I was prepared not to like "Java Persistence with Hibernate", due to some bad experiences with similar books on Open Source projects, but this was a very pleasant surprise.

There are likely to many reviews praising this book, but I would like to offer some points on the things it is not. This is not a evangelical book providing only the positive sides of Hibernate - Hibernate is evaluated based on realistic criteria, and its limitations and assumptions are pointed out. It isn't filled with topics that the authors want to cover rather than those required by users - the topics relate directly to the real use of Hibernate. The book isn't padded with diagrams, code samples or javadocs - diagrams weren't to large or small and the same applied to the code samples.

The omission of any mention of Spring was a little surprising, but then the book is already over 800 pages and I guess there are other related topics that didn't make the cut either.

I enjoyed reading the book as the authors obviously knew the topic, but still managed to present the material in an interesting manner and didn't get too dry. This book should be the weapon of choice for Hibernate users, not because it is written by the authors of the software, but because the presentation and quality of the information makes it an invaluable resource.

8/10