If I may shamelessly suggest my own book for those looking for a more basic intro to calling the APIs, including a chapter devoted to agentic patterns across the different SDKs (openai, claude, and google), https://crimede-coder.com/blogposts/2026/LLMsForMortals.
Basically I wanted to write a book that did not spend the majority of time on training LLM and architecture, as it is just not relevant to the majority of software engineers (either using agent coding tools to help write code, or using the LLM APIs as backend parts of apps you are building).
This Hitchhikers book has many examples of API use as well, but is very "here is a wall of code". Mine is a bit more gentle progressively building up simple examples -- e.g. I show how to write python code to call a tool in a loop. Then show how you can feed back the error and have the LLM update. Then show how you can do that without manually looping through the agents SDK.
I was hoping for a douglas adams connections. His take on AI seems more and more prescient by the day. Every LLM scotch-taped to a website, chipper as hell and pretty much useless, has a whiff of Genuine People Personalities.
If I may shamelessly suggest my own book for those looking for a more basic intro to calling the APIs, including a chapter devoted to agentic patterns across the different SDKs (openai, claude, and google), https://crimede-coder.com/blogposts/2026/LLMsForMortals.
Basically I wanted to write a book that did not spend the majority of time on training LLM and architecture, as it is just not relevant to the majority of software engineers (either using agent coding tools to help write code, or using the LLM APIs as backend parts of apps you are building).
This Hitchhikers book has many examples of API use as well, but is very "here is a wall of code". Mine is a bit more gentle progressively building up simple examples -- e.g. I show how to write python code to call a tool in a loop. Then show how you can feed back the error and have the LLM update. Then show how you can do that without manually looping through the agents SDK.
I was hoping for a douglas adams connections. His take on AI seems more and more prescient by the day. Every LLM scotch-taped to a website, chipper as hell and pretty much useless, has a whiff of Genuine People Personalities.
Looks like a well put togther textbook. Kudos.