I enjoy reading and learning about Software Development but if I spend half my day working as a Software Dev and the other half reading about Software Development I end up burning out and not doing any reading for a while.
What I do is read about other things. Sometimes it happens that whatever I'm reading about helps me with aspects of my career. These are the books that helped me the most so far.
1. A mind for numbers by Barbara Oakley
If you ever think that you're not "good with numbers" or letters or whatever, read this. It will teach you how you learn.
2. So good they can't ignore you by Cal Newport
Taught me the value of becoming an expert in something and all the ways it pays off. Motivated me to focus on Frontend Development.
3. The War of Art by Steven Pressfield
I should read this one once a year. It taught me that the hard part is sitting down to do a job, not doing it itself. If you have procrastination problems I recommend this one.
4. Show your work by Austin Kleon
I learned to keep track of the work I was doing and showing it to the world no matter how imperfect it was. Thanks to doing that I got my job as a SD.
If you know any other books not related directly to software development that helped you please share them :)
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Latest comments (29)
Nice I’m gonna check these out
I loved The War of Art, it really made a change on how I see creative work, but still hard to implement. The simplest things are the harder.
I truly recommend you, as I see you are spanish as me, Invicto from Marcos Vazquez. I swear to god man, just go for it.
tyty
Will do, gracias 🙏🏻
Code Complete - Robert Martin, probably doesn't count as a "non computer" book, but its most important lesson for me was that there was a "professional" way of being a programmer - the "code" part of the book was secondary.
The Daily Stoic: 366 Meditations on Wisdom, Perseverance, and the Art of Living by Ryan Holiday & Stephen Hanselman is a wonderful book that you can read a very short chapter each day. It's very insightful. In a similar vain, Aesop's Fables can help raise your emotionall intelligence.
Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking by Susan Cain gave me a lot clarity on introversion/extroversion. It gives good examples of people tailoring activities and interactions to their personality type and being effective in different contexts.
The Undercover Economist and Freakonomics has made me think more deeply about data analysis and behavioral patterns.
Great list. I loved The War of Art too!
my list:
Love & Other Demons - Marquez
A Hundred Years of Solitude - Marquez
The Picture of Dorian Gray - Oscar Wilde
John Steinbeck
J. D. Salinger
The Castle - Kafka
Grass Harp - Truman Capote
The Perfume - Patrick Suskind
Game of Thrones
Lord of Flies - William Golding
Slaughterhouse Five - Kurt Vonnegut Jr
Veniss Underground -Jeff VanderMeer
Perdido Street Station - China Mieville (is a trilogy so get the other 2 also if you like the first …)
Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
World War Z - Max Brooks
Silo (3 Book Series) - Hugh Howey
A Raven's Shadow (3 Book Series) - Anthony Ryan
@jordienr me too felt the exact same. Thanks for your recommendations. For me personally, this book kick-started a steady career for me "The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick)"
by Seth Godin It helped me choose the way I study and the way I chose my career path. Really helped.
So Good They Can't Ignore You may be my favorite career book of all time... practical and directly applicable to any career.
The first one sounds interesting. I will definitely read it. 🤩
Thanks for sharing. I have not come across the other books but War of Art - I was so absorbed by the delivery that I finished reading the book in 1 day... I still plan to refer to it again and again.
Just one more book to add to the list:
The 22 Immutable Laws Of Marketing by Al Ries & Jack Trout.
Great list. One I always think about is “To engineer is human” by Henry Petroski. It’s about sudden catastrophic failures in large engineering projects like bridges or building structures. Generally architecture and civil engineering are overused analogies in computer engineering however this book made me think more about failure, the importance of failures in producing better design and my overall approach to defensive software development. It’s an older book but I read it only in the last few years and I think it is timeless.
Others that might interest you is Midnight in Chernobyl and how the Soviet beauracracy really screwed up. Another good book is called "The Adolescense of P-1"
I enjoyed The War of Art and agree, it needs to be read as a reminder yearly it feels like!
Great list and added to my queue!
I would add the book by Anton Speraul: Think like a programmer
Thanks for sharing!
I was looking for a list of books like this, thank you for this post!