Books I Liked

The Midnight Library and the dawn of a new day Book: The Midnight Library Author: Matt Haig Listened to on audiobook read by Carey Mulligan In The Midnight Library, the protagonist attempts suicide at the start of the book. This is closely preceded by a number of things going wrong in her personal and professional life. Her cat dies. She loses her job at a music shop. She screws up the private piano lessons she was giving and loses that gig, too. She finds out her brother was in town but didn't want to see her. Even her elderly neighbor, whom she helps by picking up his prescriptions, doesn't need her help anymore because the pharmacist has moved nearby and can deliver the prescriptions himself. Her best friend doesn't text her back. All of these immediate experiences are in addition to hardships that have built up over the past couple of years. Her mother died. She broke off an engagement and has since been single. She dropped out of a potentially successful band. She was ...

 Turtles All the Way Down, spirals all the way out  Book: Turtles all the Way Down; Author: John Green; Listened to on audiobook Finished January 2023 Like all the books on this blog, I liked it... but this one I liked just  ok . This is a YA book, but I don't think I would have made it through the book at that age. The protagonist has compulsive thoughts that spiral out of control  —  with the main worry being an irrational fear of acquiring a C. diff infection, but also a more existential compulsive worry that she  as doesn't really exist in a sense. Part of this later fear comes from her lack of ability to control her own thoughts (so she has little confidence in her abilities of self-agency), and part comes from the factoid that non-human cells (like bacteria) outnumber human cells in the human body. So there's a lot to read through along the lines of "am I even me if I'm mostly made up of microbes?" When I was younger I likely wouldn't have had the pa...

Dear Martin: Reflections on MLK Day Book: Dear Martin Author: Nic Stone; published in 2017; listened to on audiobook (read by Dion Graham) Of the books I've read focussing on racial injustice and prejudice, Dear Martin has been my favorite, so I decided I'd do a quick write-up for MLK day. I finished the book Oct 17th of 2022 (about three months ago from the time of this writing), and finished the sequel, Dear Justyce, on Nov 15th.  The premise of Dear Martin is that the protagonist, a black high school student named Justyce, starts a diary of sorts to help him process his experiences as a young black man. The book's title comes from Justyce's approach of journaling as if he were writing to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Time and again, he asks what Martin would do in his situation. How to balance anger and compassion? How to respond to offenses, small and large? Superficially this book has a lot in common with The Hate U Give (by Angie Thomas). Both books focus on black h...

Shaman  Spoiler level: Moderate Shaman (Kim Stanley Robinson; 2013) is set early in human history — back when we were still coexisting with Neanderthals or some other early humanoid life forms (which adds an interesting component to the book). The main character — Loon — is a shaman-in-training. We open at the start of his walkabout trial, which makes up a relatively small portion of the book and introduces the reader to Loon's skillsets and ways of life. During the walkabout, Loon longs for the comforts of home and then, once it is over, longs for the freedom of the walkabout — the freedom of being away from his responsibilities in the pack. This pervasive and eternal "the grass is always greener" mindset is one of the many examples of how Loon's life is relatable to modern humans (i.e. the readers). And yet, Loon also arguably has a greater appreciation for what he does have than the average reader (at least this reader) — a perspective that left me with feel-good...