Book Reviews - 2000

I was looking for information on indexes and structures and this book had a much better writeup than anything else in the office at the time. It was helpful and explained pretty well how SQL Server uses indexes and a good start to how you can analyze your indexes.

I have worked my way through just about the entire book and the remaining sections are pretty basic so I probably will not read them. I think this is a great reference for SQL 7 DBAs/developers and highly recommend it. Along with the Guru's Guide (currently reading) this is worth your $$ as an investment.

This is a must read. Actually, this may become my SQL Server bible. Recommended by Joe Celko (he wrote the introduction) and the first few chapters have a wealth of information on T-SQL for SQL Server. You need to be a programmer to read this one, but so far it is worth every penny.

The next few chapters deal with the various constructs in SQL Server (triggers, stored procedures, etc). The end of the book is filled with hints for performance optimizations and undocumented SQL . Mr. Henderson includes a wealth of code in administrative procedures that he says he uses in his work. Some of them I have written and some I have no use for, but the code is worth reading and understanding. I like his coding style and have learned quite a few things about programming in T-SQL from this book. 

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

At first glance, it points out lots of well known flaws, but most of these were fixed by SP5 for NT4. With Windows 2000 being released, I think this book is becoming obsolete quickly. Of course, if you have not patched any of the holes in this book you are way behind the curve.

Updated - We are nearly a third of the way through #4 now and it is by far the best one yet. My 8 year old loves it! 

Reading #4 now, read 1-3 over many nights 1999-2000. This series is one of the best we have found for our kids and it's enjoyable for us to read as well. Read them in order as it chronicles the schooling of a young wizard across a few years. I am actually looking forward to re-reading this series with our younger son when he gets to be 7 or 8.

After a slow start, this one became a bit of a page turner. About a sick child and his parents that refuse treatment. The family just disappeared. Alex Delaware becomes involved in trying to find the child and the family. Lots of twists and some people with more problems than I can imagine.

I enjoy having this book reference things that happened in other books. I read a number of John Lescroat books where each always referred to others and there was an order to the books that made them interesting. The Alex Delaware novels seem to follow the same pattern. He must have had an interesting practice because he writes about some very sick people.

Overall I enjoyed the book and it was interesting, but not a role model for me. If you are interested in knowing what one of the most successful men in America is like, this provides some insight. It does not really provide much insight into investing, so look elsewhere for that.

Not as bad as some of the reviews, but much more unelievable than Silence. After meeting a thoroughly chilling Hannibal in the previous book, he has too much emotion in this book. Nonetheless, it was an easy reader and enjoyable.

A horrifying experience that Mr Krakauer went through. Captivating story about the ordeals of climbing to the highest point on Earth. One thing is for sure, after reading this, I will never climb to the top of Mt Everest. I highly recommend this for the story more than the writing.

This began well and became quite the page turner. I stayed up past midnight one night to finish the second half of the book. The ending was not quite what I expected, but pretty good. It reminded me of some Luldum books with a similar style to The Winner. I recommend this one if you need something exciting, but not too long or heavy.

An in-your-face look at race relations from the point of view of a black man who grew up as in Portsmouth, Virginia. Mr. McCall seems to view most of his life as being defined by his race and he may be right, but it's a view that I think is kind of extreme.

I did enjoy reading the book and it really made me think about the world we live in and the way that different races interact and get along (or not get along). I would really like to meet him one day.

I think this is a great book for anyone to read. If you are not a minority, you will never completely understand race relations, but this will give you another point of view and a look at the world from Mr. McCall's point of view. If you a minority, you will find you are not alone in some of your frustations.

Interesting reading, the style is like Fitzgerald or Hemingway. Something I noticed right away and enjoyed. The story bounces back and forth between early WWII and the future, and is interesting in the first 75 pages.

After 900+ pages, I finally completed this book. It bounces back and forth between WWII and the present day. You have to be somewhat interested in cryptography and the end was a little disappointing, but it was an enjoyable read. The book moves between a modern day computer programmer that is working to establish a data haven and his grandfather's exploits as a cyptographer in WWII. There is also a marine who works with his grandfather (somewhat) during the war and his son's and granddaughter's business interests with the cryptographer's grandson. Overall Mr. Stephenson does a good job of tying all the plots together. I wished the ending would have had more of a bang and followed through on what happens once the "treasure" is discovered, but perhaps it is coming in a follow up novel.