Review by Jason L. Mcdonald:

The Art of SEO is a good book, but it could have been a great book. I reviewed it on my blog, in detail, and as an SEO training and teacher, I am always on the lookout for the latest and greatest in SEO.

The book has a lot of great insights into SEO, but it suffers drastically from a forest-for-the-trees phenomenon. As I have taught several hundreds of people SEO, I know that most people do not need the esoterica. They need the basic process of SEO – from 1) keywords, 2) on page factors like page tags and website structure, 3) link building, 4) metrics.

This book has all the esoterica, with no break outs to the big picture. Tons of small print, and no headlines. Where was the editor? Asleep?

If you could combine the Dummies series in terms of layout with the content of this book, you’d have a fantastic guide to SEO. But, alas, you do not.

Review by Anthony Lawrence:

I am one who has been very outspoken about the more shady SEO practitioners and about the ridiculously overprices “courses” that are heavily promoted on the Internet. SEO has acquired some of the taint of huckster marketing because of that.

I hope this book helps eliminate some of that. There’s no need to pay some self-styled “Internet Guru” hundreds or thousands of dollars for SEO secrets. There are no secrets: every concept, every “trick”, every piece of advice is available on the Internet for free. Of course you have to find it all, you have to learn what things are outdated, what advice doesn’t work – or you could find 99% here in this book.

Of course it’s not for everyone. It assumes some technical knowledge or at least access to someone with that knowledge. As an example, at several points 301 redirects are used as the solution certain SEO issues. Although some minor direction is given about implementing these, you’d need more than is provided here if you were a neophyte – someone using Blogger or [...] isn’t going to become proficient with Apache from reading this.

The only small complaint I can make is that sometimes the authors use too many examples, especially for the more basic concepts at the beginning of the book. However, too many is far better than too few, so I won’t complain too much. I definitely can’t complain that they left anything out: this could serve as a course book for a SEO class.

I’ll be recommending this strongly.

Review by Woopak:

Green Chair is a tale of forbidden love between a 32 year old divorcee and a 19 year old college student. Based on a true story, GREEN CHAIR is the first film in four years from controversial director Park Chul-Soo, best known for “301,302″. Seo Jeong (THE ISLE, Spider Forest) plays Kim Mun-hee, a nice 32-year-old woman who’s making whoopee with a 19 year old boy, Hyeon ( Shim Ji-ho). Unfortunately for them, 20 is the age of consent in Korea, and she’s arrested, locked up and sentenced to community service.

Upon her release, Mun-hee tries to ditch the handsome young 19 year old, but he just won’t go away(looking at Korean bombshell Seo Jeong, I wouldn’t want to leave either). Instead they shack up in a motel and have a few more days of exhausting sex(who wouldn’t). Eventually, doubts start to creep into Mun-hee’s mind, and even though she is in love with him, she decides to end the affair. However, Mun-hee couldn’t resist Hyun’s persistence and their relationship enters a new phase.

At first impression, Park Chul-Soo’s Green Chair may seem like a straightforward tale of erotic sex and the occasional sense of guilt, but it ends up being a lot more than that. The First act of the film is highly explicit (quite tame when compared to the Korean erotica Summertime), there is quite a bit of nudity, Seo Jeong is in her birthday suit in the first few minutes. The film doesn’t merely focus on eroticism, so I don’t think it will turn off a lot of viewers. When things start to settle down and we get to observe all the details of Hyun and Mun-hee’s unusual relationship, from Hyun’s fondness for cooking to Mun-hee’s preferences when it comes to mattreses and other stuff, the film presents such dimensions with warmth and humor, that results in a nuanced, touching and subversive love story. Characters are well developed and I did kind of sympathize with the lovers’ plight.

Green Chair draws its strength from Park’s inimitable style of directing and its great cast. Seo-Jeong or Jung Suh(same actress, you can’t help but be enamored with her), renowned for her role in Kim Ki-Duk’s “THE ISLE”, brings a slightly unhinged vitality and raw appeal to the character of Mun-hee; while newcomer Shim Ji-ho(as Hyun) gives passion and confidence to his character. Oh Yun-Hong(Power of Kangwon province) plays Mun-hee’s friend who takes the lovebirds in. The warm chemistry/camaderie shared between the 3 characters is one of the film’s key strengths.

People who are only looking for pervy kicks will be disappointed and will be better off watching late night Cinemax instead. While there’s plenty of sex on display and quite frankly they are nicely shot, the movie is more focused in the essential drama of problems and complications which are unavoidably inherent in every sex-based relationship, compounded when one partner is risking it all to stay in it.

I own the 1-disc region-3 release. From my experience, Asian releases of Asian movies have the best transfers.

PICTURE/AUDIO: Anamorphic widescreen 1.78. Clean, sharp and colors are accurate. PQ is very good. 5.1 Dolby/2.0 Surround in Korean language. English Subtitles are well-translated and very visible.

In Closing:

GREEN CHAIR is not a perfect film, but it is funny and beautiful with its poetic digressions. It is a pro-sex movie with a touch of human drama. It is a bit on the “artsy” side but I hope it gives you some ideas. It has been selected in the New York Asian film festival.

RECOMMENDED! 3 ½ stars

Review by Daitokuji31:

The Green Chair opens with the thirty-two-year old Kim Mun-hee and her nineteen-year old lover Hyun embracing after a long day of lovemaking. When Mun-hee starts to leave, Hyun stops her and begs her to make love to him one more time. However, instead of making love to him, Mun-hee reassures him that she wants to continue their relationship which began when the two happened to meet at a music store. Yet, there is a problem. Hyun is not of age to have consensual sex with an adult, so when their affair is discovered, Mun-hee is sent to prison. Mun-hee is soon released and is determined to stay away from Hyun, who is still a minor, but he meets her at the gate of the prison and although surrounded by reporters, hugs her.

Unsteady and worried about ruining Hyun’s future, Mun-hee nonetheless accompanies Hyun and after sharing the meal together, spend days in seedy hotel rooms making love. Hyun, who learned about sex from Mun-hee is a bit clumsy at lovemaking, and his clumsiness and eagerness make Mun-hee believe that he does not truly care for her but only the sex so after a fight the two split, but upon arrival at her friend Su-jin’s home, Hyun is there waiting for her and the trio attempt to make a life together, but can Mun-hee and Hyun’s affair that seems to be based more on sex than love and affection truly last?

Starring the statuesque beauty Suh Jung, who also starred in Kim Ki-duk’s The Isle, The Green Chair tackles the question of where does lust and physical attraction end and love begins. Mun-hee having been trapped in an apparently loveless and sexually unfulfilling marriage turns to Hyun to experience not only sexual fulfillment but emotional fulfillment as well. Her reluctance to restart their relationship after her time in prison is not so much based on her worries about how society views her or what she believes is the “proper” thing to do, but because she thinks that Hyun would dump her and that’s she would be alone again which explains why she becomes so mad after Hyun rejoins her at Su-jin’s home. It is this aspect of the film that makes The Green Chair truly worth watching.

A number of The Green Chair’s opening sequences are quite steamy, but they also have an edge of innocence to them when Mun-hee coaches Hyun in the ways to be a better lover in order not only to fulfill her desires but his as well. Well acted and quite touching at moments, The Green Chair does derail a bit at the end of the film which is quite hokey after the relative seriousness of the rest of the film, but it does not hurt the film too much as a whole.