Reviews

The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien (September 1, 2020)

Being an action-lover, and having just finished the Two Towers, which was in large part about the melodrama of Sam and Frodo as they split from the Fellowship and head toward Mordor, I was very happy when this third volume of The Lord of the Rings plunged directly into the Battle of the Pelennor Fields.

I found Ghân-buri-Ghân and the Wild Men of the woods to be a hidden gem, similar to Tom Bombadil in the first book. These characters were not present in the movies, and therefore I did not know of them until reading the books.

I do wonder how Éowyn and Merry managed to defeat the Black Captain, a.k.a., “King of Angmar, Ringwraith, Lord of the Nazgûl, a spear of terror in the hand of Sauron, shadow of despair.” It seems that his power should have been too much for the daughter of Théoden and a halfling. Éowyn also kills a Nazgul with what seems to be relative ease. The killing of the Black Captain is ultimately a major turning point in the battle.

The Shadow Host commanded by Aragorn is a bit confusing. They are ghosts, but they can still injure physical things. Can they themselves be injured? If not, it would seem that this was an invincible army. Why did Aragorn not keep them a little longer? He could have marched straight up to the Black gate and finished off the remaining forces of Mordor.

The Council of the Captains was epic. So valiant was this counsel given by Gandalf, “We must walk open-eyed into that trap, with courage, but small hope for ourselves. For, my lords, it may well prove that we ourselves shall perish utterly in a black battle far from the living lands; so that even if Barad-dûr be thrown down, we shall not live to see a new age. But this, I deem, is our duty. And better so than to perish nonetheless – as we surely shall, if we sit here – and know as we die that no new age shall be.” The forces of Gondor and Rohan win this huge battle on the Pelennor Fields, and what do they do? They march straight on to another battle! And a seemingly hopeless one!

As the armies of Gondor and Rohan march up to the Black Gate, the narrative switches focus back to Sam and Frodo as Book VI begins.

Sam’s valor at the Tower of Cirith Ungol in Mordor is his shining moment, as he sneaks past an entire army of orcs that are fighting each other, into one of the most secure strongholds in Mordor, and rescues Frodo. He also wears the ring throughout this time.

After Frodo’s rescue, begins my least favorite part of the third volume. Similar to the Two Towers, Sam and Frodo are trekking toward Mount Doom and having a miserable time. I know this is an essential part of the whole story, but it’s hard to read without getting depressed.

This review is getting long, so I’ll skip forward a bit. My favorite part is towards the end, when the hobbits return to the Shire. I won’t spoil it, even though I’ve already spoiled the rest of the plot. But I liked it for two reasons. One, it wasn’t in the movie. Two, the hobbits use what they learned from their travels to fight for their own home country.

Children of Dune by Frank Herbert (July 26, 2020)

If you had asked me only halfway through the book, I would have rated Children of Dune with 3 stars. After having finished it, I’m rating it with 4 stars. Not nearly as good as the original Dune, but better than Messiah.

In the beginning of Children, Herbert writes in the same style which, for me, made Messiah inferior to the original Dune—focusing on internal thought processes, as opposed to external events. In this way, the plot progresses based on the thoughts of the characters, rather than physical action. This is made more complicated by the characters having prescient and psychic powers. Alia, Leto II, and Ghanima were all born with these powers. I enjoyed reading of Abomination, memory lives, and prescience much less than I did reading of the battles in the original Dune. If I wanted something so cerebral, I wouldn’t choose a Sci-Fi author.

In terms of the plot (spoiler alert), I was glad when I read that Jessica would return to the narrative after her hiatus on Caladan. Alia falling victim to Abomination was a strong element of conflict. I became much more interested when the twins’ secret plan with the Laza tigers began to unfold. The transformation that Leto undergoes on his Golden Path is the most exciting element of the book. The last 20% of the book was close to as good as the original Dune, in terms of action and plot progression.

Overall, if you’re thinking about reading the Dune trilogy, I would recommend stopping after the first book.

The Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss (June 18, 2020)

It is difficult to write a review about a 1,000-page book, like describing a long journey to someone back home. I am tempted to say, with a smug smile, “I enjoyed it very much,” and leave it at that. But alas …

There is something different about fantasy and sci-fi. Reading fiction, as opposed to non-fiction, is one thing. And then fantasy and sci-fi are an additional step deeper into the fiction realm. Reading about a world completely different than your own creates the feeling of escape from reality. When I close the book after hours of reading, I’m surprised to find that my old world has returned around me—just as surprised as I was by the new fantasy world when I opened the book at the beginning. Reading fantasy is like traveling in this way.

If I look back on the two books in the Kingkiller Chronicle series thus far, I remember the places that Kvothe has been. Spoiler alert! First, he travels widely with his Edema Ruh troupe. Then he lives the life of a beggar child in Tarbean. Then he attends the University across the river from Imre. Then he travels to Severen an an errand for Threpe. From there, he travels to the Eld on an errand from Maer Alveron. On his way back from killing bandits, he gets lured into the Fae by Felurian. From there, he travels to Ademre to help his friend Tempi. And from there, he travels all the way back to the University.

Kvothe’s character has developed considerably, even though he has only aged two or three years over the course of the two books (he was about twelve when he got to Tarbean and about seventeen at the end of Wise Man’s Fear), which makes me wonder how many books Rothfuss is planning to write in the series.

One question in the back of my mind: how powerful and talented can Kvothe become, while still remaining a believable character? For me personally, he is already pushing the limits. He has acquired the following talents thus far:

Traveling with Edema Ruh: acting and music.

Streets of Tarbean: resilience and resourcefulness.

University: naming, sympathy, artificing, physicking, alchemy, and several languages.

Severen: knowledge of court rules and the favor of a powerful Maer.

The Eld: using naming/sympathy in battle and leading a band of mercenaries.

Felurian: knowledge of the Fae and sexual skill.

Ademre: knowledge of the Lethani and fighting skill.

At this point, stories about Kvothe are starting to spread because of his great feats. This greatness is in tension with the narrative of his normal life where he has friends and love interests and occasionally makes mistakes. Rothfuss has done well to include some of Kvothe’s weaknesses: rashness, hatred of Ambrose, lack of skill with math and chemistry. There is even a chapter in the Wise Man’s Fear titled “Failures” at the very end, as if Rothfuss realized all of a sudden that Kvothe was becoming unbelievable and he needed to pepper in some weaknesses.

Another thing I am curious about is the frame of the narrative where Kvothe is older and acting as an innkeeper and he gets beat up by a couple of traveling soldiers. This would never have happened to the Kvothe from the stories. What has happened to him? Whatever it is, Bast seems eager to get Kvothe back to his old ways.

At this point, I would say the world and the characters are sufficiently built. There is enough raw material to have me thoroughly interested. I am excited to see what Rothfuss can achieve in the third book.

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss (May 16, 2020)

The Name of the Wind is written as a frame narrative, which means a-story-within-a-story. The outer story introduces Kvothe as the innkeeper of the Waystone Inn (there he is known as “Kote” to hide his identity). The inner story begins as a traveling scribe named Chronicler visits the Waystone Inn and asks to write Kvothe’s life story. Kvothe begrudgingly agrees and begins to tell his story out loud as Chronicler writes.

Rothfuss is a master of building suspense. When Kvothe is playing for his talent pipes at the Eolian. At first you think that Kvothe will win his talent pipes easily, given his skill from years of learning to play with the Edema Ruh. But then he discusses the particular song that he has chosen to play and discusses it with Stanchion, co-owner of the Eolian. Stanchion is surprised because it is such a difficult song, so this starts you wondering if Kvothe will have as much success as you thought. Then Rothfuss describes in detail all the performances that precede Kvothe’s and this adds to your doubts, as every single musician in front of him fails to earn their pipes. There is also the question of whether a female vocalist will come in from the crowd to sing the part of Aloine, an essential part of “The Lay of Sir Savien Traliard” (the difficult song that Kvothe has chosen). It finally comes to be Kvothe’s turn. He is playing brilliantly. The reaction of the crowd is described with great detail by Rothfuss. And a mysterious female voice comes in to sing the part! But then one of the strings on Kvothe’s lute breaks. And you don’t know what’s going to happen …

Another element of the book that I thought was particularly well-done by Rothfuss was its believe-ability. In other fantasy fiction I have read, the other constructs a world that is very different from the world in which we live. This is wonderful, because it’s the point of fantasy after all, but it can become difficult to stay in touch with this world if you forget other parts or just don’t understand the complexity of the world that the author is trying to create. Rothfuss created a world that with which it was easy for me to stay in touch. The struggles on Kvothe on the streets of Tarbean are very understandable. They are the struggles of poverty, hunger, and violence. His ambitions at the University are easy to understand. He has a clear goal to find out about the Chandrian. Everything is ordered to that goal. His love with Denna is a simple love, expertly described in depth and over time.

The last thing I wish to mention is the recurrence of the symbol of money. In the world of Temerant, money is copper and silver. I started to notice the recurrence of the symbol of money in Tarbean when Kvothe is forced into poverty. He has to beg and steal to survive, fighting for every iron drab. He starts to save a “rainy day” fund hidden somewhere on the rooftops of Tarbean. When he arrives at the University, he faces similar problems. Kvothe has to come up with money to pay tuition, to buy a lute, to buy a second pair of clothes. This struggle for money serves as a very relatable conflict that persists throughout the entire novel and provides very believable explanation for Kvothe’s actions.

Overall, I loved this book. I have read Dune and Lord of the Rings just before it, and it ranks as an equal, if not at the top. For those who are thinking of whether to read it, I would describe it as a mix between Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings, erring more closely to the side of Harry Potter.

Dune Messiah by Frank Herbert (May 3, 2020)

When I read what Brian Herbert (Frank’s son) wrote in his introduction to the book, that “Dune Messiah is the most misunderstood of Frank Herbert’s novels,” I knew that the reviews from the internet would prove to be true. The sequel is inferior to the original Dune novel. But I will still be reading the third book in the trilogy, and I am hopeful.

If I were Frank Herbert and I could go back and write the novels again, I would have drawn out the battle between the Fremen and the Sardaukar in the original Dune. It seemed like there was so much rising action and then the climax was over in a flash. The Padishah Emperor lands on Arrakis and then all of a sudden his Sardaukar forces are overwhelmed in what seems to be an instant by the Fremen. Meanwhile, Paul and Chani’s son is killed in one of the sietches. An entire separate 500-page novel could have been written to describe these events.

It almost seems like Frank Herbert was growing tired of writing the original and wasn’t yet planning to write the sequel, so he truncated the story and sped things along. Because of this, an entirely new storyline had to be created for the sequel. Paul is now Emperor of the known universe. Jessica is back on Caladan. And new main characters like Irulan, Edric, Scytale, and Hayt are introduced.

The central conflict completely shifts. Instead of leading the Fremen rebellion on Arrakis to reclaim his ducal throne, Paul is now fighting to maintain control over his political position and his prescient powers. As a result, the content of Dune Messiah became more politically and intellectually complex. Herbert spends more words on monologues than plot progression. As someone who reads Sci-Fi for the page-turning aspect of a good story, the sequel was less enjoyable than the original. I would have liked to read an elongation of the same plot from the original.

A thematic element that I noticed more in Dune Messiah was the balance between Mentat and Bene Gesserit. Both are powerful in their own way. Mentats are logical and data-driven. Bene Gesserit have abilities of the Voice and speech recognition. In Fremen societies, the Reverend Mothers of the Bene Gesserit are responsible for “changing” the poison into a drug that fuels Fremen orgies. Interestingly, Mentats are mostly men and Bene Gesserit are mostly woman. The respective powers of each type seems to align with our traditional understanding of gender—men being more logical and women being more emotional and empathic. Paul is the exception to this rule. He is the Kwisatz Haderach. He has the powers both of a Mentat and a Bene Gesserit (from his mother’s training).

A tangential note related to Dune: I’m starting to notice a common theme in the later works of authors that have experienced success with earlier works. I’ve noticed it with Hesse (earlier works being Gertrude, Demian, and Siddhartha, later work being Glass Bead Game), Huxley (earlier work being Brave New World, later work being Island), and now Frank Herbert (earlier work being Dune and later work being its sequel, Dune Messiah). The theme is that the author pays more attention to plot and character development in earlier works, and then more attention to theme and philosophical musings (often written into dialogue) in later works. The attempt to fit themes and philosophy into plot seems to be a less covert effort in later works. Instead the authors just come right out and say it using their characters as mouthpieces. Perhaps this is due to arrogance and laziness resulting from past successes. Or maybe later works are driven by ulterior motives such as commercial success.

Ishmael by Daniel Quinn (April 23, 2020)

I didn’t like this book. I don’t usually finish books that I don’t like, but this one I had to finish just to make sure the author didn’t make any last minute defenses against my criticisms.

My main problem with this book is that it claims to be a novel but falls short in terms of plot and character development. Other philosophical fiction authors who I enjoy—Hesse, Coelho, Rand—all do a masterful job of developing characters and plot that could stand on their own as a novel, even without the philosophy. Ishmael could not stand on its own as a novel without the philosophy. The plot is essentially this: a man goes to meet a gorilla and has a conversation. That conversation contains Quinn’s philosophy.

Other than not being the novel which it claims to be, this is problematic also because the format of the work does not allow for the full fleshing out of philosophical claims as would be more achievable in an academic paper. For example, Quinn claims that Mother Culture (the term he uses to refer to the culture of our modern civilized society) offers “an axiom stating that there is no way to obtain any certain knowledge about how people ought to live.” This is just blatantly false. While it is true for some schools of thought (e.g., moral nihilism), and these schools of thought might seem to be growing, it is far from unanimously accepted throughout our entire culture. There are plenty who still argue for objective ethics. To make such a flippant claim about the whole of modern ethics, as Quinn does in this way, is enough reason to not take his philosophy seriously.

From a logical perspective, this false premise is one that Quinn then uses to go on building his argument. But you cannot build an argument from a false premise. I found there to be more than one false premise which had me ready to throw out the book altogether, knowing that whatever conclusion Quinn would reach would not be able to stand on its own legs.

A redeeming argument from Quinn’s side could be that he purposely uses the format of a dialogue-intensive novel to achieve an understanding in the reader that is unattainable for a more academic philosophical paper. In the book, Ishmael actually explains this process to the narrator. He says, “The journey itself is going to change you.” Here is the full quote:

“And when we’re finished, you’ll have an entirely new perception of the world and of all that’s happened here. And it won’t matter in the least whether you remember how that perception was assembled. The journey itself is going to change you, so you don’t have to worry about memorizing the route we took to accomplish that change.”

If I had to guess, I would say Quinn was really talking to the reader when he spoke these words through Ishmael. In fact, Ishmael seems to function mostly as a device through which Quinn speaks his philosophy. The reader takes the viewpoint of the narrator, as a student of Ishmael.

Now having finished the book and having a clearer picture of what Quinn was trying to achieve, I can understand why Quinn chose this format. His claims across history, religion, anthropology, and philosophy would have required hundreds of thousands of pages of evidence and argumentation to be supported appropriately (in the academic sense). Quinn does not have time for this, because the claim which he wishes to make, is that the world is dying, and we need to change our ways in order to save it. Maybe such an argument doesn’t need to be completely logical, if it seeks to achieve its aim, which is to encourage action in a large percentage of the world population, especially when we consider that a great number of people are more motivated by emotion than logic. For this reason, an academic paper would not have achieved Quinn’s aim, and he couldn’t have contained all the proper argumentation and evidence in a novel which he hoped that many of the common population would be able to read.

All in all, I didn’t like this book, but it still achieved its purpose with me. The journey itself changed me, like Ishmael said it would. I do believe there is a way for man to live. And it seems we stopped living that way around 10,000 years ago, at the time of the agricultural revolution. “Mankind was not needed to bring order to the world.” The world was already in order before man.

Dune by Frank Herbert (April 16, 2020)

This is the best sci-fi book I’ve ever read. The only other times I can remember turning pages so fast were when I was reading Harry Potter and The Belgariad.

The character development and plot were the strengths of the book. I felt the line-by-line writing lacked in some areas. This seems to be expected for a 700-page sci-fi novel.

Spoiler alert: the rest of this review includes plot details.

I felt the book was very multi-dimensional. Romance and violence, yes of course. But also deeply psychological (Paul’s prescient powers and Jessica’s Bene Gesserit training) and spiritual (the beliefs of the Fremen). It is a coming-of-age story as well as a political and military struggle for intergalactic power. Friendship, betrayal, complicated family dynamics, commerce and trade, survival in the desert, and the list goes on.

Looking back and trying to recall the book, there seemed to be two parts: before Duke Leto died and after Duke Leto died. The death of Duke Leto is not a surprise. We learn of it from foreshadowing with the Reverend Mother’s fortune-telling and the expected betrayal by Dr. Yueh. This reminds me of another thing done very well by Herbert: the foreshadowing is such that you still don’t know if the predicted events will actually come to occur, and when they do finally occur, they’re still surprising somehow.

Before Leto’s death, Paul is seen as just a boy. He is learning dukedom from his father and battle training from Hawat and Halleck. There is the prediction from the Reverend Mother that he may be the Kwisatz Haderach, but we still don’t know what this means.

After Leto’s death, the Harkonnen’s have overthrown the Atreides rule on Arrakis. Paul and Jessica flee into the desert where they earn their place among the Fremen. This is the point in the book when I began to read very fast. I found the Fremen way of life to be very interesting and I was excited for Paul to organize the Fremen military to fight the Emperor.

The ending felt rushed. I was expecting a more drawn-out and detailed battle between the Emperor’s Sardaukar and the Fremen. Also, so many main characters were killed off in the last 50 or so pages: the Baron, Hawat, Paul’s son, Feyd-Rautha.

I have heard that the sequel, Messiah, is not as good, but the third book is the best.

The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien (March 30, 2020)

Summarizing the book as simply as possible, there are five main events (spoiler alert) in the second volume of The Lord of the Rings.

(1) Boromir dies and Merry and Pippin are kidnapped.
(2) Merry and Pippin meet Treebeard and march with the Ents to destroy Isengard.
(3) The armies of Rohan battle orc armies sent by Saruman at Helm’s Deep.
(4) Frodo and Sam, guided by Smeagol, journey to Mordor.
(5) Smeagol betrays Frodo and Sam to Shelob and Frodo is captured by orcs.

As with my review of the first volume, I’ll point out a few details that you won’t see in the movies.

First, for Ents, more details on their history and more description of their nature. There is much talk of how Ents are not “hasty,” except for one younger ent, Quickbeam, who Treebeard says is more hasty than the others. Treebeard also expresses his love for Elves because they were the ones to wake up the Ents and teach them language. There is a parallelism that Ents and Elves are the good versions, and Trolls and Orcs are the evil versions.

Two, Frodo’s meeting with Faramir. Much more is revealed about Faramir’s love of Boromir, his brother. Faramir speaks understandingly of Boromir’s desire to take the ring. Boromir is seen as a great warrior in Gondor. And the history of how Boromir’s lineage came to to be the Stewards of Gondor is explained.

Three, the development of the relationship between Smeagol and Sam. Sam hates Smeagol, while Frodo keeps reminding him that, without Smeagol as their guide, they wouldn’t have made it as far as they had. In the end, Sam is right about Smeagol’s nature. After betraying them to Shelob, Frodo is stung, and Smeagol attempts to kill Sam by choking him. Sam overpowers Smeagol and intends to kill him, but Smeagol runs away before he has the chance.

Overall, I personally prefer the first volume to the second. I enjoyed the Ents and the battle at Helm’s deep, but the journey to Mordor is depressing for Frodo and Sam.

The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien (March 15, 2020)

Being a huge fan of the movies, and having watched each of them more than a dozen times, I was worried that I would be bored reading the books, particularly because none of the plot developments would come as a surprise. This fear subsided when a friend assured me that one of the best parts of reading the books was getting the finer “details” that don’t show up in the movies.

Now, having read the book, one such detail is the appearance of a character named Tom Bombadil (as well as his wife Goldberry, also called “River-daughter”). The hobbits encounter these two characters rather early in the book, when the hobbits have just left the Shire and gone into the Old Forest to escape the Dark Riders, Merry and Pippin become trapped by Old Man Willow and Tom arrives to save them. The hobbits then stay with Tom and Goldberry at their house for two nights. The hobbits then continue on their journey and are saved again by Tom when they are captured in the Barrow-downs.

In the movie, these scenes are skipped over, as the hobbits seem to go directly from the Shire to the Prancing Pony, the inn of Bree.

Another detail that I found to be much more clear in the book was the character development for both Aragorn and Boromir.

For Aragorn, you get to see his humble beginnings as “Strider,” just an unknown ranger. Later in the books, this is contrasted with the respect he is paid by other characters who realize he is Isildur’s heir and wields the sword Andúril.

For Boromir, you get to see his growing fascination with the Ring, even as Frodo still bears it. When they are floating down the river Anduin, Tolkien writes of how Boromir is watching Frodo in a weird way, and Sam notices it. This is right before Boromir attempts to take the ring from Frodo.

All in all, it is better to read the books first, if you have not yet seen the movies. There were parts where I wished I did not already know the outcome of the suspense that was building (in Moria, for example). Still, the books are well worth the read for anyone who loves fantasy fiction or just loves the movies.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey (January 19, 2020)

This has become one of my favorite books. I couldn’t put it down for the last fifty or so pages. An allegory for rising up against the system, or The Combine, as Chief Bromden calls it. Kesey reminded me of Hemingway in parts, particularly due to his repeated use of “and” in a sentence and the tendency to run on sentences without the proper punctuation during rising action where he wanted the reader to read faster. Kesey’s use of simile was consistent and vivid (e.g., “they both moved like fat cats full of warm milk, lazy in the sun”). Sometimes the simile itself would even become a run-on and Kesey would get carried away describing the run-on more so than the reality. McMurphy as a character is larger-than-life. His development throughout the book is meticulous. At first he comes busting through the doors asking for the bull goose looney. At the end, as his mission is wearing on him, he becomes tired. Chief can see it in his face. And in those last fifty pages, the rapid series of plot progressions had me exclaiming audibly. An achievement all around, from syntax and simile, to a genuinely gripping story perfectly constructed with conflict.

2001: A Space Odyssey by Arthur C. Clarke (November 12, 2019)

2001 begins with a story that is easy enough to understand, about the early origins of man as our species was learning to hunt—the odd part, which becomes the focus of this book, is exactly what caused this learning in man all those years ago. That story is then cut short as the book transitions to one particular scientist that must travel to the moon to investigate a discovery there. And then, in its third part, the narrative focuses on a journey to Saturn aboard a spaceship with five astronauts and a computer named Hal. The connection between all three stories is revealed only in the end, in a conclusion that becomes quickly very weird (in my opinion) and altogether unexplained (it seems objectively). Overall, the book is a page turner and the plot progression is nonstop. Highly recommend for all sci-fi fans.

The Rum Diary by Hunter S. Thompson (October 9, 2019)

Hunter Thompson seems to despise the working world (and salespeople especially) but at other times experiences flashes of regret (for wasting years in idleness) and jealousy for those that are experiencing the benefits of living a life that he wouldn’t ever have wanted want to live.

The novel asks for an investment on the front-end as we learn about Kemp’s new job and meet all the characters at the San Juan Daily News, and then rewards with a boisterous ending as Yeamon, Chenault, and Kemp tramp around St. Thomas island for the carnival.

Personal note: I continue to wonder how talented writers are so clear in the moment. I wonder if, in some cases, they actually have their pen and paper or typewriter with them on hand, and plop it out right in the middle of the bar while everyone is drinking. Or else, they must remember it, or make it up completely after the fact, only loosely based on memory. For me, it has been easier to sit in the moment, and let it pour in through my senses, without risk of forgetting what it is I am writing about, because it is still there pouring in. The situations that Thompson write about: dancing in the streets, driving drunk, making love on the beach—would all make it very difficult to write concurrently.

A Farewell To Arms by Ernest Hemingway (June 22, 2019)

Now alongside For Whom The Bell Tolls as my two favorite novels. A love story inside of a war story. I was struck in particular by Hemingway transitioning seamlessly into stream-of-consciousness in an almost poetic style, e.g., all and all and all. I wonder more generally about why a style like Hemingway’s is so successful. Especially from an era that also produced Fitzgerald with an almost exact opposite style in the sense of it being more verbose and grammatical, i.e., harder to read. While Hemingway writes with short common words that deliver equal or more powerful impact.

Also the ability to balance between grand plot movements (characters dying, retreating during war, traveling to the army hospital, characters meeting and falling in love and getting pregnant) and attention to smaller details (normal banter between beloveds, the qualities of an alcoholic drink, the scenery of a place). And never once are you bored as the reader. Happy to stop and read deep down into one scene and then pick up to start moving again with the grand plot.

The Chosen by Chaim Potok (May 9, 2019)

Potok uses two events that could each be described in a half-page or less and magnifies them to require the first 100 pages of the book—namely, the ball game and Reuven’s hospital visit. This allows the reader to quickly get up to speed with characters and setting in the context of two pseudo-short-stories that immediately grab your interest.

Similar to how Hesse discusses music in Gertrude or Glass Bead Game, it is curious to see the limits to which an author will go in describing a complicated system of thought that exists outside of the book itself; in The Chosen, it is the Talmud and Jewish studies, as well as Freudian psychology. I wonder if this is affected by what the author is studying in their personal life while writing the book. I also think there must be limits of complexity and dryness that cannot be surpassed lest the novel become more of an academic paper than a novel.

Also interesting to me in recent reading are relationships outside of a romantic context. In this book, Reuven’s relationship with Danny is strong friendship tested always by their cultural differences—Danny is a Hasidic Jew and Reuven, while still Jewish, comes from a less orthodox background (his father is a great scholar that challenges some of the views of orthodox Judaism). The reason non-romantic relationships are interesting is that they seem to have no release. In romantic relationships they seem to build toward sexual relations and then the relationship is permanently changed thereafter. In a platonic relationship like the one between Reuven and Danny, there is only a fierce friendly love that is exemplified by acts of loyalty, sacrifice, and compassion.

I also learned a great deal about what it must have been like to be a part of the Jewish community of America in the aftermath of World War II as news was released about the six million Jews that were killed.

Gertrude by Hermann Hesse (April 18, 2019)

I am interested in male protagonists with disabilities. In this book, Kuhn hurts his leg in a toboggan accident and becomes a cripple. I also think of Jake Barnes in Sun Also Rises and his impotence. These handicaps function as a device to let male passion grow with no climax. Their love interests and romances are longer, giving time for more description and exploration of their feelings.

Music plays a similar central role as in the Glass Bead Game. In some places I think Hesse is really talking about what it is like to be an artist that writes and talks about his theories in terms of an artist that makes music (through Kuhn).

Kuhn’s love for Gertrude is a great exploration of unrequited love. Slightly predictable that Gertrude would fall for Muoth. I almost want more exploration of this relationship, which is difficult given the book is from Kuhn’s perspective.

The success and fame that comes to Kuhn from his music is a tertiary theme.

The ending is cheap. Muoth killing himself is almost unnecessary as his depressive outlook and downward spiral is already played out. I feel like it was an easy out for Hesse to resolve the conflict in Muoth and Gertrude’s marriage, but also a good device to show how Gertrude deals with Muoth’s death and doesn’t love another man.

Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (January 7, 2019)

Schopenhauer noticed a problem with humans: “Mankind was apparently doomed to vacillate between the two extremities of distress and boredom.”

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi came up with a solution that he calls “flow.” He defines it as, “the state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter.”

When someone is bored, they must increase the challenges they are facing to get back into flow. When someone is anxious (or distressed, as Schopenhauer put it) they must increase their skills.

But even the state of flow itself is not stable. It is not long before you stop enjoying yourself if you’re doing the same thing at the same level. You become either bored or anxious and then the desire to get back into flow drives you again to either face new challenges or hone your skills.

This is immediately one of my favorite non-fiction books alongside “Think and Grow Rich” and “7 Habits for Highly Effective People.”

I’ve written more in detail about this book here:

https://www.rebalancedaily.com/goals-…

https://www.rebalancedaily.com/habits…

https://www.rebalancedaily.com/desire…

https://www.rebalancedaily.com/cultur…

For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway (January 5, 2019)

In reading Hemingway this time I remember what I have forgotten from when I read The Sun Also Rises. To start slowly and unsure of what the book possesses, but then at about halfway through the first half to be taken in completely with the plot and characters and read at breakneck speed until the end.

I am impressed by Hemingway as poet and philosopher, Spanish and war correspondent. In the scenes of making love, the poetry especially. And in the conversations with Pilar, the philosophy especially. And in the knowledge of the geography and the people, his Spanishness. And of the battle scenes, his experience from the war. For the last two, I cannot be judge, but it seems to be true, the way he says it.

Also, the stream of consciousness, especially with Robert Jordan. And the switching between first, second, and third sentence—all within one paragraph—which would confuse me from any other writer.

Foundation by Isaac Asimov (November 15, 2018)

The book is organized into five separate parts that almost feel like completely separate short stories if not for the initial plot set in motion by Hari Seldon, the mention of “Seldon crises,” and the recurring idea that history is on a set course predicted by Seldon’s psychohistory after the Foundation broke away from the decaying Galactic Empire.

The plot progression was very fast. Between each short story, several decades were skipped over. For this reason, characters are developed quickly and sometimes leave the plot abruptly. For example, the very first character you meet, Gaal Dornick, is entirely absent from the novel after the first short story.

After reading further outside the book, I learned that Asimov based the decay of the Galactic Empire on the fall of the Roman Empire. Some of the main ideas were that the “mob” of the citizenry could be motivated by a religion to revolt; international trade could be used as a vehicle for religion to spread to different nations; and that trade, even without the influence of religion, could be used to affect international relations and even deter war.

The Secret History by Donna Tartt (October 27, 2018)

Began as the coming-of-age story of Richard Papen, then of six friends at college frolicking amidst intelligence and wealth, finally a murder mystery (the mystery is given up at the beginning of the book in terms of who is killed; the mystery is more about how they did it, and there are also some surprise deaths that weren’t confessed at the beginning).

The six students study Classics under their eccentric professor Julian Morrow. There are many references to ancient languages and even use in dialogue. I wonder if Tartt is a Classics scholar herself or if she had help with the different languages in the book.

Bhagavad Gita by Vyasa (September 2, 2018)

This version of the Gita was translated by Eknath Easwaran with chapter introductions by Diana Morrison. Even though the Gita is only 700 verses, it would be difficult to sit down and read the Gita all at once. Each verse is dense and mystical and demands consideration and, appropriately, meditation. As Morrison writes in one of her introductions, “The Gita is not an academic work of philosophy, but a poetic, practical text.”

There are two ideas from the Gita that stuck with me: (1) the divine Self (Atman) that lives in every individual human being; (2) desireless action, or renunciation of the fruit of action (tyaga).

(1) Morrison describes it as, “A fragment of the Self enters the body at conception and departs at Death.” Krishna says of himself, ” … in living beings I am consciousness.” More generally, it is this idea that some piece of god resides in each of us.

Other quotes related to this:

” … the immortal Atman that dwells as the conscious ‘knower’ within all beings. Krishna has said that he is the Atman; but the paradox is that he also transcends the Atman.”

“An eternal part of me enters into the world, assuming the powers of action and perception and a mind made of prakriti. When the divine Self enters and leaves a body, it takes these along as the wind carries a scent from place to place. Using the mind, ears, eyes, nose, and the sense of taste and touch, the Self enjoys sense objects.”

(2) One of the most famous quotes from the Gita, from the 47th verse in chapter 2: “You have the right to work, but never to the fruit of work.” Other than the spiritual importance, it is very practical to go about your daily work without constant attachment to the consequences of your labor; you just keep working for the good of others, no matter what.

Another quote related to this: “It is not to avoid work, especially the duties required by his station in life, but to perform those duties without selfish attachment to their ‘fruit,’ our outcome.”

And finally, something that Easwaran included in the introduction: ” … three statements which Aldous Huxley, following Leibnitz, has called the Perennial Philosophy because they appear in every age and civilization: (1) there is an infinite, changeless reality beneath the world of change; (2) this same reality lies at the core of every human personality; (3) the purpose of life is to discover this reality experientially; that is, to realize God while here on earth.”

Island by Aldous Huxley (August 19, 2018)

This should not be a novel. It is a work of philosophy forced into character dialogue with a weak narrative frame. Island reminds me of Glass Bead Gameby Herman Hesse, in that for both Huxley and Hesse these were their last novels. Both seem to have either become jaded with their success or eager to proliferate their last ideas as, in these novels, they proffered their philosophies while paying less attention to the finer art of the narrative.

Rather than progressing the plot and developing the characters, Huxley just comes right out and tells you the themes explicitly. This book only has the appearance of a novel because Huxley puts his explicitly philosophy into dialogue. But all the other characters could have just as easily been Will Farnaby, the main character. And Will Farnaby could have just as easily been Aldous Huxley himself, talking about his own ideas.

The conflict which comes from the risk of Pala being colonized by Rendang and exploited for oil merely seems as an auxiliary plot. Same with the romances with Molly and Babs that Farnaby is only remembering in hindsight. Both the conflict and romances could support great plots, but Huxley uses them merely as afterthoughts an so they seem to be just sideshows to his main philosophical dialogue.

I did enjoy some of the philosophy, however. I liked Huxley’s idea of our purpose, to live as fully human beings. Also using psychedelic drugs (moksha-medicine) for education. His philosophies on economics and politics seemed out of place.

East of Eden by John Steinbeck (July 3, 2018)

Reading of Aron’s death shocked me. I had to stand up and look out the window and take a deep breath. Is it because I felt like I knew Aron and his family? Because I understood the love that Abra had for Aron and how in the end she loved Cal, his brother, who killed Aron by showing him that their mother was a whore, out of anger for his father Adam rejecting his gift of fifteen thousand dollars and saying it was not as good as the pride he had for Aron. Could Steinbeck have achieved this with a novel less than six hundred pages? What if he did not tell the story of Adam and Charles as young sons of Cyrus? Maybe I am not familiar enough with Genesis to understand the biblical importance of each family member and each generation. For example, what was the importance of Sam Hamilton’s family? Why did we need to know so much about the lives of his children?

Steinbeck’s great strengths are his characterization and plot progression. The plot progression is fueled by consistent exciting events: death, crime, love, sickness, money, stealing. It becomes a page-turner because you care about the characters and they are always caught in something serious. Someone is always dying. This makes me think the most epic novel is base. The novelist who wishes to be popular appeals to the sex and survival drives. We care about the characters as we do for ourselves and our friends and our enemies. And it is the poignant and loud events like death and danger and sex and birth that make for a good story.

I wonder also about Steinbeck’s choice of a narrator, the son of one of Sam Hamilton’s daughters. What is the advantage of this narrator as opposed to an omniscient and unnamed narrator. What is the advantage of having the narrator as a part of the story? Even as part of the story, the narrator still oversteps his bounds by writing the consciousness thoughts of the other characters. Even if he knew Lee and met him in real-life, how could he claim to know Lee’s private and internal thoughts?

Overall, it is a long story of life as it actually was in Salinas Valley, California before and during World War I, told at about the same pace as life actually goes on and in places that actually exist.

Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury (May 28, 2018)

This book is a collection of Bradbury’s essays written in various years. Though each essay certainly focuses on the topic of writing generally, the theme that weaves all of the essays into a cohesive whole is vague at best. The book succeeds in the sense that it covers ideas on writing from one of the most successful writers in modern history. Bradbury writes, “I speak of all these things only because they have worked for me for fifty years. And I think they might work for you too.” The book fails in that it seems to have been forced to become a “book.” The essays make sense standing alone and seem to have been written for other purposes. As for the title, I was dubious that the book would really have anything to do with “Zen,” unless Bradbury were a Buddhist and I hadn’t known about it. Sure enough, at the end of the book, Bradbury writes, “I selected the above title, quite obviously, for its shock value.” I resent that. Nonetheless, the book contains truisms and great motivation for writers. I have two takeaways. One, to set a goal of writing 1,000 words per day. Two, “notoriety and a fat bank balance must come after everything else is finished and done.”

Drive by Dan Pink (May 25, 2018)

Dan Pink argues that our methods for motivating (primarily in the workplace, but also in the gym, at school, at home, etc.) are in need of an update. In the beginning, there was Motivation 1.0: we were just trying to survive. In recent history we’ve used a method of “carrots and sticks,” i.e., rewards and punishments (which Pink calls Motivation 2.0). Motivation 2.0 caters to our biological needs and assumes that external motivators (pay and promotions mostly) will encourage us to work longer and better, according to a formula where X input of external rewards equals Y output of work, and just as long as you increase X, Y will increase too.

The real crux of the book hinges where Pink cites studies which suggest that external “if-then” Motivation 2.0 rewards can actually snuff out some of our naturally good work habits like creativity and desire to do the right thing and replace these with short-term addictions and unethical behavior. Some extreme cases show that if people are rewarded more or paid more, in some cases, they will actually perform worse.

Pink recommends what he calls Motivation 3.0, which is based on three pillars of “internal” motivation. (1) Autonomy—the desire to direct our own lives. (2) Mastery—the urge to get better at something that matters. (3) Purpose—the yearning to do something in the service of something larger than ourselves.

Side note: I believe the recent emphasis on purpose, both in this book and elsewhere in culture, has set us on the horizon of a very interesting philosophical era, where we must answer many hairy questions if we are to treat seriously the question—what is our purpose?—which so many more have been asking in recent generations as the world advances and comes upon an unprecedented intellectual age.

On The Road by Jack Kerouac (May 7, 2018)

A real-life novel like this one (or “Sun Also Rises,” for example) has the normal ups and downs of a non-fiction life, whereas a true fiction novel has a carefully (and artificially) created plot with action that rises up like a drug high to a climax and then falls down gracefully and perfectly to a conclusion; it is easier and more entertaining to read the artificial novel. Kerouac tells it how it is. This makes “On the Road” difficult to read in some parts, because it is real life narrated in stream-of-consciousness, not a fantasy story told in deliberate and calculated prose. However, the dull moments are rare, given the wild and extreme adventures of Dean Moriarty and Sal Paradise, which supposedly actually happened.

As far as writing style, Kerouac ends long and story-telling paragraphs with short concluding sentences. He also has a knack for interspersing perfectly poetic existential comments in the middle of plain and simple narrative. His biggest strength, characterization—an ability to introduce all sorts of different characters and make them come to life for the reader.

A few of my favorite quotes:

“I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one falling star to another till I drop.”

“The time has come to decide what you are and what you’re going to do.”

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline (April 18, 2018)

I forgot how much fun it is to read a really good adventure novel. Reading this book reminded me of reading the Harry Potter series when I would stay up all night with a flashlight under my covers. The idea of the OASIS (a virtual reality world on the Internet that replaces real life in many ways) was what initially attracted me to the book, for its obvious implications for the present day. What I wasn’t expecting was to inhale the book in three sitting.

The strength of this book is the imagination and the story. There were parts when I questioned the grammar or word choice, but any small imperfections in no way detracted from my excitement about the plot progression. This actually made me think about the interplay within a novel between the artistry of each word/sentence/paragraph versus the progress and rhythm of the story as a whole. To me, it’s like drinking wine. If I’m only going to have one glass, I want some more interesting notes, maybe something I haven’t experienced before, or maybe even something a little uncomfortable. If I’m going to drink a whole bottle, however, the main quality I want in my wine, as my friend who loves wine would say, is that it be “drinkable.” And I think this is very similar for the diction and syntax in novels. If it’s a short artisan novel, I want some big words and beautiful sentences. If it’s an adventure epic, then the main quality I want in my words and sentences is that they be “readable.”

The book’s content is inundated with 1980’s pop culture and its language is influenced by modern slang. I was wondering if this makes the book necessarily modern, i.e., non-classic.

My favorite quote: “It occurred to me then that for the first time in as long as I could remember, I had absolutely no desire to log back into the OASIS.”

Way of the Wolf by Jordan Belfort (April 16, 2018)

This book contains three kinds of content: One, Belfort telling stories about his days at Stratton Oakmont and teaching the “Strattonites” to be sales gods. Two, Belfort trying to sell other products like BoomBoom (an energy smelling inhaler thing) and of course his own in-home and online sales trainings. Three, Belfort’s language and tonality in sales encounters.

While reading the book, I mostly skipped (or at least skim read) anything in categories One and Two about Belfort’s glory days or his sponsored products. For example, Chapters 5 and 6 are a complete digression from the main body of the book, at the end of which Belfort includes a link to the BoomBoom product. So obvious was the digression even to Belfort himself that Chapter 7 begins with, “Let’s pick up right where we left off in Chapter 4.”

However, I did find there was some good content in category Three about Belfort’s language and tonality. For me personally, the most helpful bits were about (1) Opening and (2) Looping.

Belfort’s main tip for opening the phone call is to keep things informal and friendly. Being too formal comes off as “salesy.” He writes, “A salesperson should never address their prospect in an overly formal manner; instead, the salesperson should address the prospect in the way they would respectfully address a friend.”

“Looping” is the secret to the back half of the sale, i.e., after you’ve asked for the order for the first time and gotten your first objection. He writes, “The sale doesn’t truly begin until after your prospect hits you with the first objection.”

It’s the goal of Belfort’s “Straight Line System” to get the prospect to a ten on each one of “The Three Tens,” in which case the prospect will almost definitely buy (assuming away certain contingencies like high action threshold, etcetera).

The Three Tens (a “ten” represents absolute certainty in the prospect) are as follows: (1) Product; (2) You; (3) Company.

For my personal sales strategy, Belfort’s advice on Opening and Looping were the most successful to increase my prospects’ Three Tens.

This book was a decent read, but because of categories One or Two that I mentioned above, I probably wouldn’t recommend this book as #1 for a salesperson trying to improve their skills.

Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw (March 19, 2018)

In Act I, I was pleasantly surprised to find that “The Gentleman” and “The Note Taker” turn out to be Colonel Pickering and Professor Higgins, while the flower girl of course turns out to be Eliza Doolittle.

Shaw does great work in a short amount of time to develop a few main characters with one, clear storyline, such that the first half of the play is mostly entertainment with which the reader/viewer is more than happy to follow along, and in the second half, the story line is sufficiently robust to support Shaw’s philosophical arguments in Acts IV and V after Doolittle has won the bet for Professor Higgins and successfully passed as a duchess at a high society party and opera.

In my readings about the play before I had actually read it for myself, the main theme seemed to be a satire of the British class system, but in my own reading, of Act V especially, I found Shaw’s arguments, spoken mostly through Higgins, to be of love and the conditions under which a man and a woman will marry, especially in regard to their social and economic statuses.

Overall, a succinct and highly intellectual story that I enjoyed.

The Awakening by Kate Chopin:

The strength of this novel, for me, is the interplay between Chopin’s third-person omniscient point of view and the dialogue between characters, which allows the reader to experience both what the characters are actually thinking and feeling and how that plays out in their relationships. Edna’s character development and the conflict of her romances provided my desire to keep turning the pages. iIn the beginning, she seemed to merely float along in her high society. In the end, Edna takes control of her own lifestyle (independent of Mr. Pontellier) and even engages in other loves—first with Robert on the Grand Isle, then temporarily with Arobin, and then with Robert again when he returns to New Orleans. I do wonder about the power of a romantic story to carry the weight of a whole novel, even if the other characters are uninteresting and the rest of the plot is boring.

Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes:

Incredible! My new favorite novel (third only to Brave New World and The Fountainhead). The strength of this novel is the idea for the story: a retarded adult is made into a genius by a scientific operation. The scientific operation, as a device similar to the pill in the movie Limitless, opens up a rich narrative for insights into the theme of human intelligence and its effect on a person’s relationships and interactions with the world, and even what it means to be “human.”

Keyes perfectly illumines Charlie’s point of view from the inside by writing the book as first-person journal entries from Charlie (with misspellings and grammar mistakes before the operation, and high academic language and pedantry after). Especially interesting is that Charlie gains access to the world of romantic love (with Fay, the artist, and Alice, his former teacher) only after he has gained intelligence; and both these loves fade after he loses his intelligence.

Another brilliant device is the foreshadowing of Charlie’s fate with Algernon’s degenerative behavior. Also the political messages cannot be overlooked, concerning how we view mentally disabled persons. Charlie’s mom is ashamed of him and his disability; the state home for mentally disabled persons is overflowing and receives minimal attention from the outside world; Charlie even mentions (after the operation) that he preferred his life before he gained intelligence because at least he had true friends then.

Mindfulness in Plain English by Henepola Gunaratana:

Would absolutely recommend this book to anybody that meditates regularly or wants to start meditating. The beauty of this text, as compared to other Eastern texts on meditation, mindfulness, Buddhism, etc. (The Dhammapada, for example) is that everything is spelled out in very plain, practical and easy to understand language, as opposed to metaphors, analogies, and poetic language as with ancient texts. I personally found that reading one chapter from this book each night before I began my meditation drastically improved my session, especially because I had a specific and actionable part of my meditation to focus on from the chapter that I had read.

For readers looking for instruction on a particular system of meditation, this book focuses exclusively on the vipassana system of meditation.

Orthodoxy by G.K. Chesterton:

Chesterton is undoubtedly witty. I do wonder if some clearness (and effective point-making) is sacrificed to his verbosity; or maybe I am just not intelligent enough to see the good arguments in his metaphors. On the syntactical level, Chesterton particularly enjoys parallelism, sometimes musical at the cost of a more well-explained point. Even if Chesterton were to keep each sentence paralleled (or otherwise poetic), he could offer further explanation in the next few sentences in a form that is easier to read. When he remains poetic on topics that require scientific exactitude, he must not continue his line of argument expecting that the reader is convinced merely by dictional wit.

This book is primarily a framework argument—“framework,” in the sense that Chesterton wants to switch the whole grounds on which we debate Christianity, rather than engage each of the classic arguments in turn. Though he does entertain and respond to arguments from rationalists in the “ordinary arena,” these responses are not the success of the book. In order for these responses to comprise an effective defense of Christianity, Chesterton would need to respond to “all” the arguments, but he does not; instead, he responds to a few where they conveniently present themselves along his somewhat chaotic line of thought.

I am not impressed by Chesterton’s disdain for Nietzsche. Given this book’s duality, e.g., “joy” and “grief,” and its concern with “opposites,” I am not convinced that Chesterton understands the anti-dualist framework that is so essential to Nietzschean (and Eastern) thought. Admittedly, I have not read any more Chesterton than this one book and am not sure if he displays such understanding elsewhere.

Sex at Dawn by Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jethá:

“Sex at Dawn” argues against the “standard narrative” of human sexuality—he looks for signs of youth, fertility, health (many childbearing years) and she looks for wealth, social status, health (parental investment), and assuming there’s a match they mate and form a long-term monogamous pair bond.

The authors argue against the standard narrative with evidence from our closely related primates (bonobos), hunter-gatherer communities, human physiology (testicle size, penis shape, breast size, female coloring), and modern marital problems.

As with any “pop” academic book that presents what should be in-depth academic issues to the general reading public, matters that are still continuously debated are presented with the bias of one (or in this case, two) authors.

The book undoubtedly succeeds in expanding the reader’s view of human sexuality; however, the book is too broad and all-encompassing in its argument to deliver academic certainty or conclusivity on any one issue.

An Enemy of the People by Henrik Ibsen:

The entire play is a platform for Dr. Stockmann’s monologue at a town meeting in Act IV, the theme of which is that the intelligent minority knows better than the common majority, and the leadership and policies of society should be organized accordingly. It is this monologue which inspires the townspeople to name the doctor “an enemy of the people.” The play is so short that its narrative falters under the philosophical weight of the opinions that Ibsen speaks through Dr. Stockmann, and may have been better written as a well-argued academic piece.

Candide by Voltaire:

The introduction of the book explains that “Candide” is one of the “Contes philosophiques,” a narrative form which often utilizes an imaginary trip. The main character Candide grows up in the home of Baron Thunder-ten-tronckh in Westphalia. Candide kisses Cunégonde, the Baron’s daughter, after dinner one evening and is kicked out of the Baron’s home. So begins his travels and his experience of an array of misfortune including natural disaster, war, rape, tyranny, punishment and much death. All this tragedy is meant to critique the view of philosopher Leibniz that God is good and so he created the best of all possible worlds. In the end, Candide tells his philosopher mentor Pangloss, “That’s very well said and may all be true, but let’s cultivate our garden.”The work as a novel often yields to its satire; without knowledge of European history which Voltaire is satirizing or the optimist philosophy embodied by Pangloss, the book seems to be a senseless and relentless tragedy.

The Communist Manifesto by Marx and Engels:

In the preface by Engels, he describes the Manifesto as “a complete theoretical and practical party program.” It is certainly practical and action oriented, especially in its call for the working class proletarians to unit and revolt. Though it is lacking in theory. In section II, Marx and Engels write, “The charges against Communism made from a religious, a philosophical, and, generally, from an ideological standpoint, are not deserving of serious examination.” Such a sweeping dismissive claim has no place in comprehensive political theory. Then again, this work does seem, in certain sections, to be more of a “political pamphlet,” written for working class readers. As an aside: I wonder how Marx and Engels would respond to the Rawlsian difference principle as it concerns the division of capital between bourgeoisie and proletariat.

Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller:

Miller does an excellent job of building a whole plot using mostly only dialogue between four characters in a living room. His most successful device is flashback to explain and build importance for what is happening in the present story. The themes of business, sales and the American dream take a backseat to family, love and identity. The central story being the relationship between Willy and Biff to which Linda and Happy are close secondary characters.Willy never truly knows himself; he derives his self-worth from the opinions of others and identifies with his work as a salesman, and then identifies with his boys Biff and Happy (Biff especially). Willy is most happy as Biff is the star of the football team and plays a game at Ebbets Field in front of thousands. The downfall begins (spoiler alert) as Biff flunks out of math (despite the efforts of Bernard to help him cheat) and then in desperation drives to meet Willy on his business trip to find that Willy is cheating with The Woman. Biff no longer sees Willy as a good man, and seems to lose his desire to impress him—which becomes a vicious circle as Willy derives a great part of his identity from his boys’ success. In the end, Biff struggles to define himself apart from his father’s expectations and Willy considers suicide as a final heroic act.

The Dhammapada by Buddha:

I read The Dhammapada as an introduction to Buddhism. It is a much more poetic and metaphorical writing than Western philosophy and religious texts. My biggest takeaway was the Four Noble Truths: of suffering, of the origin of suffering, of the cessation of suffering, and the way leading to the cessation of suffering (which is the Noble Eightfold Path). Buddha put great emphasis on meditation, especially to “rise out of” selfishness and duality (pleasure and pain, for example)—this, however, seems to place Buddhism in a very tight niche with regards to humanism and asceticism, depending on how we define a human in relation to the self and how Buddhists should regard their human bodies as they pursue a higher consciousness. For further study on Buddhism, I want to read the Pali Canon.

The Seventh Sense by Joshua Cooper Ramo:

Beginning and end were my favorite parts. Could websites and social media be new states? Could our geographical location become less important than our virtual location? Are technocrats our future leaders as the masters of networks? Will technology lead to the first true meritocracy? Who are the hard gatekeepers of the US: government or corporations? The author seems to have a bias that the US be in control of this new network power. I see it much more likely to be owned by corporations.

The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway:

Brilliant to see a plot without a token love story, violence, etc. Just an old man and a big fish.

Nausea by Jean-Paul Sartre:

The book achieves what it seems to have set out to but still must be nightmarish for the majority of the public. Pages 122 to 135 are essentially Sartre’s metaphysics. I was surprised to find that the final few pages end on a joyful note after a whole book of sickness from existence.

Naive. Super by Erlend Loe:

Short sentences and long lists, even some photocopied pages of search results at a library computer. This is a pleasant read, with the existential angst wrapped nicely in an easy-enough narrative. One of my favorite parts was symbolism with two children’s toys: a red ball and hammer-and-peg. The key to happiness might be bouncing a red ball against a wall, or just hammering.

When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi:

On the last page, Paul writes a short message to his infant daughter Cady—reading this, is when I started to cry. And thereafter begins an epilogue written by Paul’s wife Lucy—throughout the whole of which, I continued to cry. When I finished the book, I felt like I lost a friend.The book derives its rarity and success directly from a certain duality in its author—Paul was passionate about and successful in not only the science of the human body and mind, but also the less tangible human-ness contained in literature. He graduated Stanford with a BA and MA in English literature and a BA in human biology. He then earned his MPhil in history and plhilosophy of science and medicine from Cambridge before beginning his career as a neurosurgeon-neuroscientist. These two interests—neurosurgery and literature—continued to compete for attention for Paul’s mind, especially in his last couple years. Paul found existential meaning in this competition, even beyond his own life:

“We build scientific theories to organize and manipulate the world, to reduce phenomena into manageable units. Science is based on reproducibility and manufactured objectivity. As strong as that makes its ability to generate claims about matter and energy, it also makes scientific knowledge inapplicable to the existential, visceral nature of human life, which is unique and subjective and unpredictable. Science may provide the most useful way to organize empirical, reproducible data, but its power to do so is predicated on its inability to grasp the most central aspects of human life: hope, fear, love, hate, beauty, envy, honor, weakness, striving, suffering, virtue. Between these core passions and scientific theory there will always be a gap. No system of thought can contain the fullness of human experience.”

Through death, Paul gives us a great glimpse at life, pinched between biological processes and intangible passions. Ultimately, he achieves what he wrote in an email to his best friend Robin: “It’s just tragic enough and just imaginable enough. [The reader] can get into these shoes, walk a bit, and say, ‘So that’s what it looks like from here … sooner or later, I’ll be back in my own shoes.’ That’s what I’m aiming for, I think. Not the sensationalism of dying, and not exhortation to gather rosebuds, but: Here’s what lies up ahead on the road.”

Walden by Henry David Thoreau:

Instantly one of my favorite books. As reward for drudging through river depth measurements and cabin construction budgeting, Thoreau rewards his readers with such beautiful poetry written in original English, let alone the pure philosophical genius of his ideas. A simple but brilliant quote: “We can never have enough of nature.”

The Catcher in the Rye:

Most impressive to me is Salinger’s ability to move Holden’s consciousness back and forth between experiencing the present (and thus progressing the plot), thinking more abstractly on his opinions/beliefs about the present, and flashing back and forth to give back story and wider context to the narrative. The whole novel flows seamlessly this way to engage all readers: the plot reader, the theme reader, the entertainment reader.

How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie:

The entire message of this book could be summed up in one or two pages. Carnegie organizes the work into roughly 30 principles (e.g., smile, be a good listener, be sympathetic, begin with praise). Almost all the principles are simple and seemingly obvious. Each chapter is essentially a repetition of each principle interspersed with anecdotes. However, the full book is still worth a read because the repetition and anecdotes help to commit the principles to memory. This is not a book of new and original ideas but one for remembering things we forget. The principles draw their truth from the consistent patterns of human nature. If your social life is important to you, this book is a must read.

The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Vincent Peale:

This book is self-help. Its structure is very similar to Carnegie’s How to Win Friends: suggested techniques repeated over and over gain interspersed with anecdotes that prove the success of their application. The main idea of this book can be summed up as follows: “our physical condition is determined by very largely by our emotional condition, and our emotional life is profoundly regulated by our thought life.” While Peale does not always refer to the intermediary as emotion, he repeats again and again the connection between the physical and the mental.My only qualm is that Peale injects much of his Christian beliefs without as much evidence as he uses to argue for the psychosomatic connection. However, this does not necessarily harm the reader’s experience as it is very easy to replace Christian terminology with your preferred spirituality and the principles still make sense.

One last quote from the book that I think is worth repeating:

“As you read these words you may say, ‘There is nothing new in that.’ Indeed, there is something new in it if you have never tried it. When you start to practice it you will find it the newest, freshest, most astonishing method of happy and successful living you have ever used. What is the value of knowing these principles all your life if you have never made use of them?”

For me, reading self-help is a practical meditation—an opportunity to build habitual mental frameworks out of ideas that I may already have known but not yet employed.

Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari:

This is the most educational book I’ve ever read that’s not a textbook. Harari strikes a brilliant balance between entertaining readability and dense facts from a myriad of disciplines (economics, biology, anthropology, chemistry, physics — all within a framework of history). This is a must read for anyone even slightly interested in where we as a species come from, and where we’re going.

Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut Jr:

To me, Vonnegut is most successful in this novel by his use of devices. The Tralfamadorians are an excellent device to look at humanity from an objective “alien” point of view. And time travel is another great device to leverage all the nostalgia, hope, etc. of looking back and forth in time—interesting that this ability breeds apathy in Billy Pilgrim. Overall, a fantastic, readable and entertaining novel.

Milk and Honey by Rupi Kaur:

A short 30-minute read. One of the achievements of this book is the design and the simple sketch illustrations that complement the text very well. I do wonder sometimes about the shock value of works that contain a certain frequency of content that is erotic, emotional, etc. But then again it takes incredible skill to write eloquently on these topics.

The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway:

The central theme is an unfulfilled love between Jake Barnes and Lady Brett Ashley; unfulfilled due to Jake’s impotence and made tragic by Lady Ashley’s affairs with several other men including royalty, a writer and a bull fighter in Spain. Hemingway begins the book with a description of Robert Cohn’s boxing ability—a curious decision given Cohn is a minor character and his boxing ability is seemingly irrelevant. That is, until the end of the book (spoiler alert) when Cohn knocks out Jake, Bill and the bull fighter Pedro Romero—with whom Lady Ashley is having an affair. Generally the story is characterized by drinking and parties, though Jake and Bill’s fishing trip in Spain is the one exception, which allows Hemingway to show his command of brilliant prose describing calm nature without the shock value of partying youth in big cities. Finally, as compared to Old Man and the Sea, Hemingway’s sentences are much longer in Sun Also Rises, and his diction much more liberal.

The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran:

This work is primarily poetic philosophy, though Gibran frames the work within a narrative as Almustafa prophesies to the people of Orphalese—in this way, “The Prophet” reminds me of Nietzsche’s “Thus Spake Zarathustra.” My question then: can this kind of poetic philosophy stand alone—that is, without a frame narrative—and still maintain the reader’s interest throughout? I don’t think so; or at least, it would take a more determined and intellectual reader—two qualities which readers of Gibran (and Nietzsche) surely already possess to some degree. All that aside, the brilliance of this piece for me are the individual sentences and poems, of which this piece is merely a culmination, though not necessarily so. Through metaphor especially, Gibran is able to unlock great truths, without employing pedantry, and all while maintaining the flow of a musical poetry.(less)

This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald:

A brilliant coming-of-age story that provides a strong frame for deep discussion in politics, social classes, education, youth and love. Certain literary discussions take place at an esoteric level which risk alienating readers presumably otherwise entertained by plot. At least half of the content takes place in protagonist Amory’s own mind, while at least another quarter of the remaining half of interaction with his external environment is discussion with others that serve merely as foils to further characterize Amory. Appropriately so, as the novel ends with Amory saying, “I know myself.”Most interesting is Fitzgerald’s style: succeeding wonderfully in writing all the beauty and music of poetry into the structure and progress of prose. Even oscillating explicitly between plain character dialogue written like a screenplay and traditional poetry written in verse, with borderline-pedantic prose serving as a baseline.

And oh, what a social commentary at the end! Amory turns out, to his own surprise, to be such a Socialist.

Instantly one of my favorite books.

The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka:

A short novella in which Gregor Samsa awakes one morning and has become a giant bug. The story is absurd, but calmly so. Except for brief initial surprise, Gregor’s family, maids and house guests seem to accept as relatively reasonable that a grown human man has transformed into a bug. Gregor himself is very blasé—in a manner similar to Meursault in Camus’ “The Stranger.” Ultimately, the transformation from man to bug is a device. The question: what is Kafka trying to convey with the device? In the context of the story, themes of family relationships, patriarchal roles, and impoverished socioeconomic status—all receive light from the transformation. More meta, the transformation shows what it means to be human, especially as Gregor is still assumed to belong to the family, yet loses his human needs and abilities, and so eventually (spoiler alert), as decided by his family members, he must go, but then dies anyhow.