I knew enough of this gentleman from newspapers and media. Was I ever wrong! This is book will enlighten one as to who the real Clarence Thomas is and the grandfather who became a role model for him. His portrayals of various members of Congress are indeed enlightening!
I no longer have the book. I had lent it out so many times that it finally never found its way back to me.

I was very pleased with the service and quality of my purchase. He was professional and efficient.

This book is an excellent source for the wroks of philosophers beginning with Plato and going on to all the other greats of Western Philosophy. Although I am only on the writings of Aristotle, I am enjoying the book and find that the footnotes provide some much-needed explanantions in parts. Further, the price I got this book for was much lower than what my college bookstore was asking for.

Cahn's text was a requirement for a historical-introduction to philosophy class that I had. Cahn has included much relevant material from key philosophers from Plato and on. I highly recommened this book over Pojman.

This anthology is by far the best anthology of its kind. If you love ancient and medieval philosophy the way I do, it is possible to teach an entire semester "intro. to phil." course out of Plato, Aristotle, Sextus, Augustine, Anselm, Aquinas, Maimon, Ockham, Gerson, and the Stoa.
This book could also support a whole early moderns course, as it features full texts of MEDITATIONS ON FIRST PHILOSOPHY, ETHICS, MONADOLOGY, AN ENQUIRY CONCERNING HUMAN UNDERSTANDING, and DIALOGUES CONCERNING NATURAL RELIGION. This great text also contains a well-selected excerpt from Kant's KrV.
If you are a philosophy instructor who loves great texts, and if you teach an historical approach to intro., this text is your choice. This servicable anthology is priced reasonably enough that it can also serve as a primary-source reference for thematic courses. Thanks to Hackett for this gem. This text is also ideal as the core text for a one-trimester course. I have even used this book once for a one-semester ethics course!

I must confess my review is about the third edition, but it got me through understanding many a dry philosophical lecture. The book encompasses many of the great philosophical minds of in western history - the usual Greek medley plus other greats such as Locke, Descartes, Spinoza.
Each set of highlighted works is prefaced by a small biography.
If current western philosophical college curricula is anything to go by this book brings the relevant philosophers together in one place and thus forms a vital part of any student's bookshelf.

I got this book because of all the hype surrounding it, especially when something carries the title "Utopian society". Yet, after reading it I find that Utopia itself was never meant to be the "perfect" society, but rather a "different" society. In fact, Utopia is far from perfect, and people need to quit thinking that it is. As a STORY, Utopia is not all that exciting. Animal Farm is a much better book in my opinion.

I read this book out of curiousity mostly. Considering it was written several hundred years ago, it was a challenge to get over the dry writing. There isn't a story here as much as a listing of daily practices and customs in Utopia. Some silly, some almost ingenious.

The underlying theme is an example of a perfect society; but at aprice - personal freedoms. What I also found interesting was that a few of the ideals contridicted themselves throughout the novel. Everyone is equal, except for the non-king rulers. If this is a perfect society, why would there be crime in the first place? War is bad and nonsense, except when Utopian government finds merit in it. Everyone seeks out knowledge, but they need permission to gain it.

I found the writing very dry (most likely due to the period it was written) and almost like reading a text book. A good read however. Makes you think about personal freedoms versus a perfect society.

This is an odd little book. I read it years ago but only remembered the golden chamber pots. I reread it yesterday and today. The chamber pots are still there, as is a strange blueprint for an ideal society, or at least one version of ideal.

The account is in the form of a traveler named Raphael speaking to the author about his experiences in Utopia, an island in the New World. In Utopia there is no private property and no need for money as everyone's needs are met. Each person pursues their own happiness while simultaneously working diligently to care for the common good. Its citizens are happy, healthy and prosperous. Utopia, though, is less utopian than many current utopian visions since it still makes allowance for slavery, capital punishment and warfare.

At the end, after hearing Raphael's tale, the author dismisses the customs of Utopia as ridiculous, but almost in the next breath he wishes some of the practices were adopted in his homeland. This ambiguity mirrored my own reaction to the picture of Utopia -- silly, but in some ways strangely appealing.

I suspect this translation is a paraphrase of the original Latin. Nevertheless, it has the virtue of being lively and very readable. More is a Catholic saint, which makes much of what he says in Utopia very surprising indeed. The Tudor functionary who persecuted Protestant heretics advocates religious toleration, married priests, the abolition of private property and the pursuit of scientific knowledge as an end in itself. His criticism of society is breathtaking when one considers that there was no freedom of conscience or opinion in his time. The tone throughout is pleasantly witty, as More himself was. For those who can read old books, Utopia is well worth the effort.

I first read this book in my impressionable and idealistic youth (some time in the second half of the last century). I've read it a couple of times since then and still enjoy the way that the book can be read as either a satire (my current preferred reading) or as a description of an ideal society.

This is a very short book and well worth reading - even for those of us without Latin who can only read it in translation.

Recommended.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith