recent reading
Jul. 3rd, 2019 07:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
castironA couple of weeks' worth of reading:
Ann Leckie, The Raven Tower. I'd checked it out from the library, put off starting it, saw three days before the due date that there were holds on it, and decided to read a token few pages before turning it in. And then I couldn’t put it down until I finished. I love the structure, the non-human POV, the side stories, the slow revelation of what’s really going on, and the last line.
James Clear, Atomic Habits. A book on habits and how to establish or change them; I don’t think there’s anything new in here, but it’s well-written and has some interesting anecdotes. One part that bugged me: in the chapter where he talks about how the people around you affect your habits, he breaks them down to the close, the many, and the powerful, but his recommendations only seem to deal with the close (basically, by finding new people to hang around with that support the change you're trying to make); he doesn’t discuss how to deal with the larger society or the examples set by the powerful at all, even to say “sorry, this is background that you’re stuck with”. (Also, couldn't Clear find any women willing to blurb the book?)
I finished the Cadfael reread and most of the Phryne Fisher reread (haven't reread Murder and Mendelssohn yet) and started on a Lord Peter Wimsey reread. Just finished Five Red Herrings, one of the few books that makes me want an audiobook version, of course done by someone who can actually render all the accents that Sayers renders phonetically. Currently on Have His Carcase.
DNF due to its being due at the library: Samantha Kleinberg, Why: A Guide to Finding and Using Causes. The bit I read was interesting, but it’s taking more brain than I had available. I’ll try it again another time.
Ann Leckie, The Raven Tower. I'd checked it out from the library, put off starting it, saw three days before the due date that there were holds on it, and decided to read a token few pages before turning it in. And then I couldn’t put it down until I finished. I love the structure, the non-human POV, the side stories, the slow revelation of what’s really going on, and the last line.
James Clear, Atomic Habits. A book on habits and how to establish or change them; I don’t think there’s anything new in here, but it’s well-written and has some interesting anecdotes. One part that bugged me: in the chapter where he talks about how the people around you affect your habits, he breaks them down to the close, the many, and the powerful, but his recommendations only seem to deal with the close (basically, by finding new people to hang around with that support the change you're trying to make); he doesn’t discuss how to deal with the larger society or the examples set by the powerful at all, even to say “sorry, this is background that you’re stuck with”. (Also, couldn't Clear find any women willing to blurb the book?)
I finished the Cadfael reread and most of the Phryne Fisher reread (haven't reread Murder and Mendelssohn yet) and started on a Lord Peter Wimsey reread. Just finished Five Red Herrings, one of the few books that makes me want an audiobook version, of course done by someone who can actually render all the accents that Sayers renders phonetically. Currently on Have His Carcase.
DNF due to its being due at the library: Samantha Kleinberg, Why: A Guide to Finding and Using Causes. The bit I read was interesting, but it’s taking more brain than I had available. I’ll try it again another time.
(no subject)
Date: 2019-07-04 06:53 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-07-04 04:14 pm (UTC)I check out a lot of books from the library just because their title caught my attention and the cover description sounded interesting.