Show Me the Numbers

Few writes for people who work with numbers every day, not for designers, and his approach is refreshingly practical. He explains the basics of visual perception and then shows how each principle applies to real business reports. The before-and-after examples, which take cluttered, confusing charts and redesign them, are the book's greatest strength.

The guidance on choosing between tables and graphs, and on matching graph types to the relationships in the data, is especially valuable. Few is also excellent on small design details, such as gridlines, labels and colour, that make a big difference to readability. Few readers will look at their own charts in quite the same way afterwards.

The tone can be stern, and Few has firm opinions, including a strong dislike of pie charts and three-dimensional effects, which some readers find rigid. The examples focus on business reporting rather than journalism or science. A revised second edition expands the material. As a foundation for clear data presentation, it is excellent. It also works well as a team reference, since its clear rules give colleagues a shared vocabulary for discussing and improving the reports they produce together. About 280 pages in the Analytics Press first edition.