http://www.amazon.com/Electrical-Engineering-101-Third-Editi...
But, if you're not talking discrete components and just want something to act as more of a controller, these boards are pretty friendly:
http://beagleboard.org/ (slightly more advanced embedded controller)
http://arduino.cc/ (pretty basic and awesome community)
http://www.raspberrypi.org/ (never played with one, but another popular option)
Read:
http://www.josetteorama.com/hardware-hacking-for-ios-program...
https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/featuredarticles/Ext...
You might want to come out to a SFHN event (https://www.facebook.com/groups/gosfhn/)
and Hackendo (http://hackendo.techendo.co/)
http://www.amazon.com/Electrical-Engineering-101-Third-Editi...
But, if you're not talking discrete components and just want something to act as more of a controller, these boards are pretty friendly:
http://beagleboard.org/ (slightly more advanced embedded controller)
http://arduino.cc/ (pretty basic and awesome community)
http://www.raspberrypi.org/ (never played with one, but another popular option)
Read:
http://www.josetteorama.com/hardware-hacking-for-ios-program...
https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/featuredarticles/Ext...
You might want to come out to a SFHN event (https://www.facebook.com/groups/gosfhn/)
and Hackendo (http://hackendo.techendo.co/)