Erik - it is the one and only Freeman book I own, and my assessment is the same as yours. I struggled to get through it.
I can't disagree with what he writes, but I find he both over-complicates the subject, gets too much into minutia and then often illustrates with substandard images. On the other hand, he as a book to sell and saying things in 10 pages would not be profitable to either him or his publisher.