An incomplete list of books that I've enjoyed reading recently. Please pester me if I don't add to this list frequently.
- Liars' Poker
- Lewis, Michael.
- A very interesting look at the craziness of Wall Street culture.
- Don't Make Me Think
- Krug, Steve.
- A very nice look at usability issues.
- Paths of the Dead
- Brust, Steven. Tor Books, 2002. ISBN: 0312864787
- The latest offering from my most favoritest author. More swashbuckling fun and interesting backstory to the Vlad Taltos tales.
- Neo-Solo.
- Slickman, Diana, ed. Chicago: Hope and Nonthings, 2002. ISBN: 0970745885
- Another gift from the Neo-Futurists. This is a collection of one-person plays from Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind. They were a lot of fun to read in their own right, but also because I remember seeing many of them performed.
- Software Craftsmanship.
- Breen, Pete. Alberta: Addison-Wesley, 2001. ISBN: 0201733862
- Some great thoughts on the craft of programming. If you want to work in a profession that doesn't look at programming as a stopping off point on the way to management, you'll like what's in this book. A great alternative to the 'Learn New Technology X in Y Days' mentality that plagues the software industry.
- Mythical Man-Month.
- Brooks, Frederick P. Jr. Reading, Addison-Wesley, 1979.
- A classic in software management.
- Refactoring.
- Fowler, Martin. Addison-Wesley, 1999.
- Debugging the Development Process.
- Maguire, Steve. Microsoft Press, 1994.
- American Gods.
- Gaiman, Neil. Morrow, 2001.
- A very interesting novel that asks what happens to the gods when people stop believing in them. One idea in this book that stuck with me is the idea that there are places of great power on the earth. When we look at the history of many different parts of the world, we often see places that have always been places of worship. The deity or deities that are worshipped there change over time, but we often find that people keep getting drawn back to these same places of power. That's not the case in America, however. In America, roadside attractions are put up in these places of power. People find themselves drawn to these places, and they can't explain why. Evidence of this is that these places perform an American miracle. That is, they stay in business forever, with seemingly nothing to support them but they manage to turn a large ball of twine or some such into that most American of holy relics, cash.
- The Pragmatic Programmer.
- Hunt, Andrew, and David Thomas. Reading: Addison-Wesley, 2000.
- The Cookoo's Egg.
- Stoll, Clifford. Doubleday, 1989.
- The great story of how Cliff Stoll doggedly tracked down a Russian computer cracker. I think Cliff exemplifies most of the best qualities of nerds.
- Deep Cover.
- Levine, Michael. iUniverse.com Press, Delacorte Press, 1990.
- Michael Levine, retired DEA agent writes about his frustrating experience as an undercover agent in Operation Trifecta, the largest drug bust of its time, and how political infighting between various governmental agencies nearly kept the operation from happening at all.