My bookshelf 2022

I read about 40 books per year. These are my favorites so far. I marked the ones that are especially good for Indie Hackers with a 👨‍💻

Meditations, Marcus Aurelius.
Marcus thought long and hard about what makes a life good. And man, does he have some practical answers. Reading it is like a sanity check for me. I read it whenever I feel a bit down or find myself lost in rumination.

Steppenwolf, Herman Hesse.
A story about a man who is intelligent and reasonable but has lost his appetite for life. The most impressive thing about this book is the writing style. The words just suck you in. You hitch a ride on the thought patterns of this man.

Founders at Work, Jessica Livingston. 👨‍💻👨‍💻👨‍💻
Interviews with the founders of PayPal, Hotmail, Apple (Woz), Yahoo, and many more. Jessica just asks fantastic questions. You get an honest telling of early days. Learning that even Steve and Woz started as a mess makes you feel less self-conscious about your projects.

On Writing, Stephen King.
Makes you a better writer. Even though his advice focuses on fiction, there are many insights to take away for any writer.

The Cartoon Guide to Statistics, Larry Gonick.
The most fun intro to statistics you can get.

The Art of Doing Science and Engineering, Richard Hamming. 👨‍💻
The most important part is the last chapter, “You and your research.” It’s basically career advice. But it’s excellent and very prescriptive.

The Dream Machine, Mitchell Waldrop. 👨‍💻
This book gives you a sense of what progress feels like from within. It takes you on a ride through the most important ideas of the last 70 years that led to the computer and the internet as we know it today.

The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins.
Mind-blowing. A human is merely a survival machine for a gene. And it’s not like the gene has a personality. It’s just that it’s a replicator, and replicators can do crazy things.

Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card.
This is a bit of a guilty pleasure of mine. I read all books from the ender and ender’s shadow series. I don’t know why they resonate so much with me. But I love the ideas that Orson Scott Card places in these stories. Opens your mind.

Poor Charlie's Almanack, Charlie Munger. 👨‍💻
This is every Charlie Munger speech ever given in text form. It also summarizes and categorizes his most important theories. It is the only book I know of that is approved by him.

The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho.
A great story about a shepherd on his quest to find his treasure. A nice little story about the pursuit of one’s dreams.

Eloquent JavaScript, Marijn Haverbeke👨‍💻
The best introduction to JavaScript ever. And there’s a free online version with lots of examples that you can manipulate and play with right in the browser.

Lying, Sam Harris
Convinces you that you should never lie. Not even white lies. Once you start adopting this, you notice your life becomes much simpler and changes for the better.

The Moral Landscape, Sam Harris
Claims that there are scientific answers to moral questions. Like ‘What is worth living for?’. It’s an essential antidote to moral relativism.

Several Short Sentences About Writing, Verlyn Klinkenborg
Makes you a better writer.

Sapiens, Yuval Noah Harari
Many important ideas and explanations about the origins of humanity. This book goes together very well with the Selfish Gene from Dawkins. Especially once you start thinking about Memes, the way Dawkins introduces them, the emphasis on stories in Sapiens starts to make a lot of sense.

Measurement, Paul Lockhart
A fascinating introduction to geometry. It gave me an entirely new perspective on mathematics. It’s fun to read and full of exciting geometry problems that make you think.

The Gulag Archipelago, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Reading this makes you realize you never had a bad day in your life.

In Order to Live, Yeonmi Park
Same as with the Gulag Archipelago. It’s a story of a North Korean girl’s journey to freedom. Stories like that make you appreciate the life you have so much more.

Surfing Uncertainty, Andy Clark
I must admit, I didn’t understand this until I read a book review on it by Scott Alexander (Astral Codex Ten). But this is easily one of the most important books you can read if you are interested in how the mind works.

Never split the difference, Chris Voss
This is surprisingly good. I regularly use the techniques described in conversations and negotiations.

Barking Up the Wrong Tree, Eric Barker👨‍💻
A somewhat scientific guide to what makes people successful. It’s a bit like Gladwell’s ‘Outliers,’ just more practical.

Can’t Hurt Me, David Goggins
Read this whenever you feel down or are not reaching your full potential. Better yet, listen to it with the audio version. Kick you in the but and makes you realize you can achieve so much more.

The Danaher Diaries, Heroes of the Art
If you are into Brazilian jiujitsu, then you know Johan Danaher. And if you like John Danaher, then this book is full of golden wisdom from the man. It’s his best post in book form.

How to Avoid a Climate Disaster, Bill Gates
I didn’t know anything about climate change before I read this. It gives you all the basics with a framework for thinking about climate change. I can highly recommend this before one gets into any of Vaclav Smil's books.

Number’s Don’t Lie, Vaclav Smil
Probably the easiest one of Smil’s books. Full of interesting facts.

The Making of Prince of Persia, Jordan Mechner👨‍💻👨‍💻👨‍💻
My go-to recommendation for an Indie-Hacker. It is the journal that Jordan Mechner kept while developing Prince of Persia.

PS. For more books, I keep my Goodreads account relatively up to date: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/151863065?shelf=read