Speaking of Windows Internals, you must have heard of it as long as you are interested in the Windows architectures and internals. For it is committed to the underlying mechanism, it won't cover all Windows contents, such as Windows window management, graphics, COM/COM+, .NET, etc. If you are willing to know more about Windows underlying principle, then this book is very suitable to you.

Writing a C program not only needs to be grammatically correct, the key is that your code should be easy enough to read and maintain. Now there are so many C language books, but the biggest difference of Practical C Programming, 3rd Edition lies in its emphasizing on the practical principle, i.e. introducing C language to readers in a concise and practical form.

About how hard it is on earth for learning MFC, this should vary from person to person. If you are experienced programmers started from the base Windows OS, you'd likely have been a member of programmers developing the MFC class libraries; on the contrary, if you just have learned few years of Windows programming, then you may have not any knowledge on the underlying system. In the latter case, you must have one book on your desk for reference anytime (every technology needs this). For MFC, it will be Programming Windows with MFC.

The C language withstood test of time is absolutely not replaceable by its younger brother C++ (it just has not such ability, unless one day the computer does not use 0s and 1s any more). Experienced programmers can use C language to write fast and efficient programs all the time, and even now the running million lines of C codes everywhere fully demonstrate its formidable vitality.

If you want to be familiar with SQLite, then starting with The Definitive Guide to SQLite, 2nd Edition is definitely a good idea (especially for beginners, after finishing its easy-to-understand and dapper content, you will get a good harvest). And in fact, guide books with the same quality for SQLite are hardly to find out on the market.