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Reviews

This thing was so cheap that the batteries wouldn't stay in it (even with the door closed) and so the music would only play in short (I mean 1/2 second) bursts. Clearly I had been sent a product that had already been returned by someone else -- what a waste of my time -- my kid was in tears. When will companies stop trying to rip people off by trying to pass off obviously shoddy products that have already been deemed defective by someone else to a new consumer. This is my first and believe me my *last* experience with this vendor and this product.

I bought a zadro speakerman for my self a few years ago, and recently purchased another for my nephew. I love the simplicity of it and the sound from the "foot" speakers is of pretty decent quality. Nice for sitting on the edge of a shelf to listen quietly to your Ipod.

I bought this as a b-day present for my 8 year old. It is great because she has a place to store her ipod shuffle and it is very basic for her to hook and unhook. She likes that she can carry it to whatever room she wants. Just beware if you are looking for a high qualtiy clear sounding product this is not for you, spend the extra $$ and get a better one. This serves it purpose for kids or tweens, but for adults the sound quality is muffled and slightly distorted but not enough for a kids to mind.

I bought this speaker to use around my apartment, it works great and has a good sound quality. I was worried that it might not work with my mp3 player, but I haven't had any problems. This is a great product, and I have told my friends to pick one up.

Reviews

An excellent and very readable narrative of the lives of Billy the Kid and Pat Garrett. Author Mark Gardner manages to capture the essence of both men in one book any reader can handle. I won't repeat the details of other reviewers, but even devotees of the saga can sink their teeth into the book. For those wanting to read more about this moment of wild west history, I highly recommend "The West of Billy the Kid" (or any of Frederick Nolan's books), "Such Men as Billy the Kid" by Joel Jacobsen, and "Billy the Kid" by Jon Tuska. Read and enjoy!

Mark Lee Gardner deserves high praise for "To Hell on a Fast Horse." He combines rich scholarship with a gifted storyteller's understanding of how to keep the audience's attention. What is amazing is the extent to which both Garrett and Billy the Kid emerge on the pages as human beings, rather than as one-dimensional heroes or villains. Indeed, the book appropriately ends with a fitting quotation from Walter Noble Burns (as recorded by Sallie Chisum in 1924): "I knew both these men intimately... and each made history in his own way. There was good mixed with the bad in Billy the Kid and bad mixed with the good in Pat Garrett. Both were distinctly human, both remarkable personalities." After reading this compelling book, you will feel as if you gain genuine insight into both men and their times, both the good and evil in it. The account of these violent businessmen and gunmen in multicultural New Mexico is Gardner's account of Garrett's post-Billy the Kid career also makes for fascinating, if also very sad, reading. For example, the rise and fall of his relationship with Theodore Roosevelt underscored Garrett's difficulty in dealing with his violent past and his personal vices. The book also highlights the role of the aggressively venal lawyer and politician Albert B. Fall as an opponent of Garrett. One wonders whether some of the evil lawyers portrayed in old western movies were based on Fall. All is all, this is a great book.

"To Hell on a Fast Horse" is a great read. While it doesn't offer up much new information it presents the already known in a very gripping, concise way. This is easily the best book since Utley's "Billy the Kid", maybe even surpassing it. Heresy? Maybe, but "To Hell on a Fast Horse" is a vast improvement on Utley's "Just the facts" writing style. The book is extremely fasted paced, sometimes too much so in that he flies through some events so fast that when they are referenced later you have already forgotten that they happened but that is but a quibble Gardner has a great story to tell and he tells it well. In terms of Billy and Pat Garrett, Gardner is very even-handed and if there is a central thesis of the book it is summed up nicely in a quote on the final page describing Billy being a bad man but containing some good and Garrett being a good man but containing some bad and that both men were worth knowing. Billy the Kid is, as always, something of an enigma but it is Pat Garrett who really comes into focus particularly in the final section describing Garrett's life after Billy's death and the near constant disappointments that the old law man had to endure. Billy the Kid is the legend but Pat Garrett is the tragedy- one image in particular is very moving- years after both men died Billy got a brand new monument to mark his much visited grave while Garrett's grave become over-grown with weeds. "To Hell on a Fast Horse" is a great, great read and is a new classic in the field of "Billy the Kid-olgy"(I made up that word but feel free to use it). Kevin

Though not a thoroughgoing newcomer to Billy the Kid and Pat Garrett (who is, thanks to Hollywood and popular culture?), this is the first nonfiction book on them that I've delved into, and I must say it's an engaging introduction to the topic. Gardner is a natural storyteller. Of course, he has some great material to work with, but he presents it ably and vividly. I was mildly disappointed that he chose not to use traditional numbered footnotes, which can make his notes -- which are rich and detailed -- difficult to navigate, especially if you're trying to pin down a specific quotation. I also wish there had been a greater effort to place this story in the big-picture context of the American West in general. But these are minor quibbles in a work that doesn't really aim for that kind of academic treatment. As popular history, this is solid reading.

Robert Utley was the last historian who actually found missing details in the Kid's life and wrote about them in his books Billy the Kid: A Short and Violent Life, High Noon in Lincoln: Violence on the Western Frontier, and Four Fighters of Lincoln County (Calvin P. Horn Lectures in Western History and Culture). Like Utley before him, Mark Gardner's new book, "To Hell on a Fast Horse" captures details never published in the tragic lives of New Mexico's Lincoln County Sheriff Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (William Bonney). Most books about the Kid since Utley's publications have been a rehash of the same story while repeating old errors. However, Mr. Gardner has found even more details never published before that add important aspects to the lives of the Kid and Garrett. Although this book does not have the detail that Robert Utley and Frederick Nolan cover with their subject, this is still an excellent book. It does provide minor coverage of the early lives of the Kid and Garrett and the Lincoln County War with more focus on the last three months of the Kid's life, his escape from the Lincoln County Courthouse, and eventual death by Garrett. Mr. Gardner paints an accurate picture of the frontier west, the people that lived in it, and especially the two men who rode into the sunset and their heartbreaking finish. I wish Mr. Gardner would write a book about the Kid's years before his dramatic escape from the hangman's noose with the same tenacity he's given to this book.