I haven't read either cover-to-cover, but from the chapters I've read, Realm of Racket is a lot more conversational. It feels slightly gimmicky with the emphasi

I haven't read either cover-to-cover, but from the chapters I've read, Realm of Racket is a lot more conversational. It feels slightly gimmicky with the emphasis on games. Also Realm assumes you have some programming experience in other languages. How to Design Programs starts at the very beginning and has a lot more principled of an approach, focusing on FP and programming as calculation of values. It's by far my favourite introductory programming text.