Search results for Tim S
By: Schaffer, Michael
Packed with statistics and anecdotes of the dog industry c.2007/2008, this book breezes along with some entertaining tails (ha!) and at times some glib and/or flip comparisons and light analysis. While not especially insightful, this book is a quick and mostly light read for those looking for an overview.
Reviewer: Shel
By: Holroyd, Michael
From the 9/6/08 Times review by Michael Arditti: “He [Holroyd] creates a saga in which the glories of an older generation are dissipated by children.”
Reviewer: Beth
By: Jared Diamond
This Pulitzer Prize winner addresses the question as to why human development proceeded at different rates on different continents and why some groups of people came to dominate others. It asks the question: “Why did wealth and power become distributed as they are now, rather than in some other way?”
The author examines interactions among disparate peoples at various times in history, and proposes that the answers lie not in inate ability, but in the early domestication of wild plants and animals and other benefits of environment and location. Not only is there an advantage gained by feeding nonfarming specialists for scholarship, government, and the military, but the nasty germs developed by those who lived with livestock became very potent weapons when the “civilized” came into contact with the “primitive.”
Reviewer: Bill Grosskopf
By: Schroeder, Alice
My Dad gave us three “kids” this book for Christmas; said it was “an important book” for our times. I have now–2 months later–completed the book. All 800+ pages of text plus some of the footnotes. Thanks Dad! While I agree Warren Buffett is an important man, I must (respectfully, of course) disagree that *this* is an important biography. For all but the most detail-minded, this book is skimmable or excerptable. Dip in to a chapter here and a chapter there. My favorites and somewhat representational of the whole would be: one from the early years, one of the chapters on Buffett’s relationship with Kay Graham of the Washington Post, one on Mrs. B. and one on Geicko, and one or two on Buffett’s ongoing relationship with Bill Gates. Or browse the index for topics and, and read selectively. Then call it done.
Why, you may ask? On p.478, the author–who had complete access to Warren Buffett for years– wrote: “Buffett had the energy and enthusiasm of a restless teenager; he seemed to remember every fact and figure he had ever read…” With few exceptions, the endless repetition of those details in the book, to the point that it seems the author is reciting from Buffett’s calendar, do not make a good biography. Telling us over and over, year by year, what Buffett had for lunch at each meeting – or more annoyingly what he would NOT eat – or reciting entire lists of attendees of each meeting and dinner, do not for the most part add to our knowledge of Buffett as a person or how he thought and made decisions. It does not make for interesting reading. In short, an important man, a skimmable and exhausting book.
Reviewer: Shel
By: Shaw, Janet Beeler
I was introduced to the American Girl series a few years back when I got them for my step daughter. I read hem and began to get more and more interested in their stories. My office mate is a huge AG doll collector and I asked her to check on a particular miniture doll for me; they come in two sizes. She did and I was able to obtain my very firs american Girl Doll. Her name is Samantha. Every time anew movie or book comes out I look forward, with much anticipation, to checking in out. I just saw Crissa on DVD and she was great. Kristen is next on my list. Each girl represents a different era in America’s history.
Reviewer: Longhorn Reviewer
By: Harris, Mark
Any serious or casual movie buff should read this book. It interweaves the stories of five movies nominated for Best Picture Oscar in 1967: “In the Heat of the Night”, “The Graduate”, “Bonnie and Clyde”, “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner”, and – most improbably – “Dr. Dolittle”. These disparate films, with their long, tortured development and production histories vividly described, represent a watershed moment in the history of the US film industry. The old Studio System, dominated by moguls and super-producers like Jack Warner, Joe E. Levine, Stanley Kramer, Walter Mirisch, and the like, was tottering on its last legs, consumed with turning out expensive “road-show” musicals and epics like “Cleopatra”, “The Sound of Music,” and “The Bible” – which, if successful, could put a studio in fine financial condition. But if they failed, which they began to do with shocking regularity in the mid-60s, they could break a studio and end careers.
Reviewer: David Flaxbart
By: Sigur Rós
Beautiful, gorgeous and awe-inspiring. “Heim” is “home” in Icelandic and the film documents a number of (mostly) impromptu performances by Sigur Ros undertaken around the island.
This band is off in its’ own world. Clearly, not ‘rock’ music –but it still rocks at times –they have broken new territory and are doing something that is dangerously emotional and that is hard to put into words.
Reviewer: Tim S
By: Salter, James
If you’re looking for a gift for the cook, or a good little read with your morning tea, you can’t do better than this collection of offerings
from a couple’s lifetime of reading and cooking. A portrait of big eater Diamond Jim Brady, the development of the microwave, pitting an olive, a homily on gleaning – one for every day of the year, and each entry gives pleasure.
Reviewer: Janice Duff
By: Steffen, Cristina
Interesting book with lots of information about the time period and interpersonal relationships/dynamics between influential families in a typical Mexican town.
Reviewer: Longhorn Reviewer
By: Barber, E. J. W.
The best parts of this book are the chapters on the development of string. Barber’s hypothesis is the ability to make string is an important precursor to the development of civilization. Her point is that once people can make string, then they can tie things together. This means you can make rope and rope can be used to tether an animal or child, it can be used to make fishing lines, fishnets, bags and just as importantly you can use string to carry items on your back. Once you can carry loads then you can begin to move goods. And once you can do these things you are on track to make coiled pottery and weave.
What interested me the most was the description of how easy it is to make string. The easiest way is to use already existing vines, the second step according to Ms Barber is to take plant fibers and roll them on your leg to make an every expanding string. Rope is merely a number of strings put together. The evidence cited in this book is pottery and wall paintings, since most fabric doesn’t survive. Barber examined thousands of early pots and paintings looking for evidence of early cloth making.
Reviewer: Susan Ardis
