Discover one of the most powerful and intellectually rewarding programming languages ever created - and learn to build AI-powered applications with it, from scratch.
Lisp Programming with AI takes you from zero knowledge of Lisp through functional programming, macros, closures, and object-oriented design, all the way to integrating modern AI APIs and building five complete real-world projects. Written for the 2026 ecosystem using Common Lisp, SBCL, Quicklisp, and SLIME, every chapter is practical, modern, and immediately applicable.
Lisp is not just a historical curiosity. It is the language that invented garbage collection, higher-order functions, and dynamic typing - ideas that took the rest of the world decades to adopt. Its macro system remains unmatched, its homoiconic design makes metaprogramming natural, and its deep roots in symbolic AI make it uniquely suited for the era of large language models and intelligent systems.
What you will learn:
- Understand S-expressions, symbols, and the homoiconic structure that makes Lisp unique
- Write clean, expressive Common Lisp using recursion, closures, and higher-order functions
- Master Lisp macros and metaprogramming - one of the most powerful features in any language
- Use CLOS (Common Lisp Object System) for object-oriented design
- Build domain-specific languages (DSLs) from scratch
- Integrate OpenAI and modern LLM APIs directly into Lisp applications
- Apply prompt engineering techniques inside real Lisp projects
- Implement symbolic AI, knowledge representation, and intelligent expert systems
- Add semantic search, vector database concepts, and AI-assisted automation to your toolkit
- Complete five guided real-world projects from a rule-based expert system to an AI chat assistant
Four parts, zero filler:
Part I builds your Lisp foundation - S-expressions, variables, functions, recursion, lists, higher-order functions, and performance basics. Part II goes deep into macros, metaprogramming, closures, CLOS, concurrency, DSLs, and deployment. Part III connects Lisp to modern AI - covering the language's historic role in artificial intelligence, LLM API integration, symbolic reasoning, semantic search, and expert system design. Part IV delivers five complete projects you build step by step.
The book includes a Common Lisp quick reference, a SLIME and debugging cheat sheet, a Quicklisp library guide, a CLOS and macro patterns reference, and an AI integration checklist - everything consolidated in one place.
If you want to think more clearly about programming, understand where modern AI concepts truly come from, and build genuinely intelligent applications, Lisp is the language that teaches you all of it.
Perfect for: curious programmers who want to go beyond mainstream languages, developers interested in AI and symbolic reasoning, functional programming enthusiasts, and anyone who wants to understand the foundations that modern AI was built upon.
