dkersten

I liked Art of multiprocessor programming more, probably because it has a more beginner friendly teach everything from the very beginning approach.

I agree, its an excellent book. I have a handful of books on the topic and I find this to be my favourite.

good book if that's what you want to do, but not very useful if not.

The first book is interesting and covers a lot of ground (covering general techniques and algorithms as well as specific implementations with OpenMP, MPI and Java's facilities)