I did the PPL exams as part of an intensive course and managed fine with the AFE books and the simplifier book you mentioned. If I recall there are 3 practice papers for each exam and I found that if I was passing the 3 comfortably I would pass the exam with >90%. I had the confuser too but never used it. If I had more time and had felt the need to try and get 100% I would have done all the confuser q’s to but I never got round to it.
There may be better books on the market but I found the AFE ones fine, I still use them as a reference now they always seem to have the information I need.
Although for my IMC I used the IMC confuser which is the same deal as the PPL one and found it excellent.