Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking

Amazon.com

Gladwell includes caveats about leaping to conclusions: marketers can manipulate our first impressions, high arousal moments make us "mind blind," focusing on the wrong cue leaves us vulnerable to "the Warren Harding Effect" (i.e., voting for a handsome but hapless president). In a provocative chapter that exposes the "dark side of blink," he illuminates the failure of rapid cognition in the tragic stakeout and murder of Amadou Diallo in the Bronx. He underlines studies about autism, facial reading and cardio uptick to urge training that enhances high-stakes decision-making. In this brilliant, cage-rattling book, one can only wish for a thicker slice of Gladwell's ideas about what Blink Camp might look like. --Barbara Mackoff

Book Description

Blink is about the first two seconds of looking--the decisive glance that knows in an instant. Gladwell, the best-selling author of The Tipping Point, campaigns for snap judgments and mind reading with a gift for translating research into splendid storytelling. Building his case with scenes from a marriage, heart attack triage, speed dating, choking on the golf course, selling cars, and military maneuvers, he persuades readers to think small and focus on the meaning of "thin slices" of behavior. The key is to rely on our "adaptive unconscious"--a 24/7 mental valet--that provides us with instant and sophisticated information to warn of danger, read a stranger, or react to a new idea. Gladwell includes caveats about leaping to conclusions: marketers can manipulate our first impressions, high arousal moments make us "mind blind," focusing on the wrong cue leaves us vulnerable to "the Warren Harding Effect" (i.e., voting for a handsome but hapless president). In a provocative chapter that exposes the "dark side of blink," he illuminates the failure of rapid cognition in the tragic stakeout and murder of Amadou Diallo in the Bronx. He underlines studies about autism, facial reading and cardio uptick to urge training that enhances high-stakes decision-making.In this brilliant, cage-rattling book, one can only wish for a thicker slice of Gladwell's ideas about what Blink Camp might look like.--Barbara Mackoff

Customer Reviews:

Unabashed Fan for Good Reason.......2007-10-16

I am a huge fan of Gladwell's work. Both Blink and Tipping Point are fantastically entertaining yet highly informative - a combination that, as a writer, I aspire to and one Gladwell has clearly mastered.

Blink.......2007-10-14

Still reading the book but find it very interesting and informative. Explains many thoughts, behavors that I've had in the past.

A New Perspective.......2007-10-13

I was riveted from start to finish. I have been married and divorced, yet I chose a stray dog at a pet adoption agency in less than 5 minutes and was absolutely certain of the decision. My dog is the most wonderful companion one could ask for. This book and the book Understanding: Train of Thought explain how this can and does happen - even to those of us who consider ourselves educated, reasonable and experienced. I highly recommend them.

Intuition and Decision Making.......2007-10-13

On a 5 scale I rate this book a solid 5.

I enjoyed this book much more than Gladwell's The Tipping Point (which I rate a 4 out of 5). Gladwell presents in Blink some wonderful insight into our ability (and in some of us our super-ability) to intake lots of information, assess and analyze it, and come to some final decision literally in the blink of an eye.

I've personally been interested in the topic of intuition and how we might be able to develop it as a skill. Gladwell's work has enabled me to further my understanding of intuition tremendously. He gives many examples and provides a lot of scientific explanation of how it works, or at least how it might work.

Gladwell also provides several case studies in a variety of areas ranging from assessment of rare antique art to predicting divorce in married couples. For the case studies alone Blink is worth the price of the book.

Best Of The Book: Gladwell's chapter on "Listening with Your Eyes" and how we often allow non-pertinent factors, such as what we SEE, to be the deciding factor in major decisions. I particularly enjoyed his description of how Abbie Conant became First Trombone for The Munich Philharmonic Orchestra. `Course it's in the conclusion of the book and you really should read the earlier chapters so you get the full impact.

I recommend the book for anyone interested in how we can make snap decisions and, depending on our knowledge and expertise, often be correct.

I hope you enjoy Blink.

good, but didn't agree with some of the info.......2007-10-11

This book was an interesting read until I reached the chapter "Seven seconds in the bronx" I disagree that police officers should be taught to look at a persons face when most officers are killed by the HANDS of another person. I agree that a lot can be learned by evaluating a person's facial expressions; however, I am always skeptical about persons who second guess anothers actions. I had an appreciation for the book as a whole. I would never encourage a police officer to focus on an offenders facial expression, PERIOD! Take a ride in a patrol car and see what body part you focus on.

Of Mice and Men (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)

Average customer rating:

A discussion of the ending *Spoilers below*
Speak up for those who can't speak for themselves, because someone is advocating for their death
Tragedies
Steinbeck does wonders with so few pages. This is a great touching story
Big

Of Mice and Men (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)
John Steinbeck
Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0140177396

Book Description

MAXnotes offer a fresh look at masterpieces of literature, presented in a lively and interesting fashion. Written by literary experts who currently teach the subject, MAXnotes will enhance your understanding and enjoyment of the work. MAXnotes are designed to stimulate independ ent thought about the literary work by raising various issues and thought-provoking ideas and questions. MAXnotes cover the essentials of what one should know about each work, including an overall summary, character lists, an explanation and discussion of the plot, the work's historical context, illustrations to convey the mood of the work, and a biography of the author. Each chapter is individually summarized and analyzed, and has study questions and answers.

Customer Reviews:

A discussion of the ending *Spoilers below*.......2007-10-02

*WARNING: Don't read this review if you haven't read the book and don't want to know the ending

The book has three surprise events in the ending. The first is Lennie's killing of Curley's wife. This is shocking because Curley's father owns the farm, so Lennie could get into serious trouble. The second is when Lennie is hiding in the brush waiting for George, and he sees and hears Aunt Clara's ghost talking and later a rabbit talking. The third is not when George shoots Lennie, but when George walks away with Slim, as if the two are best pals now. This makes it seem that George did not take his friendship with Lennie very seriously, because instead of mourning his death alone, he hangs on to Slim, as if Lennie is easily replaceable and that Slim has taken Lennie's place now. I thought the ending makes George seem like a shady character, not bad enough to be called the villain, but still not good enough to be called hero of the book.

Speak up for those who can't speak for themselves, because someone is advocating for their death.......2007-09-24

You won't get any complaint from me that this book is skillfully written, in it's vivid descriptions of settings, detailed descriptions of characters, and realistic dialogue.

However, I believe this book has a bad message, and the bad message is about how it's ok to put the weak, infirm and dependent to death. It started with the discussion of Candy's aged dog. The book gave the impression that the dog's age made him no good to even himself, the "quality of life" argument that has been advanced to support euthanizing the elderly, weak and infirm.

After discussing Candy's dog, the argument proceded to Candy himself, where he longs to be euthanized when he can no longer work.

Finally, we come to George's murder of the retarded Lennie, which is completely justified by Slim, the voice of the one sympathetic character in the book. I believe that George was looking for an opportunity to divest himself of Lennie, and that opportunity presented itself when Lennie killed Curley's wife. It was also mentioned that if Lennie was institutionalized, it would be worse than death. I realized there are conflicting opinions about the moral nature of George, but I don't believe he was a good character.

As I was writing this review, I recalled Proverbs 31:8-9 "Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy." Of Mice And Men describes a world where the advocates for euthanizing the weak and infirm prevail.

Tragedies.......2007-09-16

This is a well-constructed, tightly-crafted novella by Steinbeck telling the story of George and his simple-minded companion Lennie, who arrive at a farm looking for work so they can save enough money to achieve their dream of buying their own property. You know something is bound to go wrong.

Although much of the plot might be well-signalled before it occurs, I thought that it did not detract from the quality of the work. As a short piece of fiction should, it holds the reader's attention throughout. It also seemed to me that by this time, Steinbeck seemed to be producing high-quality work. "The Grapes of Wrath" were just around the corner.

G Rodgers

Steinbeck does wonders with so few pages. This is a great touching story.......2007-09-10

Steinbeck writes beautiful prose in this very short book. The story unravels rather quickly and the strong connection one feels with the characters is created from the very first pages. The story is about two friends that travel together looking for work on farms in California. Lennie is a very large man with a feeble mind and George is Lennie's keeper who dreams with Lennie about eventually having a small piece of land where they can have animals and live from it. The book is written using the slang of the 20's and Steinbeck uses incredible imagery throughout the book. The quick story is bound to touch your heart and linger in your mind days after the last page has been read. Enjoy!

Big.......2007-09-01

What makes a big book? Not physical length. Knowing this novel's reputation as one of Steinbeck's masterpieces, I was astounded to lay hands on its mere hundred pages. Not scale of setting, either. The entire novella takes place in and around the bunkhouse of a California farm, and contains fewer than a dozen characters; it is so compact that it might almost have been made for film, television, or the stage (and it did in fact succeed in all these media). The people, furthermore, are by no means important or powerful; Steinbeck tells of ordinary itinerant laborers, bindle stiffs, living precariously from job to job. In this, the book is similar to THE GRAPES OF WRATH, but deliberately avoids its epic scope, preferring to show a few characters in intimate detail rather than to suggest the displacement of multitudes.

Yet I have no hesitation in calling the book big. Without any effort or overt symbolism, Steinbeck shows something simultaneously particular and vast. His characters are individuals, very real yet bound to one another and to us through their common humanity. The novel speaks to a particular time -- the American West in the late thirties -- and yet seems timeless. It takes a specific corner of California ("A few miles south of Soledad, the Salinas River drops in close to the hillside bank and runs deep and green") and makes it a kind of oasis of simplicity, as in the marvelous opening scene where the principal characters choose to spend a night sleeping under the stars rather than arriving too soon at the farm.

And nothing could be bigger than the heart of Lennie, the simple-minded giant who comes to the farm with his friend and protector George, but whose confused feelings and ignorance of his own strength get him into trouble. The bond between him and George is not fully explained, but it is palpably filled with a kind of love. Lennie's inability to articulate his feelings is shared by all the other characters to some extent; this is a world in which men keep themselves to themselves and move on alone. But their very inarticulateness gives their underlying emotions an almost primal power. Truly, this is a big book.

The Buried Book: The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of Gilgamesh

Average customer rating:

History tou may never have learned
Gilgamesh for Dummies?
Well researched and an interesting read!
The Covers of This Book Are Too Far Apart*
The history of the Gilgamesh tale

The Buried Book: The Loss and Rediscovery of the Great Epic of Gilgamesh
David Damrosch
Manufacturer: Henry Holt and Co.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0805080295
Release Date: 2007-03-06

Book Description

Adventurers, explorers, kings, gods, and goddesses come to life in this riveting story of the first great epic—lost to the world for 2,000 years, and rediscovered in the nineteenth century

Composed by a poet and priest in Middle Babylonia around 1200 bce, The Epic of Gilgamesh foreshadowed later stories that would become as fundamental as any in human history, The Odyssey and the Bible. But in 600 bce, the clay tablets that bore the story were lost—buried beneath ashes and ruins when the library of the wild king Ashurbanipal was sacked in a raid.

The Buried Book begins with the rediscovery of the epic and its deciphering in 1872 by George Smith, a brilliant self-taught linguist who created a sensation when he discovered Gilgamesh among the thousands of tablets in the British Museum’s collection. From there the story goes backward in time, all the way to Gilgamesh himself. Damrosch reveals the story as a literary bridge between East and West: a document lost in Babylonia, discovered by an Iraqi, decoded by an Englishman, and appropriated in novels by both Philip Roth and Saddam Hussein. This is an illuminating, fast-paced tale of history as it was written, stolen, lost, and—after 2,000 years, countless battles, fevered digs, conspiracies, and revelations—finally found.

Customer Reviews:

History tou may never have learned.......2007-10-13

Excellent read. Great look at history about how the artifacts were saved..not stolen. Well researched

Gilgamesh for Dummies?.......2007-07-03

This is a strange sort of an introductory book. It is so very general, in fact that I cannot help but feel that with a little more creativity and work it could have become one more title in the For Dummies series. Now, I like those books, they are often quite good for what they are. This poor book cannot seem to figure out just what it is. Part real history and part literary speculation, it has only two of the Ten Parts of a For Dummies title and they are not at all well melded together. The illustrations don't help to advance the tale much either as they are of very poor quality for the most part. If and only if, the person who reads this book goes on to read some of the other books and articles this book cites does this title earn its keep.

Well researched and an interesting read!.......2007-06-11

I really enjoyed reading "The Buried Book". Unlike some other Amazon readers, I felt it was a lot less tedious than actually sifting through sand and transcribing cuneiform. If you're looking for a book about the translation or the process of archaeology, look elsewhere. If you enjoy reading about personalities within a social context and high adventure, this book is for you. The reader also learns a lot about ancient literature within Mesopotamian culture. David Damrosch's research is impressive. Those that like "The Buried Book" might also like Joseph Alexander MacGillivray's "Minotaur".

The Covers of This Book Are Too Far Apart*.......2007-06-05

A fascinating topic for a book is made tedious and annoying by author David Damrosch. Damrosch, a comparative literature teacher, manages to bury a great story under an avalanche of trite comments. The man simply has no idea how to let a story tell itself. He makes the interesting banal. Damrosch burns through forests-worth of paper impressing himself with his own wit, leaving the reader to sift through his academic prose for the 'good parts' version of the Gilgamesh back-story.

For an author who obviously did a lot of research in putting this book together, Damrosch makes a rookie error in stating that Stanley's expedition to find Livingston was funded by the Daily Telegraph: it was the New York Herald that paid his freight.

"The Buried Book" is in dire need of a ghostwriter, someone who can turn the fruits of Damrosch's research into something readable.

*with apologies to Ambrose Bierce, a man who knew how to tell a tale.

The history of the Gilgamesh tale.......2007-05-30

"The Epic of Gilgamesh" is standard fare in college literature, history and religion courses today. The ancient Mesopotamian tale, which has the earliest known version of the Flood Story, has influenced and inspired Mesopotamians (including the ancestors of the early Hebrews) for centuries, along with possibly Greeks and other Mediterranean peoples. However, but for a chance archaeological discovery in the 19th century, the original tale may have been lost forever.

In THE BURIED BOOK, scholar David Damrosch explores the importance of Gilgamesh for the ancient Mesopotamians as well as how it was discovered in the early days of archeology and translated from cuneiform into English by a self-taught linguist.

The journey of the epic from ancient Mesopotamia to the college classroom and beyond is quite extraordinary, and Damrosch does an excellent job presenting the tale. He cleverly tells the story of the "loss and rediscovery" of Gilgamesh backwards, starting with its translation from the clay tablets by George Smith, who worked for the British Museum, in 1872. Without Smith, Gilgamesh and his story most likely would have been ignored or overlooked.

The actual discovery of the Gilgamesh tablets (no one entire copy has survived, and what we read has been pieced together from tablets at various sites) was made by the Iraqi archaeologist Hormuzd Rassam, a figure who bridged the divide between the Occident and the Orient. Despite his success and important discoveries, he was never fully accepted or respected by most of his European counterparts, even after making England his home and years of dedicated service to the British Museum. Both Smith and Rassam are as interesting as their work, and Damrosch nicely weaves in to his book some of their biography.

Before Rassam uncovered the tablets that ultimately contained "The Epic of Gilgamesh," they were buried for centuries. And, if not for an Assyrian king in the 7th century BCE, the tablets may not have survived at all. Ashurbanipal collected religious and secular literary works, in effect creating the world's first library. Ashurbanipal is also a fascinating character, and as THE BURIED BOOK marches backward through time, Ashurbanipal's name is added to the list of important men who preserved the amazing tale of Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh himself predates anything written about him, and Damrosch explores the history and legend of this very ancient hero and leader.

After tracing the story of Gilgamesh back as far as possible, Damrosch returns readers to the present. Saddam Hussein rushes to put the finishing touches on his latest novel as American troops close in on him. That he is a novelist may be surprising to some. But at this point in Damrosch's examination, it is not surprising that Hussein would compare himself to Gilgamesh and use the epic as a cultural, national and religious touchstone. But Hussein is not the only one to borrow from or refer to the great epic; writers such as Philip Roth and, more recently, Joan London have done the same. And, as Damrosch also explains, ancient authors most likely have been doing so for well over a thousand years.

THE BURIED BOOK is smart and compelling, as much for the story of the men who preserved the epic as for the story of the buried book itself. It is an academic subject, but Damrosch's exploration is immensely readable for lay people as well. Whether interested in literature or history, culture or religion, readers will find THE BURIED BOOK enjoyable and enlightening. The author has succeeded in making what could have been a stuffy tale totally exciting.

--- Reviewed by Sarah Rachel Egelman

Lord of the Flies (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)

Average customer rating:

John Welte's Review
required reading for teens
Rather "Piggy" then "Fatty" indeed...
Linguistic tour de force
complete recording of a tedious novel

Lord of the Flies (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)
William Golding
Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0140283331

Amazon.com

William Golding's classic tale about a group of English schoolboys who are plane-wrecked on a deserted island is just as chilling and relevant today as when it was first published in 1954. At first, the stranded boys cooperate, attempting to gather food, make shelters, and maintain signal fires. Overseeing their efforts are Ralph, "the boy with fair hair," and Piggy, Ralph's chubby, wisdom-dispensing sidekick whose thick spectacles come in handy for lighting fires. Although Ralph tries to impose order and delegate responsibility, there are many in their number who would rather swim, play, or hunt the island's wild pig population. Soon Ralph's rules are being ignored or challenged outright. His fiercest antagonist is Jack, the redheaded leader of the pig hunters, who manages to lure away many of the boys to join his band of painted savages. The situation deteriorates as the trappings of civilization continue to fall away, until Ralph discovers that instead of being hunters, he and Piggy have become the hunted: "He forgot his words, his hunger and thirst, and became fear; hopeless fear on flying feet." Golding's gripping novel explores the boundary between human reason and animal instinct, all on the brutal playing field of adolescent competition. --Jennifer Hubert

Book Description

These deluxe editions are packaged with French flaps, acid-free paper, and rough front.

"This brilliant work is a frightening parody on man's return. . . to that state of darkness from which it took him thousands of years to emerge. . . Superbly written." --The New York Times

Other Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century:

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The Adventures of Augie March by Saul Bellow
The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man by James Joyce
Swann's Way by Marcel Proust
My Antonia by Willa Cather
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
White Noise by Don DeLillo

Customer Reviews:

John Welte's Review.......2007-08-18

The Lord of the Flies was a book that I was required to read at the start of tenth grade. When I started reading the book I wasn't interested right away. I thought the book lacked any action, and I couldn't identify with any of the characters, personally. Honestly, I kept reading because of obligation. Eventually I realized it was a good book. Towards the second half of the book the author added action and the characters evolved. Arguments took place among the boys which started fighting and drama. When the story started picking up it had me excited until the very end. Overall, I would recommend this book for anyone looking for a great adventure book.

required reading for teens.......2007-07-08

Like most everyone else, I read this book because it was required reading in ninth or tenth grade. I recently reread it with my thirteen year old son and discussed it with him. For him, as I suspect it would be for most young readers, it was a magnificent introductory illustration of the distinction between the literal and the metaphoric in literature.

Rather "Piggy" then "Fatty" indeed..........2007-07-02

I'll admit i'm a late fan of this novel, never having the enjoyment of being assigned this in school. However i'm pleased in my adult life to possibly have a greater appreciation of it. This is truly a timeless story of the savage within us all and how even without a civilization, all different aspects of a society can be portrayed, even in the innocence of shipwrecked children. Ralph serves as our center, imperfect at best, yet constantly trying to do the greater good. Jack is his id, a leader by worth but not in ideology or action, our ego. Piggy is our brain and conscience, however fragile and annoyingly persistent. Roger is our wrath. An unleashed, unsympathetic, unbridled purely sickening rage. Simon is our curiosity and independence, He carrys our emotions and our feelings.

The story itself begins with Ralph as the elected leader of the group of young children, however, the lead hunter, Jack eventually finds no solice in this decision and it becomes 2 camps at odds on an island. Thats the short version, which does no justice to the complexity of the story nor the incredible imagery given by the author. In this story, children do terrible things to children, yet the degeneration into savages is so gradual you can understand there blind lust for adventure and victory overall else, especially when that same idea has been behind every war known to man.

I titled this review after a line from the novel, because i think it secretly underlined alot of what the story was about. Some Rules may not be fun, but the consequences without are far worse. This can be applied to so many aspects in life. As i think i will carry this with me a long time coming.

Linguistic tour de force.......2007-06-30

As many already know, this book contains a vast number of symbolisms and has many allusions to foreign themes (eg. ideological, other novels, biblical) and ideas. But what is it other than its allegorical and abovementioned quality that makes it remarkable? Here, I attempt to elucidate the work in other aspects other than its dark theme and storyline(which countless other reviews have already touched upon).

One of the strongest qualities of the book is its language. In the story, the sheer vividness of the landscape is written with great intensity, movements are described with precision and in between are interspaced events and dialogue that many times, because certain events are not directly mentioned or written, requires much effort to infer. That is why I suppose many have found it frustrating and a tedium to read.

As an example of description, when Golding describes the waves and how looking towards it sometimes creates a mirage, 'Strange things happened at midday. The glittering sea moved apart in planes...Sometimes, land loomed where there was no land and flicked out like a bubble...'. Despite the work's linguistic difficulty, especially for younger readers, the language is a work of art, and much concentration is required. Younger readers, however, will enjoy the story's quick pace and narrative.

With its combination of linguistic complexity, far reaching symbolism and allegory etc., the strength of this work lies in its depth and power. The bleak, pessimistic portrait of humanity is brought about through the boys and their virgin attempts at civility on a remote island and as the struggle of Ralph and Piggy against Jack and his gang is played out, many philosophical questions are raised. Is humanity innately fallible to primitism? How does society establish order? Does youth affect all this?

All said, Lord of the Flies is a brilliantly bleak, lustrously prosed, deeply discomforting portrait of mankind. No wonder it is recommended reading for so many high schools and colleges.

Note: Lord of the Flies may be a great piece of dystopian work, but there are some which will inevitably exceed it, notably the first two below:
Nineteen Eighty-Four Brave New World Gulliver's Travels (Penguin Classics) Utopia (Penguin Classics) Herland, The Yellow Wall-Paper, and Selected Writings (Penguin Classics)

complete recording of a tedious novel.......2007-06-29

Listening to this novel doesn't improve it. You get the added bonus track of Golding groaning on and on and on about how he got the inspiration for this overly simplistic morality tale. With so much good literature out in the world, if the house catches fire, leave this one behind. Sucks to my as-mar.

Average customer rating:

Easy, resturaunt quality food.
great recipes.
Great recipes!!
Do you want your brands served up by the marketing department?

Great American Favorite Brand Name Cookbook, Collector's Edition

Manufacturer: Publications International
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Great American Favorite Brand Name Cookbook: Collector's Edition (Padded Cover, Gilt-Edged Pages) (Padded Cover, Gold-Guilded Pages)

ASIN: 0785361804

Book Description

Put imaginative, fresh ideas at your fingertips with this comprehensive collection of exceptional recipes from America's favorite brand name companies!

Great American Favorite Brand Name Cookbook: Collector's Edition makes serving magnificent meals a snap. Clipping recipes from food labels has become an American tradition and now you can collect all your favorites in this marvelous compilation¾without your scissors. Jam-packed with over 1600 kitchen-tested recipes, you'll discover innovative ways to prepare tempting appetizers, refreshing salads, savory soups, elegant entrees, homemade breads, decadent desserts and much more.

Special chapters feature ever-popular pasta, glorious brunch dished and family-pleasing pizza. With over 500 full-color photographs, you'll be inspired to create delectable dished for family and friends that are sure to win rave reviews!

Customer Reviews:

Easy, resturaunt quality food........2007-01-11

This book has a good variety of dishes to choose from. They are easy to prepare and most don't require a lot of preparation time. Every thing from the main dishes to the desserts are delicious. Even though every recipe has a name brand ingredient, store brands work just as well in their place.

great recipes........2006-12-14

I thought the above comment was absolutely ridiculous. What people want to know is if this is a good cookbook. I don't think anyone is interested in if brand names are going to be the future of culinary arts. Broken down: good recipes, use generic if you are opposed to "brand names." The recipes range from fast and tasty to complicated and savory. I love this cookbook.

Great recipes!!.......2006-09-22

I have owned this book for years now and have never made anything from it that was not yummy!! I usually ignore the actual brand names and just use the brand that I like or that I feel is the best quality. My mother and sister also own this book and they both love it, too.

Do you want your brands served up by the marketing department?.......2006-03-30

With all the new channels for distribution available and considering all of the innovations in communications (both message and medium) the stakes are not only increasing rapidly -they have been moved. My opinion, the future will very likely be populated by brands that are defined less by big marketing firms and more by real people. This book seems to be ignoring the future.

Great Books of the Western World (Great books of the Western world)(60 Volumes)

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The best of the best all in one volume
Poorly Organized
Great contents, but
Finest compilation of the writings of the most brilliant minds over the centuries past ever
Cost effective when you consider your options...

Great Books of the Western World (Great books of the Western world)(60 Volumes)

Manufacturer: Encyclopedia Britannica, Incorporated
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0852295316

Book Description

Information... Knowledge... Understanding... Wisdom...

From the ancient classics to the masterpieces of the 20th century, the Great Books are all the introduction you`ll ever need to the ideas, stories and discoveries that have shaped modern civilization. This collection of 517 classics in 60 beautifully bound volumes is color-coded into four subject categories: literature, history, philosophy, and science. And since this edition includes works from 20th century authors, it`s the most up-to-date collection of the Great Books ever.

Product Details

Reading and understanding great works by history`s outstanding minds has always been considered the substance of a liberal education. The Great Books of the Western World has been acclaimed as the greatest publishing venture of the 20th Century. The set now consists of 60 volumes, with 517 works by 130 authors spanning 30 centuries, on a total of 37,000 pages containing 29 million words. Among the Great Books` 130 authors, 47 are writers of imaginative literature; 29 are masters of mathematics and/or the natural sciences; 28 are historians or social scientists, and 28 or more are philosophers and/or theologians. (This totals 132 because William James and Alfred North Whitehead have made contributions in both of the latter two subject categories).

Volume Details

Volumes 1 and 2 of this collection is the Syntopicon, a unique two-volume guide (not sold separately) that enables you to investigate a particular idea and compare what different authors have to say about it. The Syntopicon comprises a new kind of reference work -- accomplishing for ideas what the dictionary accomplishes for words and the encyclopaedia accomplishes for facts. Also included is the Great Conversation, featuring fascinating background information, extensive timelines, photos, and quotes from the classic works and their authors.

Special colors on the Great Books` spines guide you quickly to the four subject areas - GREEN: Novels, Short Stories, Plays, and Poetry

Volume 3 Homer

Volume 4 Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripedes, Aristophanes

Volume 12 Virgil

Volume 19 Dante, Chaucer

Volume 22 Rabelais

Volume 24 Shakespeare l

Volume 25 Shakespeare ll

Volume 27 Cervantes

Volume 29 Milton

Volume 31 Molière, Racine

Volume 34 Swift, Voltaire, Diderot

Volume 45 Goethe, Balzac

Volume 46 Austen, George Eliot

Volume 47 Dickens

Volume 48 Melville, Twain

Volume 51 Tolstoy

Volume 52 Dostoevsky, Ibsen

Volume 59 Henry James, Shaw, Conrad, Chekhov, Pirandello, Proust, Cather, Mann, Joyce

Volume 60 Woolf, Kafka, Lawrence, T.S. Eliot, O`Neill, Fitzgerald, Faulkner, Brecht, Hemingway, Orwell, Beckett RED: Philosophy and Religion

Volume 6 Plato

Volume 7 Aristotle l

Volume 8 Aristotle ll

Volume 11 Lucretius, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, Plotinus

Volume 16 Augustine

Volume 17 Aquinas l

Volume 18 Aquinas ll

Volume 20 Calvin

Volume 28 Bacon, Descartes, Spinoza

Volume 30 Pascal

Volume 33 Locke, Berkeley, Hume

Volume 39 Kant

Volume 43 Hegel, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche

Volume 55 William James, Bergson, Dewey, Whitehead, Russell, Heidegger, Wittgenstein, Barth BLUE: History, Politics, Economics, and Ethics

Volume 5 Herodotus, Thucydides

Volume 13 Plutarch

Volume 14 Tacitus

Volume 21 Machiavelli, Hobbes

Volume 23 Erasmus, Montaigne

Volume 35 Montesquieu, Rousseau

Volume 36 Adam Smith

Volume 37 Gibbon l

Volume 38 Gibbon ll

Volume 40 J. S. Mill

Volume 41 Boswell

Volume 44 Tocqueville

Volume 50 Marx, Engels

Volume 57 Veblen, Tawney, Keyne

Customer Reviews:

The best of the best all in one volume.......2007-08-18

These books are worth their weight in Gold. You can find most, if not all, of these writings for free on the internet since there is no copyright anymore; however, if you are looking for physical books then this is the way to go. Very well made and if you go to the Britannica website you may a good deal or at least a payment plan for the hefty price.

Poorly Organized.......2007-08-15

I had heard of the Great Books Project some time ago but had never actually had a chance to see these translations until this past semester at my school library. They were located on the top floor right next to the bathroom so I sort stumbled into them by accident one night. After sifting through a few of these I can't say that I was anything other than supremely disapointed. It was a noble attempt on Adler's part but it just didn't pan out for a number of reasons.

I'm not one of these diversity crackpots and I personally think schools that use this collection (albeit losely) as a foundation for their curriculum (St. John's in Annapolis particularly) are vastly more rigorous, comprehensive, and rewarding than those of practically every other American University. Four years of science, three of mathematics, three of intensive Greek and French, weekly seminars in Western Literature and Philosophy. It's no wonder that this environment produces among the highest acceptance rates into top professional and graduate programs in the country.

However, as I mentioned before these schools use Adler's collection as more of a suggestion than anything else mostly because this hodgepodge of some 37,000 poorly translated and at times even obsolete pages of loseleaf paper couldn't possibly offer the coherence required of a college program.

To be fair though this was not Adler's intention with this collection. Still, one is left wondering what exactly Adler's intention was with all of this. One would assume that the intention was to get these books into as many homes and minds as possible. That's a great idea in principle but if folks aren't interest in reading these books individually what would lead you to believe that assembling them in one giant mass makes them more intriguing? Certainly he couldn't have done this to make the books more affordable ($1000+)...oh dear God, I believe he did.

I found the translations to be cumbersome, utterly oblivious to the language of the author's time and location, and unnecessarily small in size. Oh and the paper is of extremely low quality as well at least in the series I read out of.

These are all problems but what I find most unfortunate is the lack of coherence to the whole thing. First off, WHERE are the history books? Aside from the two big Greeks there are absolutely none to be found in the entire collection. Tens of thousands of pages with no history whatsoever to put any of into context for the young reader who I'll assume is the target audience of this collection.

Secondly, I support the attempt to expose the general public to the beauty of mathematics and especially science. But seriously, is there any point in adding something like Newton's Principia to this collection other than to show off? Really, what percentage of the population can make sense of a book like that? Cambridge prints short introductory texts to dozens of subjects in the sciences that are more relavent to that 99.99% of the population that doesn't have an advanced degree in Physics of Mathematics. Next.

Third, if you're selecting works based on influence then how do people like Kierkegaard, Marx and Nietzsche only get one of work apeice included whereas folks like Chaucer, Pascal and Ibsen get numerous selections? How can it be that Pascal has had more influence than a man whose philosophy spawned worldwide panic, violence and revolution for most of the 20th Century?

Finally, if you're going to try and produce a comprehensive collection of the Greatest the Western World has produced why not select each authors most notable contributions to that legacy. Nobody remembers Thomas Mann for "Death and Venice." Nobody remembers Joyce for "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man."

But then again I could be wrong. Regardless, I am still going to give this book 4 stars for fighting the good fight against relativism, multiculturalism and the general degeneration of the human race.

Great contents, but.......2006-09-01

Bid a new set from ebay and it arrived in two boxes. It has great contents, but:

1) The books are small in dimension, so print is small and not easy to read.

2) The paper is thin.

3) Need more pictures.

4) Some volumes are quite thin. It will be better either adding more contents, or combine volumes to make the whole set more manageable.

5) The set is listed at $1,195, which translates to about $20 per volume. Judging from the quality of the book, printing quality should be no more than $5 per volume. They should reduce price to make it more accessible.

Finest compilation of the writings of the most brilliant minds over the centuries past ever.......2006-08-17

These books were first published in 1952. Only 500 sets were published that year, a Private Library Collection it was called, and sold for $500.00 per set. My father was one of the original purchasers, and he passed them down to me when he died. (It's still even in its original custom made bookcase!)
This entire set contains the writings of the most brilliant minds over the centuries past, carefully compiled by the publishers, with a ten-year reading plan that will give the reader the most valuable of all gifts: knowledge. A must-read for any true scholar!

Cost effective when you consider your options..........2006-03-14

Regardless of minor squabbling over what should and shouldn't be included, this is a very good collection of western works. I'd call it great in fact, when you consider the amount you'd have to pay to purchase all these seperate, not to mention all the wading you'd do through some not-so-necessary reads.

Insert the rest of a 'look how big my words can be' and 'I read this while still in the womb' review here. I'm not feeling up to the pomp.

Average customer rating:

Non Fiction
What a great book
wonderful, insightful book...
Interesting concepts
Cottelston, Cottelston, Cottelston Pie

The Tao of Pooh
Benjamin Hoff
Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0140067477

Amazon.com

Is there such thing as a Western Taoist? Benjamin Hoff says there is, and this Taoist's favorite food is honey. Through brilliant and witty dialogue with the beloved Pooh-bear and his companions, the author of this smash bestseller explains with ease and aplomb that rather than being a distant and mysterious concept, Taoism is as near and practical to us as our morning breakfast bowl. Romp through the enchanting world of Winnie-the-Pooh while soaking up invaluable lessons on simplicity and natural living.

Book Description

One of the world's great Taoist masters isn't Chinese, or a venerable philosopher, but is in fact none other than A. A. Milne's effortlessly calm, still, reflective bear Winnie-the-Pooh. While Eeyore frets and Piglet hesitates and Rabbit calculates and Owl pontificates, Pooh just is. And that's the clue to the secret wisdom of the Taoists.

Customer Reviews:

Non Fiction.......2007-09-03

A complete waste of time. I suppose it is a whimsical idea to use Pooh to explain the version of philosophy that you favor. Others might term this exploitative. In fact, there is probably a comic in there somewhere, The Revenge of Pooh, where pragmatic realistic toys with weapons come and kick the stuffing out of wacko writers.

What a great book.......2007-08-27

If you only read two books this year, this and "The Te of Piglet" should be those.

wonderful, insightful book..........2007-08-08

I found this to be a simply delightful read. It was easy to comprehend and get through. Whoever thought that Pooh might one day come back and enlighten me as much as he entertained me as a kid growing up.

Interesting concepts.......2007-08-04

I learned of this book through my truck insurance auto person in Minnesota. He told me of this book and I bought it and thought it had some great insites on life. They were always there but Pooh brings them out in a way that makes me think farther into it. Really good. PSM

Cottelston, Cottelston, Cottelston Pie .......2007-06-29

"What did you think of the book?" "What book?" asked Pooh. "The Tao of Pooh," replied William. "The who of me." "Yeah, that was a chapter. Did you like it?" "How could you not like a book about a bear?" Pooh said proudly. "That was how I felt," William confirmed.

A wonderful little book that not only introduces one to the thoughts of Taoism but also shows you how a clear mind without worry can make your life better. Don't be a Bisy Backson. Pick up this book and sit down and enjoy it. That's the whole point, right?

Children of the Dust Bowl: The True Story of the School at Weedpatch Camp

Average customer rating:

Beautiful and Inspiring
Connecting Childen to History
Children of the Dust Bowl
Readable for ages five (with help from parent) and up.
Children of the Dust Bowl

Children of the Dust Bowl: The True Story of the School at Weedpatch Camp
Jerry Stanley
Manufacturer: Crown Books for Young Readers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

School & Education | Reference & Nonfiction | Children's Books | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0517880946
Release Date: 1993-07-13

Book Description

Illus. with photographs from the Dust Bowl era. This true story took place at the emergency farm-labor camp immortalized in Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath. Ostracized as "dumb Okies," the children of Dust Bowl migrant laborers went without school--until Superintendent Leo Hart and 50 Okie kids built their own school in a nearby field.

Customer Reviews:

Beautiful and Inspiring.......2007-10-09

This book is a beautiful testiment to the human spirit, and the resilancy of the American spirit.
It is also the story of taking a chance on people that other's find useless.
A beautiful book and a beautiful story.

Connecting Childen to History.......2005-09-09

this book is an excellent companion to the historical ficiton book "Bud, Not Buddy." By reading aloud sections of Children of the Dustbowl, teachers could build some of the background knowledge that would help children understand how the daily lives of the average person changed as a result of the Great Depression and the 5-year drought in the Midwest.
Given the devastation of Hurriicane Katrina, this book also offers insight on what can happen when large numbers of people must migrate because of weather-related disasters.

Children of the Dust Bowl.......2005-09-08

The book appeared to be new, no marks, and sent immediately.

Readable for ages five (with help from parent) and up........2002-04-04

The writing in this book is excellent, flowing evenly from page to page. Many of the photographs within are pure art, having been taken by Russell Lee, Dorothea Lange, and others. These two people are the Pieter Bruegel and Thomas Hart Benton (depicting plain, everyday folk) of American photography. This book relates a small chunk of American history, to be sure, but more than that, it relates universal themes of the human condition. Overall, the book relates the brutal conditions of the dust bowl, the migration over the mountains and desert, taunting and prejudice from settled Californians, and eventual attainment of excellence, as revealed by the construction and maintenance of the Weedpatch School, which eventually became a model school in the community. My 5 1/2 year old enjoyed reading every page, and found particular mirth in the unusual daily chore that the dust bowl children did with their cows. The description of this unusual chore is worth the price of the book. What was this daily chore? One way to find out is to borrow or purchase this book.

Children of the Dust Bowl.......2000-07-26

I am a student at St. Lawrence University, and doing a summer fellowship about the works of John Steinbeck. This book, while written as a children's book, is a valuable look at the Arvin Federal Emergency School, the conditions of the Dust Bowl, American attitudes about the poor, and Leo Hart, the man whose vision for a "broader curriculum" among his students was so influential and inspiring.

Customer Reviews:

A Hit!.......2006-11-08

I read this book aloud to my class of 4th graders and they loved it! This book had humor, suspense, and positive messages. It also gave me the opportunity to teach a little about the history of the Gold Rush. A definite hit!

A good supplement to the Gold Rush unit.......2006-10-26

I definitely enjoyed reading By the Great Horn Spoon by Sid Fleischman, and I think it would be a great supplementary source for teachers to use in the Gold Rush unit. This book is a ficitional story, but it is full of historical accounts related to the Gold Rush era. The main characters is Jack and Praiseworthy. They set out on a journey in search of striking rich when Jack's aunt became penniless. The two main characters went on a wild and exciting adventures where they encountered many life-learning lessons about themselves and the historical background of that time. This book is definitely a good resource to use in and outside of the classroom, because it provides historical information along with an inspiring story about friendships.

It had tons of action!.......2006-10-18

I liked By the Great Horn Spoon by Sid Fleischman because it has a lot action. It's set in 1849. The main characters names are Jack and Praiseworthy. The book starts on a ship that's racing another ship to California. Jack hides a pig so the cook can't make Sunday dinner out of the pig. Jack and Praiseworthy get robbed several times. They go to the mining camps and try to strike it rich. I like the part where Jack and Praiseworthy go propecting. I recommend this book to ages 9 and up. If you like adventure and the Gold Rush, you would like this book.

"I ground in a few acorns for flavor.".......2006-08-18

BY THE GREAT HORN SPOON! is written for younger readers but is a delightful light read even for adults, who will get through this book in one sitting.

The story concerns young Jack Flagg of Boston and his faithful manservant Praiseworthy who, upon discovering that Jack's foster Aunt Arabella is virtually penniless, decide to set out for the California Gold Rush and save the family from poverty. Along the way, Jack and Praiseworthy have numerous adventures (they are forced to stow away aboard ship, they run afoul of the highwayman Cut-Eye Higgins, Praiseworthy, a model of rectitude, becomes renowned in the gold fields as "Bullwhip," the man who can win any fight, and they strike it rich), through all of which they persevere, largely because of their wit, their intelligence, and their reliance on each other. BY THE GREAT HORN SPOON! is a wonderful lesson in the nature of true friendship.

A fun story with a fine sense of historical place and memorably colorful characters, BY THE GREAT HORN SPOON! is a story for children of all ages.

Great book!.......2006-07-18

By the Great Horn Spoon! is a wonderful and entertaining book for ALL ages. This book can be used in the classroom when covering the Gold Rush period or it can be read for leisure. The story is about a young lad and his dreams and quest for gold. He has a noble cause and he learns valuable lessons from an unexpected source. I would definitely highly recommend this book!

The Great Kapok Tree: A Tale of the Amazon Rain Forest

Average customer rating:

Get Kids Interested in the Rain Forest
Great Book about Animals In the Rainforest
The true story of the rianforest
Treasures of Nature
great for teaching a unit on the rainforest

The Great Kapok Tree: A Tale of the Amazon Rain Forest
Lynne Cherry
Manufacturer: Voyager Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Picture Books | Ages 4-8 | Children's Books | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0152026142

Amazon.com

If a tree falls in the forest... someone or something will always be there to hear it. Many, many creatures will feel the effects when their source of sustenance and shelter falls to the earth. So when a man is sent into the Amazon rain forest one day, under instructions to chop down a great kapok tree, many eyes watch him nervously. It's not long before he grows tired, though, and the "heat and hum" of the rain forest lulls him to sleep. One by one, snakes, bees, monkeys, birds, frogs, and even a jaguar emerge from the jungle canopy to plead with the sleeping ax-man to spare their home. When the man awakens, startled at all the rare and marvelous animals surrounding him, he picks up his ax as if to begin chopping again, then drops it and walks away, presumably never to return.

Unfortunately, there's always someone else who is willing to take his place, but the message of this environmental book is plain: Save the rain forest! The story itself is not overly compelling, but each personalized entreaty from the animals provides an accurate and persuasive scientific argument for preserving nature's gifts. Lynne Cherry's fertile watercolor and colored-pencil illustrations, including a map of the tropical rain forests of the world, are vivid and colorful. A fine starting point for a discussion about conservation. (Ages 4 to 8) --Emilie Coulter

Book Description

This inspired look at what the Kapok tree means to the creatures that live in it--and what rain forests mean to the world's ecology--was at the forefront of the ecological movement ten years ago and continues to resonate profoundly with children everywhere.

Customer Reviews:

Get Kids Interested in the Rain Forest.......2007-07-29

I used this book as an introduction to the Rain Forest for my 3rd graders and it got them interested in learning more. It is a great book as a lesson plan or in a classroom library. Kids seemed to read and reread this book more than any other.

Great Book about Animals In the Rainforest.......2006-11-10

Both my 4 year old boy and my 7 year old girl like this book and so do I. It's a great way to introduce them to many of the different types of animals you could find in a rainforest. Great pictures!

The true story of the rianforest.......2006-04-12

This book is truly inspiring for anyone that does not believe in saving the rainforests. The Great Kapok Tree really tells you from all the animals point of view on how the rianforest is their home. This timeless children's book is not just for little children it is for all to learn a lesson from what could become of the future or what people are destroying. In this book there is one man who is told to chop down this very big and old Kapok tree. He starts to wack and chop. After a little bit the man is worn out so he desides to just sit and rest for a little bit, but the sounds of the rainforest lulls him to sleep. One by one animals that depend on trees or have homes there come down and talk to the man whispering and telling of how the rainforest will soon destroy all life on earth because of the oxygen that the trees give us. When the man wakes up he now has a choice, he cqn listen to what the animals said or what the other bigger man told him to do... To find out read The Great Kapok Tree by: Lynne Cherry.

Treasures of Nature.......2006-02-27

For centuries, man has abused nature and thoughtlessly destroyed forests without realizing the harm this causes. Only recently has the importance of trees become apparent, brought to light by those who value the life that trees provide. Lynne Cherry is one of these people; her gorgeously illustrated book teaches the importance of trees and the abundance that they give to nature and its creatures.

In this book, a man is hired to chop down a Kapok tree, one of the largest and most important in the entire forest. After just a few chops, the heat of the forest and the exertion of his efforts tire him out and he lies down to sleep. One by one, the different creatures of the forest creep over to him and whisper in his ear the importance of the tree, asking him to spare it and leave it to those who need it. By the time he wakes, his decision and his view of the forest are altered forever. This book is beautifully put together, both with illustrations and a story that's simply but powerfully written.

I've loved trees all my life and this lovely story teaches children the importance of taking care of nature and animals. I really can't believe one person's snooty comment that nature preservation is "not the job of children". First of all, children will not be children forever; they are the future and it is our responsibility to teach them how to take care of the environment if we want them to be responsible adults. Second of all, children CAN make a difference! If you go to Lynne Cherry's website, you'll see that a kid's organization convinced Mcdonald's to recycle their paper products.

I also disagree with the silly statement that the book puts animals above people. What it does is remind us that if we don't take care of nature, there will be no tomorrow for future generations. Besides, one of the "creatures" of the forest who whispered to the man while he was sleeping was a Native American who needed the tree, so the message of the book would be to put others ahead of yourself. I personally think it's refreshing to write a book that gives animals a voice since they're so often overlooked. This book is highly recommended!

great for teaching a unit on the rainforest.......2006-01-17

I got this book for my son, but I also work in a kindergarten and this is a good tool for teaching young children about the rainforest.

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