# Tidy First? by Kent Beck

5 Hacker News commenters recommended Tidy First? by Kent Beck and 0 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 4 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** Short, practical book on small safe code-tidying steps and the economics of software design, easy for teams to read together.

## Why people recommend it

- Short and concise, good for book clubs (2 comments): "It's extremely short and concise, and is perfect for a very light book club within any tech team." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49346411)) "We read and discussed it at work, and I enjoyed it a lot." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49346527))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [The Mythical Man-Month by Fred Brooks](https://hackerapproved.com/p/mythical-man-month.md): 56 recommend
- [Designing Data-Intensive Applications by Martin Kleppmann](https://hackerapproved.com/p/designing-data-intensive-applications.md): 37 recommend
- [A Philosophy of Software Design by John Ousterhout](https://hackerapproved.com/p/a-philosophy-of-software-design.md): 28 recommend
- [Code Complete by Steve McConnell](https://hackerapproved.com/p/code-complete.md): 14 recommend
- [The Architecture of Open Source Applications by Amy Brown and Greg Wilson](https://hackerapproved.com/p/architecture-of-open-source-applications.md): 13 recommend

## Where to get it

- [See price on Amazon](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1098151240?tag=hackerapprove-20) (affiliate link)
- [Bookshop.org](https://bookshop.org/a/130825/9781098151249) (affiliate link)

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Tidy First? by Kent Beck", https://hackerapproved.com/p/tidy-first/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).