Startup books
- Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or how to Build the Future, Peter Thiel and Blake Masters: This is the single most recommended book on Indie Hackers!
- Rework, DHH and Jason Fried: “Read [this] and you’ll know why plans are actually harmful, why you don’t need outside investors, and why you’re better off ignoring the competition.”
- The Lean Startup, Eric Reis: “Shorten product development cycles, measure actual progress without resorting to vanity metrics, and learn what customers really want.”
- The Personal MBA: Master the Art of Business, Josh Kaufman: “Distilling the core principles of business and delivering them quickly and concisely to people at all stages of their careers.”
- The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers, Ben Horowitz: “Navigating the toughest problems business schools don’t cover.”
Maker books
- The Maker Movement Manifesto: Rules for Innovation in the New World of Crafters, Hackers, and Tinkerers, Mark Hatch: “Covering the remarkable technologies and tools now accessible to you, and stories of how ordinary people have devised extraordinary products.”
- The War of Art: Winning the Inner Creative Battle, Steven Pressfield: “A guide to inspire and support those who struggle to express their creativity.”
- Obviously Awesome: How to Nail Product Positioning so Customers Get It, Buy It, Love It, April Dunford: “How to find your product’s secret sauce, and then sell that sauce to those who crave it.”
Marketing books
- This Is Marketing, Seth Godin: “Great marketers don’t use consumers to solve their company’s problem; they use marketing to solve other people’s problems.”
- Growth Hacking: Silicon Valley’s Best Kept Secret, Raymond Fong and Chad Riddersen: “Empowers any business to apply growth hacking.”
- Traction: A Startup Guide to Getting Customers, Gabriel Weinberg and Justin Mares: “We cover every possible marketing channel you can use to get traction, and show you which channels will be your key to growth.”
- Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and Selling High-Tech Products to Mainstream Customers, Geoffrey A. Moore and Regis McKenna: “Bringing cutting-edge products to progressively larger markets.”
- Badass: Making Users Awesome, Kathy Sierra: “Craft a strategy for creating successful users.”
Bootstrapping books
- Zero to Sold: How to Start, Run, and Sell a Bootstrapped Business, Arvid Kahl: “Zero to Sold is the ultimate business documentation: A memoir, a manual, a journal, and a guide.”
- Company of One: Why Staying Small Is the Next Big Thing for Business, Paul Jarvis: “By staying small, one can have freedom to pursue more meaningful pleasures in life, and avoid the headaches that result from dealing with employees, long meetings, or worrying about expansion.”
- The $100 Startup: Reinvent the Way You Make a Living, Do What You Love, and Create a New Future, Chris Guillebeau: “Lead a life of adventure, meaning, and purpose, and earn a good living.”
- Start Small, Stay Small: A Developer’s Guide to Launching a Startup, Rob Walling: “A step-by-step guide to launching a self-funded startup.”
Productivity books
- Indistractable: How to Control Your Attention and Choose Your Life, Nir Eyal and Julie Li: “Indistractable reveals the key to getting the best out of technology, without letting it get the best of us.”
- Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World, Cal Newport: “A rigorous training regimen, presented as a series of four rules, for transforming your mind and habits.”
- Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones, James Clear: “Practical strategies that will teach you exactly how to form good habits, break bad ones, and master the tiny behaviors that lead to remarkable results.”
Miscellaneous books
- Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action, Simon Sinek: “In studying the leaders who’ve had the greatest influence in the world, Simon Sinek discovered that they all think, act, and communicate in the exact same way.”
- Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance, Angela Duckworth: “Here’s why talent is hardly a guarantor of success.”
- Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder, Nassim Nicholas Taleb: “A blueprint for how to behave and thrive in a world we don’t understand.”
