YC’s Summer Reading | Hacker News Reader

YC’s Summer Reading

themacro.com

323 pointscraigcannon180 comments

I've not read the book version but "How Buildings Learn" is one of my favorite things ever (a great case-study for looking outside of software for lessons that can apply to well...software).

Stewart Brand (of Longnow fame) produced a really lovely 6 part series for BBC in the late 90's and they are on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/brandst/videos -- highly recommended (Warning: there is a very loud and obnoxious beeping during the first 10 seconds or so)

A look at "the evolution of buildings and how buildings adapt to changing requirements over long periods" -- replace buildings with software and you’ve probably got a best-seller from Pragmatic Programmers!

I'm a huge fan of Stewart Brand, starting with the 'Next Whole Earth Catalog', which is where I learned how big a fan Brand is of Christopher Alexander and his 'A Pattern Language'. Alexander's work in patterns inspired the 'Gang of Four' to write 'Design Patterns'... so I think your best-seller prediction is not only correct, but empirically validated :)

Please let me disagree. It is a beautiful book, but really boring and repetitive. Never finished it. I'll resume it for you all: "Buildings change over time to adapt for their owners livestyle."

The really good part is the author bashing renowned architects that build prize winning buildings that leak.

I've never read the book so you aren't disagreeing :)

Sounds like the video series might be the way to go if the book is too repetitive

> I'll resume it for you all: "Buildings change over time to adapt for their owners livestyle."

An important concept in the book is "shearing layers" [1]: different parts of a building change at different rates due to differential pressures. E.g. walls change faster than foundations.

Its a few years since I last read it, but fwiw I found the book insightful and not at all boring. Each to their own though.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shearing_layers

Thanks for sharing. I just watched the first couple of episodes and they were pretty great. Reminds me a lot of "Design of everyday things" meets buildings.

And of course the mental transfer to software is fairly obvious (think user centered design, make sure software is adaptable etc.)

I'm really surprised to see Ready Player One on there. It relied way too heavily on the 80's nostalgia, to prop up the shallow story telling. But even that got old, it was like hanging around with someone that talks entirely in movie quotes, while fun at the right times, gets stale fast. You didn't care about the character, because there was nothing for him to really lose.

Totally agree with you. I couldn't get past the first few chapters, because it was flat out boring.

Compared to something like Leviathan Wakes, by James S.A. Corey...Ready Player One is so....

boring.

There, I said it too.

I'll check out Leviathan Wakes, thanks!

People I've talked to about it tend to like it because it's vr-heavy dystopia with a persistent world.

I managed to finish it and mostly share your sentiment however I think it is a decent vision/motivation for VR (not so much AR/Pokemon Go style as mentioned in the post). At least for my personal research in VR-UI/UX I like to ask myself "how far is this from RPO...what steps would get us further" since I think the overall "parallel world in VR" is a neat goal to work towards (my personal utopian interpretation ignoring the dystopian view of RPO).

I thought Ready Player One was Cyberpunk-lite. For actual brain-bending, dystopian-but-vaugely-plausible futurism I would highly recommend the latest William Gibson novel "The Peripheral".

He's always had a fascinating ability to meld technology and spirituality with a barnstorming plot thrown in for good measure. This latest novel is nicely impenetrable in places too - giving you just enough outline to be curious without serving it all up on a plate.

I'd consider it a decent beach read but wouldn't nominate it for a Hugo [not that I'm likely to be asked for my nomination]. I read it off the public libary new shelf a few years ago. It was two or three evenings' worth of reasonable entertainment and Pokemon Go reminded me of having read it.

They don't invite you to nominate books, you get to vote if you are a member of the World Science Fiction Convention: http://www.thehugoawards.org/i-want-to-vote/

I ground through it to the end. Still regret it.

It's fun, but if you want dystopian capitalist world with a parallel vr universe, snow crash has more surprising ideas. (And better writing)

Although it's a bit violent and has some... interesting mechanisms (as I was told: it gets weird)

Also, the nostalgia comes baked in because it was written in the 90s. Still super relevant though

+1 for snow crash. RPO is like "Snow Crash For Dummies"...enjoyable, but not the same.

_Snow Crash_ is good fun, and I really liked the speculative elements. It led me down the path of becoming a Stephenson junky which, coming from someone that tries to avoid reading many big novels by a single author, breaks a bit with my own principles. _Cryptonomicon_ need hardly be mentioned anymore, considering it's repute, but lately I've been reading the "prequel" trilogy consisting of _Quicksilver_, _The Confusion_ and _The System of the World_. It's set in the same literary universe, centering on events in the late 17th and early 18th century, basically tracing the early days of science. They also feature some quite humorous fictionalized versions of real life historical figures. At some point I'm probably going to look into _Anathem_ and _Seveneves_ as well. All that said, Stephenson has a rather particular style which seems to be very polarizing, but I definitely encourage giving him a shot.

_Anathem_ is great. Very slow build up. The interwoven theme of race, religion, time and space makes it well worth the slow construction of the world. Here's a video of him speaking at Google for the book tour http://youtu.be/lnq-2BJwatE

I thought SnowCrash was horrendous, with terrible writing. Most overrated book I've read to date, by far.

Have you read RP1? If you haven't and that's your impression of Snow Crash: Don't.

Look at the parent of this thread, I started it to show my disdain for that book.

Ah right. Any recent books you're enjoying?

I've read several Stephenson novels and the only one that didn't follow the pattern of:

[great, great first 3rd]

[2nd third: OK, this isn't as good, but I think he's setting up for something in the last 3rd so I'm still on board I guess]

[last 3rd: oh f_ck you this is awful.]

Was Cryptonomicon.

The one that did it the worst was The Diamond Age, which followed that pattern so strongly that it made me swear off Neal Stephenson forever. At one point he has to have one character tell us what another character's motivation has been, in a conversation with that character, in a scene that exists solely for that purpose, because there's no possible way the reader could have puzzled it out otherwise. And that's just one of the problems. What a disaster, and what a great first third. Still makes me mad.

[edit: formatting]

And the fact that it's going to be a movie just makes no sense. Unless they make a major departure from the original story, I just don't see how it'll work.

I liked it actually, but I didn't expect more than a light fun read. It's pop-lit, not a groundbreaking masterpiece, and I didn't find it boring at all.

I would add "Lords of Finance" to the list: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B001QIGZEK

The book, which won a Pulitzer in 2010, describes the financial crises and global economic depression that followed the Great Crash of 1929 -- relevant to the current (post-2008-crisis) state of affairs.

Normally, books on these topics are dull and dreary. This one is surprisingly interesting and fun, in part because it shows how colorful personalities, prevailing wisdom, and political realities influenced events.

PS. The first chapter is available for free at the New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/15/books/chapters/chapter-lor...

So glad "Seeing Is Forgetting the Name of the Thing One Sees" is here – one of my favorite books and the reason I became an artist ... and then stopped being an artist.

One of my most referenced parts of the book describes an entire year Irwin spent in Ibiza (IIRC) alone and not speaking to anyone in his late 20s. The insight he gathered that year really determined the rest of the career and enabled him to step outside of the zeitgeist of the time (abstract expressionism) into something totally different.

If you're in LA, you can see a garden he designed at the Getty Center. If you're in New York, you can visit DIA Beacon, which he also designed (or non-designed really). And if you ever get a chance to see his artwork, I highly recommend it.

Such restraint, such slowness.

Just curious, what's everybody's pace around here? It took me about a month to casually get through "Ready Player One" (great book BTW), and that was for a book club. It seems like a lot of the people I respect get through about a book a week. Either they're lying or have such good focus to avoid distractions other than books. Maybe I could put down the HN for a bit.

I think it depends. I take months to finish a book casually, but when a true page-turned like "Ready Player One" pops up, I blazed through it in days. I think there's a need for active reader engagement, where there is incentive ("It's going to be a movie directed by Steven Spielberg and music composed by John Williams!") to enjoy the fruits of being cool before it becomes cool.

Audiobooks are also a good way to blast through content at the expense of a retention cost.

Less than a day for Ready Player One ;( Not focus for me as much as how much fun I'm having

I tried listening to the RP1 audiobook, but the non-stop barrage of 80s & 90s nerd cred references seemed too forced. It may have been Wil Wheaton's delivery, which seemed to emphasize each and every reference. I gave up after a chapter or two. Does this continue throughout the book or does it ease up?

It only increases.

Right now I am averaging 1 to 2 books per week (because I'm only working part time this summer), working full time it would be more like 0.5 to 1 per week.

I find for something with a narrative structure, in a normal book format, I expect to spend about 1 minute per page -- very approximately.

For example, I bought "Night Train To Lisbon" at 2AM last Saturday night to read as I was falling asleep, and I finished it around 2AM last Sunday. At 470 pages, ~ 8 hours of reading, not that different than a normal work day worth of "effort" on Sunday.

For me, the most important thing is finding books that interest me -- that is why I would decide to spend an evening reading instead of other solo downtime like watching tv or a movie, or gaming.

It depends on the book. For fiction, I usually finish it that night (I'm bad ay delayed gratification).

Non-fiction isn't quite as addictive usually and a week is about average. I usually carry it everywhere and use any free time >1min for reading (i. e. standing in line.

I mostly read business management books, but since most of them can be summarized in a couple pages (or a single big blog post, really) I just skim and skip through the hundreds of uninteresting anecdotes and simply stop reading after I grasp the concept of the book. Takes me a couple of hrs in total per book.

When I'm reading to learn, I take notes - and if I get through a chapter or two without taking any notes I will probably abandon the book.

This year, I've explicitly been trying to read a book every two weeks, and am at 19 for the year, slightly ahead of pace. Previously, I was reading about 5-10 books a year.

Books tend to fill my lengthy public transportation commutes. also I'm not opposed to borrowing some sleep time to get in a few more pages.

I regret reading before sleep. I think I've conditioned myself to sleep anytime I read now. I can rarely get more than a five or six pages before I start to drift off.

I regret reading before sleep. I think I've conditioned myself to think a lot any time I lie in bed now. I can rarely get to sleep within an hour of going to bed.

Aiming for ~ a book a week, and have been holding steady around that mark for around the past 3 years (avg. 50 books / year). I got through Ready Player One in a weekend when I had nothing else to do, but it took me a good couple months to get through Infinite Jest this year…try to balance it out with a good mix of fiction / nonfiction and easy / hard books. I waste plenty of time online, too, but average something in the ballpark of an hour / day of book-reading.

Usually a book every 2-3 weeks.

If you are looking for a new book and want to ruin your standards for fiction, read the Red Rising trilogy. I can't help use it as a measuring stick for evaluating new books as I read them :/

I go in fits and starts; anything from 3-4 books a week to 5 in 3 months. Just find quiet moments; 10 minutes, 6 times a day is an hour all told. I read on the commute, over lunch, whilst waiting for the kettle to boil, when waiting for my partner to change for bed. It adds up.

I mostly read nonfiction and usually do it "marker and pencil in hand" so I try to read carefully and soak up new ideas. I commute by train and read about a midsized book/week that way (sometimes I sleep instead of reading, sometimes I do other stuff etc.). For the commute reading I usually pick things that aren't very meaty like popscience (the Ariely books on behavioral economics or Fooled by Randomness are good examples) or intro/overview type of books like Secrets and Lies. Most fiction I read is SciFi, the occasional fantasy and some horror and thrillers/crime.

My reading is a bit odd since I tend to read 3-5 commute books at a time picking the one that I feel like each day.

At home I enjoy the occasional comic book (some superhero stuff but mostly things like Transmetropolitan, From Hell or Criminal) and grind out more meaty books, mostly mathematics or physics and work related stuff (programming, algorithms etc.). Basically anything that involves exercises or long/hard thinking. The pace is rather slow, I aim at one good non-programming related book per month and sprinkle in the work related stuff.

tl;dr I read a lot and enjoy it :D

Easy: Spend less time on HN/Twitter/Facebook/etc :-)

When I read for light entertainment, [that's how I read Ready Player One] it's roughly a replacement for watching movies/TV. It gets chunked into multi-hour sessions over two or three or so nights. If the book doesn't motivate me to read at least 100 or so pages the first and second evening, odds are I won't finish it. I used to worry about not finishing books, now I don't.

On the other hand, recently I have started rereading a few books by some favorite authors and those I have read slowly. Not everything is worth savoring or caring about much beyond the general idea.

Reading is habits and my habits around reading for several hours formed when I was a child. On the other hand, my beloved only really started reading for fun after we were living together and its taken a couple of decades to get to reading several books at once or sometimes finishing books in a few days.

If you set a goal of about 50 pages per night, you'd be surprised how much you can read.

How fast do you read that though? I'm like the grand parent post, 50 pages is an onerous commitment, something I'll only get done if I'm really really into a book and have nothing else to do that day, or am stuck on a plane. It'll take me around eight hours of reading to finish a short young adult book, for example.

Not particularly fast. I'm probably average for the typical college-educated adult.

Obviously it varies with the density of the material.

You can work up to 50 pages. Start with 10 pages per night. After a week, add 10 pages. Repeat until you hit a number of pages you find worthwhile.

I am working on Neal Stephenson's REAMDE. I say "working on" as opposed to "finishing" since it's more of a side job than a casual read. You don't really make progress, you just sort of periodically put another hundred pages between you and the front cover, without really budging how far down the binding your bookmark is.

REAMDE is sort of like if someone looked at the average globe-spanning complicated plot and action scenes of a Bond movie, and said, "I guess it's alright, you know, for a short story."

To answer your question, I am changing my metric from "books read per trip the library" to "trips to the library (to renew my loan) per book."

Yep. Stephenson takes me a while. I kept track whilst reading _Quicksilver_ and it ended up taking me 50 days, with the baseline being 50 minutes a day on weekdays during my commute, and the odd extra hour every now and then when I had a bit of time to spare.

I don't even really read whole books. At least technical ones, I tend to hunt for the chapters/sections strictly relevant to problems at hand or upcoming. Non-technical books, I tend to skip to the most interesting chapters first and read out of order. Reading this way makes it somewhat difficult to define a pace, though I would say I read slower than average and prefer very detail-oriented reading over skimming.

I write a lot while reading. Sort of like having a conversation with the author.

I read less books this way, but the knowledge in the books become much more internalized. I tend to implement them much faster too. And aren't we reading, in part, to better our lives (short-term pleasure or long-term changes)?

Of course, I read fiction just for the pleasure as well (like Ready Player One).

This method of reading also sharpened my bullshit detector. If I am not writing a lot, this indicates lack of insights. Either a bad book or a bad time for that book. So either way, a bad book for me.

I'd be very curious to hear more about this. I've flirted on and off with note-taking on books for all the same reasons you mention, but I invariably feel guilty about progressing too slowly. In a weird way, I think this a quintessentially American affliction - like our obsession with throughput and productivity washes into our real lives as well. I'm just wondering what you do to fight that instinct. Specifically, I think the two things that get me are : (1) feeling bad about not reading enough and (2) worrying about being ultimately disappointed with a book and having wasted my time taking notes.

I feel much smarter after reading more slowly. When someone asks me, "What are you reading?" I feel much more confident in answering that question.

And the knowledge is less flimsy as well; I become a master, not a slave, of the material. I do not place the source material on a pedestal. I take what I need, and discard the garbage.

I can also cook the material much better. I am able to merge ideas from the book with my previous interests. The products from mental fusing turn out to be solid business ideas and mental models.

Very interesting. I always had this fear in the back of my mind that reading books about personal development is useless since I can't retain the information long enough to apply at the right time.

Your method might just be what I need to do to get better at this.

To implement what you read, employ the method of Directives[1]. These days my notes look like the following (from "The Inevitable" by Kevin Kelly):

----------

You hate updates? Get used to them. Because in the future, living — for most surrounded by technology — will be a constant stream of updates.

1. Embrace being an Endless Newbie; don't be embarrassed if you don't know something!

In the era of constant updates, we will be newbies — forever. Something else we have to get used to. You won't have time to master anything, really. Most of the technologies that will play a large role in the next thirty years have not been invented.

...

We are living in the golden age. We just don't realize it. The last thirty years has created a great starting point. It is the best time ever in human history to begin.

You are not late.

2. Study AI and Hardware. Go out and slap AI and sensors to everything.

----------

The numbered list is my list of Directives. These imperatives seamlessly organize my notes well; all other pieces of information turn into arguments for these assertions. This info-gathering process feels very intuitive. Our brain must be good at gathering evidence for a piece of advice.

Besides the general Directives, I use org-mode for my tasks. The end goal is to develop sensible systems, not drain your willpower performing these directives. So when I have an idea for implementing a sensible system, I write it down in org-mode (which has a numbered list of all my tasks).

[1]: https://sivers.org/2do

I use a similar but somewhat simpler method: whenever I read something, immediately after I have a finished I try to write down everything I remember. That has helped me a lot to internalize the material. Another method: in subjects I'm deeper interested, before starting to read, I scan the chapters and headlines and write down what I expect to learn and what I already know.

That is awesome. Reminds me of Barbara Oakley's Mind for Numbers; she tells her students to practice recall rather than rereading the material for learning.

When I am reading to converse, I am inclined towards not looking at the original text while writing notes. This helps me capture the material into the right context, as well as remember in the long-term.

I've been reading one paperback and one audio book simultaneously. The paper back is slow: one every month or two. The audio book is for when I run, so it's based on mileage.

I shot for 1 book per month last year and got through maybe 9.5. This year I've been more productive and have hit 12 already. Granted some of the reads I've done have been small (like the MIT essential knowledge series).

Would you recommend the MIT essential knowledge series?

I used to commute 3 hours a day, I used to finish 1-2 books per week. 3 hours of solid reading every single day.

Now, depending on the book it can be 1 week to 3 months as I don't commute and when I'm at home it's quite hard to drop everything read for one hour.

So I think it depends on people's lifestyle, if you are commuting 3 hours a day reading a book in a week is very very easy.

The Magicians is a lovely book; I actually interviewed Grossman when the first one came out, in 2010: https://jakeseliger.com/2010/10/14/an-interview-with-lev-gro.... If you like it, try Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy too.

Leviathan Wakes disappoints: its plot and political economy are interesting but on a sentence-by-sentence level one wishes for more. If you haven't read it yet try Peter Watts, Blindsight.

I've gotta throw in a counterpoint about Leviathan Wakes. The Expanse is my favorite new space opera series; it's pure entertainment that makes for great summer poolside reading. If they publish 100 of them, I will read them.

That said, Leviathan Wakes is perhaps the weakest in the series. The noir/detective plot feels like a crutch. The authors borrowed some tropes before they found their voice. If you need literary prose - or prefer your sci-fi philosophical - then these maybe aren't for you.

But if you like damn good fun, and like plot-driven novels that hinge on the stubbornness of physics and economics, give The Expanse a chance.

Pullman is another one for the Christians, I suppose. If you are not religious, it seems unlikely to me that you would enjoy it (I didn't).

Pullman wrote His Dark Materials as the atheist counter to C.S. Lewis' Chronicles of Narnia IIRC.

You might want to reread them if you came away thinking they were pro-Christian.

It's been a long time since I read it, but wasn't it all kind of about souls and soul mates and stuff like that?

Yeah, and an important plotpoint is that a church is trying to get rid of the soulmates because they are part of the original sin. So you should prob turn you view around 180 degrees.

Then probably I didn't get that far while reading, sorry about that.

Still not sure how it can be atheist if it is all about souls, though.

It was profoundly humanist scifi/fantasy.

I'm an atheist and a big fan of both His Dark Materials and Narnia. Why wouldn't an atheist enjoy religious art? That's millennia of human creativity you're throwing on the fire.

I enjoyed Narnia, but found His Dark Materials unbearable. It's been a while since I read it, though, don't remember the specifics. The soul mate with animal spirit thing just seemed Christian to me - stunned that it is supposed to be an atheist book, as another comment mentioned.

So I am not opposed to religious art. A bit tired of the "chosen one" theme in fantasy, but other than that, I tend to just view it as an expression of human yearning.

One thing is what the author puts into things, another thing is what the reader gets out of it. Animism and spirits is hardly limited to Christian mythology. I personally thought it was kind of clever and vivid imagery, especially with the mad scientists fuelling their doomsday device by ripping children apart from their souls, much like splitting the atom lead to horrific suffering when used as an engine of war - or much as certain dogma in education seems engineered to squash the imagination of children.

At any rate, I can absolutely accept that the work didn't appeal to some as much as it did me - but I just thought it strange that the reason should be that it was somehow particularly "Christian". Strikes me a bit like ignoring the parallels with the story of Christ and eg. that of Horus/Osiris. I'm not convinced people didn't come up with the stories about virgin birth, magical manipulation of water and so forth without having to hear another version first: the point is more that if you have a character that's born from a virgin, that doesn't have to mean you're trying to invoke an image of Jesus Christ. Although, often, it does mean just that.

Then there's the issue of universality of myth (sacrifice, kindness etc) - and from a certain set of religious views one could probably argue that any "atheist" myth is simply anther way for a deity/deities to make his/her/their will known...

It's pretty clearly atheist, and has been criticised by religious groups for that.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Pullman#Perspective_on_...

Maybe I didn't read far enough, didn't think a book about souls could be atheist.

The book includes religion. That's what world building is. That doesn't mean it's pro religion, anymore than it's pro armour-clad polar bears.

In the books the church is pretty oppressive.

But it's different things to include religion, which is just stuff people believe, and actual souls. Religion is just a belief. Churches are just companies.

But I admit, in that sense any fantasy novel containing magic might be "religious" in some sense. The soul thing just seemed rather Christian to me.

I am an atheist and not that well versed in Christianity, though.

I enjoyed The Magicians, but I found the two follow-ups lacking, when I expected them to keep up with the original.

Link to Blindsight: http://www.rifters.com/real/Blindsight.htm

I'm in the middle of Chaos Monkeys, and am enjoying the author's excellent prose, while walking through the sausage factory of startups. There's also some interesting YC insights, as the author's startup went through it.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Chaos-Monkeys-Obscene-Fortune-Failure...

I finished this recently and liked it as well. My "policy" is to read every technology company related memoir or corporate history that I can get my hands on, and I found this one more interesting than most as a narrative.

I also like these. just read the facebook and twitter ones. which did you also find and like?

posted a list on sibling comment

Neat "policy". Also curious about your favorites. Any you can recommend?

Sure, here are my top picks:

Interesting Story

- Soul of a new machine

- Hackers by Levy

- Masters of Doom

Lots of interesting information, not so compelling as a narrative:

- Open: How Compaq Ended IBM's PC Domination

- Elon Musk (bio by Vance)

- Softwar (Larry Ellison)

Related to tech, but not really tech:

- The Decipherment of Linear B

- Oglivy on Adviertising

- The Great Beanie Baby Bubble

I just read this recently, and the gonzo account of working in tech was very well done. I just wish the writing wasn't so boorish in parts. It seemed like the author felt the need to exaggerate some of the already ridiculous at face value tales of working in ad-tech and at Facebook. All of the crude metaphors and comparisons throughout the book didn't add much for me, but his story was interesting enough to keep me going.

I reread Cryptonomicon (the last Stephenson book to really draw me in enough to make me read it, although he frontloads a lot of the complexity, so maybe if I push through the opening to Anathem just one more time...)

For those of you who read RP1 already, I would reccomend You, by Austin Grossman, which takes the concept of a treasure hunt through computing and gaming history in a radically different direction, one that is more realistic (although it still takes some bizare leaps of logic and outright wrong turns), as you follow a new developer at a games company that his friends started many years ago, desparately trying to track down an ancient, game-breaking bug, before the company closes its doors for good.

It's flawed, but has a stronger character focus than RP1, and I think I liked it better, on the whole.

I have a first printing hardcover Cryptonomicon sitting in front of me, that I haven't cracked opened yet. Bought it prior to reading Snowcrash, which I thought was the most overrated drivel that I've ever come across. Awesome beginning, that turned into ancient religious programming nonsense. I'm afraid to even begin that monster, if the writing is anything like that.

Stephenson REALLY likes showing his work. He also likes to use myth as metaphor. So Cryptonomicon is full of Crypto, WWII and modern, philosophy, math, and computing, and involves a startup, treasure hunts, at least one conspiracy, a metaphor involving greek mythology, reflections on long-term relationships, sorta-kinda mocking liberal arts academia, and a full on erotic novella about furniture and stocking fetishes, which sets up a major plotpoint (yes, really).

If these things don't sound appeling to you, steer clear. You may just not like Stephenson. But if you're intrigued by some of the things I mentioned, give it a go.

> I have a first printing hardcover Cryptonomicon sitting in front of me, that I haven't cracked opened yet.

Cryptonomicon is very easy to start, you meet Alan Turing right in the first pages, and things progress nicely. The book is long, and jumps randomly between several different storylines, so finishing it is another matter. But it is easy to start.

And because it is essentially just a collection of stories, finishing it is not even really important. Just keep on reading as long as you enjoy.

Anathem gets pretty amazing, just hold out to chapter 10,000.

Anathem is slow to start (very), but the end is absolutely mind blowing. It was my first ever Stephenson book. Not a decision I regret at all.

Stick with Anathem. Bang for buck, it's a really economical opening. The book is fabulous.

At some point this summer I highly suggest reading the nutrition facts on back of a cold beer, preferably on the beach. Not everything you read needs to be about technology development or enlightenment.

I notice that "The Intelligent Investor", by Benj. Graham, is on the list. This is the light version of his "Securities Analysis", which is all about value investing. It's how Warren Buffett did it in the early years.

Ive read it a few times and keep getting to the chapter in the annotated version where the author of the annotations basically says that unless you really want to put the work in stick with index trackers. I then reread bogleheads, and WB's recent shareholder letters and decided i'll stick with that.

Just finished "Ready Player One" yesterday. Fun read! Would recommend.

It was great, agreed. I just started "Armada" and so far it seems like much of the same spirit of this novel.

Too much so, for me, but it came with a nice soundtrack/playlist.

Spielberg is directing an RP1 movie, slated to come out in 2018! Hopefully they knock it out of the park and its a great inspiration for the VR industry.

It'll just be another threadbare cultural touchstone to kowtow at in order to win mainstream "geek cred".

Snowcrash is what shaped the future.

A Snow Crash movie was in the works at one time, but didn't happen. Maybe if VR catches on this time...

Recommended: "The Shockwave Rider", by John Brunner. Published in 1975, and way, way ahead of its time.

Or get a break from work and this world and read some Scottish SciFi !!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture_series

I read up to Excession and stopped. At the pace I was going, there was going to be a year of Culture, then nothing new from it forever. It's such a shame that Banks died but damn, did he leave a mark.

If anyone is in the same position, I can recommend the Second Apocalypse series[1]. I find it feels like you put Tolkien and Banks in a pot, inverted some tropes, and let simmer.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._Scott_Bakker#The_Second_Apo...

+1 for The Beginning of Infinity, awesome book that really gets to the heart of scientific thinking and process.

On a different note, I am just finishing up Snowflower and the Secret Fan (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snow_Flower_and_the_Secret_Fan). Not only a well written story about the life story of two Chinese women around the turn of the century but also taught me some interesting customs about women's lives in pre-Revolution China, e.g. being lao tongs (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laotong).

The beginning of infinity is a good book by I actually found his previous book "The fabric of reality" better, in terms of what scientific thinking really is. Specifically, how important criticism is in weeding out theories that are likely to be inviable before you even start to experiment.

I just finished reading https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Quantum_Thief, and it was amazing. Best sci-fi book I've read since Neuromancer.

I read the three books last year, it really was good, left some strong impressions.

IMO: the beginning introduces some hard to get concepts, expecting the reader to stop and really try to understand.

PS/EDIT: I think Ars Technica is going to do or has done an interview of the author yesterday or today.

My favorite of the summer is http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6665847-daemon and the second half of the book http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8488830-freedom Great series, very timely since its about Augmented Reality, AI, games, ... "I accept the Deamon"

I finished the expanse series in about a week- it's a fantastic sci-fi, but it's really not for people who go in expecting action. Most of the series is space politics, as well as an annoying tendency to just vaguely hint at alien stuff, flip flopping between space magic and dumb ol' block.

That being said, I really liked it, and I would recommend it. Also, if they're not your thing, the first book is the only one with zombies.

"End of Cycle"[1] is mentioned. Key points:

- The easy hits in social and mobile have been done.

- Investors are looking for the Next Big Thing, and to some extent throwing money at what's probably the wrong stuff.

- Startups which involve making real physical stuff are a lot more complicated as businesses than pure compute-based startups.

[1] http://blog.eladgil.com/2016/07/end-of-cycle.html

I'm consistently surprised to hear people saying positive things about "Ready Player One" - to me it was one of the most hackneyed and silly books I've read in a long time. My review at the time of reading (originally for private consumption only):

Terrible modern sci-fi about easter egg MMO quest for game creator’s fortune. Childish plot/dialog, cliches everywhere (e.g. ‘L337 Hax0r Warezhouse’), absolutely atrocious, really simple puzzles. The only positive thing I can say about it is that I didn’t give up on it immediately - although I was tempted, the main plot line was at least interesting enough that I wanted to hear the end. Unfortunately the ending itself was disappointing - the final puzzle was just a rehash of the first two. My main takeaways were: I hope the ‘MMO-scifi’ subgenre is finally dead, I should wait at least 10 years for more recent sci-fi to go through quality assurance, and that it seems like based on this, anyone with a half-baked idea and enough pop-culture-nerd knowledge to sprinkle throughout 300 or so pages should be able to write a best-seller. Meanwhile, the politics/worldview it espouses is basically boingboing distilled - big corporation bad, internet is free, knowledge is free, american culture and society is dead, cyber-elite should run world, pop-media is simultaneously in control of world and source of inspiration and true creativity.

I agree - I really wanted to like Ready Player One but the writing was just so difficult to enjoy. In the same way I remember thinking "wow this is really well written" when reading George R R Martin, I spent most of RP1 thinking, "I will get through this for the concept but this is not a good book."

Instead of Ready Player One, I recommend the Nexus trilogy by Ramez Naam. The action is a little overdone, but it's so much better than Ready Player One and it does a really good job of exploring very interesting technology questions!

Have to agree. RP1 has taken the ideas of VR past and synthesized them in a fun young adult novel.

Nexus paves a highway over our present into the biotech future. It makes you think about how free individuals harness technology and the culture/society/gov they live in.

I really enjoyed it myself. It was a big nostalgia fest. I wonder -- are you significantly older or younger than the audience that would've spent time enjoying these games?

I spent time on some of it. I'm only 35 so perhaps a bit young; or maybe I didn't spend enough time in arcades.

I found it heavy handed. Just dumping tons of references all over the place. Felt like he printed out a list of games and stuff and just made sure to check each one off.

I'm right dead center in the middle of the targeted age group and was extremely into arcade games at the time, but everything I've seen about "Ready Player One" makes it sound pandering at best.

15, but I loved it.

Not to mention the love interest relationship, which is basically, "Love interest doesn't trust protagonist until the story reaches a climax and all of a sudden she's protag's girlfriend despite not having any new reason to be that."

Even worse, "love interest doesn't think she's pretty but only the protagonist is a nice enough guy to see past that." The whole book was a bunch of wish-fulfillment fantasies, but I found the romance the creepiest.

Only the protagonist met her in real life. I think you read too much into that.

Yeah - the part where he walks in the room and starts playing Joust against the boss was where I gave up.

I love scifi, and but I totally agree. I thought Ready Player One was terrible. My only explanation is that it's a huge nostalgia rush for a certain set of Gen X readers.

I really liked Mr Penumbra's 24 Hour Book Store, but I think for the same sort of nostalgic reasons as people love Ready Player One.

To each their own though...

It's an interesting contrast with The Martian: both are geek porn, but one says "Geeks are awesome because they might have a high-school level understanding of science which would be improbably useful if they were stranded alone on Mars." and the other says "Geeks are awesome because knowing the script to War Games demonstrates moral fiber." and believes it. (The character who established the challenges believing this is not problematic. The book believing it, heart and soul, is a knock on the book.)

Eh, I still think The Martian was a good book. It had the plot and humor to make its concept stand up. And the very fact that some people have made complaints about the accuracy of its science is a testament to the fact that it did take its science seriously to some degree: Most fiction doesn't show enough work for you to question it.

RP1 was okay. Cline's next book, Armada, was similar, and that's where it really starts to fall apart.

I thought it was entertaining but also wouldn't recommend it unless I think someone would enjoy the nostalgic bits.

One newer sci-fi trilogy I would highly recommend is The Three Body Problem by Liu Cixin. The writing is a bit different but if you get over that the ideas are really novel and the story is epic and gripping. The Dark Forest (Book 2), in particular is one of my favorite sci-fi stories of all time. My Chinese coworkers all raved about the triology and for good reason. Note: the first and second book are out but the third's English translation is coming this fall (I am eagerly awaiting it).

My family and I thought the book was fantastic, but one thing I wanted to say is how cool the the author is (Ernest Cline). We went to a book signing at Flyleaf Books in Chapel Hill, NC. Ernest spoke and gave a presentation for about 90 mins. He was very funny, had a bunch of great stories, and really engaged with all the kids as well. Warren Robinett (the creator of Adventure on the Atari 2600) is friends with Ernest and lives in Chapel Hill so he came to the event as well and spoke a bit. Another great guy. I was just totally blown away by how engaging Ernest was and how much extra effort he put in with the kids in the audience. You really get the feeling that he is super excited about whatever he is doing. His enthusiasm was contagious. Anyway, thought I'd share this. It does make me really root for the guy now.

Have you heard of the Arthur C. Clarke Award? It's an annual written sci-fi award from the UK, but it's a judged award. People who know lots of sci-fi read all the UK published SF in a year, and pick a winner. You can't win by just appealing to pop geek voting base.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_C._Clarke_Award

I found an alternate link to Hadrian's Wall that includes a kindle version (thus a preview sample) etc: https://www.amazon.com/Hadrians-Penguin-History-Brian-Dobson...

[edit: although I see it has a lot of illustrations so kindle format maybe non-ideal.]

I read tegmark' about a year ago. Very insightful for a cosmology noob like me (e.g. Lots of stuff on inflation theory, origin of Carbon (i didn't know),etc.). Clearly believes in the 'many worlds' hypothesis which may be hard to take, but is nonetheless an insightful view on how weird reality actually is from one of mit's great scientists.

The title implies this is a list of books that YC somehow institutionally recommends (like their "how to pitch" articles). When I first looked at it that way it seemed strangely uneven in terms of quality. When I realized this was actually "some personal recommendations from our staff and partners" it became a perfectly reasonable collection :)

Has anyone read 'Dream Machine' by Mitchel Waldrop.

https://www.amazon.com/Dream-Machine-Licklider-Revolution-Co...

I have heard Patrick collision talking about this book quite a few times.

> While my experience doesn’t always jibe with the ideas in the book

Care to elaborate, @emmett?

I don't think my anecdotal evidence is particularly stronger than the author's. My point is just to take it all with the knowledge that what worked at google in an experiment there won't necessarily work for you in the same way. The world is complex and these things are contingent.

Glad to see so many great female authors represented ... Oh... Wait

If you have good books to recommend, do.

Not the OP but I'd highly recommend "Zoo City" by Lauren Beukes. Brilliantly written, gritty, bonkers-but pulsating plot set in a grimy version of Johannesburg. Loved it.

Right now, Amazon tells me that customers who viewed a-given-book-on-this-list also viewed other books on this list. Is that the effect of being on this list? Interesting.

You guys should include more tech books too.

Any recommendations on investment books?

The Black Swan

I am sure you noticed Grahams's The Intelligent Investor on the list.

Warren Buffet often cites it as his favorite book on investing stating, "picking up that book was one of the luckiest moments of my life”. I recall he decided to read it at least 10 times before making another trade, but I can't find the source. Human nature doesn't change, so that book is still relevant.

Otherwise the "Warren Buffet Way" is a modern take on the same theories.

Great! Bill Gates started to be a tech mogul that recommends books. Now it looks like everyone that want to become a tech mogul must share reading recommendations. I liked this trend.

Pretty sure reading recommendations pre-date Bill Gates...

I'm getting a 404?

edit: has been fixed.

me too

Fixed. Sorry about that!

ditto.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com