A good books on learning to build cabinets

Kitchen cabinets
Your best bet is to go to a big Hardware store like a Home Depot or Lowe's. I know Lowe's has a book section with lots of different How To books . As for the wood, you will probably use a lot of plywood, and that price will vary. When major storms come through or construction picks up, the cost of wood typically goes up. You will probably use cheaper wood for the unseen parts and a nicer one for the visible areas. Probably about $20 to $50 a sheet depending on how nice the surface is. A good book on cabinet making should tell you how to calculate the materials. Don't forget tools. If you don't have any, that will be a big cost. Building cabinets without certain power tools is practically impossible for kitchen cabinets

Modern kitchen in a traditional house

I think if you want like a modern kitchen look with a touch of traditional you should do the following...

I think that you should get rid of the idea of using any type of moldings, ex: door moldings, corner moldings, etc. The only molding you should use is the crown mold and the bottom edge piece that goes across the wall cabinets. The crown molding should be like a standard one, not a fancy one. If you have high enough ceilings and your cabs are tall, a 4 1/4" would be suitable.

There is ways of incorporating traditional touches to modern kitchens you just have to be careful and creative. For example, the crown is traditional, then your doors should only have like 1/8" revile and no molding or router edges (modern look), then the bottom you might get creative and get your cabinet maker to make you a fancy traditional piece of wood going across the bottom edge of your upper wall cabinets.

The same for the base cabinets, 1/8" revile all around, plain doors and drawer fronts, with a traditional bottom piece going across. You might want maybe make it look like a piece of furniture by putting that traditional bottom piece and some legs. He is probably going to have to give it a bit of a higher toe kick so it could rely get that furniture piece look.
kitchen cabinet modern