I'm new to 2nd edition, been playing < 6 months. I have played years of 1st edition, living in custom worlds, so I was pretty excited to switch over to 2nd edition and try using the official cannon for everything. It is my turn to GM, so I bought this book (and pretty much all of the currently available rule books) in hopes of helping me start a campaign set on Starstone Isle. But other than the nice map of the island this book provides, I find this book very lacking (not just with the info on Starstone Isle).
PROS:
-Great individual area maps of the continents, something your players will like to see in order to understand where the campaign takes place.
-Great timelines to get you up to speed with a bit of the history.
-Provides new backgrounds and dedications to choose from.
CONS:
-No maps of any town/city.
-You basically get between a two-paragraph to one-page description of the continents of Golarion, along with descriptions of (some of) their towns, cities, and important locales. The only exception is that it does provide a description of the city of Absalom's various districts; again, most are no more that a paragraph or two though. Nothing to get excited over... I believe the upcoming release of "Absalom, City of Lost Omens" is purpose built for fulfilling that specific need in the future.
-Pretty much all this info can be found via web searches.
So if you are looking for details and specific map references for any town, then this isn't what you are looking for. Without getting something like the beginner's box or campaign "Troubles in Otari", I had difficulty even getting started. At least those resources provided a town map, important NPC's, and location descriptions of Otari to start from. I haven't purchased any of the other Adventure Paths yet, but it looks like the APs are the way to go in order to find that sort of information.
