Henry David Thoreau - Walden

So far I only read the first chapter, Economics, and I’m not sure what to think of it. On one hand HDT clearly had a great capacity for identifying issues with society and capitalism, on the other hand his reaction to these feels like a capitulation, almost like a suicide. He diagnoses all those social issues, but instead of looking for a collective solution he takes the most individualistic course possible. He even states that this isn’t feasible for everyone and that wants others to go their own way. But if everyone lived his way there would be no human society possible. He states that cooperation isn’t really possible while at the same time taking advantage of cooperation (living on people’s land, help setting up the cabin, his mom washing his clothes, etc). The Indians who he praises so much were living under very cooperative social constructs, helping one another. Looking forward to seeing where this is going…

The Dungeon Anarchists Cookbook.

Third book in DCC, I believe.

About a third of the way through Blood Meridian. Basically just feels like more of The Road but less gloomy and with more of the old ultraviolence.

Claims that this is the Great American Novel leave me mystified. I realize that this book as an “anti-western” isn’t doing quite the same thing as the morally gray Spaghetti Westerns were, but I still can’t help but think that they did it better.

Probably won’t read any more McCarthy after this.

Burn by Peter Heller. Im digging it. I read The Dog Stars years and years ago. This dude can write a page turner.

Working my way through the Barker & Llewelyn series by Will Thomas. Just starting Hell Bay.

The adventures of a mystery solving duo in the late 1800’s London (sound familiar?)

I’m hooked. Having read all of Watson and Holmes as a kid and seen most of the dramatizations from Basil Rathbone onward, this scratches an itch.

Nearly done with reading A Parade of Horribles, Matt Dinniman! It felt like it took a little while to get ramped up, but I’m enjoying the chaos as things continue to spiral. Unsure what I’ll read after this.

For my audiobook, I’m about a third of the way through Isles of the Emberdark, Brandon Sanderson, which may be my favorite of his special novels so far. Very cool to see how things are all tying together in the broader cosmere. Well thought out strategy on how to expand a short story. Only quibble is Sanderson still doesn’t seem to write natural dialog. It never feels like a something someone would actually say.

Listening to Ward by Wildbow (again). Just redid Worm, they’re both so good.

Started on Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss. A lot of people say they like this one. Not far enough into it yet to say if I agree with them, but it looks like there’s some detailed worldbuilding which is a good sign.

Finally Out - Letting Go Of Living Straight by Loren A. Olson, M.D. and
Before We Were Trans - A New History of Gender by Kit Heyam

They are the first two books I checked out at the library after coming out, if anyone has any other good recommendations by all means.

My library is doing summer reading, and they added a version of the challenge for adults. Their goal is to read 4 books over the summer, for bonus points one can be a non-fiction book about dinosaurs (their theme).

In the spirit of that, planning to read 4 library books. I’ve checked out Dragon’s Teeth and Thunderstones: Quest for the Meaning of Fossils (McNamara) since it was out in the display and ostensibly about dinosaurs.

So far I am not loving it, lol. It’s slow, spending a lot of time reiterating that ancient people made stuff out of rocks and sometimes those rocks were fossils and they thought those looked cool. And the author has repeated the phrase ‘they looked for all the world like _’ like 6 times. Distractly uncommon phrase to use so much. On top of that, it’s not really about dinosaurs even, most of the fossils mentioned are sea urchins. /shrug At least it’s short and has pictures to make pages go quick.

But alongside it I also checked out The Memory Police (Ogawa). In the opening pages it seems really interesting and well-written. The premise is a bit on-the-nose dystopian tho, so we’ll see how well it’s executed.

After a bit of gap, I read a couple when on holiday for a couple of weeks and am now that I am back, am starting another:

• Domination by Alice Roberts - looking at the rise of the Christian church over the first few centuries as an extension of the Roman empire - just doing empire stuff by other means. Solidly written and well evidenced.
• Smuggling Under Sail In The Red Sea by Henry de Montfreid - A fascinating account of the author’s hash smuggling expedition in the 1920s. I would put it broadly under travel writing, since he clearly loves being away from the ‘civilised’ world and writes best in those sections. All the casual racism that you would expect from the era, though.
• Bleak House by Dickens - some recent editorial about falling literacy and comprehension quoted the opening passage of the book and prompted me to pull it from the shelf. As with so many, I had Dickens forced upon me at school and my contrarian streak dominated my opinion of his writing for a long while after, but I did eventually realise that, had I been allowed to find his work myself, I would have enjoyed it. A good few decades have passed since then and I can appreciate it free of baggage now.

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Finished Pretty Girls by Karin Slaughter (5/5), now reading My Husband’s Wife by Carla Kovach.

Finally reading The Lord of the Rings.

Almost at the end of Fellowship, but I must say it has been a bit of a drag.

I will most definitely finish it, but from all the hype I did have slighty higher expectations.

It’s also very likely that since I have already seen the movies and loved them, and already know what is going to happen, it has somewhat taken away from the book experience.

Although the whole Bombadil section was new, and I did not find it especially interesting.

Atomic Habits by James Clear It’s got some helpful advice but it reads like a Ted Talk. It’s like (axiom)(anecdote)(academic research)(broad over simplification or sweeping generalization)(summary conclusion).

There’s good advice and I’m sure if you follow it you may get results, but I wish it were more academically rigorous.