Austin Reviews

This was a disappointing book. It started ok, and actually was a fairly good (maybe B-) read for most of the book, but just a terrible finish (like D-).

The protaganist was just too wimpy. And the book finishes that way.

This was a thriller that was also a human drama (or was it a human drama that was also a thriller?). But the thrill died out, and the drama didn't flourish.

I'd give it one star, but it was decent most of the way through, so let's go with 2**.

Ben should have told his wife, Katy, up front. Two minds are better than one and she might not have been so wobbly, stronger backbone. A good read as the reader goes along trying to figure out how to have done it differently. Some may think the latter half of the story follows standard thriller lines. See also "The Moneybag" for legal aspects of a similar situation.

Though the plotline may not cover entirely new territory, Magnuson's deft style more than makes up for it. He manages to paint a very vivid picture of the world Ben inhabits, with its moments of both happiness and terror. The reader becomes wound up in Ben's life. And, Windfall is so tightly written that it is impossible to put down.

A review by Kayvan

Herbert Muskie is fat, he's strong and he is very, very mad at the people of Loomis. You see Herbert used to live in Loomis until one day thirteen years ago the town people chased Herbert out of town. Now Herbert is back, and with a vengeance, and more than willing to return the favor to all the towns' people!

This story is somewhat suspenseful but not very much, the characterswere very dumb and had very poor judgment. The one character I liked to most was probably the one that I didn't like, Herbert, I like him because he wasn't afraid to take chances. And although there is nothing that could justify his killing the towns people I liked him because he was just plain he had more color to him, he wasn't average Herbert he was fat Herbert. That's what I think gave him the edge because people probably underestimated him because he was fat. The book was kinda like a old town folk tale, like a story that is told to the children so they do not misbehave. The story pretty much just revolved around Herbert's hate or the town's people. The book is moderately long and the story is very dull.

This book is very dull and somewhat suspenseful, that why I would not recommend this book to anyone no matter how bored you are. This book is just a story about a fat man trying to pay back the people who made fun of him when he was like 13. DON'T READ THIS BOOK!!

... Loomis is a small, simple town where Colin and his family have lived their whole lives. Everything is like it always has been and everyone knows everyone else. This all changed the day Colin met Herbert Muskie or the fat man. The fat man coming to Loomis changes everything. It all started when Colin went for a walk to their grandparents for a little food. It takes place during the war so Colin's family does not have very much food or money. This is where he met Herbert. To everyone else Herbert is kind and funny but Colin sees him for what he really is; a liar, cheater and a murder. Herbert manipulates Colin's father and mother into believing that they can trust him. Colin and Verna (the fat man's step-daughter) are determined to prove to them that he is not trustworthy.

My book was not at all what I thought it would be. I didn't know what to think when I saw the title. I didn't really like the subject that much. When I read the back it was talking about the war, so I assumed it would be about the troubles of warfare to Colin. Instead it only briefly mentioned that the only work Colin's dad could get was working in Herbert's yard. It is mostly a suspense story. This is because you never really know to what measure Herbert will take a situation to get what he wants. Throughout the story he is obviously sneaking behind everyone's backs with something; the problem is nobody can figure out what until one night Colin's dad went with Herbert to Aukland. At first I didn't really like the way the author wrote the book. It seemed to wander and get ahead of it and then go back to what it was originally talking about. The sentences were all right but it just got confusing at times. The story seemed to be just right. That is except for the end. It seemed to drag on and on and then it just ended. I wanted it to go one a little more about what happened after, but it just ended suddenly. It told a little bit about after what happened, but I wanted to know so much more.

I would recommend this book for people who like a little suspense. It was overall a very well written book and I enjoyed it. It is fairly smooth reading but a little hard to follow at other times. I give it a 3.

Many have dreamed of going back to their hometown and wreaking havoc on those people that feel slighted them - imagined or real - when they were young. Well, Herbert Muskie, does just that. Through a chance encounter Colin, a young man from this town, ends up being his "partner in crime". Colin soon realizes that not only is Muskie an evil man, but his main targets are Colin's parents.

This is a typical Que effort, probably written in about 4 days, by paraphrasing pre-existing materials, including documentation you receive with the software. Also not updated for 8i, they added a few paragraphs at the beginning about new features, but didn't work through those features in the rest of the book. Poorly indexed, poorly edited (both as to explanations and # typos), way too many screen shots, just way too big.

As a Solaris admin I have little knowledge of Oracle. I really did not want to know much either. However, I must know something of it's design and layout. I also need to know what services/daemons do what. However, all the books I found covered Oracle on NT/2000. Who in their right mind would do such a thing! Anyway, this book as sufficient coverage of Oracle on Solaris that it helped get me up to speed on Oracle enough to understand an Oracle DBA when they speak!

This is a wonderful book which covers all the aspects of Oracle, including all the interfaces with Oracle. A really excellent book for DBAs and Programmer Analysts. It helped me a lot in understanding DBA part. Am excellent Que publication. I appreciate the structure and contents of the book

I was very disappointed with this book. Alice Walker seems more intent on showcasing her own writing, poems, and emotion than drawing much needed attention to FGM in Africa. There are compelling real-life accounts of FGM--read Desert Flower or Do They Hear you When you Cry.

Warrior marks was the account of all the time that Alice Walker and Pratibha Parmar spent in preparing for the documentary. They did not need to show how the mutilation is done because they painted a vivid enough picture. The book was about the emotional aspect of female genital mutilation. I must say that I commend them, especially Pratibha for the time that they spent preparing for the documentary. The book made me want to see the documentary. When Alice talks about herself in the book, she shows how her experiences were similar to that of the females in Africa. I recommend this book be read and the documentary seen.

I first became aware of female genital mutilation (FGM) when reading "The Color Purple," and again when reading Fausiya Kassindja's "Do They Hear You When You Cry." These two books led me to read "Warrior Marks." Female genital mutilation is a crime, an outrage, a sin before God. How dare the originators of this heinous procedure presume that what God created is faulty or a mistake? "Warrior Marks" enhanced what I had already learned about FGM. Any man (or woman) who tries to uphold this procedure as something that benefits girls and women is of a criminal mind. There is no benefit to putting a woman through this torture. If men were required to experience a similar experience, we would soon see the end of FGM. Please read this book if you seek another point of view. The addition of Alice Walker's poetry and the sharing of her experiences as she and Pratibha Parmar traveled through Africa is an eye-opener, and the way the book is written gives the reader a personal view in the same way that Ms. Kassindja's book does. Ms. Walker gives the women that she writes about a certain dignity, and while the reader may not be able to identify with the physical pain, some of the emotions may be felt. This is definitely a 5-star book.

Riddled with error, poorly written, an ecclesiology more Episcopalian than Catholic, this book is painfully simplistic such that it might induce a First Amendment activist to organize a book burning.

Now, admittedly I haven't read this version of the book, but I did read the first published version and found it interesting and helpful, even if I didn't agree with everything in it. But then I'm not a Notre Dame-trained liturgist with years -- make that decades -- of liturgical experience under my belt, and Austin Fleming is.

I hooted when I read the comment from the anonymous reader who said it was more Episcopalian than Catholic. I could hear Austin Fleming (OK, so he's an old friend) chortling too, after he wiped the astonishment off his face. Trust me. Austin Fleming is firmly, unshakeably, undeniably Roman Catholic, unless he has changed so much as to be unrecognizeable in the past 10 years. Not to mention you may be giving the Episcopal Church more credit than it's due in regard to preparing for liturgy. Things are not all as they seem, alas.

Hey, Austin! If you read this, drop me an email!

This first edition of this book comes to us with recommendations from highly reputable sources, e.g. a professor of liturgical studies at the University of Notre Dame and a teacher at the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome. This edition is only an improvement. Highly readable, steeped in practical applicability, it certainly is not "more Episcopalian than Catholic." The previous reviewer seems a little paranoid. Though not an exhaustive work, it is a valuable contribution to the theology of liturgical work, often dismissed as the work of people who "decorate the church" for Sunday. It's a good introduction to Liturgy.

It is bad enough for a Swede to portray a culture (Texas) that he does not understand. However, to have this book translated into British, not American, makes the portrayal all the more bizarre. I've enjoyed Gustaffson before in German translation, and on safe, European, subjects. He jes duss'nt unnerstan' Texiz.

I can't speak to the quality of the English translation, having only read the original. Gustafsson demonstrates his usual idiosyncratic reflection of reality in the setting of the book--some details are dead on, others are vague, still others are changed in ways that probably wouldn't matter to a European audience but are weird to annoying to one familiar with the city and time period in question. Reading about one's home town in Swedish is an enjoyably bizarre experience--I can't say I was as taken with the actual underlying story, which involves a lot of philosophizing about good, evil, and the existence of God which just does not feel particularly relevant. Part of the problem, from my perspective, may be that the book really contains only one major character, the narrator, and he is clearly keeping things from us. With a couple of college philosophy courses and a jug of red wine, you could probably discuss this book all night, but on the whole I think "Bernard Foy's Third Castling" is a better example of Gustafsson's current period.

Lars Gustafsson is an author with the rare ability to distill insightful philosophical explorations from stories of everyday life. In Tale of a Dog, he weaves a riveting hodgepodge tapestry of good and evil as seen through the eyes of an Austin bankruptcy judge. The stories of Austin personalities ring true to those familiar with the quirkiness of the Austin scene, where everyone is a student of something. Gustafsson, typically, steps into the shoes of the outsider, the pretender. He is a Texan who doesn't like Tex-Mex; a Judge who cannot decide; a member of the social elite who prefers the company of his road-hard hairdresser. The fun is in Gustafsson's ability to show us the world from the outside and turn the small things large. The meat is in Gustafsson's ability to draw us to his characters' world of profound moral ambiguity. This is a very good book.

It seems that the ratio of bad SAP books to good ones is about 99 to 1. This book, from a publisher who usually produces quality books, is of little use to a Java programmer, who could learn as much from the JCO sample code, and of no use to the ABAP programmer who will only get into deep trouble fast. After a terrible discussion of the JCO library, the author then moves on to a bad discussion of the Jakarta Struts framework, which is a book by itself. Save the money, people.

I have to say that I completely disagree with the prior review. I found this book to be both helpful and insightful. Not to mention, it was actually enjoyable to read. APress continues to publish some great texts.

What a disappointment of a book. Four unauthorized biographies with no information about what these people do to keep in shape.
To top it off it lacks accuracy.

I'm in 8th grade and have been dancing since I was 6, lifting weights since I was 11, and interested in nutrition since I was 12. I bought this book because of my interest in health and was inspired by such a great book! It describes Tyra Banks, Denise Austin, Christie Brinkley, and Claudia Schiffer, some of my favorite famous females. If you're interested in health like me, no matter what age you are, you must try this book!

As both an amateur actor and somebody who just appreciates a good laugh, I'm a big fan of just about everything the Reduced Shakespeare Company has done... however, reading this book by two of the RSC members was something of a let-down.

Reed and Austin, if I may call them that, presume a bit too much familiarity as they write. I got the jokes and the tone they intended, but I also got the impression that anyone who wasn't already familiar with their work would have been left pretty cold. "Who are these guys? Where do they get off?" is a response I imagine them getting.

Also, while the alternating-chapter device is cute, each of them employs a running gag (in Reed's case, the story of tormenting a poor Pastor, in Austin's, struggles with his own Atheism) that really meander and get stale for about half of the book before you realize that, rather than gags, these are actually attempts at a plot. I really would have preferred they'd gotten rid of these segments and just concentrate on what does work -- the satire.

And when they concentrate on what they're good at, it's great. Reed's chapter on the story of Moses, which he mixes up with the film career of Charlton Heston, is one of the funniest things I've read in a long time.

But the good stuff is too few and far-between for the casual reader. If you're a die-hard fan of the Reduced Shakespeare Company, it's worth it. Otherwise, you'd be better off reading some of their other stuff first.

I think it's safe to say that there probably aren't any other books out there that put stories from The Bible into a blender with references to Oprah, Harry Potter, Pink Floyd, and K-Tel Records and hit "puree"! At least not with such delicious results.

The authors are members of the renowned Reduced Shakespeare Company - and their irreverant and witty spirit is intact in this book. Who else but these two brilliant, misguided fools would tell the "Story of Moses' and include bits of Planet of the Apes and Indiana Jones? Funny is funny and they're funny. The book gives the reader an accessible look at the stories of the Bible (as well as the mental and physical breakdowns of both authors during the writing of the book!).

I particularly enjoyed the little details -- even the Foreword and Bibliography is funny. DO NOT miss reading the Index (which is my personal favorite part of the book). The section on the parallels between The Bible and Hollywood are a direct hit. I can recommend this book to anyone who wants to have their funny bone tickled. I would also check out their other books of the plays they've performed -- they're really great too.

I have to echo the bad reviews this book's received. I bought it because the cover looked cool. Silly me. How this book was accepted by Ace in the first place is utterly baffling. It has all sorts of wild point-of-view shifts, snide remarks, and absolutely inept passages of characterization. This is a very bad book and it needed a very mature editor.

Second Contact is a very bad book. Or perhaps I have simply missed the author's point, or I may not be the intended audience. I can only report what I felt.

Second Contact is the story of a planet named Kivlan, far across the Universe from Earth. An Earth expedition visits Kivlan, only to be chased away by a couple of missiles. Some time later, Earth sends another expedition, this one armed rather better, in a sincere attempt to really get to know the Kivlanians. On another narrative thread, we follow the action on Kivlan. Apparently Kivlan is a Utopia of lazy people, having existed in planet-wide peace for 300 years, but unfortunately some volcanic eruptions are making the inhabitants cranky and even psychotic, to the extent that they are annoyed by the intrusion of Earth's expedition, and, later, to the extent that one man tries to start a war and take over the planet.

It's hard to say exactly what the book is about. Characters are introduced, described in the most glowing terms, given love interests, and then dropped. The focus shifts from the first Earth expedition, to the second expedition, to the action on Kivlan, and back. Conflicts are introduced, then resolved effortlessly, usually because of the overwhelming good nature of almost everyone, on both Earth and Kivlan. Much of Second Contact deals with the rather curious utopian society of Kivlan. Is a satire on Earth society intended? The satire, if that was intended, has almost no bite. Moreover, the alien society as portrayed is terribly unconvincing, and terribly inconsistent. And the depiction of the next century society on Earth is also unconvincing, and has little extrapolated depth. So -- if this is a satire, it fails for lack of bite. Is it a serious examination of an alternate society? It fails for lack of rigor, and lack of consistency. Is it a fun romp? It fails for lack of plot, and lack of interesting characters. In a word -- it fails. Utterly.

The characters are uniformly cardboard, given fawning background stories, and unconvincing and emotionally flat love stories. (Most of which are back story anyway.) Naturally there is a love story between a Kivlanian and a human (though the cover portrait switches the sexes) -- it takes about a paragraph to develop. The plot is both discursive and implausible. The science is beyond absurd (though I will say that the book never makes a pretence of having real science -- and in the hands of, say, Robert Sheckley, the same level of science can work just fine). I thought I detected a few jokes -- some even made me grin, some grimace, and I'm sure I missed some others. I will say that the prose is serviceable -- nothing special, but not an encumbrance to the reading of the book. It was a waste of some three hours of my time.

I can only add a caveat -- some editor saw enough in this book to buy it. It is possible that I have simply and profoundly missed the point. But tread carefully.

Well, I'm not going to say the book is bad, per se. From what I've gathered, it's like the Moulin Rouge of literature: either you got the inside joke and loved it, or you didn't and hated it. I fall into the latter. For someone weened on modern books and other reading materials, this is going to seem like a waste of tree pulp. Extrememly predictable, unrealistic (even for a sci-fi story), and chocked full of story info with little relevance to the actual story, it's a wonder the editor didn't laugh at Austin and threw him out of his office. Someone who lived in the early half of the 20th Century, it may bring back memories of the good old days. At best for me, it's a guilty pleasure book, though admittedly, it's a quick read. If you're looking for a meaty or thought-provoking story, _Second Contact_ is neither. Check it out of your local library first before dropping cold hard cash to buy it.