Some of the more "interesting" things that Bandler teaches/demonstrates about hypnosis is age regression (people will actually change physical attributes like skin tention and color), removal of life time phobias, elliminating things like dyslexia and studdering, getting rid of math anxiety, improving spelling, there is no end to what you can use these techniques on. Keep in mind now, I'm not talking about hypnosis in a vacuum, I'm combining various NLP and "design human engineering" concepts.
The foundation of real change is the understanding that there is no sucess or failure, there is only a result. The question is: is it a useful result in a particular context. All results are useful sometimes in some places. NLP and related concepts are designed to expand your choices and to put you in control. Hypnosis is NOT about losing control, it is about having complete control, especially regarding what your level of awareness is and where it is placed.
Books to start with? Try "Using Your Brain For a Change", "Hypnotic Patterns of Milton Erickson", "Frogs into Princes" and Tony Robbins first book, "Unlimited Power". Much of that book is based in NLP.
When NLP was first developed, the idea was to model people who were the best at what they do, and extract the vital strategies (not the usual meaning of strategy, it is a reference to the syntax of internal representations to produce a certain result) so that anyone could duplicate the results. Along the way, what was discovered was the way people code their experiences in a subjective manner. The random bits of stuff in your brain is nothing more than representations of previous experience. You attach various meanings (some useful, some not) to these representations. The truth is, it is possible to attach any meaning you desire to any representation (or memory) you wish to. Unfortunately, we are conditioned to believe that representational meanings are fixed. This creates tunnel vision, stuck patterns, bad habits, etc.
If you're really into learning more about hypnosis, look for Bandler items on Ebay, often times you'll find videos of old seminars. They are, shall we say, intriguing.
Hope this gives you all a start.
Oh, one last thing. I'm not here to try and sell you on any of this stuff, but for those of you who are skeptical, remember: the world was thought to be flat (and you were killed if you didn't agree), we were sure that electrons and protons were the smallest particles in existance (and now physisists don't even know for sure what matter is), and had been told that it's impossible for new brain cells to develop. Of course, I could go on, but I think you get the idea. I don't know about you all, but I'm leaving no stone unturned, and I'm sure as hell not going to base what I do on what the masses do. That should sound a familar tone also.