Top products from r/ASPNET

These are the top 3 I'd say:

• Professional ASP.NET MVC 3 Framework (Wrox-August 2011)
  > Jon Galloway, Phil Haack, Brad Wilson, K. Scott Allen
  
  
• Pro ASP.NET MVC 3 Framework (Apress-June 2011) - [Pre-order v4]
  > Steven Sanderson, Adam Freeman
  
  
• ASP.NET MVC 4 In Action (Manning-June 2012)
  > Jeffrey Palermo, Jimmy Bogard, Eric Hexter, Matthew Hinze, Jeremy Skinner
  
  Don't get hung up over V3/V4; there's not a lot new in 4.
  
  Also don't worry about being "up to date", most of your time will be spent trying to figure out the best way to do something; the "how" to do something part is usually very straight-forward, there are just many options.

Get this book: Beginning ASP.NET 4.5 in C# by Matthew MacDonald

It will take you anywhere from 1 to 4 months depending on your proficiency and skills.

It will teach you the basics about the current state of the technology. ASP.NET is old and it has gone through several distinct iterations but this book should be good enough to get you going.

You will not become an expert but you will be competent enough to work by yourself or as an entry level coder in an MVC team.

edit: You will also need to get Begginning ASP.NET MVC 4.0 if the company is using MVC. It will add 1 to 3 months to your plans.

I highly recommend the book Professional ASP.Net MVC 3. It covers ASP.Net MVC 3, Razor, EF and how they all fit together. It touches the AJAX subject without going very far in it but it introduces that.

Professional ASP.NET Design Patterns