Editors' bookshelf;

              THE
EDITORS*
ECCESEELE
Ed Faulkner's Tennis: How to Play It,
How to Teach It, by Edwin J. Faulkner
and Frederick Weymuller, with an in­troduction
by Arthur Ashe. The Dial
Press, 1Q70, 294 pages, $7.95 (soft-cover
only).
Community action, group-think and
mass demonstrations dominate our life
style, but in the game of tennis you're
on your own. And while you needn't
be a Rod Laver or Billie Jean King to
enjoy tennis, the game is more fun if
you play well. This book can help any­one—
beginner, intermediate or accom­plished
player—do it.
So many sports how-to books have
the double fault of being unsatisfactory
explanations that are badly written and
of concentrating their efforts on pro­ducing
the major-leaguer rather than
the competent amateur in the sport.
Faulkner's book on the other hand is
well explained, gracefully written and
ingeniously illustrated for Everyplayer.
Ed Faulkner, who has been coaching
players since the time of Bill Tilden, is
the complete teacher who can explain
how to execute a stroke properly ("To
begin, take the throat of the racket
and look carefully at the handle . . .").
He also can anticipate all the things
that may go wrong; for instance, he
points out 50 possible problems with
the serve, explains them and offers di­rections
for correcting them.
The writing is clear and informal,
thanks to Frederick Weymuller, pro
writer and tennis pro who teamed with
Faulkner like a good doubles partner.
Picture sequences taken from movie
shots of proper and faulty strokes illus­trate
exactly how to hit forehands,
backhands, serves, lobs and volleys—
and how not to hit them.
The How to Play part outstrips all
other tennis books in memory. But the
real bonus is the How to Teach part.
By following it, even two novices can
help each other. Nonplayers can watch
players, analyze their errors and help
correct them. The book has been tested
and proved a winner by an inter­mediate
player who was both teaching
a beginner and being coached by a
nonplayer using the book.
Tennis can be played for life, be­tween
all members of the family, out­doors
for much of the year and indoors
as indoor courts proliferate in colder
climates. If you're giving a racket in
the coming present-buying season, give
this book with it. If you already own a
racket, you'll swing it with more au­thority
once you've learned tennis from
Faulkner.
Kids Cooking: a first cookbook for chil­dren,
by Aileen Paul and Arthur Haw-kins.
Doubleday, 1970,128 pages, $3.95.
Breathes there the child who has
never had a ball whipping up some­thing
in the kitchen that is pure joy to
put together—and perhaps to eat? Kids
love to play at cooking, yet parents
with the patience to help and super­vise
often reach a dead end as in­structors
just beyond a gooey sundae
but short of a passable casserole or
cake.
Now Kids Cooking comes along to
help Mom lead youngsters, step by
step, past the messing-around stage to
a number of creditable dishes for all
the regular meals and for parties. The
authors really know their business.
Aileen Paul is an accomplished cook
who has taught some of her art to all
ages on TV, to her own children and
to classes of adults and kids in her
neighborhood. Arthur Hawkins, a pro­fessional
artist and designer and
skilled amateur in the kitchen, has
written and illustrated several cook­books.
Together they have produced
a book that can intrigue kids and lead
them on from the simple to the more
difficult.
Recipes range from hot cereal and
cinnamon toast to meat loaf, chili con
came and a mystery called "wacky
cake." Each recipe has a list of "what
you need" and outlines "what you do."
Every term is explained, yet there is no
babying. The authors emphasize safety
around the stove and with knives; until
a child reaches seventh grade age, or
thereabouts, an adult should be on
hand.
Now here's what you do to make a
wacky cake . . .
Japan: Images and Realities, by Richard
Halloran. Alfred A. Knopf, 1968, 281
pages. $6.95.
The amazing resurgence of Japan as
the foremost example of an economic
miracle has reinforced the common
American assumption that this small
country is atypical of the Orient and is
indeed Western in its viewpoint and
methods. In this fascinating analysis of
the inner workings of a culture that
some forecasters see as heir apparent
to the U.S. as the world's most power­ful
nation, the author argues that Ja­pan's
appearance may be Western but
the reality is not.
Halloran, a newspaperman and
experienced Far East observer, demon­strates
that a small interlinked estab­lishment
of governmental and indus­trial
leaders is in fact making the de­cisions
for a disciplined citizenry in the
nation's drive for international pre­eminence.
It is this cadre which guides
the economy, maneuvers a press that
is more instructional than informative
and that inculcates in the rank and file
the necessity to conform for the social
good.
Without making any judgments,
Halloran's case is the contrast between
the highly visible Westernization and
the reality beneath—a system that still
takes its cues from tradition. Included
in the book is a concise survey of Ja­pan's
historical coming to terms with
the West. The author describes a nation
which early recognized the importance
of Western technology, yet was loath
to surrender its traditional values, in­cluding
a fear of outsiders that served
to preserve its culture. •