Languages Books

I think the other 5-star reviews say it all, so I will just add another 5-star review here with the rest. Refreshingly, this book does not just focus on writing for business, but addresses fiction and other writing as well.

This book shares secrets of the profi. They are so simple that you can't believe first. When I read a quarter of the book my writing style revived. Thanks to Paula LaRocque that pointed the way to great writing.

If you need to learn to write well, this is the book to buy! It's not only easy to read, but understand as well. (School teachers never seemed to explain it as easily.)Everyone that knows me, said my writing got 50 percent better after studying this book! That says a lot since i wasn't half bad before then. (Please dont take the way i write this review as a representation of what this book teaches- it's late at night and I'm too tired to correct any grammar errors, etc.).

Paula LaRocque's writing seminars are legendary -- I've attended two -- and this book lives up to them. It's like a month-long writing seminar packed into one book. Clear, concise advice and inspiring examples.

The author of The Book on Writing really knows her "stuff." As an English and Composition teacher, this is the best book I've come across in a long time. Highly recommended for teachers of writing and those wanting to learn how to write. Paula LaRocque practices what she preaches.

Dan Poynter's book is a virtual gold mine for authors and publishers. He shares his years of experience in the publishing business with a dictionary of every aspect of publishing, promoting and sales of books. Dan shares the secrets of e-books, audio-books and where to go to get the author's books changed to digital copies for mass marketing on the internet. This is his best book yet.

Poynter's Encyclopedia and Shepards' Aiming at Amazon are both perfect manuals for anybody interested in self-publishing. Brief, informative, and easy to use - what else is needed? Highly recommended.

Yuval Lirov, Practicing Profitability - Billing Network Effect for Revenue Cycle Control in Healthcare Clinics and Chiropractic Offices: Collections, Audit Risk, SOAP Notes, Scheduling, Care Plans, and Coding

Poynter, as always, knows his subject: Self-publishing. This book hits all the high points in an easy-to-access format.

If you have questions about the publishing industry, you will be hard-pressed to find a better resource than Dan Poynter's book, The Book Publishing Encyclopedia. This alphabetical resource guide is filled with facts, figures, tips, and tactics.

Any resource guide filled with so much information is bound to motivate a writer to continue striving for the exciting status of publication. It becomes a matter of absorbing enough information and doing enough research about all the available publishing options to make the right decision. Not all authors are destined for Random House, but that doesn't mean they have to remain unpublished. There are alternatives! Whether you are seeking an independent press, a mainstream publisher, or the convenience of a turn-key publisher, this book defines the terms you should know. - Brent Sampson, author of Self-Publishing Simplified

Loads of useful information for the self-publisher/author. I would have
preferred to have it in chapter form. That would have made it more readable.

A great book that talks about other animals that lay eggs other than chickens. I read this book to my preschool children and they loved it very much. The pictures are bright and very colourful. It's a must buy!

I enjoy the realistic non-anthropomorphic pictures Ruth Heller, author/illustrator, placed on each page. They are colorful, accurate and fun to look at. Some pages have just one animal and other pages are filled with lively looking insects and their eggs. I also enjoyed how she showed the size, coloring, shape and form difference between all types of eggs. I learned a lot from this book and think that kids over 3 will enjoy having this read to them. The only downfall I see in this story is that sometimes the words and sentences are in rhyming form and sometimes they aren't. I would've preferred one OR the other, not both. It doesn't flow as well with the two methods of writ, but other than that it was a good book.

This was my favorite book growing up, because of it's catchy rhyming story, accompanied by colorful, ecclectic illustrations... and now, it is my sons favorite book - so much so, that I'm now looking into buying Ruth Heller's other science books. My 4 year old loves them, and the colorful picutres hold my 2 year olds attention (a feat in itself) so well, I'm amazed!

I'm so glad I've kept this book around long enough to pass it on to my son, who already has a great understanding of any animal, who is an "Oviparous"

I think it's really great that Ruth Heller introduces a complex subject in a children's book without talking down to the children. It's great that she uses "big" words like "oviparous"--kids, after all, can remember lengthy dinosaur names; there's no reason why they can't handle other long scientific words.
But I do have slight qualms. For instance, the part about amphibians says that amphibians don't have claws--what about African clawed frogs?
The illustrations are engaging, and the use of rhyme in prose makes the text flow nicely. The subject is interesting, too. I just wonder a bit about the accuracy of the "facts" presented here.

My son brought this book home from school today as reading homework (he's in second grade). This was one of those times when I was pleasantly surprised by a homework book being better than the usual. I like the humorous rhyming language, the entertaining and educational tone, and the pretty pictures. The illustrations are not scientific in detail, but there are many recognizable species and the book is laid out in an artistic manner all too often lost now that so much is done slip-slap on computers. I am glad to see that the book is still in print. It's a winner. Not much text per page, so very easy for many, but not a baby book either.

Since i had it, it has been a good source of information. The autor has shown the vast of experience in troubleshooting cisco router and i thank for the diagrams that clearly support all the examples in the book. It brings with tips and identify common and uncommon pitfalls. I like the very explained part about routing protocols. I would like a new release with more tips about layers 1 and 2.

"A good book is which you open with interest and close it with benefits"

This book is well-written and accurate. The writing is easy to follow. I read it very quickly, but didn't notice any errors. I plan to keep it as a reference for when I need to troubleshoot particular internetworking problems. I think it will be quite useful for typical problems. (It's somewhat basic, so may not cover the more bizarre problems, but that's OK. No book can cover every possible problem.) I have never met the author, but he seems like a wise fellow, with a lot of good advice to offer to the Cisco networking professional. This book is an accomplishment that he should be proud of.

not configured a router properely so i was a novice. however my work needed good knowledge of this so when i saw this book i thought i`ll try it. superb i`m now telling engineers in the uk and europe what to do..

This is a good book which will help you to perform better in basic troubleshooting but it's not great as I was expected. The best part of this book is easy to read and understand. However for anyone who is preparing the CCNP, this book will be very much useful.

Normally, I wouldn't buy a text that involves Cisco routers/switches from anyone else other than Cisco Press; but, after researching the author's background (and since this was backed by IDG books, which has a pretty good record of publishing quality texts), I decided to give it a try. I was not disappointed (well, only that I didn't purchased it sooner).

The book is excellent! When a book is about troubleshooting, I expect it to contain real-life situations that can help me at closing time, on a Friday afternoon. This book does not lack that, as opposed to Cisco Press' CIT guide. If you're a network engineer or administrator in-charge of administering and maintaining your Cisco environment, buy this book! I am sure you would not regret it.

I aquired the book,"The Complete Guide to Writing Christian Fiction," in a group of several otherbooks I wanted to buy to help me learn how to write non-fiction books. What I didn't see was that it was for fiction writers, and I am a non-fiction writer. I decided that I really had wasted my time and money. But I decided to check it out anyway, because I didn't want to send it back.

I was very pleasantly suprised to find out that many of the principles that Ron Benery was directing toward fiction writers also worked well for me.

To tell you the truth, I got more out of his book than I did from some of the other so called non-fiction guidline books.

So if your are not sure if you want to stick with one genre, this book would be a great choice for you to have no matter what direction you go.

BTW.. I met Ron Benrey at a writer's conference, and you know what? He breathes the same air I do. He is a very friendly, caring, concerned, guy, and it shows in his work.

I have read quite a few books on this subject. I can honestly tell you this is the best of the lot. It is loaded with lots of information, is well written and easily readable. The content is a must read if you are considering becoming a Christian writer I would consider it the textbook on this subject. Do you know what words are prohibited in Christian fiction? Or Content is prohibited? Can two characters spend the night together in the same house? Before you answer read The Idiot's Guide to Writing Christian Fiction . You may be shocked. He also instructs you on how to improve on your craft, and to write the dreaded proposal that will get attention.

The Complete Idiots Guide to Writing Christian Fiction is a MUST HAVE book for any writers or hopeful writers of Christian Fiction. And it needs to be the FIRST book such folks should read. I have a pretty good library of resource books on writing but this one tops them all. I wish I had known about it much sooner! I have recommended it to all our writers' group. ---Elva Martin, President, Upstate SC American Christian Writers Chapter, Anderson, SC

After reading "Left Behind", I thought to myself "I could write something like that". After reading this book, however, I realize just how wrong I was. "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Writing Christian Fiction" functions both as a writing manual and as a set of detailed guidelines as to just what Christian publishers are looking for and it was through reading those guidelines that I came to the realization that I just wasn't cut out for writing Christian fiction. That's OK, though, it's better to know this sort of thing before I begin, rather than after I've wasted two years of my life on writing un-publishable fiction. That is why this is such a fantastic book. Writing Christian fiction isn't just about writing a book without any sex, violence or coarse language, there's a lot more to it than that and that's what Ron Benrey (a published Christian fiction writer) explains in this book. The writing manual (how to write a novel) sections of this book are mediocre in quality, I've seen better secular books on this topic (for example, "The Plot Thickens"). However, even if you don't read those sections, this book is well worth your money just for Benrey's insight into the way Christian readers and publishers think.

Love the ease of use in this book. Benray obviously knows his way around the cba market and it shows. His references and advice on what/who/where/when/why to include in manuscripts and submissions is priceless.

Clear, large type. Well bound: this Italian-English dictionary should well serve beginning and intermediate students (either Italians or Anglophones). An excellent value in terms of cost/quality. Exploded views of important verbs appear alphabetically in the main text, both English and Italian, as well as forms with prepositional, etc., attachments. "Lexical notes" appear between the Italian and English sections, and in the back; these notes offer paradigms for irregular verbs and, as well, provide an invaluable section devoted to examples of useful letters in English and Italian (for example, "seeking employment..."). There is even a section illustrating "Italian advertisements." Very helpful even for students of medieval and renaissance Italian literature (but not vice versa).

I like this dictionary so much that when I spilled coffee on my old copy I kept using it until the front cover came off. Then, I found it here on Amazon for this amazing price (it was $75 at a mall bookstore) and I finally replaced it. The definitions provide clear guidelines on usage, to help clarify precisely which definition you're looking for and it alerts you to whether the term is appropriate for British or American English. The Guide to Effective Communication at the end is priceless - I used it to decide what to record on my answering machine in Italy!

The Oxford Italian Dictionary is more than we expected. Very practical in example and useful for translators. I wish I had gotten ahold of it years ago.

Maria Garcia Bonini "Marcelarte"'s review is correct in saying the paper cover on this dictionary is misleading. Those seeking an Italian-English dictionary, might not realize this is exactly that. Those buying this as an Italian dictionary (in spite of the cover actually being in English) will not be getting what they want. The paper cover really should be changed.

Having said that, I really like this dictionary. I like that the beginning pages help you with Italian pronunciation and how the dictionary itself works. What I really appreciate is that most of the Italian words come with lots of context sentences so you can make sure you're using the words in the correct sense. It also seems like this dictionary would be good for Italian folks looking for the English words.

Warning: I guess in order to keep the size of this information-packed dictionary to a minimum, the print is really small, so some people (like me!) might need to put on their reading glasses during use.

This is the most complete and up-to-date Italian-English dictionary I've ever used, and it represents a major upgrade from the first edition. The inclusion of a large number of sample letters in both English and Italian is a great help to those who must communicate in writing in either language, and the inclusion of computer-related and military jargon as well as innumerable colloquial expressions is extremely helpful.

When was the last time you read a textbook because you wanted to?

I ordered this book to help the folks on my team who have become copy editors with no background or training in editing. I meant to simply skim through it, but enjoyed it so much I read the whole thing.

Another co-worker, who is not even an editor or writer, told me he too picked up the book to glance at it, and ended up reading an entire chapter and deciding he had to read the whole thing.

This is indeed a good copy editing textbook -- and a great read.

I had both of these men as teachers at Loyola University of Chicago. Excellent journalists. I learned everything I know about writing and reporting from Rooney, and I learned everything I know about copy editing and headline writing from Witte. I have NOT read the book. This is less a review of the book, and more a review of the authors themselves.

However, if I were looking for a book about copy editing, I wouldn't hesitate for a second to buy a book written by these two men. If it even comes close to Witte's course, it will be an excellent resource on the subject.

This is an excellent book on copy editing. It is a 'must have' for anyone who edits or does layout for 'e' and hard copy books. The book is well written and easy to understand and addresses those queries that can so often arise and make one question the decision to leave or change a phrase or statement.

This is an excellent, though dated, guide to copy editing with a focus on Associated Press style.

At college, I fell into a position editing the A&E section of a local paper. My managing editor told me to get a copy of the AP Stylebook and to figure it out on my own. I thought I did well at the time, but I know better now.

I was floating in the months after graduation as a teaching assistant when I read "Lapsing into a Comma" by Bill Walsh. The book hooked me on the idea of copy editing, but I had no idea how to start.

This book provided a cohesive look at the profession. The more I read, the more excited I became for the future. I'm not quite ready (making sure my quiz answers are right without a teacher or answer guide is time consuming) but I am already a much more confident writer.

My only gripes:

-The book is a textbook, so the answers aren't always in the back. A way to find the answers without searching the AP stylebook would have been nice.

-The book is dated. A new edition addressing the internet would be nice.

With either gripe removed, I'd would give this book five stars.

This combination textbook/workbook is one of those projects that makes me wish I had done it. Or that one as good as this was available when I was teaching.

It is broken down into three areas: copy reading, headline writing and publication layout. This is for any kind of publication, but the major focus is on newspapers.

A major factor in the book's appeal is the writing style: It makes copy editing sound like fun. It is fun, but many textbooks make it sound dull as dust. Even hardened old copy editors could learn a thing or two from this book.

Another strength is Chapter 5, which goes into some detail on the topic that gives young journalists the most problems: grammar. Without becoming simplistic, the book offers a clear understanding of this most important of all challenges.

If there is an unfulfilled need it is that the book does not take advantage of the computer. Most publications today are copy edited on a monitor. Paper is passé. Perhaps the next edition will offer a remedy.

Edna Buchanan has written a multi-faceted book about many of the crimes in Miami and the nearby area from her career as a crime reporter for local newspapers.

She wrote about her childhood and the journey that led her to journalism.

The author related how publicity usually aids in solving cases and apprehending the guilty,but not always. The "Pillowcase Rapist" was used as an example where that tactic failed.

Victims are not always located. Like in the case of Christopher Wilder where two of his victims' bodies were never discovered.
The disappearance of a 17 year old girl was an unsolved mystery. The poignant story of her mother's courageous search in dangerous locales and her timeless determination was another side to that story.

Edna Buchanan documented the carnage of the race riots that resulted after the McDuffie police brutality-murder case.

There are a number of true life,colorful characters in "The Face had a Familiar Face" that make this book entertaining and hard to put down.

I WOULD GIVE THIS BOOK 4 1/2 STARS BECAUSE I WISH IT WOULD HAVE HAD SOME PICTURES. THE STORIES WERE REALLY DIFFERENT AND NOT SURE I WOULD LIKE TO LIVE IN MIAMI, FLORIDA.

Edna is a great (and very funny) speaker. Her writing is just as good. If you want to learn exactly what a crime reporter does and learn it in a truly very amusing book, this is for you. I read this book before I heard her speak. I expected that the talk would be boring (i.e., couldn't be as good as the book), and was I wrong! She kept all of us laughing for about 45 minutes. If you ever get a chance to hear her speak, don't hesitate! If hearing her appears to be extremely unlikely, you are in luck because you can read her book! Seldom do I laugh out loud while reading a book, but I did while reading this one. If I ever hear the song "I shot the Sheriff" I know I will start laughing out loud again. This is light reading and you won't regret the time you spend!

I finished this book in 2 days. I found it different from most true crime books I read, but very interesting.

First book. Mesmerizing. Tough, critical, witty, a read-to-the-end book (forget sleeping for about two days). A tough lady who won the respect of law enforcement and fellow novelist. Humorous, sad, caring,
historical and factual with no sugar coating. Just the facts, Ma'am! Street smart. If you don't have a member of law enforcement in your family, you need to read this book to garner some idea of their lives.

Extending the hand dealt to you by the development package is where the quality programmers are separated from the mere developers; often the difference between an adequate product and a great one. If you are a developer using Delphi and want to advance to a higher level of production, this book contains the necessary boost. Anyone moving into Delphi component creation will find it essential. From properly choosing components from the Delphi Visual Component Library (VCL) to building your own components and interfacing with OLE and COM, most of the major topics are covered in detail, with sections of example code to really drive the message home.
The book starts off with a brief explanation of the models used in Delphi, basic concepts of a component, and the analysis and design of new components. This is followed up by an examination of Implementation Details, the fundamentals of polymorphism, virtual methods, exceptions, RunTime Type Information (RTTI), streaming, messaging, OLE and COM interfaces, and optimization techniques. "Design Time Support Tools," opens with an overview of the Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and emphasizes the interface issues. Danny Thorpe wraps it all up with chapters on property and component editors, and experts and add-in tools.
This book contains many insightful points. The chapter on virtual methods and polymorphism contains the best explanation of the implementation details of virtual methods that I have ever seen. This chapter could serve as a reference in any study of object-oriented programming. I've incorporated many of these points into my own training course. As one whose main approach to OOP has been via C++, I found this material invaluable when teaching a course in advanced Delphi recently. The clear descriptions of the underlying implementation distinctions between virtual and dynamic methods may save you in the area of performance. Knowing and understanding why virtual methods will defeat the smart linking of the Delphi compiler/linker can reduce the size of your EXE.
When I am presenting exceptions and exception handling to experienced programmers, they always ask the following question: "What is the real difference between this and how we have traditionally handled errors?" In only a few pages, the author answers this question and puts forward two lists, "Rules of Thumb for Implementing Exception Handlers" and "Rules of Thumb for Raising Exceptions"; solid advice for both developers and educators who develop developers.
Optimizing code when there is "abundant" stack space (surely a hint of heaven!), multiple threads and different system-defined string types differ from traditional tricks. These topics are all covered in the chapter on optimization. Just because this space is available is no reason to misuse it. Knowing that the stack will never shrink over the lifetime of the thread should force you to rethink overuse. Understanding that long strings are allocated on the heap rather than the stack should cause an occasional re-examination of approach. It is also gratifying to see that there is also a short section on sledgehammer techniques, or put another way, "genuinely useful hacks."
There is also an occasional sweet sprinkle of humor. From polymetamorphicdata (care to guess what that is?) to TypInfo ("tip info") and GUID ("gwid") the jokes are appropriate and blend well into the message. However, they are grains of seasoning rather than the bulk of the flavor.
Delphi is a development environment that provides the opportunity to do many things quickly and efficiently. Add in a copy of this book and you are ready to harness the true power of Delphi by creating your own components and pushing things to the leading edge of software creation. Some sections can be read and appreciated just for their insights into object-oriented programming and design.

Published in Journal of Object-Oriented Programming, reprinted with permission.

This is purely a Delphi programmer's guide, but it unquestioningly well written, informative, and well-rounded: Anyone seeking to learn how Delphi's VCL component libraries work, how to development components of their own, or how to extend Delphi VCL components already available from Borland or third parties, should read this book. There is simply nothing else that comes close.

Mr. Thorpe's writing style is clear, concise, and does a great job of exploring the topic at hand. Any competent Delphi programmer will be well capable of undertaking VCL development on their own if they have this book at their side. One point to note about this book is what used copies go-for on Amazon.com (and elswehere): I typically see prices of between $50 and $100, even though the book was first published about 10 years ago. How many other technology books, particularly for a specific software technology, remain in such high demand after such a long period of time?

"Delphi Component Design" was written for the VCL [Borland's Acronym for "Visual Component Library"] as it was implemented in Delphi 3.0 - back in the mid to late 1990's: the implementation of VCL it describes is still the foundation underlying VCL as implemented in Delphi today, and is close enough to the modern implementation to still be a very useful text. However, since Delphi's product direction is to pursue .NET as opposed to enhancing the older VCL, the book's usefulness is limited to those who are seeking to maintain or enhance existing Delphi VCL-based applications. Even though I no longer work in Delphi, I still find myself called-upon often enough for Delphi support that I'm not going to give up my copy of "Delphi Component Design" quite yet - even despite the used copy prices I see!

This guys are crooks. They advertise a book they DO NOT have, get your money and never reply to your e-mails.

The book is supposed to be great, by the way.

The book is a breath of fresh air and covers a good basic foundation: attitudes of programmers, basic structures of OOP with objects:- various virtual methods, basic construction of building blocks, streams, other forms of communication and a few peculiar things to watch out on. I personally have no interest in databases were some may have. 32 bit is the way to go as I can now see access to the windows API with the assistance of the book and Delphi Pro.
Danny points out its not necessary to understand every base object behind the object you are building off from.
This is true if you wish to add a minor adjustment to a component. But this I believe this is a major miss conception if you are building a new and different component. And for this purpose the book dose not begin to address threading, what is happing in TObject, as TObject is not in Delphi Pro to view and is the fundamental object that every object is built from!!!!!!. This is no different than the Pascal 7 days when every one wanted to read the OOP code for them selves at an enormous cost for a copy.
I'm not saying the book should cover the windows API as that's another subject on its own, but how a action is handled through the Objects, or how a windows event is managed though OOP:- draw, mouse button.....
I need a book that should cover enough to be able to install an object into a base object like a speed button into an editor or a listbox connected to a speed button so something like TCombobox or TGraph is understood how each piece interacts and is constructed together as a unit. When the OOPer's get hold of this understanding the tools for Delphi could become available will become limitless to the users. VB definitely has this advantage over Delphi today because we do not understand enough to create something different or new. Give it another go Danny with an extra book, as it is easy to understand what you have written, be cursus to get such a difficult subject right. And you have made a breath of fresh air already into the subject that is very useful to those that have read your first book but some of us need to go further.

This book is all about what goes behind the curtains. If are a crazy developer like me and interested in knowing how Delphi designers implemented different mechanisms such as WIndows messaging OLE COM this title is a must

Mr. Bartle's writing is precise and his facts carefully researched, even the ones he experienced himself. This is a huge, superbly constructed history of the tools and philosophies developed over the years in experimental and commercial development of online virtual worlds. Because of Mr. Bartle's personal knowledge as a long-time designer and his sharp memory for the significance of trends and details, this book will raise anyone's appreciation of whatever virtual worlds one comes across on line or on disk, whether they be famous commercial ones or those developed by enthusiasts for their own pleasure. I would think it would be a must read for gaming students. What a grand, satisfying, fascinating book! And when one considers that this exciting history is only the beginning of VW development... Wow!

This book taught me the theory behind Virtual worlds and I beleive nearly everything I read in this book.

I didn't simply believe everything because it was a published book, I beleived it because Richard used examples from real games. With all the experiance Richard has you would expect him to have learnt everything the hard way, he has but he's also smart enough to realise that sometimes you can learn from others mistakes instead of making them yourself.

The book is aimed at the 'Dungeons and Dragons' (and most of his examples are) type of game but there is no reason the information cannot be used in other genres.

The most amusing part is how right he can be.
Richard states that 'you cannot allow players to carry items over from the Beta testing to the online game, even though your players will try to convince you otherwise'; something I didn't really think and didn't really agree with.
My family and I were all about to join 'Pirates of the Caribbean' when it started; when the announcement was made that players form the Beta test would be allowed to keep items my daughters asked what a Beta test was, I explained and now they don't want to play as they consider that to be cheating. We have all decided not to play.

Learn from others (like Richard) or pay the price.

James

Covers all the aspects of virtual worlds from a psycological perspective; the intentions, the types of virtual worlds.
Doesn't include indepth technology and the development issues related to designing virtual worlds
Good primer on virtual worlds.

To begin with, this book is not a programming book. There is no code, no discussion of VRML, MPEG-4, or X3D. Instead, this book stands back and takes a "big picture" look at the design of a virtual world from the viewpoint of systems engineering, social engineering, philosophy, history, and psychology. Ethical considerations are even tossed in for good measure.
The book starts out with chapters on the history of virtual worlds and the cultural influences that affected their characteristics. Next, there is a fly-over view of the "production line" of building a virtual world. Bartle then turns his attention to the players - who they are, what they want, and how a virtual world can meet their needs. World design is examined from the standpoint of virtual geography, virtual world citizens, and finally the physics required to implement your world. Chapter 5 is about the specific sociology and physiology of the virtual world - skill levels, individual characteristics, how virtual inhabitants divide themselves into groups, combat, and even the meaning of death in the virtual world. The final three chapters are very philisophical in nature. Chapter 6 is basically a liberal arts syllabus through the prism of virtual world design. The last chapter, on ethical considerations, talks about censorship, and also looks at the player as a person and how game playing in virtual worlds can hurt more than help some kinds of people, particularly those prone to addiction.
Bartle's social commentaries may be a bit long-winded for some people, although I found them interesting. Some readers may also be somewhat frustrated by the fact that the book talks more about what can go wrong in the design of a virtual world - overly complex and static story arcs, characters that players do not get invested in, characters in which players get too invested, etc - than what can go right. I really enjoyed the book, mainly because it moves the focus of the potential virtual world designer from the artistic and technical viewpoint to the player's viewpoint - why they plays games, and why a player would pick your game versus someone else's game.

You're getting it straight from the horse's mouth since this book is written by the grandfather of the modern MMORPG.
Rest assured - if you are a game designer, developer, or just love reading about game theory, this book is worth every penny.

I have read many other books on the subject and not one of them are packed with as much depth, knowledge, and wisdom. Bartle covers every avenue that a designer needs to consider in order to be successful. This book will help you and your team create an active, emergent virtual world.

As a game developer, I learned many valuable lessons on what made other games lose subscribers, or worse -- catastrophically fail.


Richard Bartle's writing style is very creative and detailed, and like his games, it gives you the 'just one more page' syndrome. For example, in this book it mentions how often a player must be rewarded in order to retain interest. He uses this same technique for writing by giving you something insightful to read atleast every 10 pages.


Bartle has covered all the bases. Designing Virtual Worlds is a great book, very entertaining. I give it 5 out of 5 stars - a must read.

More than 700 well-written pages packed with valuable insights, and it still leaves you begging for more.