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Ask HN: Best book you read in 2010 and briefly why

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Re: Ask HN: Best book you read in 2010 and briefly why

#191

Post by fuzzythinker »

aik wrote: post #124
edw519 wrote: post #77

_Do More Faster_ by Techstars founders Brad Feld and David Cohen (Apologies to OP's request for brevity; there's just a lot of good stuff that I'd like to share.) A must read for anyone here who is serious about their startup. I read it on the flight to Startup School to "get in the mood". I couldn't put it down. It's easy to read for 2 reasons: every chapter is a short essay by a different person (including many Tec…

I wonder how many of these books you just caused to sell. I'm sold myself! Thanks for the quotes and review. Very motivating. Let me quote you. >Sometimes someone says the same thing a little differently, and that's the one that actually reaches you. Beautiful! and true.

at least 1 ;)

Re: Ask HN: Best book you read in 2010 and briefly why

#193

Post by jmg »

bmcleod wrote: post #112

Non-fiction: Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman! - I'm not sure how I'd managed to avoid reading it this long given that I already really liked Feynman and had read and watched a lot of his stuff already. It's a great book and I proceeded to inflict it on quite a few other people. Fiction: Of Mice and Men - A tiny little book that fits in masses of content and atmosphere.

Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman! is also a great listen via audiobook, especially on road trips!

Re: Ask HN: Best book you read in 2010 and briefly why

#195

Post by arvinjoar »

Not one book, but two graphic novels. "Watchmen" and "V for Vendetta", Alan Moore's perspective is such a great perspective. Alan Moore tackles important philosophical questions in a really accessible medium. Alan Moore is a realist with very dramatic inclinations and all hackers will appreciate the references in his works. He combines the pretentious with the subtle in a way that will blow your mind. It's not very time-consuming to read through a graphic novel, but after reading them you will spend a lot of time processing the content in your mind, until you reread the graphic novels by Alan Moore.

Re: Ask HN: Best book you read in 2010 and briefly why

#196

Post by zachallaun »

edw519 wrote: post #77

_Do More Faster_ by Techstars founders Brad Feld and David Cohen (Apologies to OP's request for brevity; there's just a lot of good stuff that I'd like to share.) A must read for anyone here who is serious about their startup. I read it on the flight to Startup School to "get in the mood". I couldn't put it down. It's easy to read for 2 reasons: every chapter is a short essay by a different person (including many Tec…

One of the great triumphs of _Founders at Work_ is its obvious emphasis on multiple perspectives to any single given problem. This book seems to emulate that approach to similar success, if your enthusiasm is to be taken as any indicator!

I can't wait to read it.

Re: Ask HN: Best book you read in 2010 and briefly why

#198

Post by GeneralMaximus »

cstuder wrote: post #127
aaronblohowiak wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Frankly, the second was the weakest of the three.

Frankly, after the first three, it starts going downhill very fast. I stopped reading after Foundation's Edge .

Dang, I just purchased the entire series after falling in love with the first book. Note to self: do not make impulsive purchases.

Re: Ask HN: Best book you read in 2010 and briefly why

#199

Post by ladoo3 »

sgricci wrote: post #100
blacksmythe wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also his "Cryptonomicon", a phenomenal novel.

Snow crash was great as well. Also the "Daemon" series by Daniel Suarez is great along the same lines as snow crash.

Daemon and Freedom are wonderful books. A recent article in the NYT reminded me a lot of the series.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/08/world/europe/08assange.htm...

"That left unclear whether a more serious threat would be carried out. In recent days, Mr. Assange has asserted that “over 100,000 people” had downloaded the entire archive of 251,287 cables in encrypted form. Only around 1,000 of the cables have so far been released; in many, names of sources who might be compromised or endangered were redacted. “If something happens to us, the key parts will be released automatically,” Mr. Assange wrote in a question-and-answer session on the Web site of the British newspaper The Guardian. Mr. Stephens, the lawyer, reiterated that warning on Tuesday saying a “a virtual network” of “thousands of journalists” around the world would ensure that the rest of the documents would be published."

Re: Ask HN: Best book you read in 2010 and briefly why

#200

Post by jtheory »

adaml_623 wrote: post #172
lionhearted wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fantastic book. Either that, or Eliezer Yudkowsky's fanfiction "Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality" was the best fiction I read this year. http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5782108/1/Harry_Potter_and_the_M... HP&TMOR didn't sound like the kind of thing I'd have liked... massively mistaken. Very good. Highly recommended.

I don't see the point of having a no procrastination setting on Hackernews if irresponsible people link to captivating etexts like Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality. That's book is really grabbing me at the moment.

Hmm -- and unfortunately for you, even though it masquerades as "just" a online fan fic, it's actually already the length of multiple books; the chapter count is in the 60s, and the downloadable "book-format" PDF is over 1K pages.

It's great fun, but yeah, you have to figure out a way to spread it out over a few weeks or you'll accomplish little else. :)

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