Foundation by Isaac Asimov List Price: $7.50 Buy new: $7.50 Usually ships in 24 hours

First, there is not much character development. Characters are presented merely to accomplish a historical event in the flow of the story. We get a feel for the characters not as real people, but as actors on the stage of world history. Though the reader admires the nerve and intellect behind each of these heroes, there is little else that makes them interesting. While this kind of presentation of characters may work in movie adaptations or history textbooks, I like to view my characters as a little more than men at work. Everybody is always scheming, there's not much downtime or description of what day-to-day life is like with these guys so far in the future, such far-off planets.

Secondly, there is a lack of real meaning or symbolism that defines great books. The closest we get to intrinsic meaning is the description of the false religion that Salvor Hardin invents. And this only helps us understand what the author probably thinks about organized religion. The all-importance of nuclear energy also seems like propaganda to get ther reader to "understand" how important it will be in our era, with no attention paid to other kinds of fascinating technology that may exist in the future, such as super-intellect, robotics, biotechnology, etc. I don't know if Asimov was just lacking in creativity, because with the exception of his brilliant description of the mother planet Trantor, the only thing different between this far off future and nowadays is the ability to jump through space.

Thirdly, romance does not play a role in the book. There no women in the book, which means there can be no romantic intrigue, or world events influenced by a woman. Also, there is no sense of wonder and excitement that a reader surely hopes to get when they enter an author's imagination. The landscape of these far off worlds is sparesely and hardly described. We spend much of our time in staterooms.

On the other hand, if you like books that are centered on brilliant leaders of nation-states and how their decisions affect the course of history, you will like this book. If you are fascinated by the economic, political, and sociological macroforces that shape history, you will like this book. If you're more about the game than the players, you will like this book.

Foundation by Isaac Asimov List Price: $7.50 Buy new: $7.50 Usually ships in 24 hours

6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
Nice book - that's it January 1, 2002
The Foundation saga is one of the most widely-known sci-fi series ever published. Started in the 1940's with this book, Foundation, Asimov continued the series up through the 1980's, at which point he was being basically threatened by fans to continue writing to satiate their reading interest.

Foundation's setting is in the far-future, when planets have not only been discovered and colonized, but millions of planets have been organized into a Galactic Empire that spans thousands os star systems. Hyper-industry and nuclear power form the core to this civilization, which seems to have an endless grasp on the future of civilization.

That is, until Hari Seldon, a scientist, discovers the science of psychohistory, by which future events can be predicted based on calculations of human behavior. He foresess the collapse of the Empire based on inevitable social, political, and economic forces. He devises a plan to save humankind from an imminent dark age by instituting a scientific Foundation at the edge of the galaxy.

This premise is what drew me to the read the book. What exciting prospects! The opportunity to plumb the mind of the genous Hari Seldon. To get a closer look at this Galactic Empire, whose proportions were mindboggling. To understand, at a more nuts and bolts level, this "psychohistory." To see what Hari Seldon has up his sleeve.

Unfortunately, though the book provides an historical fiction that encompasses 300 years of life after Hari Seldon, and introduces leaders of his Foundation that are memorable for their nerve and intellect, some of the imaginative possibilities, such as most of those mentioned above, are not fully realized. I am not sure if they are realized in other books of the series, but I guess that's for someone else to comment on.

Foundation came to me highly recommended. I am not new to science fiction, but I have not read that much of this genre. I was looking forward to something that would really blow my mind away. Though I admired several things about the book and thought it was a nice read, I am not going to read the other books in this series. Coming away from this book, I felt it was good, but not much more. There were several ways in which I clearly found the book to be lacking in addition to the brevity of focus on Hari, a good discussion of psychohistory, or much emphasis on the Galactic Empire.

Though Asimov's style is surely concise and highly readable, he views plot as the central element to his writing, at the expense of other aspects of great fiction that really should have been incorporated. I will outline these at length because it appears that the book's praises are already sung widely.

First, there is not much character development. Characters are presented merely to accomplish a historical event in the flow of the story. We get a feel for the characters not as real people, but as actors on the stage of world history. Though the reader admires the nerve and intellect behind each of these heroes (there are 5 heroes that are portrayed in the generation following Hari), there is little else that makes them interesting. While this kind of presentation of characters may work in movie adaptations or history textbooks, I like to view my characters as a little more than men-at-work. Everybody is always scheming, there's not much downtime or description of what day-to-day life is like with these guys so far in the future, such far-off planets. The dialogue is great, though, and that's part of the reason the book is a quick read.

Secondly, there is a lack of real meaning or symbolism that defines great books. There's not much refelction on the part of the narrator, or poignancy. The closest we get to intrinsic meaning is the interesting description of the false religion that a protagonist, Salvor Hardin, invents in order to undermine the economy of a neighboring state. Religion is also used to manipulate other planets. Hard to swallow, this helps us understand what the author probably thinks about organized religion. The book is also full of cute phrases that portray the all-importance of technology in Asimov's future: characters say things like, "What in the name of space?" or "Thank space!" The all-importance of nuclear energy also seems like propaganda to get ther reader to "understand" how important it will be in our era, with no attention paid to other kinds of fascinating technology that may exist in the future, such as super-intellect, robotics, biotechnology, etc. Not only are technology and politics the deepest material this book touches, but even the technology the book introduces is not very interesting. With the exception of his brilliant description of the mother planet Trantor, the only thing different between this far off future and nowadays is the ability to jump through space.

Thirdly, romance does not play a role in the book. There are no women in the book, which means there can be no romantic intrigue, or world events influenced by a woman. Also in the true spirit of what the word "romance" conveys, there is no sense of wonder and excitement that a reader surely hopes to get when they enter an author's imagination. The landscape of these far-off worlds is sparesly and hardly described. We spend much of our time in staterooms. Though, admittedly, Asimov's grasp of political personalities is astounding.

On the other hand, if you like books that are centered on brilliant leaders of nation-states and how their decisions affect the course of history, you will like this book. If you are fascinated by the economic, political, and sociological macroforces that shape history, you will like this book. If you're more about the game and the moves than the players, you will like this book.

The Beatles 1 ~ The Beatles List Price: $18.98 Buy new: $13.49 (You Save: 29%) Usually ships in 24 hours Used & new from: $9.00 (You Save: 53%) Usually ships in 1-2 business days.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
Paul's chance at promotion October 24, 2001
I think it's fairly obvious to Beatles fans that, although this compilation features some nice remastering and a chronological walk through some of the Beatles' most appealing material, that Paul's work is overemphasized. This comes at the expense of some obvious dis to John and George's work.

Let's take a look here. The early years of 1962-1964 are representd fairly well, with hits such as Love Me Do and I Want to Hold Your Hand. The early singles happened to feature BOTH Paul and John, usually trading off either verse and bridge or harmonizing throughout the song, so this works out nicely.

As we know, the middle period of 1964-1967 began to feature songs that were more exclusively Paul or John, and though this retrospective features good work from both men, there could have been more of John's stuff in there, cause this was a very successful time for him (e.g. Drive My Car, Norwegian Wood, etc).

However, in the later part of the album, with songs from 1967-1970, we begin to find this album definitely overemphasizes Paul's Beatles repertoire.The songs from this period start at track number 17 (<b>with primary artists name in parens)</b> :

17. Penny Lane - Paul
18. All You Need Is Love - John
19. Hello Goodbye - Paul
20. Lady Madonna - Paul
21. Hey Jude - Paul
22. Get Back - Paul
23. The Ballad of John & Yoko - John
24. Something - George
25. Come Together - John
26. Let It Be - Paul
27. The Long and Winding Road - Paul

See what I'm saying. If you're going to put Penny Lane on, you should put the (more important) Strawberry Fields Forever on there too! If you're going to put Hello Goodbye on there, you should put the (more important) I Am the Walrus. These pairs of songs were released as A and B sides on the original singles, and they belong together at this point in time as well. I do think that in response for letting Paul's songs from the later period dominate (especially the fluffy Hello Goodbye and the blah Get Back), they should have put more of John's middle period stuff on there (e.g. Drive My Car, Norweigan Wood, etc).

DOn;t get me wrong, I like Paul's stuff - but the overall caliber of the album suffers because of the disproportion. You'll find the Red and BLue compilations better handled in my opinion.

All That You Can't Leave Behind ~ U2 List Price: $18.98 Buy new: $13.99 (You Save: 26%) Usually ships in 24 hours Used & new from: $7.99 (You Save: 58%) Usually ships in 1-2 business days.

Interesting mix of old and new May 24, 2001
U2 reappears, sounding quite retro. Production values are not as sheerly awesome or daring as previous 90's albums, and arrangements are quite sparse. Some unusual effects and timbres, but not too many. Edge's (guitarist's) effects sometimes harken back to the 80's.

If you get excited by straight-ahead U2-flavored rock-and-roll and are a fan of their early LP's, you might like the feel of this album. If you were looking to hear a latest foray into electronica-tinged guitar rock, you may be disappointed.

The actual song material is much harder to classify. It is really quite diverse. THe album takes you through may different moods, from manic (Elevation) to eulogic (Walk On) to playful(Wild Honey), to picaresque(In a Little While). Quite diverse instrumentation as well. Bono's lyrics are up to par but his voice cannot obviously provide the raw yearning force that it was capable of a few years back. He makes up for it by delivering them with emotional punch that you usually seek out in his songs. Ruefully, Clayton (bassist) seems not to have contributed as much, with the album lacking his typically strong rhythmic beat, with Edge having the benefit of presenting his musical sensibility moreso. The music was not as sheerly brilliant as I would have expected, but it is a very upbeat hopeful album, which is about the humanity in all of us. And that's a good message, as opposed to slick songs about discoteques and European life.

Professional Active Server Pages 2.0 by Brian Francis, et al List Price: $59.95 Buy new: $41.97 (You Save: 30%) Usually ships in 2 to 3 days Used & new from: $3.72 (You Save: 94%) Usually ships in 1-2 business days.

Not so good sequel February 19, 2001
I read this book after reading Beginning ASP cover to cover. For those others of you that have, fair warning: There is alot of repetitiion in the first few hundred pages, albeit with sometimes better scope (sometimes though, the 1st one has stuff that's NOT in here!).

The book is not so smooth because it is plagued by typos and also casual switching from JavaScript to VBScript based on the chapter author's whim I suppose.

Speaking of that, the fact that there are 8 authors in this puppy means that the book does not flow well at times, with certain chapters repeating others and also some authros being much better that others.

Now on the positive side, there was a lot of material covered in this book, also with good examples and expert advice. I must say though, ASP Unleashed is the real gem if you want to be on your way to ASP Jedihood.

Beginning Active Server Pages 2.0 by Brian Francis, et al List Price: $40.00 Buy new: $40.00 Usually ships in 24 hours Used & new from: $4.99 (You Save: 88%) Usually ships in 1-2 business days.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
Probably the classic "intro to ASP" book February 19, 2001
My copy of this book is completely worn out. As a senior developer at a dot com, I have lent out my copy to over 10 juniors when asked by them which book they should read to get started with ASP.

This is after I myself have dogeared it, underlined it, etc. It's a great beginning book because it knows its target audience well, and caters to it. As such, it's great for the beginning to intermediate programmer of not just ASP, but also to those rather unfamiliar of client server and Microsoft DNA. SO it may be a little slowgoing for those who are already VB experts and have expereince with another similar technology (e.g. CFML, JSP).

However, for those who are NOT experts, this book is very readable and illlustrates learning ASP with as much wit as a memorable college intro to programming course.

Covers good ground as has some good reference projects.

I would have liked a CD-ROM with the book though.

It's such a great book 4.5 stars, really...

Core Java 2 : Volume 1 Fundamentals by Cay S. Horstmann, Gary Cornell   Used & new from: $3.99 Usually ships in 1-2 business days.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
Almost perfect November 30, 2000
If you have some experience programming and want to become very familiar with the workings of Java, this book is almost amasterpiece- it teaches you using the jdk (which means you get a very low level look at the language), and has excellent explanation not only of the fundamental classes and programming techiques of java, but also contrasts them with c++ and vb, for already experienced programmers who are familiar with programming ideas.

The authors use good examples and make exciting what is often treated as a dry subject. My only regrets are that the authors did not spend more time teaching us about network programming or jdbc or servlets, yet wasted time on applets. This in light of java's predominate usage at this point in these latter scenarios.

A Hard Day's Night (1964 Film) ~ Beatles List Price: $18.98 Buy new: $13.99 (You Save: 26%) Usually ships in 24 hours Used & new from: $9.09 (You Save: 52%) Usually ships in 1-2 business days.

0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
Musical joy November 30, 2000
This is one of my most cherised Beatles album, and I am familiar with almost every song in their collection, so that says a lot. Audiophiles be warned: I was initally turned off by the very low production quality. But if you listen to the album a few times and get used to it, the songs will be jangling in your head for a long time. SOme of the most melodic and naively enjoyable rock and roll songs from their collection are here. In addition to the well known songs, I was most pleased at how many unfamiliar great songs were on the album:

I Should Have Known Better
I'm Happy Just To Dance With You

Any Time At All

Things We Said Today

You Can't Do That

If you like poppy rock with great melody and a solid light groove, a must have.

Beginning Java by Ivor Horton List Price: $40.00 Buy new: $28.00 (You Save: 30%) Usually ships in 24 hours Used & new from: $5.50 (You Save: 86%) Usually ships in 1-2 business days.

10 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
Not good February 10, 2000
I have previous programming experience in Visual Basic, Perl, and JavaScript. I found this book to be slow-starting and not hands-on enough. It had a good introduction to OOP, and I am sure it is chock full ofinformation, but it is not readable at all. More like an encyclopedia. I grew tired and stopped.

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