5 comments about An Enduring Love.

1. This is a really good book. Not only does it talk about Empress Farah's childhool, education, and marriage it also discusses about the Shah on how he tried to reform Iran and it goes into depth about the issues affecting Iran. It is also touching how she stood by the Shah during his illness and her youngest daughters suicide. It is a well written book discussing about the family's life in the states. This is a must read for a biography as well as a history lover. The book is not lenghty or boring at all. I couldn't put this book down.



2. Very informative insight for Iranians living in the US and abroad. Info on the downfall of the Shah and how the Carter adminstration turned their backs on the Shah and the Iranian people. Carter is a disgrace for what he did to Iran. The Shah was not the purest of governments but far better than the Khomeni revolution and the present day government.



3. Although like any other autobiography ,former Queen Farah's memoirs are presenting a single sided view on a regime, country and people, I have enjoyed reading this book .It gives insights on an era of conflicts and reminds of us of all the personalities who have ruled the world.



4. The Iranian revolution has overshadowed much of the Shah's "other" unofficial life. Most people studying Iran try to make sense of why the events had to unfold with the inevitability that they did. Ofcourse, the obvious reasons of totalitarianism and socio-economic inequity always rise to the forefront. Empress Farah's memoir provides a glimpse into the gentler side of the monarchy. The anecdotes involving the Shah as a suitor, a husband and father are far more interesting than Her Majesty's insights into the actual day to day workings of the government. Ofcourse, no one expects the Empress to stand up and provide a critical analysis of the late Shah's reign, and the reader wonders at times if Her Majesty was glossing over some of the unpleasantries of royal rule. Despite this imbalance, or perhaps because of it, the book is worthwhile in the sense that it brings back our focus to the man demonized by many scholars and historians for the decisions he made and which paved the way to the rise of political Islam. The Shah's human qualities are what endure in this memoir.



5. This book touches human soul, Empress Farah Pahlavi stated how Her Husband King Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was working for betterment of Iran, and Iran moved from dark ages to modern ages. And now Iran has been destroyed by looters, Iranian ladies are selling their bodies to buy food for their families.
   
   It is must read book.

No comments about Letters of Catherine Benincasa (Large Print Edition).

No comments about Confessions of an English Opium-Eater (EasyRead Large Bold Edition).

5 comments about Where There's A Will: Thoughts On The Good Life.

1. Mortimer writes Rumpole, who is a delight. This is the third (I think) in Mortimer's memoirs, and I missed its predecessors so this review may do Mr. Mortimer a disservice. There is a big of bragging, some interesting notes, but it a fairly forgettable series of life lessons, barely disguised as things of leave behind one that do not fit in a Will. It is a sad truth that there are a number of writers whose characters are more interesting, and charming, than their authors.



2. I should first confess my bias--I have often been tickled and sometimes awed by Mortimer's way with English prose for 20 years. So, in picking up this book I had the high expectations one might have before meeting an old friend or beloved teacher. No disappointment. Even if some of these essays are slightly less effervescent than others, all are at least wonderful, and several are both brilliant and touching.
   
   Mortimer has given us a collection of short essays, conversational and often wryly funny, which he intends as a kind of spiritual bequeathal to his family and other heirs. The chapters range across a broad range of subjects, some perhaps outwardly frivolous, like the cooking of eggs. But in the main, Mortimer touches on matters of great substance--the nature of beauty, how to be happy, surprising ways in which our world has managed to be unjust, places and times for sex, how to dine sociably, the love of children, faith and reason, the terrors of the writer facing blank paper, and many more. I found these essays to be wise and absolutely delicious. I suspect that readers who have enjoyed Rumpole, or Mortimer's other biographical essays like Summer of a Doormouse, or Clinging to the Wreckage, will be quite pleased with these sketches.
   
   Mortimer may, sadly, be nearing the end of his life, but at present he seems to be on a literary tear. I, for one, wish him many more prolific years.



3. Sir John Mortimer is an extremely literate and honestly open-minded person who writes with a flowing exquisiteness of the English language. This small book of his thoughts on a good life is a reminiscence of the life he has led and is still leading. He mentions a lot of classical literary authors and their characters that would further enrich a person's knowledge. Also, the various types of people he met working at the Old Bailey has surely enhanced his art of observing and putting their perspectives onto paper. Together with wild imaginations of his, no wonder his many writings are keenly absorbed by the public. The last ten chapters are my favorite but in each I find something to laugh out loud about. This is his own story and the way he tells it is invigorating. In not so many words in each section, he still succeeds in relaying his message that is predominantly deliberate.



4. These are the random musings of an old man contemplating his mortality. After a writing career in which he had twenty novels published, in addition to fourteen stories featuring the fictional barrister, Horace Rumpole, and twelve plays as listed in this small book of ramblings about his life, I learned that he was actually a barrister himself at the Old Bailey. He was born five years after the end of the 1914-18 war, he says, and enjoyed and endured a 'public school' education where one of his school mates was Lord Byron. He calls Byron's DON JUAN one of the great masterpieces of European literature.
   
   Sir John Mortimer (knighted in 1998) led a privileged life from the very beginning. Now, at age 81, he looks round at his children and grandchildren whose ages range from 53 to twelve, he contemplates: "Their words will echo out into the future, with their children and their children's children." What to leave them as his paternal legacy? That is what he ponders as he tells about life as it was for him at the various stages.
   
   He wonders what to pass on to the next generation. So, he gives some ancient history concerning the birthplace of out civilization, in olden times called Mesopotamia in the Persian Empire. He talks about the times he spent enjoying one of the Seven Wonders of the World, the Hanging Gardens. Then he goes on to tell about the city of peace (back then) in the time of Charlemagne, in the Ottoman Empire. "When Turkey was defeated in the 1914-18 war, the Allies carved up its possessions with quite arbitrary boundaries and placed an arbitrary king, Feisal, on the throne of Iraq. These kings ruled until a revolution led by the Baath party finally produced Saddam Hussein who was, of course, backed by America. Algebra was invented there at the center of civilization which conquered the whole of Spain."
   
   His opinions on lots of things included this remark about democracy: "I suppose democracy was most nearly achieved in ancient Greece, when everyone except women and slaves took part in the government. The result was usually disastrous and led to the death of Socrates just as the introduction of democracy in England was started." Utopia, information technology as the cause of deterioration and decline of the English language "at least as its's spoken by the governing classes", family values and vulgarity, telling lies (the bigger, the better), Shakespeare, and old movies are just some of the topics he knows so much about. This is his postscript (P.S.) to his autobiographies, as he reflects on his good and prosperous life.



5. I am afraid I was quite disappointed in this book. The review in the Times that I had read made it sound like a much more profound and important book - one I would like to own rather than just take out of the library. I had previously enjoyed other books by John Mortimer, but this book was just a collection of random musings which did not hold together at all.

No comments about The Reluctant Jester/Large Print (Charnwood Large Print Library Series).

3 comments about With My Soul Amongst Lions (Ulverscroft Large Print Series).

1. Gareth Patterson is not a saint as others may think. He is simply a man obsessed by his own experience of his life with lions...and who can blame him for that?? Certainly his courage to follow that obsession knows no bounds but as in most obsessive personalities he is almost totally unable to see other viewpoints ..... to the point where his own and the lives of the lions he has habituated so totally are sometimes at risk. It's a simple biological maxim that if we interfere we change the reality!!! We cant even observe an electron without affecting its behaviour so how are we to weave in and out of lions' lives without often horrendous
   repercussions. The truth is ...we cannot. Gareth Patterson is that wonderful individual...a self righteous 'eco warrior' who sees one rule for his views and another for everyone else. Yes he has a wonderful heart and I admire him greatly....but to try and read his clumsy and inarticulate 'writing' is painful in the extreme. Get a ghost writer to help make the basis of his observations readable and more engaging and maybe we have something which can do a better job for the critters.
   But I fear Gareth may simply be too self absorbed to see the bigger picture.
   
   Of course it's his right to do what he wants in regard to writing but I was disappointed in the extreme with this clumsy short-sighted book



2. Gareth Patterson is a saint! He is doing what needs to be done concerning the lions. Humanity is a cancer and that cancer is destroying everything in it's path. Buy this book and jump on the band wagon to save the lions!

   ALSO: One of the major problems we face is misinformation. One example is Jennifer Henderson's review of Gareth's book "Last of the Free." The book does not begin with Batian's murder, but end's with it. And in the book, Furaha nor any of her cubs get executed! What is wrong with people? I really wish people would read these books prior to writing reviews!

   One last thing: If you buy these books and enjoy them, please do your part to help the Tuli Lion Trust.

   Here is an idea. If you live in the Tuli area, become a vegetarian! It is the meat industry and cattle ranching that is the bane of lions today. If we can put the meat industry out of business we can save the lions... and some nice cows as well!




3. This story reveals the coruption and selfishness of the human race and highlight the work and lives of The Adamsons, truly amazing people that fought so selflessly for Lions and the African Wildlife

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3 comments about Tales from Rhapsody Home: Or What They Don't Tell You About Senior Living (Select).

1. I purchased my copy of John Gould's "Rhapsody Home" when vacationing on midcoast Maine near his hometown of Rockland. Knowing that Gould was somewhere nearby made the reading that much more meaningful for me. I also related in these ways: There may be a 'Rhapsody Home' in my not too distant future. Also, unable to contain my enthuisiasm for the book, I read select passages aloud to my wife who retired as the head RN at a 'Rhapsody Home.' The nature of her responses validated for me the authenticity of John Gould's rhapsodic musings.



2. Odds are this is the best book by a nonagenarian you are likely to read this year. Gould, a Down East Yankee and columnist for the Christian Science Monitor since 1942, offers a collection of short commentaries from an assisted living center. The book isn't simply a humorous indictment of the foibles and peculiarities of life in a retirement home (though there is plenty of that, from comments about food to the saga of the unopenable window and the familiar refrain "There is nothing to be done about it"). The author ranges across all his 92 years to draw on memories of doctors, raising bees with his Grandfather, and the perfect tomato.

   This is a great book for reading out loud, my wife and I found -- the sentences tend to be short and simple, belying the emotional nuances and complexity of the thoughts underneath. The author is not a simple, genteel sort, despite the appearance of his prose. There are passages on the joys of farting humor, reproductions of the light verse with which he lampooned the failures of the management (these never survived more than three minutes on the bulletin board because they "offended the staff"), and a truly fierce (but nevertheless funny) indictment of the insurance industry.

   Think of this book as Robert Fulghum in a retirement home and you'll be close to it.




3. A long term care and assisted living administrator for manyyears, this book amused me, unnerved me, angered me. I hooted withlaughter and got choked up with sympathy. A gifted wordsmith and storyteller both, Gould spun a tale I couldn't put down. I thoroughlyenjoyed digesting his delicious words and phrases. Educational,entertaining and absorbing; a must read for any aged reader. LindaLaPointe,MRA,...

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