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We are a group of 12 Christian women reading books to increase our understanding of God and His workings in our lives. This book was a wonderful addition to our knowledge and our libraries. We found the book to be extremely helpful in guiding our understanding of God working in our daily lives and encouraging us to continue living for God daily. We learned that God's plan is not some mystery to be solved or some treasure to be found but living daily, seeking God first and following His revealed will in our daily routines. This daily life will prepare us for the future that God has planned for our life. Mr. Sittser truly captured the reality of how to live the will of God by revealing his unique view from the combined perspective of Bible theologian, college professor, father of three and a man living in today's world. We encourage anyone trying to understand the will of God for their life to read this book and seek God's will.

As an advisee and student of Dr. Sittser's I was naturally drawn to reading this particular book and I am so grateful I did! This particular book should be required reading for everyone! Christians are under emense pressure to discern God's calling and purpose for their lives, but Dr. Sittser has opened the door to following God's will in an exciting and freeing way. God has used this book in my life as I work through what it means to follow God's will. As a college student I have been paralized by the ominous future, but Dr. Sittser has a unique way of pulling everything into perspective and I can feel my fear melting away to a hope for everything wonderful that can be accomplished in the present moment of living in God's will. Please, read this book. Dr. Sittser is an incredibly wise and faithful man of God, he truly lives what he writes. This is one book you should not miss.

The Will of God as a Way of Life is a wonderful book about experiencing God's will in our personal lives. Using examples from his own life and quoting from many sources, Mr. Sittser shows that God's will is not something that is painfully hard to grasp but can be experienced in each moment through daily living. Not only is this book about experiencing God's will but it is a book about grace and hope, how God redeems our past and gives us hope for the future. When I finished the book I had a strong sense of peace, believing that God is good and in control and because of that, all is well. This is definitely a book worth reading and better yet owning!

I am currently reading Sound and the Fury and it is not an easy read. Fortunately, I started out with this volume and read Sanctuary. If you want to get into Faulkner this is an excellent place to start. It is a great story, shocking though it may be, and gives a good idea of what's to come if you want to delve deeper into WF. Next I read Light in August which may be one of his best. Faulkner is a genius at creating characters and then going into the details of their psyche. Every now and then he gets a little over-indulgent in his wordsmithing but always seems to bring it back home before going too far afield.

Faulkner is the green tea of literature. He's a great story teller but still a bit of an aquired taste. Once you get into his work, though, you'll definitely want more.

Faulkner is, without a doubt, one of the South's best writers, and re-reading this collection of novels after many years affirms that belief for me. He was a master of words and I wish we had more Faulkner novels to feast on. Almost no one can measure up to him!

There is nothing quantitative in this volume that you can't get in other editions of Faulkner's work; however, the Library of America copy is to be strongly commended for the clarity of its typeface, its sturdy cloth-bound hardcover, and its designed ability to *lie flat* at each page. The only fault I could find with this volume is that it would be nice to have _The Sound and the Fury_ included in a Library of America edition as well (currently, the Modern Library edition is the best that can be done). I strongly recommend this edition to the serious reader who, familiar with Faulkner, is looking for a reference copy of these works that will not deteriorate over time (did I mention acid-free paper and a cloth bookmark?). Considering the price of each of these titles in paperback, this volume's value to the casual reader speaks for itself; you, too, are advised to invest in this worthy tome.

The story is told how Rebbe Nachman of Breslov once suffered from amnesia and could not remember any of the Torah he had learned. In desperation, he asked one of his disciples to recite the Hebrew alphabet. He did -- and the Rebbe's memory came back to him. After reading this excellent book, you will understand how that is possible. The Hebrew alphabet is much more than 22 letters written on paper. Each letter has a numerical value, a number of symbolic Torah meanngs, and a mystical connection to the Creation of the Universe. According to kabbalah, the Hebrew letters are the primal "energies" with which God spoke the Creation into existence. The inner essence of a thing are the letters which compose its name in Hebrew. (The Overview in the book is entitled "Protoplasm of Creation," and explains this concept in more detail than I can do here.)

Unlike so many of those pseudo-kabbalah books on the market, which attempt to use the Hebrew alphabet and its numerology for fortune-telling, this book is solidly grounded in authentic Torah sources. Like all of Artscroll's publications, the approach is Orthodox, but also accessible to both Jews and non-Jews of all backgrounds. This is not an easy-read "spirituality" book, however. It is a detailed set of Torah lessons, to be savored slowly, one letter-chapter at a time. The author also assumes that you are either familiar with basic Hebrew terms, or at least willing to take the time to learn them. But even if you do not already know the Hebrew alphabet, this book will help you understand the deeper wisdom within traditional Judaism.

The Hebrew Aleph-Bet is explained in such a clear fashion that anyone can understand. It goes in depth into describing the letters and give a multitude of examples of how those letters are important to Torah interpretation. Its delves deeply into Talmud, Midrash and commentaries to present examples of inspiration and morality based on these letters. Any student of Hebrew and Kabbalah should read this book.

I am a Christian Minister, and I greatly enjoyed this book. It gives an overall view of the basic ideas of Judaism that is clear and beautiful. It also explains the concept of the creative Word of God and the power of the spoken word, by a metaphysical analysis of each letter from Aleph to Tav, each of which is an "entity." Beautifully written. I read a copy loaned by a Rabbi friend, and had to get my own copy for future reference.

Let's face it, if you study Buddhism you probably have at least a dozen solid theoretical texts lining your bookshelves. And if there is any area in which those texts seem to be weak, it is in their approach to applying Buddhist tenets to the modern workplace. At first glance, Western capitalism and Eastern spirituality appear distinctly at oods. How is it possible to follow Buddha's Right Livelihood tenet and still succeed in the cutthroat workplace?

Mr. Richmond has been there and done that. He brings practical advice that is soundly grounded in Buddhist thought and tradition. He doesn't try to pretend that it is realistic to construct an altar at your desk, but provides reasonable ways to extend your spirituality to the workplace. Above all else, this book is a practical set of guidelines for maintaining your spirituality in America's competitive workplace. I've only just read it, but it has helped me immensely to find ways to make my worklife simply an extension of the rest of my life.

You will find something that applies to whatever kind of work day you are having. I read it as I struggled with a decision to quit or not quit; to compromise my personal beliefs or keep my job. I already knew the answers, but this book was comfortingly reassuring and supportive of the path I knew was correct for me. Now when I go back to reread, and reread sections, I always find something that helps me survive whatever work situation with which I'm dealing.

This is an excellent book. It was very easy to read, and provided lots of practical advice on all sorts of work problems ranging from stress to stagnation. It accepts the premise that emotions (such as anger) do happen at work, and provides advice on how to diffuse the negative aspects of emotions and harness the positive energy. This book was very helpful to me and probably would be helpful for many people.

tHIS COLLECTION OF STORIES FROM AND OF wOMEN OF THE aMERICAN wEST SHOULD BE REQUIRED READING FOR ANY wOMEN'S sTUDIES COURSES AND SHOULD BE IN EVERY pUBLIC lIBRARY. tHE STORIES ARE FUNNY AND SAD AND ALL ENTERTAINING. yOU FEEL AS IF YOU HAD BEEN DOWN THAT SAME PATH OF LIFE WITH THEM. cERTAINLY A 5 PLUS RATING IS WHAT IT DESERVES.

I have bought seven copies of ths book for women friends. I would give anything to buy a copy for my best friend, my 82 year old mother, but she can only read large print. This book features so many unique women of a certain age that I cannot believe it is not availble in large print or audio. If that becomes available, it will be the eighth copy I buy. The book was a gift from a friend at the time of my kidney transplant, the kidney a gift from another friend, and the book has definitely contributed to my speedy recovery and healing. Buy one for yourself and another for a friend. Every woman should read this book.

As life on the land sinks into the western sunset, these lonely songs sung by rural women may be all that's left.

If you loved Tug McGraw and the things he did for the Met's and Phillies, you will love this book.

Tug brings us through his life, from a disruptive youth to a challenging career in baseball away from his family with the thought behind his mind that another child may have been his. This book is so timely coming so soon after Tug McGraw's demise from cancer.

He reviews his loves, his relationships with his families, teammates and fans and his struggles after retiring from baseball.

One chapter that is fascinating is the chapter devoted to fans.... It is a fitting tribute to his fans from someone who always enjoyed playing for them.

Tug admits in this book his wild lifestyle as a baseball player and attributes part of it to his somewhat wild homelife growing up. McGraw shows how he was the life of the party, a team player and a person who inspired others.

His sense of humor was amazing. His vignettes about his jokes throughout the book will make you smile. He even devotes a chapter to his humor.

You will cry as you hear about Tug's challenges in his life and most of all the last few years of his life struggling with his illness. Yet, Tug's legacy would not be complete without his family and it is touching and fitting what he says about them.

Interestingly Tug talks about three heroes of his; Babe Ruth, Benjamin Franklin and the King; Elvis. He tells us why these men's lives had an impact on his life. Tug shows that he was a deep person, with a depth of passion for his life, his family and his work. The discussion of Ben Franklin was so very interesting.

This book is for anyone who has come from a challenged family background, anyone who loves the music of Tim McGraw, and of course the many fans who enjoyed the life of one of America's favorite Relief Pitchers - Tug McGraw......Ya Gotta Believe.

If you want the PG version buy "Screwball", this is not a book that the twelve year old me could have or should have handled. However, as an adult it is quite the eye opening view into what life in and after professional sports is really like. Tug was and is my hero for many reasons, but this book showed me that even heroes do not have perfect lives with perfect outcomes. I cried at the end, even though I knew how it ended. It was a lot like "Brian's Song" in that regard. I am not a big fan of country music, but Tug's son Tim has a new fan, not because of his singing, but because of his truely generous and loving spirit.

If you want the pg version get "Screwball", this is not a book that the twelve year old me could have or should have handled. However, as an adult it is quite the eye opening view into what life in and after professional sports is really like. Tug was and is my hero for many reasons, but this book showed me that even heros do not have perfect lives, with perfect outcomes. I cried at the end, even though I knew how it all ended. It was a lot like "Brian's Song" in that regard. I am not a fan of country music, but Tug's son Tim can count me as a new fan, not for his singing, but for his truely generous spirit.

ABC'S OF FOOD encyclopedia is one of the most interesting and informative books I have. For example, I assumed in eating the abalone that we ate the body. In the ABC'S OF FOOD I learned it's the foot we eat. It even explained how to cook and tenderize the foot. Most fascinating were the how and where foods, such as Hot Cross Buns, originated from. With the explanation of terms, such as Dry Water, I can now answer customer questions. I work in the food area of the largest retail chain in the world and I am asked about lots of products. Now if I don't know the answer, I use my ABC's book!
Also,reading about such down home wild foods as chinquepins
(chinky pins), hickory nuts, muskadine grapes, and pawpaws brought back childhood memories of following my daddy through the woods, looking for these, along with sassafras roots for the tea in the winter for better health. And if I got hungry while there, we ate veenie weenies (Vienna Sausages)with crackers. I wonder how many of the readers have some of the same fond memories. It would be very interesting to hear from them. I hope there is a follow up book VERY soon! Linda Clark,
former Bakery Manager for Ingles, Consumers, Wal-Mart.

It is a pleasure to read a food book with such vast information. With its tightly written entries, I can absorb knowledge while relaxing. I have worked with freshly prepared food and fresh produce all my life. My father is an avid gardener.
With my past 30 years of experience in restaurant work and as a produce specialist, it is uplifting to keep learning from this book. The ABC'S OF FOOD has fascinated and challenged me to broaden my horizons. I highly recommend THE ABC'S OF FOOD to any age group. --Joan Harness, Wal-Mart Superstore Produce Specialist

Ulmer and Calhoun have presented a comprehensive food library that is sprinkled with stories and anecdotes that keep the reader at full attention. It is easy to read, concise yet useful by its brevity, and gives the reader what he is looking for. It has both utility and entertainment. Bravo Ulmer and Calhoun!

This is a very readable apologetic aimed at a popular audience. Despite its lack of philosophical complexity, it is very convincing. Its primary audience would be those seeking or interested in Christianity.

Why Believe? is intended chiefly to provide a positive case for Christianity rather than to show the inadequacy of other belief systems, which means that it is an incomplete apologetic.

It is evident that Evans is heavily indebted to C.S. Lewis. He is thus not as strong on certain points as he ought to be, namely the reliability of Scripture and the sovereignty of God.

This is basically a book written by a Christian philosopher, explaining some of the arguments for being a Christian and showing how to refute the arguments going the other way. I don't agree with absolutely everything he says, but most of it is excellent.

It sounds a bit academic - it is, but it is very readable and very helpful. The treatment he gives the arguments is well thought through, and it is good as well as challenging (in the good sense) for Christians who read it, especially when he deals with doubt.

Basically, I would thoroughly recommend it for both Christians and non-Christians, mainly of the more intellectual type, but others could certainly benefit from it as well - it is very clearly written and doesn't use obscure words.

The coverage and depth of the book are just right as Christian apologetic for the average person. I was a seeker for 19 years (starting in college) and was saved about a year ago. I have wished since that I could write a book for all those seekers out there like I was, that found it impossible to believe and keep respect for ALL truth. I wanted them to know the Truth, that it all makes sense! I am glad someone else wrote that book.

The book covers all the areas that a modern person questions, such as science, miracles, evil, other religions. There is obviously a lot of depth behind what is included, and at times I wished the book were hypertext so I could click on something and get more deeply into the subject. But I think the choice of depth was right for a general audience, and I think LIVES WILL BE SAVED by this book. Praise God who is so patient and respectful of our questioning!

The best respect we can pay the dead, I believe, is to honor the work they did. When I learned of Heilbrun's death last month, I turned to her books--the mysteries she wrote as Amanda Cross and the literary and cultural criticism she published under her own name. The first time I read Writing a Woman's Life was my junior or senior year in college. I was already familiar with feminist literary criticism, but Heilbrun's thesis was new to me: that even extraordinary women who wrote of how women were entrapped by society had not managed to record, in fiction or biography, how they themselves had defied its dictates; that women's biographies were still characterized by "becoming modesty," with success attributed to luck rather than ambition.

I am more critical of some aspects of Heilbrun's argument now (in particular, I find that her heterocentrism makes her an imperceptive observer of the marriages of lesbian and bisexual writers), but eight years later, parts that seemed irrelevant then strike me more now. Heilbrun writes of many women writers who found their voices and their own particular art much later than their male counterparts: Willa Cather, Dorothy Sayers, Virginia Woolf. The youth of many women writers of the past, she argues, were devoted to struggling with and sometimes conforming to female gender roles; freed from these expectations by age and experience, they could begin to write something new.

What is most compelling to me is Heilbrun's insistence on re-envisioning women's lives--on attempting to view them anew, in all their crooked detail, rather than smoothing out their outlines to conform to the stories she's been taught to expect.

Literature and art get the eternal present: Carolyn Heilbrun is still talking to me. I'm still talking back.

I know that's a cheesy title, but it is so true. I had to read this for a Women Writers class, and I had a hard time getting through the prologue. But once I did, I could not put the book down. Heilbrun had many points that just kept me thinking, and the more I thought about them, the more angry I'd become. Her theories on women's biographies are very true. It is hard to find one where the woman is not painted as a housewife saint void of passionate emotions. It is only in recent years that biographers, mainly female biographers, are writing more and more three dimensional stories of women writers. My best friend from high school just turned 21, and for her birthday I bought her a copy of this book. I lent my copy to a male friend who is spending his summer volunteering in Costa Rica. I am making my boyfriend read this as well. Her thoughts on the reputation of women writers, marriage, and women writing of themselves leave you thinking for weeks. I highly recommend that every woman read this, and make your significant other read it as well. It's hard getting used to the thesis format, but once you do, it is well worth it.

This book set my heart and soul on fire. Carolyn's words ring out with truth and emotion that cannot be held inside.

This book takes a great big laughable stab at the self help industry by reducing it to a profit generating circus of personality evaluation. My only gripe was that the book did succeed in demotivating me-- the attempt for a laugh was so blatent at times, it made me feel like I couldn't understand a joke unless it was bold and italicised.

A fast, funny book that finally bursts the bubble of all those crazy self-help books. I like the pith bits of wisdome like "You always get a second chance to make a bad impression" and "A journey of a single step starts with a thousand excuses." This book was a big bestseller in Canada, and it's easy to see why. There's a great comic mind at work here.

If you are inbetween books and would like to read something fresh, witty, and quick, this book is it! I read it during sporadic 5 minute breaks over a few days and people were staring at me because I was laughing so hard! Really, it will make you laugh out loud. Buy the book. Feel good. Pass it on to a friend.