Being one to generally dislike "beginner's guides" I make an exception for this one. Maybe because when it comes to dragonflies, I am a beginner.The photos are generally of good quality and the key in the front of the book helps narrow down a specimen to the proper family without resorting to some of the quirky systems in some other field guides I have seen.It obviously doesn't show you everything you might see, but so far everything I have seen has been in this book.On advantage is it also contains damselflies. I would like to see Stokes come out with a full-blown field guide (or two, one for east and one for west) for dragonflies. Hopefully this is a first step in that direction.Botton line, if you have an interst in answering, "What is that?" when you see one of these beauties in the wild, this book is a good starting point and at very comfortable price.