Here you'll find the list of books I've read in no particular order. This goes as far back as I can accurately remember. I spent a great deal of time in my primary and high-school days reading non-fiction books so there's a vast amount not covered in this list, however the texts I engaged in during this time were mostly shortform pieces I found interesting in the libraries at the time, whereas nowadays, it tends to be a lot more philosophical or nuanced.
Nineteen Eighty-Four (George Orwell)
A deeply anthropological and philosophical read. I really enjoyed this one and has helped with contesting some previously-held beliefs I had.
Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
Quirky, taboo and, just like 1984, deeply anthropological. This book encouraged me to dig deeper on human psychology/neuroscience to understand exactly why the events in the book are seemingly plausible and the aspects that keep this narrative as a piece of fiction rather than our real world.
The Fall (Albert Camus)
A birds-eye view of the life of a seemingly selfless and successful lawyer that eventually turns around and hits you with a philosophical truck. I believe this book holds an answer to why some people tend to build an identity centered around selflessness and innocence, why it is not as virtuous as it seems, and hence why it is unsustainable.
The Initial D Series (Shuichi Shigeno)
So far I've read stages 1 and 2, but I've watched most of the anime series.
Would highly recommend the books, it's far easier to pick up on the depth of the characters, their feelings and also the nuance of the authors in their writing.
The Deficit Myth (Stephanie Kelton)
This book presents an interesting take on the modern financial system since the abolishment of the gold-standard. One question this presents to you now is "What's stopping all of the governments in the world from simply borrowing or printing infinite amounts of money from their central bank?"
The Ten Equations that Rule the World (David Sumpter)
Not the greatest book I've read. It presents some interesting scenarios that involve some mathematics, but it's not an all-knowing oracle as the title suggests, rather is more like a children's playground of various interesting correlations between maths and the real-world.
Unf*ck yourself (Gary John Bishop)
A short and sharp self-help book if you're in dire need of a boot up your ass.
The Goal (Eliyahu Goldratt)
A book on lean manufacturing theory presented as a short story of a man who has been put in charge of making a factory profitable within 90 days. I accidentally got the comic book version, but I assume the principles are communicated just the same since this one still made a lot of sense to me.
This book was recommended to me as an aside to some other books I'll mention below since it also extends to software engineering.
The Phoenix Project (Gene Kim, Kevin Behr and George Spafford)
Yet another software engineering-related book. This one is not about the code itself, but rather how organisations should flow. I've always been more fascinated by this because it is often the biggest road-block and pain point when you are an engineer.
The way this is presented is quite exquisite in my eyes. It is also written as a narrative about a fictional company and project that needs to be completed. Some of the activities they partake in to get the ball rolling is quite raw, but somehow it works, and that's beautiful.
The Lean Startup (Eric Ries)
A great book that applies the learnings from The Phoenix Project ans also lays out hard principles that explain what makes certain startups so good at launching themselves into the stratosphere and maintaining their growth after the fact.
Staff Engineer (Will Larson)
A book about navigating the next career path after Senior Software Engineer. This presents some interesting takes on the various job roles you'll find around the world. In essence, there's nothing clear I took from this book other than a sense of what the environment will look like. Every company does something different so every Staff Engineer or Principle Engineer/IC will be doing something different with a different set of behaviours and trust.
One thing I like about this book is that it contains both the original conversations that the author had with people in the field, and also commentary on it. Having this mix of raw primary data and also an opinionated take on it made this very engaging.
Game Theory (Biran Clegg)
I believe this is a dandy and cushy introduction to game theory. This book is great if you've never thought of game theory and were intrigued by high-school maths.
Personally none of the concepts stuck since I don't study or apply it regularly, but it has some fun little tricks in there if you want something to bring up at a party (one not comprised of computer scientists and statisticians of course!).
Philosophical Classics (James M. Russel, et al.)
(Currently reading...)