Modern API Architecture. GraphQL, REST & Event-Driven Microservices
Clara Whiskers
Synopsis "Modern API Architecture. GraphQL, REST & Event-Driven Microservices"
What happens when your GraphQL query accidentally turns into a distributed denial-of-service attack against your own database, or when your "event-driven" microservices become an asynchronous maze where failures vanish instead of failing loudly? Modern API Architecture is not another tutorial on writing JSON endpoints. It is a survival manual for engineers who have inherited seventy-three RESTful services speaking through brittle HTTP choreography, who must serve React frontends, partner B2B APIs, and XML-speaking legacy monoliths simultaneously. You already know how to ship features and debug production outages. What you need is a coherent framework for deciding which architectural pattern to apply when the business insists on real-time updates and your platform must serve clients with radically different consumption patterns. This book treats the interface layer as infrastructure requiring the same rigor as database schema design or distributed systems consensus. You will find no advocacy for burning down your RESTful heritage to chase the latest specification. Instead, you will find practical decision matrices: when GraphQL's query flexibility justifies its operational overhead; when event sourcing introduces more pain than eventual consistency resolves; when a simple GET request remains the most robust integration pattern available.Decision matrices that tell you when GraphQL's query flexibility justifies its operational tax, and when a simple GET request remains your most robust integration patternReal-world federation strategies for composing GraphQL subgraphs without accidentally building distributed monoliths that nobody can reason aboutThe mechanics of strangler fig migrations that extract services from tangled database coupling without requiring a weekend maintenance windowExactly-once semantics, schema registries, and observability across asynchronous boundaries-the operational competencies event-driven architecture demands but rarely teachesREST reconsidered as mature infrastructure for resource-oriented domains where cache semantics and idempotent operations are still non-negotiableStop treating your interface layer as an afterthought. Build API infrastructure that survives 3 AM outages, scales with your business, and gives your team the vocabulary to choose the right pattern for the right boundary.
