Tuesday, January 01, 2019

2018 Book List

The 2018 Book List
  1. Ones and Zeroes by Dan Wells
  2. Children of the Divide by Patrick S. Tomlinson
  3. The Obstacle is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials into Triumph by Ryan Holiday
  4. The Higgs Boson and Beyond by Sean Carroll (The Great Courses)
  5. The Triumph of Christianity: How a Forbidden Religion Swept the World by Bart Ehrman
  6. Republic, Lost: Version 2.0 by Lawrence Lessig
  7. The Square and the Tower: Networks and Power, from the Freemasons to Facebook by Niall Ferguson
  8. A Higher Loyalty: Truth, Lies, and Leadership by James Comey
  9. The Story of Philosophy by Will Durant
  10. Why Honor Matters by Tamler Sommers
  11. Suicide of the West: How the Rebirth of Populism, Nationalism, and Identity Politics is Destroying American Democracy by Jonah Goldberg
  12. NeuroTribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity by Steve Silberman
  13. The Sword-Edged Blonde by Alex Bledsoe
  14. Burn Me Deadly by Alex Bledsoe
  15. Dark Jenny by Alex Bledsoe
  16. Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility by James. P. Carse
  17. The Best of All Possible Worlds by Karen Lord (black Barbadian woman)
  18. The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin (African-American woman)
  19. I Should Have Honor: A Memoir of Hope and Pride in Pakistan by Khalida Brohi (Pakistani Muslim woman)
  20. All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders (caucasian transgender woman)
  21. The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet by Becky Chambers (caucasian lesbian woman)
  22. A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers (caucasian lesbian woman)
  23. A Thousand Pieces of You by Claudia Gray (caucasian woman)
  24. Ten Thousand Skies Above You by Claudia Gray (caucasian woman)
  25. A Million Worlds with You by Claudia Gray (caucasian woman)

Breakdown

Format:
  • Audiobooks: 16
    • Audio courses: 1
  • Kindle: 5
  • Dead tree books: 7
Subjects:
  • Total Fiction: 13
    • Science Fiction: 8
    • Fantasy: 5
    • Non-Fiction: 12
      • Science: 3
        • Physics: 1
        • Psychology: 2
      • Religion: 2
      • History: 5
      • Politics: 7
      • Business/Economics: 1
      • Philosophy: 5
    These numbers don't quite match up, because some books cover multiple areas, and so I've included them in all relevant categories. So, for example, a book on free will would fall in both Psychology and Philosophy (and possibly even Religion) categories. And a book on Politics might drift enough into the realm of Philsophy (or vice versa) that I count them as both, or both might explore enough historical groundwork that I feel the need to include it as a History book.

    Similarly, some books I read using Whispersynch-for-Voice to jump between the Amazon Kindle and Audible audiobook versions of the books, so they got double-counted in the format section if I read them in both formats. I've also included The Great Courses audios that I listen to through Audible.com. Though not actually books, I figure that a 10+ hour course on a subject contains about the same informational content, if not presented structurally in quite the same way as it would take in a written book.

    Podcasts

    In addition to listening to audiobooks, my intake of thinking consists enough of podcasts that it seems worth including them as a category. Here are the podcasts that I have listened to in 2018 on a fairly regular basis:

    • Writing Excuses
    • You Are Not So Smart
    • Waking Up Podcast with Sam Harris
    • History of Philosophy
    • History of Africana Philosophy
    • Talk Nerdy with Cara Santa Maria
    • Very Bad Wizards
    • What Trump Can Teach Us About Con Law
    • The Lawfare Podcast
    • The Cyberlaw Podcast
    • Rational Security
    • The Phil Ferguson Show
    • Hidden Brain
    • Stuff You Should Know
    • Stuff to Blow Your Mind
    The History

    And for anyone who is interested in looking into the past to see some of my previous book lists...
    Prior to 2008, I didn't keep a precise running record of the books that I read.