Rating:  - Useful but no advanced material. Bloated writing style
This is a useful book. It covers all major topics in c# - no mean accomplishment. The chapters are well designed with good examples. As a professional programmer, I find software technologies keep expanding and there are always new topics to learn. For those topics that I knew little about, this book was very useful however, the depth is limited and for those areas with which I was familiar, there was little new. My other objection is that the author's writing style seems to prefer three words where one would do the job. I often found myself rereading a paragraph several times only to realize that he was trying to convey a rather simple idea.
As other reviewers have said, this book does not provide advanced, in depth information but, perhaps because of that, it is very useful on topics where on needs a basic understanding
Rating: - Very comprehensive and readable
Very comprehensive. Low errata rate. For the most part, you can it read it wherever you are (i.e. you do NOT need to have VS running so that you can look through the "mystery" code that shows what the book does not.
Rating:  - THE new .NET desk reference
I found this book while searching around for one that covered new features of .NET 3.5. I have been working with .NET since before the official release of version 1.0, but got behind after 3.0 came out. I floundered about buying this for several months, debating spending the money on hundreds of pages of material that I already knew just to get a few nuggets that I wanted. The table of contents showed that it did cover the topics I was after in 30 ~ 50 page blocks. When I finally bought it, I discovered that I couldn't be more pleased. I skimmed through the parts that I was already familiar with, and even then learned some things. In fact, I came across a new feature of ADO.NET that directly answered an issue that I was having right at that moment. The sections on material that I was less familiar with were very easy to read and great for getting a workable understanding of the technology and how to begin using it.
I highly recommend this book both for a developer who is new to .NET and as a great reference to seasoned .NET developers. For the n00b, this is a thorough reference that leaves no stone unturned. For the old timers, it is a good, concise reference for the new stuff and a valuable "mental reboot" so you don't get stuck in that rut of writing .NET 1.1 code using a .NET 3.5 compiler. Mr. Troelson is thorough, detail oriented and very readable. This book has earned the right to retire several older, well worn references on my desk.
Rating: - Best book ever on C#; not so good with the .NET 3.5 platform
I've read chapters 1-13 in their entirety read part of 14 and 15 and skimmed the ASP.NET chapters. It may be a while until I look through the rest of what's in this huge book, so I may as well review it now.
This book is really two books in one. The first part, Chapters 1-14, cover C# the language. The rest of the book covers stuff about the .NET platform.
The first 13 chapters of this book are nothing short of outstanding. I have many years of experience working with C#, but I haven't done any C# programming at all for the last year, so I felt that I needed to refresh my knowledge of the language, as well as learn about what has been added since version 1.0 This book was EXACTLY what I was looking for. Not only did I relearn everything about C# that I had forgotten, I learned a lot more than I ever knew. I feel like I know C# better now than I ever did before.
The author of this book doesn't just explain the language, he also explains what's going on behind the scenes in the CIL, so you really get a full understanding of exactly what's happening when your C# code is compiled.
Delegates are the part of C# that I always found the hardest to understand. This book explains delegates better than anything else I've read, I feel like I finally understand them.
The author of this book also avoids the two things I hate most about certain other computer books: (1) He never uses unprofessional nerd-language like "Wow, this technique is really cool!" Yes, some computer books have sentences like that and I think its demeaning to the programming profession. I don't recall reading through any bad grammar--the author is a very good writer. (2) The code samples are short and to the point. There's nothing I hate more than unnecessarily long code samples (except for the nerd-speak).
But is this book all perfect? Not really. I wish the author just cut it off at chapter 14 (which introduces LINQ but really doesn't go into enough detail for one to understand it) and sold the book for half the price. This book is too big and too expensive.
For example, the ASP.NET chapters don't seem very useful. ASP.NET is a huge topic, way too big to be covered in three chapters. I think the three chapters here would be too confusing for an ASP.NET beginner, and not comprehensive enough at all for the professional ASP.NET programmer.
Despite my annoyances at the books size and coverage of material that's unnecessary, I'm so happy about the quality of the first 13 chapters that I give it 5 stars.
Rating: - The Best C# Book, Then Period .
Any serious C# Developer out there gotta have that profound, well structured textbook. I would like to thank the author for his continuing effort to not only sharpen every new version, but also his clear and simple way of explaining the subject. I've already got the Pro C# 2008 and THE .NET 3.5 Platform. What are you waiting for? Go order a copy at the amazon web site and let the fun begin.
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