Product Description
Says Coach K: "In all forms of leadership, whether you are a coach, a CEO, or a parent, there are four words that, when said, can bring out the best in your team, your employees, and your family...I BELIEVE IN YOU.

These four words can mean the difference between a fear of failure and the courage to try."

In his previous bestselling books, Coach K has guided readers to success the way he has guided his teams at Duke University - - with the power of his inspirational words and phenomenal leadership skills.

But that was with college kids.....Now, Coach K has stepped up to take on an entirely new challenge - by volunteering to coach the US Olympic Basketball team. Comprised of some of the biggest NBA stars, Coach K had to work with huge egos and personalrivalries in order to create an American team that could win against the best competition in the world and restore Team USA to the gold standard of basketball.

This is more than a celebratory book - it's Coach K's first-hand account of how he dealt with such stars as Lebron James, Kobe Bryant, Carmelo Anthony and all the rest to buy into his "total team" play. Half a book on basketball, half a book on management techniques, THE GOLD STANDARD captures Coach K's personal style and approach to getting different (and sometimes difficult) people to work hard and succeed in reaching a common goal. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

Lucas
As a basketball fan and a coach I found this book interesting and really enjoyed reading about the things that happened behind the scenes.I do like how the book is setup and the way it was written.It was great to read how the NBA players were and gave me a different view of them.

Good item
The item came in new condition like listed; however, I had purchased the item for a Christmas gift on dec. 10th and didn't receive it till after Christmas!

Did not send
Ordered a book, seller said he put it in the mail on jan. 4th and 3wks later no book... so he obviously lied. however he did return my emails and gave refund but still it took a month in total to find out i wasnt gettin anything.

Awesome, Inspiring book!
I bought this book for my thirty-something son-in-law for Christmas.He had requested it. He was very excited to get it and read it through in the first few days after Christmas.He enjoyed it very much and definitely recommends to others in our family and in his business.

The inner story...
This book by Coach Krzyzewski is a very good read about Basketball and the Olympics. But, it was the inner story that I found fascinating.
There is a short episode about Colonel Brown and a few soldiers he brought to talk to the Olympic team. Injured soldiers. Heroes.
This was remarkable. Just remarkable.

The book was well written and interesting, but the inner story about the soldiers and this Colonel was incredible.

It shows Coach K's humanity and his kindness, and it shows the courage that these soldiers live with every day.

Well worth the time.
Randy ... Read more

Product Description
The Practical Test Standards (PTS) series guides student pilots, flight instructors, and FAA-designated examiners through checkrides, the final test in acquiring a pilot license. Each PTS guide details the skill and knowledge that must be successfully demonstrated before an examiner can issue a certificate or rating. The knowledge requirements detail which subjects will be covered-which weather reports and forecasts candidates will be asked to analyze, which physiological conditions (such as dehydration, spatial disorientation, and hypoxia) candidates will need to discuss, and what kind of flight planning exercises will need to be demonstrated. The skill requirements include what kind of takeoff and landing must be performed, such as crosswind or short-field; how a steep turn should be executed, with specifics that include what bank angle and airspeed to use; and what areas will be tested on a continuous basis, such as the checklist usage, positive exchange of flight controls, and crew resource management. The tolerances are defined so the candidates know what altitude, airspeed, headings, and banks must be maintained to complete each maneuver successfully. Each PTS guide lists the knowledge and experience prerequisites for a particular certificate or rating and provides background information and study and reference materials. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Test Standards
The criteria needed to pass your flight review. Every detail explained and the bible before your test. ... Read more

Product Description
As usual, Deborah Meier has a fresh take on standardized tests.While other critics fault standardized tests and what they measure, Meier contests the very idea of a centralized authority that dictates how and what teachers teach.This, she argues, sets up a terrible model for students because it doesn't allow for their teachers to emerge as thoughtful, accountable adults, seriously engaged with the dynamics of their own schools, classrooms, and communities.In turn, the students can't learn from them how to be thoughtful, accountable, creative adults and good citizens.Theodore Sizer, Abagail Thernstrom, Linda Nathan and others respond.

NEW DEMOCRACY FORUM
A series of short paperback originals exploring creative solutions to our most urgent national concerns. The series editors (for Boston Review), Joshua Cohen and Joel Rogers, aim to foster politically engaged, intellectually honest, and morally serious debate about fundamental issues—both on and off the agenda of conventional politics. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Meier is wrong, but the debate is very significant
I surely respect Meier's "putting her money where her mouth is" for decades now. She started a school in East Harlem, Central Park East, and stayed there for twenty-five years, opening three more schools on that model, before going to Boston and starting the Mission Hill School, where she remains the principal. But I feel Meier drastically understates the worth of two things: (1) "academics" and (2) "standards" that apply at the district, state, and even national levels.

As nimbly as Meier criticizes the "academic," there remains to me great value in presenting children healthy doses of materials that intelligent, far-sighted adults have made the cornerstones of thinking, acting, and speaking that pervade the entire civilization. Kids may well like the warm fuzziness of a Debbie Meier school, but the kids at traditional schools will come out better educated: Whatever they want to study next and whatever work and whatever citizenship roles they wish to pursue, they will have the intellectual underpinning to be able to do that. Well, many will; the incompetent and uninterested will not, and here I part company with Meier: we simply cannot keep lowering and lowering expectations and bending over backward so that more kids stay in school and pass.

Part and parcel of her hostility to high standards, Meier way-overstates the virtues of localism. She's against privatization but for a radical localism that is still "public" education only in the sense that we all pay for the onsite administrators, teachers, and parents to design a school as they please.

Now, here's where I see provincialism in Meier: She's in New York and then Boston--how exactly will her plan play out in the parts of Kansas where the "locals" want evolution to be treated as heretical, the parts of East LA where the "locals" don't want English used, and the parts of Alabama where the "locals" want to refer to a great national hero as "Martin Luther Coon"? No, I like the supra-local; I like national standards. And besides, people move around these days, from Maine to San Diego: do we want their kids exposed to entirely different educational practices and materials each time?

So I found it super-interesting in this book that a key supporter of Meier's who wrote a (very good) confirmation of Meier's thinking was William Ayers, who became a key figure in the last Presidential election as one of the "radicals" that Obama was accused of "palling around with" (in Sarah Palin's memorable phrase). The connection for me is again at the level of provincialism. Billy Ayers was a Weatherman who fell in with Cinque and the Symbionese Liberation Army. They did some of the stupidest things ever in the name of "the people's revolutionary justice," always carrying themselves as if they had millions of followers. They lived in Berkeley, where in one particular three-block area it seemed that the whole world was going the SLA way. But at their highest membership the SLA actually numbered 19.

To me, that's Debbie Meier. A few schools in NYC and Boston work because she's there: a visionary, impassioned, totally committed, articulate and energizing. The schools on their own terms work: kids enjoy being there; they design and carry out "real" (as against "academic") projects; some of them go on to college and thrive. So Meier gets on the platform and suggests that all U.S. education be designed after these schools' image. We get away from standards imposed from above, from outside; we make it all up as we go along, making each little school unique, each school responsible only to its own constituents.

Good luck running the whole country's schools that way. What we got is hardly great; the Meier plan would make things exponentially worse. The essay here by Thernstrom suggests why. It's all worth reading and thinking about.

The Standards Debate
This is one of the few books that relly looks at various sides of the debate about standards and standardization. Meier begins with a well resoned reivew of what the arguments for standardization are, and then why she believes that these actually get in the way of achieving high standards. Her article is then followed up with 5 other viewpoints on this debate.

Invective Against Standardized Tests
The title of this book is deceptive; the book is not about whether standards will "save" public education, but rather a poorly-reasoned case against the use of standardized tests. Now it is perfectly true that standardized tests can be misused and misinterpreted, but that is hardly the only way they can be used. In my experience, the New York State Regents examinations have served all three of the following purposes:
1. Provide a statewide minimum standard of academic achievement which means that those students who receive a Regents diploma have a more meaningful credential than a mere school diploma. Prospective employers know what a Regents diploma signifies, whereas they seldom know how much a school diploma means.
2. Protects students against that small minority of teachers who would fail students they don't like. Granted, good teachers far outnumber bad teachers, but this is small consolation to victims of bad teachers. I know whereof I speak. My eighth grade English teacher would have failed me, but for the Regents exam. State law said anyone who passed the Regents passed the course.
3. Alerts state authorities to schools in which students consistently exceed or fall short of the expected level of academic achievement. The high-performing schools can be studied so that other schools can benefit from their methods, and low-performing schools can be helped to improve.
It seems to be this third "benefit" which has Meier up in arms. If the state authorities use the tests as an excuse to punish schools and teachers for below-average performance instead of aiding them to improve, then they are misusing the information from the tests, and this, beyond question, is bad. And it is true that politicians often prefer to withhold state aid from underperforming schools rather than give them the extra help they need to improve. After all, it "saves the taxpayer money" to give the schools less instead of more. It may be great political grandstanding, and it may get votes from the selfish and foolish, but it is a betrayal of the children the state is supposed to be serving. Meier is quite rightly offended by this.
But Meier ignores the baby in her zeal to throw out the bath water. It is not the tests that are at fault, but the politicians that misinterpret and misuse them.
Meier's essay is followed by seven critiques by seven other authors, all of which, in one way or another, miss the point. They all would do well to read John Stanford's book Victory in Our Schools: We Can Give Our Children Excellent Public Education, which presents a program that, in addition to tests to evaluate student achievement and teacher performance, provides help to those teachers and students who are underperforming. Stanford correctly, I believe, assumes that nearly all teachers want to do right by their students, and he stood ready to provide those teachers with leadership, encouragement, and assistance in bettering their performance. Nearly all of them did!

watziznaym@gmail.com ... Read more

Product Description

Welcome to the expanded second edition of Dan Cederholm's best-selling Web Standards Solutions. Web Standards are the standard technology specifications enforced by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) to make sure that web designers and browser manufacturers are using the same technology syntax.

It is important that these implementations are the same throughout the Web, otherwise it becomes a messy proprietary place, and lacks consistency. These standards also allow content to be more compatible with multiple different viewing devices, such as screen readers for people with vision impairments, cell phones, PDFs, etc. HTML, XML, and CSS are all such technologies.

This book is your essential guide to understanding the advantages you can bring to your web pages by implementing web standards and precisely how to apply them. Web standards such as XHTML and CSS are now fairly well-known technologies, and they will likely be familiar to you, the web designer. Indeed, they are all around you on the Web. However, within web standards still lies a challenge: while the browser's support for web standards is steadily increasing, many web developers and designers have yet to discover the real benefits of web standards and respect the need to adhere to them.

The real art is in truly understanding the benefits and implementing the standards efficiently. As a simple example of its power, you can use CSS to lay out your pages instead of nesting tables. This can make file sizes smaller, allowing pages to load faster, ultimately increasing accessibility for all browsers, devices, and web users.

• Expanded edition containing bonus material.
• Teaches how to use Web Standards effectively to build better web sites.
• Solutions style promotes learning by work-through examples and assessments.

What you'll learn

Web Standards Solutions is broken down into 16 short chapters, each covering the theory and practice of different web standards concepts and showing multiple solutions to given problems for easy learning. You'll learn about multi-column layouts, using image replacement techniques to your best advantage, making the best use of tables and lists, and many more. This highly modular approach allows you to rapidly digest, understand, and utilize the essentials of web standards.

• Use XHTML elements correctly so that your markup is compact and more easily understood.
• Use CSS to style different elements of a web page.
• Lay out pages easily and effectively.
• Compare multiple methods of achieving the same results to make better design choices.
• Learn about advanced web design techniques and their important caveats.
• Make your sites more efficient and more accessible.

Who is this book for?

Web developers and designers wanting to learn standards-based techniques to improve their sites%mdash;making them more efficient, more accessible, and transferable across multiple browsers and devices.

Customer Reviews (63)

Good book but not enough
Introductions and conclusions of each chapters are too long. There is a lot of chapters like chapter 1 where the target readers seem very newbie because the author take a while to explain why is bad to create a list withorinstead of

.

All the book is dedicated to CSS but there is not enough CSS.

I think, this is better to buy a book on how to be a master in CSS and a book on how to create clean html and all the best practices will follow naturally.

Practical HTML and CSS Introduction and Reference
Web Standards Solutions is great tool for learning to use HTML and CSS the proper way.After you have studied the basics of HTML and CSS properties, this book will help advance your knowledge further.

Web Standards are a bit iffy as standards to one person can be different to another.In addition, with the different browsers and their incompatibilities its a tough subject to handle.This book does a great job at showing you good practices for you to write cleaner code and explaining the reasoning behind it.

The examples shown are core to every website from clean lists used for navigation to techniques on text replacement.Also explanations of when and what to use tables for as well as avoiding the over excess usage of just throwing in "" all over the place.

Much of the skills and techniques can be found on the web but to have all in one book makes it a ease for reference and to go back to.In addition, the explanations are clear and easy to follow.If you have a bit of knowledge of HTML and CSS already, this will be a good book to further advance those skills in a proper, best practices way.

Cedarholm web standards
clearly and concisely written with good examples Web Standards Solutions: The Markup and Style Handbook, Special Edition

Great for the most part
I picked this book up not too long ago and just got done reading it. I am a web designer with a fair amount of knowledge of HTML, CSS, and web standards so I was familiar with a lot of the concepts. He does have some great nuggets and techniques to make things more accessible. Showing the different solutions to a problem and going over the pros and cons is a nice idea. I definitely picked up more than a few things with this book.

The only reason that I don't give it five stars is that I thought it was a little verbose when it came to explaining things. Some of the things could have been more concise. It wasn't that bad though. If you are have been doing web design for a while,you will find it redundant when he explains CSS properties after he just showed them in the code. Explaining subtleties in the code that are atypical is where the nuggets are. Good book over all. Good read.

Simple, yet effective
While I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone completely new to XHTML/CSS, this book would make the perfect addition to your library if you're passionate about code. I can honestly say that I haven't put this book down since opening it. Would thoroughly recommend for those seeking a standards compliant solution to their markup. ... Read more

Product Description
This latest edition of Milady's Standard Nail Technology contains new and updated information on many subjects including infection control, product chemistry, manicuring, pedicuring, electric filing, monomer liquid and polymer powder nail enhancements and UV gels. Also included is a completely new chapter, The Creative Touch, loaded with the latest nail art mediums and techniques to enhance the learner's experience.In order to make for easier implementation, select editorial content from Milady's Standard Nail Technology and Milady's Standard Cosmetology have been aligned. This new format makes this the most complete resource for students to kick off their nail technology careers.Also included are brand new photographs and art that depict nail technicians performing their work and serving their clients encompassed by more than 400 pieces of art throughout the book, including procedural art. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

VERY poorly proofread, Milady should be ashamed of their self!!!!!!!
To those who merely buy the book just to "learn to do nails" or whatever reason they have for buying it.. sure, its a GREAT book.. cause they don't know any different.For those of us learning from this book in Nail Tech school.. it has MANYYYYY mistakes including the teacher test answer key & state board exam review book!!It does have beautiful updated pics & terminology, but we have to constantly reference the older version to make sure our answers are correct.So why are there 100 proofreaders when clearly they didn't proofread it very well?!!!Shame on Milady!! Sure hope the State Board answers are correct!!:/Yes, Milady will be fixing all these mistakes when they reprint them (who knows when that will be), but what about our books that are wrong?!Guess we're the guinea pigs.. hahaUnfortunately, my instructor might be using the older version for her next class.She is VERY disappointed in this new book!!(FYI) She has 16 yrs experience!!;)Have a great day!!;)

best book in nail tech history
if you are in the nail tech industry, and looking for a book that is pack with information and is easy to follow! Then you should really purchase this item.

GREAT!
I receive my book in an speedy time frame, and it was in good condition.
It was a quick, convenient, and easy process.
I stronly recommend this seller!

Great book, great service
The purchase of this book was great. The price was fantastic and the shipping was fast. Great buy!

It's not the best...but it will do...
I have just finished the nail tech course in my state using this book.Sadly, for being the standard textbook in the industry, the book is riddled with typos and mistakes.
They commonly say things like "course abrasive" instead of "coarse" and the review questions leave a lot to be desired.By finding an older edition I learned that some terminology has changed so you learn one term in a section, but the old term is used in the review questions.Good luck answering the questions when you don't understand what they are talking about!
Worse, your instructor will use the tests provided and I have had to have my grades adjusted repeatedly due to errors on the tests.More often than not, you will have questions that have nothing to do with what you have learned only to find they are questions from the Cosmetology text and not the Nail Tech book.
Overall, hope for a good instructor who catches these errors and will adjust the curriculum accordingly or you may have problems later. ... Read more

Product Description
The Standard of Excellence Comprehensive Band Method Books 1 and 2 combine a strong performance-centered approach with music theory, music history, ear training, listening composition, improvisation, and interdisciplinary and multicultural studies. The result is the most complete band method available anywhere. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Ideal book for beginners
The Standard of Excellence series has long been the top choice among music educators who use method books in their classes.This book is more versatile than Essential Elements or Accent on Achievement.It's great for use in a beginning band class and can be equally effective for an adult who intends to use the book to teach themselves.

Excellent!
The Standard of Excellence Book 1 for the trombone is by far my favorite collection of music for the beginning trombonist.I, myself, just started with the trombone and find this book complete and very well put together.The whole series together makes for a great beginning band as well!

great book for beginners
This is a very good book for thebeginning trombonist. It goes from whole notes to dotted quarter notes pluss alot of the dynamics. ... Read more

Product Description
A companion to Jeffrey Zeldman's Designing with Web Standards, this book approaches standards from a more tactical and instructional point of view. Today's web designers and developers need to update their skills and knowledge and get away from out-of-date table and font-based approaches. In Developing with Web Standards, they will learn current best practices in standards-based development. The topics covered are based on the author's extensive experience from the professional development trenches and will give readers a thorough grounding in contemporary web development technologies and techniques with a focus on relevant emerging aspects of HTML, CSS, and other web standards. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Great Book for Novice
This is a great book for people who are new to web development but eager to learn in a fast way. The book has a solid logical writing style and will be very easy for readers to understand the structure of the content. The book covers traditional topics regarding the history of the web standards and it also brings up many new topics such as HTML 5 and CSS 3. Some other books that give instructions are well written too, but I found them with too much information wrapped up and they could overload readers. I recommend this book to new as well as expert-level web developers to use the book as either a guide or a review.

Great Book - Should be required reading for all web developers
This book is fantastic.Anyone in web development should read this book.It would fix many of the problems that make it so difficult to work with software.I am a frontend developer and I am constantly running into instances where I have to hack around poorly written code.If the other developers I work with would read this book, it would make my life substantially easier.

standards are here to stay - hooray
Designing with Web Standards and Developing with Web Standards immediately replaced almost all of the books of comparable subject material on my book shelf.These books are succinct and cover their respective materials excellently.Other books may shed more light on such specifics as CSS, html markup, design & layout, and typography on the web, but these two books set forth the direction the web is going in and give us overview of how to refocus precisely on that journey now as web developers and designers.Those who learn and follow these practices will create websites that work well on all platforms and browsers from the past, present and well into the future.

An Invaluable Guidebook To Standards Based Web Development
Allsopp's book is a bird's eye view of where standards-based web development is at today and where it's likely to go in the near future. He touches on all the important topics with the discerning eye of a master practitioner. There is no fluff in this book.
Highly recommended.
In the day in and day out work of web development - where you get lost in a succession of small problems - it's easy to lose track of the big picture.
John Allsopp gives you the big picture with just enough detail so that you can go and research what it is he's talking about on your own.
This is one of those books you need on your shelf. You'll find yourself referring to it for general guidance over and over again.
And no matter how much you know, I guarantee you'll find out something very, very basic that, for some reason, you just never thought about much and find out you didn't have it quite right.
Developing With Web Standards is here to set you straight.

The Indispensable Guide
Developing with Web Standards is a lucid and comprehensive guide to building efficient websites now and in the future. It's a terrific reference for experienced coders (as well as being full of tips and techniques they may not know) and the perfect manual for those just getting started. And when I say "manual," I don't mean a dry textbook -- this book is a pleasure to read, from one of the true masters (who also developed a first-rate application for coding CSS). If you are involved in web development, you really should have this book. ... Read more

Product Description
The Standard of Excellence Comprehensive Band Method Books 1 and 2 combine a strong performance-centered approach with music theory, music history, ear training, listening composition, improvisation, and interdisciplinary and multicultural studies. The result is the most complete band method available anywhere. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Standard of Excellence
Thanks to amazon for this.The school was way too expensive, and the nearby music stores were completely ridiculous.So I ordered it here.Came fast, great price....Superb! ... Read more

Product Description
Already the acclaimed choice of thousands of successful organizations including the American Library Association, the Fourth Edition features an all-new chapter that considers the ways the Internet and other state-of-the-art technologies have rewritten the rules of today's meetings and conventions. This easy-to-use, paperback volume--the popular alternative to Robert's Rules--is the most comprehensive, understandable, and logical guide to smooth-running, professional meetings.Alice Sturgis was a practicing parliamentarian and consultant to national and international professional and business organizations. She taught at Stanford University and the University of California. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (12)

My 3rd Copy
As Secretary of a Kennel Club, just what I needed to keep up to date on the subtle changes in Parliamentary Procedures.For a non-profit club of volunteers, much easier to use and understand than Roberts Rules of Order

Parliamentary Procedure book
The book gives the rules to be followed when conducting meetings. This is a wonderful and clear book, however it does not really deal with modern meetings which are increasingly held online, especially in volunteer groups. It does however help to show how procedures should be used to keep order even online.

Easier to use than Robert's
My organization"the Arc of the United States uses The Standard Code of Parliamentary Procedure for all of its meetings. We find that the Standard Code of Parliamentary Procedure is a lot easier to use than Robert's Rules of Order.

very happy, a good product and a concise review
This is the primary text for this topic. It is well written, concise, accurate, and essential to those who desire accuracy in parliamentary processes.

Easy to Use
The Standard Code of Parliamentary Procedure is not the kind of read that once you pick it up you just can't put it down, but it is an easy to use reference book for those leading meetings and their parliamentarians. ... Read more

Product Description
Prentice Hall's most important C programming title in years. A companion volume to Kernighan & Ritchie's C PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE. A collection of reusable functions (code for building data structures, code for performing math functions and scientific calculations, etc.) which will save C programmers time and money especially when working on large programming projects. The C Library is part of the ANSI (American National Standard Institute) for the C Language. This new book contains the complete code for the library. It covers elements of the library with which even the most experienced C programmers are not familiar such as internationalization (the ability to write programs that can adapt to different cultural locales, for example, using the C library, programmers can write software that manipulates large character sets such as Kanji). Structured like the Standard C Library, it contains 15 headers declaring or defining all of the names in the library. A separate chapter covers each header, including excerpts from relevant portions of the C Standard showing all codes needed to implement each portion of the library and explaining why it is necessary. The book teaches readers the concepts and design issues associated with library building. Using this book, programemrs will be less likely to re-code something that already exists in a given program. Plauger is one of the world's leading experts on C and the C Library. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (14)

The Standard C Library
Although the information in this book is crucial for C Programming, I was disappointed in the quality of the print.Some of the words are not even legible.

Industry Standard since I can remember
The Standard C Library has been an industry reference for real-time operation since it was introduced. Through many versions (K&R, ANSI, etc.) and revisions it has remained THE go-to book when you need to know how a standard library function works. Recommended for anyone using C, C++, C# etc. when you want to know how it REALLY works... and will remain a classic.

A "Must Have" Reference Book
When I bought this book, in college, I really didn't understand it. It didn't really give me much information, just had a bunch of code from the C standard libraries in it.

I picked it back up a few years after I started working in the real world and now had enough experience to realize what a gem this thing was. It basically implements (full source code) all the standard libraries. It let's you see how things work on the inside. It shows structs and accessible items that you may otherwise not even know it exists.

The best part is the source for standard library functions. This is a super handy gem if you are doing embedded code that doesn't have OS support. It was a wonderful help to me that let me write a few of the standard C functions that were handy to use when in an embedded environment where those functions weren't available. Many of these I could have done myself, but only with much though, time and testing. From here its virtually free.

This is a MUST HAVE book to any hard core C/C++ developer.

A Fantastic Resource!
Essential for C programmers who want to use as many library functions as possible to avoid reinventing the wheel. A must have.

A real programmer!
People sometimes make jokes about people who call them self's real programmers (and vise versa). But this is a book that a real programmer will have on their bookshelf as reference material, along with their copy of "The C++ Programming Language" and others. I have not referred to this book in years, but I have never regretted the purchase. It is rare that someone who probably wrote the library that you are using writes a book on it. So even though it is very technical, it is a must have for anyone who wishes to meet the same standards as "The Standard". ... Read more

Product Description
The complete Holman Christian Standard Bible® is nowavailable for the first time ever! More than fifteen years in themaking, crafted by the shared expertise of nearly a hundredconservative scholars and English stylists, the HCSB® sets thestandard in painstaking biblical accuracy and pure literary form.

Accurate, yet highly readable, it’s a translation committed to leaving both the grace and gravity of the original languages intact while carefully creating a smooth flow of wording for the reader.

Stylistically, this inaugural edition contributes to the clarity ofthe written Word, arranging the poetic portions of the Scripture intocomplete lines of thought, and revering God’s presence on each page bycapitalizing all the pronouns that refer to Him.

New Bible translations may not be all that uncommon anymore, but thisone certainly is. Most importantly, it’s a translation you can trust.

• Full-color hardcover
• Durably bound for years of use
• Words of Christ in red
• Large, easy-to-read typeface
• Plan of salvation
• Table of Weights and Measures
• Where to Turn When…
• The Ten Commandments
• Life of Jesus Christ
• Miracles and Parables of Jesus
• The Twelve Apostles
• Prophecies of Jesus' Second Coming
• Lord, Teach Us to Pray ... Read more

Customer Reviews (23)

Holy Bible Holman Christian Standard Bible: Red-Letter Text Edition
This bible is a requirement for my child's class.She will be using this bible for the remaining 9 years.I am pleased that the words Jesus spoke are outlined in red for the purposes of easier reading and understanding.

HCSB - Several Steps in the Right Direction
A Bible translation's value can be judged on how successfully it fulfilled the objectives of the translators.In the case of the Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB), those objectives included providing an accurate, readable Bible in contemporary English; providing serious Bible students with an accurate translation for personal study and private devotions; and to "affirm the authority of Scripture as God's Word and to champion its absolute truth."The translators also wised to provide "a standard in Bible translations for years to come."

Not all of those objectives are completely fulfilled in a translation that uses the "Optimal Equivalence" theory of translation, as the HCSB does.While parting from a literal translation of the ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek texts is both necessary and useful in some instances, for the sake of clarity of expression, it also opens up the way for eisegesis and doctrinal interpretation to guide the text.Of course, all translators have their theological presuppositions, and the HCSB translators are at least upfront as to theirs.But the faithful, accurate translator has always to restrain the desire to refashion the text according to a preconceived determination.

But this Bible translation is definitely readable, and enjoyably so.It is up-to-date in its language, yet faithful to a broad Christian consensus in its expressions.

Still, for the serious Christian student or minister, it is best to read it in harmony with more literal translations, if not the Hebrew and Greek critical texts themselves.

Another step in the right direction is the use of the specific name of God, YHWH (in the form "Yahweh" and "Yah") in this version.Unfortunately, it does so only a few times, whereas the Hebrew text itself contains God's name nearly 7,000 times.It would have served the purpose of the use of "Yahweh" more sufficiently -- to demonstrate that "the word LORD in English is a title of God and does not accurately convey to modern readers the emphasis on God's name in the original Hebrew" (Introduction) -- if, indeed, the HCSB itself had appropriately enshrined
that "emphasis on God's name" by making more thorough and consistent use of it.As it stands, the vibrant tree of "Yahweh" in the HCSB is nearly lost in a forest of "LORD"'s.

But the HCSB is a very timely and proficient addition to the library of the serious Christian and scholar.

Love this version
Easy to read... I love that they keep the pronouns of diety in caps! Why did the modern translations stop, anyway? It's a distraction when I read other translations that have stopped.

Really nice
This is the Bible I take to church with me.The one I read is in tatters with yellow pages, it's so old.But this one is really nice.I like that the language is modernized; most churches I've been to are using these modern versions now.There is reference material in here, and notations at the bottom of every page to better explain things.It is really a great bible, and would make a superb gift for someone.The hardback cover will keep the pages from curling, too.

A much better modern translation this is
This is indeed a much accurate modern bible translation. In my last 15 years of collection i have collected nearly every english bible i could find. Mofatt, God's Word, NLT, KJV, NKJV, RSV, NRSV, Amplified, CEV, ASV, NASB, NIV, LB...you name it.

For modern translation i would rate the unbiased and accuracy of this Holman translation as one of the best along with ESV.

The worst? CEV, NIV. ... Read more

Product Description
5-1/4" X 8" Trim Size, Presentation Page, Black Letter Edition,Concordance, 10 Full-page Maps.

Discover the truth in the inspired Word of God by reading the NewAmerican Standard Bible. The updated edition continues the NASB'scommitment to accuracy while increasing clarity andreadability. Vocabulary, grammar, and sentence structure have beencarefully updated for greater understanding and smoother reading. TheNASB remains the most literally accurate Bible in the Englishlanguage. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (16)

Good, affordable, but very small print
This Bible is a good value and it's compact; however, just know that the print is very small.

Not What the Publisher Claims It to Be
I have noted some professional reviews on the Updated NASB. I thought it interesting that it still claims to be the most literal translation used commonly in churches. I will have to disagree. I compared the UNASB with the NKJV, the latter being, in my opinion, more literal than the UNASB, though not maybe moreso than the NASB of the 60's and 70's.

Both the UNASB and NKJV provide column referencing for more literal translation when the translators were less formal in the actual text.But what I found is that the UNASB had to do this far more often than the NKJV (I became fatigued with having to look over at the reference column). And I found that in more cases, the less literal translation was less supported by the original language and more interpreted by the translators. If I was to return to NASB use, it would have to be the earlier version. I never found it difficult to read or stilted in its flow. In fact, back in the 70's and 80's when I and many believers were using the NASB, I never heard a complaint about it being a stiff translation (I think the issue points more accurately to a lessening of literacy in our country).

I feet the update was not justified, for readability and certainly not for accuracy. And the earlier was certainly more accurate. For translations using Greek outside of the Received Text or Majority Text, certainly the UNASB would be the most literal, 2nd to its predecessor. But compared translation for translation, the NKJV is more literal and less interpreted in the text itself.

Finally, it sometimes takes on the words and phrasing of the NIV, which is dynamic equivalence (i.e., interpreted, not translated) in a high percentage of passages.

Bible
This Bible is small enough to carry to and from Church and Bible classes.It was delivered in great shape and the condition was great.

Great gift Bible
This is a great gift Bible. The imitation leather looks nice and is a step above the paperback Bibles. We especially appreciate this Bible for prison ministry. Besides being inexpensive, the helps and maps are very beneficial also.

NASB
Most probably the best Bible I have owned. The NASB is probably the closest English translation to the original Hebrew and Greek, and is very easy to understand. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Work Breakdown Structures
Excellent tool for project managers; it helps simplifies the process of creating detailed project tasks. ... Read more

Product Description
What is 'Standard' Bidding? This is an increasingly hard question to answer, but the proliferation of bridge on the Internet in pickup partnerships makes it imperative that someone does so. Perhaps the most popular natural system for the hundreds of thousands of online players worldwide is the Standard American Yellow Card, or SAYC. In this book, for the first time, SAYC is fully described and explained. This will be an invaluable to aid to anyone wanting to learn and understand SAYC, or anyone who simply knows the basics and is eager to fill in the missing pieces in their repertoire. Ned Downey and Ellen Pomer, the authors, are experienced bridge teachers and partners in the 'Bridge Forum' web site. Ned also teaches bridge via the Swan Games online playing site. Ellen is well-known on the Internet under her handle 'Caitlin', and regularly writes for various magazines on Internet bridge. This title gives basic introduction to the standard bidding conventions used on bridge websites. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (14)

Easy to read yet extensive information
This book gives you a readable and complete explanation of the ACBL Standard Yellow Card bidding sequences. I started out by downloading (for free) and studying yellow card from the [...]website but soon grew weary being tied to the computer so I purchased this book. The book gives you portability and immediate access to a particular topic. The book makes it easier to skim subjects you already know well and bore in where you need to. The book is well organized and its Table of Contents makes it easier to refer back to brush up on a selected bidding sequence. There are nineteen chapters on bidding, which cover every situation that I expect to encounter and taught me about several new bidding sequences, e.g., Michaels and the Unusual Notrump, that have proved to be very useful during play. The twentieth chapter is an excellent refresher on standards leads.

not a simple subject . . .
SAYC is frequently thought of as rigid and simple. This book clearly refutes that view.

I read it three times and still refer to it
I found this book in a local bookstore and have since read it cover to cover three times, and still find myself looking up sections. I've read something like 150 bridge books but this is the simplest introduction to the standard bidding system used for online bridge. Even if you want to move on to 2/1, you need a thorough grounding in SAYC and Ellen's book provides it. She also happens to be an expertin 2/1 as well, as I later discovered when I "met" her at Bridge Base Online.I suggest reading the book once in a few sittings - I did so in a weekend - then carefully re-reading it over subsequent weeks, paying particular attention to the many hands and bidding situations. If you're new to online bridge, look no further. If you're a face-to-face tourney player wanting to move to 2/1, you'll still need the solid grounding in SAYC that this book provides.

A book defining a "standard" that isn't.
The problem with SAYC is that it isn't a standard in the sense that no official body ever carefully reviewed it and called for comments, voted, etc. In fact, there are several areas now where common practice differs from what the standard says. An example is a bid of 2N over a 1 of a minor opening -- SAYC says this is 13-15, but most now play it as 11-12. The book is good at pointing these things out.

The best thing about this book is that it exists and is inexpensive, meaning you can get one for a demented partner, a beginner, etc. The worst thing is the lack of an index, which one can hope would be remedied in a second edition. I think the authors chose the right level of detail for the beginning and intermediate players. I read another review that complained about the coverage of the "SAYC conventions". In fact, I think they are all in here -- it is just that there are lots of conventions that many SAYC players also play. A good book for those is the two-volume set of "25 Conventions" by Seagram et. al.

Great title for taking bidding to the next level
I have been playing bridge for about 3 months and found myself getting into trouble during bidding.My partner would make a cue bid, or a reverse and I wouldn't quite get what was going on.The books I had learned basic bridge from didn't cover these intermediate bridge topics.I knew I needed to improve my bidding in order to improve beyond beginner.

This is a great book for that purpose.You won't find a lot of fluff and puff.The chapters are short and to the point.There are dozens of hands throughout to show different examples of how to bid, how to overbid and how to respond.Unlike other books, wherein the authors hold themselves out as the ultimate experts, this book brings forth opinions from the great bridge masters.It presents these often conflicting opinions objectively and makes recommendations, but in the end letting the reader adapt these opinions to his or her playing style.

This book will benefit beginner and intermediate players who play on the internet or at a duplicate bridge club.I highly recommend this title to anyone learning bridge or as a gift to your regular partner!

... Read more

Product Description
Consistent, high-quality coding standards improve software quality, reduce time-to-market, promote teamwork, eliminate time wasted on inconsequential matters, and simplify maintenance. Now, two of the world's most respected C++ experts distill the rich collective experience of the global C++ community into a set of coding standards that every developer and development team can understand and use as a basis for their own standards.

The authors cover virtually every facet of C++ programming: design and coding style, functions, operators, class design, inheritance, construction/destruction, copying, assignment, namespaces, modules, templates, genericity, exceptions, STL containers and algorithms, and more. Each standard is described concisely, with practical examples. From type definition to error handling, this book presents C++ best practices, including some that have only recently been identified and standardized--techniques you may not know even if you've used C++ for years. Along the way, you'll find answers to questions like

What's worth standardizing--and what isn't? What are the best ways to code for scalability?What are the elements of a rational error handling policy? How (and why) do you avoid unnecessary initialization, cyclic, and definitional dependencies?When (and how) should you use static and dynamic polymorphism together?How do you practice "safe" overriding?When should you provide a no-fail swap? Why and how should you prevent exceptions from propagating across module boundaries?Why shouldn't you write namespace declarations or directives in a header file?Why should you use STL vector and string instead of arrays?How do you choose the right STL search or sort algorithm?What rules should you follow to ensure type-safe code?Whether you're working alone or with others, C++ Coding Standards will help you write cleaner code--and write it faster, with fewer hassles and less frustration. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (28)

One of the Best C++ Books I Have Read
C++ Coding Standards is one of the best books about C++ that I have read, although I feel the title can be somewhat misleading.When the average programmer thinks "coding standard", their mind probably thinks of a crusty old document on their company wiki somewhere that tells them exactly how to lay out their curly brackets.This book is not that at all, but rather an awesome collection of C++ wisdom that should be useful to anyone using the language.Sutter and Alexandrescu write in a wonderful conversational style that reading this book is almost like sitting down for a chat with these two masters of C++ and software development.

I've learned a lot from this book, and it's a fantastic resource for C++ developers of all skill levels.Highly recommended!

Excellent catalogue of best practices
I think this is one of the most useful C++ books one could have if working in a team. Most companies don't have a very large set of coding standards, and every now and then there will be a discussion about which is the best way to implement something. That's when this book shines:

1) You can show your co-workers the page for the related item, and the explanation for the underlying rationale will be so concise, they can read it while standing.
2) Every item is backed with heavy references to standard works by the top names in C++.

Basically it is a tool for effectively ending discussions in the most constructive way possible.

It's the supreme index into the world of collected C++ knowledge.

Disappointing
I had high expectations about the fruit of the association of 2 authors that I appreciate but the result did not meet these expectations. Basically this book provides 101 rules or guidelines that you can get for free by looking at the table of content. Each of these rules is then followed by a very short explanation (1 or 2 pages usually). In my opinion, most of them are common wisdom that you can get from other sources. This is it. That is all you will get from this book. For that reason, I recommend to skip this one except if a convenient and compact collection of common knowledge is something that you are looking for.

It is just a brief repeating of other books from the same Author
If you own the 3 "Exception C++" books, do not buy this book. It is just a mirror copy of those. And the explanation in this book is brief. Typically, if you are familiar with the content of this book, it works as a quick reference manual or pocket book.

Readable, pithy, sensible, 'greatest hits' round up of advice on C++
It's Sutter! It's Alexandrescu! It's both of them together! And the dark lords of C++ have combined forces to produce... er, some coding standards.

Yes, another book of best practices. Some readers may therefore be a tad disappointed that the combined fruits of the authors' labours will not be shattering their puny human minds with the sort of C++ that cause lesser compilers to accidentally create black holes that destroy the entire universe.

But let's evaluate the book on what it sets out to do, which is to give 100 bite-sized pieces of advice on C++ coding. And it's very good. You might prefer to see it as an annotated guide to the state of the art in intermediate C++ programming, in particular to Sutter's Exceptional C++ trilogy, which has become sufficiently sprawling that a reorganisation of the material, plus pointers to which book said what, has become quite welcome.

Yes, it's true that C++ is hardly short of books telling you when to pass by value. But take a look at the bibliography - it's a synthesis of all those other tomes (the Effective series, Sutter's own Exceptional series of course, and older books like C++ Strategy and Tactics) plus magazine articles, into a neat and compact whole.

Few of the items are longer than one or two pages. This is good because the advice stays simple, clear and direct. On the other hand, some of the items feel a bit squeezed into the available space, with discussion deferred to the books in the references, which is a little frustrating on occasion. After all, a lot of the best parts of the Exceptional C++ and Effective C++ series and their ilk is not so much what to do (or not to do), but the why behind it. There's plenty of the former, but not so much of the latter.

If you've read any other coding convention books (like those in Steve McConnell's Code Complete) then the first quarter of the book may feel like the same old same old. And of course with there being exactly 100 items, some are more heavyweight than others. But there's definite C++ meat here, in particular with the items on Exceptions and the STL.

C++ Coding Standards is as well-written as you'd expect from the authors - their friendly, slightly conversational writing styles mesh nicely and I couldn't tell who wrote which bits. And it's a great summary and unification of C++ best practices that someone just starting out could easily refer to in their initial forays. Perhaps even more experienced hands will discover a few tips, implications or issues that they hadn't considered before. It could also be a good way to ensure that a team are all up to date on best practices.

Essential for those with a large C++ library? Probably not, but it does the job it sets out to do very well. ... Read more

Product Description
5-1/4" X 8" Trim Size, Black Letter Edition, Concordance, 10 Full-page Maps.

Discover the truth in the inspired Word of God by reading the NewAmerican Standard Bible. The updated edition continues the NASB'scommitment to accuracy while increasing clarity andreadability. Vocabulary, grammar, and sentence structure have beencarefully updated for greater understanding and smoother reading. TheNASB remains the most literally accurate Bible in the Englishlanguage. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

The Lord's Word...
Excellent Customer Service Skills.Very satisfied with the product and the price!Shipping was a breeze!The Lord's word is detailed in this Bible very clearly and is easy for readers.The cover is strong and durable.Purchased for our Bible class and expectations far exceeded our belief's!Don't pass up the chance to shop with this Seller you will not be disappointed!

God Bless :))

Good for young person or student
I chose this Bible for my 12 yo student.It has a good cover and it is bound well.It lays on the table flat and can take a lot of abuse.The print is a pretty good size for young ones who may still have a bit of reading difficulty.The words of Jesus are not in red which is a good thing as the red letters fade with time.Good price for the product.It should last for years.

A Fine Addition to a Bible Collection
The Bible is a very difficult work to perform a review. Many reviews of it are biased towards the opinion of the author, their theological point of view, understanding and general attitude. Therefore, I will state first up that I hail from the High Church of England and tend not to err too far from its general theological outlook and opinions. I grew up reading only the King James, or Authorised, version of the bible. Although I did occasionally find its expression a little difficult to understand - after all it was commissioned close to four centuries ago - I've never found any particular reason to move too far away from it, and in fact will often consult one of its revisions, the New King James version if I can't understand it.

That said, I purchased a NASB (despite being able to consult it for free on various free bible gateways on the Internet) because I wanted to experience a subtly different "literal" translation of the bible and especially the gospel. I am not one to claim that a "literal translation" is always the most appropriate translation for the bible - I believe the various thought for thought translations serve their purpose in the scheme of things - I tend to prefer versions that steer closer to a "literal" rendering rather than a "thought for thought" rendering. I am finding the choices the translators of the NASB have made both interesting and thought provoking and whilst it is not the easiest read for a modern reader (although I'd argue that the KJV is more difficult, only because of its use of the elder English used), it is certainly not unreadable.

Consequently, my goal was to experience a different but "literal" translation. Rather than rely on one set of translators - or my own translation were I to learn the original sources and somehow decide "which" set of "original" manuscripts or compilations of manuscripts to translate - I've found this bible to be immensely useful. That said, I still prefer the language of the KJV if only because I personally find it a familiar form to read - were I stuck on an island with only an NASB, I don't believe I would be lacking in the bible's wisdom.

Onto more material matters.

The binding and covers are sturdy but as others have mentioned, the paper is not particularly thick. In addition it is prone to creasing. That said, it is a tradeoff between the font size, the paper thickness and the overall size of the book. It is, all in all, a reasonable compromise although my only criticism of its format is the paper thickness; I have a KJV which is just as readable, with the same amount of pages but with thicker paper; the font is slightly smaller but still legible for me and my eye sight isn't what it used to be.

Given an English bible is, by definition, a translation from a number of even more ancient texts, it would be unfair to expect any individual translation to be perfect. However, if you are seeking a more literal rendition of the extant texts, whose style is modern, albeit at times complex, English, this is a fair translation to consult or even use.

This is my #1 Bible now.
It's a fine Bible. I'm not a Bible scholar but if this was a literal translation why isn't Jesus called "Joshua" or "Yahshua"? Anyway, I like that it's Hardcovered. But I didn't like the really "thin" (for lack of a better word) pages. They remind of an old pocket-sized KJV New Testament Gideon Bible I had.I just prefer they not be so thin that you can easily see what's on the other side of the page. It's still worth it though, I got over it. The Maps & the Concordance was great. I paid $10.00 for this Bible. I think it was worth it.

God's word in modern English
The New American Standard Bible (NASB) is described by those who know about biblical languages and their translation, as the most accurate of the modern English translations.I've used the New International Version (NIV) but am now reading the NASB to see how it compares.

Other than that, what can one say?It is the word of God.The words of man and his or her ideas don't begin to compare. ... Read more

Product Description
The book military firearms collectors have come to know and trust keeps getting better! In addition to updated values and bayonet listings, a collectable clips and magazines section has been added making this a one-stop guide for collectors needing accurate, up-to-the-minute pricing. Over 1,600 photographs detail the world?s greatest military firearms of the last 130 years. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (16)

Review
brilliant. An extremely spellbinding work. This exercise in brilliant analysis and insight would make even experts of history like Joe McCarthy proud.

On Standard Catalog of Military Firearms: The Collector's Price and Reference Guide
If you have any interest in C&R collecting or hold an FFL then this periodical should be a well-worn tool on your bookshelf.

Not impressed
As many of the reviewers pointed out, just a basic description of the weapons.Variations of individual weapons may be pointed out, but prices for those variations aren't necessarily mentioned.It typically only refers to the primary manufacturer of a weapon, even though other arsenals may have supplied the same weapon (which can mean a substantial pricing difference), the variations probably won't be there or barely mentioned. Also remember this is a MILITARY gun book, if you have a commercial version of the weapon or import for civilian sale it is most likely not there at all(AK-47s, AR-15 etc).I also expected some mention of importers and their markings to help identify the weapons.You can get as good or better information from most of the gun forums on the internet.

Collectors bible
Every year it improves....more info, better detail, only wished the printed pitures had better detail.....

Reference
This book is a great reference for the Gun collector and firearm enthusiast. The material is well written and a good pointto search for values on military firearms. ... Read more

Product Description

Solve any mechanical engineering problem quickly and easily with the world's leading engineering handbook

Nearly 1800 pages of mechanical engineering facts, figures, standards, and practices, 2000 illustrations, and 900 tables clarifying important mathematical and engineering principle, and the collective wisdom of 160 experts help you answer any analytical, design, and application question you will ever have.

Customer Reviews (27)

Marks' Handbook for Mech eng's - A definitie keeper for reference!
I bought the 10th (80th Anniversary) edition back in 1996 right after I graduated from University as I found myself having to refer to it while at University. Since then, I've referred to it 2 or 3 times !!! I'm not in core engineering - but it's good to have close at hand. It just feels better having it in my desk overhead.

It is well laid out and gives you most of the engineering theories and formulas you once knew and is very handy for refreshing the old neurons! The pages are very thin so be careful. Keep it away from the kids!

Like an espresso shot of engineering knowledge
Marks' is legend among reference handbooks for engineering and for good reason, the book combines excellent commentary from industry and academic experts with plenty of formulas, tables and diagrams.It lists the references for each section right at the beginning along with the authors which is convenient if you want to dig deeper into the knowledge area.

Mechanical Engineering is a very wide area and while you study many topics in school, unless you actively use them professionally your knowledge gets fuzzy.For this reason having a handbook like this one is a great way to refresh your memory or learn about topics you haven't spent much time with before going on to more specific books on the topic.I still find it amazing how much information is squeezed into each section and readers will see that the knowledge density is staggering.

It is because of Marks' section on Welding that I learned about, and subsequently purchased, the excellent books on Welded Structures and Weldment Design from Lincoln Electric written by Omer Blodgett.I would have never run across these books in a store and despite being written in the 1960s, and mentioning slide rules, they contain a wealth of practical knowledge about welded steel structures still relevant today.You just can do the calculations on a computer and skip the nomograms these days, though I still like the nomograms ability to build your intuition of how a result will end up.

I can be confident from following that chain of references that other areas of Marks' would lead to similar quality references should I need them, and that is why this handbook is worth its weight in gold.

Good Book
Very useful book.Better than a stack of old college textbooks.Used this during the PE exam and also as a routine reference book as an engineer at a power plant.Worth the money.

Handy Reference Manual
Unlike some of the reviewers, I have not had buyer's remorse (yet). I don't use Mark's Handbook a lot, but it has been providing the answers to my questions when I've looked for them. Good index. I would also recommend you take a look at the Mechanical Engineering Reference Manual for the PE Exam, by Mike Lindeburg.

Excellent Engineering Book
The book version I purchased has a blue cover, not the green one pictured.But the appearence does not matter.This is an excellent engineering text that covers nearly all aspects of engineering (materials, electrical and even automotive).I highly recommend this text for those looking for a single engineering reference point. ... Read more

Product Description
The Manual of Standard Tibetan presents the everyday speech of Lhasa, as it is currently used in Tibet as well as amongst the Tibetan diaspora. It not only places the language in its natural context, but also highlights along the way key aspects of Tibetan civilization and Vajrayana Buddhism.

The Manual, which consists of forty-one lessons, is illustrated with many drawings and photographs, and also includes two informative political and linguistic maps of Tibet. Two CDs provide an essential oral complement to the Manual. A detailed introduction presents a linguistic overview of spoken and written Tibetan. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

Good for spoken Tibetan, but unpolished
I've been studying Tibetan for 2 months intensively and so this was the fifth textbook in a row that I've gone through (after a small locally produced one from Lhasa by Ellen Bartee, Goldstein's "Essentials of Modern Lit. Tibetan", Wilson's "Translating Buddhism from Tibetan" and finally Preston's "How to Read Classical Tibetan
Vol. 1"), and I have to say that comprehensive and practical as this book is, it was by far my least favorite.

The main thing to know is that the overwhelming emphasis here is on the spoken/auditory portion of the book, and a colloquial/idiomatic form of Tibetan. If you are aiming for an understanding of literary Tibetan this is utterly the wrong book (see Goldstein instead), and if your interest is more specifically in Classical Tibetan this book will be totally useless (instead see Wilson and then Preston's two excellent volumes).

Some things are done very well here, and others not so much, so let me break it down that way.

On the positive side:
(1) A huge vocabulary of some 2000+ words, not to mention a two-way glossary (most textbooks only have Tibetan-English glossaries)
(2) Audio recordings of all the major dialogues at the beginning of each lesson and the longer readings, great for learning the correct pronunciation of Lhasa-style Tibetan and for getting an ear for listening to native speakers.
(3) Answer keys, supplementary online material, etc., as mentioned by other reviewers.
(4) The authors obviously have a great love for their subject, and the book includes lots of cultural information on Tibetan beliefs and customs, maps of the country, lengthy discussions of different dialect groups and so on. This is much appreciated and if this is your first introduction to Tibetan culture in general you will certainly learn a lot.

Aggravating Features:
(1) The written portion of the book (that is, ignoring the audio recordings) is sloppy in many, many ways, and I'm surprised no one else has mentioned this. The book is nicely divided into 41 short and digestible lessons (almost always under 10 pages each). These begin with a dialogue in Tibetan, and in the more advanced lessons often a short reading as well, followed by a vocabulary section relating to these readings. Problem: often key vocabulary words seem to be missing in these sections. More annoying, new words seem to be somewhat randomly introduced into the vocabulary sections as you go, with no context whatsoever and no practice exercises to help you learn them. Sometimes, entire huge lists of vocabulary will be introduced that have no relation whatsoever to the preceding dialogue, e.g. a lesson on going to the doctor is suddenly followed by a list of the Tibetan words for the 30-40 most common animals in Tibet (this isn't a direct example, I've forgotten the particular instances, but it is representative). Is this really going to help a beginner? The "Civilization" sections found at the end of most lessons suffer from a similar unrealistic bent, suddenly introducing the names of the 20 or so biggest rivers in Tibet, or something similar. Not that this information is 'bad,' but is it really of any use to someone trying to gain a functional grasp of the language? I would say not.

(2) The readings introduced in the lessons also seem to have just been thrown in. So in a lesson where the main object is a dialogue that illustrates the situation of having a car breakdown and looking for accommodation, suddenly there is a reading drawn from Tibetan folk stories. Again, the reading/information isn't 'bad', but where is the consistency? The vocabulary section which follows then has you simultaneously memorizing words for 'gasoline' and for 'ritual brass butter lamp container' or something along these lines. Further, some of the translations for the readings are missing entire lines of text - not a big deal if you already know the language, but a frustration for someone trying to puzzle through it for the first time.

(3) The system of transliteration is a headache. Like many authors, these ones felt the need to introduce their own new system to 'improve' upon existing ones. Thus 'Dorje' a common name and ritual implement, which is pretty much pronounced the way you'd think, is now rendered 'Torce.' Shigatse, Tibet's second-largest city, is now spelled with a Z. How is this helping anyone? The new system is anything but intuitive. Further, it diverges from the Standardized systems used in most other textbooks and essentially every scholarly work and translation, so if you move on to any of those you will have to learn the standard systems of transliteration anyway!

(4) Following these dialogue/reading/vocabulary portions of each lesson, there are dense and difficult explanations of grammatical terms or aspects (sometimes related to what you've just been reading, sometimes not), along with some sentences that illustrate their use. Problem: these many sentences illustrating key grammar have no corresponding vocabulary sections telling you what individual words mean (and often new vocab is introduced here), and no interlinear translation, so it's difficult to look up words in the glossary at the back on your own.

(5) As someone else pointed out, the book seems in dire need of a classroom instructor and many further exercises to supplement these numerous faults, and so as a self-learner I found it frequently frustrating.

Overall this is still a worthy contribution to a very small field (Tibetan language instruction),the high quality auditory part of the book making it the best modern textbook for Spoken Tibetan. In spite of this, the 'book' (written) portion especially has a very unpolished and somewhat careless feel to it, despite its depth. It is in need of a good once over from an editor, and more consistency within the lessons' vocabulary sections and between dialogues and readings. But if you're looking to learn Spoken Tibetan it will be a huge resource - and in any case you don't really have many other options!

Recommended, with the above qualifications.

Great introduction to Tibetan
This is a great textbook for spoken and written Tibetan. The dialogues are useful and the cds that go along with them are very good. They start with a slow reading of the text,and then go at a more conversational speed, thus your ears can get used to Tibetan step-by-step using the cds. The pronunciation of Lhasa Tibetan is used throughout the textbook, and it is described in detail at the beginning of the book in the introduction.

The vocabulary always is given in Tibetan script and phonetic transcript. And the grammar sections are clear and concise.

One thing that I really like about this textbook is the way it explains the relationship between spelling and pronunciation. All of the other textbooks on Tibetan that I have seen either don't get into that, or they just explain that the spelling is not phonetic and leave it at that. Few and far between is a Tibetan textbook that actually will explain the details of the spelling system and how that impacts pronunciation, and this one does. Which for anyone trying to learn how to read and write the language, this is fundamental. Thus this book gets 5 stars!

Fantastic Study Guide
This is the best Tibetan language resource on the market - the CDs which are included are fantastic.

Great book for learning Tibetan
Great book. Had used it before in a Tibetan class at a university but lost it. The informative sections in each chapter also helped prepare me when I went over to Dharamsala to study. The author included great colloquial additions!

Intense detail, linguists will love. Little much for a beginner and the phonetic spelling seems a little weird.
Love it. CDs are great. slow speed conversations then the same ones at normal speed. Lots of context and description and comparisons to other languages - as a beginning Tibetan student and long time Dharma practitioner, I highly recommend! ... Read more

Product Description
This is the primary supplement to Milady's Standard Esthetics:Fundamentals. The Exam Review contains chapter-by-chapter questions in a multiple-choice format to help students prepare for their state board exams. The answer key at the back of the book allows students to check accuracy and identify weak areas. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

Good stuff!
I needed this book for a course that i am taking. It is very thorough and easy to follow.

good but too much politically correct
This is a good book but the attempt to be politically correct ( something very common nowadays ) backfires a little. It was to be expected that when the authors selected models for the photos showing
facial procedures that they selected people with lighter skin so that readers could easily see the differences between the stages of the procedures. As it is, they selected models with dark skin, so one picture is just like all the others. The basic step-by-step facial in chapter 14 illustrates this clearly. They might as well have taken just one photo and repeated it throughout the procedure; the result would have been the same.

studying aid!
Got this for my daughter to study for her esthetician boards...it was the only one recommended.She is doing a little every day.Her boards are in Dec, so we will see how good it is!

Milady's New 10th edition Standard Esthatics Fundamentals
Milady's Standard Esthetics Fundamentals: 10th Edition
This is a great new updated edition on this subject.It has been updated to the industry in the 21st century techniques.This provides cutting edge information.Excellent for anyone who wants to study the subject for the first time or brush up. ... Read more