Rating: 8.2/10. One of the longer books I’ve read, this is a 660-page book about geology. It is actually composed of five books that were separately published from 1981 to 1998. It won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction. The author has a narrative style that takes a while to get used to: at first…
Category: Nonfiction
The Machinery of Life by David S. Goodsell
Rating: 8.1/10. A fairly unique book that explains molecular biology using illustrations and detailed to-scale 3D renderings of molecules. Only about 150 pages but there’s an illustration on nearly every page, explaining many different cellular processes, such as: DNA transcription, cellular respiration, breakdown of an E. coli bacterium, viruses, drugs. Doesn’t go too deep into…
Ten Lessons for a Post-Pandemic World by Fareed Zakaria
Rating: 7.0/10. Written in July 2020, this book gives an analysis of ways which Covid is changing the world: which trends are temporary and which are here to stay. Many of the changes were already in progress for some time, and Covid only sped it up or exposed it for the world to see. Covid…
A Story as Sharp as a Knife by Robert Bringhurst
Rating: 7.3/10. A collection of Haida mythology, interspersed with analysis of them, and commentary of how the myths were collected. The Haida are a first nations group living in the Haida Gwaii islands of British Colombia, and in 1900, linguist John Swanton from Harvard was sent to study their culture. He ended up seeking their…
The Left Behind by Robert Wuthnow
Rating: 8.0/10. Fairly short book, describing life in rural America and why they consistently vote Republican. Unlike the cities, rural Americans live in small and medium-sized communities with two characteristics: (1) it feels like everyone knows everyone else, and (2) it feels like everyone thinks the same way. Both of these are not literally true,…
Atomic Habits by James Clear
Rating: 6.5/10. Habits are actions that seem insignificant in the moment, but whose effects compound so that the long-term effect is significant. If you become 1% better every day, you will be very good after a year. The habit loop is subconscious and consists of four steps: cue, craving, response, and reward, thus you should…
Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo
Rating: 8.4/10. Written as though it were a novel, this book is actually a true story of several ordinary people in the Annawadi slum of Mumbai, whom the author observed in 2007-2011. The slum was built in 1991 on airport-owned land by migrant Tamil workers, and grew over the years to house several thousand people….
Die With Zero by Bill Perkins
Rating: 9.4/10. Summary This is a personal finance book, but runs contrary to most advice in this genre. A lot of people save a large chunk of their money, but never get around to spending it, and any money that’s still unused when you die is “wasted”, since it represents hours that you put in…
Exposive Growth by Cliff Lerner
Rating: 6.8/10. Book that claims to be about startup growth, but is really the story of the rise and fall of the author’s own company. After seeing his coworkers struggle to find dates online, he quit his job at Lehman Brothers to start an online dating company. In the early stages, especially since the product…
Eat the Buddha by Barbara Demick
Rating: 7.7/10. Summary Book by an American journalist, about the history of modern Tibet, from the 1950s until today. The book focuses on the Ngaba region in Sichuan, which was famous recently for its political activism and monks setting themselves on fire. Ngaba (also called Aba) is technically in the province of Sichuan, but most…
The Death and Life of the Great Lakes by Dan Egan
Rating: 8.0/10. The Great Lakes system contains about 20% of the world’s surface freshwater, but is “ecologically naive”: for thousands of years, its ecosystem has been isolated from the outside world as foreign fish can’t make it through the rapids and up Niagara Falls. This all changed in the 19th century as we opened several…
God: A Human History by Reza Aslan
Rating: 7.8/10. A story of how the idea of God developed and evolved, from an anthropological rather than religious perspective. The author is from Iran and was born a Muslim, converted to Christianity, then converted back to a Muslim, so he is familiar with multiple religions. Humans have an instinct to believe in god, and…