Java in a Nutshell by Ben Evans and David Flanagan

“Java in a Nutshell” has been updated for Java 11. It has everything you'd expect from the prior editions – syntax, examples and a great reference. New features from Java 8+ are highlighted.  Some design patterns and tradeoffs are explained. A lot of concepts, like garbage collection, are covered as well.

I particularly liked the examples of common methods. There were a few in Collections that I could use and didn't realize existed. I also learned about a trick to with var and anonymous inner classes (that I hope not to see in real code). And of course, I like that big O notation was used in discussing collections.  Many new features were covered well including method handles and modules.

A number of garbage collectors were discussed. I was surprised the g1 garbage collector didn't get more attention. It was well explained but didn't have a section header. I was also surprised to see an appendix that covered Nashorn since it a deprecated feature.

Overall, this is a great book and I recommend it for your Java learning/reference.

I give this book 9 out of 10 horseshoes.