Elephants Books

I am ambiguous about this book. I don't like the story but the paper art is terrific.

This is the story of Ollie the elephant, who is unhappy on his birthday despite having had a party with lots of presents. Right away Ollie strikes me as a little ingrate. He's unhappy because he got skates but what he really wants is a baby brother. When his mom tells him this is an unreasonable request, Ollie leaves. He meets a variety of animals and asks each to give him a sibling or accept him into their family -- a stork, a deer, a frog, a cat, a badger family, a mother and child kangaroo, a peacock, a bat and a woodpecker. Ollie's goals shift fluidly -- he wants a baby brother, he wants to find his mother, he wants to find his roller skates -- and confusedly. We never see the skates lost, for instance, don't know where they are, and then just as suddenly Ollie has found them again. I know that doesn't sound like much, but the story is vaguely incoherent; likewise, interactions with the other animals are disjointed and inconsistent. Ollie is gone for multiple days (!) and at one point he calls his mother but she never comes. Kind of a bleak message for a little kid's story. When he is just about to find his mother, Ollie gets so excited that he crashes into a tree and wakes up in a hospital with a broken leg! When he's recovered a bit his mom tells him he is indeed going to have a baby brother or sister. Ollie limps back to bed and dreams of being an older sibling. So that's the resolution? This is one goofy book.

On the other hand, the artwork is very fine and there are some unique and interesting paper engineering feats. I guess I would never buy this book for its own sake. There must be a lot of books that deal with the issue of siblings better than this. But it's a clever and pleasing pop-up.

I bought this book in the french version.Believe me, the story is complete and very cute, it's rare for a pop-up book.The paper work is very well done.The illustrations in water colours are delightfull for the eyes. I think than this book is for a children about 4 to 6 years old. Buy it,it's a must for your childre's librairy.

Although the book falls short on many accounts, it does give you an overall picture of India, the other Asian Tiger (apart from China). What I really liked is that I came to know about many other opportunities existing in this thriving economy. Specially if you want to invest in India specific stocks, then you need to know various sectors that can offer you a good return, as is claimed by the author. I am not that interested in details because I can get them from various books, specifically focusing on different sectors. However, if you just want an overall view of many sectors (in one reading) without wasting much time, this is a good book. The author writes in very simple languages, with many supporting data and numbers to make his point. He does a great job of providing you all the references as well, which is at the end of the book. Most of the data have been taken from various Indian government websites, consulting firms research papers, and IMF website as well.

On several occasions, the author has tried to correlate different numbers such as the growth in economy with that of the population growth, growth in social development with growth in infrastructure spending. This I think is highly questionable. Nevertheless, it gives you a feel of India. There is one chapter on India's political system that is acting as a hurdle to India's development, according to the author. But I disagree. Because it is the same system that has brought this level of growth to India, in the first place itself. In US, also we have some flaws with our government.

In two chapters, the author compares various parameters of India and China. The most notable is the FDI discrepancy and the growth rates. I think the author tries to say that growth of India is comparable to that of China, although China sells its package well to the international community. I tend to agree with that. In one of trip to China I had gotten a feeling of that as well. The author gives you many reasons regarding why the Indian economy is doing so well recently. But again, I believe there is one flaw in his argument. All these factors that he is talking of are variable and India's growth can come below 5 percent, if things don't play out the way the author is predicting. But he has tried to keep a optimistic outlook through the book.

If you are not a management guru, this book will serve you better than the more involved books, in giving you a layman's perspective. But I discovered on two occasions (at least), the author has changed the numbers (one in India's export number, the other I believe in the infrastructure spending). So lack of consistency questions some his arguments. You also get a peek into India's social fabric, which is highly complex and fragmented. Sometimes, we don't get an insider's look into the privatizations of various foreign countries. In this book, you will get a feel of how reforms started in India, and what hurdles the policy makes faced, and where the overall reform process stand right now. I came to know some interesting facts about India's fragmented politics and the effort it takes to make something work in India. Overall I think it is a decent book. Could have been better....

I think this book gives you a good understanding of the overall economic scenario of Indian economy. The author touches upon almost all sectors like IT ( we all know what that means - All the Indian Software consultants), Pharmaceutical Sector, Aviation, Telecom, Tourism, BPO, Retail, Infrastructure that are driving India's growth these days. I would say that this book does a great job of touching upon almost the entire economy in one way or other. The author however, does not go into great detail into each of those sectors. I understand that this is not a in depth study of any particular sector. The book is already a heavy duty study( more than 250 pages), even with the basic informations. I have one caution though. The author, as he rightfully claims, is not an expert or an economist. You can look at as the USP of the book. The book is primarily written from a bystander's point of view. Hence you get an unbiased evaluation of each sector. The author does a great job of informing rather than analyzing the economic activities happening in each sector. Overall, a decent book.

I bought this book and couldnt put it down. I was laughing out loud continuously throughout the chapters of Rule No.5 No Sex on the Bus!

Anyone who has ever traveled to Europe either on a Tour Guide or seeing the sights on their own will appreciate Brian Thacker's sense of humor, his outspokeness about misunderstood european culture and all the things we wish we could say outloud but didnt!

It will re-unite you with Europe all over again, or for first time visitors it will give you a down to earth perspective of what its like touring Europe on a bus.

This book is one you will enjoy page after page and have you feeling you are apart of the "Tour". =))

In this very funny book Brian Thacker describes jounreys he has made in many different countries using many different forms of transport. He is equally amusing whether he is writing about traveling by moped in Greece, taxi in Belfast, jeep in Hawaii, camel in Egypt, skis in Switzerland, elephant in Thailand, bicycle in China, horse in Mongolia,or any of the other many and varied forms of transport he's used in his life so far. Some of his observations puzzle me a little, I can't think why he dislikes Macdonalds, for instance, if you have children they're a godsend, and dirt cheap too. As with 'Rule No.5, no sex on the bus' the humour is a bit crude at times, but if you don't mind that you will enjoy this book.

This is a landmark book on environmental history that is well-received by many academics (also check out other reviews on the web). For me personally, this books helps me understand today's China's problems better than many other books I've read.

It maybe a stretch for people that to understand today's China, you need to go back to its 3000 years of environmental history. However, this book offers many potential answers to many questions that are still relevant today - e.g. Is China's growth sustainable? Why Chinese people have such relationships with their government? Where does her seemingly in-exhaustible labor pool come from?

The book illuminates the constant struggles between the Chinese population and her environments throughout her 3000 years of written history, with the Chinese state often being the driving force and the subsequent victim when nature eventually fought back. Many such struggles are still being repeated today - for example, the recent push of China to develop its north-west region resembled the same push Chin/Han dynasties started from 300 BC, which resulted in permanent soil erosions that gave yellow river its name and caused numerous disasters downstreams since. The Three Gorges Dam is an extension to the long running tradition of massive state-sponsored hydro-projects trying to control the river in the name for "growth". The list goes on and on...

History is bound to repeat herself if we ignore her. Hopefully this books will not be ignored.

I found the book fairly hard-going as the writer is a master of many fields and switches from discipline to discipline quite regularly. It is, however, certainly thought-provoking in relation to many issues about humans and the environment, and the current economic boom in China, taking place in a country that has already over-exploited its resources in an effort to feed its huge population.

The book, Tusk and Stone, written by Malcolm Bosse, is, overall, a good story. As the main character is forced to travel all throughout seventh-century India, you learn about the country's many cultures. The story teaches you how to be strong during hard times in life. I would recommend this novel to just about everyone.

It took me a while to really get into the story, though. The beginning was depressing because there was much struggle and nothing seemed to be going right for the main character, Arjun, a young man in the high-ranking Brahmin class. First, his caravan is attacked and the attackers kill his uncle and kidnap his sister while Arjun is exploring the nearby woods. Then, while trying to track down his sister, Arjun is drugged and sold to the army by a man he meets along the way. As you can see, there are not many happy parts in the beginning of the story. But you just want to keep reading to find out if Arjun's life improves.

The second half of Tusk and Stone is when Arjun's life, and the book, start improving because of his positive atittude. For example, "Arjun's willingness to accept his lot impressed the sergeant. He decided to give this young recruit a chance to do more..." Afterwards, Arjun becomes a great mahout, an elephant trainer and rider in the army. Although there were a few sad parts in the second half of the book, I must say it is a lot better than the first.

I really admired Arjun. He accepted all of the bad things that happened to him, but never lost hope. The boy's rank in the Indian culture was always twisting and turning. Even though fate was constantly pushing Arjun into lower classes, the young man's positive outlook on life and hard work eventually helped him to increase his rank and status.

Overall, Tusk and Stone is quite enjoyable and readers of all ages would be able to learn about the traditional Indian culture from it. The story also shows that by being strong in life and not giving up, you can continue on during rough times. You just need to get through the first half of the book.

What I found most interesting in this title was the relationship of young Arjun to the elephant he trained and rode into battle. Admittedly, I know little of seventh-century India, and cannot vouch for historical accuracy, but this was an interesting book in time and place. I also enjoyed Arjun's coming to maturity through hardships and valor. For 12 years and up who enjoy reading about faraway places and long-ago lives.

War Elephants is the fascinating story of how elephants have fought in human armies for more than three thousand years. From elephants that battled alongside legendary Roman legions, to elephants in modern history who have suffered bombs and napalm for their service, War Elephants examines the pachyderms' role in the equivalent of tanks, bulldozers, cargo haulers and cavalry throughout the millennia. Now after the elephants have made such great sacrifices in warfare, it is the elephants themselves who desperately need protection. A serious-minded work of significant military history scholarship by professional librarian John Kistler, War Elephants is recommended reading for anyone curious about the important role elephants have played in human history.

The War Elephant book is a welcome addition to the lore of the war elephants throughout history. Generally the book documents the role and armies that used them with varying degrees of success. The strongest part of the book is the hands on knowledge about care and handling of elephants.
The weakest areas are the historical facts.

For example as one reads along, one runs into many footnoted text areas, that seem to be irrelevant, then blatant areas of speculation with no footnotes at all.
The description of the battle of the Hydaspes relates that "Arrian implies that towers were used on the elephants to protect them from Alexander's horse archers"... when Arrian states nothing about towers at all. This is a difficult area of study because we don't have a lot of information of written or precise artistic or archeological reference. However in this period what artistic information we do have points to the Indian elephants of Porus' army being ridden barebacked. This is shown on Mauryan artwork and the Alexander Medallions.
The author goes out of his way to explain the reason that Porus rode bareback, since he had superior armor, however the argument makes no sense at all.

When we get to the 2nd Macedonian war and the author states that Perseus was Philip V's half-brother, when he was in fact his son. I can't even figure out where the author could have made such a mistake, except that section is footnoted to a 1914 text.

The author really wishes to believe Polyaenus' stratagem that Caesar had a war elephant in Britain.... which is a nice story, but we cannot verify it.... it is typical in ancient history to grasp at any straw and shred of evidence and try to hammer it into relevance for a thesis.
Whether C. E. Stevens believes that Caesar had an elephant is an ok reference, however the vast majority of writers do not follow that view.

Errors like these make the history and facts difficult to believe, and generally diminish the author's premise that war elephants were much more potent in warfare than their ancient denigrators would have us believe.

Better books that I would invest in? H.H. Scullard's venerable "The Elephant in the Greek and Roman World", and, "Alexander the Great and the mystery of the elephant medallions", by Frank L. Holt


Alexander the Great and the Mystery of the Elephant Medallions (Hellenistic Culture and Society)

The elephant was, along with the horse and the camel, the only animal that commonly played a role in ancient and medieval warfare, and it remains the only animal whose personal performance can influence the course of a battle. For centuries the elephant corps of India and southeast Asia formed the vanguard of their armies, while elephants appeared as something of an exotic terror unit in the contemporary armies of Rome, Carthage, and the Diadochi. The effect that these huge beasts had on morale was enormous, and many had been brutalized into being as ferocious as the imaginations of their enemies made them out to be. This book, a classic amongst Osprey books, is an excellent history of the role the elephant has played in man's conflicts over the course of over two-thousand years, and details the `recruitment', training, and armament of these `living tanks'.

The author breaks the book down by nation, focusing on the elephants of India, the Successors, Pyrrhus of Epirus, the Carthaginians, the Romans, the southeast Asia states like Burma and the Khmer, and then a miscellaneous list of nations that are known to have used elephants one time or another - including Iron Age China and Sassanid Persia. In each of these sections he reveals the role the elephant corps of these respective nations and peoples played in their history and major battles. Then he tackles what little is often known of the armor worn by their elephants and the number of and kind of soldiers they had to carry. Some elephants got off easy - carrying one or two men bareback - while the largest of Indian war elephants found themselves carrying up to twelve men in howdahs. The author concludes the book by discussing the tactical ups and downs of using elephants in battle, including some brutal anti-elephant tricks used throughout history.

Nossov makes a point of differentiating between the breeds of elephant used for war. The Indian elephant was the larger of the two and also tended to be more aggressive, and more desirable for rulers seeking to obtain elephants for war. The forest elephant of northern Africa, driven to extinction by Roman hunters in the 3rd Century AD, was smaller than the Indian elephant by a significant margin, carried lighter loads, and was not as combative. This latter type has gone down in history as the breed that Hannibal Barca brought across the Alps with his Carthaginian Army, though they saw little service against the Romans as all but one of them died, possibly due to disease, shortly after the arrival in Italy.

Also discussed in the book's earlier pages are the various methods the ancients used to capture wild elephants - who were then starved to make them easier to train, and were forced to watch other animals be slaughtered so that they would get used to the sight of blood and killing. It was hard, if not impossible, to make a good war elephant out of a domesticated animal - domestic elephants were both extremely expensive to take care of in great numbers and also tended to have a more mild disposition; tamed elephants who were `drafted' into military service were likely to bolt at the first sight of blood and the sound of clanging weapons - as the hapless Roman emperor Didius Julianus learned in AD 193 when he attempted to use some circus elephants to make his green army look more threatening to that of his rival Septimius Severus.

Elephants, then as now, were highly unpredictable animals who were not unknown to refuse battle with the enemy, or to go to the other extreme and attack any living thing without recognizing `sides'. Classical records mention elephants killing their own riders in their rage, and subsequently killing themselves in their grief - elephants are extremely intelligent and sociable animals who bond with their keepers. The fickle `emotions' of elephants, even single individuals, could decide the outcome of battles. It is rumored that Pyrrhus of Epirus lost Maleventum (275 BC) because of the havoc caused by a single female elephant who was distressed for the sake of her calf - after this incident it became something of a taboo to use female elephants in war.

This book's rich text is a goldmine of information presented in a highly readable fashion, but the many photographs, illustrations, and color plates are the icing on the cake. Especially enjoyable are the brilliant color plates by Peter Dennis, depicting typical Indian war elephants, Hannibal's elephants at Zama, Burmese elephants at Ayutthaya, and, most interestingly, the clash between the rival Seleucid and Ptolemaic elephants at the Battle of Raphia in 217 BC. In this battle, one of the great battles in the Wars of the Successors, Antiochus' superior Indian elephants smashed the forest elephants of his Graeco-Egyptian enemies and secured the right flank for the Seleucid Army - but then Antiochus committed the cardinal sin of ancient warfare - so caught up in the pursuit of fleeing enemies, his cavalry and elephants abandoned his infantry, who were cut to pieces by the Egyptians. This battle is one of the few well-documented elephant battles (and the only one from the Classical World) in which the elephants of the respective armies fought each other, and this must have made an awesome and terrifying spectacle for their human comrades.

This is probably on the best and most interesting Osprey books I have ever read, and I highly recommend it to anyone interested in ancient and medieval warfare, especially the role played in it by the largest animals tamed by man.

Just to be straightforward about this, I am the author of War Elephants by Praeger, published 3 years ago, about 350 pages long. Mine was the first english language book on this subject.

I am delighted that there is modern interest in the subject, and I agree with the previous reviewer that the art in the book is very nice (mine had no color, just black and white illustrations).

However, having read the Osprey book now three times, I find that about 50% of the text is directly taken from my book without credit. 25% of the sentences in the book are word for word copies. That is known as copyright infringement, and unfortunately I will have to pursue this legally. I wrote to Osprey in January 2005 proposing this book as a color adjunct to my own; they did not reply, and within a year they hired Nossov to do it, and even kept my title.

The old saying that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery is sometimes true, but not when the imitation is plagiarism, then it is sadly a bigger problem.

On the other hand, I do not say that the book is uninteresting, just that it is not original or honest, being written largely by me, not Nossov.

It's an excellent book giving an insight into the life of an elephant.Worth reading.

This book complements Dr.Sukumar's other book, 'elephant days and nights'. Whereas that book is light reading and blends anecdotal information about elephants and the fun of doing research with megavertebrates, 'The asian elephant' is for the more advanced reader with specialist information about the ecological aspects of asian Elephant.

The complete ecology and biogeography of the asian elephant has hitherto been meagre and uninformative, being limited to few paragraphs in game books and wildlife journals. This book, for the most part focuses on the ecology of Asian elephants in India, though some references are made to other populations. It provides an excellent historical perspective of the status of elephants as semi-domesticated animals, in hindu mythology and its use in medieval kingdoms. Dr. Sukumars work is probably seminal in bringing out a whole suite of relevant ecological information about asian elephants and giving it a firm footing on the conservation map.

Overall good reading and essential for the serious elephant biologist and conservationalist.

In At Large, Gary Ross presents a straight-forward account of an aging circus man who sells two elephants he has raised from babyhood, then repossesses them when the new owners fail to make their payments and the "girls" show signs of abuse. Ross pulls no punches in this amazing true story of how the nearly penniless Murray Hill manages to hide two elephants from the authorities and the furious buyers for five years. This book is very readable; in fact, it's hard to put down. It is evident that the author is determined to present an unbiased report, allowing the facts of the story to create a powerful effect on the reader. A good journalist, Ross does not force conclusions upon the reader, but presents the circumstances and charactors in a bluntly colorful and often humourous way. The beauty and grace of the elephants above all come out. But the tangled court battle for possession of these innocent creatures casts a substantial shadow of doubt and distrust on the American justice system.