Lots of DC villians appear in this story and make a bid for power. The type of power that could destroy the universe. Poorly plotted and drawn. Not worth your money.

Many DC villians will sell their souls for power, here they are offered a chance to do so. Will they do it?What do you think?

Underworld Unleashed was a good crossover. A powerful being named Neron invites a number of villians to do business with him. Neron offers these folks -- ranging from Mongul to Punch and Judee, with everyone in between -- their "heart's desire" in exchange for their souls. Mongul learn the hard way that Neron can be refused or ignored, but not challenged.

Why would Neron want souls he probably owns anyway, assuming he is some sort of demon? What is his true agenda? The Trickster, from whose point of view the story is told in large part, doesn't figure that out until the very end. All he knows going in is what the Fiddler told him: that the word "Neron" was used in ancient times to create the numerologic symbol "666."

There is a lot to like, such as Trickster's P.O.V. Some is old hat. In many places the action was disjointed, perhaps due to the absence of crossed-over stories from other magazines. But overall this is a great read, both for the promised revamping of DC villians and the creation of a genuine long-term player in Neron.

CAT'S CRADLE: WITCH MARK takes place both in the mythical land of Tir na n-Og, and in a simple Welsh village. We know that the land is mythical because we see a lot of unicorns and centaurs. We know that the small village is in Wales, because characters actually refer to each other as "Boyo". The story starts off intriguingly enough. A bus crashes, and during the police investigation, it is discovered that none of the dead bodies can be identified. It's an interesting twist on the standard missing persons story, but unfortunately, the narrative isn't able to sustain its interesting beginnings.

The plot turns out to be slightly poorer than it really should be. To make a long story short, this is the tale of a quest across a strange and magical land, filled with centaurs, unicorns, trolls and other unworldly creatures. Unfortunately, that's all the story is. The Doctor and Ace begin their trek fairly early in the book, but by the three-quarters mark, they are still pretty much in the same state that they were in the beginning, the plot not having budged an inch. Don't get me wrong now, I don't mind a story that's padded, as long as the padding consists of interesting material, sparking prose and enough entertaining substance to maintain the reader's attention. This is not what we got here. And on top of that, after one has struggled through pages and pages that don't amount to anything, the resolution is shockingly quick and far too simple. I do not have a problem with the Doctor talking his way through a solution; in fact, I think some of the best stories have been enhanced by featuring a clever and witty Doctor who is able to mentally run rings around his opponent. Unfortunately, the level of argument has to be of a higher quality than what we ended up with here. Having the Doctor more or less saying, "Don't do this evil thing" and giving the villain no greater of a response than, "Gee, okay" does not make for an exciting resolution.

Even more appalling than the lackluster outcome to the villain's evil scheme is the fact that there are numerous plot threads that are just left dangling. Character motivations that one expected to be explained by the end of the book simply aren't addressed. There are many sequences that only work if you don't think about them too much and forget them before you reach the ending. If one happens to go back and start picking things apart, one will find a host of actions and scenes that were simply left unresolved. It really leaves a bad taste in one's mouth.

WITCH MARK features two of the worst portrayed Americans that the series has ever seen. In their introduction, the author is so intent on making sure they're recognizably American, that he moves them way beyond Cliché American and Stereotypical American and blasts them somewhere into the realm of Ludicrously American and Overwhelmingly Fake American. Make no mistake, if this was a televised story, then they'd both end up sounding exactly like the oh-so-American guy in TOMB OF THE CYBERMEN who went around spouting off macho nonsensical dialog such as, "Hey, some character's gone an' bahlled up tha loh-t!", "C'mon, let's get back to tha rah-ket!", and "Hey, Vic!" Not exactly the soft, realistic character study that one should be aiming for.

The other characters aren't much better. The Doctor and Ace aren't acting like their usual selves. The Seventh Doctor seems at times to be behaving like any incarnation other than the current one. Ace is back to being a silly teenager who appears to have completely bypassed the events of REVELATION and WARHEAD. Secondary characters are similarly poor, with special mention going to the idiot, lisping priest. Future authors should take note: speech impediments aren't really all that funny, and there's nothing more annoying than reading dialog that incorporates a heavy lisp. I was begging for the character to give a quick wink to the audience, shout "Thufferin' thuccotath!", and then take a flying leap towards the nearest window.

The book does have a few things working for it. The mixture of science fiction and fantasy is actually quite interesting. There was the potential here for everything to be rationalized away in an extremely boring "here's the way magic and science really work" speech, yet it rose above these would-be pitfalls. The relationship between Tir na n-Og and "real" Earth somehow managed to come across without feeling cheap. The story was straightforward enough and could be fairly enjoyable in a leave-your-brain-at-the-door type of way. It just isn't at all satisfying.

In the end, sloppy writing and elemental mistakes really hurt this book. What should have been a mind-blowing ending to the Cat's Cradle series turns out to be a fairly standard run-around in fantasy-land. The story itself is hurt by a lack of coherence and a dearth of uninteresting characters. Definitely not one of the better written NAs.

The TARDIS' ongoing problems worsen, and an emergency landing brings the Doctor and Ace to a small Welsh village. Strange creature from legend have been spotted, and a stone circle contains the gateway to another world...

The concluding book in the Cat's Cradle trilogy, this one is plainly the work of a first-time author. While every author must write a first book, that is not necessarily ever published. Mr. Hunt shows that he needed more experience to make this book work. I could give a list of faults, but basically they all come down to that he doesn't understand how a book works. This is not to say that he has no potential!

Add to this that it is of a type that I don't like (explaining myths and legends as science fiction) means that it certainly wasn't a good read for me.

Yet another tiresome volume devoted to post-everything pseudo-disciplines. Poster has almost nothing original to say, but that doesn't stop him. Read on, if you must, to be regailed yet again with clueless francophile jargon about our postmodern, post-colonial, post-structurlist, post-disciplinary society and you just may go postal.

Poster's work is basically about how Foucault and other poststructuralists are great in understanding phenomena of the "past." Unfortunately, the crux of his argument doesn't appear until the final chapters where he reads (and misreads) de Certeau and Foucault. It's good that he tries to cross disciplinary boundaries, but his reading and articulation of "cultural history" is just too narrow.

Ecological Enlightenment, by Ulrich Beck, posed a series of questions about the way in which people should view their society. This collection of twelve essays focuses and tries to make sense of an idea Beck terms "risk society." Basically, a risk society is a society in which the conflicts are focused on the distribution of "bads," like environmental and technological risk, rather than focused on the distribution of "goods" that are typical of a class society. These "bads" may come in a variety of forms, like a nuclear accident, oil spill, large computer failure, and so on. One great example would be the nuclear accident that occurred in 1986 at the Chernobyl Power Plant in the Ukraine, or former Soviet Union.
Ulrich argues that today's society is moving into a new phase where we offer a much more critical eye to the processes of science and technology and the risks they may bring. No longer do we necessarily trust these principles, mainly due to the previous problems we have faced in traditional industrial societies. A risk society, according to Ulrich, is no longer worried only about their survival but rather much more concerned about human beings' catastrophic influence on the Earth and its entire ecosystem.
I understood the main point in Ecological Enlightenment, but for the most part it was extremely difficult to get through. It seemed to be geared toward an audience that has expert knowledge in environmental problems, sociology, and politics. Just the terminology alone is enough to turn off a person with average knowledge in these disciplines. But Ulrich's basic argument on how we are a risk society remains throughout all of his essays with concrete research and examples.
One of the more interesting topics I found in Ecological Enlightenment was in the essay titled "Science and Security". I read this soon after our discussion in class on who and what a person should believe. Ulrich argues that many controversial topics in science will no longer get one cut and dry answer. Instead, a person may expect to get numerous different answers about one questionable topic. The example in his essay is whether or not formaldehyde is poisonous. You "will get fifteen different answers from, say, five scientists, all the answers garnished with 'yes, but' or 'on the one hand...on the other hand'-if those questioned are thoughtful."
So do I think we are living in a risk society? That's a difficult question to answer and one that I could not give a definite "yes" or "no" to. Ulrich's basic argument of a risk society makes sense to me and I can see examples of this in many modern day situations. People just don't believe that everything is going to be okay and our problems will miraculously be solved anymore. But I must also say that I would be much more enlightened by Ulrich's theory if it were put in more simplistic terms.

Ulrich Beck, a professor at the Institute for Sociology at the Ludwig-Maxillians Univeristy, Munich, discusses environmental and social implications involved with modernity in his book, Ecological Enlightenment: Essays on the Politics of the Risk Society.
Beck begins by defining the term risk society, "an epoch in which the dark sides of progress increasingly come to dominate social and political debates". His overall argument expresses that people are able to recognize the changes in logic that take place in industrialized, modern societies. In the past, industrialized societies were concerned with producing material goods. However, since the end of WW II, the issue has shifted, and now people are worrying about the production of risks. According to Beck, "It is not that industrial societies produce no risks, but rather that the nature of contemporary risks tends to become more visible and worrisome as a more affluent society demands a better quality of life". Previously, in industrialized societies, typically wealthy people with high social economic status were exposed to fewer hazards than the middleclass or poor people. However, the newer risks such as the greenhouse effect, nuclear radiation and biotechnology wastes that people are faced with today, pose as harmful risks to all social groups.
With the creation of chemical, nuclear and genetically modified products, the present era, initiates what Beck calls modern risks. He states that modern risks are results of social decisions that are based on technological/economical advantages, as well as decision-making concerning usage.
Beck also emphasizes the need for scientific expertise when experimenting with modern forms of environmental degradation compared to traditional methods used in the industrial era, due to the increased levels of toxicity. For example, nucleic waste is far more deadly than factory smoke. By presenting an expert's results, the general level of comprehension is increased and the status of professionals in the related field helps determine the level of people with or without knowledge.
Additionally, Beck states that the conflict of the future will no longer be between East and West, or communism or capitalism; it will be stem between two modernities, which will battle over the compatibility of survival and human rights.
This is a very challenging book meant for highly informed readers interested in subjects related to environment sociology. Beck brings up some interesting insights of the types of challenges the world has yet to face.

I'd like to get some info on how to get a hold of the shot glasses that have 0 oz for RABBITS 1 oz For Ladies 2 oz For Gents 3 oz For ??? (I can't remember) 4 oz For JACKASSES

We had a set in the house when I was a kid and they were thick and sort of frosted. I had one left and I dropped it a few months back and broke it. Pls steer me in a good direction for help.

This is Pickvet's third, and largest book. It includes illustrations of about 1000 new glasses, bringing the number of glasses he has identified to around 4000. It also includes descriptions of all of the glasses from the three books, a price guide and an index.

This is the best of his three books, and one of the best books available on the topic. In this volume he corrects some errors from the earlier books, and adds some additional features, such as the index. Unfortunately, there are still problems with the book.

The illustrations in the book are black and white line drawings of one view of each glass. These drawings are a good references for many glasses, especially those with a simple designs, on one side of the glass. Unfortunately they make it very difficult to identify many glasses that have a wrap-around design, or those with an additional design on the other side of the glass.

A complete description would help identify those glasses where the drawing does not include the entire design, but many of the descriptions seem as if they were written while looking at the drawing. The descriptions are in a separate section, apart from the drawings, which makes looking at the drawing and reading the description very awkward.

Trying to find a particular glass in the book can be a frustrating experience. The drawings and descriptions are organized by decade, which makes it difficult to find an glass of unknown age. The index should help, but it is not complete. I know that there is a glass in one of the books with the word "huzzah" but I cannot find it...

Despite these flaws, this is still a great reference. There is even a checklist in the back, where you can check off the glasses as you add them to your collection. In these days of on-line auctions, the price guide can be a great help!

-- Mark

Unfortunately, this was the first JavaScript book I ever purchased. I leafed through the book, hoping to learn how to script. Instead what I got were long, complicated, unexplained examples of code. This books shows HTML and JavaScript solutions for specific applications, with the HTML code looking more attractive than the JavaScript. Perhaps you can rip the code right from the book and use it on your site, if you so desire, but you will end up learning absolutely nothing about scripting. This book will serve me well by keeping me warm in the winter.

I read the book from cover to cover. Then I read the appendices full through twice. And then I began reading the book again. Still, I don't have a complete knowledge of JavaScript. I can't write even the simplest javascript without making it a mirror of one that is in the book. I don't believe the book explains the structure of JavaScript. It explains what all the different functions, properties, methods, and event handlers do, and gives some good ideas of what to do with JavaScript. However, it doesn't explain how to put it all together. Keep in mind, I am a Junior at Oklahoma State University studying in the Computer Science department. I have a 3.70 gpa. This shows that I am not incapable of learning JavaScript, but that I have the necessary skills that the book recommends a person know before reading the book.

I thought this book was just OK. I thought a far better book on this subject was the Vault Reports Guide to America's Top 50 Law Firms, which has 10-pages or so on each firm and is loaded with an insider perspective on what life is like on each of these law firms.

This book consists of 18 short chapters by lawyers who tell of an experience they had during their first year after law school. Though all of the stories are mildly interesting, few really tell us much about either the legal profession or the lawyer as a person. One strength of the book is that the lawyers who contributed chapters come from a wide range of legal areas and employment situations, including one woman who left the law to be a journalist.

Positives: Gorgeous photos and substantial fact-based descriptions of pre-1971 Mercedes Benz SLs.
Glaring NEGATIVE: Only five sentences and no photos on the SLs from 1971 to the present (350SL, 450SL, 380SL, 500SL, 560SL, SL-class, etc.).
IMHO, if it could be retitled "Pre-1971 SLs", it would rate five stars but, as it is, it was a near total disappointment for this '72 350SL owner.

SL lovers will find Meredith's book fun to read for the pictures alone. Lots of neat restored 300SL coupe & rdstrs, 190SL's and 230/250/280SL's with many nice detailed photos of obscure options, etc. I particularly liked the last chapter showing raw data from the factory about production details. Be aware that the book has numerous factual errors. For example, Meredith says that the W113/Pagoda cars had black engine compartments, including the underside of the hood/bonnet. This is WRONG. Those areas should be the same color as the exterior of the car. There are other errors as well. It is a pity that a book that is so informative and that so many people will doubtless refer to for many, many years helps to spread misinformation. Future restorers beware.

Terry Kavanagh is one writer who does the most uninteresting stories in comics. He gave us the Spider-clone saga and a teenage Iron Man. This story where he supposedly gives us the origin of one of the X-Men's most dangerous foes has now been contradicted by current stories going on in the X-Men comics and must be placed as one of those false lead stoires like those that have shown Wolverine's origins,

For some reason, the movie "The Scorpion King" made me think of this book. Maybe it's because both of them contain muscle-bound, anti-heroes overthrowing an oppresive Egyptian Monarchy. There are even some scenes where The Rock, with his top-knot ponytail and overly buff physique sort of resembles Apocalypse without the blue facepaint.

Personally, I liked the artwork in "The Rise of Apocalypse". The lush character design and splash-page layouts tend to grab your attention.

Unfortunately, the story detracts from the experience as much as the artwork enhances it. As the other reviewer said, it's pretty poorly written. Apocalypse, who is (was) supposed to be one of the Marvel Universe's most powerful villians doesn't even get a decent backstory in his own origin. Terry Cavanaugh does a horrible job illustrating Apocalypse's mutant ability and an even worse job explaining the spark that sets off his millenia-old war on humanity.

Still...it's fun to look at. I'd give it 2.5 stars for the artwork alone.

This book is more focused on programming javascript for microsoft's IE. At the time of publication Netscape was still as prevalent as IE and hence (should have) made programmers decide to go with another book (to keep a cross browser focus). But now that IE has taken over (at the time of this review) this book can prove quite helpful.

I would suggest the book: Beginning JavaScript (by Paul Wilton). This has more in-depth coverage and lots of great examples to get beginners, int, and adv. users moving quick. See that review.

A typical book from the "Using" series. Provides some helpful information for beginning programmers, but has an overall low content to mass ratio.