Not to overindulge in Shameless Self-Promotion, but have you read the
'Links and Advice' and
'Book Recommendations' sticky posts yet? The 'Links' post (which is mostly meant to guide you to various introductory wiki pages) has a ton of advice, along with some warnings, so you would do well to go through the pages it links to (including the aforementioned 'Getting Started' wiki page). Much of the material in the 'Books' thread is rather dated (a lot of it dating to an earlier forum which was merged with another to form this one, almost 15 years ago), but most of the recommended sources are at least somewhat useful still, or have updated versions which would be worth checking out.
Oh, and if you need a chuckle, definitely check out the
OS developer archtypes wiki pages:
Just steer clear of becoming a
Dr. Duct von Tape, for your own sake and that of the others here, please.