Strategy

As the title says strategies and tools to unlock the power of the bond market. It delivers in that it covers the strategies and tools needed to make intelligent decisions on bonds. Before you look into this book I must warn you that this is not a quantitative book. This book covers such things as qoute depth, yeild curves, credit ratings and so on. The content of this book goes deeply into the determination of interest rates. From watching the Fed to reading what the market might be heading. There is a chapter dedicated to watching the Fed. One of the points that stuck me in this book is how not to follow dumb money (e.i. speculators, Anthony Crescenzi's advice is to follow the smart money.
This book is for is not for advanced for people. I'am aware that there are other books comparable to this one but this is the only book I have read and not planning to read another book comparable to this one. There are a lot of resources of in this book that make "The Strategic Bond Investor : Strategies and Tools to Unlock the Power of the Bond Market" worthwhile to read. I have to agree with one of the reviewers about his writing style, it is in fact engaging.

This book is the type of book that reminds you that stocks are not the only investment around. In plain language he discusses yield curves and backs up his information with solid charts and graphs.

Mr.Cescenzi opens your eyes to the psycology of those that sell bonds and the importance of bonds in your own personal portfolio.

Since I am an author of Futures/Commodities books and an investor in Bond Futures, I read this book to enhance my knowledge of bonds and to take advantage of the bond trading pits in Chicago.

I believe that's the only failure of the book. He discusses that there are no centralized exchanges for bonds and grossly neglects that many bonds have a futures component and are traded for only a fraction of their face value.

All in all this is a great resource book and should be seriously considered for those investors that are tired of being abused by the stock market.

Unlike books addressing stock market investing, there are relatively few investor-oriented Bond books, probably due to several reasons - (i) bond concepts are somewhat more quantitative compared to stocks, (ii) bonds have no central "bond exchanges" with readily available price quotes, (iii) bonds can't be sold and bought as easily as stocks, (iv) perception is people can't "swing for the fences" with bonds.
However, as the "Strategic Bond Investor" makes clear, it is imperative to become familiar with bond market dynamics to understand how and why interest rates are set, which in turn affects the economy and the stock market. The book does a wonderful job of laying bare the intricacies of the bond market, at the same time stays away from the more technical aspects. The writing style is very engaging, and the content is very organized. The discussion on Bond Types - how big various types of bond markets are and how they got that way, is fascinating. So are practioner-oriented "rules of thumb" permeating several chapters. Chapter on "real yields" was a bit confusing (when inflation is expected to go up or down, why do real yields move as opposed to "expected inflation"?) I initially felt the visual presentation (charts, graphs, tables etc) was somewhat limited, but as the book progressed, it seemed to be just the right amount, and contained a lot of high impact information. There is a good appendix containing a primer on economic indicators. With this, you'd be better able to judge the reaction of the market to CPI, employment, consumer sentiment, etc., etc.
The book seemed somewhat repetitive at places, but still read well. With this book, one should be able to answer: (1) How can bonds be expected to perform given the current economic information, market sentiment, etc. (2) what types of bonds can be expected to do better? I highly recommend the book for purchase. Another great book for the bond investor would be William Gross's "Everything You've Heard About Investing is Wrong!"

This is my favorite book by Mednis, and I have several of them. If you play 1. d4, this is, in my opinion, an essential book. Mednis carefully explains the strategic underpinnings of all the major d4 openings. He deliberately does not go overboard on tactically heavy openings, because he did not wish this to be a book on tactics. For instance, there is only one game on the Benoni. But you know the irony of that? His one game makes the Benoni understandable, as does his one game in the Benko Gambit (many other games in the annotations). Many other books have purported to explain the "ideas" and "strategy" behind the openings, but I have never seen a book do this so effectively. This book far exceeds works in its genre. For instance, it must be compared to such works as: Chernev's "Logical Chess" and "Most Instructive Games," and John Nunn's recent "Understanding Chess, Move by Move." For my money (literally and figuratively), "Strategic Chess, Mastering the Closed Game," far exceeds those other works, for several reasons. Regarding "Logical Chess," most chess players consider that book an incredible learning tool for newer players. It brings chess to life for many people. However, it has several major limitations: it does not deal with modern openings; it wastes many pages worth of material reiterating the same exact thoughts; its explanations are often quite superficial; and it frustrates in its failure to really explain the more complex moves. Mednis' work shines brilliantly on all these points: it handles all major modern closed openings; it never wastes ink on redundancy; its explanations are concise, poignant, and always illuminating; and it does not shy away from tactical complexity, althought that is not the focus of the book. Regarding Chernev's "Masterpieces" and Nunn's "Understanding," I do not wish to point out flaws in either of those books (Because they are both five star books to me), but in one very crucial way, the present book by Mednis is far more important to me than those books: namely, it is focused on the closed (d4) games, so it is a singular treatise on them. In that sense, it provides a comprehensive course on the d4 openings, in a way that completely prepares you to understand and play both sides of d4 openings (there is coverage of the English, Dutch, and Torre as well. Of course, this book is not an opening treatise on any particular d4 opening, so it is not a substitute for books on one specific opening. For instance, if you are going to play the Queen's Gambit Declined, you still will want to have Marovic's "Play the Queen's Gambit" or Sadler's "Queen's Gambit Declined".) By contrast, the Chernev and Nunn books are all over the map in terms of openings. The Nunn and Chernev books contain beautifully annotated games, but the games do not go together as a cohesive whole, as they do in this Mednis book. This point significantly diminishes the value of those books to me. Those books contain snapshots of beautiful chess, and they are great books as far as they go; but this Mednis book is a living instructional course on queen pawn openings, and for that it is unique and essential. Also, the games that he has chosen to illustrate his strategic themes are very beautiful games. At under ten bucks, this Dover book is one of the best values in the whole literature of chess.

This is a must have book for queen pawn players. Mednis gives good understandable annotations that are very accessable to average player. If positional chess baffles you or if you believe that tempos do not matter in closed games this book will cure both conditions. I recommend this book for any and all tournament players and I hope that you will enjoy this book as I have.

Plenty of words and no excess of variantions! A rare book that teaches how to handle openings (in this case games starting with d4). Not an opening manual, a book on ideas and plannings.

The typical flyfishing book concentrates on fishing streams of one sort or another. But trout lakes and ponds are often easier to find than good trout streams. Those who have spent any time fishing lakes know that there are some significant differences between the two venues. In this expansive tome Hughes covers stillwater flyfishing from top to bottom.

The book is broken into three parts: "reading stillwaters" which discusses the nature of the lake environment; "strategies for stillwater" which equipment, boats, trout behavior and fishing techniques; and "lake food forms and their imitations" which describes each class of fish food along with how to both select (or tie) an imitation and convincingly fish it.

The book is well organized and complete without being tedious; Hughes' prose provides pleasant reading. I know that I'll be a better lake fisher for reading this book.

I used to think that there was no strategy, per se, to fishing a lake--a big tub of water you trolled until you got an arbitrary hit.

This book takes an almost forensic view of a lake's features--water layers, vegetation, etc.--and shows how to read them and catch fish. It's much more detailed than I expected and I came away with a real sense of how to find trout as quickly as possible.

This book has many wonderful pictures of trout in their natural habitats. It tells you all you need to know about bringing in trout in lakes and ponds. I am amazed by the quality of this book. It is a wonderful book that you won't regret to buy.

Let's say you spent a decade or two poring over self-help literature from the likes of Tony Robbins, Deepak Chopra, Brian Tracy, and even the venerable Napolean Hill (as I have done). You've studied eastern traditions and mystical western writings. You've pondered the big questions, but what you want most is to find moment-to-moment meaning in your daily routine. And by the way, it wouldn't hurt if you made a million bucks, mastered the piano, climbed K2 -- or achieved whatever that goal is, that is your own "ultimate intrinsic desire."

If so, then you might want to take a look at this little book.

Read through it once and you may discern (as I did) that you don't need Robbins' 3-day, $1200 seminar. (Sorry, Tony). You don't need a nine-day zen meditation retreat. You don't even need to read another self-help book. You can go on to other pursuits, feeling confident that you are stringing together a succession of days that will add up to a glorious life lived.

I keep "Strategies" on my desk and refer to it often. The daily list of 11 points at the back, which I reread with each morning's coffee, has helped me to achieve far more than I ever dreamed. I am confident it will do the same for anyone else who reads and understands, as it already has done for hundreds of thousands of others since 1973.

Thank you, Dr. Kiev.

This book cuts right to the chase of accomplishing your goals! Each page is full of stunning insights into life, and he writes it with such clarity, he doesn't need to ramble. No nonsense self help - don't waste your life reading self-help books, get out there and work! Accomplishing your goals will make you feel better, not endless navel-gazing, and journal writing. But, don't think Kiev's writing style is flat, dry, or downbeat. Not at all. He's practical, yet optimistic, uplifting. You can open any page and find terrific insights.

I carry this book in my pocketbook at all times, for a daily reminder that is grounded in reality, and inspirational.

Long before we were informed about our "inner children" or "creeping codependence", Dr. Ari Kiev wrote this small, yet powerful masterpiece. What so many authors of this type of book take hundreds of pages to say, Kiev does succinctly and with great depth. Topics covered include goal setting, self-reliance, and relationships with self and others.

This book is one you will come back to again and again. It's message is timeless, unpretentious, and relevant to everyday life. It deserves to be on the bookshelves of every thinking man and woman. Once you get a few pages into it, you will find you can't put it down, but more than that, the investment you will have made in absorbing the wonderful content will pay dividends many times over.

John F. Kennedy's, "The Strategy of Peace," was written for his 1960 campaign and reflects on the major events of the time, and his proposed policies on all regions of the world. If you read this book now, some forty years later, you can see that he not only predicted disasters in dealing with Indochina and Cuba, he proposes ways of dealing with them that were over looked by Lyndon Johnson and every other Vietnam-era president.

John F. Kennedy's, "The Strategy of Peace," was written for his 1960 campaign and reflects on the major events of the time, and his proposed policies on all regions of the world. If you read this book now, some forty years later, you can see that he not only predicted disasters in dealing with Indochina and Cuba, he proposes ways of dealing with them that were over looked by Lyndon Johnson and every other Vietnam-era president.

Although I do not now have a copy of John F. Kennedy's The Strategy of Peace, I read it as a teenager and was so impressed by the brilliant new President-elect. He seemed to have a special concern for freedom for the new countries that had been ruled by colonial powers. One piece was an argument for independence for Algeria. At the time he made that speech (I recall that as being the original form of that chapter) Algeria was still ruled by France. Kennedy became President in 1961 and Algeria got its independence in 1962, after a long war. He was very concerned with Africa. He wrote about the Middle East including the State of Israel. He wanted the loyalty oath repealed. He was concerned with US-USSR relations. Scholars had a special duty to the country. If you can get a copy please do.

How many times have you been told that you must change your thinking about food if you want to lose weight? How many times have you been given suggestions on how to do that? I'm sure your answer is "many" to the first question and "none" to the last. That situation is now reversed thanks to Dr. Nikki's many practical strategies on helping you learn your current relationship with food which also helps you change your thinking so you'll be successful in shedding some pounds. I particularly appreciate her proofs regarding American society's craze for "thin". If you truly want to understand and change your mind about food, weight, and exercise, I promise that this is the book for you! Put all the others in the recycling bin and keep this one to reread many times as you need the support to continue your success with weight loss through smart thinking.

Unlike other books about diet this one tells you how to feel good, NOW, being the person you are. It has practical advice about getting off the dieting merry-go-round and about living life to its fullest, no matter what your size.

This book offers a wonderful approach to life whether you have body and food obsessions or not. Not only does it offer techniques to help me put food and my body in perspective, it gives me techniques I can apply to living life to the fullest.
I'd reccommend this to anyone who has ever tried a diet and felt like they failed. It will lift your spirits too. I now feel like I can eat any food that I want without fearing I won't be able to stop after the appropriate amount.

I studied under Mark DeKay, using the first edition of this book. The second edition adds all of Mark's lectures into what was already a great book, full of very helpful rules of thumb for orientation, materials, siting, and a lot of other design recommendations. A great book made even better the second time around!

A very comprehensive book which leaves you with shortness of breath after each page, covers very well all the aspects of the title and their interaction and effect on planning a building or project of any kind, and gives u alot of new ideas on how to find out the effects of sun,wind and light and from where will the effect be more and how to make advantage of each one of these elements. keeps you woundering whether what you have ever designed before was valid or not. rich in figures and examples, slightly difficult regarding the laguage. but it is worth every penney.

This book is very helpful in determining the siting of your building (or gardens)with respect to wind patterns, and sun patterns of your area. As a designer of both indoor and outdoor spaces I found it to be a practical resource for helping ensure the success of a design. When I want shade, I now know where shade will fall; when I want to fill a space with light, I now know where and when light will be there and can adjust my design accordingly. Great book! Would reccommend it to architects, landscape architects and anyone wanting to see how their designs integrate into the daily and seasonal climate, wind, and light patterns of their area. The Sun Peg Charts are especially helpful. Good starting and reference point for all designs. Definitely add this one to your library.

In order to be a strong tournament player, it is crucial to improve your tactical ability and have strong endgame technique.

Jeno Ban's _Tactics of Endgames_ will help you accomplish both.

Just a few of the things you will get out of it:

1) A strong desire to improve your endgame technique. The positions in the book look simple, but once you see the subtle (and beautiful) solutions, you can't help but see the complexity in the game of chess. This will force you to look more carefully when you start to play. You will even enjoy studying the endgame, which is usually thought of as tedious and dull.

2) Improved ability to spot tactics. Because the positions are relatively simple, basic maneuvers like forks, skewers, pins, etc. will stick out in your mind. Your standard of play will improve, and you will make fewer blunders, and will be able to calculate farther ahead.

I noticed studying a few chapters improved my game very rapidly.

3) Improved defensive skills--you will begin to learn how even the most hopeless position can contain elements of poison for the superior side. Good defensive skill will make you extremely tough to beat.

Tactics of Endgames is a steal. Get the book and enjoy trouncing your opponents in the opening, middle, or endgame.

Endgame studies unearth a whole new dimension of chess, but they're far from easy and some don't seem to be relevent to over the board play. That's where this book shines, since it has assembled studies that embody themes that are useful to the chess player. An exciting book. I'm a big fan of Dover Chess books in general because they're about a third the price of the over-priced books from Batsford, Thinker's Press, and Gambit (although many of the Gambit books are well-worth the money). As the other reviewer mentioned, the diagrams are pretty ugly and the text is in descriptive, but if you can play chess I'm sure you're smart enough to figure out descriptive :) Batsford's Endgame Magic is another great book of endgame studies in algebraic notation, so buy both because they're fun.

Ban takes an unusual apporoach. He classifies tactical themes, and uses mostly composed studies to illustrate each point. Endgames DO have some special tactics and you see them here. As an introduction to composed studies or as a more practiacl book this is very fine.

The drawbacks are the UGLY diagrams and the English notation. But this is a seriously good book.

This is an easy to read, well organized and very informative book. I highly recommend this book to the many managers who feel compelled or forced by circumstance to put people into managerial/supervisory positions without adequate training. Even with adequate training, you could still benefit significantly by giving this book a thorough workout.

Too many managers learn their trade through "On the job training" or "Trial by fire" as most managers see it. Having been the recipient of this kind of learning, I can say that Mr. Rochefort's book would have been of immense help to me as I struggled to understand the newances of team building, goal development, open communication and building employee loyalty.

Mr. Rochefort has an uncanny ability to weave fact and fiction while bringing clarity and excitement to learning about what makes a good manager and hence a good team. One can readily see how Mr.Treblid moves from confusion, anger and severe frustration, to a position of clarity of purpose and single focused direction for the team and company as he utilizes training and development skills that he gained while being involved in the sports industry and through his educational pursuits.

The lessons garnered from this book apply to seasoned vets as well as the rookies, if you are serious about learning and use the skills development exercises at the end of each chapter, you can not help but add to your management tool kit. You will also ensure that your managers will reinforce or acquire superior managerial skills and will be well prepared to lead your team to corporate and personal victory.

Real pro's don't jump into game sitautions without the benefits of warm up exercises and reinforcing skill sets, being a manager is no different we all need to practice and develop.

Ira Bailey Vice President Sales & Marketing Toronto Roadrunners of the International Hockey League

The following is was my book review. I added to what I previously sent you. As a management consultant, I found your book excellent because it encompasses the human elements that which include logic, structure and equally important using language to talk to people with human dignity. The content kept me interested because it was not a lecture but a story and a well thought out process that any manager can apply. Furthermore, I could easily recognize some of the characters, 'cause I too have encountered some the personalities described. One of my biggest beefs with the management consulting firms is that they are either weak in the human approach or they are weak with effective structures. Your program covers it all. To further substantiate some of the findings throughout your book: In 1998 I purchased a study on Change Management that was conducted by an American firm. It includes over 100 organizations from 22 countries and one of the most interesting point of this study is the greatest change management obstacles. Three change obstacles were most often cited: Employees resistant to change 39% Management behaviour not supportive of change 33% Inadequate resources or budget 14 % Other 14% I would espouse to surmise that perhaps employees resistance to change might be due to the management's negative support. Ultimately the employees relinquish with a tacit understanding for the hopelessness of change, at the end of the day employees resist anything that might not happen. Of course I would add that the latter is only one possible important factor there are several more as your book alludes to. Thanks much for articulating it so well.

As a management consultant, I found your book excellent because it encompasses the human elements that which include logic, structure and equally important using language to talk to people with human dignity. The content kept me interestd because it was not a lecture but a story and a well thought out process that any manager can apply. Furthermore, I could easily recognize some of the characters, 'cause I too have encountered some the personalities described.

One of my biggest beefs with the management consulting firms is that they are either weak in the human approach or they are weak with effective structures. Your program covers it all.

To further substantiate some of the findings throughout your book: In 1998 I purchased a study on Change Management that was conducted by an American firm. It includes over 100 organizations from 22 countries and one of the most interesting point of this study is the greatest change management obstacles. Three change obstacles were most often cited:

Employees resistant to change 39%

Management behaviour not supportive of change 33%

Inadequate resources or budget 14 %

Other 14%

I would espouse to surmise that perhaps employees resistance to change might be due to the management's negative support. Ultimately the employees relinquish with a tacit understanding for the hopelessness of change, at the end of the day employees resist anything that might not happen. Of course I would add that that the latter is only one possible important factor there are several more as your book alludes to.

Thanks much for articulating it so well.

This book is specifically engineered for the
target audience, and therefore one of the
best tools. Try this book and another book called
SURVEY OF 300 A+ STUDENTS (by Kenneth Green)
which gives a range of learning strategies for
this group.

I usually avoid published 'workbooks' for their repetitive and generic content. This is a different product altogether and offers several well designed categories and assignments that target important areas. The concepts are useful for more than just student support. Despite the plethora of information currently flooding the airwaves and bookstores, I find that the people who are responsible for creating the curriculum and envisioning meaningful programs for students who need them are basically out in the cold. We must target them! This approach can be referenced by parents on the move, by other IEP team members (unless they too are lost and clueless), teacher training personnel or anyone who is in the mix for the long haul and needs a nice compact non-technical piece of evidence. I did not use the CD- but I'm certain that it would easily justify the cost to tightfisted budget hawks. But the great thing about it is that it can be used for teacher training seminars and/or individual supervision- again, if the responsible party is competent.
Here's what it says-

In order to have faith in abilities and thus, the capacity to achieve- there have to be many EXPERIENCES of the same. (make sure they happen!)
Embittered learners become (by way of nature's survival instincts) emotionally defended and frequently engage in self-sabotage. They vent because they are in pain!
The emotional ramifications of chronic failure, make the experience of the poor student like those of a CONDEMNED PRISONER.
Reading these eloquently designed images of the sort of despair and suffering I know all to well- I felt like I was reading the National Enquirer for memory and drop-outs. But this is no scandal exaggeration- its an abominable scandal.
Buy it- try it- and feel free to give me feedback- I'd welcome it and promise to put it to good use. Don't stop now!

Now in an expanded and updated third edition, Teaching Learning Strategies And Study Skills To Students With Learning Disabilities, Attention Deficit Disorders, Or Special Needs by Stephen S. Strichart (Florida International University) and Charles T. Mangrum II (University of Miami-Coral Gables) is a "user friendly" guide intended for those involved in the education of middle school and high school special needs students. More than 150 activities such as sample problems and practice tests serve as a useful aid to teaching students how to take effective notes, budget their study time, prepare themselves for tests, and much more in this extremely useful guide with its heavy emphasis on teaching practical academic survival. An accompanying CD offers a trial version of a computerized assessment program.