I like to read some old-time books just to enjoy a sort of nostalgia. But for practical elk hunting information, I think one of the best I have read is "Elk Tactics" by Don Laubach and Mark Henckel. This book spends a lot of time discussing principles of elk behavior and how they lead into predicting where to find elk. Elk country is big. If you are just going to go randomly look to find elk, that is a tall task. This book tells you where are the best places to look for elk. For example, find a long gentle ridge. Look for flat spots on the ridge. Elk like those flat spots -- also called benches -- for bedding (provided they are not open parks). They like to bed close to the crest of the ridge, looking downhill to see approaching danger and then can run off the back side of the ridge when danger is seen. A lot of information with this kind of content. Now, I cannot confirm this information from my own experience, but it seems logical and sensible.
Another good book is "Elk and Elk Hunting" by Hartt Wixom. Again, this book has practical information that can be helpful to find elk. Frankly, in my view, if I can find elk, it is game over, but finding the elk is ticklish and difficult. I can figure out all the rest -- physical conditioning, cothing, rifle, scope, meat care, tents, all that endless frou-frou of equipment and gear. Frankly, it has been my experience that the elk hunting books are crammed full of equipment/gear discussions. As if there aren't enough books and information out there about that already! If you really are a total rank beginner, you could get some general book like Jim Zumbo's book on Elk Hunting put out by the Complete Hunter series. This is short, sweet, to the point and goes into some of the gear topics. You can probably find it used on-line somewhere pretty cheap. Try alibris.com or abebooks.com, used book sellers.