What they're saying ... (blurbs, reviews, comments, etc.) Dec. 1, 2009-Jan. 31, 2010

1.6.10.  Amazon. Very entertaining & educational.  Five-star review from James Campbell, Atlanta.  Dancing on Volcano was indeed a very entertaining and educational book. Joe Gatins does a fantastic job of researching and providing many facts, events, etc., that take you back to the turn of the last century, right up to the present. The book starts out a little slow, and then picks up wonderfully as Gatins takes the reader back, to the lead-up to and the horrific events that occur during his Father's participation in WWII. If one is a history buff, this book will give you a very different and enlightening description of the challenges, tragic events, and various efforts of regular people, just to survive during WWII, and the sections on the POW camps and what prisoners did to survive, was particularly enlightening and educational. A good read, and well done by Joe Gatins. 
12.26.09.  Amazon.  "Riveting history of a family."   Five-star review from Joan L. Amory, Portland, Maine.  What a family of strong, determined, creative, and occasionally unruly individuals. Gatins skillfully folds their stories into the family history that is a great American story. Characters from Ireland and France, then Spain and Germany via Colombia, forge a fortune and a narrative that is emblematic of this country. Each new immigrant takes on the challenges of its generation as he or she joins the family. The reader's joy is taking up with each inimitable personality to follow how trials are met and how good fortune is dealt with. Gatins' fine research creates a vivid milieu for his family, and difficulties of character and decisions are handled with honesty and sensitivity.
12.1.09.  Georgia Mountain Laurel. " ... not a sugarcoated family memoir in the usual sense of the word.  Rather, it lives up to its subtitle.  Fault lines, indeed ... adventures and misadventures aplenty."