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by Dwayne J. Ferguson
ISBN: 0865433356
Binding/Media: Hardcover
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. This book appears in a like new condition with light reading wear, but has an inscription/ writing on the first page. No further imperfections.
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by Bruce David Forbes
ISBN: 0520251040
Binding/Media: Hardcover - 187 pages
Condition: New
Comments: Sold with pride. Brand New, unread copy.
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Customer Reviews
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Brief, but good overview
Rating  (4)
Date: 2009-01-15
This is a good and informative book. It becomes a little Christian-oriented in the final chapter, but otherwise, an educational summary of Christmas and all of its trappings - the history, the journey of Saint Nicholas to Santa Claus, the cultural touchstones, and the commercialization of the celebration in the twentieth century, with its attendant implications. Worth reading either as a light overview, or to bring together multiple strands of research.
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Concise, Interesting, and Fun
Rating  (5)
Date: 2009-01-08
Fundamentalists won't love this book, but for the rest of us who want to understand how Christmas got the way it is today (for better or worse), Forbes's work is excellent. Forbes admits at the beginning that he wanted to provide a concise, balanced overview rather than a one-sided treatise from a secular or theologically-based position, and he succeeds. The somewhat brief book is sustantial in content, if not length.
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The Dickens You Say
Rating (4)
Date: 2008-10-16
6 out of 6 customers found this reveiw helpful
This Christmas I am buying a dozen copies of this delightful little book to give friends who suffer holiday stress. In addition to providing clarification on the actual evolution of the holiday, it offers the excellent suggestion that the Twelve Days of Christmas (from December 25 until January 6) be the time for a peaceful religious celebration of Christmas. Forbes embraces both the commercial holiday and the religious celebration and encourages readers to style their holiday celebration to suit their own needs.
The only false historical note which sounded for me occurs on page 62 of the hardback edition when Forbes states that "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens fails to mention religion except for three words indicating that Scrooge went to church. That is simply incorrect.
In addition to the many instances of "God bless you" and "God save you" sprinkled throughout the story, there are specific references to Christ when Bob Cratchit recalls Tiny Tim hoping "the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk and blind men see."
And Marley's Ghost asks of Scrooge, "...Why did I walk through crowds of fellow-beings with my eyes turned down, and never raise them to that blessed Star which led the Wise Men..."
And there are a number of other religious references to Christ's birth throughout Dickens' "A Christmas Carol."
I checked the notes to see whether or not Forbes had cited the Dickens work. He had indeed cited an annotated edition of "A Christmas Carol" edited by Michael Patrick Hearn. Forbes would do well to spend a little more time with Dickens this Christmas.
The book is still valuable for distilling an abundance of historical material into an easy and pleasant read to soothe the holidazed.
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Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Christmas
Rating (5)
Date: 2007-11-23
18 out of 19 customers found this reveiw helpful
Bruce David Forbes' CHRISTMAS: A CANDID HISTORY is a must read for anyone who loves the holiday season, or at least anyone who loves the religious aspect of the holiday season and enjoys the secular aspects as well. In this slim volume, Forbes looks at Christmas from its earliest incarnations to our present day celebrations. This is not a hackneyed presentation of common beliefs about Christmas. Forbes offers fresh perspectives about many commonly held theories about Christmas, especially what may be the three most common assumptions about Christmas, namely that it's a Christmas answer to winter solstice celebrations, that most of the symbols are pagan symbols with a Christian flair, and that Charles Dickens is responsible for Christmas as we know it today. For Forbes, Christmas is both all of the things and none of these things.
Forbes begins by looking at the variety of winter solstice celebrations since Christmas is a winter holiday then ventures into the religious aspects, reminding readers that Easter, not Christmas was the central Christian holiday and, for that matter is still supposed to be the central Christian celebration. He then ventures into looking at Christmas symbols such as the Christmas tree, the poinsettia, St. Nicholas becoming Santa Claus, Christmas in Victorian England and the United States, and Christmas as we know it today. Throughout the book Forbes uses the analogy of a snowball as a way of explaining Christmas. If someone wishes to make a snowman, it starts as a small ball of snow, gets rolled around and picks up all sorts of things along the way: dirt, twigs, rocks, dead leaves, etc. as well as snow. The result is the large snowball that becomes the base, torso, or head of the snowman. Much of how we now celebrate Christmas started the same way. A tradition started, different cultures, peoples and time periods added something to it, and today much of what we celebrate is a combination of a variety of additions and adaptations.
It turns out to be a fascinating read. As we read we learn that Christmas was never the purely spiritual holiday we sometimes imagine it to be and that there's always been a struggle to mingle the two, keeping the fun in the holiday while not forgetting it's central message--the birth of Jesus Christ.. We also see how Christmas went from a religious holiday with an excuse for reveling to the family centered holiday many now celebrate. We even get a critique of modern culture and consumerism as well as glimpses into the more recent "Happy Holiday/Merry Christmas" debates. While it's not specifically a "put Christ back into Christmas" book, Forbes as a practicing Methodist and religious studies professor appreciates the primacy spiritual aspect of the holiday while also loving the more secular aspects of Christmas, gives us a greater appreciation of Christmas. He offers his readers insights as to what the holiday ought to be about, and in a very real way rescues Christmas.
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by Webb Garrison
ISBN: 155853315X
Binding/Media: Paperback - 288 pages
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. No writing, no highlighting. This is a used copy with reading/ shelf wear.
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Customer Reviews
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A Civil War Curio Shop
Rating (4)
Date: 2010-04-27
"And I found this item while rummaging through ...", or so it would seem the author says as he blows the dust off another factual artifact on history's shelf. Most likely this little curiosity shop of Civil War arcania would be discovered by readers who are well traveled down the main arteries of the conflict's documentation and now wish to travel a curiosity road less taken.
The table of contents is like labeled shelves in a curio cabinet. Choose any shelf such as "Strange New Weapons", "Clergymen Fought Like Hell", or "Civil War Critters" and enjoy the intriguing facts thus displayed. How about "Silent Battles defy Explanation"? Here the author recounts the oft reported battlefield experience of individuals being near the struggle but not hearing it, while others miles away could; seeing the flash of gunfire but not hearing the shot. Your curiosity peaked? Try "From The Sublime to the Ridiculous", but you get the point. This book is chalk full of interesting tidbits in bite size and easily digestible form.
One you start into this book, you may well have a sublime experience; you certainly won't feel ridiculous for having pursued your "Civil War Curiosities".
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Mom asked me to find a book online about the Civil War
Rating (5)
Date: 2009-12-24
Purchased this book for my mom who lives in another state and had asked me to find her something about the Civil War. She is 92 and just now getting curious about it. It arrived promptly in excellent conditions and she is thoroughly enjoying reading it.
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Bric-A-Brac Of The American Civil War- Strictly For Aficionados
Rating (4)
Date: 2009-09-06
In the course of a life long study of history, especially when looking at the impact of great revolutions on the course of history, and the American Civil War fits into that category, I have read many books that narrate the main events of those upheavals. I have honed in on the lives of the most important political actors in those dramas as well. Further, I have gone to the backs streets of the events to find out what the "people", who formed the backbone for all the major revolutions, at least in the West, had to say. I have even, and here is where this book, "Civil War Curiosities", falls run into compilations of the oddities and contradictions that have emanated from this historic events. This, my friends, as the headline to this entry indicates is a task for aficionados. So once you've gotten the main narrative of the Civil War down, have read about the major actors and checked out was happening in the back streets then you can take some time for some light, but informative , reading about the oddities.
Of course, on the subject of the American Civil War there is no shortage of books covering individual oddities and topics, or at least the subject has been covered in such depth that at this distance from the event there is not much room for fresh commentary except for the running through the ephemera. Personally, my tastes run to more detailed mainstream studies, like James McPherson's, that center on the fight to abolish slavery or of Bruce Catton's that detail the struggle to preserve a unitary state on this part of the continent. However, Mr. Garrison, a noted author with a resume filled with books that center on compiling the bric-a-brac of this war fills a rather different niche. And along the way provides some interesting information about the personage of Lincoln, his adversary Jefferson Davis, the women of the Civil War, plenty of material on battles and leaders, and most importantly, some new information about the role of blacks in their own liberation as soldiers. Not a book for everyone but interesting nevertheless.
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An Enjoyable Read
Rating (4)
Date: 2007-12-19
1 out of 1 customers found this reveiw helpful
I picked this book up after reading a monster of a historical book and enjoyed it very much. It is written in anecdotal paragraphs, with each paragraph being relevant to the chapter it is included in. It has a very interesting chapter on hostages and also one on officers who were in the clergy. My favorite chapter was on quotes about officers from their contemporaries. I will warn the reader that the book seems to lean toward northern sympathies, which is just fine, but I like my history to be a bit more unbiased. Any casual student of the American Civil War should pick up this entertaining book. Advanced scholars will probably enjoy it as well, but the material is pretty light, and most of the anecdotes I am sure you will have come across before.
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Civil War Curiosities
Rating (4)
Date: 2007-10-27
2 out of 2 customers found this reveiw helpful
This provided some little known insights into the humanity and inhumanity of this epic war in America's history. Both sides were brutal, both sides compassionate in individual ways. A thoroughly enjoyable read.
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by Don Binkowski
ISBN: 0964652706
Binding/Media: Paperback - 362 pages
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. Book in good condition with minimal reading wear. EX LIBRARY copy. Library markings present but no further markings or imperfections.
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by J. William Harris
ISBN: 080187310X
Binding/Media: Paperback - 496 pages
Condition: Used: Acceptable
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. This is a used copy in an acceptable condition with underlining/ highlighting on the inside.
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by R. A. Ratcliff
ISBN: 0521855225
Binding/Media: Hardcover - 332 pages
Condition: Used: Good
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. Book in good condition with light reading wear. EX LIBRARY copy.
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Customer Reviews
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Interesting ideas in too many pages
Rating (4)
Date: 2009-11-23
This book describes interesting aspects of WWII intelligence. Centered on the Anglo-American and German cryptographic efforts, it's merit is to emphasize the role played by different social mentalities leading the Allies to success and the Axis to failure. The German sources are less researched than the British ones. The writing would have benefited from avoiding redundancy.
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Interesting
Rating  (3)
Date: 2008-08-22
7 out of 8 customers found this reveiw helpful
This book is written in the style of a serious piece of historical analysis (with plenty of footnotes), as opposed to a popular history or science style. Thus, some readers may find it dry; it also assumes the reader already knows the basic history, so it's best to read one of the more popular books first. But if you have sufficient background and interest, it reads very easily.
It argues that the main reasons for the allies' relative success in signals intelligence was their different organizational and institutional approach than the axis. The case is laid out very clearly and persuasively, although there is too much repetition and overlap for my taste.
I did not like the short section at the end about the internet -- I did not find the specifics very persuasive. It would have been better to stick to the lessons about effective use of intelligence and how to build a good organization.
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The Business of Reading Other Gentlemen's Mail
Rating (4)
Date: 2006-09-15
27 out of 28 customers found this reveiw helpful
While there are many books describing WW-II code-breaking techniques (starting with the bible: David Kahn's "The Codebreakers"), few describe the operation of how it was actually done. R.A. Ratcliff remedies that omission with this thorough and highly detailed survey of how British, U.S. and German code breaking was organized as a business.
He describes the way the various militaries of WW-II set up their code breaking operations and highlights how different they were--both in organization and effectiveness. The answers he provides offer exciting lessons for how to (and how not to) run any effective business organization where the output is cerebral. Here are some major take-aways from this fascinating book:
* Everyone's codes were broken to some degree or another. Reading the books in this genre--particularly about the astonishing successes of the British Bletchley Park operation--one does not notice that, as good as they were in decrypting enemy code, the British and American codes were also broken by the Germans.
In the German case, this led to a sense of invincibility of "We're smarter than they are" that doomed their own code security.
* The Bletchley Park code breaking established the gold standard for how to let intellectuals do what intellectuals do best--think--and keep hide-bound military structure out of their way. Under the nominal control of the British military, Bletchley was run loosely enough inside the walls of the compound so that analysts of could easily seek each other out, compare notes, and spot chinks in the armor across regional and service lines. The German code-breaking effort was a model of military turf battles, with each service jealously guarding its own efforts, and breakthroughs by one group rarely communicated to others.
* A key tactic--and one unrecognized by the Germans--was that of maintaining an iron-clad provenance of any code-breaking results. It was forbidden (and strictly enforced) for any Bletchley results to be recoded and retransmitted without first having the original information paraphrased. This prevented German analysts from obtaining a key to a secure code by being able to decrypt the same message content sent via a broken code. Many German codes were cracked in this manner, as, for example, the same weather forecasts were retransmitted by the different services.
The secret work and great success of Bletchley Park was not revealed to the public until 1974! The final astonishing lesson of this operation was that by trusting the workers with continual cross-discipline updates, everyone was brought more fully into the big picture. This facilitated trust among the workers to help insure security. It also caused small inconsequential-seeming details to be caught, correlated, and fitted into a mass of yet incomprehensible data as a missing link that made sense of the whole thing. One cannot help thinking that this same trust-oriented operation in a single location must have been the model for the U.S.'s Manhattan project. The difference being that Manhattan was as leaky as a sieve from Day One; the 10,000 workers at Bletchley Park kept its secrets for 35 years.
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by Rainer Geissler
ISBN: 3531129236
Binding/Media: Perfect Paperback - 421 pages
Condition: Used: Like New
Comments: Sold with pride and shipped with confirmation for US addresses. Gently read copy in like new condition. No reading/ shelf wear.
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