Pacific

This is an excellent guide to the conifers of the PNW. It is complete, unlike some of the other cards available which show a subset of the PNW's conifers. The format is well-thought out: excellent photos of needles and cones with highlighted descriptions of unique identifying features. It comes as a laminated tri-fold. I used the card on a hike down the CDT last summer, and found it most helpful.

After reading this book, I can say that it is very useful in the field of social studies and social welfare studies. It is well written and thoroughly researched. It is of practical use, too.

Bayard Taylor, with the eye of the photographer for detail and composition and the writing talent of the professional journalist Horace Greely so willingly paid, provides the reader with a fantastic look at California of the mid-1800's. His vivid descriptions of the people, the events, and perhaps most importantly, the pre-development beauty of California's wild mountains, seacoasts, and valleys, made this reviewer (a native Californian) long for a time machine to allow visits to the wondrous collection of experiences described by Taylor. From his many travels across the land, to his viewing of the first California constitutional convention, his words allow the reader to feel the wind in one's hair as the California-bred horses fly at top speed across the valleys and through the washes, or to become a fly on the wall as the convention delegates reach compromises which shaped and prepared the State for its Golden future. The pictures he paints of the natural environment of early California are so dramatic that they must could certainly be used to support any attempts to preserve the tragically few remaining expanses of California wilderness. This is a book for Californians (and those who love the state) who wish to return, if only for a few brief moments, to the sounds and the sights of it's birth: raw, chaotic, beautiful, yet with a rich Spanish/Mexican heritage and social codes that provided a useable framework to maintain law and order. Taylor describes it all, allowing us to understand not only what was happening, but also why. It's a great book.

Bayard Taylor, with the eye of the photographer for detail and composition and the writing talent of the professional journalist Horace Greely so willingly paid, provides the reader with a fantastic look at California of the mid-1800's. His vivid descriptions of the people, the events, and perhaps most importantly, the pre-development beauty of California's wild mountains, seacoasts, and valleys, made this reviewer (a native Californian) long for a time machine to allow visits to the wondrous collection of experiences described by Taylor. From his many travels across the land, to his viewing of the first California constitutional convention, his words allow the reader to feel the wind in one's hair as the California-bred horses fly at top speed across the valleys and through the arroyos, or allow us to be a fly on the wall as the convention delegates reach compromises which shaped and prepared the State for it's Golden future. The pictures he paints of the natural environment of early California are so dramatic that they could be used to support any and all attempts to preserve the tragically few expanses of California wilderness. This is a book for Californians (and those who love the state) who wish to return, if only for a few brief moments, to the sounds and the sights of it's birth: raw, chaotic, beautiful, yet with a rich Spanish/Mexican heritage and social codes that provided a useable framework to maintain law and order. Taylor describes it all, allowing us to understand not only what was happening, but also why. It's a great book.

For many years I've looked for a book in which I could find both factual information and deep analysis of the most important events where the U.S. armed forces have been involved. I also wanted to read something where history and military studies would be combined in a good balance. "Elements of military strategy" fills my needs. The author explains variations in strategy since the Indian Wars during the colonial period until the Gulf War. He uses common language, so that many people may have access to all information provided. However, concentration is required if one really wants to get all what this book offers, because professor Jones goes back and foth in time, establishing connections in strategy during the different historical periods he covers. Great book!

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This book has some of the nicest pictures I've seen of the waters below the surface in and near Puget Sound, and up into British Colombia.

Gordon Turner has written a worthy tribute to Canadian Pacific's flagship RMS Empress of Britain of 1931. This splendid looking vessel was the first large liner built for both crossing and cruising and the author has done an excellent job of telling the ship's story from inception to construction and then a year to year account of her world-girding cruises and Atlantic crossings (from Quebec to Southampton) and her glamourous passengers. The book is extremely attractive with superb photographs, many never published before. The illustrations of the ship's magnificent public rooms are of special interest. Fascinating appendices give all of the ship's technical details. The saddest part of the book, of course, is the complete account of her tragic loss during the early days of the Second World War when she was bombed by the Luftwaffe. Empress of Britain was the largest Allied merchantman sunk the war. The likes of her will never be seen again and Mr. Turner is to be congratulated for telling her story with such affection and attention.

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This book has to be one of the most gorgeously produced non-fiction titles in this genre you will see for a long while. As a physical object, Aughton's "Endeavour" is superb - from the quality of the paper, to the typography, to the richness of the reproductions. The design and layout is novel, imaginative and very attractive. Nota bene - this book is printed in Italy - a provenance for all that is fine in the craft and style of the printing industry.

Content wise, you will find most of this material elsewhere, but Aughton's compilation is what makes it such a special work. An illustration of Mataroa Island in New Zealand drawn by one of Cook's companions shows prominent Maori fortifications and villages. This is the site where Cook claimed NZ for the British Crown. Go there today and it has been reclaimed by forest and is home to the endangered SaddleBack bird. It is fascinating to see what has happened in 232 years.

Aughton provides an insightful interpretation as to why Cook put so much time and effort into exploring, mapping and "discovering" the East Coast of Australia (pka New Holland). Aughton notes that after completing his successful astronomical mission to Tahiti, Cook opened his secret orders from the Admiralty. "Head west along the 40th Parallel until you reach Terra Australis Incognita". Beating their way into the teeth of the Roaring Forties winds took a toll on the Endeavour. When he reached Australia, he spent months trying to find a suitable place to careen, refit and re-supply his ship. Aughton implies that the howling westerlies of 40 degrees south may have led indirectly to the British colonisation of Australia. The alternative of course is that Aussies could have been francophones, living in Terre Napoleon.

"Endeavour" is a beautiful Cook book. A feast for the eyes as well as the mind - but keep it away from the kitchen.

By Sam Bauman, Nevada Appeal Staff Writer

Coffee table books are common as snowflakes in December, but every once in a while one comes along that is photographically ahead of the rest.
Such is the case with "Endless Nevada, a Photo Essay" by photographer Larry Prosor and Nevada magazine publisher and Nevada Appeal travel writer Richard Moreno.
From the brilliant book jacket of embossed gold of a man fishing in the Truckee River to the picture of a lonely wagon road in the Jarbidge Wilderness, this is a treat to the eye.
There's plenty to read as well as vistas to enjoy. John. L. Smith, Las Vegas Review-Journal columnist, offers a foreword. The late Robert Laxalt adds an introduction, ending on a magnificent panorama by Prosor of "Moonset Over Independence Ridge."
Each chapter is headed by a slightly washed-out photo across two pages, with a small photo insert. The first chapter is titled "Overview." In it, Moreno offers a fast-moving history of Nevada, from geological formation millions of years ago to 1931, when the Legislature approved gambling and the six-week divorce residency.
The next chapter, "The Land," is a stunning collection of Prosor photographs, such as an open trail in Thomas Canyon, Elko County, and a surreal vision of geysers in the Black Rock Desert. Subsequent chapters include "Searching for Wraiths," "The Past," "Mealtime," "The People," "Gathering Places," "The Places," "A Cowboy Needs a Poem," "The Cowboys," "America's Outback," "The Cities" and "End of the Road."
Moreno writes of the Basque immigrants and the opening of their hotels and boarding houses, catering to the Basque sheepherders who descended from the hills for a good meal and soft bed.
In "Gathering Places," Moreno writes:
"Saloons have long been rural Nevada's social clubs, political meeting halls and psychiatry couches. Intimate secrets, heated words, unkeepable promises and tall tales have all be passed at least a time or two over a beer. In most small Nevada towns, the local watering holes are the places where nearly everyone meets, at least sometime during the week, to swap gossip, make deals, or just socialize. If a small town is perceived as something organic, then the saloon is its soul. It is where opinions are formed, decisions are made and, occasionally, consensus occurs."
In the introduction to "The Places," an especially striking photo shows two tiny people atop a gigantic tower of rock in the Ruby Mountains. You know no helicopter brought them to that peak.
In "A Cowboy Needs a Poem," Moreno writes:
"Cowboys are part of what defines Nevada and the West. Despite having been overly romanticized in movies, books, songs and television shows, there is really something appealing about a cowboy. Perhaps it is the perceived freedom of living out under the stars, or the way the cowboy myth neatly parallels traditional American beliefs in self-determination and hard work. For whatever reasons, cowboys fascinate us."
This is only a brief description of the wealth of beauty in photographs and graceful prose that make up this book. [For the money], it's definitely one for the coffee table.

This book is about a girl who struggles to find love in her abusive marriage. She travels west by way of the Panama Canal because her husband will not stop beating her. She meets a man and falls in love but struggles through because she is already married. The man she meats leads her to Christ and when they finally get to California she has to tell him about her husband. Then of all things her husband has traveled on an wagon train and has beaten her there. Will she conquer over this new obsticle the Lord has put in her life?