I'm pretty much a complete novice in any form of art, so this book was quite helpful to me. There are several parts I found useful-- how to hold and handle the brush to achieve different effects, comparisons of student paintings to similar professional works, separating 'value' from 'intensity,' etc. I can imagine this book being a waste of time for people who've been in relatively good art classes or who've done enough painting to have learned all of this already, but if you consider yourself an amateur, this is a good place to start.