A must read for concerned parents, December 28, 2002

Furthermore, this book is not solely about STDs but about the greater issue of sexual freedom. Dr. Meeker claims, and I agree with, that the primary problem among our teens is that they are taught that it is reasonable to pursue sex in any and all forms which include intercourse, oral, anal, and mutual masturbation. And the means by which teens are 'taught' about sex and its acceptance especially at such an early age, is through the media, advertisements of all sorts, music lyrics and videos, movies, television sitcoms, as well as the 'modeled' behavior of ones parents or guardians. Since morality and personal ethics regarding the value of sex have dropped to a level of cheapness in our country, it is little wonder why teens experiment and engage in various sexual acts, and in turn contract STDs.

This book is written from a conservative perspective in which sexual freedom among teens should not endorsed but inappropriate for them to embrace. Teens should not be given freedom by their parent(s) and society to choose to have sex with whoever, wherever, and in any form as one desires. Teens are treated as if they are mature adults who can and will make wise decisions. The truth of the matter is that teens are not adults and are not mature enough to make decisions that have their best interests in mind, especially long term interests. The proof is in the documented evidence. Not only are teens contracting STDs, they are also filled with emotional, psychological, and religious grief.

Dr. Meeker shares beneficial ways by which parents can assist their teens to make wise decisions for a positive sexual future, primarily to having sex with a single partner, hopefully a new spouse. For it is caring and educated parents that can have the greatest influence.

The overall goal of this book is not just to inform parents about STD's through graphic stories and alarming statistics, but to empower parents to dare to care for their teens lives. As Dr. Meeker's experience and research shows, there is an epidemic among our teens. Unless parents take an active interest in their teens' lives, their teens' future and their children's future will be very bleak.

A fine collection of some little-known stories, December 18, 2002

"Polikoushka" deals with events surrounding the recruitment of troops from an estate into the army. A member of a peasant family is chosen as the estate's last recruit instead of the title character, a domestic serf, but a tragedy that occurs to Polikoushka changes the course of things. "A Prayer" is Tolstoy's brief attempt to come to terms with the tragedy of a child's death. "Korney Vasilyev" deals with a man who returns home to make amends many years after crippling his daughter and leaving his wife upon learning of his wife's adultery. "Strawberries" sets the idle chatter of liberal aristocrats against the simple life of the berry-gathering peasant children living near them. "Why?" tells the story of a Polish revolutionary who is sent to Siberia and of the woman who joins him there to marry him and some years later tries to escape with him. "God's Way and Man's" is about two imprisoned 1870's radicals, one of whom finds peace in Tolstoy's Sermon on the Mount-based version of Christianity shortly before his execution, and the other of whom is shattered to learn of the futility of his revolutionary pursuits.

All of these works show Tolstoy's impressive sensitivity toward his characters, and we see much of his disillusionment with the artificial customs of Russian life, from the pointless meeting of the steward with the proprietress in "Polikoushka" to the absurd wording of the death sentence in "God's Way and Man's." "Polikoushka" is unusual among Tolstoy's pre-conversion work for focusing on peasants, which helps it seem at home among his later works. As for the other five stories, although by the time he wrote them Tolstoy had come to believe that the only worthwhile purpose of art was to provide a clear moral and infect the audience with the spirit of brotherly love, these stories (especially the longer ones) are really more nuanced than that. Just as Tolstoy had a hard time putting the values of Tolstoyism into practice in his personal life, it seems that in his art he couldn't help writing works more complex and interesting than what he believed to be appropriate (though he still certainly makes his message come through).

The back of the book claims that these stories are "now in paperback for the first time since their original publication," which isn't really true: the Gordon Spence-translated "Divine and Human and Other Stories" contains three of the stories (there's also a Peter Sekirin-translated book called "Divine and Human" that contains all five of the 1905-06 stories from this volume, but that book seems to be available only in hardcover). However, I'm not aware of any English-language book containing "Polikoushka," which is a very good work and the highlight of this collection, so I would tend to recommend this volume over either of the others.

These stories don't quite reach the level of Tolstoy's very best short works (I have in mind "The Death of Ivan Ilich," "The Kreutzer Sonata," and "Master and Man"), but they're still quite good, so if you've liked some of his other short stories and novellas you should take a look at this volume.