The Earth Shall Weep: A History of Native America Review

The Earth Shall Weep: A History of Native America
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Helen Hunt Jackson's "A Century of Dishonor," [1881] initiated a string of books by white writers attempting to impart the disaster imposed on North America's native peoples by invaders from Europe. James Wilson has taken a place in that queue with this sweeping study of how native peoples were displaced, deceived, diseased and nearly destroyed. It isn't pleasant reading, but conquest never is when told from the view of the conquered. Wilson attempts to provide a whisper of that voice with as many native peoples' accounts as he could obtain. The result vividly demonstrates the disparity of outlook between the Europeans and those they overran over the course of five centuries.
Although no attempt is made to preface the arrival of Columbus with some account of the previous life of North American native peoples, the text recounts their legends and mythology as they are encountered. Only a smattering of paleoanthropology is offered, and the "consensus" version of Native American origins is dismissed out of hand. Wilson's regional approach is a refreshing departure from the usual chronological format. However, since the focus is on the 48 contiguous States, region and chronology aren't all that distinct.
The issues are land and culture, with a seasoning of racism. The native American "used" the land while the Europeans "owned" it. Native American culture was disparate, often locked into local conditions. Europeans imported a hierarchical society and imposed it wherever they went. Since they went all across the continent, continual clashes were inevitable - and the Europeans won nearly all of them. By the end of the 19th Century, the "Indian", if not extinct, had lost the continent and nearly all culture. According to Wilson, that was precisely what the invaders intended. Where slaughter failed, assimilation could still force disappearance of the "native" from society.
Attempts to rectify, or at least ameliorate what had occurred over the years, were doomed to failure. The variety of cultures among the Indian nations made consistent policy by the federal government impossible. State government attempts, feeble at best, were worse. The closest to a rational policy for dealing with the remaining Indians in the 20th Century were due to one man - John Collier. Starting in the 1920s, Collier struggled to restore some form of the original culture of Native Americans. His programme, now referred to as the "Native New Deal," was based on his own search for a solution to world problems of the era. Years of effort were rewarded by his appointment as Commissioner of Indian Affairs. The onset of the Great Depression gave Collier ample opportunity to propagandize his cause as an alternative to the failure of the dominant culture. His efforts to achieve a form of "home rule" for the Indian population is reflected in many programmes still under consideration today. He has left a long, and generally unrecognized, legacy.
Those bemoaning the "lack of balance" in this book overlook the fact that Europeans were the invaders and despoilers. The spectrum of philosophies regarding the "Noble Savage" uniformly fail to address precisely what Wilson does here. An alien culture displaced another, native one, using whatever means necessary. It's a sad, but true, chronicle. Wilson's depiction of it makes dreary reading, but that's due to events, not his style. A fine introduction to the past relationship of conquerors and conquered, this book concludes with a realistic account of the present situation. With increasing demand for resources by the planet's most avaricious society, sustaining or restoring Indian culture is a remote ambition. The clash of cultures remains an issue, which this book clearly outlines. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]

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13, rue Thérèse: A Novel Review

13, rue Thérèse: A Novel
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This beautifully written and illustrated book is a magical tale woven around a box of artifacts owned by the author. They tell the story of Louise Brunet, a woman who lived in the early part of the 20th century, as imagined by Trevor Stratton, an American academic working in present day Paris.
Trevor discovers a mysterious box of letters and mementoes in his office that was secretly left there by his secretary. He becomes enchanted by the objects; old love letters, notes, faded photos, pieces of music even a pair of gloves. As he examines each of them he begins to write about their significance in a series of letters to someone identified only as `Sir' and in doing so creates the story of Louise. At the same time Trevor is becoming more aware of his secretary and the role she plays in his discovering the objects.
Louise is not what I would consider a typical woman of the 1920's. Her thoughts, desires and actions are more consistent with those of someone living today. But then I would remind myself that I was experiencing Trevor's fantasy of Louise's life. Childless and married to a man of her father's choosing, Louise suffered heartbreak when the love of her life was killed in The Great War. While she loves her husband, he is not the man of her dreams. She wants a child. She wants passion. She has neither.
Louise is an intriguing and complex woman; she also has a naughty streak. Thinking about a pair of lace gloves she is wearing while in church causes her mind to wander off on an imagined sexual fantasy. Another time she makes a false confession to shock a priest. She has a desire to sleep with her new neighbor and writes him anonymous letters while at the same time she invites him and his wife to dinner.
Throughout the pages the book is illustrated with color photos of the actual objects which were the inspiration for the novel. Each of the photos are also displayed on an interactive website which can be reached through links in the book, a wonderful enhancement to the story. This is a book that must be seen to be appreciated. Go take a look at that gorgeous site; you will not be disappointed; you will be intrigued.
Love story, romance and fantasy, this is a clever and captivating story that is at times both sexy and adult. It is a puzzle that keeps you wondering until the very end when all the pieces ultimately fall into place. An enjoyable read.

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The Maffetone Method: The Holistic, Low-Stress, No-Pain Way to Exceptional Fitness Review

The Maffetone Method:  The Holistic,  Low-Stress, No-Pain Way to Exceptional Fitness
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I am 48 years old and have exercised since I was 14. I have read this book three times. It is a godsend. Every concept, every suggestion, every analysis given has proven to be accurate for me. I first changed my training shoes per instructions with amazing results. Second, I purchased a Heart Rate Monitor and it has become my most important training aid. Third, I have slowed my training pace and increased my training time considerably and have received performance results, excellent health and mental calmness eclipsing anything that I have previously experienced. My whole training program is now focused on health. This book should be manditory reading in High School health classes. If I could give it 10 stars, I would.

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Dr. Maffetone's unique training system for champions proves that the kinder, gentler approach actually works the best. This fitness regimen has worked for champions and non-athletes alike- because it's based on Dr. Philip Maffetone's deep understanding of how the body works.Maffetone has used that knowledge to develop The Maffetone method, his successful low-stress fitness program, which can be tailored to any individual. It means "training slower to go faster," says Mike Pigg, world champion triathlete and Maffetone client. The Maffetone Methodincludes: A ten step program to reduce stress and increase overall fitness; Exercise techniques designed for increased results with decreased pain; The real lowdown on some of those fad diets. In short, this is a fitness regimen for champions that everyone can use to reach their own goals whether it be running a marathon or walking around theblock.

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The Wikipedia Revolution: How a Bunch of Nobodies Created the World's Greatest Encyclopedia Review

The Wikipedia Revolution: How a Bunch of Nobodies Created the World's Greatest Encyclopedia
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`The Wikipedia Revolution` (2009) is probably the first serious attempt at a book-length history of Wikipedia. Unfortunately Andrew Lih is not a trained historian, it is a journalistic account with more reporting and synthesis than original interpretation. However it is still a quick and interesting read, even if Lih is a devout Wikipedian. Certain sections stand out: the history of Ward Cunningham who invented the Wiki software; the history of Larry Sanger and his role as "co-founder" (or not, depending, but it is not resolved here). The role of Usenet, Hypercard, Slashdot and MeatballWiki in the formation of early Wikipedia. A glimpse into the vastly different cultures of Japanese, Chinese, German and other foreign language Wikipedias. An overview of some (in)famous incidents such as Seigenthaler and Essjay. Lih appears to have researched the book mostly using archival sources - I was disappointed not to find new interviews with Wales, Sanger or any number of others - it takes away from the books value in the long term as a primary source, a missed opportunity to add to the historical record.
There is a short Introduction by Jimmy Wales which is a standard stump speech heard many times before. The Afterword contains a crowd-sourced essay on the future of Wikipedia and it does contain a meaty examination of the difficult issues facing Wikipedia now and in the future. I found it to be surprisingly good. The Afterword is released under a Creative Commons BY license so it's freely available to copy - it's odd Lih did not point to where it can be found online. [UPDATE: see "Comments" below for a URL]
I would recommend this book for anyone who has been a long time member of Wikipedia and wants to learn more about 'a history experienced' over the past 8 years or so. There is so much that could be said about Wikipedia this book just grazes the surface but it's a good entry into what will certainly becoming a growing library of books about Wikipedia in the future.

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Incident at Hawk's Hill Review

Incident at Hawk's Hill
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This book was one of my alltime favorites as a child (in the late 60's). I grew up on the prairies, so badger holes and fields of waving grasses, as well as neighbors with rifles, were part of everyday life to me. I loved the quiet child who fit in with animals more than humans, and the relationship with the wild mother badger. The world created was more realistic and naturalistic than that portrayed by cheery kids books like the Berensteins and Dr. Seuss. There was tragedy as well as compassion: the mother badger has been caught in a trap, her babies have died of hunger, she is hurting and in pain. These are realistic concerns in nature. Not all is cute fuzzy puppies and loving understanding adults. In the end, the misunderstanding between the child who has been cared for by the badger, and the adults who only see a dangerous wild beast, very much touched my child mind and reflected my experience with adults. I saw injustice in the real world left right and center and it was seldom reflected in children's books. This is one of the deeper children's books I have read, that doesn't shy away from the complexities of life, difficult emotions and depth of feeling. I have reread it recently as an adult, and it still touched me. I highly recommend it.

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Six-year-old Ben is very small for his age, and gets along better with animals than people. One June day in 1870, Ben wanders away from his home on Hawk's Hill and disappears into the waving prairie grass. This is the story of how a shy, lonely boy survives for months in the wilds and forges a bond with a female badger. ALA Notable Book. Newbery Honor Book.

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Don't Tell Mom I Work on the Rigs: She Thinks I'm a Piano Player in a Whorehouse Review

Don't Tell Mom I Work on the Rigs: She Thinks I'm a Piano Player in a Whorehouse
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I don't ever write reviews about books, this one being my first on here but I just had to on this book. I bought this at an airport on a return trip from Australia and I'm not really sure why I got it, or what stuck out that compelled me to purchase it. I don't read fiction and to be honest it was the only thing there that was non-fiction that seemed different (the title alone should tell you all you need to know about this read). Within 20min of reading this book I was laughing so hard that I had people looking at me like I was crazy. I couldn't hold the tears back as the author had me rolling with his Seinfeld life. It's all about an average Joe who makes a living on an oil rig and always has something go wrong. A true roughneck job but written in such a comical way that you can't put the book down. It's the kind of read when you get done that you close the book and go look for someone to say "Hey you GOT to read this book man!"

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Since age 18, Paul Carter has worked on oil rigs in locations as far flung as the Middle East, Columbia, the North Sea, Borneo, Tunisia, Sumatra, Vietnam, Nigeria, Russia, and many others - and he's survived (so far!) to tell stories from the edge of civilization (places, as it happens, upon which most of our lives rely). Carter has been shot at, hijacked and held hostage, almost died of dysentery in Asia and toothache in Russia, watched a Texan lose his mind in the jungles of Asia, lost a lot of money backing a scorpion against a mouse in a fight to the death, and served cocktails by an orangutan on an ocean freighter. Taking postings in some of the world's wildest and most remote regions - not to mention some of the roughest rigs on the planet - Carter has worked and gotten into trouble with some of the maddest, baddest and strangest people you could ever hope not to meet.

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Pandemonium Review

Pandemonium
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Pandemonium is fricking brilliant. Here's the plot summary version: As a child, Del was possessed by a demon, the Hellion, known for targeting young blond haired boys. There are many demons in this version of the US, archetypes from classic stories, comic books, etc. Del got better.
Except now he's an adult and beginning to realize that the demon never really left. Something inside of him is trying to break out and take over. He has to chain himself to his bed at night to prevent himself from destroying his home or hurting other people in his sleep. So, he goes on a quest to find a doctor who can help him, then one of the most messed up priests you could ever imagine. He runs into other demon possessed people. Almost gets killed multiple times... And finds out that things are much worse than he ever imagined.
Here's the gushing stream of consciousness version: Demons! Comic books! Possession! PK Dick! PK Dick as a demon! The nature of narrative! Reality/truth. Comic books! The Shug! Archetypes! Creative unconscious! Jung!
Daryl Gregory does something with Pandemonium that I forgot you could do with fiction. He talks pretty intense philosophy without ever once making it feel like that's what he's doing. The narrative is just so strong that you don't notice you're going over really intellectual and dense territory. Del is a strong main character, the events are completely improbable but you don't even notice it until after you've read the whole book and been utterly seduced by it.

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13 to Life Review

13 to Life
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I'm gonna be brief because i don't particularly enjoy reading long reviews. All I'll say is I was sadly disappointed. I was looking forward to reading this, intrigued by the caption, and bought it as soon as I could. It took me a month to get through, and I'm surprised I even finished it. And I read books FAST. The characters make decisions that I simply don't understand, cause most of their problems due to these silly decisions, and there is honestly no depth to the plot. The book is like reading a list of problems and seeing a bunch of characters you don't particularly care about mope around in self pity. I don't mean to sound harsh, but this book really was such a let down. Though the author does leave potential for an interesting sequel, indicating toward the end (which, if you do read the book, I'd skip to because it's the only time in which anything happens) that the plot may pick up from there, I don't know if I'll bother to read it because of my extreme disappointment with this one. Maybe I'm just getting a wee bit tired of all this repetitive paranormal romance, but I haven't had any other problems in the genre recently. Maybe the sequel will be better. Anyway, unoriginal (or for those that were original, incomplete) plot lines and some characters that just fell flat with me. It seems that the majority of reviews differed from mine, which surprised me, but maybe I'm just impatient for a really riveting read which this was not. Disappointing, but not the worst I've ever read.

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Split Infinity (Apprentice Adept) Review

Split Infinity (Apprentice Adept)
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I was not much of a book reader. I found a copy of Split Infinity at the bus I was on and started reading it. I was wondering why the book cover had a picture of a unicorn and the first few chapters clearly depicted a science fiction (future world) scenario. By the end of the book, I had to get my hands on Blue Adept and Juxtaposition. I have not found a book even remotely similar to the Apprentice Adept series since. The combination and relevance of both sci-fi world and fantasy world had been excellently written and the style of magic that Piers Anthony penned in this book was clearly unique. I will definitely let my kids read this book once they are able. I have been a Fantasy genre reader ever since I found this book.

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On the technological, decadent world of Proton, someone was trying to destroy Stile, serf and master Gamesman. His only escape lay in Phaze, a world totally ruled by magic. Soon he learned that his alternate self had already been murdered, and that he was next. On Proton, his fate depended on winning the great Games. On Phaze, he must master magic to survive. And if he used any magic at all, his friends were determined to kill him at once!THE APPRENTICE ADEPTBook OneSPLIT INFINITYBookTwoBLUE ADEPTBook ThreeJUXTAPOSITION

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The Last Summer Of The Death Warriors Review

The Last Summer Of The Death Warriors
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At seventeen, Pancho has decided the last thing he needs to do with his life: kill the man he thinks responsible for the death of his sister. It's not so simple, though...first he has to figure out who exactly the man is, how to find him, and how to get past the annoying, aggravatingly happy D.Q., another teen boy with a mission of his own: live life to the fullest in his last months...before he dies of brain cancer. And...honestly...I can't do justice to the plot here. Throw in some conversations about life, death, faith, love. Mix up with heart-wrenching backgrounds, wise children, foolish adults, and sucking every drop of marrow from life.
As my little synopsis probably makes clear, The Last Summer of the Death Warriors is one of those fathoms-deep, meaningful stories that you rarely come across in YA lit. It is also an extremely subtle story--almost too subtle for my taste (the ending didn't feel wrapped-up enough for me), yet I love the way it left me thinking after I finished it. I can guarantee that it will make you question the way you're living your life, embrace the beauty of every day, and appreciate things you never thought to notice. You will never forget Pancho and D.Q. or the friends they make on their journey--Francisco Stork is a master at character and relationship development, and these aspects of the story are truly what make it shine. Even every description, although technically all of them are extremely basic and simply worded, serves to develop character--and does so perfectly.
As a bit of a warning, this is a very difficult book to read...certainly not in actual pacing or readability, but simply because it delves into topics and a world that are hard to be in. This is not a story to be read casually, and it is certainly for mature readers who can handle its issues. Yet it is a beautiful book, and it is an important book.


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The Thirteen Books of the Elements, Vol. 1: Books 1-2 Review

The Thirteen Books of the Elements, Vol. 1: Books 1-2
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At the time of this writing, the sales summary points out "Vol. 1", but it does not point out that it is "Volume 1 of 3". Volume 1 provides a historical summary of work that followed _Elements_, along with a detailed translation of Book I and Book II. Heath includes bracketed references to justify each critical step of each proof. The text surrounding each Euclidean statement is detailed, but often very lengthy; at times, this detracts from the reading of the _Elements_ itself. This set is for the scholar of the history of _Elements_, and not the best source for a first-time reading of Euclid. Even with these minor quibbles, however, my copy of Volume I is a well-worn, beloved volume with frequently-annotated margins. All of the major "players" in the development of Geometry are detailed within, as well as their contributions.
I recommend it highly for any scholar that wishes to understand _Elements_ thoroughly, through a close reading of a detailed text.

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Volume 1 of 3-volume set containing complete English text of all 13 books of the Elements plus critical apparatus analyzing each definition, postulate, and proposition in great detail. Covers textual and linguistic matters; mathematical analyses of Euclid's ideas; commentators; refutations, supports, extrapolations, reinterpretations and historical notes. Vol. 1 includes Introduction, Books 1-2: Triangles, rectangles.

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Lonely Werewolf Girl Review

Lonely Werewolf Girl
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This is one of the best books I've read this year. It's also the book with the worst editing I have ever seen.
The plot is wild and funny. The daughter of a werewolf Thane is being hunted by both her family (she tried to kill her father and quite nearly succeeded) and a guild of werewolf hunters. Worse, she battles her anxiety. Lonely Werewolf Girl has many, many characters. Sometimes it's difficult to keep track of them all. I enjoyed this book on many levels. I didn't finish this book quickly, not because it wasn't good, but the short chapters which jumped from character and place and did all sorts of funny acrobats which taxed my poor concentration. This was a good thing. I dragged the pleasure on for three days as opposed to finishing it in one swallow.
Millar, being at least as talented as Gaiman and Pratchett, would do himself well to find another editor. Or maybe the editor would do him or herself well by hiring a high school student to proof read the final draft before sending it to print. Obviously no human read the final draft, and any reasonably literary high schooler could do better than Microsoft Word at spelling and grammar. The sloppy editing did this writing wrong.
Regardless, I give this book a five. Reviews are generally seen as a reflection of the writer and not the editor. The writing was excellent.

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Twilight of the Dead Review

Twilight of the Dead
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As a fan of all-things-zombie for over twenty years I had never experienced "zombie fiction" before, and eagerly scoured the Amazon reviews of probably the exact same books you have already looked at. After reading the glowing reviews of this book I discounted the amateurish cover art and immediately ordered it.
Upon arrival the first thing I noticed once I began perusing the first few pages was the size of the font. I'm sure I'm being nit-picky but it seemed to me that a larger size font was chosen to maximize the number of pages - slim still at just over 200 pages. This, coupled with the actual dimensions of the book and the heretofore cited simplistic cover art just gave me the feeling I was holding something aimed at a much younger audience. Don't get me wrong, I fully realize this is a book about the Zombie Apocalypse, but I guess I expected something a little more literary after seeing reviews calling it the "best book I ever read" and throwing out phrases like "metaphysical subjectivism." I have to wonder what other "books" these reviewers tend to read.
As for the story, I will admit it is enjoyable for what it offers. However, some things had me wondering "wait, didn't they just say.." and "that doesn't seem right, wouldn't they have..." a little too often. I felt like I was reading a second or third draft where the plot hadn't been cemented nor the holes filled in. And my god, please use a proofreader in future. I can forgive an overlooked comma but there were too many instances where something that should have been caught actually took me out of the story wondering if maybe I had read it wrong. The biggest offender being a cliffhanger-type situation closing out a chapter - "But he had been bitten!" instead was printed "But he had bitten!" which made no sense in the context of the scene and really ruined the tension of the moment.
Character-wise it was refreshing to have a female protagonist, but I was struck by the fact that seemingly every male in her life, excluding her father, either wanted to have sex with her or already had. Seemed a bit banal to me. I found myself rolling my eyes every time another newly introduced male character threw out a clichéd come-on or uttered a moronic innuendo. Enough.
Bottom line: it's a fairly enjoyable read if you can get past the overall unpolished feeling and glaring editorial oversights.
I just glanced down at the next part of this review form, where it says "I am over the age of 13." A very applicable phrase with which to end this .

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Courtney Colvin was nearing the end of her teenage years when the undead apocalypse began. She survived, forsaking her youth and innocence, and five years later she continues to exist--albeit lonely--in the fortified town of Eastpointe. Nightmares and the unwelcome advances of Leon Wolfe are the worst things she's dealing with now in her otherwise mundane life. But when a newcomer arrives in town and claims to know the location of the antidote to the zombie plague, it sends Eastpointe into an uproar. To retrieve this cure, she and a group of other survivors must venture outside the relative safety of the compound's walls and into a world ruled and dominated by the flesh-eating undead. Twilight of the Dead puts a new spin on the zombie genre, yet remains true to the classic rules that have already been set forth. A sure-fire reading pleasure for anyone who loves character-driven horror. This Special Edition contains an Introduction by David Moody and three bonus short stories detailing important moments in the lives of other survivors

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Lullaby And Goodnight Review

Lullaby And Goodnight
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I really enjoyed Donna Anders' thrillers, and was looking for another author who wrote suspenseful, scary books I could curl up on the couch with on a cold rainy evening. Most of the thrillers written from a female point of view seem to be thinly disguised romance novels and the heroines are helpless twits, but happily I have now discovered Wendy Corsi Staub. I have read several of her books and they are all good and scary, with female characters I can respect and relate to. "Lullaby and Goodnight" is about Peyton, a thirty-nine year old woman living in Manhattan, with a successful career but no relationship and a ticking biological clock. She decides to become artifically inseminated (she is not pregnant by a former lover, as an earlier reviewer wrote). She becomes friends with another single mother-to-be in a support group. When her new friend disappears, strange and frightening things start happening to Peyton. You will be kept on the edge of your seat up to the last page.

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At thirty-nine, Peyton Somerset has an enviable life, with a thriving advertising career and a beautiful Manhattan apartment. And now she's going to have the one thing she wants most - a baby. Peyton's biological clock went off just as her fiance took off, leaving her at the alter. So Peyton's going through it alone. Already, she's making plans for the little one inside her...buying the layette, daydreaming, and worrying over the littlest things. That's only natural. All mothers do. But Peyton has reason to worry. In fact, she has every reason to be terrified...As the months pass, Peyton can't help feeling that something is terribly wrong. She's certain that someone has been in her apartment, that she's being followed, that someone is watching her. Maybe it's just hormonal paranoia that makes her distrust everyone around her. Or maybe her maternal instincts are dead on. Maybe there's someone close who doesn't think she should give birth at all. Someone who would do anything to have a baby. Anything...

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The Great New Wilderness Debate Review

The Great New Wilderness Debate
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I've always considered myself an environmentalist and supporter of wilderness, based on my many wonderful personal experiences with wilderness and nature. Shamefully, however, I never did much reading on the topic of wilderness. Nor, for that matter, did I do much THINKING about the whole CONCEPT of wilderness. What do we mean when we talk about "wilderness"? Where, and with whom, did the whole idea of wilderness begin? Has the notion of wilderness changed with our changing attitudes towards the environment and our role in it?
Luckily, you don't have to read several dozen dense volumes to get some answers to these questions. Instead, you can pick up this marvelous collection of essays spanning nearly 250 years of thought on wilderness and the environment. "The Great Wilderness Debate" gave me a chance to simultaneously catch up on the "classic" wilderness texts AND many later influential essays, including plenty that I would otherwise never have read, and several unique to this collection.
The book is divided into four parts, each of which synopsizes a different strand of wilderness writing. The first section focuses on the origin and emergence of the wilderness ideal. It includes the "classic" stuff - selections from Emerson, Thoreau, John Muir, Aldo Leopold, and Sigurd Olson - as well as essays on early wilderness preservation in the United States. A definite must-read is the Wilderness Act of 1964, which not only provided a federal definition of "wilderness" but also established the Wilderness Areas that we have today. This section alone makes the purchase of the book worthwhile.
The second section is devoted to "Third and Fourth World Views of the Wilderness Idea." The essays in this section introduced me to the fact that "wilderness" is not some kind of universally-understood concept. Instead, the American/Western/First World concept of wilderness (i.e. as a place without humans) is being imposed on a global scale. The authors in this section take issue with the colonialism inherent in forcing "our" wilderness on others, and discuss the many problems of universalizing a concept of "wilderness."
I most enjoyed the third section, a sort of philosophical WWF match where various eminent environmental thinkers - including William Cronon, Holmes Rolson III, and Dave Foreman of EarthFirst! - go head-to-head over a (seemingly) simple question: Is the "Wilderness Idea" useful in today's world? Can "true" wilderness even exist anymore? Does a focus on "pristine" areas distract us from appreciating the nature in our own backyards? It's fun to watch a bunch of hotshot environmental philosophers tussle over definitions, but it's also unnerving to think that they might actually succeed in undermining one of the few pillars supporting "wild" areas in America (however you define "wild").
Which brings us to the fourth section, "Beyond the Wilderness Idea", which attempts to go beyond the sort of "sound and fury" debate of the third section and instead to actually USE wilderness philosophy to inform environmental policy. There's a lot of discussion here about what wilderness SHOULD be and CAN be and WOULD be if only someone would listen to the philosophers. Initially, however, I found this section to be a bit of a letdown. Several of the ideas discussed here - preserving big areas, promoting biosphere reserves - have already become accepted notions since "The Great Wilderness Debate" was published in 1998, so there's a good bit of "old news." More importantly, the policies expounded here are frequently WAY too idealistic to be practical - they're nice to think about, but not something you could take to your congressman.
But what I later realized is that fundamentally "The Great Wilderness Debate" is about the philosophy and ethics of wilderness, NOT the practical policy issues. Those who would create wilderness policy would certainly do well to read this book, as these essays provide a grounding in the basic beliefs and writings that have informed the concept of wilderness. I'm sure there are plenty of great essay collections on environmental policy, but this is not one of them and is not MEANT to be one of them.
If the environmentalist movement has taught me anything, it's to THINK before you ACT. There's no doubt that "The Great Wilderness Debate" really makes you THINK about a lot of the assumptions we make everyday, about what constitutes nature, what is wild, and what is worth preserving. Consequently, I encourage anyone with a strong interest in wilderness and the environment to read this book. It's a wonderful resource for philosophy, a powerful tool for policy, and a great read for any "greenie."

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The Great New Wilderness Debate is an expansive, wide-ranging collection that addresses the pivotal environmental issues of the modern era. This eclectic volume on the varied constructions of "wilderness" reveals the recent controversies that surround those conceptions, and the gulf between those who argue for wilderness "preservation" and those who argue for "wise use."
J. Baird Callicott and Michael P. Nelson have selected thirty-nine essays that provide historical context, range broadly across the issues, and set forth the positions of the debate. Beginning with such well-known authors as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, John Muir, and Aldo Leopold, the collection moves forward to the contemporary debate and presents seminal works by a number of the most distinguished scholars in environmental history and environmental philosophy. The Great New Wilderness Debate also includes essays by conservation biologists, cultural geographers, environmental activists, and contemporary writers on the environment.

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Zazen Review

Zazen
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When I saw video from the Japanese tsunami, it struck me how badly Hollywood gets it wrong when it comes to depicting disasters. Hollywood always shows bystanders standing in awe or running away hysterical, while the Japanese video showed people looking so sad at the sight of ocean waves flowing through their city streets. It's that kind of emotional realism that drives Zazen, and what sets Vanessa Veselka apart from other novelists setting their stories in post-911 `life during wartime'-style landscapes.
The novel is from the point of view of Della, a invertebrate paleontologist working as a waitress and who is obsessed by cases of self-immolation. Living under the anxiety of a pending war and bombs going off around the city, Della asks store employees to page her sister (who died years earlier) and starts calling in bomb threats to places around town. It's a bent view of reality the novel creates, and you never know how much of it is Della's creation. (Veselka is remarkably gifted at showing a warped world anchored by emotional realism.)
The bombings create a sense of community, though less with among the victims than those responsible, and after falling in with a crew of Baader-Meinhof type radicals, Della is pulled in different directions: alienation in one extreme and and connectedness in the other. She is also ineffectual at almost everything she tries, whether it's leaving town or convincing the person on the other end of the phone that her bomb threat is real.
It's a novel that reads like a tightly wound rock `n' roll record, its world comes across like a Twilight Zone episode that keeps getting weirder and weirder, and ultimately, it's a story about how hard it is to set yourself on fire.

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Somewhere in Della's consumptive, industrial wasteland of a city, a bomb goes off. It is not the first, and will not be the last.Reactions to the attacks are polarized. Police activity intensifies. Della's revolutionary parents welcome the upheaval but are trapped within their own insular beliefs. Her activist restaurant co-workers, who would rather change their identities than the world around them, resume a shallow rebellion of hair-dye, sex parties, and self-absorption. As those bombs keep inching closer, thudding deep and real between the sounds of katydids fluttering in the still of the city night, and the destruction begins to excite her. What begins as terror threats called in to greasy bro-bars across the block boils over into a desperate plot, intoxicating and captivating Della and leaving her little chance for escape.Zazen unfolds as a search for clarity soured by irresolution and catastrophe, yet made vital by the thin, wild veins of imagination run through each escalating moment, tensing and relaxing, unfurling and ensnaring. Vanessa Veselka renders Della and her world with beautiful, freighting, and phantasmagorically intelligent accuracy, crafting from their shattered constitutions a perversely perfect mirror for our own selves and state.

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Three Case Histories Review

Three Case Histories
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This book should be required reading in all high schools. For me it was an epiphany. Especially the Wolf Man case history. The book was written in clear language with no psychobabble or medical jargon.
Here are some interesting things to be found in the book:
1: OCD symptoms actually represent repressed wishes to commit murder.
2: There is such a thing as a reverse Oedipus complex where a boy wants to identify with his mother and love his father.
3: The essential nature of psychosis is a regression to pure self-love.
4: Vladimir Nabokov based his book "Lolita" on a section of the "Rat Man" case history.
5: Peter Schaffer based his play *EQUUS* on "Wolf Man."

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A Simon & Schuster eBook--This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

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