Books

This is just a list of books (physical, eBooks, audio-books) that I’ve read recently. This exists mostly so that I have a place to keep the list.

Updated: July 10, 2020

July 2020

• Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future, by Ashlee Vance – Still reading…
• The Haunting of Hill House, by Shirley Jackson – This was a good book. It took a while to get started, and I didn’t find it particularly scary. It was more of a tragedy, though it did have some tense moments. One of the fun things about this book (spoiler warning) is learning, over time, how unreliable the POV character is.
• Lolita, by Vladimir Nabokov – One reviewer called this book “the most honest love story of the century”. I couldn’t disagree more. I didn’t really know what this book was about before going into it. The first 100 pages are pure psychological horror, and the rest is a really perverse tragedy. This story reminds me of the movie Uncut Gems. In that movie, I loved the cinematography, acting, writing, and dialogue, but hated the story. Lolita is a masterpiece, from a literary perspective, but I hate the story.
• To the Lighthouse, by Virginia Woolf – Oi, I was not prepared. This is the first book I’ve attempted that uses the “stream of consciousness” style of narrative. It was beautiful in a way that an old marble statue, abandoned for millennia, and discovered overgrown in the forest is beautiful, but I just couldn’t break it. I’ll have to come back to it at a later date.

June 2020

• On the Road, by Jack Kerouac – I loved this book. It reminded me a lot of The Sun Also Rises and reading that book prior to this one, I think, prepared me to enjoy this one more. This book is, at it’s heart, a happy tragedy.
• To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee – This was very good, but not as good as I expected. It tragically highlighted the devastating racism of the early 20th century and was very timely for 2020 as well.
• The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway – At first I didn’t like this book. It felt pointless. But I couldn’t get it out of  my head. I’ve gone back and re-read some passages, and I’ve begun to understand and appreciate it more than I did when first finishing.
• The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne – This is one of my favorite books. It’s the story of a woman accepting her artificial but inevitable fate, taking something bad and turning it for good. Hester Prynn is an inspiring character.

Mind the Gap

No, I didn’t stop reading. I just stopped recording it because I began to read a lot of genre fiction and didn’t find it worth recording. Apologies if you actually follow this sort of thing.

Also I’m including notes now 🙂

March 2019

• The Adventures of an IT Leader(x2), Robert D. Austin, Shannon O’Donnell, Richard L. Nolan
• Hacking Marketing, by Scott Brinker
• Poke the Box, by Seth Godin
• Purple Cow, by Seth Godin

February 2019

• You Inc., by Harry Beckwith and Christine Clifford Beckwith
• The Gig Economy, Diane Mulcahy
• Total Alignment, Riaz and Linda Khadem
• Capitalists Arise!, Peter Georgescu

December 2018 and January 2019

• Anything You Want, Derek Sivers
• Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill
• Go Givers Sell More, Bob Burg and John David Mann

October 2018 – December 12, 2018

I haven’t done a great job of keeping track of my books read. I have been reading as regularly as ever, however. Here’s the books I remember reading during this time:

• Rich Dad’s CASHFLOW Quadrant, Robert Kiyosaki *
• Go Giver Leader, Bob Burg and John David Mann *
  
• Go Givers Sell More, Bob Burg and John David Mann *
  
• Entrepreneurship for the Rest of Us, Paul B. Brown *
  
• The Magic of Tiny Business, Sharon Rowe *
  
• How to Win Friends and Influence People, Dale Cernegie *
  
• Capitalists Arise!, Peter Georgescu*
• Rich Dad, Poor Dad, Robert Kiyosaki
• The Instant Millionaire, Mark Fisher
  
• Emote: Using Emotions to Make Your Message Memorable, Vikas Gopal Jhingran
• Knife of Dreams, Robert Jordan
• The Gathering Storm, Robert Jordan
• Towers of Midnight, Robert Jordan
• A Memory of Light, Robert Jordan

* – These are books I will almost certainly read again at some point

September 2018

• The Phoenix Project, Gene Kim and Kevin Behr
• Game-Changer: Game Theory and the Art of Transforming Strategic Situations, David McAdams

August 2018

• The Adventures of an IT Leader, Robert D. Austin, Shannon O’Donnell, Richard L. Nolan
• The Supply Chain Revolution: Innovative Sourcing and Logistics for a Fiercely Competitive World, Suman Sarkar
• The Introverted Leader: Building on Your Quiet Strength, Jennifer B. Kahnweiler
• Binary, Michael Crichton
• Crossroads of Twilight, Robert Jordan
• The Art of War, Sun Tzu
• Winter’s Heart, Robert Jordan
• The Path of Daggers, Robert Jordan
• Total Money Makeover, Dave Ramsey
• A Crown of Swords, Robert Jordan
• Lord of Chaos, Robert Jordan

July 2018

• The Fires of Heaven, Robert Jordan
• Financial Management
• The Shadow Rising, Robert Jordan
• Judges
• Python for Data Analysis
• The Dragon Reborn, Robert Jordan

June 2018

• The Great Hunt, Robert Jordan
• The Eye of the World, Robert Jordan
• Joshua
• Dune, Frank Herbert (read w/ the kids)
• No Country for Old Men, Cormac McCarthy

May 2018

• The 12th Plant, Zechariah Sitchin
• A Journey to the Center of the Earth, Jules Verne (read w/ the kids)
• Deuteronomy
• Numbers

April 2018

• Leviticus 
• Exodus
• Genesis
• Ready Player One, Ernest Cline
• Dragon Teeth, Michael Crichton
• Acceptance, Jeff VanderMeer
• History Of Egypt, Volume 1 by G. Maspero
• Dhammapada, Buddha
• The Book of Mormon
• Authority, Jeff VanderMeer

March 2018

• Wu Wei
• Dao De Jing (x2), Laozi
• Analects of Confucius
• Dhammapada, Buddha
• Astrology and Religion, Manly P. Hall
• Annihilation, Jeff VanderMeer
• Principles of Finance (x2)
• The Startup Owner’s Manual, Steve Blank and Bob Dorf
  
• Anything You Want (x2), Derek Sivers
• The Lean Startup, Eric Reis

February 2018

• Creativity, Inc, Ed Catmull
• Scrum and XP from the Trenches, Henrik Kniberg
• The Jungle Book, Rudyard Kipling (read w/ the kids)
• Secrets of Closing the Sale, Zig Ziglar
• Personal Power, Tony Robbins

A Few Disclaimers

• Yes, as indicated in the list “(x2)”, I read some books twice in a row. If a book really stands out to me and I believe that I can derive additional meaning by doing so, I’ll read it once again, immediately after finishing the first read-through. Also, some books show up on the list more than once. That’s because they were read more than once, but not back-to-back. Yes, I know this all makes me peculiar.
• “(read w/ the kids)” means that I read the book to my kids. I read to my kids (almost) every night, and I mark the books appropriately
• Most of the books on this list I finished reading. I don’t always finish a book once I’ve started it. If it is not to my liking, or (more often) if the author repeats him/herself too much or uses too much fluff, I’ll move on to something else and I do so without apology.
• I read more than one book at a time. At any given time I’m usually reading three books. Two e/books (maybe one fiction, one nonfiction) and at least one audio book.