I probably wouldn't recommend "Secrets of Figure Creation with Poser", by B L Render, to somebody new. It's a solid book on creating Poser figures, but it's written for experienced users and is more a reference book than one full of tutorials. There really isn't a great book out there for Poser beginners and the Poser manual isn't often much help. There are tutorials here, at Curious Labs, and many other sites to help out beginners.