For antennas, you could do worse than picking up a copy of John Kraus' "Antennas" - he starts off with the basic principles and builds on them as he introduces

For antennas, you could do worse than picking up a copy of John Kraus' "Antennas" - he starts off with the basic principles and builds on them as he introduces new concepts. Uses enough math to let you understand what is going on without getting carried away with too many nasty integrals. His writeup on an idea for a gravitational transmitter/receiver system towards the end of the book is worth the money alone. :-) For a cookbook showing you a lot of how without bothering too much about the why, Karl Rothammel's Antennenbuch (in German) can't be beat, IMHO.