literature

This is the only kindy library book that my preschooler has found that we do not already possess! And it is fantastic. We had to order it from Granny in the UK cos its out of print in Australia. Who would be a kids author if something this good goes out of print! The black cat Sid lives at 6 different houses, has 6 different owners, 6 personalities in order to get 6 dinners! But the owners don't talk to each other so they don't know about this! Then he gets a cough and has 6 visits to the vet and 6 doses of medicine. The vet dobs him in to the owners and they are cross because they didn't know about it so they put onto 1 dinner rations. But Sid is a six-dinner-a -day-cat!! So he moves (from Aristotle St. to Pythagoras Place - nice touch) into 6 new houses and the new owners do all talk to each other and know about his little ways and don't mind.

We love this book to bits - lovely pictures and easy print for a learner 4 year old reader. A classic.

This is a wonderful children's story. Young children are able to relate to the main character. A good book to accompany this is Charlie Anderson. Well illustrated.

My daughter brought this home from the school library, and we instantly fell in love with it. We have a number of pets, including cats, and have our own "Six-Dinner Madeline" to boot. This book is wonderful reading for elementary school children, and anyone who loves cats.

As always, this Snappy book is adorable and loved by our 2 year old! This book is the greates number book I've ever seen (as a preschool teacher, I've seen many), because it really encourages kids to count, in a fun manner. Each page coordinates with the number, for example, the page with the number seven has a lion with seven whiskers, but all the other creatures on the page, are pictured in sevens. The book also shows the written out and the numerical form for each number. It was an instant hit in our household!

My daughter received this book when she was a couple months old and she is now 6. She still loves it! The pictures are wonderfully colorful and the pop-ups are amazing. The book is not thick, but big, which lets for big, colorful pictures. Also, the pop-ups do a cute action as you open the page up. This book is vivid and entertaining enough to even capture an adult's attention. A definite buy!

I have a three month old daughter and her eyes light up when she sees the pictures of the animals and the bugs! The pictures are so bright and capture her attention! Hope to see more books, perhaps with sea creatures, birds, rain forest animals....! Great job!

MOTIVATION FOR YOUR CHILD TO LEARN SPANISH

HUNDIRNOS EN EL DRAMA Y LA TRAGEDIA PERSONAL...ES EL SENTIDO DEL HUMOR!
Algunas personas lo traen integrado, y son muy felices porque tienen la capacidad para reírse de si mismos...
Pero la mayoría, lo aprendemos...y a veces, a golpes. Otros, ni siqiuiera lo aprenden.

Dale a tus hijos los primeros cimientos para que desarrollen su sentido del humor con un libro como este... Y ENSÉÑALOS A REÍR !

estan aprendiendo español con este libro !
¡que metodo tan exitoso... cono tal de entenderle al chiste, SE APURAN MUCHÍSIMO Y HAN APRENDIDO HASTA MAS QUE EN LA ESCUELA !
Y los chistes son super ingeniosos y blancos

The fabulous story called "A Forgotten Poet" is worth the entire price of admission here. VN must have laughed out loud when he first got the idea, chuckled heartily as he developed it, and hummed happily to himself as he wrote it down and polished it for publication. It is superb, and superbly funny. If you haven't read it, you owe yourself the pleasure!

I would never imply that the rest of the stories in this volume can be forgotten! In fact, they all seem to be nearly as good as the one I just mentioned. Look upon this book as a box of delicious chocolates which you have not yet unwrapped.... and then unwrap and savor them at your leisure.

Highest possible recommendation!

After I first read, Lolita, I was quite eager to find more stories by this amazing author. The only other Nabokov book sold by my local bookstore was The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov. I had no idea how *fantastic* each of these stories would be. He has taken a form of writing and completely made it his own. Every single one of them is superbly written. Even the less plot-driven ones stand out for their wonderful descriptions. Nabokov has a way of somehow bringing all of his subjects to life.

So, in short, this is a great book for *anyone*. Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful.

The stories in this book (there are about 65 of them) are for the most part very short. Some of my favorite are his earliest ones, they have been translated from the Russian by Nabokov's son, Dmitri, and they are semi-autobiographical, sweet and so beautiful. Included in this book are a few chapters from Nabokov's autobiography, "Speak, Memory" which were published independently as stories. I would also recommend "Speak, Memory" without reservations. It would be a good book to read after or before this one. They are both so wonderful.

I can't imagine anyone not liking at least some of these stories, especially if you like the genre of short stories and if you are familiar with Nabokov's lucid, detailed prose. Some of them are briefer and sketchier, and some are more like small novels, some are auto-biographical, and some are like fairy-tales. All of the different kinds are good, even my least favorite stories in this vast collection have stuck in my mind. They are lovely. Everyone should own this book.

The novel is a progression of stories, each told by a different narrator, and written at a different time, but each casting light on the events and characters in the previous stories. The title, as well as the story names, seem to suggest that this is a philosophical novel about loss of identity. I don't quite take it away. It is a chilling, almost soulless evocation of the dislocations of 20th century central Europe, a time when nihilism seems most in tune with the world. Identities are not lost so much as stolen. It is written in a simple, effective style, and the plotting is ingenious and highly original. One of the characters, Richard Schley, battles for the remnant of his soul, and I enjoyed most the story narrated by him. Conversely, I found little to like or admire in the first story of the novel, so my advice to readers put off by that material is to stick with it, the rest of the novel is 5 star.

Originally published in Spain as Amphitryon (2000), Shadow Without a Name, the first of Ignacio Padilla's novels to be translated into English, was subsequently published in Great Britain (2002) and now in the United States. Born in Mexico City in 1968, Padilla is the cultural attache at the Mexican Embassy in London.

During World War II, "The Amphitryon Project" was one of the many failed attempts by Nazi officers opposed to Hitler's policies to destroy the Third Reich from within. The idea was to create a legion of lookalikes for the Fuehrer and his generals, to serve as decoys in the event of a military rout. Towards the end of the war, however, those responsible for the Amphitryon Project decided to use their imposters to replace some of the Reich's generals.

The novel begins, however, much earlier than Hitler's rise to power in 1933. In 1916, as the Austro-Hungarian Empire has "begun to dissolve into history as fast as a demon before evening Mass," two men, traveling on a train to the eastern front and the massacre on the Balkans, play a game of chess. The loser will proceed to the front lines and almost certain death; the winner will assume the other's identity and survive the war as a railroad pointsman.

Thus begins the sevenfold incarnation of Thaddeus Dreyer. Through the years, identities are exchanged, masks of deception are assumed in chameleon-like fashion, and forgery, fraud, deceit, and duplicity proliferate.

A major motif of this novel is that human beings are merely pawns at the mercy of fate. As Edward Fitzgerald wrote, in "The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam": "'Tis all a Checkerboard of Nights and Days / Where Destiny with Man for Pieces plays: / Hither and thither moves, and mates, and slays, / And one by one back in the closet lays."

It comes as no surprise when Alikosha Goliadkin, one of the four narrators of this tale, expresses the cynicism of one who lives in a deterministic, nihilistic world, a world ruled not by order but by chaos: "All we have left to us now is to beat a path leading irrevocably to the destruction of the sacred, and to accustom ourselves to the idea that poetry has no place in the melancholy corner of the universe in which we have been imprisoned. . . . God, the ubiquitous, omnipotent player insists on reducing everyone to the state of miserable chess pieces."

At novel's end, we have reason to doubt the true identity of one Adolf Eichmann, architect and engineer of "the Final Solution," the wholesale extermination of the Jews. Was the man who was arrested in Buenos Aires in May 1960, tried in Jerusalem between April and December 1961, and finally hanged in Tel Aviv on May 31, 1962, actually a double produced by The Amphitryon Project?

On the plus side Shadow Without a Name is a sophisticated, intelligent novel for the literary elite. One needs Ariadne's thread, however, to negotiate the disorienting corridors of Padilla's labyrinthine maze. Otherwise, one will become lost in its twisting corridors, devoured by the minotaur of doubt. This, then, is the negative side: the novel is complicated, confusing, and without closure. Enter this dark domain at your own risk.

Even though I love magical realism and novels set in Latin America, I was so happy to find that this debut novel by Mexican author, Ignacio Padilla was woven around a very different sort of story.

SHADOW WITHOUT A NAME is a spellbinding, hypnotic novel that takes place in various locales between World War I and World War II. The book is convoluted, labyrinthine and it's sometimes difficult to follow (it gets more and more convoluted and labyrinthine as the plot progresses). It's woven around mistaken identities and concerns the capture and subsequent execution of Nazi War criminal, Adolf Eichmann.

Although SHADOW WITHOUT A NAME is a relatively short book, it is told in five sections (and to Padilla's credit, none of them seem "too short;" he gives us plenty of information to work with). The book opens in Buenos Aires in 1997 as Franz Kretzschmar, a German refugee, relates the story of how his father switched identities with another man in 1914. Kretzschmar (the father) eventually goes to prison for causing a train derailment in which he hoped to kill Thadeus Dreyer, the man whose identity he assumed. Or did he?

Things get more complicated in the second section of the book when we discover that Kretzschmar wasn't really Kretzschmar at all...or was he?

Padilla expands his story of switched identities in the third and fourth sections until we're really not sure who is who and what is what. The fourth narrator is an English novelist named Daniel Sanderson who's writing in 1989. Sanderson gives us clues to this riddle of switched identities as he discloses the true nature of the "Amphitryon Project" (this was the name given to a Nazi project developed during the war and consisted of ensuring that every high-ranking official had a "double" in order to protect his life).

The fifth section is narrated by Padilla, himself, and to me, at least, seems to suggest that the man tried and executed as Adolf Eichmann wasn't really Eichmann, himself. But if he wasn't Eichmann, then who was he? And who was Kretzschmar? And Dreyer?

SHADOW WITHOUT A NAME contains a plot that can be difficult to follow at times, but any reader who takes the time to savor this sophisticated and intelligent book will be well rewarded. Padilla writes wonderful prose that is just perfect for this novel. It's spare and lean and intelligent. Even though the book is relatively short, it still manages to be convoluted, dense and packed with mystery. In the hands of a less skilled writer, all these switched identities could have so easily slipped into melodrama or farce, but Padilla never even comes close to that. The book is open-ended and nothing is really "wrapped up neatly," so if you need a neat and tidy ending in your fiction, I would advise you to avoid this book. If, however, you're looking for something different, something dark, something very intelligent and sophisticated, you can't do much better than SHADOW WITHOUT A NAME. This is really literary fiction at its finest.

Robert A. Heinlein was one of the original grand masters of science fiction and this Reader's Companion by James Gifford professes to be the complete and authoritative guide to his work. Gifford has catalogued over 200 works by Heinlein and provides extensive cross-referencing along with an extended chronology of Heinlein's life and major works. Beyond the well known novels and short stories there are entries for every known Heinlein work, including his nonfiction articles and essays, films, rare and never-reprinted stories, unpublished works, and even the unwritten works known only from notes and outlines.

Clearly, the more you know about Heinlein's work the more you will find this reference work to be useful. Gifford's focus is more on detailing the background and history as well as providing critical insights into these works than in providing synopses. Granted, such synopses would make this book perfect, simply because only the most ardent scholar or fan is going to have read even half of the works that Heinlein wrote, but such an omission is certainly within the purview of a Reader's Companion. I am teaching "Stranger in a Strange Land" for my Science Fiction class this semester and picked up Gifford's book to find out useful background information to pass on to my students. But once I started researching that particular topic I quickly found myself paging back and forth pursuing various threads. Devotees of Heinlein's science fiction will find this book useful, not only in providing a fuller appreciation of what they have already read, but in suggesting other works to find and devour as well.

This is probably the best reference about Heinlein's works that's ever been written. One of the best thing about it is that it's complete and very well organized, so that you can find whatever you're looking for in a few seconds, very handy.
Since I've bought it I've consulted it hundreds of times, I couldn't do without it.

This is an absolute must have for any serious Heinlein fan. Gifford obviously put a lot of work and thought into crafting the Heinlein Opus list, which provides a complete compendium of everything Heinlein has written. There are also tidbits about Heinlein work not published as well.

Gifford's precise, clear, and unbiased commentary on nearly all of Heinlein's works is interesting and concise. It does a great service by providing a clear chronological progression of Heinlein as a writer, which gives the reader a fuller understanding of the works produced at a given time in Heinlein's career. I often felt nostalgic when going through commentary because I could remember the work and the period of my life that I read it, and the enjoyment that it brought me at the time.

This book is indeed a companion for Heinlein fans.

These stories are dream-like glimpses into lives. There is no overarching philosophy behind them, only pathos. They say life is mysterious, transcient, often ugly, nevertheless beautiful. That's Chekhov, the consummate artist.

But I found the Pevear/Volokhonsky translation a little dry compared to the Garnett. Not familiar with Russian myself, I can't say if the P/V is truer to the original or not. It probably is because Garnett's Russian wasn't all too reliable, but she had a better ear. Her English is smoother, more idiomatic.

e.g. From "The Darling"

P/V : "tears occasionally came to her eyes. In the end, Kukin's misfortunes touched her, and she fell in love with him."

Garnett : "sometimes tears came into her eyes. In the end his misfortunes touched her, she grew to love him."

Sometimes is less stuffy than occasionally. "Kukin" instead of his is stilting. "She grew to love him" just plain sounds better.

I chose this selection of stories as a text for a Senior College course because it is frankly the best translation, true to the original, and with helpful endnotes. The collection is comprehensive and representative of the author's stages of writing from the brief and witty to the sensitive and profound. Besides it is a great bargain!

I've read part of the Constance Garnett translation, and, as another reviewer mentioned, it's extremely hard going. The Pevear-Volokhonsky translation is much easier to read, but, honestly, it just feels very dry and mechanical a lot of the time. The introduction made it clear that it was his intention to make the writing as spare as possible, but was it really to this extent? I give it five stars anyway because for large sections it isn't readily apparent, and because it's always possible that this is indeed how Chekhov wrote or that the flow of the original is untranslatable (although the introduction also noted that his style is much easier to carry across than that of Dostoevsky or Gogol). This is a bit of speculation, but it's possible that Chekhov is something like Hemingway in translation: the spareness comes across, but the incredibly subtle fluidity which prevents it from turning into some sort of technical manual is lost. Having read a bit of Hemingway in French, I can verify that his style is much harder to translate than it would appear. But that's just speculation, and I'll leave it to you to decide. Despite the aforementioned problem areas, this does seem to be the superior English translation, and, of course, this is Chekhov we're talking about here, so the impressions gained will inevitably be worth a bit of eye-wandering here and there.

In case you are one of the unlucky few that has not read THE SOUND AND THE FURY, let me tell you that you are missing one of literature's most prized works. As an English major, I have come across many "famous" novels that left me wondering what the author had to do (wink, wink) to get his/her novel well known. However, this novel is definitely not one of those.

In short, Faulkner's novel is about the Compson family, composed of a mentally disabled son (Benjy) , a sexual daughter (Caddy) and granddaughter (Quentin), a suicidal son (Quentin-yes, 2 Quentins!), an uncaring and greedy son (Jason) , a drunken father, a nutty mother, and a caring servant (Dilsey) and her family. The book itself is divided into four sections-one written by Benjy, one written by Quentin (the son), one by Jason, and one by Dilsey. Faulkner incorporates a HUGE amount of symbolism in this novel (something I love). However, what makes this novel famous are Faulkner's writing techniques. The first section by Benjy is pretty darn confusing, for Benjy is mentally retarded. Benjy's thoughts cover many time lengths and flash back and forth between times without any notice or any indication. The reader must figure out when something occurs. Often, only one paragraph may take place in time A, then it will switch to time B for a page, time C for a sentence, time B for 3 pages, and so on. Mostly what triggers these time changes are words. For example, Benjy is outside and hears a golfer call to his caddie (this occurs in time A). The word "caddie" triggers a thought about Caddy, his sister, and he thinks about a time in time G when somebody called out "Caddy" and so on. It sounds pretty confusing; that's because it is. Quentin's section is composed of stream-of-consciousness, something Faulkner is famous for using. Here, you are given Quentin's thoughts only. It's pretty intense to read. The last two sections are written more normally.

This book is pretty hard, I will admit. I wouldn't read it as my first Faulkner. I'd try AS I LAY DYING or SANCTUARY. I suggest getting a buddy to read it, too, so you can sort things out together or (if you must....) pick up the Cliffs Notes on it. However, don't not read this novel just because it's tough. I assure you that this book is filled with so much character depth and fascinating storyline that you won't be sorry. : )

I will not discuss the story because I assume anyone looking for this edition of the book knows something of the novel. I will say that I think this edition is the best I have ever read and I enjoyed it immensely. I read the commentary and reviews with as much interest as I did the novel itself. The editor did a good job assembling an all star cast to review the book and provide background information.
Anyone interested in this novel, first time readers or fans of the book, should own this copy. It was fabulous from beginning to end. Make sure to read all the articles and reviews, you will not be disappointed.

This book is confusing and difficult to read at first. You have to ride it like you would a "rapid river"-- just hang on, get what you can, and go back a second or third time. It might be helpful to read the background information AFTER you've read the story at least once.

Now, does this sound like too much work? Well, it isn't. Once you've done the reading, you'll realize that there is real genius at work in this text. The prose is strongly crafted, and the story that Faulkner relates is one that cannot be forgotten. You will want to read the rest of the Compton's stories-- Absalom! Absalom! is one, and you'll never think of those big gorgeous moss covered southern mansions the same way again.

This is one of Jennings' best books - definitely on a par with "Journeyer" and almost as good as "Aztec". As alsways, his historical research is immaculate, and he weaves reality into his fiction in an almost seamless way.

The story follows the travels of a circus ("Florian's Flourishing Florilegium") from America at the end of the Civil War to Paris at the time of the Franco-Prussian War. The characters are all strongly drawn, and the circus memorabilia excellent. The story line runs the gamut of emotion from humour to tragedy. Jennings is able to draw the reader into his story so that we can see the book unfolding in our imaginations.

A worthwhile read - and it would make a fantastic movie - if he were younger, Clint Eastwood would make a great Zachary Edge!

The best thing about Jennings' work is that you become smarter as you read. I learn so many things, I find myself spouting them in casual conversation. I've read all three books so many times that the covers are gone and the books are mangled. There's always a Spangle novel lying open in my house. You MUST NOT miss this trilogy, nor should you miss Aztec. I've been all over the world, learned different languages and truly lived in my mind because of this brilliant man. Enjoy and Learn!

Gary Jennings has carved out a niche for himself in modern fiction - long, intricately plotted novels based around a single character in a little known historical area. Great reads, full of love and violence, colourful and exciting. And educational - history comes alive in his books, virtually bursting out of the page to take you by the throat. Or the heart.

In Spangle he has outdone himself. This is my favourite of all his books, and perhaps the most poignant. We follow Zachary Edge, a colonel riding away from Appomattox, from his chance meeting with the down at heel circusman Florian through post Civil War America across the Atlantic to Europe, all the way to Moscow and back, ending in the beseiged Paris of the Franco-Prussian War.

Along the way Florian's circus grows and prospers, until he performs before the very crowned heads of Europe. Colonel Edge learns the circus trade, all its tricks and traditions, and we learn along with him. It is a road story of course, as all circus stories must be, but this one is longer than most, and travels a more colourful, exciting road than the circus itself.

It is a grand entertainment from start to finish, at every page revealing the fruits of Gary Jennings' research into the history of the circus.

And in these latter days, where the animals are mostly gone, and circuses are fewer than they were, it is a journey back to freeer, happier days.

One of my personal favourites, as much for the wealth of detail as for the story.

First of all, i just want to say that i enjoy most of the American Girl library, and that this one is no different. The food sounds great[read the book and you'll understand TOTALLY what i mean]but i have not found much time to make any of it.
Still, they could have been abit more detailed. And i will admit some of the games were EXTREMELY pointless and immature for my agegroup.

Overall, reccomended for ages 8-11

This is the best party book ever. There is no book that could give you better party ideas!

This book is my favorite book! It has a ton of great ideas for slumber parties. It has games, snacks to make, themes to choose from, invitations to make, and much, much more! You have to get it!