First of all I'd like to say that this book was designed for a beginner and you will not go any further than a beginner-intermediate Flash MX user after going through ALL the tutorials of this book.

I had never touched Flash MX (not properly at least) before I got my hands on this book and with its guidance I took my first steps into Flash MX. The book started off well, giving me a basic understanding of everything around me in the program, and being a book of hands-on tutorials, it definitely sank into my brain faster than sitting on my bed and looking at pictures in a book or a bunch of text on paper. I definitely liked the fact that you were given the duration each chapter would take because it helped me plan my learning schedule for Flash MX, but I'll admit, I soon began to hate the fact that I knew one to two hours would be gone if I started a chapter and that would really put me off even beginning a new chapter. A good thing about the book I'd like to mention was how it had a project that would run throughout all the lessons where the reader would add more detail to it as he/she learns different things in different chapters (it seems to be a common beginner-book trend ala Foundation Flash MX).

Unfortunately, as I got deeper and deeper into the book I found myself slowly getting lost, especially when I reached the chapters on Actionscripting (it's only an introduction to the programming language). Because I'd never touched programming before in my life, it felt like too big a leap for me at that time. I would like to partly shift the blame on the author as well (sorry! but I'd rather be honest!) for not being very clear (at least not clear enough for me to understand!) on this topic. By the time I reached the last few chapters, I was more frustrated than anything else because I'd type the code, I'd read the explanation, and re-read it again but I still didn't seem to be able to grasp the concepts and ideas behind it. I mean, sure it's easy to copy/paste code, but if you don't understand the concept behind it, you can't incorporate it into your own customized work now can you?

In my opinion, this book is like a baby in an invisible walker, it's great while you're reading it and doing all the little exercises and even the project at the end of each chapter, but when you're done with the book (the baby gets out of the walker and is told to walk), you seem to still be lost. There's just something missing, and that something is *drum roll* a little bit on properly teaching you how to actually plan a project before you get started on it (one thing I liked very much about Friends of ED's Foundation Flash MX, they dedicated a chapter on pre-planning flash projects and basic deconstructions).

Overall I'd say that this is a good first book if you've never stepped into the world of Flash MX, but by no means should you stop here, this is definitely not enough if you want to make some stunning design.