The chapters are short, the code is minimal, but you get applications that are really useful and you get to build those projects that always stump you, like how to I get to print something, or how do I program an OpenDialog box to display files? (Many of the current Help examples in Visual Studio 2003 don't work and are useless.)

There is also fun stuff: The chapters on Agents are worth the price of the book alone. This opened a whole new world to me and my 16 year old son.

The book is already in need of an update since I am now using VS2003, and a couple of the chapters don't quite work with the old code, and there are a number of IDE differences as well. But most all of the applications work and you can get to modify them to suit your own applications.

I would suggest an updated book with all the first 12 chapters removed, and with examples for Mobile devices added. Hint, hint, Mr. Crooks.

If you are a novice VB .NET programmer, this is one of the first books you should get. The other first books you should get have been rated in these reviews. Just find one with high marks and that explains how to use the IDE, and how to display "Hello, world".

Unfortunately, there are hardly any books on the new Visual Studio 2003, so you'll have slim pickings for those or just stuggle with the old books.