1 comments about Thomas Edison and Modern America: An Introduction with Documents.

1. "... The collection's strength is in the broad diversity of primary sources offered and the issues that Collins and Gitelman raise for student discussion. This is no mere biography of Edison the "Great Inventor." The sources include selections from Edison's memoirs, diaries, notebooks, and letters, as well as accounts of Edison and his inventions as presented by the popular media. We thus witness Edison fashioning his own self image-sometimes in contradictory ways-just as the press was turning him into a media hero. Laboratory records by Edison and his assistants chart the development of the phonograph and the use of electricity, while newspaper and magazine articles bear witness to the intense speculation surrounding the social effects Edison's inventions would create."

   David A. Reid, University of North Florida

3 comments about Paperboy: Confessions of a Future Engineer.

1. "Paperboy", by Henry Petroski is another one of his intelligent, friendly, winning books.Petroski, of "The Pencil", and "The Evolution of Useful Things,"wrote about his family's move from the city to the suburbs in the 1950s.However, there's more- how he had difficulty finding a place in a school that would provide him with the challenge and stimulation he needed, the comfort of family, the joy of friendship, and the challenges of the physical world.Petroski is one of the great scientist=writers, like Lewis Thomas, Primo Levi, and Stephen Jay Gould. However, Petroski is a mapper of the world of bridges, buildings, and the one who ddeply notices pencils, paperclips. and how to fold a newspaper.This is a good book, and would be a great book for many men- Father's day, birthdays, high school graduations--And, a great gift for women, too



2. Not only an interesting recalling the 50's, but full of thought provoking insights. They creep in on the story and all of a sudden you realize you have read something deeper than throwing a paper across a lawn.



3. This is a great compilation of memories for anyone who grew up in Cambria Heights in the 1950s/1960s. From the stores on Linden Boulevard to the nuns at Sacred Heart School, to the kids in the neighborhood it will bring back memories of a time and place once enjoyed and long forgotten.

1 comments about Discoveries: Darwin and the Science of Evolution (Discoveries (Abrams)).

1. The book summarizes the earliest proponents and opponents of evolution, the voyage of the Beagle, and the closest members of Darwin's family.
   All of it is easy to read except a chapter entitled "Evidence for evolution" (pp. 116-128).
   
   The book could be improved with an FAQ chapter, answering questions such as "Why are there still monkeys?" and "What good is half an eye?"
   The book is small, profusely illustrated, and can be read in a short time. If there were more of it, I would give it a 5.

1 comments about Botanical Companions: A Memoir of Plants and Place (American Land & Life).

1. The trunk of this book is the unlikely marriage of two botanists, one in his 70s and the wife in her 30s. This raises the question of what binds people together. The answer is plants. Aven Nelson was one of the most distinguished botanists of the American West, doing major exploring at the end of the 19th century when the romantic Humboldtian natural history explorer tradition was still alive. But the relationship of Aven and Ruth is only the starting point for a book of ruminations on questions of larger bindings, most importantly what binds people to a place or to the Earth as a whole. The Nelsons were on the fringe of the academic world, but they had a much richer natural realm than the botanists headquartered in botanical capitals like Columbia University in New York City. Aven Nelson expressed his priorities as "the lives of men and women shall be fuller and richer because they have touched hands as it were wih a few of the lovable creations and creatures of the great uiverse." The author, Frieda Knobloch, a westerner herself, interweaves the Nelson's story with her own experiences and reflections on what binds her to the Nelsons and to the land. This book portrays science as very much an affair of the heart, of people obsessed with things they love, of imperfect people and institutions, but finally as something that has crucial things to teach the human race about living on Earth. The form of the book is very unusual, blending sections of letters, journals, biographical links, theory, and personal meditations. It's all great food for the imagination.

No comments about Steamy Dreamer; The Saga of Dr. Hartely O. Baker and the Baker Steam Motor Car.

2 comments about The Great Belzoni: The Circus Strongman Who Discovered Egypt's Ancient Treasures, Second Edition (International Library of Historical Studies).

1. This is an excellent book. It is like taking the trip of a lifetime back to early 19th century Egypt



2. The beginning is very uninteresing. Belzoni's epypt adventures are not mentioned until your half way through the book.

1 comments about Clyde Tombaugh: Discoverer of Planet Pluto (Sky & Telescope Observer's Guides).

1. When this book was first published by the University of Arizona Press back in 1991, I happened to be in a small bookstore when in walked Eugene Shoemaker. This was before the names of Shoemaker and Levy had been publicly linked in the name of a famous comet. Shoemaker spotted this book on the shelf and exclaimed happily: "Look! They've got David Levy's book on Clyde Tombaugh!" I vaguely recall that he even picked up the book and eagerly showed it to a friend. No doubt Shoemaker would be pleased that Sky and Telescope Books has now 'got' this book back into print.
   
   While David Levy may be better known as an astronomer than as a biographer, he has a couple of stronger-than-usual qualifications to write Tombaugh's biography: he knew Tombaugh over many years and got Tombaugh's cooperation for this book, and he appreciates better than anyone what an extraordinary task it was for Tombaugh to search through a large portion of the sky, both before and after the Pluto discovery.
   
   Clyde Tombaugh took a unique arc through the world of astronomy. Lowell Observatory hired him precisely because he was a Kansas farm boy without academic qualifications and would be thrilled to work for peanuts on a task that most astronomers considered futile. Tombaugh was indeed thrilled by the chance to observe the sky full-time. He was motivated by a basic deep love of astronomy that never left him amidst all the twists and frustrations of his further career. There are few biographies of astromoners in which the sheer joy of astronomy speaks so clearly. Levy also does justice to the scientific challenges involved in searching for Pluto. But Tombaugh's systematic sky survey had larger, cosmological implications: he was seeing the clumpy distribution of galaxies and challenged Edwin Hubble's opinion that the galaxies were distributed more uniformly. Tombaugh also had an adventure in pioneer rocketry, spending several years at White Sands in the 1950s, helping Von Braun's team develop some basic techniques that would become familiar to the public watching the Mercury-Gemini-Apollo programs.
   
   I put Levy's biography to a unique, tough test. I read it after visiting the small town in Kansas from which Tombaugh came. I spoke with Tombaugh's nephew and with locals who had known the Tombaugh family. I went through the local newspaper file and and visited the school Tombaugh attended (and I even showed the latest issue of Sky and Telescope, with its cover story on Pluto, to Mrs. Miller's third grade class). I visited the now-abandoned Tombaugh farmstead and found the weed-hidden cement telescope mount Tombaugh had built for the telescope he used to make the drawings for which Lowell Observatory hired him. After such a personal exposure, there's a danger that a biography will fall short, ringing false in emphasis or slipping up on various details. But it's clear that Levy got to know Tombaugh pretty well. More importantly, he turns Tombaugh into an Everyman Hero for anyone who finds astronomy to be an adventure.

3 comments about Robert Oppenheimer: Letters and Recollections (Stanford Nuclear Age Series).

1. A good book of letters should bring its subject to life for the reader. This book is dry to the point of being brittle. At no time time during the reading of this book did I get any sense of what Oppenheimer was feeling or experiencing. Oppenheimer was involved with one of the pivotal events of this century and the whole experience comes off like a trip to a neighborhood store. The recollections mentioned in the title are not those of Oppenheimer but of friends and family. Like the rest of the book their thoughts and memories add little to the understanding of Oppenheimer's life and work.



2. J. Robert Oppenheimer was better at keeping himself hidden than most people, and you won't learn a lot about him from these letters, but it does a give a rare, patial glimpse of a very mysterious person.



3. This book is not meant as general reading. For more colorful writing, see Smith's _A Peril and a Hope_. Letters and Recollections is, however, an incredibly valuable resource for those of us researching the time period and Oppenheimer. There were letters, interviews, and insights that I simply could not have obtained anywhere else. Smith has a personal connection with Los Alamos, and that shows in her writing and sources. She gives an side to Oppenheimer like no other book I've read (and trust me, I've read a lot of them). Thank you, A.K.S.!

1 comments about Howard Carter.

1. The most completest biography about Howard Carter I 've ever read.Complete story through his successful but regretfu life.
   If you 've ever interested about The tomb of Tutankhamen and the man who spent his most of life on it.You should have this book.

1 comments about Field Adventures in Paleontology.

1. Field Adventures in Paleontology is one of the most riveting books on paleontology I have ever read. It is well-written and could be understood by anyone from a high school student to a seasoned scientist. For once, someone has written a book about what it is like to do paleontological excavation work that doesn't require you to have a PhD. and university funding! The digs in this book are accessible to everyone, even amateurs like me. Besides having lots of good photos and science, it opened my eyes to how to go about joining a fossil dig--something I've always wanted to do. Every student and amateur should read this book!