ORIGINAL: Time Pilot
I've read two of Harry Higley's books, Getting Airborne Volume 1 & 2 and don't really recommend them. They are expensive and, I find, not only hard to read because of the way they are formatted, but not very well written as well. Worse, it seems on every other page is some shameless plug for another of his books.
I found the same thing about all his books. Some good info, tons of plugs for is products and a lot of contrived examples that make things much more difficult than they need to be. I haven't read either of these books but I don't intend to either.
The RCM flight training course is very good. There are also a lot of great resources on the web. You need to avoid the sites of yahoos who think that flying is all about thrashing planes around the sky and abusing them until they get buried in the dirt and find things that actually explain how a plane flies, recovery techniques and other flight dynamics. If you understand the fundamental concepts you'll get farther faster.
I'm not sure if this site has anything for beginners, but it is a plethora of information for trimming and related topics.
http://www.geistware.com/rcmodeling/index.htm