I have been learning C# and the .NET framework for a while now and have been working my way through several books; The C# Programming Yellow Book, The C# Player’s Guide (2nd Edition) and C# 6.0 and the .NET 4.6 Framework All of these books have helped me to varying degrees to get comfortable in Object Oriented programming, the C# language and the .NET framework.

When learning a new programming language, I always look to improve my knowledge of the fundamentals, so seeing an introduction to C# book that was getting good reviews piqued my interest. That book was Learn C# in One Day and Learn It Well although I am very suspicious of Learn X in Y days hours minutes titles (see Peter Novig masterly description) I ordered a copy.

At 153 pages the book is slim and can be divided into two parts. Chapters 1 through 11 cover the various building blocks that make up a programming language such as variables, arrays, condition statements as well as briefly touching on Object Orientated concepts. The second half of the book, starting on page 128 brings together what you have learnt in a project by building a Payroll programme.

I think the book is self published, obviously not an issue in itself however I felt that it could have done with an editor to catch the typos and misaligned paragraphs but these are minor irritants. The real point of this post is, can you use this book to learn C# in a Day?

In my opinion no. The main problem with this book is how brief the topics are covered. Take for example Interfaces which are discussed on pages 107 – 109. The text compares Interfaces with Abstract classes, however no where in these two pages does it tell you what an interface actually is and why you would want to create one.

In summary I am not sure who the target audience for this book is. Perhaps someone that just needs to get some course work or module “working” For everyone else it is far to brief and does not go into enough detail especially explaining why you would want to use a feature of the language. If you are interested in learning C# my advice would be to put the £8 towards a better resource.