Read one book a month

I am still averging >2 books a month, but I am listing to a lot of podcasts. EscapePod ,PseudoPod and PodCastle are three fantastic podcasts. There are others, but those are 3 that I can’t push the envelope and allow me to listen to stories that I normally would not choose on my own.

that I haven’t written a review of all of the books that I have read this year. I averaged > 2 books a month.

Flatland _ _A Romance of Many Dimensions Is a fantastic short book that illustrates what a thought experiment is. It explains, or attempts to, the perceptions of a two dimensional (planer) character viewing a point world, a line world, and a 3d world. There is much more to the story than geometry, math and philosophy. It reads like the classic satire, similar to Voltaire or Swift.

It’s a quick read. It’s worth it.

Read this book. The subject may seem esoteric and you might wonder how one can prove that most decisions we make with out conscious thought. The author makes a good argument.

Both Amazon and Audible recommended this book to me, and I passed. I was interested in memory, thought, and critical thinking. The subtitle “The Power of Thinking Without Thinking” turned me off from the book. (Statements like this remind me of infomercials and hawkers of panaceas). Some many months later, I find myself in a class on learning and cognition. Blink was recommended reading. I decided to pick it up, and it is worth it.

For anybody that is interested in how and why we may make quick decisions, intuition, and how quick decisions can lead to mistakes, this is a read for you. The book is composed of well written true life vignettes that explain illustrate a theory that will be discussed afterwords. It doesn’t read like a text book, but one finds one’s self learning as one reads. I found my perspective on the world and my thinking changed after reading it.

Information on Blink .

The recording The Essential Welty by Eudora Welty is fantastic. It contains 3 stories; Why I Live at the P.O., the spontaneous, Powerhouse (all read by Eudora Welty). I get the feeling that the first story was an earlier recording, but I have nothing than anecdotal evidence, as she sounds younger, reads very fast and sounds a bit nervous.

It is a rarity to hear an author read her/his own works. It is even rarer to hear it done well. She weights the words and provides additional depth that I might have missed in reading the stories on my own.

It’s a quick listen at around 1.5 hours. It is the kind of read/listen in which one can go though the text multiple times and still find new things that weren’t evident before.

I found the recording at Audible. But it can be found at Amazon, your public library, and elsewhere.

In short: A man’s journal and recollection of a two year stint in which he lives as simply as he can. Published in 1817, the only thing that dates it is the lack of people across the U.S. and the cost of materials.

In my teens this was how I wanted ”..to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms…” . (The less used of the “suck the marrow” quotes.)

The text is full of material that others crib or use too loosely today. I find that my quest to “live deliberately” has been a part of my life for a long time. I found the work spoke to me less today that it did in my youth. It may be that I am now near the same age that wrote this, or perhaps that I see the world differently. In any case, I think I will pick it up again, some decades from now to see if it speaks to me any differently.

Project Gutenberg public e-text of Walden… by Henry David Thoreau

In short: A selection of “translations” from the diaries of Adam and Eve cross cut. A lot of fun to read. It will make you laugh. It’s a good glimpse into the view of men and women at the time. While reading it you might wonder if we have really progressed, or if it is just a “sex’s” nature to behave in one way or another.

I read this in some literary anthology, likely something from Norton. I am read it again as part of some pre-reading for a class. I have also seen it as a play and listened to it.

If you are looking for a good and quick read, I recommend this. It isn’t going to make one feel awkward or sad, it is quite the opposite, it is comedy and comment of society.

It has me writing again, and hopefully it will yield something of worth.

There is a lot more to Mark Twain than the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (e-text ). Most of his works are full of riotous laughter and important social commentary that is still germane today.

I have the offical book for NaNoWriMo . It reads well. I bought it to get a little confidence and to get some advice from a seasond pro/ founder. The book is called No Plot No ProblemA Low-Stress, High-Velocity Guide to Writing a Novel in 30 Days

I also am working on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Road">On the Road by Jack Kerouac. That I may not finish by months end, but I’ll try.

My goal is to have this book read by months end.

I am going to read one or two books a month and post a review of what they were about.

I need to renew my Audible Audible subscription. I have listened to about 2 books a month via Audible for the past two years.