Programming Books

[Sabre]

Those with long memories will recall how I once set out on a journey to learn how to program from books. One person here even told me it was impossable, but I went ahead anyway. Despite learning how to code games about as complex as an atari 2600 game I hit a wall. Recently I was told the 2 books I had were pretty bad, with online reviews he dug up backing up that claim. (One review even said 1 of them was seemingly designed to scare people from programming) I was recommended 2 different books. One is a beginner book now free online due to being outdated and another is Game Coding Complete which apparently requires a limited level of knowlage (hence the first book).

What's your oppinion, if any, on programming books, and what do you recommend?