Dark Celebration: A Carpathian Reunion (The Carpathians (Dark) Series, Book 14)
Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • Dark Celebration:A Carpathian Reunion
  • Third verse same as the first!
  • Great update on the Dark Series!
  • Hooray for Carpathian Reunions!! May there be more!
  • Wonderful Book
Dark Celebration: A Carpathian Reunion (The Carpathians (Dark) Series, Book 14)
Christine Feehan
Manufacturer: Berkley Hardcover
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

United StatesUnited States | Horror | Genre Fiction | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
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  1. Dark Dreamers Dark Dreamers
  2. Conspiracy Game (GhostWalkers, Book 4) Conspiracy Game (GhostWalkers, Book 4)
  3. Dark Demon (The Carpathians (Dark) Series, Book 13) Dark Demon (The Carpathians (Dark) Series, Book 13)
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ASIN: 0425211673

Product Description

in this new addition to feehan's outstanding dark series we get to meet old friends,some new characters,a wonderfully funny idea from prince mikhail and some yummy recipes from around the world!another bestseller!

Customer Reviews:

2 out of 5 stars Dark Celebration:A Carpathian Reunion.......2007-10-07

I was so disappointed in this book. My first complaint is the fact that it was published in hard back when the first 16 were paperbacks. I waited a year or more for this thing to come out in paperback before I bought it, so I actually had to go back and look through my collection just to remember some of the back stories of the more recent couples. Second complaint I just didn't care for it. I LOVE LOVE LOVE all the Dark books up to Dark Demon, that one I didn't enjoy and I really wanted to because the premise and characters were so promising. The Celebration book just had too much going on and too many characters thrown at you at once. First off the whole cooking thing was stupid, they don't eat meat it's abhorrant to them yet they are playing touch football with an overcooked turkey. It also amazed me that as powerful and invincible as the group is 30 of them in one room couldn't see that the little old lady was possessed before she stabbed Dimitri. The conversations between the life mates pretty much followed the same pattern just insert different names. The whole jaguar thing was stupid, its like everyone they meet now has jaguar blood. The only thing I liked out of the whole book was the set-up for Dimitri and Manolito's stories, hopefully Feehan will go back to the way she wrote the first couple of Dark stories. But hey I won't know until next year at this time because it's released in hard back...gotta make that extra buck$$

2 out of 5 stars Third verse same as the first!.......2007-09-28

I can't believe in like, 3 pages of reviews, I'm the only one who gets frustrated with this series.

Uck. Here's the deal. This author, while her stories have potential, is a one-trick pony. These read like Lifetime Original movies. Which, is such a shame because she has really nice moments. Shea and Jacque's meeting and "courtship" was pretty f-ing awesome. But, she REPEATS herself constantly.
Example. In Celebration, and I kid you not, an exchange just like this happens:

Male: You worked so hard on this. The kids really look like they had a great time.
Female: I know. The kids had such a good time, and they really worked hard on this.

And I swear, if I read someone saying "I am so going to..." one more time...She really dates herself when she includes idiom and coloquiolism.

And all the women are either battered, orphaned, or battered and orphaned and taking care of younger siblings or other battered orphans.

The men always refer to them as "little one" and whenever anyone refers to anyone having an emotional moment, it's either "baby" or "honey". I'm sorry. I cannot reconcile these men (who are from Hungary where English is supposedly their second language) referring to their wives as "baby" in the same breath as "little one". It totally takes me out of the story.

Simply put, Feehan gets in her own way a lot. If she would just let the conversations happen, then, perhaps things would flow more. But I find myself skipping more dialogue because it's all rehashing old storylines and unnecessary exposition.

I'll keep reading though. Because the stories are good enough that with some skimming, they keep me interested.

4 out of 5 stars Great update on the Dark Series!.......2007-09-20

I adore Feehan's whole Dark series and was excited to get this new book as it came out. It was great to catch up on all the couples, and gives a way to segue into the South American family. Definitely should read series in order before you read this book, though, or you won't really understand it.

5 out of 5 stars Hooray for Carpathian Reunions!! May there be more!.......2007-09-06

I really enjoyed all my favorites being together again for a clan gathering. I know it must have been hard to incorporate everyone into the story. My favorites were there, though some featured much less than others. The real suspense and meat of the story featured future bindings and future lifemates-to-come. But that was OK, it's typical Feehan.
Best part: Syndil being an earth healer!! That is awesome news.
Worst part: all too-brief episodic nature of our poor Prince's visits to each lifemate pair. And worrying that Gary is bad because Mrs. Sandler growled at him!
I was disappointed that Francesca wasn't featured more, she is one of my all-time favorite "dark series" heroines!
In my gut I agree with the reviewer who wrote, "This author, while her stories have potential, is a one-trick pony". But I keep coming back for more of the repetition and go-nowhere nonsense. Maybe Feehan needs a ghostwriter to help with plot.

5 out of 5 stars Wonderful Book.......2007-08-17

I loved this book I enjoyed the interaction of all the Carpathians and see how they have grown in their relationships. Its filled with laughter and romance, suspense, and danger.
Reunion in Death
Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • A veritable gem
  • Not original, but still great...
  • Great hardcover!
  • Tone down the Eve Dallas butt-kissing
  • Definitely on the Top of My In Death Favorite List
Reunion in Death
J. D. Robb
Manufacturer: Berkley
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Women SleuthsWomen Sleuths | Mystery | Mystery & Thrillers | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0425183971

Book Description

A birthday bash sets the scene for a frightening reunion with a killer from Eve Dallas's past.

Download Description

"From #1 New York Times bestselling author Nora Roberts, writing as J.D. Robb, comes a compelling new novel in the futuristic series.A birthday bash sets the scene for a frightening reunion with a killer from Eve Dallas's past. At exactly 7:30 p.m., Walter Pettibone arrived home to over a hundred friends and family shouting, "surprise!" It was his birthday. Although he had known about the planned event for weeks, the real surprise was yet to come. At 8:45 p.m., a woman with emerald eyes and red hair handed him a glass of champagne. One sip of birthday bubbly, and he was dead. The woman's name is Julie Dockport. No one at the party knew who she was. But Detective Eve Dallas remembers her all too well. Eve was personally responsible for her incarceration nearly ten years ago. And now, let out on good behavior, she still has nothing but bad intentions. It appears she wants to meet Dallas again-in a reunion neither will forget."

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars A veritable gem.......2007-05-20

I am an avid fan of this series. Haven't read all of them yet but I'm working on it. I liked every single one that I have read so far but I must say I enjoyed this one more than most of the others. Maybe it's the katharsis of the main character when she finally visualises her past or maybe because the villain is another woman, or maybe because I enjoy the banter between characters. All in all I think it's up there with "Naked" the one that launched them all.

4 out of 5 stars Not original, but still great..........2007-03-22

While the plot itself might not be an original idea, the spin Eve Dallas et al place on this story makes it 100 percent their own.

When a criminal from Eve's past is released, a showdown between the two former enemies is all but certain. Will Roarke be injured in the ensuing battle? Who will the killer harm to get Eve's attention? How badly does she want revenge?

We all know Eve isn't going to hide. She's not even willing to "play it safe." Typical to Eve Dallas, she meets this challenge head-on in a clash that will leave readers VERY satisfied.

5 out of 5 stars Great hardcover!.......2006-12-27

The "in Death" books were published in paperback here until recently... I was able to find a seller in England who provided me with many of the older books in the series in hardcover, and was excited to find this one.

Great Eve Dallas book - I have almost all of them, and love them!

5 out of 5 stars Tone down the Eve Dallas butt-kissing.......2006-11-29

I'm giving the book five stars, because it's good despite a few problems.

Julianna Dunne was a fascinating villainess. What makes her fascinating is she actually seduced her stepfather and cried rape to gain sympathy, which is rather ironic as the author is constantly using the fact Eve's father did rape her to gain sympathy for the character. Thankfully, the author also breathed some new life in the tired dream of the red room and the blood that's been shoved down the viewer's throat for the last 12 or 13 books.

Julianna's has returned to wreak revenge on Eve and she's decided the way to pay her back for sending her to prison is to kill Eve's husband, Roarke. I wish they would have taken it to the mat in regards to Roarke being in danger, since Eve saw the instant Julianna tried to give Roarke a poison glass of champagne, so you didn't really feel Roarke's life was ever really that much in jeopardy.

There was also a nice little side mystery of a cold case involving the murder of Marsha Stibbs. I applauded Eve when the ever-annoying Peabody felt sorry for the woman who killed her so she could have her husband and Eve rightfully said the one she should feel sorry for is Marsha Tibbs.

The bad parts of the book regard the inappropriately creepy Dr. Mira and the bootlicking Peabody. I don't know where the author is trying to go with the Eve/Mira relationship, but it doesn't work and she comes off desperate to form some kind of bond with a woman who just isn't that into her. She was practically begging Eve to take her with her when she went to Dallas declaring she could make it all better for her if she did. Eve, however, wanted Roarke with her, as he's the one she's able to open up to about her past. Then Mira went over a bugged Roarke to see how he was feeling. I really think the Mira character needs to be drop-kicked from the series, because she really doesn't work in the capacity the author is trying to go for. As for Peabody, the only thing that makes her tolerable is her relationship with McNabb. She started mouthing off to Roarke in defense of her idol, when he was allowing her equally annoying parents to stay in his house, and if she'd done the same with Eve, she would have been kissing her butt and begging forgiveness, but she never offered one word of apology to Roarke for her behavior. Of course the most nauseating Peabody moment of all was declaring to Eve, "You're my god."

To be frank, with the exception of Summerset, all the characters at one time or another have to worship at the shrine of Eve Dallas. Roarke gets away with it, because unlike the others, he'll also only put up with so much of Eve's crap before he gets fed up and tells her off. To the others Eve Dallas is their own little tin god who they genuflect to on a regular basis.

As a reader, I'd prefer to make up my own mind about Eve, and not have all the characters telling me she's the next best thing to sliced bread.

Still, Julianna, Roarke and Eve make this book a great read. Buy it for them and just skimmed through the butt-kissing when it gets too deep.

5 out of 5 stars Definitely on the Top of My In Death Favorite List.......2005-08-10

It is so hard not to have ALL of the books at the top of the "favorite" list since each story is just as good, if not better, than the last. "Reunion" brings back a case Eve had closed more than 10 years ago, however, the system failed and allowed this cold killer, Julianna Dunne, to be released from prison. Julianna attacks her victims with cyanide and is a champ at disguise. She is cold and callus and out to get her revenge on Eve (for being the cop who locked her up the first time) in the worst possible way - by killing Roarke. The story is written very well (the scene in Dallas in heart wrenching) and I particularly enjoyed the comic relief with Eve putting up a big fight about medical care and an even bigger one when Roarke infringes on her territory at Cop Central. That situation was very well played out (I had read some negative reviews on the way Nora handled this, however, I do believe Roarke saw the error of his ways and more than made up for it by the end of the story). This book also celebrates Eve and Roarke's first wedding anniversary in a way that brought tears to my eyes. Any story that can touch you that deeply, is definitely well written. Also, I couldn't conclude my review without acknowledging the supporting characters as well. They always add to the excitement, suspense and romance and the series would be nothing without them.
Reunion (Redemption Series, Book 5)
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • Reunion
  • Kingsbury book
  • Greatness again!
  • Moved me to tears
  • Reunion
Reunion (Redemption Series, Book 5)
Karen Kingsbury , and Gary Smalley
Manufacturer: Tyndale House Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

ContemporaryContemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
Domestic LifeDomestic Life | Women's Fiction | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
GeneralGeneral | United States | World Literature | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
Smalley, GarySmalley, Gary | ( S ) | Authors, A-Z | Religion & Spirituality | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0842386882

Book Description

The Redemption series won Christian Retailing's 2005 Retailer's Choice Award for Best Series! In addition, Reunion was a 2005 Gold Medallion Award finalist!

This touching story allows us to see into the lives of the Baxter family as Erin and Sam attempt to adopt a child. As the family looks forward to a heartwarming reunion, they find out that Mr. and Mrs. Baxter have a secret that could change their lives forever.

Download Description

This touching story allows us to see into the lives of the Baxter family as Erin and Sam attempt to adopt a child. As the family looks forward to a heartwarming reunion they find out that Mr. and Mrs. Baxter have a secret that could change their lives forever."

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Reunion.......2007-06-27

This book as well as the whole Redemption Series is GREAT. I have purchase the next series on the Baxter Family as well as the Sunrise Series (still waiting for book 2). My husband, who never reads a book, started the Redemption Series on vacation and he can't put it down. You have to know my husband to understand how good the Series is.

5 out of 5 stars Kingsbury book.......2007-05-24

This is a terrific series! Karen captures your heart with her stories and keeps the focus on the Lord. Outstanding!!!

5 out of 5 stars Greatness again!.......2007-01-10

Loved it....lives up to what I have come to expect of Karen Kingsbury.

5 out of 5 stars Moved me to tears.......2006-07-10

Rarely does a book move me to tears but this one did. This book was well written. I though Elizabeth and her family demonstrated great courage during this time of adversity. Not all was sad in the book. I don't want to give too much away for those who haven't read the book yet but you will be pleased at some of the ways God is working miracles in the lives of some of the other Baxter clan. Even though this is the last one in the Redemption series it is not the last we will see of the Baxters. Looking forward to getting glimpse of thier lives in the new series which is centered around the long lost Baxter son Dayne Matthews who we are introduced to in this book.

5 out of 5 stars Reunion.......2006-07-01

Awesome read can't wait for the next series. Highly recommend this and I have serveral times already.
Found (Firstborn Series #3)
Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • Found
  • Donalee T
  • SUPERB Service
  • Karen's best series
  • Great!
Found (Firstborn Series #3)
Karen Kingsbury
Manufacturer: Tyndale House Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0842387455

Book Description

John Baxter hires a private investigator to fulfill his wife's dying wish--that they find their firstborn son and make him part of the Baxter family. Meanwhile, top Hollywood actor Dayne Matthews undergoes a personal search for truth despite great loss, and Christian Kids Theater director Katy Hart makes a decision that could take her from the simple life she has grown to love.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Found.......2007-06-12

Book 3 of the Firstborn series was so touching. My heart did flips while reading it.

5 out of 5 stars Donalee T.......2007-05-13

I absolutely love everything Karen K writes. They are such good clean moral books and that is something that is very hard to find now days. Everyone thinks there should be lots of premarital sex in books today. I really appreciate your writing.

5 out of 5 stars SUPERB Service.......2007-01-16

This order was shipped and arrived within just a few days of my order. The book itself was in excellent condition and I will be placing future orders with this very responsive seller.

5 out of 5 stars Karen's best series.......2007-01-10

The Redemption Series followed by the Firstborn series are the best of Karen Kingsbury. Each book leaves you wanting to read the next. It is hard to review just one book in this series. If you haven't read the Redemption series, start at book one and go through from the beginning, then on tho the Firstborn series.

5 out of 5 stars Great!.......2006-11-28

I buy all of Karen's books. I liked Found and the other Firstborn books. I loved the Baxter family, and it's nice to see them in this series also. Karen is one of my favorite authors! I can't wait to read the next one!
Spaghetti And Meatballs For All (Marilyn Burns Brainy Day Books)
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • Brainy and Fun
  • Meatball the Pirate
  • Spaghetti and Meatballs For All
  • Pima Community College- Student Review
  • Area, perimeter, and multiplication for all!
Spaghetti And Meatballs For All (Marilyn Burns Brainy Day Books)
Marilyn Burns
Manufacturer: Scholastic Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

CountingCounting | Basic Concepts | Baby-3 | Children's Books | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0590944592

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Brainy and Fun.......2007-05-04

A real hit with our six year old. The illustrations are wonderful and the educational aspect is not totally obvious. A very entertaining book that's he took to share with his class at school.

5 out of 5 stars Meatball the Pirate.......2007-04-06

Once upon a time many years ago I watched my daughter Emma play with her cousin Brian, whom Emma lovingly referred to as Meatball, and I wondered how long it would take before he began to cry. At eight years old Meatball looked like a smaller version of Rhett Butler, he talked with a squeaky voice that was struggling to mature, and his blondish hair oddly matched the color of his skin. Every game between the two kids eventually turned sour--a bump of the head, a twisted arm or even harsh words would send the boy reeling into the kitchen looking for comfort. While I admired his theatrics, I did not acknowledge them. Emma, on the other hand, like to pretend he was her plaything, a doll she collected. Take, for example, the afternoon she dressed him up like a pirate and sent him out into the yard with a steak knife searching for the neighborhood tabby cat. Florence, the woman that lived across the street and spent most of her days with her nose between the blinds of her front window, knocked on my door and demanded that I do something. I invited her in for coffee but she ranted and raved, cluck-clucking about manners and responsibilities and child-rearing, none of which I particularly cared to hear about. Meatball ran inside and tugged at Florence's blue polyester pants. "Don't worry," he said. "I buried the knife in the backyard." Florence grabbed his wrist and told him that he needed to dig it back up. He sighed heavily, stared at the ground and then began to cry. I pulled the cigarettes from the pocket of my robe, lit it, and waved him inside.

Charlotte, Meatball's mother, picked him up every day at 5 o'clock. She sat on the couch with Meatball on her lap and listened as he recounted his day. She disregarded any of Emma's attempts to defend herself when Meatball claimed she had harmed him. But who would believe an eight-year-old boy that said his cousin had instructed him to hunt for prey and bring back souvenirs?

5 out of 5 stars Spaghetti and Meatballs For All.......2007-02-20

Cute way of having students know how they use math in their everyday lives. Great explanation of the mathmatical idea behind the book.

5 out of 5 stars Pima Community College- Student Review.......2005-03-11

I read this book to my sister's kids (ages 4-8) and they all really enjoyed it. They had a lot of fun with the story (and didn't even know they were learning). This book is great for kids.

5 out of 5 stars Area, perimeter, and multiplication for all!.......2004-11-16

I am a student at the University of Arizona South, majoring in elementary education. I recently read this book to a class of 3rd grade students. The children anjoyed watching as the guests arrived at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Comfort and re-arranged the tables and chairs each time someone else showed up. They also enjoyed the fact that only Mr. and Mrs. Comfort's names were given and everyone else was referred to by their relation to the hosts, "Mrs. Comfort's brother's daughter's twin sons". The children loved the chaos as more and more people arrived and fewer and fewer place settings were left available, while "extra" chairs piled up in the periphery. Every student was engaged in the book because each and every one of them knew what Mrs. Comfort knew, that without a seating arrangement of eight seperate tables each seating four people, there would not be enough room for everyone to sit down. And by the end of the book, they found out they were right! The extensions available at the end of the story increase the possible learning to be attained, illustrating how to actively engage the children in hands-on activities to learn about area, perimeter, multiplication and division. Children can find out how many seats are available for each table formation in the book. They can also determine how many meatballs everyone can eat. This is a lively and interesting tale that evolves into spirited and animated discussions involving mathematical concepts. The children had a wonderful time listening to the story, then engaging and actively participating with their eight squares and 32 paper clips (tables and chairs) as we went through the story page by page with them arranging and re-arranging the seating. It was fantastic to see them so happily involved with LEARNING MATH!
Reunion in Barsaloi
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • If you loved the first one, you'll love this one too.
Reunion in Barsaloi
Corinne Hofmann
Manufacturer: Arcadia Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

GeneralGeneral | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 1905147139

Book Description

In a sequel to her international bestseller The White Masai, Corinne Hofmann continues her personal account of a white European woman in love with a Masai tribesman in remote Kenya. Fourteen years after fleeing with her baby daughter, Corinne returned to Kenya in the summer of 2004 to reunite with Lketinga and his family in their village, Barsaloi. Nervous and uncertain as to how he would react on seeing her again, she found to her relief that she was welcomed unreservedly by all who remembered her—Lktinga, who still thought of her as his number one wife; his brother James, now a schoolteacher; and especially Lketinga's mother, who had looked after Corinne with such care all those years before.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars If you loved the first one, you'll love this one too........2007-09-02

Just a short review, my title really says it all. Simple writing style again, but the story is an adventure so the writing doesn't need to be. Ms. Hofmann travels back to her village in Kenya where she married and lived with a Masai warrior for years, and bore him a child. Fourteen years later, they accept her back. Her husband seems to have changed for the better (not as immature and petulant as in the first book). The rest of the village is over joyed to have her back for a short visit. She also takes a couple of days to visit the film set of the White Masai movie being filmed (which I would love to see but it's in German). Careful when ordering this book... the ISBN number is the same as another Swiss book and I ordered the wrong one by accident (it had the same title and same ISBN, but different author) So be careful and make sure it's Ms. Hofmann who wrote it! My only criticism, I would love to see pictures of the teenage Napirai (her daughter with Ltekinga) but I can understand her protecting her identity. Also, I'd love to know how to pronounce Ltekinga too! Over all I couldn't wait for this book to be printed in English and it was satisfying to be able to get some closure and updates on the African family members and what has happened to her and her daughter also, since the author returned to Switzerland.
Red Hot Reunion
Average customer rating: 4 out of 5 stars
  • Not so Hot!
  • heated contemporary romance
Red Hot Reunion
Bella Andre
Manufacturer: Pocket
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

ContemporaryContemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 1416524185

Customer Reviews:

3 out of 5 stars Not so Hot!.......2007-10-07

I loved Bella Andre's first two books. I thought the sex was exciting and the love stories sweet. In "Red Hot Reunion" I could tell that the author really wanted to make a point of how in love the couple were in college and how much their love was fated to be. But frankly, the sex was all very basic stuff and not near as spicey and erotic as Bella's "Tempt Me, Taste Me, Touch Me." That book I loved.

If you want a sweet love story, you will likely really enjoy this book. If you also wanted some racey love scenes that raise the temperature to a boil, then this is not your book.

5 out of 5 stars heated contemporary romance .......2007-03-10

At college Emma Cartwright fell in love with Jason Roberts. However, instead of following her heart she listened to her parents that she should marry her own kind not a scholarship type. She wed Steven instead and after a few unhappy years with the womanizer they divorced. She regrets heeding her parents' admonition as she knows she threw away the love of a lifetime.

Ten years later they will see one another for the first time since she dumped him at the Stanford University class reunion. He, like his two scholarship friends, Rick Stodler and Ace McKinty, has become a success as a celebrity chef with a TV show and a bestselling book. He intends to attend only to avenge the affront that has burned his heart. However, when they see one another for the first time in a decade, the attraction remains strong, but not as powerful as his thirst for vengeance as he holds her culpable for the big hurt that haunts him regardless of the myriad of women he has been with since.

RED HOT REUNION lives up to its title and more as the lead couple have a second chance at love if they can get past the recriminations and go to the heart of the matter between them. The story line contains light bondage as Emma and Jason provide torrid sexual encounters. The suspense remains whether Jason can see the truth of his failure a decade ago; Emma seen it form the moment she realized Steven was cheating on her while saying I do. Belle Andre writes a heated contemporary romance starring likable lead characters who hopefully find the ties that bind outside the bedroom as well as those they already have found inside the bedroom.

Harriet Klausner
Reunion (The Mediator, Book 3)
Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • Great Book
  • A Ghostly Good Read!!
  • OMG! what a GREAT book!!!!!
  • The Mediator 3: Reunion
  • okay
Reunion (The Mediator, Book 3)
Meg Cabot
Manufacturer: HarperTeen
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0060725133
Release Date: 2004-12-28

Book Description

The RLS Angels are out for blood, and only Suze can stop them—since she's the only one who can see them. The four ghostly teenagers died in a terrible car accident, for which they blame Suze's classmate Michael... and they'll stop at nothing until he's joined them in the realm of the dead.

As Suze desperately fends off each attempt on Michael's life, she finds she can relate to the Angels' fury. Because their deaths turn out not to have been accidental at all. And their killer is only too willing to strike again.

Download Description

"

The RLS Angels are out for blood, and only Suze can stop them--since she's the only one who can see them. The four ghostly teenagers died in a terrible car accident, for which they blame Suze's classmate Michael... and they'll stop at nothing until he's joined them in the realm of the dead.

As Suze desperately fends off each attempt on Michael's life, she finds she can relate to the Angels' fury. Because their deaths turn out not to have been accidental at all. And their killer is only too willing to strike again.

"

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Great Book.......2007-04-09

Such an awsome book the whole series is great everyone who loves romance action all in one should read!

5 out of 5 stars A Ghostly Good Read!!.......2007-03-08

I really enjoyed reading this book. It has lots of great details. When Susannah found out about this murder, she just had to investigate it. With the help of Father Dom and Jesse she finally got the killer but was put into hospital. It would help if you read the first two books or else you will get really confused with all the names and places. This book has lots of twists and turns and will keep you reading. You won't want to put it down!

4 out of 5 stars OMG! what a GREAT book!!!!!.......2007-02-11

whoa!! this book is SO amazing! it's about this girl, suze, and her supposed boyfriend, michael meducci, and he could be a possible killer of the RLS angels! he has had a grudge against them and only for one reason that he could be able to kill them; jealousy! jesse and father dominic have helped out quite a bit but not enough that suze ends up in the hospital! i HIGHLY recommend this book! and i cannot wait to read the next one!!!!

5 out of 5 stars The Mediator 3: Reunion.......2006-12-21


The Mediator 3: Reunion is about Suze Simon, a fifteen-year-old girl with a very special gift, she can speak to those beyond the grave. Awesome, right? Wrong. Ghosts aren't always the most cooperative people. So, when Suze tries to help four teenage ghosts that were in a car accident, they aren't very thankful, unless you'd say that trying to kill her is a proper "thank you". However, Suze will find out some secrets about someone she never thought would keep them from her and that this car accident might not have been an accident at all.
This book teaches readers always to be happy with who they are. Suze has to try to accept that she is a mediator and has to adapt to being haunted every day of her life. She's spunky and her attitude is as unpredictable as the weather but she's also very generous and always willing to help. It really shows people how we take everyday things for granted.
Meg Cabot does an extraordinary job with this book with a perfect balance of mystery, teen troubles, and family issues. It takes you deep into Suze's life and feelings. I couldn't pry my fingers off of it. The Mediator is an amazing series and I've read most of them, but this one was by far my favorite. So, if you like suspense and surprises, you'll love The Mediator 3: Reunion.

3 out of 5 stars okay.......2006-04-21

This book was interesting to me and usually I don't read books like this but it is appealing. I like the characters and the style of writing that meg cabot uses. But I just didn't like the way the ending turned out but I still want to read the rest of the series.
Race and Reunion : The Civil War in American Memory
Average customer rating: 4 out of 5 stars
  • The South Wins the Reconstruction
  • A top pick
  • The Civil War in American Memory
  • A deeply flawed book
  • A beautiful work of history
Race and Reunion : The Civil War in American Memory
David W. Blight
Manufacturer: Belknap Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0674003322

Book Description

No historical event has left as deep an imprint on America's collective memory as the Civil War. In the war's aftermath, Americans had to embrace and cast off a traumatic past. David Blight explores the perilous path of remembering and forgetting, and reveals its tragic costs to race relations and America's national reunion.

In 1865, confronted with a ravaged landscape and a torn America, the North and South began a slow and painful process of reconciliation. The ensuing decades witnessed the triumph of a culture of reunion, which downplayed sectional division and emphasized the heroics of a battle between noble men of the Blue and the Gray. Nearly lost in national culture were the moral crusades over slavery that ignited the war, the presence and participation of African Americans throughout the war, and the promise of emancipation that emerged from the war. Race and Reunion is a history of how the unity of white America was purchased through the increasing segregation of black and white memory of the Civil War. Blight delves deeply into the shifting meanings of death and sacrifice, Reconstruction, the romanticized South of literature, soldiers' reminiscences of battle, the idea of the Lost Cause, and the ritual of Memorial Day. He resurrects the variety of African-American voices and memories of the war and the efforts to preserve the emancipationist legacy in the midst of a culture built on its denial.

Blight's sweeping narrative of triumph and tragedy, romance and realism, is a compelling tale of the politics of memory, of how a nation healed from civil war without justice. By the early twentieth century, the problems of race and reunion were locked in mutual dependence, a painful legacy that continues to haunt us today.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars The South Wins the Reconstruction.......2007-09-22

A nation's memory is composed of many facets some of which are mythical while others are more accurate. David W. Blight's book examines in detail how American memory of the Civil War during the period from 1863, the war's turning point, to 1915, its semicentennial, was constructed. His dissection of this memory revolves around his primary theme of the interplay of race and reunion and how reunion triumphed over emancipation: Southern white-supremacists joined with Northern and Southern reconciliationists to overcome emancipationists' efforts. He analyzes in detail the various facets of the composition and formation of this memory providing a valuable avenue for understanding the fifty-two years he covers and also insights to American racial history to the twenty-first century.

Race and Reunion uses many primary sources covering a broad range of thought, including fiction and nonfiction, which gives his book give a comprehensive view of the many aspects of the memory of the war. Several of these sources show the surprising overt intention of some Southerners soon after the war to ensure that not only would Reconstruction be overthrown but that the South would return to the status quo antebellum by promulgating its view of the war. Politics helped sink radical Reconstruction and efforts of Southern writers and historians ensured that the Southern view of history would prevail. Slavery could not be reinstituted, but the subservient relationship of blacks could, and through the efforts of Southern writers, orators, politicians, and much physical violence, it was. Jim Crow laws then ensured resubjugation of blacks.

Southern women's groups, writers in periodicals such as the Southern Magazine and later the papers published by the Southern Historical Society, joined with unreconstructed rebels such as former General Jubal A. Early to attempt "to vindicate Southern secession and glorify the Confederate soldier ... [and] to launch a propaganda assault on popular history and memory (p. 79)." Some Southern authors even made the amazing argument that had the North not begun the war, the South would have ended slavery on its own. In addition, because the North, especially New England, was responsible for transporting slaves from Africa to America, it was more blameworthy than the South for the institution of slavery; therefore, since all shared responsibility and blame, neither section should be singled out.

The Southern "Lost Cause" school formed to help Southerners cope with the devastating military and economic losses and to ensure that its military loss would not carry over to political and social arenas. It joined with the romantic "moonlight and magnolia" view in the late nineteenth century which was epitomized by D.W. Griffith's 1915 Birth of a Nation film epic. The film graphically portrayed virtually all of the stereotypes espoused by the Lost Cause school most importantly showing how child-like blacks adhered to the Southern cause and detailed the "evils" of Radical Republican Reconstruction which included black rule, Northern Carpetbaggers, and Southern Scalawags.

One of the chief tenets of the Lost Cause school was its portrayal of black slaves by writers such as Nelson Page as faithful, loyal workers and servants who actually benefited by slavery. Slavery took untutored, uneducated, pagan, non-English speaking savages and gave them Christianity, the English language, and worthwhile skills needed to become civilized. Here, slaves loved their masters and were better off under slavery than they were under Reconstruction.

The white Southern efforts to restore its antebellum weltanschauung succeeded for many reasons, the primary one being the desire found in most white Americans to come to a final resolution for the devastation and death brought by the war. Once both sides passed the initial period of shock and anger immediately after the war, moves towards reconciliation began especially among veterans. The Lost Cause school tenet which celebrated the valor, patriotism, and sacrifices of the Southern soldier soon accepted white Northern soldiers as part of that cohort. Shared memories of these soldiers helped to paper over hatreds engendered during the war except for some who still carried memories of prisoner of war experiences. But despite these, most veterans came to share the common experiences of war and their reconciliation helped the sections to join in mutually forgetting the horrors of war and in the celebration of the soldiers' valor. The famous 1913 Gettysburg reunion of veterans from both sides epitomized this spirit. In this spirit of forgetting and of a new nationalism, the "Race Problem" was shunted aside as too divisive and difficult to resolve. Too, the majority of whites saw no evils in resubjugation of blacks believing that emancipation was sufficient by itself. The "Separate but equal" doctrine promulgated by the U.S. Supreme Court its 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision was acceptable to whites. Certainly white society did not want blacks as social equals.

Race and Reunion is an extraordinarily valuable book. Despite some unnecessary repetitions of its theme perhaps due to the book's somewhat non-sequential structure, its lucid depiction of how the South's view of the Civil War overcame emancipationist's efforts is clearly shown by his use of a plethora of sources. Especially important is his effective use of black citizens including authors, speakers, clergy, veterans, former slaves, and college professors, to portray black majority and minority views. Despite efforts of writers like W. E. B. Du Bois, blacks lost most of the benefits of emancipation but more importantly, the Southern views of the war persisted long after 1915 as the established American memory. Not until the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960's was the South's victory in establishing its memory of the Civil War as the "correct" American history overcome.

5 out of 5 stars A top pick.......2006-01-05

Race and Reunion is definitely on my "top ten list" for Civil War books. The story of how the war was remembered, and its significance debated is as important, if not more so, as the various battles. Blight uses a wide range of sources North and South, concluding his narrative with the 50th anniversary commemorations.
I agree somewhat with the critique that that Blight is too dismissive of the positives of the re-unionist movement. Although post 1876 re-unionism helped ensconce Jim Crow, the genuine embrace of moderate northerners and southerners was beneficial to nationalist growth to such an extent it is now taken for granted. You might compare the French and American Armies of World War I if you don't think there was a positive effect of such a reunion; the legacy of the French Revolution being bitterer. I would recommend reading Ari Hoogenboom's biography of Rutherford B. Hayes for further evidence of the positives of the reunion movement.

5 out of 5 stars The Civil War in American Memory.......2005-10-24

If war among the whites brought peace and liberty to blacks, what will peace among the whites bring?" Fredrick Douglass, an African American and leading abolitionist during the Civil War era, realized the importance of this question at the conclusion of the war. The Confederacy may have been defeated on the battlefield, but how Americans entered the meaning of the war into their historical consciousnesses had major implications for the United States. In his classic essay titled "What is a Nation?" Ernest Renan discussed the concept of memory and how citizens' remembrances of events contribute to nation-building. Furthermore, he asserted that a nation requires a great deal of forgetting. In Race and Reunion, David Blight, a professor of History and black studies at Amherst College, examines three different visions, or memories, that Americans formed in regards to how they interpreted the meaning of the Civil War. These three different memories competed with one another and in the end one memory gained widespread acceptance while the essence of the Civil War was forgotten. As a result of this, the North and South put their differences behind them and reconciled, but at the same time the races divided.

Blight's monograph illustrates that different memories - the reconciliationist, emancipationist, and followers of the "Lost Cause" - were held by different groups of people following the war. The Civil War caused an enormous amount of death and destruction and as a result the government needed to decide if they wanted the country to heal or if they wanted to impose justice on the South. Frederick Douglass believed, "There was a right side and a wrong side in the late war" and wanted the federal government to implement policies that would protect the recently freed slaves and bring them to an equal status with their former masters. For a brief period following the war, the Radical Republicans seemed to have some success with securing rights for the blacks through the federal government. However, as followers of the "Lost Cause" began to promulgate their beliefs, the meaning of the Civil War began to be forgotten and historical amnesia began to set in. Through violence and measures taken to write history to support the Southern cause by placing the blame of the war on the North, the emancipationist vision of the war began to fade.

Blight focuses on examining the reconciliationist vision of the war and how this memory became enmeshed in the minds of most Americans. Albion Tourgée, a literary figure of the time that adopted an emancipationist vision, asserted, "Only fools forget the causes of war." Yet forgetting the meaning of the war is exactly what happened in the fifty years following America's second revolution. Facing the difficulty of securing rights for the emancipated slaves in the South, the Republicans curtailed their commitment to African Americans. No other event signifies this retreat than the Compromise of 1877 in which Samuel Tilden agreed to let Rutherford Hayes take the presidency under the condition that the last remaining Union soldiers would leave the Southern states. This event legitimized allowing the sections to reconcile while the rights of the blacks were denied. This sense of reconciliation can be found amongst the soldiers themselves. Rather than focusing on the causes of the war, past soldiers, both North and South, found commonality in the suffering, bravery, and honor that they experienced during the war. The photo that Blight includes on page 389 illustrates this idea. Taken during the semi-centennial celebration of the battle of Gettysburg in 1913, the photo shows ex-Confederate and Union soldiers clasping hands over the stone wall located on the field where Pickett's charge took place. Clearly, the meaning of the war was gradually forgotten as the nation healed and the sections reconciled at the expense of African Americans.

Blight's greatest contribution is that he shows the importance of the role that memories play in the formation of a nation. Like Renan, he understands that how major events have been remembered, or forgotten, have major implications for a nation. Nation-building is a continuous, ongoing process. The ways in which people choose to remember significant events are directly related to this process. Blight uses various statements from a wide variety of individuals as evidence of how different people interpreted the meaning of the Civil War. For example, Blight includes many statements from Frederick Douglass and W.E.B. Du Bois to show how they were dissatisfied with the prevailing memory that the majority of Americans held of the Civil War. Special attention is also given to the contrasts between Du Bois and Booker T. Washington. When Blight discusses the memory that was conjured from the followers of the Lost Cause, he mentions the role that Mildred Lewis Rutherford, historian of the United Daughters of the Confederacy from 1911 to 1916, had in writing a history of the war that alleviated the South of any wrongdoing. Central to the "Lost Cause" memory is Nelson Page, a Southern writer who showed, in a twisted sort of history, that slaves actually enjoyed living on the plantation and were happy to serve the owners. Moreover, D. W. Griffith's film Birth of Nation attempted to glorify the Ku Klux Klan and portrayed them as the saviors of a war torn south. Blight discusses these various individuals and shows how each contributed to the formation of the three memories that are central to his monograph. Hindsight has shown that the reconciliationist memory gained the most acceptance following the Civil War. As Blight explains in his prologue, "In the end, this is a story of how the forces of reconciliation overwhelmed the emancipationist vision in the national culture, how the inexorable drive for reunion both used and trumped race." Hence, "The essence of the war was...sacrificed on the altar of reunion."

Although the emancipationist memory faded into the subconsciousness of our nation's memory, it would appear once again a century after the Civil War. W.E.B. Du Bois was so insightful when he postulated, "The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line." In a massive attempt to gain rights for African Americans in the 1960s, the Civil Rights Movement erupted and delivered the emancipationist vision to the forefront of American thought. Martin Luther King Junior realized what reconciliation had meant for the black race when he stated, "One hundred years later, we must face the tragic fact that the Negro is still not free." Blight's Race and Reunion should be read by everyone. Writing in a clear, flowing pose and using a wide variety of sources including literature, Memorial Day orations, and monuments, he shows that the formation of different memories after the Civil War has had a deep impact on American nation-building. Moreover, and perhaps more significant, he explains the harm that was done to African Americans as the meaning of the Civil War was largely forgotten in the years that followed its conclusion.

2 out of 5 stars A deeply flawed book.......2005-08-24

Despite book prizes and many good reviews, this is a deeply flawed book. The author states in his prologue that he will be selective about sources and what he will discuss in the book. This is not a good way for an author to introduce a subject which he clearly views as divisive in American history. Blight has an agenda and follows it throughout the narrative. The writer has a deep problem with the reconcialtion and reunion of the North and South after the Civil War and links everything to racism North and South. He portrays a reconciliation that is an unwritten conspiracy to subvert emancipation to sectional reconciliation. One glaring ommission in the book is that reconciliation was government policy promulgated by Lincoln, Grant, Sherman and Admiral Porter. It was a conscious decision to try to bring the South back into the Union in as easy a manner as possible without the retributions other nations extract from defeated foes. After Lincoln's death radical reconstruction exacted what revenge it could from the South. The South resents the excesses of Reconstruction. Throughout the book Blight fails to see how Reconstruction coupled with the stigma of defeat could legitimately influence Southern White thinking. Although not stated, Blight also seems to have the attitude that Reconstruction should have been a permanent state of affairs for the South. If a little reconstruction was good, a whole lot more would be better. It is not hard to imagine that Blight would have approved of "re-education camps" to deal with any lingering Southern hostility.
Blight's racial prism is often used to denigrate the efforts that Northerners made to free the slaves. As an example the Underground Railroad is treated as mostly myth in which White Northerners could make up or embellish stories about how they helped slaves escape. He gives credit to a few noble individuals but downplays the extent of White participation in the liberation of blacks.
Blight also overlooks the deep-seated American character that has spared excessive retribution in conflicts with our enemies. This applies to our attitudes to German and Japan after WWII. Far removed from the racial overtones of the Civil War, most Americans have tried to forget old animosities. This includes the veterans of more modern wars, just as it did the veterans of the Civil War. This is in sharp contrast to, for instance, British veterans of WWII in the Pacific who have never forgiven the Japanese for their atrocities.
Blight fails to examine the deep-seated belief that both Northerners and Southerners considered themselves Americans. Blight fails to examine the tragedy of the Civil War as the American Iliad. This concept has made the American Civil War a subject of deep interest not just to Americans but to people around the world. It was a war thrust upon the country but unsettled problems. As soon as it was over people wanted to return to a sense of a "normal" American. But this is not a part of Blight's race driven view of why the country so desperately wanted to unite after this most horrible of American wars. His is the conspiracy of some dark racial divide both North and South
Blight makes some important points regarding the Lost Cause mythology that has driven an enormous amount of study and writing over the decades since the Civil War ended. The segregation and racism of the South after Reonstruction is to be deplored. Racism also tainted the North, perhaps actually growing stronger than when blacks were honored by the Republican press during the Civil War as soldiers for the cause. Many Southerners still recite a history that exempts slavery as the root cause of the war despite the decades of conflict which led up to the final eruption into outright war. Southerners have had a hard time accepting the defeat by the North during the war except through overwhelming force. It is hard to accept that an army of "mudsills" defeated the flower of Southern manhood.
The reason to read this book is to understand how many in the academic world always look for the worst in American society. In many ways it is not about the history of the reunion of the North and South after the Civil War. It is a deep seated view that America is permanently tainted by racism and other deep flaws of character. Unfortunately, many have taken this book as a "bible" of sorts to interpret the Civil War and the brave men both North and South who fought it and then tried to make America whole again.

5 out of 5 stars A beautiful work of history.......2004-11-17

On the canvas of American historical memory, it proved much easier to unite the Blue and the Gray than it has to connect the black with the white. David Blight's brilliant work on the memory of the Civil War argues that in the fifty years following General Lee's surrender, the war's deepest meanings were debated and negotiated, with crucial consequences for the future of the nation. In the end, the need for sectional reunion combined with virulent white supremacy to inculcate a purposeful forgetting of the racial underpinning and egalitarian possibility of the Civil War. The North allowed the South to completely dictate the terms on which the conflict would be remembered, subscribing to a narrative in which the mutual valor of soldiers from both sections was elevated, the blame for slavery eradicated, and African Americans left to fend for themselves in the era of Jim Crow.
Blight's principal contribution, beyond providing the most complete and profound study of historical memory and the Civil War yet attempted, is his suggestion that culture and memory, not politics, were primarily responsible for the nation's failure to remain true to the emancipationist meaning of the war. Tracing the development of the memory of the Civil War in American consciousness from the 1863 Gettysburg Address to the all-white North/South reunion that commemorated the battle of Gettysburg 50 years later, Blight argues that the South, through the work of historical societies, Lost Cause novelists, women's groups, and veterans associations, "forged one of the most highly orchestrated grassroots partisan histories ever conceived," in which both sections shared the blame equally and the racial causes and consequences of the war were conspicuously silent. In its zeal to heal the scars of the war and reconstruction, the North accepted the southern reading of history, choosing reunion over race, and leaving the egalitarian promises of the war unfulfilled. In this cultural context, African American efforts to remember the racial meaning of the war were marginalized as completely as were African Americans themselves.
For all its considerable brilliance, Race and Reunion is slightly tarnished by the feeling of inevitability accorded to the processes described above. While expertly explaining how the South's victory in the realm of historical memory trumped the North's victory on the battlefield, Blight fails to explain how it could have been otherwise. One gets the sense that the North's failure to forcefully impose its own reading of the war immediately after the cessation of hostilities was its downfall - it seems that the emancipationist vision of the Civil War was doomed by 1866, due to the cataclysmic psychological impact of the war, the deep-rooted need for sectional reconciliation, and the greater ideological unity of the South. This slight criticism aside, Blight's work is a monumental achievement and an invaluable contribution to the study of the Civil War which wrests the conflict from the clutches of tweed-clad 19th century historians and re-enactors in blue and gray, placing it squarely in the center of the American experience.
National Lampoon's 1964 High School Yearbook, 39th Reunion
Average customer rating: 4 out of 5 stars
  • Still Really Funny
  • One of the funniest things in the English language
  • A parody that still delivers!
  • Timeless genius
  • Just 'cause P.J.'s in it!
National Lampoon's 1964 High School Yearbook, 39th Reunion

Manufacturer: Rugged Land
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

GeneralGeneral | Humor | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 1590710126
Release Date: 2003-08-26

Book Description

Welcome back, graduates of the 1964 class of C. Estes Kefauver High School in Dacron, Ohio! They're all back in glorious black and white with color Magic Marker-Chuck U. Farley, Maria Teresa Spermatozoa, Purdy "Psycho" Lee Spackle, Faun Laurel Rosenberg, and, of course, Dacron's most famous son, Larry Kroger. Learn everything there is to know about Kroger's past before he became the pop-culture legend Pinto (Tom Hulce), the virgin fraternity pledge in National Lampoon's Animal House. With a hilarious "Where are they now?" addendum and a brilliantly funny new introduction by P. J. O'Rourke, the 39th Reunion Edition is sure to be the talk of the baby boomers who grew up with National Lampoon and of the new generation of comedy fans spawned by the success of The Onion.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Still Really Funny.......2006-08-12

The planets lined up when the editors of the National Lampoon Magazine decided to create this brilliant parody of a mid-1960s high school yearbook. The names they made up are still classic, the grainy b/w pix a masterpiece, and the banal but funny text lives on.

This edition may not be an exact duplicate of the beloved softcover edition we all knew, but it's really great anyway. Enjoy!

5 out of 5 stars One of the funniest things in the English language.......2004-08-27

Let's state it simply -- this is perhaps the funniest book ever published, even though the year 1964 is getting more distant all the time. Ingenious in its construction (a multi-level reconstruction of a typical high school yearbook), it is a hilarious, scathing, understanding, and even sort of poignant look at the kids of one year, one generation, in America long ago. Absolutely brilliant! (If you can find it, NatLamp also did an amazingly detailed town newspaper parody in the late 1970's that is also great.)

5 out of 5 stars A parody that still delivers!.......2004-08-07

First things first: I am an admitted P.J. O'Rourke buff (the dude inspired me to start writing, which is either a good thing or bad), so I was interested to check this out. Plus, after reading Tony Hendra's book about the Lampoon and the creation of the Yearbook by Doug Kenney and O'Rourke, I decided to quit putting off my hesitancy to buying it and purchased it about two months ago. I haven't laughed as hard at anything in print since.

The context of the Yearbook is essential to understanding it; rather than just a "hey, look how crazy we were!" sort of Porky's approach, there's an underlying theme of "Animal House"-style anger at the authority structures that made social conformity and Vietnam possible. The writers had lived through the Vietnam era of the late Sixties, and they looked back in anger at the controls high school placed on them. There's real venom in these pages, if you know where to look.

But what struck me, and what made me appreciate this on the terms of being a simply good artwork, was the similarities to high school yearbooks even today. Sure, the layouts and hair/fashion styles change, but the general idea is the same: there are the popular kids, and then there's everyone else (including the "hero" of the piece, future Delta member Larry Kroeger). They all exist in the mythical Dacron, Ohio, and their school is really everybody's school. I can say, coming from a similarly awful school here in the great state of South Carolina, that nothing made me chuckle more than the laugh of recognition. I graduated in '97, yet I could identify and pick up on things that would've been true of any year (the snarky tribute to a fallen classmate, the peppy rememberence of a fallen President, the losing sports teams buoyed by a sense of "better luck next year").

The yearbook is so spot on, when I went back to my senior year yearbook I could immediately see such parallels. Our football team was(still is) a walking disaster, and little good could be said for the other sports. Our school play was just as clumsy as Dacron's "Julius Caesar", and our talent shows didn't improve much on the 'entertainment' provided by the 1964 class. It was these hilarious occurances that made me appreciate the book as simply more than a rant against the complacency of the Fifties; it was at long last a genuinely funny ghost of what it mocked.

I can't vouch for whether the "new" material takes away from the old (as this was indeed my first run-in with the parody in total), but I will say it seems a bit tame compared to what's part of the original. Plus, the "literary magazine" struck a chord, as I can remember my own sophmoric contribution to a similar publication in my high school (which sold about one copy, I believe). The "where will they be in ten years" list seemed like it could've been written by the idiots in my class, and the crude names assigned to the underclassmen (shown with the same exact photo every time) would not have been out of place in my school's tome either.

Overall, I enjoyed this far more than I imagined I would. There are obvious sight gags (the basketball team's hapless conduct had me in stiches), but the real meat is in the writing (whether or not O'Rourke can really claim a majority of the material, it seems a bit arrogant to take top billing over the late Kenney), which is dead-on. No matter when you graduated, you will recognize the figures in this book. And you will laugh your ass off, even as you cry tears of recognition.

5 out of 5 stars Timeless genius.......2004-07-28

I am at a loss trying to recall another book that has ever been published that comes close to this towering achievement of humor. This thing is timeless in its genius. I first got a hold of this gem while in high school in '77-'78. I, too, had to resort to buying a used original copy on Ebay for about $120 a few years back. And now, here it is, in all its glory.

It is as funny today as it was back then. The new material is amusing, but the original stuff is the prime mover. There's just so much here, that it's difficult, if not impossible, to adequately describe this thing. Every single page has something (if not many, many things) that will make you laugh out loud, and hard. I gave my younger brother a copy a couple of weeks ago. He is still struggling to get through it (he laughs so hard he can't breathe).

I must agree that the pictures, which are impossibly funny on their own, look as though they were an afterthought in this reprint. They are, in a word, horrible. Dark at times, washed out in others. They look as though they were Xeroxed. Some pics (like the classic Spaz Leaking proudly holding his MEN sign for the Woodburning Club) are almost useless. Such a tremendous shame. I hope this problem is rectified in subsequent printings.

These shortcomings aside, the 1964 Yearbook Parody remains the book by which all other parodies or anything claiming to be humorous should be judged.

5 out of 5 stars Just 'cause P.J.'s in it!.......2004-06-16

I don't care who you are, that reviewer Edward G. Nilges is funny! So, based on his recommendation, I would have had to get this book, even if P.J. O'Rourke wasn't in it. Keep up the good work Edward!

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