If independence and reading chops are your goal, which they should be at some time in your drumming training, then this is an excellent book! Like a Ted Reed Syncopation this book is open ended and you can take these exercises, which are basically playing patters with the hands and reading the melodies with the bass drum, and turn them around dozens, if not hundreds of ways. The very challenging part is singing what he refers to as the melodies while playing the patterns. Gary gives a set number of ostinatos for the right and left hand to play while reading the melodies but you can substitute ones of your own and still accomplish a lot. In all honesty this one book could challenge you for a lifetime if you apply it in different ways.