Book Description
A woman disappears, leaving behind an incendiary diary chronicling a journey of sexual awakening. To all who knew her, she was the good wife: happy, devoted, content. But the diary reveals a secret self, one who's discovered that her new marriage contains mysteries of its own. She has discovered a forgotten Elizabethan manuscript that dares to speak of what women truly desire, and inspired by its revelations, she tastes for the first time the intoxicating power of knowing what she wants and how to get it. The question is: How long can she sustain a perilous double life?
This P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into the book, including author interviews, recommended reading, and more.
Customer Reviews:
Provocative and Disturbing - A Must-Read!.......2007-08-17
A gem, for any of you folks who haven't seen it on the Target shelves yet: Nikki Gemell's The Bride Stripped Bare.
Written in Lessons instead of chapters, the novel begins with, "Your husband doesn't know you're writing this. It's quite easy to write it under his nose. Just as easy, perhaps, as sleeping with other people. But no one will ever know who you are, or what you've done, for you've always been seen as the good wife." From there, Gemmell takes us on a journey through a woman's erotic and frightening self-discovery. The narrator moves from boring housewife to experimental secret-keeper upon the discovery of an Elizabethan manuscript that describes women's secret desires. Intrigued that another woman so far removed had felt the same urges and longings, the narrator careens through testing the limits of marriage, dragging the reader through the rabbit hole with her into a world where a bored, naive housewife quickly learns to weave lies and deceit to manipulate those around her.
Fans of poetry, you're in luck - the rich imagery and gorgeous use of language melts on your mental tongue as you read, and though many of the sentences are short, they're rich - I have to admit a tendency to blow through books and then have to go back to read for digestion. This novel, however, had me gasping with exhaustion at the end of every few chapters - it's gut wrenching, in a subversive, disquieting way. The second person voice "you" this, "you" that - the narrative voice intimately involves the reader, turns the reader into a shadowy accomplice during the length of the book. Does each of us have the capacity to blur the boundaries between fantasy and reality, and are we willing to pay the price that comes with it?
The way Gemmell captures what a woman thinks when she's got the semi-ideal life but dark yearnings makes this one a must-read for anyone interested in the workings of the mind of a woman. Note that the Amazon reviews I've seen so far have hated the book - but I do believe they came from the wrong perspective. I don't believe it is intended as a heartbreaking take of a good wife; the sex scenes were not meant to throw the book into the 'erotica' cache of reading, and it is not intended to be a novel addressing what EVERY woman wants, desires, and is willing to do - it's more about the boundaries one woman chooses to cross, and what it does to her as a person. Whether you like or dislike the narrator is almost immaterial - the journey is the thing.
Caveat - sexually explicit, unapologetically erotic, and searing honesty characterize Gemmell's work in this one. While many women will report that they have had none of the darker wanderings of the mind that characterize the novel, from conversations with close friends and my own experiences, enough of us have to make this one a very worthwhile read. Highly recommended with maximum starrage - if you're not afraid to read a novel with a provocative cover that only hints at the turmoil and emotionally disturbing text, this one is a must-read. A must re-read. A must-share-with-my-best-friend-and-a-few-men-I-know read.
Gemmell is now on my list, and I'll have to go grab her other work - The Bride Stripped Bare is beyond fantastic - it's disturbingly real. Let me know what you think of it!
A mystery with no mystery.......2007-07-10
This book is okay if your sole want is literary titilation in the manner befitting 9 1/2 Weeks, but if you are looking for something deeper than that, I'd suggest something more along the lines of Dr. Seuss. The book starts off with the protagonist's mother finding a manuscript that her missing daughter had written. That's about as deep into a mystery as you are going to get. The only thing that made me read until the end was the hope of finding some sort of clue as to what became of this woman, but, SPOILER ALERT - you never find out what happened to her or even why she disappeared in the first place! I wondered why she even bothered to introduce her disappearance in the first place. Was it just an excuse to introduce the whole story? If so, it was a weak idea, worthy of the writings of a 6th grade creative writing class. This author should have known better. Don't make a promise you can't deliver on. She might as well have pulled the old "Dallas" ending, where she wakes up and its all a dream.
Save your money..........2007-03-02
This is the WORST book I have ever read. It could have gone so many wonderful ways, but it just kept getting worse and worse.
Anyone who thinks this is a "heartbreaking tale of a good wife" needs to seriously seek some help.
This book is NO insight into a real respectful or intelligent woman. This book is however insight to a woman who becomes a manipulating, lying, control freak.
I threw it away- a first ever for me.
Don't waste your time.......2007-02-07
This book is terrible. I forced myself to finish it, hoping it would get better. No such luck. And the ending is terrible, unfinished.
Beautiful but Somewhat Unsatisfying.......2006-12-08
Nikki Gemmell writes beautifully, and her Bride was someone I grew to like and sympathize with, even though I found it hard to identify with her (maybe because I belong to a later generation, which I think--and hope--is less repressed). I enjoyed most of the book, even when I questioned Bride's decision to stay in an unhappy marriage to a man who most likely cheated on her with her best friend.
I won't spoil the ending for the people who haven't yet read the book, but I will say that I found it very unsatisfying. I wish Gemmell would have given us a clue as to what happens to Bride and what made her take that choice.
Average customer rating:
- Awful
- Brutal honesty
- The Best Narration Ever
- A very strange book, I haven't decided if I like it.
- Sexually awakening without a name.
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The Bride Stripped Bare: A Novel
Nikki Gemmell
Manufacturer: Fourth Estate
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
 Contemporary
| General
| Literature & Fiction
| Subjects
| Books
Literary
| General
| Literature & Fiction
| Subjects
| Books
Adult Fiction
| Erotica
| Literature & Fiction
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Erotica
| Literature & Fiction
| Subjects
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Victorian
| Erotica
| Literature & Fiction
| Subjects
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ASIN: 000716226X
Release Date: 2004-03-16 |
Book Description
A woman disappears, leaving behind an incendiary diary chronicling a journey of sexual awakening. To all who knew her, she was the Good Wife: happy, devoted, content. But the diary reveals a secret self, one who's discovered that her new marriage contains mysteries of its own.Inspired by a manuscript written by an anonymous Elizabethan woman who dared to speak of what women truly desire, she tastes for the first time the intoxicating power of knowing what she wants and how to get it. The question is, How long can she sustain a perilous double life?
In writing The Bride Stripped Bare, the author decided to remain anonymous so she would feel absolutely free to explore a woman's inner world. As she writes in her afterword, "That doesn't mean this book is a memoir; it's many things to me, fiction and nonfiction, fantasy and fact, a quilt pieced together not only from my stories but those of my friends."
Coolly impassioned, The Bride Stripped Bare tells startling truths about love and sex. It will make you question whether it is ever entirely possible to know another person.
Customer Reviews:
Awful.......2007-03-30
This is one of the worst books I have ever read. I am no prude, but this just seemed to be sexually gratuitous for it's own sake.
The writing style in this book also put me off, the references to the main character as "you" were really annoying.
This book left me wondering what the point of this book was.
Just a small amusing anecdote to add to this review.
I had heard that this was a good book and as a last minute birthday gift idea I bought this book for my 70 year old Grandmother who is an avid reader. I was not aware of the subject matter and when i asked her how the book was she replied that it was definately interesting. When i eventually read the book I was somewhat amused by the content and what my grandmother would have thought.
Brutal honesty.......2007-02-14
"The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference."
The beautiful truth in this novel lies not in the revelation that women have a secret sexual life, but in the ways in which women must conceal and protect that landscape from the rest of the world. The author brilliantly captures the nuances of how love can ebb and flow in a marriage corrupted by shattered expectations and betrayal, as well as the liberation and self-inflicted imprisonment that comes with acting upon one's fantasies, which also fall prey to shattered expectations and betrayal.
Reading it, I was scared and thrilled...like the first time I found my father's Playboy magazines...wanting so badly to share their secrets with my friends, but fearing the judgement that accompanies the admission that I enjoyed them.
As for the taxi driver scene...it conjures up a memory of my sister spitting spaghetti out her nose when my mother once nonchalantly cofessed to liking the idea of having sex with a group of people. It might not be such a far-fetched fantasy.
The only device I did not like was the notion that the manuscript arrived at the publisher as a result of the mysterious disappearance of the author...I know where she is, she's locked herself in the closet under the stairs!
The Best Narration Ever .......2006-07-12
Been hearing about this controversial bestseller for a long time, and it was only fitting that my husband, who had no idea what this book was about, bought this for me on our civil wedding day. There is something taboo and "hush-hush" about a novel done anonymously and this alone gives any literary work an instant 'oomph' to it.
"For my husband. For every husband" is the dedication of this book.
Take your super ordinary, super plain and content wife. The woman you would never give a second glance to as she walks down an aisle at the supermarket; the woman who has completely disappeared into being the "little wife". This book, told in the second person point of view (You being the protagonist), is about the awakening (sexual, mainly) of the ordinary wife in her mid 30's. She is the proper clean wife, and when her marriage hits a bump (husband and her bestfriend betrays her), she decides to start living her life selfishly, why not.
Selfishly meant putting her own indulgences ahead, writing an erotic novel under her husband's nose and succumbing to dark thoughts that she never thought she'd be capable of. She forms an affair, a student-teacher relationship with that of a Spanish-English virgin. And for once, she is the ringleader of the bed.
Her young lover soon becomes obsessed with her, and she puts the trysts to a stop.
Her relationship with her husband revs up again, with the help of her newfound sexuality and soon they conceive a child, and she tries to live her life on the normal mode again, content on having, for now, the stint with her young lover, as the most sensational chapter in her life.
A very simple plot, but boldy, very honestly and admiringly told. One should take all the time in the world to read this book, because, apart from the feminist plot, the story is written very beautifully. The protagonist was unamed purposely, so that every woman can distinguish herself and relate to the story. I originally thought that the author, Nikki Gemmel, wanted the book to be written anonymously only to gain the mystique factor. The book has an exclusive interview with the author and she explained very well, that she Had to finish the novel knowing her name will not come up, because anonymity will release her from inhibitions and reluctance of writing a novel that may be described as vulgar and literary pornography. She dared to describe, in graceful detail, what I believe, every woman has thought of, but had no audacity to declare out loud--to her husband, friend, etc.
After reading this book, it has sunk into me that no matter how liberated and opinionated women are of today, we are still not in the man-woman equal stage. A novel such as this is becomes controversial because 'bad impure thoughts' from a woman (girlfriend, mother, wife, grandmother), are still considered to be shocking. A man who thinks of sex 24 hours a day is considered human but once a woman confesses to that, its not exactly a sin, but it comes off as "unusual, but yeah, these things happen". It will still take us several more years before man and woman will be totally equal.
Anyway, to sum up the book, a statement from Good Reading cannot say it any better: "Husbands will be left feeling distinctly nervous" (if any husband reads this at all).
A very strange book, I haven't decided if I like it........2006-04-26
The layout if very odd, it took some getting used to. By the third "lesson" I figured I was done. It wasn't making any sense and I just didn't have the time or energy to plod through it. I picked it up again about a week later and read it all the way through in one night.
I said that I still haven't decided it I like it and that is true. It is very well written and quite a moving story. I just don't know if I personally wanted to be "moved" in quite that way. It can be very graphic at times, much more graphic than any other standard erotic romance novel. I understand how it was necessary and pertinent to the storytelling and thus was not offended by it, but I guess it made me think about things that I just don't think about. I imagine (based on the Q&A in the appendix of the paperback version) that that was the author's goal. Well done.
Sexually awakening without a name........2006-03-15
Original format for a confessional coming of age for a married woman of child bearing age. She's the good little wife in the eyes of her friends and community but she invites the reader into her personal, private world. A world where she begins an affair with a spanish virgin man of her age. She imagines herself to be the teacher to Gabriel, showing him what a woman wants from a lover, and in turn discovering the answers for herself, for the first time climaxing sexually.
Like "The Story of O" and "9 and a Half Weeks", both written anonymously about a woman's journey into raw sexuality, I found myself questioning why the authors had to remain unknown. Are we not yet of an age where such truths are acceptable to have a name? Why must we remain anonymous if we dare to speak such truths?
The ending was nice, much like the reality of a woman's life. She has a baby and such thoughts of depravation are gone and we slide into our virgin mother love roles, distancing ourselves from our whore, mother nature having the last laugh.
Easily readable in 2 page entries. An honest tale.
Average customer rating:
- A visual feast of texture & color that honors his art.
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A Meditation of Fire: The Art of James C. Watkins
Kippra D. Hopper , and
James C. Watkins
Manufacturer: Texas Tech University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
General | Instructional & How-To | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
General | Sculpture | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
General | Artists, A-Z | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
General | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
Pottery & Ceramics | Crafts & Hobbies | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books
ASIN: 0896724190 |
Customer Reviews:
A visual feast of texture & color that honors his art........1999-11-01
The work of James Watkins is powerful and sensitive. This book beautifully illustrates the wonderful scale, color and texture of his pottery. Easy to read and provides understanding to his insights that have helped shaped his creative artmaking. It provides inspiration to artist of all media to respond to the tangible and intagible world around them. This book is a wonderful addition to any art lover's library.
Average customer rating:
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Fire in a hole!
Weldon B Hardman
Manufacturer: Thurber Historical Association
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
Mining | Environmental | Civil | Engineering | Professional & Technical | Subjects | Books
Texas | State & Local | United States | Americas | History | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B0006X3ZVM |
Book Description
On a day that dawned with brisk breezes, a clear sky, and perfect temperatures, the small town of Texas City suddenly found itself facing the greatest industrial disaster in the most industrialized nation on the planet. And, in time, the survivors of that all-American city found themselves wondering if their own government had delivered them into this hell on earth.
In 1947, Texas City was experiencing boom times, bristling with chemical and oil plants, built to fuel Europe's seemingly endless appetite for the raw materials needed to rebuild its ruined cities. When an explosion ripped through its docks, the effect was cataclysmic. Thousands of people were wounded or killed, the fire department was decimated, planes were shot out of the sky, and massive ocean-bound freighters disintegrated. The blast knocked people to their knees in Galveston, ten miles away; broke windows in Houston, forty miles away; and rattled a seismograph in Denver, Colorado. Chaos reigned, the military was scrambled, the FBI launched investigations -- and ordinary citizens turned into heroes.
For months on end, the brave residents of what had once been an average American town struggled to restore their families, their homes, their lives. And they also struggled to confront another welling nightmare-the possibility that the tragedy that almost erased their city from existence might have been caused by the very government they thought would protect them.
City on Fire is a painstakingly researched saga of one of the most profound but forgotten disasters in American history. The Texas City Disaster was a searing, apocalyptic event that had an enormous ripple effect for millions of people around the world.
It changed the way Americans respond to disasters and the way people viewed the American government -- the Texas City Disaster opened the door for average Americans to confront their government and its leaders in the nation's courts of law. It was the first time that the United States of America was named as a defendant in a case that, after a series of dizzying twists and turns, would end up in the nation's highest court.
Ultimately, the story of Texas City is a story of courage, humanity, bravery, and a painful quest for justice. It is the story of ordinary Americans behaving in extraordinary ways -- and serving as role models for dignity and grace.
Customer Reviews:
Fact as (poorly written) Fiction.......2007-04-14
Needs an index, chapter listings, footnotes, and a bibliography. Author claims to have interviewed two hundred people, but does not list their names. If this is non-fiction, he needs to remember Joe Friday's (Jack Webb's) famous quote "Just the facts ma'am."
If a reader is serious about history or the events of the explosion at Texas City, and chooses this volume, I would hope he is good at speed reading, otherwise it may be a long haul.
Harrowing story of the this nations worst industrail accident........2006-06-01
Although not strictly an historical work, Bill Minutaglio nonetheless uses in depth research to reconstruct the Texas City Explosion of the late 1940's.
I do consulting work in the hydrocarbon processing industry and do a lot of work in Texas City, so I was naturally interested in this event. As Minutaglio reconstructs the event one sees that it bears the hallmarks of a major disaster--ignorance, arrogance and extraordinary bad luck all mixed together to create the conditions for horror on a grand scale.
Minutaglio uses the stories of several involved survivors and relatives of some of the prominent deceased to weave this tale. This lends a high level of credence to the reconstruction. There is, however, a fair degree of inference in what is presented.
Beyond the pure human tragedy that Minutaglio chronicles it is the social aspect of the story that really riles. Having in large part created the circumstances that led to this disaster the federal government spends great time and energy in denying the people of Texas City any real comfort, compensation or even recognition of its culpability. When one looks at how the government reacted to 9/11 and compare that to the reaction to the Texas City disaster you can't help but feel anew for the victims.
I found this to be a well written, well researched, lovingly tendered story. It's not a book that one can enjoy, but is a book that should be read. As has often been noted, we do not truly appreciate the power of our modern tools till something goes wrong. This book reveals just how truly awful "when things go wrong" can be.
Highly recommended.
Texas City Remembers .......2006-03-19
This book appealed to me because I was born there 7 years after the Disaster and grew up there where it was part of local lore that I learned from my parents who lived through it. I enjoyed the book for its human interest aspects derived from the author's interviews with survivors. The way he describes life in Texas City coincides with my memories of it from my childhood. I attended the church where Fr. Roach served and the author seemed to use his artistic license from interviewing those who knew him to portray Roach's thoughts and words.
My previous reading on this topic was of dry historical narratives of events of those days in 1947. The inside look at the role of the federal government and the ensuing litigation and resolution of survivors' claims was new to me and fascinating to read. As one who grew up in the shadows of the port and local corporations involved, I heartily recommend this book to interested readers!
No, it's not non-fiction..........2005-09-04
Don't lose sight of the fact that this book is NOT an absolute documentary piece of work -- the writer says as much in his introduction.
It is instead an extremely well-told, compelling story pieced together from documentary evidence, witness accounts and interviews that well chronicles this tragedy and puts the reader right in the middle of the event.
I couldn't put it down.
Could have been much better.......2004-02-14
"City on Fire" is a book that had to be written, for it's the shocking true story about the industrial port city of Texas City, Texas, that was devastated by a pair of ammonium nitrate explosions in April 1947. It's an event that was largely forgotten about until Bill Minutaglio's book came along.
That said, "City on Fire" was a disappointment for me. The first third of it dwells on Father Bill Roach, the Catholic priest who crusades for the city's underclass. This is the worst part of the book, for much of it seems utterly made-up. As another reviewer pointed out, there's no way all of this could be factual; how could Minutaglio possibly know what Roach is seeing, thinking and saying? Other characters are treated in similar fashion.
While the book is full of florid characterizations, it has precious little about ammonium nitrate, such as how it is handled, why it is explosive, how it is manufactured and so forth. A map of the city prior to the event would have been helpful, too, as would a diagram of the Grandcamp, the ship that was the first to explode.
Minutaglio writes as if he's writing the screenplay for a low-budget TV movie. Another complaint -- far too much italic type, much of which is put there for no apparent reason.
Book Description
Ever since they met centuries ago, vampires Jean-Marie St. Just and HŽlne d'Agelet have loved each other. But their passion has always been thwarted by the demands of duty. Today, Jean-Marie has been enlisted to kill HŽlne's sister, Madame Celeste-the evil vampire Queen of New Orleans. For HŽlne, that means choosing between the love of her life or her own flesh and blood.
Book Description
From Buddy Holly and the Crickets to the Flatlanders, Terry Allen, and Natalie Maines, Lubbock, Texas, has produced songwriters, musicians, and artists as prolifically as cotton, conservatives, and windstorms. While nobody questions where the conservatives come from in a city that a recent nonpartisan study ranked as America's second most conservative, many people wonder why Lubbock is such fertile ground for creative spirits who want to expand the boundaries of thought in music and art. Is it just that "there's nothing else to do," as some have suggested, or is there something in the character of Lubbock that encourages creativity as much as conservatism?
In this book, Christopher Oglesby interviews twenty-five musicians and artists with ties to Lubbock to discover what it is about this community and West Texas in general that feeds the creative spirit. Their answers are revealing. Some speak of the need to rebel against conventional attitudes that threaten to limit their horizons. Others, such as Joe Ely, praise the freedom of mind they find on the wide open plains. "There is this empty desolation that I could fill if I picked up a pen and wrote, or picked up a guitar and played," he says. Still others express skepticism about how much Lubbock as a place contributes to the success of its musicians. Jimmie Dale Gilmore says, "I think there is a large measure of this Lubbock phenomenon that is just luck, and that is the part that you cannot explain."
As a whole, the interviews create a portrait not only of Lubbock's musicians and artists, but also of the musical community that has sustained them, including venues such as the legendary Cotton Club and the original Stubb's Barbecue. This kaleidoscopic portrait of the West Texas music scene gets to the heart of what it takes to create art in an isolated, often inhospitable environment. As Oglesby says, "Necessity is the mother of creation. Lubbock needed beauty, poetry, humor, and it needed to get up and shake its communal ass a bit or go mad from loneliness and boredom; so Lubbock created the amazing likes of Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Butch Hancock, Terry Allen, and Joe Ely."
Customer Reviews:
Vortex.......2006-10-27
If you subscribe to the idea that certain areas of the world are natural conduits to creativity (and they're often the most UNLIKELY places on Earth), this book will definitely reinforce that notion. As a life-long Texan, I had no idea of the breadth of artistry that's emerged from the vast, desolate, seemingly limitless landscape that is Lubbock, Texas. Sure, I'd heard of Buddy Holly, Joe Ely, and the Flatlanders--what serious music lover in Texas or around the world hadn't? But to learn about this fountain of artists who may not be as well known yet have been just as prolific and, more importantly, just as influential--that was an eye-opener. It'll be one for you, too. If you love Texas music, buy this book. If you love music in general, or if you want an insight into the how the creative process is molded by a landscape, an environment, an ideal--buy this book. You'll come away informed, sated, but more importantly, curious. And it will open up a whole new avenue of inquiry for you. It did for me.
Book Description
The colorful pageantry of four powerful nations come alinve in Jane Archer's vivid narration of myth and history.
Customer Reviews:
The First Fire: Stories of the Cherokee, Kickapoo, Kiowa, and Tigua.......2006-07-19
Excellent writing. The stories immediately draw you in. The historical information about the tribes is also very beneficial to the book. This is a good read for educators and personal gain.
Daniel Molina
Poet/Photographer/Author
Essential Native American Storytelling Resource .......2005-05-22
Jane Archer has done it again. I thought her first volume of Native American stories, TEXAS INDIAN MYTHS AND LEGENDS, could not be topped for making the stories of various Native Nations come alive while also telling their history in clear and concise prose. I was not the only one who felt that way, because I have learned that stories from that book were used in a permanent American Indian Storytellers exhibit in the Frontier Texas museum in Abeline, Texas. She has now written a companion volume, FIRST FIRE, that equals or even surpasses her first book on this subject. Her skills as an experienced novelist are the secret ingredient to her success at making these timeless tales come alive. She shows her deep respect for her own part Native American heritage and all of America's indigenous people in every line, every story, every historical excursion. Obviously I am extremely enthused about this book and its companion volume. Read them and see why. Highly recommended!
Book Description
"This is the best documented look at the Texas City disaster ever done."
—Robert B. Fairbanks, Associate Professor of History, University of Texas at Arlington
On April 16, 1947, a small fire broke out among bags of ammonium nitrate fertilizer in the hold of the ship
Grandcamp as it lay docked at Texas City, Texas. Despite immediate attempts to extinguish the fire, it rapidly intensified until the
Grandcamp exploded in a blast that caused massive loss of life and property. In the ensuing chaos, no one gave much thought to the ship in the next slip, the
High Flyer. It exploded sixteen hours later.
The story of the Texas City explosions—America's worst industrial disaster in terms of casualties—has never been fully told until now. In this book, Hugh W. Stephens draws on official reports, newspaper and magazine articles, personal letters, and interviews with several dozen survivors to provide the first full account of the disaster at Texas City.
Stephens describes the two explosions and the heroic efforts of Southeast Texans to rescue survivors and cope with extensive property damage. At the same time, he explores
why the disaster occurred, showing how a chain of indifference and negligence made a serious industrial accident almost inevitable, while a lack of emergency planning allowed it to escalate into a major catastrophe. This gripping, cautionary tale holds important lessons for a wide reading public.
Customer Reviews:
MATTER OF FACT BOOK.......2007-10-07
I would describe this as something of a 'matter of fact book', not a thrill to read. That is not to say it's a bad book by any means, only that it is not written as a great story, but as a narrative of events in Texas City in April 47. The author looks at what happened, how it played out, and who was responsible. The human side of the disaster gets little attention, although there are some notable descriptions from time to time. The disaster is largely attributed to inexperience and complacency in handling explosive chemicals and fertilizer. Readers interested in the subject will likely enjoy this book, but it is far from the last word on what took place at the docks when the Grandcamp and High Flyer exploded.
pipi.......2007-08-14
A bit of American history that I had never known about.
A very detailed book about a bad day in Texas.
Texas History Reference.......2005-08-18
This book is a good source of information about the Texas City Disaster. I felt that the author was very factual about the events. However, I also felt that he seemed to concentrate on all the mistakes. Although it is necessary to point out the mistakes so that they may not be repeated, I felt that the book could also emphasize some of the positive results of the disaster. This is a very good book for reference. It is not weighted down with a lot sensationalism.
Little Known Event.......2002-11-12
I never read about this event in any of my history books. This story of events grips the reader or at least me and had me questioning how things could go so bad. It does not really touch you on an emotional level but more on an intellectual one. The information is all there and is told in matter-of-fact prose. It does not really editorialize and that is what I liked about it.
Thorough, but neither personal nor exciting........2001-10-23
This is a horrible disaster which needs to be known to all of us. As far as facts and figures, causes and blames, go, the book is thorough. What it is NOT is exciting or dramatic. I have read lots of disaster fiction and nonfiction, and what I find lacking in this book is the personal element--most such books DO include some of the many personal dramas which are part of such a major event. Lacking these, the book does not "touch" one the way it should. Similarly, the lack of personal histories weakens the drama inherent in such an event.
Certainly, read the book for the facts. But do not expect gripping drama.
Books:
- The Carnal Prayer Mat (Wordsworth Classic Erotica)
- The Coal Tattoo
- The Conspirators Hierarchy: The Committee of Three Hundred
- The Edge of Honor (Bookcassette(r) Edition)
- The Future Has a Past: Stories
- The Good Doctor: A Novel
- The Harder They Fall: Celebrities Tell Their Real-Life Stories of Addiction and Recovery
- The Last Friend: A Novel
- The Last September
- The Life of Lazarillo de Tormes (New York Review Books Classics)
Books Index
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The Bride Stripped Bare: A Novel
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