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Comment by Matt_Cutts | Hacker News Reader

If folks are looking for another Tracy Kidder book, I'd recommend _House_. It's the story of building one house in Massachusetts in 1985 or so. Kidder goes into the life of the buyers and the builders, and the result is surprisingly compelling.

I know what you're thinking: why not _A Truck Full of Money_, Kidder's book about Paul English, the founder of Kayak? It's a fine read, but I found _House_ to be more contemplative and open up wider vistas (for me, at least).

Kidder is a great writer. I think people might enjoy _House_.

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Or better yet (than Truck), check out "Mountains Beyond Mountains", about Paul Farmer's quest to defeat infectious disease where it's needed most and available least around the world.

Yes, reading that book made hearing about Farmer's recent death hit hard. Hopefully the system of clinics he set up in Haiti and elsewhere will survive long term after his death.

I have to say, I read quite a bit of that but got bored with it. Not that it's not a great story about important work, but at some point I felt like I'd read all I needed to.

I still mull over his comment about the role of "architect":

> Between 1830 and the Civil War, architects published scores of pattern and style books. At one point or another, most of those volumes argue that an architect offers the client protection from the builder. The case is often founded on social class, the architect being the client's ally by virtue of education and breeding. The argument plays upon the suspiciousness of clients about builders, a wariness that seems to have been around for so long that it probably deserves to be called natural.

I can't help but apply that class interpretation to the roles of "architect" and "developer" in a software project.

I enjoyed House which I read at the time I had just bought an old farmhouse. He's a very good writer although I have to admit that some of the topics he's chosen for books don't really make me want to dive in.

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