Prof. Brantingham is a reasonable and fair teacher. His class was not super hard but was not super easy. Reading the book is not required, but I would recommend it. It helps on 3-5 questions of the midterm. The outside readings are pointless, do not bother. I received an A in his class but I did study and I did spend time writing my paper. His tests are aimed at testing if you can apply the knowledge you learned, rather than just straight facts and memorization. Don't bother taking notes, just listen to the lecture and print out the slides to study.

Dr. B is an amazing professor! He manages to make even the driest subject matter interesting because he is a great lecturer! The guy is incredibly smart but not in a stuffy kind of way, and he has a great sense of humor. His lectures are organized, dynamic, and easy to understand, and he also posts everything in case you missed something. You also don't have to do the readings to score high on the exams, though it doesn't hurt to at least scan the book.
I would definitely recommend taking any class with him. His exams are not easy and you are certainly expected to think about the material, but if you go to class and take notes you will do fine!

He's awesome. You can choose not to take the final if you do well on the midterm and on the research paper. This means that (assuming you do) after week 7, it's just sweet cruisin'!

What's cool about him:
-always has the right popular culture reference to back up a concept
-looks EXACTLY like the singer Michael McDonald

On second thought...I think it WAS McDonald all along.

Very engaging and entertaining lecturer. Lectures from Powerpoint presentations and posts them online after class. A lot of assigned reading, but never comes play during class. Very easy to get an A-/B+ on the multiple choice midterm and final if you just memorize the Powerpoint lectures (and forgo the readings). One research paper due a couple of weeks before the final. Final grade in the class is the average of your highest two grades (from the midterm, paper, and final).