Tough reading but thought-provoking
353416
This book is pretty academic (despite the "folksy" style) and quite leftist.  That being said, there is much food for thought in this slim volume.  The hardback is for folks with more money than judgment.

The isolation of racism as a cause of unequal opportunity, and the deeper issue of how opportunity and reward should be measured are the central themes.  Worth the time you spend reading it.
4527244
I wanted to give this book 5 stars, but in the end it just wandered around too much for me. There are a lot of deep insights in this book and it is well worth the read. It is not an easy read though and it probably needs to be read through more than once to get the most out of it. It's definitely a thinking person's book and you have to do a lot of thinking to get through it.
2145133
As an older mom in a partially empty nest, I found this book interesting and important -- albeit, a very long and difficult read. Difficult, because it is painful to read and rehash how the current generation of mothers takes parenting to the painful point of obsession. Social critics suggest that feminist mothers of my own generation -- baby boomers -- invested more time and energy in building careers as opposed to nurturing our families....So perhaps it shouldn't surprise us to discover that our 'domestic neglect' inspired an over-parenting backlash?

I've often wondered whether competitive parenting, such as Warner described in her book, is an outgrowth of social or personal guilt. Whatever the cause, I am amazed at the sheer aggression with which today's younger parents approach soccer games, birthday parties, playgroups, and other things that are supposed be recreational. Are we having fun yet? Watching younger families in my neighborhood, I can't say that anyone's really thriving in such an over-booked and frantic climate. (A couple of these young moms are always out of breath. Seriously.) As another reviewer pointed out earlier, you have to wonder if any of the mothers Warner writers about are even remotely enjoying their children. At the risk of waxing sentimental, motherhood CAN have sweet, enjoyable moments. (Ironically, they are usually un-complicated, un-orchestrated moments.)

It will be very interesting to see how today's new mothers deal with the empty nest a few years down the road. Will they be competing for the most interesting midlife crisis while over-managing their kids' college careers? More importantly, what impact will all this over-managing and over-parenting have on the kids when they are out there in the world, on their own?

At this point, it's hard to pinpoint which is worse -- under-parenting or over-parenting. So, I think it's great that writers are tackling this topic and getting us to talk about it. Hopefully, books like "Perfect Madess" will force us all (women AND men), no matter what stage we are in our parenting lives, to take a long look at what we are doing or not doing for our kids -- and help us return to sanity and balance.
1216632
This is good information but not an easy read.  Very challenging concepts for a lay person to comprehend.  I'm not a fan of scholastic jargon no matter how educated you are.  Vocabulary aside, the explanations are very challenging to understand frequently.
4880411
"New Proofs" is an extremely challenging yet rewarding read, but it is not for the faint of heart.  All totaled, I probably read the book 3 times, as I had to double and triple back numerous times in order to assimilate Father Spitzer's massive intellectual yield.  And I do mean massive.  The good doctor employs Socratic method, Platonic allegories, tautological analyses, mathematical proofs and sound logic & rationale to propound his arguments.  I was quite amazed at the author's ability to adduce the existence of an Unconditioned Reality via an elegant, logical argument.

Father Spitzer's writing style is somewhat mechanistic and overwrought and though highly disciplined, it lacks personality, as well - he loves the word "probative."  I highly admired this work, and as expansive as it was/is, I can't help but wonder who the target audience was for this exegesis?  I feel quite sanguine in asserting that this book isn't for the general public, but it is well worth the effort if you're willing to put in the time.

4 stars today!
2631445
This book is more academic and philosophical than I expected.  The authors raise interesting questions, but the book requires a lot of effort and attention to read.  I'm glad I bought it, but after having it for about a year, I still haven't sat down and worked my way all the way through it.
4459732
Walker's book is a challenging read, in many aspects of 'challenge.' Walker's book follows the intertwinings of a particular family throughout all of known (and unknown) history. Through this device, Walker proposes her own alternate mythology of origin, a state of grace where humans and animals lived in peace until the formation of race and gender caused a fall into arrogance and violence. We see characters of all genders, orientations, and ethnic backgrounds struggling with survival and the difficulty of relationships. This presents the first sort of challenge: it is difficult to read stories of rape, torture, enslavement, and degradation, especially as a white male person of some privilege. But the powerful pull of Walker's writing kept me reading instead of the easy fix of putting down the book and walking away. The plainly ideological bent of the book is what presents the flip side of the challenge: Walker's insistence on her agenda is so forceful at times that it overwhelms her prose and threatens the narrative, which would again make it easy to put the book down and walk away. (Hence the three-star review rather than something higher). I would still recommend this book, difficult as it is in many ways, as a portrayal of the difficulty of human relationships when they are based on hierarchy, greed, and fear - particularly if you're one of the folks on the top side of the heap for now.
4251357
This book was very difficult to read.  I have family that died at Theresienstadt. so much of this book felt very personal.  The Girls of Room 287 speaks to the way that, in the midst of true insanity, a place of relative normalcy was carved out for the children, with the assumption that if anyone should survive, the survivors must be children since they would be necessary to rebuild a Jewish community.  This was a conscious and ethical decision that let to even more difficult than usual conditions for adults and especially the aged.  Ethical decisions are never easy.  The story of the girls of room 28 is told with compassion through the eyes of the surviving girls, so we see a world that was horrific and yet saw moments of grace and hope.  This is well worth reading for those interested in trying to make some kind of sense out of the holocaust.
1076406
First and foremost, I think this is an extremely important book which should be required reading of political and military leaders.  The book is not easy for me to review.  First, I'm no expert on this subject and second, its a tough subject and a somewhat difficult read.  My gut feeling is author Dave Grossman gets close to the truth in some areas and not so close in a few others.  Like a number of other books I've read, he seems to cherry-pick resources that conform to his ideas.  A number of knowledgable reviewers have pointed out that several of his main sources are disputed.  The author is also very repetitive making portions of the book somewhat tedious.  My final con is Grossman's broad pontifications.  He simplifies some extremely complicated societal ills (media violence, breakdown of nuclear family,  etc.)
Having expressed my reservations, I recommend this book.  Dave Grossman has tackled one of the most difficult and important topics we have as a species.  If you (as I) learn anything, its a positive.  If he does nothing more than start or extend the conversation about man's propensity to take a life, he has performed a huge service to us all.
2897691
This book was difficult to read and therefore had to re-read several sections twice to fully understand.  Patience was worth it because I truly appreciate how it made the connection about not only religion and ritual, but other aspects of daily life which are ritualistic without even thinking about them.
2716060
I thought it was tough reading, but my! Dawkins has a amazing mind.
4155022
Boy, this was a tough one to read.  It had some good concepts in it, and it changed my thoughts on the "real" reasons sex should only be after marriage (a lot of books tell  you this, but they don't explain WHY God and scripture wants it this way like this book does).

I think the hardest part for reading this was it didn't "flow."  It wasn't easy to see where one of his ideas flowed into another.  I read about 3 books a week, so for this one to take me a full week, it shows how I had to "work" at understanding what he was saying.  Concept great, just difficult to follow.
1078554
I've read Chesterton before and always enjoy his work. This was another excellent piece but, as with his other writings, it is a difficult read. I will have to read it several time to get the full value of the book. Some of the difficulty may come from the unfamiliar phrases and wordings of his time period and much of it may be that I am certainly not the scholarly type. I would recommend the book, but only to those with some background in reading and studying historical and theological writing.
4567813
The translation is a bit rough around the edges, but the content is worth pondering. Strauss's critique of modernity and his decision as a modern to return to the ancient philosophers are explored in depth. It's well worth the effort.
127890
This a difficult story to read because the subject matter is so hard.  But, if you want to know the trials and tribulations of living through and with the diagnosis of Alzheimer's being given to a loved one, this is your book.  She covers their lives from the difficulty of obtaining a diagnosis to the end of life.  There is a lot to think about in this book.
381539
This book is a difficult read because there is a vast amount of knowledge in the book.  It is a very slow read, but a read that will change your life.  In the first 2 chapters, one's life comes into a crisis about the lack of knowledge one knows about God.  Warning, reading this book will bring issues to your life that one must confront.
3232453
There is a lot to be learnt from this challenging book. You will find yourself reading and rereading it.