Burke Books

This is a VERY basic introduction. It is a large book and has a large number of beautiful color pics of the artwork, but when it comes to learning about art in my opinion this book is on a high-school level. This book introduces very general concepts of art history.

drawing is good, action scenes are okay the story is not finished and its not good, there is too much merciless killing all over the movie seems like whatever happens on the story the bad guys always win on this one :( the movie was made to disturb people and to waste your time and money.

This is not even a complete movie. It has like two different stories to it. I mean i rented it and iam glad that i did that, since i only paid 5.00 to rent the movie otherwise i would have been really disappointed.

Which isn't to say it's necessarily "bad," though I guess I'd describe it as such.

It's violent, gory, includes one or two completely extranneous sex/rape scenes, and doesn't really "conclude" like a completed work should. This was just a purchase on a whim based on the art and the back cover info. Sadly, for me it just didn't live up to its potential to be a "good" anime. Ican't give it more than 3 stars. 2.5 would be more accurate. I'd call it slightly sub-par, saved only by its action sequences, really... Even those are a bit over the top bloody. But some people might be into that. ;o]

NOT for kids. Honestly, not really sure who it *IS* for?

You'll probably like Ninja Scroll The Movie / The Series or Wrath of Ninja (Movie + OVA) better. Or try the Rurouni Kenshin Season One, Season Two or Season Three box sets or Inu-Yasha Season 1 / Season 2. Pretty much anything is better, really...

First off let me tell you despite what may be said in other reviews THIS IS NOT A SEQUEL TO NINJA SCROLL. If you are expecting one then look elsewhere. Now having said that Resurrection does follow the exploits of a charater who is in fact Jubei Yagyu based on the historic Japanese swordsman and is not Jubei Kibagami the protagonist of Ninja Scroll. It would seem that Jubei and his crew have been hired to take down a group of Christians who are holding up in Shimabara with bloody results. The second episode is as equally bloody as a dark prophecy comes to fruition.

This anime fuses historical events and unrelenting action. The animation isn't half bad and the story line is coherent. This is not for those of you who are squeamish at the sight of gore since there is a great deal of it (the rape scene comes to mind) you might want to think twice if you are offended by such things. Not to mention the subject matter concerning Christianity might strike a nerve with some people. The only real major flaw is that it is only two episodes long and there is no resolution to the conflict. The reason for this is supposedly because of the subject matter and how it may have received a negative reaction from most western countries. Still if you like good action, a nice story, and have an hour or two to kill then pick this up at your local rental place before you buy.

Ninja Resurrection is not the sequel to Ninja Scroll. This is a totally different Jubei. Still even after watching it with the knowledge of this not being apart of Ninja Scroll it still falls very far from being a decent anime. The story begins with some promise but falls short in so many areas. Character development is one of the biggest problems. The unfinished ending is the biggest problem and will leave you with a very bad taste in your mouth. Considering the length of the anime, there is no reason why the ending should be left the way it was. If your new to anime stay far away from this. I know the trailer for this movie would make you think all the 1 and 2 star reviewers are on drugs, but trust me this anime is not good. The same trick is used with Tekken and thats one of the worst animes I have ever seen. You want to see some action. Check out Ninja Scroll, Vampire Hunter D Bloodlust, 8 man after, or just check out my reviews concerning anime. I'm pretty fair with animes but I'm aware people do have different taste.

This is mostly nonsense an ugly loose "facts." I know Irish Traveller families in the East and Midwest, and you could not find more honest tradesman and caring neighbors toward non-Travellers.
What a poorly written exercise, as well.
There are certainly better examples of American Irish Travellers culture written in the last year or two.

I read the other reviews before writing my own and found some of them to be overly judgmental of this book. Scam! is a wonderful book insofar as it follows the life of one specific Traveller and his family. I agree that the book meanders and at times seems like a stream of consciousness dump of interrelated stories, but I see nothing wrong with that. The subculture it covers is not hierarchical and does not lend itself to a top down description. I think of the books style as a wandering through the network of the Traveller society. There is some value in that, though it may be unsatisfactory to those who can only process a linear exposition.

I agree that the book has many flaws in terms of writing style, but I think there is a reasonable explanation for this. As a self published writer myself, I know that it is difficult to properly proofread a work without the backing of a professional staff. Wright's book an example of a good manuscript that has not had the benefit of the services of a good publishing firm. Nevertheless, I found it very readable, even with its flaws.

At least one review alleges that the book is racist. I come from primarily Irish stock and did not find the book to be racist in the least. However, I can see how a Traveller or a person from a Traveller family would feel painted with an overly broad brush. However, the book is not a book about Travellers in general, it is a book about those Traveller families actively involved in scamming.

If you have elderly parents or elderly friends who may become the targets of the scams described in this book, it might be a good idea to buy this book for them. After reading the book, I purchased another copy for an older couple I care about.

Ironically, this book provided an explanation for an experience I had. I purchased a used car a year ago. Quickly, I discovered that some defects of the car had been deliberately hidden using the same techniques described in the book. What took the cake is that the surname of the previous owner is exactly the surname of one of the clans described in the book (along with their home location). I am certain that I bought this car from a Traveller. I've been able to fix it up and I use it as a second car, so I'm not particularly upset about it, but had I not read this book, I would never have known that I was taken by a Traveller as well.

I wish that there was a well-crafted, even-handed investigation of the U.S. traveller families of Irish and Scottish descent who comprise the bulk of the material in this 400-plus page book. Cultural mores and anthropological insights are scattered about especially in the Murphys Village (Augusta, Georgia park noted as a center for clans) and the marriage chapters. But Wright's intent, weakened if more widely marketed for the non-scholarly reader by the ill-chosen, sensationalist blurbs that cheapen his book on the inside and back covers, is to expose what has been a long-established and little understood part of largely rural Americana to a larger public. To correct an earlier Amazon review or two, the Romani (Gypsies) are not kin to the traveller clans; this is a misnomer. Wright does show how the Roma differ from the travellers and that there is actually little crossover in the Irish and Scottish travellers he follows. This book is not ideal, but until others tidy up what Wright's rummaged, it is by default the place to start reading. (By the way, in 1997 an indie B-movie with Bill Pullman, Mark Wahlberg, and Julianne Margulies was made, Traveller; NBC Dateline around the same year profiled the Disney scam that begins Wright's book. Later, as other Amazon reviewers relate, the Toogood child abuse video incident sparked another brief span of less than approving attention by the media about US "Irish" travellers.)

In the meantime, Wright's take, that took 16 years and that he admits he left unfinished until the early 90s Disney World scam and the closure to the saga of Jimmy Burke (his primary informant) finds sensationalist focal points for what the author admits is a repetitive account of the scams perpetrated by the Northern and Southern Irish travellers upon bargain hunting trailer buyers, by pigeon drops involving the elderly, those wanting suspiciously cheap bargains for roofing and driveway sealing, and, as the author accurately points out, those "refs" or "country people" wanting something for next to nothing. Without those "refs" also willing to deal outside of the proper paperwork and business protections, an observer can agree that the travellers are only taking advantage of people who themselves participate in scams in which the "refs" are also eager to bypass the law in favor of a quick buck saved or stolen.

Wright was a correspondent for Trailer Life Magazine, so the bulk of the unfortunately if appropriately named Scam deals with the minutiae of trailer sale cons perpetrated with names, facts, and dates. He does protect his sources, and passes on only general details to others. A few hundred pages of the scams, expanded from his 1980s articles in that magazine, does provide I suppose helpful evidence for those needing to learn about how to avoid being ripped off, but the data grows tedious as it's endlessly repeated as the crimes keep on keeping on. He does claim to have documented here with all names and dates what became his obsession as he determined to delve into the traveller subcultures and find out from the victimizers and the victims both sides of the situation.

As a descendant of non-US, native Irish, travellers, I found Wright's book dispiriting in its rambling and uneven pace, which ironically befits a description of a group living always on the road and one step ahead of the authorities. Still, I must admit that I believe Wright's sincerity in exposing the frauds that do occur, and that he is not acting out of any prejudice against this American sub-culture in particular. He tells on pg. 8 at the start that he had been invited by the travellers themselves to be a witness to their set-ups, and then goes on to say that travellers claim that only a few bad apples spoil their otherwise honest activities. He states simply that he presents what he knows for the reader to decide.

In addition to being incredibly poorly written, this book is misleading and racist. The Travelling people have been living in the traditional way for centuries in Ireland and yes, some have made their way to the States. Obviously, there are good and bad in every culture, but it seems that the writer of this book is trying to blame Travellers for every major scam in America. This is ridiculous. It is also insulting to the majority of the Travellers, who are law-abiding, respectable citizens who mind their own business. The book was obviously written with the explicit purpose of slanderizing the Irish Travellers, which is a shame. If the writer had done more research, as opposed to just cranking out a sensationalist tabloid essay, he would have found that a small minority of scams are carried out by Travellers, however, Travellers often get blamed for scams that they have no responsibility for .

I found the actual information in the book to be interesting. Having no other information or experience with Travelers, I can neither support nor dispute the facts as the author presents them. That being stated, I found the actual writing of the book to be frustrating and overall awful!

I had several problems with the way the book was written -
1. It did not appear to follow any logical pattern. The book felt like it was written in a stream of conscience style. It hop scotched around from topic to topic, year to year, and had no flow. It started and ended with the "Disney Scam" and kept referring back to it periodically throughout the first few chapters. The author would start a section with a phrase like, "Another favorite scam of the Travelers that year. . . " without ever identifying "that year". After reading it, I have an idea of the types of scams that the Travelers try, but absolutely no concept of the timeline that was involved.

2. The author referred to himself as "the writer" throughout the entire book. It was a "cute" ploy when he described how he first got entangled with the Travelers, but once I figured out he was "the writer" it got pretty old and annoying.

3. He carefully kept referring to his wife as, "the writer's wife" throughout the story, but at one point slipped when he was quoting a letter from Jimmy that said, "'I deeply appreciate both your and Pam's support . ..'"

4. The writer couldn't keep his made up names straight. One paragraph he called the owner of an RV dealership Norman Roberts, the next paragraph the man's name was Norman Robbins and back to Roberts later in the chapter.

5. He was listing the cities that were scam "hubs" so to speak, and he listed the same city twice within the same sentence (Minneapolis).

6. There were two maps of the eastern United States labeled "trip 3" and "trip 4" in one chapter. Why? The entire book is about how these people would go from Kentucky to Florida to New York to Indiana to Oklahoma to South Carolina to . . .. The maps were completely out of place. It was kind of like seeing a china vase in the middle of a hardware store, "what's that doing here?"

Granted, some of my criticisms may seem petty. Get an editor! Proofread the book before sending it to the printer! I don't purport to be an English expert on grammar, but the errors and style of the book were extremely frustrating and distracting to the overall message that the author may have been trying to convey.

One nice thing about the ending of the book however is that he listed all of the main characters (and even most of the minor ones) and gave a short summary statement of "where they are now". It was nice to tie up some of the loose ends that were dangling from the actual narrative.

The author summed it up best when he wrote, "This book also could not be written until now because it lacked both a focal point and a conclusion." Perhaps he should have narrowed down his focal point and conclusion a little bit more.

An important, timely & vital point is being made by these authors. I listened intently to their ideas, mostly while jogging. I loved the prehistoric stuff, but after that it all became pretty familiar. I agreed with their thoughts on controlling our technology instead of it controlling us, but there's not much we can do about it when, in so many ways, we *are* our technology. Still, it is good & inspiring & true. Everyone should read it. I just gave it three stars because in the middle sections my running pace slowed considerably, indicating non-involvement.

Axemakers Gift is the world's best kept open secret. Very enjoyable sound on only two cassettes is multiply distilled encyclopedic overview of the most significant and interesting things that have happened in the entire history of the world. Each world-changing phenomenon leads naturally to the next and shows their possibly hopeful implications for the future If I had my life to live over I would wish very early to hear Axemakers Gift to become instilled with its attitudes of confidence, cheerfulness, fearlessness, compassion, good will, hopefulness and unpretentious incredible erudition. It would give me a sound foundation for facing life instead of trying to think there was something wrong with me because I couldn't see things the way people told me to. I always knew somehow that when I was dying I would figure out what things had been all about but young people who hear this tape can start out from the first with a grounding that will give them enthusiasm for looking for new ideas and, even if they go down the tubes, I guess at least they'll have a sublime understanding of their real part in the great scheme of things. I listen to it again every few weeks to get my fix of sanity and truth and good will in the seeming hopeless of a "gotcha" world. All my thanks for Axemakers Gift, The Day the Universe Changed, and Connections.

First let me say I like James Burke. Currently I am watching his series "The Day the Universe Changed" It's excellent. The problem with this tape is his premise with evolution, It's only a theory, but Mr Burke goes on for the whole of side one about evolution as if it were fact. Then with side four it's nothing but doom & gloom. Mr Burke stick with history. Science & telling the future is not your forte.

For someone who is supposed to be an historian, Burke makes
some surprising blunders. He makes constant and poetic references such as ". . . scattered islands of light in a sea of darkness. . ." p 95 or ". . . papal mind control . . ." p104 and talks about the "dark ages" p93.
The "dark ages" as well as the *Fall* of the Roman Empire. Both the "Dark Ages" and the *Fall* are discredited terms, not used by serious historians. The so called "Dark Ages" were actually quite active in terms of science, technology and philosophy, while the Roman Empire never actually fell, but rather transmuted in the West and flourished in the East.

Burke and Ornstein both seem to ignore the fact that there was another world besides the Greek and Roman one. There is brief mention (*very* brief) of other civilizations, Chinese, Indian, etc. but the general thrust of the book seems to imply that the entire world began and ended with the Roman West.

NONSENSE! During the periods he is talking about, trade flourished, technology and pure science were vigorous and innovative and the arts were respected and supported. Certainly there were times and places dominated by poverty, intolerance and ignorance. Even without the "Axemaker's Gift" there are still periods of famine, drought and disease. Populations crash quite nicely without any human intervention.

Then there is the nonsensical theme that technology (the "axemaker's gift") is bad or detrimental. This is something that could only have been written by someone who has never had to work, really work, in their life. Certainly technology
can be abused. Nor can it be disputed that individuals have been exploited and abused by ruling elites. But these same large technological civilizations have also provided the wealth and leisure time to support philosophers and artists. If not for
the "axemaker's gift" Burke and Ornstein wouldn't have had the ability to even think about the *problem* of the "Axemaker's Gift", let alone been able to write it. They would have been too busy trying to gather and store enough food to last through the winter. Or would have died of old age at 40, never having had the time and leisure to accrue the knowledge and experience to even worry about the ills of technology.

This book is worth a $1 from the `Bargain Bin'. Otherwise, don't waste your money.

If you want to get an idea of what the "Axemaker's Gift" was
really like during the "Dark" ages:

1) Cathedral, Forge and Waterwheel
by Joseph Gies

2) The Medieval Siege by Jim Bradbury

3) Technology in World Civilization by Arnold Pacey
4) The Medieval Machine by Jean Gimpel

5) Engineering in History by R. S. Kirby et al

6) The Ancient Engineers
by Lyon Sprague De Camp

I love Burke's books, especially Connections and The Day The Universe Changed. Combined with the author's great presentation, they are some of the finest non-fiction audio books in existence.

Unfortunately, this one really loses its way about half way through its course. What starts out as an excellent outline of prehistoric human development devolves into a meandering, unrealistic plea for changing human behavior.

Of course, you could just ditch the second tape in the set and listen to the first cassette several times. It's quite good on its own.

I am a fan of James Lee Burke and even I thought this was horrible. It was so utterly boring it is hard to describe. Though some of his books are long winded, the plot and character development makes up for it. This story, however, was completely devoid of any suspense, the characters are silly and the whole thing was a total disappointment!

I got this at a garage sale, and there is no mystery why it ended up there. I held out hope that something -- anything -- would happen to either connect all the separate storylines or make me care about the characters, but I finally had to skim the last 100 pages when it became painfully obvious that the whole book would be a litany of sordid, horrible things happening to characters I didn't really care about. No one comes close to paradise in this book -- everyone starts miserable and goes downhill from there. Its only redeeming benefits are that it offers a window to race relations in the 60's and lets us see that James Lee Burke went through a Hemingway phase early in his career, either accidentally or on purpose.

The book lacks his eloquent language describing sense of place. There are a few great lines, but more simple sentence structure.
Interesting theme and plot. Gets more interesting after the first 25%.
Worth a read, just not his superb use of the English language evident in his later books. Good themes of poverty, choices made and effects, race, etc.

This is one of Burke's earlier books and Burke gets better with each effort. In my estimation, that makes all of Burke's vintage work wonderful reading while allowing me to lust for another new tale.

"Half of Paradise,"published in 1965, was James Lee Burke's first published fictional effort. Not surprisingly, it shoots off many sparks that illuminate where he's later going to go as a writer. He gives us powerful descriptions of his home territory, around New Orleans, Louisiana; both the natural and manmade environments; for his first time out, he's pretty good on character development and dialogue, and he renders strong descriptions of people's everyday lives, jobs, and family histories.

The novel reads as, probably is, three discrete novellas packaged together. It tells the story of JP Winfield, a penniless, orphaned sharecropper who discovers a talent for playing a 12-string guitar; it leads him into some prosperity and public notice, but his weaknesses are always with him. It also gives us Toussant Boudreaux, a black New Orleans dockworker who moonlights as a prizefighter, seems to have a promising career in that direction, but then takes a crippling injury. Finally it introduces Avery Broussard, descended of the area's French-Spanish landowning families: but the land's long gone, he's working as a oil company roustabout, and he's got a crippling alcohol dependency. If you see a pattern here, there is one. All three men are overwhelmed by their weaknesses; you'd have to call the book a downer. And without giving away too much of the plot, readers may learn more about Louisiana jails than many might care to.

Burke's first novel introduces,in the Broussard segments, the character of black Ba'tiste, storied family servant, who will reappear in his later works. It further gives Broussard a wealthy high school girlfriend (a character that will also often reappear in his later works) the family name of Robichaux: that, of course, will later be the surname of his famous detective Dave Robichaux. It's pretty clear that Burke was going to write his way into an outstanding future once his world view got a little less depressing. How much you want to read this first effort probably depends on how much you like the later work.

Having greatly enjoyed Mr. Burkes books in the past, I was looking forward to one of his based on my soil. But proving that a name reappears (unrelated) later in history on some nameless board or committee sounds like an exercise best left to the student. The thought that the progeny of significant men in American history would have an effect later was a good idea, but not realized in this book.

Disappointing, but I still look forward to his next novel.

I have read several of James Burke's earlier works, and I had hoped that his venture into my own field would illuminate a subject in ways that would not have occurred to conventional historians. Unfortunately, this book is nothing of the kind. On first glance, It is organized in a structure giving one chapter to each Signer of the Declaration of Independence (Mr. Burke seems not to have thought of the framers of the Constitution as belonging in his phrase "founding fathers.") However, each Signer lasts barely one paragraph with Mr. Burke connecting him to someone else, and then to someone else, and then to someone else, and then on and on he goes forming a daisy-chain of references, skittering across the surface of history like a spider sliding across a sheet of ice, until he gets to someone in modern times who shares the same name as that of the Signer [or, in the case of Benjamin Franklin, to a reference back to the original Signer]. The book is slipshod, superficial, and all too often fraught with ominous undocumented claims often introduced or accompanied by such phrases as "Some say" or "according to some." I am sorry that I bought this book; it makes the otherwise-useless book by Richard Brookhiser, WHAT WOULD THE FOUNDERS DO? OUR QUESTIONS, THEIR ANSWERS, read like a marvel of scholarly comprehension.

James Burke, well known for pursuing the stranger paths of history, has done just that once more. This time, he follows the signers of the Declaration of Independence, following paths leading away from each one to something within the last fifty years sharing that name. If what you want is a straight history book, try a different author. This is Burke's area of expertise, and he has done a wonderful job. Again.

I have read nearly all of James Burke's work, and his Connections started my fascination with History of all kinds; nowadays, that's all I read. I also became a research historian and have co-authored a book; for that, I offer my unending thanks to Mr. Burke. Unfortunately, this book is nothing more than a collection of parlor tricks, one that wears thin after 2 or 3 chapters. There's no history here nor story telling nor insights; only a compendium of extremely poorly documented linkages connecting the signers of the Declaration of Independence to a current person of the same name. Within each chapter is a set of linkages or connections that typically number above 20, not the six degrees of networking that Burke alludes to. With that many degrees of networking, I could even play this game. All this book does is showcase Burke's knowledge of fairly inconsequential people over the past 200+ years and does nothing to stimulate interest in the reader. This is one book I couldn't bear to read or finish. Mr. Burke should be ashamed to have written it; it simply is not up to his previous standards. There is nothing here...nothing at all; how unfortunate.

I purchased this book for my work as a mental health therapist. It's a good concept, but it doesn't quite work as well as it could. It's somehow both too complex and long for younger kids and too simple for older kids. Maybe if the pictures were colorful and engaging, and there were two kinds of text - simple for the younger kids, more detail for the older kids. The best use I've gotten out of the book is to use the metaphor of being a calm cat to use the techniques shown as games with the kids I see in therapy. But after reading it a couple times, it doesn't come off the shelf. A shame - it does have potential. Maybe a second edition?

I thought I had found a book that incorporated my son's cat in relaxation techniques that he could use for home and school. I was REALLY disappointed! This very small book (only about 25 pages) talked more about cats and their reactions to things. I thought that if I worked with my son and his cat I would be able to calm him down when he gets uptight. This book is not intended for that!! In fact, it has very little use other than its descriptions of what cats do and how cats react to certain things. Don't bother with this book if you're looking for specifics on relaxation techniques with your cat.

This is a great book for kids and adults. It goes beyond many of the usual stress management techniques with an emphasis on self-esteem and standing up for yourself. Children have so much stress these days. This simple, easy-to-read book gets right to the heart of ways to help the children we love. I have a copy to read for myself and my 7-year-old daughter. I have bought copies for the library for people (and families) with cancer and chronic illnesses where I work - high stress situations. I also recommend it in a stress management class I teach at a local hospital for kids. Parents and kids alike are drawn to its message.

An interesting title, for an interesting molecule. Too bad the supplement doesn't work in athletes. Too bad there is not direct science to supporty it. To bad each study examing the effects of d-Ribose come up empty - kind of like your wallet if you buy the produc or this book.

An interesting title, for an interesting molecule. Too bad the supplement doesn't work in athletes. Too bad there is not direct science to supporty it. To bad each study examing the effects of d-Ribose come up empty - kind of like your wallet if you buy the produc or this book.

Burkes book is the only book to be found on this important supplement. Ribose is a carbo found naturally in the cells of the body. Physical stress can increase the loss of nucleotides (such as ATP, ADP and AMP) from the heart and skeletal muscles. Ribose helps prevent the loss of these. Those of us who exercise strenuously need to supplement because our environment is toxic and our lives are stressful; therefore we need additional boosts to keep our bodies healthy. This book is information packed but quite the bargain.

I was looking forward to an in depth review of the cards and instead got a very fluffy basic overview. If you've never read anything about tarot, this book is a great intro or primer. The title is very misleading. If you're going to put mastering of anything in your title certain expectations should be met. This book falls horribly short. One star for a nice looking book. Zero stars for informational content. (unless you are an absolute beginner)

This books use of color and overlapping types of cards give the reader a different referance point than some of the other books. It shows a variety of card styles, types, and interpretations. This is a good book to begin the exploration of Tarot. The stories are interesting and fun to read and the layout and color of this book makes it different to the eye.

A lot depends on what one is looking for, when one purchases a book. This was my first book on Tarot and that could be the reason that I was not dissapointed. But I have read quite a few books on divination, written by quite a few authors. I got the same kind of "feeling" from this book, that I got from the other books that were taught me well.

There is some kind of energy that seems to emanate from the manner in which the author communicates with her readers. It feeds knowledge to those who are receptive. It is easy to dismiss something when it doesn't give you what you expected out of it. But, read it again and employ the energy that it gives you, and you could well be on your way to forming a second opinion.

Thank you Juliet Sharman-Burke for interpreting the arcana of the tarot, perhaps in the way it was destined to be.

The book does not really give sufficient information about the villages which are, in fact, memorable experiences. Nonetheless, I am not aware of a better source for information about places in PNG and so recommend that someone traveling to PNG buy this book. There are a few other good books about the culture and art.

Once upon a time, Lonely Planet had a good guide to Papua New Guinea (371 pages), and an excellent one to the Solomon Islands (279 pages). For better or worse these fascinating countries don't exactly attract hordes of holidaymakers, so after leaving those books unupdated for many years, the publisher has now decided to dump them together in this new edition (272 pages).
The result is basically a new, much slimmer guide to Papua New Guinea, with fewer than 30 pages on the Solomons (where it only actually covers half the country even nominally).
Not only has much of the detail been thrown out, the quality of information has also gone downhill sharply! :-(
The authors have very obviously never visited even major tourist destinations of PNG described in the book - as confirmed by owners of accomodations included in it, who told me they had merely received phonecalls from the author who didn't even visit most of the Sepik Region or the Highlands, for example!
Much of the "updating" seems to have been done by surfing the web, and as a result the book abounds in recommendations for expensive, upmarket places and tour-operators that do have websites, while completely ignoring cheaper, budget guesthouses which have no info on the net. Even excellent, small locally owned places that were in previous editions of the PNG guide are conspiciously missing! And as for what the authors consider "budget": their itinerary recommended for budget travellers includes staying at a 150 USD/night resort!

This book is a real shame to Lonely Planet.
If you are planning on resort-hopping on a short holiday, it will be sufficient, but if you want to explore these two countries in depth without spending a fortune, you are far better off trying to find copies of the now out-of-print old editions, which still contain far more useful information than this new guide.
Check Amazon for reviews and availablity of the old Papua New Guinea guide and Solomon Islands one.

Another cheap little book that may well enrich your travels in either of the two countries is LP's Pidgin Phrasebook.
Those keen on getting way off the beaten track in PNG on foot will still find Bushwalking in Papua New Guinea invaluable!

I bought this book hoping it would be helpful for the Solomon Islands. There was only about 30 pages about the Solomons. This book is a great guide for Papua New Guinea. I would suggest looking for older guides. I bought an older guide from lonely planet that was strictly about the Solomon Islands. It was much better, only the finacial info was definitely out of date.