Give a Boy a Gun

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High school sophomores Gary Searle and Brendan Lawlor have had enough. Day in and day out, for more than two years, they have been harassed, beaten up, and cursed out by most of the jocks at Middleton High--especially by football player Sam Flach. Armed with guns they've stolen from a neighbor's collection, Gary and Brendan storm a school dance, booby trap all the doors with homemade bombs, and prepare to turn their high school caste system upside down with a violent show of force. When it's all over, Sam Flach is alive (but without any hope of a future football career), Gary has killed himself, and Brendan is in a coma, after being beaten almost to death by other students who managed to disarm him. Could this tragedy have been prevented? Who, if anyone, is to blame?

Consisting of short, related statements from students, parents, school administrators, and even the troubled shooters themselves, Give a Boy a Gun attempts to give a voice to the countless sides of the school violence issue. Is this novel disturbing and at times difficult to read? Yes, of course it is. But it is also an articulate, well-rounded cross section of the many viewpoints on gun control, peer bullying, and the high school social order since the traumatic events that took place in Littleton, Colorado. While Strasser readily acknowledges that there are no easy solutions to the problem of school violence, this powerful book will be a useful tool for parents and teachers alike in exploring this issue and finding some ways of resolving the tragic escalation of teen violence. (Ages 12 and older) --Jennifer Hubert

Book Description

For as long as they can remember, Brendan and Gary have been mercilessly teased and harassed by the jocks who rule Middletown High. But not anymore. Stealing a small arsenal of guns from a neighbor, they take their classmates hostage at a school dance. In the panic of this desperate situation, it soon becomes clear that only one thing matters to Brendan and Gary: revenge.

Customer Reviews:

A Close Look at School Violence.......2007-06-07

Middletown High School seems a school like any other. There are athletes, especially football players, who feel like they own the place. In some cases they are right; the teachers treat them with a different set of standards and allow them to get away with more than anyone else. There are lots of regular kids and at the other end of the spectrum from the football crowd are the students who are considered freaks. These are the students who are the constant targets of the football players and often of the teachers who recognize the way the system works. It's just like any other high school, and it is dangerous.

Gary and Brendan are two students who are considered freaks. They are constantly bullied by the athletes. They are called names, pushed in the halls, and sometimes they are worried about worse violence. The athletes think they deserve their bad treatment for having no school spirit, for not buying into the glory of athletics. They did it to themselves, some people think. But to Brendan and Gary, it's simply an unfair system that forces them to feel upset and angry every day.

These boys aren't content to just feel angry, though. After years of being pushed around and treated badly, they have finally decided to do something about it, to fight back. They are going to make many of their fellow students and even some of their teachers pay with their lives. They are going to shoot some and bomb others. When the night of the big dance comes, will they be able to pull off this plot? Will someone notice something is terribly wrong and step in?

I liked how the story was told from so many points of view, so you could see how most people didn't think they were doing anything wrong. Even the tormentors couldn't seem to see the results of their actions. I liked the facts about guns at the bottoms of the pages; I was surprised by some of the information.

At the end of the book, many of the characters didn't get it. They still thought the whole tragedy was because Brendan and Gary were crazy, instead of looking at themselves as being partly to blame.

A great inside on all views of school shootings.......2007-01-31

A work of fiction base on facts of numerous school shootings. The book shows diary entries of the two boys who plan and execute the shooting as well as interviews with the survivors and news articles.

The book was very well put together, but the most emotional part was at the end where they show real-life facts about school shooting since the 1970's. The facts and stats will bring tears to your eyes. It also gives you the opinion of the author about what needs to be done and I think we could all learn from his point of views.

Give a Boy a Gun.......2007-01-24

This is the best book that I have read in a long time. I think that many teenagers today can completly relate to what these boys went through in their high school years.

Good Book.......2007-01-13

This is a good book. I read this book for English Class and gave a report on it in contrast to A Columbine Survivor's Story. Everybody thought it was really interesting that I could show two different sides of (basically) the same situation. This book is not for younger kids, but definitely worth reading.

great book.......2006-11-21

11/19/06
Give a Boy a Gun
The book Give a Boy a Gun is a very good book, I only recommend it to people in middle school and up because of the language. In this book there are two kids named Gary and Brendan, they are two kids that have just moved to town and they are being teased by the school jocks. After a while the reader can tell that they are getting pretty sick of being teased so they think of something that they can do to be remembered by this town for the rest of their lives.
One of the main characters in the story is Gary. Gary is a new kid that just moved to town and is being teased by the jocks because of his goofy looks and his blond hair, and is a trouble maker. Now, another new kid in town is Brendan. He is a trouble maker, he has already been kicked out of two schools and now he is in another one. He is the kind of kid that likes to carry around guns, knives, and other weapons like that. After a while the two boys get fed up with all of the teasing that is being done to them, so they come up with a plan to get back at all of the people that have teased them throughout the years. Then a little while later the two boys started coming up with plans to start shooting the people that have teased them. The more the two boys thought about it the more they wanted to do more. So the boys went online and tried to figure out how to make a plastic explosive. When the boys found out, they made one and went to an abandoned house and let one off.

In this book one thing that I liked a lot about it was that it gave facts about guns and other weapons. Because I go hunting and I like to read facts about guns that maybe I don't already know. One thing that I really didn't like about the book though was how sometimes it would skip around and I would get lost and then it would pick back up in that same spot a chapter or so later.
There are a couple twists in this book, like when they all of a sudden go out and get a gun then start making a plan to do stuff with the gun to other people that have teased them over the years. This book was a real page turner because once I start a story and it catches my attention then I just can't put it down. The pace of the book was kind of slow because it added a lot of extra detail that I don't think that it really needed, and I think that instead of this book being almost 200 pages it could have been more like 130 or something around that area. I think that kids around the age of 12 to 16 will enjoy this book. It isn't really for the younger kids because of the language and some of the things that they do in it but kids that are older and more mature I think it would be a good book for them. I recommend this book because it feels like a true story and you can learn so much from reading it like what can really happen any day, to anybody, because they got teased by a bully and just got fed up with all of it.

Glue Gun Decor: How to Dress Up Your Home-from Pillows and Curtains to Sofas and Lampshades

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Cutting up good time
Glue Anything
Not what I expected
Glue Gun to the Rescue
Great Ideas for Re-decorating with what you already have

Glue Gun Decor: How to Dress Up Your Home-from Pillows and Curtains to Sofas and Lampshades
Marian McEvoy
Manufacturer: Stewart, Tabori and Chang
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 158479416X

Book Description

Ready, set, glue! One of the hottest trends in home decorating today is the creative use of a glue gun to transform objects, accessories, furniture, and even architectural details into elegant, one-of-a-kind creations. In Glue Gun Decor, design diva Marian McEvoy provides all the guidance beginners and experienced designers will need to master this amazingly affordable decorating method.

A comprehensive how-to guide, the book features easy-to-follow instructions for using a glue gun to embellish walls, ceilings, furniture, frames, lampshades, pillows, upholstery, flowerpots, and more with materials ranging from fabric and appliqués to shells and leaves. Fifty unique projects are included, many of them explained in step-by-step photographs. With Glue Gun Decor, do-it-yourself decorators will be gluing their way to a more beautiful home in no time. AUTHOR BIO: Marian McEvoy is former editor in chief of both Elle Decor and House Beautiful. She has written for such publications as the International Herald Tribune, Vogue, and Harper's Bazaar, and has made numerous television appearances. Glue Gun Decor is her first book. Prior to becoming a specialist in architecture and design photography, Chris Kendall was involved in building restoration and furniture design. He lives in Rhinebeck, New York.

Customer Reviews:

Cutting up good time.......2007-01-09

Many great projects to get your creative juices going. Photography was
excellant; was able to enjoy beauty of pieces but not too artsy to interfer with point of the book. I've now found a new textile art to add to my passion.

Glue Anything.......2006-11-11

I saw the author Marion McEnvoy on an Oprah episode and thought this woman was amazingly creative with her simple glue gun tool. Most arts and crafts books have very traditional projects, so I never buy them. This one is not. The glue gun projects finish to look like something that you would find in Elle Decor. I just wish the book had more ideas because it's limited with projects; but for the price, it's good for inspiration.

Not what I expected.......2006-08-23

The decor used in this book looks like the 70's era. It's too outdated for me. I was expecting more.

Glue Gun to the Rescue.......2005-11-13

I have so many ideas I've wanted to try, but felt stymied by the sewing part. Now Marian McEvoy's book shows that a glue gun can work on furniture, curtains and other home projects. Glue guns are not just for crafts anymore.
There are holiday ideas too in the book.
Other books on the topic include Wild with a Glue Gun and La Casa Loca: Latino Style Comes Home: 45 Funky Craft Projects for Decorating and Entertaining.

Great Ideas for Re-decorating with what you already have.......2005-10-08

I recently needed to repair a library chair that my cat has made a nasty scratch on. I was going to have the chair professionally reupholstered until I saw Marian McEvoy on The Oprah Winfrey Show. When I saw what she was doing with a glue gun and how she decorated her gorgeous home with one, it gave me an idea that I could fix my precious chair with a glue gun and some fabric. I ordered her book and was delighted to see that it was filled with projects that not only taught me how to cheaply make my chair look like new again, but also gave me inspiration to make my curtains look new, redo my old throw pillows and dress up my lampshades.

If you like to redecorate often, this is a must-have book because it's all about redoing what you already have or how to buy affordable objects and room accessories and make them look unique and expensive.

Average customer rating:

it captures the feel of the time and place
Amazing.
Fantastic read - the best Vietnam account I have read.
HOW IT REALLY IS -- REVIEWED AT CAMP FALLUJAH, IRAQ
Outstanding

Guns Up!
Johnnie Clark
Manufacturer: Presidio Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback

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ASIN: 0345450264
Release Date: 2002-01-02

Book Description

THIS GUT-WRENCHING FIRSTHAND ACCOUNT OF THE WAR IS A CLASSIC IN THE ANNALS OF VIETNAM LITERATURE.

"Guns up!" was the battle cry that sent machine gunners racing forward with their M60s to mow down the enemy, hoping that this wasn't the day they would meet their deaths. Marine Johnnie Clark heard that the life expectancy of a machine gunner in Vietnam was seven to ten seconds after a firefight began. Johnnie was only eighteen when he got there, at the height of the bloody Tet Offensive at Hue, and he quickly realized the grim statistic held a chilling truth.

The Marines who fought and bled and died were ordinary men, many still teenagers, but the selfless bravery they showed day after day in a nightmarish jungle war made them true heroes. This new edition of Guns Up!, filled with photographs and updated information about those harrowing battles, also contains the real names of these extraordinary warriors and details of their lives after the war. The book's continuing success is a tribute to the raw courage and sacrifice of the United States Marines.

Customer Reviews:

it captures the feel of the time and place.......2007-09-12

if you want to know what the south end of Quang Nam province was like in 1968-69, this is it. i was there, just like johnny clark; but i was in 1/7. he's done a great job of capturing the feel of the time.

Amazing........2007-08-25

This is one of the best books I've read. The writer says in the end that some of this is fiction, or that certain characters are made of multiple people he knew, but the bulk of this story is true, regardless of who it happened to. I have yet to know someone who read this book and did not have to fight back tears at least once. I have read this book 4 times now. I recommend it to anyone and everyone.

Fantastic read - the best Vietnam account I have read........2007-07-12

I read this book at the suggestion of a friend (Sgt. Watson from the book). It was one of the quickest page-turners I have ever read. The reader is quickly made to realize the challenges of war as well as the personal sacrifices made by our soldiers. Anyone who is a soldier or knows one will appreciate this honest and well written account of this group of Marines' tour of duty.

HOW IT REALLY IS -- REVIEWED AT CAMP FALLUJAH, IRAQ.......2007-02-26

My buddy and I are stationed at Camp Fallujah, Iraq. By luck, when we got back inside the wire from a night time patrol, having been in a little piece of hell called "The Zaidon", we found this book in the library tent.

We thought that no one understood the horrors of combat, but Johnnie Clark, in this riveting book about the Killin Time, tells it all.

Sometimes, when the violence and the absurdity of war bring my men's spirits down, I read them an exerpt from the book...here's one of our favorite passages:

"Let's go", Chan said, I hesitated, I wanted to help the chief, and then those last words kept coming back to me: "Don't stop for the wounded".

Semper Fidelis,
The War Dog Marines at Camp Fallujah, Iraq.

Outstanding.......2006-09-21

This book is terrific. I've been reading war stories for 40 years because I find personal accounts of combat to be riveting. This book stands out as one of the best of the hundreds I've read. My compliments to the author. This was just as great the second time around.

Early Aircraft Armament: The Aeroplane and the Gun Up to 1918

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Early Aircraft Armament: The Aeroplane and the Gun Up to 1918
Harry Woodman
Manufacturer: Smithsonian Inst Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0874749948

Without Smoking Gun: Was the Death of Lt. Cmdr. William Pitzer Part of the JFK Assassination Cover-up Conspiracy?

Average customer rating:

I am one of those who lived the truth of this book
Without something...
lot's of promise- no pay off.
Good, but ULTIMATE SACRIFICE the best book ever
A good primer on the Pitzer case

Without Smoking Gun: Was the Death of Lt. Cmdr. William Pitzer Part of the JFK Assassination Cover-up Conspiracy?
Kent Heiner
Manufacturer: Trine Day
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0972020799

Book Description

This shocking account of intrigue, lies, and governmental complicity provides dramatic evidence that suggests a larger conspiracy behind JFK's assassination. Three years after Kennedy's assassination, Lieutenant Commander William Bruce Pitzer, who was reputed to have in his possession documents and film that refuted the conclusions of JFK's official autopsy, was found dead in his office at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. In 1995, a retired special forces captain claimed that a representative of the CIA recruited him to assassinate Pitzer. This, as well as the mysterious circumstances of Pitzer's death and the official and nonofficial investigations that followed, are outlined. These revelations of a possible conspiracy within a conspiracy raise larger questions of the measures taken to suppress the truth and the potential dangers of a government that operates outside the law.

Customer Reviews:

I am one of those who lived the truth of this book.......2007-02-11

Without Smoking Gun, a nonfiction work by Kent Heiner, should get your blood boiling and, unless you are a mild-mannered Mr. Milquetoast, your body functioning in whatever way you so decide to do your part in helping bring those to justice who not only inspired and developed, but perpetrated some of the most heinous political crimes of the past century including the cold-blooded murders of President John F. Kennedy, Lt. Cmdr. William Bruce Pitzer and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
What would you do if you knew that our government was lying about the greatest crime of your time and a dear friend who had shown you proof of this government's cover-up died violently and without warning? Would you tell anyone? Meet retired U.S. Navy Chief Petty Officer Dennis David who recalls the day in 1963 that U.S. Navy officer and beloved mentor Bill Pitzer showed him a film taken by a remotely controlled camera of the actual autopsy of President John F. Kennedy's dead body and some still photographs of that same autopsy. These images, the two men agreed, made it clear that the President had been shot from the front, not the rear, despite what the American public was being told.
Meet the late Lieutenant Commander William Bruce Pitzer, who in 1966 was found shot and killed in his office at the National Naval Medical Center, where the President's autopsy had been performed after the tragedy in Dallas.
What would you do if you realized you had almost been an unwitting pawn in the murder of an important witness? Meet the author of this review: I am retired U.S. Army Special Forces (Green Beret) Lieutenant Colonel Daniel Marvin. I am a combat veteran of two wars, and I am willing to testify before Congress that I was asked to kill Lieutenant Commander Pitzer, "a man who was going to give secrets to the enemy" or so the CIA agent told me in a secret meeting under the pines in the first week of August in 1965 at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. Is such a scenario possible? Yes and I am willing to testify to that fact before Congress, tell them why I am known as "Dangerous Dan" and why I feel obligated to tell the truth to this nation.- to this world..
Read of retired Green Beret Lieutenant Colonel James "Bo" Gritz's having admitted his role (then a captain) as an instructor at the Special Warfare School, writing in an e-mail to Kent Heiner, "We were teaching assassination and terrorism as part of the UW [unconventional warfare] fields of Direct Action missions and GW [guerrilla warfare].
Meet other retired military and CIA officers who agree that there was indeed a conspiracy to assassinate President Kennedy and that the United States does indeed use assassination and terrorism as a tool of statecraft. .
Fasten your seatbelts for a devastating journey through recent history. Read eye-witness testimony that I believe, if presented in a court of law, would prove that the President's body was tampered with before being autopsied. Find out why there is reason to suspect that LCDR Pitzer recorded that alteration on film and was killed in order to find and destroy that evidence. Go behind closed doors to see the infighting and prejudices which plagued the Presidential Commission charged to investigate the assassination. Go back in time to 1966, when private doubts about the Commission's findings snowballed into a public demand for answers, and the Kennedy family was preparing to turn over JFK's autopsy photos to the National Archives. Watch the drama of Pitzer's final days unfold as a 1963 FBI report is discovered which describes "surgery" on the President's body prior to autopsy, sending the Establishment into panic.
The author, Kent Heiner, is the founder and president of Mem Research, a non-profit organization supporting research into state-organized crime. He graduated from Brigham Young University with a degree in International

Without something..........2006-06-29

Basic questions remain. If the CIA was so intent on terminating the Lt.Cmdr.'s command, why did they wait FIFTEEN months after approaching Marvin in August of '65 to murder Pitzer? One would think that the CIA must have been on pins and needles until October of '66 when they could finally rest assured that Pitzer would not spill the beans about the truth of the JFK autopsy. A much simpler scenario would simply have been to steal, alter or otherwise make disappear the dreaded film shot by Pitzer. Since he did not die until nearly three years after JFK, and there could be no real assurance that he had not made a copy of the film, nor shown it to anyone in the meantime, the conspirators must have been drinking Pepto Bismol by the gallon for years. This is not to say that President Kennedy was not murdered by a conspiracy. He was. Rather, the key figure in this book, Daniel Marvin, needs to explain the aforementioned problems with the scenario he has been pushing for over a decade. It is not enough for him to assert that his own credibility speaks for itself. Kent Heiner may be a professional writer, but he has selected a subject and a theory that is simply not believable. If there are answers to the above questions, Heiner has a duty to ferret them out from Marvin. I don't think it can be done.

lot's of promise- no pay off........2006-02-02

I'm certainly not a JFK assassination buff to the extent of many potential readers reading these reviews, however I've read perhaps 75-100 books on the subject over the past 35 years and this one was one of the most unsatisfying. It's a short book (just 120 pages) so you can read it cover to cover in one long sitting. That said, it seemed the author worked hard to extend it to that length. He gets off on tangents that seem irrelevant to the primary focus of his topic. He spends a lot of time and words building up the credibiliy of his primary witness, only to reveal near the end that this witness has credibility issues. A few interesting questions are raised but the author has only supposition and conflicting evidence to reveal. When I finished I was frustrated...and thinking that all of this could have easily been distilled into a medium length magazine article

Good, but ULTIMATE SACRIFICE the best book ever.......2005-12-09

Good, but ULTIMATE SACRIFICE the best book ever
While I thought this book was worthwhile in many respects, ULTIMATE SACRIFICE is simply the best book ever on the JFK assassination.Still, worth your time.

Vince Palamara-JFK/ Secret Service expert (History Channel, author of two books, in over 30 other author's books, etc.)
Pittsburgh, PA

A good primer on the Pitzer case.......2005-05-20

In essence, this book is about three men. The main character is-as the title suggests-William B. Pitzer, who died of a gunshot wound to the head on October 29, 1966, at the National Naval Medical Center, Bethesda, Maryland. The second character-again as suggested by the title-is John F. Kennedy who died of a gunshot wound to the head on November 22, 1963, in downtown Dallas, Texas. The third character is Daniel Marvin, who is alive in his seventies despite (frequent claims of) having his life threatened. Pitzer is said by one witness to have had, within a few days of the JFK assassination, possession of a movie film of the Kennedy autopsy that showed a bullet entry in the right forehead, hence not inflicted by Lee Oswald. Marvin is said by one witness (himself) to have been solicited by the CIA to murder William Pitzer; it is thought by some that Pitzer had kept possession of a copy of that movie film and was about to spill the beans by making the movie public.

In the preface, Mr. Heiner states, "This book is in large part a result of Marvin's ten-year effort to close a dark chapter in his past by fighting for truth and justice in the Pitzer case." This is an odd statement since, beyond the contribution of obtaining in 1997 FBI documents on the investigation of Pitzer's death then writing an article in the Fourth Decade shortly thereafter, Marvin has contributed little to efforts to understand how William Pitzer died. Hounding local politicians with demands for action and talking in grand terms of congressional investigations is just so much hot air. The fundamental question, "Was William Pitzer murdered?" has not figured in Marvin's vocabulary. Having claimed that he was asked to assassinate Pitzer in August of 1965, he has made up his mind that the lieutenant commander was murdered in October of 1966.

Kent Heiner covers a lot of territory in this short book (120 pages of text). And with a clear and concise writing style, he does it well. Scanning the index turns up the following names, inter alia: Fidel Castro, Edward Cutolo, Edward Jay Epstein, David Ferrie, Pierre Finck, Gaeton Fonzi, Sam Giancana, Bo Gritz, Daniel Hopsicker, James Jenkins, Lyndon Johnson, Khun Sa, Ed Lansdale, David Lifton, John McCarthy, Charles Nicoletti, Thomas Noguchi, Nugan Hand Bank, Paul O'Connor, William Pepper, Fletcher Prouty, Johnny Roselli, Michael Ruppert, Richard Secord, Ted Shackley, Sirhan Sirhan, John Stockwell, Frank Terpil, Bill Tyree and Edwin Wilson. It's an easy and absorbing read, and with one caveat (see below) I recommend it.

A pretty comprehensive description of the historical context of the assassination of President Kennedy and its aftermath is provided. And there is good coverage of the salient aspects of the FBI FOIA-released information on the investigation of William Pitzer's death with the notable exception of the autopsy report, the only reference to which is: "In fact the complete autopsy report shows nothing which would contradict the conclusion that Pitzer had taken his own life with a single pistol shot." Actually the autopsy report describes three defects in the skull-on the face of it rather odd from a "single pistol shot." (And only a passing reference is made to the autopsy photographs on Pitzer's body, released under FOIA in 2002.)

This book's weakness lies in its kid-gloves treatment of Dan Marvin and his claims. Although to some extent Heiner keeps the controversial assertions at arm's length with phrases like "Marvin says," "evidently," "what he saw as," "according to Marvin," etc., any benefit of any doubt is given to Marvin. On the other hand, to be fair, if the author had not treated Marvin as favorably as possible there may have been no reason to write this book, or at least it would have been a different book. Not that it did not evolve during writing; it started out as a Heiner-Marvin jointly authored project titled Smoking Gun: The Conspiracy to Kill LCDR William Bruce Pitzer. Obviously, as shown by the final title, some fundamental rethinking occurred in the mind of Mr. Heiner. It must have troubled him to admit, "Marvin has only been caught in-and has admitted to-only one untruth, that being the number of officers who had volunteered for the assassination training course." (Marvin changed the number from half a dozen to over thirty. Heiner misses the reason for this change. It occurred after "Captain Vance" denied recognizing Marvin, hence Marvin had to bump up the number who took the course to rationalize this lack of recognition.) The operative words in the quote are "and has admitted to," because Marvin has been caught in other "untruths." But that is outside the scope of this review.

I have to take issue also with this sentence: "The grievances Eaglesham has publicly aired regarding Marvin seem less a matter of Marvin's exact truth or falsehood than a failure on Marvin's part to function within Eaglesham's expectations of how a truthful Dan Marvin ought to behave." The word "seem" may be operative here, but I reject the notion that my standards are somehow more stringent than those of others when it comes to judging truthfulness. For example, the back cover of Without Smoking Gun describes Marvin is a "veteran of two wars." Vietnam and Korea presumably. Lieutenant Colonel Marvin served with honor in Vietnam, but in fact he arrived in Korea six months after the armistice was signed. Is it nitpicking on my part to cry foul?
My criticism of Dan Marvin since mid-1997 is characterized by Heiner as a continuation of long-standing difficulties: "The relationship between Dan and Allan Eaglesham had been strained by discord and mutual suspicion from the beginning" and "Always citing the demands of principle, Eaglesham had often found himself at odds with Marvin." Perhaps the implication here is that I was out to get Marvin from the beginning, which would not be true. In early 1995 I withdrew my name from the Fourth Decade version of Marvin's article "Bits and Pieces" because he insisted on discussing his telephone conversations with Mrs. Pitzer although she had made it clear to him that she wanted no association with any reappraisal of the case. The editor of Unclassified agreed with me and deleted that passage from "Bits and Pieces," therefore my name is on the byline of that version of the article. It was an ethical issue, dealt with openly without discord. Later in 1995 I withdrew my support from his efforts to get the case reopened because-having learned of William Pitzer's extramarital affair-I was afraid that we might prove only that he had committed suicide, with sad consequences for Mrs. Pitzer. If Marvin interprets this as undermining his credibility-as is claimed in Without Smoking Gun-he isn't thinking clearly. At that time I wrote letters exhorting him to concentrate on the generic issue of the CIA contracts on US citizens and to leave the specifics of the Pitzer case in abeyance until Mrs. Pitzer's death. Thus, claims of "discord and mutual suspicion" constitute revisionist history, albeit in a tiny teacup. When, as a result of a face-to-face meeting in my kitchen in February 1997, it seemed that Marvin's story was flawed, I gave him the benefit of the doubt and invited a written explanation, to which he provided fudge words; therefore, I terminated our working relationship. Eighteen months later in a public apology to Robin Palmer and me he claimed that his family had been threatened. Funny, he mentioned no threat in February 1997.

I could go on, but enough said for current purposes. This is a worthy primer on the deaths of William Pitzer and John Kennedy.

Giving Up the Gun: Japan's Reversion to the Sword, 1543-1879

Average customer rating:

Fantasy presented as history
Awesome book
Fun, fresh look at Tokugawa Japan
a bang
Putting the Genie Back in the Bottle

Giving Up the Gun: Japan's Reversion to the Sword, 1543-1879
Noel Perrin
Manufacturer: David R Godine
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Asia | History | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0879237732

Customer Reviews:

Fantasy presented as history.......2006-06-19

If you take a course relating to Japanese history of this period one of the first things they will do is warn you off Perrin. He had no real knowledge of Japanese history but got this neat idea about how he imagined it happened and then looked for facts to "prove" his point, ignoring all the things that didn't fit with what he "knew" just had to be the truth.

The fact is that guns helped the three great unifiers of Japan (Oda Nobunaga, Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and Tokugawa Ieyasu) create a government that was strong enough to end war completely for 250 years (from 1615 to the 1860s). Guns were unnecessary and not needed, so not many were made. End of story, no mysterious Japanese reverence for the sword or resistance to modern things required.

See for instance the review by Conrad Totman in _Journal of Asian Studies_, v. 39 (1980): 599-601.

Awesome book.......2006-01-16

I am a Japanese and International Studies double major, and while I was in Japan last semester I picked this book for a research project, primarily because it was short and I had very little time to waste. Then I started reading, and the hours just slipped away as I diligently marked almost every page with sticky tabs and highlighter, because it was just that awesome. The paper I was supposed to write was only required to be 4-5 pages long; I ended up with 9 pages, after I cut out a lot of other info. This book is small, yes, but it is filled with useful information presented in an interesting way.

I've always had issues with history books that take potentially fascinating subjects and make them dull and boring. This book, unlike most of it's genre, was absolutely enthralling. I could not put it down. It's short, it's cheap, and it's interesting. If you have any interest in Japanese history, I think you should pick up this book.

Fun, fresh look at Tokugawa Japan.......2004-06-20

Perrin's book has a great focus: the Japanese gun. Usually, one associates the sword with Japanese martial arts. Here, Perrin explains that the Japanese not only adopted the arbusque but improved on it to a point where it became too efficient a means to kill the enemy. Ironically, the Tokugawa shoguns had to eliminate it to preserve the Pax Tokugawa that would run for 250+ years.

The book is easy to read: he approaches the material from a variety of angles (source material from Japan, modern comparisons of contemporary European nations as well as contemporary comparisons by visitors back in the 17th and 18th centuries). It is also well documented -- the list of notes alone provides one with a shopping list of future reading. Overall though, I felt the book failed to expand and build its argument -- it just kept repeating itself chapter after chapter.

Another complaint I have is that, looking at the Japanese sources, Perrin tended to rely upon WWII Admiral Seiho Arima's _Kaho no kigen sono denryu_. Arima's research into pre-Meiji gunsmithing does seem like a good source of material, but one wonders if there were other sources of scholarship to include. Otherwise, Perrin relies a lot on Western scholarship.

A final complaint about the book is the reproduction of the artwork. The black and white reproductions at times are fuzzy. A close-up instead of the full work at times might have been more helpful for the reader.

Although the book is written in a light scholarly tone which anyone can read, if it were not for its tight focus on its subject matter I would not recommend the book. Its value lies in its exploration of a subject which goes overlooked in studies of Japanese culture. A half-hearted recommendation.

a bang.......2003-10-03

I made the mistake of beginning to read this book before I went to bed. I read long into the night, unable to put it down.

Perrin packs a great deal of information into this thin volume, livened with quiet humor. This book is an excellent complement to Sword and Chrysanthemum, because he deals with aspects of Japanese culture that Benedict did not.

Perhaps in the final pages he sings praises a bit too loud, looking at feudal Japan as close to an ideal society. That was an age in which peasants took it for granted that Mother would be led into the forest and abandoned when food ran out. Life may have been peaches and cream for the upper classes, but Japan was certainly not a land in which it was 'impossible to discern misery.'

I urge anybody with an interest in Japan, or in cultural evolution, to read this book.

Putting the Genie Back in the Bottle.......2003-01-30

I read Noel Perrin's little book soon after it was first published in a different imprint, but returned to it around the time of the Gulf War in 1991 to remind myself of a few things that Professor Perrin wanted us to think about. I think many readers may mistake it as primarily a book about Japanese history or about the Tokugawa clan who banned guns mainly to maintain civil order in what was a genuine police state, one they were to rule for 250 years. Though a long-time student of Japan, I shudder to think of someone like Saddam Hussein picking up a few lessons from the Tokugawas. Perrin's point, though, was peace. He wrote this book, I believe, because he was a passionate anti-nuclear activist and advocate of non-proliferation. In talking to friends, he learned how the Tokugawas had - perhaps for the only time in human history - decided to give up a weapon of mass destruction, and they did it in part because they saw it as an evil, and a threat to their martial society. Samurai were expected to live and die by the sword, though the warlords who fought it out for control of Japan in the war-filled years around 1600 that brought the Tokugawas to power were perfectly happy to use massed muskets in battles that created more carnage than would be seen on any battlefield until the Napoleonic wars. At the end of the day, Perrin's assessment of the moral purpose of the Shoguns who banned the gun is probably naive, these were power hungry and paranoid dictators who sought to prevent massed musket attacks against themselves. But the book provides a fascinating vignette of how a society reordered itself and learned to live in peace for 250 years. I consider the book one of the more elegant essays on the confrontation in mankind's history between our inexorable bloodlust, and our yearning for something more sublime.

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Black Powder
Staton Rabin
Manufacturer: Margaret K. McElderry
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0689868766

Book Description

South Central
Los Angeles, 2010

Fourteen-year-old Langston Davis's best friend, Neely, has been shot and killed in a gang fight. Langston wishes that he could turn back the clock. But he knows you can't change history. Or can you?

When his science teacher invents a century-hopping time machine, Langston knows exactly what he must do: go back in time to stop the invention of gunpowder...which will prevent the invention of guns...which will stop Neely from getting killed.

Hijacking the time machine, Langston leaves a holographic "twin" of himself at home and bounces back to Oxford, England, in 1278, where he's in a race against time to stop the scientific "wizard" Professor Roger Bacon from sharing his new invention -- the Western world's first form of gunpowder. When Dr. Bacon is kidnapped by his archenemy, it's up to Langston and his new friend, Niles, to try to rescue him and destroy the formula for gunpowder. But is changing history really saving the world? Or is it just standing in the way of progress? Can Langston accomplish his mission and bring Neely back to life before he gets stuck in the thirteenth century forever? No matter how you look at it, it's going to be one heck of a ride through the dangereous hairpin turns of history and back to the future again!

Book Description

Michelle White may have committed suicide. For days, her body has lain in a cabin along with her terrified dog. So they call in Raine Stockton. Raine hardly has time for the poor dog she's named Hero. But as she falls for him, questions surface about his late owner-and Raine realizes that Hero may be the only witness to a murder.

Customer Reviews:

Good Dog Mystery .......2007-09-10

This is the 3rd Raine Stockton Dog Mystery I've read and it was very enjoyable. In this book, Raine is asked to go to a cabin where a frantic and starving yellow lab is guarding his mistress who lays dead of an apparent suicide from a self inflicted gunshot wound. Raine's uncle, who is the sheriff, knows that she can remove the poor dog so the deputies don't have to shoot it.

There is no identification on the woman at the scene of the suicide, or even a vehicle parked near the remote cabin, so there are many questions about the dead woman that must be answered and the answers are not easy to find. The sheriff has doubts that the suicide is real and says that the suicide scene looks staged, to make it look like a murder.

The clues and the yellow lab provide key information that leads Raine, her uncle, the sherrif, and her on again off again husband, Buck, to unravel a twisted tale of jealousy, greed, and revenge.

Raine's personal life with Buck, also takes an interesting twist in this book, and the only complaint I have is that this plot twist was unexpected and somewhat rushed and forced. I hope we continue to see more of Buck in the forthcoming volumes, since the dynamics between him and Raine have provided tension and plot development in all three books

This is an enjoyable mystery series for dog lovers. The author, Donna Ball, according to her web site, has lots of experience with dogs, canine search and rescue, canine freestyle (a form of human/dog dancing), and canine agility and it shows in her writing.

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Unlikely hero.......2007-08-13

A frantic and starving yellow lab guards the cabin where his mistress lays dead of an apparent self inflected gunshot wound. The sheriff places a call to his niece, Raine Stockton, the only professional dog handler in the area. Raine must remove the snarling dog to prevent the deputies from shooting it.

There is no identification at the scene of the suicide, not even a vehicle parked near the remote cabin. How did the woman and her dog get there? Where is her purse, ID, luggage, food? Was the scene staged to look like a suicide? Was it in fact a murder?

The first clues come from the traumatized dog. Then random events provide key information that unravels a tale of jealousy, greed, and revenge.

An enjoyable mystery for dog lovers. The author includes many of her favorite subjects; canine search and rescue, canine freestyle (a form of human/dog dancing), and canine agility. The only complaint I find with the book is not the fault of the author but rather the publisher. The book's cover illustration gives away information the reader shouldn't know until half way through the story.

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Educational-entertaining-a book you can't put down.....
Twisted in Time
Great Book!
A good story involving gangs, slavery, and time travel

Trapped between Lash and Gun
Arvella Whitmore
Manufacturer: Puffin
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0141303190
Release Date: 2001-01-29

Book Description

Jordan is going to join a gang. But just as he's about to start his future with the Cobras, his past calls him back. Way back-to the nineteenth-century, where he meets his ancestors and gets a bitter taste of what life was like for them as slaves. Jordan must live with the constant threat of the whip's lash. His journey back in time will strike a chord with any young person who has felt trapped by hard times and difficult choices.

Awards:

An ALA Best Book for Young Adults
A Child Study Children's Book Committee Children's Book of the Year

Customer Reviews:

Educational-entertaining-a book you can't put down............2007-07-04

Trapped Between the Lash and the Gun is a story about a young man about to join a gang. As part of the initiation into the gang, this African-American youth has to buy a gun. To get money for this gun, he steals his grandfather's watch - a prized family heirloom which has been passed down through his family since the days of slavery.

As he walks to the pawn shop with the watch in his hand, he is suddenly transported back to the days of slavery in the old South. Not knowing how to survive this brutal time period, not knowing the rules of survival as a slave, he must learn to survive long enough to get back to the present.

I have taught this novel in my eighth grade language arts class for several years. It has been accorded the highest honor as my students ask - "Can we read Trapped Between the Lash and the Gun" again, today?
What a joy to teach a book that students eagerly read and enjoy.

In the process, this book teaches that gang-life and slavery are one and the same. They both operate on the basis of fear and brutality while binding one to a system where there is no escape.

Twisted in Time.......2006-02-10

A boy by the name of Jordan Scott has got himself in big trouble. Jordan's friends are bad news, and his family does not know about them. Jordan has a little sister by the name of Tachelle, and Jordan's mom is always on his case. Jordan's dad had left a while ago, and Jordan is mostly on his own. Jordan hangs out with a gang called the "Cobras." Jordan needed to get money fast for a gun, and he did not have any. Jordan went to visit his grandpa, and he remembered that he always talked about a watch that he had. Jordan's grandpa said it was passed down through generations from the slave years. Jordan figured that it would be worth a lot of money.
Jordan went to his grandpa's house, and stole the watch. Jordan didn't want to, but he had to. If Jordan didn't, he would probably die. Jordan had to hurry up and take it, so he wouldn't be late. While walking down the street in the dark, he heard a loud clicking noise coming from the watch. All of a sudden, Jordan was light headed, and felt like he was going to pass out. Jordan was all of a sudden in the middle of nowhere. Jordan went back to the slave years some how.
Will Jordan survive as a slave, and will he be able to go back to his own world, or will he be stuck there forever?
What I liked about this book was that it was very adventurous. There was no dull moment throughout the whole book. What I didn't like was how the story was set up, because some parts did not make since.
The people who would like this book would be anybody. There are mixes of boy and girl characters, so either boys or girls would be eligible to read this book. Any boy or girl, twelve and up can read this book.
I have not read any other books by this author, but I am looking forward to it.

Great Book!.......2001-06-13

Trapped Between the Lash and the Gun was a great book! I really liked the way the author mixed history with the present in a realistic way. There was a lot of excitement in the book, and I could never put it down. I would definitely recommend reading it!

A good story involving gangs, slavery, and time travel.......1999-09-08

Arvella has written a wonderful novel about a modern day teen trying to cope without his daddy by joining a gang of cobras. With a time travelling watch, he goes back to the days of slavery and lives a rough life. This "slave life" teaches him that being with family and learning are the 2 most positive experiences in life. The characters of Jordan and Uriah are well written. Many teens should read this book.

Outgunned: Up Against the NRA--The First Complete Insider Account of the Battle Over Gun Control

Average customer rating:

Don't believe the reviews by gun wacko's, this is a great book
Advocacy, not facts
Fuzzy Thinking and Whining Predominate
--more of the same garbage--
How wrong-headed can you get?

Outgunned: Up Against the NRA--The First Complete Insider Account of the Battle Over Gun Control
Peter Brown , and Daniel Abel
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Gun Control | Current Events | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: B0000C7BMZ

Book Description

Ours is a nation in the grip of a strange kind of mania. Why after President Reagan was shot was there virtually no handgun legislation? Why after the Columbine massacre in Littleton, Colorado, was nothing done to regulate the tools that children most frequently use to kill one another? Why was there no legislative response after a six-year-old in Flint, Michigan, shot a classmate with a .32 caliber "pocket rocket"? Tragedy follows tragedy, with twelve children shot dead every day in America, but guns remain less regulated than automobiles. Why? As authors Peter Harry Brown and Daniel G. Abel in this powerful book demonstrate, it is because of the terrible power of the gun coalition.

Outgunned begins with the story of Wendell Gauthier, the "master of disaster" attorney, who brought down the tobacco industry to the tune of billions and then turned his attention to guns. He struck fear into the hearts of the gun manufacturers as he set out to make gunmakers bear some liability for the killings caused by the often poorly made, inaccurate handguns they marketed to criminals. Coauthor Daniel G. Abel worked for Gauthier, along with other attorneys, as the gun-control campaign gathered momentum. This legal initiative seemed to be about to make history and change the face of violence in America, but sadly, Wendell Gauthier died of cancer before meaningful gun control could be established. More than thirty class-action suits against gun manufacturers now languish in courtroom paralysis while as many Saturday night specials as ever are being made. What happened? Brown and Abel demonstrate how the pro-gun forces once again curbed the will of a nation.

This book shows the enomous power of the NRA -- how it killed pending legislation in Congress, hijacked the Campaign Act to fund the George W. Bush presidential election victory, and eviscerated the American Shooting Sports Council. That association and the gun manufacturers actually wanted to compromise and agree to new handgun laws, implicitly accepting some liability, but the NRA leadership, with Charlton Heston as their president, crushed them. In Outgunned, Brown and Abel uncover how NRA lobbyists were instrumental in stopping Smith & Wesson in its tracks. They show how the tendrils of the NRA reach into the Christian Alliance and Republican Party, and how men like John McCain have fought back and been undermined. Outgunned reveals how the NRA began dealing with President George W. Bush when he was still governor of Texas -- prodding him into signing a shocking prohibition against the kind of suits Gauthier brought against the gun manufacturers.

Outgunned is the story of a legal crusade with up-close accounts of the people who fought every step of the way. For those who believe in the importance of stopping unnecessary bloodshed, this book is essential, powerful, and urgent.

Customer Reviews:

Don't believe the reviews by gun wacko's, this is a great book.......2006-07-29

I doubt any of the unfavorable reviewers read more than the excerpts provided on Amazon. Coming from a long line of hunters and sportmen, I cannot buy into this nra foolishness. This is a very well done book which takes a facts-based approach to the overwhelming control the NRA and the gun lobby have on our government. The authors have had a wealth of experience coming up against the money, power, and ignorance which defines the gun lobby. It is well written and a real eye opener for those who want an unpropagandized look at this disgraceful national public health issue.

Advocacy, not facts.......2005-08-17

Granted, this is a book written from a point of view, but the lack of intellectual honesty displayed within is sufficient justification to look elsewhere for understanding.

Fuzzy Thinking and Whining Predominate.......2003-06-30

The authors start out the first chapter by explaining in detail exactly how sleazy and scummy the principal players on the "anti-gun" side are. Most of these lawyers would have to get an integrity transplant just to work their way up to scumballs. They are professional ambulance chasers, in the words of the authors!!

Chapter Two tells us how political opportunists in Chicago tried to blame others for their inability to regulate the most regulated industry in America. Instead of stopping criminal behavior, they merely document it for the evening news, while blaming "profit seeking manufacturers" for not doing a job specifically charged to the Federal and State governments.

The rest of the book is more of the same. Any honest and fair reading will realize that it is mostly a weak-minded liberal whining catharsis, where they even try to blame their failure not on their wrong thinking and philosophy, but on someone else (in this case the NRA).

As much as anything else, this book is a prime example of what is wrong with education in America today. Arguments are weakly presented, poorly thought out, and make no attempt at inciting discussion. Instead, the authors make use of the time-honored methodology of demonizing their critics and name-calling worthy of a six year old child.

Perhaps what we really need is a book about how America is being held hostage by lawyers, who have brought the threat of litigation to a point where innovation is stifled, hiring is inhibited, medical care is about to collapse, and hot coffee is just a memory.

--more of the same garbage--.......2003-04-14

--scuzzball ambulance chasers,flush with success after the tobacco "victory" go for guns. Disappointingly, they find a much smaller pot of money is available but go ahead anyway--I am sure expecting another win on their way to suing fast food for "obesity" and and then on to car manufacturers for selling cars that can be traced to drunk and incompetent drivers--enough there to keep another generation of lawyers in the upper income class.

Unfortunately, they ran into a speedbump on the way--four million NRA members.

This book is a largely a repeat of Handgun Control, Inc., misinformation, lies, embellished with the personalities of the ambulance chasers, big-city machine politicians and slams at NRA personnel--full of technical errors--Glock "revolvers", etc--

How wrong-headed can you get?.......2003-03-15

The authors of this book have a very strange idea about how things are supposed to work in the United States of America. According to our Constitution there are three branches of government and the people, under the First Amendment, are free to petition those branches as they chose. The NRA is a member-supported organization of gun owners who want to protect their right to keep and bear arms, as specified in the Second Amendment. As such it has a right to lobby and petition in their behalf. Charges that they have "undue influence" are ridiculous. They have exactly as much influence as the members are willing to pay for, just as any anti-gun organization would have. It just happens that there are more people who are willing to speak with their wallets in behalf of their rights than there are people willing to support legislation and litigation that would undermine those rights. The NRA does have one advantage: their position is supported by the Constitution.

The authors posit a new "branch of the government" that is not supported by the Constitution: trial lawyers. This "branch", which has made billions of dollars effectively writing law outside normal channels, now wants to attack the Second Amendment on behalf of the relatively small group of people who think that private citizens aren't bright enough to handle firearms and that they don't need them to protect themselves against criminals. This is despite the fact, as documented by Dr. John Lott, that crime rates are lower in areas where it is easier for private citizens to own guns, and even lower in jurisdictions where they are allowed to carry concealed firearms for self-protection. Since the anti-gun crowd knows it will never get a Constitutional amendment and serious anti-gun laws would be found unconstitutional, it is trying to sneak its gun control position under the door by harassing legitimate businesses with endless lawsuits.

If you are desperate for support for your anti-gun sentiments, this is the book for you. If you want the truth, look elsewhere.

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