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I found this book extraordinarily helpful in my medical school.
This book amazed me again when I found that the author has another embryology text book with additions of miracles about embryology mentioned in the Islamic text 1400 years ago, visit http://islamicbookstore.com/b6147.html.

In bried to say that the book is not only well written and presented it also makes the subject very easy to understand.

Used it for my anatomy and pathophysiology lectures. A very good book indead for someone who has just started studying the subject.

I absolutely agree with Michelle Lee (one of the reviewers above) that it is essential to SEE what is happening when you study Embryology. This book does a great job in that sense and I highly recommend it.

This book offers the opportuinity to learn the basic management of mechanical ventilators.Is great for the "amateurs" in this field

To make it short;this book is good for students, medical staff(respiratory,anesthesia,medical students). Not only does this book cover basic mechanical ventilation but, it also covers more advanced techniques such as NO,ECMO,HFV,TGI and newer modes of ventilation.Strongly recommended.Its not better than Susan Pilbeam's Mech Vent book though.

As a parent of a toddler, I was able to relate to this book about a little sheep who decided to stay up late and play. He was so tired the next day he couldn't even chew his food! Sometimes we ask our daughter, now 4, if she is too tired to chew -- and she grins. We have yet to find a copy of our own at a reasonable price, so we continue to check it out from our local library branch!

Comprehensive and easy to understand description of key facts regarding leg wounds. Would be better if there were an updated version.

This book is an advanced overview of the theory of toric varieties written for individuals with a strong background in algebraic geometry, topology, and algebra. It is very formal and not for a beginning course.

The author moves right into the necessary convex geometry in the first section of Chapter 1 and then defines a toric variety in the next section. He does not hesitate to use diagrams to illustrate the examples, which is good given the level of abstraction he employs in the book. The fundamental group of a toric variety is given an explicit characterization, but the proof is omitted unfortunately. This is followed by a discussion of when a toric variety is compact and nonsingular, with detailed proofs given. The Hironaka resolution of singularities theorem is discussed for toric varieties, the proof being a lot simpler of course in this case. A concrete realization of singularity resolution using continued fractions is given in the next section. The chapter ends with a very detailed and superb discussion of the birational geometry of toric varieties.

The next chapter is very involved and deals with Cartier divisors on toric varieties and toric projective varieties. The latter are related to convex polytopes by means of moment maps. In particular, integral convex polytopes have many connections with toric projective varieties, and these are outlined in detail in this chapter. A toric version of Mori's theorem is also outlined. Toric varieties offer a nice, intuitive picture of Mori's program for rational curves on projective varieties.

Chapter 3 deals with differential forms on toric varieties. The author employs the sheaf of germs of holomorphic vector fields with logarithmic zeroes and the sheaf of germs of p-forms with logarithmic poles to study holomorphic differential forms over toric varieties. In addition, Ishida complexes are used to study complexes of coherent sheaves on toric varieties. A very interesting discussion on the automorphism groups of toric varieties is given in terms of Cremona groups.

The last chapter discusses applications, such as Mumford toroidal embeddings, quotients of toric varieties, semisimple algebraic groups, and Newton polyhedra. Unfortunately, the author does not expound on these, but refers the reader to the literature. Instead, the author explains how to construct complex manifolds in dimension two by taking the quotient of an open set of a toric variety with respect to an action of a discrete map. Some interesting examples of compact quotientsof toric varieties are given, including complex tori, Hopf surfaces, and Inoue surfaces. The latter, for the case of parabolic Inoue surfaces, use elliptic curves in their constructions, interestingly.

The book does contain a review of convex geometry for a reader not well-versed in this area. There is a lot in this book, even though it is short. The price is very high so only for individuals seriously interested in this topic.

Dilgo Khyentse (1910-1991) was an important Nyingma master, exponent of Dzogchen (aka Mahamudra), teacher of Chogyam Trungpa and transmitter of teachings to HH. The Dalai Lama. His writings are known for their poetic beauty.

This book is his commentary on Atisha's "Seven Point Mind Training," a core Tibetan Buddhist teaching which concerns the cultivation of bodhicitta or limitless compassion. The root text of Atisha is very short, given in three pages at the beginning of this book. Dilgo Khyentse then draws the reader in quickly with vivid stories of the teachers of Atisha which illustrate the fundamental principles underlying the teaching. He then proceeds line by line through the root text and brings each line to life, clarifying and elaborating them, and again, using stories to make points and to engage the imagination. The notes and glossary at the back of the book are a welcome addition.

Professor Rosman succeeds at portraying the Ba'al Shem Tov, Israel ben Eliezer of Miedzyboz, in his environment of the Polish-Lithuanian shtetls and in the midst of the politics and economics of the Jewish kahal, and the Polish, post-Russo-Swedish War nobility. He also succeeds in separating the BeShT fables from the realities, and succinctly disproves the authenticity of the "BeShT's letters." The author also delves into the roots of the Besht's power and his role in the community.

It was interesting to read about the fights for power between butchers and merchants (and tailors); the kahal's issuance of residency permits to only working Jews; Miedzyboz's mid Century recession (1745); and the fact that one-sixth of Jewish households were led by widowed women. Rosman lays a good foundation in his biography by placing the idea of ecstatic religions and the mystical healers into historical context. It was not uncommon for Ba'al Shemtovs and practical Kabbalists to exist in early 18th Century Europe. For example, Rabbi Hirsh Frankel of Ansbach, Rabbi Jonathan Eybeschuetz, Hillel Ba'al Shem, Joel Halpern of Zamosc, Samuel Essingen and Joseph of Jerusalem were a few other contemporary healers, amulet makers, and exorcists. Rosman also discusses the pre-Besht existence of hasidim. These separatist and ascetic hasidim existed prior to the Beshtian brand of new Hasidism. I think that this book may be a new foundation for future studies in Hasidism, and will be up there with Martin Buber and Gershom Scholem's works.

There is a stereotype that the average engineer could not write for beans. Most engineers might vociferously deny this. But if you have ever had the "good" fortune to read a typical manual or paper written by an engineer for his peers, or even for laymen, then you may indeed would about the writing ability.

Traditionally in an engineering syllabus, writing was barely mentioned, if at all. There is simply too much competing for mindshare in an undergraduate cirriculum.

van Emden tries to counteract this by putting together a concise handbook for engineers faced with this quandary. It is concise out of necessity, because most engineers will not read a lengthy tome on this subject. Her advice is pretty easy to understand. No engineer should have a problem with her suggestions. But being able to implement them is another matter. Facility in converting an engineering scheme or system into an understandable verbal precis is an underrated skill. It is one of these things where the best written engineering descriptions are so logically and clearly laid out that they hide the necessary skill that made it so.

Oh Angry Sea, by Raphael Kutscher, is a well-organized treatise on the purpose and form of the Sumerian lamentation genre. He carefully analyzes the various surviving tablets of this composition and offers helpful and insightful suggestions regarding obscure words and variant readings. Included are several well-shot photographs of the major tablets. Some of the photos are clear enough to actually read the Sumerian. This is a difficult achievement and Kutscher is to be commended for his effort. In addition, a concise and well researched Sumerian-English glossary is provided at the back with documentation as to where each specific word is located in the lament. This book is well-written, carefully researched, and presented in an appropriate format. Excellent and worth owning, particularly if you are familiar with the Sumerian language. I have not regretted purchasing this book at all.

I like Gogol - I loved "Dead Souls' and "The Nose". But Taras Bulba totally caught me by surprise - which was (ironically) both pleasant and a disappointment. The story tells the tale of the Zaphorizhian Cossacks of the Ukriane and their struggle for independence from the domination of the Cathlic Poles. Returning from university, Taras Bulba's sons Ostap and Andrei partake in their first Cossak foray into the steppe. Enroute, Andrei falls in love with a Polish nobleman's daughter, and in the seige the follows, betrays his hetman (leader) and people to defend her. Tragedy ensues.
First, I was disappointed by the lack of depth he wrote for his characters - they never really sprung to life for me. Rather, they read more like charactures - carousing, drinking, rallying to the "true, Orthodox faith", pirating and plundering. This is as true of the minor characters as it is of Taras Bulba and his sons themselves - characters you would expect more "fleshing out" given the nature of the novel. I was also disappointed by the lack of scope - for a novella about the struggle for Ukrainian independence, the story itself was remarkably thin, dealing only with the events surrounding Tara's attack upon an unnamed Polish city, and his subsequent quest for revenge.

However, there is much to like about Taras Bulba. As one would expect from Gogol, the imagry is fabulous - vivid descriptions of Cossack life from their humble steppe homes, to their flamboyant dress, to the very way in which they drink themselves into a stupor. For this alone, the book is worth the time and effort to read it.

As another reviewer noted, Gogol didn't write very much about the characters, just brief descriptions, yet I was amazed at how close I felt to Taras's son, when he met his father for the last time. The only criticism I have is that I expected more to occur with Tara's son and his lover. It seemed too important a problem to end so briefly, but perhaps my desire to continue this part of the story just shows how effective Gogol's writing is. Great book.

Gogol's 'Taras Bulba' is a good example of how a literary work can return to topicality with a vengeance; not so much news that stays news, as it were, as news that re-emerges as news. Accompanied by a brief introduction by professional geo-pessimist Robert D Kaplan (reprinted in the April 2003 Atlantic magazine), this novella confronts the reader with an account of a pre-modern mindset which is only too relevant to understanding current international events.
Set sometime in the 17th century, 'Taras Bulba' describes the life of the Zaporozhian Cossacks, a people so accustomed to war that it has become the focus of their existence. Taras is a Cossack colonel, an old fighter who has survived into middle age and fathered two sons, now themselves on the verge of manhood. Far from slipping into complacent quiescence, however, he is as warlike as ever, and his sons' return home from their seminary studies rouses him to return from semi-retirement to full-time work (i.e. raiding and pillaging). His overriding motive is to initiate his sons into full Cossack manhood. The military ' or personal ' consequences are irrelevant. What matters is that his sons must learn war.
After an interval at their stronghold, the Sech, an all-male enclave where the Cossacks practise the arts of peace (i.e. getting roaring drunk), Taras is able, with little difficulty, given the nature of his audience, to foment a campaign against the neighbouring (and therefore enemy) Poles. This situation exemplifies a clash-of-civilizations scenario wherein the Orthodox Cossacks are engaged in chronic conflict with the Catholic Poles on the one hand and the Muslim Turks and Tatars on the other. Taras' war goes swimmingly at first (the Cossacks kill many of their enemies), and later not so well (their enemies kill many of the Cossacks).
Gogol's account is a subtle blend of folk tale and modern storytelling. The traditional picture would have shown the Cossacks in brighter, more heroic colours, their cause justified by the outrages of their wicked enemies, and their defeat brought about by treachery and betrayal. In Gogol's more nuanced presentation, Taras is an out-and-out war-monger and the Cossacks are shown in full, their weaknesses and vices detailed together with their nobility, strengths and virtues. The sorry fates of those lower in the social order, specifically Cossack women and Jews, are not allowed to escape the reader's attention, even though these observations are accompanied by a casual anti-Semitism. At the same time, however, Gogol also preserves the magical atmosphere of the folk tale: the horses are swift, the warriors are fierce, the young women are beautiful and the doomed are doomed.
In the end, Taras' sons reap the full measure of what their father has sowed. Taras shares their tragedy, of course, but so do all the Cossacks. The geopolitics of endless sporadic warfare have made them a culture where military prowess is the supreme human attribute. In such a context, Taras' most natural and benevolent paternal instinct ' to see his sons become fully established members of the community ' is diverted into starting an unnecessary war which ends in disaster. Yet in the aftermath Taras does not even think of changing his ways. Rather he intensifies them, draining the bitter cup of war to its dregs. There is no other way: a Cossack cannot become a peacenik.
As Kaplan points out, the mentality of a Taras Bulba is only too relevant to the modern world. Just as recent events have shown that infectious disease is not a vestige of an archaic past, so the various ancient tribalisms, ethnic, national and religious group identities, and the diabolical passions they engender, only recently dismissed as obsolete, are now boiling up again as vigorously as ever. The role of religion in the story is particularly noteworthy. Although the Cossacks place great store by their faith ' 'a rock rising from the depths of a stormy ocean' ' its role in their lives is purely totemic. It is the symbol which identifies them and distinguishes them from their enemies. The actual doctrines of this faith ' specifically its injunctions against violence ' are entirely ignored; the devoutly Christian Cossacks can throw Jews into the river or skewer Polish newborns without a second thought. Religion, we see, is both remarkably protean and plastic in its interpretations, and whether a faith becomes the talisman of war or peace seems to depend mostly on the culture, circumstances and interests of its adherents.
The world of Taras Bulba, while it may appeal to our desire to be free of the burdensome complexities of modern reality (which likely accounts for the enthusiastic back-jacket blurb by Hemingway), is at least as oppressive as our own, and not simply by virtue of the ever-present threat of violence, but also because of the stultifying force of an all-encompassing group identity, inescapable except through heavy drinking or unconsciousness, and the remorseless sacrifice of humanity to the fighter's ethos. Those of us who no longer have to live this way should be thankful.

Modern Library has produced a handsome hardcover edition, but the full price for a novella of only 140 pages will probably only appeal to cosmopolitan sophisticates. The wretched of the earth will have to wait for the paperback version.