Books 2024

Tue, 31 Dec 2024 00:00:00 -0000

Another year, another 52 books! Overall, 2024 was a so-so year in reading for me—a couple good books and a bunch of bad ones (my average rating on Goodreads was a 3.3). The new Robin Sloan release was especially disappointing and has kinda put me off his entire back catalog. Here's what I might recommend reading instead:

Favourite Books of 2024

The Courage to Be Disliked by Ichiro Kishimi
Unruly: The Ridiculous History of England's Kings and Queens by David Mitchell
Red Side Story by Jasper Fforde
Venomous Lumpsucker by Ned Beauman
You Can Negotiate Anything by Herb Cohen

Dog Books

My wife and I welcomed a new puppy into our lives earlier this year. To prepare, I read seven different "dog" books, and I think she read another five? There's a mountain of wildly conflicting advice out there, but Steve Mann's Easy Peasy Puppy Squeezy and Easy Peasy Doggy Squeezy helped a lot.

52x10

This year marks the 10th time that I've hit 52 books (or more). I think it might be time to start rereading some? Starting with a few favourites from 2015:

How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia by Mohsin Hamid
Waking Up by Sam Harris
Flatland by Edwin A. Abbott
The Fish That Ate the Whale by Rich Cohen
How Adam Smith Can Change Your Life by Russ Roberts

Really curious and excited to see how I'll feel about them a decade later...

How I Read So Much

People always ask how I read so much... honestly, it's not that hard: no phones in bed and about 45–60 minutes of reading each night. Sure, I "cheat" with some audio books on Libby (about 10-15 per year), but there's a lot of evidence to suggest that listening is just as good as reading.

Challenge Habits

Keeping up with the 52-challenge for a decade now has definitely forced some interesting habits. On the one hand, I'll ditch books earlier than most. On the other, I often force myself to slog through a garbage book because I'm too deep and need it for the count. Also, I tend to avoid books over 350 pages. And to maintain momentum, I usually juggle 2-3 books at a time (once I’m 90% done one, I’ll start the next).

Quote Ritual

Every year I collect about 1000 highlights from my Kindle. It's become something of a ritual to export these quotes, manually go through each in a system of multiple passes, curate the best, and paraphrase the remainder into ideas that I hope to remember into the next year. If you’re curious, here are my quotes for 2024.