New Years Day Books

This is a book that keeps on giving. I've been using it for over 8 years and still love it. I love its breadth, depth,inclusivity and practicality across a broad spectrum of religious traditions.
Fran

A delightful and useful addition for anyone interested in getting in touch with spiritual self.
I get a bit mixed up with seasons etc being in the southern hemishere!

This is a fantastic book which draws from many religious and philosophical sources. I like both the seed thought for the day as well as the suggested action/activity.

Pocket Full of Miracles in Paperback
I have purchased this book many times, especially as gifts to my friends. They all rave about the contents and its effect on their spiritual growth. I love this book!!!!!

I have been reading this book every day for about 12 years. Year after year, it is always a pleasure to read. I like the way Ms Borysenko draws from different faiths and spiritual paths. This book makes a great gift for someone you love. For daily mediation I also recommend Glimpse After Glimpse by Sogyal Rinpoche.

As a student at Yale Law School planning to go into estate planning, I found this book very helpful. Highly recommended for anyone who needs to plan their estate or for law students taking estate tax or planning courses. This book is easy to understand, well organized, and provides a good amount of detailed information, not just vague ideas. Highly recommended.

This book provides an easy to understand overview of estate planning plus easy to understand detail on many special circumstances. It is very easy to understand which estate planning techniques are right for you, and there are many examples that illustrate how the techniques work. Approximately half of this book is relevant to everyone. The other half gives clear, common sense explantions of advanced planning techniques that are typically reserved for those fortunate enough to be planning a high net worth estate (lets say $1M+). The advanced techniques are not for do it yourselfers, but the book gives you a good understanding of the issues and lets you converse intelligently with an attorney.

Now in a newly updated and expanded seventh edition, Plan Your Estate is a resource provided by attorneys Denis Clifford and Cora Jordan which is packed from cover to cover with everything anyone needs to know to ensure their worldly goods are promptly willed to loved ones. Written in no-nonsense terms that the non-specialist general reader can readily grasp, individual chapters clearly address wills, how to avoid probate, living trusts, property-control trusts, naming guardians for children and leaving property to children, estate taxes, living wills, how to reduce estate taxes, and much, much more. Especially recommended for individuals who own a business or who have children from a former marriage, Plan Your Estate is a "must-have", "do-it-yourself" legal resource, which is applicable to all American states except for Louisiana. Even those who prefer to let a professional handle the whole process of estate planning would be well served to read Plan Your Estate cover to cover, before stepping into an attorney's office where time is money and the clock is running.

Great for law students taking an estate planning course or an estate and gift tax course. Also good for people wanting to learn about estate planning in general. I would recommend this book.

This book is a must buy resource for persons interested in estate planning. Whether you are planning to do-it-yourself or use a lawyer, it is good to know what your options are. I am much better informed after reading this book.

A very enjoyable book. Just the high quality reproduction of the covers would make this a great book.
A richly savory festival of imagination, creativity, insight (cultural, sociological, philosophical, etc.) and, of course, delightful humor and splendiferous transcendental artwork. Lots of charming tidbits including photos, extra art reproductions, etc.
Thanks Frank and The Usual Gang for this inundation of funshine and good cheer!

(After you've seen the covers you'd probably like to peek inside). Check out: Absolutely MAD Magazine - 50+ Years

If there are better sight gags than those on the cover of Mad magazine, then I have yet to see them. This book is a collection of the first 400 covers and some of them had me hysterical with laughter. My favorite was the one where Alfred is holding a hard taco shell behind a Mexican dog that is straining mightily. Others were just as funny, although some did require explanation. The producers of the magazine were not above applying a little duplicity when creating the covers.
The only drawback for younger readers will be that knowledge of the current events of the time is a precondition if you are to get the joke. For example, some covers feature political figures, and if you don't know anything about them, the joke is lost. Other covers are spoofs of hit movies of the time, so the explanatory captions are a welcome addition. Having lived through those times, I understood most of them, but there were a few times when I didn't understand the joke until I read the caption.
This book is very funny and you cannot help but be impressed by the quality of the artwork and the zany intelligence that went into the covers of Mad. The producers of Mad constantly lampooned themselves as idiots, but they were without question geniuses.

this book is well designd and gives all the information about the covers over the years, including notes about the spacial covers.
i highly recomand this book to any mad reader.

I loved this book , mostly because Im a mad magazine FAN!!! BUY THIS BOOK!!!!!!!! GREAT BOOK

The first copy of Mad I saw was issue 29 in September 1956 (still got it too) and I was hooked. How could a magazine be so funny and be so spot-on with its satire? Easy, just employ the `usual gang of idiots' that's how. I kind of grew out of it when I discovered the National Lampoon, how could a magazine be so funny etc, etc. But I have always had a soft spot for Mad and this book of covers is a super addition to my back issues and other Mad books.

All 399 (up to November 2000) covers are in this well designed and printed book Mostly one or two covers to a page sometimes with Frank Jacobs' commentary and with a lot of the latter covers you get to see the preliminary cover roughs. As the years go by you can see how the covers changed from simple visual gags into ones that are much more graphic and busy because they have to work harder on the newsstand. The ideas are still very funny after all these years though. My favorite is issue 35 (October 1957) a wraparound that celebrated the fifth anniversary with a great painting from Norman Mingo showing a few dozen very famous American merchandising characters seated round a dining table, Alfred's at one end grinning. I would love this as a poster.

I think it is worth mentioning for Mad fans the seven CD-ROM `Totally Mad' set, every page from the issue one thru to December 1998, the interface is very user friendly and the discs have a lot of additional aural and visual surprises.

BTW, Robert Silver's photmosaic book cover, made up from the magazines covers, is stunning.

***FOR AN INSIDE LOOK click 'customer images' under the cover.

Sara M. Harvey has a very unique writing style. Although character dialogues are sometimes hard to understand or follow, this story otherwise flows smoothly and is a sweet tale. This book is one that is meant to be read slowly as the pace is slow itself. Still I was highly anticipating the end of the tale from the frist page... and since I am so impatient, the pace seemed much slower than it really is... but don't misunderstand, this is not a bad thing.

This is a story of the angel of Joy and the angel of Vengence who have both come to Earth to spend a year and a day as humans. This trip is a mission that they are both on, not a vacation, and the meaning of this visitation slowly unfolds and we, the readers, find out little by little along the way. Vengence is every bit the epitomy of his name... angry and vengeful... most of the time. Joy is rather giddy and seems to annoy Vengence for the most part. Along the way, they both realize how much they really need each other and an understanding and love grows between them as they both try to complete their missions with no clues as to how to go about doing it... this they must figure out themselves. We read about their "adventures" which really consist of their daily lives as we would live, only with a little bit of magic in-between.

This story takes place in the heart of New York, and describes the setting and town with cunning detail. The two angels take us to coffe shops, Pagan festivals, churches, museum, Times Square, and minute magic. The magic is finding out what it is like to be human, going from depression, to low self-esteem, to love and jealousy. Their moods actually seem to alter the lives of the world around them, especially in their locality. They soon begin to realize that their mission is about saving themselves by saving the world, through sacrifice of our mortal demons, and acceptance of the many blessings that many of us fail to realize we have.. those of our friendships and family. I couldn't begin to describe in enough detail the wornderful plot of this story as the depth is found by reading the surface of the tale. Not many writes can do this.

I rated this four stars because though I generally hate romance novels with a passion, (unless it is a byproduct of the major part of the storyline...) this novel had sooo much meaning for me and actually changed the way I look at many things in life. NO romance novel can manage to interest me at all, yet here is one that truly brought a little bit of the Angel of Joy into my life after dealing with my Vengeful Angel for so long. Also as I described earlier, this book does have some flaws, but kudos to the author for her imagination.

This story is actually from a series that I have yet to find for myself, and this particular book has been impossible to find anywhere else except for Amazon and the author's website. Enjoy this sweet tale and the ebbing and flowing of the characters' emotions. It really is a beautiful story with a tear-jerker ending.

I'm not a big fan of NYC.

After reading, and re-reading, this book, I wish I could go there and check out the place as it is in the story. Ms. Harvey makes the world and the city seem magical. She adds a bit of philosophy, a large amount of love, and a kernel of Joy, along with the inevitable violence required in a story containing the Angel of Vengeance, into a wonderful story which can only be considered a Romance in the best sense of the genre. The book contains chocolate, pierogi, coffee, Chinese New Year, children, art, gypsies, fear of Falling, a smidge of suspense, and a smidge of (implied) sex, among other attributes.

It's a fun book, a superb read, and is light enough to be enjoyable both when you're just awakened and when you're ready to do some thinking. Strongly recommended.

A Year and a Day - Sara M. Harvey


I finished 'A Year and a Day' and I am in love with the book. Not quite a romance book and not at all a chick lit book, but so much more. The novel is a story of two angels, Joy and Vengeance who are on assignment in New York City. Assignment is the wrong word, they are on more of a vacation from being angels. Each has an assignment, Vengeance is told to protect and guard the easily wounded Joy. Joy also has an assignment, but telling you her assignment would be a spoiler. Vengeance spends most of the book trying to figure out what assignment is so important that he must spend a year in New York City, a place he dislikes, watching over an angel that he finds most annoying.

There is so much I love about this book, how I thought it would be fluff, and how it surprised me by how deep it is. How Joy wants to look plain, so people see the beauty within. Yet, when she changes her mind and gets a makeover to be beautiful, people do not notice the inner beauty. She learns a lesson and returns to her own beautiful self. They make friends, experience life, and Vengeance learns a little bit about the humans he has interacted with, but never touched all his days.

The book takes place in New York City, and in a way, the city becomes a character as well. Things happen here that could happen no where else, and I do not just mean the Chocolate expo! If you live in or love New York City, or even if like me, you consider it a nice place that makes me miss Boston so much, you will love this city. She drops names, not to show she knows the city, but to allow her to tell her story without overwhelming you with description.

I took this book with me yesterday when I went to Mass General Hospital for my weekly treatments. I totally forgot I had a tube in my left arm, I totally forgot where I was, and the stress of the moment. She took me into NYC, and brought me along with her characters.

The book might be a bit hard to find, for her publisher is small, and I think going out of business soon. The writer Sara M. Harvey deserves more attention than she is getting, and I hope to read a second book and a third. Next time, can your angels go to Boston?

I am on my way through this book for the second time, and I love it just as much as the first time! All the descriptions are so rich, I want to go to the places, eat the food, wear the clothes and definitely meet the people.
I love every character for different reasons, and most of them remind me of friends.
It is the mark of a lovely author to capture a person so completely in their world that you want to go live in it!
Sci-fi readers will love this book, fantasy readers will love this book, romance readers will love this book, anyone studying religion, mythology, chocolate, costumes, art or New York will love this book....

This book was fantastic! I read a lot of books (I have over 3,000 in my personal collection) and this one kept me riveted the entire time. In fact, I couldn't go to sleep until I finished it! I was about to reread it again but it's disappeared, which means one of the other readers in my house has whisked it away... probably to read and reread and...

I took this book to school and read it to my daughter's kindergarten class on their last day (Bittersweet). ALL of the kids loved it and it held the attention of 15 5/6 year olds!

I read this to my students every year on the first day of first grade. It helps ease the jitters and let's the kids know that everyone gets nervous on the first day of a new school year.

My first graders loved this story. Before I read it, they were saying how much they liked 1st grade better than kinder and this just wrapped it all up in a story. After reading it, we talked about what they hoped first grade would be like and what they hoped to learn this year.

After leaving the secure feeling of kindergarten, this book will calm the nerves and reassure students that it will be an exciting year in first grade. I read the book to my class and they continued to relate back to various parts of the book throughout the year. My favorite part is when the first grade teacher closes the read aloud book at the most exciting part, a trick used by most first grade teachers. It should be part of the beginning of the year ritual in every first grade class.

....and I've yet to find a children's book that is so perfect...and absolutely gorgeous! Ms. Spiegel's illustrations add wit and charm to a lovely read-aloud experience that completely enchanted my students (now BIG second graders!) who remember the monumental transition from kindergarten to first grade very well. I look forward to more collaborations between this gifted author and her brilliant illustrator!

This is such a beautiful book, I have purchased more than one to share with my friends and family. It is so simple and very inspiring!

I have all of Kate Wests books now and I love them. She is an excellent author. This book is in excellent condition. I would and will order from this dealer again. Thanks for all your do. Great job.

A day to day day informative book on spells, rituals, plants, how to's and other interesting tit bits for those practising the Pagan life style. Fun as well as fairly well organized. Not designed to be an encyclopaedia, but certainly a basic and quick reference guide to basics as well as some out of the way info. Recommend.

I love this book and have had it for over a year and find it quite a good resource as well as a nice pick-me-up. The author has a knack for delivering information that is useful as well as uncommon. The small rituals and projects as well as recipes are a treat. I would and have recommended this book to many for daily inspiration.

For the beginner,the curious or the very experienced this a beautiful and fascinating introduction to the folkways of Witchcraft which is celebrated year round.Each page is dated and devoted to an aspect of the craft and contains very humorous and insightful advice for dealing with problems as well as offering guidance.I have worked with my copy for over a year and I do find myself expanding my knowledge from the wealth of facts and the inspiration this book offers.
Every Sabbat,planet/zodiac/Moon phase,God and Goddess and special days traditional to various cultures and legends,myths and superstitions as well as the meanings of flora,fauna and crystal are explained in Kate West's wonderful compodium of lore.
Very enjoyable to read and entertaining for anyone who wants to learn.Thank you Kate West for writing this wonderful book.Blessed be and bright blessings.

How to Live 365 Days a Year is a book that can work wonders for you if you suffer from the 76 percent of the physical problems that typically send people to doctors' offices. These are real problems, but they are more often than not caused by one's state of mind.

Dr. Schindler has clearly explained the link between mental attitude and the physical manifestations of involuntary secretion into the system. And it makes perfect sense.

I would recommend this book to all; not just to hypocondriacs. This is a preventative dose of what most of us need most of the time.

I had read this book in the 1970s and was glad to get it again. It is so helpful in dealing with life's challenges and circumstances. It is insightful and remarkably accurate. It is wonderful reading but better when its principles are put into practice.

I wish that I'd read this book a year ago when I first bought it. It may have been written over 50 years ago but its contents are probably more useful today then when it was first published, especially with the frantic lifestyles we all lead today.

John Schindler shows us in his book that all of our physical ailments can be attributed to our own mental problems, the way we think etc. This is down to a lack of proper training either from our family or educational system as well as the company we keep. This leads to a mental immaturity & the way we handle our emotions. He helps us cure these by making us aware of what the problems are and how we can go about & easily fix them with a few simple tricks.

I'm not a fast reader, but I was so engrossed in this book that I managed the 210 pages in a single sitting (only one day!!)

This is going to sound like one of the stories in the book, so here goes. Over the last year or more I've had a serious problem with my back; recently I was lucky enough to have an operation to fix it. However, during this time I got so frustrated with my condition, lack of mobility, discomfort and pain that without realising it I got stressed out & developed various conditions such as neck & shoulder ache, headaches & eczema. All of which I managed to cure using Dr Schindler's techniques in a matter of a few days without the need for any medicine.

As ever it's worth its weight in gold if you'll just listen & apply his simple & effective remedies. A great investment if ever there was one.

The other reviewer described the book so I will write about what it did for me. I had sprained a tendon in my leg/hip (how, I have no idea; it just came on) and was in some pain. I didn't know it was a tendon, so I began to worry about it. The pain increased, I began limping, and kept worrying--magnifying it into some sort of dreadful cancer eating away at my bones. (Well, you know, sprains should heal up in a few weeks. I'd had this for a couple months! And I still have it three months later.) Anyway, I read through this book and ended up releasing all the emotional involvement in my leg. The pain was reduced about 80 percent and I no longer limped. Now I just refuse to worry about it and instead bought a bicycle so I can strengthen and provide better stability for my muscular system.

We humans are very capable of endowing our minor injuries (or even major illnesses) with such power that they incapacitate us or, at the very least, demand a lot of attention. This book will help you put such things in perspective. Attitude truly is everything for the body/mind/spirit is a trinity, each component affecting the others. If you can improve your attitude you can improve your health. And the more you concentrate on your injuries or illness, the worse they will become. I highly recommend this book for anyone in pain or anyone with a bad attitude. And I recommend it for everyone who likes to read or who breathes on a regular basis. It's a keeper to which you can refer over and over for encouragement and reminders of the important things in life!

This is a book everyone should have a copy of. Having read the book and attempted to apply what it suggests, I can tell you it is excellent advice. The Publisher's Weekly 'review' above could not be more wrong and only prevents people from benefiting from the timeless advice contained in this book: if anything, it is more relevant today than when it was written. What works works and what is right is right - today, yesterday and tomorrow. In an increasingly stressful and emotionally-disturbed world, that's exactly what the doctor ordered. It's simple: read it and try it and see for yourself. Anyone who does that can only improve their mind, their health and their life.

Ahh, sibling rivalry! The little boy in this story (about ten years old) has asked God to help him sell his innocently energetic, pig-tailed, little sister, Ally Grace. He tells how annoying and mean she can be, then assures others she will be nice to them. He's ready to bargain with anyone interested in buying her.

As he mentions all of the bad things Ally Grace is capable of, he begins to wonder what it would be like not having her around. After some thought, he begins to see the good she is capable of and changes his mind.

God is mentioned twice in this book. Once, in the beginning, and then at the end. At first, it appears the young boy is asking God for help. Later, it's clear he is asking God to help him do a terrible thing. The little boy doesn't turn to God for good.
I think the author should have taken the opportunity to create a good relationship between God and the little boy. Maybe there should have been an adult in the picture helping the older brother understand he needs to ask God to help him cope with his sister. It's cute, comical, and even made me laugh, but I would not consider it to be a children's Christian book.

This is a really great book! I bought this book for my son when he was having a hard time loving his sister. It went over really well and he loves this book!

Great fun for me to share with my grandchildren as well as my own sister and brother. For Christmas I put old pictures of my brother, sister and I in a book for each of them. I then responded to the thoughts on each page with little quips of my own, remembering our own childhood memories. I put a brother or sister poem on the back inside cover and because we were all lucky enough to share the Christmas holiday with each other, I put one in each of their stockings for Christmas morning. What a special memory for all of us about being sisters and brothers growing up and what a special way to teach my grandchildren about the value of having a sibling. Humor is a grand way to get a message across!

This book is a fun way to be able to address the issue of sibling rivalry. Michelle writes in a way that makes it enjoyable to read with your children. You will definitely laugh when you read how a big brother comes up with a creative way to get rid of his pesky little sister. This would make a great gift for an older sibling when a new baby arrives!

Michelle Adams made me laugh. Then she made me laugh again and again as I moved quickly through this delightful story about a loving brother and his "bothersome" little sister.

With four brothers, I've been there. Most likely so has everyone else who grew up in a house with one or more siblings. That's what makes "Sister for Sale" such a special little tale. It's true, it's real, and it's funny.

Michelle writes in a simple, rhythmic fashion that helps you glide through this story and never miss a beat. The facial expressions in the illustrations are priceless!

I loved this little book. So did my wife, and 13-year-old son.

Sister for sale. How about a brother for free?

This is an incredible book. It's just that simple. The level of detail and precision of the research involved is better than any other "battle" book I've ever read, air or ground.
But if there is any criticism of this book to be had it is just that, there is so much information here that it can be a bit overwhelming. Not to say that it isn't well written, it most assuredly is, but it is not a book for someone with a casual interest in the air war or someone looking for some light reading on WWII.
Bodenplatte was the ill conceived last gasp of a desperate Lufwaffe. And while it succeeded in causing considerable damage at some fields even if it had done so everywhere it would have still proven a pyrrhic victory as it killed very few allied personnel, mostly it destroyed equipment... equipment that, at that point in the war, the Allies could rapidly and easily replace. But it was a fascinating battle, and if you want to understand what happened and why it happened, this is the book to read.

To write a book about a single-day operation ( 260 pages !!! )requires a lot of research , time, patience, etc. The writers did an excellent job in making this book with many personal accounts of pilots from both sides and a lot of very good photo's, not only from planes or places but from pilots as well. Combined with other books in my collection, it almost makes the picture and story complete. Hardly watching television anymore !

Bodenplatte is an excellent book and very interesting, the more so since I was at Eindhoven on New Year's day 1945 and was wounded with many others. I can certainly confirm the verocity of the attack.

Bodenplatte proves to be Luftwaffe's last major aerial offensive of World War II and this book shows why this raid proves to be so ill-fated, ill conceived and badly planned. Superbly researched by the two authors with hundreds of first hand accounts that gives much clarity to this often overlooked one day effort that totally compromised the Luftwaffe military effort along the western front for the rest of the war.

The book is divided so each fighter wing (Jagdgeschwader) who took part of the operation had their own chapter. Each chapter shows how they prepared and how they fared during the New Year Day raid. As in most cases, these Jagdgeschwaders did not fared very well at all. It pretty interesting to read that almost 50% of all Luftwaffe losses were due to anti-aircraft, mostly Allied although German lost some more to their own anti-aircraft units. The lost of German pilots proves to be the hinchpin of doom for the Luftwaffe while Allies easily replaced all pilots and planes lost in that raid.

The book read pretty well, there are over 400 black and white photos that goes with the account given and many of photos proves to be interesting ones. The book is written with certain German centric point of view although first hand accounts were given from both sides. There is also a very detail appendixs of who shot down who, what unit lost what planes and pilots and host of other material that reflect on the details of the raid. The research, as I write again, proves to be superb.

If there was a weakness, I would say that the maps could have been better design. Also, this book wasn't meant to be read by beginner reader. The authors fully expect their readers to understand the full aspect of World War II history during this period and readily be able to tell the difference between a FW190D and ME109G. There isn't much in this book for elementary education on World War II. The authors take you straight into the military narrative of the raid.

Overall, a definitive account of Bodenplatte Raid and as it turned out, it wasn't much hope for the Luftwaffe after this. The book come highly recommended for experience readers. (Funny, Hikoki Publications - Hikoki is Japanese word for "plane".)

Hikoki Publications has a well-deserved reputation for producing high-quality military aviation history books.

BODENPLATTE is a perfect example of Hikoki's commitment to quality. There have been other books on the Luftwaffe's ill-fated attacks on Allied airfields on 1 January 1945, most notably Norman Frank's book, but the Manrho and Putz book must stand as the definitive book on the subject.

The depth of research in this book is truly impressive. Comments from dozens of German and Allied personnel help trace the fate of each Jagdgeschwader over France, Belgium and Holland. The book's final chapter detailing actual losses on both sides is especially helpful in showing what a pyrrhic victory Bodenplatte was for the Luftwaffe.

The book is well-illustrated with over 400 photos, including shots of Luftwaffe aircraft caught in the act of strafing Allied airfields. (I wish Hikoki had included color profiles of some of the FW 190s and Me 109s involved but that's a minor quibble).

In short, Buy this book! Military aviation history doesn't get much better than this!

As a new middle school teacher myself, I am anxiously awaiting the school year and reading and doing as much as possible to feel prepared. I highly recommend this book for all those new teachers out there. It is filled with great ideas and reads quickly. The tips and scenarios are tremendous and the examples have been a great foundation for my own documents and worksheets. You definitely will not be let down with this purchase!

This is one book that both middle and high school teachers can refer to day to day. A teacher can take charge of the classroom and make it a conducive place for learning, and do it with creativity.
Great book.

This book offers excellent insight into the world of teaching in a middle school. There are wonderful, and practical, strategies for how to approach everything from assigning homework to seating charts to discipline problems. This book is a must have for any new middle school teacher!

I've been the editor and webmaster of a website dedicated to middle grades education for about 10 years. As part of that work, we've developed a strong online community of 600+ professional educators from across the globe who hold daily discussions about teaching adolescents. These "teachers on the frontlines" generally consider Rick Wormeli's "Day One & Beyond" to be a "must have" book for any teacher new to the middle grades. And they're quick to admit that he's got plenty of ideas that will benefit veterans as well! For middle school novices, I'd rank it at or above the level of the classic "First Days of School." Get both!