111 of 121 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars A moving, disturbing, depressing, but also touching tale, December 31, 2004
By Ian Fowler (Denver, CO United States) See all my reviews
(REAL NAME) This review is from: Frankenstein (Penguin Classics) (Paperback) Much like Bram Stoker’s “Dracula”, Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein” is a story we all think we know, but really do not. Not many films have consciously attempted to follow the novel too closely (which should not detract from the excellent James Whale/Boris Karloff film, or its masterpiece sequel, “The Bride of Frankenstein). , everything liked culture “knows” about “Frankenstein” doesn’t originate from literature, but from films. This is a shame, in a way, because the novel itself is, if not the progenitor, an early vessel of so many archetypes found science fiction and horror.

The basic plot stayed intact when moved to other media. Swiss medical student Victor Frankenstein discovers the secret of life (which he never reveals, lest someone repeat the mistake). He then puts together a body, generally a man, from different corpses. He then becomes horrified by the creature he’s built, and abandons. The creature, suffering a great deal of neglect and abuse, still manages to get a thorough education, and learns of his lineage. After murdering Victor’s younger brother, and framing the family maid, the creature tells his (admittedly) sad tale to his “father”, , then demands a mate. Victor, in a panic, agrees, then thinks better of it at the last moment, destroying the new bride. In retaliation, the creature murders all of Victor’s loved ones (including his wife), and leads Victor on a merry chase across the world.

Most most likely know that Mary Shelley wrote this book in answer to a challenge issued by Lord Byron, throughout a vacation at Lake Geneva. (Along with this story came John Polidori’s “The Vampyre”, the 1st English vampire novel.) probably also know that Shelley went on to write other works of imaginative gothic fiction. Still, her modern repute rests with this book.

As stated, many archetypes (themes, plot lines, characters) are present here. The basic fear of what bad technology may bring with the good is a central theme, as is the warning against playing God. So is the implicit admonition to be accountable in all things, be it throughout novelty or being a parent. The creature is, for all intents and reasons, an android everyone from Gort to C 3PO owe their existence to the Frankenstein monster. And the monster that slays all but one protagonist is a staple of horror, be it conventional monster movies, like “Alien”, or more realistic slasher movies like “Halloween”.

But, as I noted at the beginning of this review, certain of these elements have been lost in most interpretations. The creature is really intelligent, and well spoken, quite different from the inarticulate grunts or slow, half sentences of the movies. More, while the films have made lightening a staple of the creatures creation, Shelley never really explains the procedure. , one of the staples of the films is the explanation for the creatures “evil” nature. Frequently, the problem lies with the brain used, which nearly invariably is a criminal brain, or is damaged before implantation. In the book, the creature is really a child that is horribly neglected, but with the strength and intelligence to strike back: id without superego, and without restraints.

Thus, “Frankenstein” will be a new experience for readers who know the source entirely from the films. Unlike “Dracula”, there are not any times where a reader may look up and realize how calm it’s in the house, or how black it is gotten outside. In that regard, “Frankenstein” hasn’t aged especially well. During, but, it’s a moving, disturbing, depressing, but also a touching and beautiful tale. Those qualities have withstood the test of time. While it isn’t generally a rollicking adventure, it’s a rewarding read.

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328 of 387 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of five stars don’t purchase THIS EDITION!!!!!!, January 31, 2007
By Penelope Specksynder “Penny” (Nederland) See all my reviews This review is from: Frankenstein (Enriched Classics) (Mass Market Paperback) This “enriched classics” is a bowdlerized variant of Mary Shelley’s original text. It removes passages, changes the diction, abridges the chapters, and changes the complete structure of the novel. Our school bought this edition thinking that the extra notes could be useful to students studying the text, but there was no indication at all on Amazon’s web site that this variant had been considerably altered by the editors. The book is so bowdlerized that our school bought an complete new set of texts for the students at a significant finanacial loss for the school. WHATEVER YOU DO, purchase many OTHER variant OF FRANKENSTEIN. THIS ONE IS A MONSTER produced BY SOMEONE WHO HAS NO RESPECT FOR THE AUTHOR. BANTAM, PUFFIN, OXFORD they’re ALL good. Irene Nicastro, English teacher, The American School of The Hague.

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67 of 76 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars More Relevant Today Than When 1st Written, November 18, 2003
By Gary F. Taylor “GFT” (Biloxi, MS USA) See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE) (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (TOP 100 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME) This review is from: Frankenstein (Dover Thrift Editions) (Paperback) Modern readers must jump through some hoops to take pleasure in this legendary novel. Written between 1816 and 1818, this is much a novel of its era, and both language and ideas about plot are quite different from those of today. That on the side, and unlike such contemporaries as Jane Austen, author Mary Shelly never been largely admired for her literary style, which is frequently uncomfortable. But possibly the biggest hurdle is that of our own expectations: while it surely sent icy chills down the spines of 19th Century readers, FRANKENSTEIN isn’t a horror novel per se.While Mary Shelly may have been stylistically weak, her story wasn’t. Nothing like it had been written before, and the idea of a student endowing life upon a humanoid creature cobbled together from charnel house parts has been unexpectedly shocking to the reading public. But more shocking were the ideas that Shelly brought to the story. Having produced this thing in his own image, what if anything does the creator owe it? And in posing this question, Shelly intentionally raises her novel to an more complex level: this isn’t just the clash of man and his creation, but also a inquiring of God and his responsibility toward his creation.In many respects, the book is written like the famous philosophical "dialogues" of the ancient world: a counterpoint of questions and arguments that do fight for the reader’s acceptance. More than anything else, FRANKENSTEIN is a novel of ethics and of ideas about ideas, with Mary Shelly’s themes arrayed in many layers throughout: God, self, society, science; responsibility to self, to society, to the things we bring to society, to the truth; life, honesty, and death these are the ideas and issues that predominate the book, and any one expecting a horror novel pure and simple is out of luck.Mary Shelly is a rare example of a writer whose ideas obviously outstrip her literary skill but whose ideas are so powerful that they transcend her literary restrictions and continue to resonate today. And indeed, as science continues to advance, it couldn’t be otherwise so. Mary Shelly couldn’t see into the future of DNA research, laboratory grown tissues, test tube babies and the like but between 1816 and 1818 she wrote a book about the ethical dilemmas that swirl around them. And for all its faults, FRANKENSTEIN is possibly more relevant today than it was over a hundred and fifty years ago.GFT, Reviewer

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345 of 354 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars Love Among The Damned, February 25, 2005
By Gary F. Taylor “GFT” (Biloxi, MS USA) See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE) (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (TOP 100 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME) This review is from: Wuthering Heights (Bantam Classics) (Mass Market Paperback) Published in 1847, WUTHERING HEIGHTS wasn’t received by the reading public, many of whom condemned it as sordid, vulgar, and unnatural and author Emily Bronte went to her grave in 1848 believing that her only novel was a failure. It wasn’t till 1850, when WUTHERING HEIGHTS received a second printing with an introduction by Emily’s sister Charlotte, that it attracted a large readership. And from that point the repute of the book never looked back. Today it’s widely recognized as one of the great novels of English literature.

Even WUTHERING HEIGHTS continues to divide readers. It isn’t a pretty love story; rather, it’s swirling tale of mainly unlikeable people caught up in obsessive love that turns to black insanity. It’s cruel, violent, black and brooding, and many people find it very unpleasant. And yet it possesses a grandeur of language and design, a sense of tremendous pity and great loss that sets it separately from almost every other novel written.

The novel is told in the form of an expanded flashback. After a visit to his weird landlord, a newcomer to the area desires to know the history of the family which he receives from Nelly Deans, a servant who introduces us to the Earnshaw family who once resided in the house called Wuthering Heights. It was once a happy place, but Old Earnshaw adopted a “Gipsy” child who he named Heathcliff. And Catherine, daughter of the house, found in him the perfect companion: wild, impolite, and as proud and cruel as she. But though Catherine loves him, recognizes him as her soulmate, she can not lower herself to marry so far below her social station. She instead marries another, and in so doing sets in motion an obsession that will destroy them all.

WUTHERING HEIGHTS is a bit hard to “get into;” the opening chapters are so black in their portrait of the result of this obsessive love that they’re somewhat off putting. But they feed into the flow of the work in a extraordinary way, setting the stage for one of the most extraordinary structures in all of literature, a story that circles upon itself in a series of repetitions as it plays out across two generations. Catherine and Heathcliff are equally extraordinary, both vicious and cruel, and still never able to shed their impossible love no matter how brutally one may wound the other.

As the novel coils more into alcoholism, seduction, and one of the most elaborately imagined plans of revenge it gathers into a ghostly tone: Heathcliff, driven to insanity by a woman who isn’t there but who looks reflected in every part of his world dragging her corpse from the grave, hearing her calling to him from the moors, escalating his brutality not for the sake of brutality but so that her memory will never fade, so that she may never leave his mind till death itself. Yes, this is insanity, insanity, and there’s no peace this side of the grave or beyond.

It is a stunning novel, frightening, inexorable, unsettling, filled with unbridled passion that makes one cringe. If you don’t like it, you may want to read it at least once and those who do like it’ll return to it again and again.

GFT, Reviewer

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77 of 79 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars My favorite novel of all time, March 3, 2006
By B. McEwan “yellokat” (Brooklyn, NY USA) See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE) (TOP 1000 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME) This review is from: Wuthering Heights (Penguin Classics) (Paperback) there’s a thin line between love and hate, and once Heathcliff crosses it, we see a great, passionate and absorbingly interesting man turn into a fearsome thug. Thwarted in his love for his childhood soulmate, Catherine Earnshaw, Heathcliff turns his devastation external, becoming a hateful and hated person all across the bleak moors that surround his Yorkshire village.

Heathcliff courts and marries the sister of the man whom Catherine chose over Heathcliff, only to torture her emotionally as a way of to get with her brother. In the meantime, Catherine gradually wastes away pining for Heathcliff, for though she once rejected him, she sooner or later realizes that she’s made an irredeemable error and can never be happy. Heathcliff sums up the tragedy of their lives in a single question near the end of the novel when he asks, “Why did you deceive your heart, Cathy?”

Sound depressing? It is not. Wuthering Heights is a great and glorious novel that considerably illustrates the power of love, for good and ill. But more importantly, it teaches us that the only path to happiness is to be true to one’s heart, rather than one’s head. Had Catherine honored her bond with Heathcliff and refused to bow to the social mores of her day, not only could the two of them been much happier, but all of the many people whose lives they stumbled into could have been much better off.

Another reviewer said that those of us who love this novel most likely have a strong identification with one of the characters, and for me that’s quite true. That is the reason for reading a classic like Wuthering Heights, because when it speaks to you in the clear and true way that Bronte does, you know that you aren’t alone, and that many things transcend time and place.

Think about it a prim, Victorian preacher’s daughter living on the moors of England before there was electricity can reach across 150 years of time and speak to the heart of a wired American in the 21st century. Pretty amazing, and greatly suggested.

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93 of 104 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars A black Romantic Classic Which Epitomizes Great Gothic Literature, August 3, 2005
By Jana L. Perskie “ceruleana” (New York, NY USA) See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE) (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (TOP 500 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME) This review is from: Wuthering Heights (Penguin Classics) (Paperback) “Wuthering Heights,” Emily Bronte’s only published novel, is a saga of two Yorkshire families who live in the remote Pennine Hills of England’s North Country. To me the book has generally epitomized the best of gothic fiction. The narrative is filled with intensity of feeling, particularly Heathcliff’s passionate love for his Cathy and hers for him a love which endures beyond the grave. More than could be lovers, but, the two are soul mates and have been since their childhood. Cathy once told Nelly, her servant and friend: “My greatest thought in living is Heathcliff. If all else perished, and he stayed, I should still continue to be. Nelly, I’m Heathcliff! He’s generally, generally in my mind: not as a pleasure. But as my own being.”

Yet, the novel is more than a love story. “Wuthering Heights” is about hatred, cruelty, delusion, irritated yearning, obsession, deep despair and vengeance. At times its darkness is depressing and painful. Still love and faithfulness, which endure beyond death, bring hope and much needed light to this tale; as does a second love story, born from the seeds of the 1st. The author also addresses the issues of social class here. Both Linton and Earnshaw families are considered gentry. But, the Linton’s are a more educated, cultured group and seem to be of a higher class than those who live at Wuthering Heights. Many of Catherine’s most crucial decisions involve moving up in society.

The story is told in a series of narratives, none of which are completely dependable. Throughout the winter of 1801, a gentleman named Mr. Lockwood rents a manor house called Thrushcross Grange in Yorkshire. He’s a natural curiosity, and in time visits his neighbor and wealthy landlord, Heathcliff, a grim, forbidding man who lives at Wuthering Heights, some miles from the Grange. Lockwood also makes the acquaintance of Heathcliff’s housekeeper Ellen Dean, called Nelly, and asks her to tell him about her employer and the history of those who live at Wuthering Heights. He papers her narrative in his journal, and his written recollections make up the major part of the novel. Most of Nellie’s tale consists of memories from years before, her observations of life with the Earnshaw family, her recollections of the Lintons, and her own conclusions, which are subjective. Lockwood, gets his info second hand, from Nellie’s perspective. He continually interprets, and misinterprets the relationships and actions of the characters who play such big roles here. It’s up to the reader to seem right of it all which is what the author meant.

As a young girl Nelly worked as a servant at Wuthering Heights for Mr. Earnshaw, the owner, his wife, and their two kids, Hindley, and Catherine. Earnshaw returned from a business trip to Liverpool with a gypsy like urchin, a dark haired, good looking orphan boy. He had taken a pretty cool to the lad, a calm, stoic child, and names him Heathcliff, after a son who died. Earnshaw decides to increase him with his own kids. Catherine befriends Heathcliff nearly instantly. They share a love of nature, and an emotional intensity not known to majority of people. They’re able to communicate with each other easily, as young kids, and both possess tremendously creative imaginations. The two roam the moorland wilderness, where they are most at home, like wild creatures of nature, and become inseparable friends. Hindley detests Heathcliff from the 1st. He’s envious and goads the boy constantly. Sooner or later, after the death of his wife, Mr. Earnshaw begins to show preference for Heathcliff over his own son, which exacerbates the hostility. , Hindley is sent away to school and Heathcliff is kept at home, at Earnshaw’s side.

Hindley comes into his inheritance many years afterward, at age twenty, when his father dies. Cathy is eleven years old, and Heathcliff about 12, when the heir returns to Wuthering Heights, and seeks vicious revenge for having his rights usurped by a wretched boy from the slums with no means of his own. Clearly Heathcliff can not defend himself and is totally reliant on Hindley. He’s forced to work as a laborer in the fields, and is treated harshly, as less respectable than an animal. He and Cathy maintain their closeness. They still wander the wild North country and she shares her studies with him. One night they pay a clandestine visit to Thrushcross Grange, home of the Linton family. Cultured, spoiled and behaved, young Edgar and Isabella live there. When a dog savagely bites Cathy, it’s discovered that she and Heathcliff have been hiding in the brush spying. The girl is seriously injured and is forced to stay at the Grange for some number of weeks to recover. Throughout her time with the Linton family, Mrs. Linton becomes intention on turning wild, mischievous Cathy into a young lady. She supports her to become a young woman with manners and actions proper to her social standing in society, rather than the wild, headstrong creature she’s while roaming the moors with Heathcliff. By the time Catherine returns home, in elegant new clothes, she became infatuated with Edgar Linton. Needless to her relationship with Heathcliff deteriorates considerably, as he feels he’s losing the only person he ever loved.

Edgar pursues Catherine relentlessly, and sooner or later, the young woman’s want for social advancement, and an inexplicable fey, self destructive quality about her, prompt her to accept his plan. But, she really doesn’t love her fiance. She may care for him, but her feelings are less than what her passionate nature requires. On the other hand genteel women of this period were supposed to have neither “passionate” nor acute feelings. “‘Here and here!’ replied Catherine, striking one hand on her forehead and the other on her breast: ‘in which ever place the soul lives. In my soul and in my heart, I am convinced I am wrong!’” Catherine acknowledges to Nelly that her marriage to Edgar can not be one of love. Though she knows that Heathcliff is her true love, but, she can not marry him because he was so debased by Hindley. “It could degrade me to marry Heathcliff now; so he shall never know how I love him: and that, not because he’s good looking, Nelly, but because he’s more myself than I’m. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same; and Linton’s is as different as a moonbeam from lightening, or frost from fire”. Her powerful connection to Heathcliff is generally present, no matter how annoyed she becomes with him. Heathcliff leaves Wuthering Heights a bitter man. He knows that if he had come from a better social class, or had money, Cathy could married him. When he returns, years afterward, a self possessed, successful, wealthy man, he’s obsessed with revenge, and is more adept at exacting it than Hindley ever was.

Nelly continues her increasingly complex tale, (which I will not spoil for you), of three generations: of births, marriages, deaths, traumas, problems, a second more hopeful love story and redemption. The most recurring theme is the great love and friendship, the eternal connection, between Cathy and her Heathcliff, whose hard nature is nearly impossible to understand and to accept unless, of course, one thinks about his not known origin and early childhood as a homeless waif in Liverpool. One can only imagine the horrors he experienced wandering the streets of the rough port town, with neither protection nor kindness. What cruelty and meanness of spirit did he learn there? His awful, inhuman treatment at Hindley’s hands surely played a part in Heathcliff’s lust for revenge and lack of mercy, as did Catherine’s choice to marry Linton, which must have been devastating for him. Heathcliff remains a black, brooding, cruel man during his adult years and never reforms. He’s an anti hero, at least in my eyes, as he also possesses good qualities, with a awful sadness, an emptiness and longing which he shows to Cathy alone.

Emily Bronte’s surprising prose is filled with powerful imagery. Miss Bront spent most of her short life at home, in Thornton, Yorkshire, where she was happiest. She loved the bordering moors the large, wild expanses, unsuitable for cultivation, and full of danger. There are bogs and wetlands on the moors, which can go virtually unseen, and where one can drown. It’s also a place of great beauty. The author spent much time walking there with her dogs and was terribly unhappy when she was away. The similarities between the author’s natural environment and that of the area around Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange are evident. Ms Bronte drew inspiration from the regional Yorkshire architecture as well, also as her own personal experiences and her amazing imagination, a gift Charlotte, Emily, Anne and Branwell Bronte shared with each other and with us. I have read some Bronte biographies and generally felt that the character of Catherine Earnshaw, surely her intensity and love of nature, was depending on Emily Bronte.

Keep a box of tissues useful during your reading of “Wuthering Heights.” I wonder if this is the 1st tearjerker?
JANA

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116 of 123 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of five stars an adaptation, November 21, 2003
By J. L. Miller “JLM” (Avon, IN USA) See all my reviews
(REAL NAME) This review is from: Tom Sawyer (Great Illustrated Classics (Abdo)) (Library Binding) Just to alert the potential buyer this volume is an adaptation by Deidre S. Laiken not the unabridged version

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21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of five stars The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, January 1, 2001
A Kid’s Review
This review is from: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (Penguin Classics) (Paperback) The Adventures of Tom Sawyer is a fascinating and adventurous book about a boy named Tom Sawyer. He’s a big crush on a girl called Becky Thacker. In this book, Tom goes to an island with two of his friends, attends their own funeral, and look for treasure! Tom sees Injun Joe a killer with treasure. He wants it, but his only clue where Injun Joe hid it’s that it has something to do with number 2. Tom is lost in a cave all alone with Becky. Can he find his way out of the cave and the way to the treasure? I agree with Mark Twain’s decisions and ideas. I believe that I could be doing the same thing if I were in his position. His decisions are able to happen; still The Adventures of Tom Sawyer is such a good book. I could recommend this book to people who like adventurous books, and likes classics. It leaves you at so many cliffhangers that you may help but read all of it now, for the people who like cliffhangers.

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66 of 79 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars The 1st Great Coming of Age American Novel, May 14, 2000
By Donald Mitchell “Jesus Loves You!” (Thanks for My Reviews over 110,000 useful Votes Globally) See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE) (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (TOP 100 REVIEWER) This review is from: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (Penguin Classics) (Paperback) Tom Sawyer is one of the most endearing characters in American fiction. This great book deals with all the challenges that any young person faces, and resolves them in thrilling and strange ways. Like many young people, Tom could rather be having fun than going to school and church. This is generally to get him into trouble, from which he finds strange solutions. One of the great scenes in this book has Tom persuading his friends to help him whitewash a fence by making them think that nothing may be better than doing his punishment for playing hooky from school. When I 1st read this story, it opened up my mind to the possible power of persuasion.Tom also is given up for dead and has the strange experience of watching his own funeral and hearing what people really thought of him. That is something we all can do. By imagining what people will say at our funeral, we may help establish the function of our own lives. Mark Twain has given us a powerful tool for self examination in this great sequence.Tom and Huck Finn also eyewitness a murder, and have to choose how to manage the fact that they were not supposed to be there and their fear of retribution from the murderer, Injun Joe. Girls are a part of Tom’s life, and Becky Thatcher and he have a extraordinary adventure in a cave with Injun Joe. Any young person will remember the excitement of being near someone they cared about alone in this vignette. Tom stands for the freedom that the American frontier offered to everyone. His aunt Polly represents the civilizing influence of adults and towns. Twain sets up a rewarding novel that makes us rethink the benefits of both freedom and civilization. In this day of the Internet frontier, this story can still supply valuable lessons about listening to our inner themselves and acting on what they have to say. Enjoy!

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75 of 77 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars A timeless part of history written for the future., October 11, 1999
By A Customer
This review is from: The Art of War (Hardcover) I can not remember who presented me to "The Art of War", but I know I couldn’t hold onto the book for long. Each friend I thought could gain from the ancient words of Sun Tzu received a copy from me. I went through seven copies before purchasing the hard cover for my collection.I found James Clavell’s variant quite hard to find, but well worth it caused by clearness of reading and balance.I tried reading Cleary’s variant, but couldn’t get through the 1st chapter. But, I did buy "Mastering the Art of War" by Cleary; finding it a better tour guide.Clavell’s "Art of War" offers tactical insight on overcoming an opponent if it be war, work, relationships, or your personal demons.Sun Tzu produced a timeless part of history written for the future. I personally feel that today’s society needs to look back, master the art of war, to fix the future.Today I am purchasing book #9 for a person who inspired me. I wanted to return the favor.

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37 of 38 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of five stars Thought this could be better, August 3, 2010
By NYM See all my reviews This review is from: The Art of War (Kindle Edition) The content of the translations themselves was good, but I found the formatting hard to read. The translator also interjects thoughts into the center of sentences which disrupted the flow of the text more. Other variants can be fascinating, but I found this one stale and unremarkable.

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29 of 29 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars The Art of War, and Life a timeless and common text, January 11, 2001
By Kharmen See all my reviews This review is from: The Art of War (Hardcover) The Art of War by Sun Tzu covers the basic principles on how to wage war and command troops, much like Machiavelli’s Il Principe instructs aspiring rulers the correct way to govern a country. Though the books are alike, The Art of War applies to many more parts of life than just the conquest of territory. It can be carried over into the office, into the home, and into personal romances. The subjects are so broad they may be applied to nearly anything still the details discussed are related to every scenario you may be able to think of. Sun Tzu covers all as he describes the correct course of action to take in all scopes from the entirety of the war to the relations with the individual soldier. Everything from maneuvering troops, to the correct use of different classes of spies is covered in the book, as Tzu describes himself nothing may be omitted from this timeless classic as "The art of war is of essential importance to the state. It’s a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin. Hence under no situation can it be neglected." (1). As history unfolded, it never been devoid of wars, and doesn’t seem to be in our future. The foreword presents fascinating insight into how great rulers are said to used and succeeded with The Art of War, honored rulers like Napoleon. This common applicability of The Art of War is one of its most enticing and lasting appeals. The book leaves nothing out, covering every part of war and its orchestration. It effectively dictates the best course of action to take if you are a CEO or just another man wanting to pin his relationship down. The foreword is excellent also, it does a great job setting up the book and giving a brief and quite interesting background of the book’s history. The only negative comment I have is the odd editing works throughout the book when the editor re summarizes many of the original text into his own words, as that text lacks the power and simplicity of the other directly translated text. This book is certainly worth the read! Take your time to see how Sun Tzu’s writing apply to your life and you’ll see how powerful his words are, as it’ll supply insight into nearly any situation you are in.

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159 of 168 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars "Little Women," The Original, October 18, 2009
By A buyer See all my reviews This review is from: Little Women (Sterling Classics) (Kindle Edition) Like the last reviewer, I has been surprised to find that he book I had been sometimes rereading for over 50 years wasn’t the original novel. My own copy, much loved and thumbed, was with me since I was a ten year old. I bought the Kindle variant just to have it in my movable library, since I thought I knew it nearly by heart. To my surprise, when I started looking it over, I found that the book wasn’t the same at all. My original copy must have been "modernized" at many point. All of the familiar passages were there, but there was a great deal that I did not remember reading before. Many of that was a exactly Victorian kind of moralizing, but there was many expansion of the story.. I am not sure that I could appreciated it all when I was younger, but I found it a delight to read now, for example of a book of its times. Now I am going to download the rest of the Alcott catalogue and see how it compares to the books I thought were the originals when I read them many years ago. This was still an exemplary book. It’ll generally be one of the classics.

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94 of 99 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of five stars An American classic., March 15, 2009
By Michael Blaski (Norfolk, VA United States) See all my reviews () This review is from: Little Women (Sterling Classics) (Kindle Edition) I’m a 14 year old girl and just got around to reading Little Women about a year ago. It’s a great American classic written by Louisa May Alcott. It’s about the four March sisters: Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy. They live in New England throughout the Civil War. They’re poor, but they attempt to make the best of it as they grow and learn. We follow them through good times and bad as they, with help from Marmee and Laurie (their next door neighbor), bear their own distinctive burdens. Meg’s is poverty, Jo’s is her temper, Beth’s burden isn’t being able to play on a piano, and Amy’s is her unaristocratic nose. (as humorous as that sounds) you will fall in love with Jo’s oddities just as much as with Beth’s gentil manners. It’s a great book that everyone should read!

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154 of 170 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of five stars Whole Story edition is only half a story I am shocked!, September 16, 2005
By bensmomma “bensmomma” (Ann Arbor, Michigan) See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE) This review is from: Little Women (Whole Story) (Hardcover) I was so looking forward to reading “Little Women” to my daughter, so she may be caught up in it as I was at an early age. I especially chose the “Whole Story” edition because of its broad margins, easy to scan pages, and charming illustrations and margin notes that add historical texture to the story.

Imagine my shock to discover that at the end of THIS edition, Jo hasn’t written a book, Amy hasn’t gone off to Europe, Professor Baer hasn’t made an look of any kind and..you’ll never believe this..Beth is still carrying on a conversation (I’m trying not to spoil the plot of the real thing here).

That’s because, seemingly, “Little Women” was firstly published in two parts (“Little Women” and “Good Wives”), which are usually published as the same book. Whole Story has chosen to stop at the half way point, so most of the story you keep in mind loved, cried, and laughed over is just not here.

Imagine to get only the 1st half of Tom Sawyer.Leave him stranded on the island forever!

I feel totally conned. It is a five star story make that maybe a seven star story but it is a one star edition.

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