Trouble Don't Last Always: When a child becomes a 4-year old parent

Trouble Don't Last Always: When a child becomes a 4-year old parent
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Inspiring and Beautiful

Inspiring, uplifting and informative

An Uphill Journey

Gripping, poignant and an eye opener!

Amazing

Trouble Don't Last Always: When a child becomes a 4-year old parent
Shane Salter
Manufacturer: iUniverse, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0595347967

Book Description

His mother abandoned him. His drug-dealing dad landed him in the middle of a gunfight. After entering the foster care system, he fell through the cracks. He was rejected by everyone, known by no oneÂ…

Born to a teenage mother whose hopes and dreams for her son were shattered by her own drug addiction, author Shane Salter was thrust into parenting his younger brother at the tender age of four. His first look at the world was through a broken windowpane into an alley leading nowhere. When his mother walked out and left him, he kept it together and took care of his brother until they found foster care, a system as threatening to a child as any dark alley in New York, Miami, Chicago, Detroit, or Los Angeles.

He sought what his mother was unable to give: nurturing, guidance, and the opportunity to be a child. With all odds against him, he survived and emerged more determined than ever to succeed.

Customer Reviews:

Inspiring and Beautiful.......2006-09-14

I read this book in one day and was mesmerized by it. Shane's resiliance is extraordinary. The book inspired me to continue on my path of healing. Because of Shane's book, I am better equipped to tell my own story of addiction, tragedy and recovery. This book motivated me and is a MUST read.

Inspiring, uplifting and informative.......2005-09-10

I could not put this book down, from the first sentence it had me. A gripping yet inspiring tale of overcoming. You will not complain about your circumstances after this book but rejoice in knowing that "trouble don't last always." Superbly written. I will read it again and plan to give it as gifts to friends who need to hear his message.

An Uphill Journey.......2005-07-23

A POWERFUL...MOVING...GRIPPING account of abuse and neglect. Should be required reading for all social service agencies, foster and adoptive parents. I thank God "Trouble Don't Last Always", and thank you Shane Salter for sharing your "going- through".

Gripping, poignant and an eye opener!.......2005-05-20

I could not put this one down. His plight and how he emerges from it all is simply heroic. I learned from his personal odyssey about perseverance, love and how to live the best life you can despite the huge challenges that come our way.

Amazing.......2005-05-05

This book grabs you and will not let you go. It is a powerful story. The struggles and barriers Shane Salter endured as a child are unimaginable. With each encounter, I found myself hoping and wishing for something great to happen to whisk him out of his unfortunate circumstance. The strength lies in the books commanding writing voice and vivid descriptions. Some of the painful scenes make you react physically as if you are being abused instead of Shane. I am also left compelled to reach out to a child who may be experiencing abuse or neglect. Thanks for sharing, Shane.

Book Description

For nearly five months, starting in mid-September 1944, American GIs battled for the Hurtgen Forest, a 50-square mile tract of extremely inhospitable terrain.

Customer Reviews:

Not definitive...not interesting.......2002-06-12

The Bloody Forest is an account of the battle of the Huertgen Forest, which took place during the fall of 1944. As with all of Astor's books, this is an "oral history". This means it's really a book based on the recollections by participants more than a scholarly and objective analysis of the battles. Indeed, there is no analysis or critical thinking; no historically important questions are raised or answered. Like Stephen Ambrose, Astor does not write history, but merely chronology spiced with personal accounts. Of course, this is not the point of the book, but if you are looking for an assessment of the Huertgen campaign, this is not the book you're looking for (instead, try Miller's A Dark and Bloody Ground, which is not "hard to get" as another reviewer claims).

For someone looking for a book that focuses on personal experiences of individual combatants, the book does an adequate job of providing this. The personal stories are gripping, the descriptions of being shelled in the forest and suffering airbursts are vivid, and the tales of exhaustion, frustration, and sheer terror are both pointed and poignant. I particularly liked the stories which reflected the frustrations of command during the battles. Many focused on the problems at the company level, where the predominant issues were company and platoon comander losses, causalties in general, and the poor training and integration of the green replacements. Occasionally there are also tales of battalion or regiment HQs being so out of touch with what was happening at the front lines that orders were completely rediculous and lead to serious defeats.

The book, despite these interesting tales of failures of command, is not great, due to a number of problems. First, the stories and experiences reported in the book get repetitive very quickly. They all are about artillery and airbusts, foxholes, and mines. Granted, these were key themes of the battles, but after the first 10 or 15 stories, the reader gets the point that covering your foxhole with logs was imperitive to avoid getting nailed by airbusts. Astor does a poor job of editing these comments so that the reader isn't bored. This is a major failing by Astor, as it cheapens the effectiveness of the combatants' tales of their experiences. Instead of being exciting throughout, the book plods on and on (the reader starts to think "...let me guess, this guy will dig a foxhole, cover it with logs, and then complain about mortar fire and how wet his feet are"). This isn't fair to the vets who are relating their experiences.

Furthermore, huge sections of George Wilson's If You Survive were quoted. Although the material was appropriate (Wilson's personal accounts of his exeperience in the Huertgen Forest are very interesting), I found this to be annoying. I have read Wilson's book and I was annoyed to find out that I was going to read it again instead of Astor actually providing something new. Furthermore, it is a failure on the part of the author when whole sections of another text must be quoted verbatim to carry the story along. At least Astor properly, legally, and ethically quotes the material and documents the source. Perhaps ... Stephen Ambrose should take note.

Another problem is that Astor does not provide useful maps. There are only two for the entire book. One is a broad overview map, showing the entire region of the Westwall south of Aachen. As such, it isn't useful to pick out the locations of individual towns where battles took place. The other is a more detailed map, but it only covers the portion of the Huertgen Forest that was initially invaded in the early parts of the battle. It doesn't even include Schmidt! This lack of maps was extrodinarily frustrating, even though I've read other books on the subject and am familiar with the geography of the region.

Finally, the book is very choppy. Instead of seamlessly blending the personal stories of the combatants with a tight chronology of the battle, Astor jumps around both in terms of time and space. Several pages will be devoted to a battle in one location at a certain time, and then without warning (i.e. with nothing more than a new paragraph) Astor will jump to a new location miles away and cover a different battle that took place a day earlier. This is very frustrating, particularly when there aren't supporting maps to help the reader.

In the end, the book is a disappointment if read on its own. If you are going to read only one book on the Huertgen Forest, this is not the one to read. Instead, read Miller's A Dark and Bloody Ground for a tight history as well as analysis, then read this book to add the color and grit of the peronsal accounts.

In a nutshell: A potentially great book ruined by a bad writer.

Good Oral History, Old Arguments........2002-05-23

The strength of Gerald Astor's book lies in his oral history narrative. As a work of history, however, Astor breaks no new ground. The standard arguments: the Roer River Dams should have been the American's prime objective; the Hurtgen Forest should have been avoided; the American numerical advantage, armor and air supremacy were nullified in the confines of the forest, are repeated once again in Astor's work. Astor tries to represent as many units that took part in the fighting as possible. Good oral history, no new analysis.

Good...but misses the mark........2001-07-31

This book certainly provides the reader with an understanding of the front-line soldier during the Battle for the Huertgen. However, Mr. Astor fails to provide a larger context in which this struggle can be understood. I had difficulty understanding how the local village battles related to one another or to the Corps or Army level for example.

The oral history is good but the "big picture" is missing.

Battle for the Huertgen Florest........2001-05-30

I don't believe Mr. Astor's account of the Huertgen Forest campaign flows as well as his Blood Dimmed Tide book about the Battle of the Bulge. I have read and also written about this campaign and find Mr. Astor's book authentic and reliable in its facts. It can be used as a source book to other writers.

Great but not quite superb.......2001-01-17

While this book did captivate me, especially on a personal level, my grandfather fought in the Huertegen, I can't bring myself to give it 5 stars. It is certainly well written, and enjoyable, but the first hand accounts are broken and choppy and in my opinion, Astor should have given the veterans more space.

Astor's book does convey a forboding feeling for the darkness and terror of the forest and attempts to provide the German perspective as well for completeness. The language just didn't feel as rich as some other books (even Astor's own "A Blood Dimmed Tide") and came across as very flat even when describing horrific details and events.

The maps provided were limited and not of much use. The photographs also seemed very limited and didn't aid the text. It is hard to believe that there aren't better photographs from this campaign. Even modern photographs of the Huertegen would have been more instructive than some of the photo's included.

The Huertegen campaign was a horrible, bloody affair that revealed poor strategic decision making coming from SHAEF and it has not recieved much scholarly attention and for that we should thank Astor. This text is well worth the read, but it is not the definitive book on the campaign.

A Dark and Bloody Ground: The Hurtgen Forest and the Roer River Dams, 1944-1945
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Top Rate Professional Job

Attrition warfare at its worse, chronicled at its best

Same Sad Song: Miller Covers MacDonald's First Hit

A closely detailed study of the brutal fighting

A Dark and Bloody Ground

A Dark and Bloody Ground: The Hurtgen Forest and the Roer River Dams, 1944-1945
Edward G. Miller
Manufacturer: Texas A&M University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1585442585

Customer Reviews:

Top Rate Professional Job.......2006-05-16

I echo what others have said about this book. It is not a fun or easy book to read but it is an excellent study of one of the most useless wastes of American soldiers in the ETO. How 28th Division CG Coda, one of the heros of D-Day, could turn into such a poor operational commander is sobering. I was also struck by how the author pointed out the weakness of the US policy (continued thru Vietnam) of plugging individual replacements into front line units with predictable disastrous results. Our current rotation of units is 100% more effective. He does all this in about a page and a half. This is indicative of the insights the author brings to the work.

Attrition warfare at its worse, chronicled at its best.......2004-11-25

Edward G. Miller's "A Dark and Bloody Ground" is a tour de force piece of academic-grade conflict history. Miller's research is solid and thorough and he covers a lot of ground in 200 or so pages, taking us from the initial commitment of American troops to the forest so oft referred to simply as "Hell" (by both sides!), through nearly three months of attrition fighting involving parts or all of TEN US Army divisions, to the final capture of the Roer River dams that lie on the other side of that seventy-odd square miles of Hell. Miller states up front that he wishes to provide a clear and concise overview of the Battles for the Hurtgen in a way previously not done. In this he is quite successful.

With respect to readability, Miller's writing style is quite easy to follow but it is made a bit choppy and (at least initially) hard to follow because he switches between American and German units frequently and unless/until the reader is familiar with which side of the line what unit numbers belong this can make the going tough. A simple use of italics to refer to German units (for example) would have gone a long way towards providing clarity for the reader. Robert Rush (or his publisher) used this tactic in his book on the Hurtgen (see comparison to Miller's book below) with great success.

The final chapter of Miller's book, entitled "Analysis" is worth the price of admission for its insights. Miller provides testimony from commanders who were there and can, looking back, see where problems arose and successes were achieved. The biggest "problem" with the battles of the Hurtgen forest, as Miller and his supporting players see it, was the lack of proper tactical goals, namely the Roer River dams. The dams were not in fact objectives until late in the game after many thousands of casualties were sustained on both sides. Until these proper objectives were articulated the US Army goal in the Hurtgen was to drive the enemy back and capture roads and settlements, as had been the case in Normandy and Brittany. Breaching the Westwall was important and laudable but the casualties were not. Hindsight is always clearer than foresight.

"A Dark and Bloody Ground" is, in the end, a solid piece of historical work worthy of a read. Despite some potential "readability" problems Miller has crafted a four star gem. Anyone interested in learning more about the Hurtgen Forest battles should check out Robert Rush's "Hell in the Hurtgen" which, unlike Miller's book which deals broadly with the whole campaign, focuses on a single 4th Division Regiment, the 22nd, and its time spent dying in the Hurtgen. In a literary sense Rush's book is superior, although both hold their own against each other on content!

Same Sad Song: Miller Covers MacDonald's First Hit.......2004-11-11

If _ A Dark and Bloody Ground: The Hurtgen Forest and the Roer River Dams 1944-1945_ (1995) were a song, it would be a cover tune first recorded by Charles B. MacDonald in 1963 (see my review of MacDonald's _The Battle of the Huertgen Forest_). Like Elvis Presley's rendition of Frank Sinatra's standard "My Way," opinion would vary as to who performed the song better. A younger generation might even hold that Presley was the original artist, while older fans would stand by Sinatra's as the better performance. The song has not changed, only the artist's style and delivery has. Such is the case with Edward G. Miller's contribution to the Huertgen Forest canon. Miller emphatically echoes MacDonald's original thesis that the American planners chose road junctions and towns as primary objectives when in fact they should have concentrated their efforts on two Roer River dams. Miller contends that the dams should have been the main objective from the onset of the campaign. If this had been the case, he argues, there would have been no need to enter the Huertgen Forest, thus eliminating the chance of becoming embroiled in a bitter contest there. In addition, Miller supports the claim that in order for the Americans to cross the Roer River successfully they first had to secure the dams to prevent the Germans from destroying them, flooding the entire region, and causing substantial delay. This last point is just the type of 20/20 hindsight that Miller and others cannot resist when supporting this argument. This is exactly what happened in February 1945, delaying the American attack crossing of the Roer River by two weeks.Miller also rehashes other criticisms such as the Americans had sacrificed mobility and firepower by entering the forest; the American planner's failure to consider the harsh weather conditions and terrain favorable to the defense, and the forest should have been by-passed altogether. As narrative history, Miller is top-notch. The author skillfully retells the sequence of events that made up the Huertgen Forest Campaign. From the VII Corps's first encounter with the forest in September 1944; the failed October attacks of the 9th Division; the tragedy of the 28th Division efforts in and around heavily fortified town of Schmidt in early November; to the renewed two-corps offensive that finally broke out of the forest. Miller covers the complete campaign with thoroughness and efficiency.Along the way, Miller conducted an enormous amount of research that includes the standard primary and secondary sources, as well as a substantial amount of correspondence and personal interviews from both American and German veterans of the fighting. The author has certainly succeeded in blending thorough analysis with readable narrative, however, he got a little careless at one point. To support a contention that Eisenhower and the high command were obsessed with reaching the Rhine River in favor of destroying German forces, Miller paraphrased Martin Blumenson in the official history. Upon checking this source, it clearly showed Blumenson was referring to Germans trapped within the Falaise Pocket in August 1944, not at the German border as Miller had hinted. The biggest question with all these notions is "how? How should the Huertgen Forest have been avoided? The author admits that it would probably been dangerous for the Americans to by-pass the forest initially, but that this does not mean First Army should have committed units time and time again in a fruitless battle of attrition. I agree! Miller states that the area north of the city of Aachen presented the best avenue of approach into Germany, yet he stops there without substantiating this claim or offering a suggestion of how this maneuver could have been carried out. How could the dams have been captured earlier? Miller implies that had there not been an American manpower shortage, they "might have succeeded" in taking the Roer River Dams in September or October. Again, the author offers no clear plan on how this would have been performed. He then goes on to state that had V Corps been reinforced with one or two regiments, it "would likely have" taken the two dams in November. "Ifs," "might haves" and "would likely haves" are not concrete enough in this unending controversy. Miller has written a fine book, equal to MacDonalds first study. That is an impressive achievement in itself. Whether you like the cover tune or the original is a matter of taste. They are both the same sad song.

A closely detailed study of the brutal fighting.......2003-06-19

A Dark And Bloody Ground: The Hurtgen Forest And The Roer River Dams, 1944-1945 by Edward G. Miller (an active-duty army ordnance officer) is a closely detailed study of the brutal fighting which took place in the Hurtgen Forest near the end of World War II. Those deadly battles in the Hurtgen Forest have been overshadowed in military history and popular imagination by the more famous "Battle of the Bulge", and yet the gripping depictions of combat, terror, and the revelations of lethal blunders in A Dark And Bloody Ground make it a truly recommended resource for avid students of Military History in general and World War II Studies in particular.

A Dark and Bloody Ground.......2002-07-02

I purchased this book as part of research I am doing. I found it to be very informative and interesting reading. The author does a wonderful job putting names of men with places throughout the book. I was even able to find reference to my Dad, Capt. Gilbert H. Fuller, 2nd Battalion, 26th Infantry Regiment.

This book will prove very helpful in my writing of a WWII memorial of my parents and their contributions to the effort.

I would certainly highly recommend it to others.

The Bloody Chasm (De Forest, John W//Collected Works)
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The Bloody Chasm (De Forest, John W//Collected Works)
John W. De Forest , and John W. Deforest
Manufacturer: Reprint Services Corp
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0781211646

Forts in the Forest: Kentucky in the Year of the Bloody Seven
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Forts in the Forest: Kentucky in the Year of the Bloody Seven
Jim Baker
Manufacturer: Ohio Historical Society
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: 0914482114

The phantom of the forest: A tale of the dark and bloody ground
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The phantom of the forest: A tale of the dark and bloody ground
Emerson Bennett
Manufacturer: J.E. Potter
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

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Arizona's Dark and Bloody Ground
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Arizona's Dark and Bloody Ground
Earle R. Forest
Manufacturer: The Caxton Printers
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ASIN: B000X73RXW

A Dark and Bloody Ground The Hurtgen Forest and the Roer River Dams, 1944-1945
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A Dark and Bloody Ground The Hurtgen Forest and the Roer River Dams, 1944-1945
Miller Edward G.
Manufacturer: Texas A&M University Press
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Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000UIFB7Y

Dark and Bloody Ground: The Hurtgen Forest and the Roer River Dams,
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Dark and Bloody Ground: The Hurtgen Forest and the Roer River Dams,
EDWARD G. MILLER
Manufacturer: See notes
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ASIN: B000RQOPGC

Mineral imput for Bloody Dick implementation analysis
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Mineral imput for Bloody Dick implementation analysis
Catherine L Gaskin
Manufacturer: Beaverhead National Forest
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Binding: Unknown Binding

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The oddest of courtships; or, The bloody chasm: A novel (Appleton's popular series)
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The oddest of courtships; or, The bloody chasm: A novel (Appleton's popular series)
John William De Forest
Manufacturer: D. Appleton and Co
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B00088OT0G

Book Description

This is the first biography of Martov, the founder and leader of Menshevism. It records his revolutionary apprenticeship in Vilno and St Petersburg in 1893â€“6; his early friendship and partnership with Lenin in Siberian exile and on the revolutionary newspaper Iskra in Munich and London; the dramatic break-up of that partnership at the Second Congress of Russian Social Democrats in 1903 and the division between Mensheviks and Bolsheviks; the ensuing feud between Martov and Lenin; Martov's role in the 1905 revolutions; his later activities as leader of the Menshevik-Internationalists, then of the socialist opposition in Bolshevik Russia until 1920, and of the Mensheviks in exile, until his death. Martov is shown as a noble and tragic figure of modern Russian and Jewish history and of international socialsm, and as a key figure to the understanding of all three.

Customer Reviews:

Martov: Marx's Man Through and Through.......2005-08-04

The story of Yuili Martov is a tragedy for the ages...one that seems to have been lost over the last 100 or so years. Most Americans, not to mention Russians, have never even heard of such a man. However, Martov's story is one of epic proportions, and, in my opinion, one worth taking the time to learn and understand. Martov was not only one of the most brilliant and intelligent socialist theorists of the Russian Revolution, but, perhaps most importantly, he was the one Marxist who constantly challenged Vladimir Lenin's concept of Marxism (which has become known as Leninism). In a sense, Martov was Lenin's greatest and most outspoken political, socialist opponent. It is therefore absolutely essential for scholars and students of Russian history to read this book...for it alone offers explanations on not only the life of the leader of the socalist oppostion(International Socialism or Orthodox Marxism) to Leninism, but also explains the political atmosphere that ultimately allowed Lenin's coup d'etat to become a reality.

To begin, Martov and Lenin (along with Plekhanov, Potresov, Axelrod, and Zasulich) founded the Russian Social Democratic Revolutionary Party (or Social Democrats for short) in 1902. The party was dedicated not only to the overthrow of the oppressive Tsar, but also to the asendence of the working proletariat into power. However, the Russian socialists quickly split over ideological and organizational differences by 1905. Lenin (who wanted to cultivate a party of professional revolutionaries) formed the Bolshevik faction, while Martov (who believed that the party should be completely open to the masses of workers they were claiming to represent; i.e. join the workers, don't use them) created the Menshevik faction in protest. Moreover, Martov, being a strict Marxist, believed that the overthrow of the Tsar would have to be followed by a bourgeois revolution before the proletariat could seize power, i.e. a "backward" county like Russia would first have to undergo a capitalist takeover before a socialist revolution could occur. Lenin, on the other hand, seemingly believed that "waiting for a revolution" just wouldn't do...it had to be cultivated, used to the advantage of the working class and peasantry, and, most of all, the capitalist revolution must be skipped. These differences in party philosophy (a conservatvie and liberal interpretation of Marx, if you will) were set to divide the two parties for the rest of history.

When at last in October 1917 Lenin and the Bolsheviks seized power away from Kerensky's Provisional Government, Martov and the Mensheviks were converted from enemies of the Tsarist state to enemies of the Bolshevik state. Martov and his party were forced underground and denied the rights of free speech and press that they had thought a "socalist revolution" would gaurantee them. How wrong they had been. Martov soon came to realize that Lenin cared about nothing but becoming dictator.

After reading Getzler's book, one is (I believe) left with a favorable impression of Yuili Martov. He was a noble and moral man, adamatly opposed to Bolshevik terror in the name of socialism (which was supposed to be the highest achievement of universal brotherhood), imperialist war (WWI) in which capitalist governments forced the international proletariate to break down into nationalistic camps, 'Trotsky Justice' in which political prisoners were exectued without trial, anti-Semitism and pogroms against the Jewish, and capitalist and gentry exploitation of the working class and peasantry. Perhaps most of all, he was an internationalist...who dreamed that someday the workers in every country would ascend to power, dissolve national borders, and universal peace and socialism would replace national squabbling and capitalist exploitation. He was also a democrat, and decried until his death Lenin's abandonment of the most scared of all socialist prinicples: the right to free elections.

Unfortunately, it was Martov's extreme orthodoxy and "self-denying" principle (i.e. that socialists should abstain from taking power and working with the bourgeois government since the working class was not yet ready to seize power) that prevented him from ever becoming more than a brilliant oppositionist. Never becoming a leader of the government that followed the Tsar, Martov was quickly, as Trotsky would put it, "swept into the dustbin of history."

This book received four stars instead of five only because Getzler failed to speak of much of anything regarding Martov's personal life. He, rather cheaply, writes this off in the prologue ("Nor have I presumed to pry into the intimacies of Martov's personal life [since he had] no family, worldly possesions or private interests of his own"). Still, you think an autobiography would at least be able to cover the subject's death and funeral, as well as how he was remembered by subsequent generations.

Again, this book is an essential, easy read for anyone interested in Lenin, Russian politics, Marxism, socialism, or Russian history. However, I do believe that previous knowledge of the Russian Revolution is necessitated. I recommend Orlando Figes "The People's Tragedy" before undertaking Getzler's in-depth study of Martov.

Martov: a political biography of a Russian Social Democrat

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Martov: a political biography of a Russian Social Democrat
Israel Gerzler
Manufacturer: Cambridge
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000K6ZCFM

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