Matt Leacock, the creator of the Pandemic series, posts his thoughts, learnings, musings over at Matt Leacock Games (
http://www.leacock.com/). Matt suggests four canonical books for the budding game designer:
- The Art of Game Design by Jesse Schell
- A Theory of Fun by Raph Koster
- Rules of Play by Katie Salen Tekinbaş and Eric Zimmerman
- Hamlet's Hit Points by Robin Laws