I haven't read the COIN book, but if you want to get aggressive you can go for "Elements of Statistical Learning". Free pdf download, probably not a one-flight

I haven't read the COIN book, but if you want to get aggressive you can go for "Elements of Statistical Learning". Free pdf download, probably not a one-flight book: http://www-stat.stanford.edu/~tibs/ElemStatLearn/ http://www-stat.stanford.edu/~tibs/ElemStatLearn/ side note: Nat, did you intern at SGI in the late 90s, as the self-titled "armchair programmer of the apocalypse"?