Stewart, A. (1998). The Ethnographer's Method. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

This isn't really a book on method. It's a book on what to put into the methods section or chapter of an ethnographic article or book, and by implication, it is a book on how to evaluate an ethnographic methods section or chapter. Stewart comes at ethnography from an organizational studies perspective, so keep that in mind. Still, he does a good job at systematically considering issues of evaluating ethnography, and he suggests "tactics" to improve veracity, objectivity, and perspicacity. Pay attention: In each section the tactics are listed from better to worse - and I agree with Stewart that some of those tactics (like creating a comprehensive data archive) are downright bad. The tactics approach to improving the quality of ethnography helps the ethnographer focus on decisions and tradeoffs, and emphasizes that these decisions and tradeoffs need to be spelled out in the methods section. (Todd L. Goodsell, Brigham Young University, 18 November 2010)

Weiss, R. S.  (1994). Learning from Strangers: The Art and Method of Qualitative Interview Studies. New York: Free Press.

This is an excellent and highly readable introduction to doing in-depth, qualitative interview research. I've begun to use this regularly when I am teaching new qualitative researchers how to do qualitative interview studies because it is so accessible. Granted, it doesn't deal with qualitative data analysis software (look again at the publication date) and it does not go much into depth about epistemology - why we do qualitative research interviewing (for that, try Kvale's book InterViews: An Introduction to Qualitative Research Interviewing). But that's OK, because this book is really good at what it claims to be: a handy, practical guide to doing qualitative interview research. (Todd L. Goodsell, Brigham Young University, 18 November 2010)

Creswell, J. W. (2007). Qualitative inquiry & research design: Choosing among five approaches. Thousand Oaks: Sage.

This is an excellent book for graduate students and advanced undergraduates learning qualitative methods and for established scholars looking for a reference book. Creswell's argument is theoretically grounded, he introduces five qualitative approaches (narrative, phenomenological, Grounded Theory, ethnography, and case study), and he then compares each of them for research design, data collection, data analysis, writing, and evaluation of research. Full, article-length examples of each approach are also included as appendices, so students can see what a good product of each looks like. (Todd L. Goodsell, Brigham Young University, 31 December 2008)

Hesse-Biber, S. N. and Leavy, P. (2006). The practice of qualitative research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

I have found this to be a great book for training undergraduates with no background in qualitative methods. The writing is clear and straightforward, and yet it is comprehensive enough for students to use it as their only methods textbook for the full process of qualitative research. The only complaint that some students have of the book is that it is theoretically narrow: Many of the examples are feminist, and some students would appreciate a broadening out of the examples to include a wide range of perspectives. (Todd L. Goodsell, Brigham Young University, 31 December 2008)

Kvale, S. (1994). Ten standard objections to qualitative research interviews. Journal of Phenomenological Psychology, 25, 147-173.

Kvale's writings are excellent for explaining why to do qualitative research interviews and how to do qualitative research interviews. I decided to highlight this article, as it can be helpful for scholars who are trying to answer questions about why they are doing qualitative research. (Please do not let this dissuade you from reading Kvale's other work, though!) Kvale specifically takes a psychological perspective on the epistemology of qualitative research interviewing, and he does a nice job of summarizing the epistemological arguments in favor of qualitative research and stating them in accessible language. (Todd L. Goodsell, Brigham Young University, 31 December 2008)

Lieblich, A., Tuval-Mashiach, R., and Zilber, T. (1998). Narrative research: Reading, analysis, and interpretation. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

I refer advanced scholars to this book for its examples of how to do narrative analysis. This book starts with the assumption that you have already gathered narrative data, and you are looking for examples of how to analyze it. The book's fresh approach is that it takes the same data and shows how it can be analyzed each of several different ways. Researchers can then make a decision about how they want to go about analyzing their own narrative transcripts. (Todd L. Goodsell, Brigham Young University, 31 December 2008)

Patton, M.Q. (2002). Qualitative research & evaluation methods (3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

This is an excellent, almost encyclopedic, introduction to a wide range of epistemologies behind qualitative research and methods for doing qualitative research and analysis. Tables and figures help to summarize the extensive discussion in the text, and all of this helps the reader to see the wide range of choices inherent in qualitative methods. Patton's periodic humor helps, but the book is so complex - since it is trying so hard to be comprehensive - that I would not use it for undergraduates or for those who do not already have some background in qualitative methods. Some programs use it for doctoral-level training. (Todd L. Goodsell, Brigham Young University, 31 December 2008)

Portelli, A. (1991). The death of Luigi Trastulli and other stories: Form and meaning in oral history. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.

The entire book is good, but I have especially used the first essay, "The death of Luigi Trastulli: Memory and the event," as a way of talking about the value of perception, memory, and narrative for social research. This statement from the conclusion is enough to generate conversation about why we need qualitative, narrative research: "Indeed, if oral sources had given us "accurate," "reliable," factual reconstructions of the death of Luigi Trastulli, we would know much less about it" (p. 26). (Todd L. Goodsell, Brigham Young University, 31 December 2008)