"Beginning Spatial with SQL Server 2008" by Alastair Aitchison is a good introduction to the geospatial features introduced in SQL Server 2008. It is primarily aimed at developers who have SQL Server experience but with limited or no geospatial experience. It is recommended for such developers who wish to build a geospatial database, or to use SQL Server as the backend database for a geospatial web application.

"Map Scripting 101" by Adam Duvander is comprehensive introduction to web mapping that relies on the Mapstraction open source library. The book covers a number of basic Mapstraction map operations, and then builds up other related operations, including the Haversine formula, related web services, and server-side databases.

The book is recommended for beginners to web mapping who are familiar with HTML and CSS but have limited or no web mapping experience. Although it concentrates on the Mapstraction library, the intermediate and more advanced chapters include useful "how to" information that is applicable to any JavaScript web mapping application.

The text includes a reasonable introductory coverage of JavaScript, and shorter introductions to JQuery, PHP, and MySQL. Serious map developers unfamiliar with these topics will require dedicated texts in order to utilize them fully.

"The World of Gerard Mercator" by Andrew Taylor is an excellent biography of Gerard Mercator - someone who we have all heard of, but generally know very little. Taylor does a good job of putting him into both a historic and a cartographic context, and does his best to explain Mercator with the relatively limited information available. My main criticism of the book involves the images. Many of the maps are asking for large full color reproductions - something this small format black&white book cannot provide.