jmperry,
I agree that it takes some searching to find the answers to questions about DNN. The people here on the forums are very knowledgeable, helpful and patient. Many of us here can make a living helping people implement DNN sites primarily because it is not simplistic. People are willing to pay for the effort we extend to find these answers. Those people understand that they get value from us so they are willing to pay because it is worth it for them to not have to go thru the struggle to learn. Their time is better spent doing their core competences. The same should be true for you. It is valuable to you to have someone else do some of the struggle. All a $200 guide has to do is save you a few hours of time and it will be worth the $200. It doesn't have to have all the answers you will ever seek. Try spending less time looking at the cost and more looking at the value. If I buy a $50 book and it saves me an hour, it has paid for itself. It doesn't have to be the best book, it doesn't even have to be a good book, it just has to bring a little value. Even if a $200 guide only helps you learn the DNN terminology it will be worth it. It will help you better search for questions here and understand the answers people give. It could also be worth thousands in just making you look smarter to your customers.
When I started looking into DNN it bought “Professional DotNetNuke ASP.net Portals”. I think it cost about $40. It wasn’t a very good book for beginners and I don’t feel it explained things very well. But it helped me thru my first installation and I have never experienced many of the problems I hear people here having. I would guess that it saved me at the very least 10 hours. I can, under the right circumstances, bill myself out at $100/hr. So that book may have easily been worth 10 times the $40. When you start looking at your cash flow sometimes a $500 thing is hard to pay for, but you need to look at the value.
I just spent about 15 minutes writing this and gave you $25 worth of my time. It was worth it to me because it again reminds me to consider spending money when I need help. Maybe I should buy a module rather than create one. I hope it will help you look at the value and it will probably save you at least $25 in antacids to help you with the stress over everything not being free. Some things relating to DNN are not free, but many times the value they bring makes them a no-brainer.
And, if you need some help to display some database information in DNN check out my simple modules. Heck, just looking and playing around with them may give you ideas and that can be worth the small amout they cost.
Maybe I should charge more 
mj