Literature and tutorials for writing a ray tracer

Question

I am interested in finding recommendations on books on writing a raytracer, simple and clear implementations of ray tracing that can be seen on the web, and online resources

Answer 1

"Ray Tracing from the Ground Up" by Kevin Suffern for getting started.

"Physically Based Rendering" by Matt Pharr and Greg Humphreys for a more advanced take on it when you've gotten comfortable with the basics.

And if you get really into it, the Ray Tracing News archives are a good read. Also, a lot of ray tracing enthusiast hang out at the ompf2.com forum.