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As an illustrator and student of art, I say without reservation that this is the best damn book ever for learning how to draw the human face and body.  All the other books pale by comparison; this book is what they just don't teach in art classes any more, because postmodernism has destroyed all objective standards. I recently bought... (See the whole review)

(This book is not what you think)  Founder of Lionheart Books, Reagan has produced the ideal smaller coffee-table book for the 21st century. The Hand of God combines dozens of dazzling images of starscapes and far planets captured by the Hubble telescope with reflections on the self, the stars, and the universe, from writers as various as Oscar Wil... (See the whole review)

How could you, a mathematician, believe that extraterrestrials were sending you messages?" the visitor from Harvard asked the West Virginian with the movie-star looks and Olympian manner. ... (See the whole review)

Why don't zebras get ulcers--or heart disease, diabetes and other chronic diseases--when people do? In a fascinating look at the science of stress, biologist Robert Sapolsky presents an intriguing case, that people develop such diseases partly because our bodies aren't designed for the constant stresses of a modern-day life--like sitting in daily t... (See the whole review)

Critics have attacked the foolishness of some of today’s elite thought from many angles, but few have examined the real-world consequences of those ideas. In The Burden of Bad Ideas, Heather Mac Donald reports on their disastrous effects throughout our society. At a Brooklyn high school, students perfect their graffiti skills for academic credit. A... (See the whole review)

In his provocative new book The Age of Spiritual Machines, Ray Kurzweil, who Forbes Magazine calls "the ultimate thinking machine," takes readers on an breathtaking tour of the history of computation and artificial intelligence and makes startling predictions for the future of technology, such as: * 2010: A translating telephone will allow you to s... (See the whole review)

While the jury may yet be out on the empirical benefits of Barefoot's coral calcium, this book yields an enormous wealth of incredibly distilled and concentrated human biochemistry information... things that the mainstream medical industry definitely does not want you to know. ... (See the whole review)

At last! This is the book every AIDS-watcher has been awaiting, in which the most prominent and persistent critic of HIV as the cause of AIDS presents his case most exhaustively and popularly. Duesberg, himself a virologist, stoutly maintains that HIV cannot cause AIDS because it fails to meet the rules by which a virus is implicated as disease-cau... (See the whole review)

Few physicians talk about the clinical use of touch, and few medical schools teach it specifically, even though touch is a unique tool for diagnosis and therapeutic applications, as well as a means of communicating a caring attitude. In the poem "Line Drive," by Allen Ginsberg, the physician realizes that he "forgot to touch or be touched" while gi... (See the whole review)

Modern agriculture and food-preservation methods have done serious damage to the human diet. The detrimental effects on the human body caused by acidic wastes from processed food and chemical additives are myriad. Byproducts of the foods we eat, acidic wastes are the common denominator in all degenerative diseases. When acidic wastes accumulate, th... (See the whole review)

Often I feel I go to some distant region of the world to be reminded of who I really am. ... (See the whole review)

Why have Jews risen to the top of the business and professional world in numbers staggeringly out of proportion to their percentage of the American population? Steven Silbiger has the answer. Combining the huge appeal of the bestsellers The Millionaire Next Door and The Gifts of the Jews, The Jewish Phenomenon sets forth the seven principles that f... (See the whole review)

In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, author Stephen R. Covey presents a holistic, integrated, principle-centered approach for solving personal and professional problems. With penetrating insights and pointed anecdotes, Covey reveals a step-by-step pathway for living with fairness, integrity, honesty, and human dignity -- principles that give... (See the whole review)

This "children's" book is probably the single most horrifying and depressing thing I've ever read... even more so than George Orwell's 1984.  It revolves around a falsely utopian nightmare society that provides its wonders at a chilling cost.  Although Lowry does employ a bit of fantasy in just a few places, her story is still a very effect... (See the whole review)

Vilfredo Pareto (1848-1923) was an Italian sociologist, who, in his 1901 treatise, The Rise and Fall of Elites, foretold the ascent of socialism as a ruling doctrine in the decades to come. Pareto, to his credit, does not even remotely consider socialism capable of achieving the existential and moral utopia that its advocates espoused. Moreover, he... (See the whole review)

This story is about a group of rabbits who leave their home in search of a new place to live because of dangers that threaten them. Along the way they meet other rabbits and come across many warrens, some of which they are invited to live at, others which they must escape from. The story is not only a page turner at times, but I thought the author ... (See the whole review)

"A novel that brilliantly illuminates some of the darker interconnections between politics and sex . . . Just as the world of Orwell's 1984 gripped our imaginations, so will the world of Atwood's handmaid!" --Washington Post Book World "Atwood takes many trends which exist today and stretches them to their logical and chilling co... (See the whole review)

Inspired by the life of Paul Gauguin, the Moon and Sixpence is an unforgettable study of a man possessed by the need to create — regardless of the cost to himself, and to others. Excerpts: "And man, subservient to interests he has persuaded himself are greater than his own, makes himself a slave to his taskmaster. He sits him on a sea... (See the whole review)

With all the talk of failing schools these days, we forget that schools can fail their brightest students, too. We pledge to "leave no child behind," but in American schools today, thousands of gifted and talented students fall short of their potential. In Genius Denied, Jan and Bob Davidson describe the "quiet crisis" in education: gifted students... (See the whole review)

This book lists a number of factual errors in the works of Michael Moore from the beginning of his career up to but not including his 9-11 movie. It shows his lack of integrity as a documentarian and dangerously creative skill as a propagandist. Moore commands a frightening but small portion of society with his populist propaganda, so it is no wond... (See the whole review)

This is Heinlein's lost first novel which was originally rejected by publishers because it was too philosophical.  He eventually gave up on it, instead stealing many of the ideas for his later works.  Heinlein's copy was destroyed, but a copy was recently discovered in a friends garage and is now published for the first time in 2004.  Honestly, it ... (See the whole review)

In the year 2753, after unparalleled technological and economic advancement within the Intergalactic Protectorate, reaction has set in, as a group of environmentalist mystics seeks to usurp the mechanisms of government. A scientist on the Protectorate’s outskirts discovers a planet with an entirely new sentient life form, devoid of sight of the ext... (See the whole review)

Quantum mechanics is the most fundamental and important theory known to man.  It underpins modern science and technology and even provides us with a blueprint for reality itself.  And yet it has been said that if you are not shocked by it, you quite clearly don't understand it.  But is quantum physics really so unknowable?  Is reality really so str... (See the whole review)

A perspective on the science of cosmology that I found to be interesting from the viewpoint of Objectivism. The scientific content of the book consists of a discussion of the flaws in the Big Bang Theory (some of which may be dated, since this was published in 1991) and a presentation of an alternative theory based on the physics of plasma. But t... (See the whole review)

Standard quantum mechanics offers some widely accepted "primacy of consciousness" interpretations at odds with Objectivism. By contrast, this book of "classical quantum mechanics" attempts to explain experimental observations using a "primacy of existence" premise. In late 1999, I wrote an article for The Daily Objectivist about this book and its... (See the whole review)

This book critically examines the Objectivist position on such major thinkers as Plato, Augustine, Hume, Kant and Nietzsche and finds them wanting. It includes 3 appendixes; one that provides an overview of Objectivism.

Capitalism and Commerce provides an outstanding and accessible introduction to the best philosophical , moral, and economic arguments for capitalism. This excellent and interesting work makes a convincing case that capitalism is the only moral social system because it protects a man's mind, his primary means of survival and flourishing.Younkins tho... (See the whole review)

            Among books written systematically and engagingly, with an immense depth of notes and research to accompany them, few of our time can rank alongside Hans-Hermann Hoppe’s Democracy: The God that Failed. Hoppe, a professor of economics at the University of Nevada and senior fellow with the Ludwig von Mises institute, is an anarcho-capital... (See the whole review)

This is my favorite Ayn Rand novel. Not as overtly philosophical nor as monumental in scope as her later works, strictly as a novel qua novel, it excels those later works. And compared to the work of other authors, it is monumental. Rand tells us a love story set against the background of communist Russia in the 1920's. In part two, chapter 8, s... (See the whole review)

This is a book for those who take their punctuation seriously :  and I do mean seriously! "Punctuation really does matter, even if it is only occasionally a matter of life or death." So says the author! Who, after all, would want to get shot by a panda? -- and if you don't get the panda joke* after which this book is titled, then this book .... (See the whole review)

Fareed Zakaria's book The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad explains how capitalism has consistently preceded enduring, constitutionally limited democracies.  The author employs the famous ancient Greek story of Odysseus and the Sirens to illustrate the need to bind the masses to the rule of constitutional limits of governme... (See the whole review)

The late Harold Schonberg's third and final edition of this perennial favourite includes updated accounts of all the serialists, tonalists, minimalists, and other -ists who have bored and bewildered audiences during the last 50 years or so. (For such music to change, he quotes musicologist Robert P. Morgan as saying, "the world will have to change.... (See the whole review)

From author Max Allan Collins' website http://www.maxallancollins.com/: "Nate Heller is a cop trying to stay straight in one of the most corrupt places imaginable: Prohibition-era Chicago. When he won't sell out, he's forced to quit the force and become a private investigator. His first client is Al Capone. His best friend is Elio... (See the whole review)

From the author's web site: ... (See the whole review)

Civil War veteran, successful lawyer, spellbinding orator, and controversial iconoclast, Robert G. Ingersoll (1833-1899) was one of the best-known intellectuals of the nineteenth century. He rose to national prominence through his oratorical skills, which he publicly displayed on numerous lecture circuit tours. For almost twenty years this dedicate... (See the whole review)

Imagine Ayn Rand collaborating with Edgar Rice Burroughs (Tarzan, John Carter of Mars) and Hal Foster (Prince Valiant) to create a sword and science comic book. Better yet, stop imagining and sample the amazing world of Tandra by objectivist creator/writer/artist Christopher Lindbergh Hanther, Jr. ... (See the whole review)

This book should be in every student’s backpack.  In the post-modern intellectual battleground in which each student find himself submerged – and sometimes drowning - this book offers essential intellectual self-defence for every student who still cares to think. No matter if you already know every answer to all the sundry irrationalities y... (See the whole review)

Not a day goes by that most of us aren't presented with a graph, or a chart, or a poll by either a politician, a salesman or a newscaster - these all purport to tell us one thing, but on closer inspection many turn out to do nothing of the sort. Too high a proportion of too many of these glossy presentations don't really say what they purport to sa... (See the whole review)

... (See the whole review)

The plot outlined in this lurid exposé is a frightening one: Osama bin Laden has nuclear weapons—lots of them—and is preparing to use them to create "an American Hiroshima." Williams, a journalist, former FBI consultant and author of The Vatican Exposed: Money, Murder and the Mafia, contends that bin Laden has purchased of dozens low-yield ... (See the whole review)

The original Objectivist comic book creator, Steve Ditko is best known for his creation, with Stan Lee, of the Marvel comic book characters Spider-Man and Doctor Strange. ... (See the whole review)

I'm not a big fan of fantasy as a rule but I make an exception for this excellent comic book series by Wendy and Richard Pini, this volume of which collects the earliest Elfquest issues. ... (See the whole review)

This is perhaps the best book-length introduction to Wright's work. Plans, photos, sketches, and writings by Wright are accompanied by insightful articles on him - together they describe the sunlit genius of the greatest architect the world has ever seen.

In this provocative, witty, and thoroughly researched inquiry into what we find beautiful and why, Nancy Etcoff skewers one of our culture's most enduring myths, that the pursuit of beauty is a learned behavior.  Etcoff, a faculty member at Harvard Medical School and a practicing psychologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, skewers the enduring ... (See the whole review)

What does mathematics mean? Is it numbers or arithmetic, proofs or equations? ... (See the whole review)

Conservatives aren't born--they evolve. And for Wall Street Journal ethics columnist Harry Stein--once vilified in The Village Voice as "a well-known asshole"--that evolution began with the birth of his daughter. ... (See the whole review)

First published in 1870, Venus in Furs gained for its author both notoriety and a degree of immortality when the word "masochism"--derived from his name--entered the psychiatric lexicon. The novel describes the sexual obsessions of Severin von Kusiemski, a European nobleman with the desire "to be the slave of a woman." Severin finds his ideal of vo... (See the whole review)

A fast-paced, brilliantly researched exposé of the homosexuality of Hitler and his entourage. ... (See the whole review)

In this book the author blows the lid off the bizarre alliance between the liberal Left and radical Islam.   (from book description)   In this tour de force on the most important issue of our time, David Horowitz confronts the paradox of how so many Americans, including the leadership of the Democratic Party, could turn against the War ... (See the whole review)

Self-proclaimed lesbian pro-choice feminist Bruce, ex-president of the Los Angeles chapter of NOW and author of The New Thought Police, blames the decline of civilization on other lesbian pro-choice feminists in this lurid right-wing screed. Bruce argues that multiculturalism, identity politics and "relativism" have turned American society into a "... (See the whole review)