You Can't Win by Jack Black - autobiography of a small-time safecracker in the late 19th and early 20th century. Long enough ago for everything in life to be different, not long enough ago for everything in life to be incomprehensible.
Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?
181–190 of 357 posts
Re: Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?
#182In retrospective I wish I had read more this year.
- The Art of Community: Building the New Age of Participation
- Foundation series (Foundation, 2nd Foundation, Foundation and Empire, Foundations Edge, Foundation and Earth)
- Three Body Problem (trilogy)
- Artemis
Re: Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?
#183[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?
#184This year, I discovered Agatha Christie. A few years back, when I was temporarily advised bed rest for a month, my sis loaned me a collection of Hercule Poirot short stories. I was always a Sherlock Holmes fan and really enjoyed the logical detective work. Hercule Poirot felt like just like a pretentious quirky old man, making denouements based on evidence that is flimsy and tenuous at best. This year, I came across…
Dorothy L. Sayers, perhaps.
Re: Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?
#185A Mind for Numbers by Barbara Oakley: Decent. I think this book would best be read in conjunction while working through a textbook. I will admit that it did do quite a bit to help relieve math anxiety, but the nature of the book is practicality. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley: A reread. A bit depressing considering the state of the world today. I found myself wondering which reality would be preferable. Letters to…
> Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy: A classic. The Judge.
I actually started this while on vacation but took a break to read something else. I'm tempted to continue.
Re: Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?
#186Author: Nicole Forsgren Book: Accelerate I picked up this book after hearing high praises from Martin Fowler and Dan North during conference talks. Forsgren and her colleagues have been doing research into DevOps and its effects on organizational performance. This is a much more rigorous account than is usual in this space, so I believe it is a must read for everyone in software. --- Author: Gerald Weinberg Books: *…
As a counterpoint, I found "Accelerate" to be just ok. It is essentially a rehash of all the popular software and methodology best practices blog posts and articles we've all read in the last 15 years. This is disappointing because I expect a book to dig deeper and present new information. The main value is in the surveys measuring the improvements that organizations experienced from these practices.
Re: Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?
#187Janesville: An American Story. This is about Paul Ryan's hometown and how it flourished until the Great Recession and what happened after. If you want to try to truly understand the thought process of Paul Ryan and expand your political horizons a bit (if you're liberal), then this is a good read. Full disclosure, I haven't finished yet, but mostly done and it has at least helped me understand his thinking a bit more…
> Children of Blood and Bone: Really good and gripping. Listened to the audiobook of this one and it keeps you on your toes.
The most-liked review on the Goodreads page said to avoid this book like the plague. What makes this so good?
Re: Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?
#188This year, I discovered Agatha Christie. A few years back, when I was temporarily advised bed rest for a month, my sis loaned me a collection of Hercule Poirot short stories. I was always a Sherlock Holmes fan and really enjoyed the logical detective work. Hercule Poirot felt like just like a pretentious quirky old man, making denouements based on evidence that is flimsy and tenuous at best. This year, I came across…
Not Poirot, but still Christie: And Then There Were None / 9 Little Indians (same novel) was one of my favorites
Re: Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?
#189I was introduced to sci-fi last year and pretty much stuck to it throughout 2018. Perhaps the usual suspects given the crowd here but in any case below are my highlights. Completely blew me away: - Anathem by Neal Stephenson - Accelerando by Charles Stross - Remembrance of Earth's Past trilogy by Liu Cixin Great Reads: - Seveneves by Neal Stephenson - Glasshouse, Neptunes Brood & Saturns Children by Charles Stross -…
> I was introduced to sci-fi last year and pretty much stuck to it throughout 2018.
If you're looking for additional science fiction suggestions:
1. American War by Omar El Akkad
2. Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
3. Artemis by Andy Weir
4. Daemon by Daniel Suarez
5. Old Man's War by John Scalzi
6. Dark Matter by Blake Crouch
7. Red Rising series by Pierce Brown
Re: Ask HN: Books you read in 2018?
#190Bad blood: couldn't stop flipping the pages, reads like satire. Seeing the names of the most powerful people in the US and how they enabled Theranos' rise to prominence made me realize how much we fetishize geniuses and how little popular experts know. Books like these remind me not to pay too much attention to how people frame their success
Leonardo da Vinci by Isaacson: I went into this book expecting to be blown away by how much smarter Da Vinci was than me. Instead I was blown away by how human and hard working he was and it taught me valuable lessons on how to structure my time and life to work on things I care about. This book was instrumental in my decision to quit my job
Modern Robotics Mechanics planning and control: Because it gave me the mathematical foundation to understand how robots work. It's dense but brief so well worth the attempt. Robots was something I've been wanting to get into since I was a kid and seeing a concise treatment like this one with good intuition, mathematical formulas and code reminds me that these days I can learn anything I want