I doubt that reading a few books will help you materially progress
career-wise. From my personal experience, my interest in Prolog has absolutely
shaped my carreer, but not because I read a few books (or more). Rather,
because it got me interested in computer science as a subject in its own
right.
So here's my personal experience. I first learned about Prolog in a second
year CS course at uni. I got hooked, much like other folks get hooked on Lisp
and Haskell etc. I stopped saying things like "nobody uses Prolog in the
gaming industry", like my classmates, and started asking questions like "wait,
if facts and rules are predicates, then what are queries? [1]". So I started
reading every textbook on the language that I could find in the university
library. Most of them were AI textbooks also, from the time when AI was
basically hand-crafted programs written in Lisp and Prolog. From that I got
interested in AI, in general and -after working for a few years in the
industry- I started an MSc course on AI.
My MSc course was almost exclusively about statistical machine learning (I was
told they were planning to rename it to "data science"). I started the course
(part-time, while working) in 2014, right around the time when machine
learning started becoming a hot issue; a rather fortunate state of affairs. I
didn't go back to the industry with my hot new skillz though. Instead I
started a PhD on Inductive Logic Programming, which is basically machine
learning of logic programs, a subject that perfectly fits my background (in
logic programming and machine learning).
And that's where I am now- I'm in my final year and waiting to hear from the
editors of the Machine Learning Journal about my submitted paper that
describes a polynomial time ILP algorithm (exponentially growing hypothesis
spaces are a bitch, but you can avoid them with One Simple Trick). We'll see
how that goes- one does not simply publish to the MLJ. But if I get that
publication it will be a major step forward to getting my thesis accepted.
Er. Once I've actually written it.
Anyway, morale of the story: don't just read a bunch of books. Find a deep
interest in computer science instead. For me, my undergraduate wonderment at
Prolog led me down the path of becoming a computer scientist, growing my
knowledge and honing my skills. There's no way you can go wrong with that.
(I forgot to mention I'm doing my PhD at one of the top rated universities for
engineering research; not bad for someone who started as an unskilled
immigrant working at a warehouse :)
So here's my personal experience. I first learned about Prolog in a second year CS course at uni. I got hooked, much like other folks get hooked on Lisp and Haskell etc. I stopped saying things like "nobody uses Prolog in the gaming industry", like my classmates, and started asking questions like "wait, if facts and rules are predicates, then what are queries? [1]". So I started reading every textbook on the language that I could find in the university library. Most of them were AI textbooks also, from the time when AI was basically hand-crafted programs written in Lisp and Prolog. From that I got interested in AI, in general and -after working for a few years in the industry- I started an MSc course on AI.
My MSc course was almost exclusively about statistical machine learning (I was told they were planning to rename it to "data science"). I started the course (part-time, while working) in 2014, right around the time when machine learning started becoming a hot issue; a rather fortunate state of affairs. I didn't go back to the industry with my hot new skillz though. Instead I started a PhD on Inductive Logic Programming, which is basically machine learning of logic programs, a subject that perfectly fits my background (in logic programming and machine learning).
And that's where I am now- I'm in my final year and waiting to hear from the editors of the Machine Learning Journal about my submitted paper that describes a polynomial time ILP algorithm (exponentially growing hypothesis spaces are a bitch, but you can avoid them with One Simple Trick). We'll see how that goes- one does not simply publish to the MLJ. But if I get that publication it will be a major step forward to getting my thesis accepted.
Er. Once I've actually written it.
Anyway, morale of the story: don't just read a bunch of books. Find a deep interest in computer science instead. For me, my undergraduate wonderment at Prolog led me down the path of becoming a computer scientist, growing my knowledge and honing my skills. There's no way you can go wrong with that.
(I forgot to mention I'm doing my PhD at one of the top rated universities for engineering research; not bad for someone who started as an unskilled immigrant working at a warehouse :)
_________________
[1] Also predicates. Mind blown.