Books with author Robert E Wells

You may very well be fast on your feet. But if you want to win races, never race a cheetah -- no animal on earth can run faster! What's faster than a speeding cheetah? Robert E. Wells tells you. A peregrine falcon can swoop faster than a cheetah can run, but that can't even compare to an airplane, a rocket or the speed of light! Lively text and watercolors make you laugh while you learn.The Bulletin called Wells's first book, Is a Blue Whale the Biggest Thing There Is? "...a light and easy read for science class..". Of his second book, What's Smaller Than a Pygmy Shrew? Booklist said, "Wells introduces a challenging concept in a way that will entertain and intrigue young children". Pygmy Shrew was also selected as one of the Outstanding Science Trade Books for Children for 1996 by the National Science Teachers Association and the Children's Book Council. How Do You Lift a Lion?, his exciting new book published last season, is an introduction to three simple machines.

It took months for Eric to work up the courage to ask Rebekah Hughes out, and now the woman of his recent dreams is gone. Kidnapped! At least that's what Eric believes happened. It's difficult to clearly recall recent events when you're lying semi-conscious, bleeding in the snow. Now it's up to Eric to rescue his new girlfriend-well, his almost-girlfriend.\n\n \n\nIn the great teeter-totter of love, Rebekah has been sitting solidly on the ground, casually ignoring the fact that Eric is dangling four feet above the sandbox. So far, his brilliant, passive approach to winning Rebekah's love hasn't worked-now, perhaps, his unusually daring heroics will sway her. It's worth the trip to find out in this seriously funny, full-throttle ride into the human heart.

"Taramis, queen of Khauran, awakened from a dream-haunted slumber to a silence that seemed more like the stillness of nighted catacombs than the normal quiet of a sleeping place. She lay staring into the darkness, wondering why the candles in their golden candelabra had gone out. A flecking of stars marked a gold-barred casement that lent no illumination to the interior of the chamber. But as Taramis lay there, she became aware of a spot of radiance glowing in the darkness before her. She watched, puzzled. It grew and its intensity deepened as it expanded, a widening disk of lurid light hovering against the dark velvet hangings of the opposite wall. . ."

In the United States, the Knights of Labour (KOL) is part of the wreckage of labor history, a nineteenth-century organization of great promise that flamed out quickly and completely. Many scholars (wrongly) see it as little more than a failed experiment that stumbled due to misplaced idealism and antiquated notions of fraternalism. In New Zealand, the KOL's story was strikingly different, achieving tremendous success in a remarkably short time. "Knights Down Under" takes an in-depth look at the organization in New Zealand, and is the first thorough comparative study of the KOL in global context. It calls into question assumptions about the newness of globalism, national exceptionalism, the uniqueness of socialist movements, how social movements develop, the nature of leadership, and the possibilities and challenges of transnational organizing. The KOL was the first labour federation to envision itself as an international body that could and should expand beyond its North American birthplace. "Knights Down Under" sheds light on how the KOL evolved from the remnant of a failed Philadelphia tailors' union to an international force that helped rewrite the social agenda in far-off New Zealand. Knights immersed themselves in workplace issues, but also delved into politics, got elected to Parliament, and promoted a comprehensive program of social and labour reform. They were the envy of workers in Western industrial societies, most of which would not enact similarly sweeping changes for another four decades. Among the reforms the KOL helped enact were women's suffrage, mandatory arbitration of labour disputes, old-age pensions, early-closing hours for retail shops, land redistribution, an equitable tax code, and the creation of a department of labour. By aiding in the development of New Zealand's first political system, the KOL also laid the groundwork for the future birth of an independent labour party.