What’s in This Book?

Chapter 1, ​Build a Solid Foundation​ introduces the basic building blocks that will allow you to understand how macros work and what kinds of things it’s possible to do with them.

Chapter 2, ​Advance Your Macro Techniques​ shows how and why to use syntax-quoting, unquoting, and gensyms. These are some the trickiest concepts for new macro writers, but also some of the most useful.

Chapter 3, ​Use Your Powers Wisely​ takes a step back to dig into some of the problems macros can create, and how you can avoid those problems.

Chapter 4, ​Evaluate Code in Context​ starts the field guide portion of the book, and covers the first main use case you see in the wild: wrapping a block of code in a context for its execution.

Chapter 5, ​Speed Up Your Systems​ digs into how macros can help you write very fast Clojure code without sacrificing concision and cleanliness.

Chapter 6, ​Build APIs That Say Just What They Mean​ outlines some ways that macros allow you to provide easy-to-use APIs that let users write only the minimum amounts of code.

Chapter 7, ​Bend Control Flow to Your Will​ shows you how you can invent your own loops and other control flow mechanisms without relying on the language to provide you with new ones.

Chapter 8, ​Implement New Language Features​ goes a step further and shows you how you can steal some of the best features from other languages and introduce them to your Clojure code with macros.