2023 Favorite Books

I think the older I get, the faster the years seem to go by. I can’t believe it’s time for another favorite books post.

Note: None of the links below are affiliate links. I get nothing from linking to these books. I try to link to the author or publisher site when possible, and Amazon as a default.

Favorite Books 2023

• The Street Economist: 15 Economics Lessons Everyone Should Know - This book is an excellent, short guide to the basics of economics. It covers all the core subjects like labor, supply and demand, prices, and inflation using easy to understand language.
• Staff Engineer: Leadership Beyond the Management Track - Will Larson’s second book covers what you need to know to become an engineering leader without moving into management. It looks at the skills you will need to build to move up from being a senior engineer or developer into a staff engineer and beyond.
• Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology - This book is a fascinating look at the history of computer chips. It not only covers the invention of the integrated circuit, it also covers the economic and geopolitical effects that computer chips have had on our world.
• The Pragmatic Programmer: Your Journey to Mastery 20th Anniversary Edition - This book contains eight strategies to help you with your personal organization and productivity, and it helps to figure which of the eight implement for your own use.
• Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire: What Happens When God’s Spirit Invades the Hearts of His People - This book discusses the power of prayer to transform churches and our lives. It tells the story of the Brooklyn Tabernacle and the remarkable transformation of the church and its members when the church started seeking the Lord in prayer.
• Cult of the Dead Cow: How the Original Hacking Supergroup Might Just Save the World - This book tells the history of the Cult of the Dead Cow hacking group and shares a bit about what its members are doing now. I love books that chronicle computing history and hacking, and this book did not disappoint in being both interesting and entertaining.
• Good Strategy Bad Strategy: The Difference and Why It Matters - This is a business classic that goes in depth into what business strategy is, and just as important, what it isn’t. It discusses how the planning at most business is less about strategy and more like wishful thinking.
• The PARA Method: Simplify, Organize, and Master Your Digital Life - Tiago Forte’s second book takes a deeper look at his PARA method for organizing digital artifacts. PARA is part of the Second Brain methodology and this book takes a look at PARA in much more detail than the first Second Brain book.
• BPF Performance Tools: Linux System and Application Observability - Brendan Gregg has written a very comprehensive book all about eBPF and how it can be used to measure performance in Linux. If you want a deep dive on eBPF, then this is the book you probably want to read.

That’s it for this year. I haven’t managed to do these more often than annually, so this year I’ll just wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and I’ll most likely do this again next December.