111–120 of 459 posts
Non-fiction: A System for Writing by Bob Doto was pretty good. Also gave Feel-Good Productivity by Ali Abdaal a chance, but found it to be uninspiring, self-aggrandising drivel.
Because abusive parents false arrested/committed me without a trial as manic for buying a Linux (they can barely use apple) computer and RockBox music player. I spent much time gathering these quotes https://antipsychiatry.yay.boo/
I wanted to read classics, and devoured "The portrait of Dorian Gray" (O.Wilde), where maybe 50% of all the "as O.Wilde said..." quotes seem to come from (uttered by a single, incredibly obnoxious character.)
I challenged myself to read "Les Miserables" (V.Hugo), and actually managed to get two tomes out of five down. Eminently quotable, heavily skippable - why on earth spend half a time on describing the ins and out of Waterloo, except to show off ? - and, surprisingly, at times, _funny_.
The bio of Pierre Mendès France (J.Lacouture) was very much topical, given the mess in Franch politics. We had more PMs in one year than in a few chapters of the book. It's very weird to read that, at some point, some politicians were "liked" by the people - but lost power anyway.
A small Edouard Phillipe book called "Men who read" almost made me like the guy - his next book is more serious and expected. It pains me to think that our next election is going to be about "well read people who disappointed everyone" vs "popular jocks with no education who will end up disappointing everyone".
"Abundance" (E.Klein / D.Thompson) is an attempt from "well read people" to at least try and understand why everyone is disappointed and prefer the jocks. I don't think they included any solution in their book, though - maybe they save it for the sequel, or for E.Klein's presidential bid.
I want to read all Stripe press - if only, because the covers rock, and they're optimistic. Started with "Poor Charlie's Almanach" (C.Munger), which a disappointing rehash of the same funny speech seven times. (Tldr : be multidisciplinary, study cognitive biases, don't trade). In the middle of "The Origins of Efficiency " (Potter)
"The Wave" (Souleymane) was not optimistic. And not practical at all - sure, AI enabled drones carrying bioweapons will suck. "The Age of predators" (G. Da Empoli) reminds us that the AI enabled bioweapons carrying drones will come from an illiberal state enabled by billionaires from Silicon Valley, and Russian trolls. I wish someone told me where to go to avoid being targeted too early.
"Everything is tuberculosis" (J. Greene) reminded me of a time when scientists were trying to solve problems as opposed to creating brand new ones - but at least the next generations won't die of boredom.
"We, programmers" is a rehash of Uncle Bob's pre talks "history of programming". I loved the long and detailed parts about G.Hopper. He ends with a (failed) attempt to convince that programmers will still be needed in the age of AI.
Steve Yegge's "Vibe coding" goes full "resistance is futile" about programming with agents, and, interestingly, ends up talking more about TDD than Uncle Bob - but the words "electricity consumption" and "climate impact" are not utured, because, why spoil the fun.
"The Common LISP cookbook" tried to explain me the difference between ASDF, quicklisp and whatnot - 2025 was the closest year I ever go to actually writing something in LISP instead of reading books about it.
And also, "The baby is a mammal" (M.Odent) and "Becoming a dad for dummies", because this year was probably the last one we're I'll get so much time to read :)
I gave Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations a go and gave up around half way. Maybe if I knew the historical context it would seem more profound? I enjoyed Three Body Problem a lot more than I thought I would. That was probably the best book I read in 2025.
I also read Meditations this year. Definitely not what I was expecting. It's not cohesive at all. My biggest takeaways were the inevitability of death and generally letting go of our sense of control.
I've found many of the individual musings to be quite interesting. In particular the ones that relate to perception (my own biggest pitfall).
Pachinko by Min Jin Lee stuck with me more than anything else I read this year. It is a work of simple beauty. It’s a story of several generations of poor Korean women who eventually immigrate to Japan. The front half of the book is wonderfully paced to spend time with the characters. The back half can feel a bit rushed, but it becomes more of a page turner. The Cold Millions by Jess Walter is another period novel ab…
Project Hail Marry by Andy Weir
Dungeon Crawler Carl (Books 1-7) by Matt Dinniman
I'm currently reading:
Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism by Sarah Wynn-Williams
The Burnout Society - Byung-Chul Han The Disappearance of Rituals - Byung-Chul Han Outlive - Peter Attia (This felt like a complete waste of attention) An Emotional Education - School of Life/Alain de Botton The Story of Your Life and Others - Ted Chiang Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind - Hayao Miyazaki Plants from Test Tubes - Lydiane Kyte; John Kleyn; Holly Scoggins; Mark Bridgen Some biography I've forgotten
I RSS read all day about solid state batteries, which recently are in power banks. Hope to hear about folding MicroLED phones on www.microled-info.com But they will start out too expensive. Because abusive parents false arrested/committed me without a trial as manic for buying a Linux (they can barely use apple) computer and RockBox music player. I spent much time gathering these quotes https://antipsychiatry.yay.boo…
What am I supposed to understand from this?
My favourite SF book this year was "Translation State" by Ann Leckie. It is set in the Imperial Radch world so having read the Ancillary trilogy is useful but not essential. I like it because it contains the strangest aliens (the Presger) that I have come across. They are as far from humans in costumes as you could get. What the Presger do (and their proxies in the Human world the Translators) is totally unguessable.…