No comments about The Official Price Guide to Collecting Books, 6th Edition (Official Price Guide to Books).

No comments about Chemistry of Wine Flavor (ACS Symposium Series, No. 714).

No comments about Mexican Popular Art: Clothing and Dolls.

3 comments about Pocket Watches 19th & 20th Century.

1. As a military horoligist, I think this book is very useful. It covers a number of pocket chronometers and military watches. There are a large number of photographs. This is an authoritative reference book at a great price!



2. This volume is large and well illustrated with black and white photographs. It details the pocket watch from English Lever, fusee drive to late 20th century Swiss. The pictures and descriptions of watches are complete with text for movement, case, dial, hands, maker etc. Found a Swiss watch (Bellodes) made for the Turkish market in mid 1800's. It's one I own and couldn't find the history on until I read this book. This is an excellent reference book.



3. I bought this book based on the other two reviews - largely because I thought it was a fairly complete and useful reference. It actually only covers the subject superficially and only includes a very small percentage of the pocket watches made. Many classics are not mentioned at all. Very little information is provided on makers. As a picture book w/brief history and sampling of watches its okay but ... It's mostly a coffee table book rather than a thorough informative reference.

5 comments about Gi Joe: Official Identification and Price Guide 1964-1999 (Collectibles).

1. A very informative and concise detail presentation of the 'Singled Boxed' GI Joe's and the 'Packaged Sets' he was sold with . Wealth of detailling; Right down to the different type screws used on some fiqures. Well done. A 'must have' reference for any serious collector.



2. This book has some useful information on uniform and figure variations, but it is far from being a complete guide to G.I. Joe. For a more complete reference to every vintage boxed and carded figure and equipment set, check out this authors other book, The Complete Encyclopedia to G.I. Joe (1997 Krause Publications). Although it is primarily black and white, it is the most complete and comprehensive guide to in-package G.I. Joe stuff. When I first heard Vinnie was doing this book, I assumed it would be as complete and comprehensive as his previous book, only in full color, with a focus on individual and out of package stuff. While there are values for individual pieces of equipment, and many sets are photographed out of package, not every set and piece of equipment is covered, mentioned, or even listed in the book. This is obviously not due to a lack of knowledge on the authors part, but may be due to publishing considerations. I can only speculate. Perhaps Vinnie only had a limited number of pages to work with and realized he wouldn't be able to get it all in. If that's the case, perhaps he should have omitted the sections on 1980's and 1990's Joes and focused exclusively on the vintage 60's and 70's stuff. I like the format and the idea of the book, it just seems as if it's only about 1/4 complete. As a supplement to Vinnie's other book, this is okay, but don't expect to gain a comprehensive knowledge of Vintage G.I. Joe from it. This book was not licensed or approved by Hasbro, so the term "Official" in the title is somewhat bogus.



3. I would like to correct a statement made by reviewer Andrew Walls regarding the "official" status of GI Joe: An Official Identification and Price Guide (1964-1999). This book, like others written by Vincent Santelmo on GI Joe, was licensed and the manuscript was reviewed and approved by Hasbro Inc. As Acquisitions Editor at Krause Publications, I was involved in every step of this legal process. I can understand the reviewer's confusion since many publishers don't take the necessary steps nor commit the time and expense to create licensed or "official" books.



4. A straight-forward catalogue of Joe figures and accessories from the beginning through the 4" era and on to today. Black & white pictures are plentiful. Not the book for blissful page-flipping and reminiscing, but definitely the place to turn for organizing your collection.



5. I am no expert at gi joe collecting but I did not find what I was looking for in this book. It has very nice color pictures but is extremely specific and repetitive. This may seem good for some people but not for me. It does not include the spec for the Deep diver, vehicles and some equipment. Also it does not include many boxes that you can easily see on the net. I do not know if I can rely in its price guide also. The book is mainly focused in showing one pic of single items and in describing the subtle differences between one series and another of the SAME figure in almost all cases. The format is in two column and you have to go reading from the top to bottom and to the top again so it becomes kind of confusing to read at first.
   I will conclude that this is a nice book if you are looking for specific information and not if you are looking for a visual aid to see what item goes with what to complete your collection.
   If you want it anyway try to find the lowest price.
   But anyway do not forget to HAVE FUN!!!

5 comments about Demon Diary, Book 1.

1. this book is aiight....but
   THIS BOOK IS NOT MADE BY A JAPANESE PERSON!!!!
   it's korean, look at the name, and the way that u have to read it. it's read like american format..same with
   SOUL TO SEOUL, KING OF HELL, DRAGON HUNTER, FAERIE'S LANDING, RAGNAROK, LIGHTS OUT(ONE DAY SOMETHING WONDERFUL MAY HAPPEN), EVIL'S RETURN, and more!!!
   i'm tired of japanese taking credit 4 everything......



2. This manga is a must have for all if you Shonen-ai lovers out there. As the story goes along, you will discover secrets of gods and demon.



3. This is pretty bad and all over the place. Young demon lord has to learn how to be a demon lord to stop some god-demon conflict that barely rates a mention.
   
   Has a servant type that is a tall, pale slim hipped pillow who wears black, you get the idea. Some other goofy little magic things to have stupid express, and throw in some random magic technobabble at times.



4. This is not death note quality but if you like Rave master or db, etc., it is one worth collecting. Funny and still some noteworthy fights, it is good.



5. Demon Diary introduced me to the world of graphic novel. I would have been lost otherwise. The characters have unique personalities and the story is one of a kind. For those of you who are art lovers it is time to rejoice. This artist will blow your mind away. The characters are beautifully drawn and rich in detail. The sceneries are fitting to their settings. The plot is quite simple, but with a twist in the ending. It is a pleasant read. You will find a mysterious love affair, a brief father son moment, and a lot of comedic relief. Just sit back and enjoy.

3 comments about Encyclopedia of Designs for Quilting.

1. I have been a quiltmaker for 6 years now, but have yet to become a good quilter until I read this book. In just one evening, I was able to draft a border pattern using the box from Stovetop Stuffing and draw it on my current quilt project, a double 9-patch. I actually teach quilting but never got very intricate with my quilting stitches. I can now do feathers and cables with ease. I will refer to this book forever and will never need another for designing quilting patterns and getting ideas for future quilts. This book is entirely focused on the quilting stitches where most quilting books give you that info. as an afterthought. Thanks Phyllis D. Miller! I will now have some real heirlooms for my children.



2. New quilters to seasoned hand quilters will benefit from this book. The how-to part of the book is thorough and plentiful. Keep in mind that it was published in 1996, and the tools and methods described are traditional, similar to those used by our ancestors in quilting.
   This encyclopedia of quilting designs completes what B. Brackman started with her encyclopedias on pieced and appliqué patterns. I will definitely bring this book with me to future documentation activities. This book will help train my eye to see the various patterns on a quilt and identify them in my memory so that I will see all the patterns on a quilt. A more in-depth look will be my gain.



3. This is an excellent "how-to" on just about everything pertaining to quilting designs. Instructions are illustrated and written not just on how to draft the design/s - but how to mark your quilt with the design - suggestions on where they might fit appropriately on your particular quilt top. She gives you a listing of the tools you will need to do each particular design, helpful hints, and much more. The variety of designs ranges from the common to the more unusual. The manual also includes a numerical listing of the quilt designs using a numbering system similar to the one used by Barbara BBrackman in her "Encyclopedia of Applique." If you only plan on purchasing one book of quilting designs you can't go wrong with this one!

No comments about M+O 4EVR.

No comments about Quilting Traditions: Pieces from the Past.

5 comments about Flags of Our Fathers: Heroes of Iwo Jima (Young Reader's Abridged Edition).

1. Quite a while ago, Nick Olmsted, a graduate of the U. S. Naval Academy, recommended that I read "Flags of Our Fathers." I am glad that I finally got around to taking his advice. This story struck me on many levels at once, and this seems to be an opportune time to share some of my thoughts about this remarkable book, written by James Bradley, the son of one of the six Marines whose iconic picture of the raising of the flag over Iwo Jima riveted a war-weary nation.
   
   The film based on this book is due to be released tomorrow. My friend, Nate Fick, former Marines Corps officer and author of "One Bullet Away," had invited me to attend a special screening of the film tomorrow evening in Boston. There will be many Marines present for this gala event to raise funds for a scholarship program for the families of Marines who have fallen in combat. Here is how Nate described to me the work of the scholarship committee:
   
   The Marine Corps Scholarship Foundation will be showing a benefit premier of "Flags of Our Fathers" at the AMC Theater on Boston Common on Friday 20 October. Military guests of honor will include BGen John Kelly, legislative assistant to CMC, former ACMC's Generals Nyland and Neal, and perhaps others.
   
   For those who don't know, the MCSF is committed to funding higher education for the children of Marines and Navy Corpsmen, especiallythose killed in action. It's a wonderful organization, and one I've been proud to be involved with during the past several years.
   
   So, before I am influenced by the film's portrayal of the events on Iwo Jima and the stories of the six men - Harlon Block, James Bradley, Rene Gagnon, Ira Hayes, Frank Sousley, Mike Strank - whose picture became symbolic of a nation at war, I will share my take on the book. A review of the film will follow in a few days.
   
   James Bradley was motivated to write "Flags of Our Fathers" after the death of his father. As the family sorted through the papers that John Bradley left behind, they found three cardboard boxes full of photos and documents related to Iwo Jima. Finding this secret stash shocked the Bradleys, since James had refused to discuss his role as a famous flagraiser.
   
   "I hungered to know the heroic part of my dad. Try as I might I could never get him to tell me about it.
   
   `The real heroes of Iwo Jima,' he said once, coming as close as he ever would, `are the guys who didn't come back.'" (Page 4)
   
   My siblings and I had a similar experience. My father, who served in India with the U.S. Army Air Corps, hardly ever talked about his years of service that cost him four years of his life and compromised his health until he died at the relatively young age of 65. It was as if he had locked that part of his life away in some inaccessible vault. The closest he came to revealing that chapter of his life was to lead us in singing Army marching songs that seemed to play in his head like a continuous loop. Our frequent family drives in the country were filled with many hours of such songs. We whiled away the hours and the miles by singing "Someone's in the Kitchen with Dinah," "Alice Blue Gown," "Off We Go Into the Wild Blue Yonder," and "I've Been Working on the Railroad." I felt as if Bradley had touched a special rewind button when he wrote these words about the memorial service the family held when they were able to visit Iwo Jima in 1998:
   
   "When I was finished with my talk, I couldn't look up at the faces in front of me. I sensed the strong emotion in the air. Quietly, I suggested that in honor of my dad, we all sing the only two songs John Bradley ever admitted to knowing: `Home on the Range' and `I've Been Working on the Railroad.'" (page 14)
   
   Bradley chose an epigraph for the second chapter of the book that is timeless and haunting:
   
   "All wars are boyish, and are fought by boys." Herman Melville (Page 17)
   
   Bradley lays out in clear terms why he chose to undertake the project of writing the book and sharing the stories of the Iwo Jima flagraisers:
   
   "That was the point, I reminded myself, the point of my quest: to bring these boys back to life, or a kind of life, to let them live again in the country's memory. Starting with my father, and continuing with the other five.
   
   That is how we always keep our beloved dead alive, isn't it? By telling stories abut them; true stories. It works that way with our national past as well. Keeping it alive by telling stories." (Page 17)
   
   I have long been a strong believer in the power of narrative to capture our imaginations and our hearts. The job that James Bradley and Ron Powers have done in this book reaffirms my faith in the power of a well-told story. By Bradley bringing back to life the six Iwo Jima flagraisers and their comrades who fell in battle there, I felt as if he were also connecting me to a piece of my father's history and bringing him back to life, as well. As you can imagine, reading this book evoked powerful emotions.
   
   This book does a very effect job of contrasting the sanitized view that civilians have of war with the messy reality experienced by those in the midst of the fighting:
   
   "To the civilian noncombatants, war was `knowable' and `understandable.' Orderly files of men and machines marching off to war, flags waving, patriotic songs playing. War could be clear and logical to those who had not touched its barb.
   
   But battle veterans quickly lost a sense of war's certitude. Images of horror they could scarcely comprehend invaded their thoughts tortured their minds. Bewildered and numbed, they cold not unburden themselves to their civilian counterparts, who could never comprehend through mere words.
   
   Mike, Ira, and Harlon - these three boys back from the Pacific Heart of Darkness - now embraced death. Two were convinced that their next battle would be their last. And one lingered on for ten years before he was consumed by a living nightmare." (Page 90)
   
   "Today, a battle-scarred Ira Hayes would be diagnosed with post-traumatic stress syndrome, and there would be understanding and treatment available to him. But in the late forties and early fifties, Ira had to suffer alone. Suffer daily with images of and misplaced guilt over his 'good buddies who didn't come back.'" (Page 333)
   
   Post traumatic stress disorder - or PTSD - reared its ugly head over Iwo Jima and planted its flag in the hearts of those who fought there - and who have fought in every subsequent battle from Pusan and Pork Chop Hill to Khe Sahn and Hamburger Hill to Tikrit and Falujah. (I will return to the topic of PTSD in a series of articles in the coming weeks.)
   
   Throughout the book, Bradley does justice to the legacy of the Iwo Jima flagraisers by addressing an issue that haunted each of them - the question of what it truly means to be a hero. The flagraisers felt that fate had singled them out for notoriety and the label of "hero," but each man felt in his heart that the real heroes were the ones who did not live to see the flag raised or the parades planned or the War Bond rallies held.
   
   "And finally, I found a full-page newspaper ad from the Seventh Bond Tour, which he had participated in. It screamed: `You've seen the photo, you've heard him on radio, now in person in Milwaukee County Stadium, see Iwo Jima hero John H. Bradley!'
   
   Hero. In that misunderstood and corrupted word, I think lay the final reason for John Bradley's silence.
   
   Today the word `hero' has been diminished, confused with `celebrity.' But in my father's generation the word meant something.
   
   Celebrities seek fame. They take actions to get attention. Most often, the actions they take have no particular moral content. Heroes are heroes because they have risked something to help others. Their actions involve courage. Often, those heroes have been indifferent to the public's attention. But at least, the hero could understand the focus of the emotion. However he valued or devalued his own achievement, it did stand as an accomplishment.
   
   The moment that saddled my father with the label of `hero' contained no action worthy of remembering. When he was shown the photo for the first time, he had no idea what he was looking at. He did not recognize himself or any of the others. The raising of that pole was as forgettable as tying the laces of his boots.
   
   The irony, of course, was that Doc Bradley was indeed a hero on Iwo Jima - many times over. The flagraising, in fact, might be seen as one of the few moments in which he was not acting heroically. In 1998 Dr. James Wittmeier, my father's medical supervisor in Iwo, sat beside me silently contemplating my request for him to explain, or speculate on, why my dad never talked about that time. Finally, after many long minutes, he turned to me and softly said, `You ever hold a broken raw egg in your hands? Well, that's how your father and I help young men's heads.' The heads of real heroes, dying in my father's arms.
   
   So, he knew real heroism. He could separate the real thing from the image, the fluff. And no matter how many millions of people thought otherwise, he understood that this image of heroism was not the real thing." (Pages 260-261)
   
   "Flags of Our Fathers" is a moving and loving tribute to heroes - real and perceived. I am glad that Nick Olmsted pointed the way to it. I hope that Clint Eastwood and Stephen Spielberg's translation of the story to the screen will honor the spirit of the men who fought on Iwo Jima.
   
   Al



2. I consider myself knowledgeable about history, especially WW2. After reading just half of "Flags of our Fathers'" I realize how much I 'didn't' know about this part of the war. Most of my research was of the european theatre.
   I am so glad I purchased this book. It makes me feel so humble as to my own time spent in uniform for I never had to endure or sacrifice what these young men did.
   Anyone thinking of not voting should read this and be sure to vote for these young men gave everything so that we could have that right. Even more they went through hell before they did it.
   Do yourself a favor and get this book.
   Richard Neal Huffman - Author of Dreams In Blue: The Real Police



3. Great book showing how a major world event shaped the lives of a whole generation. I gained a lot of insight from reading this book.



4. "I saw some guys struggling with a pole and I just jumped in to lend them a hand. It's as simple as that." John H. "Jack" Bradley, also known as "Doc" states this in a quote on page 102 in Flags of our Fathers. This passage explains to me that the flag raising atop Mount Surabachi during the battle for Iwo Jima in February and March 1945 was quick and did not seem like a big deal to the flag raiser John Bradley.
   
   James Bradley never imagined the things his dad-Navy Corpsman John H. "Jack" Bradley had endured during the battle of Iwo Jima-a Sulphur Island in the Pacific ocean only 600 miles from Japan-during the closing of World War II in 1945. All James new of his father's war service was that he was in the famous flag-raising photo atop Mount Surabachi. No copy of the famous photo was hung in their house and James' dad never spoke of the other flag raisers. It wasn't until after John Bradley died in 1994 when James was looking at the Joe Rosenthal famous flag raising photo that he began to wonder what the other flag raisers were like. What were there names? What kind of lives did they live? Did they have similar experiences on that sulphur island like Jack Bradley had, troubling and unforgettable?
   
   Soon James Bradley was reading all kinds of books on the battle as he began his search for the other five Marines in the picture. Even though he discovered they were all gone, he interviewed their surviving family members and soon began interviewing other veterans from Iwo Jima. The six flag raisers-John Bradley, Mike Strank, Franklin Sousley, Harlon Block, Ira Hayes and Rene Gagnon came from different backgrounds and different parts of America. Although they had little in common other than fighting for their country, and they didn't know it at the time (three later died in the battle-Block, Strank and Sousley) they would all become celebrities for their role for 1/400th of a second in the famous photograph. Flags of Our Fathers gives a very detailed account of the battle of Iwo Jima and the lives of the six flag raisers through interviews with veterans of the battle, interviews with the surviving family members of the flag raisers and letters. Flags of our Fathers is a book you cannot put down and cannot miss!



5. A fascinating look at a part of our history. It provides an in depth look at the American psyche and the how and why the US was so well served by the young people of that era. A glimpse of the real brutality of the Japanese and why Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the ONLY options for defeating a fanatical army command that espoused no surrender.