Hi, i would recommend visiting the link below for great tutorials. I am a self taught Flasher, so i wouldn't know where to start with recommending books, but they may help you understand the principles of the Flash IDE and how Actionscript is used.

I would go through basic tutorials and jump to more specific tutorials later on. Like if you wanted to learn how to make a Quiz game, just search Google for "flash quiz game tutorial" and usually the tutorials will have explanations as well as source files.

Good luck with your endeavors.

http://www.republicofcode.com/tutorials/