Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Good books?

news.ycombinator.com

111–120 of 170 posts

Re: Ask HN: Good books?

#111
post #59

Non-fiction: "Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion" by Robert Cialdini Fiction: "Cloud Atlas" by David Mitchell I'm going to assume that you've read Crytonomicon and Snowcrash by Neal Stephenson, but if not... they are #1 on any list.

Snowcrash is fun but doesn't have anyhere near the depth of his later books. Cryptonomicon is fantastic, you shouldn't let the first one of the System of the World put you off, and I love Anathem. Unfortunately Neal Stephenson is terrible at ending books; but the journey is def. worth it.

I gave up on System of the World after it turned out not to be a trilogy after all. Anything else by Stephenson I obsess over, though. Anathem was basically a religious experience for me and I read it straight through twice - something I only do about once a decade.

I might be ready for a fourth reading now.

Re: Ask HN: Good books?

#112
post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought Slaughterhouse Five was great, but I think I found myself left thinking more after reading Breakfast of Champions.

Really? I've read both (along with several other Vonnegut books), and I thought S5 was much more though provoking. Given how quickly his books read, I might have to reread Breakfast of Champions.

I really enjoyed _The Sirens of Titan_ and _Cat's Cradle_, too.

Re: Ask HN: Good books?

#113
Has no one recommended Musashi? Really? Here's a writeup I did in another comment -

--

If you're talented and get frustrated with stupid people, you have to read "Musashi" by Eiji Yoshikawa. I mean, you have to.

Musashi was one of the greatest (maybe the greatest) swordsman of all time. He invented a Japanese longblade/shortblade mixed style of swordsmanship, at one point fighting himself out of an ambush when he was attacked by over 30 men. He was undefeated in over 60 duels, including defeating arguably the second best swordsman in Japan at the time while fighting with a wooden oar he carved into a rough swordlike shape.

Here's Musashi's Wikipedia page:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miyamoto_Musashi

The book by Eiji Yoshikawa is historical fiction - it's period accurate and follows all of Musashi's most well known story. It fills in some other details we don't know of Musashi's life - how he might have trained, some minor scuffles with bandits of the day, and it added a love story.

The book is exceptional. Musashi has immense amounts of raw talent, but is in conflict with himself in the world, arrogant, keeps getting into problems and trouble until he comes to more mastery and wisdom. Seriously, I read a lot, and this is hands-down my favorite book of all time. It's a hell of an enjoyable read, really pleasant and beautiful, fun and adventurous, but also filled with deep wisdom. It's a great swashbuckling story, but also teaches you about thinking critically, tactics, strategy, training, tradeoffs, and so on. Just a masterpiece. Easily the most influential book of my life.

No affiliate link:

http://www.amazon.com/Musashi-Eiji-Yoshikawa/dp/4770019572

Re: Ask HN: Good books?

#114
I would also add "Jonathan Livingston Seagull" by Richard Bach. Its a simple and inspiring story about a bird who tries to question the very simple facts and norms of life established by generations before.

Re: Ask HN: Good books?

#115
post #54

I read a lot of biographies. It's interesting how you start seeing the common denominators between great men when you do. Especially 'Alexander of Macedon' by Peter Green is a riveting read.

That's easily one of the best biographies I've read. It's up there with Martin Gilbert's biography of Churchill.

Re: Ask HN: Good books?

#116

I would also add "Jonathan Livingston Seagull" by Richard Bach. Its a simple and inspiring story about a bird who tries to question the very simple facts and norms of life established by generations before.

The theme of positivism in this book inspires me.

Re: Ask HN: Good books?

#118
Here's a few I've really liked that have a broader subject matter than only what you asked for. I figure that if you like to read you'd like these books.

--- NON-FICTION ---

Darkness Visible

A Mathemematician's Apology

Omnivore's Dilemma

Fermat's Enigma

The Code Book

Born to Run

Judgement of Paris

Siddhartha

Killing Pablo

The Victorian Internet

Lone Survivor

I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell

Surely You're Joking Mr. Feynman

Papillon

Into Thin Air

Born on a Blue Day

Touching the Void

Got Fight

The Conquest of Happiness

--- FICTION ---

Switch Bitch

Lost Horizon

The Cuckoo's Egg

The Simlarillion

The Time Traveler's Wife

The Alchemist

The Count of Monte Cristo

A Canticle for Leibowitz

Neverwhere

My Uncle Oswald

Stories of Your Life and Others

Invisible Cities

Life of Pi

Atlas Shrugged

--- WALL STREET / FINANCE ---

When Genius Failed

Liar's Poker

Buffett (Lowenstein)

Bull!

Black-Scholes and Beyond (textbook)

Fixed Income Securities (textbook)

The Road to Serfdom

The Smartest Guys in the Room

Fortune's Formula

The Fourth Turning

Inside the House of Money

--- ENTREPRENEURSHIP / COMPUTERS (non-textbook) ---

Masters of Doom

It's Not About the Bike

Dot. Bomb

Founders at Work

The PayPal Wars

Coders at Work

The Mousedriver Chronicles

Leaving Microsoft to Change the World

The Soul of a New Machine

Startup

The Hypomanic Edge

Small Giants

Small is the New Big

Four Hour Work Week

The Boy who Harnessed the Wind

Four Steps to the Epiphany

Pour your Heart into it

Beyond Software Architecture

Setting the Table

--- DESIGN / UX ---

On Writing

The Design of Everyday Things

Understanding Comics

The Elements of Typographic Style

Don't Make me Think!

A Pattern Language

--- PROGRAMMING ---

Programming Pearls

Effective Java

The Algorithm Design Manual

Advanced Programming in the UNIX Environment

The Pragmatic Programmer

Refactoring

Java Concurrency in Practice

Java Puzzlers

Expert C Programming

--- COOKING ---

The Secrets of Cooking Revealed

Cooking for Geeks

The Bread Baker's Apprentice

The Brewmaster's Table

--- MISC ---

Robot Building for Beginners

Mountaineering - The Freedom of the Hills

A First Course in Coding Theory

The Computational Beauty of Nature

Total Control

The Ashley Book of Knots

Make: Electronics

Re: Ask HN: Good books?

#120
Non-fiction

- 'The Selfish Gene' - Richard Dawkins

Grokking the concept changed the way I thought about life forever.

- 'Quantum Reality' - Nick Herbert

One of the best introductory level books on quantum physics mysteries. No nonsense.

- Zen and the art of Motorcycle Maintenance - Robert Pirsig

The book that introduced me to Kant, Hume and philosophy of science. Just for that, I'm forever indebted to it.

Some favorite fiction books -

- Cryptonomicon - Neal Stephenson Loved 'Snowcrash' too.

- 'The Moon is a Harsh Mistress' - Robert Heinlein

- Anything by Kurt Vonnegut, Milan Kundera, Somerset Maugham

Post reply on HN