Book Review Essays (Examples)

Civil War as a Theological Crisis' by Mark A. Noll
For the Antebellum Americans, trust in divine devotion and destiny to Scripture gave their lives stability and purpose. However, in accordance to Mark Noll's most recent book, The Civil War as a Theological Crisis, religious heads in the years just prior to the civil war were not capable of providing the best solution to the most challenging question of that time: Does the ible excuse or criticize slavery? In addition, Americans were in conflict over the operations of a providential God as both Southerners and Northerners attempted to understand the significance of war and the role of God in it. Majorly depending on the writings of the 19th century theologians as well as other religious theorists, Noll comes to a conclusion that the conflicts over these two subjects exposed a theological crisis and led to a min turning point in…

This book can really help managers in learning how to build a workplace environment in which better leadership can help employees in overcoming workplaces stresses and how leadership can be a great tool in getting over tougher times by making the best of decisions by making sure that all employees are included.
Conclusion

The book is a great read for the managers and this book can play great roles in improving work place practice as management traits for the managers have been highlighted in the book. These traits are required in order to have positive organizational behaviors at the workplace. One of the newer facts that I have learned after reading the book is that better leadership in the workplaces is one of the best tools to help in mastering organizational behaviors. Leadership is considered to be an important strategy of the managers to manage employees and the book has mentioned…

Psychological Book Review:
Rebecca ells Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

Culture and generational attitudes may separate them. Memories of physical abuse may be painful and real. Geography may keep them apart -- to say nothing of nasty quotations out of context by Northern reporters -- but mothers and daughters, particularly Southern mothers and daughters have an indissoluble bond -- as do Southern women friends. Although Southern girls may rebel, they always do so in reaction to their mother's value structures, and thus they remain frozen in the dialectic of ladylikeness vs. being a free and wild woman. Being a wild woman and getting the man you deserve, of course, though will always win out. Or, so suggests Rebecca ells' Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood.

The best selling book, later made into a popular film, tells the story of Vivi and Siddalee alker, two Southern women, a mother and daughter of two…

Psychological Book Review:
Scar Tissue

Scar Tissue is a fictional book about dementia and the effects of aging of an elderly parent can have on an individual's soul, sense of self, and sense of place within a familial context. It tells the story of an artistic woman, married to a scientist, who slips into dementia. At first her husband cares for her, but he dies suddenly, and then she is institutionalized in a place where only one nurse shows her compassion. She has two sons, one a scientist like the father, the other a philosopher. Both seek to understand her condition and care for her.

Despite the fictional conceit, this book deals with a subject that is all too physically real for many elderly Americans and families, and it is unsparing and real in its level of medical details. One can only describe it as harrowing as a real-life, true account of such…

Learning Theology Book Review
Christopher Hall is Chancellor of Eastern University and Dean of the Templeton Honors College. He has written extensively on scripture, and in the book Learning Theology with the Church Fathers, offers an innovative premise -- instead of listening to modern lectures and interpretations, turn to the source materials to study theology. The early church fathers were prolific writers, seminal thinkers and theologians, and while they did not necessarily think of themselves as great Biblical scholars. At the time of the Church's founding, these men were working pastors who traveled as far as possible to preach, integrate, and come to terms with many of the formative questions that still arise today: the concept of the Trinity, incarnation, nature of the Church, and the providence of God. What is particularly interesting about the book is that it uses the historical events of the time period to help us understand…

A disconnection from action, even when it is literally right outside one's door is felt by the viewer, where as simple and plain print media has not the power to distort the message, or at least arguably as much. A culture and society of apathy, as many would say we are living in, would be the obvious outcome of the premise of Postman's work, a serious social and cultural issue in need of discussion and solution.
Sociology and sociologists would be wise to continue an active discourse on the subject matter contained within this book, as evolving and emerging technologies, especially for human communication, frequently out run academics. A good starting platform, according to Postman would be to address, academics directly, by making sure that the messages being sent are not those associated with the delivery but rather the content. (32-35) Even education has become increasingly a matter of retention…

Devils are Here" Book eview
Since the financial crisis started in 2008, there have been many who have tried to write a comprehensive analysis. A new book by Bethany McLean and Joe Nocera called All the Devils are Here is not a new take on the crisis, but it has the element of time on its side. Since the crisis started three years ago, now id the time to release a well-researched book about how it all happened. The authors chronologically tell the tale of how "The seeds of financial disaster were sown more than thirty years ago when three smart, ambitious men…created a shiny new financial vehicle called the mortgage-backed security" (McLean & Nocera, 2011). This book is an insightful look at "the fog behind the 2008 financial crisis" (Drea, 2011), and it helps to lift that fog by going back to the beginnings of the crisis, and listing…

If there is a tendency among readers to view Malcolm X as a radical
figure, especially where compared to peaceful counterparts like Dr. King,
the autobiography helps to show racism in a light that makes Malcolm X
extremely sympathetic, or at least a rational product of his time.
Narratives from his upbringing, especially in his father's work as a black
revolutionary and in his family's constant state of moving to escape
threats, are especially demonstrative of the formulation of Malcolm's
racial ideas. So is this demonstrated in such passages as that where he
observes that "as always, some stupid local Uncle Tom Negroes began to
funnel stories about his revolutionary beliefs to the local white people."
(Haley, 5) This points to a distinct moment in history, with Malcolm
essentially chronicling the 20th century transition from segregated free
man to civil rights activist. This also helps to reveal the causes for
Malcolm's interest in black separatism, with the racial submission of many
fellow black men…

light freedom. Review book review answer question 1) How book cover period written . 2) Did book
Translucent

I've Got the Light of Freedom details the struggle of the Civil Rights movement, predominantly as it took place within the Southern region of the United States. Essentially, it provides a case study for this epoch in American history that was centered around the mid-20th Century and is largely responsible for a number of civil rights that African-Americans were able to earn through hard work, dedication, jail time, punishment, and the loss of several lives. Charles M. Payne, who authored the work, provides an analytical glimpse of a number of factors regarding this struggle that deconstructs this time period through several different lenses, and notes the involvement of women, the effects on the community, as well as the political ramifications of those involved in this movement. The author is able to provide a…

It was a revelation for the commodore.
Synopsis

The book is about leadership, but it is also about taking a tough situation and turning it completely around. The book is a metaphor for how managers who have brains, good listening skills, strategic competencies and flexibility -- and willing underlings -- can take a non-producing organization make it successful. The key points in this book:

Good managers lead by example

Listening is more than just having open ears; a good manager has to have an open mind and truly hear what is being conveyed to him by anyone no matter how lowly the position within the organization

Managers need to communicate their purpose and their vision to their teams

A climate of trust must be created for any positive changes to occur

Without taking calculated risks, not much will change for the better

Strong managers know how to build up their employees and how to generate a feeling…

Rather than risk management, which usually stifles innovation in the name of conservative and steady profiteering, Brungardt and Crawford say, risk leadership is called for, especially when an organization must be truly transformed to survive. An organization must take a risk in a calculated, planned, and intelligent fashion.
Strengths and weaknesses of the book

This stress upon the need for leaders to be creative is one of the books great strengths, as its empowering democratic approach. A lower level employee, perhaps lacking a higher degree or a full set of managerial credentials could very easily be inspired to take a risk and deploy his or her skills and knowledge gleaned from working hard in a company. Although the book praises risk, therefore, it also rewards those whom are loyal to a company, who take the time to stay and rise, however slowly, within a particular corporate firmament, as they learn intelligent…

Sgt York
A Book Review of Sergeant York and the Great ar

York is perhaps one of the most recognizable in modern American history. But perhaps few connect this name to the man's humble life and remarkable war-time accomplishments. The text attributed to Tom Skeyhill and published in 1998, Sergeant York and the Great ar helps to bridge the gap between York's name, his legend and his life.

The book is an adaptation of York's famous autobiography, pieced together from the military legend's own diary during his draft and rise to prominence in orld ar I. In addition to reproducing York's journal in its entirety, Skeyhill splices in the historical background required to help the reader navigate York's story. Skeyhill's contributions serve as companion of explanations for the geographical, military and historical implications of York's reporting. This is complete with information about military strategy and photographs. These additions to York's diary offer the…

However, this would represent a first and most visible connection between the political imperatives and the religious ideology which connected to render al-Qaeda's guiding vision in the years to come. He would go on to cite the evils of Zionism, communism and imperialism, all of which he viewed as explicit threats posted by the world against the Islamic faith. Given the various military and political confrontations which had persisted between Islam and these forces across history, we can at least gather from right's work that the threat which al-Qaeda would come ultimately to represent to the developed world was explicitly stated and intended for decades in preparation for September 11th.
A similarly humanizing description of Osama bin Ladin helps to remove some of the demonization which is produced by the estern media and political leadership, that has served to obscure the true motives and implications of the militant Islamic movement.…

pastoral book review: Lessons learned from Mitch Albom's
Tuesday with Morrie: An Old Man, a Young Man, and Life's Greatest Lesson

One of the most difficult things for a modern Christian pastor to address in the context of the contemporary Christian church community is the issue of death. Although Christianity is fundamentally a life-affirming religion, in the sense that it affirms the life-giving potential of faith and the goodness of God and God's creation, there can also be no denying the fact that it is also founded upon a philosophy of transforming death, namely the suffering of Jesus upon the Cross. In a society where individuals are tempted to think of death merely as a loss or as a negative part of life, a pastor can feel like he or she is swimming against an ideological tide to cause Christians to view their faith in a more life-affirming and positive fashion.

hile…

He held fast to that analysis to the very end and by holding on to this principle could he concur himself a beneficial role in history or else, he would have to satisfy himself with boring medical practice for which he was not at all suited. The contradiction of emotions toward Che Guevara was very prominent in the description that he made on the book about the effects of Guevara's writing in his youth. Che had no reason to suspect the impact his writing would have on thousands of university students in the ensuing thirty years, as they cheerfully marched off to be massacred (Castaneda 188). Che endowed two generations of young people with the tools of that faith in revolution and the fervor of that conviction. But he must also be held responsible for the wasted blood and lives that decimated those generations (Castaneda 189).
For the rest of…

Book Review: The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog and Other Stories from a Psychiatrists NotebookWhen a newborn enters this world, he is unaware that what he experienced inside his mothers womb would be totally in contrast to his experiences in the outside world. The book The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog and Other Stories from a Psychiatrists Notebook accounts for traumatic children who have undergone miserable conditions that shaped their physical and mental development during their early years. This paper reviews the said book to understand human development for the common readers and early childhood educators.About the BookThe selected book The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog and Other Stories from a Psychiatrists Notebook is authored by Bruce Perry and Maia Szalavitz. The psychiatrists own written account of the experiences that he had when working with emotionally stunted children who have no full understanding of…

orkplace Management: A Business History Book Review
This paper explores two novels of importance written by Richard Edwards and Harry Braverman. Both novels main goals is provide an historical account of American Business systems and how they have developed over the last century. This paper will examine each book's strengths and weaknesses. This paper will discuss how each work relates to the business world. In this respect, it is important to see the similarities and differences between the two men, their different philosophies toward business management and how history has influenced the current state of the business world.

Edwards mainly discussed the management of the workplace and how different management techniques have lead to the transformation of the American corporation. This work mainly focuses on how management functions on the many levels of the company, big or small. He does discuss and explore the issue of workers and different factors that management…

Providing a refuge through theraputic intervention and Biblical counseling for the troubled is one of the key challenges for any Christian counselors.

In fact, the notion of a refuge, Brown suggests, can provide an interpretive framework for almost the entire Psalter and the entire Biblical counseling process. A refuge is a reciprocal relationship, for it is a mutual exchange between a believer's trust in a Christian community, and a Christian community's trust in God and God's protective care and custody of the believer's soul. Counsling affirms the presence of a refuge, even during the most desolate of times, in the presence of the counselor and the understood presence of God.

The other Psalmic images Brown sees as significant for a potentially troubled believer are rocks, wings, the sanctuary presence of the Chuch, God as the King, and the pit or "Sheol" that provides a kind of counter to the image of a…

Human Resources Book Review
Phillips, Jack J. (1999) Accountability in Human Resources Management. New York: Butterworth-Heinemann

In his text, Accountability in Human Resources Management, the human resources management analyst and guru Jack J. Phillips attempts to offer a new paradigm for human resource management to further both the future of American business organizations as well as the field of human resource management itself within organizations. Phillips states that human resource departments can no longer be regarded as the 'soft science' experts of corporate environments. Human resource personnel strategies must move beyond pure subjective psychology and embrace quantitative measurements of human performance, but without losing human resource's psychological and social science strengths. Thus, data based initiatives and management must be implemented for effective human resource enforcement of company objectives, without ignoring human resource's unique needs in relation to human psychological management. In short, the thesis of Phillips is that human resources must be…

Eli the Good: Book Review
The book Eli the Good by Silas House details the summer of ten-year-old Eli Book during the summer of 1976. Eli's family is showing signs of fragmenting. His father is suffering from PTSD and still experiences flashbacks from Vietnam. His mother tries to ignore things and smooth over the rifts that are occurring in the family. His adolescent sister Josie is rebelling against parental control. Eli's few sources of comfort can be found in his friendship with a local girl named Edie; the natural world, and popular culture. There is a constant tension between the beauty of the natural world and the ugliness of the human world, between how things really are and how Eli wishes them to be.

The story takes place during the bicentennial year, and there is a stark contrast between the patriotism and pride in the American government is displaying and the suffering…

Book Review of - The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People- Stephen R. Covey Overview of the content
Author: Stephen R. Covey
Title: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Publisher: Free Press
Place: New York
Date of Publication: 1988
Number of Pages: 381
Covey’s work on self-improvement titled ‘The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People’ is grounded in the author’s view that one’s worldview is wholly based on individual assessments. For altering any situation, there is a need to adopt change within oneself, which necessitates a shift in perspective (Hussain, 2017).
This work may be considered a phenomenon of contemporary personal development texts. The author differentiates character ethic from personality ethic. The former deals with fixed individual principles whereas the later refers to human relations methods and quick-fix ideas which form the crux of most self-help texts penned in the last century. According to the author, superficial success which fails to manifest internal mastery cannot be considered success.…

Not surprisingly, this is a book in which the major themes are not political acuity and respect for the common good but are of an arrogant and willful deception, neglect, political infighting, and an apparently systemic betrayal of public trust . In the end, McMaster concludes, the most important policy and strategy decisions concerning the war -- including whether the United States should increase its presence in Vietnam or withdraw with dignity from the region - were rarely if ever discussed within the corridors of power . What mattered in the months leading up to the "disaster of the Vietnam War [that] would dominate America's memory of a decade ' was not idealism or bold policy making but self-interested machinations aimed at sustaining a web of lies,
misinformation, and self-serving political gamesmanship .

A key to McMaster establishing the main theme of his book is to show convincingly that a number…

Big Enough to Be Inconsistent
Book Review of George Frederickson, Big Enough to Be Inconsistent: Abraham Lincoln Confronts Slavery and Race. Harvard University Press, 2008.

Like almost all whites in the 19th Century, Lincoln held prejudicial or racist views about blacks, and was reluctant to extend full citizenship and political rights to them. His native state of Illinois had a constitutional provision that barred blacks from settling there at all, as did Indiana, Iowa, Kansas and other Northern and Western states. Only a few New England states actually granted nonwhites equal citizenship and voting rights before the Civil War. Whites could -- and did -- oppose the expansion of slavery in the Western territories and even slavery itself, while still not being particularly favorable to black equality. Nevertheless, compared to his contemporary opponents like Senator Stephen Douglas, Andrew Johnson and Jefferson Davis, who spoke openly of their contempt for blacks, support…

SOUTH ASIA Book eview INSTUCTIONS: Please submit a book review
abindranath Tagore is a South Asian novelist of considerable acclaim who won a Nobel prize for literature. In one of his more well-known works of literature, Home and the World, he demonstrates that his reputation is not only well deserved, but possibly even something of an understatement. While utilizing a variety of narrators, the author has produced an intricately woven tale of passion, love, politics, and plain common sense that is both riveting and didactic. He is able to develop these elements of the plot by a relatively simple opposition of characterization between two protagonists whom the third, a woman, must ultimately choose between. This classic love triangle enables the novelist to explore a variety of themes, which ultimately relate to the notion of truth vs. illusion and all of the trappings (both material and otherwise) that accompany these concepts.

In…

Race relations have long been a very contentious and polarizing issue in American society. The history of America is littered with instances of sins committed against the African American population. This atrocities range in both magnitude and severity, the most egregious of which is slavery. Here, African Americans not only built and supported much of the wealth the many families benefit from to this day, but they did so under very harsh conditions. Exacerbating the issue was the many African Americans were not allowed to read or write in an effort to keep them ignorant of their future potential. All of these instances along with racism, stereotypes, and regulations all impeded the growth of African American society.These issue along with many others are detailed in the book The Marines of Montford: Americas First Black Marines. Here many of the struggles enumerated in the introduction are given life through the text.…

Felix Longoria’s Wake Book Review In his book Felix Longoria’s Wake: Bereavement, Racism, and the Rise of Mexican American Activism, Patrick J. Carroll narrates how the death of a World War II Mexican-American soldier Felix Longoria influenced Mexican-American activism. Owing to his exemplary service in Philippines during World War II, Longoria received several awards, including a Good Conduct Medal, a Purple Heart, a Bronze Service Star, and a Country Infantryman’s badge. Upon his death in Philippines, however, the only funeral home in his hometown of Three Rivers declined to accord him a wake as he was Mexican-American (Carroll 2). As Carroll demonstrates in his book, this discriminative act immediately turned out to be a crucial moment in the progression of Mexican-American activism, with figures like Dr. Hector P. Garcia being in the forefront. Following intense activism, Longoria was finally buried in Virginia’s Arlington National Cemetery. Based on research and interviews with…

Steal my Soldiers Hearts AnalysisIn 1969, a promising young lieutenant colonel of the United States army went to Vietnam for a second tour of duty. David H. Hackworth just finished writing a tactical handbook for the pentagon, and as a result, he got the order to put to action his counterguerrilla-fighting theories. Consequently, he was presented with 4/39th--a battalion that had no war spirit at all and had suffered the highest worst casualty.Nonetheless, due to Hackworths hard-nosed, inspired, innovative leadership, he promptly turned the 4/39th--a battalion into Vietnams valiant and a force of reckoning (Hackworth and Eilhys England, 123). In the book Steal my Soldiers Hearts Analysis, Hackworth tells readers about their ambush actions, sniper missions, inside the quagmire of command politics, and helicopter strikes. Therefore, various themes can be identified from the story, as discussed below.The Thematic IdeasCourage and perseverance. Courage and perseverance are most evident in human life…

Haddon W. Robinson first published Biblical Preaching in 1980. The book quickly became a classic in its field because of Robinson’s straightforward writing style and his ability to synthesize the necessary ingredients for an effective, scripturally grounded but also emotionally strong sermon. The seminal text to guide, instruct, and inspire existing and aspiring preachers, Biblical Preaching is currently in its third edition. Most of the original material in Biblical Preaching has been preserved, and the author has added additional prefaces to update the message and reach a new generation of spiritual advisors, leaders, and communicators. With few if any overt flaws, Biblical Preaching contains an unparalleled wealth of wisdom that can easily be blended with other approaches to sermon development and exegesis. Although certainly not the first book on expository preaching, Robinson’s (2014) is essential reading for pastors, Bible instructors, and Christian community leaders. Biblical Preaching is divided into ten…

An ambitious scholarly work, Texas Women: Their Histories, Their Lives includes almost two dozen essays detailing different aspects of Texan history. Readers may be initially perplexed by the fact that Texas Women was not published in Texas at all. In fact, Texas Women is one of a series of books on southern women published by the University of Georgia Press. As such, Texas Women places the subject in the greater context of southern society. Most of the stories show how Texas women negotiated power in their communities within the overarching patriarchal structures, norms, and institutions. Texas Women is divided into three parts, arranged chronologically. The first part covers 1600-1880, from the time of the Spanish to the end of the Civil War. Although they gloss over pre-conquest Texas, the essays cover the important nodes in antebellum Texas. Part Two covers 1880-1925, a relatively short, but critical period of time in…

The Princes in the Tower: A Review Alison Weir examines one of England’s oldest murder mysteries in her historical investigation into the deaths of the Edward V and his brother Richard, Duke of York. While most English readers are familiar with the treachery of Richard III thanks to Shakespeare’s play of the same name, Weir throws a magnifying glass over the facts of the case to explore whether the popular legend (that Richard III killed the two young princes) is true after all. The book reads like a spellbinder, supplying the reader with all the background story, clues and details to draw the reader to the conclusion that Richard III was indeed the culprit and that his treachery was what enabled him to soar so quickly to political heights—only to fall just as rapidly under the weight of his own duplicity. As Weir notes, her objective with Princes in the Tower…

Alice: Memoirs of a Barbary Coast ProstituteThe booktitled Alice: Memoirs of a Barbary Coast Prostituteis based on the memoirs of a sex worker Alice from 1913, the political and social implications of this business, and how it fits in that time and that of today. Ivy Anderson and Devon Angus edit the book. The book was initiated from the post found by these editors in San Francisco (SF) bulletin A Voice from the Underworld, from the oldest business arena that was despised by the society for centuries and still is.The books thesis is the negativity of the prostitution world accompanied by its rejection, corruption of the police, and verbal laws of brothels[footnoteRef:1]. The three accompanying arguments are the cruelty of the real world that directs abandoned girls like Alice to prostitution, wage discrimination by gender, and the helplessness of the women amidst the unavailability of reasonable opportunities for earning their…

In Hard Times, Charles Dickens makes the commentary that young people need more than just “facts” in order to be considered educated.  The narrow-minded headmaster who opens the book by insisting on facts and “nothing but facts” (Dickens 1) serves as the symbol of a narrow-minded modern world devoid of soul.  For Dickens, women often represent the beauty and grace of a soul filled with life and creativity.  Yet it is this life and creativity that is driven out of the soul by the arrival of Industrialization and its brutal textile mills where women and child were forced to work by the “hard times” of the age’s social and economic conditions.  Dickens himself characterized these mills as “dark” and “satanic” (Tuttle).  In Victorian England, Charles Dickens was showing his readers that young people needed more than facts and mills:  they needed to have their hearts and minds educated and their…

Principles of Ethics and Self-Determination ‘Me Before You’ “Me Before You” looks at two issues a love story and the debate of the right-to-die, which is combined to give an excellent storyline (Moyes, 2012). Will Traynor is a young quadriplegic man who met an accident two years before and is lucky to have an assistant like Louisa Clark, a 26-year-old girl. Louisa is also Traynor’s caregiver and companion although it is challenging because Will is cynical and seems to have given up hope to live. The emotional support Louisa gives to Will Traynor has become more pressing because he is depressed by his health condition to the point of considering death as an option. Nonetheless, Louisa is more determined than ever to show Traynor that life is more worth living than he thought and a series of adventures changes both their lives (Moyes, 2012).
The case of Will Traynor would be treated…

Summary of Kate Browns argument in Plutopia Kate Brown’s book, titled “Plutopia: Nuclear families, atomic cities, and the great Soviet and American plutonium disasters” discusses the first nuclear disaster in history to have happened locally. Kate relates factors such as urban planning, scientific research, labor history and public health. According to her, the Soviet and American societies were largely transformed following the production of nuclear weapons. She claims it created a whole new kind of society with newly defined safety risks. This essay seeks to critically analyze Brown’s book. The term plutopia refers to those unique, aspirational communities that satisfied postwar societal desires in the Americas and the Soviet Union. Prosperity then was at such an enticing level that many citizens ignored the piles of radioactive waste accumulating around them (p. 4). Brown goes on to analyze the state policies in the U.S.S.R and U.S.A that influenced the creation of the…

“Here is New York” by E.B. White
Many of author E.B. White’s observations in his essay “Here is New York” still resonate today. Perhaps one of his most profound observations is the idea that is bestows “the gift of loneliness and the gift of privacy” (White 659). This seems paradoxical, given that New York is a very crowded city. But the proximity of other people enables city-dwellers to live in a state of anonymity, not needing to talk to one another at all. Of course, living alone and living in isolation from a community of people who are like yourself (given New York’s fabled diversity) can also make New Yorkers very lonely.
The fact that New York is made up of strangers, of people who have “pulled up stakes” to make their home in the town is also why it is a mecca of entertainment, art, commerce, and sports (White 696). This…

Sorkin, however, posits no argument per se. ather, his book offers insight into how the financial crisis manifested from a far more personal perspective of those involved than anything else. The book is informative in nature, and give insight into some of the thought processes and activities those on the outside may not otherwise be exposed to or privy to. The title of the book sums it up best, and the book outlines how the banks and the primary players and stakeholders have become too big to fail. The book highlights the self-interest of those in charge of some of the biggest financial institutions in the world and their blatant disregard for Main Street.
The book has a place in the larger academic debates raised within public knowledge because it adds to the public's real knowledge of those involved in the nation's financial industry and government offices. Instead of speculating…

Moeove, this aspect of the text investigates the 'language' of film in a way that causes us to appeciate the fom's singulaity. Such is to say that in this investigation of the sueal and cultually distubing elements which have invaded film in spiitually sick societies, we ae given a pofound undestanding of exactly why one might choose film as a way to fomulate a language that is othewise absent of platfom and inexpessible.
By contast, such essays ae steeped in lengthy and pedantic examinations such as that povided by Ande Bazin and entitled "The Ontology of Photogaphic Image." Hee, the autho goes to lengths to deconstuct the manne in which language is established by the caeful aangement of visual impessions within the context of a shot. Angles, objects and the aangement of inteactants all ae efeenced, accodingly to Bazin, as cucial phases in the message communicated. This is a useful…

This was even though he received no immediate remuneration, in terms of money or benefits, from developing such interests. Leonardo's notebooks of this period of his life reveal a spirit of scientific inquiry and a mechanical inventiveness that were centuries ahead of his time.
Ivor Hart makes it clear that Leonardo was far more than a great artist: he had one of the best scientific minds of his time. Perhaps Leonardo's great talent was in observing -- he made careful, painstaking observations of the natural world, such as birds in flight. Such careful observations of the natural world are critical, of course, to the eye of a great artist. But Leonardo's eye enabled him to carry out research of precision as well as beauty, in science as well as art.

Perhaps the real paradox is how separate art and science have become in the modern construction of the disciplines. Leonardo studied…

If one states one is anti-capitalist, yet still attempts to make money and purchase comfortable accessories to one's lifestyle, one is accused of being a hypocrite and holding up the cultural values of society even more than one who tries to 'live the life' of the ideal executive apprentice.
Similarly, in the novel, Yossarin finds that resistance is futile over the course of the conflict he suffers, for in the language of the military and because he is already locked within the system after being conscripted, all of his intellectual resistance is interpreted with a language that encourages him to sacrifice his life for the goal of the wartime cause, at all costs. hen he resists, he helps the enemy, he does not help the cause of humanity, when he fights he kills human beings, but this is supposed to be good for the cause of humanity, because it serves…

Leadership Style Book Review: Summary of Book
"Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be broken," reads the quotation on the title page of 17 Essential Qualities of a Team Leader: Becoming the Kind of Person Every Team ants, by management guru John C. Maxwell. The word 'leadership' on its own often brings to mind rather stultifying and outdated modalities of leading by command, much like a general, or cliches about being true to one's values. Besides, few readers will be put in charge of a military unit, or hold the title of CEO -- but virtually every individual who participates in the business world will one day either lead or be part of a team designated to work on a particular product or target area of interest for the company.

To suit the needs of today's marketplace and corporate structure, thus John C. Maxwell offers a different concept and ideal…

Business Book Review
Lundin, Steven C., Harry Paul, and John Christensen. (2000) Fish! A Remarkable Way to Boost Morale and Improve Results. New York: Hyperion.

The book Fish! A Remarkable Way to Boost Morale and Improve Results by Steven C. Lundin, Harry Paul, and John Christensen, depicts happy goldfish frolicking across the white surface of its cover -- however, the toddler-pacifying goldfish cracker is not the primary remedy offered by this business self-empowerment text for a potentially toxic and energy-draining work environment. Rather than first delineating a series of principles, Fish tells the story of Mary Jane Ramirez, an exemplary 'can-do' supervisor who is always ready to cover for a colleague with a sick child. (17) She is promoted, however, to the dreaded Third Floor of First Operations. She receives better pay and more responsibilities but must cope with an often-unpleasant work environment. Mary Jane first accepts her position because her late…

Legal Book Review: The Buffalo Creek Disaster
The Buffalo Creek Disaster was one of the costliest preventable tragedies in the history of American coal-mining. An impoundment dam burst in a coal mining est Virginia town, precipitating a deadly flood that killed or injured more than a thousand people, and left many more residents homeless. The dam had been declared sound shortly before it burst by a federal inspector. The owner of the dam, the Pittston Coal Company initially only offered a very small settlement to the victims. "Over 125 people perished immediately. Most were women and children unable to struggle out from under the thick black water choked with crushed and splintered homes, cars, telephone poles, railroad tracks, and all manner of other debris. There were over 4,000 survivors, but their 1,000 homes were destroyed as well as most of their possessions" (Stern ix-x). Survivors of the incident experienced post-traumatic stress…

Another related type of argument is to assert how he became interested in the various facets of politics that he made an impact on. For example, as a result of a plane crash and convalescing, he writes, "I realized that access to health care was a moral issue" (Kennedy 225). In other words, the way that he develops his political interest is determined by his personal experience. His view on the Vietnam War changed after an interview trip there. He uses this personal experience as the foundation for the ideas that he talks about, and it is convincing as a result. This argument from experience convinces the reader that Kennedy was authentic. Kennedy also includes many historical facts, which only adds support to his experience. ecause he was so involved, his interpretation of the facts is persuasive.
The primary thing that makes one keep reading this book is the connection…

Thus, the authors do not advocate an ethical free for all, for they acknowledge certain ethical broaches can result in corporate legal costs, thus resulting in executives violating the ethics of their profession -- but this is a more important ethical standard than either laws or social responsibility, stress the authors.
The authors also acknowledge that in the current environment, government regulations must be obeyed by businesses, else they face the costs of litigation. But Macham and Chester also question whether this is a good, namely if too many regulations exist and ultimately hamper corporate profits. In fact, they believe that in the ideal business environment, other than protecting property, the government should not regulate business at all, and rather internal ethical systems should govern the organization, ideally in a Friedman-like utilitarian fashion, taking into consideration the fate of stakeholders only so much as need be, for the organization to…

U.S. History
Historical Book Review: Moretta, John Anthony. William Pitt Ballinger, Texas A&M University Press: 2000.

John Antony Moretta's biography of William Pitt Ballinger attempts to put in an historical perspective the career of a legendary Texas lawyer. Throughout this text, the author stresses the multifaceted nature of his subject. A kind of 19th century Thomas Jefferson in the breadth of his accomplishments, Ballinger's various interests and occupations included not only his career as a lawyer, public servant, and civic leader, but also earlier service to his state of Texas as a solider. Later, Ballinger's literary talents were exhibited in his work as an author, editorialist, naturalist, education reformer, and bibliophile.

Moretta's admiration for his subject seems unfeigned. When recounting an incident from Ballinger's life, regarding his service to the Confederacy for example, Moretta cites evidence that although the subject's actual service record might indicate otherwise, Ballinger was in fact "a staunch Unionist."…

As a result of his prowess, Frederick triumphed over French, Russian, Saxony, and Sweden, and Austrian armies. Fighting skillfully on multiple fronts is an important facet of his approach. Contrary to the reader's assumptions, during this time of history, Prussia was the underdog in a time when warfare was a highly regimented and rule-governed practice. Frederick had to find a way to deploy a multitude of different types of armaments, divisions of the army, and ways to position an attack. Also, attacking by night and surprise was a key part of Frederick's approach.
It is interesting to note that, although Frederick was a king, the book gives most attention to his role as a general. He clearly saw success at warfare as equally important in his struggle to lead a successful nation. The book leaves out political administration, for the most part, or the moral reasons to embark or not…

Neo-fundamentalism's pan-Islamic ideology has a profound appeal only for such displaced Muslim ethnic groups, as is also evidenced in Palestinian radical mobilization in such groups as Hamas.
But for Algerian Muslims living happily in Algiers, in comparison, this is not often the case. In fact, the author points to the behavior of the Algerians during their last election, noting that many nationals were openly calling for greater democratization in the street. They did not see this as incompatible with an Islamic state, necessarily, because they were more secure in their fused national and Islamic identity, and did not need neo-fundamentalist Islam to be the main source of their status and identity. The more secure, nationalistic, and unified the Islamic populace, the less appeal neo-fundamentalism's pan-Islamic ideology has, while "deterritorialism" has produced the transformation of Islamic conservatism into terrorist, radical Islam united across borders, as migrant and alienated Islamic ethnicities strive…

Heward reference is a book review of Nancy Close's book Listening to Children: Talking With Children About Difficult Issues -- It is improper to reference a book review-unless of course you are also reviewing the book. I have included the proper reference
Perhaps the one of the worst fears of new parents is that their child may develop a serious disability such as mental retardation or other developmental disability. Arguably the most important influences on the development of any young child would be the child's parents and the sociocultural environment in which the child grows up (Skinner & Weisner, 2007). This socio-cultural environment includes the family environment, community environment, and geographic locale including all shared beliefs and assumptions about child development and about disabilities. However, one can argue that the most important aspect of the sociocultural environment that a child with a disability grows up in is the influence of…

In Chapter 8, Friedman shows how the lives of 241 U.S. Marines were sacrificed needlessly in Lebanon in 1983. Because the U.S. policy makers and military tacticians had no real understanding of the environment of the Middle East as a whole and in particular did not have a deeper understanding on the political scene of Lebanon, they over-estimated the force and persuasive power of American diplomacy capabilities, and underestimated the heated tensions between the different peoples of the region. The United States, for all of its alleged proficiency in language education, did not really speak the language of the Middle East; of 'my enemy's enemy' is my friend, a land where winks speak volumes. "The Lebanese, like all Middle Easterners, are a people with a vivid imagination," remarked Fouad Ajami, a friend of the author. "That is why a great power should never wink at anyone in the Middle…

Indeed, this understanding of the Marshall court comes full circle: The Court is the most cutting edge front of American legal society, casting decisions that are years ahead of what the general populace often wants, according to Armstrong and Woodward, but the Court is also a conservative vestige of administrations past because of lifetime tenure.

That is why the most influential Courts are those in which an appointed justice does not conform to the expectations of his presidential appointer, but rather strikes out on his or her own with a body of decisions that counter the president's and former administration's ideas.

Opinion

The viewpoint of Armstrong and Woodward as presented in "The Brethren" is a much more forgiving look at the Court's influence than the viewpoint presented in our text. However, "The Brethren" looks at the Court with its own jaded eyes as well. The book understands that justices are political figures as…

The war had broken the economic back of Europe, as well as its political and transport structures. Another key aspect of later Keynesian theory was the need for maintaining economic infrastructures, rather than breaking them in revenge, and that cash infusions in the short run reap dividends for all in the long run. Keynes always took a long-term rather than a short-term view of economic policies. The current policies against Germany only satisfied short-term emotions, but could cause long-term economic destruction of a major power and thus injure the world. "It was only at a later stage that a general popular demand for an indemnity, covering the full costs of the war, made it politically desirable to practice dishonesty and to try to discover in the written word what was not there."

However, Keynes' perspicuous view of world events also showed that he did not merely focus on the immediate effects…

Chapter four discusses the enduring genealogy of the TPS by discussing once again its history and the principles behind the movement, autonomation (an emphasis on the people of the organization and how they interact with the machines they use and "just-in-time" the practice of productivity through the kanban system as well as by explaining the internal and external factors that surrounded the model. The chapter places Toyota in the global context analyzing how its own practices were regarded and spread through the industry and how Toyota responded to this with strength and character. The emphasis on quality is also stresses as a lead in to the next chapter.

Chapter five is a comparison of the TPS to the mass production (Ford) model of production. The chapter discusses the fact that quantity should not be the goal of production, but quality and this should be the focus at every stage of production…

Instead of designing businesses through much analysis and interpretation, Seth Godin describes how the long-term effects of stories can revolutionize the culture of businesses for the better. When an entire business can get galvanized on the core values of their stories, they are capable of becoming much more cohesive, operate much more efficiently and concentrate on the core values of customers (Kim, Morris, Swait, 2008). This is all possible because the story core values and concepts attract only those prospects and customers who have comparable values that align. Mr. Godin alludes to how this strategy is responsible for how fan bases are created and sustain themselves over time, and shows how a brand can become multigenerational as well.
The book also convincingly shows how trust and credibility are the new currency in customer relationships. This is prescient to the exponential growth of social networking and the rise of Facebook, Twitter…

It is key to understanding the author's view of love and even her own status as a woman and as a thinker. Of course, the book can simply be read as a love story of infidelity and sexual liberty gone wrong in the face of an ever-changing political society in a state of national and European chaos. But the Mandarins de Beauvoir referred to were also the elite, the intellectual elites of Chinese society who held themselves above from the common peasants.
Thus, by calling her fellow Left Bank intellectuals 'Mandarins' De Beauvoir symbolically calls upon her fellow intellectuals to become part and parcel of the political fray, rather than wasting their energies with entangling personal alliances that can be just as dissipating as the betrayals of Vichy and the subsequent alliances that sapped the French nation of its own vital energies. She calls upon the intellectual Mandarins of French…

Bethany Moreton's "To serve God and Walmart: The making of Christian free enterprise." (Harvard University Press, 2009)
Author Bethany Moreton's work provides an insight into Walmart's corporate history and its swift climb, within 50 years, from a little discount retail chain opened up by Sam Walton to an international retailing giant. The author goes beyond readers' expectations to include Walmart Country's religious, social, and cultural history (the term 'Walmart Country' would refer to its politically charged birthplace and surroundings of East Oklahoma, north-western Arkansas, and south Missouri). It is a place where the retailer's customers, supervisors and staff collaborate with missionaries, evangelical housewives, and pastors, within a doctrine of free enterprise and community service.

Moreton has penned an in-depth and captivating analysis of the popular global retail giant, America's largest private-sector employer, and the largest global public company. Through an elaborate case study, the author has effectively assimilated its cultural history and…

Asia Was the World by Stewart Gordon
A Discussion of a Period in which Asia Thrived

For roughly a millennium, Asia represented on of the most advanced societies in the world at a time in which the West was undergoing a period which was later referred to as the "Dark Ages." China, by contrast, was a cultural and economic powerhouse in which religion, commerce, and intellectual capacities flourished. This contrast would have been readily apparent and enthralling to any individuals who visited the East from the West. Many people made the trip to the West to engage in trade and many of the merchant travelers kept a journal of their experiences visiting this culture. Stewart Gordon bases his work on the actual accounts of merchant travelers and people who lived and worked in the region. These personal accounts provide unique insights into the period in which "Asia was the World" as…

Evolution
The book Why Evolution is True by Jerry Coyne presents a cogent case for evolution, a concept that can be controversial for some but accepted fact for others. This paper will work through the book -- the case that Coyne makes -- and offer reflections on my own journey of understanding the concept of evolution and its manifestation in the natural world.

Understanding Evolution

Evolution is not "fact," so much as a theory that is supported by a wealth of evidence. Just this alone lies at the heart of a lot of the misunderstanding about evolution. First proposed by Charles Darwin as a theory based on his observations of the natural world, evolution reflects the processes of adaptation that species go through, over time and successive generations. In adapting to their environments, species undergo changes that will, given enough time and dramatically different environments, result in the development of entirely new species.

The…

Mother to Mother by Sindiwe Magona. Specifically, it will critically analyze the book. The book "Mother to Mother" is a touching and elegant story of race relations and misunderstanding in South Africa. The author bases her book on a true incident, but looks at it from the eyes of a mother who loves her son but recognizes his inadequacies. It is a devastating look at apartheid, violence, and anger in a society long split between black and white. Well-written with emotion and pathos, it is a book that discovers the difficulties of reconciliation and continuing with life after the death of a loved one.
This emotional book looks at both sides of a young white woman's murder in a black township in South Africa. The book begins with the haunting line "My son killed your daughter" (Magona 1), and that line grabs the reader from the beginning, and makes them…

What follows in this brief report is a review and summary of the book The Right Fight by Chris Lynch. The items that will be covered in this text include an introduction to the book, the setting of the book, the main characters of the book, the plot of the took, the theme or message of the book and a conclusion that asserts whether the author did well and what weaknesses in the book and its narrative that might exist. As already noted, the book was written by Mr. Lynch and it came out in 2014. Published by Scholastic Press, the book is the first in a series of four books about World War II and the individuals that were part of the same. While the book Lynch wrote is very profound and effective in many ways, it could have been even better with a few minor adjustments and changes.
Setting…

Blending pop psychology with cognitive science, Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons write about perceptual biases and inattentional blindness in The Invisible Gorilla. Sparked by a now-famous experiment the authors performed, The Invisible Gorilla: How Our Intuitions Deceive Us is not as much about intuition as the subtitle of the book suggests. Rather, the book describes six ways our brains are fooled by illusions. Recognizing and understanding the illusions can prevent people from making critical mistakes in judgment. Those mistakes can sometimes be egregious, as when cops presume a black man is a criminal or when drivers overestimate their ability to multitask on the road. Salesmen and stage magicians count on the brain’s susceptibility to illusion to be successful. Memories of past events are reconstructions, rather than accurate recordings of the facts. Therefore, the main reason why Chabris and Simons translated their research findings into a popular book written for a…