Reading List

Updated July 8th, 2025.

• Currently reading: Blood Meridian, Cormac McCarthy; The Fall of Hyperion, Dan Simmons

• On the reading shelf: The Beginning of Infinity, David Deutsch; Gödel, Escher, Bach, Douglas Hofstadter; The Glass Bead Game, Hermann Hesse; The Culture Code, Daniel Coyle; Why Greatness Cannot be Planned, Joel Lehman and Kenneth Stanley.

• On the visual media shelf: Her, Arrival, Pantheon, FMA: Brotherhood.

• Main genres: science fiction, fantasy, personal growth, cognitive science, leadership.

  • I once made a Powerpoint presentation on all the sci-fi that I’ve read. If that sounds like your thing, you can check out the slides here.

• I will typically read the first chapter (or few chapters). If I'm hooked, the book will be read in a few days. If I'm not hooked, the book will meander until it's either read or forgotten about.

  • I use the Kindle app on my phone mostly for convenience. Hot take: I actually prefer it to paper books.

• I should probably offload this to a Goodreads account at some point.

• Hyperion, Dan Simmons. 6 mini-stories wrapped into one narrative. 2 of those stories were very good. 1 of those stories was kinda meh. Rest were fine.

• Severance (TV series). This was such a fun and mind-bending concept, plenty of parellels to whatever you want it to parallel to. I think the satire got overly weighty in the second season, but such is the way of television. Time to wait another decade for the next 8 episodes.

• Wind and Truth, Brandon Sanderson. This was a weaker one in the series for me, although there were some redeeming scenes and moments. But Brandon, seriously, bring your old editor out of retirement.

• Ender's Shadow, Orson Scott Card. It's fun to read this after Ender's Game. And man, I love Bean.

  • Shadow of the Hegemon, Orson Scott Card. If I recall this theme of grand-scale strategy is what motivated Card to write sci-fi. It really shines here and continues like that throughout the series.

  • Shadow Puppets, Orson Scott Card. Nothing much to say here, continues the last book well!

  • Shadow of the Giant, Orson Scott Card. Ditto above.

  • Shadows in Flight, Orson Scott Card. A fun, shorter, more epilogue-like story with an ending that nearly made me cry.

• Elon Musk, Walter Isaacson. Ambitious, inspirational, cautionary, astounding, and uncomfortable.

• No Longer Human, Osamu Dazai. It took me maybe a year, half a year to read this? I forget why I picked this up in the first place. Mostly forgettable, but it had its moments.

• Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, Eliezer Yudkowsky. I remember I tried reading this maybe 2 years ago and couldn't get past the first few chapters. Well, it came up in conversation again and I ended up reading it through. I liked it!

• Going Infinite, Michael Lewis. People will just do anything. Wish the author had delayed publication until the trial results, but still a good read.

• Ender's Game, Orson Scott Card. I thought this was a good read. I've had the ending spoiled (just because it's old and famous), which probably dampened it for me. But it was very good!

  • Speaker for the Dead, Orson Scott Card. Thought this was much better than Ender's Game -- though maybe this is just because I wasn't spoiled this time. I loved the character interaction. The plot was well-paced and imaginative.

  • Xenocide, Orson Scott Card. Blazed through this. Really good.

  • Children of the Mind, Orson Scott Card. A fitting finale to the trilogy.

  • Ender in Exile, Orson Scott Card. I was kinda burned out on Ender as I was reading this, so I finished maybe 90% of it.

• HBR's 10 Must Reads on Managing Yourself, Harvard Business Review. Easy to read lessons. As is always the case, it's difficult to implement.

• Nineteen Ways of Looking at Consciousness, Patrick House. Shelved for now -- not what I expected, but I do want to come back to this at some point.

• Feeling Good, David Burns. Slightly outdated but still very useful. Would recommend.

• Dune Messiah, Frank Herbert. Finally picked this one up again!

  • Children of Dune, Frank Herbert. The twins are my favorite characters.

  • God Emperor of Dune, Frank Herbert. This was a weaker read for me. Setting the series aside for now.

• No Fears, No Excuses, Larry Smith. Very good read. Now comes the hard part: acting on it.

• How Minds Change, David McRaney. Pretty good, felt a bit too long. Definitely some stuff here that I could practice more.

• The 48 Laws of Power, Robert Greene. Not really digging this one. Shelved.

• Paul Graham's Blog. Very good reads.

• Neel Nanda's Blog. Very good reads. Learned a lot here. Still going through the posts.

• The Beginning of Infinity, David Deutsch. I see a lot of people recommending this but it doesn't seem to be saying anything yet. Shelved for now.

• The Pathless Path, Paul Millerd. Very good short read. Lots of lessons to be learned here. Interesting to contrast with other perspectives.

• Superforecasting, Philip E. Tetlock & Dan Gardner. Pretty good read.

• The Kindness Method, Shahroo Izadi. 10/10. Strongly influenced my thinking.

• Children of Time, Adrian Tchaikovsky. 10/10. On par with Three Body Problem.

  • Children of Ruin, Adrian Tchaikovsky. 9/10.

• Thinking In Systems, Donella Meadows. Another book that many recommend but doesn't seem to be saying anything. Will pick this up later. Shelved for now.

• The Righteous Mind, Jonathan Haidt. Pretty good read.

• What's Our Problem?, Tim Urban. Pretty good read.

2022

• Doing Good Better, Will MacAskill. Very good read.

• Never Finished, David Goggins. Very good read. "I know that atmospheric line between blue and black."

• Stories of Your Life and Others, Ted Chiang. 10/10. Chiang is so good.

• I'm Glad My Mom Died, Jennette McCurdy. An interesting life story. I'm grateful that I can't relate to much of it.

• The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro. Very good read.

• So Good They Can't Ignore You, Cal Newport. Pretty good read. Very useful framing.

• Exhalation: Stories, Ted Chiang. 10/10 for everything... except The Lifecycle of Software Objects. I might be too young to get that one, though.

• Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson. Fun read.

• The Stormlight Archive (1-4), Brandon Sanderson. Very good reads. Sanderson's solid. Love his universe.

• Elantris, Brandon Sanderson. Thought this was weaker but still fun.

• Warbreaker, Brandon Sanderson. This one's great. Still waiting for the sequel.

• The Expanse (series), James S. A. Corey. The characters, world-building, and plot are just off the charts. This has become my comfort series. I've read from Book 1 through Book 9 at least four times.

• Time Management for Mortals, Oliver Burkeman. A wiser lens to view life through.

• The Three Body Problem (series), Cixin Liu. 10/10. A series that ramps up without feeling too fast.

• Foundation (series), Isaac Asmiov. Really good reads. Fun to contrast with modern sci-fi.

• The Murderbot Diaries (series), Martha Wells. Fun reads.

• The Happiness Hypothesis, Jonathan Haidt. Really good read. Influential to my thinking.

• The Almanack of Naval Ravikant, Naval Ravikant (compiled by: Eric Jorgenson). Very good reads. One that I'll have to keep coming back to.

• The Wheel of Time (1-4), Robert Jordan. Fun at first. Then I lost interest. Shelved.

• Skin in the Game, Nassim Nicholas Taleb. It's difficult to read. I'll read again when I have more patience... or when I'm smarter. Shelved.

• Cal Newport's Blog. Lots of good reads here. Still occasionally check it out.

• Deep Work, Cal Newport. Very good read. Should probably read again.

• Mistborn (series), Brandon Sanderson. See above Brandon Sanderson review.

• Dune, Frank Herbert. 10/10. Really good read.

  • Dune Messiah, Frank Herbert. Couldn't get past the first 5 chapters. Probably a good read, though. Shelved for now.

• Meditations, Marcus Aurelius (Gregory Hays translation). Good ideas.

• The Andromeda Strain, Michael Crichton. Really fun read. At first, I thought it was published very recently, with a retro aesthetic. To my surprise, it was 1969!

• Can't Hurt Me, David Goggins. Essential read. Top of the pile.

• Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury. Pretty good read.

• Where the Crawdads Sing, Delia Owens. Pretty good read.

• Thinking, Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman. Couldn't get past the first few chapters. It was groundbreaking when published but now the ideas are mainstream, so it's saying nothing new. Shelved.

• tiny beautiful things, Cheryl Strayed. Beautiful.

• The Art of Asking, Amanda Palmer. Very good read.

• Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk. Very good read.

• Brave New World, Aldous Huxley. Pretty good read. I wish I could learn things through pillow osmosis.

• The Loop, Ben Oliver. Fun read.

• Elastic Habits. A really good idea, but it should have been a blog post.

• Scott Young's Blog. Has some great posts on careers and learning.

• Ultralearning, Scott Young. Great perspectives on learning through ambitious projects.

• The Invisible Man, H. G. Wells. Fun read.

• Atomic Habits, James Clear. Everyone reads this for a reason.

Cover photo by Florencia Viadana on Unsplash.