5 comments about Jewels of the Tsars: The Romanovs and Imperial Russia.

1. If you like books about royal jewels like me then this book is for you. The pictures are beautiful and the book is full of great information.



2. While the subject of the Imperial Crown Jewels has not yet been exhausted, and this book assembles for the first time a large portion of the former collections, Prince Michael of Greece is not an Historian, gemologist, or specialist in decorative arts.
   
   While this book, like his others, has a romantic and lyric chronology enhanced by the ruthless dropping in of uncorroborated family lore, these personal titbits are less interesting that the pieces themselves who have been done a disservice by inadequate research and fact-checking.
   
   Page after page of this book are riddled with errors, inconsistencies and projections. Aigrettes are called brooches, diadems called chokers, the immense value of colored diamonds emphasized, which the actual stones shown are foiled to impart color. Members of the family are misidentified, the structure of the Diamond Fund misstated, and recreations misrepresented.
   
   Do buy this books for the marvelous photographs, many taken orginially for inclusion in the "Jewels of the Romanovs" Show catalogue at the Corcoran Gallery, but which was never published in full.



3. Very beautiful and well written. Lots of information on Russia's history and beautiful pictures of the families and jewels. If you are interested in Russian history and gem stones, this is a very good book.



4. This is an excellent look at the jewels and other fine objects of the Tsars and their families. The quality of the paper and the feel of the book is rich too. A pleasure to read and enjoy.



5. I have not seen the book but wanted to comment on the editorial comments.
   Prince Michael's Grandmother was Queen Olga of Greece, born a Grand Duchess of Russia but she was not a sister of Nicholas II. Olga's father and Nicholas II's grandfather were brothers. Thus Olga was a cousin to Nicholas II's father, Alexander III and therefore Olga and Nicholas II were second cousins. Prince Michael is a Prince of Greece and Denmark as his grandfather, King George I of Greece (Olga's husband) was born in Denmark as the second son of King Christian IX of Denmark and was elected King of Greece in March of 1863, thus becoming the King of Greece as a 17 year old prior to his father becoming King of Denmark in November of the same year, 1863. The Great Powers of Europe were looking for a new King for Greece when Vilhelm (his Danish name) was noticed at the March 1863 wedding of his older sister, Alexandra, when she married the Prince of Wales, son of Queen Victoria, and later King Edward VII. King George also had a sister (born Dagmar in Denmark) who married Alexander III of Russia, and were the parents of Nicholas II. This Michael's father Christopher was a first cousin to King George as well, making Michael a second cousin to Tsar Nicholas II through his father. Obviously one needs a "score card" to keep track of European Royalty as most of them are related to each other one way or another as in the past royalty was only allowed to marry royalty. Fortunately that has changed over the last several generations and it would appear that ALL of the heirs to the crowns of Europe have indeed married for love, and almost all of them have married commoners.

5 comments about Finding Your Visual Voice: A Painter's Guide to Developing an Artistic Style.

1. I am truly enjoying this book. It has helped me reflect on my artwork, as well as validate my subject preferences and style. In addition, the artist interviews and works featured are inspirational. It is a great addition to any artist's library.



2. I received this beautiful book as a gift and have found it to be a wonderful companion in my studio. First of all it is packed with delicious colored photographs and painting reproductions on high quality paper. The concealed spiral binding makes it extra user friendly when lying on my drawing table but easy to retrieve from the book shelves (where it rarely stays). I found the interviews with artists to be insightful, perceptive and fun. I have enjoyed picking it up so many times and spending a couple minutes reading a gem that gives me the inspiration I need to move forward with my own work.
   Thanks Dakota for a terrificly thought provoking book that distills and honors the creative process.



3. This book is an easy-to-follow guide to sort out your own style of creative expression. I'm not a painter, but I have started dabbling in mosaic. I'm convinced that this book can help anyone interested in forming and developing their unique style in any visual art medium.
   
   The book is spiral-bound which means it can lay flat on the table while you refer to it. I love this feature. The chapters flow logically from recognizing your inspiration and suitable subject matter, to more technical topics like lines, composition, and process. The information is presented simply, with many examples to illustrate each point. Contemporary painters offer their advice through carefully guided interviews throughout the book. The most clever aspect of the book is the chance to review and reflect on each topic through end-of-the-chapter questions. Finally, exercises help you to apply what you have discovered about yourself and your art. Finding Your Visual Voice is a process of developing self awareness and you are gently guided through that process with this excellent book.



4. At first glance this book gave me the impression that it really was going to be a visual delight. The format of the pictures and interviews were a creative way to feel as if I were there with each artist Ms Mitchell interviewed. I am just beginning to experiment with the idea of artistic painting. This book has a variety of methods and formats to chose from if I want to experiment in various areas. As a teacher, I like the exercises at the end of each chapter. This book could be used for art classes as well as just for information about painting.



5. This book has been an inspiration to myself and several of my artist friends. It really helps you focus on your individual style and helps you find techniques that are best suited you personally. The layout is exceptional, and I loved the workbook style which allows you to experiment and use the various information provided by the guest artists.
   I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in painting, no matter what level they are. What artist, or person for that matter, wouldn't benefit from learning to find and listen to their "inner voice"?

5 comments about Oriental Carpet Design: A Guide to Traditional Motifs, Patterns and Symbols.

1. The book is a very well written vol d'oiseau over modern oriental rugs and carpets with excellent pictures and timely historical notes. Certainly one of the best works available in the field both to beginners and connoisseurs.



2. This is an excellent book to find all the information one needs on Persian and Oriental carpets. Very informative, and beautiful colour plates.



3. This book has the best information I've found on distinguing one type of rug from another. Many books give information about the major types of rugs...they're a dime a dozen. Ford breaks everything down into what specific tribes and villages weave, and tells us what the weavers use for warps and wefts, distinguishing colors, area motifs and designs, and more.
   
   This book is definitely academic in nature, but this is exactly the kind of fact-filled information I've been searching for. I had thought I would find it in Peter Stone's works, but even Stone's 2004 book on motifs does not come close to what Ford did twenty years ago. I currently own about 50 books on oriental rugs, and Ford's book offers the most comprehensive, detailed information of any of them.
   
   If you want to move from being a novice to becoming a more knowledgeable buyer and rug lover, you will want this book.



4. I collect Oriental rugs and Oriental rug books. This book is not for the beginner, but is meant for in-depth study of the subject of Oriental rugs. As you read you are directed to other pages for study and comparison. This is a time consuming but valuable process. If one wants to really study Oriental rugs this book can elevate you from beginner to a person who is comfortable with the subject and able to talk with experts. I used this book as a self teaching text book and loved it.



5. I bought this book after going to the library and checking out a number of carpet books - I was looking for a reference that would teach me some of the history of rug making and the people who make these incredible pieces of art as well as the practical side such as what to look for in a rug. This book is great at teaching about the different types of rugs. There are color pictures on every page, there are drawings of specific patterns so you can see specifically what make a rug one type rather than another, there are uncommon examples of types of rugs shown, etc. Its quite a good book (which is why I bought it after returning the library copy). This book is ok at teaching about the history/people or about how to tell a good quality rug - the intro goes into some good detail about things like knot types, weaves, use of synthetic dyes, chinese rugs etc but it's a fanatsic guide to decoding the different traditional motifs and patterns. I'm giving it 4 stars rather than 5 only because the text is so dry and they don't really give the stories - they give more dry facts such as this type of rug was woven in this manufacturing/village setting in x,y,z town. It would have been niceto have more details about the people and about the symbolism of the motifs. But, like I said, I knew all that before I bought the book since I had checked t out at the library. I use this book to augment others that I ended up buying that do tell more of the stories.

4 comments about Kandinsky.

1. The book was received timely and in good condition. I am enjoying the art work. The book is verything I expected to be, very abstract.



2. 
   
   Normally I do not read art books, for art tends to speak for itself.
   
   My wife bought this one in response to remarks I had made in an art boutique in Maui about a Miles Davis painting we saw there. The comment, the same one I made on other occasions upon seeing similar paintings by Ornette Coleman, Calman Shemi and Wasssily Kandinsky was that "I could hear the paintings much better than I could see them."
   
   Shemi actually has a series of painting, fittingly called "Jazz" - and if you do not think about them too hard, you can actually hear the music in them.
   
   I suppose since there are no art books about Miles, Ornette, or yet even about Shemi, the next best thing was for her to get me one about Wassily Kandinsky, known to be my favorite artist. And speaking of books about heroes, never was I more disappointed than by Miles' own book "Decoy," whose title could not have been more prophetic as it was not so much about his music as it was a decoy deflecting one from Miles' music and focusing on how Miles - even deep into his fifties - seemed still obsessed with remaining a "hip East St. Louis inner city thug." And while "Decoy" certainly cut Miles down to human size, nothing can ever erase the impact of his musical genius and legacy. Miles, whatever else, were his failings, did for music what Kandinsky spent a lifetime trying to do for painting: He freed American music from its rigidly imposed aesthetic structural strait-jacket of time and chordal discipline, in one fell swoop.
   
   His "Kind of Blue," is such a pure expression of musical yearning for freedom; such a pure expression of musical genius, such a pure stretching of the boundaries of musical form, and such a pure stripping away of social orthodoxy, that it alone serves as a transcendental model for yearnings for freedom that go far beyond the bounds of music or even the arts. We are unlikely to see one musical piece have such a profound impact on the psyche of a culture repeated ever again.
   
   What a surprise it was to discover in this volume by Ulrike Becks-Morlarney, that Kandinsky was nothing if not a frustrated musician, using his palette of colors as a musician would use a horn: to express his emotions through the visual modalities of color, light and his own understated and reorganized idea of form. Kandinsky does so with the same freedom from the rigidity of structural orthodoxy as that expressed by Jazz musicians such as Coleman, Coltrane, Monk and Davis. And while any description of what was going on in his head has to be a vast oversimplification, it is not too much of an exaggeration to suggest that Kandinsky was a "revolutionary musician" with a paintbrush, an easel and a palette of colors, rather than a horn.
   
   And just as Miles staged a quiet musical revolution with the album "Kind of Blue," one that overthrew a half-century of musical orthodoxy, Kandinsky, who gave up Law at the late age of 30, also staged a quiet revolution again the established orthodoxy of painting at the turn of the 19th Century. Both of these syn-esthetic trailblazers had keen cross-modal sensitivities and sensibilities, and could smell, feel, see and hear across and well beyond the established aesthetic boundaries. Both used these heightened sensitivities and sensibilities to burrow beneath the established orthodoxy so as to better upend it.
   
   And upend it they did.
   
   While Miles' used "structural understatement," "rhythmic nuance," and "tonal finesse" to get his abstracted musical message across, Kandinsky used "overstatement," "boldness," and "surprise" to communicate to us abstractly through colors, light and form. Miles' muted trumpet "tip-toed" across the musical canvas like "walking on egg shells," while Kandinsky's bold colors and angular lines "shocked and awed" the old representational objects and their representations motifs back into the closet somewhere well "off the stage" of the canvas.
   
   And while there is a great deal that is both comic and tragic about the lives of both of these "larger-than-life" artistic geniuses, what provides the common thread between them is their relentless single mindedness yearning for freedom from mindless and repetitive orthodoxy. In the end their goals were the same: to free art (and by extension people) from the shackles of conventional orthodoxy and mindless constrictions. Taschen has produced an enduring masterpiece of artistic biography here. It summarizes in the most exquisite way the essence of the man, Wassily Kandinsky Five stars.



3. "The artwork is composed of two elements. The inner and the outer. The inner element, regarded individually, is the emotion that feels the artist' s soul . That emotion is capable to provoke a parallel emotion in the spectator. Generally, while the soul remains bounded to body, only the vibrations will be able to be attracted though the sensation. Hence, the sensation is a bridge from the materialness toward material (artist) and vice versa (spectator). Emotion-Sensation-Work-Sensation- Emotion." (Wassily Kandinsky)
   
   Wassili Kandinski represents by far, one of the highest peaks in what concerns the reinvention and redefinition of art, deeply worried about Theosophy, inaugurated several artistic movements in pursuit of new forms of expression. Indeed, his memories from Moscow, his unforgettable impressions from the childhood, generated a vigorous inner creator impulse that would become a true driving force.
   
   The text describes with zealous detail, his metamorphoses in Munich since 1896 to 1911, his decisive meet with Gabriele Munter, his settlement in Murnau, as well as his breakthrough toward the abstraction "The blue rider" his interlude in Russia 1914-1921, his fruitful period in Bauhaus 1922-1933 until his last stage: the bio-morph abstraction in Paris 1934-1944.
   
   That febrile disposition respect the perpetual innovation, the same fact he could live in worlds so opposite (October 1917, respect the new tendencies of Paris and Munich as gravity centers of fevered proposals), the sharp contrast between tradition and innovation, the breakthrough of so many paradigms, the Fauvism, Cubism, Impressionism, Constructivism, enlivened in his soul the imperious necessity to transcend the Halls of his art and thence, his concerns for publishing and divulgating his standpoints.
   
   His life was a worthy example of Camus statement. "To create is to live twice" and this book provides of a very ordered sequence, every one of his different stages of transformation.
   
   Highly recommended.



4. Ulrike Becks-Malorny has brought recent perspectives on Kandinsky's career to further light with this new biography.

   The density of the layout is phenomenal: so much is crammed into this volume it is almost unbelievable. It includes many plates in colour and numerous documentary photographs.
   
   The handsome large format paperback begins with his artistic life in Munich, in the process showing many of his earliest impressionist, fauvist and folk inspired paintings, photographs and sketches, lino- and woodcuts, etchings and drawings never seen before.

   Most illustrations are captioned with insightful comments about the work and matters of relevant historic interest.

   It also shows how his work developed in dialogue with other artists, architects and musicians of his era, especially the Jugendstil artists, Gabriele Munter and other Blaue Reiter painters, Paul Klee, Adolf Hoelzel, Kasimir Malevich and Alexander Rodchenko.

   My only problem with the book is in the non-justified text and choice of font in Times Roman, which in this particular leading, is not the easiest typeface to scan these days.

1 comments about Art of the Royal Court: Treasures in Pietre Dure from the Palaces of Europe (Metropolitan Museum of Art).

1. I've just returned from seeing the exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and now I can't wait to have the book. I saw the book while I was in the Met's Book Shop and it is absolutely great with so many pictures of the items on exhibit. If you can't get to the exhibit which is on thru Sept. 21st, this book is the next best thing!

5 comments about Galen Rowell: A Retrospective.

1. Spectacular Photos and what an athlete. His death was a loss, but he lives on in these images



2. This is more a short biography with too few of the beautuful photos this talented outdoor photographer made. I would have like to have seen more full page photos and more of them.



3. this book was amazing, the pictures are stunning, and the stories about him are almost unbelievable. I highly recommend this book for fans of photography or anyone who loves the outdoors.



4. If you are familiar with with the work of Galen Rowell I don't need to elaborate on the beauty and quality of his work, if you aren't familiar with this man and his work it will be a valuable addition to your knowledge and enjoyment of photography. Galen Rowell had an unfortunate and untimely death
   after a very active life of globe trotting for photography that transcends
   the material plane. The book presents many of his best works in a lovely format. A coffee table book that will get noticed.



5. If you have every looked at Galen's photos and wanted to see more, this is it. With his life cut short, at least we still have archived material that can be released in a book this nice to bring us more glimpses of his world. The color is amazing, the subjects grand, and Galens storys bring it all alive in my livingroom.

5 comments about American Visions: The Epic History of Art in America.

1. "I don't listen to what art critics say. I don't know anybody who needs a critic to find out what art is." - Jean Michele Basquiat
   
   For anyone who doesn't know, the profession of "art critic" is obsolete. That's why this book gets one star. I picked it up because I was made to believe it was an article of history, or fact if you will; instead what I got was someone trying to tell me what to believe about other people's work. I dictate my own feelings. Hughes' only way of making art is to criticize that of others, yet the very people he criticize, such as Arthur Rimbaud and Jean Basquiat will always have something Hughes will never comprehend, originality.



2. In short, Robert Hughes view on Graffiti Art and artist Jean Michel Basquiat in his book American Visions: The Epic History of Art in America are dismissive. first of all, Graffiti Art evolved outside of an art historical context and it wasn't meant to opperate in it. Hughes says Graffiti art was "short lived." After the 80's art world disposed of graffiti as a trend it still existed in urban environments and is now sadly "still" being appropriated by contemporary western artists today.
   
   Hughes calls Basquiat a "Little Black Rimbaud" and speaks of his work as being "visual monotony of arid overstyling." I think Hughes was speaking about how the work didn't address him or include him and therefore he attacks the artist. By making racist comments such as the one mentioned above one has to consider that Hughes is not only wreckless in his writing but racist in intent!
   
   I think time has also proven Robert Hughes incorrect about Jean Michel Basquiat and Graffiti Art.



3. I have been a fan of Robert Hughes since I fist saw the television show "Ths Shock of the New" and also his criticism in Time Magazine. In this book, he takes as his subject the epic of the American artisitc experience. In lesser hands this could be a dull topic, but thanks to Hughes's enthusiasm and interesting takes on American life, this subject becomes quite fascinating indeed.

   Hughes begins at the beginning and starts off with a discussion of Spanish colonial art of the old west before moving onto the East coast and the founding fathers of American Art (West Copley, Peale and Stuart). When discussing the paintings Hughes ties it in with the politics of the various periods, the literature and even the music, establishing that art does not exist in a vacuum.

   I have seem many of the works discussed in this work and found Hughes's insights inspiring in some instances sending off to look up material on them. The strongest sections deal with aside from the early American artists, Cole's The Way of Empire series, the Eakins, Steiglitz, and Masden Hartley.

   Although I rate this book with five stars, I did have one or two problems. I would have thought that he might have examined Sargent's technique more thoroughly. I have always noticed that he seems to have a problem drawing hands.

   The most profound disagreement that I have with Hughes is over theRegionalist movement of the 1930s. I am afraid I do not share his view of Benton. Rather than put him in the context of socialist realism and nazi art, I would have thought a more natural point of departure would be the discovery (some might say invention) of an early American aesthetic. Benton, Grant Wood and John Curry were more part of this trend than any of the international movement of totalitarian art.

   I also disagreed with the section on the abstract expressionists who Hughes likes and I do not, finding them sterile and self-indulgent.

   The book concludes with a survey of the art work of the 1980s and 1990s. This is more about commerce and perception and is illustrated by a story of the purchase of Van Gough's Irises. Whether one agress or disagrees with Hughes's judgements, oneis sure to find this survey of American art history stimulating and thought provoking.




4. Dismissing a critic simply because you disagree with him, even violently disagree with him, is to miss the value a critic has. A critic's role is to spark your own thinking and investigation, to encourage us to formulate our own views and develop our arguments for them more explicitly. Letting a critic supply you with your views or to simply reject him because he doesn't confirm your pre-dispositions is a waste of your own reading time as well as the work the critic put into to his work.

   Rejecting a critic's views is fine, if you do it with well-formed argument and facts or for explicit aesthetic views and tastes. The whole purpose of affirmation includes the idea of rejection. Just as accepting everything is to accept nothing, making choices on acceptance includes the statement, "No, not this."

   Robert Hughes has strong views and has the talent for stating them forcefully. Whether or not you agree with him is almost beside the point. This book is a wonderful tour of American Art from Colonial times through the mid 1990s.

   While I don't want to try and state Mr. Hughes' views for him, my reading of this book tells me that when architecture, painting, and sculpture comes from an artist honestly trying to come to grips with his or her views of the world and our living in it, Mr. Hughes considers that a good thing. Whenever that is compromised in favor of social acceptance or whenever an artistic establishment forms to enforce an orthodoxy and muzzle expression he considers that a bad thing.

   He also tends to favor actual skill, facility, and even virtuosity in expression (if not necessarily technique) over posing and demanding acceptance. The artist must be able to communicate to others and win an audience and hold them over time to win the author's admiration. Influencing others and having resonance with other artists and other times is also a plus.

   The sorry state of art in our time with the dominance of a self-reinforcing elite art establishment in the museums, the shows, and the galleries comes in for a heavy beating later in the book. It isn't a blanket rejection of current art, rather it is a large pin the balloon of recent pretension and I think this is very valuable.

   I see this in the book and hope I am saying this correctly in part because I agree with this view. Not every conclusion Mr. Hughes makes is one I find myself endorsing, but as I say, that is beside the point. He has mastered a lot of information, presents us with hundreds of wonderful works to consider, and challenges us to think for ourselves about the issues he raises. I think this is a wonderful service and that this is a wonderful book. I am glad to have it on my shelf to dip into again and again.




5. In American Visions, Robert Hughes takes on the rather daunting task of summing up the history of American art. While he does not entirely succeed it is a valiant effort. By using nine time periods, Hughes attempts to make the understanding of the art he believes is important easier to digest. The inherent problem lies with the concept of what Hughes deems important. Art is not easily criticized, one man's masterpiece is often someone else's waste of time, and although I admire Hughes' willingness to put himself on the line time after time, I often disagree with his emphasis. Artists like Winslow Homer and Edward Hopper get their due, but many others like Alexander Calder get a fleeting mention. Sculpture and photography are ignored and architecture is dealt with in huge sections and then forgotten until the next period Hughes feels is worth discussing. Hughes also has the annoying habit of referencing a painting and then not have it shown, an example being the Warhol "Electric Chair" pieces that are not presented although they are discussed in some detail. Hughes' vocabulary will have you reaching for a dictionary at some points and wincing at the use of crude descriptions at others ( "Charles Demuth was not a flaming queen" "Mabel Dodge Luhan ...an intolerable b----) Overall this book frustrates as it educates and the combination is irritating to say the least. It just appears that Hughes has just bitten off more than the reader can chew. While it is a starting point for those of us whose art history is sorely lacking it just doesn't satisfy as a reference work; it is more of a critical review of art in America, not the same thing as a history.

2 comments about Secret Lives of Great Artists: What Your Teachers Never Told You About Master Painter and Sculptors.

1. Secret Lives of the Great Artists is a sister volume to Secret Lives of Great Authors. These two books were recently published by Quirk Books.
   This slim volume contains text and humorous drawings of the artists.
   The author is Elizabeth Lunday; the artist is Mario Zucca.
   Thirty-Five famous artists have their lives surveyed. Artists profiled include Leonardo, Rembrandt, Michelangelo, the Impressionist and such modern artists as Jackson Pollock, Edward Hopper and Andy Warhol. The book is a treasure trove of trivia such as these examples display:
   Vincent Van Gogh enjoyed eating paint which may explain his weird behavior!
   Frieda Kahlo had an affair with Leon Trotsky and enjoying bathing her 300 pound artist/husband the rotund Diego Rivera
   Caravaggio murdered a man in a brawl.
   Henri Rosseau was once convicted of bank fraud.
   Gustav Klimt was terrified of traveling outside Vienna
   Along the way the author provides tidbits about the Mona Lisa being without eyebrows; the Venus de Milo and Pre-Columbian art.
   This is a fun book which pay interest young people in art.



2. This is not only a well-researched book about the great art masters' lives but also a book full of laugh-out-loud humor. Who knew, as pointed out on page 48, that several of Michelangelo's assistants quit during the four years it took to complete the ceiling of the Sistine chapel - "..hardly suprising since the team lived together and shared a single bed. Since Michelangelo believed bathing was bad for his health, the staff may have been eager to make for the door as soon as possible."
   
   Recommended for serious art history students, teachers, and those of us that just enjoy funny stories.

5 comments about Palestine and the Arab-Israeli Conflict: A History with Documents.

1. I have not finished the book yet. Yet, I felt encouraged to answer Mr ML/NJ and throw some comments on his review. I would like to start by saying that finally we see a book that depcits the truth. A book that does not call the owners of the lands terorrists. A book that understands how it might feel to live in a peice of land for 1,400 years, then by a Belford declaration, you are expelled. We have always read many books that were completely biased towards the Israeli side. There has always been the double standard, not only in politics, but even in book pages and what is supposed to be free speach. Now, I am happy to see that the sitiuation is changing. I would really recommend the book for whoever wants to hear the OTHER side of the story.



2. I assure you that this book is nowhere near as dry as Smith's lectures, and I also assure you that he is extremely (almost insanely) knowledgable on this topic. His lectures are unbiased and I find it hilarious that a lot of reviewers said that this book was biased against Israel. After reading this textbook, I think that only biased people would say that this book is biased (against their own side, of course) because Smith isn't afraid to point the finger at all sides. He clearly shows that the road to peace (or the lack thereof) is a two-way street.
   
   I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to get into the nitty gritty of this topic (details are PLENTY in this text), as long as you're willing to consider that America (as well as others) hasn't exactly been an angel in the past.



3. The Arab-Israeli conflict is one that touches on so many painful emotions and biases that no book will be deemed fair or unbiased by all concerned. However, Smith's book does a very good job of attempting to be as close to unbiased as possible. It is often used as a textbook in upper-level modern Middle East history courses for just that reason. It is good choice for someone who is new to the subject (other than the inescapable news coverage) and really wants to understand some of the issues invovled throughout the history of the conflict.
   
   One of the strongest things about Smith's book is the inclusion of a number of primary sources. Other than disputing the translations, no one can deny that primary sources are as close to an honest look at history as we can get. Documents are included from many sides of the issues involved and no side comes out either squeekly clean nor as pure evil.
   
   Another strength I found, to differ with another reviewers opinion, is that the book starts quite far back in the history of the conflict. As the mythologizing of the roots of Israel as a nation has been worked into the official stance of all sides, each for their own purposes, understanding what happened at the beginning is of utmost importance if you really want to grasp the subject. This is a good book that does it's best with a difficult subject and goes into some depth in addition to excellent primary source material.



4. Like some other reviewers, I too bought this book for a college course and I too find it overly biased toward the Arab point of view. The author has the right to draw his own conclusions, but like any non-fiction book, readers must use their own judgement to evaluate those conclusions carefully. I don't know if there is an author without bias on this topic due to its sensitivity.
   
   It is also horribly dry in my opinion. I know it's supposed to be, but certain sections just drag on and on, it seems, uneccessarily.
   
   Read critically, not literally. If you have a choice (i.e. don't have to buy this particular book for a course or something) choose a more balanced author, if you can find one.



5. The book is a fairly concise and accurate overview of the Arab-Israeli conflict. It covers ancient Jewish history, the beginnings of Zionism, the emergence of Israel, the Arab Wars and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Most of the coverage is well researched and documented.
   
   The closing chapters of the book are undoubtedly biased towards the Palestinian account. One example is the coverage of the Barak-Arafat-Clinton negotiations in 2000. Smith portrays Barak as a man whose intentions were not to conduct honest negotiations but rather "carefully calculated, intended to appear more amenable to the United States." Smith writes that "there was never an Israeli offer." Further, Smith asserts that Barak was manipulating the media in order to force them to present a positive account of Israeli negotiations. Arafat's refusal to make any counter offer, or contribute to the negotiations -- as asserted by President Clinton and the U.S. chief negotiater -- are not mentioned. Smith also does not fault Palestinian terrorism -- the systematic, often daily suicide bombings experienced by Israel -- for turning Israeli public opinion against further peace talks. According to Smith, the blame lies solely on Sharon and his visit to the Temple Mount and Palestinian frustration.
   
   Smith's discussion of the Intifada speaks in terms of Israeli attacks and Palestinian "armed response." In fact, Israel had been initially very reserved in its replies to suicide bombings. Israeli interests do not lie in a military occupation of the Palestinian territories, unless necessary to alleviate security risk.
   
   Admittedly, I have an opinion about whose fault the failure of the Camp David II was. It is acceptable for the author to take an opposite view. However, in a book that claims to be a non-biased textbook for college use, the topic should be presented with acknowledgement of differing opinions. Especially, when the book presents an account that is largely a contrast to the established narrative (a narrative that there is no reason to believe is inaccurate).
   
   My rating is still positive because the book is a valuable resource in its coverage of earlier time periods. However, this book should be used with other materials for balance.

5 comments about The How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci Workbook: Your Personal Companion to How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci.

1. I bought this workbook along with the parent book, "How to think like Da vinci."
   
   I truly enjoyed the parent book, and actually did some of the exercises (the 100 question one specifically). Some of the exercises seemed kind of contrived. If I had it to do over again, I would not buy the workbook, but would instead just buy a journal (as the book suggests) and record your creativity ideas there and do what exercises you desire out of the book and record the results in your journal. This way you are working in one journal.
   
   I do not mean for this to take away from the Main book at all. This workbook seems to be more of a marketing device that a very useful too.
   
   Leon



2. I was looking for something to share with my daughter for her Home school projects but fell in love with this book and workbook for myself instead!
   This is a wonderful book to thrill and inspire you to learn new things about yourself every day! Why rush through it?! It was meant to be savored slowly like wine and cheese so don't rush your way through it!
   I AM a Leonardo da Vincian Thinker!



3. I bought this book and the companion workbook, read it, then had a presentation done for my professional organization of which I am the state president this year. It was smashing!
   
   I recomend this to anyone who is interested in learning how to "think outside the box" and to really explore how to think and approach everyday things in a different manner.
   
   These books lend themselves well to seminars for groups and for academia.



4. At first I was skeptical but the workbook has turned out great. I have been using it on and off at times in my life when a lot of things are going on and I need a way to rethink about what I am really doing with my life. It may not be for everyone but for the few people who are ambitious or have lots of intrest, this book can help bring everything in perspective. It's not even that expensive. Also, it doubles as a journal if you don't care for the exercises.



5. This is very sad book with little merit. A perfect example of an author scamming the reading public. I wish there was some kind of publishing board that could review books and prohibit some from being published.