JAVA Architecture Best Practices (REST + CRUD) literature suggestions

sorry if this question has been asked before (I checked, didn't find).

TL;DR: Any suggestions for comprehensive literature that would help a complete java noob to ensure that the application he is building meets the best practices for a rather standard REST service with CRUD and some geolocation functionality. I have some programming experience and I have touched different languages in the past but nothing too in depth, most comfortable with javascript and PHP. So my question would be this - I know how Rest works but how do you structure the app in JAVA to ensure the best practices, such as layered architecture, design patterns and so on. I understand that the question is too broad, therefore I am asking for recommendations on expert literature (some I have already looked at myself but I wouldn't want to rely only on myself). I am especially interested in things that helped you as java developers. Feel free to also drift away from the subject as long as we stay within the umbrella of Java.

A longer explanation on why I am asking this for anybody who is interested: I am in fact a student, studying what is called information architecture. Even my humble background in design and software development allowed me to see huge friction between the academic world and the actual web design (in the broadest sense) of practitioners, so we are writing master thesis with the goal of showing how much development, testing and a sort of darwinian selection for design and coding practices take place on the web and its own "community of practice" ( stackoverflow is an example of just that in itself). For that we will have to create a couple of prototypes. So far we've been doing very good but I wanted to pick JAVA Rest services exactly with the purpose of having next to no knowledge about it to also partly address certain design choices that will have to be made and the process of making them.

Any help is appreciated.