Reddit mentions of Programming Ruby 1.9: The Pragmatic Programmers' Guide (Facets of Ruby)

Umm, I think Python is a good language to start with. It's forgiving and low on boilerplate code. I haven't read it but Learn Python the Hard Way by Zed Shaw is supposed to be decent (and it's free online). I didn't like Learning Python published by O'Reilly. I'd just read reviews on Amazon if Learn Python the Hard Way isn't working for you. Whichever you end up with, I recommend typing all examples from the book into the computer by hand. Something about doing this really helps make things stick in your head. You'll also make the occasional typo and have to debug your program which is something we programmers spend more time doing than any of us care to admit.

I think it is important to try to think of something you want to make and have it in mind while you are learning the language. It can be any software but I recommend a video game. They are really good for this because you can just think up a simple concept or implement your own version of an existing game. Having a goal makes it so you are constantly solving the problems you will encounter while trying to reach that goal which is the most important part of programming (more so than learning the syntax of the language). This is actually the highest rated Python book on Amazon and is all about gamedev with Python.

After you've learned Python to the point where you are comfortable (no need to master it), learn other languages to grow as a programmer. Once you've gotten a couple languages under your belt it's actually really easy to learn even more languages (unless it's a very odd language like Haskell, Lisp, or Brainfuck). The problem solving skills you've acquired often work in any language and you learn some new techniques as you learn new languages.

• Accelerated C++ is the go-to these days for C++.
  
• The C Programming Language is often recommended for learning C but it's pricey and there are dozens of good books on C to choose from.
  
• Head First Java gets recommended a lot for learning Java.
  
• C# In Depth is very highly rated and happens to be written by the guy with the largest score on StackOverflow (a kind of Q&A for programmers).
  
• The D Programming Language I really enjoyed.
  
• Programming Ruby 1.9 is often recommended but it felt more like a reference manual to me. There are higher rated books on Amazon.
  
  

The pickaxe is a decent all rounded book for learning Ruby. You can find the first edition online here, but the current version is the third.

Of all my programming books it's the most read and one I regularly end up picking up, due the wide range of examples, and the full Ruby API in the back. It's topics are rarely the best, but it's good at everything, and covers a lot of ground.

Just be aware that it's Ruby focused, not web focused (although there is a section on Ruby and the Web).

You can also check out Why's (Poignant) Guide to Ruby. The first few chapters are fantastic, and bits are some of the funniest things I've read online, but it drags a lot towards the end, and some later programming sections can be difficult to follow.

If your using Rails, then I expect some of your issues are around all the black magic it does. When you first plunge into RoR, it can feel a little like a huge black hole of features you don't know about, and that lots of things are happening without any direct reason. This is part of what makes Rails so powerful, as some features become trivial to implement.

I can only recommend you perceiver. You'll often find you've implemented something which Rails already had, or could have done better. Unfortunately this is just part of the learning process.