My author copies of Essential C# 5.0
I know, e-books are where it’s at today; they are very convenient. But I am a traditionalist where books are concerned; I like the atoms just as much as the bits. This is the first time I’ve seen a non-electronic copy and I am very pleased with how it turned out. Though it is heavy! When you see a book only as Microsoft Word files for months on end you forget that it’s going to be almost a thousand pages.
As long-time readers of this blog know, I was one of the technical editors for Essential C# 4.0 and Essential C# 3.0. Mark was kind enough to ask me if I would like to take a larger role in the process of updating the text for the new edition, which I gladly agreed to. There is no easier way to get a byline in a book than to assist with an update to a well-written series that you already know inside-out!
Once again, many thanks to Mark and to Joan and everyone else at Addison-Wesley who made this process so smooth; you are all a pleasure to work with. Special thanks also to two of my former coworkers: C# specification guru Mads Torgersen, who wrote a very nice foreword for us, and Stephen Toub, who thoroughly reviewed the chapters dealing with asynchrony.
Fabulous adventures in coding 
Congratulations on the book Eric (and of course Mark)!
It sure is an amazing feeling finally holding a book you’ve worked on for a long time in your hands.
Good luck with the sales!
Thanks Filip!
I got the hard copy of the book as soon as it was available. Pre-ordered it actually. I’m not a beginner in C#, and out of the entire book I wasn’t familiar with, perhaps, a sixth.
However I read all of it, for all the technical details in the advanced sections throughout the book. There were very interesting read.
I can also recommend it to beginners, because they will be put on the right track right away. I wish I read that book when I was learning programming as a kid.
Thanks, Eric, for a great book.
Well thanks for that very kind review! Might you consider copy-pasting that onto Amazon? 🙂
You bet! 🙂
My copy is apparently on its way to the office in the UK… whereas I’m in the US for CodeMash.
Apparently other authors can’t now write amazon.com reviews, but I’ll blog a review when I’ve had a chance to read it…
Congrats Eric, I am big fan of your (old and new) blog and kept myself as a silent reader.
I have received a printed copy of your book, it’s simply great! Now I feel scared to tell you about my book as you are one of the C# compiler guru 🙂
All the best Eric with your Book (as well Mark).
Got my copy as soon as I could and simply love the book Eric. Been doing C# for about 6 years and still learnt some stuff!
Glad to hear it from the writer!
I wanted to ask how do you like Kindle edition V/s paperback version ? I have Kindle but I want to buy the nicer version.
Thanks in advance.
Will be picking this up! I agree about books.. I much prefer the feel to ebooks. Congrats!
Another great addition to my new years reading list. Congratulations.
Looks very interesting. Could anyone compare this book with C# in Nutshell (preferably someone who read both)?
I was the technical editor of the latest edition of C# in a Nutshell, and the co-author of Essential C#, so it is fair to say that I have read both books thoroughly, but also fair to say that I am biased. 🙂
Both books are excellent and I would heartily recommend either without reservations. Both are also very heavy. (That’s a big nutshell!)
If you’d like a more specific comparison then try asking a more specific question.
I agree, the nutshell is quite big 🙂
Thanks for your answer! It is enough for me to know, that both are comparable and top quality. I’ve read Nutshell for C# 4 and liked it. For C# 5.0 I’ll go with Essential, so I’ll compare myself.
What I didn’t like about nutshell was quite high amount of mistakes and typos in some chapters. I understand that books this size will always have some errors, but some of these could really confuse inexperienced readers. I’m curious how is Essential in this aspect. Anyway, thanks for recommendation, looking forward to this read.
I currently do all of my development in C# 4.0 and do not plan to switch to 5.0 in the immediate future.
If I was going to buy a copy of both Essential C# and C# in a nutshell, would I be better off buying the 4.0 editions or buying the 5.0 editions and ignoring the 5.0 parts?
I would never recommend that you buy an outdated technical book. I’d get the latest editions.
Lately I’ve had the repeated experience of following some awesome technical answer on StackOverflow only to see Eric Lippert as the author. Then my thought was “This guy is so great at explaining things with simple analogies that I really hope he’s written a book!” Cut to chasing down your blog and finding this entry. As soon as I get done typing this, I’ll be ordering a Kindle edition. Yes, I actually like real books too, but geez, the things are so dang heavy, and my wife complains about shelf-fulls of them accumulated over the years.
I am unable to find a place for discussing (or viewing) errata for this book. Is there a link or a process one could use to point out a possible inconsistency? Even trivial corrections can help with the following edition(s).
On a side note – glad Michaelis (and you) created this book! I needed it immensely.