Fresher Styles for Web Designers
This book will get web designers thinking about alternatives that may not have occurred to them.
My Rating: 
Pros
- Includes lots of real web pages that illustrate the types of styles covered.
- Explains how certain styles work and when their use may be appropriate.
Cons
- Rather narrow focus on just a small selection of possible styles.
- Requires a thorough knowledge of web design to understand when to and more importantly when not to use the styles covered.
Description
- First Edition: 2009
- 205 page paperback
- Published by New Riders
- ISBN: 0-321-56269-0
- More Eye Candy from the Underground
- Author Curt Cloniger
Review
This book claims to be for "Professional and aspiring web designers and hobbyists". While the information it presents would probably be of great use to professional designers I do not believe that the book would be of as much use to aspiring designers or hobbyists. Most of the styles that the book discusses have rather specialised areas where their use would be appropriate but that may not be so obvious to the less experienced designer who may not pay proper attention to those aspects. The book does make it relatively clear what situations the author considers are appropriate uses for the particular styles but the way that the book is laid out makes it somewhat tempting to just flip through the pages looking for ideas from the images without necessarily reading all of the associated text.
The book does an excellent job of providing useful information to experienced web designers which appears to be its target market. There are many other books on web design that aspiring designers an hobbyists will find more useful though as for most of them the information in this book will not apply to their circumstances and even where it does the way that the book is laid out will make it difficult for them to determine whether the styles in the book are really appropriate or not.
