1 comments about Frommer's(r) Portable Phoenix and Scottsdale, 2nd Edition.

1. I have not yet travelled to Phoenix, which is, of course, the whole purpose behind my purchase of this travel guide.

   Something tells me, though, that all of the sights and attractions of Phoenix and Scottsdale cannot be summarized in 25 or so small pages (this travel guide is as wide as a wallet and only twice as tall, hence the "small pages" bit). I am not impressed with this travel guide. Frommer's, as many people have come to know, usually published travel guides with complete, well-researched information, and rarely do you need another travel guide if you've purchased a Frommer's first.

   Not so with this one, unless all you do in Phoenix is eat and sleep-- literally. I say this because well over half of the book (est. 65%) is devoted to restaurants and hotels (and it's not a very long book (150pps not including the index). If this book was retitled "Frommer's Guide to the Best of Phoenix/Scottsdale Restaurants and Hotels," this book would have won my five star rating.

   Now, in all fairness, the reviews for the restaurants and lodgings have been very influential factors in my decisions on where I will be staying and where I would like to eat. Again, the restaurants and accomodations chunk of the book is quite informative.

   But too much of the book is devoted to where to eat, where to stay, and then "where to eat and stay outside Phoenix/Scottsdale." And there is a disproportionately large section of the book given to advice to international travellers, which for any USofA citizen is a waste of paper.

   As I mentioned before, there is not much space devoted to sights and attractions. Only highlights are mentioned. And with some of the highlights, I am not entirely sure the authors of this book have spent the required time at these attractions that would allow them to write informative reviews. I, for one, am not impressed with most of the descriptions of the "things to see and do." They seem threadbare, as if the authors walked in and out of these places in ten minutes, just enough time to get to know the official name of the place, and perhaps see the only the highlights of the place. Very poor field research, in my opinion; they give only the highlights of the highlights. I didn't find the "to-see" section very useful.

   The one use I DID get out of the attractions part of the book was the webpage addresses (URLs) for those sights that had them. This at least allowed me to use the Internet to research these places for myself. Frommer's always includes URLs for any place that has one, from restaurants to museums to attractions. This part of the book was useful.

   All of this said, I surfed Amazon until I found two other books for the Phoenix/Scottsdale/Tempe area: the Insider's Guide to Phoenix and Best Places Phoenix. They are larger and more useful than this mostly-worthless Frommer's Portable Phoenix & Scottsdale. I certainly would not recommend this book unless all you do is eat and sleep in Phoenix/Scottsdale, and only then this book covers the higher-end places, places that someone on my income cannot afford very often.

1 comments about Fun with the Family Oregon, 4th (Fun with the Family Series).

1. A great book for anyone with kids in Oregon. It will keep us busy for years. It has details about local city parks to large well-known attractions like Crater Lake. Plus there are extra tips on lodging and kid-friendly restaurants. We found a park with an old train engine in our own city I didn't even know was there.

3 comments about Round River: From the Journals of Aldo Leopold.

1. Leopold's essay, "Goose Music" is a classic must read. Too bad this chapter was left out of the anniversary edition of Leopold's Sand County Almanac.



2. I tend to throw all the naturalists/conservationists/environmentalists into one big group and think of them in similar terms. I temporarily forgot that Aldo Leopold came to the field with a hunting background. And even though he writes about being forever affected by the regretable dying fire in a she-wolf's eyes in _Sand County Almanac_, none of that feeling is conveyed here. There's a lot of hunting in this book. A lot. Part II is one camping trip after another, with a fair amount of innocent animals providing food along the way. If you're like me and would rather not witness the carnage, read just four or five of the selections: "A Man's Leisure Time," "Country," "Natural History," and all of Part III. You probably won't miss anything crucial by doing so, and you'll get the gist of Aldo Leopold's ideas about conservation and the land ethic. His philosophic musings make for worthwhile reading. It's too bad more of them don't appear here.



3. If your only other exposure to Aldo Leopold is through his Sand County Almanac, this book will likely be a departure from your perception of him.
   
   Aldo Leopold was a practicing conservationist; he sustainably extracted valuable things from the land, and gave back to the land in other ways to repay his debt. With the possible exception of wilderness protection, he didn't subscribe to the "hands-off" approach of environmentalism that is often advocated today. He used to say any experience that reminded us of our "dependency on the soil-plant-animal-man food chain" was a valuable one.
   
   Through his journal entries, the reader will follow Aldo on hunting and fishing trips. His entries here are more direct and less philosophical than his Almanac entries. They are the sharp and admiring field observations of a man taking part in all that the land has to offer. It is campfire talk with the most influential conservationist of our time.

No comments about Conrad Weiser Homestead: Pennsylvania Trail of History Guide.

5 comments about The Death of Ben Linder; The Story of a North American in Sandinista Nicaragua.

1. If you are one of the many people who risked their lives when they traveled to Central America during the 1980's this book is for you! If you missed that experience but want to know what would motivate someone to risk their lives for peace and social justice by going to Nicaragua and participating in the revolution then, this book is for you!

   During the 1980's U.S. foreign policy in Central America was driven by an obsessive effort to overthrow the Sandinistas in Nicaragua. The Sandinistas had overthrown a dictator and were developing a society that put people before profits. They set up free health care, carried out a massive literacy campaign, and gave land to small farmers.

   This threat of "a good example" was countered by the U.S. which created a mercenary army (the Contras) who set out to overthrow the Nicaraguan government. Tactics included killing teachers, destroying health clinics, and forcing the Sandinistas to spend more and more of their resources on the military.

   Ben Linder was an engineer from Portland who put his life on the line to support the people of Nicaragua. Ben was also a clown and often put on his red nose and clown make-up to juggle and unicycle in poor neighborhoods, where children had never seen a clown. He worked in a small rural village in Northern Nicaragua, maybe 30 miles from my communities sister city of Telpaneca, near the Honduran border. Like the Fresnan's who built a school in Telpaneca during the Contra War, Ben was working on a hydroelectric project trying in a positive way to support the revolution. THE DEATH OF BEN LINDER, THE STORY OF A NORTH AMERICAN IN SANDINISTA NICARAGUA is an insightful book that reminds us why people are willing to put their lives on the line for a cause they believe in. It shows the tragic results of U.S. foreign policy that seeks to make the world safe for corporations seeking to maximize profits.




2. The book is, predictably, awash in Left Wing garbage. I would not waste my time with it if I were you. Linder simply made the choice to align himself with the wrong people, namely, Red Danny Ortega's Communist punks. Ortega was in bed with the USSR, and why anyone would support Ortega's regime is beyond comprehension. President Reagan came along just in the nick of time. Too bad Linder got in the way, but sometimes we make bad choices that are very costly.



3. Anyone who wishes to understand the current administration's policies needs to read this book. At the time of Linder's assassination, the first George Bush declared his death okay because he was "on the other side". Pat Robertson blessed and funded his killers. The US State Dept. interviewed and released them. Their US controller in Honduras, Negroponte, remains big in the Bush administration and just got the CIA head, Goss, replaced after a personal conflict.
   
   I was in Nicaragua at the time with WItness for Peace working as a photo lab technician and translator. I received the first photographs of Ben's body and tried to recover something from the very poor focussing. I also served as translator as a US journalist from a major New York newspaper did an in depth article on Linder. I am very grateful for this book. We must never forget those times, nor Ben, a courageous, unarmed wtieness for peace and justice and progress. Never forget. Learn the truth. ACT.



4. This book contains page after page of detailed accounts of attacks by the U.S.-bought-and-paid-for FDN-Contras, which can ONLY be described as terrorism: military assaults on agricultural co-ops (with loss of men, women & children and burning of health centers and private homes); assassinations and kidnapping of health workers and teachers (mostly women), as they walk from village to village in the Segovia Mountains; public-transport buses hitting land mines; and dynamiting of food caches and fuel caches. I would like to hear a Reagan fan dispute the veracity of these accounts!
   
   So the U.S. is currently locked into its own "War On Terrorism", while the new "Sec. Def." of the U.S., Robert Gates, played a major role in sponsorship of terrorism, as he was deeply involved in the Iran-Contra affair.
   
   Ben Linder and his great internacionalist cohorts, especially Don Macleay (a genius) and Mira Brown, are real heroes.
   
   And how many times in the U.S. press do you read that Ortega "has renounced his Marxist-Leninst" past? Well, the Sandinistas always advocated a mixed economy and did indeed hold a fair election in 1984. Which is why such an individual as Reagan ever gained popoularity- because of the lies that are spread about.
   
   So, I highly recommend this book as a great source for knowing what it was like to be on the ground in the Segovia Mtns. during Reagan's War.



5. This book doesn't try very hard to hide its leftist agenda, but even if that's what you're looking for, this book is poorly written and an uninteresting read. I got the feeling that a family member or an ex-girlfriend commissioned it. This book sells itself as a persona-based history of that period in Nicaragua. It's weak on facts and gave me the feeling that Linder was too. Maybe it was poorly researched or maybe he really was just clowning around. Depressing on all fronts. Don't bother.

No comments about The Best Bike Rides in the Midwest: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Wisconsin.

No comments about The Land of the Cliff-Dwellers.

No comments about Our Philadelphia (Our ...).

No comments about An Introduction to Grand Canyon Prehistory (Grand Canyon Association).

No comments about Quick Escapes Florida.