Clouds Books

There are very few RPGs that have as much depth as Dark Cloud 2, it is one of those rare PS2 games that realizes the true potential of the PS2. I can't imagine how big a complete guide would have to be for DC2. Even if this guide had only helped me a little I would have been happy, but it helped me a lot. I'm one of those players that don't like to use guides but when I do I want it to hold my hand and walk me through it and this is the only thing that keeps this guide from being 5 stars.

This guide provides me a good strategy on how to progress through different stages, how to beat the boss and also have a pictoric preview of the stages I am going to walk through. This guide also have lists of photo ideas in each area and creature items list. I think this guide is valuable. I will keep it.

This strategy guide is extremely helpful for first time play-through, and as a reference for subsequent play-throughs, but there are a few wild inaccuracies, and some sections seemed to me to be incomplete. It contains detailed charts on fishing, weapons, photo scoops, and inventions that are invaluable and mostly accurate. It's well worth purchasing if you remember to take its information with a grain of salt.

Dark Cloud 2 is one of those games that desperately need a strategy guide. The game simply has too much going on. While not knowing something is rarely fatal, you will miss a fair number of things if you play from the ground up. This means going back and redoing stuff when you finally figure out what is wrong (if you figure out that something is wrong) or overcompensating by extensive leveling up.

It is no surprise that this guide is over 200 pages. Prima has a high standard for attractive packaging, and this is no exception. The material is generally accurate (I did find a few glaring mistakes) but is less successful from the viewpoint of clarity and coverage. This is one of the few guides I have read where so much effort has been made to avoid spoilers that the authors forgot that a strategy guide is supposed to be part spoiler. Because of this quirk, fairly straightforward information has been obscured or left out.

Take maps, for instance. Unfortunately, there aren't any. This is a game that always rearranges its dungeons, so maps can generally be done without. But, there are fixed locations where maps would help. These areas are important sources of supplies and character improvement materials. Just the place where a little help could go a long way to ease the craziness of the game.

Another example is improving weapons. As you move along in the game, it gradually comes clear that your weapons are never strong enough. It took me a while to realize that powering up is much more complicated than either the manual or the guide indicate. If you don't catch on to this, the last parts of the game can get very frustrating.

So, this is a mixed review. I couldn't have done as well as I did with the game without the help provided by the guide. In that sense it is a great success. But what was left out contributed to a great deal of my frustration. I'm coming to the conclusion that guides are becoming too fixed on large amounts of supplemental, cool, (and basically useless) materials (to compensate for being expensive and of limited use) and less on making sure that coverage is good. Even so, I don't think the buyer is going to be disappointed, but be prepared for a lot of unexpected quirks.

This strategy guide is informative of what items you will acquire during the game. They do let you know when an inside scoop is coming up on the particular level you are on. That's as far as i can go though. Alot of info is left vague as far as step by step dungeon walk thrus which I think is why you want a strategy guide in the first place. So you don't miss key items in the game.

This book was exhaustively researched by Bro. David Cloud. The best thing about this book is that it is not merely his opinion. He quotes Catholic documents and Evangelical books. He sheds light on the entire ecumenical movement and truly shows the end times mindset of a one world religion.

Just more ramblings from an uneducated backwoods preacher who wants your money so he doesn't have to work for a living. Pray instead that he finds Biblical truth and abandons the hate-filled, cultic path he's chosen.

Any student of the Bible knows that the end-times Apostacy will be the unscriptural yoking of believers and unbelievers. Anyone that denies this is not only ignorant of Bible truths, but also unwilling to see current events in the Biblical light! Brother Cloud is right on the mark. Excellent resource. Thank you Brother Cloud.

David W. Cloud is the pastor of a tiny "independent fundamental" Bible chapel in rural Michigan who thinks that every well-known Christian leader is in league with the Pope to get rid of the King James Bible, which God inspired in 1611 to replace the Hebrew/Greek originals, with the NIV.

(...) If Cloud wasn't such a turgid and unimaginative writer, he'd give Jack T. Chick a real run for his money in the category of Paranoid Fundamentalist Fantasy.

Cloud never presents the Gospel, or even gives any indication that he understands what the Gospel is. All of Cloud's Biblical quotes are drastically out of context and wrong.

His defenses of the KJV are even more twisted. He denies the existence of the Septuagint and the Vulgate, says that the Roman Catholic priests who editing the KJV Greek text were "orthodox believers...men of God," and basically regurgitates all of Peter Ruckman's and Gail Riplinger's bizarre ravings. (...)

Does anyone really believe that today's Evangelical Church is in league with the Vatican to usher in the Reign of the Anti-Christ? The charge is preposterous. Throughout Latin America and Europe, evangelicals are winning those who failed to find Christ within Rome. The Pope is so worried that he has set up commissions to stop Evangelicals in Latin America, Estonia, and other nations. Does this sound like cooperation to you?

According David W. Cloud, Bible-believing Christians are evil. Everyone who wants to serve God must leave Christianity and embrace Cloud's King James Only cult (this cult group, by the way, denies orthodox Christian teaching on the nature of Christ and the Trinity, and teaches that God added new revelation to the Bible in 1611 A.D.)

David W. Cloud is a twisted, sick individual. His writings have contributed nothing to the advancement of the Gospel. In fact, one would be hard pressed to find David Cloud saying ANYTHING that is in itself constructive or affirming - all he does is distort the records of reputable Christian leaders, slandering men of God. The only people who read Cloud are radical King James-Only Fundamentalists who are bitter that Bible-believing Christians rejected their heretical teachings. I've looked over most of what Cloud has on his website for kicks, and Cloud NEVER presents the Gospel, NEVER quotes Scripture in its proper context, and NEVER talks about Jesus. Cloud says that helping the poor is wrong, because this is "social gospel." Cloud DOES do the following: negate the clear teachings of the New Testament with distorted quotes from the Old - call medieval Papists who edited the Textus Receptus "good Christian men" while condemning modern Evangelicals for sins such as watching TV - endorse violent Northern Irish extremists - the list goes on. When facts fail David Cloud (as they usually do), he simply makes stuff up (the supposed Unitarian Universalist endorsement of the NIV is sheer fantasy). Fortunately, Cloud is such an atrocious writer with such a poor grasp of web design that nobody stays on his site for long.

Cloud is in good company - other King James Only cultists (like Gail Riplinger) say that we must work for our salvation, that demons have sex with us, that the government is taking samples of DNA to clone us after the Rapture, etc.

It IS true that Evangelicals recognize that some Catholics may be saved, thanks to the grace of God and the leading of the Holy Spirit. Luther thought this, too. So did Calvin, Smyth&Helwys, and every other Protestant reformer you can name. But does the fact that Promise Keepers admits that some Catholics may go to Heaven, and that some Evangelicals cooperate in political matters with some Catholics (of course, politics is something quite outside religion) mean that the National Association of Evangelicals is about to accept the authority of the Pope? Of course not!

It was impossible to avoid the distracting errors on almost every page of this book. It was published by a self-publishing company, but the author is listed elsewhere on the net as an editor. If so, she didn't edit her own book.

One website printed her intentions that this book not be so identifiable with lesbian writing. However, her mechanism of avoiding the main character's partner's gender by always using her name was artificial and pointed glaringly at what she was trying to hide.

If you want to read this author's books, please give her feedback that she needs to be more craftsmanlike. There's no excuse for this level of poor grammar and writing.

Liked the new character the Ms. McClellan has introduced, however, all this ambiguity regarding Shelby was tiresome. Several different places in the book referred to Shelby as 'she', then in another chapter, Shelby was 'he'. Also, Ms. McClellan should insist upon a new proof reader. There were passages that had to be read and reread to make sense. Overall, though, a very enjoyable story.

I was truly disappointed with this book. Not because of plot or characters, because the proof reading and grammar were atrocious. It was a task to read and re-read the pages of this book. Virtually every page has errors on it! I don't know what happened that Ms McClellan left Naiad Press but her latest choice of publisher if a definite mistake.

I am a former police chief with over twenty-five years of investigative experience and currently a college professor of criminal justice. I write what I know. Murder in Cloud City, although her first book with iUniverse.com, represents my sixth published book. (Others are listed on this page in Amazon.com)

Murder In Cloud City continues my penchant for murder but provides an interesting and exciting break with the previous approach by introducing the unique and exciting character of Major Lynne Fhaolain. Lynne is newly retired from the Army's Criminal Investigation Division and has survived her partner's untimelydeath. Caught between the pain of the past and an uncertainty of the future, Lynne moves to Leadville, Colorado, with the intents of open a bookstore and write travel books. Unfortunately for Lynne, the otherwise quiet town of Leadville, nestled in the clouds of the Rockies has been the site of gruesome murders. Unable to tame her curiosity and at the urging of two old town cronies, Lynne searches for clues to the killers' identity.

As a frequent visitor to Colorado in general and Leadville, in particular I have attempted to fairly portray the climate, landscape and possibilities of mystery represented in the area. The story unfolds in the chill of early spring of the mountains and winds its way through the opening of high summer in the Rockies. The characters, central and supportive are drawn full-bodied lending depth and tautness to the unfolding story. Police procedure, process, and practical or problematical issues are lucidly presented lending both a sense of realism and frustration faced by investigators. In this fast paced thriller, the hunter becomes the prey and the circle narrows in a desperate game of cat and mouse.

Murder in Cloud City is the first of the Lynne Fhaolain mystery series. Lynne will continue to make her home and homebase in Leadville, Colorado while she travels the West and Northwest in search of interesting vacation lands. Think of her as a "travel she writes, and murder she stumbles into" character.

The author's website may be found at www.janetmcclellan.com.

After reading through all these stories I was then amazed to find a book where ten women describe why they are joining Convents today. So if you feel a little sad after reading all this try 'New Habits' and available here. It is a joyful breath of fresh air with ten warm and intimate first person testimonies.

When I read this book, I was really interested in why these women entered religious life and, even more, why they left. Afterall, the subtitle is "Reflections on Leaving Convent Life". Having talked with a number of women who have left religious communities, I know it is never easy, and the reasons are often quite complex.

A more accurate name for the book should more likely be "What we've done since we left". That is what most of the stories centered on. However, on the positive side, they mostly centered on how they continued to live out their Benedictine charism outside of the convent. That part of the stories was beautiful, to see how these women took their many years of religious life, and somehow maintained their religious identity even though they were, technically, no longer religious.

So, I give it 3 stars. What they gave us, they gave well. They just didn't give us what the title implied. A nice, simple read, but if you are looking for insight into why women leave religious life, you won't find it here.

I was not sure if I would enjoy this book or not since I knew that it was about women who had left convent life. I found some of the stories to be very moving, but some of them made me feel rather sad. And some of the stories really made me wonder about where the individual writers were coming from because those stories seemed a bit off the wall. The book did show me that there certainly is a wide variety of personalities both in and out of the convent!

With the escape from the Iron Masters, there are now three political
forces at work, the aforementioned, the First Family, and the Mutes.
Clearwater is badly hurt, and again taken by others.

The Iron Masters want to do bad things to Brickman and the Mutes,
and the First Family are not too happy with the Clan McCall, after
previous defeats. They are still playing their own devious game.

Here we learn why Mr. Snow calls Brickman 'Death Bringer'.

Steve Brickman is a hotshot smartarse arrogant pilot, in a gung-ho military installation based underground.

Set underground because of an irradiated overworld, he is just
about ready to face his final exam, and join the elite fighting force
he has been training for all his life.

When a glitch happens, he soon finds out things are not all as they seem.

The reviewer talks about a book - however this is a CD rom movie/book/kit of the techniques with the book - Being In Control with demonstrations of the techniques mentioned in the book also for purchase with Amazon.com. Many photos from the book and movie are listed under author photos so you can see many of the techniques for yourself and decide if you would like to have the movie for your child. You have to do the exercises in the book for them to be successful. You can't just look at them and decide if they work. Helping ADD with natural techniques and LD is not like taking a pill which is passive. The simple to do exercises which fall under sensory integration , self relaxation, and accelerated learning are real and work- but have to be applied for results.

While I'm sure these techniques have some benefit to adults with a desire to change, children get nothing from this book. And for those of us with LD children desperate for help, this felt like snake oil. Sorry to be that harsh, but if felt like the author has a life coaching, biofeedback business and thought, "gosh these techniques should work for anyone. I'll tap into the huge LD market with my title." There are many, many great ADHD books out there for parents, teens and elementary kids. You could get 4 books that offer real advice for the price of this one.
This rating system forced me to give it a star, it didn't really deserve any.

I like Buddhism and I like cartoons. However, the cartoons in this book are sketchy and most don't seem to have much of a point. The cartoons are not well drawn at all. I'm surprized they could get this published. I guess fools like me buy them hoping for something better.

As a longtime devotee of Mari Gayatri I was eager to read "The Buddha Smiles". It is a great book - very funny - very enlightening. It is the kind of book you can pick up and open to any page and get just the right uplifting message you needed. I highly recommend it - very entertaining!

Mack Bolan is back,tough and cool,in the second book of the Four Horsemen Trilogy. Bolan takes on a cult,bikers and terrorists. The Millennium angle, adds a fresh and current depth to the book.The ending is exciting and intense. Mike Newton writes another atmospheric Bolan novel, that works. Check it out.

The Cloud of Death is the second long epic offering from Pendleton and Gold Eagle books in the Four Horseman Trilogy. This book has all the workings and trappings of the previous epic spread out over 348 long, dry and generally boring pages. Bolan treipses all over the west pursuing this cult of UFO believers. He guns down modest target quantities, and then tries a Mideast terrorist faction, but only gets some. The theme here is a sadly continuing one from the first book of the trilogy. I was glad when I finished it, because I instantly fell asleep from all the excitement that the book generated. Pendleton is losing his edge and should give up the ghost as far as trying to write any epic sagas. This one is another dismal failure. He and Gold Eagle have conspired to remove more money from the consumer by putting together a 1000+ page saga about a cult of UFO believers. This is just plain junk. I can hardly wait to read the third 340+ page book. I was bored to tears with this second offering and I breathed a great sigh of relief when I finally finished the book. Gold Eagle has the audacity to include a little statement about The heart stopping action concludes in #3. The only thing heart stopping is possible death from boredom.

I was disappointed in this book, it was weird and I got very little information out of it. Maybe I thought it was going to be about something else but in my opinion, it's not very spiritual or informative unfortunately.

This is a sort of humanistic psychology book that speaks of Western Christianity. Ira Progof has done just a fantastic job of captivating his audience. It is a translation of one of the classics of Christianity, but it is written in laymans terms and just absolutely brilliant. Ira Progof does the best job of translating this classic guide to spiritual experience that I am now looking for other books written by him. The translation speaks so well of inner depths and souls and things you may have always wondered but were never really sure of spiritually. I found myself staying up late at night, anxious to finish, but not anxious to end it! I may just read it again. There are passages that are so deep and so meaningful that I found myself reading them over and over. Some may find these passages I speak of vague, and they are. Yet they are worth understanding. This book takes effort and the pay-off is astounding.

Oh my God! I have a headache. I could not make heads or tails of this book. I know it's written in an older English but I thought I might still get something out of it. No dice. If you're an english language professor you might plow through it and get something for your efforts but for the average well read individual like me, I think not. Save your money and pass on this one.

Then you know you you need this book. Profound, mystical, and above all spiritual - it is about the POWER of NOW and how to harness it for your own growth on this earthly plane.