I got this book after buying "Build muscle, lose fat.." (from Amazon), as I wanted to get McRobert's overall view on our physical body and weight resistance exercise. This was and is a needed book, for it gives much sensible advice and encouragement to the average man or woman. The view is more that from Everyman. In the "Build Muscle book he goes into much more detail about the individual weight exercises and posture and performance of them. Brawn is more the overall view.
When I started to lift weights many years ago, the first sensible counsel I got was from York Barbell magazines, Strength and Health, and Muscular Development, and then as I discovered it Iron Man. There writers like John Grimek, Harry Paschall, Brad Steiner, or Hoffman offered advice for beginners, then for intermediate experience weight athletes, that worked in real life. The beginner was given a good basic programme to start with, to gain some strength, and then led along.
These were far better than the weedy rags, I mean the weider magazines, which had a lot of hype, advertisement, gossip about bodybuilding, and routines that some top ifbb bodybuilders presumably(and may well have) used to train for the olympia or Mr. Universe. I would page through these at the news stand, and I remember about one article for the beginner.
I like McRobert's contribution real well. His books are one good place to begin. Rippetoe's book Starting Strength is another.
The only thing that bothered me was the tone of complaint, even though I agree with his complaint. He writes about the genetically blessed bodybuilders and their training, and how most folks fit into a hard gaining, or slower gaining reality of life. For these folks, his ideas on training are very useful and helpful. The book would be more pleasant to read in the early going if there were not so strong a tone of complaint, however much I agree with his basic point. For this I subtracted one star, even though it is a fine book that deals with so much real world training advice.