Stats for nerds
3recommend
7mentions
4people
2013–2025years
86% recommend14% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- Books which I have read and would recommend include:
- _Ashley's Book of Knots_ --- everyone should be aware of knots and now at least the basics interesting, _The Klutz Book of Knots_ was also mentioned once
- James Clavell _Noble House_ --- part of his "Asian Saga", not sure if it has aged well --- if a person could read only one of these, I'd recommend _King Rat_, based on his experience in a Japanese prison camp in WWII.
- Hesse _Steppenwolf_ --- that Hesse is no longer read saddens me deeply, and not just because this makes _The Glass Bead Game_ less likely --- his thoughts on the difficulties of interpersonal relationships resonate even now
- Knuth _Literate Programming_ --- I _really_ wish this style f programming would gain traction and that there would be more instances of taking famous programs and re-writing as a Literate Program, e.g., http://literateprogramming.com/adventure.pdf
- Knuth _Digital Typography_ (and not just because I have a reward check)
- Knuth _Mathematical Writing_ --- if you do any work in math, you probably already have a copy --- if you don't, you probably need one
- Dewdney _The Planiverse_ --- response to the classic _Flatland_, this has a real charm and despite the dated computer technology, has held up well
- Walter jon Williams _Hardwired_ --- an amazing cyberpunk novel, part of which was published in _Omni_
- Steven Brust's _Jhereg_ --- one of my favourite fantasy novels, which I've been reading since picking it up in a Waldenbooks when I was in high school, waiting for the last two books, and esp. glad of these since they made the "Paarfi Romances" exist --- anyone who enjoys Alexandre Dumas and fantasy should read _The Phoenix Guards_
- C.J. Cherryh's _Regenesis_ --- her entire Alliance--Union series is amazing and books are so varied pretty much everyone will find something which appeals
- Trevanian _The Eiger Sanction_ and _Shibumi_ --- not sure if this and _Shibumi_ have aged well or no, but the latter was a big part of my childhood
- Ben Franklin's Autobiography --- read presidential biographies to my kind in chronological order as a trial and regret not continuing with the actual project: biographies of important persons in chronological order
- Sanora Babb's _Whose Names Are Unknown_: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1197158.Whose_Names_Are_... (ob. discl., that was my mention)
Other books which only I mentioned:
- Hal Clement _Space Lash_ now available in https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/939760.Music_of_Many_Sph... --- I recommend folks read it in reverse chronological order, starting at the back, then working to the front and bailing when things get too quaint/old-school/golden-age.
- H. Beam Piper "Omnilingual" --- this should be a part of the middle school canon, lightly updated version at: http://vrici.lojban.org/~cowan/omnilingual.html
- _Foxfire_ --- a classic series what predated the "Maker" movement
- Tolkien's _The Fall of Arthur_
- Knuth _TeX: The Program_
Books which were sufficiently striking that I have made a note of them to get to read (hopefully this will work out better than _The Black Swan_ which I found annoying)
- _Visual Thinking in Mathematics_
- _Hardcore VisualBASIC_ --- still a bit bummed that I managed to miss this and MacBasic....
- _Phoebe and her Unicorn_ --- getting this for my daughter
- _Harmony with Lego(R) Bricks_ --- book on music improvisation
- Ornamental Origami
Note that a number of books weren't actually mentioned, e.g., Isaac Asimov's _Book of Facts_
- The inclusion of Vonnegut's _Cat's Cradle_ is bizarre --- it posits an impossible substance, with bizarre properties, and examines society in a way I have trouble relating to, and its commentary on science such as it is, is if anything, discouraging.
_Dune_ for its role in inspiring the study of ecology would seem more fitting.
It's unfortunate that a didactic text such as H. Beam Piper's novella "Omnilingual" couldn't be considered instead.
- Well, that was H. Beam Piper's premise in his "Terro Human Future" and "Paratime" stories --- see the wonderful novella "Omnilingual" and see the story "Genesis":
- I've always thought it was quite unfortunate that some really arcane presentation of the periodic table wasn't used in H. Beam Piper's novella "Omnilingual":
https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/19445/pg19445-images.ht...
- There is an excellent short story from the 50s, "Omnilingual" by H. Beam Piper, that explores deciphering a literally alien language. It is mercifully in the public domain because it was written before copyright became infinite in the 1970s. You can read it here: https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/19445
I would be interested to read the book you're talking about, if you have the title!
(Your math example reminds me a bit of Lambda Calculus, but I guess you'd have a hard time making a real language out of it.)
- Some recommendations for people:
Omnilingual by H. Beam Piper, known for his alternative time line stories.
Beyond Lies the Wub, by Philip K Dick, a collection of his early short stories.
A Princess of Mars, by Edgar Rice Burroughs. The beginning of his Mars series about its civilization's decline.
