Books
This is an attempt to document my adult reading life. It’s incomplete, but I’m finding some satisfaction in watching it grow and using it to refresh my memory. It is also handy to have this available when friends and acquaintances ask the inevitable “So, what are you reading?”
CURRENTLY READING:
- Google Hacks - O’Reilly
- A Little History of the World - Gombrich
FINISHED:
2009
- The Given Day - Lehane (Fantastic historical novel, Boston post-WWI. Read it.)
- City of Thieves - Beniof (Great coming-of-age story in WWII Leningrad)
- Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close - Foer (Moving 9/11 story from 9 yr old’s perspective)
- Hunter’s Run - Martin (Fun sci-fi)
- The Girl Who Played with Fire - Larsson (Thilling crime w/ same interesting protagonist)
- The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - Larsson (Entertaining crime w/ unusual main character)
- The Magicians - Grossman (Unsentimental coming of age magic-in-the-real-world story)
- Demons in the Spring - Meno (Mix of good and great short stories)
- The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters - Dahlquist (Overwrought but a decent page-turner)
- Netherland: A Novel - O’Neill (Very well-written postmodern love story, NYC and cricket)
- Going to See the Elephant - Fishburn (Worthwhile, funny)
- You Don’t Love Me Yet - Lethem (Great, as expected of Lethem, novel of music culture)
- The Best Alternate History Stories of the 20th Century - Turtledove (Some very interesting)
- The White Tiger - Adiga (Decent first novel, quick read about class warfare in modern India)
- King Rat - Clavell (Ok, not great. Could’ve been much better.)
- Interface - Stephenson/Jewsbury (Entertaining, hilarious, thought-provoking page-turner)
- The Last Lecture - Pausch (Unworthy of the hype, if somewhat moving)
- The City at the End of Time - Bear (Interesting sci-fi, needed more editing but not bad)
2008
- Wild Years - Music and Myth of Tom Waits - Jacobs (Tom Waits is the man. loved it.)
- Little Brother - Doctorow (Modern companion to 1984, EFF talking points brilliantly disguised as an exciting, scary and plausible thriller. A MUST READ for anyone who ever thinks about civil liberty and freedom.)
- The God Delusion - Dawkins (Clarified my thinking greatly. A MUST READ for anyone who ever thinks about religion.)
- Grendel - Gardner (Poetic, psychedelic, possibly genius, deeply weird, brief.)
- Fevre Dream - Martin (Evocative, lush, engaging period piece about vampires on river boats in the mi-19th century. Read it while sipping small-batch bourbon. Highly recommended!)
- Dreams From My Father - Obama (I want this man to be President so bad it hurts. Read this book before you vote against him.)
- Sun of Suns - Schroeder (Fast-paced sci-fi, not great but a good page-turner.)
- The Kite Runner - Hosseini (Vivid, wrenching at times, worthwhile.)
- Men and Cartoons - Lethem (Not as strong as his phenomenal novels, but still good short stories.)
2007 (19)
- The Varieties of Scientific Experience - Sagan (science vs. religion, cosmology as “informed worship”… worthwhile)
- The Road - McCarthy (Pulitzer-winning, and -worthy. Bleakest thing I ever read, just heart-breaking. Haunting.)
- Spook Country - Gibson (barely sci-fi, more an enjoyable spy thriller)
- The Children of Hurin - Tolkien (compelling story-telling, pretty dark)
- Letters from Father Christmas - Tolkien (touching, looking fwd to reading these to Abi)
- True History of the Kelly Gang - Carey (wow. great exciting storytelling via a unique voice)
- Motherless Brooklyn - Lethem (worthwhile, funny)
- Founders at Work - Livingston (read most of it, some of it inspires)
- Analysis for Finacial Managment - Higgins (read 100 pgs, skimmed to get a sense of the area)
- black swan green - mitchell (warm, honest, realistic coming-of-age story by my favorite new author)
- the 4-hour workweek - ferriss (inspiring how-to manual for freeing your time and making money)
- ghostwritten - mitchell (mitchell is in elite company w/ lethem and powers, this is hauntingly beautiful stuff)
- programming ruby (aka “the pickaxe book”) - thomas / pragmatic programmers (wow.)
- gun, with occasional music - lethem (chandler meets pkdick? great dark quick fun)
- y:the last man vol. 7,8 - vaughan (losing interest in this series)
- cloud atlas - mitchell (amazingly good, weaving disparate genres)
- getting real - 37signals (interesting take on writing web software)
- four more wars - luckovich (great political cartoons)
2006 (38)
- an inconvenient truth - gore (better late than never)
- tuf voyaging - grrm (interesting sci-fi, adolescent but plenty fun)
- waiting for godot - beckett (play. deeply weird. mildly entertaining, shrug.)
- fables: 1001 nights of snowfall - graphic novel (gorgeous, creative)
- the immortal game - schenk (nf. history of chess, lucid and entertaining)
- the joy of fatherhood - goldman (nf. some helpful tips buried in the fluff)
- this is your brain on music - levitin (nf. fascinating extension/counterpoint to pinker)
- blink - gadwell (nf. similar to tipping point, worthwhile)
- a moveable feast - hemingway (interesting, intimate glimpse into eh’s life in paris)
- ronin - miller (graphic novel, gorgeously drawn, interesting story)
- origins - jenkins et al (graphic novel, wolverine, takes me back)
- y: the last man (vol. 2-6) - vaughan (campy graphic novel, can’t quite stop picking these up)
- watchmen - moore + gibbons (graphic novel, unique and outstanding)
- a public space, vol. 2 (less compelling than vol 1 but some good stuff in here)
- old school - t. wolf (beautifully written, evocative, a small gem)
- y: the last man (vol.1) - vaughan (graphic novel fun)
- i, lucifer - duncan (brilliant, hilarious, thought-provoking)
- fortress of solitude - lethem (brilliant, convincing, complete, worth re-reading)
- someone comes to town, someone leaves town - doctorow (unclassifiable, but genius. loved it.)
- a public space, vol. 1 (above average lit mag w/ some art, worthwhile)
- number9dream - mitchell (mesmerizing, intelligent, human, page-turner, wow.)
- the outlaw bible of american literature (fantastic compilation, just great)
- one day in the life of ivan denisovich - solzhenitsyn (echoes of hemingway. very powerful)
- ajax in action - crane (nf. outstanding tech book)
- sandman vol. 6,7,8,9,10 - gaiman (sad to have finished this masterpiece)
- the art of war - lao tsu (good translator’s preface, and some wisdom, but venerable commentary was intolerable)
- kornwolf - egolf (funny and dark, vintage egolf, very sad he’s gone and wrote no more.)
- deep simplicity: bringing order to chaos and complexity - gribbin (nf. mixed bag: interesting insights but dry)
- the tipping point - gladwell (nf. very interesting perspective)
- shantaram - roberts (deeply engaging, moving, thrilling epic)
2005 (17)
- a feast for crows - george rr martin (subpar for martin, but impossible to put down anyway)
- the flanders panel - Perez-Reverte (fun read, chess/art/murder)
- collected fiction of r.l. borges - borges (hugely varied; masterful poetic writing, gripping ideas and storytelling)
- kafka on the shore - murakami (interesting enough)
- a floating life: the adventures of li po: a historical novel - elegant (beautiful, engaging and engrossing)
- dying of the light - george rr martin (solid sci-fi)
- shadow of the wind - zafon (a novel for people who love books by an author who sure does)
- lies, inc. - philip k. dick (trippy, thought-provoking)
- sandman vol.5 - gaimain (excellent graphic novel, cont’d)
- coraline - gaiman (very good children’s story, possible future classic)
- sandman vol.4 - gaimain (excellent graphic novel, cont’d)
- toward the end of time - updike (drags in places, but overall touching and compelling)
- sandman vol.3 - gaimain (excellent graphic novel, cont’d)
- jinn - delaney (campy page-turner set in boston)
- wake up, sir! - ames (funny antihero)
- positively 5th street - mcmanus (gripping nonfiction)
- samurai executioner - kazuo (manga)
2004 (19)
-how the mind works - pinker (insightful, educational nonfiction)
-step across this line - rushdie (essays, mixed bag)
-pattern recognition - gibson (sharp fiction)
-the curious incident of the dog in the night-time - haddon (interesting, touching)
-american gods - gaiman (funny fantasy)
-sandman vol.2 - gaiman (excellent graphic novel, cont’d)
-neverwhere - gaiman (very good fantasy fiction)
-sandman vol.1 - gaiman (dark/interesting graphic novel)
-budding prospects - boyle (funny/wincing quick read)
-down and out in the magic kingdom - doctorow (interesting sci-fi)
-master and commander - o’brian (great, believable historical fiction)
-if the river was whiskey - boyle (decent short stories)
-fall of the towers - delany (trippy 70’s fantasy/sci-fi)
-up - sukenick (dark and unusual fiction)
-fountainhead - rand (philosophical novel)
-way of the peaceful warrior - millman (metaphysical novel)
-dark fields - glynn (thought-provoking sci-fi, hard to put down)
-bringing down the house - mezrich (interesting nonfiction)
-east is east - tc boyle (funny fiction)
2003 (21)
-long strange trip - mcnally (fascinating nonfiction)
-designing w web standards - zeldman (good, technical)
-the sun also rises - hemingway (brilliant)
-in the hand of dante - tosches (juxtaposes beauty and darkness, worthwhile)
-sandman: the dream hunters (graphic novel) - gaiman (beautiful graphic novel)
-you shall know our velocity - eggers (decent fiction)
-best american nonrequired reading - eggers (ed.) (some great stories)
-to have and have not - hemingway (brilliant)
-skirt and the fiddle - egolf (hilarious, dark)
-jennifer government - barry (very interesting)
-the old man and the sea - hemingway (brilliant, evocative)
-javaserver pages - o’reilly (useful)
-tai-pan - clavell (engrossing historical fiction)
-drop city - t.c. boyle (funny/dark 60’s portrait)
-goldbug variations - r. powers (genius writing about genius)
-life of pi - y. martel (philosophical, but light reading)
-sam’s sql in 10 minutes - sam’s (so-so)
-http1.1 developer’s handbook - c. shiflett (very good overview)
-the dogs of winter - nunn (surfer murder-mystery)
-plays well with others - gurganus (touching but overdone)
-red earth and falling rain - chandra (mesmerizing indian stories within stories)
2002 (20)
-Galatea 2.2 - Powers (intesting juxtaposition of elements, great read)
-A Storm of Swords - Martin (read over 3000 pgs of JRRM in 2 weeks. impossible to put down)
-A Clash of Kings - Martin (continued astonishment…)
-A Game of Thrones - Martin (possibly most engrossing fiction ever…)
-Anthem - Rand (worthwhile philosophical novel)
-Bonfire of the Vanities - Wolfe (good summer reading)
-Zero (The Biography of a Dangerous Idea) - Seife (fascinating nonfiction)
-The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay - Chabon (good summer fun)
-Sailing Alone Around the World - Slocum (jawdropping nonfiction)
-The Bear Comes Home - Zabor (outstanding music/surrealism)
-Fellowship of the Ring - Tolkien (classic)
-Free as in Freedom - Williams (interesting nonfiction portrait of RNS)
-Memoirs of a Geisha - Golden (decent historical fiction)
-Underworld - DeLillo (grand, majestic prose, a cathedral of a structure. history, baseball, art, etc)
-Good Omens - Pratchett and Gaiman (hilarious fantasy)
-Johnny the Homicidal Maniac (comic) - Jhonen (surprisingly touching/mature under the horror surface)
-Holidays On Ice - Sedaris (funny short stories)
-E=mc2 - Bodanis (interesting nonfiction: math)
-Dibs in Search of Self - Axline (interesting nonfiction: psych)
-A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius - Eggers (struggles in places, but heartbreaking and quite good)
2001 (19)
-The Big U - Stephenson
-One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest - Kesey
-A People’s History of the United States - Zinn
-Plowing the Dark - Powers
-Travels in Hyperreality - Eco
-Zodiak - Neal Stephenson
-Speaking With the Angel - Nick Hornsby (Ed)
-A Confederacy of Dunces - J.K. Toole
-Bobos in Paradise - Brooks
-leo@fergusrules.com - Tangherlini
-In the Beginning Was the Command Line - Stephenson
-Flatland - Abbot
-The Hacker Ethic - Himanen
-The Crying of Lot 49 - Pynchon
-Lord of the Barnyard - Egolf
-Stranger in a Strange Land - Heinlein
-Learn to Sail - Connor
-Peter Pan - Barrie
-Watership Down - Adams
FAVORITE AUTHORS
Tolkien
The Lord of the Rings
The Hobbit
Poems and Stories
+ …
David Foster Wallace
Infinite Jest
Girl With Curious Hair
The Broom of the System
Umberto Eco
Foucalt’s Pendulum
The Name of the Rose
Travels in Hyperreality
Milan Kundera
The Book of Laughter and Forgetting
Immortality
The Unbearable Lightness of Being
The Joke
+ …
Neal Stephenson
Cryptonomicon
Snow Crash
The Big U
Zodiak
In the Beginning Was the Command Line
The Diamond Age
Salman Rushdie
Midnight’s Children
The Satanic Verses
The Moor’s Last Sigh
+ …
Orson Scott Card
Ender’s Game
Maps in the Mirror
Speaker for the Dead
+ …
Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Strange Pilgrims
Love and Other Demons
The Autumn of the Patriarch
Love in the Time of Cholera
The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor
Shakespeare
Henry IV, parts I and II
Midsummer Night’s Dream
Hamlet
+ …
Italo Calvino
Invisible Cities
The Cloven Viscount
+ …
Kafka
Metamorphosis
The Trial
The Castle
C.S. Lewis
Chronicles of Narnia
The Screwtape Letters
The Martian Trilogy
+ …
Madeleine L’Engle
A Wrinkle in Time
The Wind in the Door
A Swiftly Tilting Planet
Douglas Adams
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (all of em)
Asimov
The Foundation Trilogy
I, Robot
+ …
Clavell
Shogun
Noble House
John Le Carre
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
The Spy Who Came In From the Cold
Don DeLillo
Underworld
White Noise
Ratner’s Star
POPULAR TRASH I’VE ENJOYED
-Stephen King (nearly all of it through the early 90’s)
-Clive Barker (some)
-Tom Clancy (most)
-Michael Crichton (lots)
-John Grisham (lots)
-…etc
OTHER GOOD BOOKS
-Novels
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - Pirsig
Sophie’s World - Gaarder
Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
The Executioner’s Song - Norman Mailer
Anna Karenina - Tolstoy
Notes From the Underground - Dostoevsky
Moby Dick - Melville
Ceremony - Leslie Silko
The Stranger - Camus
No Exit and Three Other Plays - Sartre
The Bloody Chamber - Angela Carter
Rule of the Bone - Russel Banks
Full Stop - Conroy
The Jungle - Sinclair
Heart of Darkness - Conrad
Darkness at Noon - Koestler
The Maltese Falcon - Hammett
Devil in a Blue Dress - Mosley
Invisible Man - Ellison
Neuromancer - Gibson
1984 - Orwell
Animal Farm - Orwell
Brave New World - Huxley
Gulliver’s Travles - Swift
Incident at Hawk’s Hill - Eckert
Where the Red Fern Grows - Rawls
The Wind-up Bird Chronicle - Murakami
The Insult - Thompson
-Nonfiction
Coming of Age in the Milky Way - Timothy Ferris
The Emperor’s New Mind - Roger Penrose
Zen Flesh, Zen Bones - Paul Reps
Winning Chess Traps - Irving Chernev
Imperial Masquerade - Lapham
TECHNICAL/COMPUTER
The Pragmatic Programmer - Hunt, Thomas
Web Development with JavaServer Pages - Fields, Kolb
Java: An Intro to CS and Programming - Savitch
Just Java - Van Der Linden
Javascript - O’Reilly
CSS - O’Reilly
HTML/XHTML - O’Reilly
Core Servlets and JavaServer Pages - Sun
Java in A Nutshell - Flanagan
Running Linux - O’Reilly
Linux in a Nutshell - O’Reilly
Apache the Definitive Guide - O’Reilly
Webmaster in a Nutshell - O’Reilly
Thinking in java - eckel
meyer on css - meyer (o’reilly)
Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable OO Software - Gamma et al
UNFINISHED
thoughts for the free life
the story of philosophy - durant
made in america - bryson
programming php - oreilly
managing and using mysql - oreilly
php5 power programming - gutmans
post captain - o’brian
pale fire - nabokov
Men and Cartoons - Lethem
The First Circle - Solzhenitsyn
Agile Web Development w Rails, 2nd Ed. - Thomas et al
The Island of the Day Before - Eco (1/3)
Brief Interviews with Hideous Men - Wallace (1/2)
The Wind in the Willows - Grahame (1/3)
Logs of the Dead Pirates Society - Peffer (1/2)
the mysterious flame - eco (1/3) decent writing but just too slow
jonathan strange and mr norrell - clarke (1/2) unimpressive, ground to a halt bored.
War All the Time - Bukowski (1/10)
Harlot’s Ghost - Mailer (1/10)
The Brothers Karamazov - Dostoevsky (1/4)
The Ground Beneath Her Feet - Rushdhie (1/3)
Gravity’s Rainbow - Pynchon (1/4)
The Alienist - Carr (1/3)
