Good books or courses to prepare for QA job interviews?

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I am looking for good books or courses to prepare for QA job interviews. The jobs involve manual testing, developing automation frameworks and tests. Please recommend some good books or courses to prepare for interviews.

PS - I searched Udemy and could not find anything good. The authors are either obscure or have little to no job experience (especially in the past 5 years). The last type seems like academics who know the theory and not the practical challenges. Some of them seem to come up with course after course without ever having to use the skills of the course in a job.

As an aside, Developers have it so good vs QA when it comes to availability of interview prep material. They have MANY sources for interview prep. So, they can always find something that they like. I wonder why there is such a dearth of material for QA or SDET.

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Hi @nsegal

You can check these links , these have a vast number of testing-related resources.

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Here is the list of all the books I own on software testing , top 10 are the best ones , some of these can be found free on web or on amazon

Book / Document Title Author(s)
Agile Testing: A Practical Guide for Testers and Agile Teams Lisa Crispin, Janet Gregory
Growth Driven Testing Pradeep Soudararajan
Taking Testing Seriously: The Rapid Software Testing Approach James Bach , Michael Bolton
Writing Test Plans Made Easy Wayne M. Roseberry
Charting the Course Robert Sabourin
Testing AI: Engineering Confidence in Non-Deterministic Systems Jason Arbon
Explore It!: Reduce Risk and Increase Confidence with Exploratory Testing
 Elisabeth Hendrickson
A Test Automation Learning Path Bas Dijkstra
Lessons Learned in Software Testing: A Context-Driven Approach Cem Kaner, James Bach, Bret Pettichord
Team Guide to Metrics for Business Decisions Mattia Battiston, Chris Young
An Introduction to General Systems Thinking Gerald M. Weinberg
What If Ajay Balamurugadas
Exploring Requirements: Quality Before Design Donald C. Gause, Gerald M. Weinberg
UX Optimization: Combining Behavioral UX and Usability Testing Data to Optimize Websites W. Craig Tomlin
The Software Tester’s Journey Vernon Richards, Nicola Lindgren
Team Guide to Software Operability Matthew Skelton, Alex Moore, Rob Thatcher
A Practical Guide to Testing in DevOps Katrina Clokie
Testing Computer Software Cem Kaner, Jack Falk, Hung Quoc Nguyen
Common Software Errors (Appendix) Cem Kaner, Jack Falk, Hung Quoc Nguyen
How Can I Test This? S. Bala, M. Harris, N. Li
Team Guide to Software Testability Ash Winter, Rob Meaney
Becoming a Technical Leader: An Organic Problem-Solving Approach Gerald M. Weinberg
Perfect Software and Other Illusions About Testing Gerald M. Weinberg
Observing and Reasoning About Errors Gerald M. Weinberg
To Design or Not to Design (Part Two) Ben Zweibelson
The Art of Software Testing (3rd Edition) Glenford J. Myers, Tom Badgett, Corey Sandler
Handbook of Usability Testing: How to Plan, Design, and Conduct Effective Tests Jeffrey Rubin, Dana Chisnell
Team Guide to Software Releasability Manuel Pais, Chris O’Dell
The Way of the Web Tester: A Beginner’s Guide to Automating Tests Jonathan Rasmusson
Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson, John Vlissides
Hands-on Mobile App Testing Daniel Knott
Appium Insights Sai Krishna V
A Practitioner’s Guide to Software Test Design Lee Copeland
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@nsegal What sort of job are you applying for? Will you be interviewed by a testing professional?

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Thanks for the list @komalgc . I found it useful and have some of the books in the list. I ordered two more. I was wondering why Lee Copeland’s book is at the bottom. It seems like a top 10 to me because it explains things quickly and in a simple way.

I was considering Writing Test Plans Made Easy by Wayne M. Roseberry. But, I am hesitant after looking at the free Kindle preview. It uses a simple sign in page as the main example. That seems ok for introduction, but too trivial for learning in depth. Also seems a bit light at around 100 pages. But, I could be misjudging it. Could you please tell me what you liked about this book?

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@mikeharris - I will be applying for “intermediate” QA engineer roles i.e. somewhere between a fresh grad/fresh tester and expert. I will be interviewed by testing professionals (plural) and also a bit by people from software engineering teams.

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@nsegal The Art of Software Testing by Myers explains Equivalence Partitioning and Boundary Value Analysis. This would be useful to be familiar with.

Agile Testing by Gregory and Crispin would give you the wider context.

I hope that this is helpful.

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@nsegal thank u for sharing ur thoughts and absolutely understand the hesitation.. what makes Writing Test Plans Made Easy top my list because it focuses on mental models rather than complex domain logic, it deconstructs writer’s block even for a experienced tester, and its practical , it highlights how to write test plans that non-testers (like ur PO, BA) will actually read and give feedback on which for me is critical skill for a fast-paces agile environments.

Regarding Lee Copeland’s Practitioner’s Guide to Software Test Design. it’s at the bottom strictly because my top 10 focuses heavily on modern, context-driven, and team-based testing strategy. Hope this helps