It was a good book because of the great battle. The voodoo vultures from venus sure did get a a good beating. The pictures are really great. Rickys Ricotta's Robot is really mighty robot. I think Kindergardeners - Second grade would like this book a whole lot.

Ricky Ricotta's Giant Robot Vs. the Voodoo from Venus isn't as strong an outing as the previous two books in this series. But it's still a good read.

Ricky and his robot are in trouble at home and lose their tv privileges. This allows them to avoid being hypnotized by a vulture bad guy on Venus who wants to (you guessed it) take over Earth. As usual, Ricky is resourceful and the Robot is strong and the good guys save the day.

I'm just nuts for this series of Ricky books that my mommy has bought me. I can't wait till number 4 comes out! The Mecha-Monkeys from Mars.I'm sure my mommy's is getting tired of reading the same three books to me night after night.thank you Mr.Pilkey!!

By Parks own admission, the memories are hazey, and are patched together in this vague account of an American fighter pilot operating out of Port Moresby and later inland New Guinea. Stumbling along, he recalls "soirees" over the hills and mountains, the ocassional dogfight encounter and the bad landings on roughly made airstrips. An easy read, though not truly compulsive, but appealing to anyone interested in the subject.

Back in 1977, Edwards Park published the sparkling "Nanette", a fictionalized account of his days as a neophyte P-39 pilot in New Guinea. "Angels Twenty" could almost be considered the non-fiction companion volume. There is no shortage of action-packed fighter combat oral histories on today's shelves, and readers interested in combat anecdotes of the P-39 and P-47 may be appeased by this book, if not sated. Yet Mr. Parks offers something more, well, soulful -and wrly humorous. The author is a gifted story-teller, and the perspective he offers may be one unfamiliar to the public: The anti-hero fighter pilot. The author's adventurous journey from uncertain tyro to capable veteran is refreshing and memorable (an underlying theme seems to reflect a great truth: In the flying business, there is little that is more satisfying than earning the respect of your peers). I was completely absorbed by the mirthy and genuine "Angels Twenty". I was left feeling as though I'd just finished hearing Mr Parks recount his tale fireside. I was also reminded of the closing words to the introduction to "Nanette": "That was the way we were". Mr. Parks' work is eminently enjoyable, and could perhaps offer insight to my largely untried generation.

I'm fascinated by the ongoing war between us humans and the bacteria, viruses and other pathogens that plague us. So, I was eager to dive into Robert Desowitz's interestingly titled book, Federal Bodysnatchers and the New Guinea Virus: Tales of Parasites, People and Politics. The book jacket told me that Desowitz is a leading epidemiologist and the author of four other books in the area. I was hoping to get his insider's view of epidemic or emerging diseases, what's being done about them, and the politics of drug development and distribution.

There was certainly some interesting information in the book. I hadn't known, for example, that the global ban on DDT that flowed from Rachel Carson's book Silent Spring inadvertently had a devastating effect on the worldwide effort to eradicate malaria. Desowitz points out that spraying DDT in the houses of people living in malaria-ridden regions was the mainstay of the eradication program, and was very successful. DDT sprayed inside houses did not contribute significantly to the thinning of birds' eggshells that was a key feature of Carson's argument, but saved the lives of millions of people. Unfortunately, this anti-malaria use of DDT was swept away along with other more destructive uses.

Desowitz also provided an interesting blow-by-blow description of the 1999 outbreak of West Nile Virus in New York. Given the risk of bioterrorism, it's sobering to learn that it took from May 21 to September 25 for health authorities to notice and begin to get a grip on the outbreak. Each of twenty or so local, state, and Federal agencies noted one piece of the puzzle--the death of wild birds, the death of birds at a zoo, and human illness and deaths, but it took forever for anyone to see the whole picture. Let's hope that our health agencies have improved both their alertness and their inter-agency communication. If not, we're in big trouble if bioterrorists strike again.

And, in his defense, Desowitz doesn't pull any punches whether he is criticizing health authorities for their failure to communicate, drug companies for their greed or environmentalists for their sometimes one-sided zeal.

What the book does not offer is coherency or consistency. In the midst of presenting one topic, Desowitz jumps into another, and as often as not interrupts that with a wisecrack about something else entirely. Early on, he describes his fellow epidemiologists as cranky and idiosyncratic. That's exactly how he comes across in the book. For me at least, that idiosyncratic style really got in the way of what he was trying to say. I kept comparing this book to Richard Preston's The Demon in the Freezer, which is a model of devoted reporting, clear thinking and vivid writing. The contrast with Desowitz's book could not be stronger. I had the impression that Desowitz basically phoned this one in, with predictable results.

Robert Adler, ...

Epidemiologist Robert Desowitz gets a few things off his chest in this free-swinging frolic through the world of infectious disease with an emphasis on politics, economics and human stupidity. In particular he is not happy about the fact that Big Pharma doesn't find it cost effective to work on drugs that might save lives in Third World countries, especially sub-Saharan Africa, home of not only Ebola and AIDS, but perennial killers, malaria and sleeping sickness. He also doesn't care for the bad press that DDT has endured since "Saint Rachel" (p. 57) published her manifesto, averring that "Nothing has ever equaled DDT" for controlling "the spineless blood-suckers" (mosquito, fly, and tick vectors) that bring dengue, plague, typhus, malaria, sleeping sickness, etc. to our bodies, and that "no essential public measure [the use of DDT] has been so irrationally denied."

He makes a good case. It seems that in saving the ospreys and the eagles and other creatures of the wild we have allowed disease vectors to flourish resulting in countless millions of human lives lost. This surprising point of view, however, made me realize once again the false dilemma that we often put ourselves into, that of "them or us." At some point our rapacious desire to increase our numbers at the expense of our planet home must cease otherwise we will find ourselves alone with our mice and rats, our cows and pigs, our cockroaches and our sheep, our fields of soy and wheat and selected parasites, the rest of nature gone the way of the dodo. Do we need more humans or do we need to save the rainforests? My answer is that we must reduce our numbers and live in concert with nature. Desowitz does not consider this larger point of view in his book. I wish he had.

He does however realize that we need more doctors and that medical schools ought to let more people in. He notes that "Innovative teaching methods can now accommodate double the student intake," wryly adding that "This may force some of the doctors in the new, bigger pool to switch from BMWs to Buicks." (p. 56) He also wants the World Health Organization reformed, calling it "a too-politicized body, best at furnishing slogans." (p. 124) Additionally, he would like to see the big pharmaceutical companies rearrange their priorities. He laments how a drug called DFMO is being manufactured for use as a depilatory to rid women of "uglifying facial hair" (with glossy ads in Cosmopolitan, Gourmet and Bon Appetit magazines) when it could better be used to fight sleeping sickness in Uganda and Sudan. (p. 146) One of his pet peeves is the way our patent laws work in respect to genetic material--part of a "patent or perish" syndrome. (See page 203.) He quotes then US secretary of commerce Ronald Brown to the effect that genetic material can be taken from you and patented for the enrichment of someone else and there is nothing you can do about it. (p. 200) Some people call this "biopiracy." (p. 193)

In the later chapters (which are among the most readable in the book) Desowitz considers the possibility that global warming will result in tropical diseases moving north. There's not only that possibility, but with the rise in the sea level and the flooding of rivers, temperate-zone sewers may back up just as they do in, e.g., Bangladesh, and we will have cholera right here in River City.

Desowitz, who is retired and therefore free to say what he thinks without fear of losing some grant or offending those who could torpedo a career, lets the chips fall where they may. Near the end of the book he recalls a Nigerian who supplemented his income by selling human waste. It seems that the Nigerian "pagan farmers...believed that the white man's protein-rich diet made his feces a superior fertilizer"(!) He ends the book with a not so facetious suggestion that maybe we ought "to exploit this bounteous natural gift" to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. (pp. 241-242)

This sort of candid, tell-it-like-it-is expression is the strength of this mostly readable book. Its weakness is that sometimes Desowitz loses awareness of his readership and gets too technical and too minuscule in his delineation of disease politics. He has a few axes to grind and sometimes stays too long at the wheel. Furthermore it is apparent that sometimes he is addressing other professionals and working out old disputes in a way that the general reader cannot fully appreciate.

Bottom line: Desowitz is authoritative and unbeholden to political correctness; he is passionate and writes with verve and a sometimes striking expression, and he is clearly an expert on the material covered.

"I'll Meet You At The Cucumbers" was about mice and they had a cool adventure to the city. It had a very good ending.

I liked I'll Meet you at the Cucumbers because it was a good book and I liked it because it has animals in it. The mice find apples and eat the apples and it was Amanda's birthday. If you like adventure books, this is a good book for you.

I work in Liberia running a safari camp and have for the past 15 years. I have been to most of the places in the book I think, many of which have different names today. A lot of the attitudes of the people have not changed from Greene's trip in 1935. For me the book was a great experience and puzzle trying to figure out where he was. There are better roads today (in some places), the people have watches, radios, but not much else has changed. For the visitor to Liberia or someone who has been there, it is a great story and very insightful into the minds of the people.

Not an adventure when compared to fictional safari tales in which the intrepid travellers fight off fierce lions and savage "natives" in every chapter. Instead, an enjoyable and realistic account of Greene's arduous and near-disasterous trek through Liberia. Greene travelled with his cousin, Barbara Greene, who also wrote an account of their journey--Too Late to Turn Back. Interesting contrasts between the two books if you can find copies of both. I had to order a copy of Barbara's book from a used book store in England.

Bielfeld's books isn't bad. It has more depth than most of the books on mice out there. It isn't written for elementary school students acquiring a first pet who might have been reading only 1-3 years. However, this still isn't sufficient as the only book you'd need if you have pet mice. While it goes into genetics, the material is not helpful (either for someone just starting out with no understanding of genetics or someone who is past the basics and wants more information about genetics and mice). The information (and drawings) on mice condos is entertaining but very misleading--it is not true that mice won't leap/jump to the floor (I've seen them do it plus youngsters in the "flea stage" accidently take some great falls). So the housing section has problems. Some of the more basic questions that a first-time mouse owner would want to know (how much to feed mice? what kind of bedding to use?) this book ducks. While there are a lot of pages on breeding, they are of no use to either a first-time owner with an accidental litter wondering how to keep the pregnant doe healthy or what to do/not do with the litter or someone interested in intentionally mating mice for several litters. While there is an extensive section on healthcare and disease, I found it to be of no use because it's so general. Common problems mouse owners may often encounter aren't mentioned while other issues I haven't seen in 3 years of mouse breeding are covered.

In summary, this book has more detail and depth than many of the other mouse books out there in the mass public. But is insufficient as a sole resource for first-time mouse owners. And those seeking more advanced information (on genetics, care of colonies, breeding) will be disappointed by the lack of specificity.

This book is a fantastic guide to the world of pet mice. It is simply said, and easy enough for young readers to understand. I, myself am only 13 years old! But "Mice" should be one of any pet lover's favorite books. It is highly informative and has fantastic photos and drawings that match the text. Great reading!!!

Of the many hamster books I've seen, this is the one I can't recommend. Visually, it has lots of nice photos and is written mainly to kids. BUT it also has opinion presented as fact. For example, the hamster 'ball', the plastic ball hamster owners have been buying since the 1970s, is described as a "prison" for your hamster!

I take issue with nonfiction books that present opinions as facts, and I'm glad I eventually ignored such a statement and bought one anyway.

Rather than call the toy "a prison," the book should have presented how the toy should be used. The *fact* is that the toy should only be used for 15 to 45 minutes - under supervision - and then your pet should be returned to his cage for at least a pit stop of for food and water. That's what the book should have said. In my case, I found that my hamster is far less timid about exploring a room when he's protected by his ball than when he's out on his own (then he barely moves). Other books, by many experienced hamster owners, suggest the ball as one of many toys for a happy pet hamster.

For a more factual, less opinionated book on owning a hamster, I would suggest anything by Betsy Sikora Siino. There's "The Essential Hamster," a slimmed-down but still useful version of her book "The Hamster: An Owner's Guide to a Happy Healthy Pet."

This is a nice book for the child hamster owner, perhaps for reading even before the pet is purchased. It does not contain all the details that a hamster owner might need, but it covers basic behavior and how to treat the pet. Cute photos, too!

Len Deighton is 3 different writers. His first books (1962-82) are directionless, pointless, storyless, boring.

His Bernard Samson books are good.

After that (mamist, city of gold) he goes into his second childhood with simpleton, stupid, unbelievable plots and characters.

Not recommended

I read this book right after a Tom Clancy novel, and well, it's hard to compete with the master, Tom Clancy. I would probably have enjoyed this more if I had read it first. The plot just wasn't near as exciting as the the Clancy book, and I think that did play a part in my opinion of this book. All in all though, it was a good book and well written

Comparing Len Deighton to Tom Clancy works only in that both authors choose from time to time to operate in the shadow world of espoinage. In a Clancy novel there is never any doubt who wears the white hat; it is this distinction that separates Deighton from Clancy. A generation back the comparison between Deighton and Clancy would have been Graham Greene and Ian Fleming. Which you choose says more about the types of novels you read than which story you preferred.

MAMista is a story written by an author quite comfortable examining the moral ambiguities presented, with good detail to his fictional surroundings, direct in his presentation, and very agile in his story-telling abilities. The characters always come alive with the story, including some minor ones you'd rather not have done so. The only complaint; in setting the mood so well, Deighton can go on a bit more than necessary. This is a minor flaw in an otherwise graceful novel.

That's about what you'll get from this simple book. Good for little kids, but even they should get something with a little more good info.

This book is ideal for children, first time hamster owners, or people looking for basic information. The illustrations are delightful. This book will tell you all you need to know about keeping your hamster (cage, nutrition, ailments), but it is not the be-all and end-all of hamster information. If this is the only hamster book you will ever buy, or you are looking to introduce a child to keeping hamsters, this one is ideal. For someone with higher reading level, or for someone looking more in-depth information, it would be best to pass on this one.

The book has got lots of great info about hamsters and has really great cartoons in it. I learnt a lot about hamsters and how to care for them from this book and all about their behaviour.

We are tried and true Rosemary Wells fans, and are familiar with most of her books. I borrowed this one from the library, and was disappointed to find Charles' parents expressing their frustration through language like "another mother would have spanked you" for not saying thank you or goodbye (maybe Wells could have the mother model good manners rather than threatening punishment)and the father actually calling him names for not participating in football, which Dad forced on him. What a negative approach to modeling the behavior you want your child to adopt, never mind giving parents the idea that it's OK to treat a child in this manner. Needless to say, I edited it heavily when I read it, then returned it to the library post haste! Not one for my library!

Charles is not just a little shy, he is EXTREMELY shy, so shy he really doesn't seem to talk at all. As usual, Rosemary Wells is not afraid to have a hero who is quite out of the mainstream. Unlike in most of her books, Charles' parents are not very understanding of him, and seem to be at the point of being quite fed up with his shyness, which can make him seem impolite. However, people in the community seem to understand he's a special little mouse who will come out of his shell when he's ready. An unusual picture book which makes you think about how children who are not outgoing are treated.

This is a wonderful little book that makes the point that being shy is not such a terrible thing. Charles shows that he can do OK, even if he is shy. An implication is that Charles' parents may have been wrong to try to make Charles over, that maybe they should have recognized his special strengths instead of focusing on his "weak" points, so the book has a message for both children and parents.

I like this book better than "I Don't Know Why... I guess I'm Shy" (see my review there), because it has a more tolerant view of individual differences, doesn't encourage kids to approach adult strangers, and has really great, funny illustrations. (In fact, I'd love to have a print of Charles on his roller skates!)