Simple Cake by Odette Williams

This was the Food 52 Baking Club cookbook for October, and i wish that I had had something like this when my children were younger.  It is written by a good home baker, and the approach is to make easy cakes that look beautiful and can be brought to a birthday party or serve as dessert for a family dinner.
The book is a repertoire of tinkered and fine-tuned recipes that reflect the author's nurturing, easy-going sensibilities: unfussy, not overly sweet, endlessly flexible, and straightforward.   Their genius lies in how they are organized: 10 classic base cakes (Very Vanilla, Tangy Olive Oil, Cinnamon Spice) and 15 toppings (Nana’s Simple Glaze, Toblerone Ganache, Beautiful Buttercream), followed by 30 “Cake-worthy Moments” where the author illustrates the infinite creative possibilities for assembling these elements to suit any situation.  So you can mix and match cakes and frostings, do variations of each, or simply follow the basic instructions.  If you never want to make something that requires more tools than a handful of cake pans and a frosting kit, this is a great choice.