Don, there are lots of ways to turn a bowl, and lots of ways to dry one. You only need one or two though, to accomplish your desires. I have tried all the ways of drying wood faster. I have soaked in soap, boiled, and soaked in alcohol. I built a kiln. While all of these methods have their advocates and evidence of their efficacy, nothing works are reliably or as inexpensively as time.
When I turn a piece of wet wood, I throw it in the barn and let it sit. Sometimes they sit for the bare minimum of time needed, and sometimes they sit for years. Last year (2005 to be exact) I finished a bowl which was roughed out in 1999. It was a special piece of wood, and was just waiting for that special customer to come along and appreciate it.
Many new turners complain that they do not want to wait for that bowl to dry. The want to finish it as quickly as possible. My answer to that is to go turn more wet bowls and put them aside! Before you know it, you will have a pile of dry bowls to finish at your leisure, with more wet ones to feed the pile of those drying.
I do a few things to help me make sure the bowl is going to dry evenly with a minimum of cracking. Even so, there are those which feed the fire to keep us warm in the winter. When I turn wet wood, if it is real wet, I will seal the end grain with wax - Anchorseal to be specific. I will bag the bowl in paper (never plastic!) to buffer the free water coming out and help the bound water come out more evenly, which prevents cracking. I will make the rim thicker and the bottom thinner to help that water leave the wood evenly, again preventing cracking. I will center the bowl on the pith, to regularize the grain pattern and again prevent cracking.
None of this even begins to address turning them thin from the beginning and letting them warp!
Can you see there is a lot to learn? It helps to get involved with a local club if you can, and there are always videos to help you along. Some are better than others.
There are a lot of helpful folks on this board as well. The main thing to realize is, it is only wood, and it groes on trees. It almost doesn't matter where you are, there is wood to be had for not a lot of money if you look. Good luck with it, and keep on posting questions.