Westerns Books

This book has great info on planning trip to Vancouver and Whistler and now after reading about victoria, think I should add tht to the trip.

This book has been very helpful in planning our trip to Victoria and Vancouver Island! Excellent recommendations for restaurants and hotels.
If you are planning a trip to this area, this is the book to help you see it all! Many Thanks

I am new as an Inquirer to the Secular Franciscan Order. This book is a must read and was recommended by a Franciscan Priest.

If you are interested in Franciscan Spirituality this book is an absolute must; but beware this is St. Francis and St. Clare full force from a fire hydrant. Watch out! If you are used to getting St. Francis via an eyedropper you are going to get soaked! The editors have added scriptural references to the text. This allows the reader who has a Bible handy to go from St. Francis' or St. Clare's words right to Holy Scripture. That is a powerful combination. Don't read this book in a week, take a long, long time. You will be glad you did.

Frequently, to suit the author and their own agenda, translations of Francis' and Clare's works are either watered down or misunderstood. Regis Armstrong is one of the rare authors who truly understands the Franciscan mentality. He is, therefore, able to do outstanding translations that allow the true spirit of Francis and Clare to emerge. As a former Poor Clare (Poor Lady of Assisi), this book was highly recommended by our Mother Abbess (who is a highly valued Franciscan theologian in her own right). If it were possible to rate this book with 6 stars, it would be well deserving of it!

"Francis and Clare: The Complete Works" is a collection of the Rules, Letter, Prayers and any other writings believed to have been written by these two founders of the Franciscan movement, Sts. Francis and Clare of Assisi. I say "believed to have been written" because the authorship of some of the writings is based on the best scholarly research available, not on a reliable canon collected during the saints' lifetimes. The writings of Francis are presented first, followed by those of Clare.

Because the works consist of a collection of unassociated writings, they do not provide a guide to holiness, as do other works, such as St. Francis' DeSales "Introduction To The Devout Life" or St. Ignatius of Loyola's "Spiritual Exercises". This is more like a law school case book in which one reads the material in order to discern the important themes.

The important themes are not difficult to ascertain. One obvious one is the well known Franciscan emphasis on poverty. From these readings the reader gets the idea that the virtue of poverty is the detachment from things of earth so that one may concentrate on the things that truly matter. A second theme, which I had not associated with Francis, is that of reverence for and adoration of the Holy Eucharist. The prescriptions made by Francis in his day resonate well in our time with its struggle in maintaining a balance between Eucharist reverence and accessibility.

This book serves well as a tool in a study of the life of St. Francis. We look to biographies to learn from him through an organized rendering of his life. We look to "Francis and Clare: The Complete Works" to learn from the saint himself.

I would recommend this book to anyone interested in the writings of St Francis and St Clare. The Classics of Western Spirituality volumes are generally well-researched, relevant, and well-introduced selections, and this is no exception.

Complete, detailed information about most places the typical eurail traveller will go. I'm in the middle of a four week trip through Europe and have found it to be valuable. You don't need a book to help you find a party.

This book is a little TOO complete. Aside from its large physical presence, it had a little too much encyclopedia information and not enough about partying. I would suggest also scooping up a Party Europe Guidebook and picking and choosing the information needed from Lonely Planet. That's how I did it and it worked fairly well.

Absolutely a must if you are going to travel around in Europe. With detailed explanations from budget travelers to high-end vacations.

Just got back from visiting 8 countries in three weeks and this book came to my rescue many times. I'd recommend making photocopies or pulling out the pages for your trip so you do not have to lug the whole book around. This was a great way to get an idea of what to plan to see (the cities in two days boxes are really helpful to make a plan and the food recommendations are great (the prices are super helpful). I will definitely buy an updated version of this book if I ever do a similar trip!

We have now completed three trips of Europe and Great Britain - all of which were fantastic, mainly because of the knowledge this book brings you. The ability to be able to be able to budget properly, know the good and bad parts of town and the true highlights of a location makes it worth every cent. Nothing really goes out of date either so even after a couple of years, it is still a very useful book to have and one that I would highly recommend taking with you (instead of those three shirts that you'll never wear!). Obviously you have to chose what suits your tastes and budgets but this book gives you the best arrangement of options available in any one location. We haven't been disappointed yet.

I have read the Romantic Suspense books by this author,The Edge of Recall,Halos: A Novel,and Freefall which were all wonderful. I couldn't get enough of her writing skill,so decided to try her Christian Historical Romance.

Mrs. Heitzmann has not disappointed me yet! Her skill amazes me.

This book and the whole trilogy,was almost painful to read,due to the heartbreaking life histories of the two main characters Quillen and Carina. The author goes into great detail letting us in on their sad backgrounds.

However,we are also treated to the development of some new wonderful friendships for Carina,and a few older ones of Quillens,and some genuine humor. I loved Quillen's fascination with Carina's hand gestures and expressions as she speaks,especially when she is annoyed/angry.

There was also some real suspense and mystery concerning possibly fraudulent property deeds. Carina had gone from Sonoma,CA to the mining town of Crystal,CO on the belief that she owned a house she saw and purchased,from a newspaper advertisement,to get away from the man who had betrayed her love.

I believe Kristen Heiztmann is without a doubt one of the best Christian Fiction authors out there,and I am so thankful to have come across her books,which make me doubly thankful that the Lord blessed me with a love for reading.

Her books will also amaze you with how descriptive she is of the surrounding and weather,so that you feel that you are in the scenes.

Excellent book!!!!!
In my opinion the beggining of the book was a little boring, but when I was around page 100 the story became very compelling, a page-turner, full of action, suspense and even romance !!! I highly recommend you to read it.

When Carina DeGratia finds out her fiancé has been unfaithful, she leaves her beloved Sonoma, California and heads for Crystal, Colorado. With the deed to her dream house in her hand and little else, she quickly finds out things are not always what they claim to be. Once in Crystal, Carina grabs the attention of two men. One a town leader, the other a man she just as soon wished she'd never met. Again, Carina learns a hard lesson in trust when she begins to realize neither man is who he seems. When violence begins to escalate in this small mining town, Carina must decide who it is she will turn to for help.

THE ROSE LEGACY, the first in a three part series, was a very enjoyable read. I'm glad I already have book two so I can plunge right in and see what else is in store for Carina, her husband, and the town of Crystal.

I have looked at Kristen Heiztmann's books on the bookstore shelves for years now, and never once bought one, thinking they were just the run of the mill historical Christian fiction, with not much meat in them. However, when I recently bought her books Secrets and Unforgotten when they were on sale for half price, I couldn't put them down! Upon finishing those two, I immediately took the Rose Legacy series books out of the library (whose storyline precedes that of Secrets and Unforgotten), and had them read in less than a week (ignoring other important tasks at times!) I love them even more than the first two I read. The characters are real and it was easy to hear the voice of the Lord in my own ear as I read their words. The Lord knew when and where I needed to read these!

I hadn't read Heitzmann before tackling this series, and I've got to say: she's good. The names struck me as a mite corny, but what did I expect from a historical, romance series? Once I got over Quillan, Flavio, etc I thoroughly enjoyed reading the series.
Only buy it if you're ready to put in the time though, cause you won't want to put it down for anything mundane like eating or sleeping:-)

This book is the best time warp trio book I ever read. It starts with Fred, Sam, and Joe watching a wild west movie. Fred says he wants to go into the movie, and THE BOOK (a magical book that can teleport you throughout time) teleports them there. Now they have to find THE BOOK to get home. My favorite parts of this book are when there is a stampede, or the flood, or when Joe, Sam, and Fred meet an indian tribe. My favorite character in this book is Joe because he passes out too much. I don't like it when some Indian comes out of nowhere and takes Joe to his village for no reason. It was hard to believe. But later you find out why. My least favorite character is Fred because most of the time it's his fault that they get in trouble. He is also the funniest. I think this book is excellent and everyone should buy it!!!!!!!!

I think the funniest part was when Joe was saying "hello, waisachu, hello waisachu".

"The Good The Bad And The Goofy" by Jon Scieszka is great for a short read (It is only fifty pages.) The fights between Fred (really athletic) and Sam (really smart) are hilarious. The book starts out in Joe's attic when Fred, Joe, and Sam wish to go back in time to see the cowboys and indians using Joe's magic book. The way the book works is they say a rhyme and end it with where they want to go. I won't tell you what happens when they get there because I don't want to spoil this great story! If you don't think that you'll like this book than don't pick it up because the book is so great that you won't be able to put it down. In short, if you like magic, comedy, and suspense then this is the book for you!

Do you like funny things? Because if you do this is the book for you. It's about three boys named Fred, Sam, and Cookie who use magic to go back in time to 1816, the western time period of time.
Jon Scieszka writes it. He writes the series called The Time Warp Trio. I really like this book.
If you want to find out what happens to Sam, Fred, and Cookie go to your local library.

Joe, Fred, and Sam are watching a western show, when suddenly they get sucked back into the book.The boys find themselves in a desert.Fred starts to hear something.It's a stampede.They are about to get hit by the stampede! Will anyone come to their rescue?
Some of the funny parts are when they almost get run over by the cows and at the end when you see the hole in Fred's hat.In one of the pictures the cow has 5 utters so tht was funny.I think you should read this book because it's just as funny as the first two Time Warp Trio books.

"Between the Gates - Lucid Dreaming, Astral Projection, and the Body of Light in Western Esotericism" by Mark Stavish. I recommend if you are Christian to read the last three chapters first so you don't go off the deep end. The last three chapters are written, as I recall, from a Christian perspective. Then just carefully peek into the rest of the book with the lights on and a room full of people. http://www.peaceandconflictresolution.org/

One of the most impressive books to come out lately. The body of light is frequently mentioned in many texts and few if any ever expand upon it. What is it? What makes it different from the astral body? How do you create it? How do you use it? This book actually details all this and more.

The first few chapters of the book offers a crash course in hermetic theory. Nothing new but does so accurately and with surprising completeness considering the vastness of the subject. Then moves on to inducing lucid dreams and astral projection in the following chapters, before getting to the creation of the body of light itself.

There are ample exercises and rites with in depth explanations and directions that would give the feel of a workbook if not for the numerous articles of information between them.

The critiques I have is in some places the author glosses over some finer points within his articles that often leaves you with wanting him to elaborate further but doing so would probably have ballooned the text beyond the scope of this work. Additionally there are so many exercises scattered throughout the chapters, many listed by the author as core, to be done daily, that I wish there was an index to them. Overall I was highly impressed with this book.

On an initial read-through, I found this book fascinating. I am not that familiar with the Hermetic literature, but I have not seen anything quite like Stavish's approach to it anywhere else. He links astral travel, lucid dreaming, and other psychic phenomena to the Qabala and path working in a unique way.

The exercises are not onerous, all the early exercises and many of the advanced are not time consuming, needing only 10-15 minutes a day. Like any other system, they require consistency and perseverance but do have the promise of yielding positive feedback fairly soon instead of years from now. Also Stavish puts his system in a context of other spiritual disciplines so the work he describes can me melded with many different paths. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in lucid dreaming or astral travel no matter what their spiritual path.

Between the Gates is the kind of book I wish I'd had in my hands over a decade ago, at the start of my spiritual journey.

This is an outstanding mixture of Hermetic theory, discussion and, most importantly, staged exercises that can serve as a strong foundation for those interested in spiritual exercises and "occult" practices. This book covers an amazing amount of material while still being quite accessible.

I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to build a solid foundation for their work in Out of Body Experiences and the many other paths that lead from it.

I really enjoyed this book. Although it is a quick read do not be fooled. The work involved is just that, involved. But, it is worth it! He has a very x-tian bent in his writings but that is his paradigm and it is tough to write outside your own view. Overall it is a very good book with exercises that explain much of what is not out in the open about developing the light body. Overall it is not a lot of new information and a good portion of this work can be found in other works. what makes this book so valuable is that it brings all of that information together into a system.

This book is one of the hidden treasures in World War Two personal histories. It is clearly one of the best I've reviewed over the last few years. It is an outstanding read and one I wish I'd read sooner.

The author starts this book on Omaha Beach where the author lands among the first wave of Infantry men to fight in Normandy. His division is the famous 29th Infantry Division. While he serves as an unarmed medic, it is clear his heart is with the infantry. This book details his heroic efforts over the next year as he fights in some of the biggest battles fought in World War Two. Eventually, he becomes a full infantryman.

Interestingly, enough, he never mentions his division by name, and seldom mentions the names of his fellow soldiers. In many ways, this book reminds me of Audie Murphy's To Hell and Back. He tells you very little about where he comes from, his training, and how or why he was involved in the war. He leaves it a war narrative cobbled together from his personal notes.

The book is detailed enough that one can watch the books progress with a map and divisional history of the 29th. However, it never bogs down the way an overly written book tends slow down. In fact, I had a hard time putting it down and was almost late to work because I found myself glued to the last few pages!

Frank Irgang is a real warrior. He doesn't sugar coat his story. This book details close combat from the perspective of a man who did it. He fought with a rifle and his hands. He describes weapons transitions in combat, bayonets and more. It is one of the few books I've ever read that describes brutal hand-to-hand combat with and without weapons. He even had US artillery called in on his position.

This is an amazing book considering only 3,000 were originally published and this book is just now seeing a return to print. I really think it's a major contribution to the history of the 29th Infantry Division's History as well as history in general. I really wish I'd learned about this book long before I made my trip to Normandy in 2004.

Any collection strong in World War II memoir needs ETCHED IN PURPLE: ONE SOLDIER'S WAR IN EUROPE, first published in 1949 and offering the author's personal record of his experiences as a combat infantryman during the war. It's a candid, sometimes brutal survey of first-hand experience and is a rediscovered classic and is a 'must' for any serious military library.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

This book is a raw look at life as an infantryman in WWII. Well-written, honest and poignant, this painful recounting of one soldier's experience will stay with you forever.
Don't hesitate to order this book!

In a thrilling, and disturbing, biographical narrative, Irgang reveals the personal hell of hand to hand and squad-level combat in World War II from the Normandy beaches, through the Battle of the Bulge and into the heart of Germany. This is not a broad strategic work, profiling salients and counterattacks, but a step-by-step, ravine-to-ravine account of one soldier's fight to stay alive, and to make any rational sense of the hell played out every day in front of him. Parts resemble the last scenes in "Saving Private Ryan," but this gripping book is much more grounded in reality. What's most interesting is that the book was first published in 1949, when few recently discharged veterans had the stomach and inclination to relive the war. Now, the book has been reprinted in 2008, amid efforts by World War II veterans to keep their stories alive, so the world will have a greater appreciation of the sacrifices they made, and an understanding of the moral judgments that were forced to be made in an instant. There's fascinating detail: such as the order to tape dog tags together that was issued before the invasion, so their clinking sound would not alert enemy soldiers; a morbid description of how German soldiers' bodies decayed differently than Americans; and how uniforms of those landing at Normandy were treated with an anti-gassing repellent. In one digression, Irgang while in Paris is caught up in a raid on Army deserters who were engaged in the black market; and he finds through a newspaper clipping while in combat that his State-side sweetheart was married to a man with a deferment. In an almost unbelieveable coincidence, a clipping from home informs him that three of his good friends died in Normandy. While in an Army field hospital near the landing beaches, he come across the graves of two of them, found in a hastily built military graveyard in Ste. Mere Eglise. For those of us raised on films such as "The Longest Day," "The Bridge at Remagen," "Battle of the Bulge," and "Saving Private Ryan," which provide the geographic context and broad-brush overview, "Etched in Purple" presents the real story of ground fighting by The Greatest Generation. The book is sparse on geography and dates, but time and place are not part of a soldier's mission. It's hurry up and wait, or take that next village or town. There's much bonding here between soldiers -- bonds that in many cases are cut short by artillery attacks, snipers' bullets and simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Suppose that one of the men in the Band of Brothers had also been a top-caliber writer with a keen eye for detail, and a man who wasn't afraid to tell his story without glossing over the grey moral and ethical middle areas all men face in combat, and you will only begin to understand the greatness of this book. As a WWII writer, I've read literally hundreds of memoirs, but none hit me so viscerally as Frank Irgang's powerful 'Etched in Purple'.

Originally published in 1949, only a few years after the war, this book has been given new life by the nation's largest military publisher, Potomac Books, and is being touted as 'The Rediscovered Classic Memoir of World War II'. And that it is.

Mr. Irgang landed on D-Day with the famous 29th Infantry (think Bedford Boys), and the memoir begins as the men load up into their ships for the trip across the English Channel before that momentous day in June of 1944. Originally a medic, Irgang's unit took such heavy casualties that he soon found himself a rifleman and sniper. He witnessed the heaviest fighting in Europe in one campaign after another, and the book tells his story in spare, lean prose. Irgang's writer's eye for detail draws out the intensity of each scene as the reader experiences men fighting for their lives, watching comrades die, dealing with the killing of the enemy and the suffering of the civilians unfortunate enough to get in their path. Along the way, Irgang is wounded, evacuated, treated, and sent back to the front. He tells of watching a Black soldier slowly bleeding to death because the white southern doctor doesn't want to treat the man until Irgang protests. He tells of watching a German woman pouring a kettle of boiling water onto the face of a wounded American soldier, and his instant reaction of shooting her. He tells of watching his friends die, not only from enemy fire, but by malfunctioning hand grenades and stray friendly fire. Jotted down as they happened, each scene has an immediacy that allows the reader to feel they are sitting right next to the young soldier.

In the end, the book tells a reader exactly what war was like, stripped bare in all of its brutality, ambiguity, and heartbreak. But it also shows the loving bond of men fighting and dying side by side in some of the most brutal fighting of the European war. You don't just read this book, you experience it. It will move you to tears at times.

I cannot recommend it highly enough. A must-read for anyone interested in the infantryman's experiences from D-Day through the Bulge and into Germany.

Some readers might find some parts slow going, but this classic work remains an excellent introduction into how and why our understanding of the heavens (and ourselves) changed so radically following the work of Copernicus. Those interested in reading Kuhn's seminal and more famous "The Stucture of Scientific Revolutions" will enjoy reading "Copernicus" to see how his thinking grew from this earlier work.

I asked my son when he was 4 years old why the Sun moved across the sky over the day. He answered me "because the earth turns". This seems like an obvious answer even for a 4 year old, but 400 years ago his response would be meet with ridicule and even worse would be considered heresy. Thomas S. Kuhn is able to beautifully and logically describe from a scientific perspective the ideas and discoveries through the ages that lead to the enormous conceptual leap from a geocentric to heliocentric world. This alone makes this book a great read. But what I valued more from the book is Kuhn's revealing of the impact of the "Copernican Revolution" outside the scientific world. It's influence on religion, society and the entire scientific process is still felt today. The idea of a heliocentric universe was not only a great scientific theory, it was really a turning point in the human race and how we see ourselves in the universe. I would also recommend "The book nobody read" and "Galileo's Daughter" as more modern follow ups to "The Copernican Revolution".

Kuhn's The Copernican Revolution was written as a text for an undergraduate course in the intellectual history of science. As such, its approach is focused and temporally expansive. The drawback of such an approach is the deficit of analysis in key areas. The analysis of the Church's role in science during the late middle ages and Renaissance was rather one-dimensional, but this obviously is not Kuhn's focus. Instead, he would like the reader to realize that any set of data can be modeled to an infinite number of paradigms (in anticipation of Structure of Scientific Revolutions). The heliocentric argument solved some qualitative problems but was largely Ptolemaic in articulation. Its aesthetic and geometric harmonies were extracted by astronomers who could could apply a mathematical rigor to it, in a post-Ptolemaic tradition (Kepler and Newton).

Kuhn challenges the reader's imagination to decipher the heavenly phenomena in the same way Ptolemy might have, without being hampered by the technical minutia of astronomy. He writes so lucidly as to pick the reader up and drop him or her under the ancient sky, and to follow a long, through time. Paramount to Kuhn is the practical importance of astronomical data and the logic of its categorization.

Perhaps the most persuasive analysis that Kuhn endeavors is that of the progression of the Renaissance neo-Platonics: Brahe, Galilei, Kepler, Descartes, and the mutation of the Copernican system into Newtonian synthesis. In one sense, his analysis is very non-Kuhnian as it can't point to a singular moment, and involves more of a patchwork of adopting new features (that is until Newton).

A concise introduction to the evolution of astronomical thought from antiquity to newton and a compelling classic.

This is a great overview of the development of the Copernican system. The main text is very clear and readable and the "technical appendix" has good expositions of key mathematical arguments. Nevertheless, I think Kuhn's interpretation of "the Copernican revolution" has some shortcomings. Kuhn wishes the Copernican revolution to conform to his idea (as presented in his book The Structure of Scientific Revolutions) of a revolution brought on by a crisis: "[Copernicus'] famous preface still provides one of the classic descriptions of a crisis state" and "Ptolemaic astronomy had failed to solve its problems; the time had come to give a competitor a chance." But Kuhn does not support this position very well. For instance he writes: "When Copernicus listed the aspects of contemporary astronomy that had led him to consider his radical theory, he began, 'For, first, the mathematicians are so unsure of the movements of the Sun and the Moon that they cannot even explain or observe the constant length of the seasonal year.'" Here Kuhn is using a rather underhand trick. He is implying, of course, that this calendar issue was Copernicus' primary motivation, but fails to address two crucial counterarguments. First, Copernicus' preface is addressed to the Pope and he is clearly interested in emphasising that "my labors contribute somewhat even to the Commonwealth of the Church, of which your Holiness is now Prince," mentioning specifically how the calendar issue was a concern for Leo X, etc. Second, when Copernicus says "first...", he does not mean "first" as in "most important," for he continues with a "second" and then reaches "the chief point of all." This chief point of all is the fact that the Copernican model has a beautiful implication: the planetary distances. A geocentric model cannot give such information because we could scale the orbit of Saturn, say, to make it twice as big and it would still look exactly the same seen from earth. But in a heliocentric model the distances are determined because if we scaled the orbit of Saturn then it would look the same seen from the sun but different seen from earth. So with the earth in the center we cannot determine planetary distances because we are the center of scaling, but with the sun in the center we would notice scaling and thus the planetary distances are locked, or, as Copernicus puts it, "this correlation binds together so closely the order and the magnitudes of all the planets and of their spheres or orbital circles and the heavens themselves that nothing can be shifted around in any part of them without disrupting the remaining parts and the universe as a whole." Thus he can claim triumphantly that earlier astronomers "have not been able to discover or to infer the chief point of all, i.e., the form of the world and the certain commensurability of its parts. But they are in exactly the same fix as someone taking from different places hands, feet, head, and the other limbs---shaped very beautifully but not with reference to one body and without correspondence to one another---so that such parts made up a monster rather than a man." (I'm using the translation from Goldoni's excellent article in the Mathematical Intelligencer.) Kuhn admits that the Copernicus' determination of the planetary distances is "crucially important" but dismisses it as the main reason for the acceptance of the theory: "'Harmony' seems a strange basis on which to argue for the earth's motion... Copernicus' arguments are not pragmatic. They appeal, if at all, not to the utilitarian sense of the practising astronomer but to his aesthetic sense and to that alone. ... New harmonies did not increase accuracy or simplicity. Therefore they could and did appeal primarily to that limited and perhaps irrational subgroup of mathematical astronomers whose Neoplatonic ear for mathematical harmonies could not be obstructed by page after page of complex mathematics leading finally to numerical predictions scarcely better than those they had before." The correct reading---beauty before truth---is staring Kuhn in the face but he refuses to recognise it, opting instead to dismiss Copernicus as "strange" and Kepler as "irrational."

"The Copernican Revolution" tells the epochal story of how the earth-centered cosmology of Ptolemy was replaced by the sun-centered cosmology of Copernicus and Kepler. The book is a classic. Kuhn understood how ideas influence each other and hang together in a system. He could write with equal erudition about observational astronomy, medieval theology, astrology, and Aristotelian physics.

"The Copernican Revolution" is a trove of historical and intellectual insights. Perhaps the main lesson is that scientific progress is not a simple matter of theory being adapted to observation. Multiple theories can account for the same observations, theories have complex non-observational bases of support, and extra-theoretical assumptions provided by "common sense" (such as the immobility of the earth) can be highly contingent products of a culture. Scientific progress is never guaranteed. Erroneous theories -- such as the theory placing the earth at the center of the universe -- can hold sway for centuries and generate a vast body of supporting evidence, only to fall out of sync with new observations and a new climate of opinion -- at which point they can hang on tenaciously, or collapse "suddenly" over the course of a generation or two. It all comes down to history.

Kuhn's great contribution to thought was to situate the history of science within the history of ideas -- he treated scientific theories as the products of cultures, institutions, and sheer accidents, not as deliverances of pure logic. "The Copernican Revolution" is fantastic and should be ready by anyone who enjoyed and learned from "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions." It's become fashionable to bash Kuhn lately but his books have a secure place in the canon of history and philosophy of science. Six stars!

I struggled with what star classification to give this book. On one hand, I find it very informational. On the other hand, I have a hard time figuring out what plants I am looking at. Apparently you need to have some deeper knowledge of plants before using this book, which I don't have. So I find it difficult to use when I am in the field. I don't even bring it along with me anymore, and sometimes resort to take pictures of the plants and then see if I can find them in the book later. So I find the book to be very much a mixed bag.

Peterson Field Guides has produced another winner. Western Medicinal Plants and Herbs by Steven Foster and Christopher Hobbs is a gorgeous guide book by, pardon the pun, the leaders in the field. This particular field guides sets the standard by which all medicinal plant guides should follow. Brilliant colour photographs of the over 500 identified species organized by colour for quick reference helps any novice quickly identify the plant and what'll happen if you try to make tea out of it. The detailed plant descriptions also include scientific name, family, location found, historical medicinal uses as well as highlighted warnings for poisons, allergies and other areas of caution. A very unique and special field guide Western Medicinal Plants and Herbs also offers harvesting and conservation tips. Pick this book up before you even considering picking flowers, herbs or plants for uses other than the filling your vase, it's a must have for anyone spending any extended time in the outdoors.

I am a layman who is looking for a guide to herbs that would help me identify herbs in the wild. My expectation was that the photographs in
A Field Guide to Western Medicinal Plants and Herbs would be fantastic and would help me ID plants in the wild with confidence. I was not pleased at all.

The photographs in this book are thumbnail size and often show only the flowers of the plants in question. The book itself is of a tiny size and affords little space to have "real" close-up photographs of leaves and overall look of the plant in-situ.

I would contrast this "Reader's Digest" version of a book made to identify plants in the wild with Roger Phillips' Mushrooms And Other American Fungi Of North America. This book is a full 11 3/4" X 8 3/4" and has photographs that fill a whole page, in some cases. I think it is fair to say that every photograph in Roger's book is larger than ANY picture in A Field Guide to Western Medicinal Plants and Herbs, whose photographs are attributed Stephen Foster. A quick view of Foster's web site shows similar "thumbnail" sized photographs. I am greatly disappointed!

The text contained within A Field Guide to Western Medicinal Plants and Herbs pales in comparison with what can be found on line.

I am hoping RHS Encyclopedia of Herbs and Their Uses gives a better view and history of the plants.

In closing, I would say this book should be the last on your list - not the first!

Peterson's Guide to Western Medicinal Plants and Herbs is a contribution to botany and field identification. This guide includes medicinal species, potentially dangerous ones, and plants with true healing powers. There is a description of range, habitat, medicinal uses, and a toxicity warning beside the species listing. Hundreds of species are covered, making a classic guide, one that deserves to revolutionize the botanical field guide section.

A novel about a historical figure? It works if you don't know anything about J. James. Otherwise it is just fluff.

If you've seen the movie then you've read the book. If you read the book then you've seen the movie. They are almost word for word, scene for scene. I saw the movie first and thought it a bore-fest; too long by 60 minutes easy. Then reading the book I thought it was too long by a good 100 pages. But you really only need one or the other, or sadly, neither. Yes the writing is very good, and yes the directing, acting and overall production values of the movie are good as well. But is it entertaining? Only so far. My recommendation, do one or the other, but not both.

This book is Great. A Must Read in my Oppion.

Two Thumbs WAY Up

....die by the sword. Or gun. Or treachery. That is an over simplistic way of looking at this book, but it gets the message across. There are several ways to determine if a man is a "legend"....one is that at least some people think of him as a fictional character...another is the sighting of him alive after he's dead. Jesse Woodson James was indeed real, and he did indeed die on April 3, 1882, shot from behind by a coward named Bob Ford. He was sighted "alive" as late as 1951, but that's either rubbish, or mistaking son for father. I certainly have an interest in the topic; my wife is a direct descendent of Captain George Todd, company commander of Jesse, and several of the gang, during the Civil War. Our son will be happy to tell you about it.

I suppose that this novel is more a character study than a straight history. Of course, it only claims to be a novel. Starting in 1865, we get a look at the last 17 years of Jesse, then we continue with the last 10 of Bob. We see the life of crime, the damage done, the women who stood by criminals. Jesse James certainly has brains, courage, strength of character, and even a certain nobility. Of course, he put his God-given talents to some very questionable uses. Bob Ford may have had brains, but the rest of Jesse's good points were WAY beyond him. Jesse, Bob, and all the others...Frank, Cole, both Zereldas, Dick...come to life. The author means for us to see them as real people, the mixture of good, bad, and indifferent, common to humanity; he succeeds. Still, he never attempts to fathom just why Jesse went the way he did...maybe, only God knows that.

On the whole, I can recommend this book...the writing is a bit stilted, the detail a bit too verbose...still, it's worth your time. If you REALLY want to know about Jesse, try "Jesse James Last Rebel of the Civil War" by T.J. Stiles. That book IS history, it covers cradle [and before] to grave, and is a lot better written...it even goes into motivation. Of course, there is a whole further area of speculation about Jesse's career...gold, Indians, the Masons, Albert Pike, the next Civil War...that is beyond the scope here. Overall, four stars is about right...

I saw the movie first and while I applauded the lush cinematography and attention to detail. The performances were great but unfortunately the overall effect was mired down in often excrutiatingly slow storytelling.

It's faithful to the book in that manner. Beautifully written with immense detail, the character study and history is frequently lost in the dense prose. It is a novel worth sinking your teeth into, but it IS a commitment of your time and attention.