2021 Reading List

I read 51 books this year, up from 21 in 2020.

Some thoughts & themes:

After I moved back to Australia last year, I cancelled my Amazon prime membership. I realized it was harder to quickly order new and used books. In July, I borrowed a Kindle, and after years of drinking the paper is better’ kool aid, I was hooked. I especially loved turning my wish list’ into samples. In December, I bought the new Paperwhite which reads beautifully.

More fiction. For every non-fiction I read 3 fiction. This wasn’t intentional. I found myself attracted to stories rather than facts. I started the year with Bryson’s The Body”, and although I found it interesting, I moved through it glacially. That’s a signal that it’s not the right kind of book for me right now.

In general, I opted for shorter reads. Especially during the latter half of this year. This led me to discover different kinds of books. I read, and loved, short stories, novellas and collected essays.

Here’s the books. *: 5 stars ∞: Re-read

Started, didn’t finish

  1. Fuzz - Mary Roach
  2. Weapons of Math Destruction - Cathy O’Neil
  3. Shuggie Bain - Douglas Stuart
  4. Live More Think Less - Pia Callesen

Anti library

  1. Bowling Alone - Robert D. Putnam
  2. My Promised Land - Ari Shavit
  3. The History of Money - Jack Weatherford
  4. Let my people go surfing - Yvon Chouinard
  5. Klara and the sun - Kazuo Ishiguro
  6. The Score Takes care of itself - Bill Walsh
  7. How to Kill a city - Peter Moskowitz
  8. Portnoy’s Complaint - Philip Roth
  9. Interior Chinatown - Charles Yu
  10. The Essence of Software - Daniel Jackson
  11. Bullshit jobs - David Graeber
  12. Winter in Sokcho - Elisa Shut Dusapin
  13. Play It as It Lays - Joan Didion

December

  1. Nightbitch - Rachel Yoder
  2. How to Be a Leader - Plutarch
  3. How to Be a Bad Emperor - Suetonius
  4. On Tennis - David Foster Wallace *
  5. Project Daily Mary - Andy Weir
  6. A Selfie as Big as the Ritz - Lara Williams
  7. Johnno - David Malouf *
  8. Interpreter of Maladies - Jhumpa Lahiri *
  9. Today a Woman Went Mad in the Supermarket - Hilma Wolitzer

November

  1. A Lonely Girl is a Dangerous Thing - Jessie Tu
  2. New Animal - Ella Baxter
  3. Comfort Me With Apples - Catherynne M Valente
  4. Will You Please Be Quiet, Please? - Raymond Carver *
  5. Chemistry - Weike Wang
  6. Witchita Stories - Troy James Weaver
  7. Cult of Loretta - Kevin Maloney

October

  1. Convenience Store Woman - Sayaka Murata *
  2. Earthlings - Sayuka Murata
  3. Weather - Jenny Offill
  4. Dept. of Speculation - Jenny Offill
  5. Flush - Virginia Woolf
  6. Problems - Jade Sharma

September

  1. Bewilderness - Karen Tucker
  2. Vagabonde - Anna Dorn
  3. Survivor - Chuck Palahniuk
  4. My Year of Rest and Relaxation - Ottessa Moshfegh
  5. The Undoing Project - Michael Lewis

August

  1. Go to work and do your job - Noah Cicero
  2. Creative Blindness - Dave Trott
  3. Body High - Jon Lindsey
  4. Leave Society - Tao Lin
  5. The Ice Cream Man - Sam Pink

July

  1. More Tales of the City - Armistead Maurine
  2. The 99% Invisible City - Roman Mars
  3. You Can Find Inspiration In Everything - Paul Smith

June

  1. Chaos Monkeys - Antonio Garcia Martinez
  2. Uncanny Valley - Anna Wiener
  3. Whiplash - Joichi Ito

May

  1. No friend but the mountains - Behrouz Boochani

April

  1. Circe - Madeline Miller
  2. Jews Don’t Count - David Baddiel

March

  1. The Rider - Tim Krabbé ∞
  2. The Salt Path - Winn Raynor
  3. Frankenstein - Mary Shelley *

February

  1. Surely You’re joking - Richard Feynman
  2. Past the Shallows - Favel Parrett
  3. Honeybee - Craig Silvey

January

  1. Revolution in The Valley - Andy Hertzfeld
  2. The Tiny MBA - Alex Hillman
  3. The Body - Bill Bryson

Date
December 26, 2021