C# is the latest hot OO (object-oriented) language to hit the programming streets. It is maintained by Microsoft, and is pretty much only written using the Visual Studio .NET applications.

Nevertheless, C# is the best way to make quick, functional, and robust Windows and Xbox applications.

O'Reilly has published the latest version of their ever popular Cookbook for this language. The O'Reilly Cookbooks are like regular cookbooks, only instead of recipes for food, they have recipes for many of those little gotchas in programming life, and even have the decency to include a discussion of the topics being covered.

And like a recipe, in the end, you have a delicious product that fills you up, or you have something other than what you needed (but, did you read the text describing what the recipe was for?).

Another good aspect of the O'Reilly Cookbooks is that they harness the latest and greatest technology. Throughout this book, they make use of LINQ (Language INtegrated Query), which is like a database query, only, well, able to query just about any source (arrays, enumerables, XML, relational DBs, and other sources!), which makes program to program communication a whole heckuva lot easier!

If you're wanting to get into the hottest OOPL, you'll want to get into C#. And if you want to get into C# you MUST get O'Reilly's books. If you're not already a pro, I recommend Learning C# for the neophyte and Programming C# for the learned. Both compliment the Cookbook nicely. ( )