Customer Reviews
must buy - By: Mr. L. T. Davis, 04 Jan 2009 
I'm not the type of person that reads a lot but i struggle to put this book down. This is the second day i've had this book & i'm only on page 56 at the moment.
When i started reading this book i thought it would have a lot of irrelevant information & that i would have to skim read to get the main details however i was wrong. This book gives more than is needed & is well worth the money.
This book brings up myths about memory & discusses scientific evidence on them. This book not only unravels myths about learning it also provides an abundance on information to help you remember.
Simply put this is the best book i've ever read.
very good book... - By: bookreader, 01 Dec 2008 
This book is a very good book on memory as it goes into detail about the subject & uses research to back ups its theories. It will dispell any myths you thought about memory & what i like about it is it gives you a realistic look on what you can achieve with memory because other books out there claim they can give you photographic memory & never forget anything which is just not true. While this book has some powerful techniques which can astound you such as remembering long lists of numbers, long lists of items, dates remembering speeches & other subjects you wish there are limits. He goes on at how people have conversations with him & straight after ask him what they just said word for word, it does not work like that so dont expect miracles though you will be impressed. I read this because Derren Brown reccomended itin his book to read. I give this book 4 stars becausein Derren Browns book he uses a much simpler system & easier to understand & use while the same onein here is not so easy to understand & has limitations. If you are interestedin memory , not just techniques but abit of background then read this !
Your Memory - By: the great amphibian, 31 Dec 2004 In the introduction to the book, one of the first things the reader realises is that the approach of the author is to present the fundamentals of memory from a scientific perspective & backing up assertions with evidence from studies. I was impressed with the frequent references to a huge number of psychological journals & also books publishedin the field of memory. This seems like the perfect introductory bookin understanding one's memory & how to use it. The scientific objectivity of the book makes it all the more appropriate as a first bookin the field, (if you would like to read several different opinions on the matter as I would), as it leads to not only knowing from evidence of the experiences of the author what is possible with memory, but also gives a sound framework of understanding how the brain is best worked with, giving data from studies to make this convincing.
On the practical side, reading this book has given me a lot of ideas on how to improve my memory, & the improvements have been taking effect since I was still reading the book. This is due partly to the results given throughout the book, taken from scientific studies, such as studying seperate subjectsin seperate places can reduce interference between recall of memorized information from those subjects, or that if two subjects that are very similar are being studied, (such as Italian & Spanish), then interference is much more likely so studying the twoin different places or at clearly distinct times is important to reduce potential interference. So many interesting facts observed from studies are here; I'll give another example: it has been observed that after studying for a test, sleepingin the intervening time before the test resultsin better recall of the learnt material than if you were to stay awake, or continue to learn the material & not sleep before the test.
Techical terms such as retention, recall, overlearning, interference, et al are here & I like the systematic way that the author uses these technical terms to clarify explanations of, for example, the use of specific mneumonics laterin the book, (without the technical terms there would surely be more chance of ambiguity).
The first sections of the book explain what is known so far from studies about memory & how to improve your memoryin general. Laterin the book, a number of mneumonic systems are expounded; namely the link, story, loci, peg, & phonetic mneumonics. The most advanced of these by far seems to be the phonetic system.
Allin all this is an excellent, well written, fascinating, & beneficial book. I wholly recommend it to anyone interestingin improving their memory, or anyone with a general interestin memory.
A down-to-earth, authoritative book on memory. - By: the great amphibian, 12 Dec 2004 In the introduction to the book, one of the first things the reader realises is that the approach of the author is to present the fundamentals of memory from a scientific perspective & backing up assertions with evidence from studies. I was impressed with the frequent references to a huge number of psychological journals & also books publishedin the field of memory. This seems like the perfect introductory bookin understanding one's memory & how to use it. The scientific objectivity of the book makes it all the more appropriate as a first bookin the field, (if you would like to read several different opinions on the matter as I would), as it leads to not only knowing from evidence of the experiences of the author what is possible with memory, but also gives a sound framework of understanding how the brain is best worked with, giving data from studies to make this convincing.
On the practical side, reading this book has given me a lot of ideas on how to improve my memory, & the improvements have been taking effect since I was still reading the book. This is due partly to the results given throughout the book, taken from scientific studies, such as that studying seperate subjectsin seperate places can reduce interference between recall of memorized information from those subjects, or that if two subjects that are very similar are being studied, (such as Italian & Spanish), then interference is much more likely so studying the twoin different places or at clearly distinct times is important to reduce potential interference. So many interesting facts observed from studies are here; I'll give another example: it has been observed that after studying for a test, sleepingin the intervening time before the test resultsin better recall of the learnt material than if you were to stay awake, or continue to learn the material & not sleep before the test. This made me recall an experience when I had to memorize a lot of facts & figures for an A-level geography exam the next morning & that I decided to try memorizing the facts overnight, but ended up falling asleep just as I had memorized them all, & when I did the examin the morning it went very well, (I got 86 out of 90), so I knew from personal experience that this observation was correct.
Techical terms such as retention, recall, overlearning, interference, et al are here & I like the systematic way that the author uses these technical terms to clarify explanations of, for example, the use of specific mneumonics laterin the book, (without the technical terms there would surely be more chance of ambiguity). The first sections of the book explain what is known so far from studies about memory & how to improve your memoryin general. Laterin the book, a number of mneumonic systems are expounded; namely the link, story, loci, peg, & phonetic mneumonics. The most advanced of these by far seems to be the phonetic system.
Allin all this is an excellent, well written, fascinating, & beneficial book. I wholly recommend it to anyone interestedin improving their memory, or anyone with a general interestin memory.
Very good - By: , 23 Feb 2004 I chose this book above all the many other memory books because it doesn't make unbelievable claims. I wasn't disappointed. everything is explained well & I'm finding it very helpful.
