Enjoying reasonably meaty books and trying to get through one a week is a little conflicted. Homo Deus is a brilliantly puzzling book. It needs some time to play with. Some time to decide which bits are nonsense and which bits are likely.
Anyway. To the list.
10 Known and Strange Things, Teju Cole
A collection of essays. Darts around quite a lot. Sync’d nicely with train journey sized reading blocks.
11 Embassytown, China Miéville
Space games. Probably a better book that Railsea, but I enjoyed Railsea more.
12 The Looking Glass War, John le Carré
Wow this is depressing. People!
13 We Have Always Lived in the Castle, Shirley Jackson
Disgracefully I only read this because it was on a list of short books that are any good. Rattled through this quickly – great book. I should likely read something a bit more fun though.
14 Against Everything, Mark Grief
Another essay collection. I found the tone a little grating, although plenty to think about. Much preferred the voice in Known and Strange Things.
15 The Sense of an Ending, Julian Barnes
The ending could have been a little more distantly handled I think. Felt a little spelled out. I don’t know. Delightful book though.
16 Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow, Yuval Noah Harari
I’ve spoken about and recommended this book more than anything since Sapiens (and probably SPQR) last year. It didn’t go where I thought it would. It’s probably a third longer than it needs to be.
17 Ghachar Ghochar, Vivek Shanbhag
Short but awesome. Translated novels kind of amaze me anyway. Read this.
18 A Sticky Note Guide to Life, Chaz Hutton
The internet is wonderful. A book by this guy.
19 Pragmatic Thinking and Learning: Refactor Your Wetware, Andy Hunt
My first re-read of the whole bookaweek thing. I think it’s maybe five years since I read this. Surprising how much that was surprising the first time round is just ‘the natural order of things’ this time round.
Steven Milne 