API Economy

Three stars feels about right. Useful, but not essential.

I came to this book already familiar with the basics, and it still had plenty to offer. The index and cross-references are surprisingly good, which matters for a book I will come back to. The author is unusually honest about where the simplifications break down, which I appreciated. Useful as a reference, less so as a straight read from cover to cover.

Excellent from start to finish. No filler, no padding.

I read this over a couple of weekends alongside a small side project, which turned out to be the ideal way to approach it. The exercises at the end of each chapter are worth doing — they caught a few misconceptions I did not know I had. The chapters on software development are the strongest — the examples are stripped down but complete, and I could follow along without constant guessing. An easy five stars from me. I look forward to whatever the author writes next.

I got a lot out of this, even if a few sections felt rushed.

I bought this on a whim after seeing it mentioned in a forum thread, and I am glad I did. I found myself making notes in the margins, which is always a good sign. The code samples assume a particular environment, which took a bit of fiddling to get running properly. A few of the examples could be more realistic, but the underlying points come across clearly. A good addition to a technical library, as long as you know what you are buying.