Wonderful topics, mediocre organization
921258
Organization:  The chapters did not flow in any reasonable sense as it pertained to the topic of the book.  There were sections in the center where he attacks Bjorn Lambourg, the Postmodernists, as well as includes a history of scientific thinking.  While these were enjoyable, all except the attacks on the postmodernists didn't exactly fit the progression that the author was making.  The last two chapters should have been pushed up considerably as the expert problem and checklist of what makes a science should have come shortly after the introduction.

Writing: Massimo is a master of concise prose and uses analogies that advance the point at hand.  His mastery of what others have said gives him access to wonderful ways to summarize ideas and distill important points quickly; other authors could wind up using twice as many words to say the same thing without adding anything.

Notes:  Some of the footnotes were both funny and illuminating.  I very much wish they'd been the bottom-of-the-page kind rather than the all-lumped-at-the-end kind.

Topics:  The selection of targets was well done and got at issues that other books seemed to skip like how to gauge expertise and how Bayesianism and Prospectivism can be used to both support the efficacy of science and recognize the problem of qualia.
1470794
The information seemed pretty thorough, but it's organized from Jan - Dec FOR EACH TYPE OF PLANT. So you don't look up January and get a rundown of everything you should be doing that month; instead, you have to look up January over and over again, in separate chapters for trees, flowers, perennials, veg, etc. Unless you only grow one type of plant, it's a pain in the rear. Hopefully future editions will be organized by month, with subheadings for type of plant. If so, I'll definitely buy a copy; but I sent this one back.
2099824
Much of the information in this book is good but the way it is organized could be better and the lay out does not help. A great idea and maybe more time spend editing could get it to 5 stars.
1804455
On the positive, the book is an easy read and a good and timely introduction to the topic. A number of interesting observations is being provided and relevant questions being raised.

Where I find the book to come short relates to its organization and its analysis:

The book contains a number of pamphlets / short topics, each beginning with a question and ending with a brief discussion related to the question, often including citations from elsewhere. All too many times I find that the subsequent discussion is too shallow to properly address the question. Moreover, rather than being served occasionally quite extensive text inserts / citations from external sources I would have preferred to have the author's consolidated view of the challenges at hand. As it is now, the content more resembles a number of more or less related blog postings with occasional external text inserts. I get the impression of navigating articles on a financial blog portal rather than having an author's effort to present a coherent view of the topic.

In my view a part of the book that contributes little is Appendix II with its huge list of issued Wall Street Fines. Also, the organization of "Appendix I - Demonetized Currencies" is odd as it is neither organized by year of demonetization nor by name of country nor by name of currency. In my Kindle edition, the practical reading of book ended at 70%, the remaining 30% consists of some tables and the mentioned huge list and is adding to the page count without providing much further insights.
4444237
Very good structure, and easy to find quotes according to topic. BUT: Many quotes are way too long! And I also miss an index according to book (if you know that a sorn said something like "lifting himself by the hair", it would be easier to find by book than by topic).

Still: I've already had use of it, and I'll probably use it quite frequently.
1172860
Whew!  Lots of words.  Capleton says what he has to say in every possible way he can think to.  Lot's of gems in here - it's just somewhat of an effort to extract them.  There's something not right about the publisher, too - there's no index for this book, instead there's a glossary, which, yet again, defines terms defined elsewhere in the text.  A good thorough index could make this a useable reference.  There are apparently 2 versions of this book and the older of the 2 is more expensive - but you can't really sort it all out because there's no colophon page!  What kind of book has no colophon?
1265541
I feel this book on an important topic suffers from cohesive organization.  Topics seemed jumbled together and there is a fair amount of making the same point multiple times. Personal anecdotes are muddled together with case studies and factual discourse.  That said the book takes what could be a dry topic and presents an ultimately strong case in a readable and personable form. Rich in factual support, research and resources.
4790326
The best thing about this book is the abundance of pictures and maps. Most of the stories are illustrated with drawings, paintings, photographs, and old maps from a variety of libraries and museums. I especially appreciated the many maps - every time I found myself thinking, "I need a map," the map I needed was within a page or two. Another plus for the book is that most of the individual stories are interesting and quick reads.

However, this is not a very cohesive collection. The fact that the ocean figures into each story in some way is not sufficient to provide a common thread capable of linking, for example, Cortes's conquest of Mexico to the Exxon Valdez. Further, the connection of many of the stories to a theme of "conquest of the ocean" is tenuous, in my opinion. Another negative, for me, is that the individual stories are so superficial. Certainly much of that can be blamed on the fact that each story is very short, no more than a few pages, but a bit more detail and depth could easily have been included.

I see this book as being most suitable for middle and high school readers. It would be a good addition to a school library. It would also serve as a great resource for homeschoolers. This book would be an excellent starting point for more in-depth study projects on things that capture a student's interest. For me, this is the kind of book I will leave on the coffee table, where I can pick it up and read a randomly selected story when I need to fill a few minutes while waiting to do something else.
3595488
There were many good things about this book--the lists of resources and the creative ways the people featured went about organizing and decorating their spaces. I also liked the fact most of them did it without big budgets. I do have to agree somewhat with the reviewer who felt the photography was a little amateurish. My biggest complaint, however, is that so many of the dwellings were either retro (hard lines), or contemporary (industrial materials and more hard lines). The majority of the living spaces were also urban. I live in a house in a suburban setting that is more than 100 years old. I am also very fond of old furniture and detailing. I appreciate eclectic mixes of decor that manage to blend old and new. For someone like me, whose taste does not run to contemporary, there was almost nothing in this book that I could use as inspiration. There were plenty of found objects and kitsch, and some interesting paint colors, but overall, I would have liked to see a more varied point of view. I found Apartment Therapy's book on organizing very helpful, so I had hoped this would be as useful. Unfortunately, it wasn't.
4928498
This is a beautiful survey of phylogentic algorithms and mathematics.  The book focuses on the justification and logic of each method, and that's what I want--I want to understand the foundations of the methods.  There's unevenness in the details in this book, however.  Some mathematical or conceptual points are laid out with complete clarity, and others require more insight on the part of the reader.  For me, this is frustrating.  I'm drawn in by the book because it focuses on what I care about, and is often very clear, but then I get stuck.  Sometimes, I just have to think about it a bit more. On other pages, I keep hitting a wall.  Others will have less of a problem, but I wish Felsenstein had included a few more intermediate steps in his presentations of both mathematical and conceptual points.  Nevertheless, I think this is a classic, and that anyone who wants to understand the foundations of phylogenetic methods can benefit from it.  However, getting the full benefit from it may require prior experience with phylogenetic methods, a pretty thorough grounding in relevant mathematics, or a course with a professor who can help you over the humps.
516908
A great idea to look at aesthetics from this perspective of advertising and media. Unfortunately this ambitious book strings together just too many ideas with little analysis. Good stuff, but not well organized. Still worth a read.
2926216
There is no doubt that Magic Tree House stories are phenomenal. Easy reading, historically related and creative. Absolute favorites in our house.

My son is 6 and is a voracious reader. I got the 1-8 series for a long trip we have to take and have spent over two hours with only being half way through downloading them to play on the iPhone/iPad, etc. The downloading takes moments...

HERE IS THE MAJOR DOWNFALL TO THIS PRODUCT:
There is very little organization. Stories broken up between CDs (not user friendly on any level for independence for the child or ease of use for a parent driving. You cannot listen to one story from beginning to end. I am re-labeling them so they will play in order. When you download them it doesn't show what book or chapter number, just a chapter title. There is a disc number and a track letter. For example disc 4 track g reads "4g Freeze".

If you are good with switching discs or computer savvy with downloading etc, it is still worth it, poor product management.
588863
fascinating and comprehensive, but needed a better editor
1138204
This book is very helpful but could be improved by organizing all topics together by season.  As written you have to look up your type of plant (vines, annuals, etc..) individually by season then find your other plants by season.  It would seem simpler and easier to me if under the season you could find all the categories and compile your tasks without flipping back and forth.  Still it is a nice, helpful and informative book.
2139121
When describing this book mixed emotions come to mind. The book itself is presented in a very well organized manner and the chapters flow very well. Each chapter has a very useful summary and is well structured. Those are the only positive things I have to say about this book. Each chapter though well structured is some what bloated. Instead of getting straight to the point about a subject the book beats around the bush and provides much of the information with out context making the material hard to follow and somewhat confusing. The book also mixes important information with non important information making it harder to take notes and is presented in a incredibly boring manner. In order to separate trivial information from non-trivial information the reader must read the chapter summaries which are very well written and are the only saving grace of the book. The worst feature about this book is the lack of examples. Each section averages about one example and the examples are not very diverse or varied. The second worst feature are the conceptual question posted along side the reading, such as "...is this diagram possible?" These questions would be helpful, but they give no answers to these questions not event in the back of the book making them useless. All in all this book is mediocre at best. If you have had previous exposure to physics such as high school physics then you will probably be able to get by with this text alone. If not I would recommend you get other text to supplement this book.
3902105
This book has a ton of content in it, which makes it fun to just sort of browse around when I want to kill some time and relax. But it's very poorly organized, which makes it difficult to find information on a particular area that I'm planning to visit. Why is there an index for "walks by distance"? How is that useful to anyone? There's like a million pages in this thing, and they somehow couldn't devote a couple pages to indexing by individual U.S. states? And there's a lot of overlap between the main types of walks they've split the book into, but no cross-referencing. They should really publish another edition with better indexing and organization.
895795
Gerson knows her compacts--she is an absolute authority, and this book gives many fine examples of compacts from all periods of time as well as good information about collecting. The color photos are a joy to look at. However, I don't like the way the book is organized--it's difficult to find what your looking for because things aren't arranged in logical order. In addition, I think it's a shame to have black and white photos--the majority of compacts really can't be appreciated unless they are seen in color, hence my 4-star rating. Mueller's two books are arranged better, with color photos for every compact, and Gerson should have tried to emulate that while making the book her own. But this book complements Mueller's, and for a rabid compact collector, this book is a welcome addition to the other books out there.