Doing a pinned #Books thread of my reading for 2024. Goal is 40 books, which is for sure low, but I also believe in playing games on "easy" mode. Audiobooks count, sorry.
Feel free to mute this if not your ball of wax.
Book 1/40
The Myth of Normal by Gabor Maté.
Self help and psychology. 5*
I start a lot of self help books but they are all usually a blog post stretched to 225 pages (If Books Could Kill gave me that). This one really hit home with research and genuine compassion. Deals with trauma of all kinds and in different spaces without giving easy answers. I genuinely got a lot from this to help me. Of course YRMV. #bookstodon#Books
Book 2/40
The City-State of Boston by Mark Peterson
History, city biography. 4.25*
I love a good city biography (different from a history as it treats the city as its own entity) and this one was super interesting. Learned a bunch, occluding that New England almost broke away from the US in 1814, but were stopped by the surprise victory at the Battle of New Orleans. As good as Montefiore's book on Jerusalem. #Books#bookstodon#revwar#Boston#history@bookstodon
Book 3/40
The Secret Life of Groceries by Benjamin Lorr (audio, RBTA)
Work, capitalism, food. 4*
My Dad worked in grocery all his adult life, so this had particular appeal. Learned a bunch about trucking scams and pay, berries, Trader Joe (the person), Trader Joe's (the Aldi company), the Whole Foods Bowery seafood counter, and enough about shrimp and slavery for a while. It is almost too much, as any of these could be its own book. #books#bookstodon#nonfiction#food
Book 4/40
The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen
Fiction, War On Vietnam, 5*
A great story about a communist spy during the War On Vietnam and immediately after. Compelling tale of war, how we see people, how we see ourselves, and the divisions inside us. The writing style is amazing and I bomb-ran through the last 50 pages. Looking forward to the series. #books#bookstodon#fiction
@bookstodon
Book 5 & 6
The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress by Robert Heinlein
Scifi, classic, libertarian 3.75*
Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
Africa, colonization, classic 5*
Two books that could be put under a colonization banner. Both about groups trying to be free.
Heinlein's libertarianism and casual 50s racism is really off-putting. Try to meet books where they are but yikes.
TFA I wish I read earlier, great book. Moving on to the second book. @bookstodon#books
Book 9 - Three Body Problem by Cixin Liu
Hard scifi, Chinese, TV show 4.5*
Weird and scifi. This is great stuff. Book is having a moment with the Netflix show so I won't bother to recap but it is really great. The political points are on the surface but well done. Looking forward to the next in the series. @bookstodon
Book 10 - A Long Strange Trip by Dennis McNally
Music biography, Grateful Dead 3.5* (rounding up to 4)
It's fine, I guess. The early years through about 1978 are well covered, and then McNally pretty well breezes through to the end. I would call it "focusing on the positive", but I don't feel like I got a well rounded story. But it is also the official bio of a large corporation. @bookstodon
I had read Annihilation before but this was my first time through the trilogy. I really enjoyed it, three books with unique perspectives and writing styles telling one story. There's enough space to let your mind wander around, which I loved. One of those series I know I'll go back to to find little pieces and connections I missed.
OK, so I skipped some. I'm just going to put the ones I really like or have a thought on in here.
Scifi, Chinese, Hard SciFi
Anyway, flipping loved this book. Changed directions on me a few times, a really different type of ending, and thought it flowed great. I particularly like scifi that does not hold your hand - for example, A Thing happens, but we're only going to go into the aftermath, not what it was. It's trusting readers, I guess.
This book was simply amazing. I felt like as it went along bringing up people and subjects (Stafford Beer/Cybernetics, Systems, Human Decentrification) that I will need a notebook for a re-reading. A lot of thoughts that I have had about how our species fits into the larger world were articulated for me. Written in 2020, but has AI arguments that we are just seeing now. Great stuff.