Beginner's book

zzzzzzzz

can anyone recommend a carpentry/wood craft book for a beginner?

jack of all

Collins do a very good woodworkers manual, got a copy 10 years ago and still refer to it occasionally.

stapeler

I'd recommend Taunton's Complete Illustrated Guide to Woodworking which covers a multitude.

ennisa

Aidan.
I have yet to find one book that covers them all, but i did find a couple in the Library in blanchardstown that taken all together were very useful.

Hand tool essentials,
this is a collection of excellent articles from Fine woodworking magazine
The essential woodworker, robert wearing
excellent and now out of print, hand tools and how to use them plus much more
Measure twice cut once Jim Tolpin
excellent for avoiding all those initial mistakes.

I would also recommend ;
Understanding wood finishing by Bob Flexner. After all there is no point in building something beautiful only to have it look like a dog's dinner after the wrong finish is put on.

I also love woodworking magazine. ( http://popularwoodworking.com/wwmhomepage ) It's add free and just focuses on woodworking. The subscription is cheap too.

My bent is towards hand tools but all these books will get you going until the time when you can start to afford some of the power tools and they might convince you that power tools aren't the be all and end all. Blanchardstown library actually had a decent selection of book including books of projects to get started and I presume the other libraries will have some too or be able to order them in for you.

Hope this helps Aidan.

Alan
Ireland/Dublin

jack of all

Alan is spot on with his recommendations there, I've a few Taunton titles that are very good and Jim Tolpin is contributor to many of the books in the Taunton "Build like a Pro" series.