Bernstein Books

This is a must have for any 4th ed players out there. For DM's and Players alike this will complete your games. It will give your pages and pages of just the list of one type of magic item. There are 6 pages of just the list of magical armors...thats not even the actual descriptions either. Honestly, if you haven't already clicked add to cart by the time I'm done...well...

Overall a very good book. If you like what you've seen in 4E so far, you'll like it. If you hate 4E, this won't change your mind. For those still on the fence, I think it shows the depth of the new system and that flexibility hasn't disappeared in 4E.

This is definitely a player resource and not a DM one. DMs may want to have it for reference, but with the way 4E handles treasure and wish lists and all, any DM expecting to get a ton of use out of this is going to be disappointed. That's not a bad thing in my opinion though as the AV puts items control more into the players hands and at the same time gives the DM a comfort level that they aren't going to have to look over every thing their players are interested in to make sure it's not a broken trick.

Sure, there are some strong combos and possibly some unbalanced ones, but overall items will be there to sweeten and customize what the characters do, not their primary source of power.

The AV adds a new feat and alchemical items. These items are now balanced so that you can make and buy better versions at higher levels - making alchemist's fire useful at all levels, not just the early ones.

The magic item section has tons of new items and options - gone are the days of formulaic rules and al a carte construction. While at first it might seem odd that some weapons can have certain properties and others not, I found in most cases allowing the missing weapon creates a broken combo (so the ommission is intentional). For example, there are several polearm enchantments that affect how far you push or slide someone. It may seem odd that it does not work for spears also until you realize that it intentionally precludes you from using a shield and taking advantage of an at-will like tide of iron.

On one hand, it will feel like a step back in the uniqueness of items since the 3E formula system provided almost infinite combos, but on the other hand, we're not even 6 months into 4E and already we have a wealth of item options - it only feels like your options are limited if you compare it to 3E. Someone who never played 3E would probably never think that weapons and armor can't be unique enough with all of these options.

Overall I wholeheartedly recommend it.

I'm starting to wonder if WotC even has an editor. It took me only until page 4 to find a glaring typo. And when I mean glaring I mean that it is one you find without having to actually search for it. I found these very same typos in the DMG. Come on Wizards, if you're going to prevent piracy of your books, you're going to actually need to perfect them before you sell them!

Another problem I found with the book is that once again they do not price any of the special armor. There is even a statement that says that the table will list the price in gp, but when you look at said table, every single price just reads "special". And when you try and figure out what special means, it never really says. Why would I ever buy a Scalemail if I can get Wyrmscale armor for the exact same price as you list in your rules?

Anyway, excluding chapter 1 the rest of the book tells me exactly what I expected and wanted it to. It is a large list of magical items to use in my game. I also love the ritual at the end of the book that moves around enchantments. That right there is proof that 4th edition is trying to be more of a "yes you can" version and I think that makes it so much more fun.

...but it depends on what you're looking for. As a DM, i found this book mostly just a huge list of charts for magic items (or pseudo-magic items, the alchemical stuff), most of them recreating the combat conditions we're all familiar with from the PHB: i.e. ongoing fire, acid, thunder, cold damage, Stun, Immobilize, Daze, Save Ends, etc etc.

There is almost no interesting descriptions, unless you consider the above list interesting. Many people do, in fact.

If you loved the magic item listing in the PHB, and the way magic items were handled in general, you will love the Adventurer's Vault. If you thought that 4e magic items were bland, repetitive, and not as good as the fascinating items that permeated 3rd edition (and earlier) then you won't like this book either. For instance, i'm pretty sure there is no Deck of Many Things in the Adventurers Vault; it's way outside of the point of giving you an advantage in a fight, which is almost solely the focus of magic now.

Nor does it even touch on the topic of Cursed Items, but maybe that is something waiting for the DMG 2.

For me, i'm going to take a few ideas from this book and just make my own magic items for the players, ones that have more varied abilities. Such as a Wand of Magic Missiles with charges that DOESN'T miss and inflicts 1d4+1 points of damage per charge expended, as well as adding a permanent +1 bonus to the wizard's normal "roll to hit" magic missile. He misses half the time anyway.

Or a Rod of Atrocity for the warlock.

See, the 4e magic items just add some fancy descriptive name to a magic item, then slaps on acid damage, or fire damage, push one square or daze until the end of the next turn, and pretend that it's something special. It's not. It's just the same old effect that can be accomplished hundreds of other ways from spells, powers, exploits, and other magic items.

This is not a bad book and has its uses, but know what you're buying before you purchase it.

In a first for D&D, the equipment book is actually the first non-setting supplement released; this is unusual, as the Arms & Equipment Guide for 2e and 3e were released in the middle of each edition's product cycle.

In this not-terribly-thick book, you'll find exactly two chapters: Gear, and Magic Items. Production values are pretty high, and the artwork is mostly all-new; I don't recall any recycled art. Some pictures are captioned, others are not, which is irritating.

Gear is non-magic items...new weapons, new armor, mounts, vehicles, alchemical items, etc. The weapons are the most detailed, filling weapon group/type combinations left open from the PHB, along with new properties, like Brutal (reroll any weapon damage dice of n value or lower). The armor isn't too different from that released in PHB, but seems better, I haven't quite figured out if they pay for the improvements some other way. The mounts are kind of a mixed bag, they're nice and fantastic, but their carrying capacity is rather limited. Vehicles I haven't looked at too much, and alchemical items seem useful.

Most of the rest of the book deals with magic items, of all the varying types, from the plussed (weapons, armor, amulets, implements) to the random, including more potions. There are a great many of each type, including a boatload of magic weapons. Many old standbys made it in, from the sunblade to the decanter of endless water to the various bags of tricks.

It's nice to have this out so early, when it's most useful. The one main flaw is also a virtue, in that the magic item properties really aren't excessively useful in most cases; many properties are once/day powers that are nice, but limited in utility. On the other hand, this means there aren't going to be One Best Item of each type for a given level, and even if you get kind of a weird item, at the very least you're getting the base enhancement bonus your rolls or values.

One useful inclusion is a "move the magic" ritual, that allows you to move an enchantment from one weapon to another, so if that +2 Sunblade drops on a scimitar, but you want it on a khopesh, you're good to go. There are suggestions on making unique magic items, but nothing specifically crunchy about that, and, of course, there are no new artifacts.

On the whole, a pretty good book. While not absolutely perfect in every way, it's definitely a worthwhile buy for any 4e player or DM.

i have been an overthinker since before i can remember. i tend to make situations worse by thinking about them too much and concentrating on the negative possibilities to the point that i feel that these negative things have actually happened. it's a really destructive habit to have.

this book really helped me see that i was not alone and gave suggestions for actual steps to take to stop overthinking. for example, using positive distractions like taking a walk whenever overthinking starts. one of the most useful points in the book was that if you overthink, you're letting the thoughts win - the other person wins the battle if you continue to overthink about a conflict. there are tons of other useful suggestions and statements in the book - i took notes as i read it so i could refer to them in the future.

i definitely am not completely free of overthinking, but i do realize more often when i am doing it and am able to curtail it. i also can better deal with overthinking nowadays. i definitely recommend this book to anyone who is plagued with overthinking and negative thoughts and ruminations.

If you are prone to ruminate and worry, you probably think this book sounds like some kind of Godsend. I mean, the title hit it on the head, right? Sounds like it describes you to a t? Unfortunately, the book doesn't deliver. It's just one lengthy anecdote after another of various women who think too much, with overly simplistic solutions on how they can/should stop. I rarely give a book one star, but this book is especially noxious because it sometimes takes on a lecturing, unsympathetic tone, which should alienate most readers. I wish I could describe it better, but frankly, there's just not that much to this book...The BEST book I have ever read on worrying? Edmund Hallowell's "Worry." That guy is a genius, and it's beautifully written. Other good books if you are a worrier? The cognitive therapy books by David Burns; the big bestseller was "Feeling Good" but I think he has many...The book isn't as fun to read as Hallowell's but if you can actually learn to really do the written cognitive therapy exercises, that will get a major handle on your worries. BTW, neither one of those books is sexist; human beings as a group are examined.

This book was very disappointing. Every chapter seems to constantly review the negative people and situations that "women constantly think of" giving examples. On and on with all the negativity, it was depressing. The advice given was what any friend could tell you. There is no new advice, just seems to be a review of everyone's problems and to "do something else", so you don't think about it. I was bored and disappointed, the worst book I've read in a long time. Made me think too much about what a waste of money it was!

I received this book as a gift and found it to be useful. I have to admit that I'm an "overthinker" - I can tell when my mind is getting carried away and getting me too upset over something trivial, but sometimes it's hard to turn that off and get back to whatever I need to be doing.

This book starts with explaining what "overthinking" is and why (and when) it can be a bad thing. Then the author has several chapters on techniques that you can use to overcome overthinking. I will definitely try some of these out to see what works best for me. I especially appreciated that each of the chapters with ideas ends with a summary chart that is a quick and easy reference. The book ends with several example situations of overthinking and how it was overcome. These cover issues regarding family, health and work. There is probably something in one of those stories that any overthinker would relate to.

I enjoyed reading the book - it was easy to read and stay interested through most of it. I did, however, come away feeling that some parts were repetitive and maybe the author could have made it a bit shorter. Overall, I would recommend the book to anyone who may find themselves overthinking because it has some great ideas to address the problem.

If you have problems with anxiety, self-esteem, and overthinking then, this book is really for you. It will help you preserve important decision-making skills. It will also help you heal from many psychological problems. This book will allow you to develop healthier thinking in general. This is a very good self-help book. I really liked this book.

As usual, Garcia Marquez delivers. Serious social commentary - all of us know about folks who serve their country in wars, to live in poverty and neglect when they return home - but great story!

An excellent translation of Garcia Marques's short stories.
The work is exact word by word. Wish they publish the original in Spanish as well. As a student of Spanish literary, this work is a great help.

This is probably the worst book I hav ever read. It is true, it's very short but nothing changes in the story, you end the story the same way you beggin it-- the colonel is a dumb-stubborn old man, he does not have anything to eat and he just waits each week friday after friday for his pension, he doesn't sell the rooster, and practically nothing happens in the whole story.
A waste of time, if you want to read a sad story that really gets you down read "Things Fall Apart," by Chinua Achebe or any good holocaust narrative.
The last line of the story sums up everything.

If you are not much into magical realism (i.e., your find One Hundred Years of Solitude or The Autumn of the Patriarch to be written in a heavy-handed style), this story of an old colonel, who waits for his pension, knowing in his heart that he will never get it, is a good introduction to Garcia Marquez. Many, regardless of how old they are, what their background is and where they are coming from can relate to the colonel. Two subtle things that are sort of in the middle of the book and may be overlooked are: the newspaper writing about Suez Canal and a sign in a tailor's shop forbidding the discussion of politics. These two clearly allude to a tough censorship that lets through its filter only what is either taking place far away or what is not government-related.

The book and its popularity among a certain kind of readers in the erstwhile colonized third world countries explain a lot about those societies and their priorities and preferences. The colonel has been waiting for decades for a meagre pension while his friend Sabhas manages to accumulate some wealth by questionable means (how else,making profits!). If you have to like the book you have to read it as one identifying the difference between the good and the evil and no way between a lazy fatalistic person and the industrious in reality. If only one Gen. Aurlieno Buendia did not give up a certain kind of righteous fight, things would not have been so bad for the poor couple i.e. the colonel and his wife. The colonel was honest when it mattered (handed over a sum to Gen. Buendia faithfully), although a long time ago in his youth, and thus he very legitimately awaits a pension without looking for any alternative means of sustenance since then. He keeps pet, a rooster, which will fight when appropriate time arrives and that will be the second occasion when a fight may help the colonel in his life. In between, only poverty is the meaning and I am sure,to some readers of a certain kind of political grooming, glory of his life. The novel is competently written to dispense with the opiate of the daydreaming masses to whom revolutionary struggle (whatever that may mean) is the only magic to improve living. Those who will appreciate the novel will have to ask themselves why do they sympathize with the colonel - is it because he is poor,is it because he was once a fighter or is it because he does not show much interest in any form of income except pension at an early age. I think, of all those of his ilk, Marquez found the most effective style to move the fatalist romantics emotionally. And to them, emotion is only what matters.

While this book was OK, I found too much about bin Laden within the pages. I felt that part should be a separate book. All-in-all it was a fast read and somewhat informative. Good book for students to use if they are looking for both sides of the story.

The beginning of this book is very difficult to stomach. Although it has been almost two years since this horrific event, it still seems like yesterday to me. Right from page one, the author begins to talk about the people who jumped from the Twin Towers. He continues talking about this for a few pages. For me, seeing people jump is the one very vivid image that still haunts me. He goes into very graphic detail about the jumpers. About how one man was impaled on a street sign. Reading this book was like reliving Sept 11 all over again. If you're not ready to relive the experience, please do not read this book. The rest of the book gives a short bio on some of the terrorists and some of the innocent people who were killed on 9/11. The book also documents the growing hatred of Amercia and how the terrorists came to be. It was surprising to note just how much the FBI knew but how little they actually did.

I found this book to be very good. It introduces you to many people involved to day.....from Mohammed Atta to the pilot of flight 11 to firefighters. I felt the book did a good job of portraying the events of that day from many different points of view. If you are looking for a book with lots of photos, this isn't the book. There's a small section of photos of some victims and photos of every hijacker involved that day. It also gives a detailed description of Osama Bin Laden and why he feels the way he does towards the U.S. The only part I didn't like is it kind of jumped around a little bit in the beginning. It starts with how different people started their days. It takes you almost up to the point when the first plane hit, then for several chapters talks about Osama Bin Laden. I actually skipped the whole Osama part until I had read everything else in the book. That's my only complaint. The last few chapters I found so gripping that I couldn't put the book down. I would def. recommend this book

This is,without doubt,the best book I've come across about that dastardly act committed on 9/11.We have all watched many hours of televised newscasts and specials covering this event;but what this book does is put human faces on the people who were involved.
The perpetrators of this act were filled with hatred and represent the many thousands of others like them who have bought into or have sympathy for an unbridled hatred called jihah.In contrast to them,are all the people who fell victim to this hatred and had their lives stolen from them, their families and friends.This book shows what it means to have good or evil in people's hearts.Unfortunately,the fight against terrorism will be long and difficult,but as history has shown time and time again,that good always prevails over evil.
This book presents the facts and shows how the terrorists set out to attack America,the bastion for freedom and liberty for the world.They were encouraged by a lack of action,and further, took advantage of the freedoms enjoyed in the country and the great benefit of doubt given them by a country whose fundamental concept is of freedom and liberty of the individual,whoever he is.While they like to demand,and take advantage of this free society,would themselves deny it to others,and seek to destroy it while imposing their own sick oppression,tyranny and hatred on their own people and anyone else they can.
While most of this book is very good,I take great exception to the attempt to compare 9/11 with Hiroshima,on page 247.
"Perhaps the only comparable event in history was Hiroshima,but even Hiroshimahad had taken place in the context of a declared war.Hiroshima was a surprise attack but not a sneak attack.Sept 11 was both.Pearl Harbor,maybe,but no warped stretch of any demented imagination,can a comparison of 9/11 and Hiroshima be made!Any such thinking is deplorable.
20 years of terrorist attacks going unanswered forced America to embark on The War on Terror.There is only one outcome that can be an option;and that has to,and will be, complete victory.Anything else is unthinkable.
And then again, on page 251,"What happened in Hiroshima and in the terrorism [in New York] is the same because there are many people who can't recover one tooth or one nail."Again,an unbelievable notion.
A very important paragraph on page 250 deserves quoting.
"Why were we hated so much? Hadn't we been on the Muslin side in Afghanistin? Didn't we help Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo? Wasn't it the case that millions of Muslins ,as
president Bush pointed out in his speech before Congress,practiced their religion freely in the United States of America,to which they had come of their own free will? Clearly,we had something to learn about the unreasoning and unreasonable anti-American fury that existed in the Muslin world,where Osama bin Laden was being treated not as a villain but as a hero.There was a lesson there someplace,and it would be contemplated for a long time into the future.In the meantime,public support quickly built, not just for a retalitory strike,a few cruise missles launched at a target,but for a long and complicated war against an only semivisible adversary.The Bush administration vowed to fight that war for a long time ,against the terrorists themselves and against those who harbored terrorists,which in the first instance, meant Osama bin Laden and the Taliban of Afghanistan."
How can anyone who is unwilling to fight for freedom expect to live in freedom?
I am writing this review just 4 days before the FREE ELECTION is to take place in Iraq.
Many countries have failed to support America,and it appears many would be joyful if America fails in her War on Terror.America won't fail and is in for the long haul;just as she was in WW1,WW11,struggle against Communism and other wars.These countries should ponder the President,s words."Either you're with us or against us."
On page 187 we are reminded of what the President said on Septmber 11,2001:
"Terrorism against our nation will not stand."
He has remained true to that promise.
God Bless America!

This is the story of the attack on our country on 9/11/01. The story goes all the way back to the late 1980's and originates in Afghanistan. Berstein does a good job of describing how bin Laden and his group of thugs got their grounding in the basics of terrorism. Not only bin Laden but some of the other members (Atta) are described in their early life.
Along with the story of the terrorists, there are stories of some of the victims of 09/11/01. Bernstein does a good job in describing their lives, so we know what America lost in this attack. Unlike other journalists, Berstein gives reasons why the FBI/CIA did not pick up on the attack.
This is a good summary of the attacks and the reasons they originated. The title sums up the surprise Americans felt when the attack came.

Purchased on 07/30/2008, account charged but still haven't received book. Stationed overseas so I figured it might take a little longer but I sent an e-mail requesting shipping date and still have no status on my order.

This was a thorough compendium on a single element. It was a fun read. Learned a few things about how Mendeleyev`s thought process in prepping the periodic table. Was a bit taken off by the writing style, sometimes confused when reading some of the long sentences, punctuated with many and many commas. Well researched and annotated.

I am a fan of high end engineering and science topics. Nuclear engineering and achievements are one of those topics I enjoy learning about. The author focuses on the historical discovery, and race to find and learn about Plutonium, and its applications/hazards.

The end of the book has an excellent while brief take on Hanford and Rocky Flats locations and proliferation concerns. A whole nother book about those topics should be done just due to the stockpiles of plutonium around the word, and the impacts it continues to have.

The debunking of "Reactor grade" and "Weapons grade" plutonium in the book is also a excellent item that brings up serious proliferation concerns.

I have read many of the books on the Manhatten project but I really like this one because it focused in on one part plutonium. If you really want the whole story read The Making of the Atomic Bomb.
Second it gave you a history of each of the scientists involved in the discoveries.
I never really realized how important it is to the scientific community that they stay well published. I found it hard to believe that scientists in Germany war like Heisenburg didn't think that the bomb dropped on Nagasaki was made out of plutonium or that the US would even make reactors for its production. It was a good thing that the allies kept all the information out of the technical journals.
I liked learning about all the scientists and where they had come from and what part no matter how small yet was very important to understanding the development of this element.
It was somewhat of a technical read but I took many physics and chemistry classes in college so the terms were not unfamiliar to me even in that section near the end where he is explaining the lantanides and actinides radii and valance electrons. It made sense why each of these groups were so similar chemically.
I will say that plutonium has some weird properties and states. Also I found it interesting that the bomb was not as easy to make as I had read earlier. I was surprised after what Klaus Fuchs told the Russians all the details in that report near the end and it still took the Russians 4 years to create the bomb. I also didn't know that we stopped sharing the secrets with the British when the war ended. The more I learn about this story the more interesting it gets.
I would recommend this to any science savy person who wants to know more about the history of the scienctists who worked on creating Plutonium.

When plutonium was first manufactured at Berkeley there was so little of it that it was not visible to the naked eye. Now it is warehoused around the world, the U.S. alone possesses about 47 metric tons, and it has almost no practical use outside its role in nuclear weaponry.

I thought basic atomic weapons were made simply by smashing sub-critical masses of U-235 or Plutonium together with conventional explosives. Reportedly, the "little Boy" bomb used over Nagasaki consisted simply of an anti-aircraft barrel containing an 80% enriched U-235 projectile that was fired into a hollow cylinder. Turns out that it isn't that simple - thank goodness. The "trick" is to quickly achieve supercriticality without firing too quickly and creating a "fizzle." (Sounds like North Korea's 400-500 equivalent TNT tons 2006 test.) Greater blasts require neutron mirrors and triggers, careful consideration of other elements' neutron absorption, etc.

Worse yet, a successful plutonium bomb cannot be created along this design unless plutonium purity of at least one in a billion is obtained because it emits fission neutrons at a rate 35X that of U-235.

"Plutonium" also reports that in 1962 a bomb using reactor-grade plutonium (about 6% enriched, vs. 85% for weapons-grade) was successfully tested underground in Nevada. It wasn't a high-yield weapon, but still in the Hiroshima/Nagasaki range. So any nation with a reactor would have the material to make a nuclear bomb?

Why the prominent "49" on the cover - represents pluonium's atomic number - 94, reversed. The "bad news" about "Plutonium" is that it is, to say the least, difficult reading, and contains too much early, early history of atomic research.

I first read this book around the age of 20. My mother had purchased it.
I already believed in re-incarnation because I had two clear memories of my own,...since childhood, of a nature no child of 3 or 4 could Possibly dream or fantasize about. (yet my mother had always told me they were 'dreams' when I tried to talk to her about them)

So,...at 20-ish,...here she suddenly had this book. I was a young bride, married to an adoring husband who had proposed to me the first time he saw me,...he'd explained "Something told me to look toward the door,...so I turned away from the person I was talking with and looked to the door, you came through a moment later,...and suddenly through my mind flashed the thought 'That's the girl I'm going to marry !!'... He said he felt a flood of love rush through him as he quickly made his way to my side, to introduce himself,...he already seemed (felt he knew)'everything important about me,...but my name (now)' He proposed just as quickly as he was able to,...but had to spend the next 8 months trying to convince me it was Real love and he wasn't crazy,...(it wasn't lust,...I was a plain mouse compared to his ravishing girlfriend who he dropped without an explanation) So, two years later I was to read my mother's book, about Bridey Murphy,....AT LAST,....Something Solid to confirm my own memories,...and explain the new husband's instant recognition of me, and subsequent proposal,.....he had 'remembered' me, not with his eyes, but with his soul (and the things he felt he 'already knew about me',...ALL proved to be true,....things he had No Way of 'knowing' on mere observation,....much less a flash recognition. 4 years after (I'd read the book) he decided to tell me that if there was ANYTHING to what I believed in,....he would find out, for sure, if anything ever happened to him in his (oftimes) dangerous job. And he'd added " If there IS,...then there is a way to 'come back',......and I WILL come back,...because there Can't be Anything greater in the Universe than 'love',...and Lady, I Love you !,....so God's gonna Have to understand and let me come back to find you, again" I filed that away and thought no more of it; he was young and healthy and loved life with a passion,...as far as I was concerned, my handsome young husband with the ever twinkle in his eyes,...was invincable (!)

2 years later, he was killed on the job in an accident so bad there was not enough left for me to have to go and try to identify. My children were young, one was in grade school. That one tried to comfort me. "Mom,...Dad Said he'd come back and find us, again" I believed he'd come back,...but Find us ? no. But for the next 12 months,...he visited me regularly in my dreams,...trying to help me deal with his loss,.....I was alone with my children and had no real family support.

On Nov. 11, 1977,...the Ann. of his loss,...he came one more time,...and he told me it would be the last time,..he had 'something he needed to go do',..He hugged me one last time, and then led me a few steps further,...to someone in the shadows,...and told me simply "stay with him, he'll be good to you" I woke up and spent that first Ann, of his loss comforted, Finally,...and the day was spent doing something creative, to mark his life and my on going forward. I was to celibrate every Ann. of his loss doing something 'positive' for my future,...often involving my children, who still do that,.....until last year,.....after Spring of '07,...there has been no more reason to recognize Nov. 11.

In 2000,...I married again. I'd spent 14 years looking for that 'man-in-the-shadows' and I'd finally found him. But April '07,....the husband I'd lost so long ago,...Found, me. 100+ miles from where either of us now lived,...in the City we'd lived in as a married couple for 8 years,...just a couple of miles down the road from the small church we'd been married in. He had never been to that City before,...but he'd been guided there on the only day I would be there,...and he encountered me within 5 minutes of his arrival. That was roughly a year and a half ago.
It's been rough. I can't pretend, otherwise. He's never married. I have been re-married for 18 years now. My husband accepts him 100% as being the man I lost when I was 26. (and they are the best of friends) Amazingly,....the rest of our friends,....and even my earlier husband's Present friends and family,...have all been WONDERFULLY supportive. Of my sons,...the youngest is not ready to meet his returned Dad (who's younger than him)(but he says to give him more time to get used to the idea) and the oldest who always believed his Dad would return,...has been un-reachable to be told,...if he knew,...he would be on a plane to meet him as quickly as he could arrange it.

I know I'm not talking about the book. Others have already done so far better than I can try to speak of a book I read some 38 years ago. But if Bridey's story is questionable in Anyone else's mind,.....it is NOT so, in mine, or the two husbands who's rings I now wear. We're still working through the problems (and they're Vast) but a Christian lady friend of our's summed it up pretty good : "If God, can do 'Anything',....why not, This,...also,....as long as the 3 of you love each other,...it's no-one else's right to try and judge you, or try to tell you there's a lie to what the three of you KNOW to be Fact"

I've come here to order a copy of Bridey's book for the husband who's been by my side for the last 18 years,...we tried to find it at the library yesterday,...and there isn't a copy in the whole system. Love?
Isn't that what life is Supposed to be all about ? My present mate is happy that my earlier one loved me so much he was able to cross Heaven and Earth to find me again.....and now,...God is in His Heaven and all in right in the world,...at least,...in mine.

I read this book in 1957 and thought it was great. Bought a copy to reread. It is one of the best on simple hypnosis. Using his technique anybody can do it on right subject. NOT A PARLOR GAME. WARNING: It works!

That was a question that I often asked myself on numerous occasions when her name was mentioned in connection with various things "lost". I think it was the advent of the internet which finally made it easy for me to check out the answer to my mildly irritating query when it re-emerged one day.

This particular book, in fact, answered my question and then went much further. The entire story is conveyed by a man (the author) who became personally entangled in the story and who ultimately wrote this coherent non-fictional account.

It's not really a spoiler to tell you that Bridey Murphy MacCarthy died in 1864 -- the kicker here is that Ruth Mills Simmons, born in 1923, knew all about Bridey Murphy... because she WAS Bridey Murphy (reincarnated? for lack of a better term).

This book is for people who wonder, "What happens after you die?" There are actually a lot of good answers to that question in here as the author recounts, in addition to other facts, the so-called "Bridey Murphy hypnotic sessions".

While Bernstein was really just a guy who got himself involved in this fascinating offbeat incident, he does a great job of re-telling all of what was discovered to his readers. Highly recommended for folks interested in true mysteries and/or psychology.

No matter what you have read about this story and choose to believe, as the saying goes, "the proof is in the pudding." I would like to point out that Morey Bernstein never once in his life said that this story was proof of reincarnation. Not even close. He said that it definitely warrants further invesigation into the phenomenon. At the time the book came out, the western world was against any idea of reincarnation as it flew in the face of western thinking (Although, lets take a look: hundreds of millions of people take reincarnation as a fact of life as part of their religion). The discreditors of the story never once found any way to show the story was a fraud. In fact, the discreditor happened to be a Chicago TABLOID!!! The women allegedly named Bridey Murphy who lived across the street upon further investigation turned out to be the mother of the TABLOID's owner. The person below me mentioned occum's razor (the simplest solution tend to be correct) Think about that. In fact, when a more credible Chicago paper picked up the TABLOID's story, it had to cut out a whole bunch of arguments because they were just way too outrageous. ex: When Ruth Simmons was a girl she had a park accross the street which she played in many times. This explains why she would have said she lived in "the meadow."
Now that is just ridiculous, especially when a hand-drawn 1800's map of the city Cork, the area in which Bridey lived according to Ruth's sessions was called "The meadow." Now Ruth, living in America her whole life, and having never even heard of the town called Cork, recalls an area of only a couple square miles in the 1800's in Ireland. None of this was made up. Everything Ruth said under hypnosis has been verified to be real and not a hoax. am i saying that reincarnation exists? After reading the book, i believe. But please, read the book and don't read anything trying to close your mind to one of the most amazing cases of age-regression hypnosis ever told.

I read this story at the age of 16. That was 15 years ago and it still has an impact of my belief system today. It changed my beliefs in religion. I loved the way it unlocked the realization that the universe is so wonderfully complex and profound. Even if the story is just that it is wonderful and holds a special place in my heart.

I honestly don't get the appeal of these books. Why bother making (or reading) black & white reprints of classic four-color comics...? I mean, yeah, the stories are still great and the original comics are hard to find, but a huge part of what made these comics great was the eye-popping artwork, including the bright primary colors: reading them in dull B&W is just plain wrong. Sure, the printing costs are lower, so you can get more pages for your money, but it's more pages of boring, not more pages of fun. It's really a travesty.

On the other hand, it recently occurred to me that these could be used as coloring books... Maybe you could buy a box of crayons to go along with all the artwork that the publishers ruined in this format. (Axton)

I wanted to leave a message where someone from DC might see it. The superman chronicles are 5 star excellent, but these black and white Showcase books are very distracting. I, for one, would be willing to pay a higher price for color. Release Superman, and for that matter, Batman chronicles more frequently, or add color and jack the price up on the showcase books. Then, this silver age fan would be happy.

I just recently bought the three volumes of Showcase Presents: Superman. Does anyone wonder why volume 1 is only $9.99 while the other 2 volumes are $16.99? It's because the first book has about 32 pages missing. Page 35 jumps to page 67, or equivalent, in my book. That doesn't detract from the book as a whole and I'm enjoying reading the stories. But I wonder if anyone else has noticed this.

I own several of the other Showcase Presents featuring more esoteric characters (Phantom Stranger, Jonah Hex, Enemy Ace, Metamorpho) so this is the first "mainstream" DC book I've bought, and I love, love, love it.

So much of the Silver Age can be tedious, but each story was so much fun that I could barely set this book down.

See the first appearance of Bizarro and Supergirl! Marvel at the lengths Lois Lane will go to marry Superman! Witness the embarrassment Clark Kent will endure to protect his secret identity!

Whoever selected these stories did a great job. One thing I would like to see added is some biographical information, particularly for unsung writers like Bill Finger. Perhaps that could come in an introduction, maybe written by a comics historian.

I'm going to buy copies for my elementary-school-age nephews (it can double as a coloring book) and collect more for myself.

This volume along with Green Lantern vol.1 were the first two Showcase books put out by DC, and so they put them out at a promotional price of 9.99 while the others retail for 16.99.
To the previous reviewer, this Superman volume does not have any missing pages, that's just a messed up book.
I personally don't mind the lack of color in the DC Showcase or Marvel Essentials at all for one reason: the great pencillers in the old days were just as good (or better) as the best ones today, but the coloring was so poor pre-1990s or so that you really are not losing anything by the comics companies removing those awful cheap coloring jobs. Many coloring these days is done by computer and it shows, you simply cannot compare older comics' coloring with the average comics of today. Now if modern comics would just drop the 'we have to be so incredibly intense and violent all the time' everything would be in great shape. Not that I have anything against these things, it would just be nice if it wasn't every comic I read today from front to back. I love the Dark Knight Returns, but I also love wacky older Batman stories and the Batman TV show. Maybe that's why I love reading these older stories in Showcase and Essentials, because they frequently have zany lighter mood stories which are fun reading.

Kotler and Scheff have managed to write a textbook that is relevant, well-organized AND interesting! While the style is characteristically dry, the prose is peppered with plenty of real-life case studies that help elucidate both the marketing concepts themselves and the application thereof. The chapters are helpfully broken into sub-categories which makes for easy note-taking and comprehension. I can see why this has been the Arts Marketing bible for so long. The only thing we need is an updated version with more intense focus on internet marketing, etc.

This is a decent reference book if you have limited marketing experience. If you have any Graduate level marketing classes or marketing experience, you'll find it to be like the other Kotler books: stale and behind the times.

I found Standing Room only was useful as the recommended text for the Arts Management Post Graduate at UTS Sydney. It would be great for a new edition to be published that includes more recent marketing examples and methods, like e- business and contemporary arts organisations as it is really dated.

If you want to run an arts organization or run one now, or run part of one: have a long visit with this book. As an MBA who has interviewed many performing arts managers and worked as a performing arts funder and on various boards over decades, I commend this to all people in the business except my competitors.

It wouldn't be fair to compare this to other business how-to books because it is a compendium, not just management theories-du-jour. And perhaps because not-for-profits have a "spiritual" side, the reader senses that the authors are holding nothing back out of mercenary considerations. So if you suspect you don't know everything about running a performing arts organization, this is the place to start.

The book is a gift, a mission informed by the authors' love of and belief in the arts as inherently good. Just one idea gleaned here could save your organization, especially in times of funding and subscription-ticketing stress. While a revised edition might meld more internet ideas into the fantastic array of tips-'n-tools presented, as-is, "SRO" is exhaustive but not exhausting.

I've been in the entertainment public relations business for 30 years and this book is one of the best I've encountered. It's accurate, up to date, well-written and thorough.

The book is a VERY basic introduction to developing a trading system and is literally geared for the newbie who knows nothing. With that said, he introduces the fundamental aspects of developing a trading system (such as identifying specific levels of risk, stops, etc...). and the different types of systems (trend following, support resistance, breakout...). He even provides examples of back tested systems that work over the given time frame he has chosen. The problems with the book are that since it is for the beginner it should probably contain the code for easylanguage or metastock so one can become use to programming in an indicator, signal, then building a strategy. He does not even go over the math of most of the indicators. I guess he thinks if it works then the investor should not know anything else. So basically what you have is a book that describes indicators and systems that are already present on most testing software. For example, there is already a parabolic trading system on Tradestation. So why do you need the book? Because you are a beginner, and that is why I gave it 3 stars, for everyone else, I would give it one.

I read this book before I started trading futures. I played around with a few of the concepts and since then (end 1999) have written my own trading system based on some of the theories. I have gone through a steep learning curve but have now started to make money consistently in the futures market.

I would totally recommend the book for down to earth explanations on how to develop a profitable strategy.

I refute any negative claims about the content of this book. The strategies outlined in the book are viable and very profitable approaches. I know, I have adapted a couple of them to my own use. I am in the minority as a profitable futures day trader because as every trader knows, most traders lose. I also lost money in my first year trading futures. There is a steep learning curve in trading. Here is my message to any newcomers to futures trading. NEVER GIVE UP! This book is a wonderful place to begin your own futures research. For day trading, I have found the very unique support and resistance methods found in the book effective in the S+P 500, Nasdaq 100, and Euro. Get some charts. Apply the methods, oscillators and indicators for yourself. You will see how effective they are. Then begin your own research using Jake's ideas as a springboard. Yes, you can make a living trading futures. There is a whole lot of very expensive bull out there about futures trading. If you do not want to take my word for it, consider this. Larry Williams recommends reading all of Jake Bernstein's work. So do I.

This is my first exposure to a Jake Bernstein book and I've read many mixed things about him. Well, after reading most of this book .. I'm glad i now have my own opinions.

This book appears to be written for a total beginner futures trader lemming, just waiting to blow out their account. There is absolutely no substance in this book, nothing to be learned and filled with verbose junk about indicators, patterns and psychology -- typical in most books. Jake provides numerous so called "backtests" of various indicator settings with variable moving averages. Every single system has different settings - which is such an obvious sign of curve fitting. The only thing I saw of some value was the 3 period high and low moving averages to serve as channels of support and resistance .. which a trader may be able to modify into something usable, since Jake's version is taught improperly.

I checked this book out from the library and I still feel I got ripped off .. and it was free.

This book looks just like a compilation of the "author's" position trading books but with editing to put in the words "day trading" where "position trading" used to be. There's no other difference. The only potentially useful info to a newbie was about monitoring the first 30 minutes to try to determine the direction of the day. However, everyone has been doing that for years and most websites suggest it, without charging. Who doesn't know what an oscillator divergence is? That's not a system and while a valid indicator for some trading styles, is certainly not unique to day trading. Mr. Bernstein was reportedly run off tv with his infomercials that made claims the government stated he couldn't back up. Put his name in a search engine to see what others say about him. If you want to get your money's worth, read whatever Larry Williams' latest book is. He'll show you his brokerage records, Mr. Bernstein won't. 'Nuff said.

Way too much male homosexual stuff. Maybe that means there are more men paying men for sex these days. I don't know the answer to that question. I like the frankness of the writing and the psychology of the book, but I think I spent too much money for this one.

Matt Bernstein Sycamore has edited here some of the most useless (and possibly dangerous) advice for sex workers ever put between pages. His attitude (as in his recent novel "Pully Taffy") is frighteningly superficial and shallow. He doesn't appear to have a thought in his head about anything besides sex and drugs, and he seems to behave as if he'd never heard of AIDS. Being a sex worker is NOT a liberating experience. It's an act of desperation, often born out of a lifetime of abuse. For Sycamore to pretend otherwise is disingenuous at best. And for a supposedly legit publisher to put this thing out is absolutely irresponsible. This book does a disservice not only to the gay community, but also to those out there who would like to see an alternative to the pablum thrust upon us by the mainstream.

Tricks and Treats is insightful, entertaining, and open about the sex business. We are grateful that an author finally tackled the business of sex with such frankness and candor. We highly recommend it to everyone that is working to gain a clearer understanding of this booming business.

Very real expose of what happens in the sex industry. No ten dollars words to describe the gritty world of prostitution. You will have a good grasp of what goes on in the business. Highly recommended.

This is a very realistic view of prostitution that was written by the people who actually know about the industry, the prostitutes themselves. No socio/psycho-babble or theories by academic types who can only begin to imagine the reality of prostitution, which makes for a very good, easy read.