Ask HN: What were the best books you read this year?

bwb · 2024-11-30T09:15:57 1732958157

If you guys want to browse, I've had 1,300+ readers share their 3 favorite reads of the year here: https://shepherd.com/bboy/2024

You can browse by a lot of different genres, etc.

You can also submit yours here -> https://shepherd.com/bboy/my-3-fav-reads

You can see my 3 here: https://shepherd.com/bboy/2024/f/bwb *Every submitter gets a page like that.

What were my 3? 1. The Cold Cold Ground - Fantastic police procedural set in Northern Ireland during The Troubles. 2. The Aggressor - Near future Tom-Clancy-like sketch of a USA/China war. 3. Wounded Tigris - Amazing Nonfiction about a team traveling down the entire Tigris River. Heavy on environment, history, and people. Utterly fascinating.

whacko_quacko · 2024-11-28T21:45:57 1732830357

The End of Race Politics by Coleman Hughes. Pretty good book. I used to be a bleeding heart liberal with pro social justice (read: pro affirmative action) sentiments, but he makes a compelling case against it. Also, it's very well written and fun to read

GaryNumanVevo · 2024-11-29T10:18:38 1732875518

It's funny you mention this because in Europe every bleeding heart liberal claims to be color (race) blind.

dantheman · 2024-11-29T05:12:11 1732857131

You might like: Discrimination and Disparities (2019) by Thomas Sowell

aaomidi · 2024-11-29T06:33:44 1732862024

The author of this book is against trans people being able to exist in this world.

No thanks tbh. This isn’t identity politics. It’s just live and let live.

dispin · 2024-11-29T10:24:29 1732875869

No he isn't, here's a recent tweet of his that explains his position:

"This also highlights the huge difference between the "LGB" and the "T''. The gay rights movement just asked society to leave them alone and let them get married. No impositions on my life. The trans movement demands that I adopt their new dialect (or I'm a bigot) and allow males to play in girls sports (or I'm a bigot). Big impositions."

https://x.com/coldxman/status/1855303418975539394

aaomidi · 2024-11-29T16:43:08 1732898588

This is extremely similar what anti LGB people were also saying in how they were contrasting it to the civil rights movement.

Also similar to what the anti-civil rights movement were saying when contrasting it to the end of slavery.

Here, let me show it:

"This also highlights the huge difference between the "Abolitionist Movement" and "Civil Rights". The abolitionist movement just asked society to leave them alone. No impositions on my life. The "civil Rights" movement demands that I accept they can share spaces with me (or I'm a bigot) and allow blacks to have access to the same systems in society (or I'm a bigot)."

The only thing that has changed between these is that once these movements get set in stone, and legislation catches up - reactionary people such as Coleman stop attacking and othering it. This is why history is important. You get to see these patterns and realize its just the same shit happening all over again.

dispin · 2024-11-29T17:44:17 1732902257

Please could you explain in more detail why you think this is analogous? I'm not seeing it.

All you've done is slot some different words into his tweet and asserted that the meaning is similar. How, exactly?

Also, your original claim was that Hughes is "against trans people being able to exist in this world" which you haven't provided any proof of. That tweet I quoted shows his actual expressed views, which refutes this.

aaomidi · 2024-11-29T18:33:59 1732905239

Dictating to trans people about _how they get to live_ is the process of saying they can't co-exist in this world. It is the insinuation that they are _separate but equal_.

We've been through this ride before. We're going through this ride again. Bigots, like that author, will lose and history will not look kindly upon them.

However, for now, they get to act as an "enlightened rationalist", and sell books to people so people can justify their discomfort against trans folks.

These enlightened rationalists aren't new. Again, I'm saying that what history provides us is seeing the patterns of behavior and speech.

--

Let me more specifically target that tweet you've sent. Trans people make up such a small number of people, and an even smaller percentage of those would be interested in professional sports. Spending this much time having a moral freakout over this, when there's practically no "unfairness" happening in any mainstream sports is telling.

This moral outrage has now led to invasive "tests" women have to go through before they participate in multiple sports at an international level. This outrage has caused a proliferation of false claims lodged against women who just, simply do well in sports and don't fall within the very subjectively defined "gender identity".

For example, what Imane Khelif went through is a damned outrage. Has this author taken responsibility of what their rhetoric might mean to so called "real women" that he's claiming to be so supportive of?

--

Now as for the language. As society shifts, and attitudes towards culture changes, our language also changes. It wasn't that far ago where words like the n-word were very common place in American culture. Now, if you're using that you will be considered a bigot. If I'm to take this author at face value, that's somehow supposedly a bad thing?

This is similar to actively, and maliciously, misgendering someone. It's just not reached that level of understanding in society yet.

Language is a living and breathing thing. The meanings of words change over time. How acceptable a phrase is changes over time. Folks crying about this are, at best just scared of change, at worst trying to monetize other folks' fear of change. I believe this author falls into the latter here.

--

It's not just his tweets, he's set his career around this issue (https://youtu.be/WDFXPlv-R_s). For someone who wants to be less _social justice_, he sure spends a lot of time talking about issues that ultimately are not relevant for 99% of the population, and is just part of the culture war himself.

dispin · 2024-11-29T19:58:03 1732910283

"Dictating to trans people about _how they get to live_ is the process of saying they can't co-exist in this world. It is the insinuation that they are _separate but equal_."

This isn't about "how they get to live". For instance, if a male wants to dress in clothing designed for female wearers and adopt a name more commonly used by women and girls then the vast majority of people will live and let live, and happily co-exist. It's not a problem.

However it becomes a problem when encroaching on the rights of others. The female category in sports is a great example because exclusion of males is the entire rationale, as this provides women and girls with a competitive space that is fairer and safer than if it is mixed-sex. Allowing males into the category - which effectively destroys it - has a negative impact on female athletes. So of course there is going to be opposition to this.

"This moral outrage has now led to invasive 'tests' women have to go through before they participate in multiple sports at an international level. This outrage has caused a proliferation of false claims lodged against women who just, simply do well in sports and don't fall within the very subjectively defined 'gender identity'."

Screening for sex can be done with a cheek swab. This is vastly less invasive than the anti-doping tests athletes must take, which involves having blood taken and urinating in a cup while someone watches.

"For example, what Imane Khelif went through is a damned outrage. Has this author taken responsibility of what their rhetoric might mean to so called 'real women' that he's claiming to be so supportive of?"

There's a significant amount of evidence that indicates Imane Khelif is actually male, with the athletic advantage that brings.

"Language is a living and breathing thing. The meanings of words change over time."

Right, but going back to the above point, if we can't use words like "man", "boy" or "male" to describe the category of people who are definitionally excluded from the female category of sports without being shut down and complained at, then how can anyone make the case for women's sports to those who disagree? Or indeed any aspect of anything relating to women.

Perhaps that's the point - attempting to make it "bigoted" and "transphobic" to argue in favor of women's and girls' sex-based rights, rather than presenting any rational argument for taking them away.

Anyway I think this shows quite clearly that your analogy doesn't fit when one digs into the detail. None of the above is anything like the struggle for racial equality.

basementcat · 2024-11-29T23:34:53 1732923293

> There's a significant amount of evidence that indicates Imane Khelif is actually male, with the athletic advantage that brings.

Would it be possible to provide links to some of this evidence in a respectful way?

dispin · 2024-11-30T00:30:02 1732926602

As I understand it, these are the major pieces of evidence:

- Karotype testing of Khelif (and the other disqualified boxer, Lin) showing XY chromosomes, reported by sports journalist Alan Abrahamson who's seen the lab reports and covering letter that was received by the IOC from the IBA: https://www.3wiresports.com/articles/2024/8/5/fa9lt6ypbwx5su...

- A member of Khelif's training team, Georges Cazorla, revealing in interview that Khelif has problems with chromosomes and hormones, and has been under testosterone suppression to bring levels into the female range: https://www.lepoint.fr/monde/2024-olympics-imane-khelif-was-...

- Extracts from a medical report leaked to French journalist Djaffer Ait Aoudia, which state that Khelif has a disorder of sex development, 5-alpha reductase deficiency, which exists only in males: https://lecorrespondant.net/imane-khelif-ni-ovaires-ni-uteru...

There are other oddities as well, like Khelif choosing not to pursue a case at the Court of Arbitration for Sport after being deemed ineligible to compete in IBA events. And the head of the Spanish national team, Rafael Lozano, saying that when the Algerian team visited to train, they ended up matching Khelif with a male boxer to spar, as the upper body strength and punching power was too much for the female boxers.

Worth noting also that all this is consistent with Khelif competing at the Olympics in the women's boxing category, as they only ask for identity documentation and do not verify sex, unlike weight classes which are strictly controlled.

lofenfew · 2024-11-29T18:38:03 1732905483

Everything is the same as everything else if you rewrite all the words to different words. Regardless, "right to exist in the world" is a patently disingenuous description of the rights in question.

aaomidi · 2024-11-30T00:31:38 1732926698

No. This just shows that I know how rhetoric like this evolves.

This is why I kept lamenting how important learning history, especially the history of bigotry is.

lofenfew · 2024-11-30T05:22:08 1732944128

Other people are similarly reading and reacting to your rhetoric. Lying about what your opponents say, regardless of what you think it might evolve into, does not reflect well on you.

slater · 2024-11-29T17:55:02 1732902902

Seems every day, HN gets a new green account that just so happens to be TERF or TERF-adjacent.

I doubt you just chanced upon HN and made a new account, so why not just post with your regular account?

FireBeyond · 2024-11-29T17:21:55 1732900915

> The trans movement demands that I adopt their new dialect (or I'm a bigot)

I'm sure he similarly complained when women asked to be called Ms, not just Miss or Mrs, too.

dispin · 2024-11-29T17:47:34 1732902454

[flagged]

FireBeyond · 2024-11-29T17:55:33 1732902933

No, it's not. "Ms" was absolutely a new dialect, and was similarly scorned by many as it gained popularity, and those who chose to use it where often derided as lesbian, feminist, or otherwise.

dispin · 2024-11-29T18:18:13 1732904293

Right, so it's not analogous to women wanting to be called Mr, which is an already-existing word used to refer to men.

aaomidi · 2024-11-29T18:35:51 1732905351

Then, simply, don't use Mr with them.

You're going to be called bigoted because that's simply where culture is heading. You either own up to that judgement others have of you, or you realize you live in a society and certain behaviors are _not okay_.

You have the freedom to be _subjectively_ a bigot.

dispin · 2024-11-29T19:29:28 1732908568

Culture seems to be heading away from this, not towards. At least according to polling of public opinion.

aaomidi · 2024-11-30T00:52:15 1732927935

Clearly not given the number of green usernames on this thread.

dispin · 2024-11-30T01:04:39 1732928679

That is a non sequitur.

WorkerBee28474 · 2024-11-29T06:50:23 1732863023

I think you're being disingenuous. I hadn't heard of that author before, so I went looking for writings that what you said. What I've found so far seems much more nuanced.

y33t · 2024-11-29T18:09:00 1732903740

Sounds more like he disagreed with trans ideology and it's literally killing all of them again.

bemmu · 2024-11-29T12:13:11 1732882391

“Piranesi” by Susanna Clarke.

Refreshing and beautiful because it’s a totally new kind of world for a story to take place in, essentially survival in a world of procedurally generated endless architecture.

Most of the time there is just one or two characters among repetitive environments, which was relaxing as I get easily confused if there are 5+ characters to remember or extensive mental visualization required.

davidanekstein · 2024-11-29T15:04:42 1732892682

To provide another perspective, I read this book and it was unfortunately just not my thing. The whole plot seemed very clear from the beginning and I found myself eager to get to where the climax occurred. The journey there wasn’t all that compelling, partly for that reason.

I do agree with your sentiment about number of characters though, that really helped. I find that my working memory for characters isn’t what it used to be.

fredoliveira · 2024-11-28T22:08:53 1732831733

Read a lot this year — a lot more than most years. A few highlights:

The making of the atomic bomb by Richard Rhodes was probably the best of the bunch. I read it because I see some parallels between the discovery of atomic power and the search for AGI, and wanted an insight on the ethics and decision making of the time. It didn't disappoint.

The dawn of everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow was a solid read and retelling of how civilization began and evolved.

The message by Ta-Nehisi Coates, I read in two sittings — it was that impactful. A reminder of how the oppressed becomes the oppressor again and again. "As it happens, you can See the world but never see the people in it"

Other highlights: The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt; re-read Thinking in Systems by Daniella Meadows; re-read Wherever You Go There You Are by Jon Kabat Zinn; The light eaters by Zoe Schlanger; I don't want to talk about it, by Terrence Real.

christudor · 2024-11-28T22:13:39 1732832019

The Making of the Atomic Bomb is in my top three non-fiction books I have ever read.

Will I like The Dawn of Everything if I didn't like Harari's Sapiens? (I loved Graeber's Debt: The First 5000 Years)

fredoliveira · 2024-11-28T23:01:11 1732834871

I'd say so. I didn't dislike Sapiens, but found The Dawn of Everything to be deeper in many ways.

Yawrehto · 2024-11-29T02:15:49 1732846549

Thistlefoot by GennaRose Nethercott. If you're into Jewish history/legend, Baba Yaga, intergenerational trauma, or just good books, I would find it difficult to recommend it more. It's well-told and well-paced (note: do not read at night if you have something to do in the early morning the next day). As you would expect from a book drawing heavily on Jewish history, it can be difficult to read.

Middlegame by Seanan McGuire. Excellent book that handles time travel and its implications reasonablly well. She also wrote a shorter, "children's" book series under a pen name; quotes from it appeared in Middlegame. It's called the Up-and-under series. I've only made it through book one so far, as I lost book two, but so far it's been good!

Silent Spring by Rachel Carson. It's been on my list of books to read for ages and it is in fact excellent, if difficult. I'm planning on reading some of her--allegedly much less dark--books about the sea next, because I've heard she can be very poetic and in Silent Spring it shines through sometimes, but not often.

kreyenborgi · 2024-11-29T22:23:22 1732919002

Another vote for Silent Spring here. One of those books that stay with you.

mlsu · 2024-11-28T21:51:01 1732830661

I finally read Nabokov's Pale Fire. It is far and away the best book I have ever read. I think about it multiple times a week unprompted and I'm sad because I am certain that I will never find another book like it.

christudor · 2024-11-28T22:09:05 1732831745

Read a few years ago and agree with this assessment. A genuine work of genius, and probably in my top five books of all time.

number6 · 2024-11-28T22:12:55 1732831975

I read maybe half. Didn't get it. Somewhere in the middle he starts to comment about all that happened? Is it part of the book?

montgomery_r · 2024-11-28T21:44:47 1732830287

Some politics books I've read or re-read this year:

Fall Out - Tim Shipman, on of his astonishingly detailed quartet on Britain's exit from the EU;

Robert Blake's biography of Disraeli, magisterial yet readable;

Boris Johnson's memoir Unleashed, great fun if you like his tone;

Colonialism, a Moral Reckoning, Nigel Biggar, an antidote to the more ahistorical versions of the BLM narrative.

The Notebook - A history of thinking on paper, Roland Allen - a joyful romp through the notebook's history;

Elusive - How Peter Higgs solved the mystery of Mass, Frank Close - a nice account of the discovery of the Higgs Boson, with perhaps too much biography of Higgs, who after all as a lecturer at Edinburgh was not a thrill-seeker.

Carlo Rovelli's White Holes, implausible but beautifully written.

mpbart · 2024-12-01T15:48:44 1733068124

The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert Caro. Fascinating book about Robert Moses’ rise to power in New York and how he managed to exert considerable influence over the city and state for decades despite never being elected to office. Caro is an exceptional author who manages to present a huge amount of information without it feeling dry.

A_D_E_P_T · 2024-11-28T21:26:10 1732829170

Michel Houellebecq, Annihilation. A clear-eyed and direct novel about the meaning and measure of individual human life in our modern age -- and yet it concedes nothing to modern literary or social fashions, but instead goes for universality and timelessness.

more_corn · 2024-11-29T04:59:39 1732856379

I thought it was about cancer.

A_D_E_P_T · 2024-11-29T10:14:19 1732875259

That's part of it, and I would say a relatively small part -- something akin to a plot device. For the book is also about one's family, and one's labor, and about the dignity of individual man relative to the dignity of man's political society. (The latter comes off much the worse.) It is a remarkable book.

gnat · 2024-11-28T21:49:00 1732830540

Nuclear War: A Scenario, by Annie Jacobsen. It's a short book, with second-by-second description of the unfolding of a research-based hypothetical nuclear war that starts with North Korea launching an ICBM towards the United States. Alarming (as only the facts about the parlous state of detection and defence can alarm) and edifying in one.

christudor · 2024-11-28T22:03:29 1732831409

Read this earlier this year -– enjoyable!

mongol · 2024-11-28T21:52:59 1732830779

Read that one too. Chilling.

Cloudly · 2024-11-29T09:59:24 1732874364

Mathematica: A Secret World of Intuition and Curiosity- David Bessis

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/200128457-mathematica?ac...

Excellent book on mathematical thinking in the true sense - what needs to happen in the mind's eye to really grapple with abstract mathematics. Definitely a eye (mind?) opener for someone who has some graduate level math education but couldn't gel with the crazier stuff.

Came across the book from this article which was on HN a little bit ago: https://www.quantamagazine.org/mathematical-thinking-isnt-wh...

edanm · 2024-11-29T15:37:08 1732894628

It's on my list, really looking forward to reading it.

I actually ran into it a few weeks before that article, then again when the article came out.

teleforce · 2024-11-29T13:52:07 1732888327

+1 this book is on my reading list for this year.

sien · 2024-11-28T22:04:28 1732831468

A few of the books that stand out that I've read this year.

Troubled - Rob Henderson. About how Henderson was in state care and wound up at prestigious universities and his thoughts on the world.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/176444107-troubled

Not the End of the World - Hannah Ritchie from 'Our World in Data' about the state of the planet.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/145624737-not-the-end-of...

Dictatorland - Paul Kenyon - About the dictators who have impoverished Africa.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36260719-dictatorland

Magic Pill - Johann Hari - About Semaglutide and how people got fat.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/201319612-magic-pill

On the Edge - Nate Silver - About how seeing the world in terms of risk and expected value can work.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/204236707-on-the-edge

Orbital - Samantha Harvey - Booker Prize winner about people on the ISS and the world.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/123136728-orbital

Build, Baby, Build - Bryan Caplan on why YIMBYism is a good idea. This is a graphic novel. It's really fun.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/181564537-build-baby-bui...

gadders · 2024-12-04T13:59:57 1733320797

Reading Rob Henderson now and have been following him to a while. It's a great read.

k__ · 2024-11-28T22:19:43 1732832383

My reads this year with my personal ratings:

Greg Egan, Diaspora (7/10)

Dan Simmons, Hyperion 1-4 (9/10)

James S.A. Corey, Leviathan Wakes (6/10)

Scott Alexander, Unsong (7/10)

Qtmn, Ra (7/10)

Qtmn, Fine Structure (6/10)

Andy Weir, Project Hail Mary (6/10)

Wildbow, Worm (8/10)

GeoAtreides · 2024-11-29T07:54:35 1732866875

Worm mentioned wooooo

amazing how a niche webserial from 10 years ago is still being read and having an impact

also, the ride doesn't have to end, lots of Worm fanfictions out there, some of them are really good

berbec · 2024-11-29T17:33:36 1732901616

The Hyperion series is spectacular and a must-read for any scifi enjoyer.

nbernard · 2024-12-03T07:43:37 1733211817

More a "must try" than a "must read". I enjoy reading SF, and didn't like the Hyperion and Endymion series...

k__ · 2024-11-29T19:00:35 1732906835

I knew about it for over a decade, but didn't read it because the premise sounded quite dumb, lol.

Pilgrims?

A random monster?

WTH?!

But it was very sci-fi-y in the end. Interesting concepts, not too soft on the science.

Loved it.

sevensor · 2024-11-29T16:31:49 1732897909

Foucault’s Pendulum (1988) by Umberto Eco. A novel about how easy it is to build meaning around the meaningless.

The Last of the Wine (1956) by Mary Renault. Athens on its way to losing the war with Sparta. You know what’s coming for Athens, but the characters do not. The atrocity at Melos echoes through the whole book.

Strong recommendation for both; they feel very much of the present, age notwithstanding.

gangstead · 2024-11-28T21:54:16 1732830856

Reentry by Eric Berger. It came out in October. It's a follow up to his book Liftoff from 2021. Great books for space nerds. Makes me really admire what Space X has accomplished while also eliminating any desire I had to work for them.

computerdork · 2024-11-29T00:46:17 1732841177

Liftoff was super interesting. The start of SpaceX and the Falcon 1 is an incredible story. Didn't know about "Reentry", will have to check it out!

christudor · 2024-11-28T22:04:52 1732831492

Liftoff is already on my list, actually! Thought I'd read that one first before deciding whether to get Reentry.

gangstead · 2024-11-29T02:46:09 1732848369

Definitely read Liftoff first. Reentry picks up at the next chapter of SpaceX right where Liftoff wraps up.

Both great books.

satvikpendem · 2024-11-28T22:05:59 1732831559

Shogun, after having watched the show. I also read the other books in Clavell's series, I thought Tai Pan and Gai Jin were interesting but not as much as Shogun. Gai Jin in particular felt like it had lots of filler.

apignotti · 2024-11-28T21:39:39 1732829979

Benjamín Labatut - The Maniac, a novelized biography about the mathematician and computer science pioneer John von Neumann.

The story of his life was absolute fascinating for me, unfortunately the last part of the book attempts a connection with the development of Alpha Go / reinforcement learning that should have been avoided.

giaour · 2024-11-29T15:38:34 1732894714

Highlights so far this year are:

- Some Desperate Glory by Emily Tesch -- really phenomenal pacing and psychological terror in a sci-fi action novel.

- The Golem of Brooklyn by Adam Mansbach -- good portrait of different strains of American Judaism in a book structured around a quest

- Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters -- great characters and structured revelation. This was sitting unread on my shelf for years because I thought it would be preachy, but it wasn't.

- The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman -- tales from Camelot in the aftermath of Arthur's defeat at Camlann. Excellent mixing of round table legends from different points in history.

mike978 · 2024-11-29T10:55:49 1732877749

A couple of my favorites from this year, I read a lot (50 to 100 a year)

Fiction:

- What We Talk About When We Talk About Love by Raymond Carver

- Service Model by Adrian Tchaikovsky

- A Man with One of Those Faces by Caimh Mcdonnell

- Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

- A Desolation Called Peace by Arkady Martine

- Antimatter Blues by Edward Ashton

- Where the Body Was by Ed Brubaker and Sean Philips

Nonfiction:

- Exiles by Preston Sprinkle

- Jesus and the Powers by N. T. Wright & Michael F. Bird

- With All Its Teeth by Joshua S. Porter

- In Praise of Shadows by Junichiro Tanizaki

- A Tale of Love and Darkness by Amos Oz

Copenhagen(play) by Michael Frayn done by BBC Radio, not really a book, but it's great. https://archive.org/details/michael-frayn-copenhagen

teleforce · 2024-11-29T13:49:08 1732888148

Asking for myself, is there any trick or strategy to achieve reading 100 books per year, are you retired, or part-time employee. Is hard to imagine a full-time employee to read that many books in one single year?

edanm · 2024-11-29T14:28:22 1732890502

Not the parent, but I am a full-time employee (I run a software business but work at it full time). I also read usually 90+ books a year.

The main "trick" is that the majority of books I read are audiobooks, usually at 2x or even 3x speed. And I'm just always reading, or listening to a podcast. There is a lot of slack time in which you can't be doing something else, and I use it for books. E.g. getting up in the morning and arranging food for my kids for school, or doing the dishes, or walking to/from work, or going to the gym, running to buy groceries, etc.

It really doesn't take that much time to read a lot. Say you want to read 52 books a year - that's a book a week. Depending on what you read, the average book is 10-20 hours on Audible, so let's say 15 hrs on average. If you read at 2x speed that's 7.5 hours of listening time per week, or roughly an hour a day. For most people that is easily achievable just with their commute to work.

paulcole · 2024-11-29T15:29:46 1732894186

I’m 42 with a full-time job and am at 103 books read so far this year.

The tricks are to put a lot of time in it and always have a surplus of interesting books on hand. I spend around $2k a year on Kindle books (if I talk to someone and they mention a book they like, I’ll usually just buy it) and make reading a daily habit.

I read on average an hour a day on weekdays and two or more hours on weekends. Reading is one of the things I enjoy the most and has been for my entire life.

edanm · 2024-11-29T15:44:53 1732895093

Out of curiosity, do you also listen to audiobooks?

And dammit, I thought I read a lot, and here you are beating me.. I'm only at 101 this year... :)

paulcole · 2024-11-29T15:57:32 1732895852

Audiobooks very rarely. Only if I’ve heard the “performance” of it is good. The last couple I remember were Great Gatsby read by Jake Gyllenhaal and Devolution read by Judy Greer. I live in the Pacific Northwest and listened to that one while trail running.

I do really like podcasts though and am at 360 hours listened this year, almost exclusively while running, walking, or doing chores around the apartment.

mike978 · 2024-11-29T23:18:29 1732922309

I'll do audiobooks while I do the grocery shopping or drive. And some of the books are kind of cheating as there are always a few graphic novels or 90 or 150 page books. But even as a parent I can find some time by cutting down screen time.

Also even though I enjoy reading a lot, I find more isn't always better, but I've been trying to survey some topics - fascism, Christian Nationalism, etc. If I really want to get something out of what I'm reading or if it is a complex topic I have to slow down.

cinntaile · 2024-11-30T12:58:21 1732971501

They don't read, they listen. The title specifically asks for books you read so I'm not sure why they mention them.

edanm · 2024-11-29T15:52:07 1732895527

I also read A Tale of Love and Darkness this year, it was great.

And A Desolation Called Peace, or really that series, is one of my favorite SF reads of the last 10 years, I've recommended it often.

znpy · 2024-11-29T09:57:57 1732874277

Not sure if "the best", but one of the best was "A Psalm for the Wild-Built" by Becky Chambers. I was reading it out of curiosity for the solarpunk genre, it ended up helping me a bit on the self-acceptance side.

Other than that, "Il deserto dei Tartari" by Dino Buzzati (in english: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tartar_Steppe). Gave me some different point of view when thinking about time passing by. This was actually an audio-book, but I don't think there's any difference.

kreyenborgi · 2024-11-30T08:32:54 1732955574

On the Calculation of Volume, by Solvej Balle.

It's a septology, curiously self-published by an established author, which she started on decades ago. Books 1 through 5 are out in Danish. The main plot device is superficially reminiscent of Groundhog Day, but with a completely different execution. Starts out kind of claustrophobic, then goes through these waves of revelations and disappointment and hypothesizing and hopefulness and rebuilding. I find it hard to compare to anything.

internet_points · 2024-11-28T22:21:38 1732832498

Hm, the one I enjoyed the most this year was Susanna Clarke's Piranesi – engrossing, awesome and beautiful.

mock-possum · 2024-11-29T06:27:53 1732861673

I read a very sadly sweet near-future-sci-fi book, very much in the vein of Bradbury, called “Klara And The Sun,” by Kazuo Ishiguro.

It very credibly tells an agonizingly familiar human story, from the perspective of a inescapably inhuman android protagonist - by seeing the world through her eyes, you also learn who she is, and what her experience of consciousness is - you in fact are offered a precious insight into the nature of artificial consciousness that no one else in the book is quite properly aware of.

perrygeo · 2024-11-29T15:56:28 1732895788

Origin - A genetic history of the Americas by Jennifer Raff. Recent evidence of how humans came to the Americas; it's a significantly different story than our conventional wisdom account.

Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches by Marvin Harris. How cultural norms establish collective behavior.

The Extermination of the American Bison. Written in the late 1800s as the tragedy was unfolding. Lots on great detail on how and why we decimated a keystone species in a matter of a few decades.

Plato's Revenge by William Ophuls. A concise manifesto on societal change. Lays out a vision for a new post-growth, post-oil, ecological consciousness that incorporates modern science, religion and philosophy.

Four Thousand Weeks. Far from a self-help time-management book, this is more a philosophy book on human's relationship with time. Delightful read.

Breath by James Nestor. Modern humans are breathing incorrectly due to factors of modern life. An exploration of the science and art of breathing properly.

Bernoulli's Fallacy by Aubrey Clayton. In the statistical wars, this book takes a strong stance: Bayesian is unequivocally better. He exploses the racist/colonial history of frequentist statistics, as well as the fundamental flaws in their math. Posits that mis-applied frequentist methods are to blame for the reproducibility crisis in science.

How the World Really Works by Vaclav Smil. A no-nonsense, factual account of the systems that keep our modern globalized society running.

Elements of Clojure by Zach Tellman. A concise, high-level philosophy about how we build and compose abstractions. One of those books where every sentence is gold. My only wish that the book wasn't tied to Clojure (most of the book is applicable to any language, despite the title).

Tidy First? by Kent Beck. How and when to make structural changes (refactoring, architecture, paying down tech debt) vs behavioral changes (new features, bug fixes). You need both, and you can use economic theory as a guide for when to invest in one or the other. But you need to treat them differently.

Numerical Linear Algebra for Programmers by Dragan Djuric. A code-centric introduction to common linear algrebra routines, Using Clojure and the neaderthal library - a high-level API for fast math optimized for CPU and GPU hardware.

gangstead · 2024-11-29T02:51:13 1732848673

Neal Stephenson has a brand new book out this month called Polostan. It's my favorite Stephenson book in a while. It's historical fiction in the Cryptonmicon genre.

codazoda · 2024-11-29T14:21:37 1732890097

Here are a few I enjoyed this year...

Walts Way, Andrew Lock Busy Doing Nothing, Hundred Rabbits The Art and Business of Online Writing, Nocolas Cole

If you want to be a writer and publish your own book I've written a short how-to guide. I'm updating it right now, building a site to promote other authors, and I'll release the new version in the coming days. My email address is in my profile if you're interested.

shpx · 2024-11-29T07:45:37 1732866337

The Machinery of Life by David S. Goodsell - it's a short microbiology book with paintings and renders of molecules and molecular processes. It's easy to read and imagining biology is straightforward when you can just see the molecules. I heard about it from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40103590

a_tartaruga · 2024-11-29T08:42:45 1732869765

^^ This book is the best

I heard about it from the same HN post

predictand · 2024-11-28T23:26:06 1732836366

Daemon series by Daniel Suarez: I can’t believe I slept on this book for so long. It would have altered my worldview fundamentally if I had read it at a younger age.

Mind Hunter: Somehow even better than the show.

A Brief History of Intelligence: Packed with so much knowledge about the evolution, mechanics, and different forms of intelligence. One of the best non-fiction books I have read in a long time.

vunderba · 2024-11-29T00:39:47 1732840787

The Daemon series along with the Magicians Trilogy by Lev Grossman are two of my favorite sci-fi/fantasy series.

LargoLasskhyfv · 2024-11-29T07:54:19 1732866859

At the times I've read the Daemon series, I also enjoyed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Nexus_Trilogy by Ramez Naam shortly afterwards.

mindcrime · 2024-11-28T22:13:24 1732832004

Seeing this reminds me of something I'm not proud of. I've done effectively no reading this year. At least not by my normal standards.

I generally read between 30-50 books a year (mix of fiction and non-fiction). But this year I knew my focus was going to be more on research, reading papers, writing code, etc. so I set my reading goal lower than normal (I usually set it to like 75, knowing that that's a bit aspirational). This year? I set it to like, 30. And I won't come close to hitting that. Right now I'm at 7 books for the year. So I don't have a big sample set to choose from. :-(

That said...

Of what I did read, a couple were pretty good:

Non-fiction:

Fancy Bear Goes Phishing: The Dark History of the Information Age, in Five Extraordinary Hacks- Scott J. Shapiro

Readings in Agents - Huhns, Singh (eds)

Programming Multi-Agent Systems in AgentSpeak using Jason - Bordini, Hubner, & Wooldridge

Fiction:

In Too Deep (Jack Reacher, #29) - Lee Child

edanm · 2024-11-29T15:50:00 1732895400

You know, I misread your opening sentence at first and thought you said you are proud of this.

And I gotta say, I've considered a few times lowering my "target" books read per year, to make more time for studying, reading articles, etc. And I totally thought that's what you were doing since you mentioned reading papers, research etc. And I was super proud on your behalf for doing that.

So anyway, just popping in to say that maybe there's a bright side to lowering your goal.

mindcrime · 2024-11-29T18:44:13 1732905853

Yeah, no doubt. I mean, don't get me wrong: I'm proud of the work I've done this year in total. I'm just not pointedly proud of having to say "I've only read 7 books this year", especially in light of my traditional norms in that regard.

MarcelOlsz · 2024-11-28T21:44:49 1732830289

Best one was Something Happened by Joseph Heller (Catch 22 guy). Worst one was 1Q84 by Murakami (so far).

computerdork · 2024-11-29T01:03:17 1732842197

Catch 22 is one of the funniest (while still having depth) books ever! Have never looked into his other books, will have to check it out

MarcelOlsz · 2024-11-29T15:29:59 1732894199

If you thought Catch 22 was funny this book will split you in half. I had to take it at only a few pages a day and re-read them a few times. I will say though, I might be misremembering how good it was, it's been a few years. I'm going to make a go of it again. I remember feeling at the time that I was reading the diary of a sort of "4chan patient zero".

computerdork · 2024-11-30T01:23:54 1732929834

Looking forward to it!

whatamidoingyo · 2024-12-03T20:17:29 1733257049

For me it was The Courage to Be Disliked. The style of writing intrigued me a bit, as it's written as a Socratic dialogue. I'm the type of person that worries too much what other people think about me. This book helped with that.

everyone · 2024-11-28T21:39:11 1732829951

We Are Legion (We Are Bob) by Dennis E. Taylor

Very entertaining sci-fi. I tore through it a a couple of days.

Hikikomori · 2024-11-28T22:04:46 1732831486

Expeditionary force series by Craig Alanson is good if you want more fun sci-fi.

grujicd · 2024-11-28T21:44:12 1732830252

It's just a first one, there are more books in Bobiverse series.

la_bruin · 2024-11-28T21:54:29 1732830869

There are 5 Bobiverse books, all of which are marvelously read by Ray Porter on audiobook if you listen in the car on long, long drives like I do.

The 5th book is an "audiobook only" release until January 2025 (I think) called, "NOT TILL WE ARE LOST".

And the Bobiverse series has recently been optioned to Universal!

http://dennisetaylor.org/status-of-things/

k__ · 2024-11-28T22:09:54 1732831794

The last one was a bit off.

number6 · 2024-11-28T22:14:37 1732832077

It just stops in the middle of the book... I hope the Missing parts follow quickly

k__ · 2024-11-28T22:35:13 1732833313

I mean, I get it, the story got bigger with every book and he hand to ground it again.

But somehow this "let's go on an adventure and do some beaver shenanigans" felt strange, lol.

greedylizard · 2024-11-28T21:45:18 1732830318

Great series. I still think about Archimedes often.

gadders · 2024-12-04T15:34:13 1733326453

Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson

Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon

All of the CJ Box series of Joe Pickett books

The Dan Abnett Eisenhorn and Ravenor Warhammer novels

In case you can't tell, I mostly read for entertainment.

massung · 2024-11-28T22:14:56 1732832096

My reads this read, which I enjoyed:

- Dead Mountain by Donnie Eichar (an examination of the Dyatlov Expedition).

- Piranesi by Susanna Clarke (fantasy).

- Be Useful by Arnold Schwarzenegger.

- Black Hawk Down by Mark Bowden.

Hopefully the other responses here give me something good to read for Christmas break. :-)

tmaly · 2024-11-29T13:18:10 1732886290

I usually come across one book a year that I really enjoy if I am lucky.

The Wall Speaks by Jerr was that book this year.

A very interesting perspective on masculine vs feminine frame.

The biggest takeaway is working on the external to improve the internal.

mat41 · 2024-11-28T23:13:02 1732835582

Olaf Stapledon, Last and First Men (1930)

Olaf Stapledon, Star Maker (1937)

Rather difficult reads for me as a non-native english speaker, but it was worth it. It is hard to imagine a more epic science fiction scenario than "Star Maker".

rasulkireev · 2024-12-01T11:22:07 1733052127

When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamín Labatut.

It is about scientists that are fully consumed by their work, going mad somtimes. Their work is making a world a better place, but at the same time is used to kill lots of people.

This is the first book for me that I can say is beautifully written. Even though the subject was heavy at times, I couldn't stop reading it.

WheelsAtLarge · 2024-11-29T01:58:45 1732845525

The End is Always Near, Dan Carlin

A quick read on many points in history when things looked grim and it must have seemed like the end of society was coming --an interesting read not necessarily mind-blowing.

dimbulb321 · 2024-11-30T21:19:58 1733001598

Two books by Ty Gagne:

- The Last Traverse; Tragedy and Resilience in the Winter Whites

- Where You'll Find Me: Risk, Decisions, and the Last Climb of Kate Matrosova

Each book covers a wintertime climbing tragedy in the NH White Mountains but they're really about human nature, risk management, and decision making. I found both books riveting, devoured each in a few evenings of reading.

computerdork · 2024-11-28T21:43:17 1732830197

Grendel by Gardner (so playful and creative), Jane Eyre (a classic with wonderful language and intense story), Sapiens (extraordinarily interesting survey of human history)

tmtvl · 2024-11-28T22:33:14 1732833194

53 days ago there was a thread about the best book we've ever read. As I have re-read the book this year I will link my comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41758060

For a general recommendation for a book to buy for Christmas I'd say the Annotated Alice by Martin Gardner is quite wonderful, if you'll pardon the pun.

Pedder · 2024-11-28T21:54:30 1732830870

Flatland 1884 by Edwin A. Abbott

computerdork · 2024-11-29T01:01:29 1732842089

when I first read it, felt like it was written in the modern era. Was surprised to find afterwards that it was written in the victorian period.

igor47 · 2024-11-28T22:16:03 1732832163

The Deluge -- a darker take on climate change than Ministry for the Future, but also felt pretty realistic.

This is how you lose the time war -- took me a long time to start this book, and then I couldn't put it down.

Non fiction, I really enjoyed Slouching Towards Utopia. I'm a sucker for narrative history like that, and I got a few useful concepts from the book. I also really liked The Prince of Peace, a biography of Keynes.

asicsp · 2024-11-29T04:53:57 1732856037

I mostly read progression fantasy books these days. Here are some series that I enjoyed a lot:

* "Beware of Chicken" by CasualFarmer

* "The Immaculate Collection" by havlo

* "The Runic Artist" by Ellake

* "The Broken Knife" by SilverSidhe

* "Immovable Mage" by ImmovableMage

* "The Gorgon Incident and Other Stories" by John Bierce

* "Quest Academy" by Brian J. Nordon

* "The Weirkey Chronicles" by Sarah Lin

runjake · 2024-11-29T18:22:12 1732904532

Replay by Ken Grimwood.

Don’t read anything about the plot, it will spoil it. Don’t read the Wikipedia article.

It’s a science fiction novel. Relatively short.

The book will hit you differently, depending on your age.

It’s messed with me for weeks and it’s still messing with me.

https://a.co/d/frMZHPq

I_complete_me · 2024-11-28T22:13:07 1732831987

Murder in the Crooked House by Soji Shimada According to some, one of the great locked room mysteries. Recommended but I am guessing it's better in the original.

The Marriage Portrait by Maggie O'Farrell Not as amazing as I thought it would be but memorable nonetheless.

Strange Sally Diamond by Liz Nugent Something nice about this book. Not for everyone. What is?

sgt · 2024-11-28T21:30:03 1732829403

Benjamin Franklin: An American Life (Walter Isaacson)

Highly recommend it. Don't waste your time with Franklin's autobiography.

istultus · 2024-11-28T21:43:57 1732830237