The academic job search handbook
(3ed., U. Pennsylvania, 2001)

Review:

Nice, generic handbook

I bought this book at the late stages of my job hunting process, days before my first, phone interview. Therefore, I did not read the first half of the book which has to do with planning the job search and searching (assisted with sample vitas, cover letters, etc. which cover half of this book's pages). My focus was in the interviewing, and later on in the negotiating phases. In that respect, I think that this book is what its title implies: a handbook giving generic guidelines to most of the situtations one might face while interviewing ( covering off-site, conference, phone, on-campus interviews), including a list of possible questions that might be asked. It gives you advise on how to prepare for each type of interview, what to expect, what to wear etc. in a brief manner, something that was very useful for my case, since I had only a few days to prepare for my first, phone interview. I also found some useful points in the "negotiating the job" section. Another aspect I liked about this book was that it covered specific situations such as dual-carrer couples, foreign nationals seeking US employment, etc. The last part of this book covers the "after you take the job" phase, which I plan to read.

Overall, this is a nice handbook, which outlines the basics, but doesn't get into much detail. I had to buy another book and combine information of both to better prepare for my job interviews. Half of the book is covered by sample materials, which I found useless, but given its low price, I would recommend it to anyone seeking for an academic job, as a start-up, quick reference guide, or a complementary book to another, more detailed one.

 

font-size: 8pt;">The International Accounting and Finance Handbook is an excellent reference for assisting those with interests or responsibilities concerning the international dimensions of accounting, reporting, and control and finance. It provides the tools for managers who need to come to grip with the differences in accounting principles, financial disclosure and auditing practices in the worldwide finance and accounting arena.

The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Religion
The philosophy of religion as a distinct discipline is an innovation of the last 200 years, but its central topics—the existence and nature of the divine, humankind’s relation to it, the nature of religion, and the place of religion in human life—have been with us since the inception of philosophy. Philosophers have long critically examined the truth of and rational justification for religious claims, and have explored such philosophically interesting phenomena as faith, religious experience, and the distinctive features of religious discourse. The second half of the twentieth century was an especially fruitful period, with philosophers using new developments in logic and epistemology to mount both sophisticated defenses of, and attacks on, religious claims. The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Religion contains newly commissioned chapters by twenty-one prominent experts who cover the field in a comprehensive but accessible manner. Each chapter is expository, critical, and representative of a distinctive viewpoint. The Handbook is divided into two parts. The first, “Problems,” covers the most frequently discussed topics, among them arguments for God’s existence, the nature of God’s attributes, religious pluralism, the problem of evil, and religious epistemology. The second, “Approaches,” contains four essays assessing the advantages and disadvantages of different methods of practicing philosophy of religion—analytic, Wittgensteinian, continental, and feminist.

Schaum's Mathematical Handbook of Formulas and Tables

Students and research workers in mathematics, physics, engineering and other sciences will find this compilation of more than 2000 mathematical formulas and tables invaluable. They will see quickly why half a million copies were sold of the first edition! All the information included is practical -- rarely used results are excluded. Topics range from elementary to advanced-from algebra, trigonometry and calculus to vector analysis, Bessel functions, Legendre polynomials and elliptic integrals. Great care has been taken to present all results concisely and clearly. Excellent to keep as a handy reference!