I recently bought it and read Kabloona in a weekend. The result was an incredibly valuable experience that has increased my awareness not only of Inuit life in the Netsilik area but of human behavior in general.Dde Poncins' prose is magnificent, even poetic. Numerous passages simply sing. Whether he is describing the describing bouts of cabin fever at the post in Gjoa Haven or celebrating the renewed vigor of villiage life that Springtime brings, De Poncins's eye for detail is refreshingly balanced and clear. What's more, Kabloona does not pretend to be an unbiased narrative. Instead, the author leads us through his physical and spiritual journey to show us how living with the Inuit has allowed him to become "a man preeminently." Certain passages seem somewhat romanticized, while others reveal the author's deeply-entrenched provincial values. The latter is evident when he describes an Inuit "pedarast" with a mixed sense of fascination and revulsion. But rather than hindering the narrative, such honesty and straightforwardness only enhances the humanity of this book. Kabloona is a thoroughly engrossing read that feeds into many areas of Inuit life, including myths, legends, and belief systems, as well as daily life and habitat.

It's been years since I read "Kabloona" by gontran de poncins. I don't remember the specifics of the book (I'm going to read it again, soon). What I do remember is the lingering humanity of the people. The hard life they lived. The culture shock between my life and theirs. I remember the mirror they held before me, forcing me to question our idea of "progress," "civility," and "modern man". Books such as "Kabloona" and "Black Elk Speaks" by John G. Neihardt and "Mutant Message" by Marlo Morgan tells us more about our roots as a species than many of the great thinkers and philosphers who speak in the abstract and grandeur of modern man. You read a book like this and you must pause and reflect, look deeper into yourself and the rushing stream you were born into. Step back and look at life from a different perspective. It can be life-altering or at the very least a stunning revelation.

I read this book many, many years ago and have forgotten many of the details. I remember one, however. When the old one couldn't travel, they put her out on the ice and drove off. That is so relevant to our contemporary society and the discussions of social security and the elderly, caring for the disabled, etc. We can't leave the disadvantaged on the ice and drive off but must find some way to care for them.

Randy Grim hates being called a hero. He feels like a fake when people use that term to describe him because, in his eyes, he's a frail and fearful person, full of complexities and issues. It takes all his energy to face life's challenges but, for some reason, it all changes when he's on the trail of a dog that needs his help. Then he's a fully focused, driven machine that will wade through filth, skid along icy, dark streets and face down the roughest, toughest people to accomplish his task. He can't and he won't leave that canine alone on the street.
This book is fast paced and fascinating. I was hooked from word one. The author has managed to weave together the story of a fascinating, though reluctant hero with the graphic and gritty reality of the price being paid by the strays in our midst. The author dissects the various causes and brings the tragic results into sharp focus. It is hard to blink, to look away, to pretend it doesn't exist. Those weary, confused eyes stare back from the pages.
While we witness the dark side of humanity and it's wretched victims, we are also allowed to share the small and great triumphs that result from Randy's dedication. Many are the hurdles that have to be overcome but, step by step, the right people join the battle, sanctuary is provided, supplies appear and donations arrive.
This is how heros and saints come to be. It's the leap of faith that says, "I don't know whether I'm making a difference. I don't know how I'm going to manage but I will. Because I'm not taking my eye off this one, and the next one, and the next one until they're safe." One small miracle at a time creates a haven. For the strays, for the people who care and for the children who see that brutality or indifference are not the only choices.
Thanks Randy, for showing the way and thanks Melinda, for telling the story so well.

Enter one very unlikely hero who is trying to call national attention to the scourge. Randy Grim was young, hip, but crippled by panic attacks and phobias (of public places, parties, elevators, driving). After rescuing his first street dog, Bonnie, he couldn't look away. "How can I?" he asks. "Each one says, 'Don't leave me here.'" And so the man who must pop Xanax to walk through an airport refuses to leave a starving, terror-stricken German Shepherd on a dark, icy and stormy East St. Louis street, even when an threatening tenement resident has him on the business end of a gun.

Journalist Melinda Roth puts a human, and animal, face on an ignored tragedy playing out in our cities. She gives us beautifully wrought, but too few, scenes of redemption.

The Man Who Talks to Dogs was an incredible book . I couldn't put it down. This is the true story of one man's desperate, heartbreaking love for dogs--of anguish, brutality and hope.

Randy Grim dedicates his life to saving the big-city feral-dog population of St. Louis, single-handedly braving the mean streets to rescue God's lost angels--those half-wild, half-domesticated dogs existing on the borderlines of urban society.

In this story, Randy brings to light the terrible struggle of these animals, who haunt burned-out buildings, eating out of garbage cans, dropping dead in the streets of starvation and illness, some never having come close to a human...or worse yet, falling prey to the sadistic cruelty of dog-fight rings or random violence. Thru this man's tireless efforts, many of these dogs have been saved, rehabbed and adopted to loving homes. Some of their stories are told in this book--- I guarantee that you will never forget them.

Randy is an incredible human being and an inspiration to all of us....Get this book, read it and live it--it is a great lesson in compassion for the creatures with no voice--- and how one person can make a difference, one dog at a time.

I watched the PBS show that this book originated from and immediately ordered the book. I already own over fifty cookbooks and this has become my favorite. As a native "Baltimoron", I've thoroughly enjoyed the stories and info about Baltimore. The recipes are fabulous. You must try a "Dirty Gertie". Fantastic. These recipes are the best that Maryland has to offer. John, hats off to you! Living in Ocean City, we can sample the best seafood in the world. Now, my kitchen is the best in town. Thanks.

I ended my search for the perfect crabcake recipe with this cookbook! His crabcakes are wonderful, the best ever. And the rest of the recipes and narratives in this book are delicious and entertaining, Shields provides an inviting glimpse into the Chesapeake culture and cuisine. Makes me want to visit the area someday.

This book was a Christmas gift from my husband, and it has to be one of my all-time favorite cookbooks. I thought I knew a lot about this region's cooking, but I learned a great deal from this book. The recipes for Baked Squash & Tomatoes and Oyster Stew have become standbys in my kitchen. Not only is this book full of fabulous recipes, but the stories woven through the book are worth reading just on their own. John Shields is truly a "Bawlamor boy" and one of the state's greatest assets. Highly recommended!

Kathleen

I gave this book to 25 family members and friends for Christmas and I have received most wonderful comments from everyone. They praise the photography and the text. One person wrote that she could "see" the grandparents walking down the path to the beach with their grandchildren. If you know someone who has ever summered in the Great Lakes in their own summer home or in a rented cottage this book is a must. It does capture the essence of cottage living in this area.

The Great Lakes Cottage Book is a specialty title recommended for those who love cottages and Minnesota. The authors present fine photos and recollections of Great Lakes cottages and scenes, focussing on subjects which reveal the cottage experience. The result is a coffee table book celebrating a special place and structure.

Ed Wargin's photographs capture the emotions of these much loved cottages with a sesitivity and beauty that few others could accomplish. His use of natural light is extraordinary and gives a warmth that reflects the feelings that abound in these cottages.

When you add Kathy-jo's unique ability to convey loving sentiments in short essays, this becomes an heirloom book. I will never again hear the screen door slam, or sit in on a rainy day or do any of the other normal activities in a cottage without remembering Kathy-jo's essay about that activity and how she captured emotions that I have had but never before seen expressed so beautifully. Thank you Ed and Kathy-jo for seeing into our hearts.

I collect field guides and what attracts me to some is the clever layout and design. This volume is in a class by itself. And the text was so informative that i could not put it dowm.
Should receive 6 stars out of 5.

When I was a child and the milk soured, my ever-frugal mother would set it aside in a bowl and allow it to continue it's transformation into something wild and strange. When the curds and the whey separated, she would pour the contents into a cheese cloth stretched across a strainer and then gather and lift the cloth and squeeze the exess fluid from the curds. We ate the cheese as is...a form of "cottage" cheese I suppose. I was reminded of this when I read FRENCH CHEESES from Eyewitness Handbooks which contains a short history of cheese-making in the front section of the book.

I like this book, and since I am not a cheese expert, I cannot say whether it will make one an expert or not, but it has enlightened me a bit as I continue to experiment with the various kinds of cheeses available in the gourmet section of the grocery stores and the delicatesson in our neighborhood.

I have eaten various cheeses in Paris and other parts of Europe, and thought them better than anything I can buy in the States though I have eaten "fancy" cheeses in some upscale restaurants. I realize the French and others use unpasturized or raw milk in many of their cheeses and the U.S. frowns on the use of untreated milk so perhaps this is a factor. CHEESES identifies cooked versus raw versions.

However, many of the cheeses in this book are not found in U.S. stores because a limited supply exists and/or the product is consumed or sold locally. Generally these are artisanal cheeses (made by hand). CHEESES includes a map showing the farm areas of France and each cheese entry pinpoints the geographic location of the product. You can match the map with the cheese of interest to you and perhaps search for it on your next excursion to the French countryside. In the meantime, the list of producers in the appendix may prove helpful.

I am a big fan of this book since the publication of the original Japanese version titled 'Encyclopedia des Fromages (this includes cheeses from other 15 countries)'. 'French Cheeses' did not only closely follow the original text but also have added wine recommendations, which are very useful.Photographs are beatufifully printed in this version, too. The only problem I have is the large names of 'foreword writer' and 'consultant' on the cover (and the authors' names do not appear on the front). As far as I have compared the two versions, I have not encountered any differences in the text between them. So, what the consultant contributed? Are these 'big names' added because the publisher thought Japanese-written French cheese book would not look attractive? I want to hear from the publisher on this. Anyway, this is a great book for cheese lovers.

This is one terrific story. But wait, its not a story as in fiction, this is real. An incredible journey to say the least. For those unfamiliar with the story, it basically is about Helen's solo journey to the magnetic north pole with her friend an companion, Charlie the Inuit Dog.

This isn't one of those I came, I conquered stories. Helen relates her adventure in a down to earth manner letting the reader truly get a sense of the adventure, challenge, fear, hardship, and joy that she experienced. Yet don't think of this as merely a woman against nature. Its also about friendship. The friendship that became of her and her new companion Charlie. Charlie saved Helen's life on several occasions by alerting her of polar bears and in some cases even defending her from them.

This is a great read for all. The story moves quickly as it captivates the reader. I think it would be especially inspiring for anyone though perhaps women might find it even more so as it just goes to show that you can accomplish anything they set their hearts to, with a little help from a friend like Charlie.

When I first read this book in 1994, I knew right away I wanted to use it in my middle school classroom (grades 7 & 8). Helen Thayer is exactly the kind of role model you want to present to children. She embodies all the character traits you want your students to emulate, among them perserverance, positive thinking, and courage. The thrilling story she tells of her encounters with polar bears, breaking ice, and a life-threatening Arctic storm will capture your students' attention immediately and will provide you with endless interdisciplinary activities. It's also a lot fun to watch your students' faces fall when you first tell them they will be reading a story about a 50-year-old woman who circumnavigates the magnetic north pole (oh, goody!), and then listen to their protests when the period ends each day and they want to keep reading! Now THAT'S a good book!

I have had the honor of meeting Helen Thayer and wonderful Charlie. I really felt as though I had taken every step with her....without freezing to death. There have been others who attempted the same journey and did not succeed due to the polar bear scare. I have given this book, as a gift, to almost everyone I know. Could I have gotten past the fear? I don't think so. She allowed me to mentally accompany her and I thank her for that.

As a long-time resident of LA (though not a native), one hears the occasional whisper about Chavez Ravine. It's widely known that Dodger Stadium was built atop these old neighborhoods, in millions of cubic yards of landfill.

Oh, but at what a price.

Normark, who says in his introduction that he grew up in a town in Washington state peopled by Swedish immigrants that felt similar to these three warm communities, was in exactly the right place, at the right time, to capture on film the places and the homes and the people who lived in them that we now know were doomed to either be destroyed (the buildings) or ripped from their roots (the people).

His black and white photographs, made on a knockoff of a Rollei in medium format, have the tonal range very typical of this period -- all those fine shades of black and white that film noir fans should love.

But the people he's illustrating aren't sinister like those movies at all. They're deeply human, alive, a family both "nuclear" and extended. You see a young girl, her Sunday dress on, a soft smile on her lips, with a book titled "Enchanting Stories" on her lap. You see games of stickball in the street. Confirmations at the church. Families at their meals. Goats grazing on the grassy hills.

All this in a small community maybe two or three miles, at most, to the northeast of LA City Hall.

These pictures are married to the recent reminiscences, like the other reviews here, of both former Ravine residents and their families.

Seeing this book, one understands why, 50 years later, Los Desterrados -- the Uprooted -- have a picnic every year in Elysian Park, just behind their former homes.

The most haunting image, in some ways, for me: Palo Verde School. It wasn't razed for Dodger Stadium. The roof was taken off, and then the landfill came along. So the school is still there, buried under the Stadium somewhere.

So if any of my fellow Dodger fans ever hear kids playing in a schoolyard as we walk back to our parked cars... It might be well to listen to those voices just a bit more closely. And look to this book to see the children's faces.

Nestled in the hills between downtown Los Angeles and Pasadena is Chávez Ravine, site of Dodger Stadium and its acres of parking lots. Few baseball fans here could tell you that long before the Dodgers left Brooklyn, Chávez Ravine was the home of three communities of Mexican-American laborers and their families.

Don Normark, a young photographer in 1948, was climbing in the hills looking for postcard-shot views of LA when he discovered La Loma, Palo Verde, and Bishop. Each neighborhood was a rambling cluster of buildings, dirt streets, and footpaths. The wooded slopes of Elysian Park overlooked the ravine, and beyond were the peaks of the San Gabriel Mountains. He felt he had found another world -- a kind of Shangri-La. For many months, he returned to take pictures of what he saw and of the people he met there. He didn't know that he was recording on film the daily life of a place and its people that was about to disappear.

The pictures, of course, are black and white, a rich range of gray tones and contrasts under the cloudless southern California sky. In a casual street scene, two men stand talking on the hard dirt, and a third, his back to them, leans across a low concrete wall. All is in sharp focus from the dusty tire track in the foreground to the pointed tower of City Hall nudging up over a darkly wooded ridge in the distance. The mid-afternoon light reflects brightly off one man's tee shirt and from the front of a small white house farther on. Meanwhile, the shadows cast by eaves, palm fronds, parked cars, and the men themselves are deeply dark.

There are many pictures of people, of all ages. Some look into the camera. Most are busy working, walking, talking, playing. A young girl wears her confirmation dress. A boy watches his father repair a car. Two men spar under branches thick with bougainvillea blossoms. An iceman stands in an open gateway, tongs slung over one shoulder. A young woman arranges flowers on an altar. A workman returns home along a winding footpath at the end of the day (see book jacket above).

Fifty years later, Normark gathered together his pictures and began looking for the people who had once lived in Chávez Ravine. This book is an album of those pictures, with commentary by the people he found, in their own words. Normark writes simply and clearly about himself and his experiences. Like his photographs, his writing style is sharply focused. In the opening pages of the book, he describes the forced relocation of the people of Chávez Ravine during the Fifties, and the various public and private interests contending for control of its development. Normark's book is both handsome and beautifully written, a fine example of text and image illuminating each other.

This book is full of classic, socially-conscious photography that bears a spiritual kinship with Dorothea Lange's Depression Era photos of Dustbowl Families. The images are doubly rich: as Old School black and white images shot on a reasonable speed film, with a broad and caress-ably subtle range of grays, and also as a record of a time and place that was stolen, and will simply never be again.

For those who don't know the story, in a nutshell: The residents of Chavez Ravine, who were almost entirely Latino, were offered the promise that their community would be replaced by public housing as part of a renewal project of sorts. (Some had called their neighborhood blighted.) But as the land acquisition proceeded, and as various official pledges were reneged and political cards played (including exploitation of the then current fear of creeping Socialism/Communism-- after all, I ask you, what could be more unAmerican than affordable replacement housing?), the project proved to be a lie. The final hold-outs at Chavez Ravine were bodily removed by deputies as the last remnants of the neighborhood were cleared to make way for a sports field and parking lot. (!)

This volume is great because these photos, which speak so eloquently of one specific place and time, also speak clearly of universal things. Children play; young couples tie the knot as family celebrates; honest and good people work to protect what is theirs, to better their lot, and just to get by. -- It is about nothing less than the struggle and joy of life itself.

If there is any uplift to the wistful story this book tells in beautiful images and words, it is in that the displaced people survived, persevered, and that their old home, and what happened there, is remembered today.

Sometimes, you have to search for the bright spot. A thought-provoking read. Recommended.

If you want to read a great book then read Silver Packages because it will just touch your heart. It all started when no one had anything so every Christmas a man came and threw silver packages out the back of the train. Chris Soentpiet's illustrations are colorful and interesting.

I like Chris Soentpiet's book called Silver Packages. The pictures he drew were OUT OF THIS WORLD!!! The book was outstanding! I like the part when the boy is holding his first one in front of the Christmas tree.

My favorite part in the story is where Frankie does not get what he wants. I like the illustrations, because they are very realistic. I give this book five stars. Read this book to find out what are in the Silver Packages.

If I hadn't been too lazy to review _Sing It To Her Bones_ when I first read it, I would have given it 5 stars. I loved the fact that it was really a book about people and relationships and that the mystery just fell into the rest of the book. I particularly enjoyed the complications of Hannah's relationship with her husband, and all the intricacies of her role as mother. So I thought the book was very readable, and couldn't wait to pass it on to my mother (my mom is Hannah's age; I'm Hannah's daughter's age).

But then I read Marcia Talley's second Hannah Ives book, _Unbreathed Memories_. It blows _Sing It To Her Bones_ out of the water. Since she doesn't have to start at the beginning with Hannah's history, Talley has more room for plot, and the story is much more interesting. I stayed up all night reading it and couldn't turn pages fast enough.

If you're wavering about buying this book, BUY IT! But you should also buy the second one, _Unbreathed Memories_, because you shouldn't miss it either. I wonder when the third Hannah Ives is coming out?

Marcia Talley was the winner of the 1998 Malice Domestic Grant.

I am certain when you open the cover and read the excerpt titled, Swan Song, you will instantly take a liking to Hannah Ives. She comes across as an honest, witty, and courageous character.

After surviving surgery and treatment for breast cancer, and a job lay-off, Hannah goes to stay with her sister-in-law, Connie, at the family farm near Pearson's Corner, an old fishing community on the Truxton River in Southern Maryland. While there she discovers a body in a well. Being the person she is, Hannah feels since she is the one who discovered the body, she has an obligation to the victim to solve the murder. This is one obligation that leads her and Connie in to some dangerous waters....

Marcia Talley is coming out of the chute strong with her first mystery. I understand this is to be a series and I'm glad to hear it. I'd like to see more about her husband, daughter and son-in-law. IMHO, Hannah Ives is going to be one of our favorite protagonists and Marcia Talley will be one of our most talked about writers.

Sing It To Her Bones was an excellent mystery. I couldn't put the book down once I started reading, the pace is fast and one is never bored. It is a great book for an airplane flight for the hours do fly when reading an intense mystery such as Sing It To Her Bones. The answer is not revealed until the very end and the result is satisfying.

This is a great book to get an integrated view of the ancient world. I looked at many different books before reading this one, having previously devoured a number of more specialized books about the ancient world over the years, but wanting something more in the way of an overall perspective and context. This book is great for that.

I was mainly interested in the sections covering pre-Classical Period Greece, from 1500 down to the Golden Age (about 500 BC), but the other areas of coverage are superb also. Freeman also has an especially nice touch and fluency with the Greek history, and I wasn't surprised to find a separate book on Greek history by him next to this one on the bookshelf. There were also several gaps in my historical knowledge that this book plugged. For example, his section on the Etruscans, which I only had very fragmentary and superficial knowledge of, was also excellent.

The book benefits from much recent scholarship, and the author points out in the introduction that one of the main differences between a modern book on ancient history and older ones is the degree to which ancient civilizations like Greece can be placed much more securely in the context of their times, showing them not as isolated cultural entities, but as arising from the interplay of much more cosmopolitan influences as they interacted with, and were influenced by, their contacts, peaceable or otherwise, with neighboring or competing cultures. This is another one of the great scholarly strengths of the book.

I also found the author's deft touch and writing style a big plus, and although by necessity this is not a short book, it rarely got tedious or boring. That is notable by itself in a work of this size and nature. Overall, it counts as the best overall book on the history of the ancient world, and one of the most consistently interesting history books, I've ever read.

If you are constantly confused by this period of history, this is the book for you. It puts into context, the whole shape of the era. It makes you realise that someone like Cleopatra is closer to our time than the beginnings of Egyptian history. I have read the whole book through and it is a superb narrative. This is no mean feat, for if you where to write a history of the United States from Columbus to the present, it would be close to a third of the time that he covers. You can start to see the relationship between the writers of the period and the politicians. You can begin to way each period is interlocked with the next. But more than that, you can look up any period and be given a succint description to help you through.

My only regret was that this book was not published years earlier. I cannot recommend a book more highly.

Over the last few years I have gotten interested in the sources of the ideas of our current world. For instance, when reading about Jefferson, Adams and people that founded the US I find they are fluent in Latin and Greek and read the classics extensively.

I have read the Histories, the Pelloponesian Wars, much of Plutarch and survey books I could find and though I found the stories interesting I have been groping for some context. I felt like one of the blind men and the elephant, only apprehending the little piece I was in contact with and not having any idea what a whole elephant is like.

I came across this book by looking through ...(this very place) and it looked like it would give me an overall structure. The book succeeded beyond my expectations. Starting with Egypt and ending with the Byzantine Empire it covers the myriad civilizations around the Mediterranean during that period. It puts Solon and Dracon into their context. It explains how the Etruscians related to the Greek civilization, and then to Roman. It discusses the Phoenecians, the Latins, the Gauls, the Celts and all the various people that interacted with the Romans as their empire expanded and then the Germans, Huns and other that became important as their empire declined.

Much of what we know about the ancient world is relatively new because excavations are ongoing and techniques are improving. Besides that our thinking aout the ancient world is evolving as well. This book trys to understand the period it covers not just from the point of view of the wealthy, literate folks that wrote the classics, but from the point of view of craftsmen, farmers and slaves as well.

This is definately the book I had been looking for to get me started learning about the influence the past has had on the present. I may not know yet what the elephant of ancient history smells like because I have not been that close, but I have a pretty good idea what it looks like thanks to this book.