I was basically told "pass this or you'll be fired" so I read the book, and then spent the weekend before taking practice tests over and over. I got an 89. There is no short cut. Take a class too, it helps certain sections of the test.
I wasn't a retail stock broker (which is what the test is clearly aimed at), so the test had zero relevance to what I did, but that didn't seem to matter. After you take it, you get to take (continuing ed) every 2 or 3 years too. Fun.