Charles Wyke-Smith definitely has away with disarming technical issues and instilling you with a desire and determination to accomplish your coding goals. This book explain CSS in a straight forward and easy to understand way and this book will continue to serve you well as a handy reference.

Stylin' with CSS: A Designer's Guide (2nd Edition) (Voices That Matter)RE: Wyke-Smith's CSS Book: I've come to appreciate this book so much that I don't know where to begin in recommending it. I had read (studied) several books on how to mark up and style web pages, but not until I began reading this one did lingering questions finally get answered at the very outset. For Example, Chapter 2 "How CSS Works" masterfully gives you such insight into concepts like inheritance, the cascade, sequences, precedence, specificity, etc. that it inspires new-found confidence you can implement web design with precision. The author rightfully states "Truly understanding just a few techniques can turn a struggling newbie into a competent CSS journeyman." (THESE INSIGHTS ARE A GREAT TROUBLESHOOTING AID.) He teaches you how to exploit the latest W3C Standards so you can produce sleek and powerful styling. In 300 pages he describes, and abundantly illustrates in color, a wide range of the latest techniques helpful to experts as well as to beginners.(Read back cover for range of topics.) I found it hard to put this book down, and carried it everywhere. Once, I spilled coffee on it in a restaurant, but the paper quality is so good a few hours exposure to the sun restored it like new. Try comparing this book with others and you will see why I recommend it enthusiastically.

I looked at this book over at B&N and it got me hooked. Especially the chapter on how to do some basic page layout. I could not believe how simple it could be! The author really got me very interested and that eventually led to me buying this book. I'm glad I did. :-)

If you're a Java developer like me or a CSS beginner, this is a great book to get you started. It's really easy to read. Complex concepts are explained in an easy to understand fashion. And the author follows and breeds best practices. These and many others, make this book excellent.

The book is broken in 7 chapters.

The 1st chapter explains the basics of HTML, the different standards and how the page is structured. Simple chapter, but it's important to understand the basics.

The 2nd chapter, How CSS Works, is really a CSS 101. Basic stuff as well, but as in the first chapter, this is a fundamental knowledge.

Chapter 3 is more of a reference guide on how to style fonts and text. Some very useful info.

Chapter 4 is where the interesting stuff starts: positioning elements. An excellent overview of the box model and some good information about floating and clearing.

Chapter 5 is the best chapter in the book. It goes over several ways to create page layouts. Want to create a 2-column layout? A simple example is shown. How about a 3-column layout? 3-column liquid layout? With the techniques presented by Charles, you can create any type of a layout and you will actually understand what's going on. Really neat stuff.

In chapter 6, focus is on styling tables, forms, and menus. The author basically presents some techniques on how to style tables for tabular data, and explains the technique on how to create CSS menus. Good chapter to dive in when you're involved with these.

Chapter 7 summarizes the overall process of building a real site.

I learned several new techniques and tips from this book. I love how the book makes complicated things simple: this is my type of a book. Also, Charles has a good way of making sure these things come across and stay in your head. Not a simple thing to do, but he did a great job.

What a great book and easy read. The author assumes nothing and explains everything. I am more of an audio learner and reading this book was like having someone talk to me.

I read it cover to cover, taking notes and highlighting items to come back to when I'm at the screen working on my site. It's doubtful that I have ever before read a technical book so quickly (if ever in entirety).

As the title of my review states, this book provides - with its conversational tone and very clear writing - a delightful nuts-and-bolts take on important aspects of CSS coding. It really feels as if the author is at your side, even anticipating your questions along the way.

It helps if the reader has read at least one primer on (X)HTML and CSS before starting this book. A mark-up/presentation language newbie can certainly benefit from this book. But with an introductory text behind him or her, the reader can really appreciate the best-practice advice Charles Wyke-Smith has on offer here.

Can't wait to read the author's "Codin'" book.