David Keller has posted here that "Bar none, the best book on preparing stock, sawing, and making woodworking joints with handtools is no longer in print - It's Charles Hayward's "Carpentry for Beginners". It goes for relatively high prices for an out-of-print book, but there's a reason - it's really worth paying $50-$75 for this book."
Good news: its been reprinted (as of May of this year), and is now available for under $20 on amazon here. I'd never heard of it before, and have a bit of a book backlog already, but with that sort of review from David it's in my cart.