Choices: Making a Good Move to a Retirement Community

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Choices: Making a Good Move to a Retirement Community
Heather M. Young , and Rheba de Tornyay
Manufacturer: ERA Care Communities
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Retirement Planning | Personal Finance | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
General | Aging | Personal Health | Health, Mind & Body | Subjects | Books
Aging | Aging Parents | Parenting & Families | Subjects | Books
Accessories:

Philips HeartStart Home Defibrillator (AED)

Health o Meter HDC100-01 "Grow with Me" Teddy Bear Scale for Babies and Toddlers

RESPeRATE Blood Pressure Lowering Device

ASIN: 0971061505

Book Description

More and more older adults are seeking alternatives to their present living arrangements. Retirement communities and assisted living complexes are options that offer the privacy and support to help you, the older adult, remain independent for as long as possible. Choices describes the process of moving. It is based on the experiences of older adults who have successfully relocated.

As you mature, your needs will change. You eventually may decide to free yourself from the responsibilities and upkeep of your home and demanding lifestyle. Choices helps you weigh your options and plan for your future.

Customer Reviews:

Pearl's book encompasses the paths Christian people........1998-10-21

A BOOK REVIEW By Charlie J. Black

All of the three decades that I have known Pearl Gray Daniels, she has been involved with the pulse beat of people.

Uniquely, Pearl's growing up in the "Holt Street Church of Christ" lead her to being curious about "Its Role in Establishing Churches of Christ Among African Americans in Central Alabama." Thus, the basis of this book.

This book evolved through Pearl's entire life. A life that commenced with the uniting of her parents, Abraham and Nancy Jones Gray. A family that would include four brothers; one being Fred D. Gray, who, himself, would, at age 12, become a minister of the Church of Christ.

Pearl's book encompasses the paths and the paths of people who, because of the church, were able to survive in time of crisis; most notably, the Montgomery Bus Boycott, of which her `baby' brother Fred was legal counsel.

In formulating this book, Pearl saw Alabama from a different prospective than a lot of her contemporaries. Before public education was taken for granted for black people, Pearl studied at Stillman College, a Presbyterian institution, and taught in Presbyterian schools in Wilcox County, Alabama.

Education, like church, to Pearl, is a continuing process. She has always been active in alumni organizations of Alabama State University and Stillman College. In Texas, in honor of her mother, Mrs. Nancy Jones Gray Arms, Pearl set up a scholarship at Southwestern Christian College.

Through Pearl's eyes, not only does the Holt Street Church of Christ have an illustrious past, it has a very promising future.

Charlie J. Black, Educator and Contemporary Writer. Author of: AFTER THE FACT: 20/20 HINDSIGHT.

The Washington Provider Syndicate

October 12, 1998

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The Political Use of Racial Narratives: School Desegregation in Mobile, Alabama, 1954-1997.(Book Review): An article from: Journal of Southern History
Clarence L. Mohr
Manufacturer: Southern Historical Association
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

Alabama | State & Local | United States | Americas | History | Subjects | Books
ASIN: B00082J61O
Release Date: 2005-07-31

Book Description

This digital document is an article from Journal of Southern History, published by Southern Historical Association on May 1, 2004. The length of the article is 636 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: The Political Use of Racial Narratives: School Desegregation in Mobile, Alabama, 1954-1997.(Book Review)
Author: Clarence L. Mohr
Publication: Journal of Southern History (Refereed)
Date: May 1, 2004
Publisher: Southern Historical Association
Volume: 70 Issue: 2 Page: 472(2)

Article Type: Book Review

Distributed by Thomson Gale

1997 Alabama Manufacturers Register (Serial)

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1997 Alabama Manufacturers Register (Serial)

Manufacturer: Manufacturers News
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | Reference | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 9997810279

Alabama Business Directory 1997/98 (Serial)

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Alabama Business Directory 1997/98 (Serial)

Manufacturer: Info USA Inc
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Directories | Catalogs & Directories | Reference | Subjects | Books

General | Reference | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 1561059285

County Business Patterns. Alabama 1997 (County Business Patterns. Alabama, 1997)

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County Business Patterns. Alabama 1997 (County Business Patterns. Alabama, 1997)

Manufacturer: United States Government Printing
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books

General | Reference | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 9990111111

1816, a Tierce comes to Tuscaloosa: A history of the Tierce family in the United States of America from 1764 to 1997

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1816, a Tierce comes to Tuscaloosa: A history of the Tierce family in the United States of America from 1764 to 1997
Memmon Tierce
Manufacturer: M. Tierce, II
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

Customer Reviews:

Holding the Line.......2000-07-08

When it comes to telling the story of the Civil War through old diaries, this book ranks on the top. Flavel C. Barber, 3rd Tennessee Infantry, kept a diary through his entire service with the Confederate Army - beginning with Fort Donelson and going through the Atlanta Campaign where he was killed. The diaries, edited by Robert Ferell, are invaluable in helping Civil War scholars piece together bits of history from the past. The diarist, Flavel C. Barber, was a school teacher prior to enlisting in the Confederate Army. Perhaps, that gave Barber an edge to his style of writing and his accuracy in writing. The diaries are well written and almost poetic in spots. I consider this book to be one of the finest books available regarding Civil War history.

Customer Reviews:

This book helped me understand what my parents went through........1997-10-21

I was the transcriptionist for Brothers Beyond Blood, by George Sharpe, M.D. When I started to work for him, he only wanted a "hard copy" version of the letters he and his wife, Alison, had written to each other during WW-II. When the work started, I knew there was something that spoke to everyone and encouraged him to "flesh out" the letters into a narrative. The tapes he provided stunned me in their detail and emotion. Two people caught up in the vagaries of war. A baby at home, Jeanette. The single-minded determination to survive and "come home." The boredom, exhilaration, and gut-wrenching fear. New Guinea and its natives. The fall and subsequent rise of the Philippines. The men who served: the "Brothers Beyond Blood." I cannot recommend this book highly enough. If you're a child of a WW-II Vet, you need to read this book. Deb Martin-Bruels

Average customer rating:

Good book for the price

An excellent guide for home owners and home inspectors

Inspecting a House: A Guide for Buyers, Owners, and Renovators
Carson Dunlop & Associates Ltd.
Manufacturer: Kaplan Business
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
General | Real Estate | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
General | Remodeling & Renovation | Home Design | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Household Hints | How-to & Home Improvements | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

The Pocket Idiot's Guide to Home Inspections (The Pocket Idiot's Guide)

Inspecting a House (For Pros by Pros)

Home Inspection Checklists: 111 Illustrated Checklists and Worksheets You Need Before Buying a Home

Home Inspection Business from A to Z: Real Estate Home Inspector, Homeowner, Home Buyer and Seller Survival Kit Series (Real Estate from a to Z)

The Complete Book of Home Inspection

ASIN: 0793180546
Release Date: 2004-04-01

Book Description

A new home should be a financial investment, not a financial drain. Homeowners often realize too late that the property they’ve purchased is in need of costly repairs. Now you can protect yourself before you make a purchase by conducting a thorough home inspection. Seasoned real estate inspectors Alan Carson and Robert Dunlop will help you master the techniques of professional home inspection. This all-inclusive guide, filled with clear and detailed illustrations, will show you:

• What to inspect yourself and what to leave to the experts

• Which materials are the most durable when it comes to gutters, exterior walls, and roof

• How to check the fuse box or circuit breaker panel for trouble spots

• How to identify pipe materials used in plumbing systems and evaluate a septic system

• What you need to know about floors, doors, windows, walls, and much more

For those who want to perform their own renovations, this book features such useful resources as a breakdown of typical renovation costs and a sample construction contract to help do-it-yourselfers avoid common construction pitfalls. Inspecting a House is a valuable resource that will save you time, money, and the endless frustrations of unforeseen home repairs.

Customer Reviews:

Good book for the price.......2006-03-18

"Inspecting A House" is about performing home inspections prior to purchasing a home. It contains sections the exterior, structure, electrical service, plumbing, heating, the basement and crawl spaces, interior, insulation, and the attic.

While I am not a professional, I did find this book useful for the cost. The book is easy to read and is fairly exhaustive of the type of problems you could run into and what those problems would look like. The book also contains several diagrams to help illistrate what problems would look like. I would have liked to have seen more diagrams, and even some color pictures... but that would have increased the cost of the book. Like I said, the book was worth what it cost.

The book is targeted to the US environment and codes. Being from Canada, I would have preferred if the author had included us as well... but this isn't fatal. Finally the last part on home renovations seemed to be out of place and far too elementary. The author should have left that part out and done more detail on home inspection.

This book gets the job done for the price. Pick it up for a good overview of home inspections. 3 out of 5 stars.

An excellent guide for home owners and home inspectors.......2000-11-24

This book is an invaluable guide for anyone who owns a home, or is planning to buy or renovate one. The different systems of the house are explored, from the heating system to the roof, with clear descriptions of the typical problems which occur in each of these areas and what to look for.

The pictures, which come from the "Illustrated Home" series of books are clear and certainly worth a thousand words each.

In addition to the technical explanations of the various systems of the house, there is a section devoted to the renovation process, dealing with architects, and information on contracts and budgeting.

Average customer rating:
Inspecting a House/a Guide for Buyers, Owners and Renovators
Alan Carson , and Robert Dunlop
Manufacturer: Stoddart
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
Home Repair | How-to & Home Improvements | Home & Garden | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0773750924

Book Description

From his first appearance on Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In, pop culture entertainment curiosity Tiny Tim captivated audiences and became an instant star and enigma. In this firsthand look at Tiny Tim's incredible life and career, his manager and confidant reveals previously unknown details of his eccentric life. Best known for his falsetto-voiced rendition of "Tiptoe Through the Tulips" and his Tonight Show wedding to Miss Vicki, Tiny Tim's public persona offered a mere glimpse of the actual man and his true behind-the-scenes antics. From his attempts to join the army and his efforts to help the FBI defuse the situation at Waco to the great joy and even greater agony Tiny Tim experienced because of the inherent conflict between his sexual appetites and deep religious convictions, this humorous account casts a new light on this zany character and one of the entertainment world's most enduring and off-the-wall relationships.

Customer Reviews:

So bad, it's tragic........2006-04-04

Plodding, slow-moving and obviously a fabrication to anyone who knew anything about Tiny Tim. This is not even worth a glance at the public library.

Just awful........2006-03-14

How can you take a subject this interesting and turn it into this jumbled snooze-fest of a book? With friends like Mr. Plym, Mr. Tim didn't need any enemies.

Grotesquely bad........2005-02-16

A waste of paper. False information poorly presented. How did this ever manage to find a publisher?

Turkey of the Year.......2005-01-01

Folks, if the Amazon rating system went into negative stars, this one would rate a -10. And the sad thing is that, being a huge Tiny fan, I was willing to cut it alot of slack. I would have been willing to forgive it's being very badly written (it is just desperately bad) I would even have been willing to forgive it's being a hopelessly shallow 'expose' type of thing. But what I can't forgive are the gross inacuracies. The book is full of so many little falsehoods that I have to wonder if ANY of it is true. For instance, Plym at one point talks about Tiny always being late for rehersals, when in fact Tiny was a fanatic for puctuality- one of his favorite sayings was 'if you aren't on time, you aren't worth a dime'. In his interviews and phone messages he always mentioned what time it was- it was a mania with him. Another example: Plym has Tiny talking about the joys of French kissing, when in fact Tiny was a germ freak with a life long aversion to the idea French kissing- no saliva exchange for Tiny! No way!. Those are small examples, but the book is rife with things that just don't sound right. Biggest among the things that smell funny to me is Plym's claim to be Tiny's 'best friend'. Strange, then, that while the book talks about Tiny's death, it makes no mention of the near fatal heart attack that Tiny suffered just a few months before. I have seen all of Tiny's personal effects, including get well soon cards and records of those who called him at the hospital, and Plym did not contact him. Nor was Plym's name in any of Tiny's several address books. He was just a guy who was Tiny's manager for a while late in his career, with a poor memory of what Tiny was really like and a desire to make money off a book. Good Luck, Plym. This thing is the Turkey of the year. For any reader who hungers to know what Tiny was really like, get ahold of 'Tiny Tim' written by Harry Stein. Now THERE is a good book.

Tiny Tim deserves better.......2004-12-02

Mr. Plym's book is a huge disapointment for Tiny Tim fans. Those looking for graphic detail of Tiny's sex life and masturbatory habits will find plenty to chew on, but those looking for a deeper portrait of the man better look elsewhere. I am suprised that Mr. Plym knows so little about Tiny's life and music. Especially the music!!! Tiny was a living archive of American popular song but none of this seemed to rub off on Mr. Plym who shows little interest in mentioning any of this. BTW, Tiny Tim had many many managers and agents during the last 20 years of his life and everyone claimed to be the "best" friend. Tiny's memory deserves better than this petrified hunk of wood fiber.

Book Description

essays, social criticism on race, sex, class

Amazon.com

Between 1865 and 1876, about two thousand blacks held elective and appointive offices in the South. A few, such as the senator from Mississippi Blanche K. Bruce, are well known, but most have languished in obscurity, omitted from official state histories. Prize-winning historian Eric Foner profiles more than 1,500 black legislators, state officials, sheriffs, justices of the peace, and constables. Essential reading for anyone interested in the scope of black achievement during Reconstruction, Freedom's Lawmakers includes biographical sketches of each officeholder (some necessarily brief because so little is known) and many photographs.

Book Description

Freedom's Lawmakers is the first comprehensive directory of America's first generation of black public officials--those who held office during the Reconstruction era that followed the Civil War. With positions including congressman, justice of the peace, constable, and member of the legislature, the nearly 1500 officials listed here offer a panorama of the black community in all its diversity--freeborn and slave, Northern and Southern, rich and poor. The book draws on extensive research in the era's primary sources, and the voluminous literature on Reconstruction that has appeared in the past generation, providing information about the antebellum status, occupation, property ownership, military service, and other attributes of black officeholders. The concise biographies are augmented by 125 halftones, including seven composite photographs at the front of the book. In some cases, only a few pieces of information are available, but in a remarkable number of instances, the book traces the life histories of previously unknown individuals, most of them born as slaves, who played a role in America's first experiment in interracial democracy. The biographies follow many individuals into the twentieth century, illustrating the impact of these black Americans on post-Reconstruction society and the consequences for black Americans of the overthrow of Reconstruction.

Freedom's Lawmakers: A Directory of Black Officeholders During Reconstruction

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Freedom's Lawmakers: A Directory of Black Officeholders During Reconstruction
Eric Foner
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OKB992

Customer Reviews:

Great book.......1999-11-28

Through Rice's own writing the book gives a nice history of one our centuries great leftist-Catholic activists, sampling Rice's writings from the thirties through the nineties. It has given me a sharp sense of the issues that were in the minds a generation of Pittsburghers who, like my working class grandparents, hung on Father Rices' words during his regular radio commentaries, and looked to him as a defender and educator through a period of great change. The paperback is nicely put together in a large format and includes many black and white illustrations.

Average customer rating:
How to Raise Money from Dead People: Estate Planning and Endowments Made Simple
Susan M. Scribner
Manufacturer: Scribner & Associates
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
Nonprofit Organizations & Charities | Industries & Professions | Business & Investing | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 1893358054

Amazon.com

John Irving's novels pose tantalizing challenges to filmmakers: at his best, Irving has proven both popular and ambitious, crafting rich, picaresque fiction that juggles Big Themes and antic comedy, braiding his central narratives with intriguing subplots and discursive back stories driven by vivid characters. Irving's accessibility teases the would-be director or producer with the prospect of commercial acceptance even as the scope and intricacy of his work raises crucial risks for the scriptwriter. With two early novels that made it to the screen, The World According to Garp and The Hotel New Hampshire, Irving's box office impact thus far evenly translates to hit and miss.

This slender memoir offers a perceptive, if hardly objective, critique of the inherent differences between novels and screenplays, with the writer sharing his own experiences creating both. Irving focuses principally on his crusade to bring The Cider House Rules to the screen, tracing its gestation through four successive directors; with Irving himself attached as scriptwriter, we see the novelist struggling to reconcile the demands of concision against his paternal instincts toward the original book. Written before the final cut of The Cider House Rules, My Movie Business often verges on self-justification. Irving's respect for the movie's ultimate caretaker, Swedish director Lasse Hallstrom, is evident, as is his hopeful enthusiasm for the project's casting (which includes Michael Caine, Tobey McGuire, Jane Alexander, and Charlize Theron). Yet Irving can't repress the wariness prompted by his earlier disappointments with both this and other novels.

Ultimately, such candor doesn't diminish the account's value as a post mortem of the creative process behind serious filmmaking, nor does it overpower the reliable grace of Irving's prose. Fans will also find My Movie Business revealing in its exploration of the inspiration behind The Cider House Rules and its eloquent stance against the antiabortion movement--Irving's own grandfather, a leading doctor, administrator, and Harvard professor of obstetrics and gynecology. But moviegoers, as well as those who haven't read Irving's original novel, should be forewarned that this memoir does reveal key plot elements of both. --Sam Sutherland

Book Description

After two producers, four directors, thirteen years, and uncounted rewrites, the movie version of John Irving's acclaimed novel, The Cider House Rules, at last made it to the big screen. Here is the author's account of the novel-to-film process. Anecdotal, affectionate, and delightfully candid, My Movie Business dazzles with Irving's incomparable wit and style.

Download Description

John Irving's memoir describes his involvement (and lack thereof) in five of the films that have (and have not) been made from his nine novels. The primary focus of "My Movie Business" is on the 13 years Irving spent writing and rewriting his screenplay of The Cider House Rules, for four different directors. A Miramax production, the film was finally shot in the fall of 1998; directed by the Swedish director Lasse Hallstroem (My Life as a Dog), with Michael Caine in the role of Dr. Larch. The Cider House Rules movie is a November 1999 release.

Irving also writes about the failed effort, with the director Irvin Kershner (The Empire Strikes Back) to make Irving's first novel, Setting Free the Bears, into a movie; about two of the films that were made from Irving's novels but not from his screenplays, George Roy Hill's The World According to Garp and Tony Richardson's The Hotel New Hampshire; about Irving's ongoing struggle, with the director Martin Bell (American Heart), to make the author's screenplay of his novel, A Son of the Circus, a film.

In addition to its qualities as a memoir -- anecdotal, comic, and candid -- "My Movie Business" is an insightful essay on the essential differences between writing a novel and writing a screenplay. Never have the two forms of storytelling been so lucidly compared and contrasted, and with such generous detail, and with so many memorable and clarifying examples.

Customer Reviews:

The pictures were nice........2004-09-29

This recollection of his writing (books and screenplays) varies from the personal to his gripes about the movie business. He admits that he is not a moviegoer, mainly because he is not comfortable sitting in dark rooms with a lot of strangers! And yet he devoted many years and frustrated efforts to get his novels filmed, using his own screenplays.

He speaks of his friendship with Salman Rushdie, author of THE SATANIC VERSES, to whom he dedicated his novel, A SON OF THE CIRCUS. He relates his experiences in India researching children who'd been sold to be performers in the circuses there. He was particularly interested in the dwarf clowns. It took him five and a half years to finish the novel; had no luck with getting the screenplay accepted.

Of his published books, the three most popular made into films were THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GARP (starring Robin Williams), which I thought was pretty weird, THE HOTEL NEW HAMPSHIRE (Jodie Foster) and THE CIDER HOUSE RULES (Tobey Maguire -- the reason I watched it).

He gives an in-depth account of the making of this movie and his involvement in every aspect except the advertising. He worried over what the poster would show. In the movie, he portrayed a train station master (that is his costumed acting on the front cover of the book), where an old steam engine similar to Knoxville's Rambler was used.

If you saw the movie about an abortion doctor and his protege, looking at the large photo layout in the middle of this book lets you re-live the emotions. It is based on his grandfather's practice in Boston as explained in his biography, SAFE DELIVERANCE, about the nationally Lying-In Hospital. His grandfather wrote nonfiction as opposed to John's novels based on his family background. Guess he used his imagination a bit.

He made demands that they use the reading of Charles Dickens' DAVID COPPERFIELD to the children in the orphanage. I think perhaps he lives in the past too much as he reminisces not about the good things but the negative which happened.

This was not one of my favorite movies (the subject matter is still a controversy which may never be resolved), but I did learn how to find a person's unlisted phone number: 'say you are calling about a death in the family.' It happened to this author when he lived in New York and asked a caller "how did you get my number?" Now, this I found interesting. That's the joy of reading -- you learn something in every book no matter how insubstantial the subject matter.

It's not exactly what I would call a "memoir" as it focuses on this film almost exclusively. The rest is peripheral.

Unprintable - Not worth it !.......2004-04-26

Amazon was in stock then out of stock on paperback edition, after advising book would be shipped and arrive in 2 days.( Then I check and its due to ship in 2 weeks.) I needed it to review for college assignment,so had no choice but to buy download version.I missed the " can't print " notation on description. Would not allow cut and paste for quotes from book and had to type all quotes referred to. Reading a book on a monitor was also annoying. Never again will I download a book.
First time ever screwed by Amazon, so I will forgive them for now.

A great memoir.......2003-11-19

If at first you don't succeed...

It took Irving a great amount of time and work to have one of his greatest novels turned into one of the most critically-acclaimed movies of the year. THE CIDER HOUSE RULES, perhaps the best known of Irving's novels, was finally made into a movie starring Michael Caine. MY MOVIE BUSINESS follows the variious difficulties he encounters, while also letting the reader in on his personal history with and opinions on the touchy subject of abortion. In true Irving style, he speaks seriously of the subject but relieves the viewer of its politics by telling some very funny anecdotes.

I highly suggest this book for any Irving fan. If you haven't really read anything of his before, I don't suggest this as a first book--read THE CIDER HOUSE RULES first.

Notes from The Disapproving Stationmaster..........2002-12-29

...I find John Irving highly entertaining and readable and like I have said in numerous occasions in this Readers' Reviewer Forum, he is one of my favorite writers.

Here is his personal account of what it took to get the great novel "The Cider House Rules" to be made into a movie, and although I feel that the novel is 'way better than the movie, the movie is an adequate presentation of the novel--or in other words, I agree with Irving that there are so many pieces of poignancy in the novel that somehow could not be translated in movie terms.

Irving starts this memoir with personal history of his grandfather, Dr. Fritz Irving, who, in spite of his pioneering advances in obstetrics and teaching at Harvard, all his coworkers and students--present day doctors, retired practioners and such--recalls a ribald poem as his enduring contribution. Go figure. John Irving's father was influential in antisceptic technique. The use of rubbergloves in operations (Hence present day hospital activity) came from Dr. Colin Irving. So the upshot is that a combination of Colin and Fritz was John's inspiration, nay, model for Dr. Larch...but we find that propelling the memoir is John wishing not to disappoint mostly Fritz in this total creative effort to get Cider in novel and movie form.

So the story is told of how first he pared the novel down to screen play. The initial version would have been 9 hours long. And there's quite an entertianing section of how he and his first director/collaborator Phillip Borsos got about the business of trying to get the darker version of the film together, one in which Paul Newman was to play the infamous Dr. Larch.

Then, when Borsos died, and the search for another director was in play, Irving tells of his history of making his novels into films. He goes thru what did and did not work with the adaptations of "Setting Free Of The Bears", "The World According to Garp" and "The Hotel New Hampshire", the various directors and actors involved in each and why his novels overall are difficult to capture in a movie. What I liked about this section is that he gives an insight of how research for his writing works in his decription of his work of "A Son of the Circus"...sometimes, serendipity kicks in.

When finally we are taken to his work with director Lasse Hallestrom, we get many of the ins and outs of why certain scenes worked in the movie the way they did--the section on Fuzzy and the young actor who played him is sriking--we get to hear Irving's take on the Homer/Candy relationship, we get why Dickens passages in certain scenes in the novel were excised, Irving talks about actors Caine, Maguire, Theron, Lindo and Badu, and we see if Irving ever felt as if he was coming to some sort of blessing from Dr. Fritz.

I can't tell you whether he has that blessing or not, but what I can tell you is that for me, Irving's movie memoir is just as enjoyable as his novels....find this, read it and enjoy it.

A wish come true.......2002-10-01

How many times have I wished I could call an author and ask: "Why did you write that?" How many times have i read a book and loved it, only to hate the movie based on it? I lose count.

Well, John Irving answered my prayers, and in one short book replied to all of my questions and to a few more I didn't even know I had.

I am a huge fan of Irving. He writes like nobody can; he also takes himself very unseriously. I have enjoyed all of his books immensely. This one was a joy from beginning to end. For starters, it gives a fascinating insight into The Cider House Rules. He explains his characters, goes through the thought process that made him write the book this or that way.

This memoir explains very well why it is almost always impossible to transform a book into a movie script verbatim. Irving goes through the painful steps that he took to make The Cider House Rules into a successful movie. It was wonderful to read about the back and forth that Irving had with the director of the film, Lasse Hallstrom. It makes me think that making a movie based on a book is more than anything a labor of negotiation. For me, one of the most poignant moments of this memoir is when Irving tells why he chose the role of the stationmaster. "I just wanted to be there, in the stationmaster's wretched persona, to see Homer get off that train." As an author, this was probably a brilliant moment in his life, seeing his characters in the flesh.

Irving not only reminisces about the trials and tribulations he had to endure to see this book into a movie. He also writes about writing some of his other novels, and bringing them to film, and as always, about his sons. He also offers an unusual insider's account of what it is to be immersed in the movie world. So much of what we know is based on glossy magazines and celebrity TV programs, when the reality is far more crude and plain. Well, no one better than this man to do a bit of reporting, straight from the trenches.

This is a book you must read only after reading AND watching The Cider House Rules. Only then could you do it justice.

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