Seems like a nice book. I like that it gets into the fundamental stuff like setq, cond, let, list, cons, etc. quickly enough in the 3rd chapter. In my opinion,

Seems like a nice book. I like that it gets into the fundamental stuff like setq, cond, let, list, cons, etc. quickly enough in the 3rd chapter. In my opinion, the sooner these concepts are introduced in a book, the better. I have found, at least from my own experience, that a programming language is best learnt by a mix of diving straight into it and writing small software that you care about with it and then supplementing that experience with the study of existing literature. When I began learning computer programming two decades ago, it was pretty much necessary to buy a good book and read as much of the book as possible chapter by chapter. For example, the first programming language book that I read was K&R and I read that cover to cover. It was quite formative in my journey of learning to program the computer. It took me a long time to start writing useful software but when I did, I had a pretty thorough knowledge of C. I have come to realise that these days, it is not uncommon for aspiring programmers to jump straight into developing software with a programming language determined by requirements. Not everyone has the time to read a book cover to cover. In fact, I myself learnt Python by jumping straight into developing tools that I needed for myself with it and then followed the official Python tutorial. My Common Lisp story was different. I began learning CL directly by browsing the Common Lisp Hyperspec (CLHS). It is not an approach you would find anyone recommending, and for good reasons. If someone wants to get started with quickly developing tools using Common Lisp, I would suggest bookmarking https://lispcookbook.github.io/cl-cookbook/ https://lispcookbook.github.io/cl-cookbook/ which is a great resource to look up common recipes for common tasks. Special thanks to @vindarel for maintaining the Lisp Cookbook. Don’t let the parentheses scare you. With proper tooling, they are no more distracting than, say, braces in other languages.