DWD's Reviews

Entertaining, Thought-Provoking, Funny and Sad This is a World War II Jewish Holocaust comedy, if you can believe it. It is in French w/subtitles and it concerns a little Jewish village that knows the Nazis are coming to deport their village. Everyone is panic-stricken until the village idiot has a brilliant idea - the village should get a train and "deport" themselves all of the way to Palestine. The movie is all about their purchase of a dilapidated old train, its refurbishment into a Nazi-style train and their escape across Europe and the chase by the Nazis. Along the way, there are all kinds of humorous encounters with Nazis, the French Resistance, Gypsies and Communists. Parts of it are "Keystone cops" and parts of it are "Monty Python-esque". I will not tell you how it ends, because the ending packs a powerful emotional punch. However, I do wholeheartedly recommend the movie. I rate this movie 5 stars out of 5. Reviewed August 7, 2004.

Good but had such potential to be better G.M. Ford I was told that this book was a disappointment. I have to agree and disagree. It is a good book - it really does approach the level of being a great farce of a detective novel. The client is outrageous and the people he investigates are larger than life throughout the story. At times, Waterman is the only sane man in the room. It makes it a fun ride - but I finished the book pleased but quite sure that it could have been even more if Ford had pushed a bit more. I would have liked for him to have met other bizarre personages that were attending the food show, but the climactic scene at the steakhouse with the helicopter and the barbecue was certainly odd and funny enough in its own right. Like all of the Waterman novels, it may behoove the reader to jot down some notes as you go along because the author does little to remind the reader who the characters are as the story progresses. The murder victim is introduced and not men

By my count, this is the 21st book in the Kinsey Millhone series. I have read most of them over the years - some are good, some are great and one or two have been duds. U is for Undertow is a strong one. A very solid story, although not a very difficult mystery. Sue Grafton has kept Kinsey Millhone in the year about twenty years ago in the past. An author has to make several choices as he continues to write about a character over the years. James Bond never ages> Robert B. Parker's Spenser moved forward in time but never seemed to age. He was a Korean War vet (making him at least around 75 years old in his last book) and he still got into fistfights and chased bad guys all over the place. Tony Hillerman aged Joe Leaphorn and just moved on to the younger generation when it was time for action. The storyline of U is for Undertow most resembled an extended episode of the CBS police drama Cold Case and is different than the rest of her books. Kinsey is asked to investigate

A Short, Solid History Published in 2009 by Oxford University Press. Muslims in America is the "first single-author history of Muslims in America from colonial times to the present", which is what the back cover proclaims. I have no reason to doubt that this sad statement is true and for that reason this book is a welcome addition to the shelf of any serious student of American history. That being said, this book is not perfect. Since it tries to cover the entire spread of American history the first pages are about isolated Muslim individuals that were brought over as slaves, continued to follow their faith and were noted for doing so. It turns out that only a few people fit all those criteria so we end up with extended biographies of these people. This is not bad, per se, but it does make the last half of the book seemed rushed in comparison. The slow, extended style is put aside for a quicker, less detailed style. That less detailed style in the latter half of the

Great book but there are a few errors... The title basically says it all. This fascinating book uses Daytona International Speedway and the old racing surface of Daytona Beach itself as its lens to focus on the world of NASCAR. Hinton has been a beat reporter covering NASCAR since the mid-1970s and knows all of the old stories and Hinton is able to package them so that the reader is reading one little vignette after another until the history of Daytona is told. I was reading another book when I picked up this one (a Christmas gift that I hadn't really paid a lot of attention to) and began thumbing through it. I couldn't put it down! It is well-written and at times it is laugh out loud funny, especially if you are a NASCAR fan and are familiar with the older, retired drivers. However, a couple of disturbing, trivial factual errors throw a negative light on the book as a whole. Two that I noted were Hinton's assertion that no rookie has won the Indy 500 since the 192

Informative, fair and well-written Short summary: Mateen Elass is uniquely qualified to write such a book. His father was a Muslim. He was raised in Saudi Arabia. He is now a Presbyterian minister in the United States. His short, 10 chapter book introduces the reader to the Koran by telling its history and the common touchpoints that it shares with the Bible, Christian tradition and Jewish tradition. Elass also introduces the reader to the proper handling of the Koran and has a balanced discussion on the role of Jihad in Islam, as defined in the Koran. An optional Bible study is located at the back of the book with lots of questions designed for group discussion. My review: An absolutely excellent book! The reader is not required to be a Christian to understand the book - but a working knowledge of Christian tradition and the Bible would help. Mateen Elass has produced a wonderful introduction to Islam and the Koran. He is respectful of Islam throughout the book, but it is cl