Sat, 03 Mar 2007
Conan the Adventurer
Conan rocks. How can you not want to kick ass with Conan?
Campy pulpy fun.
Tue, 24 Oct 2006
Expanded Universe
Angry Heinlein worried about nuclear war, government, and the failure of kids today. If you’ve read Heinlein, you know it already. If you haven’t, there are better places to start.
West of Jesus
This was a weird one. It made me want to learn to surf and take acid.
However, my primary reason for reading this was a Prairie Home Companion sketch (the adventures of Ruth Harrison, Reference Librarian) which involved a hapless library client asking about a book in which Jesus carried a surfboard and being quickly told that the library didn’t carry “The Davinci Dude”. The next day, I saw a review for West of Jesus. So it goes.
The Illuminatus Trilogy
The Illuminatus Trilogy is one of my favorites, and it’s always a fun read. If you want to read a real conspiracy book, where the conspiracies are complex and intertwingled, and the nouns and verbs are occasionally invented, this is worth the time.
Sun, 24 Sep 2006
Perfectly Reasonable Deviations From The Beaten Track
This collection of Richard Feynman’s letters is a fantastic view into this man’s life. If you haven’t read Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman! already, then you should probably start there. These letters provide insight into Feynman, but if you’re not already a fan they will probably not be nearly as interesting. To fans of the man, however, they are fascinating reading.
Sat, 26 Aug 2006
Ready for Anything
Ready for Anything is David Allen’s second book, after Getting Things Done. As is well known by those who know me, I practice GTD more or less successfully, and find that it works reasonably well for me. Unfortunately, Ready for Anything was much more like the traditional “self-help” book than Getting Things Done was, and while I found a few nuggets of useful process it wasn’t really worth the time.
Sat, 19 Aug 2006
American Gods
What a pleasure. American Gods was a fabulous read. Dark and funny and sweet and sad.
Wed, 16 Aug 2006
A Man Without A Country
I’ve liked Kurt Vonnegut since high school, so I was excited that he’d written another book. I liked it well enough, but it was so short; more like a Harper’s article that had been stretched into a book by making the font larger.
I guess when you’re Kurt Vonnegut you can do that.
Sat, 12 Aug 2006
Atlas Shrugged
Okay, I am now done with Ayn Rand.
Seriously.
It was interesting the responses I got from people who saw that I was reading Atlas Shrugged; they ranged from visceral disgust to “oh, I read that… when I was 15” to “Everybody I know who read that book turned into an asshole. Are you going to turn into an asshole?” to “Wow. Did you get to the monologue yet?”. To which I can now respond “Yes, in fact, I read the 68 page monologue. I read the whole damn thing. And you know what? I’m done with it. Oh, and I don’t plan on turning into an asshole, but if you think I have, let me know, ‘kay?”
My favorite part was the industrialist ninja strike force at the end; being ruthless in business obviously equips you to be an elite commando in and out of the boardroom.
The sad part here is that the underlying message here is actually valuable, if very simple. Be independent. Don’t rely upon the graces of others to survive. Don’t feel obligated to obey the tenets of society. Do think. Those aren’t bad things to do. Unfortunately, this seems to get twisted around by the people who adopt these novels as holy text, and get transformed into one even more simple creed: be an asshole.
I mean, honestly. I’m beginning to think that Ayn Rand is in the same class of holy book as the Bible: the folks who are yelling the loudest about it haven’t paid attention to the source material. So much for rationalism.
The Fountainhead was a much more entertaining novel; however, Atlas Shrugged was worth reading from a “seeking to understand the loonies” perspective, which I seem to get into from time to time. Still, no crazy-cult books for at least a month.
Wed, 19 Jul 2006
Toast
Toast is a collection of short stories by Charles Stross. As you might guess from the title, they invariably involve the end of the world as we know it; sometimes this means the end of life on Earth, other times it simply means the total destruction of what we currently consider reality.
Lots of fun, even if some of the stories now feel a bit dated.
Mon, 17 Jul 2006
Time Management for Systems Administrators
This ended up on the O’Reilly pile at work, so I picked it up and read it on BART. I think this book serves a useful purpose; it gets time management info in front of a group of people whom normally wouldn’t see it. However, Getting Things Done is a much better book if you really want to get better at managing your time. To be fair, Limoncelli recommends GTD in the Epilogue, so I think it’s best to think of this as a “starter book for people who hate time management books but need one anyway”. Especially if they are sysadmins.
Sun, 16 Jul 2006
The Cognitive Style of Powerpoint
More of an essay than a book, this is the cure for the dreaded PowerPoint presentation disease that infects nearly all corporates and colleges. If you give presentations, you should read it. If you suffer through presentations, you should read it, if only to learn that there is another way.
Glasshouse
Charles Stross has written another fantastic post-Singularity novel in Glasshouse. If you liked Accelerando, you will like Glasshouse. If you did not like Accelerando, well, you may like Glasshouse. In any case, you should read Glasshouse. All hail the panopticon dystopia!
The Fountainhead
If anything, Ayn Rand needs less bits on the Internet written about her, not more. The Internet appears to be the last haven of Objectivists; at least, they are a lot louder here. If you haven’t read The Fountainhead, it’s probably worth reading; all of the roles are caricatures and there is little surprise as to what happens, but Rand isn’t talked about because of her writing style.
Set This House in Order
Set This House in Order is one of the more inventive books I’ve read in a while; a very interesting description of how multiple personality disorder may be like combined with a solid mystery plot. Lots of fun, totally worth reading.
Microserfs
There’s a problem with reading a book that was really hot about 10 years ago; there’s not much to say about it now. I read this when I was in college, and re-read it recently. It resonated more this time around; probably because parts of my life now match parts of the lives of the characters more. I still like it, even though as Hoss says about Coupland: “You’re going along, and everything is fine, and then WHAMMO! Apocalypse!”.
The Prophet
My mom gave me a copy of The Prophet that belonged to my grandmother a while ago. I have absolutely no idea why I wanted to read this book; I am assuming that it was jotted down as being on a list of books that inspired an author that I enjoyed, or someone mentioned to me in passing.
Knowing absolutely nothing about it, I discover that it is a book of poetry. You have to understand something about my relationship to poetry: I can’t stand it. One of my high school English teachers once believed that part of my soul was missing because I didn’t like the poetry we were reading, and the papers I wrote indicated as much. I have never met a poem that I didn’t find plenty of reason to avoid.
So, it says something that I actually read The Prophet; admittedly, most of my motivation was that the book was my grandmother’s, and I wanted to see something that she had read, but I did finish it. Unfortunately, I have no idea what that actually means: I don’t want to read it again. I don’t feel that I got a lot out of it. So it goes.
Grease Monkey
Grease Monkey was a nice change of pace from the graphic novels I’ve been reading lately. The art detail is very good, and the stories are not bad for young adult/coming of age fare. I’d give this to a niece or nephew in a second, and it was a fun read for me.
Practical Cryptography
Bruce Schneier and Niels Ferguson have performed a miracle: they’ve written a book that helps explain cryptography to people who currently use it. It doesn’t assume a cryptography background, and is at about the same level as a good O’Reilly Press book. Given that the issues dealt with in this book are everywhere (cryptographic algorithms are in your DVD player, every Internet service has authentication and data validation issues, etc), I believe that this book is in the same category as Code Complete; if you are involved with software, you probably will be better at your work after reading this book.
Sat, 24 Jun 2006
Zodiac
Zodiac is probably my favorite Neal Stephenson novel. Not too long, tight plot, and the signature style that is in all of Stephenson’s novels. You should go find this one, also; despite its age, it has held up well.
Was
Was was actually… disappointing. It is all about the Oz myth, and why we need to make Oz in order to get by, and that was good. The writing was also good. Really, it held together nicely right up until the end, where it all kind of falls apart into goop.
Thu, 02 Mar 2006
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
But wait, you say! This isn’t some wacky scifi novel! Who the hell is posting this entry, and what did you do with Mark? Yes, it’s true, I do in fact read other things. Mark Twain, for example, is a writer that I always felt I should read more of, but have never gotten around to. So I read about good ol’ Huck Finn, and let me tell ya: if you haven’t read this book since school, go get a copy. It’s funny, and hard, and touching, and funny, and why am I trying to convince you to read Mark Twain? You already know he’s good! Go read him!
Sun, 26 Feb 2006
A Fire Upon The Deep
First Vernor Vinge novel I’ve read; really good, and obvious inspiration to a whole slew of current authors (Cory Doctorow and Charles Stross, for example, seem to share some of Vinge’s style). Anyway, I really enjoyed it, and will probably go hunt down some of his other stuff before too long.
Masks of the Illuminati
Another Robert Anton Wilson conspiracy-fest. Not as good as The Illuminati Trilogy, or even Schrodinger’s Cat.
Thu, 23 Feb 2006
Son of a Witch
While I really enjoyed Wicked, I didn’t think that Son of a Witch was nearly as good. For whatever reason, it just didn’t work for me. Liir wasn’t a very interesting character, and Candle was just kind of boring.
All in all, really disappointing.
Sun, 12 Feb 2006
The Atrocity Archives
Fun and totally worthwhile, but not as good as Charles Stross’ other books. There were too many IT references and too much stuff going on which I thought interfered with the story a little bit. Still, far better than most of the scifi I’ve read and Charles Stross is now one of my favorite authors.
Iron Sunrise
Good sci-fi adventure yarn; perfect airplane reading. Time flies and you’re having fun! You should read Singularity Sky first, though.
Sat, 04 Feb 2006
A Short History of Nearly Everything
A Short History Of Nearly Everything, despite its grandiose title, is an easy read. It is not, however, discuss easy ideas. Want to know a little bit about quantum mechanics? Want to know why E=mc2 matters? Curious about how DNA works? This is the book for you.
The Long Walk
Change of pace for me, but excellent. The author and six fellow prisoners escape a Soviet labor camp in 1941 and walk from Siberia to British India in order to find freedom. Stunning and moving. Link.
Sat, 21 Jan 2006
Singularity Sky
More Charles Stross happy singularity goodness. Not as mind blowing as Accelerando, but still really good. Beware the Critics…
Wed, 18 Jan 2006
Ringworld
Just finished reading Ringworld, and found it entertaining. What was most interesting was the idea that material science would be the way the future would be impossible to imagine (indestructable spaceship hulls, impossibly strong custom materials that block neutrenos, etc). It gave me the impression that at the time it was written material science was the new hotness; similar to how current sci-fi treat nanotech and extremely pervasive computing as the way the future becomes impossible to imagine (see Accelerando, anything about The Singularity, etc).
Sat, 07 Jan 2006
My book queue is full!
I just counted, and I have 27 books sitting in a pile that I want to read. Therefor, I am instantiating an emergency “no more books” rule for myself until I’ve actually read some of them.
Sat, 10 Dec 2005
Books I read in Hawaii
My family knows me pretty well and gave me some absolutely fantastic books to read over my last vacation.
- Wicked by Gregory Maguire
- Code Complete, 2nd Ed. by Steve McConnell
- Air: Or, Have Not Have by Geoff Ryman
- Accelerando by Charles Stross
Code Complete is only interesting for the geeks in the audience, but is totally worth your time if you write code.
I would suggest that anyone who enjoys reading would like the first three. Wicked was moving and much better than you would expect from something that’s been turned into a Broadway musical. Air was rock-solid and probably would have been my favorite book of this year if I hadn’t read Accelerando.
Accelerando was the most fun I’ve had with a novel ever. SO GOOD! SO FUCKING GOOD! GO READ IT! NOW! NOW, I SAY!
Whew.
So, uh, yeah. Go get a copy of Accelerando already.
Sat, 27 Aug 2005
Collapse
Collapse, by Jared Diamond (author of Guns, Germs, and Steel) was pretty good. Kind of lengthy for what it says which is that societies that destroy their environment fail and it’s usually their own fault as opposed to just bad luck.
I didn’t like it as much as Guns, Germs, and Steel but it wasn’t bad, and certainly worth reading if you liked Guns, Germs, and Steel and want a bit more.
Sun, 12 Jun 2005
Drop City
Drop City was given to me as a Christmas present by relatives who live in Alaska, and whom are very proud of their state. With good reason; Alaska is a beautful place to live. I really enjoyed this book, and think you should go out and buy/borrow/check out a copy for yourself. It’s fantastic.
Tue, 05 Apr 2005
Mars Trilogy
Finished the Mars Trilogy (Red, Green, and Blue Mars) while in Costa Rica. Superb hard sci-fi; it read as if it could be happening right now (at least the beginning parts), and I liked the characters a great deal.
Mon, 07 Feb 2005
The Baroque Cycle
I finished it. Finally. It is a freaking long set of books. That being said, I did enjoy it. However, I think that I will enjoy more that I’m done and no longer am facing a multi-pound hardcover in my backpack every day on BART.
Tue, 21 Sep 2004
the hollow chocolate bunnies of the apocalypse
Just finished this little gem by Robert Rankin. Apparently it’s hard to find in the US; I borrowed a copy from a friend. It’s a very funny, fast read. But I didn’t like the ending much; the book goes at full tilt until the end and then just sort of ends. Kind of like Neil Stephenson’s stuff in that way.
The title alone should be making you want to read it; if that doesn’t do it, the first chapter should do the trick. It’s a cross between Philip Marlow and the Muppet Show, gone horribly horribly wrong.