I am a beginner quilter but have loved quilts for years so have amassed a pretty big collection of quilt books. I finally decided to enlist the help of a professional quilter to teach me how to quilt. I brought over a few selection of my books, but out of all them, Skip The Borders was the best one to start with.Pros:- Beautiful photos showing the entire quilt and details for each quilt- Clear and concise instructions- Clear lists for cutting and fabric requirements- Detailed graphics of how to lay out and piece the blocks together. This was the biggest selling point for me. Also, this makes it easy to make adjustments (i.e. I don't want to make a baby quilt, but a lap quilt, I can easily count the blocks in the graphics provided in the book rather than do all the math).I'm already working on two quilts from the book. My instructor also really likes to the book. She teaches professionally at quilt centers in the city and has mentioned that students often get annoyed because you can usually only complete one beginner's project in a book. With this book, you can graduate to more complex projects, but there are many foundational techniques taught. It offers a variety of styles of quilts to learn different techniques, but appeals to the modern quilter in the selection of fabrics and colors. I plan to work my way through three or four more quilts in this book.