Jesse James Books

This book is riveting and full of details. The author spent a lot of time interviewing Jesse's two wives in their jail cell and got the whole story. This is a true example of battered wife syndrome that puts Karla Homolka's excuses and ridiculous pleas of innocence to shame. Although the way the book is compiled, it is slightly disorganized, I didn't find it too hard to follow. The amount of information and detail in it makes up for this. It's engrossing and you don't want to put it down.

I did a search on google and discovered his petitions of innocence all over the place. His execution date is set for September 25, 2008. Kind of mean to say, but I'm happy about this. Although he tries to use the alibi that he was taking his sick father in for treatment the day Judy Moody was murdered, he only did it to ensure that he would have an alibi for the time of the murder. I don't believe he's innocent, he has way too much evidence against him. The world will be a much better place without a man that committed the horrific acts described in this story.

Jesse James Cummings has two wives but I thought it was one wife and a girlfriend. Anyway, his true intentions are with this young niece, Melissa Moody. He kills her mother Judy Ann Mayo Moody who was also his own sister and later tortures, rapes, and kills his niece leaving her in the woods. It's one of the worst crimes in the midwest in recent memory. Jesse James Cummings is truly one of the most sadistic, cruel killers especially the treatment of his own niece. My heart goes out to the victim's family which is also his family. Ironically that the same family can produce a wonderful child like Melissa can also create a monster.

This man was not human! To beat a baby into convulsions is just sick. What I don't get is the women were so nieve to him and believed everything he said. Now look where they are. In prision for life. He should be put to death for all he has done and the lives he ruined. People like him make me sick and I hope each and every monster in this world pays for their in humanity.

This book was difficult to read. I had to put it down many times because of the emotional stress I felt as I read of the tortures and attrocities claimed to have been done by Jesse Cummings. I'm not sure quite what to believe, since it seems to be quite biased, and since in other readings the testimony of the two wives seems contradictory, however it is quite informative of just how depraved a person can be (even if only part of it is true) and how pathetic people under the control of a sadist can become, even to go so far as assist or at least allow crimes against even their own children. It's just another case that makes me wish there were laws determining who was and was not fit to become a parent, because clearly none of these three people were, and the children did indeed suffer greatly as a result.

This book was badly written, badly research, and doesn't even appear to have been edited for spelling/grammar mistakes. The writing is confusing because the author jumps around in time and then doesn't explain who people are in relation to the story. They just show up and then are gone. The research is obviously done be a bias person who is only interested in relating horrible facts, not actually proven events. It's a sad story that deserves to be properly portrayed. This book isn't that story. Save yourself the time of trying to read it.

Garrett clearly states that his aim is to articulate his vision that was captured in his sketch of the elements of user centered design for the web ([...]). He certainly accomplished this, but he did not go any further than that. For this reason I would only recommend this book to someone who is looking for a cursory reference on how to break down the layers of web development incorporating user centered design principles.

This book might compliment Call to Action since Call to Action is less structured, but driven more by tangible examples.

I hesitate to recommend Usability for the Web only because I haven't finished reading it. But so far it is extremely well written, detailed, and well structured. I suspect for someone looking for a thorough 432 page book rather than a cursory 174 page book, Usability for the Web will be the preferred alternative.

Anyone is the field could see that this book is rather "blah"
There is better literature on the subject out there... but this might be good for a student, or anyone who wants to get their wet in the field.

Not great, but not all bad either -- its good reference tool.

It is for my Information Design class. I haven't used it yet, but it arrived on time and in good condition.

Published in 2002, Jesse James Garrett's The Elements of User Experience is a useful introduction on how to keep the user experience in mind when designing web applications. As someone who has no formal training in information or interaction architecture, I was hoping this book would contain detailed descriptions of best (or better) practices in the field. What I discovered was a book focused entirely on the conceptual forest of site objectives, functional specifications, interactions and interfaces, not the how-to trees; this was not what I was looking for, but perhaps this type of conceptual groundwork was more groundbreaking when this book was originally published.

One of the most useful aspects of the book for me was the diagram on page 162, showing Garrett's idea of the five planes of development: strategy, scope, structure, skeleton, and surface. This diagram also illustrated the different roles of interaction designers, interface designers, information architects and so on, according to their place in the development workflow (something I never clearly understood before).

A couple of things, however, are starting to show their age (understandable in this field, where six years is a lifetime). For example, in the same illustration and throughout the book, Garrett distinguishes sites according to whether they're more like "software" or a "hypertext system". All but the most rudimentary small sites now employ some software-like attributes, and I'm not sure anyone who's just interested in building a simple "hypertext system" site would be best served by reading this particular book (something like Steve Krug's _Don't Make Me Think_ might be more appropriate). Some illustrations, like the one showing error handling that takes up the entirety of page 93, feel superfluous at best, curious in a book that argues against including content unless it helps drive user experience goals. Other illustrations and descriptions are too simplistic to be of use to anyone except those who have never or rarely surfed the web, such as the illustration comparing checkboxes to radio buttons and other form elements, or the one page discussion of color and typography.

In conclusion, this is a fine primer for anyone who has used the web, but hasn't thought about it very much and who intends to get into semi-serious web site production. Or, someone who's doing career research and is trying to figure out in what areas s/he has the most interest. As Garrett points out on page 87, "Interaction design and information architecture sound like esoteric, highly technical areas, but these disciplines aren't really about technology at all. They're about understanding people,the way they work and the way they think." (emphasis in original). For non-programmers, this book is a good way to begin the process of learning the elements at play in a successful user experiences on the web.

While this book is designed specifically for Web Design, the principles can be used with any product. The information is fairly condensed, and straight forward.
This book takes the quote 'the customer is always right' and shows you how to find out what the customer wants, need and doesn't know they want. And then the book explains how to best use that inofrmation to redesign, or improve your product (web site).

When I was in Junior High I found Jesse Stuart's book "Hie to the Hunters" in the school library. It remains one of the best books I have ever read. Stuart was at the same time a tough man's man and a sensitive poet. His love of the natural beauty of Kentucky and his people shines through in all his writing, as does his toughness, hard work and perseverance. He was born in the hill country of Kentucky to a father who was not literate and a mother who had only completed a few years of grade school, yet he and his brothers and sisters learned the value of education and became school teachers. "The Thread That Runs So True" is the story of his career in education, beginning when he was a 17-year-old teaching a rural one-room school in the 1920s, through stints as a principal and superintendent of schools, and finally as a farmer, author, and lecturer. "The Thread That Runs So True", written in 1949, remains probably his best-known book, but parts of it are almost too painful to read. Stuart's first year of teaching was at a country school where his older sister had been badly beaten up and driven from the school by a tough male student. Stuart wrote poignantly of the beautiful and the ugly in this book, and it is very worthwhile reading.

This was the book I read in high school that made me want to be a teacher. Jesse Stuart's experiences as a young Kentucky teacher in the hill country are classic.

His writing is sincere and full of the love of education. Both of his parents were good hard-working people who could barely read.

Only a true writer could have conveyed the sense of adventure, the wonder, and above all, the sense of accomplishment that inspiring young minds gives to the true teacher.

Twenty-two years ago (in 1986) I was a freshman in high school. My English teacher assigned The Thread That Runs So True as part of our summer reading. I am now a college professor & I thought that it would be fun to reread the book now that I have classes to teach.

Stuart's book is powerful. He explains the limited circumstances of his Kentucky pupils in a way that makes you think about the lack of opportunities many Americans face. Stuart will also force you to take off your rose-colored glasses about how wonderful things used to be. He recounts stories of students beating up teachers, indifferent administrators, and students literally walking barefoot in the snow to get to school. The good-old days weren't so great.

One of the best aspects of the Thread That Runs So True is that Stuart has tremendous faith in humanity - and in education's ability to improve each of us and our society. He recounts many instances in which students from the most-impoverished families dramatically improved their lives by going to school. Even a cynic will find it difficult not to feel a little inspired by reading this book.

In my opinion, the book is not perfect. Stuart's argument that education funding is the panacea to cure society's ills is dated; we now know that money for education is very important, but that money alone does not always promote student achievement. Also, I don't want to give anything away, but I thought that the ending of the book was very unsatisfying.

While The Thread That Runs So True has a few drawbacks, it is an inspiring story that will teach you a lot about education early in the 20th Century U.S.

This book and story takes the reader into the world of education at the grass roots rural level. From the one room school house with 20 year old students still mired in the first grade to brilliant students from impoverished backgrounds. A terrific review and account of cultural conditions in the 1930's, from the depression to WWII. A must read for educators/teachers. Many of the methods and means used by the author will shock and surprise today's readers, but this is Kentucky in the 1930's. Imagery depicted is fantastic.

I am not one that usualy likes the books teachers require me to read, but this book was great. The story was captivating and fun. The reading was light and I wasn't a fan of the choppy "chaptering" of the book, but I did enjoy it very much.

The information is great, but it just did not grab my attention. I love the photos of the family and era.

Much has been written about this icon of American outlaw mythology. If you are into the facts in detail, and an even-handed view of this subject, then I would highly recommend this book. If you are looking for an exciting tale, full of action and mayhem, you might wish to look elsewhere. All in all, it's a fine read with a lot of facts, and would make an excellent text source for a univerity class. There is a lot of interesting material within, such as Frank James' life after his brother's death. It's well worth the price of admission into this world.

This is high-quality 19th century history that captures the tension with which the James brothers lived. It places the reader in Frank and Jesse's historical and geographical context. Above all, it is fair. Yeatman lets the reader decide. Frank emerged as particularly complex, because he was able to straddle the life of a respectable taxpayer and a dangerous outlaw.

This work is particularly poignant, because of current U.S. debates about government spying, habeas corpus, posse comitatus and many other issues that matter as much today, as they did in the days leading up to the Civil War and Reconstruction.

Yeatman's handling of the James brothers Civil War material is particularly deft.

Yeatman's work is filled with numerous historical gems, such as Bess Truman's family's connection to the James brothers; Phil Sheridan's connection to the bombing of the James Sammeul home.

I have to agree with some of the reviews of Mr. Yeatman's book.
This is extremely poorly written. If I had wanted to read a Civil War recantation, I'd go back and re-read the many in my library.
While some of the historical references during that period may be necessary background for the James family, more often times than not, in this book, the author flies off on a tangent leaving the reader wondering "what happened?"
Trying to muddle through this book is like wandering through a blizzard. There are moments when the snow clears, only to be shrouded again moments later.
Where were the editors? A fascinating subject that has been sadly botched by this effort in my humble opinion.

That any reviewer can grant this book five stars, as some here have, boggles the mind. I have to seriously ask them what books they read that they consider this one worthy of such a high rating. Yes, the subject of the James boys is inherently fascinating and, yes, Ted Yeatman's research was extensive, which is worth one extra star, but as a writer he failed to present his material in an interesting fashion. First, he is too much in love with facts and uses them whether they are necessary or not. (I do not need to know, as just one example, the name of every insignificant Missouri militia outfit that ever marched in the same county as the James boys unless that name is relevant to them. Footnotes would have been a better location if Yeatman felt compelled to include this arcane data.) Another reason the narrative bogs down is that Yeatman failed to heed his word processor's grammar checker when it pointed out the thousands of passive sentences he wrote. Or perhaps he had that feature turned off. If so, he should flick it back on immediately. Lastly, a good writer spins out a narrative that flows like water. Yeatman's jumbled writing contains too many icebergs the reader must dodge or sink in the process.

I am not yet finished reading it and am not certain that I can continue to the end much as I want to learn about the James boys. What a shame. Bad writing made this book a great waste of the author's extensive knowledge. I fail to understand why Cumberland House published this book without extensive editing or not publish it at all. Obviously, they thought the subject material would carry it.

Indian Larry's bike is pictured on the cover and I find myself opening up to his bike "Wild Child" and the very words are vividly painted on the belt drive; in fact every bit of the bike exudes a beauty and wild genius -- especially in the details. Both Indian Larry with his busily tattooed body and his bikes are loaded with content and meaning and the picture of him and Paul Cox look like they are on fire speeding along a quiet road on their beautiful unique bikes. It is amazing to have these photos since Indian Larry took the express to Biker Heaven.

I enjoy paging thru the book looking at the different styles. In section 3, Seate has "new blood" and Tom Langton's Gold bike with a seat that says "Pleasure to Burn" almost makes me want to give my old school bike fantasies a rest...Almost!

Billy Lane's bad boy hubless bike that looks like a bit of hell, insanity and chaos that found reason -- a reason to ride. Seate's description of Kendall Johnson's "paint schemes" using phrases like "Felliniesque circus nightmare" are insanely amusing but I found Johnson's work far more exciting featured on Discovery Channel than in this book.

If you don't like paging thru a wide variety of bike themes this isn't for you. If you enjoy a big heavy book both in weight and variety than this is the book for you. I really enjoyed this book! You can return to this book over and over and enjoy something different each time or revisit your favorites. I return to the pages with Indian Larry and I am so glad I got to meet him and see his art in the flesh --- and metal.

If you like to gaze at Motorcycles and admire machinery built by hand. You will enjoy this book. Also good bio's on the guys who build the bikes. Looking forward to the sequel from this author and photographer.

I purchased this book for a friend who is very in to choppers and bikes. He was very pleased at the information & photographs provided. In turn, I too, who knew nothing about this art..have become a fan myself. Great book for collection.

Sometimes you see a book cover that jumps right out at you and grabs your fullest attention - this is the case for a great book for teenage boys called "Choppers." Well the cover was just the opening to a wonderfully and well written book about custom choppers. These motorcycles are really works of art and the color photos of them are classic!

The authors, Mike Seate and Linda Black McKay, have done a good job of taking us on a visual journey of the mind and spirit with this book. They give the reader plenty of information to make it an educational journey (including a "Chopper Glossary" at the back of the book) yet the reader is always entertained and amused by the text and the color photos.

If you are looking for a gift to give to a young man in your life then this is one book that will actually be read and looked through from beginning to end. It is fascinating and pure "dream candy" looking at what others have done to those two wheel machines. The choice of bikes to display and write about is a perfect balance of art and function. This book is part of a great series of books and like all the books in that series this is not limited to just young men. All male readers will enjoy looking at and reading this book.

I personally recommend this book for all young male readers and those who are still young at heart! Choppers is given The American Authors Association's highest book rating for young readers - FIVE STARS.

This appeared verbatim in the magazine THUNDER PRESS.

BTW, Zimberoff's next book (out next spring), a continuation and sequel to ART OF THE CHOPPER is dedictaed to INDIAN LARRY and contains a full chapter of his work, a portrait and his biography plus every other major builder on the planet.

Reviewed by Terry Roorda

QUOTE Dated photos gleaned from the collection of photographer Michael Lichter combine with perfunctory prose by writer Mike Seate to bring us "Choppers: Heavy Metal Art," a shameless effort to cash in on the current chopper craze by using the exact format found in the highly acclaimed and successful "Art of the Chopper" by Tom Zimberoff. That's it in nutshell, folks. The similarities in physical size, style and content between this work and Zimberoff's are striking to say the very least: A fat highly- produced coffee table book that examines a roster of custom bike builders through portraiture, some biographical verbiage and studio photos of some of their creations.

That's where the similarities end. In the execution of that formula, Zimberoff's "Art of the Chopper" is fresh and literate while "Choppers: Heavy Metal Art" is stale and sophomoric. Seate's writing is lackluster at its best and painfully awkward most of the time, reading like the first draft of a work being produced on contract and on deadline. In three of the early vignettes in the book we are informed that "Colorado's Arlin Fatland has what you might call a wicked sense of humor," and that "Pat Kennedy of Tombstone, Arizona, is what you might call seriously old school," and that "Nothing about Kodlin's motorcycles is what you might call tradition- al." These excerpts are what you might call bad writing; the type of tedious template prose so devoid of creativity and enthusiasm for the subject matter that any editor worth the name would kick it back in disgust and demand another go. That's assuming there was an editor involved at all, and judging from the wealth of typos and awkward usages found in this book, there's little reason to believe there was. A truly ironic typo comes early in the going when in Seate's acknowledgments he pens this gem: "to Almetta, for never letting us forget the value of the wirtten word." Yes, folks, it says "wirtten." How's that for value?

Here's some other stuff that made me wince: "Looking like a cross between a scene from a concert by gangsta rappers Insane Clown Posse and a Felliniesque circus nightmare, Johnson's paint schemes grab a viewer's attention and hold it rapt for hours." Hunh? Or how about this stinker: "These self-anointed keepers of the hardtail faith congregate in Internet chat rooms and in the letters pages of custom motorcycle-enthusiast magazines to heap dis and envy on builders who aren't afraid to move the art of the custom motorcycle into the twenty-first century." Ouch.

There's plenty more where those came from. And the tragic thing about it is that Mike Seate is usually a competent and entertaining writer-and probably the most prolific wordsmith in the genre. Therein may lie the problem. This volume represents Seate's fifth book with the word "chopper" in the title, and four of those, including this one, were published in the span of less than a year and a half. Who wouldn't get burned out? The upside of "Choppers: Heavy Metal Art" are the images furnished by renowned biker photographer Michael Lichter, a man with one of the most impressive resumés in the industry. As always, his photos are luminous, and anyone familiar with his work in Easyriders magazine over the past couple of decades will recognize his style, but there's a problem here as well. These photos apparently came straight out of his existing inventory of bike feature shots, and many were taken years ago, going back as far as 1992. When you're making the case for custom bike building being a vibrant and dynamic craft in an exciting period of change, growth and popularity, wouldn't you want the timeliest material you could bring to the premise? Other complaints in this regard are that the names of the featured bikes are not provided, though they're often referred to in the copy, and the sparse technical data given for each consists only of frame style (rigid; Softail- type) and engine style (Panhead; Evolution-type), which are obvious attributes to anyone the least bit familiar with the subject, and of little or no educational value to those who aren't. Those criticisms aside, we have to understand that doing this book right would have taken some time, and clearly the publisher wanted to get into the market before Christmas with a product that would hopefully piggy- back on the success of "Art of the Chopper." That's understandable, if not admirable, from a business stand- point. From a creative standpoint it's disastrous. END QUOTE

I'm not going to go into this review too much; understand that my depth of dungeon mastering goes above and beyond the norm and I can get very wordy with my critiques. The DMG 2 (Dungeon Masters Guide 2) is AMAZING and should've been the first installment instead of the second. Know this. Wizards of the Coast were under pressure to produce the 3.5 system and needed to get a guide on the shelf that cohesively conveyed game rules and mechanics. Of course there were sections to help a DM create a game world; however nothing that compares with the DMG2. As backward as this might sound, if there are any beginner Dungeon Masters out there who might be struggling with campaign/world creation - the DMG2 is going to put everything into perspective and read much more like a normal guide than stereo instructions (so to speak).

This book has several good points. It has some new material and a few new things for players and GM's alike. It's one irritating thing is the number of "after you buy the canned game book spend 4 hours reviewing it". It could have had a lot more things to help those of us with a creative mind that like to generate our own worlds. It is, overall, worth the money.

While this book is not nearly the resource that many of the more staple books are, like the Epic Handbook and PHB2, it is still extremely useful to add more flavor to the campaign. It gives some very good tips to create details and subtlties that make the campaign much more real without seeming narrated to the players. Anyone creating a new campaign could benefit with some of the examples in the Saltmarsh city, novice and veteran players alike.

There are also new and interesting traps, items, and rules that make this book very useful. I havn't read anyone talking about the Teamwork benefits, which are very interesting to me. I intend to implement them into my next campaign, assuming the players want to use any of them. The basic idea is that the group has worked and trained together, so they have studied each other to an extent that you gain special abilities and even feats when certain conditions are met. For example, a character with high Spellcraft and the Evasion ability can teach the rest of your party when to dodge a spell cast by a teammate. This means that the mage can cast fireball right on the fighter wading into melee and he gets to avoid the damage on a reflex save.

The new items, magic locations, and traps have some good ideas behind them, but nothing that a clever DM can't come up with on their own. I'm not saying they are useless, but many are hard to place into a campaign. The magic locations grant the owner specific powers and abilities, but in order for the players to get the location, it almost has to be the entire focus of the campaign. Very few are "side-quest" material, and the majority can take several sessions to get to, capture, find reagents to use them, and defend in order to reap the marginally useful benefits.

Most of the rest of the book is given over to npcs. There is a very large section of sample npcs to use for a fight. Unfortunetly, many aren't optimized, but that doesn't prevent them from being used by a lazy DM that doesn't feel like leveling up every single important npc in case the players fight him. There is also a section on making npcs more distinctive. This can easily be skipped over since DMG1 has a very similar section.

Overall, I have to say there is some interesting material and ideas to make a campaign world more interesting and unique. On the other hand, nothing in this book is game-changing. Useful? yes. Needed in any way? no

Overall this book contains about 50 pages of useful materials. The rest is really just fluff and made for a beggining gamer/DM who needs ideas for their campaigns.

I would recomend just buying a low level adventure if your starting out as a DM, and save your money on this book as its quite expensive for what you get.

For those who are familiar with the game, there is usefull material in the book on items, treasure charts, etc. Its just a smaller portion of the book.

If you have an extra $35 dollars go for it, it not don't worry your not missing much.

All right. Let's begin with a discussion of irony. Not irony as in the Alanis Morissette song (the greatest irony of which almost none of the things she calls ironic actually are). Instead we will talk about true irony.

Those of you who have read my previous reviews may have noticed a certain resistance to a phenomena I call "prestige class bloat." DMG II arrived at my door a bit late for a review copy, and I had some time to think about how I would view the prestige classes in this book. Every other book has drawn my anger, my disdain, sometimes even my pity for their prestige classes. But this book, I thought, "You know . . . I'm gonna give them a pass on this book. They might put the contents into the SRD at some point (it's possible). I'll let this one go."

And there are no prestige classes in this book.

I might weep. I might actually weep.

Anyway. We won't hold that against them. We won't. My review will be objective. Honest.

Actually, that won't be very hard. There's a lot to like in this book. Almost everything is useful. Some of it is downright insightful. When I reviewed the first DMG all those year's ago (all right, the first 3.x DMG . . . I'm not that old, people) I was amazed at how good the advice was. This wasn't just a set of DM specific rules, it really was a guide to being a good DM.

So here we are, years later, holding DMG II.

Chapter 1 deals with the actual running of a game. Now, in many ways this chapter resembles the Gamemaster's Law product from ICE. For years I've said that was the best book on GMing ever written. I'm friends with one of the authors. I'm crushed to say this, but, I like this one better. The bits on how to actually run are pretty blaise, although if your DM routinely shows up surly, sleepy and unwashed you might make him read this book. No, the true genius is the treatment of the different play styles. There was a lot of insight here I've missed over the years. In this section they talk about the different type of players and how to tailor a game for them . . . most importantly, they talk about how to avoid the pitfalls caused by these players. For instance, I've had problems with "Outliers" over the years. These are the players that choose strange class/race combinations, bizarre backgrounds, and seem to set themselves up to fail. An outlier can cause a great deal of trouble in a game if they go out of control at a bad moment. This book gave the simplest advice, to give the outlier the opportunity, a specific set up, to allow him to fail spectacularly early in the session, when it won't hurt anything. By doing this you'll avoid the problem of the character imploding later and taking your plot line with him. It's the simplest advice, but I've missed it for years, and now I know. I'm anxious to put it into use.

Chapter 2 deals with adventures. Now, this was sort of a ho hum chapter for me. When it's useful, I expect it to be very useful, but otherwise I doubt I'll ever look at it. It gives a section on using published adventures that I hope no one needs to read (but if you do, study it. I'm going into business as an e-publisher). It follows this up with some new traps, which are probably the most consistently useful thing in the chapter. Then it moves on to strange locations, such as the tree top city and all the rules necessary for play there. Then it moves onto special encounter rules, such as how to deal with mobs, which again, could be useful. Finally it wraps up with miniature and encounter advice, which was fine.

Chapter 3 deals with building a campaign. Most of the advice is pretty good, but the detailed examples of some medieval environments was truly spot on. I've studied a lot about medieval culture (I'm no expert, but above the gamer layman) and I thought they did a fine job here, especially in examining the fine line between realism and the style of play that is conducive to a good game. You absolutely need to compromise to find the perfect ground between the two, and I loved this book for even trying it. The rest of the chapter treats with general subjects like building a city or magical events and I looked upon it and I called it good.

Chapter 4 outlined the city of Saltmarsh. You know, I could have done without this chapter. I mean it was fine and all, but I thought the locale was a little too evocative of specific images to be as universal as a city in a book like this needed to be. We needed a Homlet, or better yet, a location that doesn't carry the baggage of roleplaying history with it (either good or bad). This chapter just didn't work for me as is. No offence to the writer. I believe this one went astray at conception (and as a game designer, I know the feeling. I've taken the fall for decisions that weren't mine in at least one book.)

Chapter 5 deals with NPCs. Its starts with a treatment of contacts and hirelings, plus a section on unique abilities. Then it hops into my favorite part, the complex NPCs. Lets face it, when you suddenly need a Blackgaurd, you need it now and it's not something you can wing and do it justice. This section gives a nice sampling of these types of difficult-to-improvise characters.

Chapter 6 is the character chapter, it starts with apprentices and mentors and moves on to running a business. Then it hits on teamwork benefits, like those given by special training in Heroes of Battle. I'm still glad these were added into the D&D system and I'm anxious to see more. Then it moves onto prestige classes. Sigh. Now, I was willing to see a few prestige classes in this book, hoping they'd make it into the SRD. Let's face it, only so many people can create versions of the Knight before you're accidently stepping on a half-dozen copyrights. I doubt anyone would sue you over retreading the same ground as everyone else, but we need to stop beating this poor horse. Still, they went a different way. This section is on how to build even more prestige classes. When I read the words, "Why make your own prestige class?" I wanted to find a set of precision needles and stick the one after another into my eyes. Flash forward ten years. "Why did he kill so many people, officer?" "Well, prestige class bloat was bad enough, but then they came out with DMG II. It was the beginning of the end." The chapter wraps up with some stuff on PC organizations.

Finally, the finishes with expanded magic item rules. The book needed this section, and I was happy with it. Of particular note is the section on magical locations which are essentially giant, immobile magic items. These types of locations have worked their way into my campaigns several times over the years. I was happy to see them here.

Overall, I enjoyed this book. I would recommend that everyone who intends to run a game read at least the first chapter. I thought it alone was worth the cover price, and so if you can find a good use for the other material in the book, so much the better. Now I'm going to take a nap an imagine a world where prestige classes are few, balanced, and in some way prestigious.

This book is not entirely truthful. I had though it was going to be entirely about fiends. It is actually more like a book of outsiders. It is very well done with some memorable monsters. I especially liked the ethergaunt. Almost worth buying just for the pictures, but definitely a must have for adventurers travelling anywhere outside the Material Plane.

It's nice to be able to through the occassional "unusual" bad guy at one's players. Fiend Folio has a slew of them to choose from. Good stuff, for when you want to throw bad stuff at your players.

The thing I like about the Fiend Folio is that there's lots of fiends in it. The fiends are arranged into a... how shall I put it.... folio-type of arrangement. So, to sum it all up, there are lots of fiends in the Fiend Folio and that makes it cool.
If you, the player-character ever have trouble defeating one of the numerous fiends enumerated within the hallowed pages of the Fiend Folio, my suggestion would be to cast a Magic Missle at it because there -is no saving throw- for Magic Missle.

Fiend Folio is an excellent supplement, with a wealth of new monsters, templates, and other goodies (such as grafts and symbiotes) that any DM can use to make a richer campaign. The only reason I didn't give it five stars is becasue it is 3.0 edition, so there are some minor incompatibility issues with 3.5 (the main thing I noticed was a few spell-like abilities not listed in the 3.5 Player's Handbook). So, if you are a stickler for such things, perhaps it is not for you. However, if you can put up with the minor inconsistencies, this really is a great source book overall!

This book is excelent! Filled with fiends, undead, oozes, and some fey, this book has so many ideas for that monster for the climactic battle, or if you just want to keep your players on their toes. There's also new rules for grafts, if you want a demonic leg or something, and fiendish prestiege classes! The only [minor] downsides are that most creatures have an incredibly high challenge rating, and for some reason there's a celestial in here... oh well. Anyway, I seriously recommend this book for any DM with even the slightest intrest in using Fiends in their campaign.

If you've seen the movie then you've read the book. If you read the book then you've seen the movie. They are almost word for word, scene for scene. I saw the movie first and thought it a bore-fest; too long by 60 minutes easy. Then reading the book I thought it was too long by a good 100 pages. But you really only need one or the other, or sadly, neither. Yes the writing is very good, and yes the directing, acting and overall production values of the movie are good as well. But is it entertaining? Only so far. My recommendation, do one or the other, but not both.

A novel about a historical figure? It works if you don't know anything about J. James. Otherwise it is just fluff.

This book is Great. A Must Read in my Oppion.

Two Thumbs WAY Up

....die by the sword. Or gun. Or treachery. That is an over simplistic way of looking at this book, but it gets the message across. There are several ways to determine if a man is a "legend"....one is that at least some people think of him as a fictional character...another is the sighting of him alive after he's dead. Jesse Woodson James was indeed real, and he did indeed die on April 3, 1882, shot from behind by a coward named Bob Ford. He was sighted "alive" as late as 1951, but that's either rubbish, or mistaking son for father. I certainly have an interest in the topic; my wife is a direct descendent of Captain George Todd, company commander of Jesse, and several of the gang, during the Civil War. Our son will be happy to tell you about it.

I suppose that this novel is more a character study than a straight history. Of course, it only claims to be a novel. Starting in 1865, we get a look at the last 17 years of Jesse, then we continue with the last 10 of Bob. We see the life of crime, the damage done, the women who stood by criminals. Jesse James certainly has brains, courage, strength of character, and even a certain nobility. Of course, he put his God-given talents to some very questionable uses. Bob Ford may have had brains, but the rest of Jesse's good points were WAY beyond him. Jesse, Bob, and all the others...Frank, Cole, both Zereldas, Dick...come to life. The author means for us to see them as real people, the mixture of good, bad, and indifferent, common to humanity; he succeeds. Still, he never attempts to fathom just why Jesse went the way he did...maybe, only God knows that.

On the whole, I can recommend this book...the writing is a bit stilted, the detail a bit too verbose...still, it's worth your time. If you REALLY want to know about Jesse, try "Jesse James Last Rebel of the Civil War" by T.J. Stiles. That book IS history, it covers cradle [and before] to grave, and is a lot better written...it even goes into motivation. Of course, there is a whole further area of speculation about Jesse's career...gold, Indians, the Masons, Albert Pike, the next Civil War...that is beyond the scope here. Overall, four stars is about right...

I saw the movie first and while I applauded the lush cinematography and attention to detail. The performances were great but unfortunately the overall effect was mired down in often excrutiatingly slow storytelling.

It's faithful to the book in that manner. Beautifully written with immense detail, the character study and history is frequently lost in the dense prose. It is a novel worth sinking your teeth into, but it IS a commitment of your time and attention.

I received the book later than expected but when I emailed the seller about it. She immediately responded and shipped the book right away.

I ordered this book since it was for one of my classes and i was very disappointed with what i received. Grant it, it was page for page exactly the book that i ordered, but when i recieved it, it had this black border that said "free book, not for resale" all over it!! Like written in white all along this black border. BUT for some reason, it's NOT in the picture and that's just not right. Plus, it's not like i can sell it anywhere, i mean it says "dont sell" all over it. If i would've known that was what i was getting, then i probably would've just gone to the bookstore and spent a little more to get a regular one that i'd be able to sell back. But if it makes any difference at all, i got it on time. This is like one of the only disappointments i've ever gotten from amazon.

The product was everything that it had listed. It's in great shape and all the pages where there no extra marking of any sort.

I would like everyone to know that for a class that calls for the latest edition, which is usually hundreds of dollars, they can easily get an A with an older edition. I have proved it with this book. Even though the teacher said I would have a hard time I found everything where it was supposed to be maybe a page or two off but it was all there. This is a great book even if you are not taking a sociology class.

THIS TEXT BOOK CAME WITHIN DAYS; I WAS PLEASANTLY AND IMMEDIATELY ACCOMMODATED WITH DELIVERY TIME; CONDITION OF THE TEXT BOOK WAS CLEAN AND A GREAT PRICING ON IT!

I WILL ORDER AGAIN!

"Civil War in the Ozarks" by Phillip W. Steele is an excellent read, and is written for the average reader who wants to gain a comprehensive knowledge of the Civil War. I enjoyed this book!

Treats some of the stories of the Civil War in the west without explaining the larger issues. This is an inexpensive book, but not necessarily a good value.

A "must read" for anyone interested in the Civil War in general, and the Civil War in the Ozarks region in particular. I especially liked Steele's writing style. Steele has a talent for delivering a lot of historical information while keeping the reader turning the pages wanting to know more. A very good book!

This book is designed for the average guy or gal off the street (from high school age to adult)to learn the bare basics about Ozarks Civil War heritage. Elite scholars may find it too simple, but hey... history belongs to all our citizens, not just professors and other professionals.

Recommend your read this one and recommend you add it to your collection. This work covers aspects of the Civil War often times overlooked. I is a wonderful starting place for a study of the War in this part of the country. Needless to say, it does need to be supplemented with further reading, but it is certainly a good start. Highly recommend