Summer vacation for students is almost here! There are several books that I highly recommend for bloggers and other internet small business owners. Even if you run websites for fun these books will be great reads! Each title links to Amazon.com for pricing information and shopping.

The CSS Anthology: 101 Essential Tips, Tricks & Hacks
The CSS Anthology is a fantastic book written by the smart guys at Sitepoint. CSS stands for Cascading Style Sheets and it is a great tool for bloggers or anyone maintaining a website. With CSS you can define the formatting that is applied to your site with ease. By formatting I mean the colors, text and other areas of your site. If you are using WordPress or other similar blog software this book will help explain how to customize the look and feel of your site by editing the style.css file found in your Them Editor. Spend the money and time to simplify how you edit the look and feel of your site!

Deduct It! Lower Your Small Business Taxes
If you are starting to make any money from your blog/website this book is a must, especially if you are spending a lot of money marketing and building your business. The U.S. tax system changes often and this book explains key deductions for your business. I read through this book in two hours and it really saved me a lot of money and educated me on the best ways to spend my money in the future.

PHP 6 and MySQL 5 for Dynamic Web Sites: Visual QuickPro Guide
Chances are your website or blog uses PHP code and MySQL as a database. PHP is by far the most popular programming language and MySQL is the most popular database application because they are both open-source (a.k.a. free!). If you are using WordPress or any of the popular blogging software you are using PHP code and MySQL databases. This book will not make you a PHP/MySQL expert, but it will help you learn the basics and teach you to write some basic programs. This will help you in the future when you are editing your templates or files, or managing your database that will save you big bucks over time instead of paying coders for basic work. I’m reading this now!

Beginning Programming (Wrox Beginning Guides)
If you even think that you may want to program for a living start with this book. It will explain to you exactly what programming language to get into. You will learn basics of programming and understand what language to focus on for the future. For example, C/C++, Java, PHP, Javascript and VBScript.

Start Your Own Business (Start Your Own)
If you think you are ready to officially turn your web skills into a business this book is for you. This book is complete with information coming up with the business, planning, funding, marketing, book keeping and more. This is a great book for great information on all aspects of business.

Law (in Plan English) For Small Businesses
Let’s face it, if you don’t know the legal aspects of business you may be opening yourself up for trouble. This book focuses on the legal aspects of business. It provides great tips on organizing your business (sole proprietor, partnership or corporation), business plan writing, financing, hiring employees and accounting.

Increase Your Web Traffic in a Weekend, Fifth Edition
If you have little knowledge on getting web traffic this book is a great read. It provides lots of great tips on generating traffic over a weekend!

Get ready for the summer buy stopping by your local book store or buying them online. Stop buy after you read some of these and let me know. Also post a reply with your recommended books!

Other posts that you might find interesting:

• Great Reads: December 15, 2007