I will try to provide a concise and useful insight into two books from the world of SQL Server. The first one is available now, while the second one is coming out very soon (in the next couple of weeks).
MDX with Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 Analysis Services Cookbook (link)
by Tomislav Piasevoli
I received an invite to review Tomislav’s book a few weeks ago and despite the fact that I am quite busy these days, I decided to have a look mainly because I expected it to be very good as I had heard about it months ago by the author and the reviewers (Darren Gosbell, Chris Webb, Greg Galloway, Marco Russo and Deepak Puri); and because I was promised a free copy, so I wouldn’t have to buy the book myself (which I would have done anyway)J. Tomislav has been one of the most prominent SSAS MVPs, quite active on the MSDN Forums and writing interesting posts on his blog. I was not surprised that he has been able to deliver excellent practical advice for his readers in this cookbook and I expect to be using it often during SSAS implementations. Let’s see what you could expect from this book if you buy it.
Firstly, it is a cookbook – Tomislav has written recipes for a large amount of real-world scenarios. I must admit that I did not read absolutely all of them. I went through the ones I think I know well and compared Tomislav’s versions to the ones I would typically use. The topics are very well covered and follow a pattern of: Getting Ready -> How to do it -> How it works -> There’s more -> See also. First, we get an introduction, and then we prepare to get the work done. After that we get a step-by-step walkthrough for the actual solution. I liked the next section “How it works”. Here we get an explanation of why we get the result letting us get some more insight rather than blindly typing code. I find it a very nice touch and I applaud the author for spending the time to include this invaluable bit of information. The “There’s more” section after that expands a bit the topic, trying different options and showing what happens when we apply them. In the end of each chapter we have a section showing which other topics are related to the one we are currently reading. All in all, I think that Tomislav’s cookbook is very, very, well written.
In general, I would say that if you want to learn MDX and how it works, you can start with a textbook-style book, which shows the basics, explains them and then builds up on them. However, if you need to work with MDX now, or if you do have some knowledge but you lack practical skills, then this book is a real gem. I would definitely recommend buying Tomislav’s cookbook, and if you are interested in getting more theoretical detail on why things work the way they do, either do a lot of blog reading, or buying another MDX book to serve as a companion to this one.
In brief, this is the best MDX cookbook out there and offers excellent practical advice over a variety of topics.
MVP Deep Dives vol.2 (link)
The second book I would like to introduce is another “must buy”. Imagine the effort required to assemble a book from 53 different authors who live in different parts of the world and are not all native English speakers (like me). Well, Kalen Delaney has made the effort…twice…and this is one of the reasons for having this book published in the next couple of weeks. Another reason is the motivation which the authors found in donating their work to Operation Smile. We are not profiting from it and we hope that you will also buy the book not only because of the outstanding content, but also because the money you spend will be used to help children with facial deformities all around the world.
The list of authors speaks for itself and I am very flattered to be able to participate with a chapter entitled “Managing Context in MDX”. The book will be out by the beginning of PASS Summit 2011 and there will be a book signing session, where you can get your copies signed by some of the authors. Come, drop by if you are there to say hello and have a chat!
Boyan Penev on Microsoft BI 
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