I think you can definitely learn from the book. I have had the book since 2001 and once Steve started advertising the deluxe package at a deep discount, I purchased it. My problems have been not taking action and putting the system to use and fearing that it won't work for me (grandiose expectations). Once I started doing so recently, I found that the system felt very ordinary! I guess I had expectations of magical results (thanks in part to their marketing, which seems to have given MANY that wary feeling). Perhaps this "ordinary" feeling comes from familiarity with the system I don't know. I do know that I didn't get it until I actually started using the system. It just seems like the logical way to get through reading materials!
My advice is to grab the book for a buck if you can (or full price, it isn't too much), read it and just put it to use immediately. Play with it. You probably won't flip through a book at a "page per second" and have instant photographic recall (if you do, I'll be jealous!
) but you definitely will learn some knew reading and studying skills. If you consistently use these new skills, you will probably start seeing some pretty decent results pretty fast. I think the trick is to start with a "beginner's mind" in that you have to completely re-architect what reading means to you. You will probably be confused as heck at first, which is why I say keep playing with the system and definitely don't be too hard on yourself. This is a main point of the entire system, a foundational concept, because getting frustrated and upset seems to disrupt the learning process. The Photoreading system teaches you to build conscious comprehension in layers over time (less time than conventional reading) rather than reading and comprehending the text word for word. This seems to confuse a lot of people.
If you really work at using the system you could probably be skilled enough to use it with your college textbooks by this fall. I've read a lot of posts about this on their forums. The general response seems to be that you really want to start on other materials and NOT your textbooks when you're learning Photoreading. There are several other tips on Photoreading textbooks in the book and on the forums.
Hope this helps.
Brendon