I finished reading Eric Meyer on CSS, Mastering the Language of Web Design in several hours and fully understood the concepts presented. The book is concise, informative, and straight to CSS which makes it a valuable resource. Now I know exactly where to find the answer when I run into CSS troubles. On top of that, the companion website provides all the codes for readers to break apart and experiment with them. At the end of each chapter there is a “Branching Out” section which challenged you to go beyond the concept presented in the chapter.

Actually, I read this book when it first came out but didn’t appreciate it because my knowlegde of CSS was limited. Now that I work with CSS on all of my projects, this book has open up many more possibilities and now I am much more comfortable with CSS than before. So if you’re a web designer, you must pick up this book. However, if you are new to CSS, I suggest that you get familiar with the basic before delving into this masterpiece or else you wouldn’t get much out of it.

If you’re reading chapter one and find it confusing or hard to understand, don’t worry just move on. In fact, I would skip the first chapter altogether. Even though, Eric did a great job on covering how to convert an existing page using CSS, why bother? It is taking way too much time and energy. It would be much faster and easier to start from scatch. It would save you time and headaches. That way you know for sure your codes are correct. Anyway, if you’re serious about web design, this is the book you need by your side next to Designing With Web Standard.

If you are new to CSS world, Cascading Style Sheets: The Designer’s Edge is the right book for you. The book is easy to understand so you will be able to pick up css quickly. Molly’s writing style is clear and concise. Her clean and attractive personal site demonstrates her skills on css. Oh wait! Her site is designed by 1976design. Whoops! Not practices what she preaches. Usually I don’t recommend people who doesn’t practice what he/she preaches but this book was well written so I made an exception. Once you’re done with this book and would like more advance css book, I highly recommend, Eric Meyer on CSS: Mastering the Language of Web Design. His personal site, Meyerweb really demontrates his skills and mastery on css.

Jeffrey’s Zeldman’s Designing With Web Standards is unbelievably valuable. He literally answered all my confusion questions throughout the book. He explained clearly why we use css a certain way or the benefits of designing one way over another. I am so glad I picked up this book. I’ve learned so much from it even though I have been designing sites with xhtml and css. I really like Zeldman’s writing style. He kept it informational as well as pleasurable to read. This is by far one of the best web design book I have read. It’s just amazing how much I’ve learned from this book. I highly recommend this book without a doubt.