5 comments about The White Masai.

1. I could not relate to the author's fanatic obsession of insisting that she had to be with this Masai man. I was tempted to throw the book away in the first two chapters. I only continued to read because I have been to Kenya myself and it gave me more insight into the Masai's culture and traditions. Worth reading if you are interested in the Masai tribe and/or the difficulties in daily living in Africa-things that we take for granted in the Western world.



2. If you enjoy adventure stories, this is a fast read. Corinne Hofmann does not write fluently, but her book is captivating. That being said, readers just can't help but dislike the author for many reasons (read the many other reviews). She does, however, capture the essence of Samburu life and effectively shows how similar/different world cultures really are. The non-western perspectives (clitorectomies, no mouth-kissing, crying only at deaths, etc.)are what make this an interesting story. Readers also realize some things are universal and never change--like jealousy, greed and corruption. One wonders how Corinne would have fit in had she not been a white female bearing gifts and money. One note--there is little, if any, detail in this book about Kenya's natural wonders.



3. Despite being a successful businesswoman in Switzerland, 27-year-old Corinne Hofmann still didn't know the difference between lust and love. She did one stupid thing after another in chasing down a man based solely on his looks, pursuing him across Kenya, pushing for a marriage even though he was acting crazy soon after they met, and taking her European lifestyle to a remote Samburu village. Some surprise when "her darling" turned into someone she didn't expect. I still don't think she realizes what an idiot she was, but she meant well and placed her trust in the fantasy of a love that would cross all barriers.
   
   Several things stick in my mind about the book. 1. How Samburu women are worth less than goats. 2. How "her Masai" Lketinga suggested that instead of marriage she just come visit him on holidays but oh no she doesn't listen... if some guy said that to me I'd get the message. 3. After living in the village she loses a lot of weight and realizes her problem is the same as everyone else's: a lack of food. Amazing she could be there so long before she noticed.
   
   I was impressed by her loving terms toward Lketinga at the beginning of the book. She really pulled off how taken she was by him, even though when she wrote the book it was no longer the case. Despite her questionable choices at the beginning of her relationship, she did get out of it quickly when it was obvious it was never going to improve.
   
   The White Masai is a great read with her cultural observations and experiences. I have the sequel but can't start reading it until I have a weekend where I have nothing else to do,- I know I won't be able to put it down.



4. I received this book for Christmas and while it held my interest until the end, I was flabbergasted at how her obsession blinded her. Egads!



5. Unfortnately, it was the schadenfreude that kept me reading, and not the "romantic" angle or the "gripping yarn" comprised largely of the author's tangles with bureaucracy or free trade in Kenya. I came to dislike the author early in the book, and it was knowing that I would have the satisfaction of seeing her capricious actions and her condescending post-colonial attitude come back and bite her that kept me glued to the book to the very last page.
   
   I had trouble believing that a 27 year-old woman - old enough to know better - on vacation in Kenya WITH HER BOYFRIEND would, upon seeing the Samburu who became her husband, begin stalking him and proclaiming him "[her] Masai" with a frightening and single-minded obsession. Love at first sight? Really? And then you stalk him all over Kenya for the next several months?
   
   The author continues on her flighty course, foisting herself on this young man she has fallen for, and then foisting herself on his family and village in northern Kenya. She seems to expect their culture to change to suit her, and when it doesn't, she acts as if she's a victim. In fact, she plays the martyr throughout the book, whenever things don't go her way, whether the problems are the result of cultural differences or because she insists on driving a dangerous jungle road (over and over and over and over again) despite numerous near-disastrous trips on the road. No matter how many stupid choices she makes, she always finds someone or something to blame when things blow up in her face.
   
   She seems endlessly put off by almost everyone she encounters during the course of the narrative, whether it's her baby daughter for messing up diapers, or the Italian priest in the mission neighboring the Samburu village who inconveniences her by not being at her disposal to bail her out of yet another of her self-inflicted disasters (broken car - AGAIN, ran out of sugar, etc.). Shortly after her marriage to the Samburu, her tone toward him, as she tells the story, changes, and you can tell that she is almost immediately disenchanted pretty much the moment she makes a formal commitment to him. Unfortunately, by then, she's pregnant and more or less stuck in the situation. Again, it's a situation which she doggedly and tirelessly pursued, so it's hard to feel sorry for her reaping the rewards of her actions.
   
   She recklessly disregards her health (I can't count the number of times she recounts how little she's eaten - but always with a figurative martyrish sigh); the most descriptive writing in the book deals with her two-and-a-half chapters retelling her miseries with malaria; and while I'm certain that malaria is no picnic, she brought it all on herself, every single woe that befalls her in the book, and it's hard to feel sorry for her, as she obviously wants the reader to do. She clearly wishes the reader to read her account and say, "Oh, poor Corinne! Look what she must put up with - all for love!" but by the time she starts complaining in earnest, you realize how flighty, immature, and manipulative she is, and it's hard to pity her for actively pursuing the situation that is currently making her miserable.
   
   As well as complaining about the ways "[her] darling" - ugh - disappoints her, she does little but complain about... well, nearly everything else, too. How hard it is to get a permit to open a store or get married. How far away all the towns are. How hard it is to get stock for her store. How dangerous the jungle road - that she still insists on taking every trip, inexplicably - is. How lousy her car is. How little she eats. How hard she works. How hard it is to be the only white person for miles. The entire book is a litany of complaints.
   
   Her writing - and maybe part of this is the translation from German to English - is workmanlike and strangely dispassionate. The tales of her frequent journeys to various towns and villages in Kenya have a hypnotic quality because they're all the same ("I must go to Nairobi. How I hate that place! It will take me days to get there." And then she recounts the various problems - tire puncture, broken clutch, broken transmission, leaky battery - that she has in getting there. And then discusses how unhelpful the bureaucrats are. And then describes the trip back home - tire puncture, broken clutch, broken transmission, leaky battery. And then the complaints about "home," in the Samburu village, despite the fact it appears the villagers bend over backward to make her comfortable both within and outside of their culture, which she so rudely crashed into without consulting anyone but her own fickle heart). For someone whose writing is so detached, though, she manages quite a bit of melodrama, but it rings empty, much in the same way that a heroine in a Gothic novel speaks hollowly of her great love and her vast troubles. And then she faints prettily and waits to be rescued by a gallant gentleman with smelling salts. This is what the entire book is like.
   
   The author is enormously self-centered and selfish, and as she expects the Samburu culture to bend to her needs, she refuses to take up much of any of the culture to meet her new family and neighbors halfway. This, unsurprisingly, causes clashes, wherein, again, she seems to believe that she is the victim and the villagers and her husband and his family are the victimizers. She has an incredibly condescending, undeniably racist attitude toward them and winds up emasculating her husband terribly. This leads to poor behavior on his part, to the point that I ALMOST felt sorry for her the last couple of chapters, but the poor guy was stalked and outmatched by an insufferably selfish and manipulative woman, so his behavior - acceptable in his culture - gets a pass from me.
   
   What kept me reading was, at first, the hope that the author would become less self-involved and more self-aware, and that the "part travel-writing" part touted on the back of the book would begin to evidence itself. Once it dawned on me that this wouldn't happen, I kept reading to see the author's downfall. Pure bonus were the letters at the very end of the book wherein she tries to explain herself to pretty much everyone she came into close contact with during her years in Kenya, in which she sounds indescribably self-serving and reveals that she learned absolutely nothing about herself or the culture into which she injected herself while she was there. I suppose her book is an explanation to the rest of us about what happened, and an attempt to make us believe that she is noble, brave, and tragic. I found her more to be stubborn, headstrong, and impetuous, and I'm glad the book is over so I can move on to more worthy projects.
   
   If you are able to borrow this book, by all means, give it a read. It was entertaining, it its own way, to read about this woman's constant delusion and habitual victimhood, and, like I said, I couldn't put it down once I'd started. But I'm sorry I paid money for the book, and I wouldn't do it again.

3 comments about Makiko's Diary: A Merchant Wife in 1910 Kyoto.

1. Reading a diary that was written without any pretension to having anyone ever read it means that one will encounter lots of trivia of interest only to specialists in social history. Despite excellent ancillary materials by the first-rate translator, Kazuko Smith--including many family and urban photos, maps, and detailed introductory explanations-- the book is more a treasure trove for students and scholars of women's roles in early twentieth-century merchant households than it is for the casual reader. There are numerous historical delights that turn up, including the parts about telephones, theatregoing, and domestic arrangements, but these are tidbits soaking in a bath of everyday effluvia. Unless you're totally absorbed by arcane Japanese recipes and the perpetual professional responsibilities of the writer's husband (to whom she refers by name only once), you'll find that the bumpy experience of reading short (mostly one-page) entries over a single year forces you to skim the dull parts in search of enlightening nuggets. The translator bends over backward to explain all the familial and friendship relationships, but even reading that material can cause you to lose track if you're seeking entertainment instead of scholarly goals. For those who are deeply invested in the historical period and in the role of gender relations in early twentieth-century Japan, this is a valuable document. More general readers will find the book an up and down experience, but there are probably enough ups to keep them interested.



2. The year set down for us by Makiko, 1910, was during a period of great flux in Japanese history, as government-sponsored Westernization was continuing from the Meiji Restoration of 1868. But amidst the laying of water pipes, the playing of phonograph records, the nightly appearance of the electric light, and the ringing of telephones dwelled still the traditional Japanese nuclear family, with its ancestral responsibilities and strict division of labor according to gender. But not all is as it once was for the young wife of a Japanese merchant.
   
   Makiko lived during a time of great transition in the expectations of women as well, from the more traditional docility to a more modern assertion of her own rights. Torn by both the duties of her marriage and natal families, Makiko was also torn by her role as wife. Her diary is a fascinating look at this transition from the traditional to modern woman.
   
   This is an invaluable primary historical source and a surprisingly readable translation by Smith. One thing, however, is that there are just a few too many foot-notes, and they appear at the end of each entry, rather than at the end of a page. One should skim these, at first, for they do tend to slow down the narrative pace a bit. Advice to those who are reading this for a class: if you only skim the entries and foot-notes pertaining to Japanese food, the book is perhaps only two-thirds it's actual length! (In fairness to Makiko, one of the main reasons for her keeping a diary was to have a "recipe book," of sorts, to refer back on as she learned food preparation from her mother-in-law; I am sure she never dreamed that her diary would EVER be published.) An added bonus is the many photographs of the Nagano family spread throughout the book.




3. The lives of ordinary women tend to be poorly documented. This leaves a large gap between decriptions of the way things were supposed to have been and the way they actually were.

   This young wife's diary of the year 1910 details domestic life in the lively and prosperous family of a pharmacy owner. She simply set down everything just as it happened, which turns out to be much different than any sterotype.

   I would recommend this book to anyone interested in Japan, domestic life, or that gap I mentioned earlier

5 comments about This Was Not Our War: Bosnian Women Reclaiming the Peace.

1. This is yet another attempt to water down the real cause of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The reader will conclude that the agressor was not Serbia and Monteneagro, but....some crazy local politicians who succeded in fomanting the heatred after coming to power. Reader is fooled into beleiving that this heatred had nothing to do with previous history, which is full of bloodshed caused by this monsterous project of Greater Serbia. Personal tragedies of these woman are masterfully twisted into illusion that "we lived like a brothers during Marshall Tito", who by the way was one of the biggest criminals and dictatiors in the recent history. If I wrote this when this communist Tito was alive, I'd be in the gulag before this message treavelled from my computer to amazon's server. Poor book, full of illusions and lies! Stay away.



2. Swanee Hunt was the US ambassador to Austria for the later stages of the Bosnian war and the immediate aftermath, and one senses that as an outsider - a political appointee in the US diplomatic service - she was trying also to bring other outsider voices into the process. But she keeps herself largely in the background, and the book is a collection of interviews with twenty-six Bosnian women of diverse backgrounds, with the interviews edited and assembled by theme, to give a rounded picture of, say, perceptions of history, actual wartime experience, the chance of reconciliation.



3. Feeling utterly betrayed by their leaders, twenty-six women from all over Bosnia meet with Swanee Hunt, former US Ambassador to Austria and Chair of Women Waging Peace, a global policy initiative. In their own words, they describe the war which ravaged their country and reduced it to rubble. As they make clear from the outset, this war was not a result of age-old ethnic antagonisms in the Balkans, where city after city had been peacefully multi-ethnic and where most families had loyalties to more than one group. It was the direct result, they believe, of the nationalism fomented by unscrupulous politicians, especially Slobodan Milosevic and Radovan Karadzic, as they seized power and wealth in the vacuum which existed following the death of Marshall Tito.
   
   The twenty-six speakers are Serbs, Croats, Muslims, Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, atheists (former Communists), and Jews, all bright, articulate women who are, and have been, working to heal their society. They include engineers, several journalists and physicians, a teacher, a member of the Bosnian Parliament, a professor at the School of Economics, a landscape architect, a member of the seven-member shared Presidency, a farm wife, a flower shop owner, a teenage student, and an art gallery owner, and they represent all areas of Bosnia, from Srebrenica to Mostar, Tuzla, and Sarajevo.
   
   With one voice, they blame their politicians for the atrocities of the war, pointing out that their leaders' manipulation of the international press and their sectarian chauvinism led to ethnic fundamentalism in a country which had previously been multicultural. The imposition of traditional roles on women led to their enforced withdrawal from decision-making, and they universally agree that that they might have been able to influence the direction of the country toward more cultural understanding and better communication if they had been allowed to continue their previous political, professional, and social roles.
   
   The stories here are lively, personal, often incredibly sad, and absolutely unforgettable. Beautiful color portraits of the women, along with brief biographies, make each woman a "living" voice, and the reader is struck by how much these women typify women around the world. Most remarkably the women, despite the losses of parents, husbands, sons, and friends, all continue rebuilding their country, ignoring ethnic labels as they work to get housing for all refugees, find medical supplies and equipment, establish a women's collective, work with rape victims, plan conferences to bring together women from all over the country, make radio broadcasts, organize news agencies, write books, promote international awareness of the atrocities in Bosnia (especially in Srebrenica), care for the elderly, become ambassadors, and run schools.
   
   Hunt's book and the words of these remarkable women are a major achievement in the understanding of this terrible war, a war far different from what most of us have been led to believe. Fourteen magnificent photographs, in addition to the women's portraits, will wring the heart--an unrecognizable national library, a snow-covered Sarajevo soccer field which is now a cemetery, and a decimated dormitory in the Olympic village. Yet amidst the carnage are smiling women who are changing the face of Bosnia. As Kada tells Hunt, "Thank you for telling my story. What's written down will last." n Mary Whipple



4. I found this book to be unbelievably moving, especially the pictures of the women, which helped me realize that these women are just like you and me, and that this could happen to any one of us. I can not imagine the strength required and exhibited by each of these women, and thank Ms. Hunt for sharing their stories. Every woman in America should read this book!



5. This is an exquisitely executed book about the struggles of women in Bosnia to survive the ravages of a war fuelled by political expedience and glamorized as an ethnic struggle. Swanee Hunt's own tone of moral outrage never eclipses the voices of the women she has interviewed. She writes of them with love, and also finds much love in them, a love only more startling for having survived such intense hatred. This book is a great, great achievement, both for its singular mix of empathy and for its clarity. As Primo Levi and Viktor Frankl found meaning in the Holocaust without diminishing its horror, so Hunt finds a language of strength and power in these compromised lives. This is a book about the very best and very worst of humanity.

5 comments about My Parents Went Through the Holocaust and All I Got Was This Lousy Tshirt.

1. Hanala Stadner writes an amazing narative of her life, beginning with a childhood of loneliness and need. Her parents, survivors of the Holocaust, do not seem to be able to understand her travails which include normal childhood growing pains. She bitterly leaves home and is able to work as a semi-employed actor. Her pain follows her as she stumbles into drug and alcohol abuse. Just when the reader is totally disgusted with her, she begins a long road to recovery and self discovery. This well written book will make you laugh and make you cry. I would heartily recommend it.



2. Stadner's book is well written and fun. She tells her stories in writing even better than she delivers them in person, and this book is loaded with all kinds of memories, each one tugging at a different heart string. She hits home over and over, and that familiarity makes it even more entertaining. At times, I found myself agreeing with her out loud, or calling my sister to remind her of something I hadn't thought of in years. I laughed, I cried, I enjoyed every minute of it.



3. I just finished your book I loved it so much that I just didn't want it to end.
   I related to just about everything you went through. My parents also went through the war as Partisans in the woods of Poland and White Russia and then came to Montreal.
   Thank you so much for writing this book. I must confess that
   I laughed and cried but the last 100 pages of your book brought back so many memories for example singing to my father on his death bed \"OYFIN PRIPITCHEK BRENT A FAYERL, UN IN SHTUB IS HEYS. UN DER REBELY LERNT KLEYNE KINDERLEKH DEM ALDF-BEZ.\"
   I saw you at Lynn University when you were in Boca Raton and had the
   pleasure of meeting you and Fabrizio,gee I hope I remembered his name, but you know who I mean the cute Italian. You signed my book and I will cherish it forever.
   Again, thank you so very much this book really made a difference to me.
   Lots of Luck, from one survivor to another Sarah Johnson.



4. Great book! The stories you related, made me laugh and cry with you.It was truly a walk down memory lane. You have successfully memorialized Cote St Luc, forever.Sheila



5. The title grabs you - humor? Holocaust? Then, you begin reading and Hanala grabs you- envelops you, fastens your seat belt for you and takes you on the ride that is her life. And what a ride.
   
   For the general public, it is a story, written with wit, humor, turns of phrase, expressions which you know you have heard before and are comfortable with but which are neither trite nor cliche, in a style that holds your attention. It is the history of a little girl clamoring for something which is impossible to receive due to no fault of her own, a "normal" childhood, filled with love, affection, nurturing, complements, structure, safety, sibling support, reliable friends, - just like in the 50s and 60s TV families into which she delves for comfort; who, not surprisingly grows into a young adult with physical addictions and emotional insecurities - making bad choices, entering into troubled relationships and behaving in a self-destructive manner bringing her near death; and finally, just as you have almost had it with her and want to read her the riot act, but knowing that nothing you say could bring her out of her messed-up life, she surprises you and takes a small step which becomes a deep reach into herself and pulls herself out of the spiral - building inner strength and finally maturing into the positive, healthy person you would be thrilled to have in your life. Hanala lays open her soul to the core, describes behaviors and experiences that most would be embarrassed and ashamed to admit, and demonstrates that we have the ability to heal ourselves, with the help of others, if we only give ourselves the chance. You laugh, you laugh a lot, and you cry, you find yourself repeating statements out loud that you have just read which may well hit deep in your own soul. Frankly, you don't want the book to end and when it does, you are OK, because you know that Hanala's story is continuing and because it is a real life that you feel connected to.
   
   And, for the readership which is made up of the children of Holocaust survivors/escapees, it is an even more special story. Hanala, through her experiences, and her insights gained through therapy, A.A. and Al-Anon programs, gives us answers as to why her parents, and so many other such parents just could not do a better parenting job - whether due to their guilt for not being able to save family or friends or for the simple fact that they survived, magnified by the relative comfort in which they are living; why they too were and are leading lives that are not filled with what many would consider "normal" actions and reactions - which behaviors many have unintentionally passed on to their children. "It is not because she won't, it is because she just can't." For Holocaust survivor/escapees' children, Hanala provides answers to questions we might not even know how to ask.

1 comments about The Accidental Adventurer: Memoir of the First Woman to Climb Mt. McKinley.

1. Accidental Adventurer by Barbara Washburn proves to be a well written autobiography. Her husband was late Bradford Washburn, a man of science as well as a explorer. Her book reflects her quiet lifestyle until she married this man and how that marriage totally transformed her, almost by accident, into a world wide adventurer, traveling with her husband from the depths of the Grand Canyon to the top of Mount McKinley (being the first woman to summit that peak in 1947). During the entire time, she was rising children, being a house wife and a teacher. Her life was definitely not boring and reading this book helps us understand how exciting it really was.
   
   I found the book to be entertaining and fun. It shows how a wife can be a true partner with her husband in all things, not just at home but in the field. Barbara Washburn not only embraced her husband but his lifestyle and work. The trials and tribulations of both man and wife proves to be truly extraordinary and the book reflects on that life very clearly.
   
   This is an easy book to recommend to anyone to read.

3 comments about Picasso: The Real Family Story.

1. Finally, a book about Picasso that tells a coherent biographical history and backs up information with references, and all by a family member who evidently did his research (the son of Maya, Marie-Therese's daughter).
   
   The author never knew his grandfather so he had to do his research in order to write such a consice history. My favorite read on Picasso is still Francoise Gilot's "Life with Picasso" but this one is a close second. The Real Family Story is an excellent read on the artist's myriad families and the heirs of Picasso, though none of the other books by family members can be discounted.
   
   The only real slant is that Olivier Widmaier Picasso appears to be closer to the Francoise side of the family than the Olga side of the family (which may be an understatement) but in such an expansive family there are naturally divides.
   
   Importantly, delves into the troublesome estate matters left behind by Picasso, which all heirs seemed to have benefitted after a lot of legal process.



2. Finally, a biography about Picasso written by a family member (his grandson by Marie-Therese Walter)that puts right all the ogre mythology. Yes, Picasso was not an ideal family man. But so much written about him in other biographies deem him almost inhuman. This bio is good because it puts all the facts out there. Good and bad. Widmaier refutes many of the "evil man myths" and gives you a straight view of what the man was really made of. I felt after reading this, a real grasp on this man/legend. A good job, that maybe his Grandfather would have appreciated, even though he was such a private person.



3. Throughout the ages, poets and philosophers have extolled the virtues of womanhood and motherhood. Pablo Picasso is quoted: "My mother said to me, 'If you become a soldier you'll be a general; if you become a monk you'll end up as the pope.' Instead, I became a painter and wound up as Picasso.

5 comments about Uppity Women of Medieval Times.

1. This is a fun quick read, and can easily serve as a springboard for those who find the subject matter of the Middle Ages, and Medieval women in particular, interesting. Though it's not really meant as a thorough in-depth scholarly historical study, there are a lot of fascinating historical tidbits contained within its pages. The book is divided into ten sections, with categories such as "Got a Brain, Not Afraid to Use It," "The Joy of Sects--31 Flavors of Religious Life," "Plagues and Other Predicaments," and "Persecution Mania, Witch-Burning Madness." Prior to reading this book, I had only heard about two dozen of these women, such as Eleanor of Aquitaine, Khadijah (Prophet Mohammad's first wife), Empress Constance (who became a first-time mother, to Frederick II, at the age of 40), Pope Joan, Christine de Pizan, and Sei Shonagon. Although many people seem to think of the Middle Ages only in relation to Europe, the women in this book come from all over the world--Korea, Angola, China, Japan, Spain, Mexico, Georgia, Russia, Hungary, England, India, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and many other diverse locales. The women covered in this volume did a lot of things that most people don't associate with Medieval women, such as having careers, being best-selling authors, exploring the "New World," being medical pioneers, making important astronomical discoveries, and fighting on the battlefield. Many of them were feminists before feminism even had a name.
   
   However, the book does have its shortcomings, as other reviewers have mentioned. Ms. Léon's Medieval timeline encompasses 470 to about 1650, whereas most other sources say the era began about the year 300 and ended either in the 1490s or the 1500s. Quite a few of the women profiled clearly lived in the Renaissance, and one of them, Queen Elizabeth I, had an entire historical era named after her. I don't exactly think of women like Queen Elizabeth I, Sophia Brahe (sister of the more famous astronomer Tycho Brahe), Countess Erszebet Báthory, Artemisia Gentileschi, and Mary, Queen of Scots as having lived in the Middle Ages. The slangy writing style can also get to be a bit much. The constant attempts at sounding funny, hip, and witty actually dumb down the historical research that went into the writing of this book, to say nothing of the amazing women profiled within. While it's possible to strike a balance between a scholarly presentation of the facts and hip modern language designed to make the material seem interesting and relevant to the modern audience, that wasn't always the case here. For example, what self-respecting Medieval woman would have used a silly childish word like "preggers"? The nicknames Ms. Léon frequently gives her subjects can also get to be a bit much, particularly when they're not nicknames that anyone would have used in the respective subjects' languages or homelands, like calling French-born Queen Melissande "Mel" or calling Bianca Capello's husband Francesco "Frankie." Seemingly little details like this can compromise the entire premise, even if it is meant to be a series of brief semi-humorous biographical sketches instead of a long-winded historical treatise. (A pronunciation guide also would've been helpful for some of these names.) Still, the basic material is so interesting and tells such a long-neglected story that these less-than-scholarly aspects of it can be overlooked to a point.



2. _Uppity Women of Medieval Times_ has so much potential. It is frustrating that potential is wasted. It is wonderful that women are beginning to receive the historical attention they deserve - however, flippant and downright silly historical abstracts like _Uppity Women_ do a disservice to women's history.
   
   I can forgive the broad take on when the middle ages took place, but struggled with the author's voice, which attempts at being humourous and "fresh" (often referring to women by nicknames created by the author.) The book itself is entirely composed of one - two page summaries of the lives and "accomplishments" of women during the middle ages. That so little information is written about the women discussed is another disappointment. More depth and less breadth would have made a much better read.
   
   The choice of women presented further detracts from the book. While many women who deserve recognition for real contributions are included such as washerwomen of the Crusades, Walladah - al Mustakfi and Sei Shonagon, there are many, many more women included who had no historical contribution whatsoever. This inclusion seriously detracts from those women who did. (Juana la Loca readily comes to mind.) A final irritation were outright historical innacuracies - for example, claiming that Nicolo Machiavelli wrote _the Prince_ for Catherine d' Medici (in 1533) - simply inexcusable in a "history" book.
   
   A bright spot of _Uppity Women_ was its international flavor. While the vast majority of its subjects were European, women from the Near East, the Americas and Asia were also included. I would recommend this book for middle schoolers, or perhaps (as an earlier reviewer noted) as bathroom reading.



3. I picked up this discount book at a Barnes & Noble. It was promoted as a bargain book and looked a bit like a novelty item, but it seemed like it would have some generally interesting information about women in medieval times. Upon perusal, I noticed that the text included anecdotes about medieval women of Spain, the Middle East, and Africa--an interesting subject that I know little about--and I made my decision to purchase the book.
   
   Because it's written in short biographical sections, the book makes a lovely bathroom book, or something to leave on the nightstand. I found the lax and conversational writing style to be acceptable, as that was part of my initial impression of the book. I wasn't looking for or expecting a hardcore historical resource, just something cute and slightly informative that might provide a boost to my self-esteem. The book itself is quite enjoyable.
   
   That said, I started paying closer attention to some of the details of the book--okay, maybe not details, but important things, such as the cover and inside flap. The cover reads:
   
   "200 daring damsels who dazzled the dark ages and rocked the renaissance."
   
   The inside front cover flap reads:
   
   "From Queen Elizabeth to Joan of Arc..."
   
   Perhaps someone forgot to clue the publisher in on the fact that the renaissance comes after medieval times and that Queen Elizabeth had an entire historical period named after her--or perhaps she was gallavanting with Shakespeare when he wrote a clock in Julius Caesar and they knew some secret means of time travel?
   
   The other piece of information that simply made my jaw drop was the classification of the book, noted on the bottom of the back cover: Humor/Games. Apparently, someone at Barnes & Noble publishers thinks that important female historical figures are the subject of humor and games.
   
   Despite what other reviewers may have indicated about Ms. Leon's writing, I like it. I think the book is a good idea in a very accesible format--I could see this book as being useful for a middle-school level resource or educational tool or as a coffee table book. I think that this book was written and intended to fill a specific niche of readers, and that's okay! However, the careless descriptions of what is most likely more accurate information is entirely unacceptable and completely misleading.
   
   While learning about women's history should be fun, the book isn't about humor, it's about the contribution of women to medieval society. I recommend the writing if you're looking for something light or introductory--please don't be misled by the publisher's mistreatment of the material.



4. This was the first of the "Uppity" women books, that I read. In my opinion it is the best. It's so funny! You can't help but love it.



5. I enjoyed Uppity Women of Ancient Times very much, so i was very pleased to discover this follow-up volume, another collection of brief biographies of interesting women. In this volume I found many characters I already knew, and many more I did not. A few minor quibbles, the author's definition of 'medieval' seems to be a bit elastic, it appears to go up to the 17th century, which is not as far as I know generally considered to be part of the medieval period. Also she is a bit prone to exaggeration, especially when she talks about the 'witch craze' being a holocaust against women. She mentions a figure of 100,000 executed, whereas I beleive the real fugre is more like 40,000, not all of them women. Also she conveniently ignores the fact that while most the victims were women, so were most of their accusers. Also she seems to have the modern obsession with careers, though the modern notion that the only worthwhile way to spend your time is in some kind of paid employment was not in vogue in the middle ages, women who worked more likely did so from economic necessity, rather than from any desire to be 'career women'. These are minor quibbles though, the stories of the women are amusingly told, and there is a bibliography at the back for those interested in learning more (a pity it includes Barbara Walker's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets, which is pure fantasy). Overall, a very amusing read.

5 comments about Twice Born: Memoirs of an Adopted Daughter.

1. In this wonderful volume, BJ Lifton conquers the ghost territory known only to members of the adoption triad--adopted children, birth parents and adoptive parents.
   
   That is to say, each member of the triad traverses the adoption journey haunted, as it were, by spirits of "would have's" "could have's" and "should have's"---those beings they imagine they could have had, or been--- if only their birth parents had raised them, if only they had not forsaken their birth children, if only they could have born biological children themselves.
   
   At the time this book was first published, in 1973, this topic was still quite taboo. Adoptive children were supposed to be grateful for the new lives they had been given and never to look back, just as birth parents were supposed to give their children to those better suited to raise them than they, and as adoptive parents were to raise their new children and never reflect on the ones they might have had, if only....
   
   But for all three members of the triad, and especially for the children, the ghost beings---who they might have been, and who their birth parents might have been---are powerful psychological forces with which, even today, the educational, medical and psychological communities are all too unfamiliar.
   
   People assume that adoptive children (barring illnesses of any kind) will develop in the same ways as all other children, but as BJ Lifton shows us from her own upbringing, this is far from true. Such children carry other beings with them, secret selves, and secret birth parents, who live in their imaginations, and whom they need to discover and meet in order to develop a complete sense of self.
   
   Herein, Lifton offers readers the very daring, candid observations she made concerning her own journey through self-discovery, the process of determining what it means to be adopted, and what it means to each and every adopted child to discover the biological roots from which they hail.
   
   This book is superbly written, and should be required reading not only for adoptive parents, but for all members of the educational, psychological, social services and medical communities who ever come in contact with adopted children. Reading it was truly enlightening.
   
   --Alyssa A. Lappen



2. The author's written several books on the psychology of the adopted, but here provides her own autobiographical experience, telling of a life where adoptees were still kept in the dark about their identification. As an adult she not only identified with orphans left behind by American soldiers in Japan and Vietnam; she embarked on her own journey to discover the forbidden knowledge of her own adoptive parents and her roots. TWICE BORN: MEMORIES OF AN ADOPTED DAUGHTER traces her journey and feelings.
   
   Diane C. Donovan
   California Bookwatch



3. This is a truly moving book with poignant descriptions of Lifton's suffering as a child. She was adopted at age 2-1/2, told of her adoption at age 7 and warned by her harsh and controlling adoptive mother never to tell anyone, especially her father, that she knew the secret. Lifton grew up with the poisonous idea that an adopted child is the product of an "evil deed that hangs over most adoptions." The little girl was told that her natural parents were dead, which was a lie. It is easy to see how the adult author of Twice Born came to the view that a person is "fragmented" as long as she lacks a link with biological kin, that an adoptee is forced out of the natural flow of generational continuity, as others know it, and feels as if having been forced out of nature itself. Seen in these terms, adoptees become impotent creatures who have been denied free will. I am very moved by the story but want to say that this is the voice of one adoptee whose experience we should take careful note of but at the same time refrain from universalizing. Not all adoptees are raised by such harsh and emotionally vacant parents and also never had adopted friends with whom to discuss things. I am an adoptive mother of a daughter whom we adopted at age 4 days and who grew up into a contented, strong-willed and self-reliant young lady. Of course, we told her of her adoption, but she was not interested in searching for her natural parents. Unlike Lifton who as a toddler had experienced separation, loss, grief, mourning...going from mother to Infant's Home to Foster Home to Adoptive Home, our daughter and the other adoptees in our neighborhood were spared such miseries. Luckily, our birthmother looked for us and today we have a wonderful relationship with her and her family. Our daughter, however, does not feel she changed since meeting her birthmother, or that she became "whole" as if she had been fragmented before. Several of her neighborhood adoptee friends are also not interested in searching and consider themselves well-adjusted adults and parents. I wonder whether Lifton would have become a happy adoptee if she had been raised by loving and honest adoptive parents. Unhappily, when she found her natural mother and the link with biological kin was made, she discovered that now she "had two mothers instead of one, but since both had disappointed me, I had none." Yes, the bitter search for one's roots may take one to an empty place. It seems that the impulse of the adoptee to find the original mother, an urge traceable through the ages, exists as a force independent of the desired object, and continues even when the object has been found. Gisela Gasper Fitzgerald, author of ADOPTION: An Open, Semi-Open or Closed Practice?



4. Twice Born is a wonderful and thought-provoking account of one adoptee's journey. I related on so many levels that it prompted me to write my own story.

   Happiness is truly found in healing.

   Kasey Hamner, Author of "Whose Child?:An Adoptee's Healing Journey from Relinquishment through Reunion and Beyond"




5. One thing's for sure: BJ Lifton can write. And she understands adoption intimately. This book really tells it like it is, from relinquishment to long after the reunion. As a birthmother, I found "Twice Born" an extremely valuable look into the mind of the adopted person.

1 comments about The Graceful Guru: Hindu Female Gurus in India and the United States.

1. This book is a blessing to those interested in a scholarly yet exciting study on several influential Modern Female Gurus from India and their impact in both India and The US. This book has a well written and comprehensive approach to this subject, and is a wonderful academic contribution to the field of South Asian studies and Women's Studies. WOW! Thank You! JAI MA!
   Aum Amriteshvaryai Namah!

3 comments about Cops: The Men and Women Behind the Badge.

1. The book is wonderful. Both of my parents are Tucson Police Officers and this book follows TPD officers. While it is in the 80's, the book still has incredible meaning and value. Anybody interested in becoming a police officer, anybody who is a police officer, or anybody who wants to know what a police officer goes through should read this book. It not only discusses the on the job aspects of policing, but the emotional and family side of police life also. During the action scene, your adrenaline will be surging, and during the emotional dtruggle scenes, you will be filled with empathy. The book is wonderful and quick paced. It is well worth the cost.



2. My parents are both Tucson Police Officers and I am studying to be a police officer here in Tucson. The stories in this book are very well written and provide a very in depth look at all aspects of a cop. The stories of action get your pulse going, and the stories of the stresses these officers live with make you empathetic. This book is wonderful. Anybody considering a career in law enforcement should read this book. Anybody who knows a cop or wants to know a cop should read this book.



3. Gellman's, COPS, follows ten Tucson Police Officers from the start and well into their careers. It is a biography of their lives, both personal and public. If you are looking for a book that tells the tail of what it is really like to be an officer this is what you want to read.