I'm mostly looking for a book or guide that I can use to learn Linux step by step from the ground up. I've searched and found a lot of great info, but it's all kind of scattered around and I feel like I don't know where to start. Is there a guide that could help get me started? thank you in advance for the replies.

The Slackbook is very good on basics, such as permissions, file structure, and the like. I bought a copy and read it through.

Garrels's Introduction to Linux. This helped me more than any others when I was starting out. Also read it through, and it's frequently updated.

Linux, the Complete Reference. It's more like a manual than a teaching document: a good reference, but not something to sit down and read through. I have an earlier edition; the best comparison I can make is that it's like a compilation of man pages.

About dot com has a good online intro to Linux. It's oriented towards Ubuntu, but the information is solid and accurate.

I would recommend downloading Garrels, printing it out, and reading it through. It's more comprehensive than the Slackbook.

Thanks for the responses everyone, I think I'll check out Garrel's introduction to linux. It looks exactly like what I'm looking for.

See also http://rute.2038bug.com/index.html.gz and the long list of free to read www.linuxtopia.org books.