Book Description
Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter Edie, known as Big Edie and Little Edie, were the aunt and cousin of former U.S. First Lady Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis. They led an unconventional existence in Grey Gardens, a mansion in East Hampton. Their home was surrounded by overgrown gardens, and filled with fleas, cats, raccoons, and old cans and rubbish. In 1976, the release of a documentary film also called 'Grey Gardens' highlighted their unique lives among the East Hampton elite, and introduced the Beales to their cult fan following. In 1975, Lois Wright, a fellow artist and dear friend of the Beales, was invited to live with them in Grey Gardens. Wright kept a journal of her thirteen months with the Beales, and using those logs, has developed this book. 'My Life at Grey Gardens' offers the reader an intimate look at the daily lives of the Beales, and chronicles the events from Lois's arrival at the house through the passing of Big Edith Bouvier Beale in 1977.
Customer Reviews:
Wish it'd revealed more.......2007-08-26
I have to give this book three stars just because the writer shared her experiences with the public. But considering, as she tells us, that she ended up taking two of the many ghosts in the Grey Gardens house with her when she was packing to return to her home...Well, you don't get a lot of objective observation. You don't get much extra insight about Grey Gardens. What she writes about is pretty much what you already saw in the film "Grey Gardens." I hoped to learn more about the rooms and what happened to all the furniture. She treats her stay there as just another day in the life of and with no one in particular. REAL disappointment.
It will keep your intrest in Grey Gardens going on forever. .......2007-07-23
I found Ms. Wright's book to be very insightful into the life of the Beale's. Though at time the book tended to trail off a bit, but it does run more of a diary of sorts then a novel, but still a great read for anyone in interested in Grey Gardens.
The Edithmania continues.......2007-07-12
For the grey garden fan this great diary that becomes a novel. Lois Wright is on the money making us want to hear and discover more about the Bouviers of Grey Gardens,
A Great Way for More Insight.......2007-07-02
For me, my journey with Grey Gardens started out as a Broadway Musical that was riveting. This led me to the documentaries and eventually to this little book that is quirky to say the least but, does give a little more insight into the lives of Big and Little Edie. What is also fascinating is how it takes a look at their lives beyond the documentary. Don't get me wrong, the author is marches to her own drum as well, but for those of us who are fans of these two women it's a great way to find one more piece to the puzzle.
Sour Grapes.......2007-05-22
As a great fan of the Beales I cannot read enough about them & I especially enjoyed Lois Wright's first person account of her life with them. However, I was disturbed when Lois, in an ultra subtle way, inferred that Big Edie's accident was actually NO accident. And since Little Edie was the only other person in the house she was the only suspect. I think that Lois truly loved the Beales & that was why I was so disturbed by her not so subtle accusation directly pointed at Little Edie. Shame on you kiddo, especially in light of the fact that Little Edie is not alive to defend herself.
Average customer rating:
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My Secret Garden
Nancy Friday
Manufacturer: Pocket
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Health o Meter HDC100-01 "Grow with Me" Teddy Bear Scale for Babies and Toddlers
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ASIN: 0671019872 |
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This book caused quite a ruckus when it was released 25 years ago because it directly quotes the sexual fantasies of dozens of women, ranging from the "very common" rape fantasy to lesbian affairs to unusually explicit scenarios that are unmentionable here. While author Nancy Friday maintains that My Secret Garden served to free millions of women from sexual oppression, there's still a need today to get rid of the guilt that millions more still feel when it comes to fantasizing, having orgasms, and making one's sexual wishes be known. "How could it be, you might ask," she writes, "that women today, at the turn of the century, would still think they were the only Bad Girls with erotic thoughts? What kind of prison is this that that women impose on themselves?"
My Secret Garden has the prurient appeal that made it one of the most passed-around books in high school study halls (it boasts chapters titled "Insatiability" and "The Thrill of the Forbidden"), but its premise, underneath the tales of lusty longings, is a serious one. Friday, also author of My Mother, My Self and Women on Top, is appalled at how parents, especially mothers, instill in their children a deep fear of sexual pleasure, and she advises how to do away with this stultifying force. While Friday can get a little histrionic at times ("Women's lust ... could bring down not only individuals, but society itself"), that doesn't make this book any less enthralling. --Erica Jorgensen
Book Description
When it first appeared, My Secret Garden created a storm of outrage and exhilaration. Women who read it were astonished to find in its pages the hidden content of their own sexual fantasies. More outspoken, graphic, and taboo-shattering than any book before its time, My Secret Garden quickly became the classic study of female sexuality. Today, millions of women have made Nancy Friday's groundbreaking bestseller a mainstay of feminist literature -- a liberating force that adds a sensational new dimension to their sexual fantasies and lives.
Book Description
This book is a practical guide for making twelve beaded necklaces and flowers. It includes over 100 clear and descriptive diagrams, carefully detailing every step of the beading process.
Customer Reviews:
Different from other beaded flower books.....................2006-11-05
I found this book to be more unique than other beaded flower books I have and I have 5 at this time. Some real different flowers than the norm.
Fabulous!!!.......2006-10-20
I am absolutely THRILLED with this book and will be purchasing the others. Not only are the projects simply stunning and unparalleled, the diagrams are the best I've come across. I am a medium-experienced beader and enjoy trying new stitches and techniques. The diagrams may look a bit scary at first glance, but, after careful and deliberate study, they became quite clear and easy to follow. The "word" instructions are much less detailed than the diagrams, which made the learning process a bit more challenging for me (I tend to rely more on written instructions than pictures), however, the diagrams are really so well-laid out and clear that, after taking the time to study them, I was able to work fine with them. Indeed, after carefully dissecting the diagrams for one project, the other directions/diagrams were very easy to follow. My one recommendation to the author (if she happens to read this feedback), would be to expand upon the written directions (i.e. adding written instructions for the start of each necklace to identify how many beads you intially string on and where you make the initial turns), instead of trying to glean the information from the diagram). I love that she includes time estimates for the pieces (I've never seen this done before), and I love that she encourages people to bead with whatever materials they can find/afford, without necessarily having to purchase the most expensive beads. I would recommend this book, even for beginners, AS LONG AS YOU ARE PREPARED TO INVEST SOME TIME READING AND STUDYING THE DIAGRAMS AND INSTRUCTIONS BEFORE STARTING A PROJECT. Prior to starting the Apple Blossom necklace I'm now working on, I read and studied directions for several of the other pieces, making sure that I could follow the diagrams mentally. I had a bit of a slow start when actually beginning the beading, but in short order I was able to figure out what I needed to do and it was like a "light" when on and I understood her diagrams clearly. Now I feel confident to tackle any of the designs presented in the book.
Nothing special .......2006-09-04
It looks like a magazine rather than a book. Only few projects are nice but it's not worth it to pay $21 for those projects.
The instructions aren't that clear and neither the graphs, I would not recommend it to anybody since there are much better books out there (e.g. The beaded garden - Diane Fitzgerald).
I have seen many Russian books on beadings and there are much more interesting and worth to be translated.
Most Beautiful Beaded Flower Necklaces I've Ever Seen!!!.......2005-12-06
These are some of the most incredibly beautiful flower necklaces that I have ever seen!!! If you are not sure about whether or not to get it, make sure that you click on the second thumbprint showing the back cover with all of the necklaces shown -- absolutely amazing!!! Plus, these flower patterns could easily be used to decorate clothing, purses, or create vases of flowers!!!
Also, as another commenter indicated, if you need additional help, you can simply go to her incredible website, Jewelry by Varvara, and e-mail her.
I'm so glad that I found this book!!!
Many Blessings,
Crystal
PLEASE BUY The Beaded Garden : Creating Flowers with Beads and Thread INSTEAD.......2005-10-13
You won't be sorry buying this other book instead! It is in full color NOT like this book, 95% in Black in white. The instructions are not that clear for a visual learner like me. The other book: Creating Flowers With Beads and Theads allowed me to pick it up and start beading!
Customer Reviews:
An excellent study and excellent erotica too!.......2007-04-30
I have enjoyed every Nancy Friday book that I have read. In this one, Nancy Friday, brings together women's fantasies under one cover and tries to represent different commonly occurring themes. The book is well organized and gives a great sense of women's interior fantasy life. It is also RED HOT and broke ground at the time in overcoming ignorance and shame where women's sexuality was involved. There is also a similar book on men's fantasies called Men in Love.
Utterly Fascinating.......2006-01-12
As a 24 year old man, I loved this book. The majority of the content is simply what it says it is: women's descriptions of their sexual fantasies. I felt this gave me a lot of insight into how women relate to their sexuality.
Amazon.com's Best of 2001
Diane Ackerman relishes the world of her garden. As a poet, she finds within it an endless field of metaphors. As a naturalist, she notices each small, miraculous detail: the hummingbirds and their routines, the showy tulips, the crazy yellow forsythia. Of visiting deer she writes, "I love watching the deer, which always arrive like magic or a miracle or the answer to an unasked question."
In her popular book A Natural History of the Senses, Ackerman celebrates the human body; in A Natural History of My Garden, she turns her attention to the world outside the body, outside the human sphere. Structured by seasons, this is a book of subtle shifts, but the reader never feels lost. Her prose is so welcoming, at times it feels like she's talking directly to you, although her lush, poetic language is the opposite of speech.
Distracted urban readers craving a book that will transport them would do well to spend time immersed in these pages, as will gardeners who've lost appreciation for their plot. Ackerman is a generous writer--a teacher who will share treasured, obscure passages from Beckett or Hawthorne. She's emotional and highly charged, and her descriptions are so clear they're small marvels. She's remarkable for her ability to find mystery everywhere. --Emily White
Book Description
In the mode of her bestseller A Natural History of the Senses, Diane Ackerman celebrates the sensory pleasures of her garden through the seasons. Whether she is deadheading flowers or glorying in the profusion of roses, offering sugar water to a hummingbird or studying the slug, she welcomes the unexpected drama and extravagance as well as the sanctuary her garden offers.
Written in sensuous, lyrical prose, Cultivating Delight is a hymn to nature and to the pleasure we take in it.
Customer Reviews:
not what I was looking for.......2006-01-12
In an earlier book, Ms. Ackerman congratulates herself on being open to experience more than most people. In light of this, I found that in this book she is too self-absorbed in herself (ironic for someone who does at times describe the natural world so beautifully) and too enamored of her ability to write prose.
She's good at throwing in fascinating factoids on everything from space to psychology to animal behavior, but alas, seems to flit from topic to topic like a bee gathering pollen. That is to say the flow of her writing is haphazard (though a bee may indeed be more purposeful than I give it credit for here).
If most people don't seem to have as much time to smell the roses as Ackerman, perhaps that is because they work away from home full time and have children and a spouse whose needs must occasionally come before theirs. It can be hard to be open to the natural world when you're worrying about being fired or demoted or if your child has come down with the flu. I never get the sense from her books that Ackerman lives in "the real world" what with her tales of meditating, biking, rose gathering, etc.
That's lovely for her, but don't pass judgments on people with different lifestyles.
I wanted to learn more about plants and the best conditions for growing various ones. Instead, I got a book of poetic, and sometimes purple, meditations, which was all right, but not what I had expected.
brilliant, meditative, poetic and charming.......2005-05-27
i checked this book out from the library during the drab winter months of oregon, and i was so enraptured with it that i kept it for 3 weeks, reading it as slowly as possible, savoring every page. it's on my list of books to buy for myself, as well. i thought her writing was fluid and descriptive. i thoroughly enjoyed meandering along with her through her garden and through her life. i imagine her garden must be incredible. i'm no book reviewer, but i can say this: i haven't read any of ackerman's other books (yet), but this one is spectacular.
a gardener's deligh.......2004-05-23
I read this book from the library and then bought it for myself because it is definitely a re-reading book. I have read it several times now and it amazes me every time. The depth of knowledge and the decriptions of her plants along with the distractions of her life are interesting, engaging and wonderful to read. Diane is one of my favorite authors but this book combines her scientific wordy writing style with one of my loves - plants and gardening. I read it when I'm sad and it reminds me of the wonders in the world and in my yard and neighborhood. I envy her spending so much time in her garden. I highly recommend it to plant people who like to read books besides the plant manuals that tell you how to grow things, enjoying the plants is the ultimate pleasure.
I loved it, and Iým not even remotely a gardener.......2004-02-25
Gardens. They're great, and I have a lovely one in my front yard. But I can claim exactly none of the credit. My style of gardening is to sit on the front steps chatting with Teri, my gardener, while she prunes the shrubs and tucks primroses and lobelia and cyclamen into the little bare spots.
But I love reading about people who DO enjoy gardening, and Diane Ackerman is a consummate writer on the subject. I've read The Moon by Whale Light and A Natural History of the Senses, two others of her several books, and find myself equally charmed by this one. It's a casual tour through the four seasons of her upstate backyard garden. But, as she's a naturalist, a poet, and a philosopher, she doesn't stop with just the plants; she uses the plants and their interdependent roles as metaphors to browse mentally through a wide variety of topics, including what gardens can do for people more than how people can tend a garden. It's like a role reversal of sorts. Some of the subjects that her free- and far-ranging mind roams over include: how we are like plants, plant's self-defense mechanisms, why we see faces in nature, etc. Her lyrical writing and vast, encyclopedic curiosity sometimes remind me of Annie Dillard's nature writing, a comparison that should be considered a compliment to both authors.
Stop and Smell the Words.......2003-10-22
Previous reviewers, grumps and rhapsodics both, are pretty accurate in their review of this work. If you're looking for a lot of how-tos about gardening, you won't find them here. What you will find is someone who LOVES her garden, and loves reflecting on it. While the "hard labor" of gardening is something she is glad to hire other people to do for her, she revels in it's lovely blossoms and the wildlife who visit it. My husband was put off by her hiring out the hard work too, but all I could think was, "If I could afford it, I'd hire out the nasty stuff too"
I really don't think it is the author's intent to instruct us on how to garden, what she does is inform us, through her example, that delight can be found in many aspects of gardening. It is a zen-like philosophy; focus lovingly and intently on what you do.
While there are no earth shattering revelations here, Ms Ackerman's musings reminded me of poems I had forgotten, books I'd been meaning to read, and, yes, plants I'd been meaning to plant. While some may have a problem with this as an overall book, I can't imagine anyone objecting to it page-by-page. This may be one of those books to be read just a few pages at a time. Savor each page as you would a rose blossom, enjoy the loveliness of it, then move on.
Average customer rating:
- A Beautiful Piece of Fiction
- Annie On My Mind
- A little slow to get started but all around a good book
- Annie on my Mind
- Possibly the best lesbian love story I've read
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Annie on My Mind
Nancy Garden
Manufacturer: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
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ASIN: 0374400113
Release Date: 2007-02-20 |
Book Description
This groundbreaking book, first published in 1982, is the story of two teenage girls whose friendship blossoms into love and who, despite pressures from family and school that threaten their relationship, promise to be true to each other and their feelings.
Of the author and the book, the Margaret A. Edwards Award committee said, “Nancy Garden has the distinction of being the first author for young adults to create a lesbian love story with a positive ending. Using a fluid, readable style, Garden opens a window through which readers can find courage to be true to themselves.”
The 25th Anniversary Edition features a full-length interview with the author by Kathleen T. Horning, Director of the Cooperative Children’s Book Center. Ms. Garden answers such revealing questions as how she knew she was gay, why she wrote the book, censorship, and the book’s impact on readers – then and now.
Customer Reviews:
A Beautiful Piece of Fiction.......2007-08-08
After twenty-five years, Annie on my Mind remains a classic. It is both a love story and a coming out story that focuses on the growing attraction between two New York teenagers. Set in 1982, the book explores the developing relationship between Liza and Annie at a time when homosexuality was greatly stigmatized. While at a museum, Liza notices Annie, who manages to capture her attention in a way she doesn't quite understand. Much of the chemistry between the two characters is built around their sense of isolation and self-discovery in one another. Even though both come from loving families, neither one seems to "fit in" socially. Nancy Garden manages to pull off the relationship convincingly while avoiding gay stereotypes. I would recommend this book to open-minded readers who prefer a good love story with a happy ending.
A quick, easy, and enjoyable read.
Annie On My Mind.......2007-07-28
God, I love this book!!!! Nancy Garden truly knows what she is talking about when she brings you along on the wonderful story of Annie and Liza. Inspirational and equally rememberable, this story will stay in your heart forever. It really shows the true fear and results of the fear of homophobia. And even though the characters may tumble through hard and difficult times throughout the plot, nothing can equal how they must feel for eachother. A great insight on how love can withstand even the hardest of times.
A little slow to get started but all around a good book.......2007-06-15
Annie on my mind is about 2 young teenage girls that become friends and fall into love quickly. this story takes you on all the twists and turns about their relationship. Im giving it only 4 stars because it took a little longer than liked to get going but i have a short attention span so i dont know how other people feel about it. all in all, it's a very good book and i recommend it to anyone who has been there or for people who need to open up about it more. it will open you eyes to the cruelty that people can have...and how it feels on the receiving end.
Annie on my Mind.......2007-06-08
This is an excelent book about young love and making one's way without regard of the negative views of others. I heartily recoment it.
Possibly the best lesbian love story I've read.......2007-05-17
I don't know where to begin. This book was near perfect. The characters were interesting and believable, the plot flowed wonderfully and the message of love is joyous. The love between Liza and Annie was so real.
All in all, this was just a terrific book!
Average customer rating:
- Our girls LOVE this fairy book
- Enhanced pictures, cute text
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My Garden of Flower Fairies
Cicely Mary Barker
Manufacturer: Warne
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ASIN: 0723249261 |
Book Description
In a large garden live the Flower Fairies™ and their many friends. There's mischievous Periwinkle, shy Daffodil, Poppy, who likes to give parties for Flower Fairy™ children, and Marigold, who loves the sun. Seventeen fairies in all are featured in this book that's chock full of the details young readers and listeners love to know about the Flower Fairies and their secret lives.
Customer Reviews:
Our girls LOVE this fairy book.......2006-01-28
The illustrations are really nice. Beautiful. Our 3 preschool daughers are very into fairies right now and they LOVE this book. They love the stories associated with all the flowers. Part of me would think the book would be a bit old for them, but not at all. They love it and want to read it over and over and over.
Enhanced pictures, cute text.......2004-12-16
My 5-year old enjoyed this introduction to the flower fairy friends. It takes the lovely drawings of Cicely Mary Barker and places them with photographs of flowers, and combines them in different ways. It is neatly done. The text describes the different fairies and what their personalities are like. It is sweet but uninspired. We're looking forward to reading others id the Flower Fairy Friends series.
Book Description
Inspired by her own family's immigrant history, Patricia Klindienst traveled the country, gathering stories of urban, suburban, and rural gardens created by people rarely presented in books about American gardens: Native Americans, immigrants from across Asia and Europe, and ethnic peoples who were here long before our national boundaries were drawn. In The Earth Knows My Name, she writes about the beautiful gardens she discovered, each one an island of hope, offering us a modelâon a sustainable scaleâof a truly restorative ecology.
"A moving tribute to those who keep the ancient love of the land in their hearts, and who stand up to the giants of agrobusiness in their fight to preserve their cultural heritage." âDr. Jane Goodall, DBE, founder of the Jane Goodall Institute, UN Messenger of Peace, and author of Harvest for Hope: A Guide to Mindful Eating
"Carefully weaving the threads of the cultures that were here before with those that came later, Klindienst makes her case for the deep, life-giving integrity of the earth . . . This is a poignant book that shows, without undue sentimentality, the underlying element we all share and can bring to life with our hands." âEdie Clark, Orion
Patricia Klindienst is a master gardener and an award-winning scholar and teacher. She lives in Guilford, Connecticut, and teaches creative writing each summer at Yale University.
Customer Reviews:
A unique book.......2007-05-16
This is an interesting, beautifully written book describing the connection between a culture and growing food, using specific individuals in different parts of America -- Native American, Hispanic, Japanese, Italian, and so on. Gardening breathes life into the culture and the person. It is an unusual, heartfelt theme.
A Garden Democracy.......2007-05-09
What a beautiful, wise, passionate and informed book. I guarantee you will want to discuss its ideas with your friends, and give copies to those you love most. And of course, if you don't have a garden, it will inspire you to start one. Or, if you don't have the space, to find a community garden. Or, if you don't have access even to a community garden, to start growing some herbs at home!
I would like to share one short quote here, from the epilogue, entitled A Garden Democracy. There's a fellow in Connecticut called Whit Davis, the last surviving member of his Yankee clan, who recently made a gift of some original Indian seed corn to a local tribe. As a result this tribe have been able to finally start recreating the Indian gardens that the first English settlers came across and destroyed in short order.
"How can a gesture as simple as the gift of seeds be a meaningful answer to centuries of injustice?
Because it makes possible the restoration of the seed's place in a structure of meaning. The English imposed on "the garden of New England" the idea of land as commodity, the wilderness as a fund of natural capital at their disposal, and seed as a form of currency. Whit's return of the seeds refuses those meanings."
Exactly. Through reading this book, and hopefully cultivating a piece of land yourself, you will come to understand that it's not just real estate, it's not just a commodity, it's Mother Earth. In other words, the Indians were right all along.
Right up there with Michael Pollan, Aldo Leopold, Sir Albert Howard, Richard Evans Schultes, Paul Stamets, Jane Goodall, Masanobu Fukuoka, Carlo Petrini, Bill McKibben, Wendell Berry, Edward O. Wilson, and all the others who have drawn attention to the fact that our relationship to the earth is more than merely economic.
Thank you Patricia!
The Studs Terkel of Gardening.......2006-09-13
In the early 1970's Studs Terkel traveled across the country interviewing people about their work, and eventually compiled the interviews into the book Working. In the early 2000's, Patricia Klindienst took a similar approach, traveling around the USA to interview ethnic gardeners, immigrants who maintain their cultural identity through their connection to the earth.
While The Earth Knows My Name will never be a musical, it is a marvellous testament to the importance of earth and water, seed and plant, and in sustaining not just our ethnic roots, but also our whole selves. Her words bring to life the feeling of warm sun on your back while you plant corn, or crisp autumn mornings harvesting beans. She lets you smell the scent of flowers, but also taste the flavor of language, in her profiles of 15 gardeners.
This book is well written, it is poignant, and it is gently honest, with the author's love of gardening, and sincere respect for her subjects masking the inevitable political undercurrents.
My only complaint is that there should have been more pictures - I craved a coffee-table presentation, with Klindienst's words matched to lush photographs.
But maybe the mind's eye is the better viewing choice. Buy the book, and decide for yourself. Better yet, buy the book, and plant a garden.
I wanted more.......2006-08-05
I would have purchased this book even if I did not know some of the people and places in this book. Patricia's material and writing are inspirational not just for gardeners but for anyone who is interested in where their food originates. The diversity of the gardens and gardeners made me realize again, the necessity of supporting our local growers. My only complaint is that I wanted more and found myself rationing my chapters. Hopefully there will be a sequel to include the gardens she omitted. I strongly recommend this book. Makes a great gift.
Will interest not only gardeners, but any intrigued by immigrant history and cross-cultural encounters.......2006-07-27
THE EARTH KNOWS MY NAME: FOOD, CULTURE, AND SUSTAINABILITY IN THE GARDENS OF ETHNIC AMERICANS isn't just from a single gardener's perspective: master gardener Patricia Klindienst traveled across the country for three years to write this, gathering stories of urban and rural gardens from American gardeners whose immigrant roots reflect their gardening choices. Hers combines a history of how immigrant Americans grew food and transmitted cultural background in the process, with chapters blending their oral stories with such background. It's a wide-ranging title which will interest not only gardeners, but any intrigued by immigrant history and cross-cultural encounters.
Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch
Average customer rating:
- Quite different (for a garden book)
- Insufferable
- the thickness of things
- Tedious - Good Word
- Skip it
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My Garden (Book)
Jamaica Kincaid
Manufacturer: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
Essays
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Women Writers & Feminist Theory
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Kincaid, Jamaica
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Kincaid, Jamaica
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ASIN: 0374527768 |
Book Description
One of our finest writers on one of her greatest loves.Jamaica Kincaid's first garden in Vermont was a plot in the middle of her front lawn. There, to the consternation of more experienced friends, she planted only seeds of the flowers she liked best. In My Garden (Book): she gathers all she loves about gardening and plants, and examines it generously, passionately, and with sharp, idiosyncratic discrimination. Kincaid's affections are matched in intensity only by her dislikes. She loves spring and summer but cannot bring herself to love winter, for it hides the garden. She adores the rhododron Jane Grant, and appreciates ordinary Blue Lake string beans, but abhors the Asiatic lily. The sources of her inspiration -- seed catalogues, the gardener Gertrude Jekyll, gardens like Monet's at Giverny -- are subjected to intense scrutiny. She also examines the idea of the garden on Antigua, where she grew up. My Garden (Book): is an intimate, playful, and penetrating book on gardens, the plants that fill them, and the persons who tend them.
Customer Reviews:
Quite different (for a garden book).......2007-04-25
I found this book at a library book sale and bought it because of the subject (I enjoy garden writings immensely) and because of the loveliness of the book itself.
The first story about a wisteria that won't bloom at the proper time is the only story I didn't like. The author repeated the sentece "What to do?" so many times that it got on my last nerve. Her writing in that piece seemed to be the meanderings of her thoughts that she then attempted to give a heavy-handed poetic touch. I enjoyed the rest of the pieces.
This book is not typical of garden books and Jamaica Kincaid puts in bits and pieces of her life, touching on racial issues and gardener snobbery. Some sentences widen the eyes and make you read it again because it is so unexpected, tidbits that most other authors would self-censor. The author can come across as a bit offensive, particularly when branding various people "ugly", and I'm not sure if she would be a difficult person to know or a fun person to know - maybe both, but I definitely enjoyed her writings and am glad I didn't let her wisteria story deter me from reading the rest of the book.
Insufferable.......2004-08-18
I found this book insufferable, and didn't get to finish it. The contrived title should have tipped me off. Why isn't Amazon listing it correctly? It should be My Garden (Book):
For started, i don't really care for Jamaica Kincaid's writing style. She uses punctuation sparsely, and you go for what it seems like a mile with no period in sight. In the meantime, she has branched in a myriad of extra information, and after a while it gets to be too much to keep track of. This is not stream of consciousness writing, or at least not the good kind anyway.
What really did me in was the beginning of her anecdote titled "Reading":
"It was a day in late October and I had two thousand dollars' worth of heirloom bulbs to place in the ground [...]"
If that wasn't enough, then she continues:
"I do not like winter or anything that represents it ..."
What is she doing then living in Vermont?!
She came across as a malcontent human being who agonizes over insignificant stuff, like the exact month her wisterias bloom. She takes the joy out of gardening, and out of reading.
the thickness of things.......2004-06-07
"Oh, how I like the rush of things, the thickness of things . . ."
Oh, how I like Kincaid's My Garden (Book). I am halfway through it and realize I had better slow down, because I am not going to find another book on the garden I like nearly so much as this one, probably for a very long time. I've got a stack of other books, none so good, and I will use My Garden (Book) like a tiny slice of truffle among the more common and less delicious food on my plate. Rationing is the only option.
What I like about her (among the everything else I like about her) is that she doesn't like Asiatic Lilies because their colors remind her of a hallucinogenic drug she took once ever seven days for a year when she was young. This is the best sort of confession to make in a gardening book.
She also confesses to amassing large debts and threatening letters from creditors about her garden habit. She confesses to being a messy, careless person with a messy house. All these confessions endear her to me. The weaknesses balance the austere authority of her prose, which also endears her to me.
Her garden aesthetic - odd, overgrown, intense and personal, wild, even, endears her to me. I remember reading a bit of memoir in the New Yorker that involved her experiments with coffee enemas. This struck me as the strangest thing I had ever read (because perhaps I was still a teenager in Kansas and ready to be struck by things). Enemas? The reason for them escaped me, but with coffee none the less - or espresso? I paid careful attention to the byline of that piece, wanting to find more of this sort of writing.
Later, one of her essays was in a book I used as a graduate teaching assistant. When I saw her name, I took a sip of coffee.
I like Ms. Kincaid because she doesn't love the writing of Vita Sackville-West. She says that the best literary companion to Vita's gardens is the autobiography of Nina Simone. How could this not be love? The best companion to life is Nina Simone and gardening like Vita Sackville-West.
How could I not see bringing Ms. Kincaid a bouquet of flowers in exquisite yellows and sharing a cocktail in some overgrown, wild garden someday? How could I not tell everyone I know who enjoys the garden or good writing to pick up this book immediately and fall in love?
Tedious - Good Word.......2004-04-20
I couldn't finish this book, and usually I finish books too quickly. The reviewer who described her book/writing style as tedious wins the prize from me. I think I would have liked her piece if she wrote differently. But...
Skip it.......2003-05-30
Has this woman never heard of punctuation? Her sentences are so long you practically have to tie yourself in a knot to read them. This is a shame, because before I got turned off by the sentence length I had spotted some fresh ideas. I toiled on until I realized there was no depth of knowledge behind the ideas. There are lots of good, even great, books of garden essays out there. Don't waste your time on this one.
Book Description
Acclaim for the Bomb in My Garden
"This one book will tell you more about Iraq's quest for weapons of mass destruction than all U.S. intelligence on the subject. It is a fascinating and rare glimpse inside Saddam Hussein's Iraq-and inside a tyrant's mind."
-Fareed Zakaria, author of The Future of Freedom
"The Bomb in My Garden is important and utterly gripping. The old cliché is true-you start reading, and you don't want to stop. Mahdi Obeidi's story makes clear how hard Saddam Hussein tried to develop a nuclear weapon, and the reasons he fell short. It is also unforgettable as a picture of how honorable people tried to cope with a despot's demands. I enthusiastically recommend this book."
-James Fallows, National Correspondent, The Atlantic Monthly
"One of the three or four accounts that anyone remotely interested in the Iraq debate will simply have to read. Apart from its insight into the workings of the Saddam nuclear project, it provides a haunting account of the atmosphere of sheer evil that permeated every crevice of Iraqi life under the old regime."
-christopher hitchens, Slate
"Mahdi Obeidi describes in jaw-dropping detail how Iraq acquired the means to produce highly enriched uranium, the key ingredient to building a nuclear weapon, by the eve of the first Gulf War. . . . [His book] offers insights into how a determined dictator, backed by sufficient resources, can come within reach of acquiring the world's most horrific weapons."
-The Washington Post BookWorld
Download Description
A news-breaking inside look at Saddam¿s nuclear program¿by the Iraqi scientist who ran it
No one knows more about Iraq¿s nuclear weapons program than Mahdi Obeidi, the man who headed its successful uranium enrichment effort. In the aftermath of the 2003 Iraq War, Obeidi voluntarily turned himself into American intelligence. Among the revelations reported by CNN at the time: In the early 1990s, under orders to hide the core of the program from U.N. weapons inspectors, Obeidi had buried in his backyard the capacity to build uranium-enriching gas centrifuges.
Now, at last, Obeidi tells all, taking us inside Saddam¿s regime and revealing the truth about its quest for nuclear weapons. He explains how he traveled abroad incognito though the United States and Europe in the 1980s and gained covert assistance for the Iraqi nuclear effort from scientists and manufacturers. He tells how he was forced to orchestrate Saddam¿s cat-and-mouse game with U.N. weapons inspectors in the early 1990s. And he captures what life was like in Saddam¿s inner circle¿the intimidation, the paranoia, the impossible deadlines. Most significantly, Obeidi discloses that Iraq never reconstituted its nuclear weapons program after the first Gulf War; the critical elements¿including the centrifuge¿remained buried in his garden until he voluntarily turned them over to U.S. forces last year.
Written with the pace and drama of a spy thriller, this eye-opening book shows how easy it was for a rogue regime to acquire nuclear technology¿and helps answer still-lingering questions about Saddam's weapons of mass destruction.
Mahdi Obeidi oversaw Iraq¿s top-secret centrifuge program and later became director-general of Iraq¿s Ministry of Industry and Military Industrialization under Saddam Hussein. In late 2003, Obeidi was granted asylum by the U.S., where he now lives. Kurt Pitzer (New York, NY) met Obeidi in Baghdad and helped him turn his secrets over to the U.S. He has reported out of the Balkans, the Middle East, Afghanistan, and Iraq and written for the Associated Press, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe, and numerous magazines.
Customer Reviews:
A glimpse inside Iraq under Saddam's regime.......2007-04-10
Once you get started you won't be able to put this book down. This oral hisory shows how honorable, intelligent people with the best intentions can be forced to do the work of a corrupt regime. Thank you, Mr. Obeidi, for coming forward with your story revealing the individuals and countries (including our own) that made the acquisition of nuclear-producing components possible, in spite of the nuclear ban. It makes the current situation of nuclear fuel enrichment in Iran and North Korea all the scarier. Thank you, Kurt, for organizing this story so well and making the scientific jargon so easily understood.
Facinating Account.......2006-11-10
The Bomb in My Garden was very easy to read and held my interest throughout. Although I did not know Dr. Mahdi as a student at Colo School of Mines, he was in school at the same time as I, graduating three years after me. That added to my interest in the book.
It gives an insight into the kind of goverment Dr. Mahdi had to work under and give in to.
Model of an Illicit Program.......2006-10-09
The book provides excellent insight into the Iraqi program throughout the 1980s and early 1990s. The most insightful portion is how they pulled it off. They needed and acquired materials and expertise from Sweeden, Italy, and even the United States. It tells in detail how they used cover stories to get their hands on sensitive items and would then use front companies to ship those items back to Iraq. Once the program was discovered, the book details how the regime attempted to cover it up. In one case, they literally tore down a building, rebuilt it, and moved the top layer of dirt from all the way around the area to cover any traces of nuclear material at that location. It is a truly facisnating book!!
Genuine truth from a wonderful man !.......2005-11-25
This is not only a trilling read, in part due to it's non fictional aspect but also it's a wonderful book because it reflects the character of it's author.
To me it is genuine and believable for two reasons:
- The facts, details and timelines are cross checkable giving the reader an insider's view of Saddam's infamous regime.
- It has the fingerprint of a critical and clear thinker - a scientist, sometimes naive but always good intentioned who gets sucked into Iraq's nuclear program.
So in addition to being a fascinating account and a lesson in political science it also contains a good R&D story !
Science has always being of great interest to me and on that note , the most memorable point of the book was where he describes the gifted hands of a fellow scientist which delivered the works at a tense and critical moment
"...and I realized that all the theory in the world can never replace an experienced hand."
But I don't want to lose sight of the book's importance in the context of the US invasion of Iraq. I am in no doubt that Bush had no choice except to invade Iraq. After 9/11 he was not going to take a chance of leaving this erratic regime in place to spray havoc on the west at some future date in cohesion with Al-queda.
Of course that's a hard thing to say after all the bloodshed that has been in Iraq since the invasion but if Democracy prevails it will have a positive ripple throughout the Arab world.
What would have been the alternative?.. I have no doubt.
#66 Most wanted man in Iraq once, tells his story.......2005-05-29
"This is the man who will deliver the enriched uranium," Hussein Kemal said to his father-in-law Saddam, nodding at Mahdi Obeidi. "He has already made great strides." "In less than 3 years," Dr. Obeidi writes in this book, "our staff of only 200 talented men and women had progressed from almost total ignorance of centrifuge technology to the successful enrichment of uranium and to the verge of large-scale production." How he accomplished this feat (beginning in 1988) is he story of "A Bomb in my Garden"; so entitled because of his hiding of a test centrifuge---the single most dangerous piece of nuclear technology---& detailed blueprints on its manufacture for over 12 years (buried in his backyard) while UN inspectors searched Iraq for just such proof that Saddam was a lot closer to acquiring a nuclear device than he was willing to conceed (an ability, moreover, he could reconstitute fairly rapidly when desired). Dr. Obeidi explains herein how centrifuges draw the heavier isotope uranium-238 from the lighter uranium-235 "in much the same way that water is drawn out of laundry in the spin cycle of a washing machine." In this way natural uranium---which contains less than 1% uranium-235---can be accumulated & progressively enriched until it reaches lethal quality (at over 90% purity). Centrifuges, however, need to rotate at over 50,000 revolutions per minute to facilitate this process; an engineering miracle in of itself. Only certain materials can bear the stress of such force and have to be manufactured to such precise tolerances that Dr. Obeidi sent dozens of his engineers & researchers to train undercover in the world's best institutes & high-tech companies once he was able to procure the requisite classified plans for such; as he (simultaneously) "put together a strategy for acquiring parts, materials, and know-how on the international black market." This he did in total secrecy, under direct command of Saddam Hussein's son-in-law. "It is difficult to describe," he writes, "the sense of total fear we lived under" trying to meet arbitrarily imposed deadlines from above---the penalty being prison and/or execution for failure. It's an amazing story; and the details of meetings and events of interest are fascinating: details of meetings with Qusay Hussein & Saddam Hussein, being threatened by Saddam's son-in-law, watching Colin Powell address the UN on satellite televison, dodging American bombs during the invasion, wooing German & Swiss industrialists and scientists to provide classified materials & so on. Once he even had to tear down half of his development facility---walls, floor, etc. and remove tons of topsoil surrounding it before UN inspectors---having surprised him by taking samples---would be expected to return once those samples (as he expected) tested positive for radiation. If you are interested in the Iraq War, Saddam Hussein's dastardly doings---or need to be convinced of such, this is the book for you. Even if you don't need convincing, this book is a rare glimpse into Iraq that you will read cover to cover with keen interest. It is well written & hard to put down. Cheers!
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