The White Tyger (Tor Fantasy)

Product Details

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• ISBN13: 9780765354341

Description

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Customer Reviews

Always surprising, always interesting - worth the read
I'm aware of the extreme praise this series of books has gotten. I was disappointed with the first book, A Princess of Roumania. In the second book, The Tourmaline, I started to see the light a little bit. But it wasn't until this third book that I finally found what the critics apparently knew all along. This is an extremely imaginative, rich fantasy that is a delightful mirror to our own world, an "alternate history" presented in a way that I've never seen before.

So, the world itself is interesting...my gripe is with the characters. Besides one very important exception, I feel no connection with the characters in this book. If, at any moment, any of the main characters (except one!) were to be killed, my only reaction would be an interested "huh".

There's 4 main characters who form the bulk of the reader's viewpoint. Of the 4, Miranda - the main character - is, unfortunately, the most boring. It's interesting to see how a "typical teenager" from the USA deals with this incredible world and the responsibilities it entails for her, but her extreme "RUN AWAY" attitude irritates me. This is the attitude she has regarding everything from the people's beliefs in the White Tyger (a political position) to her own birth mother. Just...run away.

Her two "best friends" are slightly more interesting. Both are actually, as we discovered in The Tourmaline, legendary soldiers who once served her father. They were sent to the made-up USA (OUR world) as Miranda's high school friends, to fulfill the oaths they made to protect her, and there they lost all memory of who they truly were, and came to believe they really were the high school students Peter Gross and Andromeda. It wasn't until they left that imaginary world that their true personalities awoke.

It's semi-interesting to see the duality between the gruff warrior Pieter de Graz and the poetry-spewing Peter Gross, and we're supposed to be sad because Peter Gross is the high school student we knew from the series' beginning, and Pieter de Graz is a stranger to us. But I can't manage anything other than a 'huh'. It is obviously an interesting idea, though.

Andromeda is more interesting, although I still don't really understand what's going on here. Andromeda the high school student was a female, but Sasha the soldier (her true identity) is a male. And, just for kicks, when s/he first came back to the world, s/he was a dog. So this one character has 3 different identities swarming around inside, although in this book it's Sasha the entire time.

Finally, the last character, and the most interesting by far - the Baroness. I won't go into detail here. The jacket of the book calls her a character of Shakespearean complexity and depth, and I won't argue that. Sometimes it seemed like she was the only reason I kept reading these books. She is the one character who'se death would actually affect me...I can't imagine reading this series without her. Not only because of the strength of her character, but because, without this central "villain", the books seem like they would dissolve into some political struggles between faceless government officials and countries. Here's hoping she hasn't had her Final Act just yet.

So, overall - I definitely recommend this book if you're read the first two. It develops the characters and opens up the world even more. If you haven't read the first two yet, I suggest you make your way through A Princess of Roumania, because this is a series that is certainly worth the read.

2007-04-27 | Karri | Helpful Votes: 2 | Rating: 4

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The White Tyger
In these virtuoso Princess of Roumania novels Paul Park successfully undoes the tropes and themes of the fantasy genre at the very moment that he is making use of them, leaving them to unravel behind us as we move through the narrative. A classic equivalent is Rousseau's brilliant, defiant Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, after the publication of which no one could ever tell another "State of Nature" story again in the same way, if at all. For this reason alone, these are books to be taken seriously.

What I liked best about the third volume, The White Tyger, is the relationship between Sasha Prochenko and the Baroness. It is, to my mind, the psychological center of gravity of the story thus far. It's compelling, shot through with sexual and dramatic tension as it is, and it's also interesting. Amidst the many different characters in this story, and their many different mirrored and fragmented selves, the pairing of these two is essential. At a minimum, Prochenko is the Baroness' only perceived equal. He is her twin, her undamaged alter-ego - and it is in virtue of the ways in which they are the same that he holds the kind of power over her that she holds over others.

The book is great. Buy it.

2007-04-20 | Helpful Votes: 3 | Rating: 5

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Burning bright
The White Tyger is just as wonderful as the previous two novels in Paul Park's Roumania sreies. The novels are profoundly character driven in a way that few genre novels are; they deliberately and specifically refuse to conform to a conventional quest narrative. No-one knows exactly what they're supposed to do; they're making it up as they go along. All of the main protagonists (and some of the minor ones) are in some sense or another doubled; their selves are split in two so that they have difficulty in explaining their motivations to themselves. The book is less a conventional fantasy story in which the story is external to the characters, determining who they are and what they do, than a working through of the ways that individuals make up their own fantasies, spinning out ex post narratives to explain their actions to themselves and others. The main protagonists don't know themselves.

This is most obvious in the character of Baroness Ceaucescu, who sees herself as the heroine of an opera, smoothing away the grubby and selfish motivations for her actions and reconfiguring them as the essential elements of a grand and inexorable tragedy, where she has no personal responsibility for what she does. She steals every scene that she's in. The three novels are vertiginous, and a little jarring. They don't have the feeling of safeness and stability that most fantasy novels do. All that is solid melts into air. Yet nor are they self-consciously or coyly reflexive (their contingency doesn't seem playful to me; rather it appears like a very serious attempt to talk about how the world is). I don't want to say more about The White Tyger for fear of ruining surprises; I do want to recommend it (and I can't wait to see what the fourth and final novel does).

2007-03-31 | Helpful Votes: 4 | Rating: 5

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excellent Roumania fantasy
Massachusetts resident fifteen years old Miranda Popescu continues to be yanked in two directions since she was drawn into the German occupied Roumania, a world where she is a princess instead of a mall teen and alchemy is a working science. In Roumania, two factions skirmish over controlling the American as her Aunt Aegypta Schenck tries to keep her safe while the power hungry Baroness Ceaucescu and her ally evil alchemist Elector of Ratisbon.

Accompanying her from her old Berkshires world are Peter Gross known in Roumania as Chevalier de Graz and the shape-shifter Lieutenant Prochenko formerly a female named Andromeda. Meanwhile Miranda just wants to return to being a normal New England teen even though she begins to understand the mage like powers she possesses like when she studies the souls of animals (Penguin Island aside). However, normalcy can never return for someone battling the likes of the wickedly astute Baroness Ceausescu, as Miranda soon learns when Miranda meets her biological mother as both are captives of their adversaries.

The third Roumania fantasy (see THE TOURMALINE and A PRINCESS OF ROUMANIA) is a fabulous entry in one of the better genre series. Miranda, her fellow "displaced" pals, her enemies; and her relatives make the worlds of the Berkshires and that of alternate Europe seem real as each key player feels genuine. The action never lets up as Miranda, Peter and Andromeda learn more about just who they are even while trying to survive a devious brilliant opponent.

Harriet Klausner

2007-01-28 | Helpful Votes: 1 | Rating: 5

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Sunset Park: A Novel

Description

Luminous, passionate, expansive, an emotional tour de force

Sunset Park follows the hopes and fears of a cast of unforgettable characters brought together by the mysterious Miles Heller during the dark months of the 2008 economic collapse.

An enigmatic young man employed as a trash-out worker in southern Florida obsessively photographing thousands of abandoned objects left behind by the evicted families.

A group of young people squatting in an apartment in Sunset Park, Brooklyn.

The Hospital for Broken Things, which specializes in repairing the artifacts of a vanished world.

William Wyler's 1946 classic The Best Years of Our Lives.

A celebrated actress preparing to return to Broadway.

An independent publisher desperately trying to save his business and his marriage.

These are just some of the elements Auster magically weaves together in this immensely moving novel about contemporary America and its ghosts. Sunset Park is a surprising departure that confirms Paul Auster as one of our greatest living writers.

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The Hidden World

Description

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Customer Reviews

Great series.
These books turned out to be really great. They are very unique and teeter the lines between genres (a bit of historical fantasy meets sci-fi meet teen coming of age novel, perhaps?). All four of the novels are well written and really take a second reading to fully comprehend all of the situations and how they fit together.

I gave it four stars because Park's writing can be a bit convoluted at times and there are certain all-to-convenient situations. He also doesn't explain some things that seemed to be important when they were first mentioned. These aren't big issues that take away from the overall story, just enough to take it down a notch from 5 stars. It's actually not even a 4 out of 5; it's probably 4.6 out of 5 :)

2008-11-30 | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 4

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Like Crowley said -- it's art
This one is the ending, the one that makes the whole thing be a whole thing. Arguably, the beginnings and middles of narratives do their bits in this regard too. But it's the ending that seals the deal.

More often than not, complete stories are recognizable versions of some general *kind* of story: a mystery, an epic, a romance. A coming-of-age alternate-world fantasy. Etc. And depending on the kind, certain things can and do happen, in the end, and certain things don't.

The thing that matters most about this last book in Paul Park's quartet, it seems to me, is that he's trying to break the rules for how certain types of stories (viz., the kind that his would be, if he followed the rules) have to go, ultimately, given the sort of story that they are.

So it can't turn out that Peter and Miranda, having first developed themselves into interesting, complex, autonomous people, as Rilke and everyone who's anyone says lovers must, then live happily after. And it can't be like the Wizard of Oz, and they all go home. Or like any of one of those stories where the rightful ruler is restored and then all is well forever. It's bad enough that it has to be a story at all, and therefore be determinate in the ways that stories invariably are. In real life, as Park himself likes to say, things just sort of keep on happening.

It might be that the characters end up becoming who they potentially were, thereby fulfilling their destinies in some way. I'm not sure. But I think that the way to read this 4th book is with considerations of form in mind. Plus it's fantastically well-imagined, no pun intended.

2008-07-10 | Helpful Votes: 2 | Rating: 5

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Disappointing Finish
Up until this final installment, I've probably enjoyed Paul Park's "Princess of Roumania" series as much as anything I've read over the last several years. Park is a wonderful writer, and the characters (and their alternative world counterparts) populating this series, Miranda, Peter, Andromeda, and the towering Nicola Ceausescu (one of the greatest figures of evil in all of literature) are as complex and nuanced as you'll find in any high-end fiction reading experience.

Still, "The Hidden World" had me asking, around page 160 or so, What is going on? Park's luminous prose totally takes over - at the expense of the story itself. Oh, there's some wonderful set piece scenes and passages that are breathtaking in both beauty and mystery. But as Miranda shuttles back and forth between the real (?) world and the hidden one, I found it increasingly difficult to follow the story itself - which is a real problem when you have so much double-dealing intriguing going on. One good thing, the neglected Andromeda shows up. I found myself enjoying the exchanges between her and Andromeda, which supplied me with a small anchor in the novel's murky stew. Looking back on this series, I wish Park had incorporated 50 or so pages of this effort into book 3 ("The White Tyger"), and called it a magnificent day. And for anyone picking up this novel, without having read the previous books in the series, good luck, because you're going to need a detailed roadmap that the novel, by itself, doesn't provide.

2008-06-01 (Spotsylvania, VA) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 3

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superb epic coming of age fantasy
Miranda Popescu is beginning to understand her heritage as the once lost thought dead Roumanian princess and as the mythical shape-shifting White Tyger. However, that knowledge also means responsibility to her people and lethal threats from within and without. Nasty sadistic Colonel Bocu wants Miranda dead; the spirit of evil Baroness Nicola Ceausescu may be even more malevolent than when she was living if that is possible; her late Aunt Aegypta has proven untrustworthy and so has the deceased evil Elector of Ratisbon a sinister alchemist. As Miranda now knows dead does not mean the threat expired as they can still cause havoc from the Hidden World. However, the biggest danger comes from the aristocracy still inanely and insanely experimenting with ancient magic that is not understood very well.

In that environs her country is losing the war to Turkey and some in her inner circle want that to happen so the outside upstart is dethroned. As she relies on her friends from the other earth's Massachusetts army officer Peter Gross and gender-species shape shifter Andromeda, rumors abound that tinkering with the old magic has led to a weapon of mass destruction that some say is a planetary doomsday machine based on necromantic physics.

The fourth and final tale in this superb alternate earth (circa WW I) epic coming of age fantasy is a terrific conclusion to a strong saga. The story line is fast-paced as peril seems to come from everywhere and on just about every page; yet Miranda remains a strong center holding the tense story line together. Although it behooves newcomers to read the previous three novels (see THE WHYTE TIGER, THE TOURMALINE and A PRINCESS OF ROUMANIA) as threads from them are tied up in THE HIDDEN WORLD, Paul Park provides a great finish.

Harriet Klausner

2008-04-19 | Helpful Votes: 2 | Rating: 5

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A Princess of Roumania

Description

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Customer Reviews

great beginning to an original series
loved this thought provoking alternate reality from paul park. this whole series is definetly worth your time

2008-12-30 | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 5

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Good but not great fantasy, has potential as a series
_A Princess of Roumania_ by Paul Park is the first volume in a fantasy series, one that I see from reading some of the review blurbs in the book is more or less placed in the young adult fantasy genre but has a definite following among those whose tastes are more towards I guess what one would call mainstream adult fantasy.

In some ways the book followed some fairly conventional fantasy concepts and even pretty much acknowledged that through the words of the characters (more or less). A young girl is growing up in a small New England college town, a woman by the name of Miranda Popescu. Not native to the United States, she was found by her adoptive-parents-to-be in an orphanage in Romania. Her past not well known, somehow kind individuals at the orphanage had passed on to her adoptive parents a number of items that Miranda's parents had given her, including a strange book, one that appeared to show world and particularly Romanian history though it was written in Romanian and Miranda only had had small sections translated into English by the start of the actions of the book. Other objects included a cross and some gold coins, some clearly very old. Clearly Miranda had a mysterious past, the strange objects coupled with some memories of a castle and various people along with her sense of isolation and even alienation from her parents and her classmates (she had only two friends at school, a girl by the name of Andromeda and a boy by the name of Peter) lead her to dream that she had a destiny, that perhaps she was a long-lost princess, a member of royalty from a distant land, that she wasn't really meant to be where she was at all.

This being a fantasy novel, she is pretty much right it would seem (and she even remarks upon how unusual this is what the story gets going). She, Peter, and Andromeda are whisked to an alternate fantasy world. Not physically traveling at all, they visit and are apparently marooned on the exact same spot in an alternate New England in an alternate world. Very much a stranger in a strange land, Miranda is confused by the lack of buildings, the complete absence of anything remotely like her hometown, and the strange people who fight over her, all eager to possess her, two opposing groups of people who apparently had been eagerly awaiting her arrival and are prepared to use force to oppose the other group. Miranda doesn't know who any of these people are, what they want, or who she can trust. Additionally, Peter and particularly Andromeda - even Miranda herself - are not at all the same people they were on the other side; journeying over to this alternate realm, one in which magic apparently exists, changed them, some subtly, others radically.

Miranda, Peter, and Andromeda (and the people they met and clash with in the alternate world) are not by any means the only characters in the novel. The reader discovers bit by bit that most of the action takes place in this world's Romania. It seems that Romania was one of the great powers and though in decline is still a real empire. Having fended off the Turks for years it is now embroiled in a complication political competition with a rising Germany, a nation that has expansionistic plans that are at Romania's (or I should say Roumania's) expense. It is hard to place the time of the setting but it feels late 19th century, maybe early 20th century. Trains exist though horses are still very commonly used. Magic, including some rather powerful magic, exists, though it is not widely practiced and is discouraged if not actively outlawed. Interestingly, though Judaism and Christianity exist they are hardly dominant religions in Roumania; apparently worship of the Greco-Roman gods and some deities from ancient Egypt instead are pretty much the dominant religions.

Anyway, the characters. The major character in Roumania is Baroness Nicola Ceausescu, a very complicated individual. She wasn't always easy to completely understand, though I don't mean this as anything against the writer; she was a complex individual with complex motivations. I am not even sure if she can truly be said to be a villain or a hero; certainly she viewed herself as a hero and she was opposing some individuals, some Germans working in Roumania for the German government, who I would not call good guys, but then again she did some rather bad things (but then felt wracked with guilt over them). She used to be a major figure on the cultural and social scene in the Roumanian capital but has since fallen on hard times after the death of her husband. Not possessing wealth of her own before her marriage (she was an actress), she had been forced to sell off more and more of her husband's property and cut back tremendously on her lifestyle to make ends meet, all while trying to keep up appearances and try to stay as much as she could within Roumanian society. Also a powerful sorceress (a fact apparently unknown to all) she had great ambitions to not only reenter those social circles but in fact even save Roumania, these schemes involving her magical powers and a plot to bring Miranda to this world and fulfill her destiny.

Whatever that destiny is. At the end of the book it is still not clear what Miranda is supposed to do; even Miranda and her friends wonder this.

Overall I liked the book. I won't call it great but it has potential as a series and I do plan to read more volumes in the series. I liked the alternate history setting, like ours but with differences, some surprising. I liked the pseudo-19th century feel to it, and I liked how it was set in Eastern Europe (and an alternate, wild, and very snowy New England).

2008-09-08 (Madison, AL United States) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 4

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A little slow, but worth it
When I was a preteen, I was a sucker for books about everyday, average girls who turned out to be long-lost princesses of some obscure country or other. A Princess of Roumania is an original take on that old trope, looking at that girlish fantasy from a couple of new angles.

The story begins during a typical summer vacation for high-school student Miranda Popescu. She's an average teenage girl in every way, except that she has hazy memories of an early childhood in a distant land and a handful of objects that seem to corroborate those memories. At this point in the novel, no one but Miranda really believes it, and Paul Park uses these chapters to explore her teenage alienation and how it relates to her dreams of Roumania. After all, that's what the fantasy was really about when we were young girls, right? On its deepest level, it was about not feeling at home in our surroundings and imagining an alternate life that would have made it all make sense.

Except, for Miranda, it's actually true. Yet Park doesn't take the clichéd route here, either. Being royalty, in Park's world, isn't just about tiaras and dresses and dazzling suitors. It's about intrigue, and being used as a symbol by people who don't care about you as a person, and sometimes it's about running for your life.

Park has obviously been influenced by Philip Pullman's HIS DARK MATERIALS trilogy. This is especially evident in the theme of parallel universes, the way he deals with spirit animals (they don't walk beside you the way Pullman's daemons do, but they're significant in a way that might be spoilery to explain), and in the villainess, Nicola Ceausescu. (Her name is similar to the real-life figure for a reason. That also might be spoilery to explain.)

Mentioning Nicola Ceausescu brings me to the aspect of A Princess of Roumania that I liked best. Characterization. Ceausescu is gloriously complicated: arrogant and self-loathing, crafty and impulsive, inclined to cruelty but racked by guilt afterward. Miranda, too, is a delightful character. She grows tremendously throughout the story as a result of her tribulations. All of the other major characters are fascinating as well. They have contradictions and hypocrisies and weaknesses just like flesh-and-blood people and are among the most complex fantasy characters I've encountered.

When I think of A Princess of Roumania as a character-building novel, it's a smashing success. Plotwise, I was slightly disappointed. The story seems to drag in places, and it's also too obviously the first book in a series. In many ways, Miranda's journey has only just begun at the end of A Princess of Roumania. But from the perspective of characterization, it all works. Incidents that don't seem to matter much to the overarching plot are very significant in shaping Miranda's personality and preparing her for what lies ahead.

The prose is elegant but never heavy or overwritten. Park is good at describing a scene or an emotion without pouring on the purple.

I recommend A Princess of Roumania, with the caveats that it's a little slow in places and it doesn't stand on its own. It sets the scene well for Park's later books and gives us a vivid cast of characters to love and hate.

(Sidenote: I like the cover art, unlike a previous reviewer. The girl on the cover looks much like Miranda's description, and the objects she holds are crucial to the story. It's about as apropos as cover illustrations get.)

Kelly
www.fantasyliterature.net

2008-07-31 (Columbia, MO United States) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 4

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i can't even look at it any more
the first hint that this was all going to end badly should have been the early misuse of a dorothy parker poem. but alas, i found the book well written at first. specifically, i appreciated some of the character development. but halfway through i realised, 'well, it's great for a first novel' only to discover it wasn't a first novel, so there was no reason for the author to be trying so hard. by 2/3 of the way through i realised that it was only getting worse. and, well, the final 30 pages had me muttering and ranting out loud. magic without context, poor transitions and questionable use of vocabulary made this a very difficult read.

my husband likes to remind me that i don't have to finish a book if i don't like it. but sadly, i do. and so i finished it. i will agree with the cover review that stated it was 'haunting' for i will likely be depressed about having read it for a while.

nice use of pullman's daemons concept though. truely original.

2008-02-12 (Vancouver, British Columbia Canada) | Helpful Votes: 1 | Rating: 1

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Not interesting; couldn't finish the book
About two thirds in the book I gave up. The story line wasn't interesting enough, I couldn't connect to the characters in the book and the writing could have been better. Paul often uses a lot of words and complicated descriptions for rather simple parts of the story.
What I also don't like: The "hero" of the book makes too many mistakes and is not so nice to the people trying to help her, but still manages to blunder through; mostly by luck and lots of helpers.

The story-idea could have been nice, if it was handled by a different kind of writer.

2008-02-10 (Netherlands) | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 1

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America's National Parks: The Spectacular Forces That Shaped Our Treasured Lands

Description

From stunning mountain ranges to arid expanses of desert, America has been blessed with an incredibly diverse land -- and the vision to protect it for our and future generations to enjoy. These lands are ours to view, wander, learn from, and revel in. America's National Parks captures all that is great about all fifty-six parks in the national park system. It also gives interesting, easy-to-understand background on the geological and ecological forces that continue to make each national park so worthy of protection.

Nature lovers will be captivated by gorgeous photos of landforms, flora, and fauna. Families will appreciate the information that is sure to enhance vacations at the parks. And visitors to any of the country's national parks will forever treasure this book as a memento of past visits and an inspiration for future ones.

Unlike any other book published on national parks, America's National Parks is a must-have for anyone who relishes America's natural wonders and wants to learn more about the powerful forces that created them.

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Customer Reviews

Gorgeous book on National Parks
This is a beautiful book with a lot of gorgeous pictures. Just what I was looking for. Would highly recommend it. Others seemed to have too much text and/or too many drawings and/or black and white photos. This is truly satisfying for anyone who loves nature and America's National Parks. You'll look at it again and again. Makes a fabulous gift or coffee table book.

2010-07-18 | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 4

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An Introduction to Geology as Much as to America's National Parks
You might expect a book on US National Parks to have an all-USA (including Alaska and Hawaii) orientation map along with local maps of each National Park--and it does. You would expect it to have beautiful pictures--and it does. You would expect it to discuss the flora and wildlife found in these parks--and it does. You might expect it to touch on the history of the locations going back to the days of the First Americans--and it does. You would probably expect to hear that Yellowstone National Park, founded in 1872, was the first US National Park, and that it contains most of the world's geysers--and the book certainly states this.

Being a geologist, what I find relatively unique about this book is its emphasis throughout on basic geological processes. The cross-sections it gives of various geological processes and structures are quite educational, and they are very suitable for the geology classroom. (I wish that I had seen them when I first began to formally study geology!) The reader learns about the internal structure and dynamics of volcanoes, the types of folds and faults that form during mountain building, weathering and erosional structures such as hoodoos, and even such things as fumaroles and mudspots. There are also detailed visual aids on bays and reefs.

2007-10-21 | Scholar and Thinker (Chicago IL, USA) | Helpful Votes: 10 | Rating: 5

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Great for nature lovers and armchair traverlers!
Fabulous book! The text is very interesting and educational, and it explains the scientific aspects of the National Parks and their land very well. The photos are gorgeous and made me want to visit every single park! :-) They really show some of the awesome beauty of God's handiwork. I highly recommend this book to all outdoor enthusiasts, lovers of nature and science and fellow armchair travelers. The book also contains helpful contact information for planning a visit to the parks. A great read and a great book to enjoy!

2006-12-27 | Helpful Votes: 12 | Rating: 5

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spectacular visuals, excellent text
This book is a spectacular visual text to some of the American National Parks. The size of the photos, and their photographic quality, are just excellent. The photos are right up there with National Geographic-type quality. In addition, the accompaning text gives ecological insights to where and why this part of the United States was designated and saved as a National Park. The book gives short but insightful accompanying text for each of the Parks that are presented to the reader. The only problem is, unfortunately, the organization of the chapters, and a very skimpy table of contents, and the reader can get easily annoyed with these two problems. It is hard to understand why the publisher made such errors, as the problems are very obvious, and the whole book suffers as a result. It is a beautiful book covering many of the National Parks, with super photos and very good college level text, and if you can put up with the problems of a missing table of contents, this book is a great collection of art, ecology, and the National Parks of the USA. A 5-star for the photos and accompanying text, and a 3 for a useless table of contents. Sorry, but the publisher made major mistakes in putting this otherwise spectacular book together. But I will still give the book a 5-star anyway. The photos and text are just too good to give this book anything less than a 5-star.

2003-02-07 | pldcomp | Helpful Votes: 32 | Rating: 5

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Spectacular Presentation of Natural Wonder
Paul Schullery presents a book filled with powerful and beautiful images of fifty-six national parks that have been dedicated to the preservation and protection of irreplaceable treasures. This book shows why these parks are so worthy of protection.

Not only are they places where indescribable beauty can be seen, they have also been formed by unique geological forces. From stunning mountain ranges to arid expanses of desert, these are the lands we view, wander in and learn from.

America's National Parks is a celebration of the diversity of national parks throughout the United States. They are grouped according to the geological forces that helped to create them.

Diagrammatic illustrations, important landmarks, travel routes, topographical maps and spectacular full-color photographs illustrate the sheer majestic beauty of nature.

You will also find captivating information to encourage an awareness of the landforms, flora and fauna. Families will also find information to help enhance their vacations at the parks.

Inside the front cover a map of America shows the location of each park I started to remember my trip to the Grand Canyon National Park and my husband's visit to Denali.

Our Treasured Lands
The Rolling Land - Volcanic and Geothermal Forces
The Broken Crust - The Power of Mountain Building
Water Designing Lands - Waves, Caves and Currents
Ice Sculpting Stone - The Carving Power of Glaciers
The Patient Power - Wind and Water Erosion
Weather Shaping Life - Effects of Extreme Climates

This book contains some of the most amazing photographs I've ever seen of America. From pictures of dripstone formations adorning New Mexico's Carlsbad Cavern in New Mexico to Lush Ecosystems shrouded in Fog in the National Park in Washington, these pictures help to vividly describe each park. I remember once having an argument with someone over the fact that there were rainforests near where I lived in Washington and no one would believe me. Well, here is proof!

I was also especially interested in looking up the Painted Desert we visited once on a trip across America after college. At the time, I didn't actually realize I was in the Petrified Forest national Park in Arizona because technically, we were just driving right through and I wasn't paying attention.

This book has helped to bring a new awareness to my own life and also encourages a desire for more exploration. Now I definitely want to see Mount McKinley in person.

Voyageurs National Park looks like a fascinating place to paddle around lonely islands. However, they do say never to skimp on insect repellent. A third of the park is water.

A memento of past visits or an inspiration for future exploration!

~The Rebecca Review

2002-06-07 | The Rebecca Review (Washington State) | Helpful Votes: 40 | Rating: 5

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John Paul Ii: The Pope From Po (Gateway Biographies)

Description

Traces the life of Karol Wojtyla from his childhood and student years through his ordination as a priest and his life as Pope John Paul II, the first pope from Poland.

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Customer Reviews

Most excellent book for children about the Pope!
This is a wonderful book for children to read and learn about the Pope John Paul II. The children will be able to discover
all about him. The book includes lots of photos and the history of the Pope's life. Children always experience a journey of learning with the writer, Deborah Parks. Be sure to get this one!

2002-04-03 | Helpful Votes: 0 | Rating: 5

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