70-290 MCSE Track

I bought a Microsoft book (2273B: Managing and Maintaining a Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Environment). Unfortunately this book is not too conducive for self study. It starts off by assuming you are in a class with computers that have Microsoft Virtual PC installed. Many exercises rely on pre-configured settings: eg. users, OUs already added in the MV PC. I’ve tried to follow the exercises, in vain.
Can anyone please suggest some self study books that I can follow from scratch? This is for the MCSE track. Thanks in advance for all your suggestions.