When you're starting with Visual C++ .NET, you can use this book as a tutorial by going through it sequentially. Later, you can use it as a reference by looking up topics in the table of contents or in the index. Because of the tight interrelationships among many application framework elements, it wasn't possible to cleanly isolate each concept in its own chapter, so the book isn't organized as an encyclopedia. When you use this book, you'll definitely want to keep the online help available for looking up classes and member functions.
If you're experienced with earlier versions of Visual C++, scan Part I for an overview of new features. Then skip the basic MFC coverage in Part II but read the more advanced coverage. Also, be sure to read the .NET coverage. Much of the software development community's efforts are heading in this direction, and Visual C++ .NET fully supports the .NET programming model.