Ten books, countless lessons

Welcome to Change, Logged, a bi-weekly newsletter offering 5 minutes of honest thoughts about life, design, and everything in between.

Last week, two of my close friends shared The Guardian’s list of the 100 Best Novels of All Time. They then asked a number of writers for their top ten works of fiction, including Matt Haig, author of bestseller The Midnight Library.

Around the same time, I had just completed reading 200 books since I started this hobby in February last year. It got me thinking about the books that have stayed with me the most. Not necessarily the “best”, but the ones that have lingered. So here are my ten favourite books I’ve read so far, and what they taught me.

Paris is a city that inspires you to walk, and walk I do, everyday, without direction, just taking in the city. Getting lost in it.

I read this while staying in a small boutique hotel in Paris for five days. It’s a quiet, undramatic book, but still surprisingly page-turning. Reading it in the city itself made it more vivid. Walking through cafés and streets, I felt like a flâneur, noticing waiters in motion everywhere, as if the book and real life were subtly overlapping. It taught me to notice the beauty in the everyday details you would usually overlook.

Perhaps if I can learn to see with my body, I can rest my eyes.

A recent purchase and an instant favourite, Emily Haworth-Booth’s “H notes” and shared lessons from her teacher offered a new perspective on habits I had become used to and how easily they can go unquestioned. Fresh perspectives can still make a difference, even in something you’ve been doing for a long time.

Repairs are more than examples of frugality, they are a way of letting your clothes know how much you respect them. A repair is beautiful, like a scar. Its presence enhances rather than diminishes.

Some books are cosy, like good meals, best enjoyed slowly and fully. This reminded me of the importance of slowing down, doing nothing, and simply living in the moment. Without pressure or rush, you can become fully absorbed in something and lose track of time in the best way possible, like a gentle, lingering hug.

No matter how mundane some action might appear, keep at it long enough and it becomes a contemplative, even meditative act.

This was a personal one that made me reflect on my own (short-lived) running journey in 5 Things I learnt from Running. Murakami’s book is a perfect reflection of running itself: simple, steady, continuous, and with nothing especially dramatic happening, yet you keep going. In the same way, you keep reading to the end, just like running itself.

Simplicity is in a hurry. It wants to cut to the chase and concentrate on the important stuff.

I discovered the power of true simplicity, the secret behind Apple’s products, and how it reshaped my approach to problems and solutions. When in doubt, minimise.

There is poetry in menus. They can transport you to the Breton coast, or to a Saturday night in Manhattan, they are short stories.

A book recommended by a fellow foodie friend, which I happened to stumble across as a last signed copy in a bookshop. The essays offered a new perspective on food, showing it as more than just what is served on a plate, but something that extends to pleasure, hospitality, and the shared experience of sitting at a table with others.

Although poetic in many ways, we now know the first part of the embryo to develop in the womb is the end, or arsehole. Basically you were once just an arsehole. Some people never change.

The first book I read about animals as I began my weekly riding lessons, it offered a new lens through which to see things, and showed how inspiration can come from the most unexpected places.

White moves in the opposite direction of chaos; it is the singular image that emerges from disorder.

A first design-focused book that changed how I think about emptiness and white as both colour and non-colour, and the philosophy behind that duality in design and life. It made me see white space differently, not as absence, but as something intentional.

We‘re three-dimensional beings, let’s not get our feelings hurt by silly one dimensional words.

I came across this while riding every week, at the same time I was immersed in the chaotic world of AI that has swept through the tech industry almost overnight. It felt like a timely reminder to stay human in the age of AI.

There’s a tension created by overlapping spaces; the takeaway counter space is both a place of connection and isolation, home and work, playground and business.

My first book of this kind, it sent me down a rabbit hole of similar stories about growing up in Asian families and strong food culture. The recipes after each chapter were an added bonus, with the book doubling up as a cookbook.

So that’s my top ten so far. What about you? What books would make your list of favourites?