Good expositions of technical subjects are rare treasures. I have collected here the ones I have found. Those marked "general" require no more than calculus, basic chemistry and biology, and a smattering of differential equations and probability. Those marked "detailed" vary enormously in their mathematical prerequisites, but require much more concentration and sophistication. Those marked "quirky" are not strictly technical, but shed some insights on the technical.

For a broader focus, try Alan Kay's reading list.

Last updated December 13, 2009.

general

Denny, How the Ocean Works: An Introduction to Oceanography

Exactly what its title says, no more, no less, with all the physics, biology, and chemistry involved merged seamlessly towards its goal.

Feynman, Leighton, and Sands, The Feynman Lectures on Physics (or buy from Amazon)

A vast amount of physics surveyed, often idiosyncratically, but always beautifully. Volume 3 on quantum mechanics is a true gem.

de Gennes, Brochard-Wyart, and Quéré, Capillarity and Wetting Phenomena: Drops, Bubbles, Pearls, Waves

de Gennes specialized in rescuing beautiful fields of soft condensed matter physics from obscurity by writing beautiful books about them. This is no exception.

Gowers, The Princeton Companion to Mathematics

Expositions of the heart of a most of modern mathematics. A book to browse in for hours.

Mandelkern, An Introduction to Macromolecules

Almost pure physical intuition of the physical properties of polymer materials from simple plastics and their fabrication to proteins in biology.

Miller, Meditations on Violence: A Comparison of Martial Arts Training & Real World Violence

This is one of the clearest books on human violence ever written, but a practical expert on the subject. I also recommend his blog

Moore, Davis, and Coplan, Building Scientific Apparatus

The most self contained book on building equipment ever written. Priceless for its comprehensive explanations and tables of the standard sizes and terms for mechanical parts, electronics, glass, and vacuum systems.

Skiena, The Algorithm Design Manual (or buy from Amazon)

A romp through algorithms, how to think about them, and their effects in real life.

detailed

Cormen, Leiserson, Rivest, and Stein, Introduction to Algorithms (or buy from Amazon)

An exposition of this most applied field of mathematics which is lighthearted, not in the tone of the prose, but of the mathematics itself.

Dijkstra and Scholten, Predicate Calculus and Program Semantics (and online resources)

We do not intuit the answer to most numerical calculations then try to prove it. We derive the answer by formal algebraic manipulations. Dijkstra establishes the same ability for proofs.

Landau and Lifshitz, The Course of Theoretical Physics, volumes 1-10 (buy from Amazon: vol.1 vol.2 vol.3 vol.4 vol.5 vol.6 vol.7 vol.8 vol.9 vol.10)

The ten volumes cover the core of physics. The clearest derivation available of any result in that core is in Landau and Lifshitz. The mathematics is often fudged; the intuition never is.

Sussman and Wisdom, Structure and Interpretation of Classical Mechanics (or buy from Amazon)

Lagrangian and Hamiltonian mechanics including many modern topics in nonlinear mechnics, all carefully dissected until there is no fudging in the mathematics, no blurring of concepts, no ambiguities.

quirky

Chargaff, Heraclitean Fire

A set of essays on his life, on science, and on how it changed over the years. Chargaff was a beautiful writer, an incredibly cultured gentleman, and a mold of scientist not often seen any more in biology.

Littlewood, Littlewood's Miscellany

Tidbits, odds and ends, peculiar stories from Cambridge, and the funniest joke I know (about orbital mechanics), largely without organization.

Rota, Indiscrete Thoughts (Modern Birkhäuser Classics)

A moving eulogy for Ulam, a pile of mathematical aphorisms that will bother you for months (the paper on double algebra is "On the Exterior Calculus of Invariant Theory" by Barnabei et al), and a bunch of other things to savor.