Win32 API Programming with Visual Basic, (Book/CD-Rom)

"Visual Basic provides an effective rapid application development environment in large measure because it shields the programmer from many of the intricacies of the Windows operating system. Often, though, the result is a trade off: ease and speed of development comes at the cost of poorer performance, as well as a loss of flexibility and control. Fortunately, Visual Basic is extensible: when the details that Visual Basic hides get in the way of your application development, you can always circumvent Visual Basic directly calling the Win32 Application Programming Interface (API).