Lieske & Myers: "Coral Reef Fishes"
Excellent travel companion: small yet quite comprehensive (for fishes only). However, sometimes species illustrations are quite not the same as photographs, especially for identifying things for the first time.
Kuiter, Debelius et al.: "A comprehensive guide to ..." series by TMC Publishing
Plenty of photographs, very comprehensive coverage of select fish families.
Debelius et al.: "Reef/Field Guide" series by IKAN.
Plenty of photographs, nice balance of fishes and other critters (in reef guides), the included short stories are both very interesting and informative.
Veron: "Corals of the world"
Very comprehensive (and a bit expensive); however, it is _only_ about hard corals!
Allen & Steene: "Indo-Pacific Coral Reef Field Guide"
Plenty of photographs with nice balance of fishes and other critters. However, provides very limited info on different species.
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About bookstores:
The marine ID book selection in Amazon.co.uk is quite limited. Amazon.com in US seems much better, but for Europeans it might create additional costs with VAT and shipping.
TMC series, IKAN series, and some others are available in
<a href='http://www.tmc-publishing.com/index.asp' target='_blank'>http://www.tmc-publi...m/index.asp</a>
Another European specialist store is <a href='http://www.aquapress.co.uk/' target='_blank'>http://www.aquapress.co.uk/</a>
Feel free to add your favorites to the list. Xmas is coming
