In Wondrous and Mysterious Ways

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This diet works!

Good information

if you have bowel disease, you must read this book

If you are dealing with Ulcerative Colitis, you must read this..

This book cured my son's colitis!

Self Help Way To Treat Colitis and Other IBS Conditions, Second Edition
DeLamar Gibbons
Manufacturer: McGraw-Hill
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0658012177

Book Description

A new edition of the bestselling, groundbreaking work on bowel disorders

Thoroughly updated and revised, The Self-Help Way to Treat Colitis and Other IBS Conditions returns with the latest research on the diseases of the gastrointestinal tract, such as ulcerative colitis, Crohn's disease, and irritable bowel syndrome. It also includes the practical, effective, do-it-yourself treatments that have made the book a classic of natural health.

Customer Reviews:

This diet works!.......2007-06-08

I have been taking medication for proctitis for some time now. My symptoms would not go away. I had asked my doctor which foods to avoid and basically he said to avoid anything that doesn't seem to work for me. I finally went on line for some reading material and found this book. After a week on this diet, I started seeing results. I am now symptom free and it has only been 3 weeks. The great thing about this diet is that I don't have to make special recipes. I just have to avoid specific things. It is very easy to follow. Thank you as this book has gave me my life back again.

Good information.......2007-03-16

This book provides some good information with some simple options at a cheaper price. I've tried the tips and i already feel better. This book might not be for all, but it's a quick read and worth a try if you're not feeling well.

if you have bowel disease, you must read this book.......2006-08-06

I was diagnosed 17 years ago with UC at the age of 21. I've read many books and tried every diet, not to mention been to most types of alternative practitioners, & a slew of western doctors in various states, with no positive results. I recently got this book and for the first time I saw immediate & positive change. This book tells you what to avoid, and WHY. After fighting this disease for many years, I have never felt better. And after reading this book never have I had such a clear understanding of how the body's digestion works, and I certainly have never felt this good in almost 2 decades.

If you are dealing with Ulcerative Colitis, you must read this.........2006-03-20

This book really worked for me. It's small, and to the point, but as simple as it is, I couldn't find the same information anywhere else!

It's written by a doctor who had to deal with UC himself. The theory is still on the fringes, and you won't hear about sugar intollerances and sugar, fructose problems anywhere. However, they are a key factor in getting well in a number of illnesses.

I would definitely recommend this book for a read and to try out if you are dealing with chronic illnesses from unexplained origins.. such as UC, CD etc.

God bless the author.

This book cured my son's colitis!.......2005-11-15

My son Tom, now aged sixteen, had suffered from ulcerative colitis for almost three years.
I often looked for advice and help on the internet, once it became apparent that the gastroenterologist's standard medicines, azothioprine and steroids, were not helping Tom.
We were actually told by the specialist that diet made no difference!!!
As I watched Tom grow taller and thinner by the month, we tried the specific carbohydrate diet. This did not help.
I next took him to a naturopath, who prescribed slippery elm, which worked well for three months, then back to square one he went.
Then I found the book, written by an American doctor, who himself had suffered from colitis, and had researched it, using all his scientific skills and understanding, until he found a solution.
It was simply to remove from the diet all sugar, fruit and milk.
This is an easy diet to shop and cook for. Basically, Tom can eat anything savoury. We never did buy junk food - he only eats freshly prepared meat, fish, chicken, vegetables, potatoes, rice, pasta, etc.
Within days, as it says in the book, Tom felt better. The damaged gut began to heal.
After three months, he was well enough to take some exams, and after spending three years in his room, misssing school and friends, he is now leading a normal life again!
It feels like a miracle, and it is now six months since he started the diet. We are all meticulous about Tom's food. My daughter and I no longer eat sweets, cake or biscuits - well a little chocolate maybe, to help and support Tom in his recovery.
Friends and family prayed for him, but it still feels like a wonderful miracle.
Tom himself confessed to me that he thought he would never recover.

Average customer rating:

Not wide, but wonderfully deep

Yummy recipes and lots of info!

One of the best

Enjoyable but not practical

If only he had written more

Taste: One Palate's Journey Through the World's Greatest Dishes
David Rosengarten
Manufacturer: Random House
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Baking | Cooking, Food & Wine | Subjects | Books
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ASIN: 0375500111
Release Date: 1998-10-27

Amazon.com

Fans of David Rosengarten will be thrilled with the publication of Taste, not so much a companion volume to his popular Food Network show as a distillation of all the man holds dear. It is a remarkable, lush effort, beautifully illustrated with rich color pictures of exotic and home-grown foods. How many food-addled souls out there take the time, like Rosengarten, to sit down and catalog all of the personal favorite dishes from around the world, and then explain why the dish is so delicious, and exactly what makes it special? And oh, by the way, here's how to cook it!

Rosengarten begins his culinary adventure with a chapter entitled "My Favorite Light Appetizers." Here is bruschetta, remarkable Chinese appetizers, gazpacho, Thai salads, and oysters and caviar. In this and every chapter is everything you need to know in order to buy and prepare these foods; ideas on how to serve them; order them in a restaurant; judge them for quality and seasonality; and the right wines to accompany each dish. Other "My Favorite" chapters include in-between dishes (French onion soup; quiche), main courses (Szechwan Shrimp with Chili and Garlic Sauce; moussaka), and desserts (Tarte Tatin; chocolate-chip cookies). A wealth of cooking instruction is here to make your life easier too. Take Gumbo--Rosengarten details three ways in which to thicken the texture, by traditional roux, by okra, and by filé powder. Next comes a delightful recipe for Shrimp and Andouille Gumbo, and a list of recommended beers.

David Rosengarten brings remarkably good tastes into the home kitchen--anyone studying this book will be able to hold court with the best of them, Martha Stewart included. --Schuyler Ingle

Book Description

Do you want to make spice-rubbed ribs the way they're made by the best barbecue cooks in Memphis? Crispy soft-shell crabs that taste like they're right out of Chesapeake Bay? Refreshing Thai salad just as it's made in Bangkok? A moussaka that could be the star of a great taverna in Greece? A bisteeya that will transport you to Morocco? Catalan lobster soup, Vietnamese summer rolls, proper Dover sole, a real tiramisù? A golden, buttery tarte Tatin?

David Rosengarten will show you how.

The New York Times has said that David Rosengarten's hit show, Taste, on Food Network "reconceived the idea of what a cooking show could be. . . . He explores his subjects so thor-oughly and thoughtfully that he makes instant   experts of his viewers." Now Rosengarten has reconceived the idea of what a cookbook can be. Taste gives you a chance to experiment with some of the world's greatest dishes with the world's best cooking teacher at your side.

Each recipe is accompanied by a set of criteria--letting you know exactly what experts mean when they say a risotto is good, a gazpacho is excellent, or a chocolate chip cookie is perfect. Now you'll know how to make it--and what to look for along the way. Rosengarten tells you exactly what to shop for: the bottled hot sauce from the West Indies that makes the best ceviche, the brand of chocolate that produces the deepest-tasting molten chocolate cake. He's similarly candid about equipment, detailing everything from a handy smoker that's indispensable in the preparation of jerk chicken to the best heat source for a homemade crème brulee.

The chapter on wine is itself an education. You'll find everything you need to know to match wine with food--including a list of twelve inexpensive wines that will never let you down. With his characteristic candor, Rosengarten pricks the bubble of wine pretension--exploding many of America's most fervently held myths.

David Rosengarten is a great teacher, with an irrepressible enthusiasm that comes through as vividly in this book as it does on the screen. Beginners will learn the basics from this book. For those who know their way around the kitchen, Rosengarten's in-depth culinary information will be a revelation. A cookbook teaches you how to cook. Taste teaches you how to taste. You'll never want to cook again without it.

Customer Reviews:

Not wide, but wonderfully deep.......2006-01-14

David Rosengarten's FoodTV show, Taste, beautifully illustrated how good the food network *used* to be. Instead of trying to cover several dishes during his half hour allotment, Rosengarten focused on one item in particular -- and then told you everything about it. He showed what could go wrong with, say, a reuben sandwich or creme brulee, and then demonstrated how to do it right. You knew what his standards were and how to achieve them. Oh -- and he did it all with humor.

I think his book, Taste, came out at about the same time. It has the same premise: individual dishes in great depth, rather than a whole cuisine or a collection of random beef (or whatever) recipes. So you get five or more pages about paella or BBQ ribs or the "ordinary" fruit salad. The result is that you learn EVERYTHING about that one subject: his criteria for quality, the variation in methods (for example, Rosengarten compares the difference in gumbo when the dish is thickened with roux, okra, and filé powder), and sometimes its history.

It's always informative, and I have NEVER had a recipe failure. It isn't always the simplest choice, but he explains why you should bother with the extra effort. (His explanation of charcoute garnie causes me to pick a Parisian restaurant that specialized in it, so I could understand exactly why he made such a big deal about it. I'm spoiled for life, now, because I can't find the right kind of saurkraut to make it myself.)

The result is that I don't flip through Taste when I'm looking for an "I'm in the mood for Italian" dinner. It does mean that, when we're thinking about making crab cakes, we're guaranteed to say, "Does Rosengarten have a recipe? Let's see what he does."

Yummy recipes and lots of info!.......2001-06-26

I have absolutely loved everything I have tried from this cookbook. It is also fun and enjoyable to read. The reason I gave it 4 stars rather than 5 is that many of the recipes are quite complex. Once I started experimenting, I discovered that it is often possible to simplify the recipes without losing anything. For example, the stir-fried shrimp recipe calls for deep-frying the shrimp first, which is a hassle. I had wonderful results just stir-frying them. To give him credit, Rosengarten carefully explains the reasons for each unusual step. While I chose not to follow his instructions precisely, I did learn a good deal from reading his explanations. This is a great book for anyone who is confident in the kitchen. It can also be very educational for someone just learning to cook, but beginners may find the recipes dauntingly complex.

One of the best.......2001-02-07

Unlike the reviewer who found this book impractical, I have found this to be the best books on food that I have read. There is a chpater on wine which explains simply and clearly how to identify good food-wine pairings: excellent advice that was helped me on more than one occasion. Additionally, he explains enough about several wines from around the world that you can go and choose a bottle in confidence that your money will not be wasted.

Some of the recipes are complex, but others are very simple such as marinara sauce and dried pasta. Even if you don't use the recipes, the knowlege about food that you'll gain from this book is worth the purchase price several times over.

Enjoyable but not practical.......2001-02-02

I thoroughly enjoyed reading this cookbook. David Rosengarten is entertaining and absolutely dedicated to great food. Although the text was enjoyable and informative, most of the recipes seem like too much work and they are definitely not for every-day cooking. I have had the book for a couple of years and still have not actually tried any of the recipes. If you enjoy reading about food, this book is well worth it, but unless you are looking for very elaborate recipes for entertaining, don't buy it for the recipes.

If only he had written more.......2001-01-22

David Rosengarten writes this book not only to impart favorite recipes of his but also his reflections about food. Part travelogue, part cooking book, he ably imparts a love for not only food but also gastronomy, or the lifestyle of food and partaking of the pleasures of the table.

Don't buy this cookbook if you don't want to expand your culinary horizons, don't buy this if you aren't a little fussy about your food, and don't buy this book if you are looking for quick and dirty recipes with the ingredients you already have in your kitchen. This book is essential for everyone else.

Book Description

Create lovely dollhouse rugs, quilts, pillows, bedspreads, chair seats, more, with over 100 reusable miniature transfer patterns. Designs for various parts of your dollhouse and other small projects. Over 100 designs.

Customer Reviews:

Great for all levels of Miniature enthusiasts........2006-11-05

This is a wonderful, affordable book full of iron-on patterns for rugs, bedspreads, quilts, and other mini applications. If you use just ONE pattern, it is worth the price of this book!

Great Book!.......2005-09-03

I was really surprised with this book, it's loaded with all kinds of patterns to be used for making dollhouse items. I think this is a must have for any one making dollhouse items.

Delightful and Imaginative Designs.......2000-03-31

Miniature Iron-On Transfer Patterns for Dollhouses, Dolls and Small Projects is full of imaginative, playful designs for tiny rugs, curtains and bedspreads that will enhance any dollhouse. In addition, the patterns can be applied to many other projects: I have used the delicate baby animal motifs to embellish baby clothes and the many attractive decorative borders are ideal for embroidering collars, belts, bookmarks, and table linen. The transfers are easy to work with. The designs can be used by needleworkers of all skill levels.

Product Description

This volume is produced from digital images created through the University of Michigan University Library's preservation reformatting program.

Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening: Fourth Edition, 1849 (Dumbarton Oaks Reprints in Landscape Architechture)

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Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening: Fourth Edition, 1849 (Dumbarton Oaks Reprints in Landscape Architechture)
Andrew Jackson Downing
Manufacturer: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0884021920

A treatise on the theory and practice of landscape gardening, adapted to North America; with a view to the improvement of country residences ... with remarks ... architecture. By the late A.J. Downing, esq.

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A treatise on the theory and practice of landscape gardening, adapted to North America; with a view to the improvement of country residences ... with remarks ... architecture. By the late A.J. Downing, esq.
Downing, A. J. (Andrew Jackson)
Manufacturer: Scholarly Publishing Office, University of Michigan Library
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Gardening & Horticulture | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
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The Architecture of Country Houses

ASIN: 1425566642
Release Date: 2006-11-30

Product Description

This volume is produced from digital images created through the University of Michigan University Librarys preservation reformatting program.

A facsimile edition of a treatise on the theory and practice of landscape gardening: With the 1859 sixth ed. suppl. by Henry Winthrop Sargent

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A facsimile edition of a treatise on the theory and practice of landscape gardening: With the 1859 sixth ed. suppl. by Henry Winthrop Sargent
A. J Downing
Manufacturer: Funk & Wagnalls
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Landscape | Architecture | Professional & Technical | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: B0006BRQ3C

To Live in the New World: A. J. Downing and American Landscape Gardening

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To Live in the New World: A. J. Downing and American Landscape Gardening
Judith K. Major
Manufacturer: The MIT Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Book Description

A. J. Downing (1815-1852) wrote the first American treatise on landscape gardening. As editor of the Horticulturist and the country's leading practitioner and author, he promoted a national style of landscape gardening that broke away from European precedents and standards. Like other writers and artists, Downing responded to the intensifying demand in the nineteenth century for a recognizably American cultural expression.

To Live in the New World examines in detail Downing's growing conviction that landscape gardening must be adapted to the American people and the nation's indigenous landscapes. Despite significant changes in its three editions, Downing's A Treatise on the Theory and Practice of Landscape Gardening, remained true to the original intent: to guide country gentlemen--with enough money, time, and taste--in the creation of ideal homes and pleasure grounds. While most historians and critics have focused on Downing's more formally written treatise, Judith Major gives equal emphasis to Downing's spirited monthly editorials in the Horticulturist. In the journal, Downing "spoke American" and encouraged his countrymen and women to practice economy, to use America's rich natural resources wisely yet artfully, to be content with a little cottage and a few fine native trees.

Although the book is not a biography, the people, events, and experiences that shaped Downing's thinking on landscape gardening are central to the story. Significantly, Downing spent his life in the spectacular natural setting of the Hudson River valley. Through his professional practice, travels, reading, and extensive correspondence, he gradually became aware of the individual and collective needs that he served. Landscape gardening, Downing came to feel, had to respect not only a client's desires and means, but also the nation's republican values of moderation, simplicity, and civic responsibility. Major takes a fresh look at the influence on Downing's theory and practice of British writers such as Archibald Alison, Uvedale Price, Humphry Repton, John Claudius Loudon, and John Ruskin, and analyzes for the first time his debt to the French academician A. C. Quatremère de Quincy's Essay on Imitation.

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A TREATISE ON THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF LANDSCAPE GARDENING, Adapted to North America; with a View to The Improvement of Country Residences.. With Remarks on Rural Architecture.
A. J. Downing
Manufacturer: Wiley and Putnam
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000UOFZWO

Average customer rating:

A TREATISE ON THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF LANDSCAPE GARDENING, Adapted to North America; with a View to The Improvement of Country Residences.... With Remarks on Rural Architecture
A. J. Downing
Manufacturer: Wiley and Putnam
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Leather Bound
ASIN: B000S6QET2

Average customer rating:

A TREATISE ON THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF LANDSCAPE GARDENING, ADAPTED TO NORTH AMERICA; WITH A VIEW TO THE IMPROVEMENT...
A. J. Downing
Manufacturer: Wiley And Putnam
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000MJ9BNQ

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A treatise on the theory and practice of landscape gardening, adapted to North America;: With a view to the improvement of country residences ... With remarks on rural architecture
A. J Downing
Manufacturer: O. Judd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

Landscape | Gardening & Horticulture | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B00086EA2A

A Treatise on the theory and practice of landscape gardening.

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A Treatise on the theory and practice of landscape gardening.
A.J. DOWNING
Manufacturer: NY: Orange Judd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000UG7K84

Customer Reviews:

A bit blokeish, but thorough.......2001-11-23

This is not another medical book, but is an attempt to provide some literature on pregnancy for expectant fathers. My wife is six months pregnant and so far the book has been spot-on about what to expect. The role of the husband/father in pregnancy is too often underestimated by both men and women, and this has lead to men being excluded and giving their partner less support than they should. The book teases and jokes about going to watch football a few times too many, but apart from that it's a responsible 'new lad's' guide to the earliest stages of fatherhood.

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Touching Story of Mr & Mrs Mingus

An Elegantly Written Love Story & Testimony To A Jazz Legend

More about Mingus

A Truly Wonderful Read

Leaves you wanting to know more...

Tonight at Noon: A Love Story
Sue Mingus
Manufacturer: Pantheon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Composers & Musicians | Arts & Literature | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books
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Cornell 1964

ASIN: 0375421157
Release Date: 2002-04-02

Book Description

In Tonight at Noon, Sue Graham Mingus gives us an elegant and unsparingly honest memoir of a romance
between American opposites: she, a product of privilege, a former midwestern WASP debutante and Smith College graduate who worked as a journalist in Europe and in New York; he, an authentic jazz titan, a brilliant, eccentric, difficult artist, a scion of Watts, Los Angeles, who would become one of America’s foremost composers.

Charles Mingus’s improbable love for Sue Graham, his unpredictable confrontations, excesses, and exaggerations, drew her into a bewildering world, one where jazz and art were magnificent obsessions but were refracted, as was everything else, through Charles’s individualistic interpretation of life itself. It was a world that was as exotic and rapturous, as hostile, enlightening, and baffling, as any far-off country. Tonight at Noon is the story of that world, of the tumultuous, passionate marriage of Sue and Charles Mingus, and of Sue’s personal odyssey inside and outside its confines.

Here is a love story—heartbreaking, joyous, and unforgettable—that also illumines an important chapter in jazz history and the inner workings of a rare and complex artist, whose music, thanks to his widow, still plays to packed concert halls almost twenty-five years after his death.

Customer Reviews:

Touching Story of Mr & Mrs Mingus.......2006-03-10

This book was a nice surprise for me. After reading BENEATH THE UNDERDOG, I was hungry for a more comprehensive and objective analysis of Charles Mingus. In TONIGHT AT NOON, his wife Sue tells a touching story of how the two met and sadly, how the two of them coped with ALS and Mingus's slow and painful physical decline.

Sue begins with her own life from childhood all the way up to and including a lousy marriage that would eventually end in divorce. At this point, the story goes by a bit slower than one would hope, but it is necessary in understanding her behavior later on in life. It is at the time of her separation from her husband that she is introduced to Mingus in New York City.

The story goes through the typical ups and downs of any serious relationship, but as it progresses to Charles's dealings with ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease), the nature of the story takes a dark, yet touching turn. One of the most obviously touching moments was when Sue and Charles along with many other cats from the old days were invited to the White House to celebrate the artform of jazz. Fortunately, Jimmy Carter was always an avid jazz fan, and was the first president to publically recognize the genre. It would have been a major tragedy if Mingus were to miss out on such an honor - at the very least, such an absence would have strengthened Mingus's reasoning that all jazz musicians are not appreciated until they are gone. This was the same reasoning that was the motivation for Mingus's 'The Clown'. Unfortunately, by the time he visited the White House, he was wheelchair-bound, and when he was recognized by name and asked to stand up, he was unable to. It must have been a serious horror to feel as if the world never truly recognized you until your last days, and then be unable to stand, or let alone talk about it with others.

The story takes darker twists and turns when Sue and Charles are confronted with assisted suicide as a possible alternative to the slow and painful death he was enduring from the disease. In the long run, the couple even visisted a witch doctor in Mexico who claimed to have an ALS cure, where Sue and Charles would spend their final weeks together.

I found this book to be extremely touching, although it is more of a love story (as the title suggests) than that of a biographical work of Mingus. On the other hand, who better to convey to the reader what Charles Mingus was really like than his own wife? Look elsewhere for a broader representation of Mingus, but turn to TONIGHT AT NOON for a true understanding of Mingus the human being.

An Elegantly Written Love Story & Testimony To A Jazz Legend.......2005-06-10

Charlie Mingus, the legendary bassist/composer has long been one of my favorite jazz musicians. Many have called him "irascible, demanding, bullying, and probably a genius." I can attest to the "genius" part. As a bassist Mingus has few peers. He elevated his instrument into the front line of a band with his "pulsating sense of rhythm and powerful tone." My admiration for him led me to buy the book, "Tonight At Noon: A Love Story." The title comes from one of Charlie's best compositions.

Sue Mingus, his widow and fourth wife, writes this extraordinary memoir with elegance, passion, and honesty. Their's is an improbable love story, especially given their racial, social, and temperamental differences. He was a brilliant, volatile, eccentric artist, and a product of L.A.'s Watts ghetto. Sue Graham, a Midwestern WASP and debutante, graduated from Smith College, and worked as a journalist in Europe and New York. The two met in 1964. Unlike many memoirs on the market today, this lady has a powerful tale to tell - and she can really write! One of the most moving and fundamental feelings I was left with after concluding this love story, and it is just that, is that Charlie Mingus was so very special, not just as a musician, but as a man.

The first part of the memoir covers the period of the couple's courtship and marriage, beginning when they met to the onset of Charlie's illness, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, (ALS), commonly called Lou Gehrig's Disease, in 1977. The latter half deals with his last years, and their terrible battle against his affliction for which there is no cure. Sue cared for him until his untimely death in 1979, at the young age of 56. Physically and emotionally exhausted, Sue traveled to India to scatter his ashes in the Ganges. She says, "He had more energy than ninety people running down the block when he was frozen in a wheelchair" (commenting on his final days in Cuernavaca, Mexico).

Jazz and art were Mingus' wonderful obsessions. He brought Sue into his world with all its exoticism, confusion, exhilaration, hostilities, excesses and unpredictable confrontations. Hers is the story of a loving and tumultuous marriage, and her own personal odyssey inside and outside its confines. Her writing on Mingus' shared thoughts, on many topics, makes for fascinating reading, and provides insight into the mind of this talented, complex man. At one point she writes, "He was so worried he might fail to express something on his mind that he was compelled to state it instantly, examine it, get a reaction to it. Sometimes I thought if he failed to express himself to the world around him, he would go out of his mind." Another discerning comment about living with a creative genius and asserting one's own priorities: "Artists get away with their ambiguities and immoralities because they leave something behind, maybe not to their own children, but to the world. The rest of us leave our children behind, whose judgment will add to our own."

There are several wonderful anecdotes of encounters with Charlie Parker, Sonny Rollins, Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, Norman Mailer, and some extraordinary anti-drug comments to Timothy Leary: "You've got nothing for Harlem, man. Nothing for the workers, the people who go to their jobs, the people who get up at six."

"Tonight At Noon" includes never-before published black and white photographs of Mingus and a special epilogue about the activities Mingus' music has taken on since his death. Sue Mingus is the founder and president of the Charles Mingus Institute and has managed Mingus's music for the past twenty years. She has dedicated herself to keeping his sound alive and thus created the Mingus Big Band, which has made five CDs, the latest is "Tonight at Noon," and each year tours about thirty cities in the U.S. and twenty more cities around the world.

"Tonight At Noon" was one of the "100 Best Books of the Year," chosen by the Los Angeles Times Magazine, December 8, 2002, and was among the "Notable Books of the Year 2002," in the New York Times Book Review, December 8, 2002. It is certainly one of the most memorable biography/memoirs I have read in a long time. Kudos!
JANA

More about Mingus.......2004-06-23

An important contribution to the existing material about the great jazz composer/bassist.

I give the book a medium rating because it can't seem to decide what it wants to be -- a love story, a "portait of the artist as a dying man," or collected anecdotes about a master musician and enormous personality. My bias is that I was hoping for the latter.

There's stuff here about Mingus that you won't get anywhere else because it's written by his soulmate. Sue Mingus may tell us a little bit more about herself and her background than music aficianados may want to know, but she is a very good writer and has quite a story to tell.

A Truly Wonderful Read.......2003-05-22

I just finished this gem of a book and wonder why it is buried under Music
Biographies in bookstores rather than acknowledging it for what it claims
to be, a love story. Although rich with unique insights into the
incomparable Charles Mingus, this is not essentially biography but rather a story of opposites who turn out to be not so opposite, who share the profound and conflicting challenges of what it means to be human, which includes every one of us.

Leaves you wanting to know more..........2003-03-29

This book is a must-read for fans of Charles Mingus. Here you get first-hand accounts of what it was like living with and dealing with Mingus's temperament, exaggerated lifestyle, and unique musical talents.

A majority of the book deals with Charles's last few years of life struggling to deal with ALS and going through a serious of desperate third-world medical practices to achieve a "miracle cure" which sadly never came.

All the while Sue Mingus's surprisingly fresh and concise prose will carry you through each chapter, salivating for more of Charles's sudden bouts of rage and humor, and then equally strong showings of compassion toward his family as he faces the "chill of death" head-on.

All in all a unique insight into one of Jazz's greatest composers.

Book Description

The main aim of this work is to understand Jesus as he saw himself, and to compare that self-understanding with the ways in which others have grasped the nature of his mission. (Theology)

Customer Reviews:

Signs of the times..........2003-06-06

Irving Zeitlin followed up his acclaimed survey of `Ancient Judaism' with a study of one of the pivotal points in Jewish political, sociological, and theological history: the time of the Roman occupation, which is also the time of Jesus.

In his book, `Jesus and the Judaism of His Time', Zeitlin examines the different varieties of Judaism present in Palestine during the period of the early Caesars, to look for unifying principles (that which all Jewish people would agree makes one a member of the people) as well as the established variants: Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, Zealots and Sicarii. He also looks at a movement of thought and feeling that was crossing these more established lines, namely, the messianic idea.

Drawing primarily on the three sources contemporary with the time, namely, the writings of Josephus, the Misnah*, and the Christian New Testament*, and borrowing occasionally from other sources such as the Dead Sea Scrolls, Zeitlin constructs a picture of Judaism that works toward a comprehensive overview of the source of both modern Judaism and Christianity. Zeitlin pulls in examples of Judaic influence outside (such as on the works of Aristobulus and Philo) to show the influence that Judaism was already having in the Greek- and Roman-dominated world.

(*While the Misnah and the New Testament were largely composed after this period, the subject material and stories date to this period, and were carried by people comfortable with oral traditions of transmission.)

Across the varieties of Jewish expression, Zeitlin argues, there was always a grassroots support for each of the varieties because they adhered to certain principles of respect for the Torah in the face of much more politically-powerful and worldly-seductive influences. As Josephus wrote:

`The greatest miracle of all is that our Law holds out no seductive bait of sensual pleasure, but has exercised this influence through its own inherent merits; and, as God permeates the universe, so the Law has found its way among all mankind.'

There was, however, varying shifts in outlook, not the least of which was the definition of salvation, redemption, and God's ultimate will (a situation that occurs in the development of many religious frameworks). Is salvation corporate or individual? Is God working to save the people of Israel, or each individual among the people of Israel, or both? Messianic feeling wavered between these two sentiments, and can often be seen in interchanges that occur between Jesus and others, particularly Zealots.

Of course, the idea of messianism gave rise to false prophets (and, most likely, some of them truly believed themselves to be acting according to the will of God), who often lead their followers to disaster. In some terms, even the Jesus movement apparently ended in disaster. It was due to the continuing rise of messianic figures that the Romans were sensitive to political uprising and difficulty in a province so strategically located to the Parthians and the Egyptians.

Zeitlin then turns to the person of Jesus and characteristic of Jesus in this context. He identifies Jesus in this milieu as a charismatic leader. This he defines carefully:

`Charisma, meaning literally "gift of grace", is a form of authority based upon the extraordinary personal qualities of an individual who, thanks to those qualities, is able to call forth an absolutely personal devotion to his leadership.'

He sees Jesus as a pious Jew of the time, and if he seemed at odds with a particular Jewish practice or belief, he could rest assured that given the diversity of interpretation in Judaism at the time that he was not out of place in ascribing his own practice and interpretation. Indeed, Jesus was closer to the Pharisees (whom later Christians have come to recognise often almost as an enemy force against Jesus) with concern for holiness and observance of Torah, but Zeitlin also highlights again the cross-variety influences at play. Jesus and his followers were important enough to come to the attention of observers such as Josephus, who records that the execution of James (the Jerusalem leader of the Jesus movement after Jesus) by a Sadducean high-priest was of sufficient odiousness to cause the ouster of that high-priest. That James should incur the wrath of the Sadducees (and not the Pharisees) shows that there was much more happening at the time that might appear in the New Testament.

Zeitlin continues his analysis to look at the elements of the life and teaching of Jesus that were original and creative in this context. He looks at the conflicting images of Jesus as revolutionary, and the political and social context behind his arrest, trial, and execution. He examines the early formation of a Christian community and the influence of Paul on this new movement.

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