Ask HN: What book are you reading at the moment and what do you recommend? - isatty
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sbuccini
Currently reading: Devil in the White City by Erik Larson. A fun, quick read
about something I knew nothing about.

I'm sure you'll get all the classic HN recommendations so I'll pick two that
are a little different:

* Nobody's Perfect: Writings From the New Yorker, by Anthony Lane. Lane was responsible for writing reviews of many prominent movies from the 90s. We now know which of those movies hold up (Forrest Gump, Pulp Fiction) and faded away into cultural oblivion despite insane amounts of hype (Godzilla from 2000, Pearl Harbor), and I enjoyed reading contemporary treatments of both. Why spend the time to read such reviews? Because Lane is a master of his craft. The blend of dry British humor, insightful critiques, and his surprising accessibility makes for really enjoyable prose. Also, the pieces are quite short, so I can read two or three before bed and have natural points.

* Meet Me in the Bathroom -- an oral history of the NYC music scene from 2001 to 2011. You can make the argument that the Strokes are directly responsible for the money-soaked Manhattan we have today. The Strokes, LCD Soundsystem, and TV On The Radio were hugely inspirational to me growing up so it was really neat to watch them look back on this crazy time in their own words. But really, it's a story about transitions. New York transitioning after 9/11 to what it is today; the transition of the music industry (the author makes a compelling point that although the Strokes and Vampire Weekend were both NYC-based bands that blew up 5 years apart, their trajectories couldn't have been more different); the influence of blogs and the kids who ran them had on this global industry. It's a fascinating to reflect on what is really just the not-so-distant past and see how much has changed.

~~~
he11ow
Second what you said about Anthony Lane's book. He still produces reviews
almost weekly for the New Yorker, and they're a masterclass in writing.

~~~
sbuccini
I didn't know that! I don't subscribe to the physical edition anymore so I've
been missing them. Thanks for the tip!

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Jtsummers

      Fiction, English
    

Listening: _Swords in the Mist_ , Fritz Leiber. Third in the Fafhrd and the
Grey Mouser collections.

Reading: _The Dispossessed_ , Ursula Le Guin.

    
    
      Fiction, Spanish
    

I’m trying to learn Spanish. I’ve picked up a few Spanish language fiction
books, presently starting on _Harry Potter y la piedra filosofal_. I’ve tried
reading other books, like Jorge Luis Borges’ _Ficciones_ , but I’ve found it
to be above my present level. I’ve restarted four or five times and made it
further each time, but always stalled out.

    
    
      Non-fiction
    

_The Design of Everyday Things_ , Don Norman.

I have other books started lying around the house, but these are the ones I’ve
been actively engaged with in the last couple weeks. When I can type properly
again (two to three weeks) I’ll resume _Lisp in Small Pieces_ , Christian
Queinnec. And at the office I have _The Pragmatic Programmer_ , I’ll be back
there next week and bring it home so I can continue with it.

~~~
wallflower
Good luck with reading Spanish! Please be easy on yourself, it took me 4 years
of reading off and on to get to the point of reading books like “1491: Una
nueva historia de las Américas antes de Colón“. Also, factual based books are
much, much easier to understand than novels. The problem with reading Gabriel
García Márquez is that reality and un-reality are blended together using
sophisticated grammatical constructs that you have no idea what is going on.
Remember, language can express things that are abstract. Abstraction in a
second language is hard!

If I have one piece of advice for you, please try to completely avoid reaching
for the dictionary (app or physical) while reading your books. Not only will
avoiding the dictionary make the reading faster, your pattern matching will
improve because your mind will be forced to “fill in the blanks” where there
is insufficient understanding. I know there are polyglots out there that
advise the opposite of “don’t go to the next page until you know everything”.
Bah humbug, reading should not be a homework assignment.

Finally, buying the audiobook and reading along with the book will help train
your ear for faster pattern recognition and signal/noise differentiation. Be
advised though that audio books may not be one to one exact with the printed
text.

I also recommend “Charlie y la fábrica de chocolate”.

~~~
Jtsummers
Thanks for the encouragement.

I selected Harry Potter because I know the stories decently (read the books
whenever book 7 came out, saw all the movies at least once each, maybe twice
for a couple). But I’m not familiar enough to be able to read the Spanish
version and really just be recalling the English version (why I’m avoiding
translations of my favorite authors, I know the books too well).

And yeah, I’m skipping the dictionary while reading. I tried that, it was
awful. I’m identifying words (sometimes asking my wife) and looking them up
after finishing a chapter. I plan to reread the book (possibly restart before
completing) to see how much of what’s new has stuck. I already have homework
since I’m working through a college Spanish textbook and have signed up for
online courses (weekly, but it’s practice and I’m getting to hear the
Argentine accent which is the one I need to understand most, my wife is from
there).

After this book, I’ll probably continue picking up the rest of the series (we
want a bilingual library anyways for when we have kids), and then some non-
fiction. Ideally I want to find some non-fiction histories or technical
content in Spanish by native Spanish writers. I’m also trying to read Spanish-
language news, but I haven’t made it a regular habit yet.

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O_H_E
I very recently listening to the audiobook of the Carls series[0] by Hank
Green. Some top notch fiction, some sci-fi, very 2020-like society, young
adult, accidental parallels to 2020 events, discusses social media, money, and
empathy, in a very tasteful way. Yes the book was released in 2020, but the
script was set in stone way before things went south.

(Tease: the audio of the second book is done with different actors and have a
interview with Cory Doctorow )

Buy while supporting local bookshops:

\- [https://Bookshop.org](https://Bookshop.org)

\- Audiobook:
[http://libro.fm/referral?rf_code=lfm208662](http://libro.fm/referral?rf_code=lfm208662)
(referral link)

[0] with the great full names being "An absolutely remarkable thing" and "A
beautifully foolish endeavour"

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omosubi
The 42nd parallel by John Dos Passos - really good novel about America at the
turn of the century until the depression. Considered a classic

The Peregrine by J.A. Baker Englishman follows a few peregrines around the
English countryside documenting everything he can. Past the first quarter or
so it's just a log of his days which has no real narrative and is hard to get
through. I'm not going to finish it

I just finished Oracle Bones by Peter Hessler. Really good book about ancient
China and it's relationship to the near present day (it was written in the
late 90s and early 2000s)

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mikece
Just books in general? Professional development? Science Fiction? Politics?

Can't go wrong with the classics like "Seven Habits of Highly Effective
People" along with "How to Win Friends and Influence People." For motivation:
"Can't Hurt Me" by David Goggins... it's impossible to read that book and come
up with a _good_ excuse why you cannot achieve your goals.

------
ibn-python
The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert Caro is a
fascinating take on how power and corruption can manifest in modern era.

Things Hidden Since The Foundation Of The World by Rene Girard explores
through dialogues his theory of mimesis. Barely have made a dent into it and
so am not sure if I’d recommend it yet but it’s had polarizing reviews.

------
kleer001
The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt -

Fantastic walk through his six factor model of human morality. It's as
revolutionary to me as learning about the five factor model (& HEXACO) of
human personality.

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2rsf
A Swedish thriller by Camilla Läckberg called Änglamakerskan (The Angel
Maker’s Wife), I'm mainly reading it to improve my Swedish though it is fun
and catching to read

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randomanon
Isaac Asimov's "I, Robot" inb4: except for one chapter, NOTHING like the
movie. One of the best books that I've read in my entire life.

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markus_zhang
NATO's secret armies: Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe.

If you want to see the other face of Cold War and have some fun, here you go.

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banjo_milkman
The Great Leveler: Violence and the History of Inequality from the Stone Age
to the Twenty-First Century

Seems moderately depressing so far.

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giantg2
Street Survival by Remsburg

~~~
giardini
FWIW Street Survival by Remsburg is for police officers. A citizen might do
better with a book with a citizen's perspective, one not burdened with the
constraints of being a PO.

~~~
giantg2
The information can still be useful to citizens to know how police are trained
to react and why they may ask you to do specific things.

Do you have one that's targeted to citizens and covers the same concepts minus
the LEO-specific aspects? Most of the ones I've seen only cover specific
subsets of the topics.

~~~
giardini
Perhaps Mark Macyoung's books:

"What You Don't Know Can Kill You: How Most Self-Defense Training Will Put You
into Prison or the Ground"

or the longer more detailed

"In the Name of Self-Defense: What it costs. When it's worth it"

~~~
giantg2
Those seem like good books. The longer one might be a civilian replacement for
Street Survival. I'll have to read it. I didn't see any mention of mental
rehearsal, visualization, and managing stress in the excepts/overviews, but
those don't always list everything. If they cover those as well as tactical
thought processes, then these sound like great resources.

The only caveat, which I should have mentioned in my book suggestion too, is
that any book dealing with potential legal matters on self-defense is only
written generally and one should also read their state's statutes/code.

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sharjeelsidd
The naked statistics from charles wheelan.

