The election of Pope Francis came at the end of a tumultuous time in the Catholic Church. The global child sex abuse scandal, the trial of Benedict XVI's butler and the subsequent resignation of Benedict XVI were all adding up to be a very shaky foundation for the church.

After Benedict's resignation the world looked on while waiting for the smoke to appear from the Sistine Chapel. Who would succeed Benedict, can anyone bring stability to the church?

Finally "Habemus papam" was declared and out came a kindly, paternal face, smiling and waving to the crowd. Instantly people began to warm to him purely because of this warm smile and apparent humility.

I was delighted to see this infectious smile looking out at me from the cover of this book. If Pope Francis' saintly smile on the cover doesn't sell this book then nothing will.

When Francis emerged most of us hadn't a clue who he was. Immediately the media machine got to work to feed the information to us and to try dig up the dirt. Information was flowing from every quarter, some accurate and some off the wall. Within 24 hours we had so much information on Jorge Bergoglio but it was nebulous and fractured.

In this book Fr. Michael Collins wonderfully untangles this mess of information to present us with a beautifully woven tapestry that is the life of Jorge Bergoglio. It presents us with a wonderfully humble Francis and tells us of the person behind that infectious smile

This is a short book; it took me three evenings to read. But this book doesn't hide from that fact, its subtitle attests to that. Yes there are times when the reader feels a little short changed and wanting more information. For example we learn very little about Francis' childhood, this being skimmed over in just 12 pages. But also its beauty is in its brevity. I would recommend this book for one reason; you get all the relevant information you need without the tediousness of a longer biography. Who do I think should read this? Anyone with an interest in religion and/or the humanities, whether peripherally or professionally, layman or academic, should read this book and have it to hand for its accessible facts. Tolle, lege!

www.johnsramblings.com

This is the standard text for any botanist whether amateur or professional. I reach for it every day and every day I learn something new. I would recommend that you also buy Stace's Field Flora of the British Isles which is a condensed form (subspecies?) of this book so is much smaller and easier to carry in the field. But don't buy just the Field Flora as the text and hence the information contained therein is also condensed. A word of warning: The New Flora is a technical book written by an acomplished professional taxonomist/botanist for professionals but don't let this deter any new comers to botany it is still good to have along with the more basic guides such as the Collins Guide to the Wildflowers of Britain and Ireland by Fitter et al. As you begin to identify plants using the basic guides you can also refer to Stace and you will eventually get used to the technical language of Stace. I use Stace as my primary text for identifying plants but still refer to the basic texts for pictures just to be absolutley certain. All in all buy it along with the Field Flora but have at least one of the basic texts also.