Stats for nerds
4recommend
6mentions
5people
2009–2025years
83% recommend17% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- “Zen And The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance” — Robert Pirsig “Siddhartha” — Herman Hesse “Stranger in a Strange Land" - Robert Heinlein "Wind Up Bird Chronicle" - Haruki Murakami
The first two were handed to me by my father when I dropped out of high school. Zen was a slog the first time I read through it, I came back to it my late twenties and have read it at leaset two more times since then.
- In no particular order:
* The Obstacle is the Way, Ryan Holiday
* The Daily Stoic, Ryan Holiday
* Man's Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl
* Siddhartha, Herman Hesse
* The Personal MBA, Josh Kaufman
* The Effective Engineer, Edmund Lau
* The Lean Startup, Eric Ries
* Certain to Win, Chet Richards
* Left of Bang, Patrick Van Horn & Jason A. Riley
* Native Set Theory, Paul R. Halmos
* Introducing Go, by Caleb Doxsey.
If you'd like to read what I think of these books, you can read my blog post about them here: http://aalhour.com/blog/2018/01/02/review-of-my-2017-reading...
- In no particular order:
* Siddhartha, Herman Hesse
* Man's Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl
* The Obstacle is the Way, Ryan Holiday
* The Daily Stoic, Ryan Holiday
* The Effective Engineer, Edmund Lau
* The Lean Startup, Eric Ries
* The Personal MBA, Josh Kaufman
* Certain to Win, Chet Richards
* Left of Bang, Patrick Van Horn & Jason A. Riley
* Native Set Theory, Paul R. Halmos
EDIT: list formatting
- The ones I've read and find good:
- Existentialism is a Humanism - Jean Paul Sartre : Very easy to read and is a very good introduction to existentialism.
- Thus Spoke Zarathustra - Nietzsche
- Siddhartha - Herman Hesse
- The Prize - Daniel Yergin. Siddhartha - Herman Hesse
The first is a fantastic history of oil. It brings out the politics, economics and personalities that have lit up the history of oil very well. Especially relevant in this day and age, when oil is behind so many geo-political conflicts.
The second is a bit more personal. I could write an entire essay about this book, but suffice it to say that it was exactly the right book at the right time for me. Sometimes, a book just comes along and changes your perspective and way of thinking. This was one of those books for me.
- I read a handful of short stories from Exhalation by Ted Chiang. I liked one of them in particular, the others were okay. It is nice to read short stories since you invest very little time in each—in case it turns out the author is not really what you're in to.
Begin the Begin: R.E.M.'s Early Years, Robert Dean Lurie. A band I read everything about. 1984 and the music that entered my life that year truly changed me. But I don't expect anyone that is not a fan of the early band would find it interesting.
Siddhartha, Herman Hesse. It has been recommended to me many times over the years—finally read it. As I mentioned in another comment, it's a good book that younger me might have found more profound. Older me was more or less just nodding my head, "Yep, you'll have to learn for yourself…", etc.
I've been working an analog computer so have read a bunch of old textbooks and such that I have found on archive.org and other places online.
I see quite a few books I purchased this year but have not read. (The Japanese have a word for me.) I should really try to read more next year.
