The California Gun Owner's Guide [Paperback]

Georgene Lockwood (Author), Alan Korwin (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0962195898 | ISBN-13: 978-0962195891 | Publication Date: 1999 | Edition: Special Limited 2nd

Get all the gun laws word-for-word and in plain English too.

The California Gun Owner's Guide includes all the state gun laws for having, buying, selling, carrying and using firearms. Special edition is 8-1/2 by 11 inches -- Calif. has passed twice as much gun law as the entire federal government; includes all of them, and plain English descriptions of the laws passed since 1998; plus, details on the use of deadly force and self defense, concealed-carry licenses, special weapons, gun safety, school and kid laws, transportation, federal laws... you get the most complete coverage available for California's handling of the Second Amendment to the Constitution.

Includes more than 150 self-test questions, 22 lethal-encounter scenarios for study and discussion, much more. Used in classes statewide and widely endorsed. Every gun owner needs a gun owner's guide. Why take chances, don't guess, and don't be sorry later.

• Answers your questions about owning, carrying and using guns

• It's like an entire firearms law library at your fingertips

• It doesn't make sense to own a gun and not know the rules

• You sure don't want to be in trouble for a rule you never heard of

• Ignorance is no excuse—it's better to know the rules

• You have a right to know what the laws are

• Cheaper than a lawyer, and better than many!

• It's actually fun to read!

• If you knew all your rights you might demand them

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Georgene Lockwood's bio will be posted here shortly.

Alan Korwin, author of three books and co-author of seven others, is a full-time freelance writer, consultant and businessman with a twenty-five-year track record. He is a founder and two-term past president of the Arizona Book Publishing Association, which has presented him with its Visionary Leadership award, named in his honor, the Korwin Award. He has received national awards for his publicity work as a member of the Society for Technical Communication, and is a past board member of the Arizona chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.

Working with American Express, Mr. Korwin wrote the executive-level strategic plan that defined its worldwide telecommunications strategy for the 1990s; he wrote the business plan that raised $5 million in venture capital and launched SkyMall; he did the publicity for Pulitzer Prize cartoonist Steve Benson’s fourth book; and he had a hand in developing ASPED, Arizona’s economic strategic plan. Korwin’s writing appears often in a wide spectrum of local and national publications.

Korwin turned his first book, The Arizona Gun Owner’s Guide, into a self-published best-seller, now in its 20th edition. With his wife Cheryl he operates Bloomfield Press, which has grown into the largest producer and distributor of gun-law books in the country. It is built around six books he has completed on the subject including the unabridged guide Gun Laws of America, an expanding line of related items, and countless radio and TV appearances. Supreme Court Gun Cases is his 10th book.

Alan Korwin is originally from New York City, where his clients included IBM, AT&T, NYNEX and others, many with real names. He is a pretty good guitarist and singer, with a penchant for parody (his last band was The Cartridge Family). In 1986, finally married, he moved to the Valley of the Sun. It was a joyful and successful move. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Paperback: 168 pages
• Publisher: Bloomfield Pr; Special Limited 2nd edition (1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0962195898
• ISBN-13: 978-0962195891
• Product Dimensions: 10.7 x 8.3 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 1.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,946,701 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Very disappointed!, October 20, 2006

By 

Evan D. Dorn "SF Aficionado" (Pasadena, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The California Gun Owner's Guide (Paperback)

I bought this book when I purchased my first firearm in California, in order to make sure I understood the laws and could own and use my gun legally and responsibly. I was expecting a plain-english explanation of California's gun laws. For example, how do I need to store my gun to carry it in an automobile legally? What are the CA-specific criteria for evaluating legal cases where a gun has been used in self defense? How do I identify national and state forest areas where target shooting is legal? Can a backpacker carry a firearm as protection from wildlife, or will he run afoul of concealed-carry laws in doing so? But none of these questions are answered in the book unless one wants to pore through 90 pages of the actual legal code: there's no CA-specific plain-english explanation at all anywhere in the book.

The front section "background on the laws" is generic safety and self-defense information that I suspect is not specific to California; I think the section is probably the same in all 50 books in this series. It was somewhat useful, but didn't really discuss California in specific, and spent a significant fraction of the time complaining that there is too much gun law rather than explaining the laws as they are.

Then there was a brief section about the federal law, which primarily consists of opinion (whining) about laws like the Brady Bill.

Then followed the 90-page "Main Section", which is nothing but the cut-and-pasted actual legal text of all California's laws ... as they were in 1998. An appendix includes the California changes through 2001. (I bought this book in 2006). Five years out of date, and no plain-english explanation whatsoever. It's informative if you're willing to dig through the actual legal text. And entertaining, too: for example you can discover that it is specifically illegal, in California, to hunt frogs with firearms. (??) But it isn't at all what I thought I was getting when I purchased the book.

After that are 15 poorly-written pages of ranting about how terrible the gun laws are including "Position Paper" editorials and "The Liberty Poll" (in fact this sort of material is interspersed throughout the book). Most of this seems to be written by coauthor Alan Korwin and I suspect is also boilerplate cut-and-pasted into all 50 books in the series. If you're generally pro-gun, it will mostly be opinion you already agree with. If you're pro-gun-control, it will be otherwise. If you're a moderate (like myself) it will just be more of the same old debate you're already very tired of. In any case, it's merely opinion and not particularly informative.

I also bought "traveler's guide to the firearms laws of the 50 states" by the same press. Though it only has one page on California, that page was significantly more informative than this entire book explaining what Californians need to know in specific.

If you're a lawyer living in 2001 needing a quick reference to the legal text, or you mostly want opinion screed similar to what you'd find on any pro-gun website, you'll be happy with this book. Everyone else should skip it and buy something else.