Yeah I like all of the Exposed books, really informative. . .Sams Maximum Security is one a friend lent to me (whoops never did give that back), that's pretty good too. Like you said though, not the greatest read, but good to have around as a reference. Off the topic, but comp. related, a M$ book called Code is really good if you wanna learn about electronics parts and how things are wired to produce switches and gates, starts out real light, w/ the telegraph, I think, and works it's way up to processors