Code Complete
This book is exactly as good as everyone (especially Jeff Atwood) says. Rather than trying to summarize its 800-plus pages here, instead I will link to the books it referenced that made their way onto my to-read list:
- Effective C++ and More Effective C++ by Scott Meyers
- Peer Reviews in Software by Karl Wiegers
- Writing Efficient Programs by Jon Louis Bentley
- Software Engineering Economics by Barry Boehm
- Peopleware by Tom DeMarco and Tim Lister
- Large-Scale C++ Software Design by John Lakos
- The Practice of Programming by Brian Kernighan and Rob Pike
- The Psychology of Computer Programming by Gerald Weinberg