Learning tarot doesn't only mean, IMO, to know the cards' meanings and how to combine them, but an in-depth understanding of the symbols. It's like learning a language. You can get along with a little booklet with some phrases for a holiday, but you won't be able to hold a real conversation until you learn to use the words, sentences and expressions independently. And this is what happens when you work with tarot. The more you know, the better you'll be able to read it and interact with it.
Obviously, ONE book won't give you that, and I keep distance from every book that promises instant knowledge. You can't make a good healthy meal from adding water to a powder, and you can't learn tarot in an afternoon or a week.
I think a very good start to tarot work is Mary Greer's Tarot for yourself because it gives you an idea of the scope and depth you can reach with tarot, and it puts YOU in the driver's seat. No matter which deck you use, that's a very good book.
I also like Anthony Louis' books; one for beginners and later one with lots of astrology etc. The beginner book is fine, Tarot plain and simple.
I started out[/I] with Spiritual Tarot, 78 paths to personal development, and it gave me a good basic understanding of card meanings. It's also very encouraging and empowering with some nice spreads. When I re-read it now, I still like it.
But Rachel Pollack's 78 Degrees of Wisdom is THE classic about RWS card meanings, and no tarot library is complete without it.
If you want to know more about the actual reading, Tarot Interactions by Deborah Lipp is a good book. It helps you overcome the card-by-card approach and see the reading as a whole. You learn to see patterns.
And if you read Mary Greer's 21 ways to read a tarot card, you get a very good picture what's possible, how much information you can get from one card.
I find the last two books complement each other nicely.
That's a basic, not too one-sided book shelf for beginners, based only on books I read myself. I have often heard books by Kim Huggens and Dusty White recommended, they have a very good reputation, too, but I don't know them.