Product Description
Material expressions of spiritual belief are integral components of the Los Angeles landscape. Cathedrals, temples, churches, and shrines dot the city, but they are not the only sites where notions of the divine, or at least the supernatural, are made visible. Reflecting the broad ethnic and cultural reconfiguration of Southern California in recent years, botanicas have emerged as one of the most frequent purveyors of sacramental items. This book explores these fascinating venues and their role in transmitting, transforming, and critiquing traditional faiths.

An ever-evolving combination of spiritual center, religious supply house, and alternate healthcare facility, the botanica is generally associated with folk Catholicism and other Latin American religious traditions. Vivid photographs and essays describe these sites of spirit-infused artistry, ceremonial activity, and community building. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Beautiful pictures, Good introduction.
I was really excited to see this book, as I am very intrested in learning more about Latino and Afro Latino religions and spiritual expressions, as well as the visual representations that come along with them (altars, dress, etc). The book itself has beautiful detailed pictures taken from the Los Angeles area botanicas and homes of practitioners of Curanderismo, Espiritismo, Santeria, and Palo.

The concept of the book is documenting religious expression of Latin Americans in L.A. Unfortunately becuase of the very academic approach, the first two chapters (which are really the reflections of the ethnographer who visits various botanicas) are very dry and detached. They are definately written from the perspective of "an outsider looking in" to an extreme extent. The information is presented in a way such that someone who is completely unfamiliar with Afro Latino/Latino religions and spirituality is assumed to be the reader.

Despite that, most of the other chapters (written by various authors) are very warm and include interviews with practioners, as well as personal knowledge and experiences of the authors themselves within various practices. Subjects included in the book are Puerto Rican Mesa Blanca (espiritismo), the Guatamalan saint San Simon, understanding what a botanicas are and why they exist, and a breakdown of the African origins and orishas of the Santeria and Palo traditions.

This book is by no means comprehensive of Latin American spiritual tradtions, however it is a good introduction to the religious expressions of the Dispora found in "the City of Angels". ... Read more

Product Description
Les achats comprennent une adhésion à l'essai gratuite au club de livres de l'éditeur, dans lequel vous pouvez choisir parmi plus d'un million d'ouvrages, sans frais. Le livre consiste d'articles Wikipedia sur : Patrick Parizon, Jean-Louis Garcia, Farès Bousdira, Roland Wagner, Aboubacar Sylla, Yves Bertucci, Réginald Ray, Souleymane Camara, Christian Larièpe, Jocelyn Ducloux, Roméo Bébé Kambou, Jean-François Jodar, René Lobello, Jean-Yves Chay, Denis Goavec, Pascal Prince, Yannick Chandioux, Andy Dahmani, Laurent Debrosse, Patrick Paillot, Léon Desmenez Fils, Benjamin Reiter, Jean-Christophe Cano, Raymond François, Gaston Mobati, Pape Mamadou Diouf, Lucien Kassi-Kouadio, Cédric si Mohamed. Non illustré. Mises à jour gratuites en ligne. Extrait : Patrick Parizon est un ancien footballeur français né le 3 juin 1950, désormais reconverti en entraîneur. En 2005, il est recruté par le SM Caen, qui recherche un entraîneur diplômé pour seconder Franck Dumas (officiellement manager) et accompagner Patrice Garande, qui n'a pas à cette époque les diplômes nécessaires. À la suite à la relégation du club en Ligue 2 en 2009, le club normand se sépare de lui. Coupe de France : Division 3 : Coupe d'Afrique des nations : ...http://booksllc.net/?l=fr ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (1)

Great book!
This book is written through the eyes of a middle-class, ten year old girl during the Civil war.This book is wonderful and has many extroidinary ocurrances.This young girl is truly amazing and this story has given m a better view of what life was like for someone just like me during the CivilWar.I would definantly recommend this book to anyone and everyone! ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (14)

John Henry is Potential
Inspiring, uplifting, profound reminder of how blessed and fortunate we are regardless of how bad things may be.The title is dead on:great lessons for life, for loving and doing your best where you are with what you have.

Amazing person, amazing book!
No one can read this book without boosting his or her own feelings about human potential. This book is about Patrick's fantastic developmentAND reveals both his parents' role in making Patrick's potential achievable. Also, the significant role the University of Louisville music director played.

OUTSTANDING, FROM ALL ASPECTS!!!
WOW!! What an outstanding guy Patrick Henry Hughes is.A definite inspiration to everyone.I also bought his two music CD's on which he plays the piano, sings and also plays the trumpet. Patrick is good!!!!I've listened to them over and over.

The book is well-written by Bryant Stamford with all the input and personality, wit, etc. coming through from Patrick and his dad.

Recommended for everyone... but would be a special boost to anyone with handicaps who thought they couldn't do things.Patrick just gives a million reasons why YOU CAN DO WHAT YOU WANT TO DO .. and then goes about doing it.I'd love to hear him speak, and play his trumpet and piano "in person".

With Aloha .. Nancy On Maui

Is This Incredible Young Man Even Possible -- Indeed He Is!

I've heard it said that "Heroes are made, not born." WRONG!

On March 10, 1988, a hero was born into the United States to the Hughes family. He was the first baby of Patrick Hughes (Dad), and his wife, Patricia.
Immediately after delivery, like all parents they were proud of their first son. Then doctors brought news of baby Patrick's startling condition. Their son was afflicted with many disabling conditions: blindness, incomplete hip joints, and shoulder joints that would not allow his arms to swing outward more than a few inches. In addition, Patrick's vertebral column could not support his upward body.

I Am Potential: Eight Lessons on Living, Loving, and Reaching Your Dreams is more than just the story of baby Patrick--wheelchair bound--mastering heights most of us have never reached or even dreamed of reaching. It is also the story of two other people, Patrick's Mom and Dad who infused in their baby, two critical attributes which made him what he is today.

1) Although his abnormalities were extremely rare, Patrick would never experience lack of love. If a loving God had seen fit to create him as is, then Mom and Dad would accept him as is and extend to him the same love they'd give to any other child.
2) In addition, from the time Patrick went home for the very first time, his parents had already made a monumental and irreversible decision. They would treat their newborn as if his condition was normal--for him. Be gone pity. Good-by doubt. Farewell to any sense of limitation. Patrick would be, all he wanted to be.

Patrick Senior learned quickly how to calm his wailing young son, especially when mother was absent--play the piano for him. It worked so well that at nine months, Patrick Henry began imitating the sounds his dad made on their piano keyboard.

At first he learned to match the pitch of sounds; gradually, he learned to imitate melodies and harmonies so that by age two, Father and Son started playing melodies together. As years passed, Patrick's musical ability rapidly increased. In 2001, while vacationing in Tennessee, he played Beethoven's moving Moonlight Sonata in the foyer of a church. All eyes and ears turned in his direction.

It took some time for Patrick to learn Braille, but master it he did. Not only was he successful in grade school, but he graduated high school as well. Patrick then moved on to become a college student at The University of Louisville. By this time, he had learned to play the trumpet. As incredible as it appears when seen in video footage, with his father's precise wheelchair steering ability, the twosome became a single member of the university's marching band.

This book is a must read for people with handicapping conditions from birth or from fate. Patrick's courage and the support given by mother, father, and brothers as he grew older, cannot help but inspire even the most depressed individual to accept a disabling condition and move forward.

I Am Potential is fascinating to read because the narrative switches back and forth between Patrick and his father. Yet this cannot be interpreted as lack of empathy or support from Patrick's mother or younger brothers. What is evident is this: the glue that kept this family together came from an openly shared love and trust all felt toward one another including their God.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough to the general public who often see people with a handicap as a handicapped person. Patrick has proven the two terms are not equal or even logical. In his life, there is no such thing as handicap or failure. Why? It was never permitted in his thinking.

Does he miss his sight? He would be the first to say, actually, I don't know because I don't know what seeing means. Once, when asked how he'd feel if God suddenly gave him the ability to walk, Patrick replied, "I'd say yes ... but nothing is accomplished by dwelling on the fact you can't walk. So you have to shrink its importance in your mind ... and that's what I've done."

Other interesting reads:
I am Potential - on Playaway
Helping Children Who Are Blind (Early Assistance Series for Children With Disabilities)
Chicken Soup for the Soul: Children with Special Needs: Stories of Love and Understanding for Those Who Care for Children with Disabilities

Positive review
I found this book to be quite inspirational, and would recommend it to anyone who really needs a "pick me up!!!" ... Read more

Product Description
What happens when a canonically transitive form meets a canonically transitive meaning, and what happens when this doesn’t happen? How do dyadic forms relate to monadic ones, and what are the entailments of the operations that the grammar uses to relate one to the other? Collecting original expert work from acquisition, processing, typological and theoretical syntax-semantics research, this volume provides a state of the art as well as cutting edge discussion of central issues in the realm of Transitivity. These include the definition and role of "Natural Transitivity", the interpretation and repercussions of valency changing operations and differential case marking, and the interactions between (in)transitive Gestalts in different categories and at different levels of representation. ... Read more

Product Description
A wonderful comic / graphic novel ... Read more

Product Description
A riveting first-hand account of the fierce battle for Fallujah and the Marines who fought there--a story of brotherhood and sacrifice in a platoon of heroes

The platoon included four pairs of best friends. Each of the four would lose a best friend forever.

Five months after being deployed to Iraq, Lima Company's 1st Platoon found itself in Fallujah, embroiled in some of the most intense house-to-house, hand-to-hand combat since World War II. Civilians were used as human shields or as bait to lure soldiers into buildings rigged with explosives; suicide bombers approached from every corner hoping to die and take Americans with them; radical insurgents, high on adrenaline, fought to the death. The Marines of the 1st Platoon (part of 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment) were among the first to fight in Fallujah, and they bore the brunt of this epic battle. When it was over, the platoon had suffered thirty-five casualties, including four dead.

This is their story.

Award-winning author and historian Patrick O'Donnell stood shoulder-to-shoulder with this modern band of brothers as they marched and fought through the streets of Fallujah, and he stayed with them as the casualties mounted. O'Donnell captures not only the sights, sounds, and smells of the gritty street combat, but also the human drama of young men in a close-knit platoon fighting for their lives--and the lives of their buddies. We Were One chronicles the 1st Platoon's story, from its formation at Camp Pendleton in California to its near destruction in the smoldering ruins of Fallujah.

We Were One is an unforgettable portrait of the new "Greatest Generation."

With 16 pages of extraordinary photographs from the front lines of the Battle for Fallujah ... Read more

Customer Reviews (63)

Great book about great men.
Outstanding book. I read a few of the reviews before buying the book, and it lived up to all of my expectations. Buy it, read it, remember it. The men depicted in this book are true American heroes who embody what it means to be a Marine, and an American.

One thing worth mentioning, if you buy the mp3 version for listening during your commute, you will be missing out. The print version has maps and sketches of battle situations that really help with visualizing the layout of the fight.

A Good Read
Although I liked the the book, House to House, more than this one, I have no regrets in reading it. We will never understand what our soldiers do for us unless we read books like these. Even then, we will never smell the smells, see the gruesome sights, and actually hear the sounds of war. But books like these take you closer to the realites of war. They are a brotherhood. They are our military. Salute them!

Best book I've ever read. Hands down.
This is by far my favorite book I have ever read.The story of these Marines that took Fallujah was incredible.The writing may not be the best but I deeply credit O'Donnell.I enjoyed this book the second I picked it up and I was hooked..... I think I finished it in 3 days?Anyways, like I said the story itself was amazing.I felt like I actually knew these guys throughout all the joking and the killing.Everyone must read this book!

Courage uner fire
The book was excellent. It brought a human perspective to the sacrifice our young Marines are making and the hardships they endured in Iraq while to the rest of us, it is a news item. Well written. I was deeply moved and wanted to meet the young heroes and the author who brought me their story.

Great service
Bought this for a friends Son who knew one of the soldiers mentioned in the book. The soldier mentioned has now died and my friends son was a school friend of him. The book was eyeopening as to what our soldiers lives are like and how they change from it. ... Read more

Product Description
'DISCOVER AN ENTIRE UNIVERSE!'Highlights: COMPLETE 4-ISSUE PRESTIGE FORMAT ($4.95 COVER PRICE) SERIES!*** Contains Issue #'s 1-4 ***CLASSY SCI FI ANTHOLOGY MINI-SERIES! ... Read more