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Show HN: Books mentioned on Hacker News in 2025

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Re: Show HN: Books mentioned on Hacker News in 2025

#51

Post by jasonjmcghee »

yoan9224 wrote: post #38

Love this. The top programming books being SICP, Clean Code, and Crafting Interpreters feels very on-brand for HN. Surprised by how much fiction shows up though. I'd assumed HN skewed heavily technical but seeing 1984, Dune, and Foundation in the top mentions suggests the community has broader reading habits than stereotypes suggest. One bug: looks like "The Martian" by Andy Weir is getting grouped with "The Martian…

I wouldn’t think clean code is on-brand at all.

Maybe mentioning it for what not to do?

Just search it: https://hn.algolia.com/?q=clean+code

All (justifiably) against clean code methodology.

Re: Show HN: Books mentioned on Hacker News in 2025

#52

Post by thcipriani »

dgeiser13 wrote: post #21

The Book of Dragons by Edith Nesbit is listed instead of "the Dragon book"

Same with Ezra Kline's "Abundance" vs. John Green's "An Abundance of Katherines." But I kinda like swapping in John Green—"Everything is Tuberculosis" was a good read for me this year.

Re: Show HN: Books mentioned on Hacker News in 2025

#54

Post by bdunks »

It was nice seeing my 2025 reading list represented.

I started the year reading the first five books of the Foundation Series (book #1 on the list). A must read for anyone who hasn’t read it. I couldn’t believe how well it held up 70+ years later(!!)

I just finished the 3 Body Problem trilogy, and think it’s appropriate book #2 (The Dark Forest) is on the list as it’s probably the best — but all three are great.

I’m now ready Project Hail Mary. It’s been a long time since I read the Martian,but Andy Weir’s writing style is fast paced and practically a screenplay already. It’s obvious from the first chapter why it was picked up for a movie.

Re: Show HN: Books mentioned on Hacker News in 2025

#56

Post by BeetleB »

torben-friis wrote: post #25

No offense intended towards anyone, but it usually strikes me how basic/surface level literature references are here. For a crowd pretty much defined by intellectual curiosity, it's mostly highschool reads, very mainstream scifi/fantasy and corporate self help. I wonder if it's an american thing, for engineers to be detached of liberal arts? The vibe tends to be quite different in local engineering groups.

I think two factors are in play:

The first is that there is likely more diversity the deeper you go down the intellectual hole. You and I may read much more sophisticated books, but the books you read and the ones I read differ significantly. Thus, the list is biased towards the more popular (it is, after all, a popularity list).

Second is this:

> for engineers to be detached of liberal arts?

Most of us just haven't found value in the other types of books. It would help if you gave some examples of books that should be here. For me (perhaps as an engineer), I like books to kind of get to the point. When it comes to fiction, I'm a very firm believer that, although a given novel may give great commentary about a social/philosophical issue, its primary purpose is entertainment. If I wanted to understand the underlying social/philosophical issue, a more direct, nonfiction book will always do a better job.

I've yet to find someone "changed" because of fiction. Those I know who claim to already had the sentiments before they read that piece of fiction, and the story was merely preaching to the choir. What they are glorifying is how well the story depicted an issue.

Re: Show HN: Books mentioned on Hacker News in 2025

#57

Post by seinvak »

mirashii wrote: post #17
joshdavham wrote: post #11

The top 3 programming books mentioned this year were 1. Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs 2. Clean Code 3. Crafting Interpreters Also, it’s quite fascinating how often fiction books were recommended! I wouldn’t’ve expected that on HN.

I’d be curious about sentiment analysis applied to these. I expect two of the listed to have very positive sentiment, and one generally negative in 2025.

> I expect two of the listed to have very positive sentiment, and one generally negative in 2025.

You are quite correct! Crafting Interpreters actually has the highest average sentiment score across all books with more than 10 comments. This is the average sentiment score of all three( range being -10 to 10) :

Crafting Interpreters(7.8) > SICP(4.3) > Clean Code(-3.2)

Re: Show HN: Books mentioned on Hacker News in 2025

#58

Post by card_zero »

Some more errors:

Revelations of divine love, recorded by Julian, anchoress at Norwich, A.D. 1373 wasn't really mentioned ever. Those mentions are of the book of Revelations in the Bible.

Beowulf mentions are all referencing the Old English epic poem, not a specific modern version by Seamus Heaney.

Re: Show HN: Books mentioned on Hacker News in 2025

#60

Post by whatamidoingyo »

codingdave wrote: post #2

Affiliate marketing is such a mixed bag. I absolutely love it when people can monetize their writing by adding some affiliate links that are relevant to the audience - win/win for all sides. Yet it is as slimy as anything else when the sole purpose of creating content is to publish affiliate links.

Eh, I've shared your views before. But Amazon affiliate link payouts are trash. The OP made it to the front page of HN, but I'd be surprised if he makes more than $100. It's possible, but probably highly unlikely. Let him them make some money, it's a cool project.

But, OP, if you're going to have this, disclaimers, and a privacy policy are really important (especially for collecting emails).

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