Such a book might be quite useful. One thing that consistently trips me up is that the vast majority of recipes I've encountered will presume a certain baseline of vocabulary and skills. Saute' this, steam that, salt to taste. My cooking buddy recently bought me a copy of Essentials of Cooking and already I can tell it is going to help a TON.

("Salt to taste" never fails to frustrate me. HELP ME OUT, FOLKS! If I knew how much of everything to put in, I wouldn't be reading a recipe!)