Like any other recent Wrox titles, this one contains jewels and pretenders. On the bright side, quite a few of the Java and XML chapters are strong, and I particularly liked the ones on EJB, PL/SQL-Java inter-operation, and SOAP. There is also a chapter at the end on setting up the environment to run the book samples. On the not so bright side, the PL/SQL chapters are disappointing, because they cover either fundamental stuff that anyone who calls themselves an Oracle developer should know, or irrelevant technologies like OAS PL/SQL cartridge and PSP (huh?). The chapters on JDBC and connection pooling wasted 60% of the pages by talking about the basic JDBC API and showing the details of a connection pool manager class, rather than talking more about Oracle's extensions to the JDBC 2.0 standard and optional packages API. Finally, there is one glaring omission - MTS (I am talking about the Microsoft stuff here), although it does contain an informative chapter on ASP/Oracle. One more thing: this book covers Oracle8i Release 2, not the latest 3.

With everything considered, you may still want to own this title, as it is the only book under the sun that covers all (well, almost) current distributed programming technologies that interface with Oracle (both J2EE and Windows DNA). It also covers promising Oracle proprietary technologies such as interMedia, BC4J, and Portal (aka WebDB).

This book is one of the more comprehensive I have read about Oracle programming. It has very good examples and you will find tips and information you won't find in any other books/web sites/forums etc. This book has been written by genuine Oracle developers and you will get a depth of real-world knowledge and application. I recommend highly it for the serious Oracle, Java and XML developer.

To produce this book, Wrox took twenty expert Oracle developers and had each of them write about their area of expertise. The result is that whether you are a manager, a developer, or a DBA, if you are working with Oracle 8i this book should be on your desk. This book covers virtually every topic that you need to understand about the Oracle 8i development platform. It does not cover each topic completely but it provides a thorough and in most cases sufficient introduction on each topic. For a particular topic of interest you may need an additional book but to get all the information found in this book you would need ten volumes at least. The book opens with an introduction to Oracle 8i and some of its components including Net8 (Oracle's network solution) and Designer 6i (Oracle's development environment). The next section covers PL/SQL and PSP (this is similar to JSP). This is followed by an extensive section covering Java. This section covers JDBC, SQLJ, EJB, and interMedia (Oracle's powerful search tool). The last section covers XML and includes information on DOM and SAX parsers, SOAP, XSL, XSQL, and more. Extensive case studies are scattered throughout the book. Examples show how to use Oracle tools such as BC4J to develop enterprise applications. The book even includes primers on Java and XML. As a tour of all the features of Oracle 8i, this book is without competition.

The Book of Druidry claims to be a history of an ancient religious system. In fact, the book presents a modern blend of New Age approaches, pop psychology, Nicholls' own ideas, and the well-intended but inaccurate writings of 18th century antiquarians such as John Toland and William Stukeley. For example, Nicholls and Carr-Gomm present druidry as a prehistoric system of belief that they say originated on Atlantis, was practiced by the builders of Stonehenge, and was adopted later by Celtic settlers in Britain. Such statements contradict all the archaeological, linguistic, and historical evidence that document the druids as the clergy of the pre-Christian Celts. Another imaginative idea asserted as fact in this book is that the Ce/li De/, a monastic reform movement of ninth-century Ireland, was actually founded by the sixth-century saint Colum cille as a refuge for persecuted druids and a vehicle for preserving druidry for future generations. If you are seeking accurate information in an easy-to-read format, try Miranda Green's _The World of the Druids_ or Barry Cunliffe's _The Ancient Celts_. For more depth, see Anne Ross's _Pagan Celtic Britain_, Green's _The Celtic World_, and _The Celts_ ed. by Moscati. The facts about the druids are intriguing in themselves; there's no need to manufacture a history for them.

this book was more than I anticipated. i didn't know anyone who could fit that much information in any type of book Ross does it well and keeps it interesting. A must for anyone wishing to know history and druidism...

Modern druidry traces its roots to the early 1700's and that is the tradition that this book is about. The Order of Bards, Ovates, and Druids is still around and going strong and this book seems to be an introduction to the Order.

All that aside, it is a good read. A wealth of ideas, this book can be one step on your spiritual path. Or it can be just an interesting book about modern druids. Regardless of your beliefs, if you have any interest in the subject this is a good book.

There are many other books available if you are interested in historical druids- "The Druids" by Stuart Piggott, for example.

I've long respected John and Caitlin Matthews for their elegance of expression and willingness to turn to actual Celtic sources. In fact, it's partly thanks to them that I'm studying Celtic language and literature at a graduate level. But...there's no getting around it: the evidence just doesn't support John Matthew's conclusions in this book. The translations are...imaginative, shall we say, (and yes, I do know Old Welsh) The [probably] historical Taliesin's poems are available edited by the great Sir Ifor Williams and his edition is available in English as 'The Poems of Taliesin' trans. by J Caerwyn Williams. They are a) much earlier than the material presented here, and b) not mystical or pagan. In fact, one of the best ones, the 'Marnawd Owain' begins and ends: 'The soul of Owain son of Urien, /may the Lord consider its need...' and is thoroughly Christian. Full stop.
The 'druidic/shamanic' poems Matthews presents as being earlier are AT LEAST THREE HUNDRED YEARS LATER than the poems of the historical Taliesin, and whilst it's true that they draw on common Celtic tradition about the role and power of the poet, we CANNOT draw conclusions about pre-Christian shamanic practice [if there was such a thing] from poems written between 900 and 1200. Do the maths. It's the same with the Sovereignty figure. In what sense is She the 'Goddess'? Yup, the pre-Christian Celts probably worshipped their bit of earth as a goddess. Fine. But this descends through three to four hundred years of Christianity before it appears in writing. It's a LITERARY motif, not a pagan one. To give another example, when medieval German poets referred to 'Frau Minne', Lady Love, the tradition they were drawing on could be traced back through European culture to the goddess Venus/Aphrodite. But in no meaningful sense were they worshipping a pagan Goddess! It's the same with early medieval Irish writers invoking the figure of Sovereignty, and with medieval Welsh poets concocting poems - drawing on old tradition - in the voice of a prophetic superbard, identified with a historical poet who died three hundred years or more before thy were born. such a strategy boosts their own prestige.

The saddest thing in the whole book is the introduction, in which John looks forward to the publication of Professor Patrick Ford's work on the same material. This is now out as 'Ystoria Taliesin'. It's brilliant. Get them both, compare and contrast...you'll see what i mean.

There is no true study of the Celts or of Druidry that omits the work of the Bards themselves. While we may all await with baited breath an English translation of the Four Ancient Books of Wales, Matthews has provided us with substantial, fresh, sensitive translations of much of Taliesin's work. An indispensible volume.

I've been fascinated with myths and dreams and prophecy for some time, so I found John Matthews book TALIESIN THE LAST SHAMAN quite intriguing. The book has two parts: 1) an exploration of what is known or thought to be known about Taliesin who was probably a real person who lived in the 5th - 6th centuries in Britain as well as an interpretation of what Taliesin's works represent; 2) a collection of Taliesin's poetry translated by Matthews and his wife Caitlin.

Taliesin was probably British or Welsh although he might have considered himself something else-perhaps Cymry. The Romans described the inhabitants of what is today the United Kingdom as British, while the English referred to them as Welsh-their word for foreigner. Matthews refers to Taliesin as Celtic (Keltoi), a word the Greeks used to describe the people of northern Europe. Matthews describes the Celtic society that probably produced Taliesin and links his poetry to the Celtic view of the cosmos. He sees Taliesin as a "wise" man who penetrated the secrets of the universe and then attempted to share his vision via words.

Since I don't speak or read ancient Welsh or Irish, I can't pretend to know whether or not Matthews' interpretation of the Taliesin poetry is good or bad or even accurate. Although the book is not from a mainstream academic source, Matthews appears to be relatively scholarly, frequently citing from respected works and noting where his perspective differs from that of others. He also uses contextual material to locate Taliesin in time and space as an historical person. This secondary material seems to be consistent with various academic interpretations.

As a practicing Celtic shaman, I'm not sure how useful these cards are. The method for using them is confusing and not really enjoyable. The artwork is (in my opinion) pretty bland & amateurish. There really aren't a lot of people out there writing about Celtic shamanism; some people don't even believe that the Celts practiced shamanism at all! Seems like if I want a book on the subject, I'm pretty limited to John Matthews, & his work is not always very enlightening or organized. Such is the case with this deck.
You don't need this deck to practice Celtic or any other form of shamanism, but some better decks might be "The Druid Animal Oracle", "the Celtic Tree Oracle" & "the Greenwood Tarot." It doesn't have to say "Celtic Shamanism" on the box to be of use to you.

These cards have a special format that is not like any other card/rune set that I have ever encountered. You have several families of cards to deal with and must draw from all of them. Happily, they are set out to provide a full reading. Also, the artwork on them is bright and energetic. Not if you are feeling in a meditative mood

This deck is not a standard tarot meant for divination, and thus can be difficult to use well for that purpose. For a practicing Celtic shaman, they are indispensible for planning and focusing a journey into the Otherworlds.

If you are a Celtic shaman, this deck can become a truly sacred object. Those seeking to use it as a regular tarot should have some tarot experience first; even then, it may not work as you expect it to.

This is a Fantastic book, especially for anyone who wants to do more than simply read fortunes with their Tarot pack! This course goes much further into Magic and inner development, and with that, some pretty scary realisations come! A must for anyone seriously into the Celtic aspects of Tarot or Magic. It also has a great Bibliography at the end for further studies. (I'd also highly reccomend RJ Stewart for anyone who's interested in finding something with a little more 'bite' than most of the 'new age' books on the market at the moment!)

I was drawn to this deck, the art work is beautiful and The legend of King Aurthur is of great interest to me. It beats the Waite-Rider deck that I used to use.

Those looking for a Tarot deck and course which explains the minutae and difference between a seven of wands reversed and a eight of swords are going to be disappointed in this set. Its completely different in scope, outlook and use. More of a mediative deck than one for divination, the Hallowquest is not everyone's kettle of fish, but if you have an interest in meditating on the archetypes of the Arthurian world, then this book is your cup of tea indeed.

Wenham sets out to prove that the Synoptic Gospels were written in the early to mid 40's A.D., a good 20-25 years before the earliest generally-accepted date for Mark. His analysis is thoroughgoing, well-researched, and heavily documented. Unfortunately, his defense of evidence for the early dating lacks the cogency and forcefulness of his attack on the evidence for later dating. While Wenham is vociferously dismissive of evidence contrary to his viewpoint, he uncritically accepts evidence supporting his viewpoint. He bedrocks his early dating on a two pronged analysis: 1. Dismissal of the documentary solutions to the Synoptic Problem, and 2. Heavy reliance on the Patristic evidence of authorship. Firstly, the documentary explanations of the Synoptic Problem must be dismissed because if the Gospels were based on earlier documents, they must perforce be later documents. Secondly, from acceptance of the Patristic evidence of authorship, Wenham can infer a very early date for each of the Synoptics. The book makes interesting reading, but it fails to carry the day in establishing such an early date for the Synoptic Gospels.

One caveat: If you can't read Greek, the first half of the book will be rough sailing, as it analyzes many gospel pericopes in Greek. With a little patience you can, however, muddle your way through it.

Wenham's work is, as noted above, thoroughly documented, researched and conducted. And I would go further than the earlier review. If you don't have a working knowledge of Greek, this will probably be too painful for you.

However, I would say it rewards careful reading of the one willing to examine the issue without buying into the current dogmas of NT scholarship. I did not find him uncritically assuming his own evidence true, rather in several places I recall him saying he would not dogmatically assert either way. The point is to him much of the evidence can be used to support whatever theory one wishes to contrive. "Q" can be made to look reasonable to many, as can Markan priority, if we don't examine the facts behind WHY these works were written.

As to counting Patristic evidence, one could say NT scholarship today dogmatically REJECTS Patristic evidence whenever it doesn't fit their hypothesis. Who's to say that scholars sitting in their offices 2000 years removed automatically have a better concept of the events than 2nd & 3rd century scholars? Am I attacking all NT scholarship? No. But I think it is fair to give the author a reasonable hearing. And I think, after a reasonable hearing, it is not unreasonable to see at least Matthew and Mark written before AD55, and see some measure of MUTUAL dependance between the Gospels.

Neither of these would be fashionable in many NT circles today. But that doesn't mean they are not real possiblities.

Wenham has done a remarkable job of examining the external evidence (the words of the fathers) and the internal evidence (the Gospels themselves) to demonstrate not only the plausability, but the probability of:

1. An early date for the Gospels.
2. The traditional order of Mt, Mk, Lk.
3. The involvement of not only written but oral tradition in Gospel formation.

Critics charge Wenham with relying too heavily on patristic sources. But such charge thus if one relies on the patristics at all in this matter. The critics of the Augustinian order have never satisfactorily explained the origin of the traditional order if a different order is true. In any case, Wenham does solid work in establishing the essential trustworthiness of the patristic sources.

He is perhaps even stronger is his examination of the interrelations between the synoptics as he works through the various synoptic theories and how they fare in terms of how they used or allegedly used each other in their mutual formation.

Wenham believes strongly that oral tradition played a key role in determining the form and the content of each of the Gospels. Despite this, he eschews the idea that they were written in ignorance of each other. He argues dispassionately but forcefully that each successively impacted the ones that followed.

Those who hold variant opinions of the origins of the Gospels do not hold them well until they have positively worked through Wenham's arguments.

I further recommend the writings of B.C. Butler on this topic.

I was surprised when I first read that this book was out of print and I am thankful that I bought it when it was first published.

Over the years, I have found it to be a valuable reference on the subject of Taliesin and Bards in genereal. There is controversy regarding the legitimacy of many of John Matthews' writings, but I have not yet been disappointed with his writing or research.

There has been rumour of this book being republished in the next year ot so. I hope this is the case as it is a book Iwould reccommend to anyone interested in knowing more about Taliesin and the Bardic practise.

The Matthews' Taliesin gives two unique contributions to our understanding. One is John and Caitlin's own translations of about thirty of Taliesin's poems, providing the greatest collection of Taliesin writings available in print in modern translation. The other is John Matthews' extensive demonstration of his understanding of the 6th century Taliesin as a "shaman", similar in social function and mystical abilities to shamans of ancient times in Siberia, the Americas and elsewhere.
John Matthews takes the exact opposite view of Taliesin from the scholar Sir Ifor Williams. Where Williams is interested only in the provably historical works of Taliesin, court bard, Matthews excludes these from his exploration. Matthews engages the reader's attention with Taliesin's timeless mystical works, and with Irish and occasionally Welsh texts that he sees as relevant to the understanding of pre-Christian shamanism. He interprets most of Taliesin's poems as cosmological myths.
Newcomers should beware of Matthews' errors on matters peripheral to his focus. He says "Gildas" when he should say "Nennius". He writes "Owain Gwynedd" when "Owain of Rheged" would be correct. He speaks unclearly of a sixth century "separation of the Welsh and British languages", when he means the separation of the unified fifth and sixth century British language into Welsh, Cornish and Scots Gaelic that surely began only in the seventh century after the merger of the Celtic kingdom of Rheged with English Northumbria. But none of this need deter the reader from diving into the rich understanding of Taliesin the mystic which this book provides.

I am surprised that this book is "out of print!" When I read this book, in '93, I was compelled to finish it in a few days, although I had little time to read. Taliesin is an epic adventure in Mythology, Legend, Oral Tradition and many other areas of interest. I recently loaned it out and my friend devoured it! Anyone interested in The Mysteries, History, Celtic Lore, etc. will find this book worthy of searching-for. Also, you may want to grab a copy of "The Mabinogi And Other Welsh Tales," by Patrick K. Ford.

Trying to follow the electrical diagrams in this book will reveal its limitations. Other sections seem a bit brief also. However, with the exception of the Volvo factory books, this is the best general reference that I have found. The factory books are purchased seperately, and are meant to go into a binder. To buy all the factory books for the 740 would cost over $3000, making this book a bargin!

Although there have been a few things that I was interested in that were not included in the book, for the most part it's a sufficient repair manual. I'm a very inexperienced mechanically, but I've been able to do quite a bit of work on my 740s using this book. It does cover stuff that I wouldn't even think of doing though---including pulling the tranny apart...

I searched the entire book and found no infomation on how to service or troubleshoot the high beam switch. I did see the turn signal portion but no information on the high beam switch.

Yep after months and months of ranting and criticizing that the red book publishers (Wrox) have lost their magic touch, just when we were about to give up on them, they return with an outstanding book, probably one of the best in their Beginning series ever, and coming back in form in such style, this is simply unbelievable - Beginning C# is all I needed.
Working as a developer in ASP for over 3 years now, but never actually having tried my hands in a real hardcore programming language, I bought EACH AND EVERY book on C# being published since the past one year, but couldn't get past the 40th page of any of the books, they were designed for hardcore programmers and for a moment I wondered if Microsoft and other authors were leaving pure ASP programmers down the drain.
Beginning C# is the answer to all the prayers if you've faced the same delima as I have.
First the drawbacks.
Someone at wrox has decided that publishing a book less than 1000pages is a crime.so I guess I can let go of that. This book has 1031 pages.
Having multiple authors at times irritatingly breaks the smooth flow of explanations from chapter to chapter. GDI+ may be understanding enough as a chapter but the manner of explanations and approach to "try it out" examples is suffocating, irritating and makes you want to tear the entire chapter out of the book.
Also some examples are NOT WORKING and THIS CAN GET YOU FRUSTRATED, so be WARNED.
The plus points.
25 chapters, precise to the point, length of each chapter kept under 25 to 30 pages. Basic aim of each chapter is to explain the topic and right away get your hands dirty with examples.Each example explained step by step.
OOP being an integral part of C# comes only on Ch#8 after you have grown sufficiently confident enough to open Visual Studio and write basic programs for Windows/Web.
This according to me is a very intelligent planning of chapters and hence non of the chapters come across as speaking to you in a foriegn language or in a manner of saying that "sorry if you don't understand us , you are an idiot"....
This book can be held at the same high teaching standards set by Beginning ASPDatabases/Beginning ASP/Beginning JavaScript.

The only other book which even comes close to this is C# By Herb Schildt. Which is another exceptionally good book for beginners, though it does not touch the wide range of topics as Beg.C#
With this book Wrox is back in form.
Simply put... An Amazing Achievement....

Wanting to move up to a more sophisticated WEB language (from ASP,VB) I've bought quite a few books on .Net and C#. However, all of them left me with a lot of questions on how to just get started with the language.

This book solves all those problems. Anyone new to C# or just object oriented programming, can learn from this book.

The way that Karli eases you into the concepts and describes what each line of code does is extremely helpful.

This book is probably NOT for the Intermediate to Advanced programmer as Karli covers a lot of basic programming concepts. However, It also is a great primer for anyone wanting exposure to the language.

I wanted to learn C# (and learn more about .Net), and I'm coming from a mostly VB and ASP background. I was happy with Wrox's "C# Programming with the Public Beta" book (co-written by Watson), but wanted something that was more complete. At close to 1000 pages, this book certainly FEELS complete. It is also smartly outlined with excellent examples and exercises at the end of each chapter (but where are the answers??). Best of all once you step through the chapters on Windows and the web, there are TWO complete Case Studies (something I love about the Wrox books), and an article about building an Online Shopping Cart Using C#.
This book is similar in quality to Ivor Horton's "Beginning Java 2" books. (Only with better examples, in my opinion).

I'd been looking forward to getting this deck. While I've enjoyed reading the card intrepretations, I'm very disappointed with the deck. The cards have a kind of slick/sticky coating that makes them extremely difficult to shuffle. Plus the artwork leaves a lot to be desired.

This is the best deck I have used so far. Even if the pictures aren't as beautiful as many other decks, they are brightly colored. The feel and accuracy of the deck makes up for any lack of ability on the artist's part.

The interpretations for the cards are easy to understand and apply to everyday life, they do not fall into the trap of oversimplification or cryptic meanings. I also found the histories of the people portrayed as a good way to ease into the legends surrounding the area.

I would recommend this deck to anyone.

Lisa's deck succeeded where all others have failed with me. I am able to remember the information about each card (I have a poor memory) because she packs so much symbolism into each image. Not only that but the energy she so obviously poured lovingly into each card shines so brightly as to burn their meaning into my very soul. I love the jewel-like colours, the way she portrays Avalon in both verdant and subtle hues, so adeptly conjuring up the soul-poetry and magic of this landscape and it's many and varied inhabitants. If I diodn't live here I would want to after seeing this fabulous deck which I would recommend to anyone who loves Glastonbury with it's profound mystery and soul-poetry... and to anyone who loves the Tarot. A rare treat.