Book Description
In the third book of the bestselling Children of the Lamp series, djinn twins, John and Philippa Gaunt, are on the trail of another magical mystery. As they travel from New York to London to Nepal and India on a whirlwind adventure, the twins try to help their friend and fellow djinn, Buck, find out who murdered his friend using the venomous snakebite of the king cobra. All too soon, John and Philippa find themselves caught up in the lethal world of the Cult of the Nine Cobras, only to discover that they themselves are a target of the creepy cobra cult.
Customer Reviews:
Kobra King of Kathmandu.......2007-08-28
This is an excellent third book in a series. The young djinn twins have many adventures and misadventures but there is somehow, always a silver bullet to save the day. Nice, light, reading for grades 4-7. (But I'm 54 and I enjoyed it too!)
Cobra King Of Kathmandu .......2007-08-24
The Cobra King of Kathmandu is the third book in the Children of the Lamp series. This series is based around twin Djinn children, John and Philippa Gaunt. John and Philippa knew nothing about their Djinn heritage until their wisdom teeth erupted. In Djinn, the eruption of the wisdom teeth brings forth the hidden magic that the child will possess. To say the least, the children were surprised to find out that Djinn were real, that their mother was a Djinn, and that they too possessed magical abilities. This was only the beginning of their adventure as they started training with their Uncle Nimrod in Egypt and found themselves in the middle of a fight with an evil Djinn who wanted to disrupt the delicate balance between good and evil Djinn.
In The Cobra King of Kathmandu, the twins find themselves in yet another adventure. Unbeknownst to the twins, their mother is readying herself to become the Blue Djinn of Babylon. Meanwhile, John and Philippa come to the rescue of fellow Djinn Dybbuk (Buck) who has stumbled upon a great Djinn conspiracy. Someone seems to be trying to find young Djinn, tracking them down through dental records showing young children whose wisdom teeth erupt earlier than the average person. What is this person up to? Why does he want to capture a Djinn?
I enjoyed both the first and third book of this series. I have yet to read the second installment, which I am now very eager to do. John and Philippa are very much like average kids just trying to understand this new world they haven't quite figured out yet. Their adventures are absolutely delightful.
Middle school fantasy fans - and many an adult - will choose this for leisure reading.......2007-03-07
Fans of P.B. Kerr's ongoing fantasy 'Children of the Lamp' will appreciate yet another addition to the saga: THE COBRA KING OF KATHMANDU, the third in the series and telling of the djinn twins in another magical mystery. This time they're trying to uncover a murderer who uses the king cobra to kill - and find themselves caught in a cult of cobra worshipers. Can they stop the leader's deadly plan? Middle school fantasy fans - and many an adult - will choose this for leisure reading; especially prior fans of the 'Children of the Lamp' saga.
Can't beat books one and two.......2006-12-26
The Children of the Lamp, book three
Can't beat books one and two
The story hops from here to there
Just like a kangaroo
From exorcisms at Dowding Street
To murders in Palm Springs
Intruders, snakes and works of art
Is what this story brings
From Kew Gardens to Calcutta
From imps to Green Dervishes
It tells what people will go through
To get themselves three wishes
Outsourced help lines, Eremites
Angels and secret writing
Some parts are Indiana Jones
And almost as exciting
Djinnternal mail is quite a stretch
And if that weren't enough
He throws the Yeti in the tale
And lots of other stuff
It focuses more on the "gross"
Than evenness of plot
We just don't need to know about
BO, boogers, and snot
Though everything falls into place
This book could be much shorter
The author would have helped us by
Cutting it by a quarter
Action packed and whirlwind fast
But there's much more in store
The final chapters warm us up
For novel number four.
Rated: 3.5 stars
Amanda Richards, December 25, 2006
Children Of The Lamp: The Akhenaten Adventure (Children Of The Lamp)
Blue Djinn of Babylon (Children of the Lamp (Paperback))
Book Description
Informed by unparalleled access to still–secret documents, interviews with top field commanders, and a review of the military’s own internal after–action reports, Cobra II is the definitive chronicle of America’s invasion and occupation of Iraq—a conflict that could not be lost but one that the United States failed to win decisively. From the Pentagon to the White House to the American command centers in the field, the book reveals the inside story of how the war was actually planned and fought. Drawing on classified United States government intelligence, it also provides a unique account of how Saddam Hussein and his high command developed and prosecuted their war strategy.
Written by Michael R. Gordon, the chief military correspondent for The New York Times, who spent the war with the Allied land command, and Bernard E. Trainor, a retired Marine Corps lieutenant general and former director of the National Security Program at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, Cobra II traces the interactions among the generals, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and President George W. Bush. It dramatically reconstructs the principal battles from interviews with those who fought them, providing reliable accounts of the clashes waged by conventional and Special Operations forces. It documents with precision the failures of American intelligence and the mistakes in administering postwar Iraq.
Unimpeachably sourced, Cobra II describes how the American rush to Baghdad provided the opportunity for the virulent insurgency that followed. The brutal aftermath in Iraq was not inevitable and was a surprise to the generals on both sides; Cobra II provides the first authoritative account as to why. It is a book of enduring importance and incisive analysis—a comprehensive account of the most reported yet least understood war in American history.
Customer Reviews:
The best account of the planning for and invasion of Iraq.......2007-09-27
This is a must read book for someone who wants a comprehensive, top-to-bottom understanding of the invasion of Iraq.
If you look at the references of this book, it is dozens of pages listing all of the first-hand interviews that were done for this book. Everyone from GEN McKiernan down to company commanders were interviewed and it shows in the incredible top to bottom detail. This book comes down very hard on many people and shows how much of the problems we face in Iraq today are of our own making. It is frustrating beyond belief to read about the micromanaging of Donald Rumsfeld or the idiocy of then MG Ray Odierno. Then there are some fascinating accounts of the individual battles from the sergeants and company grade officers. You see how many people tried to do the right thing or actions that would have greatly helped the US and Iraqis.
A Mixed Bag.......2007-09-20
Michael Gordon's and Bernard Trainor's "Cobra II: The Inside Story of the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq" tells the story of Operation Iraqi Freedom from the initial planning stages through the summer of 2003. This is a very comprehensive book and based, in part, on a secret report created by the Joint Forces Command after the war. Although this book has generally received fawning reviews, I had very mixed feelings as I read the book.
As others have noted, the authors tell a comprehensive, thorough story of the entire campaign. They usually offer good analysis and (at times) good criticisms, supported by the facts. However, their criticisms often outshine the better parts of the book.
The authors are extremely critical of Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, General Tommy Franks, and many others who planned and executed the invasion. The authors criticize the planners primarily for ignoring the need to invade with a much larger force. While they are certainly justified to be critical of a war that was supposed to last a few months and is now dragging into its fifth year, their criticisms form the thesis of the book and become a repeated mantra that permeates the entire narrative. This really detracts from the story they are trying to tell and often tell well.
The authors' treatment is not even-handed and their critical outlook clouds the story of the invasion. The authors focus so much on the negatives of the initial campaign to capture Baghdad that they ignore what an immensely successful campaign it was -- no one expected the Iraqi regime to fall in four short weeks. However, reading their narrative one would think that the American forces (the authors ignore the British forces) made mistake after mistake and were lucky to even reach Baghdad. Their story lacks the perspective that even the best-laid plans can be thrown away once contact is made with the enemy. The story they ignored was that, like all military operations, Operation Iraqi Freedom, was fraught with mix-ups, screw-ups, miscalculations, blunders, and other problems - Clausewitzian friction. However, the American forces overcame all of this and waged an extremely successful land campaign.
One other negative was that the book lacked a real unity of approach to describing the war. The authors attempted to narrate the war from the "big-picture," but then, during the actual fighting, spent a lot of time describing the blow-by-blow and minute-by-minute actions of the fighting at the platoon, company, and battalion level. The story was too detailed when they took this approach to selective engagements. While authors such as Max Hastings may be able to pull this off as part of their larger narrative, it was cumbersome and distracting when Gordon and Trainor tried to.
Three other criticism: 1) This book completely ignored the British actions in and around Basra; 2) This book didn't "complete" the story and take the story to a logical stopping point (such as the Sadr uprising in April 2004). The authors just trailed off in the summer of 2003 (they didn't even cover the UN bombing that summer) instead of showing how one of their major criticism - lack of sufficient troops - could have made a major difference in late 2003 and early 2004; and 3) the authors' narrative style was difficult to read at times. The book felt like it was cobbled together and written on a deadline, and because the authors relied on so many sources and described the actions of so many officers and soldiers (especially during the battle narrative), it was difficult to follow everyone they were writing about, especially since they usually did not use their rank after the first mention.
Overall, though, this is a pretty good book for anyone interested in the military planning and history of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Despite the many problems listed above, the book is thorough (if not even-handed) and full of good information.
greta read indepth look .......2007-09-18
this has been the best book writen (in my opinion) about the planning of the invasion of iraq and the first year of the occupation. i really think it is critical of everyone involved (republicans, democrats, civilians, media, military and even the iraqis) and accurately shows how all sides misjudged the situation.
Great Content - Flawed Media.......2007-07-27
Three of my CDs had dropouts; not enough to stop them from playing. I looked at the last CD and it has several scratches on it. [I just opened the case]. Seems like Random House contracted with the absolute cheapest supplier for their products.
The content (book) is very complete in a depressing way. Only the Captains and Majors seem to come out as heroes; the GOs seem to suffer from Careerism. During the runup to the war Tommy Franks was obviously "played" by Rummey; but he seemed to be easy pickings. Franks theatrical yawning during the discussion of casualties [with British officers present and immediately after a fratricide incident where U.S. killed British soldiers] is especially endearing.
Is it January 2008 yet?
Cobra II: The Inside Story of the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq.......2007-07-05
I really enjoyed this book and it's content. Offered an inside look at what really happened behind the sceens before and after the invasion.
Customer Reviews:
GREAT.......2007-06-13
LOVE THE BOOK, GOT IT IN NO TIME!
Praise for Cowtails and Cobras.......2002-10-31
I think this is the definitive book for "adventure ed". It is well laid out and easy to use. All the activities list not only instructions but when and how you might use them in a curriculum. It also has innovative ideas about how to use metaphors that can be adapted to a variety of situations. Karl Rohnke is, in my opinion, on the cutting edge of experential education and his first book is staple in any experiental ed library.
Praise for Cowtails and Cobras.......2002-10-31
I think this is the definitive book for "adventure ed". It is well laid out and easy to use. All the activities list not only instructions but when and how you might use them in a curriculum. It also has innovative ideas about how to use metaphors that can be adapted to a variety of situations. Karl Ronche is, in my opinion, on the cutting edge of experential education and his first book is staple in any experiental ed library.
a versatile and comprehensive toolbox of activities.......1999-07-13
I have used this book at outdoor education centres, camps and in a variety of classroom applications. It provides lots of neat ideas that integrate easily into traditional curricula. I especially appreciate the philosophy and clear instructions. Definitely a staple on my reference shelf.
Book Description
Trevor Legate covers the Cobra like no other author and photographer, and in this major new work he gives Cobra aficionados and motoring enthusiasts the ultimate look at this classic car. With over 280 photographs, many never before published, this book brilliantly unfolds the story of the Shelby AC Cobra from its launch in 1962, to the end of production in 1968, to the unstoppable cars reappearance in the replica kit-car market. Whether detailing the first glorious road cars or chronicling the superbly muscled race carsincluding the Daytona Cobra coupes that contested the FIA World Championshipwhether delving into the Cobras history or describing the advent of Autokraft and the AC Cobra MkIV, Legate provides every angle on the incomparable Cobra and its lasting legacy.
Customer Reviews:
A good addition to your collection if you're a Cobra fan.......2007-08-23
Contains details I have not seen in some other books, lots of good large photos, which make it worth the price alone. Written in a very "British" style, so it tends to ramble a little. I cannot see any real Cobra fan being dissapointed by this book. I'm glad I bought it.
A good book but.......2007-05-07
I am planning to build a replica Cobra. I bought this book to get as many pictures as I could of the original car. While it has these just in a cursory reading I have found many errors of fact and omission.
For example there is a picture of Shelby sitting in a Viper. The picture is labeled as him sitting in a continuation Cobra. Not even close.
It also did not have as many color pictures as I had hopped.
Great Cobra Book.......2007-01-20
Cobra: The First 40 Years is a great book for those who are obsessed with Cobras. Theres a lot of great images and information. It is the best book about Cobras so far.
An excellent book on all things Cobra.......2007-01-09
I have a large collection of books relating to the history of the Shelby Cobra, and this is one of the best, most complete of the various books out there. Excellent photography as well from an author who is passionate about he subject matter.
WOW!!!.......2006-08-10
I'd give it 10 stars, if I could. Great book for any Ford or Cobra enthusiast. A MUST HAVE for them.
Amazon.com
In New York City in the late '90s, a 17-year-old girl heads off to her private school even though she has a cold. By art class her nose is gushing mucus and she's severely disoriented. Within seconds, it seems, she's in convulsions and, most bizarrely, can't stop biting herself. All the reader can do is hope she'll die quickly, but Kate Moran's body still has a few more disgusting turns to undergo, and Richard Preston--a Jacobean master of ceremonies par excellence--takes us through them in bizarre and bloody detail.
Clearly, whatever Kate had was a head cold with a scientific vengeance. Preston's heroine, Alice Austen, a doctor with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, realizes--in the first of several gripping autopsy scenes--that the girl's nervous system had been virtually destroyed. So far, only one other person is known to have died in the same way, but he was a homeless man. Austen must connect the two cases, seemingly linked only by the subway, before the media gets hold of them and drums up a paranoia-fest--and before the virus's creator can kill again.
The Cobra Event is itself a paranoia-fest, a provocative thriller that makes you wonder exactly how much bioterrorism is taking place in the real world. Preston, best known for his terrifying chronicle of the Ebola virus, The Hot Zone, and other impeccably researched nonfictions, is not content to create fast-paced nightmarish scenes. His novel is instead a complex morality tale anchored in uncomfortable fact. Preston is keen to convey the "invisible history" of bioweapons engineering and, equally, to show the unsung heroism of his scientific detectives (along with that of the nurses and technicians who literally sacrifice their lives for medicine). Like their creator, these characters are not without a sense of humor. One calls the manmade virus "the ultimate head cold." Readers will never forget literally dozens of scenes and will never again see the subway, rodents, autopsy knives, and--above all--runny noses in the same light.
Book Description
"A PAGE-TURNER . . . THOROUGHLY FRIGHTENING."
--Newsweek
"ENORMOUSLY ENTERTAINING."
--The New York Times Book Review
"THIS BOOK SCARED THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS OUT OF ME. . . . Manages to grab you with the authenticity of its scientific detective work and haunt you with its sheer plausibility."
--Entertainment Weekly
Five days ago, a homeless man on a subway platform died in agony as startled commuters looked on. Yesterday, a teenager started having violent, uncontrollable spasms in art class. Within minutes, she too was dead.
Dr. Alice Austen is a medical pathologist at the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta. What she knows is that the two deaths are connected. What she fears is that they are only the beginning. . . .
Customer Reviews:
Good Public Health Service procedural; novel or polemic?.......2007-09-23
I have great respect for Richard Preston's nonfiction work, and this book is at its best when he is dealing with the doings of the FBI, CDC, USAMRID, and with the truly creepy life-cycles of the organisms threatening to decrease the world's human population. In that mode, the book is like a good police procedural. As a cohesive novel, though, Preston undercuts his own narrative a number of times with two nasty habits: overwrought gory details and polemics. The book is not for the squeamish, as anyone who has read his nonfiction would understand, but Cobra Event goes way beyond accurately detailed descriptions of *hot* autopsies and into the realm of David Cronenberg's "Scanners", complete with anatomically detailed exploding heads. I mean, leave something to the imagination, Richard, OK? The "splatter" descriptions are overstated and unsubtle, even if they do serve as plot points and have to be there. The other problem (for me) is that from time to time he stops the narrative cold to deliver-to the reader- a denunciation of some international organization or some other clearly dangerous situation somewhere in the world. I don't know, maybe it's just me, but I didn't like the film Lord of War because it stopped occasionally to remind the audience, with written messages at the center of the screen, how bad arms trafficking is; and I don't like it when an author drops the story temporarily to yell at me. That didn't prevent me from picking the story back up and continuing to the end, but it seems to me that Fiction should remain fiction. Harper Lee didn't break into To Kill a Mockingbird to inform her audience that a black person can't get a fair trial in this country, she showed us with her characters' interactions. I can't help thinking that Preston, a capable writer, could have worked the same way to make his points.
Richard Preston's Terror.......2007-07-17
Preston is a gifted writer. He has knowledge of contemporary society's terror threat and writes his fiction along the lines of "what could be" happening. This guy knows his stuff.
Good Story.......2007-04-20
I liked this book, however at times I felt it got a little bogged down with the textbook type style. I agree with the other reviewers that Preston tends to over-explain things that are rather easily understandable. Overall, i thought it was a great story and would recommend it.
Just as good.......2007-03-25
While reading this novel, I had to repeatedly remind myself that this was a work of fiction. Since all of Preston's other work that I have read is nonfiction, it's a change.
He wrote it the same way as he writes his other works and also included an informational section in the back of the book. I definitely think this novel is just as good as his others (I have read: The Hot Zone and Demon in the Freezer).
I definitely liked the way that the writing was similar to his other nonfiction novels. And though it was strange to have to remind myself every 100 pages that this was not a true story, I still liked that. Also, everything that happens within this novel is possible--so it is a warning of sorts.
An All-Too-Plausible Medical Horror Story.......2007-01-17
When a seventeen-year-old girl dies a horrifyingly grotesque death on her way to school, authorities are baffled. When a homeless man dies in a similarly terrible way, Dr. Alice Austen of the CDC takes an interest. When a third victim is discovered, the case becomes an official epidemic investigation. Dr. Austen teams up with the FBI and initiates a full-court press, hoping to find the cause for these frightening deaths.
What she finds turns out to be a terrorist attack. Someone in New York City is preparing for an artificial outbreak of one of the most lethal and easily communicable diseases the world has ever seen: a genetically modified version of the common cold virus combined with the small-pox virus and a rare and bizarre (and real) disease that turns afflicted persons into self-cannibals. Victims die within minutes of displaying symptoms, but they can be contagious for days beforehand. And even after death, their bodies remain contagious until cremated. As more people around the city turn up dead, the stakes rise for Austen. And when members of her own medical team start dying of the disease, she knows time is running out.
Now Austen and the FBI are in a race against time, trying to find and stop the terrorist responsible for the deaths before he unleashes the disease upon the city at large. What starts as a medical investigation turns into a manhunt and thereafter into a stakeout and finally an all-out pursuit through the dark underground of the New York subway system.
The book certainly holds one's attention, though much of the intrigue is based not on the plot but on the disgusting accounts of the victims' deaths. The death scenes are incredibly graphic and highly disturbing.
The author writes in a rather pedantic manner, and much of the narrative comes across more like a lecture than a story. Nevertheless, Preston is able to generate a fair amount of suspense in his action scenes. The chase through the subway tunnels bears an interesting resemblance to certain aspects of Reliquary, written by the author's brother (Douglas Preston, with Lincoln Child), which makes me wonder if perhaps he used some of the same research done for that book.
As with other terrorism-related books written prior to 9/11, the terrorist's motive is not particularly believable in today's world (Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six is similarly afflicted).
The book was obviously painstakingly researched. Preston has an excellent grasp of medical horrors. The bulk of the research done for this book was in the history of bioweapons manufacturing. Preston presents the astonishing and almost unbelievable (but all factual) history of biological weapons in a number of "aside" sections throughout the book (called the "Hidden History"). His research, in fact, was so convincing that then-president Bill Clinton ordered a plausibility investigation after reading this book. It's definitely scary stuff.
The book is quite simply too gross to recommend. However, the nonfiction information presented in the story is worth being aware of, particularly in light of the very real possibility of a bioterrorist attack in today's world.
Book Description
It's the fantasy of every car enthusiast: Pull a tarp off a pile in a barn, or hear a farmer say ""there's an old car out back"" and discover a classic collectible such as a Hemi 'Cuda, a rare Porsche, or a Jaguar E-Type racer. Many such tales told during enthusiasts' bench racing sessions are urban myths. But this book is full of true tales of rare gems pulled out of haystacks or junkyards-and there are before and after photos to prove it! Author Tom Cotter uses his engaging writing style in telling the tales of found Cobras, a rare Delehaye found disassembled in Czechoslovakia that eventually won Best in Show at Pebble Beach, a Ferrari racer found in a California woodchip pile, and several more. Cotter traces the early histories of the cars, how they were discovered, and where they are today.
Customer Reviews:
A Great Book If You Love Old Cars!.......2007-09-13
This is a really interesting book if you're into hunting old cars like I am. It has some great stories, and if you're a car guy it will make you want to go out and hunt for cars that people have hidden away and forgotten about. Don't think that all of the good cars have been found yet. As this book proves, there are plenty left if you are willing to do a little searching and aren't afraid to get your hands dirty. I found an old '68 Corvette convertible that was wasting away in a guy's backyard shortly after buying this book. He wouldn't sell it to me because he said he's saving it for his grandson to restore. Oh well, the search continues, and really isn't that half the fun?
A Fun Book.......2007-07-22
I enjoyed the book and was very pleased with the fast shipping and condotion. Thank you!
The Cobra in the Barn: Great Stories of Automotive Archaeology.......2007-01-20
The book contains many interesting stories of long lost or forgotten classic and antique autos. These stories are fascinating for those interesting in the history and preservation of the automobile.
Fun, inspirational.......2007-01-12
This is a pretty inspiring book; it makes you want to go on a treasure hunt! Well written and a fun, quick read.
Cobra in the Barn a hit!.......2006-11-05
The Cobra in the barn is an excellent book. The stories are interesting, fact filled, and entertaining. The short length of each story makes you eager to get to the next one to see what new, exotic car will be discovered. Some of the stories are heartwarming, some are sad. The rescue of the car and it's eventual return to glory is the satisfying conclusion in most cases. However, not all stories have a happy conclusion.
Overall, an excellent read for those of us who enjoy the automotive hobby, and it should appeal to those who enjoy a good, historical story as well.
Book Description
The history of one of the most dramatic and underreported stories of WWII.
Customer Reviews:
tombo01.......2007-09-06
A great story and a great story-teller! The most user friendly book I've read. There was no over blown technical term or military acronym that I couldn't understand. You didn't have to have 20 years service time in the Navy to know what was happining to the sailors and what the command leadership was doing right or wrong. You felt you right there with the sailors in their battle to survive! An amazing story of heroes and tragedy. The story of Commander Henry Lee Plage of the destroyer USS Tabber is awesome! He stands 3 times taller than John Wayne ever did! He was a 29 year old reservist with only one and a half years of sea time. He amazingly avoided direct orders and rescued over 50 sailors inside the fury of a killer typhoon (almost a thousand sailors died and many ships were sunk or nearly sunk). The other current book on this event "Halsey's Typhoon" doesn't even come close to the passion or power of "Sea Cobra".
stirring and insightful.......2007-06-10
My father served on an aircraft carrier that survived the typhoon Cobra, and I found this book to be a thorough and compelling account of one of the most disastrous events of WW2.
a good review of the storm.......2007-06-08
excellent account of the storm and dealt with the review of navy top brass. Let you draw your own idea at who was at fault for the lost of three ships and about eight hundred sailors. The navy felt that no one person was to blame. Just a series of unfortunate events. Yeah right!
Sea Cobra.......2007-03-15
I haven't finished this one. It is very good as far as I have read.
Average customer rating:
- Rikki Tikki Tavi
- Rikki-Tikki-Tavi
- A young reader's must have
- Rikki the valiant the true, tikki with eyeballs of flame
- Not the original text!!!
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Rikki Tikki Tavi: .
Rudyard Kipling
Manufacturer: Ideals Publications
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The Jungle Book (Books of Wonder)
ASIN: 0824965973 |
Book Description
"Rikk-tikk-tikki-tikki-tchk!"
A classic story from Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book, adapted and illustrated by award-winning artist Jerry Pinkney, this is the tale of Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, a fearless young mongoose.
Soon after a flood washes Rikki into the garden of an English family, he comes face-to-face with Nag and Nagaina, two giant cobras. The snakes are willing to attack Rikki, and even the human family who lives there, to claim the garden and house for themselves. But they do not count on the heart and pride of the brave little mongoose.
Customer Reviews:
Rikki Tikki Tavi.......2007-01-19
I liked Rikki Tikki Tavi it was a really good book. There were lots of exciting and unexpected things happening. I liked the characters - my favourite was Rikki Tikki. It was interesting to learn about the mongoose.
Rikki-Tikki-Tavi.......2006-08-31
This is the story of the great war that Rikki-tikki-tavi fought single-handed, through the bath-rooms of the big bungalow in Segowlee cantonment...
Rikki tikki tavi is about a mongoose who gets washed away from his home. a little boy finds and keeps him. Rikki must battle Nag and Nagina [did I spell that wrong?]two cobras that want to kill the family to safely hatch their eggs
so peoples enjoy the book and watch the movie too!
A young reader's must have.......2006-02-28
I loved this story as a child, and recently bought this for my daughter. It's been tough getting her to sleep since we began reading this together.
Rikki the valiant the true, tikki with eyeballs of flame.......2005-10-24
As a child, I grew up with Kipling stories. My mother would read me "Just So Stories" and selections from the surprisingly long and complex, "Jungle Book" when I was just a wee lass. And had this lush and lovely version of "Rikki-tikki-tavi" been available to me when I was a kid, I've little doubt that I'd have devoured it just as readily as I did tales like, "How the Elephant Got His Trunk". Though I missed out on "Rikki-tikki-tavi" the written tale, I did take great pleasure in the 1975 Chuck Jones animated (with voices by Orson Wells and June Foray) faithful film of the same story. For those of you eager to instill in your children a sharp jolt of Kipling to the veins, I suggest you start them out on "Rikki", both the film and this lovely picture book, then move on slowly to "Just So Stories" and finally, "The Jungle Book" (but not THAT film). Then, years later, when you're trying to get them to read "Stalkey and Company", you'll have already hooked 'em young.
"This is the story of the great war that Rikki-tikki-tavi fought, all by himself, through the English family's house in India". After finding a half-drowned mongoose outside his home, a young boy named Teddy and his family take in the little creature and nurse him to health. A naturally curious creature, the mongoose (named, you must have guessed, Rikki-tikki-tavi for the sounds he makes) explores the home and decides to stay. Good thing that he does too. Lurking in the garden is the deadly cobra Nag and his wife Nagaina. The snakes determine that Rikki is a threat to their unhatched children and decide that if the family dies then Rikki will leave the area. Now Rikki, with the help of the tailor birds Darzee and his wife, must defeat the snakes and defend the family that was kind enough to take him in.
Like "The Secret Garden", this is one of those early children's books that taught me a heckuva lot about British colonialism. When I was a kid, I just could not figure out what the English were doing in India in books like this one. Now, there's little doubt that the danger the family faces mostly comes from the fact that Rikki was in their house in the first place. Nag and Nagaina only plan to kill the family because they believe that Rikki will leave if they do. One element to this tale that I enjoyed was the role that the female creatures take in it. Admittedly, Teddy's mother is so faint of heart that she, "wouldn't think of anything so awful", as the possibility of a snake in her boy's bedroom. But Nagaina is far more powerful than her husband and Darzee's wife (who, unfortunately, hasn't a name of her own) is the one who helps Rikki out in the end. Not her silly hubby.
By the way, someone should let the tailor birds know that when a mongoose is hungry and isn't eating snakes, its next favorite food is bird eggs. If you don't believe me, ask someone from Hawaii sometime. The release of mongoose in Hawaii (to combat the rats) not only decimated the reptiles but also severely reduced the native bird populations. Just FYI.
It is true that Pinkney has edited down and simplified the words of Kipling's original tale to make it more palatable to young ears. Far more criminal than the editing though is the fact that Pinkney makes NO mention of the fact that he has done so anywhere in the book. I've scoured the publication page, title page, and bookflaps for Pinkney's explanation of the change. Nuthin'. For those first time "Tikki" readers, this version will strike them as being the original Kipling text. Pinkney could have at least admitted the changes he made. That he didn't is irresponsible.
Otherwise, it's hard to object to this book. The illustrations are classic Pinkney with Rikki a very realistic (and not particularly cute) mongoose. Knowing Pinkney's fine attention to detail, I wouldn't put it past him to have carefully researched the kinds of plants, birds, and snakes found in India for these lush watercolors. The clothing of the human characters definitely doesn't belong to the days of Kipling, of course. They look far more contemporary, which is fine. The nice thing about "Rikki-tikki-tavi" is that it can really belong to any era.
This is a story that has always been, and will always remain, a classic in the hearts and minds of children everywhere. Pinkney is not the first children's illustrator to adapt this tale. That honor may fall to Lambert Davis. If you are looking for a version of this tale that has NOT been edited down, locate the Davis version (which Amazon.com has inexplicably linked to the Pinkney reviews). Otherwise, for superior pictures and a gripping tale, Pinkney's the man to turn to. A wonderful tale and an even better mongoose.
Not the original text!!!.......2005-04-20
This has been rewritten to dumb it down. The beautiful language originally used by him has been replaced with dumber versions, and entire paragraphs have been removed. As someone who read and loved the original story as a child, I was very disappointed to see this when I began reading it to my 7 year old son.
Book Description
Palace Cobra picks up where Ed Rasimus critically acclaimed When Thunder Rolled left off. Now hes flying the F-4 Phantom and the attitude is still there. In the waning days of the Vietnam War, Rasimus and his fellow pilots were not going to be the last to die in a conflict their country had abandoned. They were young fighter pilots fresh from training and experienced aviators who came back to the war again and again, not for patriotism, but for the adrenaline rush of combat. From the bathhouses and barrooms to the prison camps of North Vietnam, this is a gripping combat memoir by a veteran fighter pilot who experienced it all. The wry cynicism of a combat aviator will give readers insights into the Vietnam experience that havent been available before and the heart-stopping action will keep readers turning the pages all night.
Customer Reviews:
Palace Cobra great book.......2007-10-08
Excellent fighter pilot's first person account of his second combat tour in South East Asia, flying bombing missions (mostly Wild Weasel, attacking Surface-to-Air Missile sites) in North Vietnam. Read Ed Rasimus' first book, "When Thunder Rolled," first.
Palace Cobra, Roll On!.......2007-04-17
Another excellent by Book Ed Rasimus, the author of "When Thunder Rolled". I had anticipated this book for months based on the strength of "When Thuder Rolled" and this book did not disappoint. I usually enjoy a good book over the course of several days like fine bottle of wine, but I guzzled this one down in one sitting like cheap hooch, getting uncontrollably drunk on the thrills contained inside. Mr. Rasimus delivers edge-of-the-seat action and a rollicking fast paced read. I also found it quite interesting how his experiences tempered his outlook and cynicism began to creep into his attitude about the war and the missions. To read his two books makes me appreciate what these men went through and to be thankful of their endeavours. Hopefully others are affected in the same way. It is my sincere hope that there will be more books in the future from Mr Rasimus.
Great Vietnam Air War Story.......2007-03-09
This book is an excellent story told by Ed Rasimus about his second tour in air combat in Vietnam. If you have not read his first book, When Thunder Rolled, you better get it! Not because you need to read it before this book (although it gives you some history leading up to this book), but because it is also a great read.
Mr. Rasimus tells the story of his tour as an F-4 pilot during the last part of the war in Vietnam. He tells it from a personal point of view and really gets the reader involved in what he was going through at the time. If you are looking for a in depth book about the F-4 Phantom, this is not the book for you. But if you are looking for a in depth book about a pilot's experiences during Vietnam, this is a must have!
Overall, I highly recommend this book. You won't be disappointed!
Palace Cobra.......2007-01-10
This is another one of those page-turner books that was hard to put down.
Great Book.......2006-10-08
I really enjoyed this book. If you love first person accounts of the Vietnam Air War you should definitely check this book out. Rasimus not only describes what it was like to fly missions over North Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia but he also tells about what his off-duty life was like in Thailand. I was surprised at his honesty in relating some of the stories about his personal life. He's also doesn't pull any punches when talking about his peers and senior leadership at that time. You might want to read Rasimus' excellent first book, When Thunder Rolled, before reading this one. Both are superb!
Book Description
Based on audiotapes he recorded during the war and sent home to his family, Randy Zahn’s Snake Pilot recounts his experiences flying AH-1 Cobra helicopters during the Vietnam War. First deployed in Vietnam in 1967 and loaded with a formidable arsenal of weaponry, the Cobra was the first helicopter designed from inception as an attack aircraft. It dramatically changed the nature of the war in Vietnam by offering the Army, for the first time, its own powerful and highly accurate weapons platform for close-air-support missions.
Randy Zahn arrived in Vietnam shortly before the 1970 U.S. invasion of Cambodia, one of the most impressive demonstrations by the Cobra in the war. He describes his stunning transformation from a naive, middle-class teenager from southern California to a hardened killer during his tour in Vietnam. Unlike the pilots who flew the fast-moving strike jets, Zahn experienced the war “up close and personal,” witnessing the grisly effects of the Cobra’s firepower on enemy soldiers. The author does not glorify killing but rather explains in sharp relief the kaleidoscope of emotions associated with combat: fear, revenge, hate, remorse, pity, and even ecstasy. He captures many of the ironies and nuances inherent in Vietnam, especially during the final years of the conflict. Zahn displays a sensitivity rarely found in memoirs written by battle-hardened warriors. This human element, combined with the vast amount of archival research and interviews with members of his former unit, ensures that Snake Pilot will become the definitive account of the role helicopters played in Vietnam.
Customer Reviews:
Should Be Called "Snake Pilot: Missing Home & Whining About it in Vietnam" .......2007-09-24
Sure, everyone's going to hate me when they read this, but maybe I'll save someone like me from reading this. After reading Low Level Hell by Hugh Mills (couldn't put it down!), I thought I had to read Snake Pilot. Now I know that I could've skipped it. I am sure that war is hell to go through, that people miss their families, that the Army doesn't always take care of their own, etc, etc. Having said that, this account is really a lot more about having a lame time in Vietnam than "Flying the Cobra Attack Helicopter in Vietnam". I was really looking for more operational info, mission sorties, weapon load outs, hair raising tales, things like that. The author seemed to overlook most of that though. Maybe he was trying to spare the casual reader the technical mumbo-jumbo, and make it more about his personal demons. Just not what I wanted to read about though.
Great book about the war.......2006-11-10
This book would make a great movie.... The way it is written makes you feel like you are out there with him... I believe I've read about every book written about the war and this is one of my favorites. The Author has a very good way of telling a story of a small group of young men doing a job that not many people could accomplish in a war zone.
16's son.......2004-06-10
Randy sent a copy with a very personal message and signature to my mom back in the states, upon finally recieving it here in Iraq I read it cover to cover closing it only to go on mission. It brought back a lot of memories of stories my father, Charles Frazier, used to tell me about the days in Tay Nihn, Phouc Vihn and all the insanity of losing friends. Being at war myself, I really connected with a lot of the stories. It was a great book deeply personal, full of the heartache of Vietnam.
PFC Frazier, Jason J
21 M.P. (ABN)
A Must Read.......2004-03-07
Evidently, the publisher's printing press has a maximum number of pages that it can print in a book of this size. Regrettably, Randy was forced to cut major portions from the original manuscript that detailed more than the actions of a cobra pilot.
In spite of this, Randy has completed the impossible task: He has documented the details correctly, and has also caught the tone, captured the frustration, and has put into writing what it was like to be a very young cobra pilot in Charlie Troop, 1/9 Cav.
This is personal. This is a personal account; with all of the personal feelings and interactions that one is expected to have in combat. He has not blown his personal, the troop's, nor the 9th Cav's exploits out-of-proportion (like another author has), and has tried his best to describe the unit as it was.... a great Troop in the highly recognized 9th Cavalry, "doing it all like it was supposed to be done" in Nam. As such, the good and the not so good are both reported as fairly as any human being in combat can. When you are done reading his excellent book, you will no doubt have assimilated his personal feelings for what it was like to be a "Snake Pilot."
Grover Wright
Charlie Troop, 1/9 Cav
1969-1970
Snake Pilot
Remarkable Book, Remarkable Man.......2003-12-28
I have gotten to know Randy and his family because they are neighbors of our son, a U. S. Air Force pilot in Anchorage.
Randy is the real deal, as a storyteller, a helicopter pilot, a husband and father, and a loyal friend to our son and his family.
If you know Randy at all, you know he puts his heart into everything he does. This book is no exception.
It tells a story that is so gripping and so human, it could not be fiction. That said, I must add that this book is not for everyone. Do not read it unless you want to know what really happened.
It is a tough read that pulls no punches. It names names, recounts vicious combat in great detail, re-creates helicopter missions with heart-pounding veracity, and makes the reader share the confusion, grief, terror, bravery, deep and abiding friendships, vulgarity and, yes, even the humor, of Randy's year as a "snake" pilot. In short, it is unforgettable, just like its author.
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