This may be one of the best, and no doubt the most useful, books I have ever read. When I first ordered this book I envisioned myself learning how to make stickmen wave, make poorly drawn cartoon dogs wag their tales or a small car bobble along a highway. I could not have been more wrong. I never would have thought that in just a few short months I would become an advanced Macromedia Flash designer. From making short action cartoons, to in-depth site intros for my friends, I feel there is no limit on what I can achieve.

The book starts off slow, making it very easy to pick up, even for the most basic of users. The pace soon quickens as you learn the ins and outs of flash programming. At no point while reading this book did I feel overwhelmed or that the book was moving to fast. Even through the more complicated sections I felt comfortable.

I would recommend this book to anybody looking to get into Flash programming, regardless of skill or ability. This book gets a perfect 5 out of 5 stars. Keep up the good work Deke McClelland, and keep supplying us with quality entertainment Amazon. Thank you.

This is the kind of book movies buffs absolutely love, written with affection by an excellent writer. The color inserts of "B" lobby cards from the 1940's are gorgeous. The author, a regular contributor to FILMS OF THE GOLDEN AGE and CLASSIC IMAGES, has to rank up their with Leonard Maltin, Lawrence Quirk, William Everson, etc. as one of our very best movie historians.

This gives woefully little information about the HUA witchhunt and how it impacted on the life and career of Larry Parks. (Read Betty Garrett's bio for that information.) This is a moment by moment synopsis with photos of The Jolson Story and Jolson Sings Again" with some biographical information on the performers. I love both movies and could have written the synopsis myself. I wanted to learn more about Larry Parks and the disgraceful blacklist period. Also, this is a very short book (minus photos) and is more like a term paper than a serious discussion on the title's topic.

When I got this book, I couldn't wait to pour through the contents. However, I was disappointed in that the book gave too much of a book report on "The Jolson Story" and "Jolson Sings Again", and not enough time to Larry Parks. The book is worth reading, and I did learn some interesting tidbits. However, it did leave me wanting more. Other books may be better, but to a new fan of Al Jolson/Larry Parks it may be more fullfilling than it was to me.

I just wanted to say that for a long time I have been looking for a book which dealt mainly with The Jolson Story and Jolson Sings Again. I probably stumbled on it with this book. Although the name implies a book on the blacklisting, I was pleasantly surprised to find alot of pages dedicated to these two films. Don't be fooled by the name. There's much more than the blacklisting.