This is a place to consolidate book recommendations.
I'm reading The Logic of Failure and enjoying it quite a bit. I wasn't sure whether I'd heard of it here, and I found a post here called Great Books of Failure, an article which hadn't crossed my path before.
There's a recent thread about books for a gifted young teen and a slightly less recent discussion of books on cogsci thread which might or might not be found by someone looking for good books.
So, what books or lists of books do you recommend?
I like the idea of design patterns, just not the hubristic treatment they get in that volume.
On the other hand, I strongly recommend his "Notes on a Synthesis of Form", which discusses cognitive and cultural constraints on the design process. It's short, sweet, and full of insights as to why design generally sucks.
Zen and the Art I liked when I read in my pre-LW days, but on reflection it's an almost perfect example of huge, self-consistent networks of beliefs that don't correspond to reality.
The powerful characteristic of Chris. Alexander's 'A Pattern Language' is not immediately obvious - the patterns themselves are not rigourously researched (the authors admit this, and use a rating system to make it clear their own level of confidence in their proposals), and many do not stand the test of time. There are a few which seem to me to be worth paying deep attention to, but I won't go into that here.
The real invention is the idea of a pattern language. What it is. The work of an architect involves dealing at a wide variety of scales, and along th... (read more)