Ask HN: Are there any programmers working on a novel and/or series?

9 points by dk574 7 years ago | 9 comments

I'm also open to hearing from programmers who write non-fiction as well. I've been working on my first book for a series and feel like I don't hear enough about programmers doing the same. What has been your experience trying to get published and how do you manage your writing life with your coding life?

jolmg 7 years ago |

On a related note, I've noticed several manga and anime that focus on a career/profession in such a way that they seem to be geared toward encouraging youngsters to take it up. I would think they do a good job of it, at least, because I finish them with a new respect for and knowledge of whatever profession the story was about.

An example of this is the manga Act-Age that explores acting, or the anime Shokugeki no Soma for cooking, or Yakitate!! Ja-pan for bread baking.

Stories like these sometimes involve some kind of realistic, profession-related "superpower", like the protagonist in Act-Age being very talented at method acting, and the protagonist in Yakitate!! Ja-pan having optimally warm hands that allow him to knead dough better.

Is anyone working on something similar for programming or can recomend one? A story that involves programming that is realistic (as in no magic, etc, but can be exaggerated to a point) and that a reader can learn significantly from?

iraldir 7 years ago | |

Thumbs up for Yakitate Japan, whoever hasn't read / watched it should immediately. Unfortunately I am not sure a similar thing can be done for programming himself. I mean what would that be like? "hehe, you'll never managed to win that hackathon, you software use way too much memory! Oh but what are you doing, instantiating your class in your export statement... Masaka!" "Sono masaka desu. SINGULUTON desu!" // main character clicks the compile button 5 second before the deadline, and thanks to his nakama optmisation of the webpack build using cache, it manages to compile in time. "So you managed to use a little trick to make your memory under the maximum allowed, but you will need more than that to beat me, the Prince of Functional Programming" // Judge arrives, try the application of the oponents, gives him perfect score as expected,then goes on to the hero. He doesn't even understand the code just by looking at it. But then as he try to open the application, he realises that actually, he implemented the form in WEBU GEE ELU, and he's blown away by the quality of the interface, giving the hero higher than the maximum score."

Scratch that, I would watch the fuck out of that show.

(initially I was gonna say it could be more about the business side i.e silicon valley but damn did that thing write itself)

muzani 7 years ago |

There's a manga series on STEM topics: https://www.amazon.com/Manga-Guide-Databases-Mana-Takahashi/...

https://www.amazon.com/Manga-Guide-Electricity-Kazuhiro-Fuji...

I actually learned more from the manga database book than from many other serious database books.

potta_coffee 7 years ago |

I've always wanted to write. I started this year with the goal of writing one - two pages per day. I read somewhere that Stephen King shoots for six pages per day. My goal for this year is just to establish some kind of writing habit and produce any kind of manuscript at all. I like science fiction and fantasy.

dk574 7 years ago | |

That's a good goal to have.

lappet 7 years ago |

Yes, I write short stories for fun and have attempted to write a novel a few times. So far I have only dabbled in publishing on blogs and such. PM me if you want to exchange notes!

hhs 7 years ago |

Check out Ted Chiang. He did technical writing for programmers, and science fiction writing for the public. His famous piece, "Story of Your Life", was turned into the film, "Arrival".

dk574 7 years ago | |

Thanks for this. This is the first I heard of him but I did hear about 'Arrival' :)

Adamantcheese 7 years ago |

I did NaNoWriMo a couple of times. I should probably get around to editing and releasing the second one, it's been uh... an amount of time since.