I've only begun skimming this book, but, based on a few minutes scanning and the author's writing style -- this book rocks. It reminds me of early-80s supplements in its exuberant, over-the-top, "who cares if it's realistic, what matters is -- is it COOL?" attitude. UNLIKE those early supplements, all the words seem to be spelled properly. :) I can't comment on mechanics and game balance yet, but, purely as idea source/catalog of every twisted weapon in SF history, this book is easily worth the nine bucks. Print it out at work. :)

The author also avoids doing what I half-feared the book would be -- endless lists of the same weapons with only the most trivial variants ("Laser Sword" "Laser Long Sword" "Laser Short Sword" "Laser Slightly Less Short Sword" "Laser Very Short Sword" "Glaive glaive glaive guisarme laser"), or page after page of flavor-text less statistics. While the book is 99 44/100 percent pure crunch (Mmmm....crunch!), there is enough flavor text for the weapon categories and individual weapons to make it readable.

I wish to stress this is a preliminary, not in-depth review, and my particular tastes in gaming may not be everyone's.

I wished to contact the author directly, but he seems to have no email. Phooey.