Last year I read quite some books, unconsciously, without much thought but entirely engrossed. It bought me peace and quiet. A big chunk of it was fiction.
As a challenge of not only equalling the amount of reading I get done, I also set myself up to expand on the topics to read. This has been hard so far.
Here is a list in reverse chronological order that I finished reading. I read 30 in all. 2 of which are audio books.
1. The Ministry of Utmost Happiness
Arundhati Roy
Notes: Heart touching, soul-crushing, nostalgia-inducing, poetry filled and an ecstasy evoking read.
Fiction straying not far from facts, blurred the lines between reality and imagined. The vivid descriptions of Delhi, J&K, the people and everything about India, has left me yearning to see them for myself in the new light shone by Arundhati Roy through her words
2. Letters to a Young Poet
Rainer Maria Rilke
3. Blind Man’s Bluff
Sherry Sontag
Notes: I always enjoy military non-fiction. This did not disapoint although it didn’t match up to my expectations of submarine warfare set with the Thunder Below: The USS Barb book
4. The Songs Of Distant Earth
Arthur C. Clarke
5. Roadside Picnic
Arkady Strugatsky
6. A Chinese Life
Li Kunwu
7. Body Language
Glenn Wilson
8. Messy: How to Be Creative and Resilient in a Tidy-Minded World
Tim Harford
9. Outliers: The Story of Success
Malcolm Gladwell
10. Production-Ready Microservices
Susan J. Fowler
11. The Dispatcher
John Scalzi
12. Rogue Heroes: The History of the SAS
Ben Macintyre
13. Consider Phlebas (Culture, #1)
Iain M. Banks
14. The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business
Charles Duhigg
Notes: Very fascinating
15. Night School (Jack Reacher #21)
Lee Child
16. Norse Mythology
Neil Gaiman
17. Make Your Bed
William H. McRaven
18. Command and Control
Eric Schlosser
19. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck
Mark Manson
20. Prisoners of Geography
Tim Marshall
First forray into politics and current affairs. I would love to read more of such books.
21. A short history of nearly everything
Bill Bryson
Notes: Literally tid bits of everything that lead to modern world.
22. Skunk Works
Ben R. Rich
Notes: Nonfiction, Science, Spy planes, Engineering.
23. 2001: A Space Odyssey (Space Odyssey #1)
Arthur C. Clarke
Notes: Classic. Reminded me so much about _Interstellar_the movie andRendezvous with rama
24. The End of All Things (Old Man’s War #6)
John Scalzi
25. The Human Division
John Scalzi
26. Zoe’s Tale (Old Man’s War, #4)
John Scalzi
27. Agent M: The Lives and Spies of MI5’s Maxwell Knight
Henry Hemming
Notes: Feels like a spy novel. Hard to believe it is nonfiction.
28. Dune (Dune Chronicles, #1)
Frank Herbert
Notes: different science fiction.
29. Lords of the Sky: Fighter Pilots and Air Combat, from the Red Baron to the F-16
Dan Hampton
Notes: Fighter jets, their evolution, the role they played in conflicts around the world from before WW1, through WW2, Vietnam war, Desert Storm (Iraq) and further.
30. The Quantum Thief (Jean le Flambeur, #1)
Hannu Rajaniemi
Notes: Different science fiction. Set in a world where souls can exist, thoughts and memories can be shared by means of mental contracts. Mind bending.