It is very hard to convey skills via books or video. I've found the best use for books or vidoes is to make sure you're performing a skill properly once you've had formal training.
Books can do well by addressing less physical topics such as mindset. For mindset I would recommend Jeff Cooper's "Principles of Personal Defense." For mindset, basic shooting skills, and defense in general, there is no finer book than Tom Given's "Fighting Smarter" which actually incorporates Cooper's "Prinicples."
If you want books for shooting and tactical skills, there are only two that I really recommend. For tactics, Gabe Suarez's "The Tactical Advantage" is excellent and recommended by Given's in his book. The other book, actually its more of a manual, I highly recomment Jim Crews' "Some of the Answer: Handgun." The book is an awesome reference for all the basic pistol schools and his typical demo weapon is a 1911. The production qualities aren't as high as some other offerings but the information is exceptional.
I haven't seen any good firearms training videos that I would recommend. I've seen four of the GunSite videos and they are "OK" although I thought Tactical Pistol 2 was worthles. The videos impart lots of general info about the particular weapon system but don't offer a lot of shooting techniques. I haven't seen the Thunder Ranch videos but suspect that anything coming from Clint Smith would be excellent.
