I’ve got several books in progress and I hope I finish them someday, including The Iliad and the Odyssey, and The Three Body Problem, but I just started The Dragon’s Path and the beginning is super fun.
I like Ray Dalio’s explanations about how the economy works. I haven’t read his previous books but the current state of the U.S. and global economy has me more interested in understanding what’s going on from a macro perspective.
I’m over halfway through his book “Principles for Dealing with the Changing World Order”. It talks about factors that have led to the rise and fall of recent nations whose currencies have held global reserve currency status. It discusses cycles of internal (domestic) and external (international) order and disorder and how these cycles effect the rise and fall of global reserve currencies. He also discusses where he thinks the US is at in the long term cycle (late stages) later in the book which I’m excited to get to.
It’s a super interesting read so far from someone who has spent decades producing models based on the topics he’s written about to form investment theses. He also has a convenient way of highlighting the important points so that if a section is too dry you can easily skim through to pull out the important bits.
I also think if you like Balajis recent podcast episode with Tim Ferris you will likely find this book interesting. I see a few parallels, partially where Balajis thinks the US might head in the next 3-5 years and the current state of U.S. international influence among other things.
I’m also working my way through Dune. Have never read the book, have watched the first Dune movie a couple of times, and the most recent one a few times. Loved the movie.
I alternate business with epic fiction. Last year I was hooked on the Dune series, this year i’m staying terrestrial. Thos is what January is looking like
I read a lot of science fiction and historical/realistic fiction that depicts environments and lived experiences that I haven’t personally experienced. The three books below were a few of my sci-fi favorites I read in 2021.
I’ve been on a historical fiction bender lately - just finished Colleen McCullough’s (seriously magnificent) Masters of Rome series and currently reading “I, The Sun”, a Novel of the Hittite Empire. Great for keeping the relative chaos, cruelty and dysfunction of our era in perspective.
Some interesting books in this thread that have gone on to my ever lengthening “To Read” list!
I like to read a mix of fiction (mainly fantasy and science fiction) and non fiction (mainly science, biographical and personal development type books).
My 2021 books are below, they were all very good, but if I had to shortlist some for recommendation they would be…
I haven’t gotten into anything recently, mostly transistor and op amp technical sheets. However I did master the 3rd side of the cube recently with the layer-by-layer method. It takes 4 algorithms called the face, push, dodge and corner-twist (the top and middle have algorithms as well that Ive known for a long time but I don’t know their names and, the top anyways, is more freestyle so you might as well enjoy it!). Its kind of freaky the way it all comes together at the end.
I also picked up a Casio Digital Diary SF-3500 for $1 and it works! I don’t know when production on these things began but the default date in the ‘schedule’ is 1-1-88 so pretty neat. The user manual is 35 pages so I’m gonna have to read that at least!
Lol its actually 70 pages with the online scanned version being 2 actual sheets per page. The gist of it how to write (set) and delete (shift exit) data in input mode and then how to search and display data in output mode by going between modes with the DATA button. The calendar is still good till 2100 so there ya go, it explains date formatting and such. The secret area, as it’s referred to, is behind a 96 char password and there are no external data connections. The CR2025s that power it must be replaced in sequence, power loss wipes the memory, pretty neat.