5 Books To Help You Write Better Code

Improve the quality, readability, and maintainability of your code

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No matter what stage in your career, whether you are a newcomer to tech and just starting to learn how to code, or you have been in the field for a couple of years, or even you’re a senior in the field, one skill that you will need to continue to work on and improve is code-writing.

The ability to write good code is often more valuable than what your code does. If your code is clean, well-organized, and easy to read and follow, your value as a programmer will be pretty high. If you can write code, you will be able to debug it, maintain it, and expand on it with ease.

Writing good code is not just for software engineers; I would argue that it is an essential skill for anyone in tech, particularly data scientists. Of course, the more you write and debug code, the more you will know how to write good code. But, sometimes, you can speed that up by reading a book about what makes a good code and how to write one.

Books are a great source of obtaining information and learning new skills; the problem is, there are way too many books out there for one person to read them all. But that’s the purpose of this article. I read many books about software engineering and writing code, and the 5 books I will talk about today are my favorite ones that helped me improve my code writing skills a lot.

Book 1: Clean Architecture a Craftsman’s Guide to Software Structure and Design

Clean Architecture by Robert C. Martin is a great one to start our list with and also an excellent place for any aspiring programmer or data scientist to start writing better code. Robert puts in over a half-century of experience, showing you what choices to make and why they are critical to the success of your code.

The book covers many real-life scenarios and applications that you’re bound to face in your day-to-day jobs, like the essential principles of software design, data management, and the different programming paradigms you can use. Not only that, but for data scientists, in particular, the book cover chapters on optimal implementation of databases and high-level structures for the web.

Book 2: Beautiful Architecture: Leading Thinkers Reveal the Hidden Beauty in Software Design

Next up is Beautiful Architecture by Diomidis Spinellis and Georgios Gousios. What makes this book unique is it’s not just the authors writing what they think; instead, it is a collection of essays written by various successful software engineers and architects about what makes a robust, maintainable, and clean code.

Going through this book, you will learn the basics of data-centric application ecosystems and how your system’s architecture can affect the performance of your overall system. You will also go through the differences and similarities between object-oriented and functional architectural programming and how using those two paradigms affects the software’s evolution and the developers’ engagement.

Book 3: Pattern-Oriented Software Architecture, Volume 1, A System of Patterns

Although software or tech, in general, is a fast-paced field, the basics of what makes a good code are not new, and despite the advancements in the field, the core concepts remain the same. This particular book is an old but gold one; pattern-oriented Software Architecture was written in 1996 yet remains very relevant today.

Most successful software systems used today have similar patterns; these patterns are often repeated because they are proven to work time and time again. This book addresses these patterns on different abstraction levels and how you can use them together to build robust systems.

Book 4: The Art of Readable Code

After years of writing code or even reading code, you will start to get a sense of appreciation for well-written codes. They are easy to read and follow, which means they will be easier to expand and debug as well. The next book on the list and an all-time favorite of mine are The Art of Readable Code.

This book by authors Dustin Boswell and Trevor Foucher showcase and analyze hundreds of examples of poorly written code and teach you why it is considered poorly written and how it can be improved. The book covers various topics such as formatting, writing better comments, refining loops and logic to reduce complexity, how to organize your code, and more.

Book 5: Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software

Last on today’s list is another old but gold book, Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software, written by the gang of four: Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson, and John Vlissides. The four design patterns presented in that book are still used today to create reproducible, robust code.

The book explains the different patterns that can be used to design software, mainly the three pattern categories, creational, structural, and behavioral. Then, you can choose to use one or a combination of those patterns to make your code better based on your application.

Final Thoughts

Whenever I teach someone how to code, I always tell them that learning the basics of coding and how to implement algorithms is the easy part. The challenging part about learning how to code is mastering the ability to write clean, maintainable, and reproducible code. However, that skill is not that easy to teach, and the more you write code, the more your code writing skills will improve.

Because coding is the core of almost every tech-related field, from scientific computing to machine learning and artificial intelligence, many books and resources can help you take your code writing skills to the next level.

In this article, I suggested 5 of my favorite code architecture and structure books that greatly benefited me improve my code writing skills and teach my students how to write and spot clean, well-written code. I hope that one of these books will help you improve the quality of your codes and be the reason you take your skills to the next level.