Rating: 
Summary: Clearly the Favorite
Review: With regard to content, Harris' CISSP Guide is, in a word, outstanding. CISSP material is on the dry side so the book breaks the monotony by interspersing the content with amusing anecdotes. Note: If you are one of those people who just cannot accept that a technical book can be anything other than *dry* & boring, then go buy Krutz & Vines CISSP Prep Guide. While I found that title informative it was *extremely* challenging to stay awake to read it. In all matters of practicality, reading both Harris' & Krutz & Vine's CISSP books were largely informative exercises for me because I don't plan on dropping the $400 bucks to take the exam. The economy simply doesn't warrant the expense. There *are* no jobs in security because all the good paying highly skilled positions are being outsourced & offshored to 3rd world scab nations at the fastest rate Congre$$ enables them to be. Furthermore, what's the point of putting your all into studying and securing professional certifications if the best you can do is flipping burgers at $6.00/hr. Don't kid yourself - that's what the United States is depreciating to. It's a race to the bottom where the multibillion dollar transnational corporations have carte blanche to shop the planet for the *cheapest* labor and couldn't care less about American jobs.
Rating:
Summary: All you need...really!
Review: After spending a few weeks agonizing over which book to buy, I bought Shon Harris' CISSP book about a month before I was scheduled to take the CISSP exam. I read it cover to cover in my free time (evenings mostly) during the next few weeks. Let me say up front here that I used no other reference material of any kind. The book covered areas of which I was both familiar and unfamiliar. The sections on the Orange Book and Common Criteria were entirely new to me. The sections on the OSI model and cryptography were not. Faithfully, I took each practice exam at the end of each chapter and scored an average of 92% throughout the book. Come exam day, I was pleasantly surprised to find that there were virtually no questions that the book did not cover. Yes the exam asked more questions in some areas than others, but the book did cover the material. I completed the exam in half the allotted time and walked out confident that I had passed (and easily). A few weeks later my suspicions were confirmed when I received my notification that I had passed. So what's it mean to you? To me, it means this book is capable of getting you a passing score on the CISSP exam. So, buy this book and read it cover to cover. If you find there are areas that you just don't get or can't absorb, then sure, find another source to fill in the blanks for you. Otherwise, go confidently into the exam room knowing you've done an appropriate amount of preparation and enjoy the experience!
Rating:
Summary: I'll try to be serious
Review: I've read some reviews and they are very controversial, so if you feel you're getting confused read this. I've just got a confirmation that I passed the test, and I used only this book for studying. So that books is definitly not a joke and can get you through. Why the reviews are so different? First, the author's style. It's more like recorded lectures then a reference. The author included some jokes and funny examples. They are perfectly correct, not abusive, they add some spice to a highly proffesional text and I personally love them because they make reading that huge book not so boring, but looks like the fact the style is different drives some people mad. Second, the nature of the exam. The covered area is very wide and includes more topic then most people normally know and use. So many readers think the topics they know the best could be written better. The problem is because of so wide coverage you can not go deeper then a certain level. The book is almost 1000 pages long and I personally think it's well balanced and provides adequate knowledge for the test. Yes, some chapters could be extended but then you'd be overwhelmed by the volume and I doubt it would improve your passing score significantly. Some people complained about mistakes. Well, it's true, there are some. But, it's the same idea here. They are not crucial and don't really affect your score much. It's like if you need to get to the airport and you friend offers help you don't really care what car he has. But if you go to dealership to buy a car every minor option gets so important. Same idea here. If your goal is to pass the test, the book can be used as the only training material and provides adequate up-to-date information in a resonable volume for a pretty cheap price. The book does it's job and does it well. It also has some personality so you may love or hate it, but it's just your emotional perception. The knowledge is there.
Rating:
Summary: Great tool for passing the exam or learning about InfoSec.
Review: I recently took and passed the CISSP exam, and this book was one of my main study guides. However, while the title implies that this book alone will help you pass the exam, I think it would be a bad idea to rely on this book alone to pass. It covers a healthy bit of information, but it does little to actually prepare you for the way the test is given. If you're taking the CISSP exam, then you should already have 3-4 years of real world security experience behind you and be familiar with the subject matter of at least a few of the domains covered in the Common Body of Knowledge (CBK). I myself have over 8 years of information security experience, but this book really helped fill in areas where I had little or no experience in, namely application development and disaster recovery planning. This is a very good book, and well worth the price if you're spending the money to take the CISSP test. But it's most effective when coupled with the two books from Krutz, The CISSP Prep Guide: Gold Edition and Advanced CISSP Prep Guide: Exam Q&A, which give you a much better idea of what the test is actually like. If you aren't taking the CISSP exam, this is still a great book that covers an introduction to information security and works well as a desk reference. My copy stays on my desk for those times when I need it.
Rating:
Summary: Best for the CISSP
Review: I used this book as my main source for the CISSP exam. I'd buy it and ignore all the rest. I also used the CISSP Prep Guide (see my review of it if you want). It was pretty good. After I got this book, though, I sat the Prep Guide aside. Maybe I can sell it here, huh? If you already have experience in the security field, and you really think you need to get the CISSP (my company made me, or I wouldn't have), this book is all you really need. Oh yeah. I passed the test. (Don't tell my security friends.)
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Book for CISSP Test Preparation
Review: After taking the ISC2 CISSP Review course, this was the only book I used to study for the test, and I passed on the first try. The sample questions in the book and on the CD are very good, but it is the explanation of the answers that really provided value to me. The explanations cover not only why one answer is correct, but why it is the best choice and why the other choices are not. The study approach I found most helpful was to take notes on the explanations to each question in the book and on the CD. Although I'm still rating the book with 5 stars, one thing about the book that was disappointing was the index. It is so thin that I had difficulty finding references for which I was searching. I hope this shortcoming is addressed in future editions. Bottom line, this is the book I recommend to friends thinking about taking the test. The combination of extremely knowledgeable and readable writing style, along with detailed explanations for all the sample questions, is the best approach I have seen to covering this material.
Rating:
Summary: I PASSED THE CISSP!!!
Review: Here is what I recommend if you are going to sit for the CISSP exam. I read this book from cover to cover, used www.cccure.org's Online CISSP Quizzer which is actually located at (http://www.lostclusterz.com/quiz/quiz.php) which is FREE and the best quiz questions I have found. It beats all the ones I have seen that cost money and even the questions included in this book. After you read the book once, re-read it but quickly and just stop at the parts that you are unfamiliar with and make sure you understand them. Continue to use the online free quiz and just re-read the book as much as you can before the test. I did this within a months period and took the exam and passed! This book just really needs a better editor, and I dislike the use of "her" (seems very ...). Regardless, this book does the trick, thank you.
Rating:
Summary: Must Have for CISSP Exam
Review: If you are planning on taking the CISSP exam, this book is a MUST have in your collection. This book was my main text book for passing the exam. It was the book that my local ISSA chapter gave out in their CISSP Prep class for good reason. The test questions in the book and on the CD are an accurate portrayal of the style and difficulty level of questions you will see on the exam. Good luck!!
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent CISSP prep book
Review: Shon Harris has written an excellent CISSP prep book. My only complaint is that she sometimes venture into areas, which are pretty, much off topic. Other than that, a winner of a book.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent, but overwhelming.
Review: This is a great book and good prep for the CISSP exam. But there is far too much information. If the author could cut out about 20% of the extraneous information, this would be a grand slam of a book.
| 
